'The Beholding Eye': Perceptions of place in Ancient Egypt

‘The Beholding Eye’: Perceptions of place in Ancient Egypt

Carl Graves cxg653@bham.ac.ukThe University of Birmingham

‘Any landscape is composed not only of what lies before our eyes but what lies within our heads.’D W Meinig 1979

naturehabitatartefactideologysystemplacehistoryproblemwealthaesthetic

‘A stretch of country as seen from a single point’D W Meinig 1979

‘Landscape is a composition of man-made or man-modified spaces to serve as infrastructure or background for our collective existence’J Brinckerhoff Jackson 1997‘In part because the concept of landscape is both relatively modern and much contested , I abstain from defining it.’J Baines 2014

‘Now within these four stelae, from the eastern mountain to the western mountain, is Akhet-Aten itself. It belongs to my father […] who gives life forever, with mountains, deserts, meadows, new lands, highlands, fresh lands, fields, water, settlements, shorelands, people, cattle, trees, and all things that the Aten my father shall let be forever.’Later boundary stelae of Akhenaten

‘Beginning of the teaching of the skilled, for instruction of the ignorant, for learning all that exists. The creations of Ptah, copied by Thoth,the sky and its concerns, the land and what is in it: vomited by the mountains, moistened by the primeval waters, all produce that Re shines upon, all that is firm upon the back of the land.’Onomasticon of Amenemope, 20th Dynasty

CULTURE

CultureMedium: Natural landscape

Cultural forms

Cultural landscape

Time

Natural factors

Natural forms

Natural landscape

NATURETime

Natural processes

Natural forms

Natural landscape

Culture

Society

Cultural forms

Cultural landscape

Natural cycles

Society’s impact on natureCultural redevelopm

ent

NATURECU

LTURE

Nature’s influence on culture

Natural processes

Natural forms

Natural landscape

Culture

Society

Cultural forms

Cultural landscape

Natural cycles

Society’s impact on natureCultural redevelopm

ent

NATURECU

LTURE

Nature’s influence on culture

‘A diagramatic representation of an area of land or sea showing physical features, cities, roads etc.’or‘a record in detail of the spatial distribution of (something).’

Wadi Hammammat map

Turin map, reign of Ramesses IVHarrell and Brown 1992

Shrine of Amun of the Pure Mountain The hill where

Amun rests

Papyrus of Ani, EA10470,37British Museum

Temple B300Gebel Barkal

‘the worship of local gods binds people to a place.’Y F Tuan 1977

Zawiet Sultan

Beni Hasan

Speos Artemidos

Balansura

Sheikh Timai

El-Minya

MA-@D@r @bnw4 itr.w 7xA

White OryxHorus (Lord of) Hebenu45km

See Helck, W. 1974. Die altägyptischen Gaue. Wiesbaden.

El-Minya and Zawiet Sultan

• Sat image

‘What begins as undifferentiated space becomes place as we get to know it better and endow it with value.’Y F Tuan 1977

‘To perceive the landscape is therefore to carry out an act of remembrance, and remembering is not so much a matter of calling up an internal image, stored in the mind, as of engaging perceptually with an environment that is itself pregnant with the past.’T Ingold 1993

Thank youCarl Graves cxg653@bham.ac.uk

Selected reading:Meinig, D. W. 1979. ‘The Beholding Eye: Ten Versions of the Same Scene’, in D. W. Meinig (ed.), The Interpretations of Ordinary Landscapes: Geographical Essays, Oxford, 33-48.Richards, J. E. 1999. ‘Conceptual Landscapes in the Egyptian Nile Valley’, in W. Ashmore and A. B. Knapp (eds), Archaeologies of Landscape: Contemporary Perspectives, London, 83-100.Tuan, Y-F. 1977. Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience. Minneapolis.