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'Ancient Egyptian Autobiographies Chiefly of the Middle Kingdom: a Study and an Anthology' Zurich Open Repository and Archive University of Zurich Main Library Strickhofstrasse 39 CH-8057 Zurich www.zora.uzh.ch Year: 1988 Ancient Egyptian Autobiographies Chiefly of the Middle Kingdom: A Study and an Anthology Lichtheim, Miriam Abstract: By a selection of sixty ancient Egyptian autobiographical inscriptions, presented in new transla- tions, the author examines the growth of the autobiographical genre during the Old and Middle Kingdoms, from ca. 2500 to ca. 1800 B.C. The Old Kingdom created the basic form: the autobiography as an inte- gral part of the inscriptional and pictorial program of tombs - the planned and often sumptuous tombs of the well-to-do, who filled the major positions in the royal administration. After the decline oftheOld Kingdom, the rising middle class diversified the genre, and loci other than tombs, notably free-standing stelae and rock faces of quarries, also became carriers of autobiographical self-presentations. The cult of Osiris added yet another dimension: autobiographical stelae erected near the Osiris temple at Abydos and specifically designed to place their owners in the care of the god-of-the-dead. The texts of thesestelae often describe their position as being ”at the terrace of the great god”, a description which has caused much scholarly rumination. Just what was the terrace of the great god? This study demonstrates that the texts themselves furnish the conclusive answer. Finally, the reader meets a magnate of Middle Egypt in his splendid tomb, whose carefully stylized autobiography is a classic of Middle Kingdom oratory. Posted at the Zurich Open Repository and Archive, University of Zurich ZORA URL: https://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-141274 Monograph Published Version Originally published at: Lichtheim, Miriam (1988). Ancient Egyptian Autobiographies Chiefly of the Middle Kingdom: A Study and an Anthology. Freiburg, Switzerland / Göttingen, Germany: Universitätsverlag / Vandenhoeck Ruprecht. LICHTHEIM · ANCIENT EGYPTIAN AUTOBIOGRAPHIES ORBIS BIBLICUS ET ORIENTALIS Published by the Biblical Institute of the U niversity of Fribourg Switzerland the Seminar für Biblische Zeitgeschichte of the University of Münster i. W. Federal Republic of Germany and the Schweizerische Gesellschaft für orientalische Altertumswissenschaft Editor: Othmar Keel Coeditors: Erich Zenger und Albert de Pury Tbe Autbor: Miriam Lichtheim grew up in Berlin. She studied Semitic languages, Egyptology, and Greek at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, finishing with a M. A. degree in 1939. Continuing at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, she obtained a Ph. D. in Egyptology in 1944. Subsequently she became a professional librarian, working first at Yale University and later at the University of California, Los Angeles. There, until her retirement, she held the dual position of Near Eastern bibliographer and lecturer in ancient Egyptian history. Apart from articles, her publications include: Demotic Ostraca from Medinet Habu, 1957, the three­ volume Ancient Egyptian Literature, 1973-1980, and Late Egyptian Wisdom Literature in the International Context, OBO 52 (1983). ORBIS BIBLICUS ET ORIENTALIS 84 MIRIAM LICHTHEIM ANCIENT EGYPTIAN AUTOBIOGRAPHIES CHIEFLY OF THE MIDDLE KINGDOM A STUDY AND AN ANTHOLOGY UNIVERSITÄTSVERLAG FREIBURG SCHWEIZ VANDENHOECK & RUPRECHT GÖTTINGEN 1988 CIP-Titelaufnahme der Deutschen Bibliothek Lichtheim, Miriam: Ancient Egyptian Autobiographies Chiefly of the Middle Kingdom: a study and an anthology / Miriam Lichtheim. - Freiburg, Schweiz: Univ.-Verl.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck u. Ruprecht, 1988 (Orbis biblicus et orientalis, 84) ISBN 3-525-53713-1 (Vandenhoeck u. Ruprecht) Gb. ISBN 3-7278-0594-3 (Univ.-Verl.) Gb. NE : GT Publication subsidized by the Swiss Academy of Humanities Die Druckvorlagen wurden vom Herausgeber als reprofertige Dokumente zur Verfügung gestellt © 1988 by Universitätsverlag Freiburg Schweiz Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Göttingen Paulusdruckerei Freiburg Schweiz ISBN 3-7278-0594-3 (Universitätsverlag) ISBN 3-525-53713-1 (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht) Digitalisat erstellt durch Flurin Baumgartner, Religionswissenschaftliches Seminar, Universität Zürich To the Colleagues at the University of Basel ERIK HORNUNG and ELISABETH ST AEHELIN CONTENTS PREFACE: ANCIENT AUTOBIOORAPHY 1 I. Autobiography in the Old Kingdom: The Basic Forms 5 Sources Nos. 1-5: Hetep-her-akhet - Nekhebu - Pepinakht-Heqaib- Sabni-Pepiankh the Middle II. In the First Intermediate Period 21 1. A Time of Autonomy 21 Three Nomarchs (Sources Nos. 6-8): Henqu­ Ankhtifi - Khety I Six Citizens (Sources Nos. 9-14): lndi­ Iti - Neferyu - Seneni - Hasi - Fegu A Theban Nomarch (Source No. 15): Intef 