Social life in ancient Egypt / by W.M. Flinders Petrie.

  • Flinders Petrie
Date:
1923
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Social life in ancient Egypt / by W.M. Flinders Petrie. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    36/236 page 14
    during war being carried on by old men, boys, and women. If, however, the army were of 400,000, as in the XXVIth dynasty, or if it were recruited from the whole population of serfs, then the military holdings might allow of the employment of one or two serfs to each feudatory. Somewhere between these limits was the probable condition ; at least it seems that the military holders can only have had a small amount of serf help, and must have worked as cultivators themselves. The third class, definitely called husbandmen, must have had a different tenure to that of the serfs under the other classes. They must have been free farmers, yeomen, only subject to taxation. It seems that they held the land bordering on the river and canals. This gave them a longer cropping season than the others, for they could sow the beds of the canals as the water receded. This is a favourable ground, as it needs no watering, and is always available, however insufficient the inundation may be for higher ground. The other classes definitely named by Greek writers are the shepherds, swineherds, hunters, artificers, traders, interpreters and pilots. These none of them occupy lands, the first three merely wandering over unoccupied ground. In the above statement of the three great
    No text description is available for this image
    No text description is available for this image
    No text description is available for this image