Category Archives: Ceramics

More details about the pottery from House 55

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My week here at Elephantine passed by very quickly. Despite of all the work, I also had the chance and pleasure to enjoy the beauty of this place and of the landscape at the First Cataract.

More ceramic material from House 55 is now processed – my pottery database holds currently almost 2400 pieces from the structure, including 350 Nubian sherds. Of particular interest are painted and imported wares as well as functional vessels. The latter allow a close comparison with the material we excavated in the last years within the New Kingdom town of Sai in Sudan.

In general, the functional ceramics from House 55 at Elephantine compare very well with the Sai material. Despite of close parallels regarding the general corpus and the vessel types, I have suggested that a distinct difference applies to the use of Marl or Nile clay for functional vessels (Budka 2018). This can be illustrated by spinning bowls, but also the so-called fish dishes (‘Schaelbecken’), pot stands and zir vessels.

The class of spinning bowls is quite interesting – these are dishes with two handles attached to the interior of the base. The handles are used for wetting linen fibers during spinning. Such spinning bowls are frequently attested in Egyptian settlements like Amarna and Elephantine (where also other evidence for textile working is found).

Example of a spinning bowl from House 55.

As of today, I have recorded 15 pieces of spinning bowls from House 55 in detail, some of them in a very good state of preservation. More were found in fragmented state and are not considered in my database. 50% of the recorded material was made in Marl clay, 50% in Nile clay. This proportion between Marl and Nile clays differs considerably with the evidence from Sai – although only a small number of spinning bowls were found there within the New Kingdom town, almost all of them are made from Nile clay and were most likely locally produced for demand at the site. Almost no Marl clay spining bowls were imported from Egypt.

All in all, my short stay here at Elephantine was extremely productive and important for working out further details of comparisons between the pottery corpora from Sai and Elephantine.

Reference

Julia Budka 2018. Pots & People: Ceramics from Sai Island and Elephantine, in: Julia Budka und Johannes Auenmüller (eds.), From Microcosm to Macrocosm. Individual households and cities in Ancient Egypt and Nubia, Leiden, 147‒170.

Busy with Egyptian and Nubian pottery from House 55

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As usual on excavations, time flies by. I was busy in the last days with drawings of important pottery vessels from House 55. The importance can be of different character: 1) completely preserved vessel and thus significant for the corpus of shapes and pottery types; 2) chronologically interesting piece and of significance for the ceramic phases and their fine-dating and 3) functionally relevant vessels including so-called hybrid vessels illustrating the intermingling of Nubian and Egyptian pottery making tradition on the island.

I had a bit of all three main categories during the last days, besides some very nice imports found in House 55, coming from the Levant and Cyprus, as well as a unique sherd of the famous Tell el-Yahudiya ware.

Among my favourites are the Nubian sherds from House 55. The Nubian cooking pots are mostly of Pan-Grave style with incised decoration, but a minority of the cooking vessels shows basketry impression and is very similar to pieces from Sai. Within the fine ware, Kerma Black Topped cups and beakers dominate, sometimes with the silvery band on the outside characteristic of the Kerma Classique period. Today, I made a drawing of a very nice Black Topped beaker and was able to reconstruct its complete outline.

Besides making drawings, I am busy with material excavated in the 26th and 27th seasons in House 55, thus more than 20 years ago. Among other interesting pieces, today I had the sixth piece of a so-called fire dog on my table. These fire dogs continue to fascinate me – especially since my work at Sai. At Elephantine, almost 50% of the ones found in 18th Dynasty levels are coming from House 55! But the small number is completely different to the large amount of fire dogs we found within the New Kingdom town of Sai Island. Research about the proper functional use of these devises thought to hold cooking pots above the fire will have to continue.

Back at Elephantine – recording of ceramics from House 55

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After finishing the successful 2019 season of the Ankh-Hor Project at Luxor, in the Asasif, I am now back in Egypt, at Aswan, working at Elephantine Island on the processing of material from House 55.

Due to a number of reasons it’s just a very short season, but I am very happy to concentrate again on the very interesting ceramics from the workshop building excavated in the last years by the Swiss Institute in close cooperation with AcrossBorders.

I will focus on the early 18th Dynasty ceramic material and here also on the Nubian wares from House 55 – this nicely ties in with my new MUAFS project and our recent discoveries between Attab and Ferka. Work will start tomorrow – very excited and an update will follow shortly!

Presenting new C14 results from Tomb 26 in Vienna

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Teaching classes and exams were finished this week in Munich and now some time for research has arrived! While we are still busy preparing the next monographs about the New Kingdom town of Sai, I am delighted that I will take a short break in the upcoming week going to Vienna. Thanks to an invitation for a lecture at the NHM Vienna, I will be talking about Tomb 26 and our latest findings there.

Among others, I will be presenting for the first time the very interesting results from C14 samples from Tomb 26. Unfortunately, the bone samples all failed to yield any extractable collagen for dating. This is why only charcoal samples were used and processed by the Beta Analytic Radiocarbon Dating Laboratory. Nevertheless, these results are informative and support the phases of use of Tomb 26 as proposed based on the stratigraphy and the ceramic evidence.

I would like to highlight the results for the individual who was the first person interred in Chamber 5. This adult male was the one buried along the northern wall with a deposit of flower pots and other vessels at his feet.

