The Sociology of Tomb and Temple Robbers of the Late 20^th Dynasty: Part II, The Bands of Thieves and the Ramesside Society

This article is the second part of a study devoted to the sociology of tomb robberies at the end of the 20 th Dynasty and focuses on the organization of the thieves into bands. These structures were relatively stable. Leadership was inconstant and associated with unequal loot sharing and conflict. Households, including enslaved people, played an important role in band organization particularly among tomb robbers, while hierarchy and patronage with corruption and blackmailing characterized temple thefts. Another social pattern relying on equality, solidarity, and merit existed among tomb robbers of an equal social status and probably corresponds to what ancient Egyptians called wnḏw. How these patterns of sociability are representative of the society of the time is discussed. [Formula: see text]