Ancient Egypt. A Very Short Introduction

Cover......Page 1
Contents......Page 10
Preface......Page 12
Acknowledgements......Page 14
List of illustrations......Page 15
1 Introduction: the story so far......Page 18
The Narmer Palette......Page 21
What is ancient Egypt?......Page 27
Greek and Roman views of Egypt......Page 28
The Bible and Egypt......Page 33
The emergence of ‘Egyptology’......Page 37
2 Discovering and inventing: constructing ancient Egypt......Page 46
The Tell el-Dab’a frescos......Page 51
The Amarna Letters......Page 52
Wilbour’s Phoenician rolls, Petrie’s New Race, and other embarrassments......Page 56
Egyptology embracing science......Page 59
Applying science to the Narmer Palette......Page 61
3 History: building chronologies and writing histories......Page 65
Palettes, mace-heads, and history-writing......Page 69
What is Egyptian history?......Page 73
Building chronologies......Page 75
The Qasr el-Sagha temple: a case-study in dating things......Page 81
Historical change and material culture......Page 85
4 Writing: the origins and implications of hieroglyphs......Page 89
The Narmer Palette and the origins of Egyptian writing......Page 90
Can we date the beginning of Egyptian writing?......Page 93
Use and abuse of texts in Egyptology......Page 95
5 Kingship: stereotyping and the ‘oriental despot’......Page 99
Amenhotep the athlete......Page 104
Hatshepsut: female pharaoh or proto-feminist?......Page 106
Ramesses the Great......Page 112
6 Identity: issues of ethnicity, race, and gender......Page 118
The iconography of Egypt’s early ethnic identity......Page 119
Black Egyptians: Bernal, Diop, and the reinvention of Kemet......Page 121
Gender and sexuality......Page 124
7 Death: mummification, dismemberment, and the cult of Osiris......Page 130
‘Foremost of the westerners’......Page 132
Ancient Egyptian attitudes to death......Page 136
Ancient, modern, and postmodern mummies......Page 138
The curse . . .......Page 141
8 Religion: Egyptian gods and temples......Page 143
Religious origins......Page 148
Egyptian religion and kingship......Page 150
Religion and ideology......Page 151
9 Egyptomania: the recycling and reinventing of Egypt’s icons and images......Page 154
Interpretation in Egyptology: the case of pyramidology......Page 156
Amarna issues......Page 161
Icons and sirens: Egyptian femmes fatales......Page 166
Too many ‘alternative Egypts’?......Page 174
From ‘wonderful things’ to ‘wonderful fellows’......Page 175
References......Page 178
Further reading......Page 183
Useful websites......Page 192
Glossary......Page 195
Timeline......Page 200
Index......Page 202