Origin of the Ancient Egyptians - Essay Example

__________ ID: _______ ID: _______ Outline Origin of the Ancient Egyptians - Early Predynastic Period.2 Predynastic Technological Development..2 Egyptian Origin in Historical Context of Architecture3 Egyptian Proposed Solutions to Problems.3 Domestic Architecture.5 Ancient Egypt Religion5 Ancient temples - source of healing5 Egyptian Punishments.6 Beliefs and customs..6 Egyptian Literature.7 Origin of the Ancient Egyptians: Early Predynastic Period This was the initial period ranging from 4000-3150 B.C. in which ancient Egypt was based upon the initial origins of the gods and semi-gods as the rulers of Egypt, there was no concept of human kings, instead people of this era preached their assumed Gods, which were based upon the virtue of 'power' like Sun, moon, earth etc 1. Nagada culture was followed in the predynastic period ranging from Nagada I to Nagada III, which possessed the ability to produce complicated artifacts from the designing and manufacturing skills of craft workers. Nagada culture is considered to be the origin of Egypt initiation as they were rich in intelligent craftsmen and workers. They were rich in stone, wood, minerals, sand, and many kinds of vegetation 2. Predynastic Technological Development Predynastic technological developments can be divided into several distinct areas, each with its own specialized tools and techniques, but sometimes sharing other tools, methods and materials. In particular, the establishment of the tools and procedures for the large-scale manufacture of stone vessels during the Nagada II 3and the Nagada III/Dynasty 4 periods crucially contributed to the growth of other technologies in these periods, and in the Dynastic era. For example, the carving of the ceremonial schist palette of King Narmer, and Dynastic hard stone statuary, benefited from the skills and tools established for shaping earlier Predynastic hard stone vessels, stone hand-axes and mace heads. Also, it is possible that the Late Predynastic expansion in faience manufacture can be attributed to an increased availability of copper-contaminated quartz powders 5. Among the great sayings from the origin of ancient Egypt, a common anecdote resides that when the world's first historian, Herodotus visited Egypt in the fifth century B.C., he asked its priests the key to Egypt's greatness and he was replied by the answer that Egypt is the gift of the Nile. Egyptian civilization would never have accomplished its wonders had it not been for this gift of nature, so crucial to its people and so mysterious that they considered it divine. This is what Egypt has always been famous for. Egyptian Origin in Historical Context of Architecture Although pyramids and temples from ancient Egypt still impress us thousands of years after they were built, all that remains of the homes where people were born, grew to adulthood and died are occasional low mounds of mud outlines. Temples and tombs endure because Egyptians made a sharp distinction between their religious architecture, constructed of permanent stone for eternity, and all other buildings, even palaces and fortresses, which were built of less durable adobe 6. Many ancient cultures held similar beliefs about their ruler's divine afterlife and expended great energy creating special burials for their kings. Egypt's special contribution was a new tomb design first devised in about 2700 B.C. Architects for the pharaoh Zoser stacked six decreasingly smaller stone brick rectangles on top of each other to form a towering, 200-foot-high 'Step Pyramid'. This first large building ever raised in stone by humankind initiated a series of pyramids, structural feats that became the symbol of Egypt. "Three distinctive architectural elements were developed in ancient Egypt - the pyramid, the propylaeum or pylon, and the obelisk" 7. Ancient Egyptians had to contend with enormous temperature swings. At noon on a summer day, in this country surrounded by desert, the temperature could reach 120F; nevertheless, because the Sahara does not hold its heat, temperatures could fall into the upper thirties on winter nights. In addition to sheltering people from both heat and cold, residential architects had to provide some sort of sanitary devices as well as storage facilities for preserving food. Because rainfall was infrequent and slight enough, plentiful sun-baked mud (adobe) served adequately for the main construction material, as it has in the American southwest 8. Egyptian Proposed Solutions to Problems Thousands of years before air-conditioning or central heating was invented, Egypt developed a solution to its temperature extremes by evolving a housing plan that remained viable from the time of the Old Kingdom to the end of its history. The basic Egyptian house for all but the very poor consisted of a high rectangular enclosure wall with an entry door at the narrow end that faced north, if possible, to take advantage of the prevailing breeze. Inside, the compound was divided into three facilities. Just past the entry door lay a garden with a central pool of cool water that also irrigated the trees and shrubs planted around it. Next came a roofed area raised on columns open at the front to catch breezes and provide shade for family and guests, after which came apartments for the owner and immediate family, walled and roofed for privacy and to seal out night time cold. These three elements an open courtyard, a columned portico and private apartments made up the architectural plan of all Egyptian