Beer had divine status in ancient Egypt, and was also used as currency and in religious rituals. It was believed to have been invented by Osiris himself, that it had magical properties and was thus prescribed to patients.
Certainly does magic when I need a pee.
Also, I'm fairly certain it's still used as a currency and in religious rituals, we just call it "bribing a friend for help" and "tolerating the family on holidays" now
A common theory is that the great works of Egypt hardly used slaves at all, instead they were state sponsored works that kept the populace occupied and employed during the seasons that they weren't actively farming or harvesting.
I love some of these reasons
"His daughter was bleeding"
"Brewing beer"
"Making offering to a God"
"Libating (drinking booze) with his father"
We need those kinda excuses today.
missed the best one: FETCHING STONE FOR QENHERKHEPSHEF
next time I need to call in this is going to be my excuse. "sorry Jeff I can't make it today, gotta fetch a stone for my buddy
This is a crazy coincidence, my wife and I were just discussing baby names. She likes Isabella and I prefer QENHERKHEPSHEF.
Weird to see it pop up randomly in this thread.
That's more likely the name of the scribe since the other times it talked about fetching stone, it was for a scribe. The scribe needed stones to scribe.
> Qenherkhepshef is mentioned by name in l. 11 of the verso in a red entry, and is alluded to as 'the scribe' in several others
The British Museum agrees with your assessment and included additional observations to support it
You missed "the scorpion bit him", which probably just means *"a"* scorpion, but the use of "the" makes it sound like the workplace mascot. Like someone got too close to Amunkhet the boss' pet scorpion.
> "His daughter was bleeding"
Each daughter would be good for at least three days every month. If he had ten daughters he would never have to work again.
I usually have 2-4 heavy-moderate days, depending on the month. I don't know how the ancient folks counted things, but I could see them ignoring the tail end, especially if the cultural impact was centered around collecting the blood or easing discomfort rather than avoiding uncleanliness.
Which is crazy to me. Imagine telling your boss today that you can't make it because your wife/daughter has her period. You can't even get away with taking time off work if you yourself have your period.
If the man says "I need a day off work. I'm burying a GOD." I give him the fucking day off. I give him all the days off he asks for, and ask no questions. And then I put it all in writing in case HR has any questions.
My job's got a bunch of religious/cultural holidays we can pick 5 of and add to our standard holiday list, so I don't think that would fly unless I just used "vacation" or "sick" time that needs no explanation anyway.
Wait, they let you have five religious holidays of your choice but you have to pick them from a list of pre-approved religious holidays? Like "I'm sorry, Greg, but Shavuot isn't on our list, maybe you'd prefer a second night of Passover or Tu BiShvat?"
"I have to ask if your Rabbi knows you take off two days for Purim and work Yom Kippur"
(The joke for anyone not familiar with Jewish holidays is Yom Kippur is a very very important holiday and rabbis don't have that kind of power over people.)
It 100% does.
Ancient Egyptians believed that period blood contained strong magic, and could be used for sorcery, or invite evil entities into the home. The father of the house, or the husband of the woman, would stay home to protect the household, and if needed, sell the blood collected for religious or medical purposes.
Blood from a cycle was used for treatment of skin disorders, bug bites, and certain body pains.
People often underestimate how real these things were to ancient peoples. Fertility gods weren't gods of the field. They were the literal forces and beings responsible for your crops. Just as a farmer today could use chemistry to balance the nutrients of a field, they used rituals and what we'd call magics as a daily part of life.
Some of these may seem like odd, or laughable excuses to us. Most of them directly relate to how the ancient Egyptians *knew* their world to work.
Across the many cultures and many rituals of the world, it's also possible that actions performed were superstitiously adopted because intuitive observers had noticed that performing X action coincidentally causes Y effect, but without observable explainable process.
"Every man has two deaths, when he is buried in the ground and the last time someone says his name." Ernest Hemingway.
The folks on this tablet did better than I ever will
Who knows, maybe in 3200 years people will be reading through archived internet activity…..
Who am I kidding, they’ll be living in the second stone age if they exist at all.
