Part One: ‘Imhotep’, was it a name or a title?
by
Damien F. Mackey
“And two millennia later, other rulers, different people, raised [Imhotep]
to the rank of a deity: in the era of the Ptolemies, the Greeks … revered him
as the god of medicine on a par with their “native” Asclepius.”
Alexandra Malenko
Some of this article, originally written last June (2024), needs a bit of amending.
Even a year ago I would not seriously have queried the historical reality of Imhotep. As far as I was concerned, the genius Imhotep of Egypt’s so-called Third Dynasty was the clear candidate for the biblical Joseph, son of Jacob, who had saved Egypt from a seven-year Famine.
Did not Imhotep do the very same on behalf of his ruler (Pharaoh, as we say), Horus Netjerikhet, generally considered to have been the same as Djoser (or Zoser)?
Thus we read, in part, in Netjerikhet’s (Neterkhet’s) celebrated Sehel Famine Stela:
Year 18 of Horus: Neterkhet; the King of Upper and Lower Egypt: Neterkhet; Two Ladies: Neterkhet; Gold-Horus: Djoser; under the Count, Prince, Governor of the domains of the South, Chief of the Nubians in Yebu, Mesir. There was brought to him this royal decree. To let you know:
I was in mourning on my throne,
Those of the palace were in grief,
My heart was in great affliction,
Because Hapy had failed to come in time
In a period of seven years.
Grain was scant,
Kernels were dried up,
Scarce was every kind of food.
Every man robbed his twin,
Those who entered did not go.
Children cried,
Youngsters fell,
The hearts of the old were grieving;
Legs drawn up, they hugged the ground,
Their arms clasped about them.
Courtiers were needy,
Temples were shut,
Shrines covered with dust,
Everyone was in distress.
I directed my heart to turn to the past,
I consulted one of the staff of the Ibis,
The chief lector-priest of Imhotep,
Son of Ptah South-of-his-Wall:
"In which place is Hapy born?
Which is the town of the Sinuous one?
Which god dwells there?
That he might join with me."
He stood: "I shall go to Mansion-of-the-Net,
It is designed to support a man in his deeds;
I shall enter the House of Life,
Unroll the Souls of Re,
I shall be guided by them."
He departed, he returned to me quickly,
He let me know the flow of Hapy,
His shores and all the things they contain.
He disclosed to me the hidden wonders,
To which the ancestors had made their way,
And no king had equaled them since.
He said to me:
"There is a town in the midst of the deep,
Surrounded by Hapy, Yebu by name;
It is first of the first,
First nome to Wawat,
Earthly elevation, celestial hill,
Seat of Re when he prepares
To give life to every face.
Its temple's name is 'Joy-of-life,'
'Twin Caverns' is the water's name,
They are the breasts that nourish all.
….
The important point to be noted is that this is a late inscription, thought to date to Egypt’s Ptolemaïc period, much, much later than the era to which it alludes.
The following article by Alexandra Malenko, whilst presenting a typical, and most favourable view of Imhotep, includes sufficient precautionary comments to rein in any excess enthusiasm, e.g. “the myth created by the directors”, “great unknown”, “the world had forgot about him”, “what is fiction or exaggeration”, etc.:
https://huxley.media/en/imhotep-leonardo-da-vinci-from-the-banks-of-the-nile/
Author: Alexandra Malenko
IMHOTEP: Leonardo da Vinci from the banks of the Nile
Even when there were no pyramids in Egypt, the legend said that he was great and powerful, he was the first who erected such a miracle in the sands. During the time of Cleopatra, he was revered as a wise and a skillful healer, during the reign of the Ptolemies, in the so-called Hellenistic period in the history of Egypt, he was worshiped as a deity. But here’s the trick: the name of Imhotep is well known to us, but not from scientific works, rather from entertainment films.
