Shsh....secrets (Harpocrates and initiation rituals!)

The figure to the right has his finger to his mouth. This is Horus the Child, or in Greek, Harpocrates (from the Egyptian Hor-pa-khered literally Horus the Child). You can recognize children in ancient Egyptian depictions by their hair (the side-lock of youth) and by the finger placed against the lips. Indeed, the ancient Egyptian hieroglyph for a child showed a child with finger to lips. 

Our copper alloy statuette here right (W1375) has both these characteristics. BUT, the Greeks misunderstood why Harpocrates had his fingers to his lips and reinterpreted him has a god of silence (and secrets).

In the last blog post I explained that Sekhmet was sometimes used in Theosophical rituals. Well, it seems Harpocrates was also used in modern rituals, and all because of the Greeks associating him with silence and secrecy. If you google, you will find, for example, that he appears in initiation rituals in Golden Dawn societies.

Those Greeks had a lot to answer for!


A little bit more about this object: It is 13 cm high, and would have been a votive offering.



The Centre has several other items relating to Harpocrates. Click here to investigate.

Sekhmet and the Theosophical Society

This object has intrigued me for years. It's not so much what it is in Egyptological terms but its 'museological value', its post-excavation history, and the social web which ensnares it. I'm sharing, partly in the hopes that others might add some information.

But, first a little bit about it which may be of interest to 'pure Egyptologists' (if such people exist).

It is accessioned as W496. It measures 18.5cm and is made from glazed steatite. I presume it was orginally seated on a throne or chair, it has its hands by its sides and the mane suggests the figure depicts a lioness rather than cat. It has breasts so I'm assuming it is female.

It's a bit like the faience figure on the right which is in the Kunsthistorishe Museum and dates to 724-332BC (Late Period). The flat jaw is similar. Or the one on this link, from the same museum, again Late Period. There is a glazed steatite example here (I'm afraid I don't have the actual book where it is published but the web says: 'Published: J. Eisenberg, Art of the Ancient World, 2007, no. 204').

Presumably items like this were votive offerings. 

We don't know where this object was found, or who excavated it. But, we do know how Henry Wellcome came by it. As is shown by the 'Wellcome slip' or 'flimsy card' (a cataloguing tool used by Wellcome's cataloguers sent out to museums when Wellcome's collection was dispersed) we have in the Centre, Wellcome gave it the number L.79347. It is further stated on the slip that Wellcome bought it from the 'Theosophical Society (H.W. Watson), 1 Bloomsbury Street, WC1 Case No,. 7117.'

This object was owned by the Theosophical Society[i], founded by the Russian lady Helena Blavatsky (1831-1891) in 1875. Her teaching synthesized many ancient and modern religious beliefs including those of ancient Egypt[ii]. It is not clear how the artefact was used, but it seems that the members of the Theosophical Society considered the lion as important, as a sign of the zodiac, as a symbol of one of the four elements and as a solar eye. In Blavatsky 1886 the lion is frequently cited as a zodiacal sign, or as a symbol of the elements.

The Evangelical zoolatry -- the Bull, the Eagle, the Lion, and the Angel (in reality the Cherub, or Seraph, the fiery-winged Serpent), is as much pagan as that of the Egyptians or the Chaldeans. These four animals are, in reality, the symbols of the four elements, and of the four lower principles in man. (Blavatsky, 1886,  I. 363 see also II, 114)

"Oh Toum, Toum! issued from the great (female) which is in the bosom of the waters"

(the great Deep or Space) . . . "Thou, luminous through the two Lions" (the dual Force or

power of the two solar eyes, or the electro-positive and the electro-negative forces. (See

Book of the Dead, III., and Egyptian Pantheon, chapter ii.) (Blavatsky I 673, footnote).

But is it really Sekhmet? Might it be Mut? Does it matter, did it ever matter? The Egyptians mixed and matched goddesses. Though usually lioness goddesses are labelled as Sekhmet. Maybe this is due to romanticism? Even today, Sekhmet as opposed to other lioness goddesses, seems to be considered the epitome of Egyptian aggressive female deities and possibly thus romaniticised[iii].

