By bringing together the most significant examples of written evidence, ecofacts, and artifacts from the Greco-Roman sites of the Egyptian Eastern Desert, this paper explores the social, cultural, and environmental aspects and factors that shaped the vertical relationship between the Eastern Desert’s inhabitants and the local divine powers and the horizontal one established among members of local communities. In particular, it focuses on describing the motivations for and circumstances of honoring gods in the desert, attempting to reconstruct part of the Eastern Desert’s sites’ festival calendar, and inquiring into the commodities offered to the gods and how these would have been supplied. Thus, it seeks to highlight the religious, social, and economic significance of honoring the gods within a challenging physical environment that tested the social cohesion and financial security of its inhabitants and where the provision and availability of resources to feed humans and gods were noticeably restricted.
Eastern Desert; Graeco-Roman period; divine honors; offerings; ostraca; ecofacts; artifacts
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