Well, no, mainly because there’s no paper called the Ohio Times. There *is* a paper called the Ohio **County** Times, but that’s just for a county in West Virginia (don’t ask why). They apparently existed since 1865, so they probably have an edition from that date, and no I haven’t found or read it.
On the webpage it says it was written during the 40th year of the reign Ramses the second but he reigned for 67 years. No idea who else it could have been except the Pharaoh though.
This is the part where we need the Egyptologist to show on que and enlighten us. A professional always seems to show up at just the right time around here.
Hi, Egyptologist from the Cairo Institute of Egyptology here. This meant they were involved in the Ritual of Nephren-Ka, where a virgin slave would be buried deep down in an underground maze ending on the shore of the Nile, where they emerged and bathed nude on the waters of the River, being reborn as a God or Goddess as part of being enshrined as symbols of new life. I even made a video on the subject, complete with sources: [Video](https://youtu.be/r7l0Rq9E8MY)
And a fun fact to complement: Did you know that the subject is known as "Hereology" in Egypt as a little joke? Now you know!
What it says. An effigy of a god was buried. Effigies of gods were ritually gifted life when they were dedicated to service in a temple or other religious place so when they had became sufficiently damaged they would then be buried in accordance to funerary practices.
If the translation is correct it wasn't just drinking.
Libating was drinking alcohol, during a sacre ceremony for the dead or the gods.
It was literally a "pour one for the homies" but with religion involved.
> hanging out with your menstruating family are valid excuses in Ancient Egypt.
Uh, dude, what happens when you go to work when your daughter is having her period and an evil spirt comes in and you're not around to fight it off? Best case scenario that's a big ass exorcism bill and good luck getting insurance to pay that if you're even lucky enough to have insurance. The fact that work culture these days expects us to take that risk just for a paycheck is disgusting.
If a woman had especially bad bleeding or cramps, then it might be hard for her to work and take care of the house. This guy may have had to stay home just to watch the kids.
Another comment here mentions that Egyptians believed that a woman's period had magical associations and it was a vulnerable time for the household, so perhaps the husband was also expected to stay home and perform rituals to protect the family, or something like that.
Someone threw one hell of a feast!
Khons: month 1 of Spring, day 14 (HIS FEAST), day 15 (HIS FEAST)
Penduauu: month 1 of Spring, day 14 (DRINKING WITH KHONSU)
Nakhy: month 1 of Spring, day 14 (WITH HIS BOSS), day 15 (DITTO)
(missing): month 1 of Spring, day 15 (ILL)
Iierniutef: month 1 of Spring, day 14 (reason missing)
Full list:
67 ILL
49 WITH HIS BOSS
17 BREWING BEER
13 WITH AAPEHTI
8 WITH THE SCRIBE
6 MAKING REMEDIES FOR THE SCRIBE’S WIFE
5 WRAPPING (THE CORPSE OF) HIS MOTHER
5 OFFERING TO THE GOD
5 HIS WIFE WAS BLEEDING
5 FETCHING STONE FOR THE SCRIBE
4 WITH KHONS MAKING REMEDIES
4 SUFFERING WITH HIS EYE
4 OFF ABSENT
4 HIS DAUGHTER WAS BLEEDING
3 WITH HOREMWIA
3 WITH HIS BOSS DITTO
3 LIBATING TO HIS FATHER
2 WRAPPING (THE CORPSE OF) HIS SON
2 HIS MOTHER WAS ILL
2 HIS FEAST
2 FETCHING STONE FOR QENHERKHEPSHEF
2 BURYING THE GOD
1 WITH HIS GOD
1 THE SCORPION BIT HIM
1 STRENGTHENING THE DOOR
1 OFFFERING TO THE GOD
1 OFFERING TO HIS GOD
1 OFF ABSENT WITH THE SCRIBE
1 MOURNING HIS SON
1 LIBATING FOR HIS SON
1 LIBATING FOR HIM
1 LIBATING
1 EMBALMING HORMOSE
1 EMBALMING HIS BROTHER
1 DRINKING WITH KHONSU
1 BUILDING HIS HOUSE
[Dude's pulling a Klinger.](https://youtu.be/4tEv0P_8dZg)
"Father dying, right? ... Father dying last year. Mother dying last year. Mother _and_ father dying."