When the object came to Swansea it was considered important enough to be catalogued by the then honourary curator Kate Bosse-Griffiths. She didn't catalogue all the objects, but rather selected those which appeared 'important'. She also put it on display as can be seen here:

And, it has an entry in the guidebook. According to the Guide Book written by Kate Bosse Griffiths (Egypt Centre archive A1, 8) which accompanied this exhibit. This object was within a display of ‘small sculptures’ of various materials: In this display there are examples of various techniques resulting in sculptures in the round and in relief by chiseling stone, casting bronze and moulding glass and Egyptian fayence.

The object itself was not, at the date of writing the guidebook, considered important enough to be listed alone. It was however, sent for conservation to Cardiff in 1980 (we have the evidence in the Centre)

In 1996 there was an exhibition of objects organised by David Gill of Swansea University, together with Alison Lloyd of the Glyn Vivian Art Gallery called 'The Face of Egypt'. The aim of the exhibition was to highlight the forthcoming opening of our Egypt Centre. I visited the exhibition prior to being appointed as curator here, but of course I don't remember all the objects. What I do remember is an 'arty' type exhibition with beautifully displayed objects but very little explanation. The objects were shown as one might expect in a traditional art museum. There was a guidebook, a copy of which we have in the Centre. In the guidebook (page 9 number 64), under a section labeled ‘Gods’ the item is catalogued as a ‘Figure of Sekhmet with female body and lion’s head. Ceramic 7.7x7.8x18.6cm’.[iv]  It is not ceramic. However, unsurprisingly there are a few innacuracies in the guidebook, perfectly naturally since at this time there was no professional Egyptological curator of the collection[iv]. And no-one is perfect, there are mistakes in our catalogue!

The object was selected for display in the Egypt Centre in 1997. We put in a case of animal related objects (see pic on right). It's on the bottom, towards the right with other feline-related objects. At the time, the Wendy Goodridge and I thought it would be good to display objects thematically, partly according to what schools and the general public might want, though we were heavily restricted by the previous plans for the museum which had been drawn up and which presented a chronological theme for the upstairs gallery and funerary themes for downstairs. Of course it could also go in our technology case, or our stonework case, or in the votive offering case, or in the gods case.

So there we have it, an object used in ancient Egypt in a 'religious' context and reused in the near present in a religious context by the Theosophical Society. I would love to know how the object was actually used by the Theosophical Society. One might argue that even today it is shown in a sort of secular temple (museums are often compared to churches).

One day I hope to research this more.

References

Blavatsky, H.P. 1886. The Secret Doctrine, The Synthesis of Science, Religion and Philosophy. (you can read this online, just google it)

Bosse-Griffith, K. 1976. Hyffforddwr/Guide. (Egypt Centre archive A1)

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i. As can be ascertained from the catalogue card in the Egypt Centre which predates 1997.

ii. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sakhmet
iii There was in the past, many links and friendships between occultists and Egyptologists, and other elite more generally. We should not find this surprising as disciplines were not so seperate. Aleister Crowley for example was friends Budge, Gardiner and others.

iii. While the object is neither photographed nor given its accession number here, it is identified as W496 by the size and description and because a working file from the Face of Egypt Exhbition labelled ‘gods’ had a photograph of W496 therein.

iv. The collection was under the care of David Gill, a classist, who was helped by a former student of Liverpool University. Click here for a history of the Centre.

What have museums ever done for us?

Went to the Welsh Museums Federation meeting yesterday at the Cardiff Story. The conference was all about resilience in these difficult times. It was a bit depressing to hear about the problems so many colleagues have in keeping their museums afloat while councils, etc. make cuts. But, it was heartening to hear ideas about what to do.

One of the big problems could be that the great and the good in charge of museums just don’t realise what they are cutting. So, I thought, a quick post on what museums do for us, apart from of course being amazing treasure houses of artefacts made available for all.

