and now we need to head off to Egypt now Egypt
is contemporary in time with Mesopotamia in other words both civilizations are growing
around the same point in history but as even though they're happening at the same time
they are very different from one another in the way that they develop and the kind of
culture that ends up being created now part of that is simply because of the geography of the
location Mesopotamia remember the land between the rivers it is a rough place to live they're
going to be really creative when it comes to survival when it comes to figuring out how to
remain in some sense organized and stable in a world where politics and the environment
itself is often against them Egypt isn't that kind of a place Egypt is incredibly
stable and largely thanks to its location Egypt is located along the banks of the Nile
River in the ancient world now Egypt is originally broken up into multiple kingdoms but two large
ones show up often in Egyptian history that is Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt Upper Egypt and Lower
Egypt are often combined into a single unified state of Egypt but at different points in history
they will be separate or they will be ruled by two Co rulers instead of being two completely separate
countries or being unified into a single unified Egypt now this is where I get problems and you
guys can't actually see me but if you could you would see me stopping and squinching up my face as
I try to get this right and where as we go through Egypt Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt are backwards
to my head because we are on the southern half of the globe which means that the river is running
from south to north which means Upper Egypt is upriver so it is south it's further down on the
map Lower Egypt is the lower part of the river it includes the Nile Delta which is a large
very fertile swampy area on the banks of the Mediterranean Sea and it is lower even though it
is higher on the map yeah it's it's like that I get so confused anyway the Upper Egypt and Lower
Egypt are different regions but they both share the blessing of the freshwater of the Nile River
which is what makes them habitable now Egyptian language really shows us exactly how important
the Nile River is in ancient Egypt in ancient Egyptian language there are only two words
for travel upriver and downriver so in other words there is not even a word in the ancient
Egyptian language for traveling to the east or the west basically you only traveled upriver
and downriver traveling any other direction was unthinkable Egypt is incredibly stable because
it's centered on the banks of the Nile River and because there's not a lot of chance for it to
political upheaval when I showed you Mesopotamia I showed you how many different groups of people
lived in that same region and they were constantly vying for political superiority Egypt doesn't
work that way and chance for conquest if you look you'll see that the Egyptian Nile River
where all of the center of farming and culture is located lies on the map between the western
desert and the eastern desert in other words it kind of lies between two areas that say don't go
here don't go here you're gonna die there really isn't a way to march an army through that at this
point in history the only places where there are really threats are from the Mediterranean Sea
the problem is you've got the Nile Delta there and it's going to be very hard to invade or
attack Egypt through that swampy region with ships you can attack from the south coming upward
and that does happen on numerous occasions and you can attack through what we would call the Sinai
Peninsula still those are angles those methods of attack are nothing they're tiny compared to
what we see in Mesopotamia Egyptian culture is almost completely centered on the Nile River
because the Nile River is life that freshwater provides them life and sustenance all of the farm
fields in Egypt are also on the banks of the Nile River we talked about Mesopotamia I talked about
how they had terraced fields within the walls around them and canals and they had to figure out
how to keep the water in how to keep put they'll keep the water out Mesopotamian farming is very
different they have crop rotation Egypt simply plants their crops on the banks of the Nile River
the reason it's so simple for Egypt is because of the Nile River flood now the Nile River flood
is an annual event you can see in the photograph on your screen with the modern buildings in the
background that it still happens to this day the waters rise around the end of June and basically
the flood period lasts for several months then there is a planting and growing period at that
point and essentially what happens is that the soil is number one watered because it's flooded
with fresh water and number two soil is exchanged every year what I mean by that in Mesopotamia I
told you there were the first people to invent crop rotation because essentially they have to
to keep the nutrients in their soil by growing different things in the soil in different years
Egypt when the Nile River floods the Nile River washes up over the farm fields the current of
the river washes away the topsoil and brings fresh nutrient-rich topsoil that has not been
used in farm fields and drops it on the farm fields when the river recedes it leaves fresh
dirt behind they never have to worry about their crops growing because they get new dirt every
year the Mesopotamians have nothing like this the Egyptians have the luxury of essentially
never having to worry about the fields and the soil in them it is naturally replenished and
