Mummy's Wrap

Posted By Page on February 3, 2010

Early in the Old Kingdom, or perhaps even in the Pre-Dynastic period, the ancient Egyptians based their calendar off the lunar cycle. For the most part, this simple form of tracking time was quite adequate for any people’s needs (Strudwick, Helen; The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, pg. 446). The ancient Egyptians, however, quickly noticed that the lunar cycle spans twenty-nine and a half days, making one year have, not the regular twelve-moon cycle, but a thirteen-moon cycle. Furthermore, the ancient Egyptians wanted to base their new year off the annual inundation of the Nile floodwaters. This was difficult to predict when using the lunar calendar (http://www.ancientegyptonline.co.uk).

In their observations of the sky, the ancient Egyptian priests noticed the brightest star in the sky was Sopdet, or “One Who Is Sharp,” otherwise known as Sirius in the modern world. The priests noticed Sopdet disappeared beneath the horizon for seventy days. These seventy days became so important to the ancient Egyptians, the days were introduced in one of ancient Egypt’s most sacred and famous rituals: the ritual of mummification (http://www.egyptianmyths.net). The priests also noted that once Sopdet returned to the night sky, the Nile flood was soon to follow. Once this discovery was made, a change in how time was calculated took place. The new year began when Sopdet rose. This time period was broken into three seasons, each with four lunar months of thirty days. By these calculations, there were 120 days in one season and 360 days in one year (http://www.egyptmonth.com).

Realizing that this did not exactly coincide with the rise of Sopdet, the ancient Egyptians found that five days were remaining in the year. Instead of adding or subtracting days from each month, the ancient Egyptians simply added five to the end of their year. These five days were explained in their mythology (Studwick, Helen; The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, pg. 449).

The myth explaining the five extra days of each year began with the goddess Nut and her brother, the god Geb. Nut the sky goddess and Geb the god of the earth were considered passionate lovers, but were forbidden to join together as Nut was married to Ra, the sun god. During the day, the god of the air, Shu, separated Nut from Geb, but at night, Nut lay with Geb. Angered by this, Ra refused to let her bear her children on any day of the year as punishment. Desperate to bear her children, Nut went to Thoth, the scribe god and god of the moon, who stole light from the moon to create five new days to add to the end of the year. These days were not considered part of the calendar, so Nut was able to give birth to one child each of those five days: Osiris, Seth, Horus the Elder, Isis, and Nepthys (http://www.yourdiscovery.com). These five “non-days” were days of celebration for the ancient Egyptians (Studwick, Helen; The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, pg. 449).

As we know today, each year is 365 days and six hours. Without compensating for the six hours, the solar and civil calendars would coincide only once every 1,460 years. This discrepancy was rarely noticed by the ancient Egyptians as they never moved to correct it. However, during the reign of Ptolemy III (246-222 BC), an extra day was added to every four years, evening out the discrepancy and beginning the use of a “leap year” (Studwick, Helen; The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, pg. 449).

 

Ancient Egyptian Season	Ancient Egyptian Month	Gregorian Equivalent
Akhet – The Flood Season	Thoth	19 July – 17 August
	Paophi	18 August – 16 September
	Athyr	17 September – 16 October
	Sholiak	17 October – 15 November
Peret – The Growing Season	Tyvi	16 November – 15 December
	Meshir	16 December – 14 January
	Phamenoeth	15 January – 13 February
	Pharmouthi	14 February – 15 March
Shemu – The Harvest Season	Pashons	16 March – 14 April
	Payni	15 April – 14 May
	Epiphi	15 May – 13 June
	Mesori	14 June – 13 July

The five “non-days” come at the end of the year and correspond with five gods’ birthdays:

Osiris – 14 July; Horus the Elder – 15 July; Seth – 16 July; Isis – 17 July; Nephthys – 18 July

{Table recreated from Studwick, Helen; The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, pg. 448}

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Category: Ancient Egypt, Everyday Life, Science/Technology, Time | No Comments »
Tags: ancient calendar, ancient egyptian calendar, annual nile flood, calendar, geb, lunar calendar, nut, senenmut, sirius, solar calendar, sopdet

Posted By Page on January 27, 2010

Beginning as long ago as the Pre-Dynastic period, jewelry was an important part of an ancient Egyptian’s costume. It was never seen as simply decoration, but as talismans to be worn in honor of the gods and to protect the wearer of the jewelry. Symbols were carved out of different materials and made into necklaces, bracelets, anklets, arm-bands, and headbands (http://www.egyptmonth.com). Powerful symbols were worn to infuse the wearer with the power of certain gods or goddesses. Some of the symbols used include the scarab for rebirth, the ankh for life, the nefer for beauty, and the eye of Horus for protection. These symbols were often combined into one piece of jewelry, imparting the magic of each symbol to the wearer (http://jewelry.lovetoknow.com).

