تاريخ مصر القديمة )2(- ر.س 122 الفرقة االولي- قسم االرشاد السياحي Ancient Egyptian History II First Grade Tourist Guidance Department Amenemhat III-Amenemhat IV-Sobeqneferu 6/4/2020

Dr. Sherif El Sabban [email protected] Dr. Heba Mahran [email protected] Amenemhat III

• Under the reign of this king, Egypt enjoyed the most prosperous time in the Middle Kingdom a time of peace and productive development in seeking new sources of wealth. • His Reign: • The highest known date being found in a papyrus dated to Regnal Year 46, I Akhet 22 of his rule. He may have had a long coregency (of 20 years) with his father Senusert III. • His Family: • Two definite wives are known for the king, both of whom were buried under his pyramid at Dahshur. Hepti was known to be the mother of his successor Amenemhat IV. One definite daughter was Neferuptah B. she had a sarcophagus with her name in the king’s second pyramid at Hawara. Sobekneferu, who is to became the last ruler of the dynasty may be a daughter of Amenemhat III.

Internal Activities

• At Sinai, the king established a well equipped colonly for the exploitation of minerals so as to create a permanent industry contributing a fixed annual amount to the royal treasury. • - During his long rule Amenemhat continued the work probably started by his father to link the Faiyum Depression with the Nile. • This immense work of civil engineering was eventually finished by his son Amenemhat IV and brought prosperity to Faiyum. • The area became a breadbasket for the country and continued to be used until 230 BC when the Lahun branch of the Nile silted up.

Internal Activities

• The vizier Kheti held this office around year 29 of king Amenemhat III's reign. • The Rhind Mathematical Papyrus is thought to have been originally composed during Amenemhat's time. • He recorded the maximum height of the Nile every year in the fortress of Semna. This enabled his vizir to estimate the crops of the coming season and taxes were fixed accordingly. • He built a very large building known as the Labyrinth at Hawara, where he set the administrative centre for the whole country special sets of rooms and halls being reserved for eh nome. According to Herodotus it contained 12 halls and 3500 rooms.

Internal Activities

• He built two pyramids of mud bricks, one at Dahshur and the other at Hawara and a large temple at Medinet Madi Fayum. • Many other monuments were erected during his reign and numerous smaller pieces can be seen in the different museums o the world. • He was buried in his pyramid at Hawara. • His daughter, princess Neferuptah had been at fist buried in the same pyramid, but she was later transferred to another pyramid, specially built of her two kilometers to the south east of her father's pyramid. The burial chamber of the princies lay in the center o the pyramid and was discovered intact in 1956. It contained three large silver libation vases, a granite offering-table and a huge, red granite sarcophagus which contained her magnificent jewellery cosmetic equipment and large alabaster jar full of a brown material. • All the objects found in the tomb of Neferuptah are now exhibited in the Cairo Museum.

External Activities

• There is very little evidence for military expeditions in the reign of the king. There is one record for a small mission in year nine of the king. The evidence for that was found in a rock inscription in Nubia, near the fortress of Kumma. • At the Red Sea coast, at Mersa was discovered a stela mentioning an expedition to Punt under Amenemhat III. The highest official involved in the expedition was the high Steward Senebef. Other people in charge were a certain Amenhotep and the chamberlain Nebesu

Amenemhat IV (Maakherure)

• His Family: • Amenemhat IV was the son of a woman named Hetepi. • The relation of Amenemhat IV to Amenemhat III is uncertain; the former could have been the son or grandson of the latter. • Manetho states that he married his half- sister Sobeknefru, this claim is not yet supported by archaeological evidence. In particular, Sobekneferu is not known to have borne the title of "King's Wife". It was proposed that Amenemhat IV was adopted by Amenemhat III and thus became Sobekneferu's step- brother.

His Reign

• Amenemhat IV first came to power as a junior coregent of his predecessor Amenemhat III, whose reign marks the apex of the Middle Kingdom period. The coregency is well attested by numerous monuments and artifacts where the names of the two kings parallel each other. • The length of this coregency is uncertain; it could have lasted from one to seven years, although most scholars believe it was only two years long. The Turin Papyrus records Amenemhat IV on credits him with a reign of 9 years, 3 months and 27 days. Amenemhat IV is also recorded on the Abydos king list and the Saqqara Tablet. In spite of the Turin canon, the duration of Amenemhat's reign is uncertain.

