Biographical Texts from Ramesside Egypt

The Ramesside period in Egypt (ca. 1290-1070 B.C.E.) corresponds to the late Bronze Age, a time of great change both in Egypt and the Near East. Viewed as an age of empire, dominated by the figure of Ramesses II, this period witnessed crucial developments in art, language, and religious display. Biographical Texts from Ramesside Egypt offers insights into these cultural transformations through the voices of thirty-one priests, artisans, civic officials, and governmental administrators who served under the kings of the nineteenth and twentieth dynasties. Forty-six biographical texts, which were inscribed in tombs, on statues and stelae in temples, and even on temple walls, give details of their careers and character. The translations are introduced by brief descriptions of the texts' monumental contexts and, where possible, summaries of the careers of their owners. They are formatted metrically and in stanzas to emphasize their poetic form and to foster a clearer understanding of them. The volume offers an introduction to the historical background of the Ramesside period and draws together some of the key themes and interpretive issues raised by the texts and their contexts. These include the representation of the people's relationships to god and king, the thematization of the priestly life, and the various transformations of the texts' media, including the implications of the change in the decorative programs of nonroyal tombs and the use of temple walls for some inscriptions. The introduction also locates the texts within broader contexts of biographical writing in Egypt and other societies, including our own.

Elizabeth Frood is University Lecturer in Egyptology and Fellow of St Cross at the Oriental Institute, University of Oxford. She is a co-author of Woodcutters, Potters and Doorkeepers: Service Personnel of the Deir el-Medina Workmen (Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten).