¹ The papyrus fragments were first presented by the authors at a colloquium at the British Museum entitled ‘Egypt, the Aegean and the Levant’ on 9 July 1992. They were subsequently illustrated and described by the authors in ‘Akhenaten's army?’, Egyptian Archaeology, 3 (1993), 34–5. Full publication of these and other papyrus fragments from Amarna is being prepared by RP for a forthcoming monograph. We are grateful to P. E. Nicholls for the photographs, and to the following for advice, comments and support: D. Arnold, W. V. Davies, M. Drower, H.-W. Fischer-Elfert, J. L. Fitton, V. Hankey, R. Johnson, B. Leach, C. Mee, E. Pusch, and T. G. Reid; and especially to the Dr M. Aylwin Cotton Foundation for a grant to cover the cost of the colour plate.

² These links are most recently reviewed in Warren, P., ‘Minoan Crete and pharaonic Egypt’, in Davies, W. V. and Schofield, L. (eds), Egypt, the Aegean and the Levant (London, 1994 in press).Google Scholar Recent studies on specific aspects of these links include: on pottery, Kemp, B. and Merrillees, R. S., Minoan Pottery in Second Millennium Egypt (Mainz am Rhein, 1980)Google Scholar; Minoans in Egyptian tomb–paintings, Wachsmann, S., Aegeans in the Theban Tombs (Leuven, 1987)Google Scholar; on Egyptian objects found in Crete, Phillips, J. S., The Impact and the Implications of the Egyptian and Egyptianizing Material Found in Bronze Age Crete ca. 3000–1100 BC (unpublished Ph.D. diss., Univ. of Toronto, 1991).Google Scholar Egyptian-Mycenaean connections were being researched by the late Bell, M.; see e.g. The Tulankhamun Burnt Group from Gurob, Egypt: Bases for the Absolute Chronology of LH III A and B (unpublished Ph.D. diss., Univ. of Pennsylvania; not seen by us).Google Scholar

³ Bietak, M., ‘Minoan wall-paintings unearthed at ancient Avaris’, Egyptian Archaeology, 2 (1992), 26–8Google Scholar; V. Hankey, ‘Review of the colloquium “Egypt, the Aegean and the Levant”’, ibid. 3 (1993), 27–9 (with errata at 4 (1994), 40); M. Bietak, ‘Connections between Egypt and the Minoan world: new results from Tell el-Daba/Avaris, Nile delta’, in Davies and Schofield (n. 2).

⁴ For a recent review of this material see Cline, E. H., Orientalia in the Late Bronze Age Aegean: A Catalogue and Analysis of Trade and Contact between the Aegean, and Egypt, Anatolia and the Near East (Ph.D. diss., Univ. of Pennsylvania; Ann Arbor, MI, University Microfilms).Google Scholar For a catalogue of Egyptian objects from excavations at Mycenae see id., ‘Egyptian and near eastern imports at LBA Mycenae’, in Davies and Schofield (n. 2). See also Hankey, V., ‘Pottery as evidence for trade, 1: From the mouth of the river Orontes to the Egyptian border; 2: Egypt’, in C. W., and Zerner, P. C. (eds), Wace and Blegen: Pottery as Evidence for Trade in the Aegean Bronze Age 1939–1981 (Amsterdam, in press).Google Scholar

⁵ The chronology is that of Quirke, S. and Spencer, J. (eds), The British Museum Book of Ancient Egypt (London, 1992)Google Scholar; all dates are approximate.

⁶ The numbers and nature of the Amarna sherds are usefully summarized in Hankey, V., ‘The Aegean interest in El Amarna’, Journal of Mediterranean Anthropology and Archaeology, i (1980), 38–43.Google Scholar

⁷ Mommsen, H., Beier, T., Diehl, U., and Podzuweit, Ch., ‘Provenance determination of Mycenaean sherds found in Tell El Amarna by neutron activation analysis’, Journal of Archaeological Science, 19 (1992), 295–302.CrossRefGoogle Scholar NAA analsyes carried out on Mycenaean pots from other sites in Egypt, such as Gurob, have produced similar results, as in Leonard, A., Middleton, A., Hughes, M., and Schofield, L., ‘The making of Aegean stirrup-jars: technique, tradition and trade,’ BSA 88 (1993), 105–23, at 118–19.Google Scholar

⁸ Merrillees, R. S., ‘Mycenaean pottery from the time of Akhenaten in Egypt’, in Acts of the International Symposium ‘The Mycenaeans in the Eastern Mediterranean’ (Nicosia, 1973), 175–86.Google Scholar

⁹ Hankey (n. 6), 45–6.

