Nubian and Egyptian Ethnicity 205One of these tombs was dedicated to Siamun, who held the title “Overseer of Foreign
Lands.” Siamun would have played a prominent role in the colonial administration,
regulating traffic across this internal border and perhaps assembling the annual tribute
in gold, cattle, slaves, ivory, and other precious goods from the conquered kingdom of
Kush. In a nearby middle-class component of the cemetery, remains of decorated and
inscribed coffins, evidence for mummification, and specialized items such as Ushabti
figurines reflect an Egyptian belief system, while luxuries such as a rare Mycenaean
juglet attest to the prosperity of the community (Smith 1992, 2003). The use of vaulted
subterranean chambers as family crypts also reflects Egyptian practice, since Nubian
tombs were usually made for only one person. Since Egyptian (and presumably also
Nubian) funerals were public events, monuments, practices, and objects such as these
on display during funerals would overtly signal and materialize an Egyptian identity to
the participants, evoking primordial ethnic ties to Egypt.
During the second season of excavation, however, we found burials of four women
in Nubian style, flexed and oriented head-to-the-east as opposed to the position of the
Egyptian burials that lay above and around them, extended (i.e., mummified) on their
back, oriented head-to-the-west. Looters had shoved one of these burials into an unusual
position in order to steal valuable jewelry, but had missed a set of Egyptian amulets
dedicated to the dwarf god Bes, who the Egyptians believed protected the household
from both physical and spiritual dangers (Wilkinson 2003: 102–4). A Kerma-style
cup was placed at the head of another set of two Nubian burials, but apart from the
cup and a couple of shell beads, the grave goods associated with all four burials were
Egyptian. This inconsistency shows the complexities and the long-term entanglements
that often characterize colonial encounters and that complicate the recognition of
ethnic identity. The amulets would, however, not necessarily have been visible during
the funeral, and may therefore have been more a matter of personal choice. The burial
of women in Nubian style, however, would make a very overt assertion of ethnic
identity against the formalized Egyptian rituals of burial and monumentality of the elite
cemetery’s pyramids.
Piankhi, Pharaoh of Egypt
Upon their assumption of the Egyptian throne in 750BC, the Nubian pharaohs of Egypt’s
Twenty-Fifth Dynasty appear to be more Egyptian than the Egyptians they conquered.
Just 300 years earlier, these same people were the leaders of “Wretched Kush,” sub-
jects of Egypt’s New Kingdom Empire (ca. 1500–1070BC). Nubian kings adopted
Egyptian regalia, worshiped Egyptian deities, and were buried under pyramids inscribed
with Egyptian texts, their bodies mummified and furnished with Egyptian grave goods
(see Figure 13.6; Morkot 2000; Edwards 2004; Bonnet and Valbelle 2006). They also
consciously deployed the ancient Egyptian ideology of ethnic self–other in order to legit-
imate their claim as rightful kings, restorers of order after a period of fragmentation under
multiple dynasties of Libyan descent. In his account of the final conquest and consolida-
tion of Nubian control over Egypt, King Piankhi highlights his Egyptian-ness by stressing
his piety, seeking the approval of Egypt’s many gods in temples on his journey north,
and protecting them from looting by his armies. When the rival princes of the north