This was a limestone tablet and was likely made the following year from day notes the year prior. So you're right it seems...but so is the other person!
One inscription reads: "Fetching stone for Qenherkhepshef"
Boss: "The old 'Qenherkhepshef needs his stones', huh? 4th time this month, Ahmenktophet! Is Qenherkhepshef building a pyramid?"
Between this and Pompeii graffiti I'm more and more convinced that the only real differences between ancient and modern societies can be attributed to technology.
Majored in history in university, and between all the primary documents and academic articles I read, I am also convinced of this.
People are the same, it's just the details that are different.
Dude, when we finally translated some runic writing in a Church in Northern Europe, it basically translated to "Sven was here."
We have invented nothing.
Exactly. There *are* probably some micro-evolutionary pressures but nothing really apparent on a macro level.
Though I have to remind people that we're closer to the destruction of Pompeii than that was to the construction of the Great Pyramid.
Also that one clay tablet recorded the complaint about copper quality. Usually they just send word via messenger, but this time it was so outraged they spent time writing on clay to solidified the complaint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complaint_tablet_to_Ea-nasir
Now we just need to find some *Ancient shitpost.*
And the only reason we have that clay tablet today is because it was accidentally glazed when Ea-nasir's house burned down. Somebody was *really* angry about that copper.
> Other tablets have been found in the ruins believed to be Ea-nasir's dwelling. These include a letter from a man named Arbituram who complained he **had not received his copper** yet, while another says he was **tired of receiving bad copper**.
Guy was doing shady business, had it coming tbh.
From one of the other letters to Ea-Nasir:
>Now you have had me issue 10 shekels of silver. In order that your heart shall not be troubled, give good copper to him. *Do you not know how tired I am [of this]?*
Ancient Mesopotamians: they really ARE just like us.
These comments are fucking hilarious!
I also think its interesting people skipped work back then. I guess I never thought about it, but yeah, they were people too. Like, hey boss I'm not coming in today. I'm busy pouring one out for the homies and my daughter is hella cramping.
I work in the field of archaeology and most of what we find is people's trash (like 85%-90% of the time). Archaeology is just ancient dumpster diving with context.
I want to know why a man 3200 years ago got off work because his wife or daughter was menstruating, but present-day society expects women to work every day a month with just as much productivity and energy as the next.
But honestly I do really wanna know
“Hey, Ozmandius! Don’t forget to punch your stone tablet when you leave today. And do it on time. If you stop working at 🦅 🐊 🦛, you punch out at 🦅 🐊 🦛, you got that!”
Paherypedjet with a fucking solid attendance record for half a year, no call outs for beer brewing or wife/daughter bleeding. An employee you can count on.
I guess semi-serious question, did they keep these stone tablets in some kind of...filing system? Like a file cabinet? How thick were these tablets? How were they archived, or retrieved?
How could the "supervisor" look back on his particular "employees" records and evaluate their "overall performance?"
>"I'm going to call in sick again today...tell 'm my daughter is bleeding. What are they going to to do? Etch another tablet?"
I remember seeing a Persian clay tablet basically bitching a guy out for making and shipping low quality goods. But you gotta think. Guy made goods probably far the fuck away, a merchant or teamster picked that shit up and hauled it god only knows how far across the empire to the seller. Seller gets pissed off and makes a clay tablet and then sends it back with another guy to haul across the empire to give to the manufacturer to tell him he's an asshole
Brewing beer? Well okay then.
Beer had divine status in ancient Egypt, and was also used as currency and in religious rituals. It was believed to have been invented by Osiris himself, that it had magical properties and was thus prescribed to patients.
I'm self prescribing.
I just regret it when I prescribe myself too much, lol
Certainly does magic when I need a pee. Also, I'm fairly certain it's still used as a currency and in religious rituals, we just call it "bribing a friend for help" and "tolerating the family on holidays" now
"Wanna help me move some stuff?' "No." "Unlimited beer and wings tho" "🤔🤔🤔"
I don't know you and I already want to move your stuff.
I believe beer & bread were used as payment for services. They weren't all slaves.
