The Egypt Code (47 page)
Authors: Robert Bauval
Ritual king-killings were practised not only in Africa and Asia, but also in Europe. The ancient kings of Prussia, for example, willingly accepted being burnt alive on a sacrificial pier to comply with ‘divine law’. The kings of Scandinavia agreed to be executed by the sword after a pre-fixed reign of nine years by the ‘command of the gods’.
6
Also according to Fraser:
6
Also according to Fraser:
. . . there are some grounds for believing that the reign of many ancient Greek kings was limited to eight years, or at least that at the end of every period of eight years a new consecration, a fresh outpouring of the divine grace, was regarded as necessary in order to enable them to discharge their civil and religious duties. Thus it was a rule of the Spartan constitution that every eight years the
ephors
should choose a clear and moonless night and sitting down observe the sky in silence. If during their vigil they saw a meteor or shooting star, they inferred that the king had sinned against the deity, and they suspended him from his functions until the Delphic or Olympic oracle should reinstate him in them. This custom, which has all the air of great antiquity, was not suffered to remain a dead letter even in the last period of the Spartan monarchy; for in the third century before our era a king, who had rendered himself obnoxious to the reforming party, was actually deposed on various trumped-up charges, among which allegation that the ominous sign had been seen in the sky took a prominent place.
7
Fraser also speaks of a particular aspect of this ritual practised on the ancient Spartan kings, wherein, ‘if the tenure of the regal office was formerly limited among the Spartans to eight years, we may naturally ask, why was that precise period selected as the measure of a king’s reign? The reason is probably to be found in those astronomical considerations which determined the early Greek calendar . . .’
8
He was compelled to conclude that in some of these ancient cultures at least the kings were ‘liable to deposition or death at the end of an astronomical cycle’.
9
This, of course, immediately brings to mind the rituals performed by the goddess Seshat (see Chapter Two) whose function, among others, was to decide on the length of the king’s ‘reign years’ or ‘life years’. It also brings to mind the very important royal festival practised in ancient Egypt known as the
heb-sed
(again see Chapter Two). The
heb
-
sed
festival is generally described by Egyptologists as a ‘royal jubilee’. In reality it was much more than that. It was, in fact, a sort of pharaonic equivalent of a full medical check-up for the king in order to confirm to the people that he still retained his full sexual potency and physical and mental capacities. As G.A. Wainwright explains:
8
He was compelled to conclude that in some of these ancient cultures at least the kings were ‘liable to deposition or death at the end of an astronomical cycle’.
9
This, of course, immediately brings to mind the rituals performed by the goddess Seshat (see Chapter Two) whose function, among others, was to decide on the length of the king’s ‘reign years’ or ‘life years’. It also brings to mind the very important royal festival practised in ancient Egypt known as the
heb-sed
(again see Chapter Two). The
heb
-
sed
festival is generally described by Egyptologists as a ‘royal jubilee’. In reality it was much more than that. It was, in fact, a sort of pharaonic equivalent of a full medical check-up for the king in order to confirm to the people that he still retained his full sexual potency and physical and mental capacities. As G.A. Wainwright explains:
nothing is more certain than that the pharaoh was divine . . . Kings of this type contained within themselves the power that produced prosperity . . . To do all this, a divine fertility-king must keep himself in good health and live a well-ordered life. For as he functions regularly and in good order, so will the universe remain stable and continue in its allotted course, for he is himself the universe. The service rendered by such kings has always been to ensure the fruitfulness of the earth, and consequent health of the people . . .
10
The question that arises, therefore, is what happened when a king ‘failed’ the tests put to him at the
heb-sed
?
heb-sed
?
The first
heb-sed
festival for a king normally took place after the thirtieth year of his reign, but there is evidence that it also occurred at shorter periods and that originally it took place every seven years.
11
According to Wainwright, the
heb-sed
festival stemmed from ‘the old sky and fertility-religion’ and went back ‘at least into prehistoric times’.
12
Most Egyptologists agree that the
heb-sed
is very old and was practised from the very early dynastic times all the way to the Late Period. Kings of the New Kingdom such as Amenhotep III and Rameses II appear to have performed their first
heb-sed
in the thirtieth year of their reign; but they also performed other
heb-seds
at shorter intervals. Unfortunately there are but few inscriptions that give details of the events that took place during this festival, and interpretations by scholars are usually based on pictorial scenes rather than textual ones. The best of these pictorial scenes are from the sun temple of Niuserra at Abu Ghurab (these, unfortunately, have been removed in modern times and are now displayed in various museums around the world).
13
We know of an important ritual performed at the
heb-sed
which required the king to run around the boundary walls of the ceremonial complex which, in some cases, could be over a mile. ‘Thus we find,’ wrote Wainwright:
heb-sed
festival for a king normally took place after the thirtieth year of his reign, but there is evidence that it also occurred at shorter periods and that originally it took place every seven years.
11
According to Wainwright, the
heb-sed
festival stemmed from ‘the old sky and fertility-religion’ and went back ‘at least into prehistoric times’.
12
Most Egyptologists agree that the
heb-sed
is very old and was practised from the very early dynastic times all the way to the Late Period. Kings of the New Kingdom such as Amenhotep III and Rameses II appear to have performed their first
heb-sed
in the thirtieth year of their reign; but they also performed other
heb-seds
at shorter intervals. Unfortunately there are but few inscriptions that give details of the events that took place during this festival, and interpretations by scholars are usually based on pictorial scenes rather than textual ones. The best of these pictorial scenes are from the sun temple of Niuserra at Abu Ghurab (these, unfortunately, have been removed in modern times and are now displayed in various museums around the world).
