Archaeology of Everyday life in Ancient Egypt

Pre-requisites: The command of the English language and the basic use of German or French.

Course objectives: To enable the study and review of social processes using the remains of material culture based on complex and varied data using a theoretical and methodological approach, with the aim of training candidates for independent research.

Course description: The research of everyday life entails different aspects of social behavior, from the relation of a society to its environment, the collection and or production of raw materials and food, organization of living space and the way in which different activities are organized, across social rules of behaving, the question of social structure, family, religiousness and the rituals for the dead, to the institutions and interaction of individuals or a group with them. The essence of the course is analysis of the manner in which social and historic processes influence the form of everyday life and how, based on material remains, it may be reconstructed. During the introductory part of the curse these processes will be reviewed using particular examples, and prepared to accommodate the needs of the candidate’s research (the analysis of primary sources and interpretation).

Learning Outcomes: Essay, oral examination

Literature/Reading:

• Ambridge, L.J., Searching History: Non-Elite in Ancient Egypt, History Compass 5/2 (2007) 632-645.
• Baines, J. 2009-2010. Modelling the integration of elite and other social groups in Old Kingdom Egypt. In Elites et pouvoir en Egypte ancienne, ed.J. C. Moreno García = CRIPEL 28: 117–44.
• Bloxam, E. 2006. Miners and Mistresses. Middle Kingdom mining on the margins. Journal of Social Archaeology 6 (2): 277-303.
• Eyre, C. and J. Baines. 1989. Interactions between Orality and Literacy in Ancient Egypt. In Literacy and Society, ed. by K. Schousboe and M.T. Larsen, 91-119. Copenhagen: Akademisk Forlag.
• Frood, E. 2010. Social Structure and Daily Life: Pharaonic. In A companion to ancient Egypt I, ed. by A.B. Lloyd, 469-290. Oxford: Willey-Blackwell.
• Meskell, L. 2000. Cycles of life and death: narrative homology and archaeological realities, World Archaeology 31 (3): 423-441..
• Meskell, L. 2002. Private Life in New Kingdom Egypt, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• Moeller, N. 2009-2010. The influence of royal power on Ancien Egyptian settlements from an archaeological perspective. In Elites et pouvoir en Egypte ancienne, ed.J. C. Moreno García = CRIPEL 28:193-209
• Mumford, G. D. 2010. Settlements – Distribution, Structure, Architecture: Pharaonic. In A companion to ancient Egypt I, ed. by A.B. Lloyd, 326-349. Oxford: Willey-Blackwell.
• Riad, S. 2008. Organization’s Engagements with Ancient Egypt: Framing and Claiming the Sublime? Organization 15(4): 475-512.
• Shaw, I. 1992. Ideal Homes in Ancient Egypt: Archaeology of social aspirations. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 2 (2): 147-166.
• Szpakowska, K. 2008. Daily Life in Ancient Egypt. Recreating Lahun. Malden – Oxford: Blackwell.
• Ezzamel, M. 2004. Work Organization in the Middle Kingdom, Ancient Egypt, Organization 11(4): 497-537.
• Meskell, L. 1999. Archaeologies of Social Life. Age, Sex, Class, et cetera in Ancient Egypt. Oxford: Blackwell.
• Meskell, L. 2004. Object Worlds in Ancient Egypt. Material biographies past and present, Oxford: Berg.
• Rossi, C. 2010. Science and Technology: Pharaonic. In A companion to ancient Egypt I, ed. by A.B. Lloyd, 391-408. Oxford: Willey-Blackwell.
• Wilfong, T.G. 1997. Women and Gender in Ancient Egypt from Prehistory to late antiquity. Ann Arbor: Kelsey Museum of Archaeology.
• Wendrich, W. 2010. Identity and Personhood. In Egyptian Archaeology, ed. by W. Wendrich, 200-219. Oxford: Willey-Blackwell.
• WILFONG, T.G. 2010. Gender in Ancient Egypt. In Egyptian Archaeology, ed. by W. Wendrich, 164-179. Oxford: Willey-Blackwell.