Great power of cinema! This art is capable of distorting and altering everything, shown on the screen is so easy to believe, and the myth created by the directors is so difficult to collapse… Through the efforts of Hollywood masters, Imhotep is known to the broad masses for the film The Mummy, its numerous remarks and remakes. And whether it is Imhotep performed by Boris Karloff or Arnold Vosloo, the film image is incredibly far from the truth.
THE GREAT UNKNOWN
Imhotep (his name in translation means “the one who walks in peace”) lived in the 27th century BC [sic]. He was a healer and an architect, an inventor, a genius of his time and a polymath, as the ancient Greeks called such unique ones, Leonardo da Vinci of the Ancient World. During his long life, Imhotep served three pharaohs. His extraordinary talents were revealed during the first ruler of the Third Dynasty, Djoser.
And two millennia later, other rulers, different people, raised him to the rank of a deity: in the era of the Ptolemies, the Greeks – the inhabitants of Egypt – revered him as the god of medicine on a par with their “native” Asclepius. According to some testimonies, the cult of Imhotep lasted until the appearance of Christianity and Islam in Egypt.
With the arrival of the dominant religions, his temples were destroyed, most of the works were lost. Until the nineteenth century, until researchers began to decipher hieroglyphic texts, the world had forgot about him. But the very first mentions of an outstanding scientist of the Ancient World stunned Egyptologists.
In 1926, during the excavation of the Djoser pyramid, archaeologists discovered a statue dated to the years when Imhotep hypothetically lived. On the basis of the statue, after the name of the pharaoh, the name of Imhotep was written and a list of titles was given: the keeper of the treasury of the king in Lower Egypt, the ruler of a large palace, the first after the king in Lower Egypt, the priest of Heliopolis, the architect, the carver of precious vases…
For one person, the title of chati would be enough – this position in modern gradation can be equated with the post of prime minister. Chati was in charge of political and economic issues, was involved in the formation of the budget, made current executive decisions… But Imhotep was also a priest, therefore he had many responsibilities outside the palace. As a priest of the god Ra, the god of sun, he traveled extensively in Upper and Lower Egypt, taught the people the wisdom set forth in the sacred texts.
WHO IS YOUR LORD?
Pharaoh Djoser has been ruling Egypt for over twenty years. In the first years of his reign, he conquered the Sinai Peninsula and from that campaign brought rich trophies, in particular a lot of copper and turquoise – both were a kind of strategic raw materials for Egypt, had a high price.
Djoser wisely disposed of the conquests: he used them in the improvement of the palace and the construction of his own tomb. His second campaign was directed to the south, he reached the sixth rapids of the Nile, conquered Northern Nubia and ordered the construction of a fortification wall to protect the southern borders of his possessions at the first rapids of the Nile.
The palace of Pharaoh Djoser was located in Memphis – the capital of Lower Egypt, located next to Saqqara. The palace was the center of the capital. Numerous craftsmen and artisans settled around it, in particular, architects, stone carvers, sculptors… Among the architects, as the researchers believe, Imhotep originated.
For some time he was probably a scribe, then he ran the “office” under the pharaoh.
Not everyone knew how to read and write in Ancient Egypt. The scribes were both the chroniclers of the pharaoh, and legislators, and jurists; it largely depended on them how the state would function. It is not difficult to assess whether Imhotep achieved great success as a scribe: in the later periods of the Egyptian kingdom, the scribes revered him as the patron saint of their craft, honored him on a par with the god of wisdom Thoth. Both in sculptures and on bas-reliefs, he is invariably depicted with an open scroll in his hands – a symbol of knowledge and wisdom.
STROKES TO PORTRAIT
It is not yet possible to reconstruct the path of Imhotep’s ascent exactly. The most generous source of information about his life – the burial complex in Saqqara, designed and built by him, has not yet given scientists exhaustive answers.
But if the assumption of the researchers is true that the great polymath of antiquity did not come from the most noble family, then it is obvious that he made a remarkable career at court solely thanks to his talents.
