Ancient Egyptian Religion

During the late Old Kingdom to the end of the Middle Kingdom, there were two principal forms of representation in the elite tomb: wall scenes and funerary models. The two artistic media exhibit several similarities in design, with both depicting people and animals engaged in everyday life activities. This has caused scholars to label funerary models duplicates or substitutes of wall scenes, implying that they served the same purpose in the tomb. However, there are a number of notable differences that are yet to be acknowledged. My PhD research comprised a detailed comparative analysis of the two artistic media in order to more precisely understand the role of the funerary model in the tomb and its relationship to the wall scene. In today’s paper, I will outline the similarities and differences between funerary models and wall scenes in their representation of bread-making, offering-bearers, and cattle in procession. These three themes showcase some of the distinguishing characteristics of funerary models and will consequently demonstrate why the three-dimensional medium should not be understood as duplicates or substitutes of wall scenes, but rather a distinct type of representation that was specifically conceived for its role in provisioning the deceased for eternity.

The relations between Re, the Sun-god, and the gold seem to be a well-known topic of the Egyptian religion given the solar associations of that precious metal. Nevertheless, there are not detailed studies on those associations. This paper aims to analyse the spells of the Pyramid Texts where that deity and the gold are related, taking into account its precedents and the literary and intertextual elements of the concerned passages. As a result of this analysis it has been established that the richness of images, contexts and expressions that associate the god Re and the gold is significantly higher than the most evident metaphor that link them by means of the light and bright of both of them. They are thus related in contexts of protection against snakes, rising with an exalted joy, in descriptions of the sky before the sunrise as a space full of light as made in several minerals, in the image of Re as a calf of gold when he rises from the east, or the description of a rosette –a primeval form of Re– and of a boat of this god as made in gold.

This Element offers a new approach to ancient Egyptian images informed by interdisciplinary work in archaeology, anthropology, and art history. Sidestepping traditional perspectives on Egyptian art, the Element focuses squarely on the ontological status of the image in ancient thought and experience. To accomplish this, section 2 takes up a number of central Egyptian terms for images, showing that a close examination of their etymology and usage can help resolve long-standing question on Egyptian imaging practices. Section 3 discusses ancient Egyptian experiences of materials and manufacturing processes, while section 4 categorizes and discusses the different purposes and functions for which images were created. The Element as a whole thus offers a concise introduction to ancient Egyptian imaging practices for an interdisciplinary readership, while at the same introducing new ways of thinking about familiar material for the Egyptological reader.

https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108881494

Textbooks
Quirke, Stephen.  Ancient Egyptian Religion.  London:  British Museum, 1992.
Lichtheim, Miriam, trans.  Ancient Egyptian Literature, vol. 1: the Old and Middle Kingdoms.  Paperback ed.  Berkeley:  University of California Press, 1975.
________.  Ancient Egyptian Literature, vol. 2:  the New Kingdom.  Paperback ed.  Berkeley:  U. of California Press, 1978.

Lectures and readings
Readings are listed before the lecture (and discussion) to which they relate.  Some of the texts in Lichtheim appear more than once, since they are relevant to more than one lecture (e.g., obelisk inscriptions that relate to the cult of Amun and to divine kingship).  Reading ahead, particularly in Ancient Egyptian Religion, may be helpful; note that I have reversed chapters 4 and 5 in the reading list.  The student may wish to read the chapters in the original order, then review Chapter 4 before we talk about magic and medicine.

Examinations (2) will consist of short identifications and a choice of essay questions.

Week 1.  Introduction.  Outline of Egyptian history; Egyptian geography and resources; introducing the gods.  Defining terms:  religion, divinity, monotheism, polytheism, immanence and transcendence, syncretism. 

Readings.  Quirke, Introduction and Chapter 1:  "Power in Heaven."

Week 2.  Temple, town, nome, and nation:  theological geography of ancient Egypt.  Archaeological evidence for prehistoric and early dynastic religion.  The earliest shrines and temples; unification of Egypt.  Development of religious iconography.

