Egypt–Mesopotamia relations
Egypt–Mesopotamia relations were the relations between the civilisations of ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, in the Middle East. They seem to have developed from the 4th millennium BCE, starting in the Uruk period for Mesopotamia and the Gerzean culture of Prehistoric Egypt. Influences can be seen in the visual arts of Egypt, in imported products, and also in the possible transfer of writing from Mesopotamia to Egypt and generated "deep-seated" parallels in the early stages of both cultures.
Influences on Egyptian trade and art (3500–3200 BCE)
There was generally a high-level of trade between Ancient Egypt and the Near East throughout the Pre-dynastic period of Egypt, during the Naqada II and Naqada III phases. These were contemporary with the Late Uruk and Jemdet Nasr periods in Mesopotamia. The main period of cultural exchange, particularly consisting in the transfer of Mesopotamian imagery and symbols to Egypt, is considered to have lasted about 250 years, during the Naqada II to Dynasty I periods.Designs and objects
Distinctly foreign objects and art forms entered Egypt during this period, indicating contacts with several parts of Asia. The designs that were emulated by Egyptian artists are numerous: the Uruk "priest-king" with his tunique and brimmed hat in the posture of the Master of animals, the serpopards or sepo-felines, winged griffins, snakes around rosettes, boats with high prows, all characteristic of Mesopotamian art of the Late Uruk period. The same "Priest-King" in visible in several Mesopotamian works of art of the end of the Uruk period, such as the Blau Monuments, cylinder seals and statues. Objects such as the Gebel el-Arak knife handle, which has patently Mesopotamian relief carvings on it, have been found in Egypt, and the silver which appears in this period can only have been obtained from Asia Minor., Naqada II period.
Spouted jars of Mesopotamian design start to appear in Egypt in the Naqada II period. Various Uruk pottery vases and containers have been found in Egypt in Naqada contexts, confirming that Mesopotamian finished goods were imported into Egypt, although the past content of the jars has not been determined yet. Scientific analysis of ancient wine jars in Abydos has shown there was some high-volume wine trade with the Levant during this period.
material is thought to have been imported through Mesopotamia from Afghanistan. Ashmolean.
It is generally thought that cylinder seals were introduced from Mesopotamia to Egypt during the Naqada II period. Cylinder seals, some coming from Mesopotamia and Elam, and some made locally in Egypt following Mesopotamian designs in a stylized manner, have been discovered in the tombs of Upper Egypt dating to Naqada II and III, particularly in Hierakonpolis. Mesopotamia cylinder seals have been found in the Gerzean context of Naqada II, in Naqada and Hiw, attesting to the expansion of the Jemdet Nasr culture as far as Egypt at the end of the 4th millennium BCE. Cylinder seals were made in Egypt as late as the Second Intermediate Period, but they were essentially replaced by scarabs from the time of the Middle Kingdom.
Lapis Lazuli was imported in great quantity by Egypt, and already used in many tombs of the Naqada II period. Lapis Lazuli probably originated in northern Afghanistan, as no other sources are known, and had to be transported across the Iranian plateau to Mesapotamia, and then Egypt.
In addition, Egyptian objects were created which clearly mimic Mesopotamian forms, although not slavishly. Cylinder seals appear in Egypt, as well as recessed paneling architecture, the Egyptian reliefs on cosmetic palettes are clearly made in the same style as the contemporary Mesopotamian Uruk culture, and the ceremonial mace heads which turn up from the late Gerzean and early Semainean are crafted in the Mesopotamian "pear-shaped" style, instead of the Egyptian native style. The first man/animal composite creatures in Egypt were directly copied from Mesopotamian designs. It is also considered as certain that the Egyptians adopted from Mesopotamia the practice of marking the sealing of jars with engraved cylinder seals for informational purposes.
Egyptian architecture also was influenced, as it adopted element of Mesopotamian Temple and civic architecture. Recessed niches in particular, which are characteristic of Mesopotamian architecture, were adopted for the tombs of the First Dynasty and Second Dynasty.
Transmission
The route of this trade is difficult to determine, but contact with Canaan does not predate the early dynastic, so it is usually assumed to have been by sea trade. During the time when the Dynastic Race Theory was still popular, it was theorized that Uruk sailors circumnavigated Arabia, but a Mediterranean route, probably by middlemen through Byblos, is more likely, as evidenced by the presence of Byblian objects in Egypt. Glyptic art also seems to have played a key role, through the circulation of decorated cylinder seals across the Levant, a common hinterland of both empire.The intensity of the exchanges suggest however that the contacts between Egypt and Mesopotamia were often direct, rather than merely through middlemen or through trade. Uruk had known colonial outposts of as far as Habuba Kabira, in modern Syria, insuring their presence in the Levant. Numerous Uruk cylinder seals have also been uncovered there. There were suggestions that Uruk may have had an outpost and a form of colonial presence in northern Egypt. The site of Buto in particular was suggested, but it has been rejected as a possible candidate.
The fact that so many Gerzean sites are at the mouths of wadis which lead to the Red Sea may indicate some amount of trade via the Red Sea. Also, it is considered unlikely that something as complicated as recessed panel architecture could have worked its way into Egypt by proxy, and at least a small contingent of migrants is often suspected.
These early contacts probably acted as a sort of catalyst for the development of Egyptian culture, particularly in respect to the inception of writing, and the codification of royal and vernacular imagery.
