Join me in excavating the Egyptian Predynastic Period, a time before Egypt had pharaohs and a unified culture, religion, and nation. During this era, which ranged from c. 5000-3050 BCE, Egypt consisted of a hodgepodge of different cultures and settlements. It was only at the end of this period that a single ruler unified Egypt, and Egyptian kingship as we know it started to take shape.
Before we dive in, a quick word about dating and dividing Egyptian history.
Dividing Egyptian History
Ancient Egyptian history is divided into major periods, all of which are further divided into dynasties based on the reigns of pharaohs. The idea of dynastic groupings came from Manetho, a priest of Re from Sebennytos, who wrote a history of Egypt in the 200s BCE.
The period I’m talking about now is called “predynastic” – it refers to an era before the dynasties and pharaohs.
Disclaimer!
You’ll see scholars list different date ranges for Egypt’s major periods, but they’re more or less similar, plus or minus a few decades (or even a century). Surprise, surprise, scholars can’t even agree on a standardized dating system. I’m going really broad strokes here to give you a bird’s eye view and some nice even numbers. I can’t reconcile an endless number of dating systems into one. It gives me a headache, and this is not the hill I choose to die on.
With that said, see my handy-dandy timeline above for the major cultures in the Egyptian Predynastic Period.
Egyptian Predynastic Period
Egypt’s Predynastic Period consists of two main cultures. First is the Badarian culture, followed by the Naqada culture, which has three stages: I, II, and III.
Badarian Culture
When: 4,400 – 4,000 BCE
Where: El Badari, Upper Egypt1
The Badarian Culture had no writing system, so what we know about it comes from archaeological evidence found in cemeteries.
- Bodies were buried in oval pits, wrapped in reed mats, and decorated with beads, shells, ivory, bone, and jewelry.
- Grave goods accompanied the bodies.
- Personal care objects like palettes for grinding makeup pigments, cosmetic jars, and combs.
- Human figurines, like this figure of a woman. She has some huge tetas2 and a detailed pubic area.
- Pottery.
Badarian Graves reveal interesting insights:
- Previously nomadic/pastoral people were settling into communities, and society was beginning to take shape. Some of the graves were more elaborate than others, meaning social stratification was happening. The more stuff you had, the higher status you had.
- Religious beliefs and the afterlife came into play here. Burials with goods suggest the deceased needed certain items in the afterlife.
- Art was becoming important.
- Badarians started experimenting with representing the human body, although it was rare. We’re not sure why – perhaps the figure of a woman mentioned above had something to do with the idea of rebirth in the afterlife, but who the hell knows? With no written records, it’s a guessing game.
- The damn pottery. Writing about pottery gives me some serious PTSD, I just find it so freaking boring. But it’s important because it tells us Badarians were decorating their vessels to make them pretty, which gave the objects social meaning and the owner status.
Naqada Culture
When: c. 4000-3050 BCE in total, but split into three stages:
- Naqada I – c. 4000-3500 BCE
- Naqada II – c. 3500-3200 BCE
- Naqada III/Dynasty 0 – c. 3200-3050 BCE
Where: Upper Egypt
The Naqada people didn’t have writing, large architecture, or statuary. But they did have a lot of fucking pottery. Like the Badarian culture, what we know about them comes from archaeological evidence in cemeteries. Graves were much more elaborate than in previous cultures, meaning social relations were becoming complicated and classism emerged. There’s also the site of Hierakonpolis, which, in addition to graves, had a religious temple with very important artifacts relating to early kingship in Egypt.
Let’s go through some major developments spanning the three Naqada periods.
Pottery
Pottery is important (at least that’s what I keep telling myself) because it helps archaeologists date things. The technique, called seriation, allows archaeologists to date objects in sequence and relative to other artifacts in the ground. Naqada I had what we call C-Ware pottery, while Naqada II had D-Ware. I’m not going to bore you with the details. In grad school, I had to learn all of this pottery and identify each type with “Pot Quizzes.” I won’t subject you to the same torture. Instead, I’ll show you some of the cooler examples.
