prehistoric egypt

BEFORE THE BEFORE THE PHARAOHSPHARAOHS

PREHISTORIC EGYPTPREHISTORIC EGYPT

M. Fahmy RaiyahM. Fahmy Raiyah

Jacques de Morgan Flinders Petri

PIONEERS OF EGYPTIAN PREHISTORIC EXCAVATIONS

PALAEOLITHIC (c.500,000–10,000 BC(

Upper, Middle and Lower Paleolithic industries of Egypt.

Date Period Egyptian variant5000 BC Neolithic Qarunian

Shamarkian6500 BC Epi-paleolithic Arkinians

QadanHalfanKubbaniyanIdfuan

20,000 BC Upper (late) Paleolithic KhormusanAterianMousterian

90,000 BC Middle Paleolithic Arkin 8Umm ShagirBir Sahara 14

300,000 BC Lower Paleolithic

Two bipolar Upper Paleolithic blade cores (up to 13 cm long)

Handaxes from prehistoric Egypt. Lower Paleolithic or Middle Paleolithic. From the

Metropolitan Museum in New York.

Khormusan(between 45,000 and 15,000 BC)

Lower Nubia and Upper Egypt• Tools from stone, animal bones and hematite• Small arrow heads

Halfan (between 17,000 and 13,000 BC)

From the second cataract to Kom Ombo

Levallois tools

Microliths

Microlithic tools

Kubbaniyans(16,070 – 15,640 BC(

used tiny microlithic tools and divided their time between two distinct but overlapping habitats.

storing food

Qadan (13,000-9,000 BC)

Qadan burials: The bodies were buried loosely flexed on their left sides with their heads to the east and facing south. More than one individual often shared the same grave

CLIMATE CHANGES• From 120,000 – 90,000 BC: A moister, rainier period

prevailed, enabling Lower Paleolithic people to live and hunt on ancient savannas.

• About 90,000 years ago: The rains that characterized the Lower Paleolithic Period were interrupted, and for a short time the Sahara became a vast desert. Soon, a more humid climate returned, and scientists call this the Middle Paleolithic. Springs, lakes and lush grasslands covered much of the Sahara, surpassing the savanna conditions that had prevailed in the earlier Lower Paleolithic Period.

• Around 37,000 BC: the climate began to dry up, and by 30,000 BC Egypt’s environment was as arid as it is today. The flora and fauna of the Western Desert disappeared, and the Middle Paleolithic peoples living there lost their food sources.

• moister, more hospitable climate returned to Egypt from about 17,000 to 13,000 BC.

NEOLITHIC

6000 BC: Mid-Neolithic period

4000 BCLate Neolithic/

Early Predynastic

date the cultural background duration

before 8000 BC Palaeolithic

8000-5200 BCEpipalaeolithic

(Tarifian ; Qarunian - Fayum B - 6000-5000 BC)

3000 years

6000-5000 BC Nabta Playa 1000 years

5200-4000 BC Fayum Neolithic (Fayum A) 1200 years

4800-4200 BC Merimde 600 years

4600-4400 BC El Omari 200 years

4400-4000 BC Badarian 400 years

4000-3300 BC Maadi 700 years

4000-3500 BC Naqada I 500 years

3500-3200 BC Egypt in the Naqada Period Naqada II 300 years

3200-3100 BC Naqada III 100 years

Source: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/museums-static/digitalegypt/chronology/index.html

Predynastic cultures in Lower and Upper Egypt

Date (BC) Upper Egypt Lower Egypt3150 Protodynastic Protodynastic3300 Naqada III Naqada III3400 Naqada IIcd (Late Gerzean) Ma’adian (Late Gerzean)3650 Naqada IIab (Early Gerzean) Omari B (?)3750 Naqada I (Amratian) Omari A (?)4400 Badarian4800 Merimden5200 Fayyum A

Source: After Brewer, Douglas J. and Teeter, Emily, Egypt and the Egyptians (Cambridge University Press, 1999)

NABTA PLAYA

Between 9500 and 5000 radiocarbon years ago the area of Nabta Playa, in the Western Desert of Egypt received 100 to 200 mm of rainfall per year, making it more suitable for human occupation. The rainfall gathered in a series of lakes; Nabta Playa, one of the largest in the region. The earliest sites were located around these large water resources, as were many Palaeolithic sites in Egypt. The lakes attracted humans and other animals and supported a subsistence base of hunting, gathering and in some cases fishing. During the last part of the Neolithic sequence at Nabta Playa, beginning around 4500 BC, the climate began shifting towards the modern hyper-aridity.