Of course it’s really important that in museums you get to encounter the real object, not just a picture in a book. The real, authentic object can bring subjects to life, it can make you feel closer to the past, or to some admired personality. Even, for bad events. Ask people who have been to Ground Zero if they felt the same looking at the thing in a book compared to actually standing there. More banally, also sometimes when you see something for real it looks so much more different than in a book. I was really surprised how small the Mona Lisa really is when I visited the Louvre many years ago.

And museums collect things. Lots of local museums do contemporary collecting so that future generations will actually know what we hoped, feared and loved. That’s important, surely? Yes we could write it down but objects sort of condense messages. A biro pen for example tells you about technology, it can tell you about consumerism (is it made cheaply for a mass market or is it a special, added-value sort of thing). It might have a logo on it which gives ideas of marketing. You might wonder who owned it, who made it. In the future pens might be obsolete as we tend to communicate more and more digitally. So, the actual number of these things around might tell about changing technologies. You get the picture, an object is in museological terms- multi-vocal (it can give lots of messages)

What else do museums do? Well museums bring in vast amount of money in tourism, so they add value to the area in which they are situated. People go to museums, of course on rainy days, and Wales has a lot of them, but also for cheap family days out. In the UK as a whole, museums are the number one tourist attraction, and tourism is the 5^th largest industry.

Museums are places which the whole family can enjoy together. Most museums these days have activities etc. for young and old. And, often they are free!

Museums help combat social exclusion, they allow cultural participation for all, thus combat excluding effects of poverty. The Baroness Andrew’s report had several examples where museums actually do this.

Museums are places that are not just for the young, not just for the old, not just for particularly abilities, but for everyone. Everyone can get something out of an encounter with an amazing object (which of course museums have in plenty). You don’t have to be clever, or old, or young to appreciate beauty or be blown away by how weird/old/funny, etc. a museum object might be.

Museums are places for fun and for learning, and I don’t mean boring learning of lists of facts (though you could do that in a museum if that’s what floats your boat). When you go into a museum you can choose what to see, how long to look at it, and also what to ignore.

Museums contribute to a sense of identity and can give people pride in what that do and where they live. They can show what’s great and interesting about an area.

I'm sure lots of people have lots more ideas and examples of how great our museums are and what they do? And, they do all this and more on a shoestring. Let's hope they are around a good deal longer.

Stereotypes of women in ancient Egypt. Gentle Bastet or aggressive Sekhmet?

This is a small amulet about 3.5cm high. It is made of faience and was loaned to us by Woking College.  It shows a feline goddess holding a staff and wearing a cobra headdress. It’s accession number is WK42 and you can see it on display in the Egypt Centre.

Although we have called this a 'Sekhmet amulet', and indeed amulets of feline-headed goddesses are often so categorised, strictly speaking it could be one of a number of feline-headed goddesses: Bastet, Mut, Wadjyt, etc. All were daughters of the sun-god Re. The feline head may be either a cat or a lioness. If a cat it is more likely to reflect the passive, nurturing aspect of the goddess, if a lioness, it is more likely to show her aggressive side.  The addition of the uraeus cobra may possibly be to reinforce the aggressive or protective side of the goddess and to show her as the Eye of Re, a daughter of the sun-god.

The Egyptians may not have minded exactly which goddess was intended. Indeed, in the New Kingdom tale of the Return of the Distant Goddess (time of Tutankhamun), the aggressive goddess Sekhmet is changed into the gentle goddess Hathor by plying her with alcohol! Additionally the Egyptians commented on the dual nature of the female comparing her to the goddesses.

Much Egyptian literature presents the stereotypical passive woman, the good wife, or the active but dangerous temptress. Literature was written largely by men for men, so we may assume that these were male views of women, although in the case of stories, it is likely that they were publicly performed for both men and women. There are always exceptions: in love poetry women are shown as actively ensnaring the male, but this does not seem to be regarded as subversive or dangerous.