¹⁰ Cline, E. H., ‘Monkey business in the bronze age Aegean’, BSA 86 (1991), 29–42.Google Scholar

¹¹ The bases have been destroyed by the local villagers: Porter, B. and Moss, R., Topographical Bibliography, ii ² (Oxford, 1972), 450–1.Google Scholar The definitive publication of these lists is in Edel, E., Ortsnamenlisten aus dem Totenlempel Amenophis III (Bonn, 1966).Google Scholar

¹² The ‘Aegean list’ (list EN) is also discussed in Astour, M. C., ‘Aegean place-names in an Egyptian inscription’, AJA 70 (1966), 313–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Scholars denying that the list represents an actual visit to the Aegean in the reign of Amenhotep III include Merrillees, R. S., ‘Aegean bronze age relations with Egypt’, AJA 76 (1972), 290.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹³ A recent translation is Moran, W. L., The Amarna Letters (Baltimore and London, 1992).Google Scholar

¹⁴ Davies, N. de G., The Rock Tombs of el Amarna, iii (London, 1905), 9–12, pls 13–15Google Scholar; the same ‘durbah’ is also represented in the tomb of Meryre II: ibid. ii (London, 1905), 38–43, pls 38–40, 47.

¹⁵ On the toponym see Wachsmann (n. 2), 93–9.

¹⁶ Ventris, M. and Chadwick, J., Documents in Mycenaean Greek (Cambridge, 1956), 136.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Wachsmann (n. 2), 27–40.

¹⁸ Ibid. 35–7; on the toponym ‘islands …’ see ibid. 93–9.

¹⁹ This has been disputed by Strange, J. S., who identifies Keftiu with Cyprus: ‘Caphtor/Keftiu: a new investigation’, Acta Theologica Danica, 14 (Leiden, 1980).Google Scholar His proposals are refuted by Wachsmann (n. 2), 93–102.

²⁰ Martin, G. T., The Memphite Tomb of Horemheb Commander-in-chief of Tut'ankhamun (London, 1989), 27Google Scholar; for the sherds, see p. x.

²¹ Merrillees 1972 (n. 12), 289. But cf. id. 1973 (n. 8), 180; Wachsmann (n. 2), 108.

²² Wachsmann (n. 2), 109–10.

²³ Pendlebury, J. D., The City of Akhenaten, iii: The Central City and the Officials' Quarters (London, 1951), 140–1Google Scholar; see also Kemp, B. J., Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization (London and New York, 1989), 283–5Google Scholar; Kemp, B. J. and Garfy, S., A Survey of the Ancient City of el-'Amarna (London, 1993), 63Google Scholar, map sheet 5.

²⁴ Namely, a faience ring (36/79) and a pen-case with the cartouche ‘Amenhotep’ (36/163). Pendlebury (n. 23), 141, pl. 79. 9.

²⁵ Letter of W. Fairman dated 5 Jan. 1954, now in the offices of the Egypt Exploration Society.

²⁶ Ashmolean Museum 9134.266 (mentioned in JEA 24 (1938), 161). They are currently being conserved in the BM before publication with Amarna fragments. They have traces of painted vignettes and hieroglyphs.

²⁷ Pendlebury (n. 23), iii. 141.

²⁸ This is clear from a letter of Fairman, cited above (n. 25),.

²⁹ Christie's sale catalogue, Fine Antiquities: London, Wed. 8 July 1992, 102 (lot 268: ‘A group of painted papyrus fragments from the House of the King's Statue at Teli-el-Amarna’).

