Scribbling Through History Ragazzoli, Chloé; Harmansah, Ömür; Salvador, Chiara ...
2018, 2018-05-31
eBook
For most people the mention of graffiti conjures up notions of subversion, defacement, and underground culture. Yet, the term was coined by classical archaeologists excavating Pompeii in the 19th ...century and has been embraced by modern street culture: graffiti have been left on natural sites and public monuments for tens of thousands of years. They mark a position in time, a relation to space, and a territorial claim. They are also material displays of individual identity and social interaction. As an effective, socially accepted medium of self-definition, ancient graffiti may be compared to the modern use of social networks. This book shows that graffiti, a very ancient practice long hidden behind modern disapproval and street culture, have been integral to literacy and self-expression throughout history.
In the New Kingdom scribes can be understood and described as a social world and a cultural milieu. Contemporary sources testify to a specific scribal literature written by scribes, about scribes and ...for scribes, with the Late Egyptian Miscellanies included. They let us glimpse the ideology of a subelite who redefine in their own terms emblems such as the hand, the fingers, the mouth, which are the organs for reading and writing, and the specific means for scribes to act on and in the world.
'Visitors' inscriptions' refer to the ink graffiti left in the public part of funerary monuments in the New Kingdom to record individual visits. This study of the graffiti of TT 60 is part of a ...larger body of research on visitors' inscriptions in the Theban necropolis. It presents a range of questions raised by this category of texts, which is here considered as a cultural practice. With these texts, individuals fashion a certain social identity and use the impact of the tomb in terms of social memory to their own benefit. The scribal identity of all the writers of graffiti is closely examined and this practice is considered as part of a specific scribal culture and social identity, which develop in this period and can be traced in the Ramesside literature with compositions such as the Late Egyptian Miscellanies and related texts. The discussion is followed by an appendix containing both published and newly recorded graffiti, along with their positions in the wall decoration.
Au Nouvel Empire (1539-1075 av. J.-C.), les scribes – « ceux qui écrivent » en égyptien – prennent le devant de la scène dans les sources littéraires. Ils construisent et promeuvent une image ...d’eux-mêmes, qui révèle l’existence d’une communauté et d’un « monde social » (A. Strauss), fondés non pas sur la classe mais sur l’appartenance à une profession. Parmi les textes consacrés au métier de scribe, les florilèges appelés « miscellanées » ou « Enseignement par lettres » constituent une sorte de vademecum de la production écrite de l’époque, qui accompagne le scribe dans sa carrière et jusque dans sa tombe. Ils fonctionnent comme des véritables machines à produire d’autres textes, quand les deux autres types d’enseignements de l’époque, « l’Enseignement pour délier l’esprit » (les onomastica) et les « Enseignements par exemples » (les sagesses) portent respectivement sur le savoir théorique et le savoir pratique. Les scribes braconnent dans les modes d’expression du sommet de la société pour développer leur code de valeurs, qui repose sur l’éducation, les compétences au travail et leur rôle de transmetteurs (et non pas de créateurs). Des structures sociales fondées sur les relations professionnelles plutôt que familiales sont mises en avant. L’émergence d’une telle conscience communautaire se fait dans les termes des mutations idéologiques en cours. Une place plus grande est accordée à l’individu dans la société en mettant de côté les autorités traditionnelles au profit d’une divinité personnelle toute puissante. Les scribes peuvent ainsi faire de l’écriture une pratique de piété placée sous l’égide de Thot – les écrits leur survivront après la mort et assureront leur postérité. Chaque manuscrit devient un possible monument funéraire à travers le colophon. Les scribes réinvestissent en outre les tombes traditionnelles qu’ils visitent, en y laissant, sous la forme de graffiti, des textes commémoratifs à leur bénéfice mais aussi des offrandes littéraires.Cette promotion du mot écrit par rapport au discours trouve un écho dans les biographies monumentales des très hauts dignitaires et témoigne d’une diffusion des idéaux lettrés à l’époque.
In the New Kingdom (c. 1539-1075 BC) scribes – ‘those who write in Egyptian’ – took a prominent role in literary texts. There they constructed and promoted a self-image, framing themselves as the members of a specific ‘social world’ defined by their profession rather than belonging to a social class.This period corresponds to the flourishing of sources dedicated to the scribal trade, especially the Late Egyptian Miscellanies aka ‘Teaching by letters’. These collections of small texts were scribal tools and a vademecum of the textual production of the time. Kept by the scribe throughout his career and accompanying him to his tomb, they were a device for producing other texts, while the two other types of teaching, ‘Teaching to clear the mind’ (onomastica) and ‘Teaching from examples’ (wisdom texts) dealt respectively with theoretical and practical knowledge.Scribes borrowed phraseology from the top-elite to develop their own code of values, which was based on education, craftsmanship and personal skills. Social structures dependent on professional relationships rather than family were promoted. The development of such a community feeling reflected changes of ideology in progress at the time. A new position was granted to the individual in society through the shift of allegiance from traditional authorities to a personal, almighty god. Thus scribes could turn writing into a pious practice under the aegis of Thot – texts and copies would survive them and grant them posterity. Each manuscript became a potential funerary monument through colophons and signatures. Furthermore, scribes used the decorum of traditional tombs where they left prayers and commemorations as graffiti to their own benefit along with literary offerings. This promotion of the written word over the spoken one is echoed in monumental biographies of the top-elite and bears witness to the diffusion of learned values during this period.
