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The feminist, medievalist and political theorist Lina Eckenstein (1857-1931) spent the excavation seasons from 1903 to 1906 working with Flinders Petrie (whose wife Hilda was a close friend) at Saqqara, Abydos and elsewhere. This 1921 publication was inspired by her experiences at the site of Serabit in the Sinai peninsula (Petrie's account of the excavation is also reissued in this series). Eckenstein describes it as a 'little history which will, I trust, appeal to those who take an interest in the reconstruction of the past and in the successive stages of religious development'. The narrative begins in the prehistoric period, suggesting that the inhospitable landscape (caused by ancient deforestation) and climate dissuaded large-scale permanent settlement until the first hermit and monastic communities of the Christian era (although the Egyptians had been drawn there by resources of turquoise and copper), and continues down to the nineteenth century.
List of contents
Foreword; 1. Introductory; 2. Sinai a centre of moon-cult; 3. The sanctuary at Serabit; 4. The Egyptians in Sinai, 1; 5. Early peoples and place names; 6. The Egyptians in Sinai, 2; 7. The Israelites in Sinai, 1; 8. The Israelites in Sinai, 2; 9. The Nabateans; 10. The hermits in Sinai; 11. The writings of the hermits; 12. The building of the convent; 13. Mohammad and St Katherine; 14. Sinai during the Crusades; 15. The pilgrims of the middle ages, 1; 16. The pilgrims of the middle ages, 2; 17. The convent between 1500 and 1800; 18. Sinai in the nineteenth century; Alphabetical index.
Summary
This 1921 narrative begins in the prehistoric period, suggesting that the inhospitable landscape and climate dissuaded large-scale permanent settlement until the first hermit and monastic communities of the Christian era (although the Egyptians had been drawn there by resources of turquoise and copper), and continues down to the nineteenth century.