that water that waters life in Egyptian life in Egyptian culture and Egyptian belief in Egyptian
mythology the Nile River represents life because it is what gives their fields life and allows
their crops to grow now I can say that I can say that passionately but you know what says it
a lot better than me a picture here look at this yeah yeah see that can you tell where the river
stops flooding gee let me think really hard guys this this is why Egypt is able to be so stable
this is why Egyptian culture focuses so strongly on the Nile River the Nile River is what lets them
live because that fresh water provides them life and it keeps their fields and crops growing
year by year by year now that Nile River also shapes Egyptian culture in another way it creates
a culture around it that is what we call cyclical everything in Egyptian culture goes essentially
in cycles things repeat over and over again and of course they move forward of course they change
but ultimately there is a pattern the Nile River floods every year around at the same time of year
then now River retreats around the same time every year you plant crops around the same time every
year everything in Egypt is constantly changing but it repeats recognizable patterns that idea of
cycles that cyclical culture is reflected as well in the way the Egyptian structure their calendar
for them their calendar is site is structured on the lunar month the 28-day cycle of the Moon
which is strongly related to agriculture an Egyptian year lasts between 12 and 13 cycles now
it varies because like I said a lunar month is around 28 days so if you have 12 months of 28 days
you're not going to come up with a correct number of days that we have in our calendar essentially
their calendar is increasingly incorrect every year which is why they have a correction point
they check where the star Sirius what we would call the dog star rises on the horizon and there's
a marked point where it's supposed to rise when it no longer rises in the correct location they
add an extra month making a year of 13 lunar cycles in order to correct for the error in the
number of days in their months now we know this thanks to documents like what you're seeing on the
screen that's actually the broken off tarp part of an Egyptian obelisk an obelisk is a form of Steel
it's a marker stone it's a tall rectangular stone with a pyramid at the top the easiest reference
modern world of The United States is actually the Washington Monument the Washington monument is
an obelisk shape this is the top of an obelisk who's recording the Egyptian calendar and again
it's all about cycles now that pyramid shape on the top is also worth mentioning at this point
simply because it's going to keep coming back up i mean most people immediately recognize Egyptian
pyramids that Egyptian pyramid structure actually goes back to Egyptian mythology like many
things in Egyptian culture it has its roots in their religious belief system in Egyptian
mythology there are many different stories many different variations on stories you'll
discover that in a little bit but one of the stories deals with actually a creator being a
creator god and he is actually a self-created being his name is Aten he's a maker or a creator
in many of the stories Aten is the first god who creates himself out of the chaos in that story
in that version the earth is covered with ocean with water with this black on unshaped sea and
Aten appears on one tiny piece of land in that sea that tiny piece of fake land that origin of
all life in all order is a pyramid-shaped piece of soil that pyramid-shaped piece represents
the beginning of life it represents the origin of life and it represents the rebirth of life the
Egyptians also have a creature in their mythology called the Bennu bird which is a bird that lands
on that tiny pyramid shaped piece of land lays its eggs and then destroys itself to rise again
to be reborn on that trend on that tiny pyramid shape they call it the Bennu bird we would call
it the Greek word we would call it a phoenix that idea of the pyramid as life and rebirth repeats
over and over again it's a part of that cycle now Egyptian kings are also going to fit into
that idea of cycle cyclical matter but Egyptian kings are much more complicated than most people
reading a fourth-grade history book would believe the earliest part of Egyptian rulers or the
earliest group of Egyptian kings or Pharaohs are what we call the pre-dynastic period of the
pre-dynastic group the pre-dynastic group are Pharaohs who do not belong to a set family
so in other words they are not part of one of the great ruling families of Egypt that we
can kind of trace now kind of trace I just said that this is way more complicated than we tend
to acknowledge part of that comes from the fact that we do not have a definitive list of Egyptian
pharaohs back at the beginning when I talked about prehistory I talked about how difficult dating
is and the BCE era simply because we don't have a definite number count like this is 2018 when
I'm recording this so we know that it has been 2018 years since us agreed upon zero-point
pre-dynastic is BCE which means they are far before that agreed upon point essentially they
have no definitive way of counting where they are in history so they tend to date things
by kings the problem is we don't know where these kings are located in history frequently
because we do not have a complete list what we do know is these very early rulers are often
ruling about two different kingdoms either upper Egypt or lower Egypt and there is a rapid
turnover because again there is a great deal of conflict between upper and lower Egypt it is not
