clem ciamarra Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> well bauval claims that area "Heliopolis, Memphis
> and Giza" to be very special. i suggest read message of
> sphinx he even mentions the term "garden of eden" in
> regards to that area

I see where you're going wrong: I would not rely upon Bauval as the main support for your contentions, for (as Hermione noted) he has his own interpretations of evidence - sometimes that don't square with historical and archaeologial facts.

> i gave the link about nubia to indicate that
> people from that land were a different race, and supplied you the link.

What is "race" here? nothing of biological fact, for sure.

The Egyptians had a true love-hate relationship with the Nubian peoples over the millennia, but they could not deny one inescapable geographic fact: for the flood to come to Egypt, it had to pass through Nubia. When the flood didn't (it was delayed, or somehow blocked by dry spells), they even had myths of divine "trips to Nubia" to coax the flood - the myth of the Wandering Eye of Ra is such an example.

> true nile came from south - and it has been said
> to give life - it too was a tempest at times.

Er, so?

> plus greg mention - temple of horus in edfu -
> nomes there - upper egypt - now i read somewhere
> that temple was built after horus reunited upper
> after defeating it with armies in lower egypt.

Not so. I was referring, BTW,not to Edfu, but to Hierakanoplis, which is where a temple to the hawk-god, as a local form of Horus, Horus the Nekhenite, was known since the 1st Dynasty, having been built upon an earlier structure (Baines and Maklek 1980: 78).

> as far as foreigners or descendants that became
> mixed with different cultures - your correct in
> questioning them.
>
>
> please let me know if bauval was lieing to us
> all,

As Hermione noted, Bauval has his own interpretations, but factually speaking, I should think you need to read far more sources than his works alone, for I know that many of his interpretations are not widely accepted in the archaeological and/or academic world.

In short, I don't see that the "north" of Egypt was any more sacred than the "south" - and I don't think the Egyptians thought in such a dichotomy (north vs. south).

As far as I am aware, and from the Egyptian texts themselves, if any one place in Egypt was considered "sacred" and something upon which almost all Egyptians agreed, it was the village of Abydos, for in Egyptian autobiographies, myths and historical writings, Abydos was the resting place of Osiris, and as such was a place of religious pilgrimage for Egyptians through much of their history.

This emphasis upon the long-lasting sacredness of Abydos is recounted in the follow publications:

Desroches-Nobelcourt, C., M. Duc, et. al. 1986. Sen-nefer. Die Grabkammer des Bürgermeisters von Theben. Mainz: Verlag Philipp von Zabern. [Discussion of the New Kingdon tomb of Sennfer which includes a recounting of his pilgrimage to Abydos.]

Similarly, the same sort of discussion of New Kingdom pilgramage is to be found in

Dorman, P. 1991. The Tombs of Senenmut. The Architecture and Decoration of Tombs 71 and 353. Publications of The Metropolitan Museum of Art Egyptian Expedition 24. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Lichtheim, M. 1988. Ancient Egyptian Autobiographies Chiefly of the Middle Kingdom. A Study and an Anthology. Freiburg: Universitätsverlag/Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, [M.K. stelae from Abydos are the focal point of chapter 5. Notable points are the scope of the "pilgrimage" to Abydos and the identity of the "terrace of the great god".]

Texidor, J. 1964. Un nouveau papyrus araméen du règne de Darius II. Syria (Paris) 41: 285-290. [About the pilgrimage of two Phoenicians (concluded from the names) to the sanctuary of Osiris at Abydos in 417 B.C]

The best sources on the idea of pilgrimage in ancient Egypt are

Yoyotte, J. 1960. Les pèlerinages dans l'Égypte ancienne. In Sources orientales, 3: Les pèlerinages: 19-74. Paris: Aux Éditions du Seuil.

Volokhine, Y. 1998. Les déplacements pieux en Egypte pharaonique: sites et pratique culturelles. In D. Frankfurter, Ed., Pilgrimage and holy space in Late Antique Egypt: 51-97. Leiden: Brill.

Katherine Griffis-Greenberg

Doctoral Candidate
Oriental Institute
Doctoral Programme in Oriental Studies [Egyptology]
Oxford University
Oxford, United Kingdom