³⁰ Gaballa, G. A., Narrative in Egyptian Art (Mainz am Rhein, 1976), 30–2, 38–40.Google Scholar

³¹ See Gaballa (n. 30), 33–40, 90–1, 99–129; a new example from the start of the Eighteenth Dynasty is published by Harvey, S., ‘Monuments of Ahmose at Abydos’, Egyptian Archaeology, 4 (1994), 3–5.Google Scholar

³² Davies, N. M. and Gardiner, A. H., Tutankhamun's Painted Box (Oxford, 1962), esp. pls 1–2.Google Scholar

³³ See Schulman, A. R., ‘Hittites, helmets and Amarna: Akhenaten's first Hittite war’, in Redford, D. B., The Akhenaten Temple Project, ii: Rwd-Mnw and Inscriptions (Aegypti Texta Propositaque, 1; Toronto, 1988), 53–79Google Scholar; R. Johnson, pers. comm.

³⁴ Schulman, A. R., ‘Some remarks on the military background of the Amarna Period’, JARCE 5 (1964), 51–69CrossRefGoogle Scholar, with brief communication at pp. 124–6; see also n. 33 above.

³⁵ For Libyan features see O'Connor, D., ‘The nature of Tjemhu (Libyan) society in the later New Kingdom,’ in Leahy, A. (ed.), Libya and Egypt c.1300–750 BC (London, 1990), 29–113.Google Scholar

³⁶ The stela from the funerary temple of Amenhotep III at Thebes: Urk. iv. 1656. 14; Davies, N. de G., The Rock Tombs of el Amarna, i: The Tomb of Meryra (London, 1903), pl. 15.Google Scholar

³⁷ The Nineteenth Dynasty Miscellany of P. Lansing describes the hardships of a soldier's life thus: ‘The enemy is come and surrounds him with arrows, and life is far from him … But he knows not himself. His body is weak and his knee is feeble on account of him’ (i.e. the enemy; 10. 2–3). Trans, after Caminos, R., Late Egyptian Miscellanies (London, 1954), 401.Google Scholar We are very grateful to H.-W. Fischer-Elfert for drawing our attention to this.

³⁸ Trans, in Lichtheim, M., Ancient Egyptian Literature, ii (Berkeley, 1976), 57–72.Google Scholar

³⁹ See n. 32.

⁴⁰ Kendall, T., ‘gurpisu ša aweli: the helmets of the warriors at Nuzi’, in Morrison, M. A. and Owen, D. L., Studies in the Civilization and Culture of Nuzi and the Humans: In Honour of Ernest R. Lachman (Winona Lake, Indiana, 1981), i, 201–31.Google Scholar

⁴¹ Carter, H. and Newberry, P. E., The Tomb of Thoutmosis IV (Westminster, 1904), 26–33, pls 10–11.Google Scholar

⁴² Kendall (n. 40), 217, 221.

⁴³ Schulman (n. 34), 54–5 n. 25.

⁴⁴ Kendall (n. 40), 219–21.

⁴⁵ See Wachsmann (n. 2), 76; Amenmes = Porter and Moss (n. 11), I. 1, 82; Menkheperreseneb = I.1, 177. The scenes are illustrated in Davies, N. and Davies, N. de G., The Tombs of Menkheperrasonb, Amenmose, and Another (London, 1933), pls 5, 7, 34–5Google Scholar; Kendall (n. 40), 215–16.

⁴⁶ A note to this effect was included in the entry in the Christie's catalogue (see n. 29), which was derived from Fairman's notes.

⁴⁷ Wachsmann (n. 2), 4–26.

⁴⁸ e.g. on an ivory inlay head from a chamber tomb at Mycenae: Tsountas, G., Arch. Eph. (1888), pl. 8. 12Google Scholar; Borchhardt, J., Homerische Helme (Mainz am Rhein, 1972), 34, pl. 2. 1.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ e.g. on the boar's tusk helmet found with the Dendra panoply in Dendra chamber tomb XII: Hood, S., AR 1961, 9 f.Google Scholar; Borchhardt (n. 48), 32, pl. 6.

