An Ancient Egyptian Home
So much for kings and queens; but you can have a closer peep at the home-life of those old Egyptians if you like.
From The Street of Human Habitations by Ray S. Lineham, 1894.
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
So much for kings and queens; but you can have a closer peep at the home-life of those old Egyptians if you like. Very good; nothing could please me better, and if you will just hurry up a little, we will overtake that merry throng, and see whence they are hound, and what they have to say for themselves. A dinner-party! Well, we are in luck, for, to tell the truth, I was beginning to feel that a little refreshment would not come amiss after our morning’s meander in this rather dry district. Have no anxiety about your coat; the barber is a much more important individual here than the tailor, for every man’s head must he shaved, and there is no more emphatic way of depicting a person of low habits than by giving him a beard.
Here we are at our destination, and in plenty of time, too, so you may spend a minute in examining the exterior of our host’s mansion, before passing inside with the rest of the guests. We are evidently about to be entertained by a gentleman of some standing, for this is decidedly above the average run of Egyptian habitations. The houses of the common folk are more like that uninviting-looking structure in the rear. It is quite a mistake to imagine that these people are a melancholy race. The fact is, you will find them rather hilarious this afternoon; still, there is no denying it, they spend a considerable portion of their life in preparing to die, and they are usually quite content with a temporary house of sun-dried bricks to live in, whilst their tombs, whatever else they are, are certainly made to last.
As I remarked before, this is an exceptionally fine specimen of a private dwelling, and the builders of it are architects whom you will find it hard to beat even at the top of our street. What could be more graceful than those tall, slender, lily-stem columns crowned with their capitals of lotus flowers? Can you imagine anything prettier than that overhanging cornice, which is quite a feature in Egyptian architecture? I dare say it strikes you that the lighting arrangements might be improved.
Wait till you are inside, my friend. You have an Eastern climate to deal with here, and sulphurous fogs are not an every-day occurrence, so there is not the same objection to an open roof that exists in some localities you may have read of. These Egyptians prefer their rooms top-lit, let me tell you, and a very good idea too. The courts and windows of the best houses are supported on columns, and the porch—also of columns—has a lintel hearing the name of the owner.
But I don’t fancy cold goose—and the Egyptians, sensible people, dine at noon—so let us look in and see how things are progressing. Ah! the host has been called away for half an hour, hence there is a little delay about the dinner, and we shall just have time to walk through the kitchen and inspect the cooking.
The cauldrons on the dresser are well filled (those birds look anything but comfortable, and every moment I expect to see them step out on to the table); beef, fish, game, vegetables, and, I do declare, here are some first-rate black puddings. Plenty of bread and cakes with carraway seeds, and—yes—I thought I smelt goose! There they are, frizzling over the charcoal fire, whilst the legs of lamb simmer quietly in the broth-pot. You are quite astonished at the domestic arrangements, and well you may be, for the inscriptions on the wall tell you—if you can read them—that you are walking through a kitchen which was furnished a thousand years before ever Moses made his appearance in the land of the lotus. Now for the dining-room and dinner, if you please.
There is no end of a commotion here. The steward is not at all satisfied with the way the floor has been swept, and the housemaid has totally forgotten till this minute to water it. Amid considerable excitement, in rushes the cook with the dishes, for the porter has just been informed that the master is coming. Here is your seat (a whole one if you are single; married people only get one between them), and a couple of servants to anoint your head, wash your hands, and give you a general brush-up.
And there come the host and his wife at last. They take their places at the end of the room on a sort of double chair, and the feast begins. As dinner proceeds, you are entertained with music and a variety of skilful athletics. The Egyptians are skilful gymnasts, but, be it known, they leave boxing severely alone. It may be a desirable accomplishment, but the gentlemanly Egyptian of 4000 years ago does not appear to think so, and I am not sure that I don’t agree with him. He spends his time more profitably in other pursuits—shoe-making, glass-blowing, meat-curing, etc., as you will gather from these rows of workers outside.
He is likewise a skilful metallurgist, but his patience and accurate working are best shown in his cabinet-making, the veneering, glueing, and dovetailing of which are truly marvellous. No one knows so well as he the art of mural decoration, and, as an architect, he is as much at home in light and delicate structures as in those everlasting monuments which have never, and can never be surpassed. Nothing comes amiss to him: he is the inventor of the arch as well as of artificial egg-hatching, and already he divides his year into twelve months of thirty days each, and uses a decimal and duodecimal system of calculation.
He is, above all, a model husband and father, spending many a spare hour in constructing those fearful and wonderful toys you see in the hands of his little girls, wooden dolls with strings of beads for hair, cats with movable jaws, and creatures of a nondescript character, with jointed limbs, all just as delightful to the Egyptian nurslings as your own fine mechanical toys to children you may have a rather closer interest in.
Idleness and insubordination are not, however, permitted in man or beast. The very cats are trained as retrievers, and the monkeys gather the fruit, whilst the crocodiles step nimbly out of the water when called by name, and cheerfully submit to have their ears pierced merely that you may see how they look with earrings!
Now let me prevail upon you to taste this beer. It is the Egyptian Allsopp’s very best—made of red barley and bittered with lupins. I don’t believe they know anything about hops. They are terrible beer-drinkers here, I am sorry to say, and even go so far as to express, on their sepulchral tablets, the hope that they may have jugs of beer in the other world. Stimulants are used to excite the palate before drinking; cabbages, for instance, are in great demand. I fail to see the stimulating properties of this excellent viand myself; with me it has frequently had rather a depressing influence, but certain it is the thirsty Egyptian finds it answer his purpose.
Lineham, Ray S. The Street of Human Habitations: An Account of Man's Dwelling Places, Customs, Utensils, etc. in Prehistoric Times, and in Ancient Egypt, Assyria and Chaldea, Phoenicia, Persia, India, and Japan, Chapman and Hall, 1894.
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