Internal Activities • Amenemhat IV completed the Temple of Renenutet and Sobek at Medinet Madi statrted by Amenemhat III • Amenemhat IV possibly also built a temple in the northeastern Faiyum at Qasr el-Sagha. • He is responsible for the completion of a shrine at the Temple of Hathor in the Sinai and may also have undertaken works in Karnak where a pedestal for a sacred barque inscribed with Amenemhat III and IV names was found in 1924. • Four expeditions to the turquoise mines of Serabit el Khadem in the Sinai are dated to his reign by in-situ inscriptions. • In his Year 2, Amenemhat IV sent another expedition to mine Amethyst in the Wadi el-Hudi in the south of Egypt. The leader of the expedition was the assistant treasurer Sahathor. Farther south, three Nile-records are known from Kumna in Nubia that are explicitly dated to his Years 5, 6 and 7 on the throne, showing that the Egyptian presence in the region was maintained during his lifetime.

External Activities • Important trade relations must have existed during his reign with the city of Byblos, on the coast of modern- day Lebanon , where an obsidian and gold chest as well as a jar lid bearing Amenemhat IV's name have been found. A gold plaque showing Amenemhat IV offering to a god may also originate there. • Recently, continuing excavations at Wadi Gawasis on the Red Sea coast have produced two wooden chests and an ostracon inscribed with a hieratic text mentioning an expedition to the fabled Punt in Year 8 of Amenemhat IV, under the direction of the royal scribe Djedy. Two fragments of a stela depicting him and dating to his Year 7 were found at Berenice on the Red Sea.

His Burial

• The tomb of Amenemhat IV has not been identified. He is nonetheless often associated with the ruined Southern Mazghuna Pyramid. • No inscriptions have been found within the pyramid to ascertain the identity of its owner, but its architectural similarity with the second pyramid of Amenemhat III at Hawara led Egyptologists to date the pyramid to the late 12th or early 13th Dynasty. • Less likely, Amenemhat IV could have been interred in Amenemhat III's First Pyramid at Dahshur, since his name has been found on an inscription in the mortuary temple.

Queen Sebekneferu

• Her name was Sobekneferu (Nefrusobk, Neferusobek, Sobekkara). The name 'Sobekneferu' means, "The beauties of Sobek", the crocodile god. The rulers of the 12th Dynasty established a religious and economic center in the Faiyum where the crocodiles were nurtured and worshipped. • Her reign • She ruled from 3 to 4 years Her Accession • A daughter of the king named Nefruptah was invested with a cartouche around her name, something never before done for anyone other than a king, and she was given titles often used by a king's wife, though apparently she was never married to a king. After her death, she was first buried in her father's burial chamber, but was then reburied in her own pyramid some two kilometers away. • She may have been the wife and sister of Amenemhat IV as well. • Sobekneferu apparently ruled for only some four years, but is known from a number of monuments and artifacts, including five statues, fragments relating to the mortuary Temple of Amenemhat III, scarabs, seals and beads, as well as from a Nile inundation record. This latter document from the Nubian fortress of Kumma relates a poor flood, and dates to Sobekneferu's last year.

Attributes • Usually, the queen uses feminine titles, but several masculine ones were also used. Three headless statues of the queen, discovered in the Faiyum, and a few other items contain her name. In one damaged statue of the queen of unknown origin, the costume she wears is unique in its combination of elements from male and • female dress, echoing her occasional use of male titles in her records. In another intriguing statuette of the queen now in the Metropolitan Museum in New York, the queen wears a sed-festival cloak and a most unusual crown, which may have resulted from an attempt to combine unfamiliar iconographic elements of male and female rulers. She contributed to Amenemhat III's Labyranth, and also built at Herakleopolis Magna. • Burial • Nothing is known of Sobekneferu's death or burial. Some have suggested that her burial might be one of the Pyramids of Mazghuna, but this is very unlikely. Thus, one of the most powerful women of early world history final destiny remains a mystery to us. • Her death around 1786 B.C, marks the end of the Middle Kingdom a period of magnificence and prosperity.