Patronage and Other Logics of Social Organization in Ancient Egypt during the IIIrd Millennium bce
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examined the evidence of patronage during the First Intermediate Period, and then tried to analyze possible precedents, reflecting on the role that patronage could have had from the earliest moments of state structuration in the Nile Valley.
Abstract: Several years ago, an insightful analysis by Jan Assmann demonstrated the existence of patronage practices in Ancient Egypt during the First Intermediate Period. Does this indicate a change in social structure, as the author suggested, or does it instead denote a change in the way such practices are referred to in the available sources? In order to consider this question, this article examines the evidence of patronage during that period, and then tries to analyze possible precedents, reflecting on the role that patronage could have had from the earliest moments of state structuration in the Nile Valley.
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01 Feb 2020
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TL;DR: The basic social relations of peasant life are directly related to an environment characterized by extreme scarcity, and the outlook this situation engenders in the peasant is the "Image of the Limited Good" as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: The basic social relations of peasant life are directly related to an environment characterized by extreme scarcity. The major factor of productive wealth in agriculture is land, to which the peasant has little or no free access. Labor—his own, and that of his family members—is available to the peasant, but this relatively unproductive factor must be applied to land in order to generate wealth. Few other outlets for productive labor employment are available to him. When the peasant is able to combine land and labor in a wealth-generating endeavor, his productivity is likely to be extremely low, due to limiting factors such as technology, capital, marketing information, and credit. All of these life aspects combine to hold down the peasant's income and preclude savings. He is, in a word, poor.Furthermore, the peasant is powerless against many threats which abound in his environment. There are disease, accident, and death, among the natural threats. There are violence, exploitation, and injustice at the hands of the powerful, among the human threats. The peasant knows that this environmental constellation is dangerous. He also knows that there is relatively little he can do about his situation, and, accordingly, his culture often features themes of vulnerability, calamity, and misfortune. As George Foster has neatly summarized if, the outlook this situation engenders in the peasant is the “Image of the Limited Good.”
289 citations
Book•
01 Jan 1990
TL;DR: The authors explores the succession of interrelated changes that lead to civilization and draws conclusions about the dynamics of social change and the processes of social evolution applying those concepts to the rise of Greece and Rome.
Abstract: Explores the succession of interrelated changes that lead to civilization and draws conclusions about the dynamics of social change and the processes of social evolution applying those concepts to the rise of Greece and Rome. This book should be of interest to advanced students and lecturers of anthropology, archaeology, ancient and social history.
77 citations
TL;DR: A paradigm contrast between ideals of respectful care for the dead, on the one hand, and realities of medium and long-term neglect, destruction and reuse on the other, can be found in the archaeological record of ancient Egypt.
Abstract: Ancient Egypt offers a paradigm contrast between ideals of respectful care for the dead, on the one hand, and realities of medium- and long-term neglect, destruction and reuse on the other. Ideals are expressed in normative mortuary monuments and in texts; the archaeological record, together with relatively few skeptical texts, testifies to realities. Death was as socially riven as the realm of the living. Vast amounts were invested in royal and elite monuments, while cemeteries as a whole cannot account for more than a fraction of the population. Preservation of the body was essential for conventional conceptions of an afterlife - often envisaged to take place away from the tomb - but embalming practices cannot have been required for all. The contradictions implied by divergences from the ideal were negotiated over very long periods. Such processes of accommodation may be particularly necessary in complex societies and civilizations. They emphasize that, even if the actors may present the matter otherwis...
63 citations
TL;DR: In this article, an analysis of the archaeological data suggests that the political significance of royal burial complexes is rather ambiguous, but that of the cemeteries of the capital and the provinces is more explicit, once the social and chronological complexity of these sites is understood.
Abstract: Archaeological and textual data, which are both biased and fragmentary, are essentially complementary in any effort to reconstruct the political systems prevailing in Egypt between 2600 and 1780 B.C. An examination of certain aspects of the archaeological data suggests that the political significance of royal burial complexes is rather ambiguous, but that of the cemeteries of the capital and the provinces is more explicit, once the social and chronological complexity of these sites is understood. Some aspects of the provincial data also suggest that the collapse of the comparatively highly‐centralized system of the Old Kingdom, the effects of which were still visible after 170 years of formal reunification, was due to sustained famine created by natural causes rather than a failure in the political system. Finally, any effort to reconstruct Egyptian foreign policy during this period must refer to the archaeological data since the relevant textual sources are heavily biased.
47 citations