Egyptian or Nubian? Dry-Stone Architecture at Wadi el-Hudi, Wadi es-Sebua, and the Eastern Desert

Bibliographic Data

ID20372881
AuthorsKate Liszka (California State University, San Bernardino, corresponding author)
Year2017
Volume103
Issue1
Pages35-51
Publication date2017-06-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe Journal of Egyptian Archaeology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0307-5133 • E-ISSN: 2514-0582
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0307513317714407
OpenAlexW2765847155
LanguageEN
Citations received7

When building in dry-stone, Nubians and Egyptians used different techniques to construct walls. Wadi es-Sebua has been used as a type-site for C-Group Nubian settlements. Its exterior wall exhibits courses of stones laid at an angle, a technique I associate with Nubians. The Egyptian fortified mining settlements at Wadi el-Hudi, el-Hisnein, and Dihmit use dry-stone architecture, similar to the architecture at Wadi es-Sebua. Texts and pottery support that many Nubians also worked for contemporary Egyptian mining expeditions in the Eastern Desert during the early Middle Kingdom. I suggest that Nubian workforces carried out much of the architectural construction of these fortified settlements using their own traditional building techniques, but following an Egyptian design, and I argue that the so-called ‘loopholes’ found in these exterior walls were not for military defence, but rather were windows. These construction techniques point to a latent Nubian agency within the operation of Egyptian mining settlements

Ancient history · Archaeology · Geography · Human settlement · Pottery · Wadi · Ancient Egypt and Archaeology · Ancient Mediterranean Archaeology and History · Archaeology and Historical Studies · History · Architecture

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