Ancient Egyptian Civilization PDF

## CAPITOLO 1 Popoli e culture del Vicino Oriente ### LEZIONE 2 ##### Il deserto e l'acqua ###### L'Egitto dei faraoni **1 Un fiume, un Paese** **CONCETTI CHIAVE:** The civilization of Egypt arose in the 4th millennium BC., along the final stretch of the Nile: the floods of the river, which made...

## CAPITOLO 1 Popoli e culture del Vicino Oriente ### LEZIONE 2 ##### Il deserto e l'acqua ###### L'Egitto dei faraoni **1 Un fiume, un Paese** **CONCETTI CHIAVE:** The civilization of Egypt arose in the 4th millennium BC., along the final stretch of the Nile: the floods of the river, which made the land fertile, allowed the development of agricultural communities. Around 3200 BC. Egypt was unified into a kingdom whose history is divided into three periods characterized by a strong central power (called Ancient, Middle and New Kingdom), alternated with periods of political fragmentation (intermediate periods). The Nile and its beneficial floods: From Lake Victoria, in the heart of Africa, rises one of the longest rivers on Earth, the Nile, which - after traveling about 6,700 kilometers - flows into the Mediterranean Sea, dividing into several branches and forming a vast delta. It is in the last stretch of the Nile that the civilization of ancient Egypt developed, along the approximately 1,200 kilometers of the narrow but fertile valley crossed by the great river. *GEO STORY A “closed” and resource-rich region.* The climate of Egypt is arid. The Nile was the only abundant source of water and, together, the main route of communication: without the Nile, Egypt would have been a desert without life. Every summer, swollen by the rains of the equatorial area, the Nile overflowed and flooded a large part of the valley, depositing a mud very rich in organic elements, *limo*, which allowed to obtain more crops of cereals in the same year. It was on this narrow green strip that Egyptian civilization was born and flourished. The development of water regulation techniques in Egypt: The first groups of farmers threw seeds of wheat and barley into the *limo* deposited by the river: they raised sheep, goats, cattle and (for transport) donkeys; they wove linen and modeled vases. Thus, the first stable agro-pastoral communities formed. The Nile floods, however, while more predictable and regular than those of the Tigris and Euphrates, sometimes became too abundant and caused damaging floods to crops, sometimes they were too scarce and caused severe famines. Over time, it is likely that the increase in population has led to an increased demand for agricultural goods and therefore pushed to develop some techniques for exploiting the waters of the river: so they began to build dams, dikes and canals, to control its course and expand cultivated areas. The birth of a unified state: During the 4th millennium BC., in Egypt, there was a more and more pronounced specialization of techniques and professions, writing appeared and some villages became cities and local states were formed. The conflicts between them led to the formation of political entities increasingly large, until the country was divided into two kingdoms: Lower Egypt (north) and Upper Egypt (south). Around 3200 BC. a king of Upper Egypt, who tradition called Menes (or Narmer), conquered the north and became the first “king of Upper and Lower Egypt”, according to the formula that from then on would define the power of Egyptian rulers for millennia: Egypt had thus become a unified state. **Le fasi della storia egizia:** The history of ancient Egypt is traditionally divided according to the dynasties that succeeded on the throne since the time of Menes until the 4th century BC. This long arc of time is divided into three main periods, characterized by a strong central power and separated one from another by periods of crisis and fragmentation. After a period of formation of the state entity called *protodynastic*, including the 1st and 2nd Dynasty (3000-2686 BC., approx.), we distinguish the Ancient Kingdom (2686-2180 BC., approx.), which includes the pharaohs of the 3rd-6th Dynasty; the First Intermediate Period (7th-10th Dynasty); the Middle Kingdom (2055-1775 BC., approx.), which groups together the dynasties from the 11th to the 14th; the Second Intermediate Period (15th-17th Dynasty); finally the New Kingdom (1550-1070 BC., approx.), which is identified with the pharaohs of the 18th-20th Dynasty and which represents the period of greatest splendor. With the end of the New Kingdom began the irreversible decline of Egypt: after a Third Intermediate Period (during which the 21st-25th Dynasty reigned, between 1070 and 747 BC.), Egyptian rulers alternated with others imposed by the new dominators, first the Assyrians and then the Persians, until the conquest of the country by Alexander the Great, which took place in 332 BC. *chapter 5, lesson 2.