The Women and the Boatman

by Mark Gajewski

  We tethered the donkeys to a tree trunk, then moved to the high acacia–wood fence blocking the wide end of the wadi. The fence posts were set close together, each embedded deeply in a trench. The fence stretched some fifty yards, each end anchored against one of the wadi’s sheer rock walls. Nykara held me up so I could see over it. I enjoyed that immensely; I loved feeling his arms around me. He was so strong he lifted me as easily as if I was a feather.

  Aboo truly was a mighty hunter and he’d filled the wadi with a host of dangerous animals. Killing had never been the purpose of his hunting; it was capturing and mastering wild animals that proved Aboo could master nature and its chaos. As such, wild animals were symbols, and there was no more visible proof of his power over our world than this menagerie. It’s why I’d painted so many in Dedi’s tomb, for he too had been a great hunter in his youth. I assumed Rawer was allowed to assist Aboo because Aboo intended for Rawer to succeed him as ruler. I wondered if Abar had considered that in her plan. Was she going to learn how to hunt, so she too could control chaos?

  “Aboo’s been busy,” Nykara said, surveying the wadi’s arm. “There’s dozens more animals than the last time I looked.”

  “The festival to mark the start of inundation is only two months away,” I reminded him.

  “I assume you’re going on the elite hunt next week?” Nykara asked hopefully.

  “The third year in a row. You’re transporting everyone on your boat?”

  “I am.”

  “I can’t wait to be alone with you every evening.”

  “Me either.”

  “Is it true Aboo established this hunt?” I asked.

  “In the first year of his rule, as a visible sign of his power. It’s the one time all year the elites participate in something as a group. Brings them closer together and quite unsubtly proclaims throughout our region they’re better than the rest of us.”

  “Why hunt at this particular time? Because of the festival?” I asked.

  “Herds of game animals have drawn close to the valley these past months due to the summer heat,” Nykara explained. “It’s dried out the grasses on the plains. So, animals are more plentiful on the nearby plateaus than usual. It’s easier to catch the giant perch that hide in the deepest part of the river, too, because the water’s at its lowest level now.”

  “I’ll be conducting the rituals the night before the hunt,” I said, “and taking care of anyone who gets hurt the next day. Several elite daughters are going along to participate in the dance. Including Abar.”

  “The hunt will be about fifteen miles downstream this year. This will be the first time any of the elites have traveled on a wood boat.”

  I turned my attention to the pen. “I suppose Aboo will sacrifice most of these during the festival.”

  “He always does,” Nykara agreed. “Aboo isn’t stingy with his wealth. Can’t say the same for Rawer.”

  The variety of animals was amazing. The wadi contained a number of fenced areas and pens to keep each species separate. The pens were lined with wood troughs overflowing with food and water. A handful of trees provided a small amount of shade. Herdsmen strode everywhere, accompanied by a multitude of dogs. Most of them were running back and forth, barking and nipping at the heels of animals, moving them about. Massive amounts of emmer and river plants and fruits and other feed were piled just outside the fence. Flies buzzed everywhere. Some of the herdsmen were busily filling baskets from the pile; others were carrying feed to the pens. Closest to us was a troop of baboons, all newly captured. Some had been injured then, or perhaps as they struggled against their restraints afterwards; linen bandages were wrapped around nearly every one’s forearms. Nykara spotted the hippo and pointed it out to me; it was attached to the trunk of a small tree by a rope affixed to a hind leg. It was nosing a pile of fresh green river plants. In the far reaches of the wadi were several crocodiles, a leopard, a host of ostriches, several aurochs and, most magnificent of all, a bull elephant. It was old and terrifyingly large; its capture by Aboo had convinced the leading men of Nekhen to drop whatever objections they’d had to him becoming our ruler in Dedi’s place. In fact, Aboo had taken its name and attributes, the elephant’s spirit merging with his. That was one animal he wouldn’t kill during the next or any festival.

  “Aboo’s trying to breed some of the animals to ensure a constant supply and show his command over nature,” Nykara told me.

