City Wall(s) in Avaris

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H E I N R I C H - B A R T H - I N S T I T U T

T H E P O W E R O F

W A L L S

C O L

L O Q U I U M A F R I

C A N U M

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HEINRICH-BARTH-INSTITUT e.V.in Kooperation mit der Universität zu Köln

5 C O L L O Q U I U M A F R I C A N U M

Beiträge zur interdisziplinären Afrikaforschung

Contributions to Interdisciplinary Research in Africa

Contributions à la recherche interdisciplinaire en Afrique

K Ö L N 2 0 1 3


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The Power of Walls − Fortifications in

Ancient Northeastern Africa

Proceedings of the

International Workshop

held at the University of Cologne

4th −7th August 2011

Edited byFriederike Jesse & Carola Vogel

H E I N R I C H - B A R T H - I N S T I T U T


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Aerial view of the Gala Abu Ahmed fortress. (© University of Cologne, ACACIA project)

To Rudolph Kuper

for his commitment to African Archaeology and his long-lasting and

passionate work in Northeastern Africa which ‒ among other things ‒

led to the discovery of Gala Abu Ahmed more than 25 years ago.


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Contents

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Friederike Jesse & Carola VogelIntroduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Border and Territory

Dan’el KahnThe History of Kush – an Outline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Anja KooState-Territory and Borders versus Hegemony and its Installations:

Imaginations Expressed by the Ancient Egyptians during the Classical Periods . . . 33

László TörökEgypt’s Southern Frontier Revisited . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

Fortifications between Syria/Palestine and Nubia –

Overview of the Historical Development of Fortifications

Carola VogelKeeping the Enemy Out ‒

Egyptian Fortifications of the Third and Second Millennium BC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

Květa SmolárikováEgyptian Fortifications from the First Millennium BC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

Bogdan ŻurawskiStrongholds on the Middle Nile: Nubian Fortifications of the Middle Ages . . . . 113

Mariusz DrzewieckiFortifications and the Post-Meroitic Period in Upper Nubia: Some Thoughts . . . . 145

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The story behind this book can be traced back to the winter of 2008/09 and to the Wadi

Howar desert region in northern Sudan where a team of the University of Cologne was

doing excavation work at the Gala Abu Ahmed fortress. One of the important questions

of the project was ‘Why was it necessary to build such a massive structure at this rather re-

mote location?’ While working and in the evenings at the camp we came up with fasci-

nating theories of the ‘who’ and ‘why’. Beyond, there were a lot of serious discussions

about the functions of the different buildings we uncovered from beneath the sand, about

the possible trade routes or thoroughfares crossing this part of the Sahara, and whether or

not an Egyptian influence was possible despite the distance. The large amount of archae-

ological evidence pointing to a Pharaonic context such as faience fragments, sherds made

of marl clay or pieces of alabaster led to the discussion whether or not the Egyptians may

even have been responsible for the construction of Gala Abu Ahmed itself.

Against this background, the question of frontiers and their protection became important.

While discussing all these topics and realising that we could not find sufficient answers,

we came to a point when someone asked ‘Why don’t you organise a workshop on this

topic?’ The idea was born and a little more than two years later an international workshop

entitled ‘The Power of Walls – Ancient Fortifications in Northeastern Africa’ was held at

the University of Cologne. The meeting was part of the Gala Abu Ahmed research project

and funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG). As the organisers, we were

overwhelmed by the strong and positive reactions to the invitations – news of the work-shop spread quickly and many people called to ask whether they could participate. That

encouraged us very much and confirmed the necessity of discussions about fortifications,

frontiers, territories and their protection in northeastern Africa.

About 30 researchers from different countries in Europe, but also from the Sudan and the

United States finally met for a long and intense weekend in Cologne: 4 th–7th August 2011.

We would like to thank all participants for attending, for their contributions and their en-

thusiasm for discussion. The workshop venue was appropriately located in the ancient

fortifications of the town of Cologne, now used by the University of Cologne. We would

like to thank the Institute of Geography and especially Andreas Janotta for their hospital-

ity. The workshop venue represents only a small part of the enormous Prussian fortifica-

tions which turned Cologne into one of the most impressive fortified towns in Europe in

the 19th century. An excursion to the well preserved ‘Fort X’ was the obvious thing to do –

Dirk Wolfrum, Peter Sievert, Werner Pitzler and Uwe Zinnow of the ‘Arbeitsgemeinschaft

Festung Köln’ vividly brought these powerful ancient walls to life for us. The realisation

of the whole workshop would not have been possible without the help of Eymard Fäder,

Preface


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City Wall(s) in Avaris 241

Irene Forstner-Müller

City Wall(s) in Avaris

While urban fortifications are a well known phenomenon in the Ancient Near East in the2nd millennium B.C., they are less well attested in Egypt. There is no evidence for city wallsin New Kingdom Egypt (Pilgrim 2010: 265; Spence 2004). During the Middle Kingdomand the Second Intermediate Period the situation is slightly different, as they do occuralthough they are not a common phenomenon even then (Kemp et al. 2004: 259f.).

