 我相信各位老師在教歷史的時候常遇到的問題
之一是，學歷史有什用處。尤其是，古代史有
什麼用處？
 雖然這不是什麼新鮮的問題，但的確是重要而
值得不斷思考的問題。我們不能說讀歷史只是
為了聴故事，或者為了找出解決某種問題的答
案，譬如有關政治或社會問題的某些事件的來
龍去脈，以及是非對錯，責任歸屬的問題，尤
其是近現代史，歷史扮演了提供證據的角色，
有它撼衛正義，還原公道的作用。
 但是古代史，既然與現實世界的問題以乎
沒有直接關係，有什麼用呢？
 １）與近現代史的功能有些類似，找出某
些歷史上事件的真相，
 ２）在找尋真相的時候，瞭解世界，瞭解
人類社會，瞭解現代世界的形成。
 ３）給學生一種時間感，一種站在高處回
顧世界的心胸和能力。人的氣質，可以因
為具有歷史的眼光和分析能力而變得更有
深度。
 要說明古代史和現代的關係，古埃及可以





是一個例子，但當然不是唯一的例子。
在眾多古文明中，埃及一直占有最受矚目
的排行榜第一，是有它的原因的：
１）古蹟的遺留
２）自古以來的名聲
３）歐洲文明自文藝復興時代以來的推崇
我們今天不談古蹟文物本身，而是要看看
其它兩項因素。
 希望今天能夠傳達的要點：
 １）現代世界的文化多元性。
 ２）每一件事物都有它的歷史，都可能有
一段曲折而長遠的故事。
 ３）不但每一件事物有它的歷史，每一個
我們身邊的現象也都不是偶然，而可能有
其特殊的來源。
 ４）歷史教育的目標之一，就是告訴學生
這些可能性，以及探索這些可能性的興趣
和能力。
1. THE IMAGE OF EGYPT IN
EUROPE THROUGHOUT THE AGES
所有的歷史都是現代史
NAPOLEON IN EGYPT
1799
Please use the following link to view the picture
http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr280/Fo
undingFather1776/Top%205%20Sinister%20L
ogos/Pic14napoleon.jpg
Napoleon in Egypt 1799
 Why Egypt?
 Institute d’ Égypte (Mathmatics, physics,
literature, political economy)
 Déscription d’ Égypte (1809-1828)
 Rosetta stone
The Rosetta Stone
Please use the following link to view picture of The Rosetta Stone
http://jdownsrosetta.files.wordpress.com/201
0/04/rosetta-stone-11.jpg
Egypt in the Eyes of the Greeks
 Iliad II, IX, 383-384
 Thebes was a rich place, it has a hundred gates,
every gate could allow two hundred warriors and
their chariots to pass through.
 Odysseus IV, 220-23;232
 Egypt was a far away country, but Helen brought
back from there the magical grass which could
let people forget sorry and pain. Egyptians are
the most knowledgeable doctors in the world.
Some Greek terms originated in Egyptian
 MEMPHIS=Mn-nfr=The beautiful fortress
 Egypt=Aegyptus= Hut-ka-Ptah=Mansion of
the soul of the god Path
New Kingdom wall paintings: Minoans from Crete had
visited Egypt
Please use the following link to view the wall paintings
http://www.malerei-meisterwerke.de/images/maler-dergrabkammer-des-mencheperresonb-grabkammer-desmencheperresonb-hohepriester-des-amun-szene-asiatischertributbringer-05844.jpg
Greek perceptions of Egypt:
the beginning of an ambivalent
attitude
1. idealizing
2. scandalizing
 Herodotus: Egypt was the oldest nation in the world,
Egypt possess great wisdom, the Egyptian priest are
the wisest and most intelligent people.
 On the other hand, he noted some strange customs of
the Egyptians: The Egyptians have adopted customs
and practices which almost invariably are the opposite
of those followed by people elsewhere: men weave,
women work the land, people eat outside of the house,
but defecate inside; in mourning they allow their
beards to grow while in Greece the men shave; men
carry weights on their heads and women on their
shoulders; women urinate standing up while men squat
down.
 Plato (428-347BCE)
 Egypt is an ideal state, a model, where
everything was orderly; music, art and dance
are part of the religious ceremonies.
