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Objectives

In 1979, Michael Hoffman wrote one of the first serious syntheses of the Prehistoric and Predynastic periods of Egypt in “Before the Pharaohs”, a pioneering book that consolidated both the available data and the work that had gone into extracting it from the ground. At that time he wrote: “Ironically, despite the 150-year existence of the science of Egyptology and widespread public interest in the spectacular discoveries, scholarly writings, and occasionally heated feuds of archaeologists, no comprehensive account of Egyptian prehistory has appeared to date” (Hoffman 1979, p.xIII). Given how fascinating Dynastic Egypt is, it seems quite extraordinary that no attempt had been made before this time to explain Egypt’s pre-hieroglyphic past, although W.C. Hayes, in the 1960s wrote a very good early account in his book “Most Ancient Egypt” (Hayes 1964, 1965). A second definitive synthesis of the available information appeared in 1992, (Midant-Reynes 1992, now translated by Ian Shaw into English in 2000).  Other texts have also emerged, but are limited in number.  Many are out of print.  The World Wide Web, a store of information about everything imagineable, is similarly short of good information about the Predynastic and Prehistoric periods (see Links for those that are available). It is with a view to plugging some of those gaps that this website has been created.

I have six main objectives for writing this paper:

• To provide a lucid synthesis of the material remains and the implications of those material remains in prehistoric and Predynastic Egypt
• To describe the main archaeological remains and put them into a chronological and geographical sequence to make their relationships clear
• To assess them against African, Near Eastern and European materials where appropriate
• To assess, where possible, what we can about the groups that made artefacts and what signs they represent in socio-economic terms
• To identify areas which require research
• To trace the evolution of the Egyptian civilization from its predynastic origins

This is a synthesis and as such is not intended to provide new or original information or opinions about the material under discussion.  Extensive references are provided throughout the text in order to provide the reader with sources, and these are listed in the Bibliography.
 

The Importance of Prehistoric Egypt

Egypt lies in a strategically important location – it provides the only land route from Africa to the Levant, via Sinai. Due to the nature of the environment, even when the climate was more forgiving, the most logical routes from Africa would have taken land travelers either up the Nile or via the oases of the Egyptian Western Desert, where fertile lands and the river would have provided all the natural resources required for subsistence.  There is no evidence, for example, that there was ever a land-bridge across the Mediterranean at Gibraltar (Dennell 1983, p.39).

Egypt has always had potential for settlement. During cooler times, the present Egyptian deserts resembled Savannah areas in present day Africa; even during warmer times, the Nile and the oases of the western Desert provided rich areas of growth and life.

It is therefore reasonable to hypothesize that there would have been prehistoric occupation in Egypt from the earliest times onwards, and since the late 1800s evidence of prehistoric occupation has been recovered from all over Egypt and the Sudan.

Although Egypt’s dynastic sites have attracted most attention, funding and research, there have been good research projects focusing on prehistoric sites in the distant and more recent past, and there are currently some highly professional and ambitious projects bringing prehistoric Egypt much more to the fore.

There are four key reasons why the prehistory of Egypt is an important area for study:

• In the “cradle of humanity” model of human development, Egypt is considered to be one of the favoured routes “out of Africa” when early hominids expanded into the rest of the world.  Studies in Egypt may help to clarify some of the issues about the northward migration of man.
• The Egyptian dynastic period is sophisticated and complex. Studies of predynastic Egypt should help to clarify how Egypt progressed from a simple set of settlements to the complex centralized state and social structures visible in the material record of dynastic times.
• The way in which prehistoric societies adapted to the unique nature and relatively discrete location of the Nile and the oases may provide insights into the mechanisms involved in early adaptation and change at any given time, providing invaluable data about the subsistence strategies and technological capabilities of early prehistoric people. 
• Studies should help, in the long term, to gain an understanding of how African, Egyptian, near Eastern and European assemblages relate to each other.

Scope

Time Period

For the purposes of this paper “prehistory” covers the earliest material culture (from the Lower Palaeolithic) up to the beginning of the Predynastic period c.3800BC and “predynastic” covers the period from c.3800BC to c.3050BC – 2613B (the Tasian, Badarian and Naqadan I, II and IIIa and b). The Protodynastic phase begins at around 3050BC and ends at around 2613BC. Reference is made to the Early Dynastic with a view to establishing some idea of the continuity between the Predynastic and the Old Kingdom.
 