First up, we have vessels designed with cross-hatched animals like hippos and crocodiles. There’s also a cool bowl at the British Museum with 3D Hungry Hungry Hippos on the rim. We’ve got another bowl with human feet at the Met, which is so damn cute. Humans also appeared on pottery, particularly men with penis sheaths and women with bare breasts. In Naqada II, we see narrative storytelling on pottery, like boat scenes.
Flint Knives
During Naqada II, stonework entered the art realm, especially on flint knives. A cool example is the Gebel el-Arak knife. The handle is made of ivory and is intricately carved with a narrative scene. On one side is a man standing between two lions. This lion tamer extraordinaire isn’t Egyptian, but Sumerian. His hat identifies him as a Uruk priest king of Mesopotamia, meaning these two civilizations were in contact with each other during the Egyptian Predynastic Period.
Human Figurines
Human representation was much more common by Naqada II. We’ll talk about two fascinating examples: the bird woman and the creepy seated woman. The bird woman is a real beauty. She dates from c. 3650 BCE and is a miniature figure. Her face is an elongated beak, and she has no facial features. She has long, elegant arms stretching out behind her head. What’s this pose she’s holding? Is she dancing? Celebrating something? Or is she mourning because she was from a grave? We don’t know, but we love her.
The creepy seated woman (c. 3450-3300 BCE) is also miniature. Strangely, she has tiny, shrunken hands. Her feet are also tiny, with soles painted red. Her nose is also a beak, and she has green makeup around her eyes, perhaps reflecting cosmetic practices in this period. She has decorations on her body, which could either be jewelry or tattoos. She wears an elaborate hairstyle and has curves for days. I find her creepy but very intriguing.
Hierakonpolis
The site of Hierakonpolis experienced a surge in the Naqada period but had been in use since 4500 BCE. It will surprise no one that this site had large cemeteries. There was also housing, but unfortunately, the structures didn’t survive because they were made of perishable materials.
Tomb 100
The most important burial at Hierakonpolis is Tomb 100. It’s the only painted tomb in the entire Egyptian Predynastic Period. Archaeologists were able to date the tomb through pottery. Damn that pottery. Unfortunately, we don’t know who the tomb belonged to, but it was obviously a very important person, probably a king. This is the earliest evidence of kingship in Egypt. The grave is unique because it was lined with brick and split into two rooms. The painting included a boat scene, a man grasping two lions, and a man smiting three prisoners with a mace. Smiting with a mace was a favorite activity of later Egyptian kings, so perhaps this is where it all began.
Temple and Main Deposit
There’s evidence of a possible temple at Hierakonpolis, which had some interesting finds known as the main deposit. The finds included the Palette of Narmer, the Two Dog Palette, the Scorpion Macehead, and the Narmer Macehead. We’ll talk about the Two Dog Palette now and save the others for later.
In Naqada III, also known as Dynasty 0, Egyptian kingship as we know it emerged. As early kings took power, there was an explosion of art used for the select few at the top of the food chain. Art became monumentalized, and palettes got an upgrade. If you remember from earlier, palettes were stone slabs used to grind minerals for cosmetics. Small and portable, they were previously for personal care and use. In this period, they expanded in size and became much more decorative.
The Two Dog Palette, found in the main Hierakonpolis deposit, is a prime example. It’s large and in charge at about 25 inches long. Its find-spot in the ritual public space (aka the temple) tells us it was probably a ceremonial palette used to create makeup for the statues of gods.
The palette symbolizes order versus chaos. One side depicts two dogs symmetrically placed on either side of the stone, containing a chaotic scene of wild animals bunched together. The other side is cool because it shows two “serpopards” around the circle in the middle where the pigment was ground. These “serpopards’ were a mix between leopards and snakes. Other fantastical creatures are depicted and became associated with the early kings who took power at this time.