One of the few examples known from these periods is Elephantine, the capital of theFirst Upper Egyptian Nome. Due to the town’s pivotal position at the 1st Cataract, the

doorway to Nubia, it is not surprising that fortifications/city walls are known there fromthe Early Dynastic period onwards (Ziermann 1993). During the Middle Kingdom in thelate 12th Dynasty a city wall was built (Pilgrim in press). This wall was partly repaired inthe 17th Dynasty and abandoned in the early 18th Dynasty by which time Elephantine hadalready lost its strategic position as the fortress at the southern Egyptian border (for thedevelopment of Elephantine as a border fortress from the Middle Kingdom to the NewKingdom cf . Pilgrim 2010).

In Avaris city walls and similar fortifications are attested for the Second Intermediateperiod (Fig. 1). At that time Avaris was one of the largest towns in Egypt and the Ancient

Near East (see also Bietak 2010: 13). By the 15th

Dynasty, when it was the capital of at leastthe northern part of Egypt, it covered an area of more than 260 ha (for the latest map of thegeophysical survey cf. Forstner-Müller et al. 2010). Fortifications, albeit not a closedperimeter, were detected at the northern, southern and eastern limits of the town.

The North: ‘Ezbet Helmi

Parts of this city wall were excavated by the Austrian mission in the late 1980s and early1990s in the northern section of ancient Avaris at the modern village of ‘Ezbet Helmi (Jánosi1994: 28–30) (Fig. 2).

There, in areas H/I–VI, the site was occupied during the later Second IntermediatePeriod. While small buildings and attached domestic installations such as ovens coveredthe area from the early Hyksos Period onwards (Bietak et al. 2001: 30–31, 48 and figs. 8–9),the settlement pattern changed distinctively with the construction of the city wall in the lateHyksos Period. The whole northern part of the town was now protected by a largefortification wall with bastions towards the Nile and the area became more prestigious incharacter. A large garden was situated to the immediate south of the wall (Jánosi 1994: 30).


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242 Irene Forstner-Müller

The wall itself was built from dark grey mud bricks. It was aligned to the Pelusiac branchof the Nile, therefore in this area in an east-west direction. Only the foundations of thiswall were preserved. Its base is 6.20 m wide. The northern face of the wall was battered.The 5.30 m-wide bastions protruded ca. 3.60 m from the façade and were 18.10 m apart.The foundation bed was filled with yellow sand. Whether an earlier thick muddy-sandylayer was artificial and is evidence of a land-reclamation strategy or constituted a naturalphenomenon remains to be seen (Jánosi 1994: 28).

In a later phase (Jánosi 1994: 29), the wall was reinforced at its northern face by amud brick casing which was built along the slope and filled the gaps between the bastions.

The same wall, visible in the magnetogram (Forstner-Müller 2010: fig. 12), extendedtowards the east and was at least 280 m long.

Fig. 1 Overall map of Avaris/Tell el-Dab’a, the city wall is marked in white (graphic: Leila Masoud, copyrightAustrian Archaeological Institute).


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Fig. 2 Wall in ‘Ezbet Helmi/area H/I; in the back garden with tree pits (photo: Archive Austrian ArchaeologicalInstitute).


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Fig. 3 Magnetic image of Ezzawin (measurement T. Herbich, Archive Austrian Archaeological Institute).


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The South: Ezzawin and Tell el-Dab’a

Artificial fortifications are also visible at the southern limits of Avaris (Fig. 3). There, at themodern village of Ezzawin, an extensive magnetic survey has revealed a suburban townquarter (Forstner-Müller et al. 2010: 73f. and figs. 1–2, 4). The survey shows a densely built-up quarter with buildings and streets. Following the slightly irregular street-grid, the

buildings are generally oriented SWW-NEE and NNW-SSE, but neighboring houses alltend to follow slightly different alignments, varying by a few degrees. A surface potterysurvey allows a cautious dating of this area to the later Second Intermediate Period. To thesouth a clearly defined border is visible.