It is impossible to say with certainty what Imhotep looked like. Found painted and sculptural images do not allow to recreate the portrait of the ancient sage. Determine how tall he was, what build, what facial features he had, would allow the study of the remains. But the tomb of Imhotep has not yet been found.
Although, as it is known from ancient texts, in the old days thousands of sufferers came to his tomb – to worship him as the god of healing, to ask for healing, and at the same time for wisdom and perseverance. There is only an assumption that the tomb of Imhotep was built in Saqqara – not far from the pyramid of his master, Pharaoh Djoser, and the magnificent buildings that have glorified him for centuries.
ARCHITECTURAL HERITAGE
The tombs of the pharaohs of the Early and Ancient Kingdoms were mastabas – low trapezoidal structures made of stone. This tradition was changed by Imhotep. For Pharaoh Djoser, he designed something unprecedented – he installed three proportionally decreasing scales on top of each other and built a pyramid.
It was the first pyramid, the largest and most amazing structure of its time. The stepped edges of the pyramid climbed stairs to the sun, to the sky, to the gods – such a bright symbolism could not remain unnoticed. This invention for many centuries determined the direction of development of the architecture of Ancient Egypt.
Djoser’s pyramid looked impressive inside too. A vertical tunnel led to the burial chamber, located at a depth of 28 meters. To get into the main room, one had to overcome a five-kilometer labyrinth that looped between small rooms and hiding places, crossed the passage halls and rested against blank walls.
Archaeologists discovered this miracle of architecture only in the twentieth century. The walls of the burial chambers (and in the pyramid of Djoser, built as a family tomb, there were several of them) were decorated with blue and emerald tiles, which are perfectly preserved. Alas, there were no valuables in the tomb: the robbers had time to work hard.
Most of the finds during the reign of Djoser (and the time of Imhotep’s works) were discovered by the French archaeologist and Egyptologist Jean-Philippe Lauer. He devoted more than 75 years to the study of antiquities in the sands of Egypt, from the 1920s to 2001. It was he who found the step pyramid of Djoser buried in the sands, was the first to describe it, and investigated its amazing layout.
He also restored the burial complex built around the stepped pyramid – another architectural creation of Imhotep. This complex is another testament to the extraordinary genius of the ancient polymath.
It is interesting that the burial complex of Djoser was built not of clay bricks, but of stone, of limestone. But the main thing: in the construction of this building, Imhotep was the first to use a hitherto unseen form – vertical columns. He did not dare to leave them unsupported, they protrude from the walls, but it was also a revolutionary step.
THE GOD OF HEALING
Many researchers reasonably consider Imhotep the founder of modern medicine. He was one of the first to consider diseases and the healing process not as punishment or mercy of the gods, but as natural processes, and began to apply methods of treatment not related to religious rituals. Until now, no sources have been found that would confirm that Imhotep was a healer. It can be argued that his ideas contributed to the development of medical science.
Imhotep’s teachings are retold in a text known as the Edwin Smith Papyrus, dated around 1500 BC. The ancient scientist knew methods of treating over 200 diseases, including a method for treating inflammation of the appendix and arthritis, he knew the healing properties of many plants and natural products.
Guided by his instructions, the Egyptians consumed a lot of honey – a product with pronounced bactericidal properties, they also used honey to heal wounds.
However, it should be noted that even before the birth of Imhotep, from about 2750 BC., Egyptian doctors knew human anatomy well. They knew how to do a kind of neurosurgical operations, and very successful. Obviously, they received extensive knowledge about the structure of man through mummification. During this complex procedure, the internal organs were removed from the body, inquiring minds had the opportunity to examine them well, study, and comprehend the principles of their work.
The Egyptians believed that the heart is at the center of a network of channels through which blood, air and semen are carried to different parts of the body. The ancient physicians also knew that proper nutrition and adherence to the rules of hygiene create a reliable barrier to many diseases.
