Date of Award
8-11-2015
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
Art and Design
First Advisor
Dr. Melinda Hartwig
Second Advisor
Dr. Glenn Gunhouse
Third Advisor
Dr. Lela Urquhart
Abstract
Ancient Egyptian belief in an afterlife influenced a wide variety of architectural and art forms. In the Eighteenth Dynasty at Thebes, non-royal officials were equipped with tombs that were decorated to aid in their everlasting sustenance and rebirth in the hereafter as well as commemorate them to living visitors. Part of this continuation of life involved the participation of the funerary cult of the deceased, as well as the prompting of visitors to speak the owner’s name and provide the required offerings—allowing (and encouraging) public access to the decorated tomb chapel. However, some visitors wished to harm the deceased’s perpetuation of life. In order to obliterate the memory of the tomb owner in the minds of the living and his existence in the afterlife, enemies carefully hacked the tomb owner’s images out of the decoration program in an act of damnatio memoriae. The owners of Theban tombs 66, 75, and 76 fell victim to this intentional destruction by contemporary hands.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.57709/7192297
Recommended Citation
Deane, Margaret, "Damnatio Memoriae in Non-Royal Tombs: Case Studies in the Theban Necropolis." Thesis, Georgia State University, 2015.
doi: https://doi.org/10.57709/7192297