Читать книгу A History of Ancient Egypt - Marc Van De Mieroop - Страница 16

The question “what is history” is much too wide‐ranging and thorny to address here, but before embarking on reading a book‐long history of ancient Egypt it may be useful to see how it applies to that ancient culture. Less than 200 years ago many would have said that ancient Egypt does not have history. In the early 19th century, the influential philosopher of history Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831) proclaimed that cultures without accounts of the past resembling historical writings in the western tradition had no history. But the discipline has moved on enormously, and most historians today consider all literate cultures – including ancient Egypt – worthy of study. The field of “world history” goes further and includes the world’s non‐literate societies in its purview. This attitude erases the distinction between history and prehistory, a step whose consequences are not yet fully appreciated. It has the benefit for students of ancient Egypt that it removes the awkward problem of what sources they use in their research. Historians mostly consider textual sources to be the basis of their work, but in the case of Egypt we have to wait until the 2nd millennium BC for a written record that is rich and informative about multiple aspects of life. Archaeological and visual remains are often the sole sources for earlier periods, and they stay very important throughout the study of ancient Egyptian history. Writing Egypt’s history thus requires a somewhat different approach than for other periods and places where narrative and documentary sources provide a firm outline.

This book is called “A History of Ancient Egypt,” because it is clear that many other “histories” can be written, each with their own emphasis and intent. Historians can concentrate on political, social, economic, or cultural issues, each of which will provide a different picture of the society they discuss. Most basic surveys build their structure around political history and focus on the deeds of kings and their entourages. This will also be the case here, although it does not monopolize the account, and I will also address other concerns. The choices I made are personal but inspired by other treatments of the subject. Ideally, more attention would have been given to the ancient Egyptians who were not part of the elites, but this book is intended as an introduction only and hopes to inspire further reading and study.