One of the first medical recommendations was a ban on the consumption of raw fish and pork. However, in the matter of healing, the help of the gods was useful. During the treatment procedures, prayers were certainly read and special rituals were performed. There was some practical sense in it as well, because confidence in a favorable outcome of the disease is already a small victory over it.
Imhotep, it seems, was, as they would say today, the popularizer of medical science, as a result, the fame of the great healer deservedly went to him. Temples were erected to him in Thebes and Memphis, people were ready to go half the world to worship him.
It was then that thousands of statues of Imhotep were created: it was believed that everyone who possessed such a thing was under his patronage. At the same time, scientists believe, incredible stories about the great genius of the wise priest and chati were born: as if he cured Pharaoh Djoser of blindness, saved the kingdom from a seven-year drought, and defeated the great famine in the country.
What is true in these retellings, and what is fiction or exaggeration, scientists are not ready to answer unequivocally. Time will tell, because excavations in Saqqara continue, the sands, albeit reluctantly, reveal ancient secrets. Perhaps it is there, on the plateau in the Nile Valley, that the solution to the nature of human genius will be found.
[End of quote]
I commenced this present article by writing:
Even a year ago I would not seriously have queried the historical reality of Imhotep. As far as I was concerned, the genius Imhotep of Egypt’s so-called Third Dynasty was the clear candidate for the biblical Joseph, son of Jacob, who had saved Egypt from a seven-year Famine.
Did not Imhotep do the very same on behalf of his ruler … Netjerikhet …?
Joseph as Imhotep was, for me, a given, and I, consequently, was critical of certain conservative revisionists - albeit very good ones - who could not see this, and who had, as a result - by confusing Joseph with Moses in Egyptian history, as I thought - made quite impossible a full-scale revision of ancient Egypt against the Bible.
And so I wrote to this effect on various occasions:
If any revisionist historian had placed himself in a good position, chronologically, to identify in the Egyptian records the patriarch Joseph, then it was Dr. Donovan Courville, who had, in The Exodus Problem and its Ramifications, I and II (1971), proposed that Egypt’s Old and Middle Kingdoms were contemporaneous. That radical move on his part might have enabled Courville to bring the likeliest candidate for Joseph, the Vizier Imhotep of the Third Dynasty, into close proximity with the Twelfth Dynasty – the dynasty that revisionists most favour for the era of Moses.
Courville, however, who did not consider Imhotep for Joseph, selected instead for his identification of this great biblical Patriarch another significant official, MENTUHOTEP, vizier to pharaoh Sesostris I, the second king of Egypt’s Twelfth Dynasty.
And very good revisionists have followed Courville in his choice of Mentuhotep for Joseph.
With my own system, though, favouring (i) Imhotep for Joseph; (ii) Amenemes [Amenemhet] I for the “new king” of Exodus 1:8; and (iii) Amenemes I’s successor, Sesostris I, for the pharaoh from whom Moses fled (as recalled in the semi-legendary “The Story of Sinuhe”), then Mentuhotep of this era must now loom large as a candidate for the Egyptianised Moses. ….
What I just wrote above may still fully apply chronologically speaking.
The difference now, however, is that I was no longer embracing ‘Imhotep for Joseph’ so uncritically. And here is why:
Only when Brenton Minge’s book, Pharaoh’s Evidence. Egypt’s Stunning Witness to Joseph and Exodus (2023), arrived for me to review did I begin to question, not only Imhotep as Joseph, but even the very historical existence of Imhotep.
