The Predynastic Figurines of Upper Egypt

Abstract

Approximately 250 anthropomorphic and therianthropic grave figurines have been found in Predynastic Egyptian graves dating from c4000 BCE to c3000 BCE. Early interpretations favoured the popular Mother Goddess theory, for the predominance of female figurines seemed to early archaeologists and historians to support prevailing theories on the matriarchal origin of civilisation and a universal pre-state worship of a supreme female deity. In the 1960s, Peter Ucko turned the Mother Goddess theory on its head with his publications on the Egyptian and Near Eastern figurines. He concluded that neither ethnographic parallels nor the physical appearance of the figurines indicated that they represented any divine being. Rather, he stated that the figurines were probably used for other purposes, such as dolls, twin substitutes, concubine figurines, initiation figurines, and sorcerers' agents. This thesis uses Ucko's four-stage methodology to examine specifically the Egyptian figurines in light of: 1. Their physical appearance. 2. Their cultural, environment, and archaeological contexts. 3. The religious systems of contemporary, similar societies in Nilotic Africa. 4. The historical religion of the Egyptian Dynastic period following the Predynastic.