Houses of the Ancient Egyptians were built out of bricks made from mud. The mud was collected in leather bucket and taken to the building site. Here workers added straw and pebbles to the mud to strengthen the bricks. This mixture was then poured into wooden brick frames or molds. The bricks were left out in the sun to dry and to cure. After the house was built it was covered with a plaster, very similar to the technique used in adobe housing in the American Southwest. Inside the plaster was often painted with either geometric patterns or scenes from nature. Inside the houses were cool as the small windows let in only a little light.
The homes of the wealthy and noble classes were larger. Beyond the hall were bedrooms. The kitchen was removed some way away from the living quarters to keep out smells of food and such and were built primarily on the eastern side of the home so that the prevailig wind would also aid in carrying away smells.
This is an example of a nobleman's home from the Tel el Amarna area. This gives ua an accurate picture of how the nobleman's home was laid out and how it was possibly decorated. This house stands among extensive grounds, and was surrounded by a high wall. Visitors would enter by a towered gateway(1) and having been checked by a guard, whose lodge was to the left (2). From there visitors to the estate would take a tree lined path to the place of family worship. Small temples such as (3) fronted by a flight of stpes and a painted column were common on such estates. The path would then lead you to an inner courtyard from which you could enter the house by a flight of shallow steps. Passing through a doorway framed in stone, its lintel carved with the name of the owner of the estate. From the porch you could go through a vestibule (4) and into a quite handsome room known as the north loggia or porch. (5). From the loggia you would enter the central hall (6) which was the heart of the home.
The West loggia (7) would have been mostly used as a sitting room in the winter. Guest rooms are also on this side of the ouse. The private quarters on the other side of the hall in clude a sitting room for the women (8) their bedrooms and the master's bedroom (9) with his bed standing on a dias in a niche.
The bathroom (10) contains a small slab on which the master is lying while a servant pours water over his body. Behond the bathroom is the toilet.
Stables (12), servant's quarters (13), kitchen (14) and cattle yard(15) are on the southern and eastern sides because the prevailing wind will carry away all undesirable odors.
The garden (17) with its formal pool and rows of trees and shrubs. Every pant stands in its puddle of river mud.
The well (11) is conveniently near the garden and the cattle yard. It consists of wide hole in which a flight of steps leads down to a platform from which water is drawn up by a rope and bucket.
Illustrations from "See Inside an Egyptian Town" 1977 Grisewood & Dempsey, Ltd. Used by permission.
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