Afr Archaeol Rev DOI 10.1007/s10437-017-9261-3

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

New Insights on the Inscription on a Painted Pan-Grave Bucranium, Grave 3252 at Cemetery 3100/3200, Mostagedda (Middle Egypt) Julien Cooper & Hans Barnard

# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2017

Abstract The so-called pan-graves occur in the archaeological record of the Egyptian Nile Valley during the Second Intermediate Period (13th–17th Dynasties, 1950–1550 BCE). Because of their uncharacteristic layout and contents they are usually interpreted as associated with a foreign group coming into the region from the south or southeast. Only a single text, comprising six Egyptian hieroglyphs painted on the skull of a bovid, can be connected with certainty to these graves and the people who constructed them. Since its excavation and analysis in the 1930s, this inscription has been interpreted as the personal name or title , ‘master of the horn.’ Our new examination of the original materials questions this reading and suggests some new etymological possibilities. The text likely transcribes an ancient East African language such as Beja and is of insufficient length to be translated with certainty. Résumé Les sépultures dites « pan-graves » apparaissent dans les vestiges archéologiques de la vallée du Nil en Egypte durant la deuxième période intermédiaire (XIIIe-XVIIe Dynasties, 1950–1550 avant notre ère). Du fait de la particularité de leurs

J. Cooper Nomadic Empires Project, Faculty of History, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 2RL, UK H. Barnard (*) Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA, A331 Fowler Museum, 308 Charles Young Drive North, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1510, USA e-mail: [email protected]

arrangements et de leur contenus, elle sont généralement interprétées comme étant associées à un groupe étranger à la région, originaire du sud ou du sud-est. Un seul texte, comprenant six hiéroglyphes égyptiens peints sur le crâne d’un bovidé, peut être associé avec certitude à ces sépultures et à ceux qui les construisirent. Depuis sa mise au jour et son analyse dans les années 1930, cette inscription a été interprétée comme étant le nom personnel ou le titre lu , ‘maître de la corne’. Notre nouvel examen du matériel original met cette lecture en question et propose de nouvelles pistes étymologiques. Le texte transcrit vraisemblablement une ancienne langue est.-africaine telle que le Beja et ne peut, de par sa brièveté, être traduit avec une totale acuité. Keywords Beja . Cushitic languages . Egypt . northeast Africa . Nubia . Medjay . Pan-grave . Second intermediate period . Second millennium BCE

Pan-Graves and the Pan-Grave People The material culture of Ancient Egypt is generally characterized by enduring traditions; the gradual introduction of new forms, techniques and materials; and the rapid acculturation of immigrants and invaders. Only rarely does the archaeological record reveal truly idiosyncratic evidence which is usually interpreted as the presence of outsiders in the Egyptian heartland. An example is the so-called pan-graves, which occur in Upper Egypt and Lower Nubia around 2000–1500 BCE (Fig. 1). Pan-graves were first described at modern

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Hu (Hut-Sekhem, Diospolis Parva), south of Abydos (Petrie 1901), and later found in relative abundance in Lower Nubia (Bietak 1966; Sadr 1987; Hafsaas 2006; Näser 2012). Most are some distance from the river Nile and many are on the fringes of cemeteries associated with the C-Horizon (2500–1500 BCE), with the pangraves dating from the end of the Middle Kingdom or the Second Intermediate Period (13th–17th Dynasties, 1950–1550 BCE). Large pan-grave cemeteries, with

Fig. 1 Location of pan-grave cemeteries in Egypt and Lower Nubia (drawn by Ralf Miltenberger, adapted from Näser 2012, p. 82)

more than a hundred graves, have been described at Mostagedda (Brunton and Morant 1937), north of Abydos, and at Debeira and Ashkeit (Säve-Söderbergh 1989), near the Second Cataract. Although they likely represent the same culture, cemeteries and graves show significant variation. Typical pan-graves are round to oval pits in which the body of the deceased is buried, in a crouched position, on its right side with the head either to the north or west

Afr Archaeol Rev Fig. 2 Typical pan-grave as excavated in Sayala in Lower Nubia (adapted from Bietak 1966, Plates 21, 29)

