Fekri A. Hassan

The Predynastic of Egypt

The Predynastic of Egypt, spanning an interval from ca. 4000 to 3050 B.C., was an eventful period. After the inception of food production in the Nile Valley at least a millennium before, it was the time when the identity of Egyptian society was forged. Egypt was settled by refugees from the deserts of the eastern Sahara and the southern Levant, fleeing from mid-Holocene droughts, and became a melting pot of indigenous Nilotes and desert herders, part-time cultivators, and hunters. Within a millennium, an increasing dependence on agriculture led to sedentary life and, in some cases, to the development of sizable communities. By 4000 B.C., the settled communities had also developed a distinct division of labor between men and women and ritual and religious beliefs in which women, grain, fertility, and death were salient and interrelated elements. The Predynastic communities were also faced by the most destabilizing factor of agricultural economy, namely, fluctuations of yield. Attempts to dampen the fluctuations through interregional integration led to the emergence of community representatives and eventually chiefs. Legitimation of the status of chiefs through affiliation with the traditional and supernatural power associated with women, fertility, and death and the acquisition of exotic goods stimulated trade and an industry in funerary goods. Enlargement of economic units through alliances, with occasional incidences of fighting, especially after 3600 B.C., led to the rise of a state society governed by supreme rulers. The wedding of the funerary cult of Late Predynastic Egypt with political power and military might was the basis for the most fascinating aspects of Ancient Egypt—religion and kingship.

Holocene lakes and prehistoric settlements of the Western Faiyum, Egypt

Abstract Holocene lake stages in the Faiyum depression commenced with a high lake stand during the 10th millennium bp, followed by an early Holocene lake from 8500 to 7000 bp. A pronounced recession and the development of a palaeosol preceded another rise to a mid-Holocene, high lake level from 6500 to 5100 bp. A major drop in level coincided with the late Neolithic and Early Dynastic. The Moeris lake witnessed by Herodotus is also documented. The drop in lake level during early Ptolemaic times marked the end of the freshwater lake and was apparently, in part, a result of declining Nile floods. Terminal Palaeolithic sites are associated with the early Holocene lake and Neolithic sites with the mid-Holocene phase. Prehistoric settlements were placed near lake-margin marshes and ponds. The richness of the lake margin in aquatic resources and its susceptibility to short- and long-term fluctuations influenced both subsistence and settlements, and is believed to have encouraged a para-agricultural economy.

A pollen record from Birket Qarun and the recent history of the Fayum, Egypt

Abstract Sediments and fossil pollen of two short cores from Birket Qarun, Egypt, reflect Nile floods, lake levels, and agricultural developments of the last 325 yr, and demonstrate the potential of a long and detailed record from the Fayum Depression. The chronology of these cores is inferred by correlation of historic events with changes in the fossil and sedimentary records. Subangular clay clasts and blocky structure resulting from occasional exposure, drying, and reworking of lake sediments reflect low Nile floods of the mid-1600s. Abundant pollen of shallowwater, rooted aquatic plants provides evidence for continued low lake levels through the 1700s. A high lake level, resulting from the extreme Nile flood of 1817–1818, is recorded by hystrichospheres, reworked by wave action, from Eocene marine sediments exposed on the north shore of Birket Qarun. Political administration, as reflected in agricultural policy, is also recorded in lake history. Changing lake levels are, in part, correlated with canal neglect during Mamluk and Ottoman control, and renewed canal maintenance under the agricultural policy of Mohammed Ali. Increased cattail (Typha) pollen dates from perenial irrigation after 1873. Olive and date pollen, and pollen of newly introduced exotic trees, are abundant after 1930 as a result of accelerated introduction and cultivation of fruit, lumber, fuel, and windbreak trees following World War I. The sequence of introduction of exotic plants is reflected in the pollen of Zea mays, from the New World, followed by Casuarina from Southeast Asia and Australia, and Eucalyptus from Australia.

Desert Environment and Origins of Agriculture in Egypt

Examination of paleoclimatological and archaeological data from the Egyptian Sahara and the Nile Valley strongly suggests that management of animals and supplementary fanning appeared in the southern part of the Western Desert during the early Holocene under subarid conditions. Excessive annual and short‐term variability in rainfall, associated with pronounced temporal and spatial unpredictability of water and food resources, is considered one of the key factors stimulating the initiation of domestication. The onset of marked desertification during the 7th millennium bp motivated an eastward movement into the Nile Valley attested to by an almost simultaneous appearance of ‘Neolithic’ sites from the Delta to the central Sudan.

High-Precision Radiocarbon Chronometry of Ancient Egypt, and Comparisons With Nubia, Palestine and Mesopotamia

Radiocarbon dating began in archaeology with ancient Egypt, for it was to the securely dated materials from Egypt that Willard Libby naturally turned when his new radiocarbon method needed verification from reliable historical sources. With this paper the reverse process begins: verifying and correcting the conventional chronology for Egypt and neighbouring regions by calibrated radiocarbon. This paper compares calibrated radiocarbon dates against historical dates in a manner not well covered by A NTIQUITY s usual convention. So in this paper only uncalibrated radiocarbon dates are denoted by ‘b.p.’, historical dates are denoted by ‘ BC ’, and calibrated radiocarbon dates by ‘Cal BC ’ or simply ‘ BC ’ when the meaning is clear from the context.

Heavy minerals and the evolution of the modern Nile

Abstract Heavy mineral analysis is a useful tool in tracing the changes in the hydrographic setting of the Nile through time. Analyses by the writer and others are presented to differentiate between a former Nilotic system, a Proto-Nile, and the modern Nile system, and to demonstrate the changes undergone by the modern Nile. The Proto-Nile was almost totally dependent upon discharge from equatorial and sub-equatorial tributaries in East Africa and from local Sudano-Egyptian affluents. The modern Nile system, in contrast, is dominated by contributions from the Blue Nile and the Atbara River, which drain the Ethiopian Plateau. The discharge of these rivers is governed by the monsoonal rains which are responsible for the summer floods in the Lower Nile Basin. It has been generally believed that this riverine system is very recent, perhaps not much older than 20,000 years. The evidence presented in this paper indicates that the Modern Nile system was well established by the later part of the Middle Pleistocene. In its early stage, the modern Nile was characterized by greater contributions from the non-Ethiopian East African and Sudano-Egyptian tributaries than at present.

Beyond the surface: comments on Hodder's ‘reflexive excavation methodology’

Comment is offered on the ‘post-processual’ approach to excavation in the field advocated in the September Antiquity.

Prolegomena to a grammatical theory of lithic artifacts

Abstract Lithic artifacts may be regarded as the material transforms of design schemata, guided by pivot, token or prototypic designs and subject to manufacturai and pragmatic rules and functions. The designs are flexible and merge through substitution, modification, or deletion of elements. A grammar can be constructed to describe the set of rules involved in the production of the designs. This grammatical approach provides a basis for interpreting similarities and differences between assemblages as an alternative to traditional typology and unstructured attribute analysis.

The World Archaeological Congress in India: politicizing the past

The wider context to events at the World Archaeological Congress — 3, held in New Delhi late 1994, that were reported in the March 1995 ANTIQUITY.