  “That’s got to be easier and safer than hunting.” I’d patched up enough of Merenhor’s huntsmen to know how dangerous that occupation could be.

  We reluctantly turned away from the menagerie and gathered up the donkeys and walked the rest of the way to the lower settlement, to the walled oval court now so familiar to me atop the low ridge just west of the cultivated strip. Once again we tied up the donkeys, this time near the entrance to the court. Red linen banners were blowing nearly horizontal in the strong wind atop the four towering sycamore columns flanking its entrance. The sun reflected from the copper falcon atop its even higher pole, so brightly I couldn’t look at it directly. To the right of the entrance, sweating errand boys were dragging heavy containers out of several mud–plastered reed huts where the materials used by Dedi’s craftsmen were stored. Those materials were now replenished monthly by boats plying the river between Nekhen and the trading posts Dedi had established based on Abar’s suggestion. Nykara had explained why he’d set them up at some length. They were, according to him, a rousing success, in some measure because of the value my decorated pottery brought in trade. Half a dozen of the traders who worked in the posts had already joined with local women in the far–flung settlements. A couple of those women were pregnant.

  We headed towards the craftsmen’s workshops standing in a row to the left.

  “Why are these workshops located beside the court?” I asked.

  “Craftsmen spend much of their time making objects for people to donate to the gods during festivals and rituals – protective amulets, fertility figurines and such,” Nykara replied. “This is a convenient location for everyone in the lower settlement. The carpenters and brewers are over in the industrial area, of course, and my metalsmiths are near the boatyard – they require too much space to be here.”

  Most of the workshops were shaded by palm fronds layered atop large rectangular wood frames. A few were open to the sky. Columns of smoke spiraled lazily from fires in many of them. All of the craftsmen were employed by Dedi and overseen by Nykara. Apparently, according to Nykara, Dedi’s father Gehes had obtained control over all the craftsmen when he ruled Nekhen, much as his father Teta had gained control over all boats. For decades the craftsmen had made what Dedi wanted, when he wanted, in the quantity he desired, and in a style he approved – just as I did. Some of the items were exchanged with other hamlets and settlements throughout the valley, some served as payment to the elites who supplied raw materials. When Dedi yielded rule to Aboo, he’d promised to give a portion of what his craftsmen produced directly to Aboo so he could grant them to the elites and make them further beholden to him. Dedi continued to honor that pledge.

  I loved visiting the workshops and seeing the amazing items produced there. I went every time I could. It was my very favorite section of Nekhen. The shops were colorful, noisy, alive, always crowded with men and women seeking specific items, the women burdened with containers of produce or handicrafts to exchange for whatever it was they needed. Today, for the first time, Nykara and I had come together. It was an illuminating experience. Everyone knew Nykara, of course; among his responsibilities as Dedi’s heir was keeping these craftsmen supplied with raw materials, approving the objects they created, and feeding them and their families. The affection with which they greeted him was genuine. I basked in the glow of that reflected affection, and in the respect due me as the bearer of the talisman. We walked through the workshops slowly, taking our time, dodging other visitors, chatting with ones we knew, pausing to see what each craftsman was making.

&nb
sp; In the first shop men were bent over pieces of ivory and bone, intently fashioning combs and hairpins and pendants and amulets and hand clappers, shaping and smoothing them, etching images using copper tools. The ivory objects were all destined for either trade or the elites – no commoner could possess one by Aboo’s edict. Nearly every item featured one or more animals – ostriches, hippos, giraffes, antelope, various birds. I picked up one wondrous comb with five decorated rows above the tines, each row containing multiple animals; the detail work was amazing. Then another craftsman’s work caught my eye. Atop a slender wand of ivory marched four hippos. Three had been fully formed; the craftsman was working on the last one. Clearly, the wand was designed for use in some kind of ritual, for it was too delicate to actually be used for anything practical. I expected I’d see it some day in the oval court.

  Nykara pointed to one craftsman, whispered. “He’s a master. Everything he makes is exquisite.”

