Egyptologist Answers Google’s Most Popular Questions About Ancient Egypt
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- Опубліковано 2 лип 2024
- How did they build the pyramids? Why were they so obsessed with cats? Did they mummify everyone? Egyptologist Chris Naunton answers Google's most searched questions about Ancient Egypt.
00:00 Introduction
00:42 When did the Egyptians live?
01:43 Why did the Egyptians build pyramids?
02:25 How did the Egyptians build pyramids?
02:59 How did the Egyptians cut granite?
04:30 Why were the Egyptians obsessed with cats?
05:31 Did the Egyptians believe in an afterlife?
06:18 Why did the Egyptians mummify their dead?
06:45 Why did the Egyptians put organs in jars?
07:23 What did the Egyptians look like?
08:36 Why did the Egyptians wear eyeliner?
08:53 Why did the Egyptians shave their heads?
09:37 What did the Egyptians wear?
11:21 Why did the Egyptians use hieroglyphics?
12:23 How did the Egyptians become pharaohs?
14:24 Why did the Pharaohs wear false beards?
15:43 Why did the Pharaohs marry their siblings?
16:53 How long did the Egyptians live?
18:16 What did the Egyptians eat and drink?
20:25 What jobs did the Egyptians do?
21:58 Did the Egyptians believe in curses?
22:30 How many gods did the Egyptians have?
23:18 Did the Egyptians have electricity?
23:36 Who did the Egyptians fight?
26:17 Did the Egyptians have slaves?
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The amount of time we spend looking at cat videos and memes on the internet will probably make future civilizations think we worship cats too!
We are.
2009 I was indifferent to cats. I now have 4 cats. The Internet taught me cats are awesome
@@Berengier817 Hahaha touché
Indeed. Cats made us built whole industries to produce food for them in countless different flavours.
I thought the same thing!
I can only imagine how utterly confused they will be when finding out about us.
We are weird
Egyptologist: We don't know.
History Channel: Aliens.
Dave Lister: Massive, massive whips.
It's History bro
LOL!!!!!!!!!
😂😂😂
i think it's important to note when he's saying "we don't know" he doesn't mean it's a mystery; he means there's a number of theories which can very well account for how they accomplished the thing in question, but it can't be said for certain which ones were used: it could be mixtures, it could be that certain methods and techniques were used at some points and others at others (which, given its over 3000-year history, seems almost impossible to not be the case), etc. other egyptologists will state with more confidence that we _do_ know because they don't want the uncertainty regarding the aforementioned to be taken as "we don't know" and this taken as "it's a mystery" because the ancient alien people will then take this as a concession. in most areas of history this kind of epistemic modesty is refreshing, especially with regards to more modern history, but i fear that in this context it really is playing into the hands of ancient alien apologists :/
Yeah as a social scientist I felt for him at several points in the video because some of these questions are either very broader or debated. It is incredibly difficult to summarize different POVs on a topic/issue period let alone the spot in a way going to be accessible to most people. Also, I agree that is refreshing to see willing to acknowledge the limitations of science/academia; far too many people are unwilling to be transparent about this and in my opinion leads to break down between how the general public thinks research works and the reality of it.
This is how actual experts operate... if they don't know for certain, they're not just gonna speculate.
@@ConsecDesign Yes, they will often say things like "It appears" "We think" etc. But rarely speak in absolutes when dealing with ancient societies.
This is why Egypt is so fascinating: most of the answers end with 'we don't know.'
To be fair it was a long time ago and the arabs basically destroyed everything. (Demolishing religions and cultures that are not islam and replacing them is kind of their kink. First thing they did upon founding their religion, actually).
Following the greeks leaving, It wasnt until the british and french came around in the 1800s and said "Hey there is a bunch of cool shit lying around in the sand" that anyone started to care and look into it.
go watch the history channel. Every answer ends with ALIENS
"Why were the Egyptians obsessed with cats?"
Meanwhile the internet is 70% cat videos/memes.
28:09 and getting paid to do work was a sure sight better than sitting at home bored and not getting paid. They worked in the off-seasons, farm for four months, pyramid work for four months, rinse and repeat. You said "subsistence farming" here, but Egypt was producing a massive surplus of grain from a very early era: to the extent that not only could they feed themselves during the off-seasons but they were also providing disaster relief to everyone else . When people say "subsistence farming" that's not usually what they mean.
Right??
It seems like when an expert says, “We don’t exactly know how they did xyz”, it’s assumed that it is a near impossible feat. It’s not. They’re just saying that it isn’t known *exactly* what method they used, that there could have been many methods, and that stating any particular process may have inaccuracies. It’s important to understand that a culture’s relationship with time can be very different from another’s, and that generally our modern relationship with time is very different from that of Ancient Egypt and so it’s hard for us to understand why so much time and energy would be devoted to building the pyramids. While I’m sure opinions varied, at the cultural level it was viewed as a worthy effort.
Thank you for the comment. I wish his response had been more in line with what you mentioned. Certainly, as an Egyptologist, he could offer several educated guesses about how the Pyramids were constructed.
@@MatroX67 Agreed. Some "educated guesses" would be nice to qualm those alternative speculations about aliens and lost high tech civilisations. He dives a little deeper into it at the end of the video defying the outdated "slave-theory", he could've done the same here.
People seem to forget Europeans built massive cathedrals that took centuries to finish in some cases. It is not just time but also the available technology, as well as motivation. The Catholics equally bought into the story but instead of a state, it was the Vatican. This happened pretty much everywhere in the world where a large enough population was ruled by a single ruler or had one major religion with a lot of power. People will start to worship and build shrines, which get ever larger because life is a pissing contest.
