Ballana .Culture X

"Beyond the gorge of Abu Simbil and Gebel Adda, the desert cliffs and Pleistocene gravel terraces recede from the vicinity of the river and leave plains on both banks of modern alluvium and upper Paleolithic silt. The scanty vegetation is mainly composed of a few palms and "sunt" trees, which border the river's edge.""We moved forward in extended order noting each possible site, and on November 3rd we came within view of a vast field of tumuli scattered over an area of more than two kilometres. As the tumuli partly obscured by banks of drift sand and decayed vegetation they did not at first appear to be anything other than natural formations, but as we drew nearer we noted that most of them were covered with large schist pebbles and were so regular in shape that their artificial nature was apparent.""On November 7th we received reports of plundering on the east bank of the river at Qustul, and visited the site consequence. We were amazed to discover a further series of tumuli directly opposite those on the west bank, at Ballana, which differed only in their smaller size and absence of pebble covering. Between some of the tumuli at the south end were a few small graves of the X-group period, and it was these graves which had attracted the attention of the plunderers.""Work was started on November 8th with 150 men and boys, and examination of depressions noted on the east side of most of the tumuli revealed the entrances to robbers' passages which had been cut below the ground level on which the mounds were built. The clearing of these passages revealed the fact that they broke into burial chambers of large tombs, which had been constructed beneath the tumuli. Although varying considerably in the size and number of the rooms one feature remained the same in all of them: the entrance of the east side was always found blocked and intact. And it was obvious that the plunderers had realised that beyond this blocking was an open court, or pit, and that the opening of the door would cause an inrush of debris into the tomb"."The few object and pottery left by the plunderers served to show us that these tombs were built for persons of considerable wealth, and were to be dated to the X-group period. The possibility of offerings, etc., left in the open court before the entrance persuaded us to risk a considerable sum of money to get to that entrance by the removal of the tumulus... And on November 10th we commenced the excavation of the Tomb No.2.""Some days were spent in the removal of the tumulus and by the end of a week a large pit was revealed which contained a vaulted chamber of mud brick. This chamber, which was connected with the main rooms of the tomb, had been spared by the plunderers and in it were found, comparatively undisturbed, a large amount of pottery and some leather bags containing dates.""Clearing the debris to the east of this pit we uncovered a ramp which led down from the surface to the entrance of the tomb. By November 23rd the bones of sacrificed horses with their silver trappings and harness were uncovered, and it was then that we realised the true value of the discovery. The excavation of Tomb No.3, which was completed early in the following month, yielded even richer rewards"."At Ballana and Qustul the method of burial and the design of the royal tombs was the same, varying only in the degree of richness and size, according to the importance of the owner. In the construction of the tombs the procedure was as follows: An inclined passage was cut in the hard alluvium leading down to a large pit and a series of brick rooms were constructed in this pit with a small open court into which the inclined passage opened. In some cases each of the brick rooms have been built in separate pits and are connected by short passages tunnelled in the alluvium. The roofing of each room was barrel-vaulted, and in the larger tombs the doors had stone lintels"."Due, no doubt, to the moisture of the ground at the bottom of the pits at Ballana the walls were built with stone foundations." It is evident that the owners of these tombs held to the Ancient Egyptian belief of the material survival after death of both animate and inanimate objects, for they buried with their dead wine and food, furniture, cooking utensils, jewels, weapons and tools and materials to make them, but in place of the ushabtis of the Egyptians they sacrificed their slaves and animals"."One room was usually reserved for the wine jars and drinking cups, and another was devoted to bronze and silver cooking utensils, lamps, jewels, weapons and tools. In the Tomb 80 at Ballana, for example, we found spears and axes together with metal working tools and iron ingots. In the larger tombs a separate chamber was reserved for the burial of the queen, who was undoubtedly sacrificed, with her attendant slaves. But in the smaller tombs the sacrificed queen was placed beside her consort.The king was placed in the chamber nearest the main entrance to the tomb, and it is evident that his installation was the last act before the final closing. His body was laid on a canopied wooden bier, below which were placed bronze and silver vessels for his immediate use. He was dressed in his royal regalia and weapons for his protection were left leaning against the foot of the bier, and at its head lay the sacrificed bodies of a male slave and an ox. An iron folding chair was frequently placed by the side of the bier. The entrance to the tomb was then blocked with bricks and stone and the owner's horses, camels, donkeys and dogs, together with their grooms and possibly soldiers, were then sacrificed in the courtyard and ramp. The animals were buried wearing their harnesses and saddles, the dogs in some cases had collars and leashes. The sacrificed humans met their deaths either by the cutting of the throat or by strangulation, and the animals were pole-axed. Finally the pit and the ramp were filled and a great earthen mound was raised over the tomb; in many cases offerings such as weapons, jewellery, vases, game etc., were buried in the mound. And at Ballana most of the mounds were covered with a layer of large schist pebbles"....
W.B. Emery, "The Royal Tombs of Ballana and Qustul", 1938.

La tumba de Mena

La TT69 en Sheij Abd el-Qurna (Sheikh Abd el-Qurna) pertenece al escriba de los campos del señor de las dos tierras del Alto y el Bajo Egipto, Menna.

Menna, también tenía el cargo de supervisor de los campos de Amon. Probablemente Menna supervisó las tierras que pertenecían al templo de Karnak y el estado de los graneros. Trabajó posiblemente midiendo campos, inspeccionando el trabajo de la tierra, y controlando que no hubiera defraudadores a la hora de la entrega de las cosechas.Menna vive durante la dinastía XVIII y probablemente trabajó con los dos faraones Tuthmosis IV y Amenhotep III.Estaba casado con Henuttawy (Henut-taui) y posiblemente tenian varios hijos, uno de ellos continuó con la profesión de su padre, y además tuvo tres hijas, una de las cuales fue Amenemwaskhet.

THE JUDGMENT OF THE DEAD II

the first part of it the deceased, after adjuring his heart, says, "May naught stand up to oppose me in the judgment; may there be no opposition to me in the presence of the sovereign princes; may there be no parting of thee from me in the presence of him that keepeth the Balance!... May the officers of the court of Osiris (in Egyptian Shenit), who form the conditions of the lives of men, not cause my name to stink! Let [the judgment] be satisfactory unto me, let the hearing be satisfactory unto me, and let me have joy of heart at the weighing of words. Let not that which is false be uttered against me before the Great God, the Lord of Amentet."
Now, although the papyrus upon, which this statement and prayer are found was written about two thousand years after Men-kau-Rā reigned, there is no doubt that they were copied from texts which were themselves copied at a much earlier period, and that the story of the finding of the text inscribed upon an iron slab is contemporary with its actual discovery by Herutātāf. It is not necessary to inquire here whether the word "find" (in Egyptian qem) means a genuine discovery or not, but it is clear that those who had the papyrus copied saw no absurdity or impropriety in ascribing the text to the period of Men-kau-Rā. Another text, which afterwards also became a chapter of the Book of the Dead, under the title "Chapter of not letting the heart of the deceased be driven away from him in the underworld," was inscribed on a coffin of the XIth dynasty, about B.C. 2500, and in it we have the following petition: "May naught stand up to oppose me in judgment in the presence of the lords of the trial (literally, 'lords of things'); let it not be said of me and of that which I have done, 'He hath done deeds against that which is very right and true'; may naught be against me in the presence of the Great God, the Lord of Amentet." From these passages we are right in assuming that before the end of the IVth dynasty the idea of being "weighed in the balance" was already evolved; that the religious schools of Egypt had assigned to a god the duty of watching the balance when cases were being tried; that this weighing in the balance took place in the presence of the beings called Shenit, who were believed to control the acts and deeds of men; that it was thought that evidence unfavourable to the deceased might be produced by his foes at the judgment; that the weighing took place in the presence of the Great God, the Lord of Amentet; and that the heart of the deceased might fail him either physically or morally. The deceased addresses his heart, calling it is "mother," and next identifies it with his ka or double, coupling the mention of the ka with the name of the god Khnemu: these facts are exceedingly important, for they prove that the deceased considered his heart to be the source of his life and being, and the mention of the god Khnemu takes the date of the composition back to a period coaeval with the beginnings of religious thought in Egypt. It was the god Khnemu who assisted Thoth in performing the commands of God at the creation, and one very interesting sculpture at Philae shows Khnemu in the act of fashioning man upon a potter's wheel. The deceased, in mentioning Khnemu's name, seems to invoke his aid in the judgment as fashioner of man and as the being who is in some respects responsible for the manner of his life upon earth.
