northward as far as d War with the South 396. 16aThe first time that my soldiers fought with the southernb nomes, which came together southward as far as Elephantine and [they smote them] as far as the the west side. When I came to the [I drove him3] 18 as far as the He gave to me land, while I did not - I reached the east side, sailing southern boundary. city, I overthrew [the foe1] fortress of the port of the South. restore his town g 19[—— up-stream; [there came] another,i like a jackal [— — aLines 16-40 were never finished; the lower third was never cut (my restorations chiefly indicate the probable connection). Moreover, they were plastered over, and a new inscription containing the conventional encomium was painted on the plaster. As the content of this very portion of the text is political, this must have been the motive for effacing it. See Griffith, Babylonian and Oriental Record, III, 128. As the effacement was done before the inscription was finished, it would seem that there was interference from the south during the construction of the tomb. bThe word "southern" is broken and not quite certain. It exactly fits the remaining traces as well as the context, and later course of the war. cMaspero reads "Gaou" (Ķau), (Revue critique, 1889, II, 416), but wisely adds? The same name occurs at Benihasan (§ 620, note), but cannot be located. dThe southern boundary of the Heracleopolitan kings (?), which was then not far north of Abydos; cf. § 423. In this case there would have been an invasion of the Heracleopolitan kingdom by the Thebans, who were then driven out. eA reference to his campaign on the west shore of the river; the east shore follows in l. 19. f This must have been a city on the frontier between the territory of the north and south, for he has just passed "the southern boundary," and in the next line. reaches "the fortress of the port of the South." gAbout one-third line. hSee Erman (Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache, 1891, 120), who suggests that tp rsy is really the south, and šm‹ middle Egypt. This distinction is apparently maintained in these Siut texts, and is clear at this point, where Tefibi drives his enemy as far as the southern (rsy) border of the Northern Kingdom, and then "as far as the fortress of the port of the South (tp rŝy)." The northernmost point to which tp rsy is applied is the Thinite nome. Now, the Theban king, Intef (Horus: Wɔḥ ‹nh), states that he captured all of the Thinite (Abydos) nome, and “opened all her fortresses" (§ 423), using the very word for fortress (yth) employed in l. 18, above. He also made the Aphroditopolite nome (just north of the Thinite nome) "the door of the North" (ibid.). Remembering that Tefibi's campaign is thus far confined to the west shore, one would suspect that Tefibi's "port of the South" is Intef's "door of the North." All the indications, therefore, point to this region as the southern extremity of Tefibi's campaign. iWith the determinative of a person. 2owith another army from his confederacy. I went out against him with one -. There was no fear a 21 He hastened to battle a like the 'light'; the Lycopolite nome — like a bull going forth 22 forever. I ceased not to fight to the end [making use of the south wind] as well as the north wind, of the east wind as well as [of the west wind] a 23г——). He fell in the water, his ships ran a ['when attacked by wild fire aground, his army were like bulls, a 25 - I drove out rebellion by by the -a 26of a mighty bull. When a man did well, La 27for his lord.c _a 36Heracleopolis. The land was under the fear of my soldiers; no highland was free from fear. If he made La 37fire in the southern nomes. He did it as an affair of his [I placed] him at the head of my soldiers 397. 38The temples were made to flourish, offerings were made to the gods; the wicked saw it, a 39he put not eternity before him, he looked not to the future, he saw evil II. INSCRIPTION OF KHETI Id La 40 398. Kheti (called I to distinguish him from Kheti II of the next tomb) was the son of Tefibi of the preceding tomb. He inherited the lands and titles of his father, being a nomarch by inheritance from his mother (1. 8). Besides the usual functions of the Assiut nomarchs, he was also The following lines, to 1. 35, inclusive, are very fragmentary and obscure. In 1. 28 there is reference to "the South" ("Oh, speak a word to the South (tp rśy)”). In 1. 33 the goddesses "Bast of the South" (Bstt nt tp-rŝy) and Hereret (Ḥrrt) are mentioned, and the following lines (to 1. 35, inclusive) consist of epithets in the feminine, referring to one of them. In 1. 35 there is reference to Middle Egypt (3m) and the building of "its fortresses." dIn the middle tomb (IV) of the three on the same terrace, on the north wall, opposite the scene of the soldiers with large shields. Text in Griffith, Siut, Pls. 13, 14, 20. See also 391. eGriffith, Siut, IV, 75; cf. Kheti II's title, § 410. "military commander of the whole land." His inscription is of great importance for the inner history of the Heracleopolitan kingdom, but is unfortunately fragmentary and obscure. After some references to Kheti's services to the king, Merikere (ll. 1−7), and the ancient origin of Kheti's family (11. 7-9), it is stated that he has chastised Middle Egypt for the king's sake (1. 10), a clear indication of insurrection within the Heracleopolitan kingdom. This trouble quelled, Kheti conducts the king up-river, probably to receive the homage of the kingdom, which, including the nobles of Ehnas, was in great fear, as Kheti's enormous fleet passed up (l. 10-15). Returning to Ehnas-Heracleopolis, the king is received with acclamation by old and young (l. 16, 17). Kheti now returns to his home and is commissioned to restore the ancient temple of Upwawet, which, at the present day, lies somewhere beneath the modern buildings of Siut (11. 