Readings.  Quirke, Ch. 2:  "Power on Earth."
Lichtheim, vol. 1, "The Memphite Theology," pp. 51-57.  "A spell from the Coffin Texts," pp.131-133
Lichtheim, vol. 2:  "Two Hymns to the Sun God," by Suti and Hor, pp. 86-89.  "The Destruction of Mankind," pp. 197-199.

Week 3.  Cosmogonies.  Heliopolitan cosmogony; the "Memphite theology"; myth of the destruction of mankind.  Images of creation in temple design.  Ideas of time, eternity, and everlastingness.

Readings.  Quirke, Ch. 3:  "Preserving the Universe."

Week 4.  What is an Egyptian temple?  The temple as the god's earthly mansion, model of the universe, "power station", administrative center.  Daily cult; priestly duties through the day and night; offerings and reversions thereof.  Festivals:  the New Year's Festival, the Beautiful Festival of the Desert Valley, Feast of Lights, Opet Festival, royal jubilee, Sokar festival.

Readings.  Quirke, Ch. 5:  "Surviving Death."
Lichtheim, vol. 1:  Excerpts from the Pyramid Texts, pp. 29-50.
Lichtheim, vol. 2:  "The Prayers of Paheri," pp.15-21.
"A Harper's Song from the Tomb of Neferhotep," pp.115-116.
"From the Book of the Dead," pp. 119-132.

Week 5.  Funerary beliefs.  Osiris and other divine patrons of the necropolis; aspects of the human personality; preservation of the body; judgement of the dead.  Tomb paintings and funerary texts.

Week 6.  Funerary beliefs, part II.  The royal afterlife; the underworld books in the Valley of the Kings.

Readings.  Lichtheim, vol. 1:  "The Instruction of Ptahhotep," pp. 61-80
"The Instruction addressed to King Merikare," pp. 97-109.
Lichtheim, vol. 2:  "Chapter 125:  the Judgement of the Dead," 124-132.
"Instructions," 135-163.

Week 7.  Moral and ethical content of Egyptian religion.  Ma'at (truth, right order, and justice); wisdom literature; the virtuous person.  Personal piety.

Readings.  Lichtheim, vol. 1:  Stelae of Intef, Ikhernofret, and Sehetepibre, pp.120-129.
Lichtheim, vol. 2:  "The Great Hymn to Osiris," pp. 81-86.
"Horus and Seth," pp. 214-223.

Week 8.  Exam (90 min.)  Abydos, a holy city.  Elephantine, a border town:  its temples from the archaic period to Graeco-Roman times.  Memphis, the ancient capital:  temples to Ptah and Hathor; deities of the Memphite necropolis.

Readings.  Lichtheim, vol. 2:  "Obelisk inscriptions of Queen Hatshepsut,"  25-29.  "The Poetical Stela of Thutmose III," 35-39.  "Stela of Amenhotep III," 43-48.  "Three penitential hymns from Deir el-Medina," pp. 104-110.  Prayers to Amun and Amun-Re, pp. 111-112.

Week 9.  The gods of Thebes.  Theban temples:  the Karnak complex, largest religious structure in the world.  Temple of Mut in Asheru.  The "Southern Sanctuary" of Amun at Luxor.  "The West, She-Who-Is-Opposite-Her-Lord."  Deities of the Theban necropolis:  Hathor, Meretseger, Amenhotep I and Queen Ahmose-Nefertari.  Royal mortuary temples of Mentuhotep II, Queen Hatshepsut, Seti I, Ramesses II, and Ramesses III. 

Readings.  Lichtheim, vol. 1:  "The Instruction addressed to King Merikare," 97-109.  "A cycle of hymns to King Sesostris III," 198-201.
Quirke, ch. 3:  "Preserving the universe." 
Lichtheim, vol. 2.  "Inscriptions from royal monuments," 25-78.

Week 10.  Divine kingship.  Old Kingdom:  ruler as incarnation of the sun-god.  Changing views on kingship during the First Intermediate Period and the Middle Kingdom.  Religious restoration under the Thutmosid kings of the New Kingdom.  The son of Amun-Re as warrior, sportsman, and priest.  Amenhotep III and his deification.  Ramesses II; Ramesside cults of royal ancestors.  Decline of royal prestige after the New Kingdom.

