In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, comparable stone features were discovered in houses at Akhetaten, the short-lived city constructed by King Akhenaten as his residence about 1350 bc (Spence 2007). Shallow slabs have rounded raised edges, with narrow entrance ramps, and are found in reception spaces rather than bathrooms where washing installations appear in slightly different form. Evidently, water or another liquid was being poured here in a ceremony with its own space, but the object of the performance is not recorded from depictions or written evidence. In a walled village in the low desert east of the main city at Akhetaten, the painted walls of some rooms include motifs of mother-and-child
Protectors (Aha/Bes and Ipy/Taweret), as also found in a near-contemporary royal context, the palace complex for King Amenhotep III at Malqata on the low desert west ofWaset. More evidence comes from the village built near there, for artists working on the painted corridor tombs of kings in 1300-1100 Bc (Deir al-Madina). Here, perhaps reflecting the painting and inscriptional skills of the artists, raised pillared platforms in the front rooms of several houses are decorated with scenes including the nursing of infants and, again, Aha/Bes and Ipy/Taweret figures. The platforms are sometimes large enough to accommodate one or perhaps two persons, with steps for access; they have been interpreted as birthing pavilions, but may have had wider scope, for invoking other protective forces including the reigning king or the past rulers associated with the village, King Amenhotep I and his mother Ahmes Nefertari.
Another focus of offering, or perhaps an aspect of all domestic practice, might be the immediate predecessors as links to a longer line of ancestors. Ancestor worship is not considered a major feature of ancient Egyptian practice, including depiction or writing, in comparison with other parts of the world. However, the period 13001100 BC also saw the production, across Egypt, of small sculptures in the form of a head and schematic upper body, known in Egyptology as ancestor busts. These are not specific to one social group; the finest to survive are perhaps the pair inscribed with the names of Pendjerty and Muteminet, the parents of a high official of Ramses II, Amenmes, perhaps from his Theban tomb chapel, the offering space above his burial place (Habachi 1979). Intriguingly, the inscription for his mother, Muteminet, begins with the words “my mother—Tefnut,” as if she embodied the latest in a female line back to the first division of creation, where Atum, “All,” produced Tefnut and Shu. His father, Pendjerty, similarly linked him back to Shu. Here, perhaps we find a statement on human identity that each of us bears through our parents a line to Tefnut and a line to Shu. The reverence for immediate parents may then have taken the place, in ancient Egypt, of what appears as a more collective ancestor worship in other times and places. Kate Spence has connected the Akhetaten lustration slabs with the literary Teaching of Any, where the good man is reminded to offer to his deceased father and mother. The immediate bonds of parent-child may have framed acts of reverence and invocations for help, involving past generations, even where a collective past family or people might have been recognized.
Figure 2.18 Finds from the Petrie 1889 clearance of Lahun: (a) figurine of a lion-faced naked woman and two clappers found buried with it and (b) painted-plastered cloth leonine mask from the adjoining house. From W. petrie, Kahun, Ourab, andHawara, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner and Co, London, 1890, pl.8.
World History