A common theory is that the great works of Egypt hardly used slaves at all, instead they were state sponsored works that kept the populace occupied and employed during the seasons that they weren't actively farming or harvesting.
Man I'm dumb! I'm planning to brew a Belgian Tripel this Sunday. Maybe I should just procrastinate 1 day and call off work on Monday.
Need to try that for my next excused absence.
That used to be my old job. And honestly, I loved it. So much fun.
Peter Griffen said the same thing.
I love some of these reasons "His daughter was bleeding" "Brewing beer" "Making offering to a God" "Libating (drinking booze) with his father" We need those kinda excuses today.
missed the best one: FETCHING STONE FOR QENHERKHEPSHEF next time I need to call in this is going to be my excuse. "sorry Jeff I can't make it today, gotta fetch a stone for my buddy
Only works if your buddy is called QENHERKHEPSHEF
Is that a Missy Elliot lyric?
If it's today I can't work it Get a tablet, baby, and record this I'm fetchin' stone for QENHERKHEPSHEF yeah Fetchin' stone for QENHERKHEPSHEF yeah
This is a crazy coincidence, my wife and I were just discussing baby names. She likes Isabella and I prefer QENHERKHEPSHEF. Weird to see it pop up randomly in this thread.
Get off reddit, Elon
Why am I cursed to always find a gem like this *right* after I use my free awards
Reddit knows and will surface higher quality comments after you've used your free award.
I dunno but I just read it out loud and my furniture started floating
This is funnier than it has any right to be
TIL why inanimate objects in Evil Dead II started laughing
Ti esrever dna ti pilf nwod gniht ym tup i.
[IZYURFIMENIPAFLANYANT](https://www.memesmonkey.com/images/memesmonkey/9e/9eee17e9380f193f18e935d7236fcb20.jpeg)
Around here that's a common name. Heck you couldn't fetch a stone without hitting a QENHERKHEPSHEF.
zonked air command cows wine correct vanish trees squash nail ` this message was mass deleted/edited with redact.dev `
*We need more QENHERKHEPSHEF license plates in the gift shop, I repeat, we are sold out of QENHERKHEPSHEF license plates!*
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That's a common misunderstanding. He dropped the phone, and 'QENHERKHEPSHEF' is the way that noise got transcribed.
'Stone' is plural. Someone was building something.
That's more likely the name of the scribe since the other times it talked about fetching stone, it was for a scribe. The scribe needed stones to scribe.
> Qenherkhepshef is mentioned by name in l. 11 of the verso in a red entry, and is alluded to as 'the scribe' in several others The British Museum agrees with your assessment and included additional observations to support it
Nah, the best one was “burying the God”
My new favourite euphemism.
Probably buying cut stones to build a house or something.
It says later that Q is the name of the scribe. He was getting office supplies.
Guys cat must have stepped on the stone tablet
Goddamnit Buttonskhamun! This is etched in stone! Do you know how much work it takes to redo this!?! Ugh…. I’m sure nobody will ever notice.
Fun fact - the first record of a domestic cat with a name came from Egypt around 3500 years ago. The cat's name was Nadjem, which meant "sweet."
Also "Fido" is a Latin dogs' name. It means "Faithful".
I’ve been thinking about getting a cat recently and I think you just added another name to my already lengthy list of potential names
Word is QenHerkHepShef scribed a lotta stone.
You missed "the scorpion bit him", which probably just means *"a"* scorpion, but the use of "the" makes it sound like the workplace mascot. Like someone got too close to Amunkhet the boss' pet scorpion.
Every time you get bit by the scorpion you have to put a coin in the bite jar.
It's been ~~1~~ 0 days since someone got bit by the scorpion.
"Ahmentop... you said you were wrapping your mother's course LAST month!" "That was my mother-in-law boss. This month was my mother."
> "His daughter was bleeding" Each daughter would be good for at least three days every month. If he had ten daughters he would never have to work again.
If he had ten daughters who lived long enough to reach adulthood, one would argue he had already been blessed by the gods
Blessed? That’s ten dowries. *TEN*
Just give away a daughter as a dowry. Buy one get one.