houses, however large or small they might be and however many times these elements might be multiplied to incorporate additional three-part shelters for servants and, in a palace, for a harem 9. Refinements to this basic structure could include stairs leading to a roof terrace where poles supported an awning shade for family or guests to catch breezes not felt at ground level. Some of these terraces incorporated ingenious scoops, which trapped daytime breezes and circulated them through vents to the apartments below. To minimize the heat, windows in inner rooms were placed high to let the hottest air exit as it raised. Windows were small in area light was not desired when the sun shone so hot and bright and unpaned, merely slatted with wood to keep birds out. Bedrooms incorporated raised alcoves for sleeping and adobe benches along one or more walls for sitting and supporting objects; niches in the walls held small oil lamps. Closets had not yet been invented. Bathrooms, which adjoined the bedrooms of more expensive houses, consisted of a latrine wall enclosed on three sides for privacy, with a channel running to the outside of the enclosure. A screened area beside this section held wooden stools with holes in their seats above a bowl. Poor farmers simply used outside areas near their houses for sanitary purposes 10. Most houses included an area behind the private apartments that held stables for animals and silos to protect grain from predators, thus adding a fourth division to the three-part Egyptian house. The silos were domed structures of adobe brick that stood six feet high with a door halfway up for access to the grain inside and a trapdoor in the roof for filling the silo. A modest house would have four or more such granaries. Larger dwellings might also include a separate slaughterhouse where cows and other animals were butchered and their meat was hung to cure. By the time of the New Kingdom, cellars were added, providing additional spaces for storage and for work such as weaving and baking that could be performed in cool, subterranean conditions 11. Kings lived in style with hosts of retainers. Unlike modern countries with royal heads of state, Egypt did not maintain a national palace into which succeeding rulers moved. Although palaces covered acres of land, they too were constructed of adobe to last only a generation or so, allowing the next pharaoh to build a new one to his own specifications. Each ruler constructed not just one new residence but several for the different places he needed to reside the capitals of Thebes and Memphis at the very least. Unhappily, none of these grand palaces has survived, so what we know of them is based on tomb pictures and on the few floors and crumbling walls that comprise the remains of the two best preserved examples. These belonged to a father and his son, Amenhotep III and the heretical pharaoh Akhenaten, built during the Eighteenth Dynasty, the apex of Egypt's wealth and power 12. The ancient Egypt is famous for the influence of people by the plants growing around them. The fact that certain plant shapes were copied in stone for architectural purposes has already been mentioned: ancient Egyptian builders copied the flower of the lotus plant, in bud or fully open, and the leaves of palm trees as design ideas when creating stone column capitals. A particularly important native plant was the common reed. Another reed 13, also growing in Egypt, was not used to the same extent as the common reed. This reed grew along the river Nile in great abundance, and was in use for pens, arrows and small pieces of furniture. The leaves were used for making sleeping mats and the rhizomes for medicinal purposes 14. Domestic Architecture As far as Domestic Architecture is concerned, the most important archaeological evidence is provided by the towns, which were built to house the royal necropolis workmen and their families. It has been suggested that true urban development never existed on a widespread scale in Egypt, and that, because the country's political stability and the natural barriers of deserts and mountains protected most settlements, there was no need for walled towns, except on the trade routes where goods entered Egypt 15. Ancient Egypt Religion There was no particular belief except that in order to gain any benefit, the Egyptians had to influence and make their Gods happy. For this purpose the temples were created as one of the most important aspects of divine worship. They were central and crucial to the relationship between men and gods, and there is currently sufficient knowledge to enable us to determine the purpose and function of these buildings 16. Ancient Temples - Source of Healing Besides worship, temples were also considered to be involved in other services like healing, instruction etc. In addition, they became a major economic force and employer in Egypt 17. In this respect, temple of Denderah was the place where sick were treated 18. Egyptian Punishments Long after the early predynastic period, if we study Pharaonic history, it is clear through evidence that defacement and physical damage were common ways of perpetuating extreme forms of injury upon the person. Physical punishment in Pharaonic times, such as the cutting of the nose, was mimetically transferred to the nose and face of images of the perpetrator whose breathing was thus terminated in the hereafter. Altering the historical record, attacking personal enemies, censoring a religious event, are all motives for the "mark of the second hand," erasure, which