Everything about Bos Aegyptiacus totally explained
The
Ancient Egyptian cattle
Bos aegyptiacus (name not recognized by
ITIS) was a domesticated form of
ox of uncertain origin. The earliest evidence of
Bos aegyptiacus is from the
Fayum region, dating back to the
8th millennium BC.
Unlike other species of ox,
B. aegyptiacus didn't have a hump. It had either large widespread horns, which arched first inward and then outward or shorter horns which had the same structure. According to Egyptian art,
B. aegyptiacus was coloured either black, brown, brown and white, white spotted, black and white, or white.
It is uncertain as to where
B. aegyptiacus originated, as some claim that it was acquired from the
Levant or
Mesopotamia while others claim that it was domesticated from a unique
North African subspecies of the
Aurochs,
Bos primigenius mauretanicus. There is evidence for both sides as cattle had been domesticated in the Levant by the 8th millennium BC but excavations of early
Holocene western
Sahara show that indigenous cattle existed previous to the 8th millennium.
Regardless,
B. aegyptiacus was of great importance to the Ancient Egyptians who put it out to pasture on land that was unfarmable, either because it was too far from the
Nile to
irrigate or in the
Nile Delta (and thus too wet to farm).
B. aegyptiacus was used for food,
milk,
leather, and
sacrifice.
B. aegyptiacus came to be considered so important that many
Egyptian gods were considered to have the form of
B. aegyptiacus, notable deities being
Hathor,
Ptah (as the
Apis Bull),
Menthu (as the
Bukha bull), and
Atum-Ra (as the
Mnevis Bull). Many were
mummified.
During the
New Kingdom the
Zebu, a hump-backed
cattle from
Syria was introduced to Egypt and the
B. aegyptiacus seems to have slowly been replaced by this new cattle.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Bos Aegyptiacus'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://bos_aegyptiacus.totallyexplained.com">Bos aegyptiacus Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
