Surveying by Ancient Egyptians

Two questions I have regarding the wall painting from the tomb of Menna are:

1. What is the thing in the middle of the bottom painting (the thing that we thought may have been an oven)?

2. What is the role of the two people standing on the right side of the bottom painting?

I want to note that when we first looked at this picture I was completely clueless. I could tell there were people holding a rope on the top but that was as far as I could grasp. I also noted that whoever painted this also made sure to draw in what seems to be grey hair – older people? I bring this up to appreciate my classmates. How quickly were people noticing that there were knots on the rope signifying units of measurement. And that they were harvesting some sort of grain. That there were scribes, some people doing labour with others recording. I was a little lost for words listening to my colleagues talk about their findings and interpretations. I thought it was remarkable that they were able to deduce such things so quickly. 

One that that stood out to me was how the author of the essay explained cubits, and that cubits were also broken down into “palms” which were measured using fingers. Including everything we’ve learned in this class so far, it got me to thinking how much limbs, and fingers were used to count, do arithmetic and generate mathematics from the ground up. Now we have tools to do all the measuring for us but I tried to think, “if I had absolutely no tools and was asked to measure something how would I do it?” Using my arm almost seems innate but the safety net is that I can confirm my findings by falling back on the tools we have. Early civilizations did not have these tools, and yet the constructed such complex and comprehensive concepts of mathematics and the most important part may be that it was crucial to every day life.