Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures

This essay traces the intertwined topics of collaboration and multisited ethnography in the writings of anthropologist Sondra Hale on Sudanese artists and art. Hale’s trajectories and movements in and out of Sudan traverse parallel, sometimes overlapping tracks with the artists she studied, championed, and curated. Studying Sudan and its artists may have begun in Khartoum during Hale’s first three-year period there from 1961 to 1964; however, this essay analyzes Hale’s subsequent writings based on the places where she encountered artists, residing abroad and in exile, in Cairo, Asmara, Addis Ababa, Oxford, the Hales’ Los Angeles home, as well as in American venues for meetings of the Sudan Studies Association.

This paper will explore the ritual power and significance of gold for Nubian cultic practitioners at the ancient Egyptian temple of Philae, located at the traditional border between Egypt and Nubia. Philae was a place of cultural, religious, economic, and military interaction between Egyptian and Nubian populations, both of whom engaged in religious practices at the temple, often jointly. Though co-religionists, Nubian practice diverged in specific ways from that of Egyptian priests and practitioners. Long associated with gold, Nubia served as the primary source of this precious metal for ancient Egypt. This paper will explore the presentation of gold by Nubians at the temple of Philae as recorded in hieroglyphic texts that decorate the temple walls and in the words of Nubian visitors who inscribed their prayer texts on the temple walls primarily in the Egyptian language (Demotic), but also in the Meroitic language and in Greek. Additionally, I will describe the unique symbolism and ritual power of gold in the Nubian religious practices at Philae.

The early and middle Holocene of North Africa was a time of dramatic climatic and social change, including rapid shifts in vegetation communities and the introduction of domesticated plants and animals. Recent research from the Fayum basin of Egypt, which holds archaeological evidence for early use of domesticates, aims to place inhabitants of that region within their contemporary environmental setting. We present here results of wood charcoal analysis from three early- and middle-Holocene deposits on the north shore of the Fayum and reconstruct both contemporary woodland ecology and patterns of anthropogenic wood use. In total, three woodland communities likely existed in the area, but inhabitants of this region made heavy use of only the local lakeshore woodland, emphasizing tamarisk ( Tamarix sp.) for fuel. While seasonally watered wadi woodlands were not harvested for fuel, more arid locations on the landscape were, evidencing regional mobility between ecological zones. Results indicate that wood was locally abundant and that inhabitants were able to select only preferred species for fuel. This study provides further evidence for low-level food production in the Fayum that preserved critical ecosystem services, rather than dramatic niche construction to promote agriculture as seen elsewhere in middle-Holocene Southwest Asia.

President's Research Catalyst Awards, Grant ID# CA-16-376911, Preserving at-Risk Cultural Heritage.