Through the Eras

Religionfrom the open forecourt, the Deir el-Medina gave way toa small room, called the pronaos, which led to a series ofone to three sanctuaries for cult statues, or more probably,stelae (carved or inscribed stone slabs or pillars), tothe gods of the shrine. Around the sides of these roomswere subsidiary service rooms or rooms in which theguardian of the chapel could live. The priests who servedthese chapels were also the workmen who lived at Deir el-Medina and served part-time in the chapel. The chapelswere places where worshippers could go to make prayersand offerings, and to receive oracles.DOMESTIC SHRINES. Houses at Amarna, the capitalduring the reign of Akhenaten (1352–1336 B.C.E.),have preserved evidence of domestic shrines. Theseshrines were located in the garden, surrounded by treesand separated from the rest of the garden by a wall. Theyconsisted of a sloping flight of stairs leading up to a platform,on which was a walled room containing an altarof brick or limestone. Found within these shrines werestatues of Akhenaten and his family, or stelae showingthe royal family worshipping the Aten. Evidence of domesticshrines can also be found at Deir el-Medina,where the hills around the town are dotted with overfifty tiny shrines arranged in rough rows. These shrinesconsisted of a few rough stones, arranged to form a back,floor, two sides, and a roof. Sometimes stones markedoff a miniature forecourt. Inside each shrine was originallya small stele, commemorating its donor’s dedicationto his gods. Additionally, there were places set asidewithin the house itself where people could worship theirgods. The walls of a house could contain niches in whichcould be placed a stele of a god. Such niches could befitted with a wooden door, and could be found in anyroom of the house. Deities particularly popular in suchhouse shrines were Meretseger (protective goddess of theTheban necropolis), Renenutet (goddess of harvest),Sobek (crocodile-god), Amun, Taweret (goddess whoprotected women during childbirth), and Hathor(mother-goddess). In addition to the gods, stelae depictingdeceased relatives or anthropoid busts of such relativeswere erected and served as the recipients ofofferings. Deceased relatives were worshipped as akh aper(“effective spirits”) and were thought to be able to influencethe lives of their living relatives. The nature ofthe cult carried on in these private venues is not wellknown. From the images on the stelae, it seems that offeringsof incense, food, and libations were made to thegods. The ritual involved in these offerings, or their frequency,is unknown. One suggestion is that a smaller,less elaborate version of the daily temple ritual may havebeen celebrated, but this is just conjecture.Portrait of Akhenaten, limestone relief sculpture fragment ofthe New Kingdom. © VANNI ARCHIVE/CORBIS. REPRODUCED BYPERMISSION.SOURCESJohn Baines, “Society, Morality, and Religious Practice,” inReligion in Ancient Egypt: Gods, Myths and PersonalPractice. Ed. Byron Shafer (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell UniversityPress, 1991).Florence Friedman, “Aspects of Domestic Life and Religion,”in Pharaoh’s Workers: The Villagers of Deir elMedina. Ed. Leonard H. Lesko (Ithaca, N.Y.: CornellUniversity Press, 1994): 95–115.Geraldine Pinch, Votive Offerings to Hathor (Oxford: GriffithInstitute, 1993).Ashraf I. Sadek, Popular Religion in Egypt during the NewKingdom (Hildesheim, West Germany: HildesheimerÄgyptologische Beiträge, 1987).ETHICSRELIGIOUS WORLDVIEW. For the ancient Egyptiansthe matter of ethics was firmly grounded in their religiousworld view, so much so that one scholar has writtenthat “in the Egyptian’s terms, morality and religionArts and Humanities Through the Eras: Ancient Egypt (2675 B.C.E.–332 B.C.E.) 235