Archaeological

This paper is intended to summarize the state of knowledge regarding prehistoric and predynastic contexts in Egypt, looking at the material remains that have been identified and at different approaches that have been and are being taken to analyzing them and identifying further sites and artefacts. It has been written with the first-time reader in mind, and all technical and unusual terms are described in the glossaries. It simplifies the information to enable it to be accessible to a wide audience, which means that by definition it skims some of the more detailed arguments. To find out more the reader should go to the original sources quoted throughout the paper, and listed in the Bibliography.

The paper mentions pioneering work in brief, as well as reviewing relevant and present projects in detail, with a view to understanding both the origin of present archaeological understanding and the quality of excavation and post excavation projects that modern researchers are employing to help fill out the picture that current excavations offer.

Due to the nature of the environment, particular attention is paid to the geological and environmental contexts of prehistoric sites and surface scatters, where this is known.

Because of the relative rarity and the dispersed nature of early prehistoric material remains, it is particularly difficult to establish early calendrical dates for Egypt, although a number of very useful regionally based relative shcemes have been devised. The available estimates, together with Carbon-14 and other chronometric dates where available, have been detailed in Appendix A.

This paper takes into consideration that there are many approaches to prehistoric material – and takes two approaches in parts one and two respectively.  Part 2 looks at Prehistoric and Predynastic contexts as a chronological narrative. Part 3 looks at the material record and analyses their value and their conclusions that can be drawn from them.  There are many different approaches to the past which are beginning to be increasingly important in Egypt, deriving from intellectual thinking from archaeology, anthropology, history and philology, and from the increasing dependency on multidisciplinary approaches.

All dates shown in tables are derived from Vermeersch and Hendrickx 2000, unless otherwise stated.

There is no original material in this overview – it is intended to provide a brief but useful synthesis of current knowledge and information about often-neglected prehistoric material remains in Egypt and to meet the objectives described in the Introduction to this section, and to meet the objectives described in the Introduction.
 

Geographical

The following areas are covered in this paper:

• Egyptian Nile Valley (Aswan to Cairo)
• Egyptian Delta
• The Faiyum
• Western Delta
• Egyptian Western Desert (Eastern Sahara/Libyan Desert)
• Egyptian Eastern Desert (Arabian Desert)

To be included:

• Nubia (Aswan to Khartoum)
• Sinai, when applicable

The study of prehistory in this area is not complete unless it includes desert areas as well as Nile Valley and Delta zones.   Although the occupation patterns are different, they are both central to an understanding of the development of Egypt and Nubia over time.  As Renée Friedman puts it in the Forward to Egypt and Nubia, Gifts of the Desert (2002, p.XIII) “Recent and ongoing investigation of a wide variety of archaeological remains in the Western (Eastern Sahara or Libyan) and Eastern (Arabian) Deserts is showing that in fact these forbidding yet fascinating realms played a significant role in the making, maintaining and sometimes the breaking of Egyptian and Nubian civilization.”

Although in the past the desert areas have tended to be neglected by comparison with the Nile Valley, the Nile does offer the possibility of better preservation of archaeological contexts. This is because each year the river itself flooded and the strength of it often washed away or buried beneath the occupation remains that had been left on the flood plain which was occupied when the Nile was not in flood.

Document Structure

Divisions

The document is divided into 4 parts, which separates the document into logical sections which make it easier to digest. 

Part 1 (Chronological Narrative of Prehistoric Egypt) explains which industries have been identified and how, where known, they relate to each other, a ‘culture history’ approach to the past.  As Kemp puts it (Kemp 1989, 1991) “Chronology enables us to follow changing patterns over time and to chart progress towards our modern world.  But too great a concern with ‘history’ – with dates and the chronicling of events – can become a barrier to seeing to societies and civilizations of the past for what they really were:  solutions to the problems of individual and collective existence” (p. 5).

Part 2 The Geology of the Faiyum (other areas will follow, the the Faiyum has taken precedence because of its unique character and the impact that this had on occupation)

Part 3 is a conclusion which summarizes some of the main points.

Other sections include the image gallery, details about myself for anyone who wants to know my academic background, and Appendices which compliment the site.
 

