-
)1
i
The Study of the Ancienr Near Easrin the Twenty-First
Century
The william Foxwell Albright centennial conference
edired by
Jennoro S. Coopen and GIENN M. Scswnnrz
Winona Lake, IndianaEISENBRAUNS
1996
,ffi I 7ltAR p97
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Contex tualizing Egyptian Representationsof Sociefy and
Ethniciry
JoHN BarNps
On Ancient Near Eastern ldeology qiil SocietyThe study of
ideologyl in the Ancient Near Easr has made progress in its
appli-
cation to numerous categories of source material, and it has
gradually .o,.,. a b.accepted that few ancient sources are free
from ideological bias and overrones.2 Theprincipal advances in this
area have .o-. in the analysis of ancienc sourccs rhat weredesigned
explicitly ro persuade, whether they be royal inscriptions, works
of art, orletters and correspondence. Mario Liverani3 in particular
has clarified remarkablyAuthot's flore: This Paper was written for
a session on "Ideology, propaganda and National Conscious-ness" and
is concemed with these topics in the order named. The last main
section, on ethnicity andrelated questions, studies only one aspect
of its general theme but in rather more detail than the oth-ers'
Because of the vast scope of the subject matter, my trearmenr of
each ropic is.quite limited andinevitably focused on elite,
high-cultural materials.
The Albright Centenniai Conference, which broughr together
specialists in various areas anddisciplines, itself exemplified
important points I wish to m"ke. t am very grateful indeed to
JerryCooper for the invitation to attend and to him and Glenn
Schwartz fo, -riing rhe evenr ,u.h
" ,,r.-
cess' I should also like to thank Christopher Eyre, Richard
Parkinson, and.Anrhony Leahy for com-nlenting on drafts and David
o'Connor and Antonio Loprieno for making several rvorks available
tome' This paper was written before I had access to Mario
Liverani's preltige and irrerest (see n. 3),which is relevant as a
whole to the topics I discuss. I have added ,orn. ..d..rr.es to
this importantwork, but I have not been able ro presenr a susrained
dialogue with it.
Abbreviations are generally those of rhe Lexikon der
Agyptologie; refcrences are selective. Dates fol-low Rolf Krauss'
Sotfrfu- und Monddaten: Studien zur astronomisclrcn ttnd
teehrtischen Chronologie Alt-agyptens (HAB 20; Hildesheim:
Gerstenberg, 19g5).
1. I cannot present definitions for ideology rnd propaganda
here; my usages are inrended to beconventional.
2. In response to a question posed during the conference, I
should make clear that the archaeo-logical record is biased like
the textual and artistic but ofren in differenr ways. If it were
nor biased, itwould also be unrevealing for the study of ancient
civilizations.
3. For example, M. Liverani, Three Amarna Essays (tranr Matthew
L. Jaffe; Sources and Mono-graphs on the Ancient Near East 1/5;
Malibu, Calif.: Undena,1979);..Rib_Adda, giusto
sofferente,,,Altorientalisthe Forschrlngen 1 (1974) 175-205;
contribudon to I canali tlella propaganda nel mondo antico(ed.
Marta Sordi; Vita e Pensiero; Milan: Universiti Cattolica del Sacro
Cuore, 1976) 22-26; prestigeand Interest: lnternational Relations
in the Near East ca. 1600-1100 o.c. (History of the Ancient
NelrEast/Studies 1; Padua: Sargon, 1990).
339
-
t3.+0 John Baines
the correspondence and treaties betweerr rulers of different
ancient Near Easternculrures, as well as conrriburingl much ro
understanding the ideorogy of individualancient polities' He has
shown that, despire its constituiive role in ancienr interna_tional
relations, the correspondence cannot be read as presenting rhe
realiry;i;;;.relations in any straightforwarcl way- He has
d.-onr,."i.o"ri"r',n. ideological modesof argument and expectations
of writers and readers led them to misunderstand oneanother:
ideology was as much a sr.rbject of negotiati." ;;; talking past
rhe otherside in the ancient Near East as in any other period or
place. A co'rparably decisiveclarification has come fronr Peter
Machinist,a who has explored interrelations be-tween Assyrian royal
propaganda and rhe image of Assyria in the Hebrew Bible.For single
curtures, rittre anarysis has cha'ged views as decirivery
;;l;.;;.r,and the reasons for this slower progress are not hard to
see. Single cultures displaytheir diversiry less than competing
ones. Generations of scholars rvere concernedwith reconstructing
the outlines of history-dynasties, synchronisnr, "l;A;;;;regions,
and so forth-and only graduaily turned to the in"tyri, o[ the
soLrrces asdocunrents and as representatives of genres. An-rong the
earriest Egyptological con_tributions in this area was Alfred
Hermann,s study of a genre of roval inscriptionthat he termed
the'royal story'(Korrigstroveile)-5 subrequJnr work,'orably by
ErikHornung,r'applied corrrparabre methods to the presen,rrion of
thc *r" *'u*ro"*,king perforr'ed his office, de'ronsrraring thar
the ,.;;;;;;
.;;;r; ;;:ffi;subordinate to the exigencies oF a role in
maintaining the .or',ror.7 A vital aspectof these studies has been,
the discovery that cosmology played a cenrral part in theEgyptian
enactmenr and presentadon of historical .u.rro'"ni in the
configuration ofthe rnonu'rentar space wirhin which the king,s
,..,l. ;;;';"ri,r.o. Trris has beenstudied especially by David
O'Connor.s
Examples such as these illustrate two approaches that have
proved fruitful andhave so far yielded only a small part of their
potencial: rhe integration of material
-l' ll Machinist' "Assyria and its Image in the First
Isaiah,',J.{os 103 (19ti3) 7rg_375. A. Hernrann, Dic iig-yptisclrc
Kdni.gsnovellc (LAS 1{); Gliickstadt: Augnstin, l93ti). No
satiSfac_torv Enqlish equivalent fbr his cerrn has been found.6'
For exanrple' E' Hornung, ceschichte als Fcst: zuei vortriige zum
cesclilclttsbiltt derfrrihen Mensch-leir (Libelli 246; l)annstadr:
wissenschaftliche Buchgesert.r,"n,'rqeaj;Lortr"a in his ce,sr der
pha-raonenzeit (Zurich: Arremrs, .l99g) r47-63; Engrish:,rcrea.into
Intage: ir*ri;;'
^nr,ent Egyptian Thought(trans' E' Bredeck; New York: Timken,
tggz) i+l-ocridem, "politisch.'pl.n,.ng und Realitit im
altenAgypten," Saeculunr 22 (197'I) 4g-5g; Jan Arr-r.,r,, ..politik
zwischen niru"t ,r,'a Ol;;;';;r.d;politischen- Handelns im
pharaonischeir Agypten," 'saecurnm35 (19g4) g7-L14.7' Philippe
Derchain.has exemplified ihis point cogently, while remarking rhat
the image of rheking he described existed in its pu.est form
exclusively in the tempre sanctuaries of the Greco-Romanperiod: "Le
r6le du roi d'Egypte dans le maintien d-e l'ordre cosmique,', Le
pouuoir er Ie saeri,by Lucde Heusch et al' (Annales du centre
d'Etude des Religions l; Brussells: Univlrsit6 Libre de
Bruxelles,Insriut de Sociologie, 1962) 61_73. '+eJJe!J' vr'vs
8' For example, D' o'connor, "Beloved of Maat, the Horizon of
Re: The Roval palace in NewKingdom Egypr," in Ancient Egyptian
Kingship (ed. David o,connor ""0 o""r#Ti;.'#;:i;;
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contextualizing Egyptian Representations of society and
Ethnicity 341
within a broad context, whether this is a sociery or complex of
societies, or a the-oretical context, model, or comparative schema;
and the intensified analysis ofsources as Sources-studies of genre
and discourse. The former is holistic, bothwithin Near Eastern
studies and in the broader specrrum of scholarly disciplines.The
latter, which is complementary; addresses detailed evidence while
drawing oncomparable methods and applying them to different rypes
of source material. Bothneed to cross boundaries between
disciplines, and in this conrext the ancient NearEast has a role in
contributing to broader theory as well as utilizing it.
Another implication of Liverani's work is that to interpret an
ideology is not rointerpret a realiry but to model a construction
of realiry. Ideologies and realities areplural. The sophisticated
materials that presented ancienr ideology created a distancefrom
the realities to which they related. There are different
ideologies, boch withina sociery and between societies. 'While
those of different societies are evidenr, rhevarying ideologies of
single societies tend to be masked by the elite dominance ofthe
more-or-less public record, which is what is chiefly available for
study.
Gctrre arrd Source
The study of genre and of the nature of source material
continues to conrributecrucially to the understanding of ideology
and is an akernarive to focusing directlyon ideological questions.
The implications of this approach go beyond the sourcesthenlselves
to the societies that created them. A basic premise is that the
group forwhom the ancient documents, monuments, and works of art
were produced wassmall and often not well integrated into the
sociery. In many societies (not includingEgypt until quite late
periods), rulers spoke a different language from the ruled. Theuses
to which writing was put were specialized;e ancient written genres
had theirown organization and character, which must bc
comprehended. Expansion in thesubject matter and range of use of
representational art and writing was gradual. Itcannot be taken for
granted that any genre should appear in one culture simply be-cause
it occurs in many others. Interpretations need to be modeled in the
social andoral contexts in which the material originally belonged,
in addition to rhe require-ments to site that material within
genres. Although many ancient sources presentthemselves to us as
unique, few will have been unique in antiquiry.
Leiden: Brill, 1995) 263-300; and idem, "Mirror of the Cosmos:
The Palace of Merneptah," FragmentsoJ a Shattered Wsage: The
Proteetlings of the International Symposirun on. Ramcsses the Crear
(ed. EdwardBleiberg and Rita Freed; Monographs of the Institute of
Egyptian Art and Archaeology 1; Memphis:Menrphis State (Jniversity,
1991 [1993]) 167-98. O'Connor is preparing a book entirled City and
Cos-mos in Ancient Egypt.
9. For one aspecr, see John Baines, "An Abydos List of Gods and
an old Kingdom use of'lexts," Pyramid Stutlies and Other Essays
Presented to I. E. S. Edwards (ed. John Baines et al.; Occa-sional
Publications 7; London: Egypt Exploration Sociery 1988) 124-33.
-
342 John Baines
There is an interplay berween approaches that address, on the
one hand, genreand the s,",.,s of preserved sources in ancient
society and, on the other hand, con_clusions that can be reached by
identifyirrg irrconrirtencies and contradi.;;* i;ideology' Aspects
of ideology that lie at the margins of central concerns may pointto
significant anomafies and show what the ,oor.., ignore. As is onry
too weilknown, things are ofren ignored by official media pr..irfly
because they are at onceimportant and unwelcome. on another level,
new genres sometimes incorporateforms that seem to fit rather
poorly with those which existed hitherto. Indicationsof this soft
may show that there was concern with a topic rhat is otherwise
littleknown; such a concern may have long preceded its registration
in available sources.Although quesrions of genre and of rhe
record,s consistency h;;;-i;;;;..;identified, they have nor been
sufiiciently exproited. Too ofren, scholars havetended to accept
what the ancient sources ,"y
"l-or, at face value and to becomechampions of ancient rulen and
the social order that served th.--rrth;; lil;those who claim to be
reincarnations of peopre in antiquiry who were mostlykings and
queens in their previous existences. For a fuller comprehension of
thesocial order and of the spread of its varues, it is necessary ,,
;";ot;;.;,";;;:charitable approaches to the rulers with more
charitable app.oaches to the ruledand to those whom the rulers
tended to ignore and omit from the pubric record.