In texts, the quiet, obedient wife is praised. An Old Kingdom husband praises his wife in a tomb chapel inscription: ‘she did not utter a statement that repelled my heart; she did not transgress while she was young in life’. Another wife is credited as ‘one who speaks pleasantly and sweetens love in the presence of her husband’[i]. The Middle Kingdom Instructions of Ptahhotep advise: ‘love your wife with proper ardor, Fill her belly, clothe her back . . . . ’ [ii]. But they also say ‘Remove her from power, suppress her! . . . Restraining her is how to make her remain in your house; a female who is under her own control is rainwater’.

The Middle Kingdom Tale of the Herdsman  recounts the story of a dangerous temptress: a herdsman sees a woman, possibly a goddess, in the marshes, she unclothes herself and the herdsman is terrified by what he witnesses. Unfortunately, this story survives only in fragments, but what we can piece together invokes the archetypal story of the watery siren, both erotic woman and terrifying monster. A parallel has been drawn in this tale with the story of the Mut goddess who resided in the marshy borders of Egypt and Libya.

In the Middle Kingdom Instructions of Ptahhotep, the dual nature of women is described:

One is made a fool by limbs of faience

And then she turns into carnelian.

Here the woman is described as both ‘faience’ and ‘carnelian’. The positive and beautiful blue of faience turns into the aggressive and fiery red of carnelian[iii]. The Tale of the Herdsman may suggest, in the unclothed nature of the woman, that it is women’s sexuality that was feared. However, in the Middle Kingdom there are some positive associations of women, such as the princesses in the Tale of Sinuhe, reviving the hero through the shaking of sistra.

The danger afforded by women continues in New Kingdom literature. In the Instructions of Ani, a man is warned of women traveling alone:

A deep water whose course is unknown,

Such is a woman away from her husband.

‘I am pretty,’ she tells you daily,

When she has no witnesses;

She is ready to ensnare you,

A great deadly crime when it is heard.

In the Tale of the Two Brothers, Anubis’ wife attempts to seduce her husband’s younger brother, Bata, and Bata’s young wife betrays her husband. In Truth and Falsehood, a woman rescues Truth, but then treats him badly after sleeping with him[iv]. While men may also be shown in an unfavourable light, in Egyptian tales it is usually suggested that women accomplish sinister deeds through their sexuality.

The dual and dangerous nature of the woman continues into the Late and Graeco-Roman Periods. In the Late Period, the Instructions of Ankhsheshonk remark:

When a man smells myrrh his wife is a cat before him

When a man is suffering his wife is a lioness before him[v]

In the Graeco-Roman, The First Tale of Setne Khaemwes, a character called Tabubu seductively dressed in transparent linen, ensnares the hero and then mysteriously vanishes[vi].

Women are rarely shown actively engaged in any vigorous activity in tomb art, and they appear as passive partners to the male. This is even the case in the Old Kingdom, where it could be argued that women had more status than in later periods. Men are shown striding forward, while women stand with their legs closer together. The man always sits on the right (superior) side and the woman on the left (inferior) side[vii]. By tradition, women may cling to, or adore their active husbands, but in a study of 42 New Kingdom couples, only 2 show reciprocal gestures of affection. Men are central while women show them deference( Whale 1989; Robins 1994).

Women are also shown as passive in Old Kingdom fowling scenes and in one case a woman urges the male to get a bird for her. Usually, women stand by their husbands, who are actively hunting the birds Two unusual instances of women depicted alone in fowling scenes have been noted, but the woman’s role is ambiguous in both instances as she is described as ‘viewing’ rather than ‘performing’ the activity . The lack of active female roles in art may be because Egyptian tomb imagery used women largely as sexualized images, placed in supporting roles to men.

The apparently restrictive nature of women’s clothes, as shown on tomb paintings, may have been because they were expected to be less active than men. However, it could equally be true that these clothes were not tight and restrictive, but merely appear so in ancient Egyptian art because the typical wrap dress would have been shown two dimensionally. Certainly, actual Egyptian women’s clothing found in tombs is not restrictive, but rather sack-like.

