A View from the Herd: Cattle, Sheep, Goats, and Pigs in Pharaonic Egypt

Throughout Egyptian history, pastoralists have played a vital role in food production, and the importance of domesticated animals is reflected in their abundant depictions in texts, tomb reliefs, and 3D art. Richard Redding highlights how critical animal-rearing was to all aspects of the ancient Egyptian economy in both institutional and domestic settings. The success of this economy was due to the decisions made by herders in managing their animals, deciding the structure and size of their herds, when to slaughter, and when to sell. These decisions were dependent on economic forces, environmental conditions, and the herders’ knowledge of their animals. 

The first section of the book deals with methodology, the origins of domestic species, environmental factors, and herd-management, leading to a framework for modelling animal-management. The annual inundation was a particular factor: herders had to decide whether to move their animals to higher ground and provide fodder, or to cull some and move the rest to non-flooding grazing land. Redding’s estimates of herd sizes will surprise many readers. Taking the Old Kingdom as his focus, he calculates that in just one year, more than 29,300 cattle and 14,200 shep would have been required to feed the Giza pyramid-builders – which represents only about 3% of the total herd sizes in Egypt at this time.

Redding then devotes a separate chapter to each animal, including meat yields and other secondary products, before comparing their relative diets, management, labour requirements, nutritional yields, and the risk and rewards for the herders. Cattle-raising was mostly carried out in Lower and Middle Egypt, the south being too arid, while sheep were kept in larger herds, and pigs (difficult to herd) were kept in villages, and were more important than previously believed. The work ends with a study of the animal remains found at five Old Kingdom sites, emphasising that the goal of archaeozoology is not simply to study ancient domestic animal remains, but rather to discover and explain patterns in the faunal record, because these are ‘the result of human decision-making and reflect the socioeconomic structure of human societies’.