  I moved closer. Statuettes of men and women ranging in size from six to sixteen inches were carefully arranged to one side. The master was applying blue inlay to the eyes of a man adorned with a girdle and penis sheath. The eyes of every male statue were similarly inlaid. By contrast, the eyes of the females were all modeled in the ivory. All the females were nude, legs together, one arm down a side and the other supporting the breasts, hair arranged either in tripartite fashion or a single mass in back. I’d never seen figures so spectacular.

  We moved to the next workshop. Men were carving stone, tapping copper chisels of various sizes with wood mallets to shape it. Each type of stone gave off a different tone and the rhythmic tapping was quite musical. In one corner I recognized Khamudi, the younger brother of Dagi, who now served as Nekhen’s permanent trader at Tjeni. Both were sons of Padiu, the craftsman in charge of Nekhen’s stone carvers. Khamudi was one of Nykara’s friends, perhaps a year younger, quite handsome. I was well–acquainted with him, for Uncle Hemaka had sent me on errands to his father’s workshop many times. Khamudi had made a few attempts to court me soon after I began to wear the talisman. He’d given up once he’d learned I was with Nykara.

  “I need to speak with Khamudi,” Nykara said. “Do you mind?”

  “Of course not.”

  We quietly slipped to his side.

  Khamudi looked up as my shadow fell across the bit of stone he was working on. “Amenia!” he said with a glad cry.

  “No greeting for me?” Nykara asked, feigning hurt.

  “You’ll get over it.”

  “How’s Dagi?” Khamudi asked Nykara.

  “I stopped at Tjeni on the way back from Maadi. He was fine,” Nykara replied. “He’s doing an excellent job with the trading post. Tamerit was very pregnant. You’ve probably got a new niece or nephew by now.”

  “Let me know when you find out.”

  “Certainly.” Nykara placed his hand on Khamudi’s shoulder. “Is it done?” he asked cryptically.

  Khamudi nodded. He fumbled in a leather pouch fastened to his waist, removed a small rolled up strip of leather, handed it to Nykara.

  Nykara tucked it into his waistband.

  “What are you working on, Khamudi?” I asked, squatting beside him.

  “A cow’s head of flint. An offering for the upcoming festival,” he replied. “Aboo’s commissioned a large number.” Khamudi held up the white stone, about half the size of his hand. One of the incurving horns was complete; he was still chipping the other.

  “It’s beautiful.” I glanced around. “What else are your father’s craftsmen making?”

  “Let me show you.”

  Khamudi and Nykara and I began to circle the workshop.

  “These men are creating arrowheads out of flint,” Khamudi said. “We mine it from the base of the plateau due north of your upper settlement.”

  “Beneath the boats etched in the rock?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Khamudi said. “Father believes such a ready source of fine flint is one reason some of the first farmers settled at Nekhen. Back then there were no specialists, you know. Even farmers had to make their own arrowheads and knives and stone weapons.” He lowered his voice. “There are countless flint chips around our quarry. I’ve found half–formed arrowheads that look nothing like the style we make. Their quality is exceptional. Frankly, compared to ours, they’re extraordinarily beautiful. I’ll bet people have been using our quarry for thousands of years. Perhaps we inherited our fixation on quality from them.”

  “Just as we potters have, from our ancestors,” I said. I picked up one of the arrowheads, much larger than those I’d seen hunters use, with a hollowed–out base. “Why so large?” I asked.

  “It’s for a ritual, not actual hunting,” Khamudi explained. “At the next festival Aboo will offer many to the gods as weapons to symbolically control chaos.” Khamudi eyed me speculatively. “Which means you’ll be offering them too.”

  “What are all these types of stone?” I asked. The different piles, I assumed, had been brought back to Nekhen by Nykara on his various expeditions, or by Seni from his quarries in the eastern desert by caravan. It was highly likely some of this stone had been obtained in exchange for my pottery.

  “Diorite, basalt, alabaster, marble. They come from the Eastern Sea Hills. And over there – garnet, olivine, malachite and fluorospar. That craftsman is making scorpions from limestone. They’ve been commissioned by commoners as festival offerings.”