 In Greek tragedy, Egypt‘s image was not
positive, because it was on the Persian side
during the Persian Wars. (for example, the
Egyptians were thought to be deceptors, the
term “to Egyptize” means to deceive.) But on
the other hand Egypt was a rich country, its
priests were wise people who guided the people.
 Diodorus Siculus (fl. 1st century BCE)(General History)
was other serious writer about Egypt. D. visited Egypt in
about 59 B. C., and quoted his personal experience in
Egypt, but he also relied upon previous writers such as
Herodotus very heavily. He recounts the story that Osiris
was a beneficent king resembling Dionysus. Egypt had
three classes: the Priest, the soldiers, and the
technicians. Their trades were hereditary. The king did
everything according to the sacred law, thus what he did
was all according to the highest standards.
 Strabo (63 BCE-24CE), Geographica
 Lived at Alexandria for some years , and had
travelled through Egypt from north to south.
In his Geographica his gave a rather detailed
and accurate survey of the land of Egypt.
Thus his work is still quite useful in the study
of ancient geography of Egypt.
 Plutrach. (A. D. 50-120) In his De Iside et
Osiride, (Isis and Osiris), he narrated the
famous Egyptian mythological story about
the murder of Osiris and the avenge of his son
Horus against his murderer and brother Seth.
 Plutrach gave various explanations to the
myth: Osiris was the Nile, Isis the earth, Seth
(Typhon) the sea; or, Osiris the moonlight,
Seth the sun; or Seth the drought, Horus,
who finally avenged his father, was the rain.
 His explanation can be see as “nature
allegory”
Roman period
 Because of the affairs of Caesar and Mark
Antony with Cleopatra, Egyptian culture was
much known in Rome. The goddess Isis,
already an important mother goddess in the
Hellenistic period, was once widely
worshipped in the Roman world.
Antinous, a Roman dressed in
Egyptian Style (2nd century CE)
Please use the following link to view the picture
http://webfea.fea.aub.edu.lb/arch121/Roman
%20Art/VII24.jpg
Roman wall paintings with Egyptian themes from
Herculaneum
Please use the following links to view pictures of Roman wall paintings
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/romans/
images/gal_daily_isis.jpg
http://www.scalarchives.com/scalapic/011206/
c/0053865c.jpg
A pyramid in Rome (tomb of Cestius Epulo, 12 BCE)
Please use the following link to view the picture of pyramid in Rome
http://www.alchimiabb.net/ita/images/piramid
e_cestia.jpg
 Recent study shows that quite a number
of Graeco Roman papyri recorded
cultural interactions between Greek
culture and Egyptian culture. These are
mainly a variety of Demotic and Greek
documents. There are evidence of Greek
words borrowed by Egyptian, or vise
versa. In literary texts, mutual borrowing
and influence are evident.
 During the Graeco Roman period the
intellectuals of Egypt and Greece were in
contact, thus the idea that the Greeks
and Romans knew little about Egypt was
not correct. This is probably caused by
the bias of the traditional Classic
scholars. Another reason: the Demotic
literature of the Graeco-Roman period
has not been well understood.
Europe from Medieval to Renaissance
 Christian theology was the major
intellectual guide of European intellectuals
during the Medieval period. In the
Christian tradition, the image of Egypt was
mainly a negative one, since in the Bible
Egypt was a place where the Israelites
suffered. Early Christians in Egypt used to
destroy the Egyptian temples and statues
for those are the idols of the heathen.
The Arabs
 The Arabs of the Medieval period regarded
the ancient architectures were built by
giants or magicians. Their main interests
were to find treasures. In the 9th century, a
person named Ma’mun dug into the great
pyramid of Giza, but found nothing.
 In the tenth century, the casing stone of
the Giza pyramids were moved to build the
city of Cairo.
 Medieval Arab scholars were rather
interested in ancient Egyptian
antiquities.
 1200, a doctor named Abd’ el-Latif went
to visit the Giza pyramids and found that
the Sphinx was intact. He gave a detailed
description of it, but since it was written
in Arabic, it was unknown to the
Europeans until the 19th century.
 Abu Ja’far Al-Idrisi (d. 1251)was the
first Arab scholar who studied the
pyramids systematically. He not only
analyzed the shape and reason for the
building of the pyramid, but also
studied the chemical compound of
the dirt in the buildings to determine
the origin of the buildings.
 The Arabs also studied Coptic texts,
which was of help to the European
scholars in the decipherment of the
Egyptian script.
