I have come across a form of combat from ancient Egypt called 'water jousting'. Does anyone know the actual Egyptian term for this, or any other ancient Egyptian terms for things like wrestling, which the greeks called pale (πάλη)?
1 Answer
Archeologists call it "Egyptian Fisherman Jousting", an aquatic combat sport practiced in ancient Egypt. Modern knowledge of this sport comes from studying ancient Egyptian tomb reliefs.
Though the Egyptian reliefs that depict fisherman jousting don’t appear in contexts of war or battle, many of these depictions appear to be quite malicious and violent. This leaves the impression that the activity pictured may not have been entertainment, but rather something more aggressive, such as battles for fishing territory.
We do not know what the Ancient Egyptians called this. If you really want an Egyptian name, we could infer:
𓊠𓏥𓂙 (wHa-w-aach[a]), the 𓂙 can mean both "to row" and "to fight", the 𓏥 indicates a plural of 𓊠 (fisherman)