* *Inevitably, many of these dates must be considered approximate.* **2 The society and its ruler** **CONCETTI CHIAVE:** The society of ancient Egypt was organized into closed and hierarchical social classes. At the top there was the pharaoh, the king considered of divine nature and endowed with absolute power, assisted by a head of administration. The most prominent groups were the scribes, employed in the administrative system, and the priests. At the base of society we find farmers, artisans and soldiers, all at the service of the pharaoh. The pharaoh: Egyptian society was strongly hierarchical, to the point that the social classes, in the earliest times, were rigidly closed and distinct. At the top was the pharaoh, who enjoyed absolute power over the whole territory and over the entire population of Egypt: he was not a mere representative of divinity on Earth, but a true god, son of Ra, the Sun god, to the point that the Egyptian one is usually considered the first *theocracy* in history. By virtue of this divine origin, the pharaoh had the task of preserving on Earth the order of the universe, established at the time of creation and including the laws of nature, the movement of celestial bodies, the succession of seasons and the annual floods of the Nile, as well as the social and political structure of the kingdom. Moreover, the pharaoh intercedes with the other gods, performing the offerings and rites prescribed, so that they may grant prosperity to his country and his people. The bureaucracy and the scribes: Egypt knew the most articulated administration of antiquity. At the direct orders of the pharaoh was a kind of prime minister, often referred to as *visir*, who controlled the administration of justice, the treasury and tax revenues, and supervised public works. He had at his service many officials, distributed in a hierarchical order in central offices and in the various districts of the country. Since all public acts were carefully recorded and archived, scribes played a key role in bureaucracy. Present at court as well in the most distant offices, in the tax collectors, in the fields to census livestock or measure crops, they possessed essential knowledge, which guaranteed them prestige and privileges: the knowledge of writing. The hieroglyphic writing: The signs of the Egyptian writing system are called *hieroglyphs*, a term deriving from the Greek *hierós* ("sacred") and *glypho* ("incise") and literally means *sacred signs carved*: they were attributed with a divine nature. In the beginning, as it happened with the Sumerian pictograms, the hieroglyphs expressed an idea of something (object, animal, person or action): the drawing of a house was to mean "house", the image of a man facing a wall was to mean "build" etc. In this sense, the hieroglyphs were *ideograms*. Over time, however, many signs were used to indicate the sounds needed to form the name of the object represented: for example, "arm" was said *remen*, and to write it, they did not draw an arm but a mouth (*re*) and a chessboard (*men*), which in this case indicated sounds and did not have the meaning of ideograms. There was, in short, an evolution towards *phonetic writing*, based precisely on *phonemes*, that is, the sounds of which the words of a given language are made up. The meaning of hieroglyphs, remained a mystery for a long time, was deciphered thanks to the so-called *Rosetta Stone*, which takes its name from the location in Lower Egypt where it was found in 1799. This is a stone slab of the 2nd century BC, which bears a text written in three writing systems: hieroglyphic, demotic (a type of simplified writing that spread in Egypt from the 7th century BC) and Greek alphabet. Through comparing the three texts, the Frenchman Jean-François Champollion was able to understand the value of hieroglyphs both as ideograms and as phonetic signs. The priestly class: The scribes shared the "power of writing " with another very important social class: the priests. This group was in turn hierarchical: within it, the low clergy, who were responsible for funeral ceremonies for common people, did not really count, but the powerful elite composed of the high priests of the major temples, who kept the doctrines and cults, passed them on to carefully selected disciples, they observed the stars and disciplined the work necessary to regulate the flow and outflow of the Nile. Moreover, they led the temples as economic institutions endowed with large land assets, with many farmers at their service. The basis of the economy: farmers, artisans and soldiers: The vast majority of the