J. van der Vliet, J. L. Hagen (eds.), Qasr Ibrim, Between Egypt and Africa: Studies in Cultural Exchange. (NINO symposium, Leiden, 11-12 December 2009). Egyptologische uitgaven, 26. Leiden; Leuven: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten; Peeters, 2013. Pp. vi, 191. ISBN 9789062582266. €42.40 (pb).More on Qasr Ibrim, which is the site where Coptic fragments of 2 (Slavonic) Enoch were recovered, is here and here. And editor Joost Hagen has been mentioned recently here.
Reviewed by Stanley M. Burstein, California State University, Los Angeles (sburste@calstatela.edu)
[Authors and titles are listed at the end of the review.]
Well-preserved settlement sites are often called another “Pompeii.” Though most don’t live up to the billing, Qasr Ibrim is one of the exceptions. Located roughly half way between the first and second cataracts of the Nile in the frontier zone between Egypt and Nubia, Qasr Ibrim was, during its long history from the early first millennium BCE to the nineteenth century CE, one of the principal urban and military centers of Lower Nubia. Moreover, not only did it survive the flooding of Lower Nubia by the Aswan High Dam, but the anaerobic conditions created by the hot and dry climate of the region have resulted in the exceptional preservation of organic materials of all kinds, from garbage to luxury textiles, leather goods, and papyrus and parchment documents. With publication of the extraordinarily rich finds from the Egyptian Exploration Society excavations at Qasr Ibrim still far from complete, books dealing with the site are of necessity essentially progress reports. That is certainly true of this excellent volume, which contains thirteen papers delivered at a conference held at Leiden in December, 2009 on the theme of cultural interaction between Egypt and the Mediterranean basin and the interior of Africa.
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UPDATE: Stephen Goranson sends reference to an article that challenges the identification of the Qasr Ibrim Coptic fragments with 2 Enoch: "The Angel of Tartarus and the Supposed Coptic Fragments of 2 Enoch," Böttrich, Christfried, Early Christianity, Volume 4, Number 4, December 2013, pp. 509-521(13).