Episode 72: The Home Front (Letters to Ahmose)

on

Thutmose III (Part 6): Personal Correspondence in Thebes.

148 – 1460 BCE. Letters are a rare and exciting find in Egyptian archaeology. Imagine our good fortune to possess an entire corpus from one individual: Ahmose, “Peniaty’s man,” a middle-class Egyptian living and working in the Egypt of Thutmose III….

cover

Direct Download (Save As mp3)

bm-10107-ptahu-to-ahmose

The letter of Ptahu to Ahmose, concerning a maid-servant taken by Tetimose (British Museum)

ahmose-letters-3230a-top-3230b-bottom

Two letters of the Ahmose corpus, in transcription: (top) Teti writes to Ahmose concerning a house; (bottom) Ahmose writes to the treasurer  Tey concerning a maid-servant.

Papyrus; Hieratic epistolary text verso and recto.

A letter from Ahmose to an official, of which only the introduction survives (British Museum). Not discussed in episode.

ahmose-shabti

A shabti (servant figurine) of Ahmose (Glanville 1928)

ahmose-kohl

A kohl (charcoal eye-liner) box of Ahmose (Glanville 1928)

Bibliography

Edward F. Wente, Letters from Ancient Egypt, 1990.

S.R.K. Glanville, “The Letters of Aahmose of Peniati,”Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 14 (1928) JSTOR

T. Eric Peet, “Two Eighteenth Dynasty Letters,” Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 12 (1926) JSTOR

Elizabeth Frood, “Social Structure and Daily Life,” in Toby Wilkinson (ed.) The Egyptian World 2010.