In Chapter 30A there is no mention made of the "guardian of the balance," and the deceased says, "May naught stand up to oppose me in judgment in the presence of the lords of things!" The "lords of things" may be either the "lords of creation," i.e., the great cosmic gods, or the "lords of the affairs [of the hall of judgment] ," i.e., of the trial. In this chapter the deceased addresses not Khnemu, but "the gods who dwell in the divine clouds, and who are exalted by reason of their sceptres," that is to say, the four gods of the cardinal points, called Mestha, Hāpi Tuamutef, and Qebhsennuf, who also presided over the chief internal organs of the human body. Here, again, it seems as if the deceased was anxious to make these gods in some way responsible for the deeds done by him in his life, inasmuch as they presided, over the organs that were the prime movers of his actions. In any case, he considers them in, the light of intercessors, for he beseeches them to "speak fair words unto Rā" on his behalf, and to make him to prosper before the goddess Nehebka. In this case, the favour of Rā, the Sun-god, the visible emblem of the almighty and eternal God, is sought for, and also that of the serpent goddess, whose attributes are not yet accurately defined, but who has much to do with the destinies of the dead. No mention whatever is made of the Lord of Amentet--Osiris.
Before we pass to the consideration of the manner in which the judgment is depicted upon the finest examples of the illustrated papyri, reference must be made to an interesting vignette in the papyri of Nebseni and Amen-neb. In both of these papyri we see a figure of the deceased himself being weighed in the balance against his own heart in the presence of the god Osiris. It seems probable that a belief was current at one time in ancient Egypt concerning the possibility of the body being weighed against the heart, with the view of finding out if the former had obeyed the dictates of the latter; be that as it may, however, it is quite certain that this remarkable variant of the vignette of Chapter 30B had some special meaning, and, as it occurs in two papyri which date from the XVIIIth dynasty, we are justified in assuming that it represents a belief belonging to a much older period. The judgment here depicted must, in any case, be different from that which forms such a striking scene in the later illustrated papyri of the XVIIIth and following dynasties.
We have now proved that the idea of the judgment of the dead was accepted in religious writings as early as the IVth dynasty, about B.C. 3600, but we have to wait nearly two thousand years before we find it in picture form. Certain scenes which are found in the Book of the Dead as vignettes accompanying certain texts or chapters, e.g., the Fields of Hetep, or the Elysian Fields, are exceedingly old, and are found on sarcophagi of the XIth and XIIth dynasties; but the earliest picture known of the Judgment Scene is not older than the XVIIIth dynasty. In the oldest Theban papyri of the Book of the Dead no Judgment Scene is forthcoming, and when we find it wanting in such authoritative documents as the Papyrus of Nebseni and that of Nu, we must take it for granted that there was some reason for its omission. In the great illustrated papyri, in which, the Judgment Scene is given in full, it will be noticed that it comes at the beginning of the work, and that it is preceded by hymns and by a vignette. Thus, in the Papyrus of Ani, we have a hymn to Rā followed by a vignette representing the sunrise, and a hymn to Osiris; and in the Papyrus of Hunefer, though the hymns are different, the arrangement is the same. We are justified, then, in assuming that the hymns and the Judgment Scene together formed an introductory section to the Book of the Dead, and it is possible that it indicates the existence of the belief, at least during the period of the greatest power of the priests of Amen, from B.C. 1700 to B.C. 800, that the judgment of the dead for the deeds done in the body preceded the admission of the dead into the kingdom of Osiris. As the hymns which accompany the Judgment Scene are fine examples of a high class of devotional compositions, a few translations from some of them are here given.
EGYPTIAN IDEASOF THEFUTURE LIFE
BY E. A. WALLIS BUDGE