Groups here were not sedentary but practiced seasonal migration to take advantage of different food resources as they became available. Initially, cattle, and later sheep and goat, were probably herded by the migrating people. By planting a few crops in well-watered areas along the way, they added an additional food resources. Cultivated plants might have been abandoned until harvest, or they may have been tended for part or all of the growing season. Some groups may have even been semi-permanently settled, like those in the late Neolithic Fayyum, where it is thought some members lived at one site year-round.

Nabta Playa calendar in Aswan Nubia museum

FAYOUM c.5100–4500 BC

The earliest fully developed Neolithic sites in the Egyptian Nile Valley are located in the north and date between c.5100–4500 BC, with Fayum A and Merimde Benisalame being the older ones.

Transition from hunting and gathering and fishing to farming and herding.

• New technology/tools for farmers

• Wild to domesticated animals

• Guaranteed food supply at hand

• Permanent Housing

• Pottery (for storage)

• Child-bearing women = sedentary

• Population increases

• More help for farming (intensive)

• Village life initiates urbanization

The Fayum Pre-dynastic period has been split up into two phases,

• Fayum A: 5200-4000 BC

• Fayum B: 6000-5000 BC

MERMIDA5000-4400 BC

OMARI4600-4400 BC

It discovered in 1924 by the Egyptian mineralogist Amim El-Omari and Paul Bovier-La pierre. Bovier-La pierre excavated parts of the site during two weeks in 1925. In 1943 Fernand Debono continued the excavations. The excavations were finally published in 1990.

From the settlement only pits and postholes survived. The houses might have been built from wattle and daub. All excavated objects were found in the pits.

The pottery is made with the local clay. The stone tool repertoire consists of small flakes, axes, sickles and point.

The dead were buried in abandoned storage pits near houses. The body was placed on the left side with the head to the south and facing west. Many burials contained a small pot place in front of the body

MA’ADI/BUTO

Ma’adian pottery vessels

The subterranean style house found at Ma’adi from above (a) and in profile (b). The closest known counterpart to this structure is found in Southwest Asia.

Badarian culture

4400 -4000

• used copper in addition to stone

• planted wheat and barley

• Kept cattle, sheep, and goats.

• Fished from the Nile and hunted gazelle.

Ancient Badarian figurine of a woman with incised features (c. 4000 BC), carved out of hippopotamus ivory, held at the British Museum. This type of figure is found in burials of both Badarian men and women

blade of knife

arrowhead

axe

Typical Badarian artefacts

A large sunken ceramic vessel employed as a Badarian grain silo.

An ostrich eggshell bead in profile and as a strung series for a necklace.

string of beads from a Badarian tomb, the oldest glazed beads

NAQADA

The Naqada period was first divided by the British Egyptologist William Flinders Petrie, who explored the site in 1894, into three sub-periods:Naqada I: Amratian (after the cemetery near El-Amrah)

Naqada II: Gerzean (after the cemetery near Gerzeh)

Naqada III: Semainean (after the cemetery near Es-Semaina)

NAQADA I (Amratian)

4000 BC to 3500 BC

An interestingartefact of the Naqada I Periodis the animal relief pot.

Stone vessels

Stone vessels

An abbreviated list of pot marks recorded on early Naqada vessels. Note how some marks resemble early hieroglyphs.