Readings.  Lichtheim, vol. 2:  "The later boundary stelae of Amenhotep IV/Akhenaten", pp. 48-51.  "Hymns and prayers from el-Amarna," 89-100.
Quirke on Akhenaten, passim.

Week 11  The Amarna crisis.  Akhenaten's theology:  was the "heretic king" really a heretic?  Was he really a monotheist?  Temples to the Aten; the role of Queen Nefertiti in Amarna theology; Amarna art; private house-shrines; recent discoveries at the workmen's village.

Readings.  Lichtheim, vol. 2:  "Horus and Seth," pp. 214-223. "Hymns, prayers, and a harper's song," pp. 100-116. 

Week 12.  Evolution of solar religion in the New Kingdom.  Ramesside reactions to Amarna theology; personal piety in Ramesside Egypt; religious life in the workmen's village of Deir el-Medina.

Readings:  Quirke, ch. 4, "Preserving life."  Handout:  oracular decisions of Amenhotep I from Deir el-Medina.

Week 13.  Oracles and divination.  Oracles and the king; consultation of oracles by commoners; classical accounts of Egyptian oracles; Ammon of Siwa and Alexander the Great.  Magic and medicine.  Dreams and their interpretation.

Readings.  Quirke, Epilogue:  "Egyptian Deities Abroad."

Week 14.  Egyptian religion and the larger world.  Foreign cults in Egypt and Egyptian gods abroad; Isis and Serapis in the classical world.  Religion in Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt; the recluses of the Serapeum and other temples; letters to the gods; Ptolemaic relations with Egyptian priesthoods; the Hermetic tradition.

Week 15.  Final exam (90 min.)  The influence of Egyptian thought on the Old Testament and on Christian iconography and belief.  Renaissance images of Egyptian religion.

Temples were nearly ubiquitous across the ancient Near East. Rather than serving as a gathering place for a worshipping congregation, a temple served as a terrestrial divine abode. In it, the god(s) lived amid society, yet carefully sequestered from it behind walls and doors. While primarily a residence, the temple also granted people limited access, usually for the purpose of divine service. The people believed that gods dwelt outside of the realm of human experience. Temples bridged the gap between human and divine, allowing regulated access to the deity, usually present in the form of a cult statue, and giving people the opportunity to influence the gods. Through this mutually beneficial interchange, the gods received the service they desired, while the people hoped their service would elicit divine protection and blessing. Protection and blessing, though, were conditional. The gods would remain and stay favorably disposed only if they were satisfied with their accommodation and service. Temples then, at least in theory, were lavishly and fastidiously constructed and maintained in order to keep the gods happy. This article focuses on the major temples, especially those from 1500–500 BCE, in Mesopotamia, Egypt, Hittite Anatolia, and Syria-Palestine. The article also focuses on the structure and ideology of the temples, not the rituals performed within them. For the most part, biblical and Israelite references will be kept to a minimum, as they are numerous enough to warrant their own article. Too numerous to include, archaeological reports generally have been excluded, yet they are referenced in the works cited and may be found with a Google web search.

Spells 154‒160 of the Coffin Texts have long been known to form a unified composition since most of them promise the knowledge of sacred localities. The main purpose of these spells is, however, not to draw up a mental map of places of ritual import but to describe a more tangible yet still grandiose journey, the wanderings of the moon across time and space. After the introduction (spell 154) which explains the origins of the month, the separate texts represent the successive stages of the monthly cycle: the period of invisibility (spell 155), waxing (spell 156), events around the full moon (spell 157), waning (spell 158), the arrival of the last crescent at the eastern horizon (spell 159), and again the conjunction of the sun and the moon when a solar eclipse can occur (spell 160). The references to the moon in the texts are sometimes straightforward, while to grasp the lunar content of other passages a greater understanding of ancient Egyptian astronomical concepts is required. The spells present a hitherto unsuspected coherent account of lunar phenomena and can appropriately be dubbed the Ancient Egyptian Book of the Moon.
Full text of the paper will be available on Academia.edu in three years’ time. Until then you need to get hold of the book, http://www.oxbowbooks.com/oxbow/current-research-in-egyptology-2016.html, or send a request to the author.