To a certain extent, the passive/aggressive duality and positive associations of passivity extend to deities like WK42. There are aggressive goddesses, such as the creative and active Eye of Re. While such goddesses are not necessarily seen in a negative light, the story of the dangerous lioness goddess, Sekhmet, sent out on a killing spree by Re shows this goddess must be controlled and changed into the passive and beautiful Hathor if humankind is not to be annihilated. The connection between deities and mortal women is described in Papyrus Insinger: ‘the work of Mut and Hathor is what acts among women. It is in women that the good demon and the bad demon are active on earth’

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[i] Fisher 2000, 3–4.

[ii] Lichtheim 1973, 69.

[iii] Troy 1984, 78.

[iv] Troy 1984, 211–14.

[v] Troy 1984, 78.

[vi] Lichtheim 1980, 127–38.

[vii] Fischer 1989, 6–7; Fischer 2000, 3–4.

Fischer, H.G. (1989), 'Women in the Old Kingdom and Heracleopolitan Period', in Lesko, B. S. (ed.), Women's Earliest Records From Ancient Egypt and Western Asia. Proceedings of the Conference on Women in the Ancient Near East. Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, November 5–7, 1987. Atlanta: Scholars Press, pp. 5–24.

– (2000), Egyptian Women of the Old Kingdom and of the Herakleopolitan Period. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Lichtheim, M. (1973), Ancient Egyptian Literature. Vol. 1. Berkeley: University of California Press.

– (1980), Ancient Egyptian Literature. Vol. 3. Berkley: University of California Press.

Robins, G. (1994), 'Some principals of compositional dominance and gender hierarchy in Egyptian art', Journal of the American Research Centre in Egypt, 31, 33–40.

Troy, L. (1984), 'Good and bad women. Maxim 18/284–288 of the Instructions of Ptahhotep', Göttinger Miszellen, 80, 77–81.

Whale, S. (1989) The Family in the 18th Dynasty of Egypt: A study of the representation of the family in private tombs. Sydney: Australian Centre for Egyptology.

Year of the sheep/goat/ram

On a coffin in the Egypt Centre (W1982) we have a really great scene of the seperation of heaven and earth, with Geb and his consort Nut seprated by Shu (or in or case Heka). Little bit more about it here. There are several reasons why I find this interesting, one because this motif shows a male god as the earth and a sky god as female (in conrast to the usual mother earth idea prominent in many cultures). In the case of our coffin it has the god of magic, Heka, in place of the usual Egyptian god Shu. Usually Shu seperates the pair and ours is one of the few where it's different. This is a scene of creation.

But I am getting off the point, I was going to talk about rams and sheep and such on this secene as it is approproriate for the start of the Chinese New Year (being the year of the ram, or goat or sheep). Should point out that Egyptologists see these clearly as rams. However, there is some debate as to whether the Chinese year is a ram, a goat or sheep.

On the Swansea coffin, two kilted ram-headed deities help She/Heka. There are other coffins which show ram-headed deities assisting. If anyone is interested look at Budapest 87.4.E (Liptay 2011, 69, plate 17) and  the British Museum Greenfield Papyrus (EA10554, Budge 1912, pl. 56) as well as E1.1822 in the Fitzwilliam Museum.  Part ram, part bird figures are shown lifting up Nut on other 21^st Dynasty coffins (e.g. the coffin of Pameshem, Cairo 6008 in Goff, 1979, fig.141). On other coffins the rams are given names such as ‘This God Great in Heaven’ and ‘This God Great in the Duat’ (Budge 1893, 49). The rams are labelled in the Greenfield Papyrus e.g. ‘Ba which embraces all things?’ (BA-sxnt-dmD). 

Rams were associated with a number of gods in Egypt and perhaps in the Theban area were particularly with the night-time aspects of Amun (Niwiński 1987-88, 104). Additionally, the Ram of Mendes is the ba spirit of Osiris and the solar ram is associated with crossing the netherworld at night (Eaton 2006, 87). Rams generally represent fertility. So all this is a good reason for them to appear on a scene of creation.

