Your Egypt

[Ausar]

A scientist for the people



"Egypt and humanity need a different kind of history." Geologist-turned-Egyptologist Fekri Hassan brings the Spinx and the Pyramids down to earth


Neil MacDonald <http://www.cairotimes.com/content/archiv03/prof.jpeg>


RESUME

Dr. Fekri Hassan deals with everything from the population density of hunter-gatherers to the formation of landscapes to international water issues. Though he can now be tagged as an archaeologist, Hassan started out as a geologist. "I never made a switch--I maintained the two disciplines together," he says, regarding the overlap as obvious. An instructor at Ain Shams university until 1968, he then moved to the US, where he delved deeper into archaeological questions. For the past five years he's worked in the Department of Egyptology at the University of London's Institute of Archaeology. Hassan regularly returns to his native country to do fieldwork, and is presently leading the excavation of a late Pre-Dynastic to early Dynastic site in the Delta.

It's unfortunate, in a way, that Egypt's earliest big monuments are as spectacular as they are. Many people can't get it into their heads that pyramids might be the logical outcome of organic, indigenous cultural processes, rather than a gift bestowed on the country by some master race from outside. Fekri Hassan looks at little rocks to try to place the Old Kingdom's big rocks into their proper context.

It was stones that first got the young geologist thinking about the link between human and environmental development-limestones around Moqattam, the Citadel, and the Pyramids. "I was considering 2 million years of earth history," says Hassan. "And this is the same period that saw the beginnings of human history."

As an archaeologist, he's continued to concentrate on the relationship between the environment and culture. "A great deal of my interest has always been in the human condition," he says. "I regard science as a means by which we can understand ourselves and our world better. From that perspective, it was clear to me that archaeology was one of the many disciplines by which we could learn more about ourselves and about humanity in general."

When he came into archaeology, he says, he found a highly compartmentalized field of study where politics often intruded at the expense of science, and archaeologists were obsessed with specific regions. "But my interest from the outset was to look at specific issues-population, for example," says Hassan. As he sees it, that's far more useful than defining the limits of what you want to learn about before you start your investigation. "From a scientific perspective, if you're looking at water, you study the properties of water wherever it is." By being exposed first to geology-which is more on the hard-science side-"I was saved from archaeology's particular obsession with regionality."

Despite a long established tradition of Pharaonic-centered Egyptology, the country's prehistory was a nearly untapped subject. One exception was the work of Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie who considered the subject around a century ago. During the late 1970s, Hassan re-investigated some of Petrie's sites, documenting settlements and finding radiocarbon dates. For Hassan, the main attraction of prehistory wasn't that it was unspoiled by prejudices, but simply that it is a crucial phase for considering existential issues. "Prehistory may not be glamorous, but it provides depth of time. How did we advance from [making] fire to [building] pyramids?"

He criticizes the tendency in traditional Egyptology to play up the big, spectacular finds as all-important. "I think that interest in the spectacular aspects actually alienates people, by creating a past that belongs to the rich and famous, and, by extension, a present that seems dreary or even terrible. This sort of archaeology," says Hassan, "is escapism and, at worst, entertainment."

It's hard to see this argument going down well in Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) circles, where they still revel in photogenic finds that demonstrate the glory Egypt has bequeathed to the world. Taking national credit for achievements is beside the point, in Hassan's view. "We should look at archaeology as a means to develop keener understanding of who we are, and what others are," he says.

But isn't it hard, nevertheless, to generate interest in prehistoric archaeology, which hinges on scatters of charcoal and fairly nondescript (to laypeople) flakes of stone and metal? "That's a function of promotion," counters Hassan. "The media has a role, schools have a role." And as for the wide gulf in the popular imagination between prehistory-normally equated with preliterate societies-and history, it's unfortunate that the distinction has been made, he says. "Wisdom is not necessarily a function of writing-it's not the preserve of literate societies. I think this association reflects the prevalent bias against illiterate societies."

He considers it crucial to search for evidence to bridge that gap. "In the case of Egypt, this is significant," he says. "It was once assumed that this was a civilization without prehistory. Unfortunately, that leads to the idea that it must have come from somewhere else, the assumption that civilization just-boom-appeared." In the early years of archaeology, he points out, imperialist foreign powers were keen to show that Egyptian civilization was not indigenous, focusing instead on the influences of Mesopotamia and Greece. "Egyptology was born within the fold of French and British imperialism as a means of self-aggrandizement," he says. "It was marked by major competition between centers of foreign influence which set up archaeological centers in Egypt that essentially don't work together." His humanistic conception of archaeology has little to do with the classic nineteenth-century expeditions in search of lost civilizations. "The idea of centers of excellence was associated with Europe's view of Europe itself at the time as a new center of excellence," he comments. But even worse, Hassan notes, "that colonial attitude led to a resistance against providing Egyptians with information on their own past."

The handful of Egyptians who attempted to study archaeology a century ago, he points out, met interference aimed at discouraging them. "The antiquities organization, till 1952, was headed by foreigners, especially French," he notes. And the same patterns of discrimination persist.