The terms Dt and nHH have often been treated as synonyms reflecting notions related to the vastness of time. However, from the study of original source material – the texts and iconography compiled over some three millennia, and authored by those who surely had complete understanding of their subject matter – it becomes clear that those modern interpretations are somewhat questionable. Clues to the connotations which may be ascribed to Dt and nHH are perhaps most clearly apparent in texts and imagery from the reign of Tutankhamun – a time of some political upheaval during which it was more than usually important to express traditional mores with some clarity so as to demonstrate a return to the well-established ideology underpinning pharaonic culture prior to the Amarna interlude. Testing those indications against the wider range of extant literary material confirms that Dt and nHH were neither synonyms, nor were they entirely temporal in nature, but rather referenced a duality of ontological conditions which together were fundamental to the fabric of pharaonic ideology. The reappraisal of this duality of conditions allows the many texts and iconographic depictions surviving from dynastic Egypt to be considered from a new perspective – one providing deeper insight into the character of pharaonic culture. Moreover, it becomes apparent that the influences of an ideology which evolved during times pre-dating the pyramid builders permeated the philosophical and theological treaties of the scholars of ancient Greece and Rome, and thence into more recent times. At least two great gods may live on.

Interpretation of symbols and glyphs found on 1st Dynasty BCE to 18th Century CE artifacts, are a means of tracing the transformational journeys of Bes, the Egypto-Nubian deity. The wanderings, which began in Nubia and Upper Egypt, continued north up the Nile into teeming markets and inns of port cities connected to the sea routes of the Mediterranean and Aegean and by land migrations west to Benin.
Beliefs based upon ancient Pygmy philosophy and tenets were incorporated into Bes as a divine representative. These views were spread by means of reciprocal gift systems, trade, migration and wars. The growing need for an accessible protector, healer and divine intermediary, spanning the distance from the Levant to the western Mediterranean was met by Bes, binding diverse communities into a common front against the external forces of disease and death.
As successive wanderings took place mostly in times of transition and upheaval, cultural contact between dissimilar populations malleably transformed images, names and myths associated with Bes  and Pygmy ancestors. These complex results are comprehensively examined in this paper to help us successfully transition into a new era.

A new critical edition of the ancient Egyptian 'Jackal Hymn of the West' from the so-called Book of the Night, with hieroglyphic transcription, transliteration, translation, extensive commentary on the cryptographic texts, and cryptographic sign list. The present study improves upon many cryptographic readings proposed originally by Étienne Drioton and seeks to align the present "western" text more closely with its eastern, southern, and northern counterparts from the Book of the Day.

From prehistoric figurines and graffiti to modern digital photographs, human beings repeatedly produced images, transforming the world itself into a relentless fabric of images. This volume presents the proceedings of the international conference held at the UCL Institute of Archaeology in 2014 inside the framework of the European project 'EPOCHS', with the aim to explore the fertile imaginary world of Middle Bronze Age Egypt (2000-1500 BC).

Images do not exist in their ontological isolation, as atomic unity, but they form a complex agency network with other images and with the society that produced them, hence the title "Company of Images". Eighteen papers focus on this intricate web, tackling the topic from different perspectives: material culture, archaeological finds, anthropological and social relations, iconographic representations, and analysis of the written sources, including linguistic approaches. The final goal is to highlight theoretical and methodological issues in order to explore connections between the images and their society, people who created images and who were recursively affected by the images they created.

In ancient Egypt the deceased were an integral part of the world of the living. The dead kin were perceived as extended family members and a bilateral relationship was developed between the two worlds. The deceased expected to receive from the living all the due rituals and offerings in order to ensure their well-being. Fulfilled all the needs of the dead, the living might expect their assistance and protection in everyday life problems. It's in the context of this relationship that we see emerge the ancestors' cult as an integral part, and with high relevance, of household religion, attested since the Middle Kingdom. The possible knowledge about this domestic religious practice results from both textual and material sources. It is the combination of texts, objects, and structures that makes possible for us to understand the motivations underlying this practice and where and how it was accomplished.

