An ancient, 3,200-year-old rock known as the “ostracon”, which is housed in the British Museum, contains the sick notes of ancient Egyptians, and offers great insight into the reasons everyday folk felt they could not work.
The 1,250 BC Egyptian ostracon, labeled ‘year 40’ of Ramses II, is inscribed with the new Egyptian hieratic script and lists the days by season and date – “month three of summer, day 20,” for example.
“It provides a workmen’s register for 280 days of the year,” the British Museum writes. “A list of forty names is arranged in columns on the right edge of each side, followed to the left by dates written in black in a horizontal line.”
“Above most dates is a word or phrase in red, indicating the reason why this individual was absent from work on that date,” it added.
The most frequently listed reason for taking the day off was illness, but “The next most frequent is being away with one’s superior doing private work for him, a practice that was not forbidden if done in moderation.”
Some of the Reasons the Ancient Egyptians gave for Skipping Work
“Brewing beer” is a common reason given, along with taking the day to embalm relatives for mummification. A lot of workers were also given time off based on their wives and daughters “bleeding.” It’s possible they had to cover some of the chores at home.
An ancient Egyptian named Huynefer had to take month three of summer, day three off because he was “suffering with his eye,” which still makes him better off than Seba, who on day 17, month four of Spring, was off because “the scorpion bit him.”
Amenemwia took day 16 of month two of winter off because he was “strengthening” the door, while Aapehit had to make an “offering to the god.”
“Libating” – drinking ceremonially in honor of a God or ancestor – comes up more than once, and odd jobs, such as “fetching the stone for the scribe” and “with Kohns making remedies,” appear too. On month one of Spring, day 14, Penduauu was simply “drinking with Khonsu.”
This ancient Egyptian ostracon was one of 90 found at Deir el-Medina, which provide a deeply compelling view into the inner workings of the New Kingdom.
In Classical Athens, when there was a decision to be made about whether to banish or exile a certain member of society, citizen peers would cast their vote by writing the name of the person on a shard of pottery (ostrakon), and the vote was counted. If unfavorable, the person in question would be exiled for a period of 10 years from the city, thus giving rise to the term ostracism.
Broken pottery shards were also used for toiletry hygiene. Historians have suggested that shards from a vote may have been re-used for this purpose, to curse the exiled individual by soiling their name.