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Mennat-Allah El Dorry

  • Position: Assistant Professor, Chair of Coptic Studies
  • Department: Department of Sociology, Egyptology and Anthropology
Brief Biography

Mennat-Allah El Dorry is an archaeobotanist specialised in Egyptian food and agricultural history. She has worked extensively on archaeological sites across Egypt from different time periods, and focuses on monastic archaeology sites in Egypt, such as the settlement of St. John the Little in Wadi al-Natrun, Dayr Anba Hadra in Aswan, and in Bahareya Oasis. Her publications on Egyptian monastic archaeology vary from articles on wine production to manufacture of fuel in Coptic monastic settlements.

Trained initially as an Egyptologist at The American University in Cairo (class of ‘05, with minors in coptic studies and film studies), El Dorry studied archaeology/archaeobotany at University College London, from where she received her MA in 2007. She completed her PhD at the Institut für Ägyptologie und Koptologie at Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster with a work entitled “Monks and Plants: A Study of Plant Foodways and Agricultural Practices in Egyptian Monastic Settlements” (summa cum laude, funded by the Gertrud-und-Alexander-Böhlig-Stiftung). 

El Dorry worked for almost 15 years at the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities on various projects and has held different positions, the last of which was head of the minister’s scientific office. She has been awarded fellowships in Berlin, Lyon, Brussels, and Cairo, and was appointed lecturer of archaeobotany at Ain Shams University in 2021, teaching both undergraduate and graduate classes.

Research Interest
  • Egyptology

  • Coptology

  • Culinary history

  • Wine production and economy

  • Cotton textile production and economy

  • Monasticism

  • PhD in Egyptology, Institut für Ägyptologie und Koptologie at Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, 2015.

  • MA in Egyptian Archaeology: University College London, 2007. 

  • BA in Egyptology (minors in Coptic Studies and Film Studies), The American University in Cairo, 2005.
  • Malleson, Claire, and Mennat-Allah El Dorry. ‘Assessing Ancient Agricultural Regimes: A Case Study of the Egyptian Nile Delta’. Journal of Field Archaeology 0, no. 0 (2025): 1–14.
  • El Dorry, Mennat-Allah, and Essam Ahmed. ‘A Preliminary Assessment of Archaeobotanical Remains from Saqqara, Egypt’. In The Kingdom of the Mummies: Essays in Memory of Ramadan B. Hussein, edited by Janice Kamrin, Mohamed Ismail Khaled, and Christian Leitz. Supplément Aux Annales Du Service Des Antiquités de l’Egypte, Cahier 46. Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, 2023f.
  • El Dorry, Mennat-Allah. ‘It’s a Dung Job: Exploring Fuel Disc Production in Egyptian Monasteries’. In Monastic Economies in Late Antique Egypt and Palestine, edited by Jennifer Cromwell and Louise Blanke. Cambridge University Press, 2023e.
  • El Dorry, Mennat-Allah. ‘Forbidden, Sprouted, Stewed: An Archaeobotanical and Historical Overview of Fava Beans in Ancient Egypt’. In Food and Drink in Egypt and Sudan: Selected Studies in Archaeology, Culture, and History, edited by Mennat-Allah El Dorry. Bibliothèque d’Étude 184. Institut français d’archéologie orientale, 2023d.
  • El Dorry, Mennat-Allah. ‘Food History in Sudan: State of Research’. In Studies in Food and Drink in Egypt and Sudan, edited by Mennat-Allah El Dorry. Bibliothèque d’Étude. Institut français d’archéologie orientale, 2023c.
  • El Dorry, Mennat-Allah. ‘Food History in Egypt: State of Research’. In Studies in Food and Drink in Egypt and Sudan, edited by Mennat-Allah El Dorry. Bibliothèque d’Étude. Institut français d’archéologie orientale, 2023b.
  • El Dorry, Mennat-Allah, ed. Food and Drink in Egypt and Sudan: Selected Studies in Archaeology, Culture, and History. Bibliothèque d’Étude 184. Institut français d’archéologie orientale, 2023a.
  • Warden, Leslie Anne, Nicolas S. Picardo, Louise Bertini, et al. ‘Expanding Our Data from the Old-Middle Kingdom Western Delta: First Analyses of the Kom El-Hisn Provincialism Project’. Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt 59 (2023): 220–63.
  • Hood, Amber, Mennat-Allah El Dorry, Martin Odler, Anita Quiles, Joanne Rowland, and Sonia Zakrzewski. ‘Beyond Dating: Science in Egyptology’. Interdisciplinary Egyptology 1, no. 1 (2023): 1.
  • Dorghamy, Yasmine, and Mennat-Allah El Dorry, eds. Egypt’s Culinary History. Vol. 10. Rawi: Egypt’s Heritage Review. Rawi, 2019.
  • El Dorry, Mennat-Allah. ‘Foodways und landwirtschaftliche Tätigkeiten in einer ägyptischen Klosteranlage’. In Peregrinations Avec Erhart Graefe: Festschrift Zu Seinem 75, Geburtstag, Multilingual edition, edited by Anke Ilona Blöbaum, Marianne Eaton-Krauss, and Annik Wüthrich. Ägypten und Altes Testament 87. Zaphon, 2018a.
  • El Dorry, Mennat-Allah. ‘Grapes, Raisins and Wine? Archaeobotanical Finds from an Egyptian Monastery’. In Plants and People in the African Past: Progress in African Archaeobotany, edited by Anna Maria Mercuri, A. Catherine D’Andrea, Rita Fornaciari, and Alexa Höhn. Springer, 2018b.
  • El Dorry, Mennat-Allah. ‘Wine Production in Medieval Egypt: The Case of the Coptic Church’. In Studies in Coptic Culture: Transmission and Interaction, edited by Mariam F. Ayad. American University in Cairo Press, 2016.