Egyptian population was composed of farmers, who produced all that was necessary for the sustenance of the country: wheat and barley, meat, linen for fabrics, papyrus used for river boats, for ropes and as writing material. They were required to perform a range of services, even non-agricultural, to the pharaoh or the temple: it was mostly they, who built dikes and canals, kept them in good condition, working in construction sites for the pharaoh's own work, like the pyramids. In return, they received a small payment in kind, because in Egypt, as in Mesopotamia, money was not used and exchanges were based on fixed equivalences (a certain measure of wheat corresponded to a given amount of meat or to a set number of hours of work). Next to the farmers, the work of artisans was also important, both in the making of jewelry for the privileged classes and, for example, in the construction and maintenance of tombs and their furnishings. Conversely, throughout Egyptian history, the army had little weight: it was mostly composed of mercenaries recruited from neighboring regions or even from farmers, who had to participate in the war as one of the many services to which they were obliged. The scribe, a prestigious profession: Scribes owed their prestige, in addition to their role in state administration, to the complexity of Egyptian writing, which required years of study: only a few learned it. In the picture, a polychrome statue of a scribe, dating back to the 3rd millennium BC. *Offers to the temple: A woman who brings offerings is depicted in this statuette from the Middle Kingdom* The position of women: Talking about a phenomenon that spans three millennia, as is the case of the position of women in Egyptian society, is possible only in general terms. However, it is worth noting that the condition of women in Egypt was probably the most advanced within the Near East. Already in Mesopotamian society, women enjoyed property rights, but in Egypt, they could also enter into contracts, appear in court as a victim, assume the guardianship of a son, inherit the paternal property and leave it in turn to their heirs. It should also be remembered that in Egypt women were not *a priori* excluded from the title of pharaoh: this is the case of Sobekneferu in the 18th century BC.; of Hatshepsut, who upon the death of her husband Thutmose II (1492-1479 BC) ruled first on behalf of her stepson and then independently for about 15 years; and finally of Nefertiti, in the 14th century BC. *▸ p. 51.* Rare cases, certainly, in 3,000 years of history, but unique in the panorama of the Near East. **3 A long history** **CONCETTI CHIAVE:** The Ancient Kingdom was characterized by the attempt of pharaohs to strengthen their own authority over local powers and by the construction of grandiose buildings, such as the pyramids. The Middle Kingdom saw the expansion of Egypt to the East and South and the reclamation of new territories. The New Kingdom was the period of maximum expansion of Egypt and an era of cultural splendor; repeated internal invasions and independent movements inside it led to its end. The unification of the kingdom: From a historical point of view, the *protodynastic* period and the early centuries of the Ancient Kingdom were marked by the difficult process of unification of Egypt: the first pharaohs had to fight against the particularism of the governors of the districts into which the kingdom was divided and only slowly managed to bring under their control the entire territory, sometimes leading expeditions to harm the neighboring populations. Between 2700 and 2500 BC., Egypt expanded to Nubia and established its control over Libya and the Sinai peninsula, territories important for their resources and for the trafficking of Egyptian merchants. *The long story of Egypt compared with Mesopotamian civilizations* **The monuments of Giza:** The complex of Giza was built during the 4th Dynasty (2613-2494). Of the three pyramids that make up the complex, to which there were other smaller ones, dedicated to queens, princesses and dignitaries of the court, we see in the photograph that of Chefren, which is not the highest - surpassed by that of Cheops - but it has the peculiarity of being, so to speak, guarded by a colossal Sphinx statue, a creature with the body of a lion and the face of a man. **Monumental architecture:** What characterizes the civilization from the first dynasties is *monumental architecture*. Impressive temple structures were built, but the greatest efforts were concentrated in the construction of impressive burial complexes. The work carried out by farmers, especially during flood periods, when it was not possible to work the fields, allowed the construction of monumental works. The