Modeling Ancient sources and the societies That protluced ThemA
difficulry encountered in compensating for limitations of the
evidence is rharof working against the grain of the sources *a g"p,
among them in order to inves_tigate whether alternative
ideologies
-... pr.r.rrr within single societies. It is moredifficult stiu
to study the ideologies-o, .rr., gain direct i,oidence of the
exist_snss-ef sectors of society that were not ,ho-o on the
official *""r-.",r,'rn.
creation of which often came close to monopolizing a state,s or
a peopre,s resources.Nowhere is this difficulry more acute than in
Egypt, where ;.'";;;;;r;;_work, the interesrs of scholars and of
the public,
"rrait. topography of the land itselfcombine to make the
discovery of new materiar rare and "o.r...r,
with these ques_tions often slight' Relevant evidence is so
sparse that advances are as likely to. comefrom new methods of
anaryztngthe implications of the dominant ideorogy as fromthe
identificacion of new sources.This is nor to deny the significance
of archaeology for these questions. Excava_tion has brought
fundamental discoveries, such as the presence of the
palestinianMiddle Bronze Age culture in the Egyptian Delta in the
late Middle Kingdom(ca. 1800-1600 n.c.E.). "Hyksos" rulers late in
the period commissioned wallpaintings in a Minoan or generic
east-Medirerranean style for a public building. 1010' Known
principally from excavations directed by Manfred Bietak at Tell
el-Dabca; see, for e-x_ample' his "Avaris and Piramesse:
Archaeological Explorarions in rhe Eastern Nile Delta,,,
proceedingsof the Bitish Aademy 65 (1979) 225-90; ideri, ,.tgypt
and canaan during the Middre Bronze Age,,,
-
Contextualizing Egyptian Representations of Society and
Ethnicity 343
But archaeological fieldwork in itself contributes only
indirectly to the interpreta-tion of ideology, into which such an
advance needs to be integrated; the fact thatthe discovery
occasioned surprise points to overconfidence in comprehension
ofideology and of how it relates to "realiry." This episode
illustrates how little isknown of ancient societies outside the
administrative and cultural elite, which mayhave extended to five
percent of people; for many periods even the elite is littleknown.
llGaps in evidence are often as significant as, or more significant
than,what is preserved. If they are not taken into account, models
based on fragmentaryevidence, which may be adequate for homogeneous
small-scale societies, can beseriously misleading for large and
complex ones. 12 While it may prove almost im-possible to relate
the accessible ideology of the elite to the broader sociery it
isnecessary to bear constantly in mind that ideology may not be
representative of acomplete society's views and that in some way it
will have been created against thebackground of a much larger
social group whose belieG are nearly inaccessible.
Even at less than five percent of the population, the ruling
elite in Egypt num-bered ten thousand or more. Interpretive chariry
has tended to see these people asa homogeneous group who were
concerned to govern effectively and to sustainthe social order.
Recruitment is said to have been through merit not birth and,
inprinciple, open. This picture would flatter the most enlightened
democracy. Whilethere was some meritocracy and its virtues were
often claimed, the claim is notlikely to be correct in any simple
sense. Rather, it is an ideological fiction. Therewere hierarchies
of knowledge and access to religious and other privileges
bothwithin and probably outside the elite.r3 These hierarchies may
have been the mostovert and acceptable among many manifestations of
competition and exclusion inthe exercise and control of power. Less
restricted uses of power included the van-dalization of monuments
of people's enemies or of those who fell into disfavor; thiswas
common in all periods. An improved model of the group who produced
thesources, incorporating these hierarchies and exclursions,
emphasizes how little of
B,{SOR 281 (1991) 27-72. For the wall paintings, see, for
example, M. Bietak et al., "Neue Grabtrngsergebnisse aus Tell
el-Debce und'Ezbet Hilmi im ostlichen Nildeltr (1989-199 l),"
Agypten undLevante 4 (1994) 9-80, with comments by Dominique Collon
(pp. 81-88) and Nann6 Marinatos(89-93). See also W. V. Davies and
Louise Schofield, eds-, Egypt, the Aegean, antl the Levant:
Intercon-ncctions in the Second Millennium ac (London: British
Museum, 1995).
11. This figure multiplies one percent, as a rough proportion of
the literate (John Baines andC. J. Eyre, "Four Notes on Literacy,"
CM 61 [1,9831 61,-96), by a small factor for their family mem-ben.
Since many literate, as subordinate scribes, hardly belonged to the
ruling group, the calculationprobably overestimates the group's
size, while the multiplier may allow too tnuch for the part
playedby family members in political life.
12. A corollary of the marginal status of evidence for the
general constitution of ancient societieshas been that it attracts
those who work on the margin of the discipline and often idenrify
issues thathave eluded the more conventional.
13. See John Baines, "Restricted Knowledge, Hierarchy and
Decorum: Modern Perceptions andAncient Institurions,",l,4 RCE 27
(1990) l-23; Kjell Rydstr
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344 John Baines
themselves they showed to the world and to us- 1a This reserve
relates also to thequestion of propaganda (below, pp. 353-60). It
should nor be assumed that per_suasion would occur in an open
context, where evidence for it is easily found;most of it will have
been oral.
'Qaps in evidence can best be identified in relation ro
strucrures and models.These are devised on the basis of analogies
and generalizations that may precededetailed investigation.
Approaches based on theoretical construcrs have only gradu-ally
gained acceprance in ancient Near Easterr, ,.rrot.rJio.- tn.r,
increased cur_rency has led to major advances in understanding and
will surely lead to more.Models are important in overcoming
uncontrolled interpretation, especially inhistorical
reconstruction. Most of what happened in ancieni Near Eastern
historycan never be known or even usefully made the object of
specularion (the ,"-.
"p_plies' for example, to classical Greece). The use of "
th.o..tical framework avoidsthe pitfalls of arguing from guesses
abour morivarions and other such imponder_ables. Both frameworks
and openness to comparative approaches alow interpreta_tions to be
tested and more generally controlled.
scholars also need to exploit as much evidence as possible in
relation to anyproblem. often, whole categories have been omitted,
the most striking amongthese being art' Architecture and
representational art were fundamental in ancientNear Eastern
civilizations, perhaps most of all for Egypt. In their original
contexrs,Egyptian historical inscriptions are almosr all integratei
i.rro works of art, often ina subordinate position. The works of
art were i' t.r.., set in an architectural con_text that has roo
often been ignored in interpretation. t5
works of art and architecture obey rules of decorum that arso
probably in_formed ceremonial life and the conducr of king and
elite, ror*ing an overarchingframework within which individual
elements acquired and presenred meaning.16Decorum, and the
conventions of a bureaucratic society centered on royalry formeda
background that could be taken for granted in composing much of the
artisticand literary record. Apart from the subordination of
histo.y"to cosmic and literaryimperatives, the context of art and
decorum relativized the slgnificance of individ-ual events by
setting the work, created for the gods, the king, and posteriry
over
14' Compare wolfgang Helck, Zur verwaltung des Mittleren und
Neuen Rekhes (pA 3; Leiden:Brill' 1958) 534-47' His later works,
such es Pofitlche cegensiitze i^ ottrn igyptnr (HAB 23;
Hildes-heim: Gentenberg, 1987), present these issues less well.15'
For these anistic aspects' see John Baines, "on the Status and
purposes of Ancient EgyptianArt," Cambndge ArchaeologiealJournal 4
(lgg4) 67_94.16. on decorum, see Baines, "Restricted Knowledge";
idem, Fecundity Figures: Egyptian per-sonifieation and the
lconorogy of a cenre (warminster: Aris * lhillips,1,ggr 27j405; see
also, quite in_dependent but closely congruent' Jorgen Podemann
Ssrensen, "Divine Access: The so-calledDemocratization of Egyptian
Funerary Lit.r",.r.. as a Socio-cultural process,,, Tlrc Religion
oJ the An-cient Egyptians: Cognititte luyt:!": and popular
Expression (ed. Gertie f"$""a, Borex 20; Uppsala:Almquist &
Wiksell, lg1g) l}g-25
-
Contextualizing Egyptian Representations of Society and
Ethnicity 34s
vt1*."'$ *',s gr"''.F:,.\. "
f_t l
""- :]li'
!: .f\l,,.1
-
'l
Figure 1. Wall with the gifts of Thutmose III to Amon-Re and, in
the base area, rhe be-ginning of his annal inscription.
Rephotographed from Gusrave Jequier, Les temples mem-phites et
thibains, des origines i la XVIile dynastie (LArchitecture er la
Ddcoration dansI'Ancienne Egypte 1; Paris: Albert Moranc6, 1920)
pl. 47. context: pM II, zded.,97 (zs2).
and above the single occasion that might have prompted its
consrruction. In thisperspective, it may be surprising how many
individual evenrs of the immediate pastthese works of art
commemorated and to what degree they were "objective" indoing so.
In comparison, 'Western artistic traditions are generally much less
con-cerned with recording present achievements.
Context: New Kingdom Historical Records
An instance of the significance of decorum, illustrating both
the possibilities ofinterpretation and its limits, is the
inscription containing the annals of Thutmoserrr (1479-1425 n.c.n.)
in the temple of Amon-Re at Karnak (fig. 1).17 The rext is
17. Text: Kurt sethe, urk. rY:3 (1907) 645-756; context: pM II
(2d ed; 1.972) 97-98; additionalphotograph of context: R. A.
Schwaller de Lubicz, Les temples de Karnak (Paris: Dervry,
1982)vol. 2, pl. 147l. pa*iaI translation: Miriam Lichtheim,
Ancient Egyptian Literature: A Book of Readings(3 vols.; Berkeley:
Universiry of California Press, 1973-80) 2.29-35.
-
346John Baines
among the most important from the New Kingdom, but it has hardly
been srudiedin relation ro its inscriprionar conrext. The
;;il;il;';;o in the base area ofthe north walr by rhe barque shrine
in the heait of ,i.,.-pr.. The main registersabove conrain a figure
of the king presendng to the god .""'"r"r.a images of a vastrange
of gifts of temple furnishings, including ir.-r"o. the ,."1. of
obelisks.The base area in inner room, of tempre, of ,hr, period is
mostry uninscribed-The placement of this inscription can be
interpreted in t*o ways. First, if the rosrbarque shrine beside th.
t.*t r.r.mbled i,, predecesror, d..orrted under Hatshepsut(ca'
1473-145g CI-c.r.), it will have had oft..irrg u."r.., i., its base
area, above aniche-facade plinth pattern commonly found o., ,r"o,
bases. ls This reatment com_presses a maximum meaning in a single
context, so that the barque shrine and thesurroundjng room almost
constitute f t.-pl. -*ithin a temple. Second, the place_ment both
declares the great significance of the campaigns recorded in the
annalsand relegates them to a suitably subordinate
p"rirl;;'i;?;;;;." * Amon_Re andthe king's gifts to him' le The
position was not an innovation. Thutmose followedHatshepsut, for
whom a very long text was carved both near the sorar sanctuary
ofher morruary tempre at Deir el--Bahri and in the lower regrsters
on her barqueshrine, which he demorished.20 Hatshepsur,s poorry
p..r.rr.l text legitimized herusurpation of power by referenc.
'ro
.r.r-.ro.r, orr.r., (or ..marvels,,) Amon-Rehad granted to her;
they may have been as vital to her reign_if in a differentway-as
Thutmose's text was to his. Tlthe king's rerationship to rhe sods:
he d'.il:J;r.I ;lf,l.T:j,: 1:1.'",:rif he is a femare u,u,p.,,
.,,ai* ,.;;r;l;;;; iil#i::,ffi_ l;JTilTl',his successful rule, in
this case his ."-p"igrrr, back to the god who vouchsaGd
thevictories..Moreover, the positioni.rg of the texts presents
royar achievements as ailffi$:: ?: tff,r^,.
