Tracing the Source of the Elephant And Hippopotamus Ivory from ...

The degree of contact between the Late Bronze Age Aegean and North Africa
(Libya) is a widely questioned and debated subject. While this area was not in direct
contact with Egypt, ivory may have been traded through Minoan and Mycenaean contacts
in the coastal regions of Northeastern Libya (ancient Cyrenaica). It must be emphasized
that this hypothesis, advocated by L.G. Hayward (1990), is based on seemingly shaky
evidence according to Krzyszkowska (1990: 18, 29). Some Late Minoan artifacts have
been recovered from Northeastern Libya, but not from Late Bronze Age contexts.
Further support for this theory comes from representations of two Berber tribes with
Aegean weapons in depictions of Ramesses III’s two Libyan wars of his fifth and
eleventh regnal years (c. 1180-1174 BCE) from his mortuary temple at Medinet Habu
(Hayward 1990: 104-107). Krzyszkowska (1990) does not see North Africa as a source
for ivory until the 8 th century, at the earliest, although by the seventh century the area was
utilized by Etrurian workshops, and by the fifth “Libyan” ivory was heavily depended on
by Greece (Krzyszkowska 1990: 18). Gautier et al. (1994: 13) advocate the
Mediterranean littoral of North Africa as capable of supporting a large number of
elephants, ascribing the lack of finds to lack of research, and moreover support a much
wider geographical range than just the coast.
There is better evidence of trade contact in northwestern Egypt, where a
considerable amount of imported Late Bronze Age Cypriot and Syro-Palestinian pottery
and some Aegean sherds have come from a small island east of Marsa Matruh (ancient
Paraetonium) (see Figure 21 for location of Marsa Matruh). Excavations at Marsa
Matruh (see White 1986; 1989) have recovered Cypriot wares (White Slip II, Base Ring,
Red Lustrous, and White Shaved), Levantine wares (a Canaanite jar and lamp), and a few
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