pharaoh Zoser (2667-2648 BC. approx.), of the 3rd Dynasty, had his enormous burial complex built, in which a grand stepped pyramid stood out, in Saqqara (a few kilometers south of Cairo), near Memphis, the city where he had moved the capital of the kingdom. Snefru, founder of the 4th Dynasty, dedicated immense human and economic resources to the construction of three pyramids and introduced innovations to this type of structure: we passed from the stepped pyramid to the pointed one with smooth oblique walls, more familiar to us. His son Cheops (2589-2566 BC. approx.) and his successors Chefren and Mycerinus were not far behind, and built their pyramids near the modern location of Giza. *STEM* *The pyramids of Giza, p. 60.* **The crisis of the Ancient Kingdom:** With the end of the 5th Dynasty, however, economic problems began to manifest themselves: tax revenues declined, as the goods and agricultural products required from the population as payment of taxes concentrated in the hands of local officials and enriched the district governors or temple institutions. From 2200 BC. approx., in large regions of the country, the control exercised by the pharaoh became increasingly weak. The governors tended to become independent, to the point of inheriting their position and acquiring autonomous armies. The crisis of central power began during the 6th Dynasty and worsened considerably during the next two dynasties. A time of great political instability followed, and in some moments also of open civil war (First Intermediate Period), which ended when one of the governors of the city of Thebes (corresponding to the area of modern Luxor), Montuhotep II, managed to restore the political unity of Egypt around 2055 BC. **The Middle Kingdom:** With the reign of Montuhotep II (2061-2004 BC. approx.) a new period of well-being began, the Middle Kingdom. In this phase, the administration was restructured in depth, reducing the number of local officials and making the central control over their work more stringent. The newfound unity of the country was also expressed in a resumption of military expansion to the northeast (Sinai, Palestine, Syria) and south (Nubia), which culminated in the important conquests of Nubian territories carried out by pharaoh Sesostris III (1878-1842 BC. approx.). His successor, Amenemhet III, is attributed with the completion of a land reclamation and irrigation project in the region of Fayyum, not far from the Nile delta, which involved an expansion of arable land: a probable sign of the dynamism of the Egyptian population, whose mouths to feed must have increased. The political stability that characterized the Middle Kingdom was accompanied by a refined cultural life, which saw the flourishing of artistic and literary activities. **The invasion of the Hyksos:** Shortly after the apogee of the Middle Kingdom, however, a new period of crisis opened, determined by internal rivalry in the court environment and by the occurrence of repeated usurpations of the throne, but above all by the infiltration into the country of populations of Asian origin, the *Hyksos* (in the Egyptian language, “kings of foreign countries”). Around 1700 BC., starting from the region of the Nile delta, they extended their control over the whole of Egypt, giving rise to a real dynasty, the 15th. The *Hyksos* eventually came to be fascinated by Egyptian civilization: they imitated their art, their rulers took on the traditional titles of the pharaohs and wrote their own names in hieroglyphs, they introduced their own cults but adopted Seth as the national god. It was the *Hyksos*, moreover, who spread the use of horses and chariots in Egypt, which had played a key role in their conquest. **The reconquest of the power and the New Kingdom:** The Egyptian princes who controlled the Theban area, in Upper Egypt, however, managed to maintain their independence from the *Hyksos*. They gave rise to two dynasties, the 16th and 17th, and tried repeatedly to expand their control over the neighboring regions. It was one of these Theban lords who undertook the military campaign that finally led his sons, Kamose and Amosis, to drive out the *Hyksos* from Egyptian territory: it was around 1550 BC. and with pharaoh Amosis began the 18th Dynasty and the New Kingdom, the period of greatest splendor in Egyptian history. **Nefertiti and the worship of Aton:** *She must have been beautiful. At least, that's how she appears in her most famous portrait, a bust found in the city of Akhetaton (modern Tell el-Amarna) and now housed in a museum in Berlin. Moreover, the contemporaries spoke of her as "beautiful in face, lady of joy, endowed with favors, great in love."