Colonization of Nubia by Egypt

Hi everyone! I hope you're enjoying your week. I will be taking next week off for Spring Break and will be going to Cyprus to visit my grandparents so please don't be alarmed when I don't post anything next week.


Anyways, this week was a super exciting week at the BONE lab! We finished cleaning Burial 6 and since all the shelves where we store our cleaned bones are filled, I spent the beginning of the week labeling the bones and looking through field forms. Last Friday was Admitted Students Day for graduate students and the BONE lab was open for all to see. What was really exciting was that Dr. Baker brought "Car Crash Lady" out for all to see! If you don't remember, "Car Crash Lady", she is a female skeletal remain around the age of 60 who survived a broken hip,a major concussion, lesions on her spine(from multiple stabs), and a fractured leg. She is affectionately called "Car Crash Lady" because her wounds are like those of a car crash victim. Below I have pictures of her remains so if you never liked any of the previous skeletal remains consider yourselves warned.

An interesting lesson I learned from Annie was how bioarchaeologists determine the sex of skeletal remains. The two most accurate skeletal parts to look at would be the pelvis and the skull. Males tend to have bigger skulls, greater muscle development, and more rugged muscle attachments. However, as we know, there are males who exist with more feminine features and vice versa so the most accurate way to determine the sex of a skeletal remain is to look at the pelvis. The pubic arch, the space at the base of the pelvis, is smaller in men than in women. Also, females have larger pelvises and have a rounder pelvic inlet to accommodate for childbirth. There's your lesson for how to tell the sex of a skeletal remain( as long as the remain is not a child)!

As for today's article discussion, we discussed the relationship between Egyptians and Nubians specifically at the site of Tombos and how the colonization of Nubia by Egypt affected Nubians. The article we read was "A Bioarchaeological Perspective On Egyptian Colonialism In Nubia During the New Kingdom" by Michele R. Buzon. Buzon used cranial and dental analyses as evidence of the conclusions she found of Egyptians and Nubians in Tombos. Buzon found that middle class cemeteries showed signs of Egyptianization with Egyptian style burials and grave goods. The study concluded that at the time there were clear advantages of looking and acting Egyptian at the time and the colonial cemetery of Tombos had immigrant Egyptians as well as native Nubians. However, compared to other periods, the New Kingdom period provided mutual benefits to Nubians and Egyptians where there were very little signs of interpersonal violence in the skeletal remains analyzed. Annie and I discussed how nearly every article we read would have an Egyptian bias and point of view towards Nubians because very little research has been done that just focuses on Nubia itself. If Nubia is taught at colleges it is often taught as a subsection of Egypt which totally demeans Nubian culture.

I hope everyone enjoyed this week's post and the further exploration of Nubia's relationship with Egypt. I wish everyone who is at school a wonderful spring break and I hope to get back to you guys the following week!