@@Spielkalb-von-Sparta There is quite a lot of evidence they weren't slaves, so he could actually elaborate. The remains of a large town that the expert mentions had a large "cafeteria" (for the lack of a better word). They excavated down to the original ground level and found tons and tons of fishbones and small animal bones. There were bakeries and many houses. Way too fancy for slaves. The remains of one person in the cemetery had an amputated arm, just below the elbow. It was done by surgery and the person survived for so long, the remaining bone of the forearm curved inwards. The person had been using the stump to do work. This is way too much effort for a slave.
The pyramid was a prestigious project so it had to be done well. Using slave labour is not going to give you the level of quality needed. Only skilled labourers could do this, and they were housed and fed well.
All the other things he doesn't elaborate on is because even an educated guess will become an absolute fact on the internet. Better to just say it has been lost to time rather than speculate. Everyone claiming to know has to provide evidence that holds up, instead of the other way around.
@@Yvolve Yeah. As opposed to slavery it was most likely the best gig in the country.
I think some of the answers were too simplistic and ignoring the context of the publication a bit - like talking as if this was a conversation between egyptologists, not general audience.
E.g. "We don't know how they built the pyramids" means we weren't there, there are no photos of it and the pictures and texts don't describe every single detail.
It DEFINITELY doesn't mean "we have absolutely no idea how they did it". We know how to quarry the stone and cut it - because it was successfully demonstrated with the tools available at that tie. Same goes for moving the stones, also shipping the stones on the Nile. (There are notes from a supervisor describing the daily jobs, houses, tools, food remains etc. of the builders were found and so on. Also, we have several means of how to actually build a pyramid (also demonstrated, so we know they could have used several methods - but we may not know exactly which ones they did). As a matter of facts, with one of the best organised method using many zigzagging ramps, Kufu's pyramid could have been built using a bi, but not enormous force of professional builders in 3-5 years, depending on the number of shifts.
Yes, it required skill and knowledge, but if you look at the history of pyramid building, you'll see the first attempts were quite primitive, but as they learnt from their mistakes and invented better techniques (as humans usually do), the results are better and better.
(In the case of the great pyramid, actually too perfect, the outer casing stones were too precisely stuck together, and the thermal expansion damaged the stones, so they fell and got taken away.)
Thank you Dr. Chris Naunton. I have enjoyed many of your UA-cam lectures and read your book Searching for the Lost Tombs. As a history professor for 40 years, I congratulate your explanations and spreading of this information to the general public. Finally making my first ever Viking Cruise to Egypt in September.
Will look him up
There is a theory that in the image around the 3 min mark a worker is pouring liquid past the statue. So in theory - they moved some heavy objects via a liquid friction system along with the ropes to ease it up and down Egypt for projects.
Yes there has been a lot of speculation of them using mud as a lubricant. There is a famous story from the 1950s of an archeologist moving a 1 ton stone through a town single handed using a mud concoction
The cat sculpture at 5:26 is brilliant! It's like a grumpy old git of a cat.
"Now get thee down t'ut co-erp an buy us some't whiskers! Ma food berl's empteh"
I love this type of content, no bullshit for views, honest and Straight forward.
WRT to the incestuous royal marriages: I understand your aswer that they may have thought it kept the bloodline pure and such more or less idealistic considerations. But wasn't it also just a way to keep wealth and power within the ruling family? Any dynasty will always need to keep their rivals in check, and if as a king you allow other nobles to marry into your family they might get ideas for themselves.
Yes.
Props to this guy for saying, we don't know. That's good
Interesting you showed King Tut's tomb when talking about pyramids... when he wasn't buried in a pyramid!
Thank you! And the mediums and stepped pyramid were *after* the Giza pyramids. Not precursors.
@@jessicazaytsoff1494 Well the first recorded Pyramid was stepped, but yeah they chose the wrong graphics!
@@jessicazaytsoff1494 Not true. The meidum and stepped pyramids are from the 3rd dynasty which is before the 4th dynasty pyramids of Giza.
He was buried in the side of a mountain which was pyramid shaped, I believe.
To be fair, “you” here would be the editors and almost certainly not the hired expert.
To the ancient Egyptians not being obsessed with cats- for some reason it reminds me of Phoebe from friends. If you watched a few select episodes you would think she obsessed with cats (smelly cat, thinking the cat is her mom) but in the context of the show she seems to like cats as much as any other animal.
It does seem like many of the mummies I've seen were also cats, so I think they liked them just a little more than crocs.
re - How long did they live?
When correcting for infant mortality skewing the mean, the median life expectancy would have been around the 50s, not "40 at most."
Even so, the median has confounding variables, just as the mean, since "armies" were normally press-ganged from the local populace and almost exclusively made up of men aged 20-30. Since many of them would never come home again, it's reasonable to conclude that:
If you survived childhood and the various military expeditions, then you could reasonably expect to live to around 60 years of age. Sometimes a bit more, sometimes a bit less. Seeing a Pharaoh live into his 90s would have seemed like incontrovertible evidence that he was indeed a "Man-God."
This is why "Life Expectancy at Birth" is an _utterly idiotic_ way to measure typical life-span, since all it really tells you is how bad infant mortality was.
"Life Expectancy" is _always measured from a specific age._ Usually when someone just says, "Life Expectancy", they mean "at birth." But a far better metric is "Life Expectancy at Age 15." Because if you reach Puberty, you're probably gonna make it through what is a typical _adult_ lifespan for that place and time.
my favorite Egyptologist,I will always listen...😊
It'd be interesting to hear a presentation on the development of the afterlife "story" over time in Ancient Egypt. It seems like the Book of the Dead didn't exist during the old kingdom.
Scientists Against Myths have demonstrated how they could've cut and drilled various rock. And mechanical advantage seems like an obvious method of moving large stones.
What over mountains from hundreds of miles away?
@@andrewcaddy298 over mountains?
