Daily Life

Trade

Throughout history, Nubia was the closest trade partner with Egypt. Egyptian relieves dating to the Old Kingdom depict Nubians presenting Egyptian pharaohs with gold, ivory, Ebony, ostrich feathers, doam (palm fruits), and exotic products, and animals like giraffes. Exotic animals and other products from Nubia were exported to the Mediterranean world via Egypt. A frescos in a Minoan palace in Thera (Greece), depicts antelopes. In other Minoan palaces in Crete and Thera several frescos depict monkeys.

Fresco from Thera (Greece), showing antelopes imported from Nubia.

The Kushites were the only elephant exporting people beside the Indians, as known in the ancient literature of the Old world. Kushite elephants were extensively used by the ancient armies of Europe and the Near East. The Egyptian city of Elephantine, comes from the Greek word for elephant, and was named so by the Ptolemies since elephants, brought from Nubia, were sold and exported there.¹

An ivory bust of a Nubian wearing leopard leather with a monkey, and an oryx. 7th century B.C. From Nimrud, Iraq.

Elephant tusks were very important to the economy of ancient Nubia. Thus most of the ancient world obtained ivory from Nubia. Syria was known in the ancient world for trading with ivory, which was imported from Nubia.² In the fourth century BC, Herodotus wrote that the Nubians paid the Persians a tribute that included “twenty large elephant tusks” (Herodotus iii. 97).³

Gold was also a natural mineral Nubians have been known for in the ancient world. The Egyptians in the New Kingdom benefited from the conquest of Nubia, mainly by excavating gold sites there. New Kingdom Egyptian Paintings and relieves depict Kushites presenting gold as tribute to the Egyptian pharaohs. Wiring in the first century AD, Diodorus writes that in Meroe, "there are mines of gold, silver, iron and brass, besides abundance of ebony and all sorts of precious stones.”(Diodorus i. 33).⁴

it has been recorded in ancient sources that the Kushite pharaohs never applied the death sentence; convicts in Kush were rather sent to work in gold mining. In the Meroitic period the Ptolemies and later the Romans heavily excavated the Nubian Desert for gold.⁵ There are no evidence on weather the Ptolemies or the Romans paid taxes to the Kushites to excavate in the gold sites there.

From the tomb of the Viceroy of Kush, Huy, from Thebes. The scene depicts Nubian royalty bringing gifts to the Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankh Amen. The gifts included ostrich feathers, ostrich eggs, live apes and a tiger, ebony, elephant tusks, and slaves from the south.

Gold Balance from Semna (Sudan) dating to the period of Egyptian rule in Nubia. Courtesy of the Harvard University_MFA Boston Expedition and the Khartoum National Museum. Source: Wildung, Dietrich. Sudan Ancient Kingdoms of the Nile.

During the Napatan-Meroitic period, Kushites also exported slaves from the sub-Sahara to other regions.⁶
By the sixth century CE, the Kushites had already established trade roots connecting to Arabia. Kush exported to Arabia dates,⁷ slaves,⁸ and until recently wine.⁹

One of the most products imported by Nubia was bronze. Bronze was first introduced to the Kushites by the Hyksos in the seventeenth century. Bronze was extensively used by the Nubians. The type of metal was the best available for making swords and daggers in the ancient world. The Nubians must have imported most of their bronze from Egypt.

Strabo, a first century AD Roman historian and geographer, wrote:

“The Aethiopians (Nubians) live on millet and barley, from which they also make a drink; but instead of olive-oil they have butter and tallow.”(Strabo xvii Ch. 2: 2).¹⁰

Hence, oil was one of the most commonly imported products in Nubia. The Nubians extensively imported olive oil from Lebanon via Egypt. Cedar trees and lumber were also imported from the Levant and used as building materials. Temples and royal buildings in Nubia were mostly roofed with cedar trees. The Amon temple at Kawa for example was roofed by cedars that Taharqa has imported especially from Lebanon as recorded on his stele at Jebel Barkal (Sudan).¹¹ The items also include highly valued acacia wood, which was imported from either Phoenicia or a nearby location in the Levant .

• ^{1 See: I. Omer, Investigating the Origin of the Ancient Jewish Community at Elephantine: A Review.}
• ^{2 "Ivory," International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: E-J (Eerdmans, 1982) 940-2, and I. Shaw, The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt (Oxford University P, 2003) 149.}
• ^{3 Herodotus, and D. Lateiner, The Histories, trans. G. C. Macaulay (Barnes & Noble Classics, 2004).}
• ^{4 Diodorus in Society of Antiquaries of London, Archaeologia: Or Miscellaneous Tracts Relating to Antiquity (The Society of Antiquaries of London, 1851).}
• ^{5 Angelo and Alfredo Castiglioni, "Gold In The Eastern Desert", Sudan Ancient Treasures: An Exhibition Of Recent Discoveries From The Sudan National Museum, ed. D. A. Welsby, and J. R. Anderson (British Museum P, 2004) 122-6.}
• ^{6 J. D. Fage, and R. A. Oliver, The Cambridge History of Africa: From C.500 BC to AD1050 (Cambridge University P, 1979) 565-6.}
• ^{7 S. J. de Laet, M. A. Al-Bakhit, International Commission for a History of the Scientific and Cultural Development of Mankind History of mankind, L. Bazin, S. M. Cissco, History of Humanity: From the Seventh to the Sixteenth Century (Taylor & Francis US, 2000) 508.}
• ^{8 de Laet, note 7 above.}
• ^{9 J. L. Burckhardt, and Association for Promoting the Discovery of the Interior Parts of Africa, Travels in Nubia: By the Late John Lewis Burckhardt (J. Murray, 1822).}
• ^{10 Strabo, The Geography of Strabo, The Loeb Classical Library (1932).}
• ^{11 H. T. Aubin, The Rescue of Jerusalem: The Alliance of Hebrews and Africans in 701 B.C. (Soho P, 2002) 155, and Spalinger, "Foreign Policy of Egypt"Chronique d’Egypte 53, (1978).}