Palimpsestic Practices and Pharaonic Receptions of Primo Rock Inscriptions at Wadi Hammamat
Résumé
Located halfway between the Nile and the Red Sea (Eastern Desert), a narrow 6km-gorge between Bir el-Hammamat and Bir Umm el-Fawakhir, the greywacke and siltstone quarries—known today as Wadi Hammamat—display profuse epigraphic material that covers the entire Pharaonic period, from Predynastic times to Roman rule. Alongside the many non-graphically-invested rock faces, the large majority of Pharaonic inscriptions are clustered in a few places, generally engraved next to one another. Through a multidimensional perspective and based on several case-studies, the paper will focus on both production and reception processes through the prism of palimpsestic practices. The examination of these figurative and non-figurative artefacts from different times, which partially or entirely cover primo rock inscriptions, raise the broad question of pragmatics. The lecture will propose interpretive insights into what could have been the possible statuses of the testimonials engraved in this liminal and highly symbolic place where mere mortals shared in the divine.