(Fig. 2). Some graves are lined with stones or have a simple superstructure; others preserve evidence that the burial was preceded by the application of resins or ashes to the floor of the grave. Grave goods typically include handmade bowls with thin walls, thick rims and crosshatched incisions (Kemp 1977; Williams 1983, 1993). Other grave goods include weapons, bracelets and necklaces of seashell beads—mostly Red Sea Nerita and Conus sp.—sometimes with characteristic spacers, and one or more animal skulls, often in separate pits. Such offering pits, containing the skulls and horns of mainly sheep and goat, but also cattle and gazelle in smaller numbers (Table 1), occur with some frequency in pangrave cemeteries and may indicate a close association between the deceased and their herds, a relationship projected into the mortuary sphere. The ratio of sheep to goat to cattle in these pits is largely consistent with the composition of herds amongst nomads in northeast Africa and the deposit may be reflective of a living herd (Näser 2012; Bangsgaard 2013). Some of the skulls were found partly painted red or black and decorated with red or black lines and white dots. Very few skulls display more elaborate decorations; one of these

preserved a short text which is described and discussed in detail below. The pan-grave funerary arrangements are idiosyncratic in an Egyptian context and are usually interpreted as associated with a group newly settled in the Nile Valley, although it cannot be ruled out that they resulted Table 1 Species of the animal skulls excavated at pan-grave cemetery SJE47 in Debeira (Nubia) (adapted from Näser 2012, original data from Säve-Sönderberg 1989) Number

Percentage

Female goat

163

49

Male goat

43

13

Immature goat

47

14

Female sheep

45

14

Male sheep

14

4

Immature sheep

12

4

Female cattle

2

1

Male cattle

2

1

Immature cattle

3

1

Total

331

100

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from otherwise unknown local developments. Commonly, they are interpreted as associated with the Medjay mercenaries of the historical sources (SäveSöderbergh 1941; Bietak 1966, 1987; Hafsaas 2006), an assumption based on the robust appearance of the bones of the deceased and the presence of weapons and Red Sea shell beads in some of the graves (Bietak 1966). Although this assumption passes the test of Ockham’s razor, reality was definitely more complex (Sadr 1990; Friedman et al. 2001, 2004; Barnard, 2009a, b, 2012; Bintliff and Barnard 2012; Liszka 2012, 2015). Medjay feature in written sources from the Old through New Kingdom (Giuliani 1998; Zibelius-Chen 2007; Liszka 2015), while pan-graves are relatively securely dated to the Second Intermediate Period. Pan-graves were found in or near the Nile Valley, on both the east and west bank (Bietak 1966; Krzywinski 2012; Näser 2012), and not in the Eastern Desert where the Medjay are thought to have originated (Barnard 2009a, b; Liszka 2012). Weapons occur only in the larger pan-grave cemeteries of Middle Egypt—such as Mostagedda, Balabish and Hu—in the graves of men, women and children, and are absent further south (Liszka 2012, pp. 498–496). The presence of shells cannot be used to link the deceased to a specific culture or region, as shells have been traded directly and indirectly over great distances by many people from very early times onward, and for a variety of reasons (Hogendorn and Johnson 1986; Trubitt 2003; Bar-Yosef Mayer 2005; Botha 2008). Apart from establishing sex (Table 2), the systematic analysis of the human skeletons unearthed from pan-graves has been limited. Skulls with metric properties compatible with a sub-Saharan, East African origin (“negroid” in the dated terminology of Table 2 Sex of the human skeletons excavated at pan-grave cemetery 3100/3200 in Mostagedda (Egypt) (adapted from Näser 2012, original data from Brunton and Morant 1937) Number

Percentage

Female

39

45

Female?

4

5

Male

20

23

Male?