until Upper and Lower Egypt are brought together and unified that we begin having a steady line
of Kings and fortunately for us we're not we know who one of the first kings to unify Upper and
Lower Egypt was we know that because we actually found something with his name on it that tells
us in pictures he unified Upper and Lower Egypt the object that marks that upper and lower
Egypt unification is something called the pallet of king Narmer now this pallet of king
Narmer dates back to pre-dynastic Egypt some others is before a definitive family group
had taken over the pallet itself is a stone about 25 inches high dated to between 3,200 and
3000 BCE 25 inches high is pretty good-sized guys that's more than 2 feet tall it has a
front and a back and yes it is actually a pallet it's a makeup pallet it was designed to
hold the Kings makeup now if you think that's weird it really isn't Egyptians commonly wore
makeup around the eyes male and female it was not only a fashion statement it served to
practical purposes the first of those two practical purposes was actually what we would
think of as sunglasses it actually allowed the Egyptians to put black lining around their eyes
to prevent light bounce if you've ever seen a football player put black lines on their cheeks
black marks to prevent the light from bouncing it's a similar idea and the Egyptians did that
with their black eyeliner the other reason the Egyptians use that black eyeliner was because
the mixture of the eyeliner actually included several antibacterial things that prevented eye
infections they probably had fewer eye infections from water and other environmental factors that
might have been in vectors for infection thanks to that eye makeup unfortunately historically
we know something else we know a lot of those antibacterial substances also unfortunately happen
to be toxic but we won't talk about that part now we know whose makeup palette this is because
the top of the makeup palette is what's called a Serekh basically this is like his more of
the King's monogram his initials at the top of the palette they're located between two cow heads
very anthropomorphic or zoomorphic again human and animal characteristics those represent the goddess
Hathor whom you will encounter on your quiz on Egyptian gods now in between those two images of
Hathor there is Serekh now the Serekh is made up of two picture images the top one is what's called
in ancient Egyptian is pronounced Nar is a catfish know if that doesn't look like a catfish to you
it's a little mouth with the bristles or facing your right hand side tails facing left so that Nar
represents a catfish on the bottom below that that strange vertical shape is actually a chisel like
you would use to chisel a pattern into stone or wood the Egyptian sound designated for chisel is
mer so this is basically catfish chisel or king Narmer so he's King catfish chisel or king Narmer
king Narmer signs this palette with a Serekh on the front and the back so we know the name of
the King because his name is actually included on the palace like he monogrammed it he brought his
initials on it he wrote his name on it essentially so we would know whose it was fortunately for
us that tells us who the guy is and the pictures below this top area below the Serekh tell us
exactly what it is he's claiming to have done now beneath that is Serekh that set of initials that
name is actually a picture of king Narmer himself as the ruler of upper Egypt conquering lower
Egypt now again ancient artwork size does matter if you'll notice the king is the largest figure on
the palette the thing I love but there's a little dude behind him it's actually his servant his
servant is carrying a water container so basically is carrying his sippy bottle and his shoes because
evidently when you're about to bash someone in the head with a mace which is what king Narmer
is doing you don't wear your shoes who knew? now if you'll notice King Narmer here is standing
he's about to execute a prisoner whose hair he's got grasped in his left hand that is a mace
or other weapon that he's got held back in his right hand behind his head now king Narmer
here is wearing the crown of Upper Egypt now just so you know I actually had to delete and
go back because I had this backwards because upper and lower Egypt just mess with my head
that is the ruler of southern Egypt which is up river and it is indicated he is the king
of upper Egypt because he's wearing a bowling pin shaped crown if you'll notice king Narmer
he kind of looks like he's giant got a giant bottle nipple on his head basically that is the
crown that marks him as the king of upper Egypt he is defeating lower Egypt as shown by the
strange image just to the right of the king on your screen that shows a hawk or a falcon
which is representative of the god Horus you'll meet him later he is the god who's supposed to
take care of the living the people of Egypt and the hawk or falcon is giving with his little
arm the strange thing that has a human head and like a fan on its back that has things on
its back are actually papyrus reeds those are indicative or symbolic of lower Egypt the place
where the Nile delta is that large swampy area the fact that Horus is giving this to the king
indicates that king Narmer king of upper Egypt is being given the kingdom of lower Egypt below
the line on the pallet you will see two figures that appear to be lying down crushed sideways we
believe that they represent conquered people or people that he has been victorious over in his
conquest of lower Egypt so the king of upper Egypt now rules lower Egypt which means he is
now the king of upper and lower Egypt unifying them now you get the other side of that story on