It was not only the symbols of the gods and goddesses that were important to the ancient Egyptians. The materials were just as important as the symbols themselves. Each material was like a symbol in its own right. Materials were associated with deities, emotions and certain states of being. For example, the ancient Egyptian name for lapis lazuli, the deep blue stone so often used in ancient Egyptian jewelry, was the same word for “joy.” Thus wearing lapis lazuli would imbue the wearer with joy. The same thought process goes for a material associated with a god or goddess. Gold was associated with the solar deity, be he Atum, Amun-Ra, Aten, or Ra. Gold would sway the deity to protect the wearer of the gold jewelry (http://www.egyptmonth.com).

The Egyptians often used materials deemed in today’s culture to be semi-precious. Today’s culture considers a material to be precious or semi-precious based on its scarcity. The more precious a material is, the rarer it is. The ancient Egyptians did not hold these views on the materials they used. Each material was precious to them due to their magical powers. The same ideology was used in accordance to glass beads. Bead making had been around through much of the New Kingdom, but it was not until the 18th Dynasty (1550-1291 BC) that bead making became an art form
(http://www.mnsu.edu). Glass was not used to make containers, vases or bottles. Instead, glass was used as a substitute for the stones used in jewelry-making. While the actual stones may have been unattainable, due to rarity or expense, the use of glass beads did not cheapen the jewelry in the sense of its power. Indeed, the ancient Egyptians went to great lengths to make the glass look like the stone it was substituting. Some of their most precious materials, such as gold, were used to create the desired color. Gold, in this case, was used to create red-colored glass beads (http://www.egyptmonth.com).

The creation of glass beads became an important position that even pharaohs found appealing. Tutmosis III is even said to have labored in a glass factory by choice. Furthermore, glass beads became a highly sought after trade piece, some ancient Egyptian beads having been found as far away as China (http://www.egyptmonth.com).

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Tags: Ancient Egypt, ancient egyptian, ancient egyptian jewelry, ancient jewelry, ankh, Eye of Horus, glass beads, jewelry, lapis lazuli meaning, nefer, semi-precious stones, symbols

Posted By Page on January 20, 2010

While there was little distinction between any individual’s clothing, something else was needed to distinguish one being from another, specifically the pharaoh and the gods and goddesses from the common people. Headdresses and crowns were one of the distinguishing characteristics of the ancient Egyptians. At one point in the history of ancient Egypt, the country was divided between Upper and Lower Egypt. These separated lands had their own rulers who wore the crowns of their office. The red crown, or Deshret, was associated with Upper Egypt. The white crown, or Hedjet, was associated with Lower Egypt. When the two lands were combined, the pharaoh was often represented wearing first one crown, then another, as is seen on the Narmer Palette. By the 4th Dynasty, while not common, the pharaoh was represented wearing both crowns at once. This combined crown was known as the Pschent (http://www.touregypt.net). By the Middle Kingdom, the Double Crown had replaced the single red or white crowns (http://www.touregypt.net). Another crown or headdress associated with the pharaoh is the Nemes headdress. It is most famously represented by the funerary mask of Tutankhamen and is also seen on the Sphinx. It consists of a single cloth, usually striped, bound tightly across the forehead with two loose pieces of the same fabric hung down on either side of the head behind the ears and over the shoulders. The excess cloth was tied in a single plait and allowed to hang down the spine. The forehead portion of this headdress sports the uraeus, an upright flared cobra goddess known as Wadjet, and the vulture goddess, Nekhbet. Often, a plain form of this same headdress was worn by people other than the pharaoh, and would be called the khat headdress (http://www.egyptologyonline.com). One final crown is commonly associated with the pharaoh and that is the blue crown, or the war crown. It appears slightly flared, the flares beginning in front of the ears and raising to the back. It has a rotund, bulbous front. Often, the goddess Wadjet is yet again standing at the pharaoh’s forehead (http://www.touregypt.net). The crowns and headdresses described above pertain to the pharaoh in his more human form, but other crowns associated with gods and goddesses were often combined with these headdresses to associate the pharaoh with a particular deity. Each deity had their own headdress to distinguish themselves from each other.

