Ancient Egyptian scribes enjoyed a privileged status in the society of the time because of their reading and writing skills. However, the repetitive tasks of their work contributed to premature wear out of their bodies. The analysis of the bones of scribes buried in the Abusir necropolis between 2700 and 2180 BC made it possible to highlight degeneration due to osteoarthritis in different precise locations of their skeleton which the researchers describe as “degeneration factors”. risks linked to their professional activity.
Petra Brukner Havelková and colleagues from the Department of Anthropology at the National Museum in Prague and the Czech Institute of Egyptology at Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic, examined and compared the skeletal bones of 30 scribes and of 39 men of lower social status than the scribes. As the vast majority of the traits assessed did not differ between the two groups, the researchers deduced that the members of the control group had had a lifestyle that was not physically demanding and therefore similar to that of the scribes. “None had done grueling work, like that of an agricultural worker. They were probably members of the scribe’s family or people from the house cleaning it,” they say.
The scribes, however, were distinguished by a higher incidence of “osteoarthritis and degenerative changes” in certain specific areas of the skeleton, such as the mandible, cervical vertebrae, shoulder, hand, knee, pelvic bone and the foot, which would result, according to the authors, from the professional activity of scribes which consisted of repetitive tasks in a stationary posture.
To interpret their observations, the researchers based themselves on texts, wall relief decorations in tombs and statues describing the way in which these civil servants who were dedicated to writing administrative documents worked. “They used a fine rush pen shaped like a brush and wrote on papyrus, pottery shards or wooden boards. »
To accomplish their tasks, they mainly adopted three postures: the tailor’s position (sitting on the ground, legs crossed) where their skirt served as a writing table, a squatting position with one leg on the knee and the other folded with the heel on the ground, as well as standing. “The position chosen probably depended on the circumstances and environment in which the scribe carried out his activities and one imagines that each individual tended to return to the position he preferred. Even if these positions and the movements performed were not physically demanding, repeating the same movements and holding these positions for long periods day after day may have affected specific regions of the skeleton,” the study authors argue. in an article that they published Thursday June 27 in Scientific Reports.
One of the regions that appeared significantly more affected in scribes than in controls was the spine, particularly the cervical section behind the neck. “All cervical vertebrae show degeneration, more particularly osteoarthritis at the level of the apophyseal joints (that is to say between the vertebrae). The C7 (lowest) cervical vertebra, which is located where the lordotic (concave) curve of the cervical spine ends and the kyphosis (convex curve) of the thoracic spine begins, is often one of the most impaired. Among the scribes, it presents a huge incidence of osteoarthritis compared to the control group, which could result from a constant overload on the cervical spine,” the researchers point out.
In the typical working position of the scribe, the head is tilted forward and the spine also bends to accommodate the distance between the eye and the object that is on a horizontal work surface. In this “position which is characteristic of many modern professions, the head finds itself in front of the center of gravity” and the load moment applied to the segment between the cervical vertebra C7 and its neighbor, the dorsal vertebra D1, would be 3.6 times larger than in the neutral position. “Sitting cross-legged in such a position for long periods may have induced increased degeneration of the cervical spine in scribes,” the study authors explain.
They also noticed a very high prevalence of osteoarthritis at the level of the temporomandibular joint which connects the lower jaw to the skull. Osteoarthritis in this specific area usually results from dental pathologies, such as teeth grinding or particular eating habits. But its presence among the scribes could emanate from their habit of chewing the end of the obliquely cut rush used as a pen in order to give it the shape of a paintbrush. Scribes frequently repeated this action because “when the pen became frayed or clogged with ink, he would cut off that end which had become unusable and masticate the next section.”
We also noted in the group of scribes an increased presence of osteoarthritis in the right shoulder, more precisely at the level of the head of the humerus (bone located between the shoulder and the elbow) and the clavicle. This would indicate that the shoulder must have been overloaded when the scribes were in a static seated position and their arms were raised without support, as when typing.
The first metacarpal of the thumb of the right hand was also significantly altered by osteoarthritis, presumably due to pen grip and specific thumb movements whose high frequency and duration may have generated long-term mechanical stress.
The presence of osteoarthritis at the lower end of the right femur where the latter articulates with the patella of the knee – which was probably induced by the repetition of deep flexions of the knee -, as well as at the level of the neck of the talus of the right foot (tarsal bone which articulates with the tibia) and damage to the left ischial tuberosity (bulge located behind and at the bottom of the pelvic bone which is a point of support in position sitting) suggest that scribes preferred the squatting position where the right heel rests on the ground and the left leg is in a kneeling position or in a cross-legged sitting position, indicate Havelková and her colleagues.
According to the latter, all of the regions which were more strongly affected among scribes potentially represent risk factors linked to their professional activity. The fact that the damage in the lower limb region (femur, talar neck and pelvic bones) is not very different from that of the control group, however, suggests that the positions adopted by the scribes were common among the population of the Ancient Egyptian empire, they specify.
The researchers also argue that “the identification of the affected regions and particularly their combination could be useful in identifying individuals who exercised the profession of scribes among the skeletons found whose title would not have been preserved.”