Palaeoethnotrichology

Donation stelae are essential to the understanding of the historical setting of each period as they traditionally include a king's reign years and record donations from some of the most prominent dignitaries of the time. Donation stelae give us a glimpse of the economic aspects of the ancient Egyptian temples. This paper provides an examination of a republished donation stela of King Ramesses II. The stela was discovered at Sidi Oweis, north of Sudan at Serra. The study aims at contextualizing this donation stela, whose main character is Heka-Nakht, the viceroy of Kush and governor of the principality Teh-Khet during the reign of King Ramesses II. It is proposed that the main role of the viceroy of Kush in the process of donation during the Ramesside Period was to be as a deputy between the central government in Egypt proper and the provincial authorities. The researcher conducted an analytical and historical study.

Amenhotep son of Hapu was born in the delta town of Athribis in the latter years of Thutmose III’s reign, living through the reign of a further two kings before the accession of Amenhotep III. There is little known about his life until he was approximately fifty, when he was chosen for a royal appointment as a sS ‘scribe’. His career thereafter developed rapidly, and he rose within the hierarchy of the royal administration to a position of powerful influence, becoming the king’s confidante and advisor. Rewarded by the king with an impressive mortuary temple, adjacent to the king’s own temple at Kom el-Hettan, and permission to erect statues of himself within the Karnak precinct evidences the high regard in which he was held. After death his mortuary cult developed just as his career had done. First as sS mAa xrw ‘scribe, true of voice’, Amenhotep became an intermediary between the living and gods, a healer, an oracle, and finally designated nTr mnx ‘excellent god’.
This dissertation assesses how and why he attained such success in both life and posthumously through the following avenues of inquiry, using textual material and artefacts available: researching the political and cultural changes during the period of his life and those of his posthumous cult to understand what effect they had on both his career and his deification; exploration of the character of Amenhotep, what sort of a man he was in life; how he interacted with his peers; what tasks he fulfilled in his career; determine how much influence the preparations he made during his lifetime laid the foundation for his eminence after death. Finally, the qualifications for deification are explored to establish how Amenhotep son of Hapu fitted within the realm of the divine.

The approach to ancient Egyptian statuary is often focused on individual examples, typological studies, or art historical considerations, admittedly hindered by the lack of evidence inherent to looted antiquities. In contrast, statues from the New Kingdom artists’ village of Deir el-Medina come with an exceptionally rich archaeological context, and yet, its globally dispersed corpus has not been consolidated, let alone analysed as a whole.
This pilot study focus on museum statues representing private individuals from the village, complete and from secured or probable provenance, to advance the understanding of the private statuary practice in Deir el-Medina’s environment by regrouping and recontextualising the artefacts. It demonstrates how fruitful a holistic contextual approach—examining archaeological, visual, and textual evidence beyond the analysis of the corpus—is to reveal what three-dimensional representations the artisans desired for themselves, how they conceptualised, produced, and used them, and why they did so:

What? The constituted corpus of 41 statues reveals extraordinary variety and creativity in rapidly evolving types, monuments of all sizes realised in dominantly local materials, techniques and styles emphasised by a rather conventional iconography, and remarkably multifaceted inscriptions.
How? As artists, the villagers conceptualised statues holistically, and if they did not realise the monuments themselves, they chose colleagues for their particular craft, and sometimes family relations, to produce artworks which could be exchanged in economic transactions and used in various, increasingly public, thought-out settings.
Why? The artists designed statues not only for their religious effect, but also for social affirmation, artistic positioning among peers. They innovated, because they could—and wanted others to know, in their time and in the future.

If the results underline how particular statue conceptualisation among artists may have been, they also provide insights into commission, production, transaction, use, and reuse which should be transferable to other statues and sites.

The triad Cat. 767 in the Museo Egizio, Turin, depicts a king embraced by the gods Amun-Ra and Mut. This statue is inscribed for Ramesses II, but shows traces of repairs and a number of features characteristic of sculptures predating the reign of this king. The authors therefore challenge the commonly held dating and interpretation of the piece. Notably, the article explores the following question: Are we confronted with a monument of the Eighteenth Dynasty, mutilated during the Amarna period, then re-carved and reinscribed under Ramesses II, or is this an original Ramesside production, accidentally damaged and restored? This case study also invites some reflections on the practice of reuse and re-activation of statues during antiquity, as well as on the so-called “usurpation” of monuments.

