Pre-Dynastic Egypt in Barcelona

Figure 1 - Naqada I Pottery

     The Egyptian museum in Barcelona has a few more objects from Pre-Dynastic Egypt in its collection in addition to the slate palettes mentioned in the previous post. For instance, the pots shown in figure 1. These pots were probably fired upside down with the mouth of the pot near a fire, resulting in the top of the pot being black in color. Years ago the Pre-Dynastic Period was divided into three parts called the Badarian, Amration and Gerzean periods. Today these periods are called Naqada I, Naqada II and Naqada III. These particular pots are from the Naqada I period (formerly known as the Badarin).

Figure 2 - Pre-Dynastic Maces

     Stone mace heads are also known from Pre-Dynastic Egypt (figures 2 & 3). The Museu Egipci has reconstructed the wooden handle on a couple of their mace heads to show what these weapons would have looked like thousands of years ago. If you look closely at the mace heads shown here, you will note that they come in several different shapes. Exactly why the mace heads are in such different shapes is not known for sure. One wonders if these maces were used in one of the battles that eventually led to the unification of Egypt under King Narmer and the start of dynastic Egyptian history.

Figure 3 - Re-constructed Pre-Dynastic Mace