The ram is also a metaphor for the part of the soul the Egyptians called the ba. This probably derives from the Egyptian for the ba should being the same word as ram, i.e. bA. Ba-birds are often shown as birds with human faces. We have several wooden depiction of them in the Egypt Centre and the the left I show you one. There is a bit more about them here.

On our coffin, the idea that these are indeed intended as soul-birds is reinforced by the addition of the ba-bird (the birds with human heads) also in the scene, and two of these ba-birds (those beneath the arms of the kilted ram-headed figures and shown with arms in front of them in a gesture of worship) appear to have rams horns. E1.1822 in the Fitzwilliam also depicts ba-birds without horns, there called ‘the living soul of Osiris’ (Budge 1893, 49) - I think - I haven't checked this on the actual coffin. Liptay (2011, 66) believes the combination of ram and ba-bird invoke Chapter 85 of the Book of the Dead where ram and bird appear alternately on vignettes.

So those rams seem to have lots of meanings.

The Egyptians did seem to like mixing metaphors.

References

Budge, E.A.W. 1912. The Greenfield Papyrus in the British Museum. The funerary papyrus of princess Nesitanebtashru, daughter of Painetchem II and Nes-Khensu, and priestess of Amen-Ra at Thebes, about B.C. 970. London: British Museum Trustees.

Eaton, K.J. 2006. the Festivals of Osiris and Sokar in the Month of Khoiak. Studien zur Altägyptischen Kulture, 35, 75-101.

Goff, Beatrice L. 1979. Symbols of Ancient Egypt in the Late Period. The Twenty-first Dynasty. The Hague, Paris and New York: Mouton Publishers.

Liptay, E. 2011. Coffins and Coffin Fragments of the Third Intermediate Period. Budapest: Museum of Fine Arts. 

Niwiński, A. 1987-88. The solar-Osirian unity as a principle of the theology of the ‘State of Amun’ in Thebes Dynasty 21. Jaarbericht van het vooraziat-egyptische Genootschap, 30, 89-106.

Demon bed legs!

In view of the recent advertisement for the forthcoming demon conference in Swansea, I thought I would tell you a bit more about a couple of the items featured on our poster (put together buy Kasia Szpakowska and her demon team Felicitas Weber and Zuzanna Bennett). Here is the poster:

Part of what I am about to suggest, is of course speculative, that is, I can't prove it but I wonder if the two bed legs featured are part of a 'woman's bed' of the type mentioned at Deir el-Medina, for women to nurse their young babies. Whether that is the case or not, the legs are quite unusual in showing in paint Bes and Taweret with a snake. The left leg above shows Bes, and the right Taweret, the snakes are painted in red on the inside of the bed. They have the Egypt Centre accession number W2052a (the Bes leg) and b (Taweret). Their similarity suggests they are part of the same bed. W2052a is from the foot end, left side if you were looking from the head of the bed. While W2052b from the head, right side. This would place the snakes on the outer surfaces of the head and foot ends and Bes and Taweret on the opposite outward facing edges. 

Sir Henry Wellcome purchased these bed legs, decorated with pictures of Taweret and Bes, in 1906 from the collection of Robert de Rustafjaell. One is marked in pencil ‘Akhmim’ suggesting that it possibly came from this area.

Bed legs such as those here are frequently constructed in the shape of lion legs. Just as the lion was symbolically associated with the rebirth of the sun at dawn, a lion shaped bed might confer refreshed awakening from sleep for the occupant.

The ancient Egyptians saw the hours between sunset and sunrise as particularly dangerous, a time when they may be at risk from malevolent forces. To protect themselves from such powers positive deities were called upon. The two most common were the hippopotamus goddess Taweret and the dwarf god Bes. It is possible that beds were generally decorated with such deities, however, Taweret and Bes were also particularly connected with women in childbirth.

Thus, these legs may be part of a 'woman's bed' upon which a woman would have given birth and/or rested shortly after birth.