الملخص

الملخص: ثالوث رقم (Cat. 767) ، معروض بالمتحف المصري في تورينو، يصور هذا الثالوث ملكًا يحتضنه المعبود آمون رع والمعبودة موت. على الرغم من أن هذا التمثال نُحت للملك رمسيس الثاني إلاّ أنه تظهر عليه آثار إصلاحات وعدد من خصائص فن النحت التي تسبق عهد هذا الملك، ولهذا يحاول الباحثون في هذا اللمقال إيجاد التفسير الصحيح لتأريخ تلك القطعة حسب الخصائص الفنية الشائعة لمثل تلك المجموعات من خلال الإجابة على التساؤلات الآتية: هل أننا أمام نُصباً تذكارياً من الأسرة الثامنة عشرة، قد شُوِّه خلال فترة العمارنة أم أنه تم إعادة نحته ونقشه مرة أخرى خلال حكم الملك رمسيس الثاني؟ أو أن هذا التمثال يعود بالفعل إلى عصر الرعامسة، وقد تعرّض للتلف ورُمّم بعد ذلك؟ كما تقدم هذه الدراسة أيضاً بعض التوضيح حول إعادة توظيف التماثيل وإعادة إحيائها خلال العصور القديمة، وكذلك حول ما يسمى بـ”اغتصاب” الآثر ـ نسب الأثر لغير صاحبه ـ.

Egyptian crowns and headdresses have been essential in composing royal imagery throughout history. Egyptian pharaohs used various crowns for different purposes; some were used to show authority, while others were used for religious or festival ceremonies. Like their numerous symbolics, which this paper will not discuss, they are also differentiated in shape, size, color, and decorative elements. In addition, many political and religious reforms in ancient Egypt resulted in the increasing variety of crowns and their evolved forms. Scholars have studied iconographic representations of many ancient Egyptian crowns; however, one type, particularly the so-called cap crown or skull cap, has not yet been thoroughly examined. Hence, the focal point of this study will be the existence and decorative evolution of the cap crown, starting from its earliest evidence in the Old Kingdom to the end of the Third Intermediate Period. This paper will present and analyze the different styles and ornamental elements of all known cap crowns through iconographic evidence on reliefs, tomb paintings, and royal statuary.
In part, the study's perspectives are limited because only a limited number of preserved iconographic representations are distributed unevenly in space and time. Nevertheless, this paper will help the reader understand the typology of cap crowns in ancient Egypt.

There's no doubt that in civilizations from Egypt to Greece, fragrance was spread as a vital element in life and death. Egypt was famous for its perfume throughout the ancient civilizations. In ancient Egypt, Alexandria was famous for the manufacture of perfumes and as the marketplace of several Egyptian products, such as myrrh. Mendes too was famous for its perfume.
Indeed, perfumes were required for use in temples, rituals, ceremonies and festivals. There were various words in ancient Egypt used to refer to perfume, such as “ndm.st“(pleasant) and “rdw” (jar). In the temples, large quantities of incense, perfume and scented flowers were offered to the gods. Some gods were linked with
specific scents, such as Anubis god, who anointed the mummy with sacred oils to prevent the body from decaying. Besides, the ancient Egyptians used perfumes in many different forms to give an agreeable odor to the body.
In particular, flowers and spices such as cinnamon and myrrh added fragrant scents to perfumes and oils used in everyday life. In other words, recipes for and depictions of perfume preparation can be found in numerous ancient temples, while the recipes for perfumes were inscribed on the walls of the laboratories of the Ptolemaic temples.
Theophrastus, the Greek philosopher, talked about the ways used to color perfumes and scents, such as the pigmentation used for red perfumes, which was alkanet from the plant Anchusa. Two Greek Kyphi “burnt substance” recipes mentioned lists of ingredients for perfumes.
Further, the perfumes were made from mixtures of several ingredients and three techniques seem to have been used; the substances were pounded, mixed together, and then put on the fire. Also the ancient Egyptians used several kinds of herbs and plants to produce perfumes, such as iris. Iris root or balsam was used as a
base for the ancient perfumes. While the most fragrant oils in ancient Egypt were myrrh, frankincense and lily, which were mixed with essences of flowers, fruits and herbs

