I Time-Traveled to History's First Strike: Why Pharaoh's Workers Walked Out

3,200 years ago, a scribe in ancient Egypt wrote down why a workman named Seba missed work: "the scorpion bit him." His coworkers were off brewing beer, embalming a brother, fixing a door, and one man was "with his boss" thirteen times. Eighty years later, the same village of tomb builders put down their tools and staged the earliest recorded strike in history. Our time traveler visits Deir el-Medina, the Place of Truth, home of the Crew who cut and painted the royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings: their ten-day week, their grain-and-beer salary, the real attendance register in the British Museum, and the Turin Strike Papyrus, where the scribe Amennakht wrote down what the hungry workers shouted. CHAPTERS 0:00 The strangest attendance sheet in history 0:37 Jump to Year 40 of Ramesses II 0:51 Deir el-Medina, the Place of Truth 1:53 Payday: grain... and beer 2:21 A village that writes on rocks 2:52 Every excuse on the sheet 4:00 "With his boss" 4:22 Year 29: the grain is late 4:56 The first recorded strike 5:23 Making their case at the Ramesseum 5:47 The vizier, the mayor and half rations 6:25 How we know: the Turin Strike Papyrus 7:01 Myth check: slaves? 7:28 Back in the museum WHAT'S DOCUMENTED, WHAT'S NOT Every excuse in the video is on the real register (British Museum EA 5634, Year 40 of Ramesses II). The strike scenes follow the Turin Strike Papyrus (Year 29 of Ramesses III, about 1157 BCE); the workers' lines are translations, lightly shortened. Who "Khonsu" was (the moon god or a coworker called Khons) is unknown, and so is the meaning of the cat-and-mouse drawing; the video says so. The "brewing for a festival" explanation is a likely reading, not a recorded fact. Dates BCE are approximate; Egyptologists' chronologies differ by a few years. SOURCES British Museum, EA 5634, ostracon with a register of absences (description, translation and curator's comments): https://www.britishmuseum.org/collect... Museo Egizio, Turin, the Strike Papyrus (Cat. 1880): https://collezionepapiri.museoegizio.... P. J. Frandsen, "Editing Reality: The Turin Strike Papyrus" (1990); W. F. Edgerton, "The Strikes in Ramses III's Twenty-Ninth Year", JNES 10 (1951) J. J. Janssen, "Absence from Work by the Necropolis Workmen of Thebes", SAK 8 (1980) J. Černý, A Community of Workmen at Thebes in the Ramesside Period (2001); L. H. Lesko (ed.), Pharaoh's Workers (1994); A. G. McDowell, Village Life in Ancient Egypt (1999) J.-C. Antoine, "The Delay of the Grain Ration ... at Deir el-Medîna", JEA 95 (2009) Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, Giza Workers' Town and Cemetery: https://egymonuments.gov.eg/monuments... Full source list and fact-check notes are kept with the project. PHOTO AND FILM CREDITS The Strike Papyrus, Museo Egizio, Turin (Cat. 1880), CC0 · Ostracon with a cat serving a mouse, Museo Egizio (S. 6296), CC0 Tomb of Sennedjem (TT1), workmen's huts and the 1906-09 excavation of Deir el-Medina: Archivio fotografico, Museo Egizio, Turin, CC0 Model bakery and brewery of Meketre, ostracon with a king's head: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, CC0 "Deir el-Medina ruins (2009a)" by Andrew (waldenpond), CC BY 2.0 · Aerial view of Deir el-Medina by Pufacz, public domain Valley of the Kings by Francesco Gasparetti, CC BY 2.0 · Corridor of tomb KV9 by Fabio Achili, CC BY 2.0 Emmer wheat by Globe Master (SideEffect), CC BY 3.0 · Donkeys in Luxor and the Ramesseum by Marc Ryckaert, CC BY 3.0 Deathstalker scorpion by Alastair Rae, CC BY-SA 2.0 · British Museum by Yair Haklai, CC BY-SA 4.0 Medinet Habu by Vyacheslav Argenberg, CC BY 4.0 · "Les Pyramides" (1897), Lumière / Alexandre Promio, public domain All via Wikimedia Commons; licences: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ VIDEO CLIPS (Pexels licence, free to use): Nile at Aswan by Blanka OG · Karnak reliefs and columns by BOB DK · temple hieroglyphs by K · Giza sunset by Peggy Anke All animation and sound effects were made for this video. MUSIC Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com), licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b... "Hidden Agenda", "Echoes of Time v2", "Ibn Al-Noor", "Mystery Bazaar", "Vivacity", "Procession of the King", "Spy Glass", "Cool Vibes", "Heartwarming" Where should the Tiny Time Traveler go next? Tell us in the comments. #AncientEgypt #History #TinyTimeTraveler