Flinders Petrie was the first archaeologist working in Egypt to exploit the importance of stratigraphy, the principle that through time archaeological remains are deposited in layers or strata of soil. Many factors can complicate the stratigraphy of archaeological sites, from animal burrowing to earthquakes, but in general the latest artifacts and other remains are in layers closest to the present surface, while the earliest ones are lower in the ground, just above bedrock or sterile soil. Petrie applied the principle of stratigraphy in archaeology in 1890 at his excavation of Tell el-Hesy in Palestine, when he dated the different layers of the settlement by the associated pottery, which he knew from Egypt. Petrie recorded these strata in his drawings of sections, the vertical record of excavated cross-sections through different strata of the mound.
Before Petrie, excavators in Egypt generally discarded pottery. Recognizing the significance of changing pottery styles as a chronological marker, Petrie sampled and classified the pottery from his excavations. One result of his investigations of Predynastic cemeteries was the first seriation of graves, using pottery types and other artifacts. In his seriation scheme Petrie ordered the graves in a relative sequence (which he called Sequence Dating; see Box 5-A), from early to late, which we now know roughly spanned the 4*h millennium bc (based on radiocarbon dating, which was not invented until the mid-20*h century). Seriation is a technique which archaeologists routinely use today to order finds into relative periods of time, from early to late.
Another important early development in archaeological methods was George Reisner’s survey strategy to find and record threatened sites when the first High Dam at Aswan was heightened in 1907. Traverses were done along both banks of the Nile in the northern half of Egyptian Nubia up to the height that would be flooded. This was the first large-scale, systematic salvage or rescue archaeology done anywhere in the world; such archaeology would be conducted increasingly in the later 20th century, as archaeological sites in most countries became endangered by expanding towns and cities, and by economic and agricultural development.
With the construction of the second High Dam at Aswan in the 1960s, a number of prehistorians did fieldwork in southern Egypt and northern Sudan for the first time. They employed rigorous methods for the survey and excavation of prehistoric sites, and the classification and analysis of artifacts, especially stone tools and pottery.
As anthropologically trained archaeologists, many prehistorians working in Egypt and Sudan were influenced by new developments in archaeological method and theory in North America and Europe in the 1960s and 1970s. Processual archaeology proposed that archaeology should be done using scientific methods and theory. Although some scientific methods from the “hard sciences” are not applicable for archaeology, hypothesis testing, where a model of some aspect of socio-cultural development is formulated and then tested by archaeological fieldwork, was deemed important for research design. Field investigations include both excavations and archaeological survey, to locate sites, but especially to obtain data about settlement patterns (although this has been very difficult to do in Egypt because of the poor preservation of ancient settlements; see 3.3). Bruce Trigger’s pioneering study of settlement patterns in Nubia since the beginnings of agriculture was the first of its kind. An important project which has studied late prehistoric settlement patterns in an area in Egypt (and changes in these through time) has been that of Michael Hoffman and his successors at Hierakonpolis (see 5.3).
Archaeology in Egypt now includes statistical analyses of archaeological data, as well as various types of scientific analyses that are routinely part of many excavations. Material scientists and other specialists analyze the materials used in every aspect of past cultures, from the minute remains of paint in rock drawings to the metallurgy of metal tools. Form, artifact function and use, as well as the technology involved in their production are studied. To better understand ancient technology, artifacts (and even a small Egyptian pyramid!) have been reproduced in what is called experimental archaeology.
Ancient botanical evidence is obtained through a technique called flotation: small plant remains (especially carbonized seeds) float to the surface when soil samples from sites are processed in water. Paleo-ethnobotanists, who do such analyses, study the origins of agriculture and Neolithic cultures in Egypt, and also provide important economic information about agriculture in pharaonic Egypt. Ethno-archaeologists study traditional crafts, housing and settlements, farming and food preparation, and other practices in rural Egypt, to help explain archaeological evidence through ethnographic analogy. There are scientists who study ancient deposits of pollen (palynology), which may yield environmental information. Phytoliths, microscopic casts of plant cells, may also be present at sites.
Human bones are analyzed by physical anthropologists to determine age and sex, as well as ancient diseases and pathologies, and DNA analyses are now beginning to yield new information about genetic affiliation, especially from well preserved Egyptian mummies. Animal bones are studied by zooarchaeologists not only for age and sex, but also to determine many other factors about both wild and domesticated species - in order to better understand animal husbandry.
