Ancient Egypt was one of the oldest civilizations in all of recorded history, a people clinging to the Nile River, trusting in its seasonal flooding to provide the soil that would feed them each year. Around 3150 BCE, Upper and Lower Egypt unified under the first of a long series of pharaohs (Dodson, 2004), in what was called the Early Dynastic Period. According to the Egyptian priest Manetho, there was a king named Meni who, according to tradition, brought the two regions together into a unified state (Shaw, 2002). However, there is no actual record of Meni (or Menes, in Greek) in history that supports Manetho’s account, and it may have been that the country took somewhat longer to unify. There are some scholars who think that “Meni” was actually the pharaoh Narmer, who appeared in works of art wearing the royal regalia (Clayton, 1994). A key part of the centralization process involved the creation of a capital at Memphis. This allowed the ruler to manage the workforce and agricultural practices within the highly fertile Nile Delta, while controlling the trade routes going to the Levant. As time went by and the pharaohs became increasingly wealthy, their enhanced lifestyle appeared in the elaborate design of the mortuary cult buildings at Abydos and the mastaba tombs, the purpose of which was to honor the deity who was the pharaoh after death (Shaw, 2002). The pharaohs used their power to create a strong monarchy, giving them secure control over all of the resources, labor and land that were necessary for the Egyptian civilization to thrive.
When a country can move beyond basic subsistence practices, it is possible for that society to make advances in such areas as technology and the arts. In ancient Egypt, this began soon after the establishment of the Old Kingdom; many of the achievements that are associated with ancient Egypt came about during this time period, such as the Sphinx and the Giza pyramids (James, 2005). Government officials gathered taxes from the citizens and managed large-scale irrigation works to boost overall crop yield, created a justice system to bring a sense of order to the country, and rounded up peasants to lend a hand with building projects (Shaw, 2002).
When one has a government with a complex central administration, even in ancient times, there is a lot of paperwork to do, and so a need arose for a class of literate scribes and officials who received grand homes from the pharaoh in exchange for their services. The pharaohs also gave land to the mortuary cults that would worship them so that there would be enough resources to ensure that the pharaoh would still be worshiped after death. At first, this helped to spread the glory of the pharaohs, but over time, this ate away at the pharaoh’s wealth, to the point where the central government was larger than what the taxes coming in could afford (Shaw, 2002). The pharaoh became less and less powerful, and when famine hit the land around 2200 BCE, the first ancient Egyptian government collapsed, entering a period of time called the First Intermediate Period (Clayton, 1994).
For many scholars, the period of the Old Kingdom represented the climax of ancient Egyptian culture and served as the source of the unique style of Egyptian architecture and art. It is as though a centralized program was created to manage the design of forms, order and proportions, and all of the elements of statuary, architecture, reliefs, and even the objects used for mundane tasks had their own place in the system (Hawass, 2011). The purpose of this centralization was to show the perfection of each monarch’s method of governance, and to show the close relationship between each pharaoh and the world of the gods.
The vast majority of Egyptians worked as farmers, and they were bound to the land that they worked. They lived in small mud-brick dwellings that were designed to stay cool even on hot days. Each dwelling featured an open-roofed kitchen, with a grindstone and small oven to use for breadmaking (Manuelian, 1998). The walls were white but often featured linen tapestries dyed in rich colors. Reed mats, raised beds, small tables and stools were the covering on the floor.
Hygiene was particularly important for ancient Egyptians, especially given the time period under discussion. They used a soap made from a combination of chalk and animal fat when they took baths in the Nile. Men used ointments and perfumes to fight body odor and keep their skin supple and shaved all of their body hair to stay clean (Manuelian, 1998). Clothes consisted of white linen sheets, and both men and women wore cosmetics, jewelry and wigs. Children did not wear clothes until they came into puberty, around the age of twelve; at that point, boys were circumcised and had their heads shaved. The father was responsible for bringing in the income while mothers were in charge of the care of children (Manuelian, 1998).
Because of the agricultural wealth afforded by the Nile River, ancient Egyptians had leisure time and fill it with a number of different activities, such as playing games and performing music. Senet and mehen, two of the earliest board games, were popular among adults; children reveled over ball games and juggling. Tomb paintings at Beni Hasan have shown that wrestling was also a popular pursuit, as were boating and hunting among the wealthy (Shaw, 2002).
Cuisine during the Old Kingdom is not significantly different from the cuisine of modern Egypt. Bread and beer were the major staples, along with figs, dates, garlic and onions. On feast days, meat and wine were served to all, while the wealthy had them more often. For preservative purposes, poultry, meat and fish were either dried or salted and then put away for later use (Manuelian, 1998). In addition to cuisine, another difference between the lives of the peasants and the wealthy had to do with the sort of homes they lived in. The mud-brick home, the domicile of the peasant, was much less elaborate than the palaces of the wealthy. No peasant homes have survived the sands of time for archeologists to pore over, but the palaces in Amarna and Malkata have lasted from the time of the New Kingdom until the present age, and they show rich decorations, with murals of birds, people, gods, geometric shapes, and water pools on the walls (Badawy, 1968). Buildings for the wealthy, and that were supposed to be durable (such as temples) were made from stone instead of the mud bricks. The pharaoh Djoser’s mortuary complex was the first large building designed from stone in the world, and it features rich detail on the post and lintel supports, with a motif of lotus plants and papyrus running throughout (Badawy, 1968).
As with most objects in their lives, works of art were also supposed to serve practical purposes. The iconography that appeared during the Old Kingdom would hold sway throughout all of the transitions in Egyptian culture, as well as intrusions from foreign culture (Robins, 1997). The elements that were a trademark in Egyptian art included simple lines; flat, colored areas; simple shapes; and no indication at all of any spatial depth. Text and images were often written together on the walls of temples and tombs, as well as coffins and statues. The figures on the Narmer Palette can also be interpreted as hieroglyphs. The benefit of this, for the Egyptian leadership, was that it was possible to commission art that served specific ideological purposes (Robins, 2001). Statues and finer reliefs were carved from stone, but for less ornate and ostentatious settings, wood was used. Artists used charcoal, limestone, and copper and iron ores to make paints (Nicholson, 2000). The purpose of art ranged from recording military victories, religious lessons and royal decrees for public viewing. Art made by peasants was primarily done for the dead, to be placed with dead bodies for protection in the afterlife. Mummification involved a lengthy process of extracting the brain and then desiccating the body, so that it would not rot, before wrapping it in linen, along with protective amulets, for the mummy’s journey to the afterlife.
There is much in ancient Egyptian culture that is still fascinating to modern sensibilities. One of the more intriguing aspects of this society is its durability, as so many of the common cultural practices that were in place 5,000 years ago are still popular today.
Works Cited
Badawy, Alexander (1968). A History of Egyptian Architecture. Vol III. Berkeley, California: University of California Press.
Clayton, Peter A. (1994). Chronicle of the Pharaohs. London, England: Thames and Hudson.
James, T.G.H. (2005). The British Museum Concise Introduction to Ancient Egypt. Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press.
Manuelian, Peter Der (1998). Egypt: The World of the Pharaohs. Bonner Straße, Cologne Germany: Könemann Verlagsgesellschaft mbH.
Meskell, Lynn (2004). Object Worlds in Ancient Egypt: Material Biographies Past and Present (Materializing Culture). Oxford, England: Berg Publishers.
Nicholson, Paul T. (2000). Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Robins, Gay (2000). The Art of Ancient Egypt. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
Shaw, Ian (2003). The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
