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Wall Painting from Thebes
The Banquet is part of a wall painting from Thebes, dated about 1400 bc, during the period of the New Kingdom. The figures here are represented in typical profile. The top section shows nobles of the court and their wives receiving attention from slaves while waiting for the food, which is piled high on the right. The figures in the row below are probably ladies of the court.
Bridgeman Art Library, London/New York
The ancient Egyptians produced a large body of creative works in areas such as music, literature, painting, sculpture, drama, and architecture. Often the purpose of their artistic output was not recreation or cultural enrichment, but the communication of some sort of message or theme. See also Egyptian Art and Architecture.
Religion, which was extremely important in Egyptian thought, society, and life, had a great influence on the arts. For example, biographical texts that appear on the walls of funerary chapels make up an interesting body of literature. Their main purpose was to reaffirm the accomplishments and moral character of the deceased, so that he or she would pass successfully to the afterlife. On another level, these texts indirectly provide information about the activities of the pharaoh, since they often refer to the deceased's role in relation to the ruler.
Paintings, carvings, and other representations of figures in two dimensions appear on the walls of temples, tombs, coffins, and sarcophagi, as well as on papyri, textiles, and cartonnage (form-fitting coffins made of a papier-mâché-like substance). By convention, the artists portrayed the most characteristic features of the individual in one harmonious image. The resulting representations could then function on many levels simultaneously. For example, the typical depiction of a tomb owner was meant to portray that individual outside the limits of both time and space—an image for eternity. This representation might also relate to the hieroglyphs that accompany it, and it may even be an integral part of the text.
Sculptures served a variety of purposes. Carved statues of deities were worshiped in temples. The actual worship took place after appropriate rituals were completed. The rituals were believed to animate the image and insure that the deity had taken up residence in the statue. Statues of royal persons and ordinary people were also produced. The ancient Egyptians believed that these statues, too, could serve occasionally as residences for the personality of the individual after death. Sometimes, such a figure represented the final hieroglyph of the individual's name, which would be carved on the side or base of the statue. The ancient Egyptians also placed statues of themselves in temples as a demonstration of their piety. They also put figurines in human form, called shabtis, in tombs to be substitutes for the tomb owner when he or she was called to perform labor in the afterlife. Other statues placed in tombs were meant to be residences for an aspect of the deceased's personality in case of damage to the mummy.
The pyramids are the best-known examples of Egyptian architecture. These huge tombs have four triangular sides that meet in a point at the top. To the ancient Egyptians they might have represented the primeval mound that was the origin of life in their creation myths or they might have represented the solidified rays of the Sun. The Egyptians built more than 100 pyramids as final resting places for their rulers.
Egyptian temples were rectangular in shape and intended to be oriented in an east-west direction, that is, in line with the rising and setting of the Sun. In temple architecture, a huge gateway called a pylon stood at the entrance to the temple area and led into an open court. The pylon often took the form of the hieroglyph for the word horizon, a character in which the disk of the sun appears over a design representing the physical horizon. When the Sun rose in the morning and passed over the entrance to the temple, the resulting image reproduced the hieroglyph, symbolizing that the gateway was indeed the horizon. To the Egyptians, the temple, a structure built by humans, could be a cosmic environment fit for the gods.
Carved and brightly painted scenes adorned the walls of temples and tombs. Some of the representations showed the interaction of the kings and gods. Others depicted symbolic scenes that related to the cosmos or the afterlife. Painted decoration was also used on household items such as pottery vessels and furniture, and it was often applied to the interior walls of houses.
The ancient Egyptians wrote various kinds of literature. These included epic stories about wandering heroes, tales of pharaohs and magicians, wisdom literature that advised proper behavior (selections from which are the ancestors of some biblical proverbs), and comic stories about their deities. They wrote political propaganda, satire, and what may have been the world's first fairy tale. They also crafted love poetry that is beautifully evocative and meant to express the feelings of two individuals toward each other. Their dramas were primarily associated with religious literature and rituals. Performances apparently accompanied some burials. In addition, performers reenacted, in the temple, battles between the gods Horus and Seth that related to the royal succession.
No written music survives from ancient Egypt, but musical instruments were included in several burials, and musicians accompanying ritual dancers are often depicted on the walls of tombs and some temples. Some scenes of musicians and dancers represent entertainment at parties, while others portray religious activity. Musical instruments used in ancient Egypt include trumpets, flutes, harps, and various percussion instruments.
Many types of artifacts from ancient Egypt were not created for religious purposes. For example, in the category of minor arts, the Egyptians manufactured exquisite jewelry, cosmetic dishes, utensils, dishes, containers, furniture, and other objects. The beauty of these items seems to have been dictated by the ability of the artisan and the desire and perhaps wealth of the purchaser. Faience, an inexpensive nonclay ceramic material with a glaze made from quartz, was used in pottery, tiles, jewelry, and amulets.
Works of art were generally unsigned, but the names of particular artists are known because many texts record a title, such as line draftsman (one who draws the outlines of images to be painted or sculpted), sculptor, architect, or musician, before the name of a particular person. Two of the most important architects known are Imhotep, who designed Djoser's Step Pyramid, and Senenmut, who conceived the mortuary temple for the female pharaoh Hatshepsut. The royal temples, palaces, and tombs were state-sponsored projects involving several hundred anonymous artisans. Carving the reliefs on the walls of most structures was apparently a group effort, but certain areas of the decoration may reveal the distinctive style of a particular artist. The royal workshops often set the standards for statues, reliefs, and paintings created for others among the elite.