An increase of cross-cultural learning as a consequence of increased travel and migration between Egypt and the Levant during the Iron Age occurred after millennia of migration in earlier times. The result was an Egyptian-Levantine koine, often not recognized as relevant by historians due to an uncritical reproduction of ancient myths of separation. However, the cultural exchange triggered by migration is attested in the language, in the iconography of the region, in the history of the alphabet, in literary motifs, in the characterization of central characters of the Hebrew Bible and, last but not least, in the rise of new religions, which integrated the experience of otherness in a new ethos.

The Twentieth Dynasty tomb of Ramesses VI (KV9) includes
two copies of the cosmological treatise known to modern scholarship as the Book of the Night. Both versions of the book in KV9 include a cryptographic annotation to the twelfth hour, which is unique to that tomb. This annotation accompanies a file of jackals, the “bas of the westerners,” who tow the solar barque through the Underworld, toward the moment of sunrise. The content of this “Jackal Hymn” overlaps partially with cryptographic annotations to the baboon-, ibis-, and ram-headed bas of the east, north, and south, found in the Book of the Day. The present study offers a new translation and analysis of the Jackal Hymn, discarding numerous readings proposed in earlier studies, which had been based upon the phantom “principle” of acrophony, while taking into consideration orthographic, grammatical, and thematic parallels from the broader cosmological corpus. A careful reading of the cryptographic signs, utilizing only well attested substitution mechanisms (e.g., reduction of weak consonants), demonstrates clearly that the two versions of the text agree in every major respect and that divergences presumed in earlier studies are largely illusory. In addition, analysis of the grammatical structure of the text itself and identification of its thematic divisions help to clarify the meaning of several otherwise obscure passages.

In addition to his particular skill and knowledge in calming the goddess Sekhmet, the wab priest had other functions and abilities. In the sources we find him described both as an expert in making medical diagnoses by observing blood circulation and as the veterinarian responsible for the bull stables in the temples. He was the only one with the ability to distinguish the living hypostases of the god Apis and was enabled to certify the purity of the animals to be sacrificed. By the ritual slaughter and butchering of bulls under his supervision the prophylactic protection of Egypt was sought. However, the wab-priest of Sekhmet had a double role: he spread diseases and also cured them. This duality defined the priest as much as it defined the ambivalent goddess he served. Indeed, holding life and death in her hands, this goddess had the privilege of preserving life as well as the power to send calamities. The wab-priest could interact with Sekhmet since his purity immunized him from the dangerous effects of the goddess' fury. Once she had been pacified and ritually neutralized, Sekhmet's qualities were transferred to and assimilated by her officiant. The survival of these officiants into the Roman period is further proof of the cultural resilience of Ancient Egypt under Greco-Roman domination.

Note that this paper is to be read in conjunction with THE DECORATED NORTH WALL IN THE TOMB OF TUTANKHAMUN (KV 62) (THE BURIAL OF NEFERTITI? II) (2019) (https://www.academia.edu/39903971/The_Decorated_North_Wall_in_the_Tomb_of_Tutankhamun_KV_62_The_Burial_of_Nefertiti_II_2019_) and THE TOMB OF TUTANKHAMUN (KV 62): SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES (THE BURIAL OF NEFERTITI? III) (2020)(https://www.academia.edu/44309046/The_Tomb_of_Tutankhamun_KV_62_Supplementary_Notes_The_Burial_of_Nefertiti_III_2020_). THE BURIAL OF NEFERTITI? ANIMATIONS may be accessed separately at https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLD-SFAqqGpS603n_o7CORky6pUvB061X5

Recent work  on the funerary chapel of Amenirdis I at Medinet Habu has proved her selections from the Opening of the Mouth ritual to be deliberately chosen and meticulously laid out on the walls of her funerary chapel such that the texts, which were inscribed in retrograde, commence at the doorway to the chapel and culminate on the innermost wall of the corridor surrounding her cella. This interpretation of the layout of OM scenes suggests that the scenes inscribed on opposite walls run parallel to each other and should thus be read concurrently rather than sequentially. While this theory differs from more conventional interpretations of the division of the ritual, it accounts for the scenes' layout, their retrograde direction of writing/ reading, and relates the scenes' textual content to their physical location on the walls of the chapel. A new system for numbering the various scenes of the Opening of the Mouth arose from this particular analysis of Amenirdis's texts. The new numbers incorporate the scenes' physical location on the monument on which they occur.