17-31). The people lived in peace and security during the remainder of Kheti's reign (ll. 31-34). 399. Of the first seven lines only the upper portion (from a third to a half line) is preserved. The content was important, but only the merest scraps are now intelligible. They show that the text is an address to the deceased Kheti, of historical import, and are as follows: """ a stock of ancient time 3 166 King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Merikere (Mry-k3-R) of Heracleopolis. Thou overthrowest the rebels. "lord of the two regions, beloved of the god, shade of the whole land." These last epithets (1.7) refer to the king; and probably Kheti's services to him in overthrowing the rebels, furnish the connection. The text now becomes more connected, though still very obscure in places. aReferring to the ancient origin of Kheti's family; see also 1. 8. Kheti's Lineage 400. [Heir1] of a ruler, ruler of rulers, a son of a ruler, son of the daughter of a ruler, an ancient stock b [Tson of the daughter of a ruler, —1 of the beginning, a noble 'without an equal. . . . . c for thou hast put 'fear in the land, thou hast chastised 10 Middle Egypt for hisd sake alone. Services for the King 401. Thou didst convey him up-river, the "heaven cleared for him,e the whole land was with him, the counts of Middle Egypt, and the great ones of Heracleopolis, the district of the queens of the land, who came to repel the evil-doer. The land trembled, Middle Egypt 'feared, all the people were in terror, the villages in 'panic, 13fear entered into their limbs. The officials of Pharaoh were (a prey) to fear, the favorites to the terror of Heracleopolis. 14The land burned in its flame aGriffith (Babylonian and Oriental Record, III, 164) and later Maspero (Revue critique, II [1889], 413) have interpreted this passage as indicating that Kheti was the descendant of five princes. It seems to me there are two convincing objections to this: (1) five princes could be written in Egyptian only by employing the usual construction with the numeral 5, not by repeating the word “prince” (ḥķ”) five times! (2) The usual method of indicating a line of descent is the one employed in this very passage, by repeating the paternity of the parent (s' st hk); hence a male descent through five generations of princes would be written (s ḥķ3) “son of a ruler," repeated five times. (I have rendered the politically very unprecise title hk by the equally unprecise "ruler,;" it is probably synonymous with nomarch in this passage.) Of the 5 hk -signs, the first is genitive after a lost noun preceding, as shown by the surviving n; the second is nomen regens of a genitive construction in which the following plural of ḥk (written three times as often) is nomen rectum. The last construction, written in the same way with four hk-signs, is found in Sirenpowet's tomb (Assuan, de Morgan, Catalogue des monuments, 185, l. 8), and often with other words, e. g., in the name of Amenhotep IV's queen (nfr-nfrw with four nir-signs). bAbout one-third line. cKing Merikere's benefits to Kheti are referred to. dThe king's sake. eSee Erman (Gespräch, 69, 70), who makes the verb transitive: "he cleared the heavens." f Lit.: "(river)-bend" (many different localities are so designated) apparently in apposition with Heracleopolis. See Erman, Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache, 1891, 120, and Griffith, Kahun Papyri, II, 21, and infra index. Some protecting goddess. hThe pronoun refers to Heracleopolis. .15..... Never was the front of a fleet brought into 16 ... They Sheshotep, while its rear was still at a... descended by water and landed at Heracleopolis. The city came, rejoicing over [her] lord, the son of her lord; women 1mingled with men, old men and children. Old Age 402. The ruler's (hk) son, he reached his city, entering into the house of his father. He saw the 18approach to their house, his sarcophagus, his old age. When a man is in his place (his tomb), the city 19of eternity Building the Temple 403. Thy city-god loves thee, Tefibi's son, Kheti. He hath 'presented thee, that he might look to the future in order to restore his temple, in order to raise the ancient walls, the original places of offering, to the venerable ground, 21o— -1 which Ptah built with his fingers, which Thoth founded, for Upwawet, lord of Siut,d by1 command of the king, 22the ruler (hk) of the Two Lands, the king of Upper and Lower Egypt, Merikere, to make a monument for the souls of Anubis, the great god; that he (the king) might spend for him (the god) millions of years, that he might repeat Sed Jubilees; 23under the leadership of the confidant of the king, Tefibi's son, Kheti, great lord of Middle a The reading of this second locality is unfortunately quite uncertain. Maspero reads "Hou" (Revue critique, II (1889), 418). Sheshotep is the modern Shatb (Baedeker's Egypt, 1902, 205), just south of Assiut, while Hou is 125 miles farther up-river. It is impossible that the fleet should have been 125 miles long. Moreover, the direction of the fleet's movement (1. 10) is up-river, so that the rear must have been at a place below Sheshotep. The return down-river is narrated in 1. 16 following. [Since writing the above, I notice that Maspero (Dawn, 457) has changed "Hou" to "Gebel-Abufodah," which would make the fleet about 30 miles long; but this is a guess like "Hou."] bAs the preceding paragraph closes very abruptly, it is possible that the following paragraph contains the words of the rejoicing multitude to the king as he enters the city. cHis own approach to the house, meaning the tomb of his ancestors; hence his death. dThis "by" would of course not refer to the building by the gods, but to the proposed restoration. *Meaning that the building of the temple is to be under Kheti's leadership. |