In sum, the Greeks knew of the ancient history of
Egypt, and they idealized Egyptian wisdom, but these
were not enough to encourage them to study in
depth Egyptian civilization. The Romans regarded
Egypt as their granary, yet were not really interested
in Egyptian culture. The Arabs had certain interest in
Egypt, yet their main stream Arabic culture did not
allow them to go further into this culturally and
religiously very different ancient civilization. Before
the Renaissance, Egypt was not really regarded in the
eyes of the Europeans as an important place in
history and culture.
After the Renaissance
 Because of the struggle between the Europeans and
the Arabs during the late Medieval period,
Europeans did not have much contact with Egypt.
 After the 14th century, because of the effort of
Renaissance intelletcuals, classics of the GreacoRoman period were re-discovered, and with this the
interest in Egypt.

 When the Turkish empire began to
crumble, the obstacle between East and
West travel was gradually removed. Many
Europeans began to travel to the East and
wrote about their experience in Egypt.
Thus Europeans in general began to know
more about Egypt.
17th and 18th century
 There were about 200 travelogues about Egypt from
1400 to 1700, which shows the European interest in
Egypt. The development of imperialism als0 increased
the interest in Egypt. But the Egyptian language was still
seen as a mysterious symbol system, each sign was
regarded as having secrete meaning, the entire text was
a combination of series of symbolic meanings that
contain the secrete of the world and ultimate wisdom.
 Such understanding no doubt came from
the ancient Greek idea that Egypt
possessed the supreme wisdom.
 Athanasius Kircher (1602-1680) was a Jesuite father,
wrote many works about Egypt, and studied the
Egyptian language. His contribution in this regard
are two fold: one, he discovered the importance of
Coptic in the study of Egyptian hieroglyphs, two, his
study of the Egyptian hieroglyphs was still using the
symbolic understanding, thus he did not find the key
to decipher the Egyptian writing.
2.
The establishment of Egyptology
 When the Rosetta Stone was found in 1799, the French
scholars made rubbings and sent back for study. But
after the war, French was defeated by the British, the
Rosetta Stone was shipped to London and put in the
British Museum.
 Johan D. Akerblad (1763-1819) first recognized some
Demotic alphabets, but because he thought that all
demotic signs were monosyllabic, he failed to make
further progress.
 Thomas Young (1773-1824)discovered that Demotic signs and
Hieratic signs are evolved from the hieroglyphic signs, thus he
knew that Demotic was not a complete alphabetical system.
Thus he thought that Egyptian writing was a combination of
phonetic signs and ideographic signs. He correctly identified 6
hieroglyphic signs and the corresponding Greek alphabets and
thought that the Egyptian writing and Coptic had a close
relationship.
F. Champollion (1790-1832)
 Building upon the research of previous scholars, he
finally deciphered in 1824 the Egyptian hieroglyphic
writing, which was basically phonetic writing with
phonetic signs of various syllabus, plus a number of
non-phonetic signs or ideographic signs that denote
the meaning of the word. He became the first
Egyptological professor at the College de France in
1831.
 Richard Lepsius, Denkmäler aus Ägypten und
Äthiopien (Berlin, 1849-50; 1884), 12vols of plates, 7
volumes of documents.
 First Egyptological Journal: Zietschrift für
Aegyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde.
 Auguste Mariette (1821-1881),
first systematic archaeologist,
established the Cairo Museum
 Gaston Maspero (1846-1916),
turning the goal of archaeology:
from object and treasure
collecting to using objects to
understand the life of the ancients.
 Flinders Petrie (1853-1942) founder of modern
archaeology
 In order to understand the ancient society, one has to
study the relationship between objects. He established
a sequence dating system using pottery shapes to
determine the relative chronology between different
sites.
 Archaeology is a science that involves planning,
digging, recording, publishing, protecting, and
museum display.
 In 1892, Petrie became the first
Egyptological professor at the University
of London (the late famous Chinese
archaeologist Xia Nai 夏鼐 was his
student).
20th Century
 現代社會中的古埃及形象
音樂，電影，小說，時尚，建築
Music and opera
e.g. Aida
Movies
 e.g. Cleopatra

The Mummy
Novels
e.g.
Ramses -The Son of the Light, Christian Jacq
Ramses -The Lady of Abu Simbel, Christian Jacq
Fashion
Obelisks around the world
London
Vatican
Paris
Egyptianized art
Past Glory, today’s pride？