Importance of local Egyptian developments
While there is clear evidence the Naqada II culture borrowed abundantly from Mesopotamia, the most commonly held view today is that the achievements of the First Dynasty were the result of a long period of indigenous cultural and political development. Such developments are much older than the Naqada II period, the Naqada II period had a large degree of continuity with the Naqada I period, and the changes which did happen during the Naqada periods happened over significant amounts of time.Although there are many examples of Mesopotamian influence in Egypt in the 4th millennium BCE, the reverse is not true, and there are no traces of Egyptian influence in Mesopotamia at that time. Only very few Egyptian Naqada period object have been found beyond Egypt, and generally in its vicinity, such as a rare Naqada III Egyptian Cosmetic palette in the shape of a fish, of the end of 4th millennium BCE, found in Ashkelon or Gaza.
Development of writing (3500–3200 BCE)
It is generally thought that Egyptian hieroglyphs "came into existence a little after Sumerian script, and, probably , invented under the influence of the latter", and that it is "probable that the general idea of expressing words of a language in writing was brought to Egypt from Sumerian Mesopotamia". The two writing systems are in fact quite similar in their initial stages, relying heavily on pictographic forms and then evolving a parallel system for the expression of phonetic sounds.Standard reconstructions of the development of writing generally place the development of the Sumerian proto-cuneiform script before the development of Egyptian hierogplyphs, with the suggestion the former influenced the latter.
There is however a lack of direct evidence, and "no definitive determination has been made as to the origin of hieroglyphics in ancient Egypt". Instead, it is pointed out and held that "the evidence for such direct influence remains flimsy” and that “a very credible argument can also be made for the independent development of writing in Egypt..."
Since the 1990s, the discovery of glyphs on clay tags at Abydos, dated to between 3400 and 3200 BCE, may challenge the classical notion according to which the Mesopotamian symbol system predates the Egyptian one, although Egyptian writing does make a sudden apparition at that time, while on the contrary Mesopotamia has an evolutionary history of sign usage in tokens dating back to circa 8000 BCE. Also, the Abydos clay tags are virtually identical with contemporary clay tags from Uruk, Mesopotamia.
Near Eastern genetic affinity of ancient Egyptian mummies
A recent 2017 study of the mitochondrial DNA composition of Egyptian mummies has shown a high level of affinity with the DNA of the populations of the Near East. The study was made on a mummies of Abusir el-Meleq, near El Fayum, which was inhabited from at least 3250 BCE until about 700 CE. A shared drift and mixture analysis of the DNA of these ancient Egyptian mummies shows that the connection is strongest with ancient populations from the Levant, the Near East and Anatolia, and to a lesser extent modern populations from the Near East and the Levant. In particular the study finds "that ancient Egyptians are most closely related to Neolithic and Bronze Age samples in the Levant, as well as to Neolithic Anatolian and European populations".Overall the mummies studied were closer genetically to Near Eastern people than the modern Egyptian population, which has a greater proportion of genes coming from sub-Saharan Africa after the Roman period.
The data suggest a high level of genetic interaction with the Near East since ancient times, probably going back to Prehistoric Egypt: "Our data seem to indicate close admixture and affinity at a much earlier date, which is unsurprising given the long and complex connections between Egypt and the Middle East. These connections date back to Prehistory and occurred at a variety of scales, including overland and maritime commerce, diplomacy, immigration, invasion and deportation"
Egyptian influence on Mesopotamian art
After this early period of exchange, and the direct introduction of Mesopotamia components in Egyptian culture, Egypt soon started to assert its own style from the Early Dynastic Period, the Narmer palette being seen as a turning point. The cylinder seals were soon abandoned in favour of scarab seals.Egypt seems to have provided some artistic feedback to Mesopotamia at the time of the Early Dynastic Period of Mesopotamia. This is especially the case with royal iconography: the figure of the king smitting his enemies with a mace, and the depiction of dead enemies being eaten by birds of prey appeared in Egypt from the time of the Narmer palette, and were then adopted centuries later by Mesopotamian rulers Eannatum and Sargon of Akkad. This depiction appear to be part of an artistic system to promote "hegemonistic kingship". Another example is the usage of decorated mace heads as a symbol of kingship.
There is also a possibility that the depictions of the Mesopotamian king with a muscular, naked, upper body fighting his enemies in a quadrangular posture, as seen in the Stele of Naram-Sin or statues of Gudea were derived from Egyptian sculpture, which by that time had already been through its Golden Age during the Old Kingdom.
Later periods
Egypt records various exchanges with West Asian foreigners from around 1900 BCE, as in the paintings of the tomb of Khnumhotep II at Beni Hassan.Hyksos period
From circa 1650 BCE, the Hyksos, foreigners of probable Levantine origin, established the Fifteenth Dynasty of Egypt based at the city of Avaris in the Nile delta, from where they ruled the northern part of the country. Khyan, one of the Hyksos rulers, is known for his wide-ranging contacts, as objects in his name have been found at Knossos and Hattusha indicating diplomatic contacts with Crete and the Hittites, and a sphinx with his name was bought on the art market at Baghdad and might demonstrate diplomatic contacts with Babylon, possibly with the first Kassites ruler Gandash.Exchanges would again flourish between the two cultures from the period of the New Kingdom of Egypt, this time an exchange between two mature and well-established civilizations.