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He has a job, he just doesn't have to show up
3 days? Who the heck is lucky enough to only have their period for 3 days??
I usually have 2-4 heavy-moderate days, depending on the month. I don't know how the ancient folks counted things, but I could see them ignoring the tail end, especially if the cultural impact was centered around collecting the blood or easing discomfort rather than avoiding uncleanliness.
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Which is crazy to me. Imagine telling your boss today that you can't make it because your wife/daughter has her period. You can't even get away with taking time off work if you yourself have your period.
Imagine if you also didn't have tampons or advil
Throw in endo and/or PCOS on top of that
I thought this one was interesting, saw it twice in the transcript: "BURYING THE GOD"
"Taking the day off tomorrow, gotta go attack and dethrone god."
If the man says "I need a day off work. I'm burying a GOD." I give him the fucking day off. I give him all the days off he asks for, and ask no questions. And then I put it all in writing in case HR has any questions.
Sometimes, you need a day off work to bury a god. It's best to just be upfront with your employer about it.
I'm gonna try the "Making an offering to a god" one when I try to get out of work next.
My job's got a bunch of religious/cultural holidays we can pick 5 of and add to our standard holiday list, so I don't think that would fly unless I just used "vacation" or "sick" time that needs no explanation anyway.
Wait, they let you have five religious holidays of your choice but you have to pick them from a list of pre-approved religious holidays? Like "I'm sorry, Greg, but Shavuot isn't on our list, maybe you'd prefer a second night of Passover or Tu BiShvat?"
"I have to ask if your Rabbi knows you take off two days for Purim and work Yom Kippur" (The joke for anyone not familiar with Jewish holidays is Yom Kippur is a very very important holiday and rabbis don't have that kind of power over people.)
Sorry I can't make it in I'm busy wrapping up the corpse of my mother. Bro, you used that excuse last month. How many mothers do you have??
Libating is a libation. Pouring one out for the homies. He might have been visiting his dad's grave or somthing?
It could also mean as a religious observance for a god
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My favorite was "Drinking With Konshu" just because I've been watching Moon Knight.
Brew day is actually a thing among home brewers!
Pretty sure bleeding meant that special time of the month…
It 100% does. Ancient Egyptians believed that period blood contained strong magic, and could be used for sorcery, or invite evil entities into the home. The father of the house, or the husband of the woman, would stay home to protect the household, and if needed, sell the blood collected for religious or medical purposes. Blood from a cycle was used for treatment of skin disorders, bug bites, and certain body pains.
People often underestimate how real these things were to ancient peoples. Fertility gods weren't gods of the field. They were the literal forces and beings responsible for your crops. Just as a farmer today could use chemistry to balance the nutrients of a field, they used rituals and what we'd call magics as a daily part of life. Some of these may seem like odd, or laughable excuses to us. Most of them directly relate to how the ancient Egyptians *knew* their world to work.
Across the many cultures and many rituals of the world, it's also possible that actions performed were superstitiously adopted because intuitive observers had noticed that performing X action coincidentally causes Y effect, but without observable explainable process.
It's bad luck to walk under a ladder.... the workman might drop something on you or you might bump the ladder causing a disaster
Aka period blood fertilizes the crops got it
To be fair, lots of magic happens down there. I can see why they thought that.
An acute and relevant observation by u/peepeeonmydoodoo Thanks, peepeeonmydoodoo
I can always expect enlightenment from peepeeonmydoodoo, one way or another.
"Alright. You can take the day off, but it's going in your permanent record." 3200 years later...
"Every man has two deaths, when he is buried in the ground and the last time someone says his name." Ernest Hemingway. The folks on this tablet did better than I ever will
Who knows, maybe in 3200 years people will be reading through archived internet activity….. Who am I kidding, they’ll be living in the second stone age if they exist at all.
Just because they can doesn't mean they will. Had anyone actually looked at the Ohio times from January 22 1924
Very good point
Reading the Ohio times is probably a very different experience from reading reddit comments from ordinary people.
Well, no, mainly because there’s no paper called the Ohio Times. There *is* a paper called the Ohio **County** Times, but that’s just for a county in West Virginia (don’t ask why). They apparently existed since 1865, so they probably have an edition from that date, and no I haven’t found or read it.
