6 - Egypt in the Wider World

Summary

The ancient Egyptians were part of a continuous web of people living on the African, Asian, and European continents and the islands between them (Figure 6.1). Lifestyles and habitats varied greatly across this region, but cities and palaces emerged in many areas during the third and early second millennia bc that functioned as regional collecting points and hubs of interregional exchange. Objects connected people over long distances. The circulation of foreign products and styles contributed to an awareness of identity and otherness. In a hymn of the New Kingdom, the god Aten is praised for having created all human beings in Syria, Nubia, and Egypt, distinguishing them by their spoken languages, skins, and characters. Egyptian visual display expressed ethnic differences explicitly by emphasising features of the body, such as hairstyles, skin colour, tattoos, and clothing, though how people behaved towards stereotypes is difficult to gauge. The integration of material remains in the analysis and a refined interpretation of written and visual sources show that practices of contact were multilayered.