Women, Weaponry and Warfare
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Women, weaponry and warfare A multidisciplinary study of the use of weapons by women in Dynastic Egypt Number of Volumes: 2 Volume 1 of 2 Rebecca Angharad Dean M.Phil University of York Archaeology March 2013 ii Abstract This thesis is a detailed study of the utilisation of weaponry by ancient Egyptian women during the Dynastic Period. This work incorporates extended literature reviews, including a detailed discussion of several examples of women utilising weaponry and taking part in warfare in societies outside of Dynastic Egypt, an analysis of feminist and gender-based approaches to the subject, an examination of women within ancient Egyptian society, and a review of the specific weapons associated with these women. Detailed experimental archaeology also forms part of the thesis research in order to test the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of the specific weaponry when utilised by both men and women. In addition to the experimental work, a comparative discussion of examples of weapons’ trauma on ancient Egyptian remains is carried out. The thesis concludes with the discussion of research carried out and the potential for future work, and the conclusions drawn from all aspects of the thesis research. A catalogue of unpublished ancient Egyptian weaponry in the collections of the Harrogate Royal Pump Room Museum and the Yorkshire Museum in York is also included as an Appendix to the thesis. Volume One iii Contents Volume One: Abstract – ii Acknowledgments – v Declaration – vi Introduction – 1 Chapter One - Women and Weapons Outside of Ancient Egypt – 9 Chapter Two - A Feminist Approach in Egyptian Archaeology – 51 Chapter Three - Literature Review: Warfare and Women in ancient Egypt – 99 Chapter Four - Literature Review: Ancient Egyptian Weaponry – 151 Chapter Five - Experimental Archaeology – 186 Chapter Six - Experimental Archaeology: Comparative Discussion – 210 Chapter Seven – Discussion – 235 Conclusion – 252 Volume Two: Appendix – 3 Bibliography – 39 List of figures – 61 Chapter One Figures – Women and Weapons Outside of Ancient Egypt – 71 Chapter Two Figures – A Feminist Approach in Egyptian Archaeology – 75 Chapter Three Figures – Literature Review: Warfare and Women in ancient Egypt – 84 Volume One iv Chapter Four Figures – Literature Review: Ancient Egyptian Weaponry – 101 Chapter Five Figures – Experimental Archaeology – 124 Chapter Six Figures – Experimental Archaeology: Comparative Discussion – 161 Chapter Seven Figures – Discussion – 184 Appendix Figures – 190 Volume One v Acknowledgments First I must thank Professor Joann Fletcher and Professor Terry O’Connor for their assistance and support. Professor Fletcher inspired me to continue my research and was always ready with astute advice on my thesis. Her encouragement and her boundless enthusiasm have kept this project on track over the last four and a half years. Professor O’Connor’s guidance, optimism and support have been invaluable to me during the writing of this thesis. I am indebted to Dr Stephen Buckley for all of his advice and encouragement, and his assistance with the experimental work. I am also grateful to Kate Fletcher for her help with the khopesh experiments. Thanks are also due to Neil Burridge, who manufactured the wonderful weaponry that was used for the experimental archaeology, and whose advice and enthusiasm for the project inspired me further. I am also indebted to Thom Richardson of the Royal Armouries Leeds for his advice on the utilisation of the weaponry. I would also like to thank Professor Loveday Alexander of the University of Sheffield for all her advice, encouragement, and incredibly useful suggestions. Thanks also go to Lucy Wilson and Gemma Doherty for their constant support, and a belief in me and my research. They have kept me going over the last four and a half years. Finally, a huge debt of gratitude is due to my wonderful parents and my sister, for encouraging my interest in Egyptian Archaeology all those years ago, for supporting my decision to continue my research to a doctoral level, and for always lending me their help and advice whenever it was needed. Without them, none of this would have been possible, and I am forever in their debt. Volume One vi Declaration I declare that this thesis has been written by myself, and the work contained therein has not been presented anywhere else. Volume One 1 Introduction There can be no argument that warfare in ancient Egypt is a well-studied subject. There has been a long fascination with the wars conducted within early societies and ancient Egypt is no exception. Research has been wide-ranging, and certain aspects of ancient Egyptian warfare have been examined comprehensively as have the potential reasons why the