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EGYT 1550 Ethnic Identity in Graeco-Roman

Instructor: Dr. Mairs Tu Th 9am – 10.20am Sayles Hall 012 EGYT1550 Ethnic Identity in Graeco-! Egypt under Greek and Roman rule was the original ‘multicultural ’, with communities of , , , Romans, , and even Indians. This course will explore the sometimes controversial subject of ethnic identity in Egypt ‘after the ’, through a focus on the everyday lives of individual people and communities. Topics will include:

• multilingualism; • ethnic conflict and discrimination; • gender and intermarriage;

Evidence will be drawn from ancient texts on as as recent archaeological excavations.

Instructor: Rachel Mairs! Tu Th 9:00-10:20! Week 1: History and

! In-class quiz, 7 Feb ( exercise and multiple choice history questions).

! Read an outline of the history of Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt (see syllabus for suggestions). Egypt ‘after the Pharaohs’:

Conquests by the Great (322 BC), the Romans (30 BC) and the Arabs (AD 641) ‘ Alexander’ ‘Pharaoh Alexander’ The of , Siwa, 331 BC ‘Pharaoh Alexander’

Alexander at the of (Thebes) ‘Pharaoh Alexander’

Louvre

Full, traditional Egyptian list of royal titles (stp n ‘chosen one of Ra’, mry Imn ‘beloved of Ammon’, etc.), but with ‘Alexandros’ transliterated from into hieroglyphs.

Alexander’s royal titulary ( temple) The Decree of Memphis (‘ Stone’): IV, 218 BC The Decree of Memphis (‘’): Ptolemy IV, 218 BC

Callimachus (c. 310-240 BC)

! Greek critic and poet, from Cyrene on the Mediterranean coast of , which at that time was under Ptolemaic rule.

! Lived in during the reigns of Ptolemy II Philadelphos (‘sibling-loving’) and Ptolemy III Euergetes (‘the benefactor’).

! Wrote a survey of the contained in the (now lost).

! Favoured short, epigrammatic verses and coined the famous Greek saying ‘mega biblion, mega kakon’ (‘big , big evil’). (early-mid third century BC)

! Greek poet from .

! Lived in Alexandria for a time in the reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphos.

! Wrote longer verses: hymns, dialogues, etc.

! Was very, very complimentary about the . Theocritus and the Ptolemies Theogony ll. 79-88, “From come kings; nothing is more divine than the lords of Zeus. And so you chose them as your own portion. You gave them to guard, and you seat yourself in the high point of cities, overseer of those who rule their people with crooked judgements, and those who rule otherwise. You have given flowing wealth to them and abundant prosperity. It is reasonable to judge by our king; for he has far exceeded the rest. At evening he accomplishes what he thinks of in the morning. At evening the greatest things, the lesser as soon as he thinks of them.”

Hymn to Zeus ll. 1-8, “From Zeus let us being, and at Zeus, best of the immortals, let us cease, , whenever we hold forth in song; but of men let Ptolemy be spoken of first and last and in etween, for he is the most distinguished of men. Heroes, who of old came from demigods, when they accomplished fair deeds hit upon skilled songsters, but I know how to praise and would sing of Ptolemy.”

Encomium of Ptolemy Philadelphos ll. 13-15, “In lineage such a man to accomplish a great deed was Ptolemy, son of Lagos, when he stored up in his heart a plan that no other man could have devised.” Sotades (early-mid third century BC)

! Greek poet from Maroneia (could be either or ).

! Lived in Alexandria during the reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphos.

! Wrote obscene satirical poems.

! Made the mistake of lampooning Philadelphos’ marriage to his sister, : “You’re sticking your prick in an unholy hole.”

! He was imprisoned, escaped, was tracked down by Ptolemy’s admiral, shut up in a chest made of lead, and thrown into the .

! For obvious reasons, few quotations from his work survive. The Ptolemies and ! Egypt was the last of the Hellenistic kingdoms to fall to Rome (leaving out the Hellenistic states in and …).

! But Rome had long exercised great control over the external and internal affairs of the : Diplomatic contacts went back as far as the reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphos. Ptolemaic Egypt stayed friendly with Rome during the Roman wars with Carthage. But a patron-client relationship begins to develop in the second century BC, with Rome as the most powerful party. Rome got involved in Ptolemaic dynastic struggles; Ptolemaic kings (e.g. Ptol. VI Philometor) might even go to Rome to sollicit Roman help. Rome protected Egypt from Seleucid in the Sixth Syrian War (ended 168 BC). VII Philopator (reigned 69-30 BC) maintained some of Egyptian independence throughout her relationships with and , but following the Battle of in 30 BC, Egypt became a Roman .

