REPORT ON THE 2006 FIELDWORK SEASON OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA BERKELEY AT THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITE OF EL HIBEH,
BENI-SUEF GOVERNORATE

By Carol A. Redmount, Project Director

Abstract

El Hibeh lies on the east Nile bank about 55 km south of the modern town of Beni Suef. Occupation began at the site and seems to have been most extensive during the Third Intermediate Period, but Hibeh continued to be occupied into Byzantine and possibly early Islamic times. In 2006, courtesy of funding from an American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE) Antiquities Endowment Fund (AEF) Grant, the UC Berkeley mission focused on basic site stabilization activities and its on-going documentation of the site and collection of base-line data (mapping, survey, geoarchaeological researches and so forth). In addition, processing of ceramics and other material culture finds from earlier seasons at the site continued.            

Introduction and General Observations

El Hibeh, ancient Egyptian Teudjoi and Greek Ankyronpolis,¹ is a large and important archaeological site in northern Middle Egypt in Beni Suef Governorate (Figure 1). It lies on the east bank of the Nile, almost directly across the river from the modern town of El Fashn. Present evidence suggests that occupation of the town mound began in the Third Intermediate Period and continued into Byzantine and possibly early Islamic times. The site is particularly important for our understanding of the history of the Third Intermediate Period, as it seems to have marked the northern border of Theban control and been an official residence at this time.² El Hibeh also is well known as the reported find spot of a number of important papyri, most notably the Tale of Wenamon and the Petition of Petiese (Papyrus Rylands IX),³ which appeared on the antiquities market in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Sheshonq I, first king of the Twenty-Second Dynasty, built a small limestone temple at the site, dedicated to a local version of the Theban god Amun. This temple is mentioned in Papyrus Rylands IX, also known as the Petition of Petiese, and still stands today, although it is deteriorating because of the fluctuating water table at the site and the poor quality of the local limestone from which it was constructed. El Hibeh is, like most sites in Egypt today, endangered by a combination of factors, in this case the rising water table of the Nile, the increased planting and irrigation of local agriculture, the spreading land claims of the villages north and south of the site, and the completion of the new highway from Cairo on the east side of the Nile. Pressure on the site from these sources is already serious and will continue to worsen. El Hibeh consists of two main parts: 1) a walled town mound; and 2) a series of outlying cemeteries with numerous burials, mostly disturbed, cut into the desert floor or limestone outcrops surrounding the site.


Previous archaeological work at El Hibeh was undertaken mostly in the earlier part of the twentieth century. Ahmed Kamal was the first to work at the site; he published his results in 1901.⁴ Kamal was followed by Grenfell and Hunt, who excavated at Hibeh in 1902 and 1903⁵ and recovered enormous quantities of Greek and Demotic papyri from mummy cartonnage.⁶ Junker excavated burials at the site for three days in 1911;⁷  Ranke completely excavated Sheshonq I’s limestone temple and explored some Graeco-Roman houses on the town mound in 1913 (trial excavation) and 1914 (main excavation);⁸ and an Italian mission undertook extensive excavations at the site in 1934 and 1935, uncovering structures and burials dating from Third Intermediate Period to Roman times.⁹ Almost 50 years would pass before an American mission, co-directed by Robert Wenke and Cynthia Sheikholeslami, worked at El Hibeh for one season in 1980.¹⁰ Most recently, the University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley), began work at the site season in 2001.¹¹ The earlier archaeological excavation at the site concentrated heavily on mortuary material and/or the Sheshonq temple and was largely unsystematic. Unfortunately, with the partial exceptions of the 1913/14 clearance of the temple and the work of the American mission in 1980, none of the earlier work was completely published, even to the standards of the time.

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¹E. Grafe, “El-Hibe,” Lexikon der Ägyptolgie II (1977): 1180-81.

²G.A. Wainwright, “El Hibah and esh Shurafa and their Connection with Herakleopolis and Cusae,” Annales du Service des Antiquités de l’Égypte 27 (1927): 76-104; R. Caminos, The Chronicle of Prince Osorkon, Analecta Orientalia 37 (Pontificium Institutum Biblicum, 1958), p. 174-76; K. Kitchen, The Third Intermediate Period in Egypt, 2nd ed. (Aris and Phillips, 1986), pp. 248-250; K. MyÑliwiec, The Twilight of Ancient Egypt (Cornell University Press, 2000), p. 35.

³H. Goedicke, The Report of Wenamun (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975); F.L. Griffith, Catalogue of the Demotic Papyri in the John Rylands Library Manchester, Vol. III (Manchester University Press, 1909); G.A. Wainwright, “Studies in the Petition of Peteese,.” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 28, no. 1 (1944): 228-271; M. Smith, “Papyrus Rylands IX,” Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, Vol. II (Oxford University Press: 2000), p. 24; G. Vittmann, Der demotische Papyrus Rylands 9, Ägypten und Altes Testament 38 (Harrassowitz, 1998).

⁴A. Kamal, “Description générale des ruines de Hibé, de son temple et de sa nécropole,” Annales du Service des Antiquités de l’Égypte 2 (1901): 84-91.

⁵B.P.Grenfell, “Excavations in the Fayum and at El-Hibeh,” Egypt Exploration Fund Archaeological Reports 1901-02: 4-5; ibid, “Excavations at Hibeh, Cynopolis and Oxyrhynchus,” Egypt Exploration Fund Archaeological Reports 1902-03: 1-3.

⁶B. Grenfell and A. Hunt, The Hibeh Papyri, Part I. Graeco-Roman Memoirs 7 (Egypt Exploration Fund, 1906); E.G. Turner, The Hibeh Papyri, Part II. Graeco-Roman Memoirs 32 (Egypt Exploration Society, 1955). The earlier volume consisted entirely of Ptolemaic Greek papyri dating to the third century BCE from their first season. The later volume included other Ptolemaic as well as Roman papyri.

⁷H. Junker. “Die Versuchsgrabungen in El-Hibeh und bei el-Fashn,” Anzeiger der Österrreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien, Phil-Hist. Klasse, 49 (1912): 98-101

⁸Ranke, op. cit.; for objects and relief from the excavations, see E. Feucht, “Zwei Reliefs Scheschonqs I. aus el Hibeh,” Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur 6 (1978): 69-77; ibid., “Relief Scheschonqs I. beim eersclagen der Feinde aus El Hibeh,” Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur 9 (1981): 106-117; C. Nauerth, Karara und El-Hibe: Die Spatantiken Koptischen Funde aus den Badischen Grabungen 1913-1914, SAGA 15 (Heidelberger Orientverlag, 1996).

⁹E. Paribeni, “Rapporto preliminare su gli scavi de Hibeh,” Aegyptus 15 (1935): 385-404; G. Botti, Le casse di mummie e i sarcofagi da El hibeh nel Museo Egizio di Firenze, Accademia Toscana di Scienze e Lettere “La Colombaria” “Studi” V (Leo S. Olschki, 1958).

¹⁰R.J. Wenke, Archaeological Investigations at El-Hibeh 1980: Preliminary Report. American Research Center in Egypt Reports Volume 9 (Undena Publications, 1984).

¹¹C.A. Redmount, “El Hibeh: A Brief Overview,” pp. 303-311 in The Archaeology and Art of Ancient Egypt, Essays in Honor of David B. O'Connor, Vol. II. Edited by Zahi A. Hawass and Janet Richards. CASAE 36. Publications du Conseil Suprême des Antiquitês de l'Égypte. Cairo 2007.

2006

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