fi rst offered it to the gods and then redistributed it. There is also
evidence that grain could be used for taxation purposes. Barley also fi gured prominently in Egyptian myths about
resurrection. Because the plant dies and the seed goes dormant and
then sprouts up into a new plant, it was a kind of symbol of the
afterlife, and mummies were often buried with barley necklaces.
The Egyptians ate many different kinds of bread. It was made from
barley or spelt for the lower classes and more fi nely ground and
bolted wheat for the upper classes. They also leavened their bread
with yeast. Many different kinds of breads have been found buried
with the dead to feed them in the afterlife. Bread was the staple
food for Egyptians.
The Egyptians ate a lot of wild game—including ibex, gazelle,
and antelopes—and hunting was a favorite pastime. Above all,
the Egyptians loved beef. Large-scale cattle industry developed
in the north, where there are broad, fl at plains. Although there are
numerous illustrations of butcher’s shops and cut-up pieces of
beef, we don’t really know how they cooked it, although we might
assume that they boiled it.
We know that the Egyptians kept dairy cows because there are
frequent depictions of milkmaids. Priests also kept sacred bulls,
which had special marks that denoted that they were incarnations
of the god Apis. The Egyptians also used beef by-products in
many medicines.
Egyptians defi nitely kept pigs in an earlier period of time, but
like the Hebrews, they seem to have avoided it later. There is no
evidence of an explicit taboo, but there are practically no remains or
depictions of pigs, and they were forbidden to be used as sacrifi ces.
Sheep and goats were also domesticated. They were introduced from
Asia along with ibex—a kind of Nubian mountain goat—which is