Burial in Chamber 5 of Tomb 26 associated with flower pots deposit.

My archaeological dating – not earlier than Thutmose III, most likely mid-18th Dynasty – is now nicely supported by the calibrated dates of 1451-1291BC.

Looking much forward to this small break and the trip to Vienna which is very likely to result in fresh input for our ongoing analysis of Tomb 26.

More experiments with cooking like an Egyptian/Nubian

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Our most recent excursion to Asparn/Zaya and the MAMUZ Museum to conduct experimental archaeology related to Egyptian and Nubian cooking pots was again very successful.

This year, we focused on two tasks: 1) using dung from various sources (sheep, goat, cattle, horse and donkey) as fuel and 2) cooking actual food with the replicas of our Nubian and Egyptian cooking pots.

The experiments of both tasks were very informative and worked really well: especially horse and donkey dung is well suited to boil lentils or bulgur, but also goat/sheep and cattle dung fires do work if the pot is placed just above the glow; the Nubian cooking pot is great to sauté vegetables as well as to cook them.

I’ve written a more substantial report with some pictures on this in German. For now, I would just like to express my heartful thanks to all colleagues who made this practical class at Asparn possible and helped a lot at the spot; and of course loads of thanks go to our small AcrossBorders team. Well done, especially of our excellent cook Patrizia!

Preparing for publication

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The last weeks have been quite intense – time flies by and the end of the project is approaching while the teaching term here in Munich has again started. All of us are currently busy preparing tasks for the next publications of AcrossBorders.

Johannes and me have submitted the manuscript of our conference proceedings to Sidestone Press – it will appear, as planned, in September 2018! And will provide new information about cities and households in Ancient Egypt and Nubia, of course with a special focus on AcrossBorders and its case studies Sai Island and Elephantine.

Veronica is currently preparing several things for the next monograph, to be published again in CAENL of OREA. This volume will be entitled “AcrossBorders 2: Living in New Kingdom Sai” and will comprise descriptions of the environmental conditions for the New Kingdom town of Sai Island as well as overviews of the excavations in SAV1 East and SAV1 West and the associated material remains. The book will also include results of AcrossBorders comparative approach looking at Abydos and Elephantine when assessing Sai as New Kingdom microcosm in ancient Nubia.

Last 3D models, sections and plans are getting prepared by Cajetan, while Daniela is busy with digitalizing drawings of objects from Sai Island, here in particular from SAV1 East.

I am very proud of my team because we’re so well in time, processing is much advanced and the assembly of all data will provide fresh results in the very near future.

New short film about AcrossBorders project

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A short film, available both in English and German, has just gone live!

In the film (editing and animations: hertha produziert), our new fieldwork on Sai island is presented, especially the work conducted and recently published in sector SAV1 North. 3D reconstructions by our architect Ingrid Adenstedt illustrate the recent advances in the study of the architecture of New Kingdom towns.

Various analyses of the material remains, especially the ceramics – with my personal favorites, the fire dogs, are highlighted to illustrate the new insights into Sai’s regional and trans-regional networks and its heydays.

Looking much forward to feedback for our video!

Pottery, chronology and society in New Kingdom Sai, Sudan

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Some brief thoughts about what ancient ceramics tell us about life in New Kingdom Nubia, using Sai Island as a case study, have just been published.

To access the full version of the article, please visit: www.scitecheuropa.eu/new-kingdom-pots-people/84560/

Article originally published on: www.scitecheuropa.eu/new-kingdom-pots-people/84560/
Reproduced by kind permission of Pan European Networks Ltd, www.scitecheuropa.eu/

© Pan European Networks 2018

Showcasing settlement archaeology in Egypt and Nubia

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The last 5 years have been really busy – with fieldwork at Sai and Elephantine, AcrossBorders has illustrated the rich potential of modern settlement archaeology, taking advantage of recent developments in archaeometry and other interdisciplinary fields.

Results from micromorphology, geology, isotope analysis and archaeometry of ceramics and other materials provide much food for thought and illustrate the complex entanglement of cultures in New Kingdom Nubia. Cooking pots are among the most interesting findings as I have just outlined in a German blog post for the Young Academy on derStandard.at.

The closing of the AcrossBorders project is already approaching – to celebrate its success, an interdisciplinary workshop with most of our cooperation partners and many team members will take place next week in Vienna. Hoping for a fruitful discussion of possible future developments related to settlement archaeology in Egypt and Sudan, I am very much looking forward to this event.

Winter in Egypt, week 3 at Elephantine

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Having had a very pleasant visit from Friends of the Egyptian Museum in Munich today, I was just reminded that actually winter has arrived in Europe… Someone told me that it’s even supposed to snow in Munich early next week – well, I’d better not think to much about this… Anyway, I thought I share some pictures of the beauty of Aswan, especially for all of you who are not enjoying the very nice weather here in Egypt!

Week 3 just started, some more days to go before I have to head back to Munich (and will face real winter after all…). We are still focusing on Nubian wares and other pottery vessels; Oliver will be concentrating on pots from the early phases of use of House 55 this week. Lucia has already produced wonderful drawings of the numerous net weights and will continue with female figurines in the next days. Daniela is busy polishing the database and completing some entries. Making very good progress, more to come!