Egyptians went to war and the structure and composition of the ancient Egyptian military (e.g. Shaw, I. (1991) Egyptian Warfare and Weapons). There has also been a great deal of research undertaken into specific military encounters such as the Battle of Kadesh (e.g. Goedicke, H. (1966) ‘Considerations on the Battle of Ḳadesh’, The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 52, 71-80; Epstein, C. (1963) ‘That Wretched Enemy of Kadesh’, Journal of Near Eastern Studies 22 (4), 242-246), together with detailed studies of the various weapons in use throughout the Dynastic period. In 2009 I completed an MA dissertation (Dean 2008) which examined one type of ancient Egyptian weaponry, the mace, in relation to women in Egyptian society, the choice of weapon based on the size of an MA project and the opportunity to study the unpublished selection of ancient mace-heads within the collection of Harrogate Museums and arts. The MA dissertation was a springboard for this doctoral thesis, in which all the arguably functional weapons associated with women in the Dynastic Period are studied. This subject has not been as thoroughly examined as other aspects of Egyptian archaeology, with previous studies of warfare mainly focussed on male society. The period selected for study begins with the Early Dynastic Period (1st Dynasty, c.3100 BC) through to the end of the Saite Period (26th Dynasty, 525 BC). A small selection of Predynastic examples are also included, mostly relating to the museum cataloguing carried out as part of this research. The Persian, Ptolemaic and Roman periods are excluded, since the many variations in weaponry present at these times range far beyond the scope of a PhD thesis. One important point to note is that female warriors or at least women bearing arms were not necessarily prolific in ancient Egyptian society. What this thesis aims to Volume One 2 demonstrate is that such women did exist at various times, and although not customarily part of the Egyptian military, could adopt militaristic behaviours and styling in some circumstances. These examples are frequently linked to demonstrations of power and the display of a particular image relating to pharaonic status. This thesis also aims to highlight that women were physically able to use the weapons then available, meaning that that weapons associated with such women should not be automatically be dismissed as ‘token’ or ‘symbolic’. The evidence examined includes burial goods, literature and artistic portrayals supported by experimental archaeology. The experiments carried out as part of this thesis also demonstrate that women were able to wield the weapons with which they were buried, and were shown utilising in artistic portrayals and described as such in literary texts; these are assessed in detail in this thesis. Where possible, the sites and provenance of the images and statuary have been cited, although there is often a lack of provenance with several of the examples discussed, which can limit to a certain extent the discussion of possible socio-historical and cultural contexts. Whereas the initial subject of this thesis (‘Women and Weapons’) may seem a little simplistic, the in-depth discussion of the women themselves and their apparent exclusion from the archaeological record provides the theoretical sections of this thesis. The examination of their omission from the discourse of Egyptology, deliberately or otherwise, raises the matter of sexual politics within archaeology which is of huge importance to this thesis. Therefore an engagement with feminist and gender theory within archaeology addresses these issues, utilising the work of Roberta Gilchrist, Griselda Pollock, Judith Butler, and Lynn Meskell. The concept and theoretical position of so-called ‘Third Wave Feminism’ is also considered in relation to its potential impact on the study of Egyptian archaeology. The omission of women from the archaeological and historical record of Egyptian archaeology relates in large part to the lack of gender studies in Egyptian archaeology and the absence of gendered archaeology before the 1970s. Indeed, archaeology has long ignored those categories of individuals within the Volume One 3 archaeological record that “do not conform to masculine ideals” (Baker 1997, 184). This means that there are certain sections of a cultural society that become ‘invisible’ within the archaeological record, such as women, children, the elderly (Baker 1997, 184), and those who do not conform to what some archaeologists might regard to be ‘gender norms’, including those who appear to have cross-gender or third-gender roles (discussed in more detail later on in this thesis). Work by Hjørungdal in the 1990s addresses some of these issues, particularly the archaeological tradition where biological sex of burial is determined