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22 agriculture: Egypt HARVESTING The dry season began in March and continued to July This period was called shemu (also shomu), meaning “the drought.” Harvesting usually occurred in May or June and sometimes in April, before the next flood began Grains were harvested using sickles made of wood that was cut and glazed to form a sharp edge; by Roman times sickles made of iron were becoming more common Large estates made use of traveling harvest teams, who began their work early in the season and followed the maturing of crops downriver as the season progressed (The Nile flows north into the Mediterranean Sea, so downriver means in a northerly direction and upriver refers to a southerly direction.) Because harvesting involved a great deal of work in a relatively short period of time, nearly everyone participated Livestock was then allowed to graze in the fields to eat the stalks left behind Also, poor people often followed harvesters, hoping they could scavenge some bits of grain for themselves After the grain was cut with sickles, it had to be bundled Sometimes the bundles were loaded onto the backs of donkeys, but often they were carried in sacks suspended from poles, each pole carried by two men The grain was then taken to a dry place to undergo a process called parching, or drying out the grain so that it did not later get moldy or rot There, the threshing process would begin Workers spread the grain, still on its grassy stems, in a fenced or otherwise contained place where the ground was packed hard and first carefully cleaned Donkeys then trampled it In some places cows performed this job This trampling helped separate the grain from the chaff, or the seed coverings and other debris that is not eaten During the next step in the harvesting process, called winnowing, workers used large forks, like pitchforks, to scoop up the straw, leaving behind mostly grain The straw was kept for use in the production of mud bricks, which were strengthened by the inclusion of the straw Using sieves made of palm leaves and reeds, workers—usually women at this stage—sifted the materials to further separate the grains from the remaining smaller bits of chaff Finally, the grain was ready to be stored in granaries for later consumption The fields of ancient Egypt were highly productive, particularly considering that crops were grown without benefit of modern tools or fertilizers Records show that at that time an acre of land could yield nearly 4,200 pounds Total production could range as high as 2.8 million tons, though 2.5 million tons was the production for a typical good year This amount of grain fed a population during the New Kingdom (1550–1070 b.c.e.) that has been variously estimated from as few as million to as many as million people During bad harvest years, production fell to as low as about 1.5 million tons One period of dryness demonstrates the vital importance of the Nile and its annual flooding in the life of the ancient Egyptians Late in the third millennium b.c.e., Egypt suffered a period of great political instability The royal families were feuding, and questions arose about the proper succession of kings Then, around 2134 b.c.e., the Eighth Dynasty fell In the resulting power vacuum, local nobles seized control of the land in their areas and gained command of portions of the king’s army Although in theory HYMN TO HATHOR: THE EGYPTIAN AGRICULTURAL CYCLE About two miles southeast of the town of Dendera, Egypt, is the Dendera Temple complex, which features one of the best-preserved temples in all of Egypt Covering about 430,000 square feet, or nearly 10 acres, it has become a major tourist attraction The main temple in the complex is the Hathor Temple, dedicated to the goddess Hathor, whom the Egyptians regarded as the mother-goddess of the world and the patron of, among other things, the sky, the sun, music, dance, and the arts The dates of construction provided in the texts inscribed on the temple range from 54 B.C.E to 64 C.E.; it was built on the site of an earlier temple from the Middle Kingdom (ca 2140–1640 B.C.E.) Hathor’s name means “house of Horus,” referring to the night sky and therefore the god of the sky, Horus, who was the son of Osiris As a mother-goddess, Hathor had been considered in earlier centuries as symbolic of the Milky Way, which the ancient Egyptians believed was the milk that flowed from a celestial cow Thus, as far back as 2700 B.C.E., Egyptians worshipped her as a cow deity She was also known by the name Mehturt (also spelled Mehurt, Mehet-uret, and Mehet-Weret), a name that means “great flood,” again in reference to the Milky Way However, because the Egyptians saw the Milky Way as a waterway on which the gods could travel, they came to associate it with the Nile River Hathor, then, was believed to be responsible for the yearly flooding of the Nile In this way, she also became associated with motherhood, for the breaking of the amniotic sac as a signal that a woman is about to give birth was thought of as analogous to the flooding of the Nile, with the “birth” of the crops that would grow after it receded Archaeologists discovered a hymn to Hathor when they refurbished the Dendera Temple complex This hymn, inscribed on the Hathor Temple, makes clear her connection with Egyptian agriculture Hathor is said to “cause the flood flowing downriver in its season.” To farmers, Hathor caused “the watered earth to close over the seed when its right time has come,” making men to “work it in joy.”
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