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Author Topic: Where is Punt?
ausar
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Anybody have any ideas of where the central location of Punt is. The canidates are Southern Arabia,Somali,northern Eritea, or along the Red Sea coast of Sudan. Bear in mind that most of the depiction in Punt show giraffe and other scenes of wildlife not usually found within Somalia. What evidence we have for Somalia is through incense trade,but Kemetians sometimes also got their incense through Yam located further south into around modern Dongola?


In bricks found at 5th dyansty building materials we have found a plant known as teff known to grown only within the Horn of Africa and no where else. Around the 5th dyansty is the first known contact the Kemetians had with the land of Punt.



Posts: 8675 | From: Tukuler al~Takruri as Ardo since OCT2014 | Registered: Feb 2003  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
supercar
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quote:
Originally posted by ausar:
Anybody have any ideas of where the central location of Punt is. The canidates are Southern Arabia,Somali,northern Eritea, or along the Red Sea coast of Sudan. Bear in mind that most of the depiction in Punt show giraffe and other scenes of wildlife not usually found within Somalia. What evidence we have for Somalia is through incense trade,but Kemetians sometimes also got their incense through Yam located further south into around modern Dongola?


In bricks found at 5th dyansty building materials we have found a plant known as teff known to grown only within the Horn of Africa and no where else. Around the 5th dyansty is the first known contact the Kemetians had with the land of Punt.


I imagine that it would be in the regions of modern Ethiopia (perhaps southern region) or northern Eritrea (via Ethiopia), because these areas do have the animals you mentioned. Forget about Southern Arabia; we know such animals don't dwell there. The same can be said of Sudan. Remember that the Egyptians had gone further south, even to central Africa, where they witnessed the Pygmies. There are Egyptian artifacts depicting them.

[This message has been edited by supercar (edited 11 July 2004).]


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neo*geo
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It was probably in or near Somalia.

BTW Ausur, have you heard anymore info about that site in Somalia that is thought to possibly have been some kind of vacation home for a Pharoah?


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ausar
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Well,the pgymys you mention was from a gift from the people of Yam. The farthest south the ancient Kemetians wernt was probabaly what is today southern Sudan around a swamp area called Sudd.

Neo*geo,I have heard nothing of the report of a pharoah's village in Somalia. Perhaps a poster from Somalia who frequent this board can inform us more.


K.A. Kitchen in the book Foods,Metals,and Archaeology in Africa seems to indicate that Eritrea is the current consideration for the land of Punt. Don't know if incense grows in this area. Anybody have any ideas?



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supercar
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quote:
Originally posted by ausar:
Well,the pgymys you mention was from a gift from the people of Yam. The farthest south the ancient Kemetians wernt was probabaly what is today southern Sudan around a swamp area called Sudd.

Neo*geo,I have heard nothing of the report of a pharoah's village in Somalia. Perhaps a poster from Somalia who frequent this board can inform us more.


K.A. Kitchen in the book Foods,Metals,and Archaeology in Africa seems to indicate that Eritrea is the current consideration for the land of Punt. Don't know if incense grows in this area. Anybody have any ideas?


About the incense growing in Eritrea, I wouldn't rule it out. Guess I would have to research this, to be certain. It should be pointed out that Eritrea until recent period, was part of Ethiopia. The Land of Punt covered regions of Ethiopia all the way to parts of Somalia.


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supercar
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Found this on a what appears to be a British incense marketing website: panspantry.co.uk

"The major component of ritual incense is of course Frankincense…Frankincense was used in vast quantities by the ancient Egyptians, and also by the Romans. This is a natural resin which is produced by several closely related bushes (Boswellia species), and although nowadays this is frequently imported from India and Malaysia, the original location of the Frankincense bushes was exclusively the Yemen, Oman, Eritrea and Somalian regions."

I found this on the web: Some archaeologist named Neville Chittick regards this point as being the best reason for placing Punt in Somalia, in an interview shortly before his death.

"The chief line of evidence is the emphasis on incense and the northern slopes of the mountains in Somalia is the prime area, the only area, where the 2 main varieties of the right type, occur. But, of course you can extract incense from trees in regions further north but it is of inferior quality. Actually we have no means of knowing whether the Egyptians were aware of the higher quality stuff and the illustrations in the reliefs of the trees concerned are insufficiently precise in their particulars for it to be possible to distinguish which type the Egyptians meant. A case can certainly be made out for Eritrea but then you have to take it that the Egyptians were making do with inferior incense. And it is very difficult to think that any part of the Eritrean coastline can look like the lagoons and hills you see in the relief of Hatshepsut. It is true that Oman/Yemen produce incense too, and incense of the highest quality but then there is the nature of the appearance of the inhabitants which is African rather than Arab in the carvings."