_.1;::" giving rhem additio,,"r l,"r,,. whle pracing
This last point relates to a further consideration: in the base
area, the texts couldin theory be read. So .the pracemenr might
h.tp ro ;;;a"; message and hencehave significance for the texts'
possibre "rr"ro, ;, ;r;;;d'., a signrficance re_affirmed by their
central rocatio'in the temple. n.rt to r-t"t. th. macter thus is
atonce to negare it: only ofticiants in temple rituals had access
to the room wh.erethe inscriptions were carved, and few peopre
could. read t i.r.*rrpnr; it would havetaken hours to read rhe text
on the *"tt,
".ra a potentiar spectator wourd not havehad a powerful ramp and
sufticient time next ro th. t.-pi.,, barque shrine, quite
18. Pierre Lacau et il., (Jne-chapelle d,Hatshepsout i
Karnak(SAE; Cairo: IFAO, 1977_79) 69_92.19' This prominence of
grfts to the god -; ;. compared with rhe amount of space in the
an_nals taken up with enumerarions or uo"rylrr," fi'a" t3*.*.,
"r. ;;;i;;;Egyptian craftsmanship.20' Lacau
etal''chapelled'Hatshepsout,szllii.Forthedatingof
rtur*or.trejectionof Hat-shepsut' which is still not resolved,
,..'P.t.. t o.ir*. The Monuments of senenmtt: probrems in
His-torical Methodol,ogy (London: Kegan paul International, lggg)
46_65.
-
Contextualizing Egyptian Representations of Society and
Ethnicity 347
apart from the fact that the later sections of Thutmose's
inscription could only beread from a ladder. The texts can be
termed propaganda only if a different contextcan be posited in
which they, or knowledge of their existence, location and con-tent,
were more widely disseminated. Such contexts are possible. The
existence ofduplicates in a generally poor record suggests that
many royal inscriptions may havebeen set up in duplicates in
numerous temples,2l and although this disseminationwould not ensure
that there was ready access to them, the process of
inscriptionwould have resulted in relatively widespread awareness
of their existence. Thereprobably also were public proclamations of
the king's deeds. Like other texts, theannals exploit rhetorical
devices which imply that such displays could have occurred.Some of
these devices play on restricted knowledge, as when it is said that
a full ac-count of some details of the siege of Megiddo exists on a
leather roll in the templearchives.22 There need not be a close
connection between the form in which theking's deeds were
proclaimed and the textual record inscribed in the temple, buttheir
content would have to be comparable.
Two other implications of the problem of audience are relevant
here. First, al-though kings appeared publicly in procession and
displayed their conquests andtheir relations with the gods,23 many
of these displays must have been addressedchiefly to the ruling
elite. As with so many aspects of Egyptian-and other-cul-tures, a
message of these displays to the rest of sociery may have been that
suchevents were too important for people so low-ranking as
themselves to participate inchem. It may, then, be mistaken to
search too hard for a centripetal, integratingfunction for these
texts and for the broader persuasion they could have exerted.
The second point, which is more important, leads back to the
status of art. Theinscription and its placement on the wall form
part of an artistic and religiouswhole whose legitimizing
implications are to a great extent internal. The meaningof these
immensely significant central products exists in relation to a
continuing ar-tistic tradition.2a Wherher they were widely
disseminated might have been almost
21. See examples cited by Edward Bleiberg, "Historical Texts as
Political Propaganda during theNew Kingdom:' BES 7 (1985-86) 5-13,
esp. 11 n. 34. I do not agree with Bleiberg's assumptionthat the
outer areas of temples were accessible to those who wished to read
inscriptions; in any case,many inscriptions would hardly have been
decipherable from the ground.
22. The lost preceding clause probably stated that the full
account was too long to accommodatein rhe inscription: IJrk.
IY:662,5-6; Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian ljterature,2.33 with n.
9.
23. David O'Connor ("Beloved of Maat") has a valuable discussion
of New Kingdom examples.The displays of defeated enemies recorded
for Amenhotep II, in which he transported the living anddead bodies
of leaders and displayed them on city walls (if there really were
such things at Napata),are the other side of these celebrations.
See Peter der Manuelian, Studies in the Reign of Amenophis II(UliB
Z0; Hildesheim: Gentenberg, 1987) 50, 52-53,72-73.
24. Irene W'inter's important article, "Royal Rhetoric and the
Development of Historical Narra-tive in Neo-Assyrian Relie6"
(Studies in Visual Communication 712 [1981] 2-38),. rather neglects
thisaspect of a continuing tradition. The extent to which artistic
change is an internal matter for artistscan be seen also in
European Renaissance and Baroque traditions.
-
348John Baines
^a ?-t1.:-2 F=-';iir,;..
Figure 2. Sery I receiving tribute from Asiati,exterior wall of
the Great Hypostyle Hall at
c pnnces and attacking Shasu nomads; northproduction: rpi*"oti.
s ttrwetr -r"t o Ft-t,t^ n,. 'lt":fj.ph:tograph by John Baines.
Lil-;;-ili5ff
;,'fiT,,'"i::?;;:l;,i!;,!:iii-iiii'^i;;'H?"[:,,[1'3'i1;;:Jlil::
complex composirions can hardly have been used in ,h.i.
l;;:.;ttfJ,;. _tllT
irrelevant' In this penpective, the weaker form of dissemination
I suggest, thatsome peopre courd have known the placement and
content of the texts rather thanthe texts themserves, would be
sufficie.rt to sustain their status.This role of works of arr can
be'lusrrated from the reign of sery r (r291_r27gn'c'e') in the vast
expendirure on tt. tirrg,r-tempre at abydos and his tomb in
theValley of the Kings, as we' as especially i., to ,ro*t
,"u;;;;o.nring his military:ilti.?Xj:.::j:,:::.,"1i: :,.",
Hypo,ryre Ha[ at Karnak (f,s. 2).2s rhese
25' Abydos: Amice M. carverley and Myrtle F. 8101e, lre,Temrte
of King sethos I at Abydos (ed.Alan H' Gardiner; 4 vols.;.Londo.,,
Egypi E;pil;." ,:.,_.r, , aon*,tr,*rsiry of chicago press,1e33-ss).
romb: Erik Homuns, 4'rb;;;';;!raoh seii 1 (z;J;.;;._* &
winkrer, 1ee1).Hyposryre Ha': Epigraph,: ,:*Jr,. rhe
Baukh,i,r1,
"y y,r, i,) i," ii,t)"io,n ,or, chicago:
rhe71:X,;:,:;,;::::,|]ifI "",:!:::ll.f i:F;:..,r,,..o.a,, see
wlriamJ Murnane, rhe Road,o Kat".,"
1
i
t
I
'
A Histoicat rnterpretation or the Baute n iii"i
iir;!::i';:;"::itlfrLn;:"H ,:;:";::f:!::h
';i';::;i':' ^i"',:::,^:":;i:i:;a;:::i;:,:^I'*r'.c,
,..
"1-^:;;;;.*.*.. -Franwon A,es,Faber & Faber, 1951)
iti-+t,which is valuable o":"t'nto"onol Att of the Aneient Near r^r
rr."J""tpite shortcomings in approach.
-
contextualizing Egyptian Representations of society and
Ethnicity 349
the message of the king's achievements. The Karnak temple
complex would havebeen accessible to relatively few,26 Thebes was
nor the political or population cen-ter of the country, and their
placemenr high on the walls would not have alloweda detailed
reading (rhe dado in fig. 2 is more than z m high). The same
question ofaccess, in comparison with the cultural significance of
works, affects such morepublic productions as medieval ltalian
fresco cycles: many of these also are too highon the wall and too
dimly lit to be easily seen.
The existence of the reliefr of Sety I makes it unlikely that
the dearth of majorcampaign inscriptions from his reign is due
entirely ro chance. It seems rather thathe chose to use this
medium, perhaps because of its cultural significance and despiteits
limited direct potential for propaganda. The reliefs are imporrant
as works that rec-oncile the discordant tendencies of the late 18th
Dynasry as well as integrating specificevents with the generality
of the king's role and his actions for the gods in a new way.
The significance of this form continued in the reign of Sery's
successor Ram-esses II (1279-1213 n.c.e.), who celebrated the
Battle of eadesh in elaboratecompositions inscribed in several
temples (figs. 3-a). Unlike Sery Ramesses also or_dered the
inscription and dissemination of extensive texts that acted as a
foil for thereliefr.27 Literary copies of the later New Kingdom
show that these texts were notrestricted to the temple context but
reached a rather wider social group-althoughit cannot be known how
far their message spread through society (as is true of ear-lier
royal inscriptions that entered the literary tradition). The
reliefs themselvesmark a development from those of Sery I in being
more formalistic in compositionand more clearly symbolic in
organization. Roland Tefnin'has shown in an impor-tant analysis
that the texts and reliefi recording the battle are complementary,
eachwith its own merhods and rhetorical forms.28 This
complementariry is a generalcharacteristic of Egyptian relief that
must be taken into account in interpretation,but the Qadesh
compositions add an extra layer of discourse.2e Apart from
these
26. Latge temple complexes were evidently more widely accessible
than individual structures, burthe majoriry of indications of
unofficial presence, such as graftiri attesting to a cuir of
relie6, is post-New Kingdom; see Claude Traunecker, "ManiGstations
de pi6td personelle i Karnak," BSFE 85(1979) 22-31; idem, "une
pratique magique populaire dans les temples de Karnak," La magia
inEgitto ai tempi ilei faraoni Atti conuegno internazionale . . .
1985 (ed. Alessandro Roccati artd AlbertoSiliotti; Milan: Rassegna
Internazionale di Cinematografia Archeologica: Arre e Narura Libri,
1987)221-42. More research is needed in this area.
27. Texts: Kitchen, Ram. Ihscr. ll (1979) 2 (list of sources),
3-147; study: Thomas von der'Way,Die Text-Ilberlieferung Ramses'
II. zur Qade!-Schlacht: Analyse unil Strul
-
350 John Baines
-t
j..||ffiH' de I'image egvptienne" lcar s+lro
Figure 3' pylon of the remple of Luxor, viewed from the north;
photograph by JohnBaines' The eadesh reliefs are on the upp..
p".i;; .J;,;."""'
compositional points, coror frequently presents almost discrete
meanings, and irswidespread loss restricts significantly *h"t ."r,
be known about works of art.30The relie* of Sery I and Ramesses II
cannor have had a simpre propaganda pur_pose, because in their
finished form they were not accessible enough to rendersuch a
purpose meaningful (see fig. 3 for the pracing of one ,.rrio., of
the eadeshrelie{i, high on the pylon wall at Luxor; fig. +, the
deta1, is ar a height of about8 m)' Their iconography and
composition are, however, designed to convey amaximum of persuasive
meaning, so that che question of who they might persuaderemains'3'
Their immediate audiences were two: (1) the members of the elite
con_
The fundame"'"I -T1,-:1 Erich winter (IJntercuchungen zu den
iigyptkchen Tbnpelreliefs dergiechisch-nimisehen Zeit ID1AW 98;
Graz, vienna, and cologn'e: H.r-r.rn f,Jt uo, Nachfolger,
196g])demonstrated the degree of elaboration possible in th..aesig'
of seemingly ordinary compositions.30' see Patrik
Reuterswerd,.studiei zur Polychymie tler plastik I:
Agypten(Stockholm srudies inHistory of An 3/1; Stockholm: Almqvist
a wiksell, 195g); Baines, Fecundity Figures, 1.39_42,3s7_gg.31' on
this r differ from Bleiberg ("Historicar,.:o..:,
d.ri;;J;;;aganda,,) and Simpson("Egyptian Sculpture and
Two-Dim.rri'or"l Repr.rent"tion,,), both of *hom seem ro assume
with_
,.$l]|illltr.R:T, the works would have been
sufncien;r;;;;;;;;;;,. for their propaganda
-
Contextualizing Egyptian Representations of Society and
Ethnicity 351
Figure 4. Detail of the Qadesh reliefs on the pylon at Luxor;
photograph by John Baines.
cerned with the creation, execution, and interpretation of works
of art, that is,those who maintained the "Great Tradition"
encompassing the closely integratedstrands of artistic and literary
creation; and (2) the gods. In a broader sense, rhe au-dience was
also posteriry for whom the possibiliry of reading the text or
viervingthe reliefs might not have been considered specifically.