User of Hyperlinks

Hyperlinks off-site lead to relevant information provided by other websites. Internal hyperlinks link original sources to the bibliography.  The Virtual Galleries page links off-site but is an integral part of this site’s offerings - unfortunately there are so many photographs that I overshot the space-allocation offered by my website host, so I have placed them on another site to ensure that although they are elsewhere, they are still accessible.

Hyperlinks off-site

Hyperlinks to the glossary – the first time when a new term is mentioned (may lead back from the glossary to another part in the document where something may be explained in greater detail).

Use of Appendices

The Appendices are used in order to supplement the main text, providing glossaries of information for those who are not familiar with all the terminology listed in the main text, and supporting information to clarify certain issues.

Terminology

There is no escaping terminology. As G.K. Chesterton put it: “Art is limitation; the essence of every picture is the frame.” Terminology provides the frame for the subject matter, and if you don’t understand the frame, you’re going to have real trouble with the contents.

A lot has been written about terminology for prehistoric contexts in general, but it is a particular minefield in Egyptian prehistoric studies. No single solution is going to make everyone happen, so I have simply chosen the one that makes most sense to me. This section summarises some of the issues and explains how and why a certain terminological framework has been used here. 
 

Piggy in the Middle – Between Europe and Africa

One of the advantages of Egypt, from a research point of view, is that it offers the opportunity to study a discrete area, an insular zon,e within which largely indigenous social developments occurred. However, prehistoric and predynastic Egypt was not an island and shares material records with other early areas from the earliest times (e.g. Acheulean assemblages), and acquired new skills and knowledge from elsewhere.  However, the terminologies that describe prehistory come not from Egypt but from Europe, the Near East and Africa. In particular, the dominant terminologies for describing the earliest prehistoric remains are influenced by Europe and Africa, each with slightly different ways of looking at Egypt.  Egypt has become a bit of a bone of contention, an academic piggy-in-the-middle, between Africanists, who would like Egypt to be seen in terms of an African human and natural background (e.g. Kleindienst 2001 and Gartner 1996) and those who describe Egypt using European terms (e.g. Vermeersch and Hendrickx 2000, Midant-Reynes 1992/2000).
 

The Three Age system was developed at the beginning of the nineteenth century (Stone, Bronze and Iron ages), and was further refined in the mid nineteenth century, when the Stone Age was subdivided using Greek terms (Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic), and was a useful way of organizing European prehistoric data when early prehistorians were attempting to make sense of the vast quantities of raw data that were being excavated. 

At the end of the nineteenth century the Palaeolithic was further subdivided to reflect complexities that were being discovered, into Lower, Middle and Upper Palaeolithic phases, and in time further subdivisions and cultural names found their way into the mix.  The French Palaeolithic work was the most important in this process of refinement:  “The importance of the French traditions rest on the energies of a number of early workers . . . who utilized the rich discoveries of flint, bone and antler artefacts to organize and partition the Palaeolithic record of the country into what became the classic sequence for this archaeological period.  The descriptive terms they employed have been used and copied throughout much of Europe and later were employed in Africa and Asia” (Gamble 1986, p.5).

The subdivisions were a useful way of organizing information chronologically, and for allowing it to be compared, refining knowledge and building frameworks within which studies could take place.  Robin Dennell has provided a useful summary of the issues in his book “European Economic Prehistory, A New Approach” (1983).  “Much prehistoric research over the last twenty years has been devoted to dismantling and rebuilding a prehistoric framework that had been constructed of archaeological ‘cultures’ . . . . By noting styles and artefacts shared by adjacent cultures, prehistorians were able to build a relative chronological framework” (Dennell 1983 p.10).

After the so-called ‘Radiocarbon Revolution’ (Renferw 1973), emphasis moved to looking at spatial distribution of specific types of artefact and these in many cases deconstructed the defined “cultures” as it became clear that certain components in assemblages were not local inventions but “exotic” intruders, the result of trade and exchange networks.  Additionally, it has become clear that Europe, far from being the cradle of technological development was in fact only one of many areas secondary to the main event that had place in Africa: “the roles of paramount and periphery had been reversed in terms of the relation between Europe and Africa as continents for research into early man (Gamble 1986, p.8).