It is generally understood that in ancient Egyptian statuary, "a private person is never sculpted together with the king". However, an unusual small limestone statue in the collections of National Museums Scotland contradicts this understanding, depicting a man kneeling to offer a statue of a king (NMS A.1956.139). Clearly Ramesside in style, it has sometimes been assumed to represent a royal tutor and his charge. Recent archival research in the notes of Scottish archaeologist Alexander Henry Rhind has revealed the provenance of this statue as having been excavated in Deir el-Medina in the 1850s. This paper will discuss possible identifications for the king and the official and examine the statue in relation to similar examples excavated in the Hathor chapel at Deir el-Medina by Bruyère (Deir el-Medina nos. 91, 250 and other fragments). In context, these statues offer insights into the relationship between the Ramesside kings, their viziers, and the high officials at Deir el-Medina, as well as the mutually beneficial performative role of commissioning and dedicating monuments.

The proportions of the human fi gure in Egyptian art were determined on the basis of simple and rarely changing rules. The oldest preserved guidelines used for this purpose come from the times of the Fifth Dynasty, and the square grids from the mid-Twelfth Dynasty. The objective of this article is to interpret the guidelines from the chapel of vizier Akhethotep, dated to the Fifth Dynasty, and answer the following questions: when were they made and what rules were used to determine the proportions of the vizier’s body? To do this, the author proposes employment of a measuring method which uses square grids as the main tool and the smallest element of the grid, that is, the square module as the basic measurement unit.

The proportions of the human fi gure in Egyptian art were determined on the basis of simple and rarely changing rules. The oldest preserved guidelines used for this purpose come from the times of the Fifth Dynasty, and the square grids from the mid-Twelfth Dynasty. The objective of this article is to interpret the guidelines from the chapel of vizier Akhethotep, dated to the Fifth Dynasty, and answer the following questions: when were they made and what rules were used to determine the proportions of the vizier’s body? To do this, the author proposes employment of a measuring method which uses square grids as the main tool and the smallest element of the grid, that is, the square module as the basic measurement unit.

This paper is focused on private tomb scenes with mourners dated to the end of the 18 th Dynasty located in the Egyptian Memphite necropolis, with a special interest on the artistic resources and the clear division of groups according to the gender of mourners, as mourning men in expressive attitudes are particularly rare in ancient Egyptian scenes. The presence of men in grief, together with the traditional female mourners, within the funerary procession is striking, portraying expressive poses which provoke feeling of empathy and sorrow in the beholder. Indeed, the expressions of feelings in mourning scenes and their diverse artistic treatment in Memphite tomb decoration reveals the innovation and originality of the artists, features that could be traced back to the reign of Akhenaten. This paper explores the complex process of creation of the funerary iconography of the Post-Amarna art, a period of religious, political and social changes which were mirrored in private tomb scenes. [es] Tristeza, género y empatía: Escenas de duelo amarnienses y post-amarnieneses (XVIII Dinastía) de la necrópolis menfita en Egipto Resumen. El presente trabajo se centra en las escenas de duelo de tumbas privadas de finales de la XVIII Dinastía ubicadas en la necrópolis menfita egipcia, con un especial interés en los recursos artísticos utilizados y la clara división de grupos de acuerdo con su género, ya que los hombres en duelo en actitudes expresivas son especialmente raros en las escenas del arte egipcio. La presencia de hombres en duelo, junto con las tradicionales plañideras, dentro del cortejo funerario es sorprendente, con poses expresivas que provocan sentimientos de empatía y tristeza en el que las contempla. De hecho, la expresión de sentimientos en las escenas de duelo y el variado tratamiento artístico en la decoración de tumbas menfitas es indicativo del nivel de innovación y originalidad de los artistas, rasgos que pueden rastrearse hasta el reinado de Tutankhamón. En un ámbito más amplio, esta investigación explora el complejo proceso de formación del arte post-amarniense, un periodo de cambios religiosos, políticos y sociales que tienen reflejo en las escenas de las tumbas privadas. Summary. 1. Introduction. 2. Sources of inspiration: Mourning scenes from Tell el-Amarna. 3. A unique piece of information: the tomb of Meryneith/Meryre. 4. Memphite reliefs with mourning scenes from Tutankhamun/Ay/Horemheb reigns. 5. Conclusions. 6. Written sources and bibliographical references.