Another interpretive srrar-egy, related to the general
understanding of ritual and comparable forms of action,is to view
the works as being "performative." By their existence they enact a
com-munication or, in the case of ritual reliefs in temples, an
action, so that they areselGsufficient.32 This is not the same as
saying that they had a literal magical or re-creative function-a
problematic interpretation that is widespread in the
literature.
There is a temptation not to take the gods seriously as an
audience for worksdedicated to them and thus to interpret the
motivations for constructing the monu-ments and choosing particular
forms for them as resulting solely from human ma-nipulation and
being addressLd to humans. Although some inscriptions and reliefiin
temples, such as the record of the selection of Hatshepsut as king
by her father
32. See Philippe Derchain, "A propos de performativiti: Pensers
anciens et arricles rdcents," GM110 (1989) 13-18. This is an area
in which interpretations have been far too literal. See the
valuablearticle of Erhart Graefe, "Die Deutung der sogenannten
'Opfergaben' der Ritualszenen igyptischerTemple als
'Schriftzeichen,"' in Ritual and Sacrifce in the Ancient Near East
(ed. Jan Quaegebeur; OLA55; Leuven: Peeten, 1993) 143-56.
-
3s2John Baines
Thurmose r (ca' 14g3-14g3 0-c.8.)," -:r:be fabrications, and
much else in tempredecoration may be equally tot..*.d with
legitimations *ithin the human socialorder, the gods shourd not be
dircou't.j ; ;.il;;;;,r: {f.ptrans berieved in thegods' Texts say
repeatedly that sociery consists of th. godr,?. deceased, the
king,and humanity,3a and,this formura,to,ra be grven d".;;;; If the
creation of thetemples and their decorarion had been .*.iir., i"
b;-;; and deception, rheseinstitutions would hardly have
endured.
I have pursued the contextual imprications of these New Kingdom
conrpositionsat length in order ro suggest how an "pp.o".r, ;r;;;
:;il and through the sys_tem of artistic decorum can enhance the
meaning of the whole and lead to a per_specrive that moders that of
rhe actors. tn.r.
"r-. -;; il" such an approachcannot do' In particular' it gives
little access ro politicar motivarions that led ro mili-tary
campaigns and other historical actions or to the discussions
preceding either rhepolicy or the record of the events. Least of
all does it give any insight into rhe
events*,'rym::'J:':,:;:il':J::"*ffi'k;;:"#i;nr,eror*.;;";
one advantage of this approach is that it takes evenrs as being
culrura'y andhistorically constructed, ,o irr", the aim of
interprer"riorr l.rr.s to be simpry asearch for "what happened"-an
approach that may not be productive.3s Much ul-timately fruitless
speculation t ",
g;; inro examining motirrations of ancient rulers.Such questions
need the rypes Jr ,o.rr.. marerial availabre to the modern
hisro_rian-and even when the materiars are availabre, success i,
,ro, grr"."nteed. w.heresomething that looks a littre like such a
source is preserved, as with rhe retter ofAmenhotep rr (1426-1400
n.c.E.) on a srera of the *.ipi.;;;;ersaret,36 the pubricsetting of
the piece distinguishes it f.o- the private ""i ,"ir"r"r materials
of latereras and civilizarions that qred writing in different
*"rr.-;;;r, wolfgang Herckwas correct to say that Che sources hide
rh
th eir co mp e ri ri o,, C, p ower, and hence ..', :"Jil
;i:lr.n: T:;t #.jl"rffi :their inconsisrencies,3T but his implied
"t- t' using this srraregy may be una*ain_
rr o'J;it3l[1.iil,']i';?'" et Bahai /r1(London:-Egypt
Exproration sociery n.d.) pls. 56-64; pM?4 r-- r^- r, tdon,1972)
347_48,I, (16)_(21).34' see Jan Assmann, or rcaiu ai
1"ir"r'irriy:__!iy kosmogmphischer Begreittext zur
reur4ischensonnenhymnik in thebanischen
ltyrry""r"a cruirr,riiroalK 7; chicist'iJ, a.rgrrri.,, rg70)
59.35' compare Anthonv.John spai"g.., ,a;p r)rr -"t
,n, u,tn)ir")^irii ,t the Ancient
EgyptiansIJilt}.i'fl;:,,T,".'"' v"t' u"i""'irfn*"5tzr
237-41.."'.;,;;;;;;;, ,s prestrge and rnterest is
36' Wolfgang Herck, "Eine stere des Vizekcinigs. wr-itt,,,JNES
14 (1955) 22_31 .
..
37. w. Helck, "Zur Lage der egyprir.rr., C.*ir.f,or.rrr.iUu
^u,,i ^irr,r"
o* Vierten InternationalenAgyptorogenkongresses, Miinchin
llesls*Ji." "* ^irru,o,*.rr." r"i*. u.rn*. o, Hamburg: HelmutBuske,
1991) 7-8, ciring the Nitocts ar*ffi;; of 656 s.c.e., where whatur
progress {iom the nofth to Thebes .";";;;;;; been that, because ,h.
drr
ir p*trnted as a peace-Either the dates are manipulated
1". r"-" p"rp"r. o, th.lou-ey was ar -".ltt
are too compressed'a military maneuver. rext: Ricardo a.
c"*"Jf;rhe Niiocasi.;il;.;rJ#T,iTtii_l?i -
-
Contextualizing Egyptian Representations of Society and
Ethnicity 353
able- The basic goal of reconstructing a historical skeleton is
vital, but attempts tocreate a modern-style political history of
Egypt or of the ancient Near East are besttransmuted into cultural
and socioeconomic approaches.
As with many studies of artistic material, the inrerpretation of
the annals ofThutmose III presented here raises the question of how
far it models an actors'persPective, or how far it partakes in
general iconological strategies and addressesinherent semiotic
features of the works that might not have been perceived bytheir
creators and their ancient audience. This issue is significant, but
it can hardlybe resolved, and interpretation could not progress if
it were the principal focus ofattention. It is, however, desirable
to distinguish between interpretations that claiman actors'
perspective and ones that claim validly to draw out the meaning of
thematerial, often in consonance with specific modern theories. In
the foregoinganalysis, I have attempted to indicate which of these
approaches applies to particu-lar aspects of the argument; for the
most part, I have been attempting to recon-stnrct an actors'
perspective.
Propaganila anil Hierarclry
I have indicated difticulties with the notion of propaganda in
relation ro templereliefl and inscriptions. Since propaganda
necessarily implies an audience and theidentifiable audience in
temples was small, it miy have limited application to a so-cial
group such as the ancient Egyptian elite.38 Whereas the temple
inscriptionspose this problem most acutely, stelae, on which the
majoriqv of "historical" textswere inscribed, are iconographically
more self-contained and by implication couldhave stood in more
public places. Such monumenrs as the Poerical Stela of Thut-mose
III,3e which conrains a strophic laudatory speech of Amon-Re
recounting theking's exploits to him and presenting Amon-Re's own
part in them, would notmake sense if they did not have an audience
beyond the king himself. Yet this ex-ample, together with the
Qadesh inscriptions of Ramesses II and the historical nar-rative of
Kamose, the latest pre-New Kingdom king,a0 suggests a diflerent
path ofdissemination from the broadly popular. The Kamose texts
passed over into literarytradition, as did those of Ramesses II.
The Poetical Stela points ro the strongly lit-erary character of
the speeches of gods and hymns to gods preserved especially
38. For penetrating comments, which I nevertheless think extend
the range of the concept unduly,see Liverani, Prestige and
Interest,26-29. Among quite useful studies rhat do not ask the
question aboutaudience is Alan B. Lloyd, "Natfonalist Propaganda in
Ptolemaic Egypt," Historia 31 (1982) 33-55.
39. PM II, 2d ed-, 94, 771; convenient illustration: Kun Lange
and Max Hirmer, Egypt (4th ed.;London; Phaidon, 1968) pl. 145.
Translation: Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature,2.35-38.
40. Labib Habachi, The Second Stela of Kamose (ADAIK 8;
Gliickstadt: Augustin, 1972): H. S.Smith and Alexandrina Smith, "A
Reconsideration of the Kamose Texts," ZAS 103 (1976) 48-76.
-
354John Baines
from the New Kingdom, but reaching back to earlier periods.+r
New Kingdomroyal inscriptions with these speech.r'for- a compact
lradition, showing rhat atightly defined repertory of such forms
existed. az The wider conrext of these textsremained within the
elite; they moved into the s,,eam of tradition but did not
nec_essarily spread to large numbers of people-a3The same
restriction holds for imaginative lirerarure, but with additional
difti_culties. The titre of Georges posener,s important ;;,
iirar"rrn er poritiEte dansl'Egypte de la XII' dynastie,aa
announced that it studied *h"t
-"y be termed propa_ganda, but his focus on poritical aspects of
literature was almost at che expense ofits literary aspects. while
some of ,h. ,.*r, he analyzed can meaningfuily be seenas political
propaganda because they relate ,o , .tor.ty ;ila political
context,others that assert Egyptian values do so in a subtle and
indirect way.+5 The literarycorpus and the group who produced it
were too small and too closely involved withthe rulers for directly
subversive literature to be produced and to enter a
continuingtradition. This audience was arso highly cultured; the
opinions of its members arenot likely to have been swayed by crude
persuasion or moralizing. Furthermore,many of the texts thar are
oft.r, .l"i-ed to have propaganda as their intent havesubsequently
been dated to periods later than th. .rr.rrtr"to which they were
heldto relate' These redatings do not make the interpreradon of
them as propagandaimpossible, but they do prace the texts' meaning
in the more general context of the41. On the speeches, see Jan
Assmann, ,,Aretalogiea,, LA I Og75) 425_34:for hymns, sce nu_merous
publications of Assmann; anthology: Agyptische Hymnen und
cebete(Die Bibliothek der AltenWelt: Der AIte Orient;
,"*::\:Artemis, f 6iSf.-illp"ront lite,ary srudy of prayers:
Gerhard Fecht, Lir_eratische Zeugnisse zur "pers\.nlichen
Friimmilgkeit'; ir| agypr*, Anaryse trer Biispiete aus dett
ranessiclischenschulpapyi (AHAW; Heidelberg: c".r winr..
unio,..rirdtrrr..lrg, 1965). som. te*tr, such as the steraof
Amenmose with the g..at hym' to osiris 6i.r,i.irr,, anruii
rgypii"i;;,rr"ture,2.B,t_86)and rhestela of Baky with its complex
meditarions rar."r"a* Varille, ,.La i!i. a,,
-yr,ique Bdki,,, BIFA, 54fi"tL:?#how a marked individualiry i',
.r,"i.. or -"t.;rt ".'a or.l.orl, in religious orienra-
42. Nicolas-Christophe Grimal (les ternres de Lclna-ulte
dAtexandre [M6loires de rAcaddmie or,
,1,{!l^!ofJ"({,:r;:r:::{::;::f ,,:r:rd;::{:::;!rie Narionale, 19861
449-66) presenrs th. p"rr"g.r-i'larer New Kt"gd.;;;:riptions that
paraller rhePoetical Stela. r rew r\rrrBuurrf lns'
43' There is a problem of the definition of literature here: rhe
broad view considers to be ,.litera-ture" all well-formed
monumenlal and papyrus texts thar .;;;;&;;;."-"or t..ai,ion
(exemplifiedby Lichtheim' Ancient Egyptian Literatire)'; narrower
definidons .".";; only imaginative fiction,rnstructions' and
related genres (as in the featments of Loprien" i., ,rrir'"oi"rrre
and R. B. parkinson,"Teachings' Discounes and rhres from the
Middl;
lnqa'om," iiaii, i"ii"m studies[ed. Stephen"o5|:;iilf;:T;.
l?*lli;ll?
tssq er_tii1Boih penpec,i,,., ",.
i"iia in different contexrs;44' Posener' Littltature et
po.litique dans t'Egypte de Ia XI(. dylastie(Bibliothdque de
l,Ecole des HautesEtudes 307; paris: champion, 195-0.
poserr..:,
".g,r;.rrts built on e"rli.r *orl of Adriaan de Buck.45. For
commenrs, see John Baines, ..tnt..pi.tiog.Sin"h.,,,/81 ;; irirrl
,r, Stephen euirke,"Review of A. Loprien o, Topos unir Mimesis:
zir^-a*uoarr in der iigyptischen Literatur,,, Discussions
inEgypnlogy 16 (1990) 92; parkinson, "r.".hirg., oir"orr.r., and
Thles,,, 102 with n. 44.
