Sir William Mathew Flinders Petrie was born in 1853, and lived until 1942. He had little or no formal education, but learned a practical knowledge of geometry and surveying from his father. This knowledge was to prove invaluable in his later years. Petrie and his father both had a strong interest in Egypt, especially in the pyramids. In his youth Petrie was fascinated with history, and spent much of his time browsing in the British Museum amongst the coins and books.
In Egypt, in his early days he was employed by the Egypt Exploration Fund, and he worked for them over three years. Through his contacts in the British Museum, Petrie was aware that there were gaps in archaeological knowledge of Egypt, and that there was not a lot of meaning to the sculptures and inscriptions. Petrie was convinced that the key to ancient Egypt lay in the pyramids and he commenced a survey of them. Looting was still rife at this time, so recording was important. This was a novel undertaking by Egyptian standards, however his work was soon noticed by serious archaeologists of the time.
Between surveys, Petrie started to collect sherds of pottery, and he turned from surveying to excavating. His work in this area was given approval by the Royal Society.
Petrie excavated at Tanis, and at Naukratis where there was Greek pottery thick on the ground. The workers he employed himself, and they were housed to prevent blackmail by sheikhs in the area.
The methods used by Petrie, would horrify any modern day archaeologist, consisted of three types of worker.
Each group was supported by earth carriers and general labourers, with Petrie himself always on site supervising. One of the sites excavated was at the temple of Psouseunes of IXXI Dynasty. Here he recovered large quantities of pottery and Papyri. Some of the latter was framed in glass and translated.
Although his methods were rough by today's standards, he realised at Naukratis the importance of accurate dating of objects and the strata they came from. From this he was able to date objects by correlation using the foundation layers.
After a visit to Mycenae, he recognised Egyptian objects which belonged to the same period, i.e. the XVIII dynasty. This was one of the first examples of cross dating, Petrie was also now aware that full records with as much information and descriptions were needed. Petrie's specific skills came in collecting, securing information, recording the importance of everything found, and proving and testing hypothesis, as work goes on, assessing the history of all objects recovered. His methods laid the foundations for archaeology today. He listed materials, inscriptions, descriptions of objects, positions, material culture, weights and full archaeological survey. Prompt publication complete with accurate plans, excavation records and precise chronology was important to him, and many modern academic archaeologists could do better by emulation.
Amongst others, Petrie employed a young man as an artist and recorder who was also to leave his mark on Egyptology. His name is probably the most famous of all archaeologists, for the discovery of the relatively undisturbed tomb of Tutankhamen, this man was Howard Carter.
Among many other sites, Petrie worked at Nequada. Here were over two thousand graves set in three or four cemeteries over an area of four to five square miles. The most common type of graves were rectangular pits of between three and four feet deep, and having had a roof of woven branches, covered by earth. The wealthier people of that time had larger tombs lined with brick. These were thirteen by nine feet, with the body placed on reed mats in the foetal position. The head normally to the west, grave goods of stone vessels, bracelets, slate palettes and flint knives were present in many. Often the remains had been well preserved with skin and hair still visible, many of the tombs showed evidence of secondary burials. Some evidence exists of internment after decomposition and disarticulation. The dates of this cemetery are not known, but this was when typological classification started when it was noted that there was clear definition between early prehistoric graves and later ones. The pottery style differences were gathered and Petrie commenced to classify a range of types. Whilst Petrie was excavating using the stratification, he noticed the pottery changing from decorative to domestic, and from this he celebrated the discovery of pre dynastic Egypt. Later he was to be given the honour of being the first Professor of Egyptology, under the terms of the will of Amelia Edwards.
In 1901 and only after six years of hard study did Petrie announce his system to the world. (see appendix) This information would prove useful for decades to come, with the developmental sequence of pottery starting at the number thirty and running through to eighty, this being the most recent. The system left room at either end for adjustment. Prehistoric pottery is all of a soft body faced with red hematite, and as the pots were baked mouth down, the rim was usually ash covered. Those which did not burn through, reduced the red peroxide of iron to the black magnetic sesqui oxide, such as is familiar to us on the black scale of sheet steel. The interior of the pot is likewise black, owing to the reducing gases from the ashes below. Rarely did the heat or combustion last long enough for the oxygen to pass through the pottery to redden the inside. The iron is reduced to a brilliant mirror like coat of black all over. The reason for the polish being smoother on the black as opposed the red, is that Carbonyl gas as a result of imperfect combustion, is a solvent of magnetic oxide of iron and so dissolves and re composes the surface facing. Once the chemistry is understood, the idea that smoke blackened the pottery is no longer true in most cases. This however is one of the few times that Petrie's work has been disproved, and only down to the result of more modern knowledge and science.
During his time in Egypt, Petrie was fundamental in drawing up regulations for the local government, in regard to the export of antiquities. This made it almost impossible for any foreign expedition to work in Egypt without permission. This was after an occasion when one of the sites on which he had worked was destroyed by an angry farmer. It transpired that the farmers crops had been destroyed when a tourist had insisted on seeing the beautiful painted pavements and frescoes at Tel el Amernah. We know what the site was like because Petrie had recorded it, both in colour, and black and white on a scale of one tenth. With the large quantity of finds to deal with, Petrie used his new method to define the pottery. This categorised seven stages of development of pre dynastic and black topped pottery from Nequada and other sites.
Petrie's methods of work led to approval from many academics of the time, his literary output was prodigious, with more than a thousand books and papers published. As a result, students were taught that this was the way forward for archaeology and would teach us all much more than the treasure hunters and tomb raiders that went before. If we look at the published work and information available from others in the field who went before Petrie's time we can see how much was lost and possible knowledge destroyed. Flinders was quite prepared to return to sites that others had supposedly dealt with, simply to make a true and accurate record. During the course of one such exercise at Abydos he recleared the tomb to discover royal jewellery of the 1st dynasty, he also uncovered the only known statue of Cheops found to this day. That tomb had been ravaged by the Frenchman Amelineau. Nowadays the thinking is to disturb as little as possible, to record everything as fully as possible and to save as much as possible for our future generations. The ability of science today can give us a tremendous amount of knowledge, from carbon dating to wood dating, from pollen samples in the soil, to insect identification. We have so many scientific procedures available, that we now realise that anything may be possible in the future of archaeology. The credit is given to Flinders Petrie, for starting it all correctly and laying an excellent foundation from which to work.
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