Many of today's sports were practiced by ancient Egyptians, as described by many paintings and relief scenes depicted on the walls of ancient temples and tombs all over Egypt.
Thousands of years ago, Ancient Egyptians laid down the basic rules for competitive games. They chose neutral referees, uniforms for each team in multiplayer games, and celebrated winners by dressing them with different necklaces.
Ancient Egyptians even held many local and international sports competitions and festivals where the best athletes from other countries participated. Prizes were given to the winners to encourage them. These competitions were ruled by judges from Mittani Empire (between northern of Syria, Turkey, Iran and Iraq) and Canaanites cities (Palestine, Lebanon and Syria) and Nubia cities (Southern of Egypt and Sudan). Ancient Egyptian kings, princes, and statesmen were keen on attending sports competitions, which they encouraged and provided with the necessary equipment.
Popular individual sports such as hunting, fishing, boxing, javelin throwing, wrestling, gymnastics, weightlifting, and rowing and the ancient Egyptian version of hockey were the most popular team sports, and a form tug-of-war. Archery was popular as well, but primarily limited to the royalty and nobility.
Sporting events in ancient Egypt were part of the religious rituals and festivals honoring the gods. Participants often staged simulated battles between Horus and Set's followers to celebrate Horus' victory and celebrate the harmony and balance over the forces of chaos.
This essay focuses on four aspects of sports in Ancient Egypt: the role of sports in society, sports of the nobility, ancient Egyptian sports that later became Olympic sports, and the invention of the Jubilee and its celebration.

The Theban private tombs dated to the New Kingdom (c.1550-1070 BC) are monuments full of symbolism. They belonged to elite officials that wanted to preserve their memory and identity for eternity and ensure their rebirth in the afterlife. Among the functions of these tombs are the protection of the body of the deceased, the preservation of his memory and identity not only among the living but also among the dead, and to act as an instrument for their transformation in the hereafter. Through the building and decoration of these tombs, we can discern several details of the life of the deceased, his achievements and role in society, and also about Egyptian religious beliefs, their rites and gods, and about many other social, economic and artistic realities of his time.
We cannot forget that these tombs have a magical function related to the mortuary cult, and the interaction between the living and the dead inside of the tombs, which were visited during some festivals celebrated in the necropolis.
This paper aims to analyse these private burials in New Kingdom Thebes and their symbolism, focusing on the buildings themselves, their decoration and the activities that took place inside them. Within the decoration of these tombs, this paper will focus on the ‘scenes of daily life’, and mainly on the banquet scenes of the Eighteenth Dynasty, because their symbolism is strongly connected to the idea of rebirth, and to Egyptian religious belief.

Tutankhamun is the most iconic and recognized figure from ancient Egypt but remains embroidered and hyperbolized. There has been little to no recognition or consensus within scholarly communities of his disability or how his disability may have factored into his personal, political, religious, and social roles within Egyptian society. Instead, he remains the perfect face of a pharaoh. There has been little consideration or research into whether his tomb was adapted to fit his needs as a disabled man. This article explores how Tutankhamun ̓s tomb was perhaps modified to fit his needs as a disabled man, through an examination of the tomb layout, certain artifacts, botanical materials, artwork, and other grave goods. It also posits that disability need not be hyperbolized into an all or nothing proposition, and his injuries and death may have been caused by a confluence of events.

This article investigates whether families at Deir el-Medîna consistently preferred to worship one particular deity, who could be understood as their ‘family god’ and whether this connection was fixed, binding and exclusive. It traces the religious titles held by three well-attested families at Deir el-Medîna (the Sennedjem (i) family, the Kasa (i) family and the heirs of the scribe Ramose (i), the stelae, offering tables, statues, graffiti and texts they generated in honour of various deities, and other references to personal and family worship of given gods.
It turns out that none of these three families worshipped any single god from generation to generation throughout the Ramesside period, with the exception of the Sennedjem (i) family who maintained a consistent connection with the god Amun and his spouse Mut, perhaps because the local temples at Karnak maintained an annual cycle of feasts, processions and other activities in which worshippers could participate.
Although these results apply only to these three families, these families spanned most of the village’s history and included both ordinary workmen and chief workmen and scribes, so that their experiences cover a broad span of religious practice at Deir el-Medîna.