4

5

Infant/child

19

22

Total

86

100

the researchers) have been described in Middle Egypt—in Mostagedda (identified by Strouhal and Jungwirth 1984, p. 190, based on Brunton and Morant 1937, Tafel 84, Plate 76, pp. 117–123), Qau al-Kebir (Derry 1927), and Hu (Thomson and Randall-MacIver 1905, pp. 100–102; RandallMacIver and Woolley 1906, p. 16)—as well as Lower Nubia, in Shellal (Reisner 1910, pp. 52–54), and Sayala (Strouhal and Jungwirth 1984). The metric analysis of 15 pan-grave skeletons from Sayala, Lower Nubia, found them distinctly different from surrounding C-group skeletons (Strouhal and Jungwirth 1984, pp. 188–191). The pan-grave skeletons displayed properties clearly associated with a sub-Saharan rather than a Nilotic origin and were also notably smaller and more gracile than surrounding C-group skeletons. Other research reached similar conclusions (Barguet 1952; Al-Rayah 1973; Gratien 1978), contradicting the excavators who noted a robust appearance of the bones based on cursory observations. Based on this small dataset, pan-grave skeletons were interpreted as possible descendants of Late-Palaeolithic groups near the Second Cataract (Strouhal and Jungwirth 1971), or from Ethiopia or Somalia (Al-Rayah 1973). Next to Medjay, the historical sources mention many Egyptian words for cultural or religious outsiders, including Iuntiu (Lansing 1947; Meredith 1957), Tjehenu or Tjemehu (Breasted 1962; Murray 1965), ‘Amu (Weinstein 1975), Heriu-Sha (those who are on the sand), Nemiu-Sha (those who traverse the sand) and Khetiu-ta (those who move around the earth) (Behrens 1982). While some of these terms are easily translatable Egyptian lexemes, others like ‘Amu appear to be foreign words. Either way, the exact usage and denotative meaning of these terms remain unclear. Some may indeed refer to historic groups, but they should not be interpreted as ethnonyms in a modern sense (Wobst 1978; Smith 1986; Dolukhanov 1994; Banks 1996; Jones 1997; Burstein 2008; Smith 2008; Barnard 2013). More likely most or all were somewhat pejorative umbrella terms, similar to Aborigine, barbarian, Bedouin, Bushman, Caucasian, gypsy, Eskimo, Indian and pygmy in present-day English. As the Egyptian terms are furthermore divorced from an obvious material counterpart, there seems little reason to associate any of them with the pan-graves or the people that constructed these graves.

Afr Archaeol Rev Fig. 3 Photograph and detail of the watercolour of the painted bucranium found in Grave 3252 of Cemetery 3100/3200 in Mostagedda, north of Abydos in Middle Egypt (adapted from Brunton and Morant 1937, Plates 74, 76)

The Painted Bucranium from Grave 3252 The only written evidence that can be securely associated with the Pan-Grave People, as we here identify the builders of the pan-graves, is the word on a painted bucranium found in 1928–1929 by British Museum Expedition to Middle Egypt in Grave 3252 of Cemetery 3100/3200 in Mostagedda, north of Abydos (Fig. 3). Grave 3252 did not contain a human burial, but was a pit in which some 40 pairs of horns from goats and cows had been buried, most left attached to the frontal bone. The pit appeared undisturbed and also yielded a buff unguent pot, identified as type 57h, and a string of small beads of blue faience. The cache was located between Grave 3251, in which two males had been buried, and Grave 3253, containing a single female. The excavators described their find as follows. In the centre of the group [of horns and skulls] was an ox-frontal, with the figure of a man, painted black, in a red kilt, holding a red object in his right hand, and over his shoulder an axe, coloured red; in front of him is a rectangle containing hieroglyphs, no doubt giving his name (Q.s.k.’.n.t., apparently). The ground is filled up with black and red dots, and the whole is flanked by two sacred eyes. (Brunton and Morant 1937, p. 121) The most remarkable paintings are shown on pl. lxxvi [partly reproduced here in Fig. 3], where the presence of the sacred eyes may have some

connection with the sacred eyes on Middle Kingdom stelae [...] This suggestion of a stelae is borne out by the figure of the axe-bearer with his name in front to him, Qeskant. (Brunton and Morant 1937, p. 131) Mr. G.W. Murray has pointed out to me that there is a common word in the Nubian language, goskanti, meaning an egg. (Brunton and Morant 1937, p. 131, footnote 1).

Judging from the photograph, the painting must have been difficult to make out and interpret at the time it was excavated and is even more so today (Fig. 4). We can therefore assume that the watercolour published in 1937 represents the most accurate record ever to be available. The above interpretation of the excavators has entered the scholarly discourse unquestioned (El-Sayed 2004). We think, however, that a critical reappraisal of the evidence is warranted (Näser 2012, p. 88, footnote 3; Cooper 2015, p. 84).

