Smoky Workshop Beside Sudan Temple Suggests Kush Was No Mere Copy of Egypt

KARIMA, SUDAN — An international team of archaeologists has uncovered what it describes as a complete faience workshop at the Sanam temple in northern Sudan, and argues that the find challenges the old notion that the Kingdom of Kush merely imitated its northern neighbour, Egypt. The findings were reported in the journal Antiquity, according to The Debrief.

The temple stands near the town of Karima and dates to the Middle Napatan Period, roughly 750 to 580 BCE. It was built by King Taharqo, one of the Kushite rulers whose realm extended into Egypt after an earlier king, Piankhy, conquered it. Surrounding remains are said to include a royal treasury and several cemeteries. The site was first excavated more than a century ago, but the report says limited technical means and an incomplete understanding of Kushite culture hampered those early efforts.

The new workshop still held hundreds of beads and a shabti figure, the report states. Faience is a glossy, glazed ceramic-like material, sometimes tinted blue or green by copper compounds. The Kushites, it is claimed, adapted the craft to local conditions, using crushed seashells as a source of calcium carbonate in place of imported limestone.

What surprised the researchers was the location. Faience firing could produce considerable smoke and fumes, and Egyptian workshops were often placed at the edges of settlements. Here, three firing pits were found close to a religious building.

The team reads this as evidence of state control. Lead author Dr Rennan Lemos of Durham University said the temple was "not simply a religious monument but also a center of state-controlled production," turning out objects, including shabtis intended for the royal cemetery at Nuri. The researchers suggest Kushite rulers asserted power partly by regulating raw materials, labour and specialised knowledge, whereas Egyptian rulers leaned on control of land and agriculture.

Dr Lemos, working with Dr Kathryn Howley of New York University, concluded that the Kushites selectively adapted foreign ideas rather than merely adopting them. The paper, "Crafting Power in Kush," appeared on October 19, 2026.