I don't know how credible this assessment is, but it is safe to say that incense does grow in Eritrea. After all, the Egyptians seem to have left the impression that they got these goods from African looking people.



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Wally
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The country of Punt was actually a region, the same region that the Kemetians referred to as "Ta Nter" or "God's Land," or quite simply the "country" of East Africa, reaching as far south as Mozambique. The Somali coast was merely a 'stepping-off' point for any journey into the interior. The products of Punt were the products of this entire East African region which, in part, explains their diversity

The Land of Punt (Cradle of the Egyptian race)

For the intrepid, the word is formed from p + won + it or
-Pounit; pwonit : "country of the first existence" (Kind of anticipates modern anthropological discoveries, don't you think?)

-Punt, ancient land S of Egypt accessible by way of the Red Sea. Its
exact location has not been identified, but it probably included the Somali
coast. Temple reliefs at Deir el Bahari in W Thebes depict an Egyptian
expedition to Punt in the reign of Hatshepsut.
The Columbia Encyclopedia, Edition 6, 2000 p31655.

-Punt, the original home of the gods...
-after inspecting the results of her (Hatshepsut) expedition, the queen
immediately presented a portion of them to Amon, together with the impost of Nubia, with which Punt was always classed.
J.H. Breasted, A History Of Egypt, Part 1, pp274-277

(The following description refers to the Puntites of Somalia)
-the Puntites, who are pictured as a long-haired Hamitic people, closely resembling the Egyptians.
Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: TheGale Group. 2003.

My ref: http://geocities.com/wally_mo/punt.html


[This message has been edited by Wally (edited 12 July 2004).]


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Thought2
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quote:
Originally posted by ausar:
Anybody have any ideas of where the central location of Punt is. The canidates are Southern Arabia,Somali,northern Eritea, or along the Red Sea coast of Sudan. Bear in mind that most of the depiction in Punt show giraffe and other scenes of wildlife not usually found within Somalia. What evidence we have for Somalia is through incense trade,but Kemetians sometimes also got their incense through Yam located further south into around modern Dongola?


In bricks found at 5th dyansty building materials we have found a plant known as teff known to grown only within the Horn of Africa and no where else. Around the 5th dyansty is the first known contact the Kemetians had with the land of Punt.


Complex society is found in eastern Sudan at Kasala.


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homeylu
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I think it was more than likely Ethiopia or Somalia, in these area you can find all the goods traded and animals descriped- giraffes, hippos, monkeys, elephants (for ivory),exotic birds, a variety of snakes ,gold, fankencense and myrrh trees (for incense) and limestone mountains. Not to mention the round beehive shaped huts depicted on some reliefs.

It could not have been southern Sudan, because geologically there aren’t any siginificant gold mines there, gold was extensively traded in Northern Sudan the area they called Nubia, southern Sudan was known as Kush, and Punt was more than like further south.

One of the expeditions during the reign of Pepi II, Harkhuf (who lead the expedition) wrote to the King that he was bringing back a dancing dwarf with him. (This is the pygmie Supercar is speaking of) they are not found in Southern Nubia.
The stories of “The Shipwrecked Sailor” show Amenemhat sent expeditions to Punt.

The Puntite officials on the wall relief of Ramses II were definitely Africans, so Arabia is out of the question.

“Most historians believe it lies at the western African coast near what is today Somalia or Ethiopia. Such assumption is based upon the African features of the queen of Punt (at el-Deir el-Bahary temple) and the ornaments around her legs. The location was described as a sand coast with heights covered by ebony and incense trees. Upon its return, the expedition has bought back ivory, silver and gold too. Giraffes, which are purely African animals, and monkeys were shown to live there.”


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Wally
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“Most historians believe it lies at the eastern African coast near what is today Somalia or Ethiopia. Such assumption is based upon...

Yeah, but most Kememu knew that p_won_t ("country of the first existance"; "country of our ancestors", etc) was East Africa, or quite simply, Africa.
"Ta Nter," "Punt," "Iau" are all synonyms for the same neighborhood. It wasn't a nation...


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