2. About Women: Three Stelae from Naga-ed-Der 37 III. Under the Eleventh Dynasty, I: The Mature Autobiography 39 Sources Nos. 16-21: Djari-Rediu-Khnum­ Tjetji - Intef son of Tjefi - Henu IV. Und er the Eleventh Dynasty, II: The "Abydos Formula" 55 Sources Nos. 19 and 22-25: Tjetji - Henenu - Qemnen - Intef - Meru V . Middle Kingdom Stelae from Abydos 65 1. Dwellers in the Thinite Norne 65 Sources Nos. 26-35: Nakhty- Mentuhotep - Rudjahau - Intef-iqer- Wepwawet-aa - Amenysonb 2. Officials on Mission 84 Sources Nos. 36-42: Mery - Shen-setji - Ded-lqu - Djaa - Semti the Younger - Ikhemofret 3. "Pilgrims" 101 Sources Nos. 43-59: Ankhu - Mentuwosre - Intef son of Sent - Intef - Amenemhet - Imeny - Inhemakht - Nebipusenwosret - Sebeksen - Wepwawet-hotep - lbia 4. Conclusions 129 4. 1 Tue Abydos Formula 4. 2 Tue Terrace of the Great God 4 .3 Personal Piety VI. The Autobiography of Amenemhet and Remarks on Style 135 1 . Source No. 60: Tue Nomarch Amenemhet 135 2. Remarks on Style 142 LIST OFILLUSTRATIONS 147 SYMBOLS 148 ABBREVIATIONS AND BIBLIOGRAPHY 149 INDEXES Tue Sources by Number 157 Tue Sources by Location 159 Royal Names 163 Personal Names 164 Egyptian Words (Selection) 169 PREFACE: ANCIENT AUTOBIOGRAPHY Among the literary genres that evolved in ancient Egypt, the genre "autobiographical inscription" held pride of place. Beginning early in the Old Kingdom (ca. 2500 B.C.) the "autobiography" flourished uninterruptedly for more than two millennia, ending only when Egypt became a Christian country. Elsewhere in the ancient Near East, in the Syro-Mesopotamian realm and, later, throughout the Persian empire, autobiographical inscriptions also became an established genre; but they differed from the Egyptian kind in being the recorded pronouncements of kings and lesser rulers, whereas in Egypt the autobiography was specifically a non-royal product. Tue Egyptian autobiography arose in the context of the private tomb. Its owner, a "private" person, was in Old Kingdom times always an official in the king's administration, one who had obtained sufficient means to erect a tomb in which to record, in effigy and in writing, his individual person. Tue resulting personal memoirs on stone continued to evolve throughout Egyptian history. I shall not attempt to sketch the quite different autobiographies of westem Asiatic rulers. lt would require a symposium of specialists to characterize and compare the various types of autobiography in the ancient Near East. The major work on the history of ancient and medieval autobiography - Georg Misch, Geschichte der Autobiographie - has an introductory chapter on ancient Near Eastem autobiography, which is entirely inadequate, inevitably so, since it was written too soon and without firsthand knowledge of ancient Near Eastern literatures. Misch was interested in all kinds of autobiographical impulses; he thus included fictional tales narrated in the first person and, roaming among Egyptian and westem Asiatic sources, he composed a hotchpotch account in which nothing is rightly established. As for autobiography in classical Greece, A. Momigliano, in his The Development of Greek Biography (1971), made the point that in Greece autobiography was an offshoot, or sub-species, of biography. Biography seems to have come first and was fuelled by the Greeks' curiosity about the lives of famous men. Now this situation is entirely different from that of 1 ancient Egypt. In Egypt the genre "biography" did not develop at all. Here then is proof that biography and autobiography are not necessarily interrelated. The point is worth stressing, the more so since egyptologists often appear to be apologetic about calling Egyptian autobiographies by that name and instead speak of "biographical inscriptions", a term which is in fact a misnomer. Even the Lexikon der Ägyptologie entered its survey-article on Egyptian Autobiography under the title "Biographie". Academic studies of the genre Autobiography are now very much in fashion. To quote John Sturrock in the Times Literary Supplement of October 3, 1980 : "Autobiography is losing its innocence and being ravished by the professors". I now find myself wondering, if the professors of Western literatures and history who write about autobiography would not gain in precision, and enrich their palettes, if they did not start from the assumption that autobiography is a modern Western literary form (so reported as one of G. Gusdorfs points in the TLS article cited above), and if they would not assume that one need not travel farther back in time than St. Augustin's Confessions - a mountain of an autobiography, to be sure, and one which appears to be blocking the view into the two millennia that preceded it. If autobiography is the narration of bits of one's life from a position of self-awareness and reflection, then ancient Egyptian autobiographical inscriptions were true autobiographies.
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