To this day, he says, tension between Egyptian and foreign archaeologists is one of the "major problems" in the world of Egyptology. "It's remarkable how Egyptian archaeologists have accommodated it," he says. "We've been civil, courteous." But there are signs of restlessness, particularly among Cairo University graduates who want to do fieldwork and can't get work on foreign expeditions. "Now we have [Egyptian] Egyptologists in the key positions in the antiquities organization. But given the lack of infrastructure and of any support, other than the occasional PhD grant-you can't come up with an organization based on nothing. You must provide high-level managers, and facilities. That is why there is still this glaring disparity between indigenous Egyptian and foreign archaeology."

The warped foreign-indigenous relationship has a contemporary echo in the western, New Age obsession with finding outside sources for Nile Valley civilization. "They always assume something extra-terrestrial, as though ordinary people couldn't have created the Sphinx, the Pyramids, or whatever. This is a dangerous direction." This continuous alienation of people from history, he says, "is like writing an autobiography starting from when you're 55 or 50." Insults and distortions are still common in serious academic circles, too, he says. One recent academic publication claimed that Egyptians-being Muslims-are inherently not interested in their ancient, pre-Islamic past. "This is a blatant lie," fumes Hassan. "First, because Egyptians are not all Muslim; and second, many [pioneering] archaeologists have been Muslim, like Ahmed Fahmy, for example." And Egyptian contributions have to be recognized for the health of the science. "Egyptians with their own historical and cultural background may enrich Egyptology in ways not previously thought of-for example, seeing survivals in art and culture. Egypt-with a rich and diverse cultural background: Pharaonic, Islamic, Coptic, Hellenic-is in a sense a model for a cosmopolitan, global culture. Egyptology may provide that perspective, if we can accommodate different facets of the past and emphasize continuity instead of chopping archaeology into periods of interest to foreign scholars."

Hassan does see considerable improvement. "It is heartening that there is a new generation of archaeologists around who've not been influenced as much by their colonial heritage, and who should be able to freely collaborate with their Egyptian counterparts. In the long run, without such collaboration, foreigners are not welcome-as is the case in some other countries. Egypt is exceptional in welcoming foreigners to excavate. We acknowledge the contribution they make to knowledge." He regards his own current dig in the Delta, with a mix of foreign and Egyptian staff, as "a model for many future projects. We have a need for common projects, for archaeologists from different nations to work together."

Hassan laments that the country has never had any program for "public archaeology," a necessity if the host society is to be truly included in the process. "I know of no expedition that has had an archaeology program for those who can't read, or a program of tours or trainees."

He regards his own transplantation as a non-issue, and prefers not to discuss the advantages or disadvantages of living, teaching and publishing in a Western country (though he returns to Egypt frequently for fieldwork). "This is an age of globality, and scientists change places all over the world," he says.

The London-based Egyptian-whose office is in the neighborhood of the British Museum, current home of the Rosetta stone-doesn't see the repatriation of his native country's antiquities as an urgent matter. "Every Egyptian archaeologist has a part to play in this," he says. "But it's a complicated issue, and you can get a lot of heat without much light. I think there are equally pressing issues we can achieve progress on instead of wasting energy on something that's not likely to bear fruit in the near future." That doesn't mean he thinks stolen Pharaonic treasures should not ultimately be returned to their place of origin. "Egypt-and other countries-should never, ever give up the right to claim what is theirs," he says. "But energy could be better spent on management and conservation. It's a matter of priorities-there's limited funding. We have to develop our resources first."

With the growth in the country's population and areas of settlement, conservation is, in Hassan's view, an extremely pressing issue. And conservation, as he sees it, includes continual exploration and excavation. "Some people think, leave sites below ground," he says. "But you have to know where they are; otherwise they may be destroyed in the ground." That can be due to straightforward bulldozing, or to rising groundwater, another side effect of population growth. He refers to his own site in the Delta: "If we hadn't worked there when we did, it would have been destroyed."

Hassan is adamant that archaeological sites are not dime-a-dozen luxuries that are simply in the way of development. "These are the first pages of Egyptian civilization," he stresses. "You can't read a book with the first few chapters torn off-and imagine you had no hope of ever finding them."

The way the country is developing, even once-remote areas are no longer safe from bulldozers. "The threat is not just to sites on the surface," warns Hassan. Prehistoric artifacts in particular are not easy to recognize without specialized training. "Sites can be destroyed in toto," he says.

Early last year, at Hassan's urging, Gaballa called a meeting of Egyptian and foreign archaeologists and geologists working in the Western Desert to initiate a salvage scheme. A three-day gathering in Abu Simbel produced a set of resolutions: to begin an archaeological desert survey, headquartered in Kharga; to set up facilities there for research and storage of collections; to start a training program for SCA inspectors, with the focus on how to find and tag prehistoric sites. And another very important point: SCA inspectors should participate in the excavation of canals. "It should be as in any other country," says Hassan. "You have to have archaeologists present when you excavate."

Lest anyone think that the group is opposed to development, Hassan points out that archaeology, especially prehistoric, is in line with sound development of the country's deserts as a cultural resource for tourism. The SCA has also resolved to develop a cultural-archaeological map of the Western Desert. "Some sites promise to be centers of desert tourism," Hassan says," and it's forseeable to have a museum at Nabta, where there's the earliest evidence for cattle-keeping in Africa."

Doing salvage operations in the face of major development projects might seem like standing in the path of a stampede of elephants. What's been accomplished so far? "We're putting out a newsletter," he says dryly. "We're trying to collect material. We're doing what we can."
Vol. 3, Iss. 2
18 to 31 MARCH 1999

Photograph by CLAUDE STEMMELIN

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