A New Reading of the Pan-Grave Inscription To investigate the only known written source left by the Pan-Grave People, we collected new high-resolution colour and infrared imagery of the bucranium, now kept in the British Museum. Colour images were

Afr Archaeol Rev Fig. 4 Photograph of the painted bucranium from Grave 3252 as it appears today. Photograph kindly provided by Bryan Kraemer, courtesy of the British Museum (image in full colour online)

subsequently manipulated with DStretch, a plugin for the enhancement of rock art images in the open-source imaging program ImageJ (Fig. 5, top right). DStrech applies a Karhunen-Loeve transformation and can make details visible that are nearly imperceptible to the naked eye. This program allows image enhancement within different colour spaces, each producing a specific result. We found that YBK (yellow, blue, black) enhancement produced the most informative results as this emphasized both the red and black pigments. Enhancement of the red made clear that the human figure next to the text is holding a boomerang or throwing stick, while enhancement of the black made the hieroglyphs slightly easier to read. Digital infrared photographs corroborate these results (Fig. 5, left). This new rendering allows for a revised reading of the text which differs from past copies and interpretations. Consequently, a new analysis of the text and its etymology must be carried out. The excavators interpreted the third sign of the inscription as (D28 on Gardiner’s sign list), allowing for the which has been followed by most authors. reading The reading of would be orthographically expected as this sign is typically followed by an aleph as a phonetic

complement, as it is here. Based on the new image and reading, the third sign, however, does not unambiguously resemble (D28), but appears instead to be a single arm holding an object. It is most likely not an ayin (D36), which has an empty hand. (D37, or ) or (D38, ) would be possible, rendering the text or . These signs are generally used either only in fixed constructions ( ). If the name or text is not Egyptian, however, the general principles of Egyptian orthography need not necessarily apply. Indeed, there are instances of these signs being used independently for or both in Egyptian lexica and foreign onomastics. The word “haematite” and the toponym “Busiris” (Hannig 1995, pp. 970, 1408), for instance, show the sign used to transcribe . There are also instances of the sign being used for phonetic m or mn, as in the word mn.t “swallow” (Cooper and Evans 2015, p. 15). In foreign onomastics in Egyptian texts there are a number of cases where this sign could be used for m (Osing 1976; Hannig 1995, pp. 1346–1347; El-Sayed 2011), which on balance would seem the most likely reading in this text. Different scribal traditions allowed for different orthographic idiosyncrasies in the

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Fig. 5 Left: Infrared image of the text on the bucranium from Grave 3252 (photograph kindly provided by Bryan Kraemer, courtesy of the British Museum). Top right: False colour (YBK enhanced) image of the inscription in the painted bucranium from

Grave 3252 after manipulation using the DStretch plugin in ImageJ (original photograph kindly provided by Renée Friedman, courtesy of the British Museum). Bottom right: Our reading of the hieroglyphs (image in full colour online)

transcription of foreign names. As this pan-grave inscription is unique, the transcription system need not replicate those of other known corpora of foreign lexical material, such as the Execration Texts or the list of foreign names in the Middle Kingdom Papyrus Moskau 314 (Rilly 2007). If an interpretation based on a non-standard Egyptian orthography were forced, a reading of might be suggested, meaning “the bone which Anet gave,” with Anet as an unattested personal name. The lack of any determinatives as well as the non-standard orthography of the perfective relative form as (rather than the regular bread loaf or ) would argue against this interpretation. One might also entertain the reading of the third sign as a determinative (perhaps D40 ) and therefore read the first three signs together as . As there is no other trace of determinatives in the text this option is questionable. Yet another unlikely interpretation is to read (D19) – (N16) – (D45) – , meaning “the first of the sacred land, Anet” in which Anet is the “chief” of the “sacred land” (the cemetery? the Eastern Desert? some other sacred precinct?) and probably the person depicted. Sign D19, however, is not attested for before the New Kingdom, and sign N16 is without its regular determinative group of a canal with ideogram stroke.

