3.2 Reconstructions

Viewing the produce of the estate

Look first at the speculative reconstruction incorporating the three surviving ‘Viewing the produce of the estates’ fragments (Figure 16).

© Trustees of the British Museum

Figure 16 Reconstruction drawing of produce fragment by C. Thorne and R. B. Parkinson

As we have learned from the offering and banquet scenes, the various activities taking place are dedicated to Nebamun – who is represented by two large-scale figures at the left-hand end of the picture. Only one of these Nebamun figures has survived.

The overall scene affords us a glimpse into the dynamic of ancient Egyptian productive life. The fruits of agricultural production are brought before the overseer for annual review. The agricultural workers show extreme respect for the overseer, reflecting the hierarchical nature of Egyptian society. A pivotal role is held by the scribes, demonstrating the power of literacy to the functioning of Egyptian society.

Agricultural scenes

Now consider the reconstruction of the ‘Agricultural scenes’ fragments (Figure 17).

Photographs by Jurgen Liepe; copyright The Ägyptisches Museum, Berlin. Drawing by R. B. Parkinson and Claire Thorne

Figure 17 A reconstruction of the wall with agricultural scenes, including fragments now in Berlin (ÄM 18529–31, 18539)

What is happening in this scene, somewhat in the manner of a strip cartoon, is that to the left in one ‘frame’ Nebamun and his team are out in the grain fields carrying out an inspection with the help of the farmer, while to the right their drivers have parked the chariots in the shade of a large sycamore tree at the edge of the field, and are waiting for the officials to complete their inspection – most likely before either heading off to another farm, or if it is late in the day, back to the ‘office’ (i.e. the administrative buildings in the temple complex) at Thebes.

Now watch this video in which Richard Parkinson and Paul Wood talk about the ‘Agricultural scene’.

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INTERVIEWER:

I noticed on one of the other paintings, a painting where you have drivers of chariots waiting with their horses while someone else is standing in front of the crops, this kind of thing wouldn't be preserved in the material record, would it? It would be just in images of this kind.

RICHARD PARKINSON:

Yes. What we have from the tombs of Tutankhamun and some members of the very high elite are entire chariots that were put in tomb chambers. But of course, what we don't have is details like how they're bored waiting for the officials.

The top man, he's got good horses. He's pulling tightly on the reins. They're prancing, lively. These hinnies at the bottom are eating from the basket, eating the leaves of the sycamore there. They're sheltering in the shade of the sycamore. And because they're less lively animals, the chariot driver's sitting down, just holding onto the loose reins, almost having a little rest, waiting for the officials to come back.

We've got the chariots. Without these paintings, we couldn't imagine what it felt like to be a bored charioteer waiting for the boss to come back and say, out of the shade, drive me back to the office.

And when you look at the man swearing the oath about the boundary stealer, he has stubble. He's going bald. The hair's wispy. The belly button is protruding. His kilt isn't expensive enough to actually cover his genitals.

He's really treated very freely, because he's just a lowly farmer. And that's a sense of the reality of life. It isn't all glamorous people on monuments celebrating themselves and their gods.

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Offering bringers

Finally, consider this reconstruction of the ‘Offering bringers’ (Figure 18).

© Trustees of the British Museum

Figure 18 Reconstruction drawing of bringers fragment by C. Thorne and R. B. Parkinson

These animals are part of another gift of offerings. The difference here is that whereas in the other scenes it is the produce of the farm that is being brought forth, here in addition to the products of harvest – the sheaves of grain – these animals are representatives of the wild, captured out in the desert, which is by implication now also brought within the purview of Nebamun, Grain-accountant in the Temple of Amun.

Now watch this video in which Richard Parkinson and Paul Wood talk about ‘Offering bringers’ scene.

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INTERVIEWER:

Now, we've been looking at scenes of agriculture, domestic animals, and harvesting crops, but I know that there's one of the pictures which shows scenes of wild animals. What's happening there?

RICHARD PARKINSON:

Well, as with so often in the tomb-chapel, it's a very standard motif, but treated with wonderful skill and artistry. What you see is a row of offering bearers, the main function of the tomb-chapel, to bring food. Some of them have sheaves of corn. And then, in the centre, the detail that attracted D'Athanasi and Salt's eyes, you've got these two wonderful desert hares being just held up by the ears, dangling down, beautiful whiskers, as with the cat and fowling in the marshes, a wonderful sense of texture all over.

And the more closely you look at these paintings, the more details you see, the pink inner ears, the hairs on the outside of the hare's ears. And here, on this man's kilt, you can just see first they did one design of the folds, then painted it over in white, and then changed it, just an extra twist to give a sense of detail, of variety. Everybody has got a slightly different set of pleats to their kilt.

And if you look at the bottom, it's very eroded, but it's another detail that's been very crucial for reconstructing the chapel. They're not standing on the normal black register line, they're standing at the bottom of the decorated space. There's a big white band with black lines, and then a thick bright blue border right at the bottom of the decorated space on the wall. And we have no parallels for blue borders in that position. It's another sign of how exuberant, unusual this team of artists were. Unusual, that is, in so far as we don't have other examples preserved.

It's a reminder to us, these may be the finest surviving paintings from Ancient Egypt. It doesn't mean they were the finest painters that there were, it's just, the few bits we've got, these happen to be the best.

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In conclusion, Nebamun was an administrator – quite a well-off one. His memorial chapel showed both sides of his life, at leisure and at work: a banquet for friends and relatives, and these scenes of animal husbandry and the produce of the fields, not least the grain which was the staple of Egyptian life. One of the defining features of ancient Egyptian society, perhaps the single most important one that made the civilisation what it was, was its bureaucracy: the multiple layers of efficient administration that held the system together. This was a largely pre-industrial, agrarian society, a barter economy moreover. So these scenes give us, in effect, a glimpse of the sharp end of that system, out in the fields, recording the information about the produce of the estates that Nebamun and other officials like him in the great Temple of Amun at Thebes would then use to organise the community’s spiritual and temporal life. If these encounters had not occurred, if those records had not been kept, if the farmers had not kissed the ground and if Nebamun had not sat on his folding chair as the animals squawked and bellowed and the dust rose, there would not have been any banquets and floral collars and exquisite costumes, nor indeed any temples to raise and tomb-chapels to decorate.