Brenton Minge, who holds to a conspiracy theory view that Imhotep was a made-up imitation of the real Joseph, begins his Chapter 4: Was Imhotep … Joseph? with what has already been noted above about Imhotep – those late sources (p. 45):
The problem, in historical terms, is that while Imhotep is placed around 2650 BC … his cult, or even any remembrance of him, only made its first appearance more than a millennium later. Imhotep authority Dietrich Wildung points out that, before then, “We have no clear records that Imhotep was remembered, much less venerated, for the thousand years after his death until the beginning of the New Kingdom” (emphasis added). …. Hence the Encyclopedia of Ancient History’s observation that his first claim to “deity” was in the “Late Period” (ie., around 712-332 BC) … effectively representing a 2,000-year “deity” silence from his claimed time to his earliest statue! ….
On pp. 46-47, Brenton Minge will present one of his crucial arguments, that the word imhotep on the base of king Netjerikhet’s statue is not a name at all, but a title, and that the actual name of the title-holder has been carefully erased. He writes:
Background
In 1926, excavations at Sakkara’s Step Pyramid uncovered the base of pharaoh Netjerikhet’s statue, bearing the insignia of both the king and, as is presumed, Imhotep. Concerning the latter it reads (reading right to left):
“Chancellor of the King of Upper and Lower Egypt, first after the King, Administrator of the great palace, Director of public works, Overseer of the seers [of On], Imhotep the Architect, the Builder …” … (continuing, but broken off – see below left).
Imhotep Netjerikhet
Statue base, Step Pyramid: Firth and Quibell, The Step Pyramid 2:pl. 58b ….
Observe grain “sheaf” djed symbols.
For an officeholder to appear beside his king on an Egyptian royal statue is otherwise unheard of …. Yet here the full blaze of Pharaonic glory includes the architect, side by side with his Pharaoh – a truly remarkable honour.
But what of the name Imhotep itself? For two reasons, it is submitted that this was not the name of the person being honoured, but part of his titles.
1. “Imhotep” literally comes from two words: im, meaning “overseer” (as still reflected in the Arabic imam), and hotep, meaning “peaceful”, or “blessed”, as in the Field of Hotep, or “Field of the Blessed”. With the variant imy, im occurs in more than 70 Egyptian administrative titles of the Old Kingdom … always containing a meaning closer to “overseer”/ “director”. Hence “Im-hotep” (often formerly spelt with a hyphen) … would seem as much of an administrative title as all the others in the inscription, effectively meaning “overseer who comes in peace”, or, more concisely, “blessed overseer”.
2. The inscription is unfinished, with the end part (at left) being conspicuously broken off. Yet the end, according to Egyptian protocol, is precisely where the proper name belongs, as Battiscombe Gunn – later Professor of Egyptology at the University of Oxford – observed:
“Egyptian titles never follow the name of their holder, but only precede it. …”.
That is, THE PROPER NAME ALWAYS COMES AT THE END, AFTER THE TITLES. Therefore “blessed overseer”, by virtue of its placement as much as its wording, cannot be a name, but only a descriptive “job title”, since there is clearly more to go! The description is manifestly unfinished. As Professor R.J. Forbes, of the University of Amsterdam, observed, “Only in the case of gods do the titles follow the name, never in the case of human beings” … (recalling from the encyclopaedia above, that Imhotep’s first claim to “deity” was still millennia away).
So it would seem that, assuming the inscription is authentic, this endearing title (“blessed overseer”/ “overseer of peace”) was effectively later lifted from it, and reprocessed as a proper name with a life of its own. “A later tradition”, writes The Oxford Classical Dictionary (without taking our view), “identified Imhotep … as the architect”. …. Yet it could just as readily be referring to Joseph himself, the true and known “blessed overseer” of Egypt under his king (with his Egyptian name skilfully removed at the end; see Genesis 41:45; 45:26).
[End of quotes]
On the matter of Pharaoh, I will note here two other of Brenton Minge’s views.
He takes the name Zoser, or Djoser, as being a late addition, and so we find him often writing (e.g. p. 17): “… Netjerikhet (later called Djoser) …”.
And:
Contrary to the standard opinion, that the ancient Egyptians began to use the title, “Pharaoh”, only in the New Kingdom era, which would mean that the use of the word in the Book of Genesis is anachronistic, Brenton will argue that the term Pharaoh was an old usage.