The eyeliner was practically used to keep the sun out of their eyes. It’s the same reason why a baseball player would have those black marks under their eyes. It helps keep the sun from eyes. I’m surprised he didn’t think of that
I feel like they just found a historian that knows generally about the history of Egypt and not a full-blown Egyptologist. Something about his answers just being simple, with little to no explanation and seemingly wanting to get on with the next question quickly makes me think that. Maybe the channel directors told him to do that, idk, but it makes him look like he doesn't really fully understand what he's talking about.
The answer about the cat is what made me start to question this guy because there's document proof as to why the Ancient Egyptians revered cats. Not just that "they liked them"
There's no evidence that the Egyptians used black eyeliner for this reason. Indeed, there's very little evidence that it works at all.
I guess that could be a good reason, but rich people wouldn't walk outside in the sun, they'd have servants and stuff making sure they are always shaded and what have you
@@larryredenbaugh6854 Yeah, I have to agree with you here. There's even a report of a Roman soldier being murdered by an angry mob after his chariot ran over a cat in Ancient Egypt. The fact that this guy didn't even bring up that story makes me wonder what his expertise really is.
Having been through grad-school myself, I can tell you that anyone with a PhD _loves_ to share knowledge, _loves_ to talk about their research. But this dude? Didn't really seem all that interested.
@@larryredenbaugh6854he knows his stuff. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Naunton
He’s just a lot more cautious. I wish he’d gone more into the hypotheses
As much as I love learning about ancient civilizations and History Hit in general, I gotta admit that I wasn't crazy about this expert. He didn't really seem to want to be here and share his knowledge, but seemed more annoyed at questions the general population had about this field. "When did the Egyptians live?" could have been brushed off with "well, ANCIENT Egypt took place between these years...." but his answers just came across as curt and like "ha, how could you be so dumb?" Maybe I'm being too picky 😅 but I've liked so many of their other experts so much more
Interesting, how impressions can be so different. To me it seemed he took the questions quite seriously, to the letter.
But I think he was concerned of saying something wrong so he was holding back on his knowledge. It might be better if they'd given him the questions in advance to give him the opportunity to prepare proper answers.
I’ve had to do something similar to this but with reference to the law as apposed to history. I think what you’re picking up on is just him being incredibly tired of uneducated, quite frankly thick, people. I am often stunned at how unintelligent the public is generally, let alone when it comes to my field of study. The fact of the matter is, unfortunately, dumb people ask uninspired, lazy, boring questions that could be answered with the tiniest bit of research imaginable. It’s insulting to have someone waste your time with idiocy and laziness when you are well respected in your field.
@@WilliamMarshalofPembroke These are the "most googled" questions. Isn't that the very definition of people attempting to do the "tiniest bit of research"?
Video content/subject matter: 10/10. Delivery of said subject matter 3/10. I’ve never been more bored trying to watch a video about something I’m genuinely fascinated by. Sorry, Doc.
Hi, I’m once again begging for more series on the HistoryHit app (with video) with Kate Lister. I love her so much and will literally watch anything with her in it at this point but I suck at paying attention to podcasts so I’m struggling through Betwixt the Sheets bc I keep zoning out and having to go back 😅 Give us more Kate in video, I beg.
Love Betwixt
I know the idea to a degree is to a more casual answer from experts. However, as an anthropologist when you going to ask about topics as broad and/or debated as many of these questions were it would be a courteous to give them before hand. A decent a amount of the people in the comments are frustrated by him saying "I/We don't know" to what seem like relatively basic questions, which is unfortunate because as academic it usually means consensus on an issue /topic not that we literally do not know. Doing so would give the experts time to come up an answer includes different POVs on topics.
This was awesome!
I love these educational videos! I would love to see more Egypt content that isn't sensationalized or that demeans their advanced culture by claiming aliens did everything. So many interesting things to share like their laws, cultural traditions, family structures, etc. More than just the mummies and death!
Didn't cats keep the grain suppies free of rodents and that is why they revered them?
They loved eating bread, beer, etc., made from grain without a ration of rodent scat in it as much as I do!
I would not say they particular revered them. But, just personally, I always assumed that it had more to do with pest reduction than anything else.
Same reason they were popular on ships. Not because the sailors revered or worshiped them. Just they were practical to have around.
Even today, rodents consume an insane amount of stored grains. Like 3% maybe. Not to mention diseases. I can only imagine what a rodent could eat and contaminate back then.
Sure, but this doesn't mean they revered them. What it does signify is that they lived closely together. And cats being their cute selves it's probably an easy subject to choose when building a statue or engraving something. Also, imagine you are someone from the future looking at all the pictures on the internet from our times. There are vast amounts of cat pictures, so it's not improbable that they would think that we revere them, I mean why else would we post those, right. Surely it can't be because we keep them as pets and they are cute.
There is a big mistake that was made when interpreting historic artifacts back in the day where ppl would just label anything they didn't understand as spiritual, religious or ritual, luckily that tendency is nowadays snubbed on among historians. Like when they discovered burried ppl with ocre facepaints, the simple explanation here is that it was merely a tribal marker to distinguish us from them (which we still see in tribes all around the world). Same with grave gifts, when my gf died, I also felt an urge to surround her in the mortuary with objects that she loved, and i'm about as religious or spiritual as the average carrot, so there is no real reason to assume that in ancient times this was definitively done for spiritual reasons.
So there are often much simpler potential explanations for lots of ancient artifacts or customs, it doesn't mean that those explanations are correct, but claiming "spiritual" for anything we can't explain is even dumber as this is a simple cop out that can't be argued for or against. But when the field of history really got established the vast majority of ppl were religious so it was an easier leap to make and was less likely to get questioned.
In other words, before jumping to reverence, it may be a good idea to see many statues with subjects that aren't definitively religious as not much more than an ancient form of snapchat so to speak. We depict the things we are around and that we like, there is no reason to assume that this was any different in "ancient" times. It doesn't mean that they didn't revere them in some way, but it does mean that there is no reason to assume it without clear evidence.
