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ORGANIZE THE VISIT PRACTICAL INFO AND CHARGES DISCOVER THE MUSEUM SUPPORT THE MUSEUM TICKETS & SHOPDONATE Organize the visit / Appointments / Between the Nile and the Sea: The history and archaeology of Eastern Sudan from the neolithic to the medieval period – Julien Cooper LECTURES Between the Nile and the Sea: The history and archaeology of Eastern Sudan from the neolithic to the medieval period – Julien Cooper
On Tuesday 24th May 2022, at 6pm, in collaboration with ACME (Amici e Collaboratori del Museo Egizio) we will host the online lecture "Between the Nile and the Sea: The history and archaeology of Eastern Sudan from the neolithic to the medieval period" held by Julien Cooper.
The region east of the Sudanese Nile, often known as the ‘Atbai’, is a harsh desert region punctuated by rocky hills, vast sandy deserts, and numerous gold mines. Yet despite the ‘peripheral’ nature of this region far away from the Nile River, historical and archaeological investigations, most notably those of Linant de Bellefonds, Angelo and Alfredo Castiglioni, as well as the Sudan Archaeological Research Society, have revealed that this region was anything but peripheral and rather was a vital part of the political and economic map of ancient Northeast Africa. Over the millennia, the region was the home to nomads known as the Medjay and the Blemmyes who often raided the Nile and harassed goldmining expeditions. Many desert routes criss-crossed the deserts creating a vast network of tracks that enabled trade and Muslim pilgrims from the Red Sea to route the Nile. Nomadic camps from numerous periods demonstrate that the Atbai deserts were settled, providing a complexity to this region seldom witnessed in deserts in Egypt and Sudan. Since 2018, a fieldwork project called the Atbai Survey has aimed to document the threatened archaeological heritage of this region, discovering numerous sites such as goldmines, nomadic settlements, and rock art sites. A further goal of this work is to reorientate the history and archaeology of the local nomadic groups in their proper place, not just telling the story of the desert from the perspective of Ancient Egypt or Kush. This presentation will present some of the new discoveries and excavations of the Atbai Survey and shed new light on the indigenous and Egyptian history of this desert.
Julien Cooper studied for a PhD at Maccquarie University, Sydney, investigating the peripheral geography of the Red Sea region as found in Ancient Egyptian texts of the Pharaonic period. Since then, Julien has undertaken postdoctoral fellowships at Oxford University as well as Yale, and now works as an Assistant Professor teaching Egyptology at United International College, Zhuhai (China). Since 2015, Julien has participated on epigraphic surveys with the Sudan Archaeological Research Society and has directed a project in the Eastern Desert of Sudan since 2018. His research interests are dedicated to the peripheral geography of the Egyptian and Kushite states and employ a variety of methodologies, including epigraphic and archaeological analyses, studies of loanwords and language contact as well as philological analysis and historical reconstruction.
The event will be held in English and will be introduced by Christian Greco, Director of Museo Egizio.
It will be broadcast via streaming on the Museum's Facebook page and Youtube channel
-------------------- It's not my burden to disabuse the ignorant of their wrong opinions Posts: 2699 | From: New York | Registered: Jun 2015
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Keep in mind there is a long history of research on the Eastern Deserts and sites of occupation going back 10,000 years and more.
quote: In this paper, we discuss human occupation during the Early and Middle Holocene in the Eastern Desert of Egypt, based mainly on the data provided by excavated deposits from the Sodmein Cave, which produced an important Holocene stratigraphic sequence. This sequence is dated by a large number of conventional and AMS 14C dates. It appears that the area was empty of human occupation during the Late Glacial Maximum (LGM) and the earliest Holocene. With improved climatic conditions, humans arrived in the area, as hunter-gatherers using no ceramics, from around 7.1 to 6.4 Ka cal BC. Humans were absent from the cave during the Holocene 8.2 Ka event (ca. 6.3 Ka cal BC). From 6.2 to 5.0 Ka cal BC, herders visited the site on a regular basis importing caprines. The bone evidence for domesticated small stock is very limited at Sodmein but is nevertheless extremely important, as it contains the oldest known specimens for Africa to date. After 5.0 Ka cal BC, the area was almost entirely deserted.
