Early Dynastic Egypt

by Toby A H Wilkinson

  Figure 8.4 Royal cult statues. Evidence for the production and dedication of royal sculpture in the Early Dynastic period: (1) seal-impression of Den from Abydos showing three statues of the king engaged in various ritual activities; the accompanying inscription states that the statues were made of gold (after Kaplony 1963, III: fig. 364); (2) (3) inscriptions on stone vessels of Anedjib from the Step Pyramid complex of Netjerikhet; two

  statues of the king are depicted, one wearing the red crown, the other wearing the white crown (after Lacau and Lauer 1959: planche III. 1–2); (4) entry from the fifth register of the Palermo Stone, referring to a year (in the reign of Khasekhemwy or his successor) as ‘the year of dedicating the copper statue “high is Khasekhemwy”’; this entry indicates that copper statuary was created long before the well-known images of Pepi I and Merenra found in the temple at Hierakonpolis (after Schäfer 1902: pl. I). Not to same scale.

  The six relief panels installed beneath the Step Pyramid and South Tomb of Netjerikhet’s mortuary complex may depict royal statues rather than the king himself (F.D.Friedman 1995:32). The close parallels between one of the panels and the stone vessel inscriptions of Anedjib described above seem to support this hypothesis. A relief fragment of Netjerikhet from Heliopolis, showing the king enthroned and accompanied by three royal ladies, may also depict a royal statue, but this is not certain (Eaton-Krauss 1984:95).

  Buildings of the royal cult

  The construction of buildings for the royal cult seems to have been the most important project of each reign, absorbing much of the court’s revenue. Hence, the size of the royal mortuary complex offers a guide both to Egypt’s prosperity and to the power of the central government to exploit the country’s resources. Moreover, the increasing elaboration of royal cult buildings from the Predynastic period onwards is ‘one of the most socially, economically and politically sensitive indicators of the rise of the state’ (Hoffman 1980:336). The surviving buildings of the Early Dynastic royal cult are characterised in general by their apparent mortuary nature. The large enclosures of the First and Second Dynasties at Abydos, Saqqara and Hierakonpolis are usually termed ‘funerary’, and the Step Pyramid complex of Netjerikhet is regarded as having fulfilled a primarily mortuary role. However, the picture may not be so simple. There is evidence from the Old Kingdom to indicate that the royal cult at a pyramid was celebrated during the lifetime of the reigning king. Furthermore, the decoration of Old Kingdom royal ‘mortuary’ temples does not focus on funerary themes, but on the ritual duties and festivals of kingship, especially the Sed-festival (Seidlmayer 1996b: 122). The same appears to be true of the surviving relief fragments from the Hierakonpolis enclosure of Khasekhemwy, and of the six relief panels from the Step Pyramid complex. It is possible, therefore, that the Netjerikhet complex, and some if not all of its First and Second Dynasty antecedents, was used for the celebration of the royal cult before the king’s death.

  It has been suggested that the enclosure which occupies one corner of the walled town of Hierakonpolis may have been built by Khasekhem(wy) to serve his royal cult (O’Connor 1992). In this case, it may have been conceived as an institution separate from the local temple of Horus of Nekhen, although occupying the same geographical location (Quirke 1992:13). There is no doubt that the large mudbrick enclosures built by Khasekhemwy on the low desert at Hierakonpolis and Abydos were connected with the royal cult. They provide an early illustration of the concept that the royal cult was not restricted to one location but could be celebrated throughout the country. Furthermore, it would seem that royal cult centres were not confined to the immediate vicinity of the king’s burial (Quirke 1992:82). The most vivid illustrations of this point are the small step pyramids of the late Third Dynasty (Seidlmayer 1996b). Located at sites throughout Middle and Upper Egypt, all but one of the pyramids seem to have been built in the reign of Huni (Plate 8.1). They ‘must have marked the locations of an official cult centered [sic] around the person of the king’ (Seidlmayer 1996b: 122). This is confirmed by the objects found at the pyramid of Seila, dated to the following reign of Sneferu: stelae with the king’s name, fragments of a shrine, a royal statue

  Plate 8.1 Markers of the royal cult. Four of a series of small step pyramids erected throughout the Nile valley at the end of the Third Dynasty: (top left) Zawiyet el-Meitin, on the east bank of the Nile just south of the modern city of Minya; (top right) Abydos south, also known as Sinki; (bottom left) Tukh, just north of Naqada; (bottom right) el-Kula, just north of Hierakonpolis (author’s photographs).