@@capusvacans interesting viewpoint. I think of artworks of the middle ages in Europe. It was exclusively Christian until the Renaissance because in that part of the world everything was about God, even if the actions of most of the people did not necessarily reflect Christian values. It was the Popes, priests and Kings who commissioned artworks, each having their own purpose, whether it was out of piety or power over the people. In ancient Egypt, religion was extremely important as well. Who were the patrons of art? It was likely the Pharaohs and temple priests. An artist in ancient Egypt probably would not have sculpted an animal for art sake. He knew it was time consuming and he had a family to feed and the tastes of the person who was paying were probably spiritual.
@@stevenleslie8557 Sure, but that still doesn't point to a reverence for cats. There could be many reasons for this. Ppl with money to waste could also just want pretty things (just look at some of the useless expansive crap that rich ppl surround themselves with these days). Or maybe pharaohs had pet cats and just wanted some memorabilia for them after they died etc.
Just some random idea that isn't even inconceivable that i just came up with is:
that maybe cats and other subjects that weren't directly linked to religion or the rulers were mostly made by apprentice or beginning sculptors as it may have been seen as disrespectful to mess up a statue of a god/ruler. Sure, i just made plenty of assumptions, but throughout the middle ages eg. this type of things was fairly normal. An apprentice would make some jewelry that was just intended to be pretty, a master would make the things that depicted religious subjects or which were intended for ecclesiastical use (like intricate scepters and chalices).
Basically, all we know is: Egyptians had cats and they liked to depict them. Pretty much anything else is speculation, until we get clear evidence. But it is fun to speculate, as long as we don't mistake our speculation for truth.
I went to Egypt and asked all 3 of our guides about the history of cat worshipping, they all told me that cats were never worshipped lol. This is something school drilled into us in the US so was quite shocked to hear that from 3 separate Egyptologists, born and raised in Egypt!!
Tourist guides are not necessary trained Egyptologists. They tell stories to keep their customers happy.
@@Spielkalb-von-Sparta they were all Egyptologists 😊
Egyptology student here:
Yeah, they didn't worship cats, they worshipped various gods, some of which had cat characteristics,. So cats were often the intermediary or representation of those gods, but that also goes for ibises, bulls, crocodiles, etc.
And the "animal worship" stuff mostly came during the Graeco-Roman Period, when other cultures and religions were mixing into Egypt - Meaning that Egyptians likely wanted to heighten their own cultural differences, but also wanted to make money off of these foreign tourists. Ancient tourists would go to Egypt and be told they need to give animal offerings at temples, and so they were sold these animal mummies (some of which were just wrapped up sticks, half of the animal, an entirely different animal, etc. - So essentially an ancient scam)
I learned in school that some Egyptians believed that cats were like a God or the souls of the dead or something.
Pretty sure that's not correct at all
Damn, Chris… how vague and boring was this! But I’m relieved to know that the ancient Egyptians looked like human beings and ate bread made from grain.
I loved this! Wide range of questions that I think would engage everyone. Sadly one of the most frustrating things of Ancient Egypt, there is not a lot of answers. Oh for a time machine!
I’m a barber, we learned in school they also shaved their heads as a spiritual thing. They believed spirits were attached to your hair, so you cut the hair, you rid yourself of the spirit.
just the head hair? I have hair everywhere mate
We learned some of these stuff in school, yet he said he ‘thinks’ they shaved because of purity?
Yes! Egyptians were obsessed with being clean and thought that body hair is considered filthy. So they wore wigs.
I'm Australian, but my ethnic heritage is Egyptian. My mother would take me to Egypt with her, at the end of each school year, to visit with her family. During one such visit, mum and I went on one of the Nile cruises that stop at all the Pharaonic monuments and temples and such. At some site or other, I heard the familiar twang of the Aussie accent and went to investigate, being immeasurably glad to have someone I could speak to in English (but who also spoke English with the same accent as me, so we'd have no problems understanding one another). Anyway, he claimed to be an Egyptologist from Melbourne (we lived in Sydney [when we were in Australia] at that time). He believed that the Ancient Egyptians had some form of "acid" (ie - something very caustic), which they would use to melt through granite and other igneous rocks. As evidence, he pointed to some marks in the granite that could be found, replicated precisely, at regular intervals. in fact, if you examined ANY large block of granite that had been worked, you could find these same marks, replicated precisely and once again appearing at regular intervals.
While I hated to do it, I HAD to suggest to him that these marks may have been made more recently. Perhaps in the 60s, when- after building the Aswan High Dam, many of these ancient relics and even some temples, had to be moved, lest they end up underwater, in the newly forming Lake Nasser (forming as a direct consequence of the high dam). These marks could have been left by the tooth of a forklift, or whatever tools they were using to be able to move such enormous lumps of rock...
ANYWAY, he still might have been correct about the use of a caustic agent to dissolve the rock...
same reason we're obsessed with cats. cats are rad.
'We don't know.'
Ok, some of the answers were lacking. Even I, someone who has but a passing interest in Egyptology, know that they wore Kohl to protect them from the sun and from eye infections (of course, they didn't call them that).
Even how the pyramids were built could have been elaborated on. Egyptologists have some theories on how they did it so he could describe some of those. Leaving it to "we don't know" invites pseudoscience to invent things.
Exactly how kohl is used today
Well yes, you've got a point. The problem I see is the format. The Expert didn't know which question he was confronted with and therefore had no time for preparation. It might be fun as a kind of live show but doesn't help the content.
You can't possibly be up-to-date in every detail of your field, so I understand he's hesitant in his answers before spreading information he's not 100% sure of.
He also avoided answering the overall question of whether Egypt had slaves, instead talking only about it in the context of pyramid building. Even then, it was a rather incomplete explanation regarding them being commanded to do such service.
