Guillemette Andreu
Egypt in the Age of the Pyramids
Cornell University Press 1997
Stron XVI+172, format: 16x23 cm
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CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ix
TRANSLATOR'S NOTE xi
CHRONOLOGY xiii
MAP xvi
1 THE AGE OF THE PYRAMIDS i
2 PHARAOH'S SUBJECTS 13
3 PUBLICWORKS 27
4 SCRIBES AND SCHOLARS 44
5 ARTS, CRAFTS, AND TRADES 5
6 FAMILY LIFE 74
1 A BUSY DAY 88
8 LIFE IN THE COUNTRY 105
9 FISHING AND HUNTING 123
10 A PEOPLE OF BELIEVERS 137
BIBLIOGRAPHY 151 GENERAL INDEX 161
INDEX TO TEXTS CITED 172
THE GOLDEN AGE OF ANCIENT EGYPT comes alive
as Guillemette Andreu re-creates the details of daily life. Construction sites teem with workers building the Great Pyramids and the Sphinx. Administrators bustle to and fro, handling their assignments from the pharaoh's court. Scribes train themselves to draft a variety of letters.
Andreu describes the Egyptians as they spend a day in the marshes with family and friends. They glide on light skiffs through the papyrus plants, stopping occasionally to marvel at the marsh creatures: frogs, butterflies, kingfishers, ibises, herons, lapwings, weasels, and mongooses. Because the marshes also shelter crocodiles and hippopotamuses, the day is not without its perils. In her vivid representation of Egyptian life, Andreu makes use of letters from family archives, full of household instructions from travelers and nostalgic greetings from grown children living away from their parents.
The principal source of evidence for Egyptian life styles between 2650 and 1750 B.C. are the scenes carved or painted on the walls of tombs. Short hieroglyphic inscriptions accompany these images, recording what might have been said by the men and women pictured. Andreu's book is amply illustrated and supplemented by a bibliography. It will delight tourists planning to visit Egypt, museum goers, as well as students.
GUILLEMETTE ANDREU is Professor of Hieroglyphs at L'Ecole du Louvre in Paris and an Egyptologist in the Department of Egyptian Antiquities at the Louvre Museum. She is also the author of Images (k- In I'i? quotQiennt en Egypte an temps Jes pharaons.
David Lorton is an American Egyptologist. He lives in Baltimore, Maryland.
oto: John Folev, Paris
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