  and an offering-table (Leclant and Clerc 1988: pl. 32; Edwards 1993:69; Seidlmayer 1996b: 122). The distribution of royal cult centres of this type throughout the country seems to be linked to the exploitation of agricultural resources. There may originally have been a small step pyramid in each nome: the location of the three southernmost pyramids certainly suggests such a distribution. They would therefore have represented ‘a project of mapping the royal cult across the country’ (Seidlmayer 1996b: 124). The small step pyramids may be seen as the predecessors of the funerary estates depicted in procession in the temple of Sneferu’s Bent Pyramid at Dahshur, and of the nome-triads from the valley temple of Menkaura. The small step pyramids belong to a time when the economic system characteristic of the Old Kingdom was being devised. ‘Constructing these monuments throughout the country could have served to make explicit and intelligible the ideological background to the economic demands of the state on a local level’ (Seidlmayer 1996b: 124). The monuments of Huni’s reign emphasise that the royal cult, through its political and economic influence, was central to the unity of Egypt.

  The situation on the island of Elephantine is particularly revealing about the religious programme and priorities of the Early Dynastic court. The investment of resources in a monument of the royal cult—a small step pyramid and an adjoining administrative complex—stands in marked contrast to the official neglect of the local shrine. Indeed, the state-sponsored construction of a fortress at the beginning of the Early Dynastic period showed flagrant contempt for local religious practice, encroaching as it did on the small community shrine nearby. The failure of the central authorities to care for this sanctuary was clearly not a matter of lacking funds, but of a completely different ideological background’ (Seidlmayer 1996b: 122). The name of the complex adjacent to the small step pyramid at Elephantine was sšd-nswt-Hwỉ, ‘(the palace) diadem of King Huni’. This may be connected with hb-sšd, ‘the festival of the diadem’, which figures among the coronation rites of Shepseskaf as recorded on the Palermo Stone. Like the cult at royal ‘funerary’ monuments, the royal cult practised at Elephantine seems also to have been connected with festivals of kingship (Seidlmayer 1996b: 122–4).

  Royal ancestors

  Reverence for the royal ancestors, well attested in later periods (for example, the New Kingdom king lists at Karnak and Abydos), may already have played an important role in Early Dynastic theology. In particular, the role of royal ancestors in legitimising a new king seems to have been recognised by Netjerikhet who, according to later tradition (the Turin Canon) was the founder of a new dynastic line, and whose connection with the kings of the First and Second Dynasties may have been tenuous. His appropriation of the stores of stone vessels collected by royal predecessors to furnish his own burial may be interpreted in this light as ‘a retrospective acknowledgement of the pharaonic monarchy’ (F.D.Friedman 1995:10, quoting Redford 1986:134).

  Corpus of deities attested in the Early Dynastic period

  Throughout the course of Egyptian civilisation, unnamed deities are notoriously difficult to identify. The phenomenon of the ‘interchangeability of attributes’ makes secure identification difficult, even if the iconography seems to point unambiguously to a

  particular god or goddess (Pinch, personal communication 1995). The identification of the deities listed below is reasonably certain in all but six cases, these being denoted with a question mark (?). (See Figure 8.5 for a map showing the loc
ation of cults.)

  Anti

  Depicted as a falcon in a bark, Anti was a local god of Middle Egypt, worshipped on the east bank of the Nile, especially in the Badari region.

  Figure 8.5 Early Dynastic cult dedications. The map shows the location of cult centres associated with particular deities, as attested in contemporary sources. Capitals denote ancient place names.

  The deity was known to classical authors as Antaeus, and his cult centre, Qau, as Antaeopolis. A copper ewer from a wealthy late Second Dynasty grave at Badari, grave 429, bore the incised inscription hm-n r ntỉ-htp, ‘the priest Anti-hotep’ (Brunton 1927: pl. XVIII.10). This theophorous name is probably the earliest mention of the god Anti, and indicates the reverence shown to the deity in the Badari region from an early period.

  Anubis

  The fashioning or dedication of a divine image of a jackal is recorded as a salient event on a label of Aha from Abydos. The jackal deity in question is generally assumed to be Anubis, god of the desert necropolis, and he figures prominently in First Dynasty royal inscriptions. The dedication of his image was apparently repeated in subsequent reigns of the First Dynasty: the Palermo Stone records an occurrence in the penultimate regnal year of an unidentified First Dynasty king, and in year 8 of a subsequent First Dynasty ruler. The distinctive standard of Anubis appears on a sealing of Djer from Abydos (Petrie 1901: pl. XV.108), whilst a stone vessel fragment from the same king’s tomb is incised with the figure of Anubis (Petrie 1902: pl. IV.8). From the end of the First Dynasty, a jackal deity is depicted on a sealing from the tomb of Qaa (Petrie 1900: pl. XXIX.86), and a recumbent jackal appears on the stela of Sabef, an official buried in one of the tomb’s subsidiary graves (Petrie 1900: pl. XXX; cf. Weill 1961, chapter 8). The figure of Anubis also appears on a private First Dynasty stela excavated by Amélineau in 1895 (Petrie 1900: pl. XXXII.17).