All knowledge of the world is shaped by the way our senses perceive it. In archaeology, and especially in Egyptological studies, a visual approach has predominated the analysis of ancient material remains. When viewed from a sensorybased framework, however, a new, dynamic dimensionality of the material record might be revealed. This approach to the study of the past promises to open both innovative and rewarding avenues for exploration. Such work fosters an environment for interdisciplinary study involving researchers in such diverse fields as  neuroscience, psychology, ethnography, and the digital humanities. This paper aims to explore the applications of sensory analysis to Egyptology by focusing on New Kingdom tomb depictions of banquets and relevant mortuary texts to champion this paradigm as one that has potential to truly humanize the past.

The Egyptian collection in the Gayer-Anderson Museum (Bait al-Kritliya), Cairo is small, as Major Gayer-Anderson gave or sold most of his pharaonic pieces to museums throughout the world. 2 However, a group of objects of varying degrees of artistic merit remain in his Cairo collection, which is located in two Ottoman houses attached to the mosque of Ibn Tulun. The subject of this article is one of these, a brownish-orange quartzite torso of a woman. The female torso in quartzite comes from a two-thirds life-size seated figure. It measures 34.5 cm high and 33.4 cm at its widest point. The head is missing, broken off almost at the base of the neck. The lower portions of the body are also missing, broken off diagonally from the statue's proper right waist to its proper left hip. There is pitting on the torso's surface that appears to be damage from a pick or other sharp implement, rather than some sort of weathering, and what might be a disfigurement made with a chisel above the navel. The back pillar is partially preserved, although the inscription that was on it seems to have been deliberately demolished—the breakage is too extreme to call it an erasure (figs. 1-3). There is no indication of any kind of head covering or hair descending onto the shoulders; perhaps the statue was adorned with a type of short wig or a crown. The remains of the neck seem to rise straight up from the shoulders. The figure is wearing a schematically rendered, beaded broad collar carved using relief and incised techniques, under which is visible the swell of the realistically modeled clavicles. The collar consists of nine concentric bands, thin and thick alternating, with the outermost band edged by teardrop-or petal-shaped pendant beads. There is no obvious indication of any garment or textile covering; creases at the armpit suggest that the figure is nude or, less probably, wearing an extremely tight, clinging garment. It is possible that details of clothing and additional jewelry might have been added in gesso and gilding or paint, as is seen on other statues. 3 The breasts are located at a realistic level on the chest and are small, firm and gently rounded; there is virtually no suggestion of nipples, and there is a relatively wide space separating them. The waist narrows slightly before flaring out to the swelling hips and the start of a damaged, rounded belly; both features are typical of late 18th and early 19th Dynasty sculpture. The figure is longer waisted than the female figures carved during the reign of Akhenaten, but shorter waisted than those sculpted in the reign of Ramesses II. The engaged arms are broken above the elbow, so that it is difficult to be absolutely certain of their position. However, the 1 This article is most affectionately dedicated to Dorothea Arnold, a brilliant and inspiring scholar, a stimulating teacher, and a generous and kind friend.

This essay considers the depictions of women in the art of the Ancient Egyptian 18th Dynasty. Four major categories are followed, influenced by the history of female representation; divinity, royalty, mourners, and fertility. Although women are represented in other ways, these are key themes present in the art of Ancient Egypt.