	Amun wears a flat-topped crown with a long ribbon streaming from the back. It is topped with two tall feathers and, when combined with Ra to become Amun-Ra, the sun disk rests between the feathers (http://www.touregypt.net).
	Isis wears the definitive hieroglyph of her name, the throne of Egypt. Later, she took on aspects of Hathor and was often shown with the sun disk and cow horn headdress originally associated with Hathor (http://www.touregypt.net).
	Osiris usually wears the atef crown, or the white crown with two feathers on either side (http://www.touregypt.net).
	Nephthys wears the hieroglyphs that give her her title, woman of the house. It is the hieroglyph of a house surmounted by a basket (http://www.touregypt.net).
	Ma’at, the goddess of truth, wears a single feather in her headband. It is this feather that the deads’ hearts are weighed against to prove them worthy of an afterlife (http://www.touregypt.net).
	Mut is interesting as she is the only goddess to wear the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt. She also often wears the vulture crown associated with Egyptian queens as her name contains the vulture hieroglyph which produces the sound mw (http://www.touregypt.net).
	Seshat, the scribe goddess, wears the hieroglyph of her name, a seven or nine pointed star, or perhaps a flower with the aforementioned number of petals, crowned by a downturned pair of horns or crescent moon. There is some debate as to whether her symbol consists of a star or a flower. As she is the one who decides the length of a king’s life and the ancient symbol for an Egyptian king was in fact a flower, it could be that her symbol is the flower (http://www.touregypt.net).

Queens of Egypt wore headdresses, much like the pharaohs did. The headdress most commonly worn by queens was the vulture cap associated with the goddess Nekhbet. The vulture and Nekhbet were associated with motherhood. To further emphasize their maternal role, the queens’ headdresses often had elements pertaining to Hathor, such as the cow horns with the solar disk (http://www.touregypt.net). During the reign of Akhenaten, the Heretic King, such adornments were no longer pertinent to the monotheistic religion Akhenaten had implemented. The queen was no longer required to make such deific connections. Nefertiti, the legendary beauty, had no call to wear the vulture headdress. Instead she wore a tight-fitting, flat-topped crown. After the reign of the Hereitic King, the old polytheistic religion was reinstated and the old headdresses of the queens were once again necessary (http://www.egyptologyonline.com).

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Category: Ancient Egypt, Every Day Life | 1 Comment »
Tags: amun, crowns, Deshret, headdresses, hedjet, Isis, ma'at, mut, nefertari, nefertiti, nekhbet, nemes, Nephthys, Osiris, pschent, Seshat, wadjet

Posted By Page on January 13, 2010

Two weeks ago, the article Clothing in Ancient Egypt Part 4: Hygiene and Cosmetics was published.  A study has recently become popular that has produced additional information which is not only pertinent to this topic, but also very interesting.  The study researched the medicinal properties of kohl, a black powder used as eyeliner, which was mentioned in the above article. The process of making kohl is long and slightly difficult. It begins with a muslin cloth, only a few inches square, dipped in a paste of sandalwood or the sap from the Blackboard tree. Both true sandalwood and the blackboard tree are found in India and south Asia and could have been imported to Egypt. Other species of sandalwood are found throughout the world, and in Africa, but it appears the most common source of this ingredient was from India and southern Asia.  This step of dipping and drying in the shade was repeated throughout the course of a single day.  A wick was then made out of the muslin cloth.  It is placed in a lamp filled with castor oil and burned.  The burning lamp is placed in a brass container that is sealed with an opening large enough to only let in the required oxygen to allow the wick to burn.  Once burnt out, the remaining soot is mixed with a drop or two of cow’s butter or castor oil.  It is stored in a dry container (http://en.wikipedia.org). Easier ways of obtaining kohl include simply burning camphor or an almond while holding a spoon over the flame to catch the soot (http://www.copperwiki.org). The recent study, released on December 23, 2009, found that, in addition to the ingredients mentioned by Graeco-Roman authors, kohl also contained two non-natural forms of lead chloride.  These lead salts were ground and added purposely to the kohl.  They add no visual component to the kohl as the lead is dull and black, as is the kohl without the lead chloride present.  The ancient papyri mention these lead salts as being highly medicinal.  Scientists began researching this line of reasoning and discovered that the lead was responsible for eliciting specific responses, such as the overproduction of nitrogen monoxide, which stimulates immunological defenses (http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ac902348g). In addition to the possible health benefits of lead salts in moderation, there are other medicinal aspects to kohl.  It repels sand mites that are common in Egypt.  These insects are attracted to the eyes, often blinding humans.  It also helps clean the eyes of dust and sand while, much like the eye black used by American football and baseball players, it reduces the glare from sunshine. Lead is still considered highly toxic, however, and kohl has been banned from being imported into the United States in accordance with the Food and Drug Administration (http://www.copperwiki.org).