Why would a rich person need that? They would hardly ever go outside walking in the sun, if they did, I'm sure they'd have servants and slaves who'd carry them and provide shade
i thought the idea that historical people drank so much beer because of "health and safety" had been discredited?
King Tut Pea is my favorite pea. The 'story' is that they regrew this type of purple pea from one found on his tomb.
I’ve never heard the Arab conquest in the 7th century chosen as “end” of ancient Egypt civilisation. Specially when described as the civilisation of pharaohs, gods with animal heads,… most of the time it’s 1st century with the Roman or a bit later with Christian and closing of temples. Interesting point of view, I wish I could hear more.
I've been surprised by this take as well. Chris Naunton elaborates a bit more on his own channel in the video *Egyptology in one Hour* for example.
@@Spielkalb-von-Sparta Thanks for the tip!
The first two most important questions" we don't know" 😂
See... this is what I do not get... The question is about pyramids and footage of Tutanchamun is shown... whoms mummy was not buried in a pyramid, but in the Valley of Kings.
If one wishes to truly inform, perhaps it's better not to mix things up like that. It's really irritating sometimes, especially due to the misinformation that has been going in on in the past years thanks to social media. We do not need to adapt that trend.
I’ve seen plenty of egyptologists answer all the questions he said “we don’t know” to. At least they gave the ranges of thinking.
I feel like I could have given these answers.
Someone needs to get this guy a Red Bull. Lol
That was very interesting 🤔
Thanks to my heritage, I have a VERY identifiable "Egyptian" appearance. Usually a girl will ask me "Are you Egyptian?" rather than asking me what my ethnic heritage might be. Guys have rarely ever asked me any such things. Conversely, I've had complete strangers (who were girls) approach me on the street to ask me if I'm from Egypt. The most flattering instance, however, was when I was at some ancient temple or other In Egypt (the one with an excessive number of statues of Ramases all about it, along with a large number of Lion statues). Anyway, a French girl started talking very excitedly at me. She was very intent and very animated, but she was also speaking French, which I couldn't understand for the life of me. Her brother was nearby, though and unlike her, he spoke English. When she paused to take a breath, he offered to translate (to English) for me, if only I could speak English. I suspect that he was as surprised as was his sister, when I told him that I could indeed speak English, that it was in fact my native tongue and that I'd dearly like to hear this translation. As he related it, the gist of what his sister was -babbling about- enthusiastically saying was "Holy Shit!! You look just like one of these statues, if it had come to life!!!"
There's a point to all of this:
Even though Egypt was conquered by the Persians in about 500 BC. And even though the Greeks evicted them (and then stayed on, in their place) about a hundred years later. And even though the Romans tossed out the Greeks, another 400 years later and then the Arabs had their turn to invade and so forth and so on... So, even though there's a LOT of ethnic variance in Egypt, due to the LARGE number of invaders, who weren't shy about spreading their genes, I don't have to wonder about my genetic heritage. Nor do I need to pay 23-And-Me/ Ancestry.Com/etc a modest sum to lie to me about DNA and technobabble (Vox, I think, did an expose on the industry, having twins send in their samples separately [to the same company], only to get back some 'DNA Ananlysis' which was nothing like the analysis that the other twin was sent. Seriously, you should watch that special)... I know where my genes are from, because I look just like the statues of my ancestors. It makes me just as identifiable as the unique Asian appearance does for Asians.
Anyway, I say all this because I was unsatisfied with your answer to the question "What did they look like?"
Well, it turns out that the art work and the sculptures and statues and such, are actually a very GOOD indicator as to what Ancient Egyptians looked like. Because if they didn't, then that would mean that they made all those statues to look like ME, rather than having it look like them, which is especially impressive when the artist in question lived some 5,000 years before me.
U probaly look like and arab/or greek,in thst case no u dont look even remotly close to anicet egyptisns cuz they were very dark with kinky hair
Why did the Egyptians think the gods have animal heads? Well Timmy it’s because of their idea of representation, the same way Athena would have an owl on her shoulder in our depictions they would show her with an owl head. Oh, you really wanted to know if they were all furrys? And now you want to go back to the electricity question? Still no.
Animism and shamanism are present in every corner of the world. It wasn't unique to Egypt.
@@rotmage That is a fundamental misunderstanding of what I said.
Ohhh. I thought this was a Wired interview. OK it all makes sense now.
First a Question for future reference: do any of the surviving texts say what a"service" in a temple was like? Were participants limited to priestly and higher levels only? Second is just a thought: we could use a more modern phrase to describe much of what was built back then : Public Works Projects. Same could be said for most Cathedrals in Europe.
The temples were not open to everyone-only priests/priestesses, and during certain ritual ceremonies members of the aristocracy. Priests and priestesses were generally the children of the aristocratic class, cementing the relationship between the state and religious practice.
During ritual ceremonies and festivals, common people would have their activities in the area outside of the temples.
The temples didn't quite have "services" since they were limited to just the priests, but we DO have texts outlining the rituals done within temples, as well as a brief idea of how priests rose the ranks.
For the temple rituals, the main one is the "Daily Temple Ritual" which consisted of opening the shrine that the god (in the form of a small statue) was housed in. The priests then washed and clothed the statue and, finally, swept away their own footprints to have everything pure. Other ceremonies included the various processions that involved placing the god on ceremonial barques and parading them between temples.
For the priesthood ranks, the statue of Bakenkhons gives us the rough dates of how one goes from being a simple temple worker, to a wab priest (basic priest) and through the ranks to become the High Priest of Amun in Karnak - took about 70-80 years.
There are also talks of initiations, with the Chamber of Gold in Dendera (I believe) having texts on the walls preventing non-initiated persons into the chamber
@@Mildon44 Thank you for the info.