⁵⁰ For hunting and the symbolic aspect of a boar's tusk helmet, see Morris, C., ‘In pursuit of the white-tusked boar: aspects of hunting in Mycenaean society’, in Hägg, R. and Nordquist, G.C. (eds) Celebrations of Death and Divinity in the Bronze Age Argolid (Stockholm, 1990), 149–56.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Goldmann, H., Excavations at Eutresis in Boeotia (Harvard, 1931), 220, fig. 290.Google Scholar

⁵² Grave N, grave circle B: Mylonas, G., Ancient Mycenae (Princeton, 1957), 149.Google Scholar Graves IV and V, grave circle A: Karo, G., Die Schachtgräber von Mykenai (Munich, 1930), 112, nos. 521–31, pls 69–70Google Scholar; 151, no. 877, pl. 71.

⁵³ In Kammergrab B: Yalouris, N., ‘Mykenische Bronzeschutzwaffen’, AM 75 (1960), 44, Beil. 31. 4.Google Scholar A list of surviving remains of these helmets and pieces cut for helmets are usefully listed in Borchhardt (n. 48), 32–3 (mainland), 52 (Crete). Depictions of such helmets are likewise listed at 33–7 (mainland), 52 (Crete). See also A. P. Varvarigos, (unpublished Ph.D. diss., Athens, 1981).

⁵⁴ Karo (n. 52), 119, pls 128–31; Sakellariou, A., ‘Une cratère d'argent avec scène de bataille provenant de la IVème tombe de Mycènes’, Congresso di micenologia, i (1967), 262–5, pls 1–4.Google Scholar Gold ring: Schliemann, H., Mycenae: A Narrative of Researches and Discoveries at Mycenae and Tiryns (London, 1878), 259, no. 335.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Vermeule, E. and Karageorghis, V., Mycenaean Pictorial Vase Painting (Harvard 1982), pl. 10. 19. 1.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ See n. 47.

⁵⁷ Reg. no. BM GR 1882.10–14.8, cat. no. 213; no known provenance. Assigned to LH III C in Kenna, V. E. G., Die englischen Museen, ii (CMS vii; Berlin, 1967), 235, no. 195Google Scholar; Borchhardt (n. 48), 52, pl. 4. 7.

⁵⁸ From the votive deposit below the Delos Artemision. Gallet de Santerre, H. and Trehheux, J., ‘Rapport sur le dépôt égéen et géométrique de l'Artémision à Délos’, BCH 71–2 (1947–1948), 156, pl. 25Google Scholar; Borchhardt (n. 48), 74, pl. 3. 1; Poursat, J.–C., Les Ivoires mycéniens: essai sur la formation d'un art mycénien (Athens, 1977), 157, pl. 14Google Scholar; Krzyszkowska, O., ‘The Enkomi warrior head reconsidered’, BSA 86 (1991), 116.Google Scholar

⁵⁹ Mylonas, G., PAE 1971 [1973], 150, pl. 184 b–c.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ Lang, M. L., The Palace of Nestor at Pylos, ii: The Frescoes (Princeton, 1969), 32 H SW: 75 f., pl 24 c.Google Scholar

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⁶² e.g. the horn brought by a composite Aegean in the tomb of Menkheperreseneb: Davies and Davies (n. 45), frontispiece, p. 7.

⁶³ Cerny, J., Paper and Books in Ancient Egypt (London, 1952), 6–7.Google Scholar

⁶⁴ Pusch, Edgar B., ‘Auslandisches Kulturgut in Qantir–Piramesse’, in Schoske, S. (ed.), Akten des 4. internationalen Ägyptologenkongresses, ii (Munich, 1985), 254.Google Scholar

⁶⁵ Davies and Gardiner (n. 32), pls 1–4.

⁶⁶ Morgan (n. 61), pl. 2.