An early problem in looking at archaeological data “was the neatly-wrapped package of prehistoric behaviour, whereby the social organization and subsistence inside each parcel could be inferred from the technological label on its wrapping-paper” (Dennell, 1983 p.16). It became very quickly clear that while the system of cultural identification, whist it had its uses for sorting data in the past, was and is no longer appropriate:  “What seems very doubtful is that the existing framework, devised generations ago in terms of technological change, is the most appropriate way of studying themes of general interest. For the earlier periods of European prehistory, these include the behaviour of early hominids, the ways that late Pleistocene hunter-gatherers responded to conditions of extreme coldness and aridity, and later to the onset of interglacial conditions the origins of food production, and the relationships between hunter-gatherers and agriculturalists. All these topics are areas of widespread and fruitful interest, and there is no reason why the terms of reference for their study should be predetermined by minor aspects of material culture” (Dennell 1983 p.4).

On the other hand, the old framework is familiar to all prehistorians working in Egypt and elsewhere, using terminology that forms a core language, a vocabulary and grammar common to all students of European prehistory which allows them to share information and knowledge without further explanation.
 

Africanist Terminology

The African continent is studied using a slightly different terminology – although it appears on the surface to be an anglicised version of the European Greek-based three-age system, it refers exclusively to African industries and geography and has little synchronicity with European finds and contexts, apart from the obvious and eternally mysterious widespread Acheulean industry and the Mousterian technology, btoh of which extend over vast areas.

I have stolen the phrase “Africanist” from Kleindiest (2001) who sees the problems of using a European terminology very acutely, as does Garlake (1996).  Kleindienst (2001) suggests that Egyptian studies have conventionally been European-centric and that conclusions about the prehistoric material have been written from an exclusively European point of view, in the context of European technologies and using European terminologies. She suggests, probably rightly, that this has coloured an understanding of Egypt’s relationship with the rest of Africa, lending weight to the assumption that European and Egyptian finds are directly comparable. This biased approach may negatively effect the way in which Egyptian industries of the earlier phases are studied.

The application of Euro-centric terms of reference can be very misleading, implying as it does association with European contexts, when in fact, associations with African industries are perhaps more likely – unfortunately research in Africa is also limited for prehistoric contexts, and this causes problems in its own right. “Whether it is made explicit or not, archaeologists bring to their researches particular concepts, theories, techniques and biases. These are still almost all derived from outside Africa and were originally intended to meet problems of other continents and periods.  Within Africa, the theoretical bases that must form the foundations of any significant research programmes remain stunted” (Garlake 1996, p.32).
 

Terminology in This Paper

For the purposes of this paper, the European terminology for describing the prehistory of Egypt has been adhered to. I have chosen to go with the European prehistoric grammar simply because most of the work being carried out in prehistoric Egypt is being carried out by Europeans, which means that the most common language being used to describe prehistoric is, at the moment, European.  However, it is important that the limitations of these terms are fully understood inn the context of Egypt and that their use here is in no way intended to pigeon-hole information.  I have tried to keep a balance by looking at Egyptian material in terms of both African and European findings and by bearing the objections and comments of Kleindienst and Garlake in mind (see the Limitations section below). 

As the text proceeds, the problems with different terminologies as they relate to the Egyptian material are pointed out. An example is the use of the terms “Mousterian” and “Levallois” for Egyptian assemblages when, in Europe, they are usually associated with Neanderthals.  Although the MSA toolkits certainly bear notable similarities (for too great to be coincidence) there is absolutely no evidence of Neanderthal remains in Egypt. 

As more material is excavated it should be possible to create a more intelligent and relevant structure for Egyptian prehistoric material, which still allows direct comparison with prehistoric studies in both Europe and Africa (and elsewhere) without being subservient to them.

Issues and Limitations in Prehistoric Studies of Egypt

Destruction and Concealment of Evidence

Nile floods and re-depositions have erased traces of settlement. As Hendrickx and Vermeersch put it (2000, p.17) “although the river clearly brought life to Egypt, it has also brought about the erosion of older archaeological deposits.” It is also likely that Nile sediments have preserved evidence beneath alluvial deposits, but buried them so deeply that archaeologists have not been able to locate them: “Although recent fieldwork has placed our knowledge of the prehistoric cultures of the Nile Delta on a new foundation, the problems are as great as ever. The reason lies in the Delta’s geographical situation.  Unlike the sites of the Upper Egyptian valley, with its long bordering desert regions, the Delta sites are within the river’s immediate area of contact, and in many cases they are now buried under thick layers of sediment” (Seidlmayer 1998, p.12). An example of this is the site of Malakat where Nile alluvium effectively protected artefacts.