* *In the middle of the 14th century BC., Nefertiti was the most powerful woman in Egypt and shared with her husband Amenophis IV the attempt to promote a complex religious reform, which aimed to reduce the power of the priests (a hint of the tensions that always existed between the pharaoh and the powerful priestly class). Amenophis imposed the worship of the god Aton, the solar disk, abolishing the worship of the other gods and especially that of the supreme god Amun.* *Some even report that after her husband's death she remained for some years to reign alone, an exceptional case, although not unique, of a woman who has held the role of pharaoh. And even the future new king, Tutankhamun, in order to legitimize his power had to marry one of Nefertiti's daughters.* *The reform was in any case a failure and the queen disappeared from the historical stage: neither her tomb nor her mummy have been identified yet. The portraits remain, to restore the physiognomy of the woman who was the wife of “He who pleases Aton”.* Thebes became the capital of reunified Egypt, while new campaigns of conquest were launched both towards Palestine and towards Nubia. Under the son and successor of Amosis, Amenophis I, Egypt also experienced a real cultural renaissance. It was probably thanks to the fame he achieved in life that, shortly after his death, he rose to the role of official deity and was paid a cult so strong and rooted that it survived for several centuries. Thutmose I is instead credited with the inauguration of the famous Valley of the Kings, in Thebes, the burial place of the pharaohs of the New Kingdom. The subsequent kings - above all Thutmose III - led armies in numerous expeditions, aimed mainly at the current territories of Syria and Iraq, and several times reached the banks of the Euphrates, raising monumental inscriptions commemorating their successes. *LOCATION* For a long time no foreign army could approach Egypt. Economic, artistic and literary life was blooming, and the immense riches linked to war booty allowed the construction of grandiose temples near the capital. The failed reform of Amenophis IV: Around 1350 BC. a king of the 18th Dynasty, Amenophis IV, was a promoter together with Queen Nefertiti of a religious reform that revealed tensions always existing between the pharaoh and the powerful priestly class *WOMEN IN HISTORY.* Amenophis imposed the cult of the new god Aton, the solar disk, changed his name to Akhenaten ("He who pleases Aton") and built a new capital Akhetaten ("The Horizon of Aton") at modern Tell el-Amarna. Perhaps Amenophis wanted to introduce a monotheistic religion, centered on the cult of a single deity; certainly he wanted to limit the powers of the Theban priests, who had managed to impose their god, Amun, throughout the country *p. 54.* We know in fact that the reform met with strong opposition from the Theban priests, who feared losing their role and their privileges. In fact, after the death of Amenophis IV, his successor Tutankhamun (1333-1323 BC.) immediately restored traditional cults and the priests had the pharaoh’s “heretical” name erased from all inscriptions. **The battle of Kadesh between reality and propaganda** *The pharaoh Ramses II wanted the battle of Kadesh to be depicted on the reliefs of five monuments built by him. In the picture we see the relief of the Ramesseum, a temple located near the capital Thebes: as we can see in the reconstruction (below), the pharaoh is depicted with larger proportions, while he crushes the enemy horsemen on his chariot, a war machine used by both Egyptians and Hittites.* *The victory had thus been so triumphal to deserve such a celebration? In reality, it was not so; indeed, the Egyptians had encountered great difficulties and the clash had ended without any victor. We are therefore faced with a case of intentional alteration of historical reality, dictated by obvious propagandistic reasons.* **The age of Ramses II** With Ramses II (1279-1213 BC. approx.), pharaoh of the 19th Dynasty, Egypt reached a new peak in artistic culture, of which there are still traces in the myriad of palaces and temples built by the king. However, it was also a period of hard military clashes, especially with the Hittites (▸ lesson 4), who from their base in Anatolia had come to dispute with Egypt the Syrian-Palestinian region. In 1275 BC. the Egyptians faced the Hittites with uncertain results near the Syrian city of Kadesh. A few years after this clash, mutual recognition between the two powers was reached. With the death of Ramses II the last age of splendor of Egypt also came to an end **The decline** Around 1200 BC. other movements of peoples shook the entire Near East, and Egypt was repeatedly attacked by new invaders, the so-called *Sea Peoples*, who we will discuss