The text has recently been subjected to lexical and etymological analysis in an overview of foreign lexical material in Egyptian documents from the Old and Middle Kingdoms (El-Sayed 2011). El-Sayed identified with two lexical items in the Beja (or Tu-Be awiye) language. Beja is the northernmost branch of the Cushitic languages, a branch of AfroAsiatic languages—next to Semitic, Berber and Chadic—which stretches along the eastern coast of Africa from Egypt to Kenya and includes several languages in the Ethiopian highlands. Many words in El-Sayed’s compendium have proved difficult to associate with a specific African language, although strong arguments have been made for the existence of several lexical identifications. Lexica connected with the Medjay and the Eastern Desert have on several occasions been connected with words from Beja. This language has also been identified as the origin of some names appearing in Greco-Roman and Coptic texts, so it is likely that an earlier version of this language was spoken in the region. A valid reason to suggest that at least some Middle Kingdom Medjay were Beja speakers is the personal name in Papy, who arrived at the rus Boulaq 18 of a Medjay chief Theban court in the 13th Dynasty (ca. 1755–1630 BCE), whose name is related to the contemporary Beja word

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kwaaya “friend” (Scharff 1922, pl. 21, l. 69.3; El-Sayed 2004, pp. 156, 360). In this respect, the word on the bucranium had a good match for a common Beja lexical element, the possessive kina, transcribed with Egyptian . El-Sayed’s represents a consonantsolution presumes that the vowel group /kV/. The first two consonants, transcribed as , were matched by him to the Beja word for “horn” (kos) and thus the name could be broadly translated as “master of the horn” in an old variety of Beja. Given the new reading presented here, however, this lexical solution can no longer be sustained. El-Sayed’s lexical analysis of the bucranium was considered a particularly attractive solution as this enabled linking a personal name with a common lexeme in the Beja language ( ), kina “owner, master” (El-Sayed 2011, pp. 264–265). The word kina has also been identified in Beja names of the Coptic period (Satzinger 2004, 2014, p. 212), suggesting that Beja has a relatively unbroken existence in this region. The identity of PanGrave People with pre-Beja speakers should be seriously considered, but is impossible to test against the extremely limited evidence. The presence of a final -t in the Egyptian transcription provides an additional problem, as this is a feminine marker in Beja, and the person depiction on the bucranium is clearly male. Based on our new analysis of the text the reading should be taken with extreme caution or even discarded.

Discussion and Etymology Given its proximity and cultural similarity, the association of the cache of horns and skulls in Grave 3252 with the surrounding pan-graves seems secure. It remains unclear, however, if and how the cache was linked to the men in Grave 3251 or the female in Grave 3253. It may indeed be that the interment of the cache of skulls is contemporaneous with the burial of any of the three humans nearby, as implied by the excavators, but the cache may also may represent a shrine that, over time, collected human burials around it, or later offerings made to those buried in the cemetery. Furthermore, it is unlikely that painted skulls were freshly prepared as part of the burial ritual. For this, animals would not only have had to be gathered, selected and slaughtered, but the skulls would have needed to be defleshed, degreased and prepared before being painted. This would have

taken a considerable amount of time exceeding the period during which a burial could be delayed given the Egyptian climate. It must thus be questioned if the text on the bucranium indeed refers to one of the three dead, and if it does to which one, or rather to the person or persons preparing and depositing the cache, or to something else entirely, such as a deity, a group of people (family, clan, tribe) or even the animal or skull itself. Without additional analytical research, these issues now remain near impossible to resolve. In the period under discussion, the linguistic map in northeast African provides an extremely complex picture of linguistic diversity as well as uncertain and fuzzy ethno-linguistic boundaries. Considering that the PanGrave People have not yet been geographically fixed, there are a number of languages to be considered when analysing this word on a bucranium. Such etymological analyses of personal names and toponyms have proved difficult in the study of African onomastics in Egyptian documents. On occasion, different scholars and linguists have offered competing etymologies of identical names. For instance, the list of African personal names present in Papyrus Moskau 314 was analysed as belonging to Berber languages (Schneider 2003, pp. 175–176), or pre-Meroitic (Rilly 2007), completely different languages. In the Nile Valley south of Aswan, a complex patchwork of languages belonging to the Afro-Asiatic and Nilo-Saharan macro-families existed. In Upper Nubia, it is clear that Meroitic, or more accurately preMeroitic, or several Meroitic-like languages were spoken. Dependent on when one dates the arrival of the Nubian languages (Old Nubian, Nobiin, Kenzi, Dongolawi) into the Nile Valley and Nubia, some have argued that a branch of this family or even Nara—a language now spoken in western Eritrea (Rilly 20062007, Rilly 2010)—may have been spoken in Lower Nubia. It seems more likely, however, that a language wholly separate form these suggestions was spoken in the area inhabited by the C-Group people in Lower Nubia. This “C-Group language” was considered by Behrens (1981) to be a branch of Berber. The evidence for this is limited to a small number of lexical items of questionable Berber origin (Kossmann 2011; Zibelius-Chen 2014). The linguistic origin of this C-Group language will remain undetermined until a comprehensive lexical analysis is conducted on their onomastic record in Egyptian documents (Zibelius-Chen 2006, 2014). A number of place names belonging to sites within the C-Group

