Review: Disease, by Joyce Flier
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by Joyce Flier
University of Texas Press; March 1996
ISBN: 0292724985
116 Pages
By looking at artwork, medical papyri, literature, mummified bodies and the research of pathologists, Joyce Flier unravels certain mysteries of Ancient Egyptian and Nubian life, while posing others, in her introductory Disease. She begins by examining the environment, the heat, sun, sand and Nile. While the Egyptians may not have suffered from the nuclear age's environmental hazards, they had their own. A clean people, it was their very bathing habits that increased their chances of absorbing parasites ranging from lice to schistosomiasis (bilharzia):
Contrary to popular belief, nits (and the adult lice) are not proof of poor hygiene, but rather the opposite. Head lice cannot travel on greasy or dirty hair shafts and so their presence on Egyptian hair would support the observation by Herodotus that the Egyptians were indeed very concerned with cleanliness.
Tuberculosis, a problem in congested urban areas today affected the Egyptians, too. Besides the blood coughing form best known today, they suffered forms that led to physical deformations. A preponderance of the evidence Flier examines shows skeletal deformities. Of course, bones are more durable than soft tissue and many fatal conditions leave no trace in the body, so we can't tell how many Egyptians suffered from the form we know so well.
Flier repeatedly addresses the problems of evidence. In the early years of fascination with Egyptian mummies, unwrapping was a spectator sport. Even after X-rays were discovered, they were too costly for regular use, so many excellent specimens fell to the scalpel.
Evidence from healed bones on one body suggest a palace assassination:
As an infirm individual he would surely not have returned to the battlefield and so the second and fatal set of injuries may have been sustained elsewhere. It has led to the suggestion that Seqenenre died as a result of palace intrigue.
While broken arms are a common injury among soldiers, a surprising number of arm breaks on women's skeletons suggests wife beating was also common:
The many examples of such parry fractures on female bodies in Nubian cemeteries led Elliot Smith to suggest that there were cases of flagrant wife beating!
Some information is clinical, and for a lay person many of the technical terms may seem meaningless, but descriptive text, excellent plates and illustrations illuminate Flier's discussion. A distinct image of the health and activities of the Egyptians emerges: They died young, usually before age's infirmities set in, and they ate well enough for their teeth to rot. Flier questions the myth of the competence of the Egyptian dentist, but the competence of the Egyptian medical practitioner is left to a future volume. With the small exception of this omission, Disease, written by the Special Assistant for Human Remains in the Department of Egyptian Antiquities at the British Museum, Joyce Flier, amply fulfills its goal to be an introductory text on the health of Egyptians and Nubians.
