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3,200-year-old Egyptian tablet records excuses for why people missed work

openculture.com

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Re: 3,200-year-old Egyptian tablet records excuses for why people missed work

#331

Post by lIIIllllIIII »

ARandomerDude wrote: post #70
blakesterz wrote: post #54

The original with ALL of the excuses is at the British Museum here: https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/Y_EA5634

Interesting that the dates are "Month 3 of Summer, Day 24" etc. The curious bit to me being the enduring use of 4 distinct seasons, when there are obviously other ways to mark a year. Is anyone aware of a culture that did/does not have exactly 4 seasons?

Australian indigenous people. Varying numbers of seasons, I'm guessing depending on the climate in which they live.

http://www.bom.gov.au/iwk/climate_culture/Indig_seasons.shtm...

Re: 3,200-year-old Egyptian tablet records excuses for why people missed work

#332

Post by tomcam »

moffkalast wrote: post #134
blakesterz wrote: post #54

The original with ALL of the excuses is at the British Museum here: https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/Y_EA5634

> Year 40 Penduauu: month 1 of Spring, day 14 (DRINKING WITH KHONSU) "Khonsu, you have any good ideas?" "I have a bad one."

That was a perfect joke. Thank you.

Re: 3,200-year-old Egyptian tablet records excuses for why people missed work

#333

Post by rpmisms »

throwaway383jf wrote: post #160

This is pleasantly surprising how ancient times valued women. Atleast they acknowledged the value women brought day to day lives. Looks likes only during the 600's A.D women were more oppressed.

It seems like the devaluing of women is an oft-exaggerated historical trope. Women have always been valuable to society, after all, the men don't have babies.

We'd see a lot of it as sexist today, but when manual labor was pretty much the only option, you could take a look at any couple and have a pretty good idea which one would be better for working in the fields.

Re: 3,200-year-old Egyptian tablet records excuses for why people missed work

#334

Post by ncmncm »

dghughes wrote: post #306

My first thought was what work? Weren't nearly all people farmers for most of history? At least after hunter gathering ceased. But maybe pyramid building was their job and it took so long to build just one it was a career.

Half the year there was no farming to do.

If they built them that way, that means laying one 2-ton block each minute of every daylight hour for half of each of 20 years. Plus extra for the special features.

Re: 3,200-year-old Egyptian tablet records excuses for why people missed work

#335

Post by ncmncm »

shagie wrote: post #186
aaronharnly wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, a better calendar than ours :(

The Longest Year in Human History (46 B.C.E.) - https://youtu.be/fD-R35DSSZY gets into the "why the year we have is designed the way it is" ... though it takes 22 minutes to get to that part. It wasn't really better as the 30 * 12 + 5 approach needed manual application of the + 5... which is what the new calendar was trying to avoid.

I gather +536 felt longer.

Re: 3,200-year-old Egyptian tablet records excuses for why people missed work

#336

Post by robinsoh »

thechao wrote: post #173
divbzero wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another phenomenon I’ve found curious is the cross-cultural definition of a week as roughly a quarter moon, and correlated names for days of the week. [1] Sunday Sun Sōlis Hēlíou 日曜日 Monday Moon Lūnae Selḗnēs 月曜日 Tuesday Mars Mārtis Áreōs 火曜日 Wednesday Mercury Mercuriī Hermoû 水曜日 Thursday Jupiter Iovis Diós 木曜日 Friday Venus Veneris Aphrodítēs 金曜日 Saturday Saturn Sāturnī Krónou 土曜日 [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N…

There's some ... but I think it misses two really important ones (and this is just off the top of my head): 1. The Romans had an eight day "week"; and, 2. The mesoamericans had a 260 day "week" (or, at best, interlocking 13 and 20 day "weeks"). I think the 7-day week is more of a statement about how effective the Judeo-Christian culture has imposed a modern week on the rest of the world.

> I think the 7-day week is more of a statement about how effective the Judeo-Christian culture has imposed a modern week on the rest of the world.

The 7-day week originated in Sumerian Babylon culture from 2100 BC and has to do with quartering moon phases. I worry when seeing many things attributed to "Judeo-Christian culture" which actually originated from other cultures, many aspects of what's in "Judeo-Christian culture" including perhaps some of the key stories in the Old Testament like the Flood appear to have been copied or at least inspired by stories from Sumerian culture which was considered the 'high culture' of the region.

Re: 3,200-year-old Egyptian tablet records excuses for why people missed work

#337

Post by jointpdf »

drocer88 wrote: post #213
Someone wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is anyone aware of a culture that did/does not have exactly 4 seasons? Ancient Egyptian :-) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_calendar : “The ancient Egyptian calendar – a civil calendar – was a solar calendar with a 365-day year. The year consisted of three seasons of 120 days each, plus an intercalary month of five epagomenal days treated as outside of the year proper. Each season was divided into four month…

"There are just two seasons in the old Icelandic calendar: [...] summer and winter." https://icelandmonitor.mbl.is/news/news/2015/10/21/do_you_kn...

The local version of this is: there are only two seasons in Michigan—winter and construction.

Re: 3,200-year-old Egyptian tablet records excuses for why people missed work

#338

Post by dennis_jeeves1 »

LudwigNagasena wrote: post #176
dylan-m wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is incorrect - iq has risen steadily In particular, we recently invented this peculiar notion that one can boil intelligence down to a number :b

I am pretty sure people used to call others stupid or intelligent even in Ancient Egypt. Quantifying that measure is not really such a huge leap.

True, the village idiot had iconic status and the donkey was legendary. I always wondered (thoughtfully) what the anti-IQ crowd was all about, was it that IQ tests are imperfect or was it that IQ as a fundamental concept is flawed.
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