-
Contextualizing Egyptian Representations of Society and
Ethnicity 355
use of the past.a6 If intended, propaganda must have been
conveyed by hidden al-lusion, little of which can now be recovered.
Since the texts survived any period inwhich they could have had
propaganda significance, their literary and educationalworth, and
perhaps their general i.ncorporation of centripetal values, secured
theirlater retention.
In the case of the Story of Sinuhe, propaganda for the 12th
Dynasty king Sen-wosret I (1918-1875 e.c.r.), which the work is
often assumed to propound, oreven the possibiliry that the text was
a coded announcement of a political am-nesrya7 become meaningless
if it was composed after the end of his reign. A ratherlater dare
of composition is likely, borh because works of literature are
rarely set inthe present and because the opening lines are probably
best read as referring inparallel to the two kings, Amenemhat I and
Senwosret I, as deceased.as The textcould nonetheless promote the
cause of the dynasry as a whole or of later kings asworthy
successors to the great predecessors whom it names. Part of the
appearanceof propaganda may, however, be negated by genre and
context. A crucial passageoften cited here is a eulogy of Senwosret
I that the fugitive Sinuhe addresses to anomadic chief who has
saved his life.+e The chief counters this tactless piece ofrhetoric
with the dry comment:
Egypt is indeed fortunare in the knowledge that (Senwosrer I) is
flourishing.(But) you are here.You rvill be with me. What I do for
you is good.5t)
Much of the eulogy's significance may be in the text's
incorporation of a wide rangeof literary genres in its narrative
structure; this particular inclusion is ironic and inpart perhaps
is managed for genre purposes. A eulogy of a king occurs in an
"auto-,biography" as early as the 5th Dynasty (ca.2450 B.c.E.).5r A
close parallel forSinuhe's set piece is a cycle addressed to
Senwosret II[,52 while part of the LoyalistInstruction, a
generalized praise of kings and advice to ofticials, was related
toAmenemhat III and inscribed on an "autobiographical" stela of a
contemporaneoushigh official.53 The eulogies probably derive from a
context of performance, perhaps
46. See John Baines, "Ancient Egyptian Concepts and lJses of the
Past: 3rd-2nd Millenniumn.c. Evidence," Who Needs the Past?
Indigenous Values and Archaeology (ed. Robert Layton;,One
WorldArchaeology; London: Unwin Hyman, 1989) 131-49-
47. For example, He1'ck, Politische Cegensiitze,3T with 91 n'
55'48. Roland Koch, Die Erziihlung des Sinuhe (BAe 17; Brussels:
Fondation Egyptologique Reine Elisa-
beth, 1990) 3. I owe this point to Richard Parkinson, and revise
my opinion, "Interpreting Sinuhe," 38.49. Translarion: Lichtheim,
Ancient Egyptian Literature, 1.225-26'50. Koch, Die Erziihlung des
Sinuhe,40, lines 1-8.51 . Alessandro Roccari, La litttrature
historique sous lAncien Empire tgyptietr (LAPO; Paris: Editions
du Ce4 1982) 97-98.52. Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature,
1.198-201.53. Georges Posener, L'Enseignement Loyaliste, sagesse
hgyptienne du Moyen Empite (Centre Hist.
Phil., EPHE, I\f section II: Hautes Etudes Orientales 5; Geneva:
Droz, 7976); see his p' 15 for parallels
-
356John Baines
ln court life or in royal progressions throuin Sinuhe i, ";;
"?,r,ii r"._t ,;;;;.jlj:":.Tffi:J,}ffi:jl:,,:i::Iil:than
demonstrating any simple p."p";;;; intent.
-
The Story of the Eloquen, p."o.riiithe text *,
" p.oa,r.t or th. nrnJrorn *,;;lT Ilr.J: the literar view
thatinfluenced interpretations. The rro,"r, now dated ro rhe
*roo:'|:1 setting, rongThis composirion is a comprex discourse
". .;i, ;r.;, #;i:::i';i:lT:L;be seen as propaganda for
" p""r.rrf", kirrg, b,r, ,."ai.rg,
", !.o'"r"r.da have beenil:T::LtfiT'h? f.'Hl,"jlt'+-".";;"'
;#:,,s ,ha, i, is direc,ed
menrioned, r,"ir.r" thar texrs ;;; ;;r"_;ttft :ff;i:?inii:*::*f
::::likely to have been preserved i., tr"jitiorr; kings "rra
,n.o"rupporrers would nothave fa'ed ro norice their
impric"ri""r.-w_rr.r. "-r.*,,, ..rrr."iof royarry as in
the;:::J'*-:::;lii:T:;l:1$ "e* or n.o,l, o'*',n
" miri,ary officer,
Middle Kingdom royar inscripdons, Gw of which have been
accessible forstudy' relate more clearly to the iorrruiirry of
propaganar. it. mosc unusuar arethe earliest,ss the texts of
S.rr*orr.t, ,ro_ Elephantinern "rra
Tod,60 the lattercontaining a highly corored description "irlr.
a..", "r ri. toJa ,.*pt. and narrar_il:,:l..
i:ili?#::::,'*lt:'"Tl,J::,:::t
_!'*'.,",,..".e or vio,ence andp rorotyp e. rn comf,
arisr.,,i,.
-u,
i;;;;;'il::'#;T T:.i:;t:y ;.flT,;: T # III
*"i,"i:i:,ftr.f;.Tffi ";,I:,:,;,,,:J"ji_'7,{:{,ri:",an, (oxrord:
Griftich ,,,,,,,"*, ,nn,,,'",.'l; ff:-.ilL;l*f , *in;#;;: $;1] -ith
rererences; idem, .. rhe Date or the56' w' K' Simpson,
"rrt.,poliri."r u"ii""'""l"f the Eloquent peasanr,., cM r20 (1gg1)
g5_gg.57' For references' see parkinson' "i.]Jil:,tiscourses
#il;:rili 5**u,, for a reconsruc_tion of rhe narrarive, see Emma
g*"".rri.;r.,"',attagyptirrt,
*rrr*"'1rrr'ed.; Munich: Diederichs,1989) l7B-79,321-22. For-rhe
s.r..ril._i"r.. u",r.r, ..aonceprs rnd Ur., of rhe past..,58' The
earrier srerae of the"lt* drr"*r'iheban king *ilffi;";tef are nor
distinctively'ii;;r:!:^y,;::;;To;'i;:#',",#jr::i:';!*::,::'
,ii,,i.""tilot[/"),u,,,. Zeugnisse der , lMen tuhotep,n J a-.n.-
r,1i,,.i_,." o.o.tl ;..#'; H::1il:,:t-70- F,"g-.n,, or
Nebhepetre
. -^l? WUfgang Hetck, ,.Die Weihins.f,in" i.*"1!* 2! Antal
ee-ii. :sostris' I. am Saret-Tempel von Elephantine,,,
60' wolfgang Herck' "politische.spannunge" ,1
l..g,."n des Minreren Reiches,,, Agypten, Dau,rcrund wander:
svmposium....oktob.er rpsz rJJ'ra"r8;.M-ainz:;;;*_, irrry or_rr,
Donard B.$it3;r#;,T,1Jl;.ilrt.n or s.nwo,,itl "li *r, ,r,i or,*1"
,,i.,*-.,, in Nubia and the,* ;iai,: iira;';;
('|xT'ilj,]nnotl38-55; c' Barbotin.'olJ'tiu*i:i-'in,..ip,ion de
sdsostris
-
contextualizing Egyptian Representations of society and
Ethnicity 357
served on the 18th Dynasry Berlin Leather Roll, which includes
exrensive self-praise of the king, sits more easily with later
traditions.6r
The rather later text of the Semna-Ljronarti srelae of Senwosret
III (1g36-lBlBn'c'e') is strongly literary, deriving in large part
from instruction genres and in-cluding a word-for-word parallel
with the Insrruction of ptahhotep.;2 Although itsmessage of
standing firm on the frontier and keeping the Nubian enemy i.,
co.r_tempt and subjection had practical significance ro, tt,.
Egyptian occupying force,the text seems best suited to edifying the
elite, perhaps in pa.t the local officerclass, rather than the
soldiery. As christopher Eyre remarks, there is no reason tosuppose
that it was read for these purposes from the stelae themselves,
which maywell'not have been readily accessible; there p$bably were
papyrus copies thatwould have been used for insrruction, perhaps as
much in Egypt
", on the Nubian
frontier. The propaganda side of the text may thus be subsumed
in the more gen-erally literary purpose of transmitting culture and
values.
A similar transmission of complex values associated with
attitudes to foreignersand the internal manipulation of power
occurs in the Instruction for Merikare,63 aliterary text
that.probably belongs to the same general period. Merikare
emphasizesthe harsh responiibilities of governmenr and discusses
the necessiry of reconcilingfactions; the work is far more
critical, and in a sense pragmatic, than royal inscrip-tions and
other literary texts.
The coherence of the stream of high-culrural written tradition
emerges sronglyboth from monumental inscriprions and from literary
and religiou, ,.*,I np intL-pretive approach through genre and
through modeling the social group producingthe record is crucial.
If the restrictions on the dissemination of written material
aretaken into account-even allowing for rhe proclamation of royal
exploits-the po-tential of propaganda appears limited. The
hierarchical character of sociery .o-.,to the fore; spreading
propaganda beyond the elite may have been of little concern.The
means by which the position of the elite was legitimized in the
eyes of thoseoutside it are largely unknown.
61. Translations: Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature,
1.115-18; R. B. parkinson, Voices JromAncient Egypt: An Anthology
of Middle Kingdom Writings (London: British Museum, 1991)
+O-+l;Philippe Derchain, "Les ddbuts de I'Histoire [Rouleau de cuir
Berlin 3029]," RdE 43 (lgg2) 35-4:.,argues for an 18th Dynasry
date. If the text is early, ir is the oldest exampl. of
".'roy"l ,rory" i.,Alfred Hermann's sense (Die Agyptische
Kdnigsnovelle).62' Christopher J. Eyre, "The Semna Stelae:
Quoration, Genre, and Functions of Lirerature,"
Studies in Egyptology Presented to Miriam Lichtheim (ed. Sarah
Israelit-Groll; Jerusalem: Magnes, 1990)134-65, esp. p. 138.63.
Translation: Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature, 1.97-109;
Wolfgang Helck, Die LehreJr'ir
Ki)nig Metikare (KAT; .Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1977); Gun
Bjcirkman, "igyptology and HistoricalMethod," otSu 73 (1964) 9-33,
remains valuable. As with the Tale of the lloquerri p.rrrn,,
-..,yauthors have dared Merikare to its historical setting
during the 9th/10th Dynasry.