A different type of destruction and concealment is modern activity - farming and urbanization. Not only do farming settlements and agricultural activities destroy ancient settlements and traces of farming (because they occupy the same rich environments) but they effectively prevent archaeologists from accessing the layers beneath modern activity because peoples’ homes and livelihoods would be effected. Urbanization has had far reaching consequences on many prehistoric and predynastic sites.

Consequences of Limited Evidence

Where material survives in relatively small amounts, and where geological correlations are poorly understood, work to elucidate precise chronologies, evolutionary sequences and social patterns is at the best a challenge and at the worst productive of tenuous conclusions.

The older the material remains, the poorer the sample is with which to work from earlier prehistoric contexts in Egypt. Although increasing numbers of artefacts dating to the earlier Palaeolithic phases are being found, many of them are in secondary deposits, meaning that their original location and context are not known.  This means that conclusions about early Egypt are difficult to reach and it is a particular challenge to move beyond the conventional narrative-chronological framework to draw conclusions about social and cultural aspects of life at any given time. Even the chronological framework is patchy is places, and subject to disagreement partly because some of the artefacts are in secondary contexts. As more sites are excavated using modern and multi disciplinary techniques, and more information is published and available, this situation will improve and modern methods of analysis will become more relevant and appropriate.

Imbalance of Excavations, Geographically

Imbalance in the pattern of excavation has led to a confused picture of cultural differences over the entire area of Egypt: “A picture has emerged of a country whose political and economic integrity was a constant source of strength, but whose geographic and cultural diversity has been obscured by an incomplete material record” (Manley 1996, p.12).

Firstly, there has been a significant bias towards work in the Nile valley in Upper Egypt: “Through the accidents of the Nile’s alluvial deposition and selective exploration, less is known about the Predynastic cultures of Lower Egypt than those of Upper Egypt” (Adams 1988, p.7).

Secondly, excavations have tended to be biased towards religious and funerary contexts:  While this is not always the fault of excavators, because evidence still remains untouched, it still produces an unbalanced picture which distorts the overall picture of the Egyptian past.

Unprovenanced Material

Particularly from the Lower and Middle Palaeolithic there is extensive un-provenanced and out-of-context material, due to secondary deposition. It is difficult (and often controversial) to make use of these artefacts to draw conclusions about the Egyptian Palaeolithic, and impossible to use them for establishing detailed relative chronologies.  Without the precise context, it is impossible to use this type of material to determine spatial distribution and geographically sensitive relative chronologies, and without proper excavation all associated objects and remains (e.g. faunal and floral associations) are lost. 

Lack of Prehistoric Research

The fabulous temples and tombs of dynastic Egypt have tended to overshadow Egypt’s more distant past.  Predynastic Egypt received attention from early writers including Petrie, Brunton, Quibell, Caton-Thompson and others.  Although there has been a thread of interest in prehistoric Egypt for decades, the amount of serious prehistoric research in Egypt was minimal until the Aswan Dam rescue projects which saw the flowering of Prehistoric studies in the 1960s and 70s.  Predynastic research has been more prominent as scholars begin to ask questions about the origins of the Egyptian civilization and how it evolved, but only recently has there been any serious exposure to the prehistoric past with sites like Nabta Playa, the rock art of the Eastern Desert and a number of oasis projects. Peter Garlake describes the problem as follows:  “The early history of a continent is intertwined with the history of a discipline.  It began in Egypt with the revelations of the monuments and treasures of the pharaohs and the recording and reading of hieroglyphic texts.  Philology has so skewed our understanding of that civilization that, until the archaeology of settlements is fully addressed, Egypt’s place in African history and the influences that permeated to and from the far interior will remain in the realm of the polemic” (Garlake 1996).   The fact that prehistoric studies in Egypt are in the minority, combined with the difficulties of Nile sedimentation and differential excavation patterns, means that the picture is very patchy indeed.

Lack of Reliable Dating

Very few dates available (either relative or chronometric) for the prehistoric period. Even when dating has been attempted, the failure of C14 to provide dates beyond 10,000BC has forced archaeologists to rely on alternative methods (for example dating of contexts in which artefacts were stratified, and alternative scientific methods like AMS dating). This has meant that forming chronologies that are reliable and regionally accurate has been very difficult, particularly for earlier periods where the range of artefacts that can assist with relative dating are few and far between.