@curtisdaniel9294 no worries! Always happy to talk about these things 😊
22:00 in terms of ancient Egyptian curses - I did my BA Dissertation on Private Egyptian Magic, with a section on curses.
While it's not the tomb curses that have been prevalent in our pop-culture views on Egypt, they certainly had spells that the living individuals would cast against people and evil spirits as a form of protection. One famous one if the "spell for smiting a man" (the actual name of the spell) in which the spell caster invocates, and assimilates with, the gods Montu, Osiris, and Seth in order to smite the adversary and "sever thy bones and eat thy flesh".
Wasn’t the Kohl or eyeliner perhaps a fashion trend starting from protective eyeliner, withstanding the sun’s glare?
I enjoyed the Wired Egyptologist answering questions better. Felt like she provided better answers.
I think they might have been obsessed with cats because the whole "Growing a ton of grain so you dont need to eat raw boar meat that you killed yourself" was sort of a new trend, and storing all that grain long term came with a massive mouse infestation. So having this little mouse killer around stopped you from dying.
Also see: The invention of beer, also by egypt, when some stored grain got wet and some mad lad decided to drink the grain juice and it just happened to have fermented sucrose in it from the grain and it made you feel funny and killed bacteria.
They weren't obsessed with cats. They liked them. That doesn't = obsession. Everything you just mentioned is true everywhere since cats have been domesticated, so in that case EVERYONE is obsessed with cats.
Ancient Egypt developed agriculture along the Nile plain. The abundance of food available caused a large population growth. With agriculture now only occupying a fraction of the large (and growing) population, other work would become necessary to keep the people busy. In addition to the various craftspeople, repair persons, clerks, shopkeepers, shoemakers, tailors, and all the other occupations needed for a large population, there were large public works projects like roads, bridges, and yes, pyramids.
Remember, we didn't have "money" as we know it now, or even as the Romans knew it. The wealth of the nation came from the food they produced, and from the population that food enabled, who could create substantial other objects.
Slaves also have to be fed, and you then also need to provide guards to corral the slaves. Employ the people and give them enough to satisfy their needs, and a little bit more for barter to improve their lives.
While explaining why Pyramids are tombs why use footage from burial crypts in the valley of the kings?
They took out the brains as well... quite an omission for an expert.
I hear you. He probably dismissed it just as the Egyptians dismissed brain matter during the mummification process. Generally, it was tossed and not preserved. It’s my understanding that they sort of confused what we know as the brain with the heart, which to them, had multiple functions..
If the pyramids were tombs why hasn't anyone ever found anyone buried in them?
Because they were robbed... But a body isnt the ONLY thing that proves a tomb is a tomb. Vast majority of tombs in the Valley of the Tombs had no mummies in. The royal mummies we do have were mostly from a single cave called "the royal cache".
We have mortuary texts in some of the pyramids (i.e. the Pyramid Texts) explicitly detailing how pyramids are tombs and how the spells aid the pharaoh on his journey to the afterlife.
Pyramids also often have a mortuary temple, a valley temple, sometimes an offering altar, etc. We know for a fact that they are tombs
I just came back from a trip to Egypt. The guide had told me that the pyramids were more like lighthouses for vessels on the Nile River. What truth do you think this has? Thank you for taking the time to answer some of the questions from Google.
Indirectly, maybe. They used to be covered with plaster and have huge golden peaks, those golden peaks would shine in the sun, so in a way yes. But lighthouses are generally on the shore and not very tall, so it's not a very practical lighthouse lol
I don't think he should be allowed to guide tourists then.
Why do you need light houses on a river? And why are pyramids built so far away from it you can't see them?
It's the guide's job to tell fancy stories to tourists. I haven't been to Egypt, but even at tours in medieval castles some guides tell you a lot of rubbish.
🤔 I'm not sure why he's being overly cautious in responding, some of the answers have been mentioned in multiple books by multiple egyptologists over the years and they pretty much agree with each other... Could have said something to that effect. Like "A lot of egyptologists theorize that..." Otherwise he seems very uncertain.
Ok, but you were asked specifically if the Egyptians had slaves, not whether slaves built the various monuments. And the answer that you beat around the bush and never gave is...YES. Why didn't you just say that, THEN go into detail about how the monuments of the old and middle kingdoms were built by regular Egyptians for both religious but also administrative reasons?
Q: Why were the Egyptians obsessed with cats?
A: For the very same reasons we are today!!! ❤
This is definitely not my favorite expert thats been on here. Usually they seem really excited to talk about their expertise. He seemed more annoyed, even laughed at simple questions as if he was thinking "wow they dont even know THAT?". At least that's how it seemed to me.
I don't think he seems annoyed, he seems more matter of fact. I laughed out loud at the question of did the Egyptians believe in an after life. I hope I could have suppressed that laugh if I was being filmed, but to be honest , I don't know if I could or not.
I hope you are not condemning this guy for laughing at the question about whether Egyptians had electricity!! That one really made me laugh!!!
he's not annoyed, he's just british. as a brit myself, he doesn't come off as condescending to me in the slightest.
He was clueless.
I think he’s just British 😂
Kushites to the south of me, Libyans to my west,
Here I am,
Stuck in the Middle Kingdom with you.
I never realized that Stealers Wheel stole and old Egyptian folk song for their hit 😛
I'm surprised that i only saw aliens in one comment i expected a lot more.
This guy is super interesting
This guy again... The guy who cost me money and time! Who caused me to buy books and spend time reading about things I never knew I was fascinated by. 😁
The eye liners were used against eye infections common in Egypt and to prevent flies to come near the eye. It was used untill recent as the early 20th century in egypt for that.
I think the correct answer for the end of ancient Egypt is when the roman empire converted to Christianity. It made laws against the old religions, closed temples and prosecuted priests and forbidden the hyroglyphic writing. The roman emperors are not any more Pharoahs and didn't respect anymore the old traditions and way of life. Plus revolts in alexandria against philosophers may even ended the library to function.