Increasingly geologists, geomorphologists, and specially trained geoarchaeologists work with archaeologists, helping to differentiate natural geological processes at archaeological sites from the results of human activities, as well as the processes that transformed a site after it was no longer used (see 3.3). Satellite images are analyzed to better understand the environmental settings of sites: such studies are called remote sensing. On-ground remote sensing (geophysical prospecting) is used to locate buried remains, and includes the use of equipment such as magnetometers and ground-penetrating radar. Topographic mapping of excavated remains is done by professional surveyors.
Excavations in Egypt today are multi-disciplinary, requiring the input of many specialists from different disciplines (see Box 1-B). Especially important for Paleolithic investigations are lithic analysts because stone tools and the debris from their manufacture are the most frequently recovered artifacts. Ceramics become more frequent at sites dating after ca. 6000-5000 bc, and pharaonic sites can contain huge volumes of potsherds, which need to be studied by ceramic analysts. Philologists and Egyptologists
Box 1-B The Millennium Project at Giza
For the first two years of the 21st century archaeologist Mark Lehner (Harvard University and the Oriental Institute, University of Chicago) directed multidisciplinary investigations to the south of the pyramids on the Giza plateau. Over several field seasons a huge area of ca. 12,000 square meters was cleared of 4,500 years worth of accumulated sand and debris. The cleared areas were then surveyed and mapped for archaeological remains, and excavated. What emerged is the “Lost City,” a settlement consisting of a huge 4*h-Dynasty production facility, with long narrow galleries. Evidence was found of paved streets, a large columned hall, a copper workshop, workers’ housing, many storerooms, and state bakeries to feed all the workers.
Geophysical prospecting to locate buried remains was conducted with a magnetic gradiometer, and professional surveyors mapped the site. An osteo-archaeologist excavated the much later human burials (26th Dynasty and later) and studied the human remains. Animal bones were studied by a zooarchaeologist, and botanical remains were examined by a paleo-ethnobotanist. Artifact analysis was done by
Lithics and ceramic analysts, and Assistant Director John Nolan, an archaeologist and epigrapher, studied the hieroglyphic impressions on the clay sealings found throughout the site. Sediments from the settlement were analyzed by a geo-archaeologist, and geomorphologist Karl Butzer found evidence that at Giza in the 4th Dynasty there were periodic heavy rains - heavy enough to melt the mud-brick of some of the buildings in the “Lost City.”
The multidisciplinary Millennium Project is an example of how archaeology is now done in Egypt. It was a huge project of two and one-half years of fieldwork by archaeologists and other specialists, plus more years analyzing the results of these investigations. Excavations continue at the site, which now includes evidence of a workmen’s village to the east. Until this project began, almost nothing was known about the organization of the workers and the work program that produced the Giza pyramids. Evidence of the “Lost City” now provides much more social and economic information about the enormous undertaking of royal pyramid construction.
Are needed on excavations of pharaonic sites, and classical scholars on excavations of Greco-Roman sites.
Conservation and preservation of archaeological sites is an extremely important concern in Egypt. Many archaeological projects are involved in the preservation, restoration, and reconstruction of ancient monuments and tombs. At major temples, such as that of Amen-Ra at Karnak, study and restoration of the architecture and reliefs were conducted throughout the 20*h century and continue today. Specially trained artifact conservators are now often part of archaeological expeditions, and there are special projects to conserve and record tomb paintings, as well as reliefs and inscriptions in temples and tombs. Major projects to conserve ancient monuments in Egypt include archaeologists, epigraphers, and art historians, but also engineers, architects, geologists, and other specialists in cultural heritage management.
The Giza Sphinx is an example of a monument that has been restored over the past 3,500 years, with the most recent repairs done in the late 20*h century. Stone monuments are increasingly threatened by salts in the ground water, and paintings in subterranean rock-cut tombs are especially vulnerable to environmental conditions. In western Thebes the tomb of Nefertari, the chief wife of Rameses II, was closed for most of the later 20th century because of the poor condition of its paintings, but it is now open after a major restoration project by the Getty Conservation Institute and the EAO.