I am including in this Addendum several points in my notes to the text which were omitted from the final publication because of the semi-popular nature of the book Ancient Christian Magic: Coptic Texts of Ritual Power. In presenting these notes, I would like once again to acknowledge Prof. Helmut Satzinger's exemplary editio princeps of the text (JARCE 12 [1975] 37-50 with Pl. XIII).

En este trabajo se abordará la figura de la diosa Isis desde diversas perspectivas. Primero, analizaremos su papel en Egipto, su lugar de procedencia, desde los tiempos Neolíticos hasta la conquista de Alejandro Magno, que da inicio al período helenístico. En esta época se producen cambios en la forma de entender a la diosa en Egipto, pero lo fundamental es que su culto se generaliza en Grecia, si bien ya había llegado allí siglos atrás. Esto da lugar a una asimilación sincrética de Isis a otras divinidades y también a la transformación de su culto en una religión mistérica. Isis acaba llegando al mundo romano, donde algunos emperadores intentarán erradicar su culto, mientras que otros, por el contrario, lo promoverán, hasta su definitiva desaparición en el siglo VI d.C. Una vez dado un repaso a su historia, analizaremos el mito más famoso de la diosa: el de Isis y Osiris, partiendo sobre todo de la versión que ofrece Plutarco. Por último trataremos de sintetizar las principales atribuciones de esta diosa: madre, trono y maga.

Palabras clave: Isis, diosa, Osiris, madre, culto

In Interpreting Ancient Egyptian Narratives, Martin Pehal applies structural analysis to four New Kingdom narrative compositions. The study explains the strong configurational character of ancient Egyptian (mythological) thought which has the ability to connect various ontological levels of human experience with the surrounding world into complex synchronic structures. These symbolical systems are shown to be mediating between the various cultural paradoxes which were inherent to ancient Egyptian society. Axial role in this process is attributed to the institution of positional kingship represented by the Pharaoh. Its transformative function is also put into relation to the special status of female characters who are shown to play the part of the “powerful powerless ones” further personifying the aspects of the mediating function of myth. Gradually, the study outlines a genuinely Egyptian “structural net” of basic mythemes and explains in what way it was possible for such a system to change and incorporate foreign mythological motifs especially from the Near East.

ABSTRACT: Preface to the Guide:

Focus and limitations:
The compilation of this guide began in Spring 2007 as a series of check lists and book requests for the somewhat small collection of Egyptological and related works in M. H. Sterne library at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.  During the development of several courses on Ancient Egypt, the Ancient Near East, and other areas spanning Prehistory through to the Roman period (and later), the collection grew, and continues to expand, and began to require a research paper guide for students enrolled in courses dealing with these geographic areas and time periods. The nature of the prime cliental, namely undergraduate to MA students in a North American setting, in conjunction with limited funding, has steered  –of necessity– the building of both Sterne library’s collections and this guide towards mostly English-language sources, less expensive works, and more easily available and more recent publications.

Overall aims:
In order to maximize student and public research usage of the existing, albeit still limited, collections, I have since compiled and incorporated selected journal articles, book chapters, encyclopedia entries, and other book titles from Sterne Library’s physical holdings (i.e., non-electronic sources) into diverse categories of research topics/subjects.  In addition, every effort has been made to add a full listing of electronic sources (including links) available to researchers of the geographic and temporal areas covered by this guide (i.e., mainly Prehistoric to Roman period Egypt).  The guide also provides general assistance for more serious/professional scholars (i.e., a quick reference to key articles, chapters, and volumes), but remains a tool aimed at English-speaking undergraduate-MA students and the public, focusing on Sterne’s holdings (note: other emerging Egyptological libraries will also approximate Sterne’s holdings).