To simplify it here (Minge, p. 80):
PHARAOH: Where is the word?
For two centuries Egyptology has effectively asked the question, “Where is the title ‘Pharaoh’ in the Old and Middle Kingdoms of Egypt?” Given our insistence that Joseph and Israel’s subsequent sojourn belong in this very period (ie., dynasties 3 through to early 13), and the frequent Bible use of “Pharaoh” with them, it is incumbent on us to be able to address that question.
Surprisingly though it may seem, the answer is actually staring us in the face. This is in the form of the Old and Middle Kingdom serekh, the distinctively royal rectangle accompanied by the royal falcon Horus … representing the royal palace, or “house” of the king. Just as America’s White House, though technically a building, has come to also represent the actual person of the President, so it was with Pharaoh. As Miroslav Verner notes … the royal “Residence” could equally have the Old Kingdom meaning of “building”, or “the ruler himself”. ….
[End of quotes]
In a series of half a dozen or more articles since then, I have solved the problem of Imhotep (at least to my own satisfaction), by multi-identifying Joseph in Egypt, for one, as Khasekhemwy-Imhotep:
Joseph, whose coat was of many colours, was a man of many names
(3) Joseph, whose coat was of many colours, was a man of many names | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
And the:
Biblical King of the seven-year Famine
(3) Biblical King of the seven-year Famine | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
was Horus Netjerikhet, not Djoser (Zoser), who was Joseph.
Part Two:
Old Egypt’s abundant preparations for the Famine
Here I am totally dependent upon the brilliant research into the subject as I find it most skilfully rendered in Brenton Minge’s book (already referred to above), Pharaoh’s Evidence. Egypt’s Stunning Witness to Joseph and Exodus (2013, unpublished).
Chapter 1: The Great Famine
P. 3:
Documented Nile failure and regional impact
According to J-D Stanley and others, there was such a major Old Kingdom failure of Egypt’s River Nile that even “the Lake Victoria outflow ceased for a short period”. …. This must have been a catastrophic cessation of the Nile’s principal source. Though only brief in historical terms (“a short period”), such was the drought’s impact that even in the lush Nile Valley itself sand dunes appeared … while sediment cores of the fertile Faiyum reveal “severe low Nile flood discharge:…..
To this day archaeologists speak of the “Old Kingdom drought” that resulted in a “catastrophic decline in the Nile flows”, reflecting Josephus’ summary of the seven-year famine that “neither did the river overflow the ground”… (i.e., there was no annual inundation). ….
Pp. 5-6:
“World’s oldest large dam”
Disastrous though it was for other nations, the seven-year drought was met by an Egypt that was fully prepared. The remains of a sizeable dam not far from Egypt’s ancient capital of Memphis (which was itself built next to the river Nile) are consistent with this preparedness. The Garawi ravine dam (also called Sadd el-Kafara) is described as “the world’s oldest large dam” in the specialist publication Dams. …. While modest by modern standards, relative to its time it was originally a trailblazing 118.7 m (390 ft) high, and with a 98 m (320 ft) thick wall at base that still extends some 113 m (370 ft) in its length today. …. The surviving wall height, though much diminished, still represents “one of the oldest and greatest known dams” in historical terms, as Alper Baba and colleagues observe. ….
Significantly the dam is dated to the Old Kingdom’s “Third Dynasty”, as Schutz, Seidel and Strauss-Seeber note. …. This is the dynasty of the famed seven-year famine that befell Egypt during the reign of king Netjerikhet. Thus the official website of the Egypt State Information Service, under its “Netjerikhet (Djoser) [sic]” entry, declares that “Egypt experienced a seven-year famine during Djoser’s reign” (emphasis added). …
Used only briefly
Modern engineers who have studied the dam note how well constructed it was, “exceed[ing] by far the minimum values … specified for today’s standards” (emphasis added), as Garbrecht states. …. Yet they also note the obvious haste with which it was constructed. A History of Dams author Norman Smith says that the ancient engineer “was in a great hurry to put the dam to work”. …. But why, unless he was aware of a pressing impending need for its precious water?