⁶⁷ Verdelis, N. M., ‘Neue Funde von Dendra’, AM 82 (1967), 1 ff.Google ScholarÅström, P. et al. , The Cuirass Tomb and Other Finds from Dendra (SIMA 4; 1977), 28 ff.Google Scholar

⁶⁸ Åkerström, A., Berbati, ii: The Pictorial Pottery (Stockholm, 1987), 131.Google Scholar

⁶⁹ From Klavdhia, Cyprus. Walters, H. B., Catalogue of the Greek and Etruscan Vases in the British Museum, i. 2: Cypriote, Italian and Etruscan Pottery (London, 1912), 67, no. C 342Google Scholar; CVA British Museum, i, pl. 10. 8; Vermeule and Karageorghis (n. 55), fig. 4. 18.

⁷⁰ Pierides Collection, cat. no. 33; unknown provenance. CVA Cyprus ii, pl. 1; Vermeule and Karageorghis (n. 55), fig. 4. 15.

⁷¹ Crouwel, J., Chariots and Other Means of Land Transport in Bronze Age Greece (Amsterdam, 1981), 133.Google Scholar Crouwel himself does not extend this line of argument to the dotted garments, which he sees as non-specific patterning. The dotting on such garments is interpreted by some as being representations of scale armour: Catling, H., ‘A bronze plate from a scale-corslet found at Mycenae’, AA 85 (1970), 441–9.Google Scholar

⁷² Metropolitan Museum 74.51964; Myres, J. L., Handbook of the Cesnola Collection of Antiquities from Cyprus (New York, 1914), 48, no. 436Google Scholar; Vermeule and Karageorghis (n. 55), pl. 3. 16.

⁷³ Walters (n. 69), 65, no. C 339; Vermeule and Karageorghis (n. 55), pl. 3. 21.

⁷⁴ Åkerström (n. 68), pl. 6. 3.

⁷⁵ A tablet from Tiryns, Si 5, again has to-ra-ku on each line with an ideogram, one resembling Tunica and one Arma: Crouwel (n. 71), 124–5, pls 169–9.

⁷⁶ Ventris and Chadwick (n. 16), 329–30, no. 230.

⁷⁷ Åkerström (n. 68), 131–2, identifies this with a short metal corslet for fighting on foot. Vandenabeele, F. and Olivier, J.-P., Les Idéogrammes archéologiques du Linéaire B (Paris, 1979), 21–2Google Scholar, fig. 7, suggest a similar interpretation, namely that the ideogram of the object called qe–ro must indicate two plaques of a short metal tunic.

⁷⁸ Ventris and Chadwick (n. 16), 380–1, no. 299 = V 789: ‘qe–ro: we have already met this word on 230 = K 740, where it describes an object whose outline is reminiscent of the corslet ideogram and has the adjunct Bronze. It possibly represents some kind of foundation or framing to a metal-reinforced corslet’. However, in the second edition (1973), 495, they interpret qe–ro as arm protectors.

⁷⁹ Chadwick, J., The Mycenaean World (Cambridge, 1976), 160Google Scholar; Crouwel (n. 71), 125.

⁸⁰ Yalouris (n. 53), 47, Beil. 29.

⁸¹ Marinatos, S., Arch. Eph. (1932), 39, pl. 16 topGoogle Scholar; Snodgrass, A. M., Early Greek Armour and Weapons (Edinburgh, 1964), 72.Google Scholar

⁸² See Åkerström (n. 68), 132–3.

⁸³ See e.g. the Asiatics on the painted casket of Tutankhamen: Davies and Gardiner (n. 32), pl. 1.

⁸⁴ Wachsmann (n. 2), 41–2. The presence of the helmets and the fragmentary nature of the papyrus prevent us from seeing whether the helmeted warriors also have the long locks of hair characteristic of depictions of Aegeans. However, judging from the surviving traces this is unlikely.

⁸⁵ Thutmosis III, when recording the booty from Megiddo in his annals at Karnak, includes ‘1 fine bronze coat of mail belonging to that enemy; 1 fine bronze coat of mail belonging to the prince of Megiddo; 200 [leather] coats of mail belonging to his wretched army’ (Urk. iv. 664. 3–5; trans, in Lichtheim (n. 38), 34).

⁸⁶ Kendall (n. 40), 215–17.

⁸⁷ The stirrup jar is published by V. Hankey in Davies and Schofield (n. 2).