Daily Life in Ancient Egypt

Egyptian society was highly stratified and hierarchical.
Five classes of people existed:
- Royal family: A very small group at the top of the social pyramid.
- Priests and nobility: Positioned beneath the royal family.
- Middle class: Scribes, merchants, and artisans, mainly urban.
- Peasant farmers: The vast majority of the population; their primary function was agriculture.
The remains seen in Egypt today represent largely elite culture (pyramids, tombs, temples).
Most people lived at a subsistence level.

Farmers lived in modest mud-brick houses (huts).
Home furnishings were very simple (stools, pots, boxes, beds).
Life mainly consisted of hard labor.
The general custom was one day off in ten; later, it became two days off in ten (early concept of the weekend).

Ancient Egypt was a wealthy society, evident from treasures like Tutankhamun's.
The wealth came from an efficient system of taking surplus production from farmers and turning it into wealth for the elite.
Most Egyptians lived modestly, worked hard, and died young.

Life conditions were much harder than today in pre-modern societies.
Infant mortality was high (many babies died around age two when they stopped drinking their mother's milk and started eating solid foods).
Life expectancy for an ordinary person was 29 (dying of old age at 29).
Even elites seldom lived past 50 or 60.

Information comes from funerary evidence (examining mummies to determine cause and age of death).

Egyptian women were subordinate to men, like in most pre-modern cultures.
They were less restricted than in some other ancient cultures like Greece or Rome.
Polygamy was rare, so women weren't usually in harem situations.
The family unit was based on a couple.
Women were not confined to their houses.
They could own property, inherit property, and run their own businesses.
They could represent themselves in court.

There were a few occasions where women ruled.
Queen Hatshepsut ruled as regent in the New Kingdom; statues represented her as a male pharaoh.
Cleopatra: An anomaly, ethnically Greek, and associated with Roman leaders.

Girls married at age 12-14 (onset of puberty) for they were to have children, and they had to start early.
Young men married around age 20 (after learning a trade and having possessions to provide for their family).
Women's work was confined to the home but seen as dignified.
Men were told to leave household affairs to their wives, and children were told to honor their mothers.