A magnetic anomaly with a maximum width of 30 m runs along the southern borderof the town (Forstner-Müller et al. 2010: 73f. and fig. 4). The area to the south of this linewas once under water. Perhaps the anomalies recorded to the southeast of the settlementreflect harbor installations where the floodplain was dredged in order to create a place for

docking boats.This line continues to the east and is also visible, with interruptions, to the south of

the modern village of Tell el-Dab’a.In spring 2012 auger drillings were undertaken in order to investigate the nature of

these installations, to establish whether these are fortifications made of mud brick ormuddy-sandy reinforcements along the shore of the river Nile. First results hint at thefact that at least part of the installations consist of mud brick.

The East:‘

Ezbet Machali and

‘

Ezbet Mehesin

Similar fortifications are also visible (Fig. 4) in the results of the geophysical surveywhich was undertaken in the eastern part of the town in the vicinity of the modernvillages of ‘Ezbet Machali and ‘Ezbet Mehesin (Forstner-Müller et al. 2008). This part,like the area in Ezzawin to the south can be interpreted as a suburban quarter of Avaris.At its eastern edge an anomaly is visible, running along the bank of a subsidiary branchof the Pelusiac branch in a north-south direction. The extension of the magnetic featureis rather restricted. Perhaps it was necessary to fortify the river bank against flood events.Auger drillings undertaken during the spring season in 2012 in order to get a better ideaabout the nature of these reinforcements proved that, as in the south, the magneticanomaly most probably originates from mud brick constructions.


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Fig. 4 Magnetic image of Mehesin (measurement T. Herbich, Archive Austrian Archaeological Institute).


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Conclusion

In the later Second Intermediate Period parts of the town of Avaris were protected by acity wall. This wall did, however, not enclose the entire town. It was constructed in partsof the town that were deemed vulnerable and can thus be considered a real defencesystem, not a symbolic one. Besides their defensive character, these walls also servedideological purposes by demonstrating royal power and control over the enclosed area.

The situation in the town shows a different picture within the individual town quarters.A main wall with bastions was erected along the northwestern edge of Avaris along themain branch of the Pelusiac Nile. It seems that threats were expected from this direction.Fortified installations are also known from the south and to a minor degree from theeast of Avaris. There the main aim, besides defense, might also be to provide protectionfrom natural events such as the Nile flood and erosion of the shore.

There is little doubt that the threats to Avaris were realistic, not perceived (Spence

2004: 269). The historical sources from the Second Intermediate Period show a complexpolitical situation, with three major political players: the Hyksos in the north, the Thebankings and the rulers of Kush in the south (see Davies 2003). This period was not acontinuous time of peace but a time of struggle for power between the Hyksos kings ofthe 15th Dynasty in the north and their Theban counterparts in the south (Gardiner 1916;Habachi 1972). Besides the Kamose stelae, this change in the extent of Hyksos territoryand the relationship between the rulers in the north and the vassals in the south becomesevident in the papyrus Rhind which shows that at least at some time in the reign of KingApophis the Hyksos were accepted as regular rulers over Egypt even by Thebes. This has

also been confirmed by the latest excavation results at Edfu, where several sealingimpressions bearing the name of King Khyan were found within layers of the 17th Dynasty(Moeller & Marouard in press).

The building of a fortification/defense system at Avaris in the later Second Intermediateperiod may well be connected to the aforementioned historical events and threats. Even ifKamose’s attack against Avaris was not decisive, the protection of at least some parts of thecapital became necessary.

In the New Kingdom the city wall was no longer in use at Avaris. This is a generalphenomenon all over Egypt at this period when the character of towns changed and citywalls fell out of fashion or were no longer necessary (Spence 2004; for Elephantine seePilgrim in press).


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Müller, eds., Cities and Urbanism in Ancient Egypt, Vienna, 22 nd‒26th November 2006. Untersuchungen

der Zweigstelle Kairo 35, Denkschriften der Gesamtakademie 60, Vienna 2010: 11‒68.Bietak, M., J. Dorner & P. Jánosi2001 (mit einem Beitrag von A. von den Driesch & J. Peters), Ausgrabungen im Palastbezirk von Avaris.

Vorbericht Tell el-Dab‘a/‘Ezbet Helmi 1993–2000. Egypt & Levant 11, 2001: 27–119.

Davies, V.2003 Kush in Egypt: a new historical inscription. Sudan & Nubia 7, 2003: 52–54.

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City Wall(s) in Avaris

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