Ancient Egypt
3000 BCE to 332 BCE
Ancient Egypt
• app. 10,000 sq. miles
• the same as Sumer and
Akkad
• radically different in
shape
• a ribbon of fertile land
600 miles long
– half a dozen miles wide
for most of its length
• compared to 165 miles
in Mesopotamia
Comparison and Contrast with
Babylon
•
•
•
•
profound differences
because of environmental conditions
Mesopotamia: open to invasion
Egypt: isolated by geography
Different Perspectives
• Mesopotamians: pessimistic
– life is unpredictable, their gods unstable,
their afterlife indistinct and undesirable
• Egyptian religion inspired confidence
– in the eternal, stable order of the
universe
Different Perspectives, con’t
• divinely guided, rhythmic cycle of life
and death
• and belief in a final, eternal bliss
Ancient Egyptian Housing
Middle Class
Homes
Peasant
Homes
Scenes of Ancient Egyptian
Daily Life
An Egyptian Woman’s “MustHaves”
Mirror
Perfume
Whigs
Egyptian Nobility
Egyptian Priestly Class
Egyptian Scribe
Hieroglyphics “Alphabet”
24 “letters” + 700 phonetic symbols
Papyrus  Paper
Hieratic Scroll
Piece
Papyrus Plant
Papyrus
text
Making papyrus
Hieroglyphics
On a temple
Egyptian Math & Draftsmenship
1
10 100 1000 10,000 100,000 1,000,000
What number is
this?
Hieroglyphic
“Cartouche”
Champollion & the Rosetta
Stone
Sculpture
• early and sophisticated development
• human figures and archicectural forms
• led to great expertise in painting and other
representational arts
Unifier of Upper & Lower Egypt
• There is conflicting
historical evidence over
who united Upper and
Lower Egypt. Some
evidence points to a king
called Scorpion. More
solid evidence points to a
king named Narmer. (also
known as Menes)
c. 3050 B. C. E. ?
Kings and Queens of Egypt
• Pharaoh: link between the gods and
people
• Pharaoh: divine
– his rule eternal and absolute
• Egypt was not just ruled for the gods
but by a god
Distinctions ?
• human vs. divine ??
• They could tell the difference
• in practice: whoever held the throne
was divine
• including: women, foreigners,
commoners
The Pharaoh
• shed his impermanent and human
status
• assumed the eternal and
unchangeable divine status
• became the embodiment of the divine
• led a divinely unified Egyptian state
Egyptian Book of the Dead
Egyptian Religion
• each city had its patron deity
• emergence of national government
caused some to be more important
• as dynasties changed, the primary
gods changed
• why??
Examples
• Memphis: Ptah
• later, as the center of power changed,
Re/Ra
• or Horus
• etc.
Ptah
Amun
Atum
Osiris, god of
resurrection
Also known, as
the Throne
Isis
Sister and
wife of
Osiris,
mother of
Horus
Isis, with the child
Horus
Virgin Birth
Provides the
iconographic style for
the later
representations of
Mary and the baby
Jesus
Horns removed,
the moon is dropped,
behind the head,
to become the halo.
Horus
Horus
• Horus is the son of the god Osiris
• Born of a virgin
• Baptized in a river by Anup the Baptizer
– Who was later beheaded
• Horus was tempted while alone in a desert
• Healed the sick and the blind
• Cast out demons
Horus continued
• Walked on water
• Resurrected “Asar” from the dead.
– This translates to “Lazurus”
• Had 12 disciples
• Was crucified
• After 3 days two women announced that Horus, the
savior of humanity has risen from the dead
Egyptian Gods & Goddesses:
“The Sacred ‘Trinity’”
Osiris
Isis
Horus
Egyptian Mummies
Seti I
1291-1278 B. C. E.
Queen Tiye,
wife of
Amenhotep II
1210-1200 B. C. E.
Ramses II
1279-1212 B. C. E.
Journey to the Underworld
The dead travel
on the “Solar
Bark.”
A boat for the
journey is
provided for a
dead pharaoh in
his tomb.