Condition of existing sites

There are problems for excavators in the way in which some Predynastic sites have decayed or been destroyed.

One problem is the damage caused by sebakh diggers.  For example, Barbara Adams describes this as one of the difficulties inherent in Predynastic settlements sites:  “One of the major problems in the excavation of Predynastic settlement sites is the scattered ruinous remains of horizontally stratified mud brick, often attacked by sebakh diggers who used the material as fuel”.  Sebakh diggers are frequently quoted as the cause of considerable damage to sites.

Similarly, predynastic sites are sometimes robbed by plunderers who believe that they will find valuable treasures which can be sold. Although nothing valuable may be found, and sometimes the artefacts are abandoned at or near the site, the contexts are destroyed and much of the archaeological value is depleted by the disturbance and destruction.

Terminological/Cultural Context Issues

Egypt has been studied largely by European and American researchers who adopt a European-centric perspective when looking at the Egyptian past. As Phillipson (1993, p.90) “The archaeology of the northernmost part of Africa has for the most part been studied, because of the region’s geographical position, in an essentially Mediterranean, rather than an African context.  The terminology and the conceptual framework conventionally employed thus differ in some important respects from those used in other parts of the continent.”  This has meant that Egypt has been considered more in the context of European discoveries than African, and may mean that its prehistoric remains are poorly understood against the rich background of Africa’s prehistory.

There are some real issues with the use of the terms Mousterian and Levalloisian in north African contexts – mainly because they derive from Europe and specifically because their appearance in Europe is usually associated with the appearance of the Neanderthal (Homo sapiens neandertalensis) sub specie of man. However because Egypt has been studied by Europeans and is close to Mediterranean sites, which are in some ways similar, the terminology has been transferred.

Approaches and Methodologies, Old and New

Traditional Approaches

This paper mainly uses approaches taken by archaeologists. However, towards the end of the Predynastic period and in the Protodynastic period, both archaeologists and Egyptologists are at work, and it is useful to define the differences implicit in the approaches taken.  It is interesting that there are numerous (and often conflicting) definitions of archaeology and history but almost none of Egyptology, which sits squarely between the two. History and archaeology are characterised by heart-searching and self-analysis, demonstrating considerable concern with their function, purpose, scope and methodologies.  Egyptology seems to be innocent of any such soul-searching and in some ways this lack of concern is visible in the rather fragmented and one-sided information that we have about ancient Egypt. The following attempts to provide often simple and brief descriptions of both archaeology and Egyptology as they are currently practiced in Egypt.

Egyptology

Ancient Egypt has attracted interest from many different disciplines and has been the inspiration for the formation of a discipline unique to it: Egyptology.  While archaeology is endlessly defined in all its different guises, Egyptology is very rarely defined. Pick up a book about any prehistoric subject and the author will have detailed for the reader’s benefit his interpretation of what archaeology is, the type of material on which conclusions are based, and the methodologies used to reach conclusions. Pick up a book on ancient Egypt and you will usually find yourself straight into the body of the work, without explanatory preamble. Even the British Museum’s Dictionary of Ancient Egypt (Shaw,I. and Nicholson,P. 1995 p.90) offers a history of the discipline without actually defining it.

The fact of the matter is that Egyptology has grown up out of a number of disciplines which focused initially on the art, monumental architecture and the epigraphy of Egypt, with archaeological techniques taking a very secondary role, its principal purpose to uncover art, artefacts and further texts for translation. In many ways, although methodologies have improved and become more systematic, Egyptology as a discipline has not evolved very far away from this focus. It’s main focal points are historical individuals and events, religion, and art. There has been relatively little work on socio-economic issues, or in the background to the development of civilized ancient Egypt.

Egyptology is a mainly historic subject – it evaluates ancient Egypt through the writings that it left behind, and defines its society and economy (on the odd occasion that it mentions the economy) in terms of a chronological framework provided initially by Manetho’s king-list (Manetho was an Egyptian priest, living during the time of Ptolemy I and II, who wrote a history of Egypt based on this access to the archives of Egypt’s temples). This chronological framework has allowed evaluation of change, which is of considerable interest, but has also taken attention away from the base-line of life in Egypt, as it was lived.

