Rennan Lemos

Monumental rock-cut tombs decorated with wall paintings or reliefs were rare in New Kingdom colonial Nubia. Exceptions include the 18th Dynasty tombs of Djehutyhotep (Debeira) and Hekanefer (Miam), and the 20th Dynasty tomb of Pennut (Aniba). The three tombs present typical Egyptian artistic representations and inscriptions, which include tomb owners and their families, but also those living under their direct control. This paper compares the artistic and architectural features of these decorated, monumental rock-cut tombs in light of the archaeological record of the regions in which they were located in order to contextualize art within its social setting in colonized Nubia. More than expressing cultural and religious affiliations in the colony, art seems to have been essentially used as a tool to enforce hierarchization and power, and to define the borders of the uppermost elite social spaces in New Kingdom colonial Nubia.

Samples taken from the canopic jars of Djehutyhotep, chief of Tehkhet (Debeira), Lower Nubia, and local versions of Egyptian canopic jars from Sai, Upper Nubia, suggest that the materials used for mortuary ritual unguents in Nubia may have differed from those used in Egypt. Nubian samples consisted of plant gum and bitumen, whereas those from Egypt conformed to the standardizing black resinous liquid recipe used for mummification and other funerary rituals. However, there may be time frame issues to be considered as most samples analyzed from Egypt date to later periods. A standard black funerary liquid was used at Amara West, Upper Nubia, probably poured over a wrapped body, which might suggest that the gum and bitumen mixture was reserved for filling canopic jars, perhaps indicating that the use of canopic jars in Nubia differed from their use in Egypt. Evidence from the canopic jars of Djehutyhotep, local versions of canopic jars from Sai, and the sample from Amara West also indicate a source of bitumen that was not the Dead Sea, which was the main (although not only) source used in Egypt. The new results from the analysis of the Djehutyhotep canopic jars and previously published results from Sai point towards alternative ritual practices associated with local conceptions and uses of canopic jars in colonized Nubia. These samples and data from Amara West further reveal that the bitumen used in mortuary contexts in Nubia originated elsewhere than bitumen used in Egypt, which might have implications for our understanding of colonized Nubia as part of other trade networks independently from Egypt.

Archaeology in Sudan and Nubia has been greatly impacted by modern colonialism in northeast Africa. In theory and practice, the discipline's history in the region includes interpretations of past realities that worked as intellectual bases for colonization. From a postcolonial standpoint, Sudan and Nubia offer us an opportunity to investigate complexity in the past beyond oversimplifying colonial narratives entangled with the practice of modern archaeology in the region. However, more complex, postcolonial interpretations of the ancient past have played only a small part in 'decolonizing' initiatives aiming to reframe archaeological practice and heritage in Sudan and Nubia today. In this paper, I discuss the different trajectories of postcolonial and decolonial theory in archaeology, focusing on Sudan and Nubia (roughly the region south of Egypt from Aswan and north of Sudan up to Khartoum). I will argue that bridging postcolonial and decolonial theory through what I will refer to as 'narratives of reparation' can offer us ways to address both conceptual problems underlying theory and practice and avenues for an all-encompassing decolonization of the field.