South of Kush, along the coast of East Africa, lived peo-
ple who seemed to put water to another use. According to
the Greek geographer Strabo (64 or 63 b.c.e.–aft er 23 c.e.),
fi shermen of the region stored shellfi sh and fi sh in pools of
water near the shore to keep for eating later, perhaps when
catches were poor. Th is is a logical practice, and Strabo took
greater pains than most ancient geographers to make his ac-
counts accurate. A later development was the use of baskets to
catch fi sh and keep them in water. Th is use of baskets was also
found among Bantu-speaking peoples of West Africa.
Th e Bantu speakers were farmers, and by 200 c.e. they
were advancing east and south out of West Africa, using their
iron tools to carve out farms from forests. How they stored
their harvests is not entirely clear, but inferences can be made
from the recorded practices of their descendants. One is that
their granaries were elevated above the ground on posts made
of tree branches. Th is helped protect the grain not only from
pests such as rats but also from fl ooding, a common prob-
lem in central Africa and parts of eastern Africa south of
Kush. Another practice was that of making granaries out of
walls of woven mats and conical roofs of long rushes that ran
lengthwise from the peaks down to the edges, thus making
rainwater fl ow out and away from the granary. Much of this
inference is speculative because archaeologists have not made
much progress in researching in Africa’s forests; the central
regions are remote and therefore hard to reach, and the re-
gion has been very dangerous for scientists because of bandits
and warfare.EGYPT
BY KATHARINA ZINN
Most food in ancient Egypt was not produced or consumed
daily, and to be kept longer it had to be preserved. Meth-
ods of storage and preservation were designed to solve this
problem and to accommodate the growing population of the
region. Stored or preserved food could include grain, fruits,
vegetables, meat, fi sh, poultry, and wine. Th e storage facilities
in ancient Egypt showed a wide range of types and extended
from single storage jars or basketwork containers for domes-
tic use to large storeroom complexes. Meat, fi sh, and poultry
were stored in pottery vessels. Plates or bowls were used to
hold off erings (it was necessary to off er food to the deceased
daily), and tightly closed jars were used for long-term stor-
age. Oil, fat, and suet were stored in stoneware jars. Grain
was stored in small domestic pits or jars as well as large-scale
granaries controlled by the state or a temple, such as the
Ramesseum (a mortuary temple in Th ebes dedicated to the
Egyptian king Ramses II [r. 1290–1224 b.c.e.]) and Medinet
Habu (dedicated to Ramses III [r. 1194–1163 b.c.e.]). Store-
rooms for grain and other agricultural products were named
shenut (“barns”) and had a specifi c administrative structure
devoted to their maintenance. Precious goods, such as herbs,
spices, and salt, were kept in small leather or linen bags. Of
further importance was the form of rations for food supply.In a society without money, rations had a special signifi cance;
food had to be stored within the food circle from harvest or
slaughtering to ration distribution.
Grain was stored in large quantities at the local, provin-
cial, and state level in granary silos whose maximum capac-
ity was calculated by scribes. Some silos are partly excavated,
while others have been depicted in artwork or as model gra-
naries in tombs. Depictions of stored grain or models placed
in tombs were meant to guarantee a supply of food for the
dead. Scenes portray people sacking up and carrying the
grain from fi elds to the granaries, sometimes using donkeys.
Grain was put directly into storage facilities aft er winnowing,
sieving, recording, and measuring by scribes. At the granary
porters carried the baskets up the stairs to the charging hole,
where the grain was poured in. Th e process was supervised by
a scribe or administrator who recorded intakes, storage, and
removal. All harvested goods belonged not to the farmer but
to the king or to the temples or nobles who had received the
land as a gift from the king.
Th e fi rst small-scale granaries were pits with basketry
linens and a total yield of about 7.5 pounds. In El Faiyûm,
a large oasis, Egyptologists have found well-preserved wheat
and barley from the Neolithic Period (dating to about 5200
b.c.e.). Th is shows the long tradition of storage that pre-
ceded dynastic times. Other early examples are in El Badâri
in northern Upper Egypt about 4500 b.c.e., where postholes,
pits, and storage jars were found. Th e oldest large granaries
were cones with round bases and domed tops that were made
of mud brick or seasoned wood and sometimes plastered. Th e
larger ones had steps or a ladder leading to a hole at the topPainted wooden model of a granary, from Aswān, Egypt, Sixth
Dynasty, around 2200 b.c.e. (© Th e Trustees of the British Museum)storage and preservation: Egypt 10630895-1194_Soc&Culturev4(s-z).i1063 1063 10/10/07 2:30:56 PM