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territory are phonetically inconsistent with a NiloSaharan language like Meroitic or Old Nubian. The pho(Debeira), nemes present in names like (Aniba), (Semna), or (Abu Simbel), all localities in Lower Nubia (Zibelius 1972), contain phonemes that are non-existent in Nilo-Saharan languages. Thus, the inhabitants of Lower Nubia spoke an Afro-Asiatic language or languages in the second millennium BCE. A further caveat in this approach arises in the supposition that linguistic identity does not always correspond to the boundaries of material culture. It is thus far from certain that all Pan-Grave People spoke the same language, or for that matter other material horizons like Kerma or C-Group. Nevertheless, given that distinguishable material cultures in Nubia are regionalized and display distinct and specific burial practices, it is credible that they represent a given group of people who shared some cultural affinities, including likely language. An impediment to linking the transcription / to the lexical material of any language lies in the difficulty of reconstructing ancient Egyptian phonology and analogue sounds in non-Egyptian languages. This task is even more problematic given the sound changes evident in all languages over millennia. The phoneme represented by the Egyptian sign aleph is ambiguous. In earlier Middle Kingdom loanwords, it regularly represents a transcription of /r/ or /l/, but there is reason to believe in some later Middle Kingdom and early New Kingdom loanwords it represents an ambiguous vowel /V/ (Satzinger 1994; Rilly 2007). This is proven most clearly in the African language contexts where the name of the same Kushite ruler is written with varying orthographic systems. In the Execration Texts , while the name of a Kushite ruler is transcribed as in a rock-inscription in the Eastern Desert the same , both of these transcriptions name is written as encoding the same name and pronunciation of */t(V)rVhV/ (for the inscription, see Davies 2014, pp. 35–36). Peust (1999, p. 110) has developed the hypothesis that Egyptian might be a labiovelar consonant in earlier Egyptian, in which case it might represent the sound [kw] that is common in languages of northeast Africa, or a similar uvular or velar consonant. The writing An can also sometimes represent /l/. Given this, and the varying pronunciation of A, it is not clear if we are dealing with a phonetic transcription of something like */qzdlt/~/kwzmlt/~/qzmVnt/ and so forth.

The final –t is likely a morphological suffix, which occurs in too many languages of the region to be particularly helpful in identifying the language. Beja commonly employs a feminine suffix –t in personal names, but postpositional –t morphemes are also known in other languages of the region such as Meroitic (-te). Some ancient Blemmyan masculine names appear with a –t ending, so this morph must have had more uses than simply marking usually feminine nouns (Satzinger 2004). Egyptian corresponds to a foreign /s/, but also possibly (sh). The do recall the opening consonants of the name, reading ubiquitous Nubian toponym . In later Meroitic, this is transcribed as qs (or qesw, qos), but this would be surprising on a Pan-Grave item as the Kerma culture, located much further south, is usually interpreted as the material expression of Kush. Another possibility is to read the first two consonants as the Egyptian word “bone,” whereby the word could refer to the bucranium itself. The difficulty with this interpretation is the orthography, which did not employ , the standard ideogram in this word. Following the interpretation of El-Sayed, it is more likely that is transcribing a foreign word, likely to be the Beja word kos meaning “horn” (El-Sayed 2011, pp. 264–265). It is likely that this Beja word derives from the same root (k’os) from which Egyptian and other Afro-asiatic languages get their general word for “bone” (Orel and Stolbova 1995; Ehret 1995). In favour of a Beja interpretation for this word on the bucranium is the fact that this root specifically means “horn” in Beja, whereas in other Afro-asiatic languages the root is either absent or more generally refers to “bone.” Given the nature of the bucranium and its presence in a deposit of horns, this etymology seems very likely. If we accept this etymology, we might be dealing with a descriptor of the object or burial rather than an individual’s name. Brunton and Morant’s (1937) connection to the word goskanti in the Kenzi Nubian language must be considered an irrelevant coincidence, especially as it means “an egg,” which seems inappropriate in this context. For the sake of thoroughness, other etymological possibilities should also be mentioned. A single lexical item that would make sense of the whole consonantal sequence would be Beja gašmelli “crane, stork,” which is possible as a name formant as some of the Medjay names in the Execration Texts seem to from originate with animal terminology, for instance kurib “elephant” (El-Sayed 2011, p. 282). Of interest, also, is Afar gasmalto “old woman” formed from the common Cushitic kinship term gwasa/gosa (Morin 2012, p. 438; Hudson 2013, p. 161).