-
358John Baines
rmaginative senres. rhar rater
"p;.", i;-";ff;iff #.T:ffilt::ir;:posed.6a The principar
assertions or royt "rra
.tt. .o.,;r;;;"_ the ord Kingdomare morruary monuments and the
reliefr o...r"r*'ri.rir, .orrr.ying an over_whelming messase of
royal ,.,d, to , t.rr.1
."r;;;:;;r;.;:;r. rn rhis sense, rheyare propaganda for the
state and for the coheren..-of itr."*r"" of this life and thenexr'
rhe impact of which t r.rt t" ii o^rl !. -"ri"-p-p"g"rrairtic,,
reliefr arethose treating foreigners (r.. ;i;,"'*,r. ,Ur,_rr), but
th.y h"rre rhe same limita_rions as New Kingdom temple -r..tiJt""r,
being accessrbl. to Gw and not easily
;:::'r::fTnlT*' widespread 'o"L"l fo.m (although analogies can
be round in
;ft*1;"",ffi L{:ri*f;lffi H*i*i{',T'ffi #iff *the mortuary
sphere. Both the .rrorr''r-'.rr* and the palermo not concerned
withlimited range of ideological .o.r..-r.--^'rrr
a'o [ne Palermo Stone present only
a,".JT5ff::T::',:ffi.J;1";,ff""s of persuasion, this does nor mean
rhatspeech'performance,andarchiterr"...;"t;;;trrtt::::."r1y;T:;:i3;H::iattested
in nonroyal biographies, and in the ensuing Finr
Inre:ilT"'-.".i"1k"i j**,**l:;:fi k:..:H::i$.;,:i.i:Iperiod when
the range of use,
"e *.,rr"* li: 1,_,r.0, fo, o,f,.. g';:il;:Ti*:sequendal texts'
67 The appear of these ,rit.rot, was narrowe. th-"n th"t of later
imagi_native texts, and this exclusivra, *", i.rghtened by
resricticcommon in any sociery, knowledge and i1 availabiliry
*...;;;rr.::"ff;::rrfi.;and were subject ro religious
r".,.r-a*'lorhat holders'rao.,.ir, office were amongthose who had
access ro arcane mareriars. * 1i, ort",*iir"rr, ;, rerigious
concextsconrrasrs with the rargely securar image oF ord *,n*oor_
no"'J"rar monumenrs, em_
'tJ ;'.'.T*ru,j:*' :--:";::tli the p ubric record,, i r i, p
resen ted S in ce
This interpreradon shourd be compared with evidence from the old
Kingdom,naffi":#:'TfiT".:::::::;; *.* rewer and works or riterature
in
i n p re -
Ne r'v Ki nsdom tit.""ri.,'i n :;;#f.. -,ff ::ffi ::;:,ff::ill.
ij:;:
L-;-'T;h;il*:r t;;i::;:;^,:,;:::! :::^-,i1 'o:"ji:,:, Das Grab
a,s vorschu,e der Li,_::1tu:,ir.n.alten Agypr.n." t*n1 r)i
dorii,ru,';.',"" und ldentitlt: Das Grab als vorschule de'r
Lit_(ed. Aleida Astmann et al.; Munich: Fink- 1ss.
^^t'l::'::Archao_hgie
der literarisclrcn rcoo,*unii*inn(ed. Aleida As'mann ., ,r.;
rur,i"i.i: ;;';"i;;.r':"o::'!' Archiiologie tler titerarischen
rcoo,*unii*innerarure: Ancienr r.*t, ,nd ##:1,.,*;JTflji:ii: *.
;;#JI'"f i1o.0",", Egypcian Lit_eratu re : f.ln : *::',.,"**i::l :'
::"i' ili *"'i;,T:'::". H Ti i- r r"'o "'edge and Ora.,
ffuf.."ol.,
"f'.1; ?j)T,iil'ill1:? ,r;*:.::i:;:,:i!:'_;;i:;:\,rn: ';';::,
B..k, v.r j: Kn.w,.
sophical Sociery j,g8g) 47_1 41the American philosoohic . ^
rol,rce book, vol. 1: Knowl-41. . al Sociery t84; Philadelphia:
American philo_--!qr vvLrsLy' IY6V) +/-741,. - --t ^" r, r
rruauclPlli
11, al. classic example is the inscriptions of Ankhristication
ln pro-o,in'g th.irr,rb;"..-p----,
-^..,-, .tto (probably 9th
Dynasry),';::';::;:;;i:3;;;;:i:,:Uij:'rii::xi':'lE!,'ffi'J?i[,lll?ffi,X];l];11
,:],";,,:':::^"i1:':;!';;?:::!t^:{;ii"#"1'il;:fi,;;'JT?l;fiffi:'#','J."1,?*.l:;il.l,;;j;z:#:Egyptian9]'
l* Baines, *Abvdos Lisr of Gods.',68. See Baines, ,.Resdcted
Knowledge.,,
-
Contextualizing Egyptian Representations of Society and
Ethnicity 359
numbers of the elite, whose tombs had a "secular" character, may
have participatedsignificantly in religious life and hence in
resrricted knowledge.
Hierarchies of knowledge are in one sense the reverse of
propaganda: they assertthat only those who know matter, and
ostensibly they do ,rot seek to disseminate.But the rwo are in no
way incompatible. Every ,o.i.ry and social group needsmeans of
persuasion, and propaganda in one group or context can go together
withrestriction in another. In Egypt, as elsewhere, people also
used the fact of their re-stricted knowledge as display without
divulging what it was they knew. Most oldKingdom examples of this
phenomenon are, probably by chance, in the nonroyalsphere- From the
New Kingdom, bur most likely composed in the Middle King-dom, comes
the text describing the king's role in the solar culr,6e which
d.rror., i"t,central stanzas to asserting that the king "knows"
numerous things about the courseof the sun and its significance
(while revealing little of what he knows), showingthat he is
indispensable to human and divine order. Until the late New
Kingdorithe text was inscribed only in inaccessible places, so that
the prestige the king,sknowledge gave him was indirect: only the
privileged could know that he had thisspecial knowledge and most of
them did not have access to its characterization, stillless to its
content- Knowledge about knowledge was a set of Chinese boxes.
Whatthe king and the small circle of people supporting him knew did
not bring materialadvantage: the message was that through knowredge
the king was the guarantor oforder and should be accorded due honor
and service. The function of the knowl-edge was deeply serious, for
it was central to maintaining the cosmos.
Much of the significance of these hierarchies of knowledge was
in the pro-claimed broader integration of human sociefy with the
gods through the privilegedgroup at the apex of sociery among whom
the king was paramount. yer norhingdemonstrates that this
"propaganda" was widely disseminated. Wider disseminationmay have
occurred, or these Iegitimarions may have underpinned the elite,s
ownsense of its proper position more than they exerted a wider
appeal.
The role of propaganda needs to be evaluated in the contexr of
improved modelsof the elite as well as improved understanding of
the function and genres of the writ-ten and monumental materials
through which the elite and its propaganda can bestudied. Work in
the 1950s and 1960s led to the opening-up of the sourcs to
morecomplex readings and initiated the strategy of questioning the
superficial intent andhonesry of the record and examining its
configuration in a structured fashion. Thosereadings have needed
refining through social, literary, and art-historical analysis.They
should also be extended to later periods, including the
Greco-Roman, whichhave seldom been a focus of this kind of
research.T0 Thus, propaganda has not
69. Text and analysis: Assmann, Kdnig al: Sonnenpriester;
translarion: Parkinson, VoicesJrom AncientEgypt,38-10.
70. Grimal, Les termes de la propagande, is a collection of
material rather than an analysis, whileGreco-Roman sources have
tended to be seen from a Classical penpective (but see Lloyd,
"Nationalist
-
360John Baines
proved to bc the mosr nowcrfi,l "-^1.,,:.
L e u ri s tic,,"r u. i, ;.:: H: *lj:"},lT: : ;:.r.fi
;,:*::r:j?il[il;: : Ithere is every reason to think that they would
have recognired th. phenomenon.Both in contexts where there would
have been such recognition and for rhe broader,.JT"*;:H:]* of the
record's nature, the notion or-prop"g"'da wll continue
Nation and EthnicityInsofar as propaganda relates to an ideology
that is propounded and transmittedby a whole curture, it has a
focus at the boundar., u.r*..r, one culture
"rra ,nJnext, ber'uveen one ser of varues and others th"t might
;;";r." rhem. These areideological concerns of societal, curtural,
and national self_definicion.To identifi' a range of ideorogie,
"rrj ,o.i"r rypes is nor to recover a sociar real_iry but ro
nrodel images of "
,o.i.ry from a number.i;;;richer and more varied image or an
ancicnt society i, lik;^;:';:'.tjllii';"lij;,$than a schematic one,
but
"rry ,..o.rrrruction that may be in prospect is stiil filteredby
the projections of the actors, who were mosr ofren outsrde rhe
groups they por_trayed. These linritations do not make tlanv ress
worthrvhle Here as ersewhere, j'ff;:l;ifil'ffr;1'J'ffiT:lthat "the
truth" is often n6t the goal of research, has been llo,, ,o take
roor in an_cient Near Eastern srudies.
Models can be recovered from the sources more readily than
direct evidence forvarying social groups. In Egyptian ideologr, il
;;;;1,""., society resemblesthe complexiry of the ordered-cosnros,
which is shot through with elemenrs of theuncreated world'71 By
analogy' those who were not included rvithin the normariveimage
of'the .or116q-grr"t ir, thor. who either were not ethnrc Egyptians
or rvereexcluded on some other grounds-would belong with the
.,.r.r.rr.a world. whilethis equation may have helped to coerce
social integr"rion, ,ro, a' of society, andespecially nor rhose
marginarized by the equation, w'l have subscribed ro it. It
isnonerheless striking how often Egyptologists have accepted
visions of this sort*fbrexample, equating rhe presence of ethnic
foreigners:" il;; wirh disorder, anddecline'72 By conrrasr, william
y Adams, whose work is Ir,
".r.r.rr, Nubia, em_
und Mensch nach dtn ;ounrlui,.,a"__-,,."---,.-._7, rvJrlrvrt.r
rranve sources see Eberhard Ofto, Co//!::;,:;';;;
i,i'*i,'lo,,ifll,|,ili,',{ff:,i;:;iy,::"!:l?:;i;^*:::,Ar:::i:Ji;,,y;r;W:;":!;winter,
"Der Herrscherkuit in'a.r, egvpri,.h;{il+Fi},,.-H:1,
knriiische Asypte, (ed,.Herwig Maehler and Volker Michael
Soo.t", Mninz uo., Zabern, 1976)
1,47_60.r,.,,,11;.'ff;:'":::iffi'"':,f;lTli;.f".1Ti1,."ff"i:Xy,*:)i;:::ll
,,, o,, anr! ,t,e Many
-72' A not untypical exampre is Redford, "rn. roa lnscriprion
oi's..,*orr., I,.. -16; Redford'Ti#if#'r#1T:::,:?.:,:'"
texts as ",.duing ".,ur.,'il-,r,..*,, r,ro" Kingdom to ..rhe
-
contextualizing Egyptian Representations of society and
Ethnicity 36r
phasizes the baleful effect of Egypt on surrounding populations.
T3 These judgmentsare no more than a matter of perspective and
personal preference.
I illustrate here approaches to filling gaps and conrradictions
in models of soci-ety, exploring thc definition of identities and
of ethniciry.