THE JUDGMENT OF THE DEAD I

The belief that the deeds done in the body would be subjected to an analysis and scrutiny by the divine powers after the death of a man belongs to the earliest period of Egyptian civilization, and this belief remained substantially the same in all generations. Though we have no information as to the locality where the Last Judgment took place, or whether the Egyptian soul passed into the judgment-hall immediately after the death of the body, or after the mummification was ended and the body was deposited in the tomb, it is quite certain that the belief in the judgment was as deeply rooted in the Egyptians as the belief in immortality. There seems to have been no idea of a general judgment when all those who had lived in the world should receive their reward for the deeds done in the body; on the contrary, all the evidence available goes to show that each soul was dealt with individually, and was either permitted to pass into the kingdom of Osiris and of the blessed, or was destroyed straightway. Certain passages in the texts seem to suggest the idea of the existence of a place for departed spirits wherein the souls condemned in the judgment might dwell, but it must be remembered that it was the enemies of Rā, the Sun-god, that inhabited this region; and it is impossible to imagine that the divine powers who presided over the judgment would permit the souls of the wicked to live after they had been condemned and to become enemies of those who were pure and blessed. On the other hand, if we attach any importance to the ideas of the Copts upon this subject, and consider that they represent ancient beliefs which they derived from the Egyptians traditionally, it must be admitted that the Egyptian underworld contained some region wherein the souls of the wicked were punished for an indefinite period. The Coptic lives of saints and martyrs are full of allusions to the sufferings of the damned, but whether the descriptions of these are due to imaginings of the mind of the Christian Egyptian or to the bias of the scribe's opinions cannot always be said. When we consider that the Coptic hell was little more than a modified form of the ancient Egyptian Amenti, or Amentet, it is difficult to believe that it was the name of the Egyptian underworld only which was borrowed, and that the ideas and beliefs concerning it which were held by the ancient Egyptians were not at the same time absorbed. Some Christian writers are most minute in their classification of the wicked in hell, as we may see from the following extract from the life of Pisentios, Bishop of Keft, in the VIIth century of our era. The holy man had taken refuge in a tomb wherein a number of mummies had been piled up, and when he had read the list of the names of the people who had been buried there he gave it to his disciple to replace. Then he addressed his disciple and admonished him to do the work of God with diligence, and warned him that every man must become even as were the mummies which lay before them. "And some," said he, "whose sins have been many are now in Amenti, others are in the outer darkness, others are in pits and ditches filled with fire, and others are in the river of fire: upon these last no one hath bestowed rest. And others, likewise, are in a place of rest, by reason of their good works." When the disciple had departed, the holy man began to talk to one of the mummies who had been a native of the town of Erment, or Armant, and whose father and mother had been called Agricolaos and Eustathia. He had been a worshipper of Poseidon, and had never heard that Christ had come into the world. "And," said he "woe, woe is me because I was born into the world. Why did not my mother's womb become my tomb? When, it became necessary for me to die, the Kosmokratôr angels were the first to come round about me, and they told me of all the sins which I had committed, and they said unto me, 'Let him that can save thee from the torments into which thou shalt be cast come hither.' And they had in their hands iron knives, and pointed goads which were like unto sharp spears, and they drove them into my sides and gnashed upon me with their teeth. When a little time afterwards my eyes were opened I saw death hovering about in the air in its manifold forms, and at that moment angels who were without pity came and dragged my wretched soul from my body, and having tied it under the form of a black horse they led me away to Amonti. Woe be unto every sinner like unto myself who hath been born into the world! O my master and father, I was then delivered into the hands of a multitude of tormentors who were without pity and who had each a different form. Oh, what a number of wild beasts did I see in the way! Oh, what a number of powers were there that inflicted punishment upon me! And it came to pass that when I had been cast into the outer darkness, I saw a great ditch which was more than two hundred cubits deep, and it was filled with reptiles; each reptile had seven heads, and the body of each was like unto that of a scorpion. In this place also lived the Great Worm, the mere sight of which terrified him that looked thereat. In his mouth he had teeth like unto iron stakes, and one took me and threw me to this Worm which never ceased to eat; then immediately all the [other] beasts gathered together near him, and when he had filled his mouth [with my flesh] , all the beasts who were round about me filled theirs." In answer to the question of the holy man as to whether he had enjoyed any rest or period without suffering, the mummy replied: "Yea, O my father, pity is shown unto those who are in torment every Saturday and every Sunday. As soon as Sunday is over we are cast into the torments which we deserve, so that we may forget the years which we have passed in the world; and as soon as we have forgotten the grief of this torment we are cast into another which is still more grievous."
Now, it is easy to see from the above description of the torments which the wicked were supposed to suffer, that the writer had in his mind some of the pictures with which we are now familiar, thanks to the excavation of tombs which has gone on in Egypt during the last few years; and it is also easy to see that he, in common with many other Coptic writers, misunderstood the purport of them. The outer darkness, i.e., the blackest place of all in the underworld, the river of fire, the pits of fire, the snake and the scorpion, and such like things, all have their counterparts, or rather originals, in the scenes which accompany the texts which describe the passage of the sun through the underworld during the hours of the night. Having once misunderstood the general meaning of such scenes, it was easy to convert the foes of Rā, the Sun-god, into the souls of the damned, and to look upon the burning up of such foes--who were after all only certain powers of nature personified--as the well-merited punishment of those who had done evil upon the earth. How far the Copts reproduced unconsciously the views which had been held by their ancestors for thousands of years cannot be said, but even after much allowance has been made for this possibility, there remains still to be explained a large number of beliefs and views which seem to have been the peculiar product of the Egyptian Christian imagination. It has been said above that the idea of the judgment of the dead is of very great antiquity in Egypt; indeed, it is so old that it is useless to try to ascertain the date of the period when it first grew up. In the earliest religious texts known to us, there are indications that the Egyptians expected a judgment, but they are not sufficiently definite to argue from; it is certainly doubtful if the judgment was thought to be as thorough and as searching then as in the later period. As far back as the reign of Men-kau-Rā, the Mycerinus of the Greeks, about B.C. 3600, a religious text, which afterwards formed chapter 30B of the Book of the Dead, was found inscribed on an iron slab; in the handwriting of the god Thoth, by the royal son or prince Herutātāf. The original purpose of the composition of this text cannot be said, but there is little doubt that it was intended, to benefit the deceased in the judgment, and, if we translate its title literally, it was intended to prevent his heart from "falling away from him in the underworld." In