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If the first word is formed by “horn,” the second word could be /mlt/, /dlt/, /mVnt/, or /mrnt/ dependent on the realization of aleph or whether it stands as a group – - as /l/. Several Blemmyan personal names of the Greco-Roman period include the formant –mne as a postpositional element (Satzinger 2014, p. 212), including the Blemmyan king mentioned at Kalabsha, Ϊσεμνε (Isemne). The function of this suffix or morpheme in the Blemmyan language is unknown as there is no similar morph in modern Beja with which one could compare. Based on an ostracon that purportedly represents a Beja translation of a biblical text in Coptic script, Wedekind has also identified a postpositional morpheme -men (Coptic ) of unknown function (Wedekind 2010, p. 78). If this is connected to the form in this word then the name could be “horn-mne,” where the function of the postpositional morpheme is unknown. A relationship to the Beja verb milha “to lead” should not be discounted. In Saho-Afar, the nearest linguistic relatives of Beja, meela means “people” or “name” (Morin 2012), either of which would be appropriate in this context. We must conclude that it remains extremely difficult to solve the etymology of this phrase or personal name, and we must be satisfied in providing a set of options or hypotheses. Based on the linguistic revaluation of a single word, the people that created the pan-graves must have been some as yet unknown group that came into the Egyptian Nile Valley, possibly from the east but more likely from further south, during the turmoil at the end of the Middle Kingdom. This pan-grave text is consistent with a Cushitic (Beja) origin, although this cannot be decisively proven. Nevertheless, it is tempting to proffer this as a proof of the Pan-Grave People speaking a Cushitic language. A comprehensive study of the pan-grave ceramics and decoration has revealed close affinities between the pan-grave culture and other cultures of Nubia and eastern Sudan, such as Gebel Mokram (de Souza 2016). In Egypt, the Pan-Grave People initially remained separate from the Egyptian population, although they appear to have incorporated some elements of Egyptian material culture into their funerary rituals and probably also into their daily cultural expressions. It has been argued that the Pan-Grave People slowly acculturated to Egyptian norms until they could no longer

be materially distinguished from their social and cultural surroundings (Näser 2012), although a recent study of their burial practices has shown that they retained a degree of indigenous identity, at least in their burial practices, until the disappearance of their material culture in the New Kingdom (de Souza 2013). These problems are yet to be harmonized by archaeologists, and the reasons for the occurrence and disappearance of the pan-grave material culture is still debated. By the New Kingdom at least, the textual Medjay appear in varying geographic contexts in Egypt and seem to be functioning as an integrated part of the Egyptian bureaucracy. Egyptian texts of this period often use the more generic term “southerner, African,” to refer to inhabitants of the deserts east of Nubia (Helck 1967). Modern scholars and probably also the Egyptians associated the Pan-Grave People with the Medjay, even though the word Medjay predates their arrival to the Nile Valley and was probably more an intellectual construct than an ethnic term in the modern sense (Burstein 2008; Pierce 2012). The rather simplistic equation of ancient peoples, be they the builders of the pangraves or the Medjay, with the modern dwellers of the Eastern Desert adds little to our understanding of this complex series of events.

Conclusion The short text on a bucranium presented here is of importance as it represents the only textual evidence on an object clearly connected to the pangrave culture. Another possible instance of hieroglyphs—a single enigmatic bird, perhaps —appears on a pan-grave vessel from Hu (Petrie 1901, Plate 40), although it is unclear whether this is indeed a hieroglyph rather than a zoological symbol. Although the text on the Mostagedda bucranium is likely to be a personal name, a descriptor related to the bucranium or a title or kinship term cannot be discounted, with none of these necessarily mutually exclusive. The solution suggested by El-Sayed, “master of the horn,” for example, could function as a personal name or as a descriptor. The connection to the word “master, owner” should now be discarded as it does not account for the new reading of the text. Compared to a personal name or title, the difficulties of

