Source Analysis: New Kingdom Society: Administration

Source Analysis: New Kingdom Society – Administration

New Kingdom Egypt was known as a superpower in ancient times. The Pharaoh in ancient Egypt was the political and religious leader of the people and held the titles, 'Lord of the Two Lands’ and 'High Priest of Every Temple’. The Pharaoh was the head of state, and had various symbols and titles which defined who he/she was. There are three different main types of government in the world, democracy in which the people control the government, dictatorship in which the government controls the people, and a monarchy in which a royal figure controls the country. Ancient Egypt had a very interesting government in that it was a mix of the three, a government that was influenced by elected officials

of different sections, and a monarch ‘pharaoh’ that controlled all aspects of society whether they be military, social or religious. New kingdom Egypt had various functions and structures in Egyptian society to define what it was. Egypt had a complex structure of internal and external administrations that the Pharaoh could not control. Forming a government included of two main sections and three sub sections, the two main being internal and external government and the three sub sections being the Religious, the Military and the Civil. The eleven sources will be used as evidence to explain the internal and external government. The reliability and problems with these sources will also be mentioned as they may have problems in reconstructing the past.
Being a very god centric society the prevalence and importance of the religious aspect of Egyptian society was quite prominent.

The Pharaoh was considered to be as important as the gods in all things, having believed to have been chosen by them. The pharaoh Hatshepsut claimed to be a physical descendent of the deities as seen in source one, a section of the Obelisk of Hatshepsut, Temple of Karnak. This Pharaoh was considered to be the true king of Egypt, because she had gained the laws from the will of god. The hieroglyphics specifically state ‘Amun-Ra, Lord of Heaven, I have given the kingship of the Two Lands and the Office of Atum to my daughter Maat-Ka-Ra (throne name of Hatshepsut). Source one is the most reliable out of the eleven, due to the source still intact, hieroglyphs still readable and the carvings in the stone clearly visible. This connection that the pharaohs have with the gods is one that makes him/her worthy of controlling all of Egypt. Using their divine connection with them to bring their Kingdom great protection and wealth for all of its

citizens.
This physical connection between both Pharaoh and god is further shown in source two. This source presents a faience vase which has been damaged, but still clearly shows the pharaoh who gives a tribute of a Maat concept to the god. While the pharaoh is considered to be to greatest of all Egyptians, the gods must be still talked to concerning political, religious and other matters. The feather represents Maat who was the ancient Egyptian concept of truth, balance, order, harmony, law, morality, and justice. This could mean that the pharaoh is asking for order and peace which is represented as Maat. To show how important religion was to Egyptian society, we must look at the priest of Amun-Ra a select group of religious individuals who worked underneath the pharaoh in controlling religious rights. Source six displays just how important the religious government was to Egyptian society. The source displays a number of priests carrying a barque of Amun-Ra, which usually occurs on special occasions and festivals. The most important of all of the priests was the Steward of Amun controlled all land, slaves, artisans, workers, animals and navy owned by the god Amun; this virtually gave the religious government proxy control over every aspect of Egyptian life. This source can be analysed as there is no sign of damage, the issue lies in understanding what is really happening in this source and the information it’s meant to be giving us, It shows us an event in which the priests of the Amun-Ra must’ve attended but, the reasons of the event and why the priests were a part of it is not noticeable while understanding what the source is.
One source that is really intriguing is source seven. In New Kingdom Egypt there was indeed literacy, but the amount of people that were illiterate was about 90% of the population. Major government position whether it was religious, civil or military required the people to be literate. The only issue was that 10% of the population were literate, it is impossible for 10% to possibly work in a vast majority of these positions. To become literate, one must become a scribe as shown in ‘Be a Scribe’ an extract by extract from Papyrus Lansing. The source given is about a father who gives his son an insight of the vast variety of jobs. He goes on to describe these jobs as ‘dirty work’ while also offering him the choice of being scribe, a job without a boss and a job that will bring his son great riches. This source can be used to present the perceived importance and social standing of a scribe, as an elite of the community, and far above traditional craft jobs such as pottery. However this source can be considered bias, which makes it look like story telling more than what really is going on. It can’t be used as a source to discuss the external and internal administrations of Egypt.
In order to keep control over the huge land space that lay inside Egypt’s borders, Egyptian society utilised a civil government, controlled by viziers.

The duties of Vizier in ancient Egypt. In this source, the vizier is highly regarded as the highest official in Ancient Egypt to serve the king, or pharaoh during the New kingdom Egypt. The Vizier was constantly being reported on everything that occurs under his rule. He was indeed an important asset for the Pharaoh’s rule, as he was in command of many activities, structures etc. in both of the Two Lands. While there were over 42 provincial governors in the New Kingdom period, there were only two viziers, one that represents Lower Egypt and one to represent Upper Egypt. The Viziers duties shows in source three, a relief from the Tomb of Rekhmire, a Vizier that worked under Thutmose III during the new kingdom era. Source three is broken up into four sections, each representing the administrative role the Vizier controlled, such as wood working, metallurgy and major constructions under the pharaoh. This source illustrates what the Vizier’s job really is, although a part of the source is not easy to analyse, which makes it harder for us to understand further information behind this source. The other role that the Vizier had was welcoming foreigners, which is depicted in source four. This is a primary source from walls of the tomb of Rehkmire. The hieroglyphs in this source state ‘Giving praise to the Lord of the Two Lands and

kissing the earth to the perfect god by the Great Ones of all lands. They pay honour to the strength of his majesty. They bring by means of upon their back all of God’s Land all great silver, gold, lapis and turquoise, it being brought by the giving of them.’ This source gives us a sense of bias thoughts in this image. It is considered that Egypt is physically superior to all allies, trade partners etc. While bias is implemented throughout this source which can cause issues about reliability, it can be used to help up us understand into the self-perceived importance of Egypt in relation to other lands.
Another source depicts the activities of the Vizier is source five ‘Duties of a Vizier’, which was also recovered from the tomb of Rehkmire. The noticeable aspects of the source is those regarding the Civil, military and social activities of the Vizier, which explains just how the Vizier had controlled the military, the activities of the civil positions underneath them and the divine tributes of the people. This source is considered a primary source, but due to the translation of this source it makes it a secondary source. Two more roles, the overseer of the grains and the overseer of the treasury can also be inferred from source ten, the former controlling the harvest and production of crops and the latter controlling the taxes and tribute. However due to a lack of sources provided, further detail cannot be gathered to give a reliable perception of their duties and social context Another aspect of the Civil government that can be analysed through their sources is the provincial governors, who was expanded to include over 42 under the command of Thutmos the third during the New Kingdom era. The source itself was lifted from the tomb of Provincial Governor Paheri, who was the provincial governor of Nekheb during the time of Thutmose the second, Hetshepsut and Thutmos the third. The source itself portrays Paheri supervising the farming duties of his plantation, such as the creation of wine by collecting and crushing grapes, the skinning and hanging of fowls, and the tanning of leather. From this source it can be viewed that the duties of a provincial governor was to manage creation of important resources, such as food, leather and other materials. However while Paheri’s source is primary and useful in analysing his life, it cannot be used in analysing all of the provincial governors. Due to changes in environments and roles, not all of the Governor’s lives and duties were the same.