The Egyptian collection in the Gayer-Anderson Museum (Bait al-Kritliya), Cairo is small, as Major Gayer-Anderson gave or sold most of his pharaonic pieces to museums throughout the world. 2 However, a group of objects of varying degrees of artistic merit remain in his Cairo collection, which is located in two Ottoman houses attached to the mosque of Ibn Tulun. The subject of this article is one of these, a brownish-orange quartzite torso of a woman. The female torso in quartzite comes from a two-thirds life-size seated figure. It measures 34.5 cm high and 33.4 cm at its widest point. The head is missing, broken off almost at the base of the neck. The lower portions of the body are also missing, broken off diagonally from the statue's proper right waist to its proper left hip. There is pitting on the torso's surface that appears to be damage from a pick or other sharp implement, rather than some sort of weathering, and what might be a disfigurement made with a chisel above the navel. The back pillar is partially preserved, although the inscription that was on it seems to have been deliberately demolished—the breakage is too extreme to call it an erasure (figs. 1-3). There is no indication of any kind of head covering or hair descending onto the shoulders; perhaps the statue was adorned with a type of short wig or a crown. The remains of the neck seem to rise straight up from the shoulders. The figure is wearing a schematically rendered, beaded broad collar carved using relief and incised techniques, under which is visible the swell of the realistically modeled clavicles. The collar consists of nine concentric bands, thin and thick alternating, with the outermost band edged by teardrop-or petal-shaped pendant beads. There is no obvious indication of any garment or textile covering; creases at the armpit suggest that the figure is nude or, less probably, wearing an extremely tight, clinging garment. It is possible that details of clothing and additional jewelry might have been added in gesso and gilding or paint, as is seen on other statues. 3 The breasts are located at a realistic level on the chest and are small, firm and gently rounded; there is virtually no suggestion of nipples, and there is a relatively wide space separating them. The waist narrows slightly before flaring out to the swelling hips and the start of a damaged, rounded belly; both features are typical of late 18th and early 19th Dynasty sculpture. The figure is longer waisted than the female figures carved during the reign of Akhenaten, but shorter waisted than those sculpted in the reign of Ramesses II. The engaged arms are broken above the elbow, so that it is difficult to be absolutely certain of their position. However, the 1 This article is most affectionately dedicated to Dorothea Arnold, a brilliant and inspiring scholar, a stimulating teacher, and a generous and kind friend.

In the course of my doctoral research on ancient Egyptian funerary ritual, and in particular on the word HAi, I encountered the word dmD(y)t in three ancient sources. In an attempt to discover the meaning of this word I realized that it had been grouped, along with a number of other titles, into a category of words which apparently signified, " a mourning woman. " However, upon further investigation I became aware of the specific meaning of the word dmD(y)t. In the cult drama, this woman (or women) was responsible for collecting the bones of the deceased in order for the body to become whole again in anticipation of its rebirth in the Afterlife. Therefore, the title dmD(y)t may be translated as " bone or limb collector. " It was initially thought by Gardiner, and followed by Faulkner, that the dmD(y)t was related to the dmDw. The word dmDw is commonly translated as " crowd " and is far more common. 1 In his dictionary entry Faulkner cites examples of dmD(y)t only from a funerary text from the Ramesseum Papyri (discussed below). 2 The entry for the word dmD(y)t in Wb V 462, 12 reads " von der Klagefrau. " The Belegstellen lists two references from the tomb of Amenemhet (TT 82) where the title refers to a single woman (also discussed below). In the former source, the funerary liturgy, this designation is used both in the singular, dmD(y)t, and in the plural, dmD(y)wt. According to Gardiner, the word dmD(y)t also refers to a crowd and is " possibly identical with the collective Wb V 461, 12 " — there transliterated dmD.wt. 3 Gardiner's assumption is based on the word's supposed connection with dmDw and its reference to a crowd of people. With that, Gardiner points out that Coffin

A USAID funded project, supported by The Ministry of Foreign Cooperation, was begun
to decrease the level of the water table around the temples on the west bank of Luxor. The
team that led the salvage archaeology campaign was headed by the first author of this
paper, who selected a wonderful group of archaeologists to watch out for the discovery
of any new artifacts or monuments along the route of the new sewage system being built
there. The team consisted of Mohamed Abdel Aziz, Mohamed Abdel Badea, Abdel Ghaffar
Wagdy, El Taieb Mohamed Khodary, and Omar Abou Zied.
In the course of its work, the team was able to find most of the missing parts belonging to
the colossal seated statue of Amenhotep III and Queen Tiye, now in the Egyptian Museum,
Cairo. This double statue is made of limestone and was originally found at Medinet Habu,
near the Roman Court, in 1859 by Auguste Mariette. When it was discovered many parts
of the statue were missing and it was restored by filling in the gaps. The newly discovered
pieces were also found at Medinet Habu, in the same area the colossal statue was found,
and include the wig, left arm and leg of the queen, part of the nemes headdress, chest, and
right leg of Amenhotep III, as well as portions of the base.