A hollow scraper from Armant

This large crescent-shaped piece of flint is flaked all over. It has one concave edge 100 mm across and some cortex (the outside of the original flint pebble or slab) is visible. Hollow scrapers are usually found in the Thebes area and seem to be Middle Palaeolithic (around 300,000 years old). This example is from Armant, 12 miles South of Thebes. The brown patina shows it to be Palaeolithic.

From Seligman 1921, p. 124

Such items were described by General A. H. Lane Fox Pitt-Rivers in 1882. In 1921 Seligman suggested that these were probably prepared cores with the hollow retouched. One can imagine that they may have been used to scrape cylindrical hafts for other artefacts. However, what these were actually used for and why they have only been found around Thebes remains a mystery.

Hérisson et al 2016, fig. 22

Outside of Egypt there is a similar example from the Acheulean of La Grande Vallée at Colombiers (Hérisson et al 2016, fig. 22).

  

References

David Hérisson, Jean Airvaux, Lenoble Arnaud, Daniel Richter, Emilie Claud and Jerome Primault ‘Between the northern and southern regions of Western Europe: The Acheulean site of La Grande Vallée (Colombiers, Vienne, France)’ Quaternary International, 2016, 108–131.

Pitt Rivers, L. F. 1882, ‘On the Discovery of Chert Implements in Stratified Gravel in the Nile Valley Near Thebes’, Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, 11, 382–400.

Seligman, C.G. ‘The Older Paleolithic Age in Egypt’, Journal Royal Anthropological Society of Great Britain and Ireland, 1921, 51, 115–153.

Something I don’t know much about: Predynastic Pottery

Egypt Centre’s volunteer documentation assistants have just started audit checking a group of material from Armant. I have briefly blogged about it here, but I didn't explain how beautiful some of the pieces really are. Before I tell you about the Armant stuff, and particularly the pottery, a quick thank you to the volunteer documentation assistants, Richard, Olivia, Charlotte, Jessica and Lisa. They have been checking that the items in our store match the computer records, making sure they are photographed and not falling apart and adding information to the database!  While carrying out this they are learning a bit about museum documentation and are becoming adept at using the Modes Complete database. While most are Egyptology students, one is not.

Back to the Armant stuff. The pieces are all from the excavations cemeteries and settlement sites 1600-1900 which haven’t been published. We have possibly the most northern ‘Nubian’ A-group pottery in Egypt here in Swansea. The Armant material is largely Badarian (c.5500-4000 BC), A-group (c.3500-3000 BC) and includes the mysterious Saharan sherds. Some of the Badarian pieces are particularly amazing to look at. Granted, as this is real excavated and very old material, most of the pieces are fragmentary, but they are just soooooo fine.

The piece above (AR50/3257) is on display. It is Badarian black-topped polished brown ware, a precursor to the later Naqada black-topped red ware. The walls are finer than those of the later stuff. The thickness of the walls is all the more amazing as the piece, like of its date, is coil made. That is a long snake-shape is made (a coil) which is then twisted into a pot shape and smoothed down. The piece shines slightly as it has been polished by rubbing with a smooth stone. Egyptologists argue about how the black top was achieved but it was generally thought that it was placed upside down in the kiln, into the smouldering ashes. The piece in this photograph has been mended in antiquity showing that it must have been considered important to the Egyptians.

And here is a piece (503243) from Armant which has been decorated by impressing with a pointed instrument and then the holes filled with a white pigment. It was categorised by the excavators as A-group, though I am aware that some later Nubian pottery (C-group, 2300-1500 BC) as well as Petrie’s N-ware, also has this white pigment decoration. This, and other pieces have a dark brown, reddish fabric, which is like Petrie’s N-ware. N-ware, is generally believed to derive from Nubia. Unfortunately, I am not an expert on this so, if anyone has any thoughts I would be glad to hear. Whether, A, or C-group, this type of decoration is strongly reminiscent of Nubian wares. The other items found with the same grave context are largely fragments of finely made stone vessels, which would suggest, if Egyptian, an Early Dynastic date. There’s a good discussion on Petrie’s N-ware, with references, in Jane Roy’s, 2011. The Politics of Trade: Egypt and Lower Nubia in the 4th Millennium BC, 259-262.

If you want to know more about adult volunteering at the Egypt Centre click here.

Renée Friedman and Armant

On Wednesday night the Friends of the Egypt Centre invited Renée Friedman to Swansea to talk about Hierakonpolis and the animal burials there. It was, as predicted, a brilliant talk.

While in Swansea, Renée also took the opportunity to look at the Egypt Centre stuff excavated by Mond from Armant cemeteries 1600, 1700, 1800 and 1900, particularly the Badarian pottery. It's always useful to have researchers visiting our collection as we get to know more about our own artefacts. I had long been amazed by our material from Armant, particulalrly the incredibly fine-walled Badarian stuff, much better made than later material. While it has been on my to do research list, it probably would never have happened. The list is somewhat long! So, I am really happy that Renée found us. She explained that our Armant material was important as it was a site which not only had A-group ('Nubian') and Pan Grave (later material in the Nubian tradition) material and Badarian pottery but also the mysterious 'Saharan' sherds which no one knows a great deal about. We have possibly the most northern collection of Nubian pottery.

The picture above is one of the pieces of Badarian pottery. The holes are where the piece had been mended. We are hoping that in the future, with  Renée to advise, we may have a small display of the Armant material discussing the different cultural groups. Meanwhile, the piece of pottery shown above and a few others from Armant are integrated into our existing display.