The late Predynastic and Protodynastic periods are in theory the domains of both archaeologist and Egyptologist. Egyptologists focus on the early appearance of writing in the form of name serekhs on jars, and on signs that would indicate a direct influence on Old Kingdom material culture, but by and large there is not much Egyptological activity in the earlier times.

Archaeology

Egyptology often depends upon texts backed up by religious symbolism and monumental architecture, all of which are entirely lacking in prehistoric and early Predynastic contexts.  These periods are not the domain of the Egyptologist or epigrapher but of the archaeologist.   Archaeology has evolved as a discipline in a much more radical way than Egyptology, as different people have attempted to understand what archaeology can really contribute to our understanding of both the past and the present.  Graeme Barker helpfully offers the following definition in the Companion Encyclopedia of Archaeology (1999, p. xxxiii): “Archaeology is commonly defined as the study of past societies through their material remains, and history as the study of past societies through their written records.” He goes on to point out that archaeology spans both the humanities and sciences:  “archaeology needs and extraordinarily broad church of expertise to try to understand the total history of humankind from its material remains”.  It is, in fact, a multi-disciplinary subject and much of the success of archaeological projects depends on individuals who are talented at bringing these disciplines together and making them work as an integrated whole.

At the same time, the archaeology of dynastic Egypt has been largely ignored – the detailed world of daily Egyptian life has been subsumed beneath the glamour of the royal, the noble, the religious and the elite. A number of archaeologists working with Egyptian material have written about the challenges facing the practice of archaeology in a country where the focus has been almost exclusively historically inclined: “Ancient Egypt has proved remarkably resistant to the writing of history which is not traditional in character; which is not, in other words concerned primarily with the ordering of kings and the chronicling of their deeds (Trigger, Kemp, O’Connor and Lloyd 1983 p. xi). They go on:  “the truth is that the names and faces of great and lesser kings are masks that conceal a void …. Continuity of a different order is, however, provided by the material remains that are open to the archaeologist to explore” (p. xi).

In short, archaeology is essential in prehistoric and Predynastic contexts but it is also beginning to be seen as a vital component of dynastic studies as well. A number of works have attempted to redress some of the balance including Kemp (1989, 1991) and Trigger, Kemp, O’Connor and Lloyd (1983).
 

Breaching the Gap

Because of the differences in approach between Egyptology and archaeology there has traditionally been a significant gap in understanding the period between Predynastic (the domain of the archaeologist) and Protodynastic/Early Dynastic periods (the domain of the Egyptologist). Matters have improved in recent years, but this difference of approach still looks like a badly stitched seam. . Unification, even if a violent one-off event (which is by no means certain) did not establish a new culture;  it merely consolidated power over a relatively uniform material and social identity into one centre.

At the same time because of the fascination in dynastic Egypt (and to a limited extent predynastic Egypt) there has been very limited work carried out on earlier prehistoric contexts (Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, and early Neolithic).  This is slowly being redressed by a handful of dedicated prehistorians who are beginning to make real contributions to the overall picture.

Current Approaches

General Archaeological Methodologies

Archaeological methodologies are generally divided into a number of schools. Two powerfully opposing approaches were: culture history and process history. Gamble, writing about the Palaeolithic in Europe summarized these approaches;  “The European Palaeolithic can be discussed in terms of two paradigms.  The first reflects the inward-looking regional traditions.  This is culture history paradigm that has for a long time been the dominant force in directing all archaeological research . . . The second paradigm views culture as an adaptive system” (Gamble 1986, p.8). The former approach is European, the latter American.  Egyptian work has necessarily built on the European tradition. Other approaches have also been made and these will be described in the main text.

The culture history approach grew out of the European studies into the Palaeolithic and are based on the three-age system described above.  The work that has been done since this system was formed has built up a vast picture of the Palaeolithic world-wide, filled out with immense detail, and this has continued to be the source of data upon which all other studies (irrespective of methodology) have been based. “The record of observations and the register of ideas that we know as The Palaeolithic is the result of a series of inward-looking regional traditions of research which, taken together, constitute our understanding of this segment of the past” (Gamble 1986, p.3). Establishing chronologies and inter-relationships has not always been straight forward but has provided the foundations of all Palaeolithic research: “The practitioners of this approach take as their goal the elucidation and fine resolution of regional sequences based on sound stratigraphic observation. The comparison and analysis of artifactual material is based on the recognition of patterns of likes and unlikes in artifact shapes and assemblage composition  . . . . The achievements have been considerable in documenting cultures from the human past” (Gamble 1986, p.9).