Envoys from Alexandria, C. P. Cavafy (1863-1933) For centuries they hadn’t seen gifts at as wonderful as those sent by the two brothers, the rival Ptolemaic kings. But now that they have them, the priests are nervous about the oracle. They’ll need all their experience to decide how to express it tactfully, which of the two— of two brothers like these—will have to be offended. And so they meet secretly at night to discuss the family affairs of the Lagids. ! But suddenly the envoys are back. They’re taking their leave. Returning to Alexandria, they say. And they don’t ask for an oracle at all. The priests are delighted to hear it (they’re to keep the marvelous gifts, that goes without saying) but they’re also completely bewildered, having no idea what this sudden indifference means. They do not know that yesterday the envoys heard serious news: the “oracle” was pronounced in Rome; the partition was decided there. The Roman under Pharaoh Augustus 27 BC – AD 14

Temple of Kalabsha, Lower Pharaoh Augustus

Temple of Dendur, , now in Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Roman Aegyptus Roman Egypt: Some key dates I

Bronze figure of the najor port fol Lgyptian hawk-god was the greatl Ilorus drcssed in ! 30 BC, , Egypt of the wj Rotnan at tlotu', of orre unknown provenance becomes a . N.eligion

Tl-rere can bê ulclerstancl d which a class ! AD 212, Emperor Caracalla Ptolemaic pe1 they are loo{ , Edf extends Roman to tules are sub{ Although t isrn, there wd all inhabitants of the empire. section on Nl gods as Ra, tl shipped alml to*a.ds monl heart and tonl ! Reign of Constantine (AD decreed that.l observecl feal 306-337): end of official example, Hol however, the gocls that chd of , fying animalq chus , an! Each of thii division of into is far from sii merge togetl

Thus , i East and (‘Byzantine the -god { the god ofphl After Alexl Egypt’). onlv,I in the Gl Greek comml own gods wl , Thotl ! AD 641, Arab conquest. on. How the hippopotamrl A good e! equated with tant s¿ir-rctuaJ east. -]

DAVID PEACOCK

of the functic ical evidence servecl by tl-re One of thq Dioiketes ldios Logos gtrabo (r7. r. r F¡nance l/C'Private officer Account' 'l'here are thr.e1

Epistrategoi tior-r there ale I 4 regional at Syene, as gu administrators horse units wh

l"he is, Equestrian offic¡als, of Roman government Royal Scribe of the centre, appointments. Secretary of remain in the Graeco-Egypt¡ans, government appointments. it. Another le¡ rnents ofwhi( Local executive magistrates, 'elected' or co-opted. while the thit include the I Officials appointed to Apollinaris. compulsory public servtces. is m fill in the detl clence includr well as papyri Diagrarl showing the these, as the urban of Roman Egypt has been little stuclied. The two During the fir bureaucratic structul'e of best unclerstood are and Arsinoe, whence the eviclence is derived four lìoman Egypt. alae(cavt flom papyri. It appears that theywere places of some sophistication ancl wealth. which accordr Thus, Oxyrhynchus had a gyrnnasium, public baths, a theatre, and about The units d twenty , while Arsinoe had running water supplied by two Leservoirs between diffel into which water was pumpecl from an arm of the . struct their hi] During tl-re first two centuries AD, the llolres and their netropolises enjoyed attested auxill little in the way of self-government, but in no Septir-r-rius Severus ordered the Koptos ar,l the creation of town councils in each nolrìe, a step towarcls upgrading the in nr 59. Duri] metropolises to municipia (a municipiumberng, in essence, a self-goveming leturning to l borough). This, however, lecl to considerable reser-rtment, for with increased Mons Porphy] responsibility came increased financial burcleus to the holclers of office. fronr the lecol Under Roman rule, all lnales between the ages of r4 and 6o were obligecl to Another el pay a poll tax aur.rually. Roman citizens were exempt, but these probably only ()in n{ formecl a minor part of the population. The upper classes, the'metropolites', before endin$ paid at a reduced level. Class was, thus, a subject of some collseqLlence and at The tasks tl the age of r4 a metropolite boy woulcl be required to present his creclentials. empire was o( and east of E! TheArmy their eating il (Aswan) woul As in other , the main agent of control was the almy. The epigraphic . Ec¡ually, ancl papyrological evider-rce that Egypt pictttle provides furnishes an unrivalled bility of units t

424 Roman Mining

Mons Claudianus (building stone) Roman Mining

Mons Porphyrites ()

Porphyry dish, Begram, (first century AD) El Kanais Trade with India Communities in the Oases

Kellis, Dakhla Further Reading

! Burstein, S. M. (1995) "Pharaoh Alexander: A Scholarly Myth," in M. Burstein (eds.), Graeco-Africana. Studies in the Relations with Egypt and Nubia, New Rochelle, NY, and Moscow: A.D. Caratzas.

! Ray, J. D. (2007) The Rosetta Stone and the Rebirth of Egypt. (Wonders of the .) London: Profile Books.

! Stephens, S. A. (2003) Seeing Double: Intercultural Poetics in Ptolemaic Alexandria. (Hellenistic and society ) Berkeley: University of California Press. ! Ager, S. L. (2005) "Familiarity Breeds: Incest and the ," The Journal of Hellenic Studies 125, 1-34. ! Mairs, R. (2010) "Egyptian ‘Inscriptions’ and Greek ‘’ at El Kanais (Egyptian Eastern )," in Jennifer Baird and Claire Taylor (eds.), Ancient Graffiti in Context, 153-164. London: . Wiki: http://proteus.brown.edu/ethnicidentity12/Home

(pwd: ethnicity12)

Office hours:

Rhode Island Hall 202, Tues 2-3pm, Thurs 11am-12pm, or by appointment.

Questions? [email protected]