later (lesson 4). Ramses III had to deal with this dangerous threat and celebrated in the walls of his own funeral temple, near Thebes, the defeat of the new enemies. However, from that moment on, Egypt found itself facing repeated attempts to conquer by neighboring peoples or state entities. The pharaoh's political authority was weakened by internal resistance and by the independent movements of a priestly class now capable of usurping privileges and royal powers. Ramses XI was the last pharaoh to be buried in the Valley of the Kings: it was 1070 BC. and thus the New Kingdom came to an end. During the Third Intermediate Period, Egypt was ruled by dynasties of Libyan and Nubian origin, and in 671 BC. it was conquered by the Assyrians (▸ lesson 4), who had become in the meantime rulers of Mesopotamia. Independence was regained shortly after by Psammetichus (664-610 BC. approx.), who founded a new dynasty, but it was the last period of prosperity and autonomy of a country that was no longer able to compete with the emerging powers. Between 525 and 404 BC. Egypt underwent two Persian dominations, interspersed with the last brief indigenous dynasties. Finally, in 332 BC. it was conquered by Alexander the Great (chapter 5, lesson 2). **The lesson in brief** **The Nile river:** *guarantees* *fertility of the ground* *which enables the development of the Egyptian civilization* *characterized by* *strict social structure* *where you can find a wide administrative apparatus (scribes)* *a powerful priestly class* *farmers and artisans dependent on the pharaoh* *theocratic regime* *that is* *the pharaoh (the king endowed with absolute power) is considered a god* *three phases of political unity* *and cultural development* *(Ancient, Middle and New Kingdom)* *alternating with* *phases of crisis and political fragmentation* *(intermediate periods)* **Where and how did the Kingdom of Egypt form?** In Egypt, the presence of the Nile favored the emergence of agricultural communities: the floods of the river, in fact, deposit on the ground a fertile mud, *limo*. In the 4th millennium BC., these communities gathered in the kingdoms of Lower and Upper Egypt. Around 3200 BC. a unified kingdom was born. **How was Egyptian society organized?** The pharaoh, or the king of Egypt, was endowed with absolute power and was considered of divine nature (one speaks therefore of theocracy). The pharaoh was assisted by the *visir*, head of the administrative apparatus, of which the scribes formed part. They enjoyed prestige because they knew writing (hieroglyphic). The priestly class was very powerful. The basis of society was made up of farmers and artisans, dependent on the pharaoh. **What phases marked the history of Egypt?** The history of Egypt is marked by three phases of political unity and cultural development, alternating with periods of crisis (intermediate periods). The three phases are: the Ancient Kingdom (2686-2180 BC.), in which royal power consolidated; the Middle Kingdom (2055-1775 BC.), a period of territorial expansion and commercial development ended with the arrival from Asia of the *Hyksos*, who occupied the north of the country; the New Kingdom (1550-1070 BC), an era of cultural splendor that saw the maximum extension of the kingdom. In this phase, Egypt entered into conflict with the Hittites and confronted them in the Battle of Kadesh (1275 BC.). The invasions of the *Sea Peoples* (1200 BC. approx) and the internal fragility caused the crisis of the kingdom, which was then conquered by the Assyrians (671 BC.), by the Persians (525 BC.) and by Alexander the Great (332 BC.). **The face of the Sphinx:** This black granite Sphinx has the face of Pharaoh Amenemhet III (Middle Kingdom, XII Dynasty) ## CAPITOLO 1 Popoli e culture del Vicino Oriente ### LEZIONE 3 ##### Tremila anni di civiltà ###### Religione, arte and knowledge of the Egyptians **1 The sky of the Egyptians** **CONCETTI CHIAVE:** The Egyptians venerated many gods, originally imagined with animal likenesses; among these, the Sun god Ra assumed particular importance, later identified with Amun, the god venerated by the priests of Thebes and by the pharaoh. The belief in life after death explains the great importance given to funerary rites, the most characteristic of which was embalming. Many gods and many cults: The prestige of the priestly class and the divine dignity attributed to the pharaoh make it clear how central religion was to the life of ancient Egypt. The Egyptian pantheon presented itself as very crowded, with hundreds of deities to whom different beliefs, sometimes contradictory, were linked, due to the presence of numerous local cults. However, Egypt also had a state religion based on the gods of major cities and