Theban Desert Road Survey in the Egyptian Western Desert, Volume 1

This volume publishes forty-five inscriptions from Gebel Tjauti and forty-five inscriptions from Wadi el-Hl, two major concentrations of rock inscriptions and rock art on pharaonic caravan routes of the Egyptian Western Desert. The inscriptions range in date from predynastic to Christian times. Inscriptions of particular interest in this first volume include those from Gebel Tjauti: a Naqada IID/IIIA tableau revealing important new information concerning the unification of Upper Egypt and the founding of Dynasty 0; a road construction inscription of the Coptite nomarch Tjauti providing evidence for the beginnings of the northern expansion of the Theban realm during the middle Eleventh Dynasty; the depiction of a Nubian ranger; and Coptic cryptography; and from the Wadi el-Hl: epigraphic evidence for the use of the Farsht Road for transport of supplies to the temple of Amun during the New Kingdom; a new Middle Egyptian literary inscription; a rock-cut letter that contributes to our understanding of the history of the textual variants of the Story of Sinuhe; and an inscription recounting desert celebrations in honour of the goddess Hathor. The inscriptions are published as photographs and facsimile drawings, with hieroglyphic transcriptions, translations, commentaries, and glossary.