Egyptian religion
• extremely tolerant of difference
• extremely tolerant of many gods
– as opposed to, say.. Hebrew religion
• the principal deity (national/Pharoah’s
deity) allowed other gods to flourish
Religion as a Unifying Force
• Mesopotamia: master-slave
relationship
• Egypt: gods like a shepherd
–who cherish and care for the people
–Would change very little over the
3000 years
Religion, con’t
• probably the origins of the idea of
Jehovah-as-shepherd
–especially in the Psalms
–which are pre-dated by Egyptian
psalms
–Akhenaton’s Hymn to the Sun
Egyptian Social Hierarchy
Achievements of the Old Kingdom
• efficient, centralized authority
• astronomy, arithmetic, geometry
• medicine
The Most Important
• Solar calendar
• pyramids
• belief in immortality
Ancient Egyptian History
Periods
Time Frame
Nile Culture Begins
Archaic
Old Kingdom
Middle Kingdom
New Kingdom
3900 B. C. E.
3100 – 2650 B. C. E.
2650 – 2134 B. C. E.
2040 – 1640 B. C. E.
1550 – 1070 B. C. E.
Late Period
Greek Ptolemaic
Era
Roman Period
750 – 332 B. C. E.
332 – 30 B. C. E.
30 B. C. E. – 395 C. E.
Pyramids
• Imhotep: architect and developer of
the calendar
– Imhotep: physician, architect, doctor, miracle
worker, giver of wisdom
– designed the Step Pyramid of Zoser
– processor of the Pyramids of Giza
Engineering an Empire: Pyramids
Step pyramid of Zoser
Djoser
Imhotep
Architect of the
pyramids…later
he become a
god…
The Broken Pyramid of Snefru
The Bent Pyramid of Snefru
The Red Pyramid of Snefru
Giza Pyramid Complex
Plan of the Great Pyramid
of Khufu
Pyramids, con’t
• eternal home for the immortal
pharaoh
• insured their divinity for all eternity
Belief in Immortality
• first to really develop the idea
• sophisticated consciousness
• another order of existence
Map
Showing
Egypt,
Nubia,
And
Kush
Decline of the Old Kingdom
• Old Kingdom: the most stable period
• the Pharaoh dominated life
– forestalled the emergence of provincial power
– but gradually lost power to royal officials
• gradual drying of the environment
– failure of the Nile to flood on time
First Intermediate Period
• 2180-2050 B.C.
– localism, anarchy, short reigns, palace coups,
assassinations
•
•
•
•
“seventy kings in seventy days”
reversal of established order
dissolution of law and order
disruption of trade and agricultural production
•
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9QAPch2o6Q
The Middle Kingdom
• 2050-1800 B.C.
• united under the Eleventh Dynasty
• from Thebes, not Memphis
– followers of the god Amon
– elevated to the rank of primary god
– modern examples??
The Middle Kingdom
• Fortifying of Egyptian borders
• military garrisons on the borders
• new office: the vizier
Second Intermediate Period
•
•
•
•
1800-1570 B.C.
invasion by the Hyksos
People from Palestine
Hyksos dynasty by 1650 B.C. (Fifteenth
Dynasty)
Chapter 4 Sec 1 Questions
Do not go past this slide
• Day 3-Save for Tomorrow!
The New Kingdom
• rise of the Seventeenth
Dynasty
– Thebes
• beginning of the
imperial period
The New Kingdom
• 1570-1150 B.C.
• reaction to control by a
foreign people
• policy of planned
aggression
• create a “buffer zone”
in Palestine
Imperialism: 18th Dynasty
• Thutmoses I
• Hatshueput I
• Thutmoses III
– conquest of an Asian Empire
– successor had problems
The Valley of the Queens
1473-1458 B. C.
E.
Temple of Queen
Hatshepsut
The New Kingdom
This whole conquer others
thing led them into
conflicts with others like
Persians, Greeks and
eventually Romans.
Akhenaton: the Amarna Revolution
• worship of the Aton
– the solar disk
• elevated the worship of the Aton
– suspended the worship of other gods
– particularly Amon
The Aton—the physical
disk of the sun
The Valley of the Kings
Archaeologist, Howard Carter
(1922)
Entrance to King “Tut’s” Tomb
King Tutankhamon’s Death
Mask
1336-1327 B. C. E.
King Tutankhamon
Treasures From Tut’s Tomb