  The ỉmỉ-wt fetish, closely associated in later times with Anubis, occurs not infrequently on Early Dynastic sealings. One scholar has suggested that the fetish played an important role during formal appearances of the king in public, and that a new fetish would have been fashioned to commemorate significant royal events, especially the foundation or dedication of a temple (Logan 1990:69). The hypothesis that the fetish was associated with ritual killings (Logan 1990:69) is based upon a single piece of evidence, a wooden label of Aha from Abydos, and must remain unproven.

  Anubis should not be confused with another jackal god, Wepwawet (perhaps the same as Sed).

  Apis (Hap)

  In later periods the Apis bull was identified with Ptah, but it is possible that Apis was originally a separate deity. According to later tradition, the cult of Apis was established by Menes (cf. Simpson 1957; Logan 1990:64), although the earliest known reference to the Apis bull occurs somewhat later, in the reign of Den. His regnal year x+12 on the Palermo Stone is identified by the ‘running of the Apis’. This festival also took place in year 2 of Semerkhet (preserved on the main Cairo fragment of the annals), in the reign of Qaa (recorded on two year labels from Abydos: Leclant and Clerc 1992: pl. XXVIII, fig. 35; Dreyer et al. 1996:75) and in years x+4 and x+10 of the Second Dynasty king, Ninetjer.

  An ebony label of Aha from Abydos which records a royal visit to the Delta also depicts, in the second register, a bull within an enclosure (Petrie 1901: pl. IIIA.5). The bull is not named, and it may be the Apis bull, but a connection with a bull cult at Buto

  (von der Way 1989:285) is perhaps more plausible, given the nearby location of the other shrines shown on the label.

  Ash

  Probably a protector deity connected with royal estates, Ash appears to have been particularly important at the end of the Second Dynasty (for example, Petrie 1901: pl. XXII.179). Ash is depicted on a number of sealings from the reigns of Peribsen and Khasekhemwy. On sealings of Peribsen and Sekhemib the god may be shown wearing the white crown, and is sometimes depicted with the head of the Seth-animal, suggesting that there may have been a connection—perhaps an early example of syncretism— between the two gods.

  Bastet

  Closely associated in later times with the site of Bubastis in the Delta (ancient Egyptian B3st), the cat goddess Bastet may none the less have had a separate origin, since her name is written from the earliest times with the ointment jar (which also had the sound value b3st in ancient Egyptian). The name Bastet may therefore mean ‘she of the ointment jar’ rather than ‘she of Bubastis’ (Shaw and Nicholson 1995:50). Bastet assumed a degree of prominence in the early Second Dynasty, though for what reason remains unclear. The figure of the goddess appears on inscribed stone vessels of both Hetepsekhemwy and Nebra (Lacau and Lauer 1959: pl. 11, nos 57, 58). An inscription from the following reign of Ninetjer names the phyle of priests responsible for the provisioning of Bastet (in other words, for maintaining her cult): s3 f3w B3stt (Lacau and Lauer 1959: pl. 13, nos 63–6). At the end of the Second Dynasty, a priest of Bastet (and servant of Sobek) is mentioned on an incised stone vessel from the tomb of Khasekhemwy (Amélineau 1902: pl. XXII.l). In Utterance 508 (§1111) of the Pyramid Texts, Bastet appears as the king’s mother, but we cannot be sure if she was identified as such in the Early Dynastic period.

  Bat/Hathor

  Bat is a rather obscure goddess whose cult centre seems to have been in the seventh Upper Egyptian nome, near the town of Hu. A Predynastic palette from Girza shows a celestial cow goddess, her head surrounded by stars. This object indicates that the worship of a female protective deity with astral connotations, perhaps already identified as Bat, was a feature of Egyptian religion from at least the middle of the fourth millennium BC (Hornung 1983:103). A very similar representation may be seen on the rim of a diorite bowl from Hierakonpolis, dated to the late Predynastic period or early First Dynasty (Burgess and Arkell 1958; Fischer 1962). The best-known representations of Bat occur on the Narmer Palette (cf. Baines 1991:104). A celestial goddess with a human face and the ears and horns of a cow appears both at the top of the palette and on the king’s belt. (At least one author identifies the goddess on Narmer’s belt as Hathor, based upon Utterance 335 (§546) in the Pyramid Texts which states that ‘the “apron” of the king comes from Hathor’ [Troy 1986:54].) Another Early Dynastic representation of