the other side of the pallet if you flip it over on the other side of the pallet we see king
Narmer is the ruler of lower Egypt conquering upper Egypt now on this side king Narmer is once
again in the top register the top area and again size does matter he's standing there at the top
again adorable little servant with his water bottle and shoes faithfully following behind him
in this panel he'll where a king Narmer is shown wearing a very different crown no bowling pin
on this side he's wearing a crown with a flat top and a spike on the back that crown we know is
the crown of Lower Egypt the place where the Nile Delta is located the place where on the other side
of the palette he was being given reign or a power over that region in front of king Narmer are his
soldiers standard-bearers and then over the far right hand side you see the conquered peoples of
Upper Egypt these conquered peoples are depicted as decapitated bodies very neat though they have
their heads nicely placed between their legs so they don't get lost but you can see Narmer here
is shown marching in victory with the crown of Lower Egypt conquering Upper Egypt again at the
very bottom of the palette you can see an image of a defeated individual being trampled by a
mighty bull again we believe that the bull is a reference back to power and virility masculinity
it probably represents the power of king Narmer. the middle register of the back of this pallet is
actually the makeup talent part the makeup would actually have been miss mixed in that space that
is actually between the two creatures necks what those creatures are we do not know for sure they
appear to have lion heads but they've got your aft necks and we don't know what they are it could
be a composite image like a Lammassu or a Shedu. it's also possible they could symbolically
represent the two halves of Egypt upper and lower Egypt being unified by Narmer it is also
quite possible that those two creatures simply represent the fact that king Narmer needed a space
to mix his makeup and so that space between the two could have been created specifically for
the practical purpose of this makeup palette. regardless what this tells us between the two
sides the front and back of the palette of king Narmer is that Narmer was the king of Upper
and Lower Egypt he unifies the two regions and brings them together into a single Egyptian
nation now this is picture so we were able to figure out what happened based on interpreting
the images on the actual pallet the only thing that is written in any kind of writing per se is
the Serekh or the catfish chisel at the top these picture writings actually refer to the later
Egyptian form of writing Egyptian hieroglyphs now Egyptian hieroglyphs are awesome and
terrifying at the same time Egyptian hieroglyphic writing is one of the most complex systems known
in the world in Egyptian hieroglyphs most of the writing is done in form of pictograph actual
picture of writing now those picture writings are very complex simply because they are not largely
phonetic they're not largely sound based many of them stand for words or concepts which means that
there are more than 5000 different characters and Egyptian hieroglyphs many of them stand for
entire words or phrases in a picture others do stand for actual sounds but the problem with
those ones is that they are only consonant sounds there are no vowel sounds in Egyptian writing
instead a vowel sound is simply indicated but what is called a delimiter which is a small symbol
carved in front of the picture that tells you what a vowel sound is supposed to be accompanying the
consonant sound indicated by the picture not only that Egyptian hieroglyphs picture writing can
change its meaning depending on its delimiter and its location in relation to other Egyptian
symbols so putting it really oversimplified the bird means one thing when it's next to the eye
but it means something different when it's next to the bug this is incredibly complex in fact
the writing system that bears most resemblance to an our knowledge is actually Central American
writing Mayan and Aztec writing is more similar to this than any other system understandably it
is incredibly daunting because translating it it's not a one-to-one it's not this letter means
this sound it is very complex because symbols can stand for words and phrases or symbols can
stand for single sounds you have multiple symbols stacked on top of one another let me
give you an example of how this actually works in translation so you can see the fact that
it ranges from simple to incredibly complex. here this is actually a translation of a
hieroglyphic inscription you can see that some things make sense for example in the
one two three, third line down I get four pillars four pillars okay I got there's
four little Y shaped doohickey thingies I got that like in the very bottom row fish
I get fish it looks like a fish got this no problem some of the other things they don't
seem to make any kind of sense and there are multiple symbols for one simple word
the complexity of Egyptian hieroglyphs is mind-boggling and because it was so complex
because it was over five thousand characters with these changing meanings standing for
entire words and phrases essentially we were unable to crack hieroglyphics we were not
able to read Egyptian hieroglyphs we could read Mesopotamian Cuneiform years before
we got anywhere near Egyptian hieroglyphs we knew Egyptian hieroglyphs were complex we knew
that they recorded largely religious and political information for example what you're seeing
is actually the inside of a tomb those oval repeated shapes that you see going across those