In spite of this haste in construction, the dam was only used for a short time – a “few years at the very most”, as Smith observes of its tell-tale absence of sedimentation.
“Of one thing we can be certain, however; the dam was only in use for a very short time. … [D]ams always act as traps for silt … behind the remains of the Sadd el-Kafara there is no evidence of siltation at all, indicating that the reservoir must have had a life of a few years at the very most”. ….
That such a dam should ever have been built at all, and particularly not far from the river Nile, has long been a mystery. The traditional explanation for its construction – that it was to mitigate flash floods – borders on the comical, when it is recalled that the rainfall for the area averages 18 mil. (0.7 of one inch) … per year! Similarly unconvincing is the explanation for its brief usage – that it prematurely “collapsed” (hardly likely, given the acknowledged strength and stability of its construction, with its safety standards “exceed[ing] by far” today’s minimum requirements). ….
Yet against the backdrop of Joseph’s famine preparations, the dam is just what we might expect.
G.W. Murray’s question, asked soon after World War II, as to “why the ancient Egyptians would have wanted to store so great a body of water apparently in a hurry”… receives a perfectly reasonable answer that squares with all four aspects of the evidence:
• It was built hastily, because of the known countdown to the drought
• It was built not far from the Nile, so it could readily be filled in the good inundation years with an abundant supply of water
• It was situated near Memphis, to drought-proof Egypt’s ancient capital
• It was used, if at all, for only a “few years at the very most, because the drought, though bitter, was also relatively brief – limited to the “seven years” as revealed by God to Joseph.
In short, this “stupendous dam”… as scientists Christina De La Rocha and Daniel Conley describe it, was effectively an additional form of drought “insurance”, taken out, like all insurance, before the event. In this case an event of which Joseph alone, initially, among all the nations, had prior knowledge. ….
Chapter 6: Joseph’s canal and character
P. 75:
The extraordinary impact of Joseph upon Egypt continues down to the present, in the form of Bahr Yusef, or Joseph’s Canal. According to a recent Japanese reclamation project of Bahr Yusef, even today the canal irrigates “11 percent of [Egypt’s] total cultivated land …”.
….
…. Xiaofeng Liu observes that “In c. 2300 the canal connecting the Nile and Lake Moeris was deepened and widened to form what is now known as Bahr Yusef”. …. The dating aside, there is noting to question in such a combination of natural topography and human intervention. Thus the Oxford Atlas of the World similarly calls Bahr Yusef a “principal canal” … the very word “canal”, by definition, denoting an at least substantially constructed waterway. ….
P. 76:
So how old is it?
From the inscriptional evidence of the third dynasty, we know that a distinctive “canal” made a sudden appearance in the hieroglyphic record during that dynasty. …. This was no ordinary canal, as indicated by its designation as the “Great Canal” (mer wer). …. Such a term shows that it was largely an engineered construction, since under no circumstances could a natural waterway have been called “great”” by comparison with the mighty Nile. Confirming that this Great Canal was one and the same as Joseph’s Canal is the ancient city of Gurob, situated next to Bahr Yusef, where Joseph’s Canal turns into the Faiyum. The ancient name of the city is known to have been Great Canal … (Mer-wer) – obviously mirroring the canal on which it was situated, i.e., Bahr Yusef. ….
Pp. 77-78:
“Waterway of Joseph”
Accordingly the BBC declares of Bahr Yusef that
“We do now that between 1850 and 1650 BCE a canal was built to keep the branches of the Nile permanently open, enabling water to fill Lake Quaran and keep the [Faiyum] land fertile. This canal was so effective that it still successfully functions today…[F]or thousands of years it has only been known by one name. In Arabic it’s the Bahr Yusef. This translates into English as The Waterway of Joseph. Could this canal have been built by a certain prime Minister called Joseph? Was this Prime Minister the son of….Jacob” (Emphasis added). ….