At New Kingdom Deir el-Medina, ‘women’s beds’ appear to have been purchased along with birth amulets [Toivari-Viitala 2001, 178]. Unfortunately, we don’t know what such beds were like, though there are clues in the ‘Wochenlaube’ scenes (see footnote) and in model clay beds [Pinch 1983, 406, pl. V]. On both, snakes are shown. On the clay models, the bed legs may take the form of Bes, and a snake is depicted on either long edge of the bed. But only one complete bed exists which depicts snakes; it is that of Sennedjem, which is Ramesside in date, and like ours has a painted decoration. Here two snakes are shown on the bed frame, one on each side. Other depictions of snakes on actual, as opposed to model, beds do occur, e.g. a New Kingdom bed leg from Thebes has cobras entwined around the legs (EA 21574; Quirke 1992, fig 70). Depictions of Bes on actual beds are, however, much more common (Graves-Brown 2010). Pinch (1983, 406, pl.V) shows that on depictions on ostraca of mothers nursing their babies, Bes appears on the bed legs. 

On the Wochenlaube scenes the snake has been identified as a protective fertility snake by Brunner-Traut (1955, 24). There are also parallel scenes where Isis and baby Horus are shown flanked by protective serpents.The pottery beds on which such serpents appear are dated to Pinch (1993, 209) as late 18th Dynasty to Third Intermediate Period. 

The legs may well have come from a tomb, however, this does not preclude their use in everyday life. Birth items were particularly apt for the tomb as, for the ancient Egyptians, rebirth in many ways, mirrored birth.

Further Reading and References

Brunner-Traut, E. 1955. Die Wochenlaube, Mitteilungen des Instituts für Orientforschung, 3, 11-30.

Graves-Brown, G. 2010. Dancing for Hathor. Women in Ancient Egypt. London and New York.

Killen, G., 1980-1984. Egyptian Furniture. 2 volumes. Warminster.

Pinch, G., 1983. Childbirth and Female Figurines at Deir el-Medina and el-Amarna, Orientalia, 52, 405-414.

Quirke, S. 1992. Ancient Egyptian Religion. London,

Toivari-Viitala, J., 2001. Women at Deir el-Medina. A Study of the Status and Roles of the Female Inhabitants at the Workmen's Community During the Ramesside Period. Leiden.

Footnote: Several ostraca are known from ancient Egypt shown nursing women seated on beds, often with convolvulus and sometimes with snakes depicted. Women may be shown having their hair done and a mirror may be evident. Similar scenes also appear in the front rooms of some houses at Deir el-Medina. These scenes, which seem to indicate some special area for birth or post-parturition recuperation, are termed by Egyptologists ‘Wochenlaube’ scenes (the term was coined by Brunner-Traut in 1955).  

Royal wine

And thank you again to Dulcie Engel, who led our handling session on ways of writing. This is one of the objects she chose and our volunteers got to actually touch it. Another item is featured here. We are doing a session in March for members of the public.

W960. Pottery neck of wine jar with hieratic inscription.

The inscription states that the wine came from a vineyard in the Western River and was bottled in the 12th year of the reign of the king. In 3 pieces. 27.5cm long. From Amarna.

The Western River is thought to be the Canopic branch of the Nile in the western Delta. Wine making in ancient Egypt dates back to at least the Early Dynastic Period. According to Plutarch it was the god Osiris who first taught the Egyptians to drink wine. The best wine came from the Delta region.

Most of the fragments of wine jars from Amarna were found in the Central Palace, though there a number of fragments also come from the Workmen’s Village. It has been suggested that the wine labels found in the Workmen’s Village show that vessels were reused for other purposes. Wine labels are important for dating the site of Amarna. Year 17 is the latest attested date of label.

This seems to read:

HAt-sp 12                                              year 12

irp (nDm) n pr.....                                 wine (sweet) of the house [i.e. estate]....

n itrw imnty Hri KAmw             of the Western River, vineyard supervisor....

Further Reading.

Murray, M.A. 2000. Viticulture and Wine Production in Nicholson, P.T. and Shaw, I. Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology, Cambridge University Press.

Wahlberg, E-L. 2012. The Wine Jars Speak. A Text Study. University of Uppsala (online- http://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:528049/FULLTEXT01.pdf).