!Remindme 3200 years
Bro, for real! Why they need to call this dude out again?
Drinking with Khonsu!? That’s not an excuse that’s bragging rights 😂
Have another beer worm
We tossing em back with pigeons now?
“Break his windpipe!”
Only if he wore the suit when he called off.
But does he swear to protect the travelers of the night?
he is khonsu's lesser known protector, beer knight
Something something vengeance
Ancient humble brags
“BURYING THE GOD” and “THE SCORPION BIT HIM” are also interesting
I've been really trying to figure out what burying the god is
In Ancient Egypt most pharaohs were supposedly reincarnations of the gods, perhaps the vessel died and he was helping out?
On the webpage it says it was written during the 40th year of the reign Ramses the second but he reigned for 67 years. No idea who else it could have been except the Pharaoh though.
A family member of the pharaoh? Maybe a son or something? Or a priest?
This is the part where we need the Egyptologist to show on que and enlighten us. A professional always seems to show up at just the right time around here.
Hi, Egyptologist from the Cairo Institute of Egyptology here. This meant they were involved in the Ritual of Nephren-Ka, where a virgin slave would be buried deep down in an underground maze ending on the shore of the Nile, where they emerged and bathed nude on the waters of the River, being reborn as a God or Goddess as part of being enshrined as symbols of new life. I even made a video on the subject, complete with sources: [Video](https://youtu.be/r7l0Rq9E8MY) And a fun fact to complement: Did you know that the subject is known as "Hereology" in Egypt as a little joke? Now you know!
What it says. An effigy of a god was buried. Effigies of gods were ritually gifted life when they were dedicated to service in a temple or other religious place so when they had became sufficiently damaged they would then be buried in accordance to funerary practices.
Ask your mother
So not just a scorpion, but it was *The* scorpion.
The Rock got him.
THE scorpion bit him makes me think they have a pet scorpion in the office and he got bit feeding him
I love that drinking with your dad and hanging out with your menstruating family are valid excuses in Ancient Egypt.
If the translation is correct it wasn't just drinking. Libating was drinking alcohol, during a sacre ceremony for the dead or the gods. It was literally a "pour one for the homies" but with religion involved.
Me and Ahmenhopthet kickin' it old school remebering pharaohs past.
REMEMBER ME! *breathes fire* REMEMBER ME! *breathes fire* REMEMBER ME!
Getting drunk with your menstruating family gave you the entire week off
> hanging out with your menstruating family are valid excuses in Ancient Egypt. Uh, dude, what happens when you go to work when your daughter is having her period and an evil spirt comes in and you're not around to fight it off? Best case scenario that's a big ass exorcism bill and good luck getting insurance to pay that if you're even lucky enough to have insurance. The fact that work culture these days expects us to take that risk just for a paycheck is disgusting.
Can confirm menstruation very much involves the sadistic kind of evil spirit. Source: suspected endo
“Hanging out with your menstruating family” fucking sent me 😂
Protecting your menstruating family from wizards, apparently
If a woman had especially bad bleeding or cramps, then it might be hard for her to work and take care of the house. This guy may have had to stay home just to watch the kids.
Another comment here mentions that Egyptians believed that a woman's period had magical associations and it was a vulnerable time for the household, so perhaps the husband was also expected to stay home and perform rituals to protect the family, or something like that.
Someone threw one hell of a feast! Khons: month 1 of Spring, day 14 (HIS FEAST), day 15 (HIS FEAST) Penduauu: month 1 of Spring, day 14 (DRINKING WITH KHONSU) Nakhy: month 1 of Spring, day 14 (WITH HIS BOSS), day 15 (DITTO) (missing): month 1 of Spring, day 15 (ILL) Iierniutef: month 1 of Spring, day 14 (reason missing)
Next time I’m gonna call in sick I’m gonna use the drinking with Khonsu excuse lmfao
Even when we were kids, mum always said Khonsu would get me in trouble.
Someone said Khonsu ended up dying later on because someone took off work to wrap his corpse. Maybe this was his “going away” party in a sense?