The dating, though only approximate, is not far off. Clearly the evidence is in, and it is overwhelming. From ancient attestation, to regional recognition, to pyramid harbours, to dynastic fit, to its very name, Bahr Yusef can only be Joseph’s canal. Logically it follows that the pyramids visited each year at Giza by millions, while not remotely needing to have been built by Joseph, were nevertheless enabled in their construction by his already existing canal.
Once generally dismissed by Egyptologists, it is now more widely recognized that Joseph’s Canal was indeed the Old Kingdom “waterway along the western desert edge to the sides of the royal funerary complexes”, which Andrzej Cwiek describes … Miroslav Verner maintains, and Georges Goyon observes. Without, again, any necessarily taking our view, their collective take on the evidence seems confirmed by a series of drill cores and trenches from the late 1980’s which revealed, as Mark Lehner notes, “a Nile channel that ran about 200 to 300 m east of the [greater pyramid] site at Giza…[which] must have served as part of a major inland port at the centre of the Egyptian state” (emphasis added). ….
This is breathtaking stuff. No wonder that the ancient historian Pompeius Trogus … expressly wrote that “Joseph…was eminently skilled in prodigies”. …. No wonder, too, that Joseph was held in such awe in the ancient world that his distinctive Step Pyramid design was imitated, at least conceptually, as far afield as China … in the East, and the Americas in the West.
Pp. 86-87:
Unique Step Pyramid relationship. Joseph’s building genius behind the Step Pyramid has already been established (see chs. 3 and 4). Yet the Buried Pyramid shows a remarkable relationship to it. The respective palace-facade walls of both complexes are of “exactly the same design”, their bastions of the “same measurements”, and their ingresses of “equal spaces”, as Goneim notes . …. Even the massive lengths of the respective enclosures are identical … a correspondence that can only be accounted for by deliberate (and likely common) architectural design!
Both pyramids also share the identical accretion layer construction … (where the layers rest, as it were, slopingly on each other, rather than horizontally as with fourth dynasty pyramids and onwards). Both, too, are step pyramids – a similar distinctive of the third dynasty. Likewise both are the only pyramid complexes with an extensive north court/south court arrangement. In fact, here the massive c. 187 x 187m square north court is doubly accentuated, being raised six metres above the rest of the complex, and then “surrounded by an embankment wall … with bastions”, as Swelim observes, exactly like the [outside] wall of the Complex of Netjerykhet””. …. This represents a literal status “elevation” of the courts, clearly highlighting that the great enclosures were of supreme importance in the public service of the Buried Pyramid’s owner (as suggested also by the tomb’s placement alongside the Gisr el Mudir great enclosure).
A similar parallel (recalling Firth and Quibell’s dummy underground “barns or storehouses” of the Step Pyramid next door) … is the vast granary-lookalike architecture of the underground Buried Pyramid.
As noted by Martina Bardonova in her doctoral dissertation, “Grain Storage in Ancient Egypt”,
“More resembling to a kind of storage complex are the rows of storerooms in the U-shaped corridors in the substructure of Sekhemkhet’s … pyramid” (emphasis added). ....
Another indicator is the substantial Step Pyramid “boundary marker” fragment that was embedded in the Buried Pyramid’s wall during construction. …. This confirms that it was built after the Netjerikhet complex, but is clearly related to it, all the more as the piece bore part of Netjerikhet’s royal serekh.
Also noteworthy is the striking “sheaf” configuration of the entrance. …. It reveals the same bundled grain shape found throughout the Step Pyramid. …. A similar “sheaf” top also occurs in the entrance to that monument’s South Tomb.
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