Domestic Space and Gender Roles in Ancient Egypt: A View from Amarna and Deir el-Medina

Through spatial, iconographic and textual analysis, archeologist Aikaterini Koltsida challenges the notion of rigid boundaries between gender, time and space in the domestic architecture of Ancient Egypt. Focusing on two specific workmen’s villages uncovered through archeological surveys, this essay shows how past studies has overlooked evidence of productive housework performed by women, such as weaving and animal keeping, while primarily emphasizing their reproductive roles. Koltsida’s findings reveal that a wide range of activities, including religious rituals and handicrafts, were conducted by women in the same spaces as their male counterparts. Morevover she questions the idea that household rooms were segregated along gender lines, suggesting that women and men may have simultaneously and interchangeably performed domestic chores and customs. This pieces, republished in this issue of ‘Burning Farm’, highlights how contemporary gender biases can subtly influence our understanding of domestic spaces from millennia ago.