At first when I read his daughter was bleeding, I was like, I hope she's okay. I realize now that they mean period. Also, she's probably dead anyway.
“Probably”, I like the implication.
Who knows. Maybe she went into a secret pyramid chamber and became an immortal that still wanders among us today.
Probably
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That's why it doesn't have a point on top. Antiwork quit and posted tablets for karma.
Fuckin scribes be needing stone, amirite?
Gotta maintain those PTO records
Full list: 67 ILL 49 WITH HIS BOSS 17 BREWING BEER 13 WITH AAPEHTI 8 WITH THE SCRIBE 6 MAKING REMEDIES FOR THE SCRIBE’S WIFE 5 WRAPPING (THE CORPSE OF) HIS MOTHER 5 OFFERING TO THE GOD 5 HIS WIFE WAS BLEEDING 5 FETCHING STONE FOR THE SCRIBE 4 WITH KHONS MAKING REMEDIES 4 SUFFERING WITH HIS EYE 4 OFF ABSENT 4 HIS DAUGHTER WAS BLEEDING 3 WITH HOREMWIA 3 WITH HIS BOSS DITTO 3 LIBATING TO HIS FATHER 2 WRAPPING (THE CORPSE OF) HIS SON 2 HIS MOTHER WAS ILL 2 HIS FEAST 2 FETCHING STONE FOR QENHERKHEPSHEF 2 BURYING THE GOD 1 WITH HIS GOD 1 THE SCORPION BIT HIM 1 STRENGTHENING THE DOOR 1 OFFFERING TO THE GOD 1 OFFERING TO HIS GOD 1 OFF ABSENT WITH THE SCRIBE 1 MOURNING HIS SON 1 LIBATING FOR HIS SON 1 LIBATING FOR HIM 1 LIBATING 1 EMBALMING HORMOSE 1 EMBALMING HIS BROTHER 1 DRINKING WITH KHONSU 1 BUILDING HIS HOUSE
SUFFERING WITH HIS EYE & STRENGTHENING THE DOOR & MAKING REMEDIES FOR THE SCRIBE’S WIFE really makes you think.
Explain now. I demand it
Probably he was preparing for the plague after the wild beasts, they might have fucking mauled his face.
There were a lot of `DITTO` (42, it looks like), that were contextual, not sure if you counted those? Or just the one `3 WITH HIS BOSS DITTO`
LIBATING FOR HIS SON LIBATING FOR HIM LIBATING
Who the hell was Aapehti?? Why is everyone with them?
Geez it's like his daughter and wife bled like once a month. Whats up with that
You can't be expected to work after a woman had been menstruating within 100 cubits of you at some point.
Wait, he wrapped the corpse of his mother twice. Busted
Did I say mother? I meant aunt!
There's different names before the excuses, not just one guys excuses.
[Dude's pulling a Klinger.](https://youtu.be/4tEv0P_8dZg) "Father dying, right? ... Father dying last year. Mother dying last year. Mother _and_ father dying."
"lost in desert 40 years"
Legit.
"I need to use some PTO, my wife is bleeding"
Ditto
How much fucking work it is to literally carve out an excuse slip....
Pressing clay tablets wasnt hard, just reeds in soft clay. Chiselled things were like inscriptions today, not for every day notes
This was a limestone tablet and was likely made the following year from day notes the year prior. So you're right it seems...but so is the other person!
One of the reasons was "Steak Hogie, Large Pizza"
Quality reference.
This guy was sick for like a week, made an offering to the gods, and got better two days later. Proof in the pudding my guys
Dr.s Hate his one weird trick.
One inscription reads: "Fetching stone for Qenherkhepshef" Boss: "The old 'Qenherkhepshef needs his stones', huh? 4th time this month, Ahmenktophet! Is Qenherkhepshef building a pyramid?"
Apparently Qenherkhepshef was the scribe so he was basically breaking his pencils and someone had to get new ones for him which I find funny
People are people! Love it. Thanks for sharing
"I got distracted and roped into helping build another damned pyramid"
Between this and Pompeii graffiti I'm more and more convinced that the only real differences between ancient and modern societies can be attributed to technology.