Again music ruins a video hope the sound editor is proud of them self
If I had to make a huge pile of stones, I'd hire a crane.. or a couple of them. If I had to do it without modern technology, and had plenty of manpower, I'd build barges. Build a lock system that runs along the exterior all the way to the top, and just float them up. All you need is a river, some wood, pitch, and a lot of guys with buckets. It's a lot easier to pull a barge on water than a stone on the ground.
You don't need buckets if you have shadufs.
Two important points to consider. The first is that man does not have the kind of transport for use in that terrain to deliver the enormous stones, as some stones weighed between 3,000 and 5,000 tons each.
There is no technology available to cut those large stones to an even flat surface that is so precise, you cannot push a razor blade between the stones.
I am of the opinion that it wasn't today's man who built these pyramids, but of a race which was wiped out a very long time ago.
@@YouChwb 2,000-3,000 ton stones for building walls? Not even close.
We don’t know.
We don’t know.
Oh…and…
we
don’t
know.
That’s a good thing in a historian and/or archaeologist . Anyone who says they know empirically what happened 5000-3000 years ago is lying. We can guess using the archaeological evidence we have, but we don’t know…
I heard they had places where they bred cats just to kill them and give them as gifts or something to place into tombs. Did they do that with other animals or is that just not true?
A few other animals and birds, but it was cats who pulled the short straw on that one.
That is probably an urban legend. Most of the cats in canopic jars have names, so they were almost certainly pets. There are a few examples where this is not true, but there's many possible explanations. Cat jars are not common enough to suggest what you've described.
@@sophiejones3554 Five TONS of mummified cats imported into the port of Liverpool suggests otherwise. Especially when you know those mummies came from an offerings site in Egypt.
@@Frank_Nemo I think you don't realize just how long the history of "Ancient Egypt" is, and just how many tombs there are. Not all of them had cats in them, not by a longshot. As far as I know, and I will grant Egypt is not my area of specialty but I am in fact an Anthrppologist, there wasn't a mummified cat industry. Some tombs have a very large number of cats in them, but others had none. There's no evidence that it was considered some kind of requirement, such that an industry like you described might have developed. Note, I did not say it was impossible or that it happened: only that as far as I or anyone in the field knows it as not a thing.
I know of the shipment you're referring to, but from a scholarly point of view the problem is that those artifacts had no provenance. We can't tell if they are genuine artifacts from the ancient world or fakes, let alone if they came from Egypt (since the Egyptians were not the only people to practice mummification). Nor can we say what those cats were intended for. Scientifically, there is no way to make those artifacts mean anything if indeed they are genuine artifacts at all. Whatever context they might once have had, was lost when they were shipped. No information can be gleaned from them, nor can they be used to prove anything.
@@sophiejones3554 No provenance apart from the fact that it is known that they were found at Speos Artemidos.
'Scientifically, there is no way to make those artefacts mean anything' - Apart from examination of the cat mummies and mummy wrappings of the ones in the Liverpool Museum, you mean? You are a fraud and full of BS.
3:20 very odd how he answers the question IMHO. We dont know how specifically the egyptians cut or moved large stones, may it be granite or something else, but we definetly know how people cut and moved stone in ancient times. Methods that are still in use today by traditional craftsmen. Also it always helps if you got 20.000 slaves which you dont have to pay and without labor protection and such.
I thought the same about the question about cutting stone. Your point with the unpaid and not cared for slave is obsolete though, but you probably wrote this before having watched the video till the end.
@@Spielkalb-von-Sparta You are absolutetly right. I did not finish upon writing the comment. I should have
As he says in the video, slaves didn't build the pyramids. They were mostly farmers who worked via "corvée labour". They were housed and fed fairly well.
22:59 The god depicted on the right of the screen is Amon-Tex the god of dual-wielding six-guns
3:45 THERE is the photo that the woo-woo "egyptologists" never show. They were not quarrying rocks they were not going to be able to lift. They quarried previous rocks from there, and lifted them away. And they made flat surfaces.
Interesting question about the beard.
Can you explain Chris Dunn’s work on the pre dynastic granite and diorite vases that are accurately machined to within a human hair of completely flat and circular. Also some have tiny handles. How did they do that?
You don’t sound like you believe your own spin on how they cut granite.
Why would a trained knowledgable archaeologist bother with the crank theories of Christopher Dunn?
@@jsworpin his experience is in machining and i’m talking about his work on the pre-dynastic vases not his theories on power generation at Giza. Have you actually seen the work he’s done on the vases or are you just posting dismissive comments without any knowledge on the subject?
PS I’m a Geologist so I know a bit about granite.
It’s also interesting that the 10,s of thousands of vases are predynastic and later generations (as with pyramid building) never managed to recreate the same quality of work. Isn’t it strange that the peak technology of a civilisation is at the start.
Regards
Henry
They used the tools available to them to make very precise work. It took more time but the reward was a better quality item.
What do you mean they have tiny handles? Of course they do! Handles were around for a long time. They just chiseled those too.
@@CrisSelene Gee, I never thought of that. Thanks.
But seriously, I think it’s impossible to produce those vases under the current paradigm with any amount of time using copper chisels and sand.
Have you seen the results of the laser scans or just another completely obvious reply with nothing to back it up?
As with the pyramids, and many other constructions, there is sacred geometry throughout the vases on many vectors.
These are made of granite and diorite very hard rocks 7 on the hardness scale.
I think with modern computer controlled lathes and diamond bits we would struggle to reproduce. Just the thinness of some of the vases. Why I mentioned handles as even with lathes these are the most difficult things to produce.
The complicated way of answering the first question-- I still don’t know the answer.