  Another craftsman was knapping a wonderful and delicate hippo from a piece of flint. Next to him was of ring of boys, all industriously trying to duplicate in stone the image of a falcon set up in their midst. The master was standing behind one boy, bent over, giving him directions. He grasped a long slender stick in his hand. The backs of a few boys were striped from his blows. No doubt that’s how the master kept their attention.

  “Apprentices,” Khamudi whispered.

  None of their work came close to matching that of the master. More figures lay on the ground beside his feet – ibex, giraffe, dog. I supposed the apprentices would be required to become proficient at reproducing them all.

  We came to the section of the workshop where men were making fish–tailed knives, some of blackish flint, some of murky brown. They were beautiful – the regular sequences of pressure flakes on the blades created a wonderful undulating pattern. The cutting edges were fine and evenly serrated.

  “Only the most highly–skilled craftsmen create these knives, and Aboo determines each and every person who receives one,” Khamudi said.

  “Both my uncles crave one,” I informed him.

  “The knives are status symbols. Those who own them are set apart from the rest of us,” Khamudi said. “Did you notice many of the images and arrowheads we saw earlier had small mistakes? Their flaking was rough and irregular? Not these knives. The men who make them have spent years attaining perfection. Making fish–tailed knives is what I want to do someday.”

  “I’m sure you will, with your talent,” I said.

  Khamudi picked up a blade, its long handle decorated with a row of ibex. “Aboo will use this knife to slaughter his animals during the upcoming inundation festival. The order depicted on the knife will allow him to symbolically control the chaos of the natural world.”

  We moved to the next group of craftsmen. They were knapping fine slender chips off of flint blocks. Others were fashioning the chips into inch–long microdrills. Apprentices were affixing the drills into holes in the ends of long slender wood shafts.

  “These drills are sturdy enough to bore holes in carnelian, amethyst, rock crystal, and garnet,” Khamudi said. “Dedi’s craftsmen use them in his workshops here at Nekhen.”

  “They’re also one of the most important products we export throughout the valley,” Nykara interrupted. “Dedi and I trade them on every expedition. Craftsmen in every settlement I’ve visited rely on us for these tools. It’s a reason Nekhen has become so powerful.”

  “Over here we’re making objects out of other types of stone
,” Khamudi said.

  A man was using a drill to hollow out the center of a chunk of white amethyst with pink veins running through it.

  “It’ll be an ointment jar, and when he’s finished the jar will be so thin it’ll be virtually transparent. And see this pink limestone? It’ll become a hippo–shaped amulet. We also make vessels out of alabaster and diorite and granite and breccia and porphyry and serpentine and siltstone and steatite.”

  “It must take much training to become skilled in so many different materials,” I noted.

  “Not just materials. Styles.” Khamudi pointed to the last craftsman. “He’s making cylinder seals. Nykara brought a few back from Maadi on his first trip. We’ve been making them ever since, following the Maadi patterns. They’ve become status symbols too, that Aboo hands out only to the elites. Heth sketched out for us some of the designs he remembered from when he lived in the North.”

  “What’s over there?” I asked, pointing to an area hidden from view by a reed screen.

  “That’s where Father carved the statue of Aboo that stands in the ruler’s cemetery. No one ever made such a thing before. Aboo used to come by late at night to look at it.”

  “I helped bring the block of stone back from Abu,” Nykara told us. “It was a chore, getting it onto the boat.”

  “Statues,” I said. “New ways of carving stone. New designs. Wood boats. The new style of pottery I’ve invented. Metal–working. Aboo’s funerary complex. Doesn’t it feel like there’s a wave of change sweeping over our valley, and that we’re caught up in it?”

  “It does indeed,” Nykara replied.

  Someone shouted Khamudi’s name.

  “Time to get back to work,” he said ruefully. “Guess I’ve been missed. See you both at the inundation festival – together, I trust.”

  “Count on it,” I said.