The Over-Defned Nation State and lts CultturcThe point of
departure for a uniform Egyptian ideology r.vas the formation of
a
state by conquest or by rapid assimilation of people and
territory over a larger areathan any other polity of the time.Ta
Before the state formed, there was no such en-tity as Egypt, but
its unity was a dominant idea for later periods, including onesof
political fragmentation. At the outset, the state must have
encompassed peopleof varying culture, ethniciry and probably
language.T5 The creation of a state andculture involves forging an
ideology and an identiry that will underpin its unirycreating a
collective "self" that implies a collective "other,'n u'here the
other is of-ten axiomatically diverse and the self unitary. Neither
of these processes need bethe same as forming a civilization or
culture: many major civilizatioris and culturesare not unified and
consist of numerous states or other polides. Nor are culturetraits
coextensive with states or perhaps even civilizations. From Bell
Beakers inprehistoric northern Europe to MacDonalds, there have
been material cultureconrplexes that have spread ovr vast areas
without seeminglv bringing ideologicaluniformiry or indeed any
orher nrarked sameness. Whar is striking in Egypt is thestrong
convergcncc of these two processes.
The establishment and elaboration of an identiry for a stare or
civilization tendsto be shielded from the investigator's vicw,
because the state has an overriding interestin presenting its unity
as self-explanatory and unquesrionable. For
archaeologicallyrecovered civilizations, furthermore, the period of
formation rnay be followed byrapid expansion that almost physically
obliterates whar went before.
It is dcsirable to probe this identiry and how it is formulared.
[n these areas theinterest of the actors was often almost
obsessive, yet the evidence lies on the mar-gin of the record and
of modes of presenting ideology. whar was marginal in onesense was
central in another, because it contributed to defining the
center.
In Egypt, the internal and external peripheries of sociery
cannot e4sily be stud-ied archaeologically. Few settlement sites of
diverse character are accessible, and the
73. This is a persistent theme of his Nul'ia: Corridor to Afica
(London: Allen Lane, 1977).74. For the period, see John Baines,
"Origins of Egyprian Kingship," .4ncient Egyptian Kingship
(ed. David O'Connor and David P Silverman: PA 9; Leiden: Bnll,
1995; ()5-156; Barry J. Kemp.Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a
Ciuilizatfoa (London: Routledge and Kegan Prul, 1989) 19-63;
W'ernerKaiser, "Zum verdnderten Bild von der Entstehung des
gesamtdgyptischen Sraates," MDAIK 46(les(D 287-e9.
75. The absence of dialect from written texts of most periods is
sympromatic of the centralizingemphasis of Egyptian culture. There
were numerous dialects in the spoken language, bur they
hardlyaffected rhe wrirten high-cultural tradition.
-
362John Baines
mortuary sphere, which has producedth e do mi na", s;".,1,, rr,.
.*,._"i ffiiii*::,X iffi*Li ;iffi,T,:,rhar' excepr fot *:or:,.:1r*.
t"Jt*.lo,r, A-G.o,rp
.utr.r.. disappeared ar rhe srarrof the, dynastic period,77
there is 'rit.
,r."rUy with which toture' At the norrhern exrreme of the
.",r"r','.-*J.I:': compare Egyptian cul-;*T:'tjr
;f;jrt*:l*nt:"[",i:li,' i;H, d::i Hn:group living in this
environment and ,;o-
*ot' periods, were a partly assimilatedcar texts.78 ir,. a.,
that this rrd;;::Ti:;:::fH,::iffi T1# :imrecord and nothing in
archaeologr tr trrli."rive both J,rr! il*.urties of character_izing
the population of Egypt t"'"ii trr aspecrs and of rhe reticence of
the officia,sources' yet, despite the barrenness or inhospitabre
;;r;; oi rr, ,,r.ro,rndings andIrs ostensible hostility,ro
outsiders, Egypr was open to immiil:[T::'::L',,::,:f
'"ffi.":j*::J-'n*"..''l#.,fl::T j:;:::'":",::.
In anothe',.r0.., t"ror.".-;ffT'#"ffi:H"hed in studyins
concep_tions of self and o,h.. u.."rr. irr-om-.i"I rdeorogy was
aggressively uniformitarianand evidence for cultura, ot*t*rrl,
*"rre. These asp..r, JJ*urrre with a high leverof politicar
uniry to form a p,ruii.,iltr", different ,r"- ,i. Ies tightry
definedand uncenffalized' civ.llization of t;;;;"*ia, which
,.-"ir,, nonetheless currur_;i1"if"'#'##;::::'
t"tu'1................; ^"'ii,,iou, o,n-...,,..',,',r,",
ru.,oporamia wastrarized
o o*.. ',*.il'J;:f ; :::.:ff :JJi:,ffi::i:::.:?:il:,:l i;more
rigid and comprehensive a.fi,rrtion of curture ,ir",, *i, possible
in Meso_
*'J:: ;H.':ffiff :H':.': J:*'"' or t"'ti,,g i.o.',",,.,..,
civlization,are in many
-"r, .i-"r, porar opposrr.r. o"t"o" features' Egypt and
MesopotamiaEgyptorogsrs have t.nd.d ," ir.r.", aynastic Egypt as a
singre culture berongingto a single ethnic group, speaking
" ,r.,gr. ,".*r""*r* li"nit,.* a singre ser ofshared values. The
assumption of such lnifor-r.i
."-., io_ t"kirrg an eliterecord as reflecdng ".r.ierrt
ro.irr.."liry fairly directly ,.rr.rr'" realiry existed,
itHl1i:li1;: lnT:::::.,rj1a;J,n. .r,. Despite the skewed nature or
therecord, it is also crear thar th.
i^-pli."tilil;#;:H:ffi:*";:i:
76' For possible aooro4shg5' see Janet E' Richards, lIortual'
vaiability and socia! Dffirentiation in,, o ol; K, :.?*"f:::, 0," _
L,",".^*l )i ill.,",r, *, ia, t ee2).77' The mosr irnportanr
materiar h.,. i, s.,.;'!lt]J,:1fi1,!li?r.'*,
^_",ouo Royat Cenrctery at
,Yjff'ffi1',1llil.i#oT'To or chicago, o-ri.l,,r r",,i,",.
*,oLiloliition 3: Excavarions be_1e86). - -'^- ""e Sudan Frontier;
chicago: o"."i"i ffi;;. iilil .r"-.^iry of chicago,Axiat Age
Civitizationjts;.;.'.i' *-;,:-"::::t:]t':'*' in Mesopotamia;'
The19g6) 183-202, srr-ri
S' N' Eisenst"at, nlngh;*,on, N.y: Sute Univers:. rigins antl
Diuersity of
try of New york press,
-
F'a
:
contextualizing Egyptian Representations of society and
Ethnicity 363
elite. The most striking feature of what can be said about the
non-elite of the mosthighly centralized periods is that they left
few material remains distinctive of theirsocial or regional group
and, indeed, left lirtle record of any kind of their own
ex-istence, in contrast with their service to central and elite
undertakings. They werevirtually proletarianized and, when not in
their largely unrecoverable villages, livedin conditions of almost
industrial uniformiry and cultural anonymity. s0
Yet this drab picture cannot adequately reflect society: the
constraints of deco-rum and of preservation of sources exclude too
much. The dominance of the cen-tripetal culture of unified periods
can be compared with the rather greater diversityof the
decentralized intermediate periods. Continuities berween the Old
Kingdomand First Intermediate Period, for example, suggest that old
Kingdom sociery in-cluded as wide a range of people as the
intbrmediate period, but few ..foreigners,,acquired the resources
to create monuments. sl The fact that some material can
beidentified suPports the assumption that ethniciry and not just
the presence of for-eigners, could occur in any period. Awareness
of such discrepancies and variationswill contribute to more
adequate models of society.
The Defnition of Dffirence: Libyans on Early Monuments
The definition of the cosmos was incorporated in an iconography
in which anycomplete monument could represent a microcosm and,
hence, both exempli$, thecosmos and extol its vah;es. The focuses
of the cosmos were the king and the gods."Monuments" varied in
scale from quite modest-sized objects, such as the crucialset of
votive pieces dedicated in temples around the beginning of the
dynasticperiod,82 to complete decorated buildings. The interior of
any temple showed ex-clusively "native" material, but the outside
depicted the king's mastery of orderagainst encroaching disorder.
Palaces almost certainly had a similar symbolism. Dis-order was
identified with the non-Egyptian world and from the beginning
waspresented in rerms of foreign people. Internal "hisrorical"
action within Egypt, inthe modern sense of central policy and the
treatment of dissent, was seldom
80. See John Baines, "Literacy, Social Organization and the
Archaeological Record: The Case ofEarly Egypt," State and Society:
The Emergenre and Development of Social Hierarchy and politieal
Centrali-zation (ed'. John Gledhill et al.; One World Archaeology;
London: lJnwin Hyman, 1988) 204-9. Forspecialized production at one
of the few excavated provincial sites of the period, see
Marie-FrancineMoens and'W'ilma Wetterstrom, "The Agricultural
Economy of an Old Kingdom Town in Egypt'sWest Delta: Insights from
the Plant Remains,"-/NES 74 (1983) l5g-73.
81. Occurrences on nonroyal monuments, including one of the
Early Dynastic Period, are listedby Hannes Buchberger, "Zum
Ausllnder in der altigyptischen Lirerarur: Eine Kritik," WdO
20-21(1989-90) 25-26. For a useful survey of evidence for
foreigners, see Edda Bresciani, "Lo straniero,"L'uomo egiziano (ed.
Sergio Donadoni: Rome and Bari: Laterza, lgg}) 235-6g.
82. See John Baines, "Communication and Display: The Integration
of Early Egyptian Art andWriting," Antiquity 63 (1989) 471-82. The
approach of l?hitney Davts, The Canonical Tiadition inAuient
Egyptian Art (Cambidge: Cambridge University Press, 1990) is
problematic in many respects;see my review in Antiquity 65 (1991)
170-71.
-
364John Baines
Figure 5a. Libyan/Cities palerte, obverse: Cairo Museum CG14238.
Drawing by Manon Cox.
side are fi gures or embrem",i.,"y;,;;;,'il;*
ffi:":ifillll.li;:il37
recorded, presumably because the country, Las deemed well
ordered when the
::::'i: i'1l"1# jr':;: :*i'i'ilr1d 11 s ord e; " i *' *' i ar i
mp o si'ci o n o fThe earriest pictoriar monumenrs t;
Jj;i,t*'#ffiT'1,;;J::r,;.
,*" .*vealing menrions of "Libyal'* *"-.r"r, to."rio.,, i;"-;;"
proposed for the;:'?:; ;T;TJil: *:TT#i'#1i::y:r," ;. ;; "i"",,,
wi,h assuranceor the menrions i, o.,
" ,.r'i,t fr.tt. .r illJ":;;';it-**:.t*i:I.J;,?*
11?,?; ff;l? ll."T:i':,,:::;i, ;; rrom a mlitary campaign on rhe
oth""83' For implications of this attitude toward historicar rexrs,
see above, p. 356. There are severarexceptions among New Kingdom
ntr.a."i'r.*r,'u",
,r,.r.-ro"';;#;.5., as being achieved bv$i;piid::l:? ffi:: :*
n5;ltlT ;t,o,he,h.one,..,".i,,* r"hn Baines .,ri,*l
"'"l1ortj1':T'n' pA s, Leiden: Br'r, 1ee5) ,-oil"t Egvptian
Kingship r'a' o"uia "HJ;t;
,,. il;rilil"i:fftffi: a"'n.'vl.'ip,'i'*:":1"-. Nores on the
Libyans o-f the ord Kingdom
i?:T*::i;?:",1_,fi i:.::;:;:,fl
:,y,7;,";;:,t;;.*ltlil;i:,.1*;Lki.:T;
-
Contextualizing Egyptian Representations of Society and
Ethnicity
Figure 5b. Libyan/Cities Palette, reverse: Cairo Museum CG14238.
Drawing by Marion Cox.
object is an ivory imitation cylinder seal (fig. 6) showing King
Narmer, perhaps thelast king before the 1st Dynasry, in the form of
the catfish hieroglyph that writes hisname. rvielding a club to
smite Libyan enemies.
