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Exploring the Role of the Living in Effecting Food and Drink Offerings in Private Mortuary Cults of Late Old Kingdom Egypt

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Exploring the Role of the Living in Effecting Food and Drink Offerings in Private Mortuary Cults of Late Old Kingdom Egypt It’s a kind of magic: exploring the role of the living in effecting food and drink offerings in private mortuary cults of late Old Kingdom Egypt Philippa Jane Browne Selwyn College University of Cambridge Under the supervision of Dr Kate Spence This thesis is submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy December 2019 This research was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council UK Declaration This thesis is the result of my own work and includes nothing which is the outcome of work done in collaboration except as declared in the Preface and specified in the text. It is not substantially the same as any that I have submitted, or, is being concurrently submitted for a degree or diploma or other qualification at the University of Cambridge or any other University or similar institution except as declared in the Preface and specified in the text. I further state that no substantial part of my thesis has already been submitted, or, is being concurrently submitted for any such degree, diploma or other qualification at the University of Cambridge or any other University or similar institution except as declared in the Preface and specified in the text. It does not exceed the prescribed word limit for the Archaeology and Anthropology Degree Committee. Philippa Jane Browne December 2019 [2] Philippa Jane Browne Thesis summary It’s a kind of magic: exploring the role of the living in effecting food and drink offerings in private mortuary cults of late Old Kingdom Egypt Food and drink were vital for post-mortem existence in Ancient Egypt, and the presentation of these by the living to the dead at the tomb formed a key part of the mortuary cult. Egyptological scholarship commonly proposes that once the cult ceased, and the temporary, perishable offerings along with it, a permanent, ‘magical’ supply was provided via image, text, and object representations of sustenance in the tomb. This study examines these ‘modes’ through which offerings were present and presented. Complementary theoretical frameworks are employed in case studies that analyse illustrative examples of the offering-related decorations, installations, and objects from a number of elite late Old Kingdom tombs (c.2492-2181 BCE) at Saqqara. These demonstrate that tomb design incorporated different modes to communicate salient information about the cult to the living: it took into account their varying literacy and resource levels – as did the different modes of offerings that they could use to sustain the dead. Modes were therefore deployed to facilitate interaction between the two parties. The conclusion is that magic (Egyptian ḥkꜢ/Ꜣḫw) was involved in effecting offerings of all kinds, but that the living played an indispensable role in channelling this force to endow offerings with the capacity to sustain the dead, rather than such agency being inherent. Ongoing cult participation both ensured the effectiveness of the offerings in the tomb, and articulated the social relationships between the worlds of the living and dead. The study results in a more nuanced understanding of the mortuary cult, explicating the significance of offerings in the articulation of relationships between the living and dead, and establishing the notion of reciprocity as a driving factor. Finally, it suggests that to focus solely on offerings as ‘magical/permanent’ or ‘real/temporary’ is to obscure the cult as a social process. [3] Acknowledgements Firstly, thank you to Dr Kate Spence for her encouragement and sound advice, particularly when I had health struggles, as well as for the wonderful opportunities that she has given me to teach. I hope that I manage to pass on not only the valuable lessons that she has taught me, but also her sense of dedication to the field and to her students that she has demonstrated since first supervising me as an undergraduate fourteen years ago. Thanks also goes to Dr Hratch Papazian for letting me sit in on just about every Egyptian class that he ran, and especially for teaching me Old Egyptian so that I could pursue my PhD topic. He reignited my interest in language, gave me the confidence to supervise others in it, and helped me to achieve more in this area than I thought I could. My advisor, Prof. John Robb, has given me food for thought regarding my ideas on the application of theory to my work. I would like to assure him that the Ancient Egyptians did not believe that they evolved from bananas and turned back into fruit when they died. This thesis, as well as my fieldwork in Egypt and attendance at various conferences, would have been impossible without the funding that I received from the AHRC, Selwyn College, and the Thomas Mulvey Egyptology Fund. I would also like to thank Dr Scott Williams of the Digital Saqqara Project who created the bespoke GIS maps of Saqqara for my work. Thank you to my wonderful colleagues and friends of the Material Culture Lab, a community among which I have spent many happy years working. We have shared our ideas, tribulations, and successes (and sometimes ice cream). During the writing up phase of the PhD, I became a near permanent feature of Greens Café, Cambourne, where the staff always made me feel welcome and, importantly, kept me plied with coffee. Last, but by no means least, I am incredibly thankful for the unfailing support from my family – especially Sandy, Holly, Ben, and my mother. My close friends, some of whom are also Egyptologists, have spurred me on and inspired me with their own achievements. ‘Miracle Minny’, my cat, has been my constant companion throughout long working hours. To date, she defies the odds being in remission from aggressive lymphoma. This work is dedicated to the memory of my three family members who passed away during the course of my PhD: Beatrice ‘Anne’ Sarginson; David Hawes; and John Harle; as well as to the memory of my father, Simon Browne. [4] Contents Declaration................................................................................................................................. 2 Thesis summary ......................................................................................................................... 3 Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................... 4 Contents ..................................................................................................................................... 5 Chronology ................................................................................................................................ 8 Map of Egypt ........................................................................................................................... 10 List of maps, plans, diagrams, and tables ................................................................................ 11 List of figures .......................................................................................................................... 13 Chapter 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................ 19 1.i. Research problem .......................................................................................................... 20 1.ii. Existing literature ......................................................................................................... 21 1.iii. Response to research problem ..................................................................................... 24 1.iv. Limitations ................................................................................................................... 25 Chapter 2. Background ............................................................................................................ 27 2.i. The mortuary cult .......................................................................................................... 27 2.ii. Data selection ............................................................................................................... 30 Types of material forming illustrative examples ............................................................. 34 2.iii. Methodology and method ............................................................................................ 35 Adopting a ‘thought experiments’ approach ................................................................... 36 Introduction to the theoretically informed case studies ................................................... 37 Chapter 3: Manifesting the presence of the deceased in the tomb .......................................... 45 3.i Key roles of imagery of the deceased in the tomb ......................................................... 45 3.ii Making the deceased present through imagery ............................................................. 46 Presentification ................................................................................................................ 46 3.iii Creating a visual connection between the living and dead .......................................... 47 Reciprocal sight ............................................................................................................... 47 3.iv Summary....................................................................................................................... 49 Chapter 4. Eliciting and justifying cult participation through tomb façade decoration .......... 51 4.i. ‘Inviting’ and ‘signalling’ functions of façade decoration ...........................................
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