Ancient Egyptian Houses - Layout and Function

One of the main causes of the spreading of diseases in ancient Egypt must have been the fact that the whole family slept in such confined spaces.

The average ancient Egyptian home was very simple and plain, and consisted of about 4 areas.

Each area had its function(s):

• The Front Room, which acted as an entrance to the house from the street and where guests could wait.


• The Living Room, where they had a shrine for their household god/goddess and where they conducted their daily religious rituals.


• The All-purpose Living/Eating/Sleeping Room with a staircase that would lead up to the roof of the house.


• A Roofless Kitchen, where the women of the house would make meals from scratch and with a staircase that would lead to an underground cellar where they would store food and beer.

Most of the houses were made of mud-brick mixed with straw. In fact, until today many Egyptian homes outside of the main cities are made of this combination. It's cheap, reusable and convenient. People can expand or destroy them with ease, and they have a cooling effect for the hot and humid Egyptian weather.

But that was the housing reality for the working class; the elite had a totally different lifestyle.

First off, their houses were not made of mud. They made beautiful mansions with stone, large enough to have many more functions.

They had stables, cattle pens, workshops, storage areas, servants' quarters, an entire chapel rather than a shrine, and more...

More like an entrance hall, a main hall, toilets, bedrooms, and lodge...

Even more still, some houses (or mansions) had entire bathrooms with built-in showers, offices, and women's private quarters too.

They even had household harems!!

Another difference lay in the decor of course. The quality of the furniture, the flooring, the embellishments on walls, etc...

The differences between the classes were huge back then; but sadly this is still the case until now.

There was a common thread however - first of all even in the elite homes there were still so many people that it was crowded even with all the space. Wood was very rare and so furniture was sparse. And all the roofs were flat.

Amazingly enough, you can still see some villages relatively intact with the houses (including the working class homes). Even though most were made of mud-brick, some ancient Egyptian houses still survive till now and that's how we know this much about them.

The main villages were Amarna and Deir El Medina.

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