The palette has three registers of cattle, donkeys, and sheep,
with two registersof trees beneath them and the hieroglyphic group
lhnw'Llbya' at the right-handedge. This word thus appears to
characterize the "landscape:' of trees rather than theanimals
above, but the animals might be plundered from the landscape, or
the Prod-ucts of rhe trees-which may be oil- or fruit-bearing
species-could be part of theplunder. The latter point raises little
difticulry but the animals are herd animals seenin the Egyptian
environment, so they might belong within it rather than outside;the
same could then apply to the trees. Thus, this mention of thnw does
not nec-essarily refer to a place outside EgyPt, and it has often
been suggested that thispalette and similar monuments document an
expansion of the Egyptian state ratherthan a campaign abroad.ss
Both explanations are possible, and it is probably not
85. For example, Siegfried Schort, Hferoglyphen: (Jntersuchungen
zum (Jrpsrung der SehriJt (AA'WLM;.Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1.gil) 24,
19-27.The reading of Manfred Bietak ("La naissance de la notion
deville dans I'Egypte ancienne: (Jn acte politique?" CRIPEL 8
[1936] 32) misinterprets the conventionsof decorum under\ing the
composition.
-
366John Baines
s$ ?\-)
Figure 6. Ivory imiyl.-.,, o*C;l fi'ffiin
#*ll'3::'_f1.,*1."y3]i, main cempteurawrng by Michdle Germon
Rilev.
seal ofE.3915;deposit.
worth attempdng to. resorve the questi.on, because the palette
may not record aiff:ru:f'j.ll':'n'i "" id';i;;;',,",.-..,, or
domin",,ce. A*empts ro iden-of formation of rhbased
on rhe assumprion that ,h.;t;;.;elonged to the periodgenerations
earlier
e Egyptian state' a process which i, ,ro- generally placed
somepresence of
"
,.hnffil,,iirlr?"j|'rxn"' i' lo 'o*. ..r"p.in *o.. notabte is
the
ove r a re gi o n b y dep ic tin g 1 t,
""
a tr* ;;.'i llll;l::: ffi :#,;l;:":H;mlThis lack of exoticism
is, however, h; ro assess. Unlike iate, Egyprian depictionsbut like
much in wsrern *r, ;;'o;;.1.,-", simpry represenr a Iocation
ou,tsideEgypt in the same form in which o'n;;;:n: ,rr. .r""*ri*."rd
be depicted. The;i[l,T::il Tffi.i ;'nfl o*;*;;' rb*ig"- .;;;
;;.,"*,h e ra c,,ha,The sear is similarry org".rized in reglsrers
that are cur at an angre by the clubhetd bv the catfish. Berr."th
rr,. ."riri'i, ,t. *-a ;;;;.'in... regisrers show,tfil,!H::i;:n-
miniarure,."t.-i,,r,. -o,. o.o,i."lioi. incruded, but
the1*b:,,"'."0,'".,,:i{'ri:'J':#:X.:::i::ilfr
X..il;1,;;lj*}U:Xthree figures, perhaps redupricating ilr. ;.ri..,
of pr,rJirr. arrrt. foreign figures
-
Contextualizing Egyptian Representations of Society and
Ethnicity
in the iconographies of many societies, these are not
grotesquely distorted but arequite close in form to figures of
Egyptians of the same period.86 They lack strongethnic
features.
Two features of these objects may be singled our: their
relatively domestic pre-sentation of Libya and Libyans; and their
classificatory characrer.
The contrast between this undistorted representation of Libyan
enemies and ex-treme conceptions of foreigners in other sociefies
may relate more generally to a so-ciery's modes of verbal and
visual representation and to its relations with the worldoutside.
"Realistic" representational forms are characteristic of
well-established civi-lizations, and the tendency to develop them
signifies more than just technicalaccomplishment.8T Extremes of
distortion are known from small-scale and self-contained societies.
A classic example of verbal conceptions in ethnographic litera-ture
is the Lugbara of Uganda, who conceive of symbolic reversals of the
normalhuman form as one moves away from their world, so that those
who reside a coupleof days' journey away walk upside-down.88 Like
the Egyptians, the Lugbara mainrainordinary relations with those
whom they encounter from outside and can thus sepa-rate ideological
conceptions from everyday experiences.
on these objects the Libyans appear as people defined as not
being Egyptian bybeing shown in subjection, almost more than they
seem ro be foreigners. Someeiements in Libyan iconography, such as
the penis sheath,8e have parallels amongEgyptians of rhe period, so
their costume alone cannot prove that they are foreign.They are
also shown in well-ordered forms in which Egyptians also might
beshown-as if they were incorporared among Egyptians as defeated
but accepted,rather than as enemies. An enduring analogy for such a
status is the treatment ofnative Egyptian 'subjects' (rfujt),
people who are presented neither as enemies noras foreigners.eO on
the Scorpion Macehead, roughly conremporary with the Lib-yan
Palette, the 'subject5' x1e 5hown as lapwings suspended by the neck
from the
86. The late 18th Dynasty Memphite tomb of Haremhab presenrs
markedly contrasted rypes ofEgyptians and foreigners: the Egyptians
are suave and almost dandified, while the foreignen havestrongly
cast, wrinkled features. Even here, however, there is little
distorcion in depicrion. See Geoff-rey Thorndike Martin, The
Memphite Tomb of Horemheb, Commander-in-Chief of Ti.rtcankhamiln I:
TheReliefs, Insuiptions, anil Commentary (MEES 55; London: Egypt
Exploration Sociery 19d9) pls. 78-117.
87. Compare the argument from Egyptian representational art:
John Baines, "Theories and Uni-venals of Representation: Heinrich
Schdfer and Egyptian Art," Art History 8 (1985) 1-25.
88. John A. Middleton, "Some Social Aspects of Lugbara Myth,"
reprinted tn Myth and Cosmos:Readings in Mythology and Symbolism
(ed. John A. Middleton; Garden Ciry N.Y: Natural HistoryPress,
1967) 47-61.
89. See John Baines, " lAnkh-sign, Belt and Penis Sheath,"
&{K 3 (1975) 7-24. To the Egyptianexamples cited there should
be added numerous ivories and other objects from the beginning of
thedynastic period.
90. For example, Christine Favard-Meeks, "Le Delta igyprien
jusqu'i la fondarion d'Alexandrie,"S/K 16 (1959) 62-63. Her view of
rhe rftjt as marginal inhabitants of the Egyprian cosmos is
prob-lematic, but this could be part of the meaning of the
term.
-
368John Baines
Figure 7. Macehead of King Scorpion, Oxford, Ashmolean
MuseurrMarion Cox. e ---'rtv't' varurur nsnmolean Museum E.3632;
drarving by
i":T'":':::;T:',,1: Y#::::,'i:i::: ,"j.]T, s1,ds (ng 7) e,
La,ers,a,ues,il:j" i' ;::.-:1, j1. -t'.f Pr'. "*,a . ".t* : ;
;;?'T- ffi , :l
,*;;*: :ly",,ni"..o '" lJ;i"* l,;ili":,,"?:;; Hj*:":'::ic on o
grap hi. s.h. m.. L, . o
-p,.i ;;;' ;;' ;# i: il:T-JHI" 1""'.Tt ::^'." . i :king'"
^."r-
c,,L:^^.- -r Y .rot"*,,::l
::l-'ects, tfe Libyans
";;;;; mirdty.ance over the
*::.li'"':::i:1., incrusion ., ."rool";;;; ."._ies is
nrsrlr.::X:::.::i:.n"...,,.".*.]lJffi #.ff ::'n::ir:#:L,";,'|:*Tfi
:,IJlfi::::i:,TilK::r:*::.q:'ffi *Til:ffiTjll:ii'ff,1,::of
standards is preserved). The Nine;"*r;;;.t;: t;dir*;,U:n:flit
'#;::::.i:ililt:#:::iii,:tiilil*il::.,1t:ffi;:I,il,,::,*:..-:ltl:r
Er_".Ede, .ZuNAI,L//- to.r- , . ^- ,1NAWG 1'e63:1: ros-ri For a new
ot,.*J""'""ffH"il;:i'r*r::.;i.:x*,xxtmacehead, see patrick Gauthier
*a neriJ"'n4rJ.rrrR.yn.r, ..La t6te de marchlo^-Nij 5 (1995)
g7-127. ----tt-rteynes, "La t6te de massue du roi
Scoqpion,,;rr{{;.llil'ililTifii*,t
,}i'?'J]' rhe step Pvrumi,t (SAE, Excavations at saqqara; cairo:
rm-93. Eric Uphill, ..The Nine Bows,,,J EOL Ig (1965_66)
393_420.
-
Contextualizing Egyptian Representations of Society and
Ethnicity 369
A full listing of their names is not known before the reign of
Amenhotpe III(ca. 1360 n.c.e.), but their iconography occurs on rhe
statue of Djoser just cited,where they are placed under the king's
feet, in an image repeated endlessly in laterperiods. There is no
reason for thinking that the list of the "bows" changed
radicallybetween early times and the New Kingdom. The full list
includes Upper and LowerEgypt, as do some lists of regions either
dominated by or bringing offerings to rheking, who is thus shown
with even his own country in crude subjection. This pe-remptory
assertion of the king's dominance is most prominent in iconography,
whilethe image projected in texts is generally less fierce; this
discrepancy lies partly in thecharacters of the different media.
The violent aspect was probably advantageous assomething from which
he could graciously depart. It was also in harmony with thevision
that order and disorder pervaded and threatened the ordered cosmos.
Egyp-tians and foreigners were surely aware that it was schematic
and not realistic.e+
The Libyan features on the palette are probably cosmographic
insofar as they areplaced in the lower part, where marginal
elements were norrnally shown. The treat-ment is at the same time
strongly classificatory, with the listing of booty' on the
pal-ette, while the inclusive composition of the seal is so closely
comparable with 5thDynasry and later temple reliefs of Libyan
captives (fig. 8) ot that the latter may usethe same basic schema,
which survived as late as the end of the dynastic period,when it
featured in the western quadrant of schematic circular
representations of thecosmos.e6 The temple reliefs include animal
boory depicted and enumerated, as wellas totals of numbers of
captives, and thus fuse the content of the palette and the seal.The
"family" of the chief trampled by the king have Egyptian-seeming
names, andthe Libyan group has the Egyptian name h3tjw-'.
Among representations of enemies brought in subjection by the
gods to theking,"7 the set piece of the Libyans is the most
powerful definition of where theEgyptians sited the boundaries of
their world: at. an almost arbitrary point close tothemselves,
where they could know and inventory what they subjected and/or
re-jected, even if it was similar in character to themselves. As
with the annals of Thut-mose III, a reading of the Libyan relie{b
that integrates them into a classificatorycontext and into decorum
does not lead to the comprehension of a particularevent: the same
statistics and names of captives were inscribed whenever the
relief
94. Variations in the presentation of foreigners in different
sources and contexts are taken intoaccount throughout Liverani,
Prestige and Interest.
95. This point has often been commented on. See, for exampie,
Jean Leclant, "La'famille libyenne'au Temple Haut de P6pi ler,"
IFAO: Liure du Centenaire 1880-1980 (ed. Jean Vercoutter; =
MIFAO104 U980]) 49-54. The most informative version is that of
Sahure: Ludwig Borchardt et al., Das Grab-denkmal iles Kiinigs
SaShu-Re' II: Die Wandbiller (Ausgrabungen der Deutschen
Orient-Gesellschaft inAbusir 1902-1908 7; Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1913)
pls. 1-3. For the 25th Dynasty scene of Taharqa, seen. 141
here.
96. J.l.Cldre, "Fragments d'une nouvelle repr6sentation
6gyptienne du monde," MDAIK 16(1es8) 30-46.
97. Borchardr, Das Crabilenkmal des Kdnigs Sa3f;u-Re'Il,pls.
5-7, again preserves the best example