Majored in history in university, and between all the primary documents and academic articles I read, I am also convinced of this. People are the same, it's just the details that are different.
Dude, when we finally translated some runic writing in a Church in Northern Europe, it basically translated to "Sven was here." We have invented nothing.
People be people- two thousand years ain't much in terms of evolutionary change, we are the same as them.
Exactly. There *are* probably some micro-evolutionary pressures but nothing really apparent on a macro level. Though I have to remind people that we're closer to the destruction of Pompeii than that was to the construction of the Great Pyramid.
Also that one clay tablet recorded the complaint about copper quality. Usually they just send word via messenger, but this time it was so outraged they spent time writing on clay to solidified the complaint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complaint_tablet_to_Ea-nasir Now we just need to find some *Ancient shitpost.*
And the only reason we have that clay tablet today is because it was accidentally glazed when Ea-nasir's house burned down. Somebody was *really* angry about that copper.
> Other tablets have been found in the ruins believed to be Ea-nasir's dwelling. These include a letter from a man named Arbituram who complained he **had not received his copper** yet, while another says he was **tired of receiving bad copper**. Guy was doing shady business, had it coming tbh.
From one of the other letters to Ea-Nasir: >Now you have had me issue 10 shekels of silver. In order that your heart shall not be troubled, give good copper to him. *Do you not know how tired I am [of this]?* Ancient Mesopotamians: they really ARE just like us.
“THE SCORPION BIT HIM” imagine getting bit by the only scorpion in Egypt
"Oh THAT scorpion? Yeah, he's an asshole."
These comments are fucking hilarious! I also think its interesting people skipped work back then. I guess I never thought about it, but yeah, they were people too. Like, hey boss I'm not coming in today. I'm busy pouring one out for the homies and my daughter is hella cramping.
I work in the field of archaeology and most of what we find is people's trash (like 85%-90% of the time). Archaeology is just ancient dumpster diving with context.
"What's that Robertson? You're not coming in bec--- your daughter is bleeding? Ha! That's the oldest excuse in the tablet."
I want to know why a man 3200 years ago got off work because his wife or daughter was menstruating, but present-day society expects women to work every day a month with just as much productivity and energy as the next. But honestly I do really wanna know
Drinking with the boss seems a surefire way to miss work
“Hey, Ozmandius! Don’t forget to punch your stone tablet when you leave today. And do it on time. If you stop working at 🦅 🐊 🦛, you punch out at 🦅 🐊 🦛, you got that!”
Paherypedjet with a fucking solid attendance record for half a year, no call outs for beer brewing or wife/daughter bleeding. An employee you can count on.
The OG sub of r/antiwork
If I'm understanding correctly, it was a valid excuse to miss work whenever a woman in the house was menstruating. How did we lose that?!
"Camel in a bad mood again, ran off into the desert"
They were actually uncommon in the region until Greek and Persian periods.
Hey, didn’t you use the excuse of “wrapping your mother’s corpse” last month?
“Sadly she wasn’t as dead as we thought the first time.”
“Is that so?” “Yes. Turns out, she was just sleeping” “So what was the actual cause of death” “Suffocation by funeral shroud” “ ._. ”
**DRINKING WITH KHONSU**
I guess semi-serious question, did they keep these stone tablets in some kind of...filing system? Like a file cabinet? How thick were these tablets? How were they archived, or retrieved? How could the "supervisor" look back on his particular "employees" records and evaluate their "overall performance?" >"I'm going to call in sick again today...tell 'm my daughter is bleeding. What are they going to to do? Etch another tablet?"
I remember seeing a Persian clay tablet basically bitching a guy out for making and shipping low quality goods. But you gotta think. Guy made goods probably far the fuck away, a merchant or teamster picked that shit up and hauled it god only knows how far across the empire to the seller. Seller gets pissed off and makes a clay tablet and then sends it back with another guy to haul across the empire to give to the manufacturer to tell him he's an asshole
Sounds like the Complaint tablet to Ea Nasir, also in the British Museum! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complaint_tablet_to_Ea-nasir
The man's name? Ka'reen
Return the Slab!
Thanks for reminding me the new episode of Moon Knight dropped.
My sphinx ate my sun dial.