That boats were of great symbolic importance to the earliest inhabitants of Upper Egypt is shown by this predynastic model of a man lying in a foetal position in a coracle-like vessel, surely one of the most poignant images from this early period, conveying a deep sense of desolation. As was probably the case here, the boat was frequently used to represent the transit of the dead to the Afterlife. Naqada I, probably from Middle Egypt

A clay figurine

A disc-shaped mace head made of dark grey and white porphyry.

Sickle blade with the characteristicdenticulated cutting edge.

Scorpion palette

A sherd of Naqada I pottery bearing a representation of the red crown of Lower Egypt

Senet board and pieces.

Circular huts from Naqada I culture

NAQADA II

Painting in tomb 100 in Hierakonpolis

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Grey-green ware with the wavy-handle lug

Grey-green waredecorative wavy design

Naqada II stone vessels which, unlike earlier periods, are made from harder stones such as basalt.

Designs on three Nagada II (Gerzean) Decorated Ware vessels.

The pear-shapedmace replaced the

earlier disc mace.

mace head

An amulet shaped in the form of a

bull’s head.

Two-headed palette with opposing effigies, a characteristic design ofNaqada II.

Polished side of a Gerzean flint blade from Abu Zaidan (09.889.120). The Brooklyn Museum, New York.

Gerzean flint blades with rounded ends The British Museum, London

The Gebel el-Arak knife.

Brooklyn handle: carved ivory knife handle from Abu Zeidan, late predynastic (Nagada IIc/d). Brooklyn Museum

Rivers handle: carved ivory knife handle, late predynastic (Nagada IIc/d). Pitt-Rivers

Museum, Farnham, Dorset.

Davis comb: carved ivory comb, late predynastic (Nagada IIc/d). Metropolitan

Museum of Art, New York

Copper tools of the Naqada II Period: an adze (a) and an axe blade (b).

A typical Naqada II pit grave with the deceased placed in a crouched position, head to the south and looking to the west. Characteristic period ceramic vessels accompany the deceased in her final resting place.

basket coffin

wood coffin

NAQADA III

The ritual knife, dating to Naqada III period, now on display at the Brooklyn Museum

The Gebel-Tarif knife of the Naqada III period.

Slate Palette with conquering towns scene

Bone Tags from tomb U-j at Abydos, Early Naqada III

Naqada I (Amratian(

Naqada II (Gerzean(

Naqada III (Semainian / Dyn.“0”(

BURIALS

Appendix

ROCK DRAWINGS

Rock drawings come from different time periods, ranging from the Paleolithic, Neolithic to the pre-dynastic and dynastic times.

In the 1930s, Hans Winkler collected and classified rock drawings from 40 different sites in both the Western and Eastern Deserts.

Earliest rock inscriptions are geometric designs and stylized animal footprints.

Detail of late Paleolithic rock art panel showing bovids. Qurta.

Detail of late Palaeolithic rock art panel showing three highly stylized human figures. Qurta.

Rock drawing, southern Upper Egypt, probably fifth- fourth millennium B.C .

THE CAVE OF SWIMMERS WADI SURA GILF KEBIR

Neolithic (?) hand stencils from Wadi el-Obeiyd Cave. Farafra Oasis.

Predynastic representation of highprowed boat with human figures, ubiquitous in the Eastern Desert. Wadi Barramiya. Probably Naqada II.

Finely engraved human and animalfigures. Theban Desert. Possibly early Predynastic(Tasian or Badarian).

Nag el Hamdulab vandalism to Naqada III site

MAPS

BIBLIOGRAPHYBrewer, Douglas J. Ancient Egypt, Foundations of a

Civilization. London: Pearson, 2005.

Davis, Whitney. Masking the Blow: The Scene of Representation in Late Prehistoric Egyptian Art. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992.

Rice, Michael. Egypt’s Making: The Origins of Ancient Egypt 5000 – 2000 BC. London: Rutledge, 2003.

Teeters, Emily. Before the Pyramids: The Origins of Egyptian Civilization. Chicago: The Oriental Institute of University of Chicago, 2011.

Digital Egypt for Universities, University College London: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/museums-static/digitalegypt/neolithic/omari.html