Marginal Communities and Cooperative Strategies in the Kerma Pastoral State

Abstract

Abstract This paper examines the relationship between marginal Nubian communities—who are culturally different and who occupy peripheral contexts—and the Kerma “pastoral state” in Upper Nubia during the Classic Kerma period (1750–1550 BCE). It is argued that the funerary assemblages of two such communities—Mirgissa and al-Widay I—document localized identities and active roles in cross-cultural interactions with other cultural groups. These interactions and identities may have been intentionally encouraged and utilized by the Kerma state in order to gain access to exchange systems and maintain power within a more decentralized “pastoral state.” Cooperative processes such as commensality and social reception presented mechanisms for forming friendly relationships with these communities and a variety of Nile valley and desert groups and polities. It is argued that these communities were not marginalized and exploited by the state and but instead used their marginality to achieve degrees of autonomy and form their own localized practices.