Aswan Excavation Flashcards
Where (approximately) is Aswan situated? Also describe the landscape of the region
Located in Southern Egypt at the first cataract (current in the Nile), close to border to Sudan
- Landscape is lush close to the Nile, has green lands that provide agriculture and inundates the land. - Behind the green lands is where the Sahara starts, all dessert landscape behind the green.
Current comes from the granite. bed of the river being granite makes the water run very fast (bumps up against rocks and goes quicker).
What is mud brick? Why is it important for dating purposes to carefully draw and describe the walls of mud brick houses? Where do we get the absolute dates from for these houses?
Mud brick = sunbaked bricks with straw or stones inside to make them stronger.
Important for dating purposes because we can use law of superposition.
- Draw the walls and see which walls overlay others and therefore which walls are older compared to other walls.
Absolute Dates obtained by dating the ceramics inside the house.
In 1871 the temple of Isis was discovered in Aswan. Which aspects of the temple were researched to reconstruct the reuse of the temple after it was no longer in use as a temple? (mention at least 3)
AWG!!!!!!!
Architecture = noticed there were holes in the walls used for wooden beams.
Graffiti = crosses, Christians praying at a temple, God Khnum and Goddess Isis, Imhotep the mummy, etc.
Wall Niches = books or candles were placed in these niches.
What is the disadvantage of an emergency excavation, like the one I mentioned in Aswan?
Don’t have a lot of time to record everything (1-2 weeks), need to rush the excavation process and only get snapshots of the daily life.
Why are excavations much harder to perform in the city of Aswan than on Elephantine island?
Excavation sites in Aswan were right in the middle of the city and around modern houses.
- Can’t do open area excavations (only rescue excavations).
Elephantine island did not have houses on or near the excavation site (completely abandoned), could perform open-area excavation.
Is the ruin hill of Elephantine island mainly a result of natural or human formation processes? How did the hill come into existence?
Hill is purely human made (called a Tell). Kept adding new walls over the old walls that fell down, over thousands of years the hill slowly built up.
Cultural formation process, human
The site (Elephantine) was abandoned in the 14th century CE. Why have the Late Antique layers been poorly preserved in comparison with, for example, the pharaonic layers?
Younger layers were higher up and more exposed to the elements (natural formation process).
Also people were taking the soil from the top layer to use as fertilizer (cultural formation process).
In the ‘excavations’ on the island of Philae by Ludwig Borchardt and Captain Lyons in 1895/1896 an important map was made of the island and its temples were carefully described. In what way did this excavation fail to meet the modern standards of archaeology?
The excavators threw the mud houses into the Nile as they were seen as obscuring the view of the temple.
How were the temples of Philae rescued during the building of the Aswan High Dam in the 1960’s and 1970’s?
Temples were rescued by being rebuilt on a higher location (Agilkia) to make the land dry. The temple blocks would be dismantled and moved to a higher location, where the temples would be rebuilt, and then a coffer dam was placed around it.
Island is no longer in original location
Water retreats and leaves a fertile layer, Egyptians were agriculturalists and used this land to build on.