Early Kingship in the Egyptian Predynastic Period
Let’s talk about kingship in Egypt. The Turin King List is an invaluable artifact listing the rulers of Ancient Egypt according to the Egyptians. In the beginning, the gods ruled as kings. Men became rulers after the gods and retained aspects of their divinity on earth. The first king on the list is Menes, but we know jack shit about him. There’s nothing about him in the records, but some scholars believe this may be a false name for the probable first King of Egypt, Narmer. But before we talk about Narmer, we have another person to consider.
Scorpion King
In the Royal Cemetery at Abydos, there’s a tomb called U-J dating to 3150 BCE. It’s huge compared to the other graves from the same time. It was about 216 feet and had 12 rooms. The tomb contained 400 jars from Palestine, all filled with wine and oil. The jars were labeled with 150 ivory tags. Yes, they were labeled! Scholars consider this the origin of writing in Egypt, the birth of Egyptian hieroglyphics. Egyptians used it for the boring task of recording where the jars came from. Go figure, writing emerges out of a need for administration.
What’s important about Tomb U-J is Egyptians put a lot of resources into it. Such a grand effort was only for someone important, someone like a king. Fortunately, the tomb contains motifs identifying who he is. He’s King Scorpion.
Yes, there really was a Scorpion King. We know a bit more about him from the Scorpion Macehead, which depicts him standing with a hoe amid an irrigation project. The scorpion next to his head identifies him. King Scorpion wears the crown of Upper Egypt and carries a mace. We know the mace was the weapon of choice for kings smiting enemies. Violence was an integral part of kingship during these early years. So, we definitely have a king, but is he the same king as Menes or Narmer? We don’t know! There isn’t enough evidence to say.
Smite Me, O Mighty Smiter!
We’ve arrived at King Narmer. We know about him through the Palette of Narmer and the Narmer Macehead. We’ll talk about the palette in depth. It dates to c. 3100 BCE, is made of slate, and is over 25 inches tall. On one side of the palette, Narmer wields his mace, ready to wreak havoc on a prisoner’s face. If the mace wasn’t enough to tell you he’s a king, he’s wearing the crown of Upper Egypt. On the other side of the palette, Narmer wears the crown of Lower Egypt, signifying the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under one ruler. Narmer’s name is written in pictograms at the top. His name appears above a serekh (a representation of royal architecture), symbolizing kingship.
Was King Narmer the first pharaoh of Egypt? Did he conquer and unite Egypt? Probably, maybe, we’re not sure. Many scholars say yes, while others believe it was a complex process that didn’t culminate in a single event. So…probably, yes.
And that ends the Egyptian Predynastic Period. Up next is the Early Dynastic Period, where kings laid the groundwork for Ancient Egypt’s golden era, the Old Kingdom.
If you’re interested in general overviews of Egyptian history and art, check out the resources in the Bibliography & Further Reading section below.
Footnotes
- The southern part of Egypt is called Upper Egypt. I know this sounds counterintuitive, but let me explain. The Nile River is the center of Egyptian civilization and the basis for geographic names. The river runs from south to north and empties into the Mediterranean Sea. As a result, the south, where the Nile begins, is called Upper Egypt. The north, where the Nile ends, is called Lower Egypt. I know it’s confusing as hell, but whenever you see these terms, remember Lower = North and Upper = South. ↩︎
- Boobies in Spanish. ↩︎
Bibliography & Further Reading
*The following links are Amazon affiliate links, which means I earn a commission if you make a purchase, at no cost to you.
Ikram, Salima. Ancient Egypt: An Introduction. 3rd Printing. Cambridge University Press, 2018.
Riggs, Christina. Ancient Egyptian Art and Architecture: A Very Short Introduction. Very Short Introductions. Oxford University Press, 2014.
Shaw, Ian. Ancient Egypt: A Very Short Introduction. 2nd ed. Very Short Introductions. Oxford University Press, 2021.
Wilkinson, Toby. The Rise and Fall of Ancient Egypt. New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2013.
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