temples, or alternately favored by this or that pharaoh, who became national deities. Initially, the Egyptians attributed animistic forms to deities: they worshiped the crocodile, the cat, the ibis, the ox (Apis), the jackal (Anubis). Later, natural elements were deified like the Nile and the stars, first of all the Sun. In the Ancient Kingdom, the precedence was assumed by the Sun god Ra, whose cult was spread by the priests of the city of Heliopolis. Ra, who is reborn every day to bring light and life to men, was conceived as the creator and the governor of the universe; later, however, priests and pharaohs of Thebes imposed their god, Amun, and the two deities ended up being identified. From Ra and Amun emerged a single divine figure: the Sun god Amun-Ra. The myth of Osiris and Isis: A widely diffused and vibrant cult throughout Egyptian history was that of the god Osiris and Isis, his sister and wife. This relationship echoed the custom of pharaohs to marry a woman from their own family, often the sister, probably in the belief that this way they could pass on the divine nature of their parents. According to the myth, Osiris is killed and dismembered by his wicked brother Seth; Isis, then, recovers the scattered limbs of her husband, reassembles the body using embalming and restores to him his breath of life. Osiris, resurrected, has a son from Isis, Horus (represented with the features of a falcon), who avenges his father by killing Seth, while Osiris himself becomes the god of the afterlife and the judge of the dead. The myth of Osiris therefore speaks of the alternation of life and death as a balance that governs the universe, but it also represents the certainty of life after death. Embalming, a symbolic rite of Egyptian civilization: The treatment of dead bodies, and in particular the practice of embalming, represents an important aspect of Egyptian culture, of which the story of Osiris is a real “founding myth”. The deceased was shaved and washed carefully; then, part of the brain and entrails was extracted. After being subjected to a process of dehydration, cleaned and sprinkled with balms and aromatic ointments, the body was finally wrapped in bandages. **The weighing of souls:** *This papyrus from the 13th century B.C., is taken from the Book of the Dead, a collection of funeral formulas that aimed to help the deceased on his journey to the afterlife. The scene depicted shows the "weighing of souls", that is, the moment of judgment: on the two scales were placed the heart of the deceased and a feather, symbol of the goddess of justice Maat: if the two elements remained in balance, the deceased was safe.* **Preserving the body for the afterlife:** But why reserve such treatment for the deceased? In the Egyptian conception of the afterlife, what survives is the *ka*, a kind of "double" or vital principle that every human being possesses from birth. The *ka* resides in the tomb and after death leads an existence very similar to that of the Earth: therefore, it needs food, drink, clothes, ornaments, jewelry, weapons and, above all, material support, the body. This explains the importance given by the Egyptians to funeral rites, the pomp of tombs and the wealth of funerary goods (at least for the upper classes), as well as the custom of preserving the body from decomposition through the complex and meticulous process of embalming. In the early phases of Egyptian civilization, the afterlife life was attributed only to the pharaoh. From the Middle Kingdom onwards, however, the belief spread that everyone was granted a form of life after death, but an element of judgment was also introduced: in order to travel the path that leads from earthly life to rebirth, indicated by the myth of Osiris, one must have lived a righteous life. **2 Art and its religious function:** **CONCETTI CHIAVE:** Egyptian art had a destination almost exclusively religious and obeyed rigid compositional rules, focused on geometric shapes. In funerary architecture, we witness an evolution from the *mastaba* (single-story building) to the pyramids, reserved for the pharaoh. The purpose of Egyptian art: Egyptian art was closely linked to religion: it therefore, more than aiming for the search for formal beauty, had mainly a ritual function. Regardless of the subject depicted, sculptures and paintings were created not so much for the homes of the living, but for temples and for tombs; even battle scenes were depicted on the walls of temples, and it is still in the tombs of the nobles that we find images of everyday life. As a result, Egyptian artists were bound to a series of rules that remained unchanged for three millennia. Figures in the round had to be upright and symmetrical. The position of feet and