presupposes a certain level of knowledge by the perpetrator Bodily mutilation easily destroyed earthly wholeness and perfection and similarly removed any chance of surviving into the hereafter, let alone achieving the physical perfection that Egyptian culture required. Corporeal mutilation extended beyond representational spheres since we know that ordinary criminals had their feet beaten, their noses cut, ears removed and, for heinous crimes, they could be burned alive or impaled on sticks 19. (Meskell, 2004, p. 8) Beliefs and Customs Ancient Egyptians were firm believers of life after death; their faith on this concept was even more than our faith so they equipped their graves and tombs with goods for individual use in the afterlife, there is an abundance of material, from the monuments, artifacts, and literature, for the study of funerary beliefs and customs. The earliest graves date to the Predynastic Period, and provide most of the extant evidence for the earliest cultures. Around 3400 BC, a new type of burial place was introduced for the leaders of these communities; instead of the shallow pit-graves at the desert's edge, they were now buried in mud-brick tombs, which incorporated a superstructure above ground where the tomb goods were stored, and a substructure below ground for the burial. This type of tomb (which Egyptologists now call a 'mastaba') continued in use for the upper classes during the Old Kingdom although, by then, the pyramid had been introduced for a king's burial 20. It was customary for great cemeteries to grow up around the royal burial places which were themselves located near the ancient capitals. Thus, the Giza and Saqqara necropolises (which served the city of Memphis) and the West Bank tombs which accommodated the population of the southern capital, Thebes, are particularly important, although excavation at burial sites throughout Egypt has continued to add to our knowledge of funerary customs. Also, the work undertaken by Petrie, Emery and others on the predynastic and early dynastic tombs has provided much information about the early development of religion and funerary architecture 21. Although most of the ancient Egyptians were not religious, but they used to enjoy their religious festivals and during festivals, the image of the principal god was carried out of the sanctuary in the deck-shrine of the god's ceremonial barque. In the open air court, the god might meet visiting gods. There, too, at least during the New Kingdom, common people might first glimpse the principal god's shrine. They could also pour water libations and offer prayers to or through the gods, kings, and prominent persons represented by statues; and amulets and divine figurines, which mediated a sense of god's presence, became especially potent after being worn or carried into the court 22. Egyptian Literature The Egyptians had one of the great literatures of the ancient world. The literature extends over 3,000 years and includes religious texts, stories, didactic writings, historical accounts, and love poetry, as well as legal, medical and scientific records. Religious texts are found inscribed on tomb and temple walls, on papyri and on artifacts. In the temples, the wall scenes and accompanying inscriptions preserve the rituals that were once performed there. One particularly important genre of religious writings are the Funerary Texts. The earliest of these, the Pyramid Texts, comprised a series of spells that were inscribed on the walls of several pyramids at Saqqara, which date from Dynasties 5 to 7. They were placed there to ensure that the deceased king was able to reach the sky where he took his rightful place among the gods, in the company of his father, the sun god Re 23. With the conclusion of the pharaonic period, when Alexander the Great of Macedon conquered Egypt in 332 BC, the country came to be ruled by a line of Macedonians (the Ptolemaic dynasty) before it became part of the Roman Empire in 30 BC. During this Ptolemaic era, many Greeks took up residence in Egypt, and Greek was imposed as the language of governance and administration. The Egyptian language continued to be employed by the indigenous population, and hieroglyphs were still used for religious inscriptions, especially for the decoration of the Egyptian temples. To this day this stage of the language and writing is known as 'Ptolemaic Egyptian' 24. Works Cited & Bibliography Arnold Dieter, Bell Lanny, Finnestad Ragnhild, Haeny Gerhard & Shafer E. Byron. (1997) "Temples of Ancient Egypt": Cornell University Press: Ithaca, NY. Brier Bob & Hobbs Hoyt, (1999) "Daily Life of the Ancient Egyptians": Greenwood Press: Westport, CT. David, A. R, (1996) "The Pyramid Builders of Ancient Egypt: A Modern Investigation of Pharaoh's Workforce": Routledge: New York. David Rosalie, (2000) "The Experience of Ancient Egypt": Routledge: London and New York. Lorton David, (2000) "The Twilight of Ancient Egypt: First Millennium B.C.E.": Cornell University Press: Ithaca, NY. Meskell Lynn, (2004) "Object Worlds in Ancient Egypt: Material Biographies Past and Present": Berg: New York. Stocks A, Denis. (2003) "Experiments in Egyptian Archaeology: Stoneworking Technology in Ancient Egypt": Routledge: New York. Brenner Carla & Downs Linda, (1998 October) "Views of Ancient Egypt" in Magazine Title: School Arts. Volume: 98. Issue: 2. "The Art of Medicine in Ancient Egypt" (2005 October) in Magazine Title: USA Today. Volume: 134. Issue: 2725. AncientEgypt, accessed on < http://www.ancient-egypt.org/> Read More