Seafaring Expeditions to Punt in the Middle Kingdom: Excavations at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis, Egypt.

• Author: Spalinger, Anthony

Seafaring Expeditions to Punt in the Middle Kingdom: Excavations at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis, Egypt. By KATHRYN A. BARD and RODOLFO FATTOVICH. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East, vol. 96. Leiden: BRILL, 2018. Pp. xvi + 233. $156.

This is a very significant piece of work that summarizes, in great detail, the joint work of (Catherine Bard and Rodolfo Fattovich at the Red Sea port of Mersa/Wadi Gawasis. Archaeological research there has been going on regularly since 2001 and the number of preliminary reports has risen to a very significant degree, as befits the importance of the site and the scholars' results. But this volume covers all sorts of historical connections in the ancient world, in particular long-distance trade during the pharaonic period of ancient Egypt. Harbor sites as well as mines are thus discussed, and it is to the great credit of both main supervisors of the archaeological work that so convenient and well written a volume has been produced. Included are numerous color photographs and helpful maps as well as discussions--not merely digressions--relating to geomorphology, climate, geology, and the like. In a nutshell, Bard and Fattovich have provided an extremely important publication that covers a large number of related research projects.

In chapter 3 they deal with the spatial use of the harbor at Mersa/Wadi Gawasis, and perhaps that section of the work should be analyzed in detail as it is paradigmatic for the entire publication. Revealing as well as intriguing is their coverage of the local gallery caves, which were mainly employed as carpentry workshops and storage areas. The authors discuss the types of wooden cargo boxes used, food storage zones in caves, the famous "rope cage" (no. 5), and so forth. But also treated are the important production areas at this port as well as ramps or slipways(?). In particular, I found their coverage of the "spatial organization" of the harbor highly informative, especially the comparison between their site and those at Ayn Soukhna and Wadi el-Jarf.

In the following chapter the authors turn to the epigraphic (or textual) data relating to the expeditions of Egypt's Middle Kingdom. Certain stelae are analyzed in great detail, and there is a very helpful chart of officials' names, titles, and toponyms found in these texts (Table 2). Because the epigraphic data have been published elsewhere, this volume does not give the reader a complete catalogue. Year dates are likewise included...