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analysing a text with a completely unknown function are obviously even more pronounced. Furthermore, in this period, northern Sudan was linguistically far more diverse than at present and the former existence of as yet undocumented languages and events of linguicide cannot be disregarded. Without additional evidence, it is thus nearly impossible to equate a single loanword or name in an Egyptian document with a specific African language, not to mention an established material culture. There is compelling evidence that the Eastern Desert was inhabited more or less continuously for the last 100,000 years, but it is extremely unlikely that these inhabitants formed a single, homogenous group that identified themselves by a single name like ‘Amu, Heriu-Sha, Iuntiu, Khetiu-ta, Medjay, Nemiu-Sha, Tjehenu or Tjemehu. Furthermore, the culture of the dwellers of the desert developed and changed over time as they adapted to changing circumstances or were joined or replaced by different people. The superficial similarities in the way of life of the different desert dwellers, which is for a large part dictated by the environment, has tempted some to assume cultural continuity over very long time periods (Seligmann 1913; Blackman 1914; Bietak 1966; Dahl and Hjort-af-Ornas 2006; Zibelius-Chen 2007; Krzywinski 2012). Although isolated aspects of the culture within a region, such as way of life, language or ceramic traditions may persist for a very long time, significant changes in other aspects are inevitable. Most of the indigenous inhabitants of the Eastern Desert still speak the Beja language, which is the most recent version of a language occurring in Egyptian documents since the First Intermediate Period (El-Sayed 2004; Zibelius-Chen 2006), but many others are native speakers of Arabic. Almost all of the inhabitants of the Eastern Desert are now Muslim, drink coffee with abundant sugar and live in more or less temporary shelters made of wood or palm-leaf mats, while the raising of dromedaries has become an economically and socially important part of their pastoral way of life (Krzywinski and Pierce 2001; Sidebotham et al. 2008; Barnard and Duistermaat 2012). All of these were introduced since the time of the Pan-Grave People and the Medjay, and equating these groups with the modern inhabitants of the desert is meaningless (Zaborski 1989; Burstein 2008; Barnard 2009a, b, 2012; Liszka 2012; Pierce 2012). Over the millennia, not only goods and ideas travelled

in and out of the desert but also people, resulting in a gradual shift of the ethnic composition of the region (Barnard 2013). If the pan-graves were indeed constructed by immigrants from the Eastern Desert and if these immigrants can indeed be identified with the Medjay of the written sources (SäveSöderbergh 1941; Bietak 1966), for which there is precious little evidence, they can still not be equated with desert dwellers of later periods. These issues can only be addressed by a largescale interdisciplinary research project combining historical and archaeological data with geological, geographical, environmental, ecological and economic information to come to a more complete understanding of phenomena with an otherwise low profile (Bintliff and Barnard 2012). The archaeological evidence indicates that the Pan-Grave People distinguished themselves from the longterm inhabitants of the Nile Valley in their mortuary practices, physical appearance and probably lifestyle. They likely arrived in the area from the southeast, although it remains unclear from exactly where and what motivated them to move. It is also unclear why they again vanish from the archaeological record. Likely they assimilated into Egyptian society, as suggested by the historical sources; alternatively, they may have moved again or been violently removed from the area. The evidence is suggestive that they had their own ethnic identity and thus likely their own language. The available data are, however, insufficient to provide many details on any of these matters. We think much can be learned from re-examining, re-analysing and re-thinking the available excavated materials, kept in many museums and archives, using modern methods and technologies. This should be done without preconceived notions of the connection between the materials, historical sources and ancient ethnonyms.

Acknowledgements We would like to thank Bryan Kraemer, Renée Friedman, Kate Liszka and the British Museum for providing high-resolution digital photographs of the bucranium. Thanks are also due to Rose Campbell, Jacco Dieleman, Bryan Miller, Chris Ehret, Kate Liszka, Claudia Näser and two anonymous reviewers for their valuable insights that greatly improved the final text. All errors and omissions are entirely our own. The research of Julien Cooper is supported by the project "Nomadic Empires: A World-Historical Perspective," which is funded by the European Research Council under the European Union's Seventh

Afr Archaeol Rev Framework Program (FP/2007-2013) / ERC Grant Agreement no. 615040. Compliance with Ethical Standards This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors. Conflict of Interest conflict of interest.

The authors declare that they have no

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