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Category: Ancient Egypt, Every Day Life, Herbals | No Comments »
Tags: health benefits of kohl, kohl, lead in kohl, medicinal, medicinal kohl

Posted By Page on January 6, 2010

As was noted in the previous post, Ancient Egyptian Clothing Part 4: Hygiene and Cosmetics, cleanliness in ancient Egypt was particularly important.  The quest for cleanliness was especially important in regards to their hair.  It was quite common for the ancient Egyptians to shave all hair from their bodies in a quest to remain clean.  This may have been quite helpful in that count as it was easier to keep disease and parasites such as lice from infecting a person (http://www.egyptologyonline.com/wigs_&_hair.htm).  Ancient Egyptian priests were completely shorn and wore no false hair as an act of purity (http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/priests.htm).
That is not to say the ancient Egyptians were not mindful of their hair, natural or otherwise.  There are many remedies for balding and greying that survive on medical papyri that can still be read today.  It was common for the ancient Egyptians to try to dye their hair to meet the cultural expectations to have jet-black hair.  Juniper berries would be ground up to make a black hair dye.  Henna was also used as a hair dye, to give people an orange or red tint to their hair (http://www.egyptologyonline.com/wigs_&_hair.htm).  This is evident when studying the mummy of Ramses the Great.  Whatever his true hair color was as a young man, it is obvious he dyed his hair with henna as his hair began to lose its natural pigment (http://www.white-history.com/earlson/rameses.htm).

Balding was treated with as much care and scrutiny as hair color.  There are many remedies detailing how one was to incite hair to grow again.  Often essential oils such as fir and rosemary were used to massage the scalp (http://www.egyptologyonline.com/wigs_&_hair.htm).  Other remedies call for more exotic ingredients such as fat of lion, fat of hippo, fat of crocodile, fat of tom-cat, fat of snake, and fat of Nubian ibex (http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/timelines/topics/eberspapyrus.htm).

Natural hair is rarely seen in ancient Egyptian artwork.  Only in representations of children or young girls is a person’s natural hair represented in artwork.  Children were completely bald save for a circle of hair left unshorn on the side of their head.  The side lock was completely shorn when the child reached puberty (http://www.egyptmonth.com/mag07012000/mag4.htm).  There are also depictions of dancers, mostly young girls, with long, flowing hair.  Other depictions of dancers show the girls’ hair plaited with weights at the ends to swing with the beat of the music (http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/dance.htm).

While great care was taken to preserve one’s natural hair, even more care was taken with the wigs of the ancient Egyptians. Wigs, which were constructed out of human hair, were worn both by men and women and much like the clothes of the ancient Egyptians, the wigs’ styles changed with each dynasty.  During the Old and Middle Kingdoms, the wigs were fairly simple.  Men wore short wigs and women wore long wigs.  When Egypt became influenced by the Nubian culture in the New Kingdom, the wigs began to mimic the hairstyles of the Nubians.  Both men and women wore whatever length of hair was their fancy, though the men still favored a shorter hairstyle than the women.  The wigs became more wedge-shaped with tiny braids throughout.  For the more elaborate wigs, the hair was braided with luxurious items such as ribbon or even gold.  Wigs were important enough to the ancient Egyptians that not only were their wigs made during life, but there would be numerous wigs buried in the tombs for the afterlife (http://www.king-tut.org.uk/ancient-egyptians/egyptian-wigs.htm).

During the pre-dynastic period, it was not uncommon for men to sport facial hair.  As the dynastic period began to take hold, facial hair was shunned.  All men wanted to be clean shaven.  It is thus interesting to note that the beard was a symbol of the pharaoh;s power.  The false beard, also sometimes referred to as a postiche, was worn for special occasions and festivals.  It was long enough to reach the top of the collar bone, was thicker at the chin than at the end and often was slightly turned up at the end.  The beard, plaited and made of such diverse materials as leather, metal or hair, was attached to the face with a chinstrap that hooked over the ears.  It represented the pharaoh’s connection the god of the dead, Osiris, who is depicted with the same style of beard.  This famous symbol was used almost exclusively by the pharaohs, but sometimes a queen would sport the false beard, as well., and noblemen were often portrayed with a short form of this beard (http://www.ancientegyptonline.co.uk/royalemblems.html).

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Category: Ancient Egypt, Every Day Life | 1 Comment »
Tags: ancient wigs, beard, false beard, hair, shave, wigs