Abstract
The present article is a contribution to a long lasting debate concerning granaries and more precisely the large rectangular granaries from the Middle Kingdom era. Its four main aims are the following ones: Presenting the large rectangular granaries in a broader context of other storage facilities and drawing attention to their specificity.
Secondly, the article questions the possibility of estimating a settlement population on the basis of the large-granaries storage capacity and focuses on the difficulties resulting from such a use of this particular kind of archaeological evidence. The third aim is to discuss the functional frame of these structures.
The fourth and last focus of this study is to point out the necessity of studying all kinds of storage facilities, in order to better understand the redistribution system and private ownership in the Middle Kingdom.