  Bat occurs on a limestone model of a carrying shrine, from a deposit of early votive objects. The figure of Bat is recessed within the front of the shrine (Schlögl 1978:27, pls 81.a-c). A gold amulet from the Early Dynastic cemetery at Naga ed-Deir (grave N 1532) shows a bull with the Bat-fetish and an ankh pendant hanging from its neck (Reisner 1908: pl. 6; Fischer 1962:12). The Bat-fetish is also depicted on the ivory inlays of a box from Abu Rawash (Klasens 1958:53–4, fig. 20(y), pl. 59; Fischer 1962:13, n. 45), whilst an ivory from the tomb of Semerkhet at Abydos is decorated with two heads of Bat, very similar to those shown at the top of the Narmer Palette (Petrie 1900: pl. XXVII.71).

  The name of Bat seems to be a feminine form of the word b3, ‘soul’. In Utterance 506 (§1095) of the Pyramid Texts, the king identifies himself with ‘Bat with her two faces’; the Texts also contain several references to the ‘great wild cow’ as the king’s mother, for example Utterance 675 (§2003). The ‘great wild cow’ was later regarded as a manifestation of Hathor; and, indeed, there are strong connections between Bat and Hathor, even though they probably had separate origins. Both goddesses probably served a protective function (F.D.Friedman 1995:3); Bat is sometimes described as a particular manifestation of Hathor; Hathor eventually supplanted Bat as the local deity of Hu; and the two goddesses share very similar iconography. These similarities have led to some confusion in the minds of modern scholars. Thus, the Bat-fetish, although sometimes accompanied, and hence identified, by its phonetic complement, is often referred to as the ‘Hathor emblem’, ‘on the basis of the later and abundant evidence for its identification with that goddess’ (Fischer 1962:11). There is no explicit reference to Hathor before the Fourth Dynasty, although the temple of Hathor at Gebelein apparently received royal p
atronage at the end of the Second Dynasty. It seems likely that, in this area, Egyptian theology was characterised by ‘a common substratum of ideas which lent the two goddesses a somewhat similar character’ (Fischer 1962:12).

  Hathor’s name (‘house of Horus’) ‘proclaimed motherhood as her principal function’ (Frankfort 1948:171), so it is not surprising that the Egyptians portrayed her as a cow: there are parallels in other African, particularly Hamitic, cultures in which the cow is a powerful mother-image (Frankfort 1948:173–4).

  Deshret (the red crown)

  A shrine or enclosure dedicated to the red crown is shown on a year label of Djer from Abydos (Amélineau 1904: pl. XV.19; Emery 1961:59, fig. 20). The label seems to record a royal visit to the Delta, and a device in the top register probably indicates a sacred complex at Buto (see below). It is very likely that the shrine to the red crown—a symbol closely associated with Lower Egypt since the unification of the country—would have been located in the Delta. A connection between the red crown and Wadjet, the serpent goddess of Buto and tutelary goddess of Lower Egypt, is suggested by an ivory label of Djet from mastaba S3504 at Saqqara (Emery 1954: pl. XXXVb). In the writing of the Two Ladies’, the usual serpent is replaced by a red crown (cf. Gardiner 1958). We may perhaps conclude that the shrine to the red crown of Lower Egypt was located within the temple of Wadjet at Buto.

  Geb

  The earth god Geb is shown in human form on a relief fragment from a limestone chapel of Netjerikhet from Heliopolis (now in Turin). It has been suggested that the original decoration showed all nine members of the Heliopolitan ennead, since the figure of Seth is also preserved (cf. Baines 1991:96). However, it is also possible that the shrine was dedicated to the ‘corporation’ (h t), an earlier grouping of gods, referred to in the names of Semerkhet, Netjerikhet and Sekhemkhet; the corporation may have been superseded by the Heliopolitan ennead when solar theology rose to prominence towards the end of the Third Dynasty (Hornung 1983:222). Originally, both groupings probably symbolised the gods in their ‘indefinite plurality’: in Egyptian writing, three represented the plural concept, three times three (making an ennead) a plural of pluralities (Hornung 1983:222). As one of the Heliopolitan ennead and as an earth god from the time of creation, Geb features prominently in the Pyramid Texts (for example in the ‘Cannibal Hymn’ Utterances 273–4 [§§393–414]). The king himself is identified with Geb in Utterance 599 (§1645).