are actually what we call cartouche it's those are actually names of kings so you're looking
at the basically family history of record of the family painted onto the walls of the tomb but we
couldn't actually read any of that we had no idea how to understand these Egyptian picture writings
until Napoleon's soldiers landed in Egypt now that may sound really weird if you know who Napoleon
was Napoleon is a French leader who is going to come a long long long after this class is over
he's thousands of years later what's Napoleon, a French dude doing in Egypt? well Napoleon gets
around historically Napoleon actually tried to conquer the world he's and his army show up in
surprising places they show up in Spain they show up in Egypt they show up in Russia that was a
bad idea but when Napoleon sends his soldiers into Egypt he doesn't just send them in to conquer
Egypt he actually sends them in to win Egypt over if we were doing this in modern parlance
we would call this a hearts and minds campaign Napoleon sends in not just soldiers he sends in
scholars he wants to preserve Egyptian history to show the respect for Egyptian history and help
the people better understand their own culture these scholars he sends in are called his savants
whose intellectuals and Napoleon's soldiers are under strict orders that if they find anything
that looks important and historical they should not destroy it they should not shoot it they
should instead go get the savants so one day as Napoleon's soldiers are in small town called
Rashid which he's down in the Nile Delta in Lower Egypt I'd to think in Lower Egypt the Napoleon
soldiers see a large black stone in the foundation of a building in Russia now the Egyptians call
this town Rashid however Napoleon soldiers the Europeans they do not call this town Rashid
the Europeans found it this is town Rosetta. the stone that is actually spotted by Napoleon's
soldiers as part of the foundation of another building becomes known as the Rosetta stone
because it is found in the town the Europeans call Rosetta now the Rosetta stone is a vitally
important bit of history found by accident by Napoleon soldiers it's a vital piece of history
because the Rosetta stone is the object that lets us begin for the very first time understanding how
to read Egyptian hieroglyphs the Rosetta stone is the gateway the translation key that opens up
an entire world of Egyptian culture to us as we begin to look at it now the Rosetta stone is found
in the town of Rashid known to Europeans as the Rosetta it is a large stone about three foot nine
high and in the stone has three different areas of writing now I wanted to say that before I go to
the next slide because actually I want you to be able to see it on the big shot of the stone here
you can see the entire bottom area of the stone has small writing on it that area of writing is
actually in Greek I'll show you that again in a minute the middle area is in a form of writing
called Egyptian writing called demotic D E M O T I C that demotic is a later form of Egyptian
it was something that people in Napoleon's time would have been able to read and in the very top
area is Egyptian hieroglyphs now the stone like I said is pretty large it's about three foot nine
and it's a little over two and a half feet wide it weighs just under a ton it's not something you
would just pack up in a backpack and bring home the stone itself was originally used as a public
announcement stone a marker stone the bottom area the part I showed you that actually was in Greek
Napoleon's soldiers could read or Napoleon savants not as soldiers forgive me Napoleon savants as
scholars could read that no problem it could read ancient Greek very well they understood
what that part of the Rosetta stone said that part of the Rosetta stone the part that's
pictured in the middle on your screen actually was a an announcement by the Egyptian government
now if you're wondering why this is something in Egypt would have been written in Greek there are
two reasons for that the first is that Egypt was conquered or invaded by the Greeks by a fellow
named Alexander the Great whom you'll meet a little bit later now Alexander the Great loved
Egypt he's the whole reason we have a city in Egypt named Alexandria named after Alexander and
when he came into Egypt he actually intermarried with the Egyptian Royals he brought a lot of Greek
ideas a Greek culture to Egypt and he brought Greek language Greek language throughout history
has remained the language of the intellectuals so intellectual people of Greek heritage educated
Egyptians would have spoken Egyptian just fine or at spoken Greek just fine when the Rosetta Stone
was originally carved that Greek section that could easily be read by Greek speaking Egyptians
in the time and could easily be read by Napoleon scholars was an announcement of the crowning of a
new king it's really boring basically it says you know this guy is crowned king of Egypt blessed
by the Egyptian priesthood in the Egyptian gods blah blah on this day of this month of the reign
of king so-and-so okay now on the left-hand side is a picture of the next area of writing up that
area of writing is something called demotic is D E M O T I C don't call it demonic that would
be entirely different it's demotic all right Egyptian demotic was a later form of Egyptian
something that would have been spoken and wrote and written under Alexander during the time that
the Greek would have been used and basically it was for people who read and wrote Egyptian instead
of Greek and what it says on the Rosetta stone is exactly the same thing the Greek says this guy
