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by novacole
2659 days ago
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Why would it be a crackpot theory to suggest that for Western Europeans, whose civilization as we know it starts in the late 1400s, who convinced themselves of African inferiority for the purpose of justifying their theft, rape, and murder of those people, upon seeing Black looking people in Egypt from thousands of years before their civilization started, would want to erase signs of it? Sounds just about right to me. |
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A few things that this theory falls utterly short on:
- Reliefs that were never exported or even found by colonists are often defaced.
- Pharaonic texts specifically reference the practice of defacement and treat it as an act distinct from general vandalism or theft.
- Works show other systematic damage unrelated to racial issues (from the article, statues receiving offerings had their right hands removed, and those providing them had their left hands removed).
- Single reliefs show noses removed on some figures but not others, even when the preserved noses look substantially non-European (e.g. the article's last photo).
- Defacements aren't random, or tied to ethnicity; instead, politically inconvenient rulers like Hatshepsut are overwhelmingly erased while others (even close family members) are not.
- Where text accompanies figures, the names of the defaced figures are also defaced. Which requires knowledge of Ancient Egyptian, a motive to target specific historical figures, and a concern with matters unrelated to appearance.
- Weathering on in situ works commonly suggests noses were removed much closer to their creation than to the 1800s. (This is less clear for works brought to Europe, but that opens the question of simple fragility.)
All of that is above and beyond questions of evidence for the practice, or historical context that Egyptian statues with black features were actually convenient for some racist theories like Samuel Weston's. There's basically no racist practice colonists wouldn't have been willing to engage in, certainly. But advancing specific claims that are inconsistent with huge amounts of evidence is rightly considered a fringe belief.