The riddle of the Nubians

Egyptologists have not generally engaged in the debates about Afrocentrism with any great enthusiasm. Although Martin Bernal's Black Athena provoked considerable controversy and responses (some by eminent Egyptologists), it was considered to be more about Greek culture than Egyptian. Therefore, a volume by a leading Egyptologist that addresses some, if not all, of the key issues is to be welcomed. Donald Redford's From Slave to Pharaoh is a fairly slim volume that focuses "on the role of racial identity in the formulation of imperial power in Egypt" and with the assimilation of Egyptian culture by the people of the Middle Nile.

As an historian and Egyptologist, Redford can be provocative, brilliant and frustrating, and in this volume he displays two, perhaps all three, of these qualities. We are told in the first sentence that this book "is not a history of Nubia and the Sudan in antiquity, still less a history of Egypto-Nubian relations". Redford intends his study to focus on the attitudes (predominantly racial) of one group to the other, and that group is inevitably the Egyptians as the writers of the surviving evidence. The first three (brief) chapters cover these issues, but as the book goes on Redford discusses historical events in detail, increasingly falling into a historical narrative. Chapters seven to thirteen are fairly conventional narrative history, with associated discussions (and digressions) on specific issues (such as royal titularies). Chapter 14, one of the most valuable sections, is devoted to Redford's own excavations at Karnak.

In this narrative, Redford promotes a number of older ideas but gives no space to defending them, and his notes frequently ignore the issues and more recent literature. He follows the older model, which sees the 500-year domination of Nubia and Kush by the pharaohs of the Egyptian New Kingdom as a time of exploitation, with Egyptian colonists and no special place for Nubians. Most provocatively, he states that, by the time of the Kushite conquest of Egypt in the mid-8th century BC, the culture of the Kushite kings was thoroughly Egyptian. This will no doubt annoy a number of archaeologists of the Middle Nile region, who would argue that the culture of the region was never Egyptian, only the iconography and some of the ideology of kingship.

The result is a book that contains some extremely interesting material and some valuable insights, but it will probably satisfy few readers. Neither the title nor the subtitle really relate to the bulk of the content. Those seeking to use it as a classroom text would also find problems, in that it would doubtless work well in conjunction with other volumes on the same subject for discussion of issues and interpretation, but cannot really stand alone as a textbook: it ignores too many recent debates (such as the chronology of the early Napatan royal graves).

As for dealing with the subject of the title, what is there is certainly interesting, but it is remarkably brief and omits much. Redford focuses largely on Nubia and Egyptian activities there. But surely the title leads the reader to expect much more about "Nubians" in Egypt itself? Mercenary troops get some attention, but the evidence for others who settled is dealt with rather briefly. There is far more evidence for people from the south in Egypt, at all levels of society, and the black experience of Egypt is far more wide-ranging than this volume suggests.

Redford's Egyptological knowledge is broad and deep, and what he says here is at times provocative and in places illuminating. The frustration comes from the book's brevity. Over many years, Redford has written eloquently about Kushite rule in Egypt, and he could usefully have written more here.

Robert Morkot is lecturer and coordinator for Egyptology, School of Education and Lifelong Learning, Exeter University.