ABSTRACT
The discussion of Askut lacks one crucial religious dimension that plays a prominent role in ethnic expression: funerary practice. As discussed above, burial monuments and rituals reinforce and define ethnic identities through their demonstration of primordial attachments. Unfortunately, only brief preliminary publications have appeared for the cemeteries associated with Askut (Mills 1967-8; Mills and Nordström 1966). As a result, we must look elsewhere for this evidence, in this case to a new excavation at Tombos, a colonial cemetery that lay at the third cataract upon another key frontier within Egypt’s New Kingdom empire. There are similarities in the geo-political situation of the two sites. Amun promises to deliver the Nubians with their tribute to Pharaoh, but the residents of Tombos were ideally situated to enforce Nubian compliance. Like the second cataract, the third cataract at Tombos is dotted with rocky islands and submerged granite boulders creating rapids that open on either side to a clear, navigable channel. As is the case today, travel through the cataract would be restricted to a narrow channel, and would prevent all but small boats from traversing the area outside of the flood season without portage (Figure 6.1). To the south, the narrow floodplain opens up to the expansive Kerma basin, an important source of economic support for the former capital of Kush at Kerma. The river remains clear until Gebel Barkal and the fourth cataract, where the Egyptians presumably established another colonial settlement. Unfortunately, archaeologists have yet to locate evidence of Egyptian colonial occupation outside of the massive temple complexes that lay next to the dramatic mountain that gives the site its name. Although Tombos lies far downstream of the official New Kingdom border at Kurgus, its strategic position was nevertheless
analogous to that of Askut in the Middle Kingdom, since the third cataract marked an important internal boundary, as is explicitly set out by Thutmose I on his great Tombos stela (Bradbury 1984-5). The Egyptian colony at Tombos doubtless acted as an important customs post for the regulation of trade and assembly of the annual tribute promised by Amun to Amenhotep III and other Pharaohs, but collected by mortal hands. Since ethnicity is often polarized on competitive political and economic boundaries, we might expect strong expressions of ethnic identity to appear at Tombos.