There were inherent dangers in the approach. The biggest problem evident in some early works is the tendency, deriving from western ideas of industrial and evolutionary progress, to believe that the human past was somehow goal-orientated towards a civilised state. Writing about human biological evolution, Stephen Jay Gould neatly summarizes the situation that existed within archaeology”  “Most pernicious and constraining among these prejudices is the concept of progress, the idea that evolution possesses a driving force or manifests an overarching trend toward increasing complexity, better biomechanical design, bigger brains or some other parochian definition of progress” (Gould, 1995). The disadvantage of focusing on tools as chronological indicators is that precious little is learned about the societies that they represent: “much potential information has been ignored in concentration upon the retouched tools and type fossils . . . . This over-tidy approach has over-simplified the complexities of the archaeological record and the potential it has to inform us about past behaviour that operated at many levels and scales (Gamble 1986 p.12).

Archaeology has changed a lot since the 1960s when Lewis Binford and others drew upon work in anthropology to present the “New Archaeology” which looked at assemblage composition and variability with a view to determining subsistence strategies and models of adaptation: “the explanation of change and variation via the examination of the behavioural content of the same material residues” (Gamble 1986 p.16). Although most of the New Archaeology failed to live up to the expectations, it set, it did stimulate the conversation that resulted in processual, post-processual and other approaches to the archaeological record that try to move beyond the description of cultures and chronologies.

As we gain more information, the focus will shift from drawing up group listings and monitoring changes in the material record, to focusing on other areas. For example, subsistence strategies at any given time:  “the reason why we should treat subsistence as a central theme in prehistoric studies is simply that it is an essential and universal human need, irrespective of social and chronological context” (Dennell 1983 p.5). Symbolic aspect have also become increasingly important in discussions of human social and economic development (e.g. Hodder 1990).

However, these modern approaches assume a reasonable sample upon which to draw.  In looking at prehistoric Egypt (particularly early prehistoric), much more data that is needed to enable archaeologists to understand subsistence patterns in Egypt and how prehistoric groups worked as units and interacted with each other requires much larger numbers and more informative sites to ensure a relatively clear picture.

This means that at the moment Egyptian studies are directed at unearthing data from the ground and assessing in the light of already excavated materials.  As Derek Roe put it in regard to the British material (somewhat tongue in cheek): “This is certainly no green pasture for the New Archaeologists (as they used to be called):  they must either tread the steep and rugged pathway . . . or go elsewhere muttering about low-density evidential catchment situations inevitably productive of low-resolution culture-historical syntheses poorly time-calibrated” (1981 p.5).

In its earliest stages, this process necessarily forces a “culture history” approach while chronologies are worked out, distinct assemblages are described and similarities and differences identified.  “For the Palaeolithic archaeologist, a great deal does indeed turn on being able to place his major sites in their correct order and know the time interval between them” (Roe 1981, p.11).

However, as more material becomes available, archaeologists will be able to analyze the relationships between technologies and economies as well as ideologies and social organization, both of which groups and across the board.  At the moment only a few studies on particularly rich sites give an indication of some of the social insights that may be gained as more sites emerge and can be compared.  Where possible, interpretive analysis has been added to the descriptive narrative, in order to provide a clearer view of the groups and societies involved.

Egyptian Specific Approaches

As Egypt is almost an island, a strip of fertile land surrounded by a sea of desert, it offers an unusual opportunity for studying social evolution within a relatively discrete area, and lessons learned from these studies may be useful as a benchmark against which other prehistoric social process and changes can be compared.  There is therefore considerable motivation to move towards a process-history approach.

“The study of archaeology has developed in two principal directions. The literate civilizations of ancient Egypt and North Africa have been investigated through two hundred years of changing approaches, while the prehistory of more southerly regions first received serious attention in South Africa at the end of the nineteenth century. The two studies have long remained separate, and their methodologies are only now beginning to converge” (Phillipson 1985, 1993, p.2,3).

It is the process of convergence that has caused some problems.  The earliest students of the prehistoric past of Egypt are described below, but although they did some excellent work, it covered the tip of the iceberg. Only recently, in the last 20 years or so, have archaeological methods been brought to bear on Egyptian material of prehistoric and predynastic contexts, the approaches that have been applied for decades in Africa and Europe. 

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