REVIEW BY SARAH GRIFFITHS
This new British Museum publication explores the lives of the ancient Egyptians through objects held in the museum’s extensive Egyptology collection. Having first explained the basics (geography, the dynasty system, historical evidence, and the role of the pharaoh), the book then has six themed sections, each with stand-alone, but related, ‘In Focus’ features, beginning with ‘Pharaohs and gods in myths’, followed by sections exploring the pharaoh’s role as high priest, the royal family, the ruling administration, ‘Egypt and the world’, and ‘An eternal life’.
In spite of the title, the ‘pharaoh’ is not the sole focus of the book: we are offered the perspectives too of ordinary Egyptians who, according to Margaret Maitland, ‘were not always reverential towards their ruler’ – for example, one Giza work gang called themselves the ‘Drunkards of Menkaura’. We meet administrators, priests, and the workers at Deir el-Medina (including bad boy Paneb), illustrated with the statue of Katep (director of the wab-priests) and his wife Hetepheres, an unusual vessel in the shape of a scribe seated at quite a jaunty angle, and ostraca.
A section on the symbols of power (by Marcel Marée) describes how the king was represented as an animal of great strength from earliest times, particularly in the form of a bull: the earliest kings are shown wearing a ceremonial bull’s tail, or in the form of a bull trampling their enemies, while many kings, including Roman emperors Caligula and Claudius included the phrase ‘victorious bull’ in their Horus names. Another chapter by the same author is dedicated to the museum’s wonderful collection of 39 Sekhmet statues, exploring their history as well as the attributes of the goddess herself.
