Interdepartmental Program in Ancient History

PGM XII.270-350, a text prescribing rituals for the creation and use of a magical ring, provides a particularly useful example through which to explore the phenomenon
of miniaturized ritual in the magical papyri of late Graeco-Roman Egypt (as elucidated by Smith 1995). The ritual for creating and consecrating the ring’s gemstone makes it clear that the stone is considered a miniature cult statue. The subsequent “Ouphor” invocation to be performed whenever the ring is used corresponds
in name and function to the Egyptian wp.t-r3 or Opening the Mouth ritual as used in daily temple liturgy. The nature of these ritual miniatures reveals the sophisticated discursive and conceptual level at which the traditional forms of temple
ritual were adapted and redeployed for use in other contexts by members of the Egyptian priestly class in late antiquity.

This article re-evaluates the significance attributed to Hecataeus' encounter with the Theban priests described
by Herodotus (2.143) by setting it against the evidence of Late Period Egyptian representations of the past. In the first
part a critique is offered of various approaches Classicists have taken to this episode and its impact on Greek historiography.  Classicists have generally imagined this as an encounter in which the young, dynamic and creative Greeks construct an image of the static, ossified and incredibly old culture of the Egyptians, a move which reveals deeper assumptions in the scholarly discourse on Greeks and 'other' cultures in the Mediterranean world. But the civilization that Herodotus confronted in his long excursus on Egypt was not an abstract, eternal Egypt. Rather, it was the Egypt of his own day, at a specific historical moment - a culture with a particular understanding of its own long history. The second part presents evidence of lengthy Late Period priestly genealogies, and more general archaizing tendencies. Remarkable examples survive of the sort of visual genealogy which would have impressed upon the traveling Greek historians the long continuum of the Egyptian past. These include statues with genealogical inscriptions and relief sculptures representing generations of priests succeeding to their fathers' office. These priestly evocations of a present firmly anchored in the Egyptian past are part of a wider pattern of cultivating links with the historical past in the Late Period of Egyptian history. Thus, it is not simply the marvel of a massive expanse of time which Herodotus encountered in Egypt, but a mediated cultural awareness of that time. The third part of the essay argues that Herodotus used this long human past presented by the Egyptian priests in order to criticize genealogical and mythical representations of the past and develop the notion of an historical past. On the basis of this example, the article concludes by urging a reconsideration of the scholarly paradigm for imagining the encounter between Greeks and 'others' in ethnographic discourse in order to recognize the agency of the Egyptian priests, and other non-Greek 'informants'.

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In this book I explore the ancient history and modern historiography of relations between Egypt and Greece from the fifth century BCE to the early Roman empire. Beginning with Herodotus, I analyze key encounters between Greeks and Egyptian priests, the bearers of Egypt’s ancient traditions. A series of four moments emerge as rich micro-histories of cross-cultural interaction: Herodotus’ interviews with priests at Thebes, Manetho’s composition of an Egyptian history in Greek, the struggles of Egyptian priests on Delos, and a Greek physician’s quest for magic in Egypt. In writing these histories, I move beyond Orientalizing representations of the Other and colonial metanarratives of the civilizing process to reveal interactions between Greeks and Egyptians as transactional processes in which the traditions, discourses and pragmatic interests of both sides shaped the outcome. The result is a dialogical history of cultural and intellectual exchanges between the civilizations of Greece and Egypt.

Indigenous Egyptian elites who held titles in the late Ptolemaic court hierarchy offer a counterpoint to the typical model of Hellenistic court society as a culturally and ethnically exclusive social space. Though underrepresented in standard accounts, several Egyptians held the honorific title of “kinsman” of the king (syngenes). Statues of these men wearing the mitra of the syngenes in the forecourts of temples, together with Greek and Egyptian epigraphic evidence, show that indigenous elites who circulated between Alexandria and Upper Egypt contributed to the creation of a transcultural space that was critical for maintaining the power of the Ptolemaic state in the Egyptian chora during the troubled conditions of the second and first centuries B.C.E.

This paper uses astronomical data in Thessalus’ treatise De virtutibus herbarum to arrive at a rough estimate of its date of composition. Dates of the sun’s ingress into the signs of the zodiac that are given in the treatise are compared with modern calculations. The resulting differences are compared with the differences between modern calculations of the dates of the sun’s ingress and those derived from other ancient sources and methods (Ptolemy’s Handy Tables, Vettius Valens’ Anthology, and P. Oxy. 4148) to determine the likely date of composition of Thessalus’ treatise. The revised estimates suggest that the text was composed between the middle of the first century a.d. and the early third century A.D., with dates in the second century most probable.