arms, hairstyles, clothes and ornaments all obeyed precise figurative norms, and the proportions between the various parts had to follow predetermined proportions. Representations of kings, nobles and dignitaries are marked by a rigid stillness, while a more free and lively style emerges in those of servants and workers. The preference for geometric shapes characterizes paintings, as well as *bas-reliefs*, where human figures have their torso depicted from the front, and the head and legs in profile. *Hatshepsut, model pharaoh: Among the few women who held the role of pharaoh was Hatshepsut, here depicted in the typical pose of the pharaoh despite her very particular condition*. **The mastabas:** The oldest Egyptian funerary buildings were shaped like parallelepipeds; the burial chamber was underground, while the building on the surface (in the picture on the right) was divided into four rooms, which housed statues and portraits of the deceased. A *false door* (on the left) symbolized a passage to the afterlife, surmounted by a slab with the name of the deceased. In front of it were left offerings of goods useful for life after death. **From the mastabas to the pyramid:** The oldest type of Egyptian burial is the *mastaba*, a single-story building with slightly inclined outer walls; inside, the *mastaba* had corridors and rooms that reproduced the structure of the living’s homes, and housed statues and offerings, as well as - naturally - the sarcophagus, placed at the bottom of a well. Rich private citizens continued to build *mastabas*, while the pharaohs moved on to monumental tombs, sometimes cyclopean: the pyramids. The construction of the pyramids was a collective endeavor, requiring years and years of work, and employed thousands of people like artisans, workers and, above all, farmers, who were required to take part. Symbol of the king's power and of his divine nature, the pyramid was the place where he led his afterlife existence, continuing to protect his subjects. During the New Kingdom, the pharaohs adopted a new type of burial, consisting of a complex of underground chambers dug into the rock, as in the case of tombs in the Valley of the Kings. **The houses and the palaces:** The monuments reached us today are above all sacral buildings, temples and tombs built in stone; there is no trace left of the inhabitants’ homes, neither of the royal palaces, nor of the homes of the nobles and senior officials of the kingdom. The reason is simple: in all these cases, bricks made of clay mixed with straw, which were dried in the sun, were used. a building material, which clearly has not survived the passage of time. However, we know that Egyptian homes, usually two-story, were coated with white plaster, with windows screened with grilles, in order to keep the interior cool and filter the sunlight. The walls were often decorated with frescoes in bright colors; furniture was simple but well-designed and functional; stools and beds had feather cushions, although the Egyptians, to sleep, used wooden headrests: many have been found in tombs. **The working of metals and glass:** The Egyptians reached a high level of quality even with the making of ornaments and decorative objects, or even for everyday use: we know this, even in this case, thanks to the finds in tombs. Techniques like the working of metals, which came from Mesopotamia, were perfected in Egypt itself. The Sinai and Nubia provided copper in abundance, while the working of bronze and iron, due to the lack of raw materials, spread later. The rich gold deposits of Nubia and of the eastern desert provided the pharaohs with an excellent means of exchange: the caravans that made the shuttle between Egypt and the capitals of Western Asia left with gold and returned laden with luxury handicrafts, metals and precious stones. Egyptian craftsmen also refined the technique of making opaque glass. This material was often used in inlay work on jewelry, necklaces and furniture. **3 Literature and scientific knowledge:** **CONCETTI CHIAVE:** Egyptian literature is very rich and varied in its genres: religious works, historical chronicles, fables, love lyrics, collections of maxims and even narrative works. The Egyptians put their mathematical and geometric knowledge to the solution of practical problems, and possessed advanced knowledge in astronomy and medicine. Literary genres: Egypt has produced a very rich literature and includes various genres. Many religious works have reached us, such as writings dedicated to the worship of the dead (*Texts of the Pyramids* and *The Book of the Dead*), chronicles of pharaohs' achievements, moral fables, love lyrics, collections of maxims, proverbs and precepts, often attributed to some sage of the past