What is it about?
This chapter examines the earliest writing and related marking practices from Egypt (c.3300 / c.3100–c.2750 BCE), namely graphical marks on ceramic jars and small labels of bone, ivory and wood. In contrast to research focusing on production, this material is examined here from the perspective of consumption. Whether through ‘reading’ or other forms of semantic meaning-making, the author argues that such acts were never neutral, but rather situated within a web of embodied and multisensory processes.
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Perspectives
I hope this chapter encourages you to think about ancient writing and related types of imagery as part of lived experience. For acts of reading / viewing, we often focus on the sense of sight, but engagement with marked objects and sufaces can involve the other senses as well as diverse ways of using our bodies. Interactions are also informed by materials, techniques, scale, and other physical aspects of writing and iconography. I hope you find this chapter valuable when thinking about the meaning and purpose of marking 'systems' -- whether ancient or modern.
Kathryn Piquette
University College London
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: ‘Reading’ through the body in early Egypt, Written Language & Literacy, December 2021, John Benjamins,
DOI: 10.1075/wll.00054.piq.
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