was crowned King and this year blessed by the Egyptian priesthood and the gods under the reign
of blah blah blah this is exactly the same thing as it does in Greek so basically it says it in
Greek it says it in the later Egyptian they can read both of those the third thing the thing at
the very top the thing that's pictured all the way over on the right hand side of your screen
that's Egyptian hieroglyphs no one has any idea what those mean they're presented to Napoleon's
scholars but they can't read them no one in Egypt can read them no one has any idea what the
hieroglyphs mean but guys duh if it says it in Greek it says exactly the same thing in Egyptian
you know what it probably says in hieroglyphs oh yeah this is the same thing they're pretty sure
that this is a repetition of the announcement of the crowning of a new king so basically they
already know what it says all they have to figure out is how does it actually say that and that's
a mind-bogglingly complicated undertaking even already knowing what the hieroglyphs say it takes
scholars over 20 years in order to crack the code of the hieroglyphs and figure out how it says
it there are two competing scholars working on it and actually the way they crack it is by
finding the names they find the names of the people they know and basically knowing the names
specifically what that says and what sounds are included they're able to work backward from there
now the Rosetta stone doesn't include all you know more than 5,000 characters it's broken at the
top but still even with all of that being able to find the Rosetta stone and use it to begin to
understand hieroglyphs open the world of Egyptian culture to us it allowed us to read the carvings
on tombs on marker stones on government documents and get a real glimpse of Egyptian culture and
we learned a lot about Egyptian culture as we were able to read their writing one of the
big things we learned about Egyptian culture the Egyptians were really religious like really
religious like the Greek historian Herodotus the historian Herodotus the Greek guy said he'd never
seen anybody religious like the Egyptians were religious I mean wow the Egyptian religion is very
important because it informs their culture and their government essentially for the Egyptians
in the ancient world their culture and their religion their government and their religion are
not separate things they are all intertwined and interrelated now Egyptian religion is incredibly
complex we are talking about three thousand years of culture here Egypt is a very strong stable
culture it's a very cyclical culture things do not change in huge ways over that 3,000 years or
so however just because things don't completely change doesn't mean that there aren't shifts and
alterations a lot of the shifts and alterations come in Egyptian religious belief and culture in
the very ancient world Egyptians are polytheistic they have many many gods and goddesses and the
Egyptians tell the stories of their gods and goddesses and relate them directly to their
leaders their kingship the Egyptians believe there is a very strong connection between their
Pharaoh their leader and their gods now having said that which god or goddess is considered to be
most closely related to the king and which one is considered to be in charge of looking after
the people of Egypt it sounds terrible that guy's the best way I can explain this to you
it's like modern pop culture it's like movies and TV shows things come in and out of style and
fandoms rise and fall in ancient Egyptian belief there are certain gods who are always important
but which God is most important at a certain time in Egyptian history kind of determine it
depends upon who is popular at the time so when we're talking about generalizations over 3,000
years when I say this God is very important that might be true at 1,000 but not at 3,000 okay so
there's a lot of shifting in and out, it depends on where you are in Egyptian culture these gods
and goddesses are all a part of Egyptian myth and belief and they're all important but which
one is incredibly important it depends on where we are and certain myths and legends are going to
become more and less important at different points in Egyptian history so we are generalizing for a
college humanities class that's in the first two years of college all right so I'm not going to
get deep into the complexities of mythology and chronology tying them into Egyptian rulers what
I do want you to understand is that these gods and goddesses are important and their stories
are important for the Egyptians even if it's not the most trendy or popular story at the time
now I'm going to talk about some of the gods and goddesses a little bit in your next lecture but
I want you to do a little bit exploring and read some of those stories for yourself so you're
gonna have a quiz on the Egyptian gods and goddesses you're going to need to do a little bit
exploring and reading don't fall down the rabbit hole remember that there are multiple variations
on the stories of gods and goddesses so you may find some differences talking about 3,000 years
of human of Egyptian history here and you may see some variations and some elements that are
more or less important at different times in Egyptian history what is important is those
gods and goddesses are important to the way that the Egyptian to see their kings and they
see their kings as being very muchly related to those gods and goddesses pay attention to that
part and also pay attention to gender dynamics just like we did in Mesopotamia with Innanna
make sure that you pay attention to the role of the goddesses and gods in Egypt and how the
different gender roles appear in their mythology