quote: Pottery production in the Eastern Desert was clearly associated with both Nabta Playa and the Khartoum Variant tradition on the one hand, and with Kerma on the other. No direct connection could be established wih Karmakol. Interesting to note is the presence of a few example of incised wavy-line pottery, all concentrated on sites close to Abu Hamed, as well as the presence of the incised composite pattern in the corpus. This may be evidene of a southern influence. Using the radiometric evidence from other contexts, particularly Nabta Playa and thus te Khartoum Variant, the Early Holocene decorated vessels from the Eastern Desert are dated between 7500 and 6000 BCE. The Eastern Desert material is thus firmly associated with cultures farther west, although contast with the south are attested as well.
One important aspect of the study of this area is the revelation that the areas of the eastern Desert closer to the 1st Cataract is hyper arid and likely the reason for the population decline of the the so-called A-group. And likely this area was one of the sources of this population who migrated back and forth between the Nile and other areas to the East and West based on climactic conditions. Similarly this is also true for the entire Nile Valley.
A lot of ancient rock art has been found also in the eastern Desert.
quote: This desert is well-known for its Egyptian inscriptions, almost entirely New Kingdom in date, which reveal the presence of an imperial Egyptian administration deep in the desert (Castiglioni and Castiglioni 2006; Davies 2014; Ruffieux and Bashir 2014). Many of the same locales bearing pharaonic inscriptions also exhibited a generally earlier phase of rock art, usually depicting cattle and other fauna. As part of this wide survey of the Eastern Desert of Sudan, two new and noteworthy rock art sites were discovered by the SARS-Yale 2018 expedition, site 18.25 and site 18.27, the latter of which will be presented here as a unique record of 4th millennium BCE Naqadan or possibly A-Group iconography in the Sudanese Eastern Desert. The unnamed site 18.27 was named by the mission ‘Jebel Maraekib’ (Map 1), derived from Arabic plural of marakib ‘boat’ due to the depiction of 13 boats on the rock walls of the jebel.
Not to mention the largest collection of predynastic rock art is also found in the Eastern Desert, but a little North of Atbai.
quote: The predynastic petroglyphs which represent the participants’ sacra and cosmology are mostly distributed in an arc between Kom Ombo in the south and Qena in the north (Judd 2009; Lankester 2013), with some west of the Nile (Darnell 2009). The so-called Naqada cultural zone in the valley adjacent to the area of the petroglyphs comprises a dozen sites where elite burials, especially containing C and D (White Cross-Lined and Decorated) Ware (Graff 2009), dated to the Naqada I and II periods (c.a. 3800-3350 BC). The majority of the petroglyphs, which record the activity of those engaging in the rite of passage through journeying into the desert, may be assigned to Naqada I/early Naqada II (c.a. 3800-3500 BC; Lankester 2013). This is the period where elites were consolidating their power through prominent architecture and elaborate burials at locations such as Hierakonpolis, Mahasna, and Abydos (Friedman 2011). Hunting imagery is found in the Central Eastern Desert over millennia and in many dynastic tomb paintings. There are twelve examples of hunting hippopotami and crocodiles on the Naqada I-IIa C-Ware, and twenty vessels portraying hunting with dogs or by dogs alone (Graff 2009). This includes several with the prey being grasped, as occurs in the desert scenes. Dogs also occur quite frequently on later ivories, but usually at the end of a neat row of animals seemingly controlling them, and also on palettes and knife handles (Hendrickx 2011a).
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thank you.. Doug M's post was as informative as Julien Cooper's video
-------------------- It's not my burden to disabuse the ignorant of their wrong opinions Posts: 2699 | From: New York | Registered: Jun 2015
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