Dig Turns Up Surprises And Questions From Ancient Greece

A little more than 100 years ago, two teams from the Greek Archaeological Service investigated the site of Mt. Lykaion, thought to be the birthplace of the god Zeus. Archaeologists found pottery, clay figures and animal bones at an altar of the Greek god, and were able to uncover remains of numerous buildings, including the hippodrome—a stadium for horses and chariot teams—an athletic stadium and bathhouse.
But a more recent excavation has uncovered evidence that could change how researchers understand the history of the cult of Zeus. That’s beacause a research team has found pottery remains and evidence of activity from an ash alter they believe was used as early as 3,000 BCE—about 1,000 years before Greeks began worshipping the god Zeus.
“That’s why we’re so excited,” says David Gilman Romano, a senior research scientist in the Penn Museum’s Mediterranean Section and one of the Mt. Lykaion site’s co-directors. “We didn’t realize that we would be finding things this early.”
Romano and the team don’t know exactly how the altar was used prior to worship of Zeus and if it was used in connection with natural phenomena such as wind, rain, light or earthquakes. The findings, Romano says, “have created so many new ideas that we’re still recovering from it.”
Among the items uncovered at the altar was an Arcadian League silver stater (pictured above) and a Late Minoan rock crystal seal bearing an image of a bull. This latter finding suggests an early connection between the Minoan isle of Crete and Arcadia—the Greek region that is home to Mt. Lykaion. Romano explains that two myths from ancient literature persist about the birthplace of Zeus. The first is that he was born on Crete—either Mt. Dikte or Mt. Ida—and the second is that he was born on Mt. Lykaion.
Centuries ago, people made a harrowing pilgrimage to this festival center, which held athletic games, much like the site of Olympus located only 22 miles away. Arcadia, explains Romano, is believed to be the earliest settlement of mainland Greece. “[Researchers] always thought the essence of Greek religion comes from Arcadia.”
Romano notes some similarities between the sites of Olympus and Mt. Lykaion—both have ash altars and ancient athletic games. “There may have been some imitation of one site,” he says. “We rather think we had the first one.”
The remote mountainous site has long been considered an important pan-Hellenic sanctuary site but wasn’t fully explored until Romano did a comprehensive topographical and architectural survey in 1996.
In the current project, which began in 2004 (excavations began in 2006), researchers have used digital cartography, geographic information systems, geophysical ground and geological surveys and remote sensing to uncover the site’s buried past. In the summer of 2007, 47 people from Greece, the University of Arizona and Penn dug 17 trenches, one of which held the pottery remains indicating activity at Mt. Lykaion as early as 3,000 BCE. Key to the project’s success, says Romano, is the collaborative nature of the work. “[We made sure] to collaborate with our Greek colleagues on everything and not just have a one-sided project,” he says.
Romano got in touch with several colleagues to aid in the excavation of the large site, including co-director Michalis Petropoulos, chief of the archaeological region, and Mary Voyatzis C’78, a University of Arizona classics professor whose father just happened to be born in the tiny village close to Mt. Lykaion. “They consider her to be a local,” Romano says.
This summer, Romano will return to the site with Penn students for more excavation, where he hopes to gain a better understanding of the building plans and expand the first trench in a number of directions. Getting to the mountainous site will be much easier, due to the construction of a new road. When Romano visited the site in 1977 for his dissertation, he had to hike three hours with his then-fiancé and friend to reach the ruins.
Despite Mt. Lykaion’s remote location, Romano knew he’d be back. “It was so beautiful and so quiet,” he says. “I wanted to come back here and work here.”
Source: By Heather A. Davis of UPENN. edu