From Single Sign to Pseudo-Script

Ben Haring, Ph.D. (1997), Leiden University, is Senior Lecturer at that university. His publications on administration and writing in Pharaonic Egypt include Divine Households (NINO, 1997); Writing in a Workman’s Village (together with Koen Donker van Heel, NINO, 2003); Palaéographie hiéroglyphique 2 (IFAO, 2006).

• PrefaceList of FiguresPrologueAncient Egyptian Identity Marks in Theoretical and Comparative Perspective1 Making Sense of Funny Signs1.1 An Ancient Text from Berlin1.2 Documentary Texts, Hieratic and Otherwise1.3 The Research History of the Necropolis Workmen’s Marks1.4 A Quick Lesson in Hieroglyphs1.5 Marks and Hieroglyphs1.6 The Aim of the Present Book2 Identity Marks, Egyptian and Other2.1 A Unique Document2.2 Ancient Egyptian Pot Marks2.3 Builders’ Marks, from Teams to Individuals2.4 Marking Systems Worldwide2.5 Masons’ Marks in Europe, Medieval and Later2.6 The Morphology of Masons’ Marks2.7 Why Were Masons’ Marks Applied?2.8 Masons and Masters2.9 Masons’ Marks in Families and Workshops2.10 General Characteristics of Marking Systems3 Writing and Other Sign Systems3.1 Theories of the Sign3.2 The Sign in Structuralism: Paradigm and Syntagma, Signifier and Signified3.3 The Sign According to Peirce: Referentiality and Semiosis3.4 Visual and Material Communication: To Write, or Not to Write?3.5 Writing and Other Graphic Systems, Independently and Together3.6 Literacy: Mastering Writing … and Much MoreThe Deir el-Medina Marking System4 The Setting: The Workmen of the Royal Tomb and Their Textual Legacy4.1 An Exceptional Village4.2 The Early History of the Royal Necropolis and Its Workmen4.3 Great Changes for Egypt and for the Royal Necropolis4.4 Ramesside Necropolis Administration, and Administrators4.5 The End of the Royal Necropolis4.6 Hieratic Necropolis Records … by the Thousands4.7 The Nature of the Documentary Texts4.8 Local Knowledge and Output, Textual and Visual5 The Use of the Workmen’s Marks: Historical Overview5.1 The Earliest Marks of the Royal Necropolis Workmen5.2 The Origin of the Marking System5.3 A Break in the History of the Marking System?5.4 Nineteenth-Dynasty Ostraca with Marks5.5 Marks and Families5.6 The Function of the Nineteenth-Dynasty Marks5.7 The Twentieth-Dynasty Duty Rosters5.8 Other Types of Record from the Twentieth Dynasty5.9 The Late Twentieth Dynasty6 How the Men Came by Their Marks, and Vice Versa6.1 Marks and Their Users6.2 Long- and Short-Lived Marks: Pomegranate, Lotus and Jackal6.3 Long-Lived Marks and Their Graphic Variety: The Families of Qaha and Sennedjem6.4 Short-Lived Marks: Name, Reputation and Status6.5 Mark, Family and Position6.6 Morphology: Distinctive Forms versus Allomorphs6.7 Sign Categories and Fuzzy Borders6.8 The Role of Writing and Literacy6.9 Morphology and Semiosis: Anything Goes?6.10 Historical and Functional Context: Graphic Communication and LiteracyEpilogue: The AlphabetBibliographical EssayReferencesTimetableIndex

"With this publication, the author exemplified how a close familiarity with a subject enables research in areas of Egyptian society that had not been touched until now and how the resulting insight is presented properly." - Eva-Maria Engel, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, in: Bibliotheca Orientalis 76.1-2 (2019)"Over one thousand ostraca are assessed, together with other objects from the workmen’s settlement and tombs, especially pottery vessels, and hundreds of graffiti in the Theban mountains. The technical data and Egyptological scholarship of the book are deliberately made very accessible to be of assistance in the understanding of identity marks in other periods and cultures. This is a remarkable work of social history." - George J. Brooke, in: Society for Old Testament Study Book List 2019