Why were Ancient Egyptians obsessed by cats (and I agree they weren't any moreso than other animals)? Because they were obsessed with grain, which was because they were obsessed with being able to eat to stay alive. Rats and mice like eating grain and cats like eating rats and mice, and also like being allowed to sleep inside when it's wet. That sounds like the start to a beautiful relationship.
ever hear of the mamluks?
23:31 The Egyptians may not have had electricity, but neighboring civilizations did. It was not functional in the way we have electricity now, but they did have the capability of creating a current in the form of batteries. See the Baghdad Battery.
Now that sounds interesting 🤔 thanks for the recommendation. Is there a documentary on UA-cam?
@@dionnegonsalves8188 Yes, there's a pretty good documentary on UA-cam regarding those artefacts: *The Baghdad Battery? Archaeologist Reacts!* by the channel *Artifactually Speaking.*
The Baghdad Battery has been disproven countless times. it's pseudo-scientific fantasy
Honestly the intro where he said some people say the pyramids were power stations and he goes ermmm no they didn’t have electricity was so cringe and daft. Electricity is not the only form of power and or who knows what they had we still find out more each day. I don’t even believe they was power stations but I won’t write it off peoples theory’s to the unknown like he has, some expert.
Upon watching the rest he’s worse than I imagined. Hard watch, this guy talks like he grew up with Tutankhamun
Interesting. However you cleverly bypassed giving a clear answer for at least two questions which may be deemed controversial - what Egyptians looked like and whether there was slavery in Egypt. Very disappointing in that regard.
Watch on 1.5x speed, you're welcome
Were the Pharoahs robbing royal tombs?
The state needs money and you can get that by reading the tomb of a Pharaoh from a previous dynasty. Weakening him so you don't have to deal with him in the afterlife.
such a shame that those outside this culture did not care enough to write extensively about them before they became wiped out in the conquest. so much of this fascinating history has been lost. and they lasted so long they didn't even write so much about themselves in a way that outsiders could discover
That makes perfect sense, though. Do we write extensively about brushing our teeth or what we mean by the word "underwear" or "breakfast"? No, because we consider them both mundane and also obvious.
Blame the white man
I don’t care for mummies, but I do like mommies
Got to love Egyptology…
How old are the pyramids…we don’t know. …5000?
How….we don’t know.
Give elaborate answers that obviously are not right…ok. We don’t know.
Well, which pyramids... there are many from differing time periods. The Pyramids of Giza were built in the 4th dynasty, c. 2,600 BCE - we know this from relative dating as well as from C14 dating on some pieces of wood in/around the pyramid. This is all detailed in a video by World of Antiquities
I thought the Pyramids were massive, but it looks like you could nearly lift one, I fucken love science, learning is gud, I can lift a pyramid mum! Watch me
When did the Egyptian live? Your answer was not flippant. I had to get past the "huh?" stage of the question.
Do the measured and informed answers of an 'expert' infuriate you? Please jam whatever you definitely reckon about ancient egypt in the comments! No references please.
Anyone could read a book and produce more detailed and interesting answers than this ‘expert’ did. As for spreading misinformation on the narrative of Pyramid tombs- I think that should have been abandoned when it was conceived a hundred years ago
Pyramids were tombs. I think you are the one who spreads misinformations.
'Anyone could read a book and produce more detailed' - True, but many people prefer watch video on yt rather than open books.
Chris is truely expert and his book "Searching for the Lost Tombs of Egypt" is truly excellent.
and what special book would that be? Just because something is a book doesn't mean it's true, or complete
Impurities is definitely NOT the right word. Now de-toxers are gonna go ballistic.
History hit ripping all the good youtube concepts without an ounce of shame.
Not one of my ancestor pharaohs were buried in a pyramid! 😂 imo they may have been used as a power source, but i can’t prove it.
no, they were tombs, and we can be very certain on that. The main one being the Pyramid Texts, texts within pyramids explicitly showing how pyramids are tombs
They had 2 cat goddesses Bastet and another one. They mummified cats the families shaved their eyebrows when acat died . I t was a sin and crime to kill a cat . THey were obsessed with cats , no other animal had these !!
They wanted to look like that, they were gods. Basically a cult of personality. Kinda like north Korea?
That thumbnail would make one hell of a soyjack
Kingdom of Kush xDDDDDDDDDD
so no aliens?
You lost me in cutting granite with copper😂
it is possible, especially with the sad and quartz as an abrasive. The documentary "The Pyramid Builders, New Clues" on UA-cam shows this well.
Bet they didn’t have ginger cats.
Ohh low blow!
They were reserved for royalty 😂
Theres a lot he doesnt know for someone who calls himself an Egyptologist. I cant imagine devoting my whole life to the history of one civilization.
because there are things that we just dont know in the field of Egyptology. We can have theories based on limited evidence, but when the academic consensus isn't fully established, it's better to admit that we don't fully know instead of giving potential misinformation.
@@Mildon44 Yeah but why devote your life to knowing everything about Ancient Egypt? Seems like not much of a job.
@nychris2258 because it's fascinating and it covers a huge area - both in terms of time periods but also areas if speciality, such as texts, translations, art history, material analysis, experimental archaeology, chemical analysis, religion, medicine, social life, warfare, etc.
No one Egyptologist can be an expert in all of them because of how wide-ranging it is.
My focus is on Private Egyptian Ritual Magic. A friend of mine focuses on Egyptian bronze mirrors, another focuses on ancient Egyptian gynaecology.
And within terms of a 'job', you do a lot of stuff. From excavation, artefact analysis, reports, text translations, writing books, museum work, writing academia papers, etc. etc.
@@Mildon44 And that could be said about a lot of jobs really. Dumb anything down enough and it is going to sound boring
@@glenchapman3899 and yet, overcomplicating things by talking about pretty dry academic arguments based on very limited evidence is also boring.
What's wrong with saying "we don't know" when we don't know?