Design and usage:
An attempt has been made to obtain sources spanning all aspects of Ancient Egypt and related areas, which have in-turn influenced the subdivision of the guide into general works, time periods, and diverse subject areas. Some of these categories have grown sufficiently large to merit further subdivision, such as the New Kingdom section, which has a general list of sources, materials regarding individual rulers, and a few affiliated topics of interest (Exodus; Sea Peoples).  I have attempted to place each source (i.e., books; book chapters; encyclopedia entries; journal articles) under each pertinent topic category that it covers, but naturally I may have missed some categories, while there may be other complementary and broader works that cover such topics elsewhere.  A list of the pertinent call number ranges has been placed at the end of the guide (see table of contents) to assist in the merits of additional shelf-browsing.

Beyond the guide:
Naturally there are numerous significant Egyptological sources outside Sterne Library’s holdings (including electronic links: e.g., JSTOR) that might be retrieved via interlibrary loan.  Sterne Library’s current Egyptological resources, however, are sufficient to introduce most areas of Egyptological research, and enable the researcher to consult the endnotes/footnotes and bibliographic data listed in recent books, articles, and encyclopedia entries to compile a list of further resources that may either be accessed via interlibrary loan, or possibly by visiting directly a neighbouring professional Egyptological library: e.g., the instructor (UAB); Atlanta (Emory University); Memphis (Memphis State University).

The collections in other Birmingham and Alabama libraries have online links via Sterne Library’s website, and offer many duplicate and different Egyptological works that are often accessible to the public/students: e.g., Birmingham Public Library, Gorgas Library (UA).  Naturally, I encourage students, faculty, and public researchers to see me for further assistance with this guide and their research topics.

Gregory Mumford (UAB)
Update: 15 Jan., 2021

PLEASE NOTE: This resource has received substantial updates in pertinent sections within the guide.  Some additional sorting of various articles/entries is still required, but these articles can be found, unsorted, at the end of the guide (e.g., articles from KMT, JSSEA, EA, etc., listed chronologically and by issue). I anticipate another update in the following year ...

This article stresses the fact that religion in ancient Egypt is not limited to the great temples, secluded from the outside world. The case-study of the cult of Renenutet, the «lady of the granary», shows that buildings meant for economic activities also left room for piety. Through epigraphy, iconography and scarce archaeological remains, this paper reviews the evidence for the presence of Renenutet in granaries throughout Egypt (but mostly in the Theban area). It also analyses the material conditions of her worship: situation and appearance of the chapel and cult statues, specific offerings, and staff members of the granary attached to the goddess’ service.

Socio-Historical Examination of Religion and Ministry (SHERM) is a biannual, not-for-profit, peer-reviewed academic journal that publishes the latest social scientific, historiographic, and ecclesiastic research on religious institutions and their practices. SHERM is dedicated to the critical and scholarly inquiry of historical and contemporary religious phenomena, both from within particular religious traditions and across cultural boundaries, so as to inform the broader socio-historical analysis of religion and its related fields of study.

In partnership with the FaithX Project, SHERM is a full, no-fee, open access academic journal, which means it publishes and publicly makes available your research without charging subscription dues or publishing fees. Whereas other open access journals still require authors to pay for making their publications available, SHERM believes in making high-quality scholarship accessible to the public while promoting the wide dissemination and visibility of your published article. Our goal is to increase the opportunity for erudite academicians to publish their work, gain a larger readership outside the confines of conventional journals, and receive citations from future researchers.

En el Egipto Antiguo, y la época amarniana no es una excepción, la necesidad de hacer visible el dominio de unos sobre otros obligó a llevar a cabo una política de los paisajes y de las obras monumentales que inmortalizara el poder. En este marco, la construcción de la ciudad de Akhetatón se ubica como la mayor muestra de devoción al dios Atón y de centralización del poder en manos de Akhenatón. Además de representar la centralización y la reforma propias del período, la ciudad de Akhetatón fue planeada como un reflejo de la expresión de la realeza egipcia dado que fue la sede política y religiosa del poder egipcio. Estas expresiones se pueden observar en el hecho mismo de mudar el centro de poder, pero más específicamente en la disposición de los edificios de la ciudad, en la arquitectura propia de esas construcciones y en la decoración de palacios, templos y tumbas.