EGYPT
GEOGRAPHY
- Nile Valley
- Upper and Lower Egypt
- Cataracts
- Qena Bend
- Fayum
- Delta
-
Neolithic
- Domesticates appear to have been introduced from the NE with the possible exception of cattle.
Predynastic
- Badarian, Amratian, and Gerzean
- village societies
- regional pottery styles
- no monumental architecture
Early Dynastic 3,100-2,700 BC
Dynasties 1-3
- Based at Hierakonpolis and Abydos in Middle Egypt Upper and Lower Egypt
- Abydos- Royal Cemetary with tomb enclosures
- Unification under Narmer= Menes?
- Scorpion- Possible predecessor of Narmer.
- Possible influence form Mesopotamia
Old Kingdom 2,700-2,181BC
Dynasties 3-8
- Djoser (Dynasty 3)- Sakkara
- Snefru (Dynasty 4)- Meidum and Dashur
- Khufu, Menkaure, Khaphre (Cheops, Menkare, and Cepheren) (Dynasty 4)- Giza
1st Intermediate Period
2160-2040 BC
- Anarchy
- Memphis ceases to function as administrative capital
- Kings in Memphis, Herakliopolis and Thebes
- Delta prey to incursions from Palestine
Middle Kingdom 2040-1786 BC
- Reestablishment of unified Egypt under Theban dynasties.
Second Intermediate Period 1786-1558 BC
- Five contemporary dynasties including one (Hyksos) from outside Egypt.
New Kingdom 1558- 1303 BC
- Reunification under Theban dynasty
- Akhenaton and the Founding of Amarna
- Tutankhamon
- Ramses and the Pharaohs of the Exodus
- Period of International Empires and International Trade
Geographical Features
- Little External Military Threat
- Little need for irrigation
- Mineral resources in the Eastern desert and Sinai
Hegemony: Access to Resources
- Bureaucratic control of crops from harvest to rationing
- Labor organized into phyles divided into divisions
- Annual labor tax?
- Who controled this labor?
- By the New Kingdom there is clear evidence for traders, craftsmen, as well as serfs, nobles and slaves
- Pious foundations
Hegemony: Warfare
- The Narmer Palette
- Middle Kingdom Nubian forts
- Martial art style becomes prominent in the Middle and New Kingdoms
- Introduction of Chariot Warfare
Hegemony: Population Size
- No early cities have been excavated
- Memphis below the water table
- Exception is the New Kingdom city of Amarna
- Was scarcity ever a problem in the Nile Valley?
Hegemony: Information
- Scribes had considerable economic power
- Knowledge of Geometry and Engineering
- Cheops, chief engineer buried in elite tomb
- Considerable esoteric knowledge
- embalming
- pyramid texts
Hegemony: Symbols of Power
- King is the incarnation of Horus or Ra
- Architecture as the projection of Power