13
We know of an important ritual performed at the
heb-sed
which required the king to run around the boundary walls of the ceremonial complex which, in some cases, could be over a mile. ‘Thus we find,’ wrote Wainwright:
[that the
heb-sed
] consisted essentially in a running ceremony, performed in archaic times before the king and from the First Dynasty onwards by the king himself . . . several of the old sky-gods figure in the ceremony . . . The ceremony clearly went back at least into Prehistoric times . . . Physical activity is essential in fertility-rites such as these clearly show. No doubt the king’s agility here brought fertility to the fields, and induced the necessary activities in the skies in providing the water required . . . Thus we find that the Pharaohs were divine; controlled the activities of the sky; kept their people in health; hoed the ground; reaped the harvest; carried out a ceremony for the fertility of the fields, and concerned themselves with the opening of the dykes for the inundation . . . The Pharaohs were in fact fertility-kings, upon whose health and proper observance of the rites the health and wealth of the country depended . . .
14
The rituals in
heb-sed
were by no means the only ones in which the king had to personally participate. His daily life was full of rituals to honour the gods and to ensure through them the welfare of his people and Egypt as a whole. If we are to believe the ancient Greek writer Diodorus, who visited Egypt in the first century BC, every daily activity of the pharaoh, from the moment he woke up to the moment he retired for the night, was ritualised ‘according to a plan’.
15
In Diodorus’ own words:
heb-sed
were by no means the only ones in which the king had to personally participate. His daily life was full of rituals to honour the gods and to ensure through them the welfare of his people and Egypt as a whole. If we are to believe the ancient Greek writer Diodorus, who visited Egypt in the first century BC, every daily activity of the pharaoh, from the moment he woke up to the moment he retired for the night, was ritualised ‘according to a plan’.
15
In Diodorus’ own words:
not only the order of priests but, in short, all the inhabitants of Egypt were less concerned for their wives and children and their other cherished possessions than for the safety of their kings . . . all their [the kings’] acts were regulated by prescriptions set forth in laws, not only their administrative acts, but also those that had to do with the way in which they spent their time from day to day, and with the food that they ate. And the hours of both the day and night were laid out according to a plan, and at the specific hours it was absolutely required of the king that he should do what the law stipulated and not what he thought best. For there was a set time not only for his holding audiences or rendering judgements, but even for his taking a walk, bathing, and sleeping with his wife, and, in a word, for every act of his life.
16
The law that Diodorus is referring to which regulated every hour of the king’s life was almost certainly Maat. And at one time the last duty imposed on kings by this cosmic law was, according to Wainright, to ‘lay down their lives at the proper time for the good of their people’.
17
In full agreement with this conclusion, the mythologist Joseph Campell, in his book
The Mask of God: Primitive Mythology
, asserts that the kings of ancient Sudan and Napata, two regions that border the south of Egypt (and Napata was once annexed to Egypt), were allowed to rule for a limited period that was somehow ‘computed’ by astrologer-priests using the motion of the stars. And when apparently these astrologer-priests were asked how they calculated the life period, they explained that, ‘Every night we keep watch on the stars, and we do not let them out of our sight. Every night we observe the moon, and we know from night to night, which stars are approaching the moon and which are moving away. It is by this that we know.’
18
17
In full agreement with this conclusion, the mythologist Joseph Campell, in his book
The Mask of God: Primitive Mythology
, asserts that the kings of ancient Sudan and Napata, two regions that border the south of Egypt (and Napata was once annexed to Egypt), were allowed to rule for a limited period that was somehow ‘computed’ by astrologer-priests using the motion of the stars. And when apparently these astrologer-priests were asked how they calculated the life period, they explained that, ‘Every night we keep watch on the stars, and we do not let them out of our sight. Every night we observe the moon, and we know from night to night, which stars are approaching the moon and which are moving away. It is by this that we know.’
18
All this suggests that the ancient priests of these regions not only practised a sky religion whose ‘law’ was written in the stars, but also used the stars and the moon to determine the time of death of their kings. The combination of stars and moon is very much evident in the symbolism associated with the goddess Seshat, whose headdress, according to G.A. Wainwright, was originally a reversed lunar crescent, the symbol for the month, cupping a seven-pointed star or flower.
19
Seshat was also the wife-companion of the moon god Thoth, who was regarded as the inventor of astronomy.
20
Interestingly, the Egyptologist Jane Sellers sensed that the lunar eclipses might somehow have played a part in the regicide rituals:
19
Seshat was also the wife-companion of the moon god Thoth, who was regarded as the inventor of astronomy.
20
Interestingly, the Egyptologist Jane Sellers sensed that the lunar eclipses might somehow have played a part in the regicide rituals:
The possibility must be considered that total eclipses were considered a divine signal . . . In Egypt, it may have been that, with total eclipses, the living king who was the embodiment of Horus was then required to replace Osiris (that is ‘become an Osiris’) and a new Horus would come to the throne . . . The spectacular image of the sun being blotted out and then being ‘reborn’ had similar imagery of life after death, and such a spectacle could have been understood to mandate the living Horus, who was the Son-of-Re, to take his father’s place now, and be himself replaced. It is a death and a rebirth, but one that has come to be, not the simplistic image of a stellar or solar deity, but rather a rebirth with a change of nature . . . The death of a Horus and the birth of a Horus; the death of Osiris and the birth of Osiris; these may have been believed to be ordained by events in the sky. Menes, first ruler of the unified Egypt, may have been brought to the throne by an eclipse, but another ruler may have been commanded to die. It is a death that must promise rebirth. A new king would become the new Horus, but the dead king would unite with the soul of Osiris, and become Osiris . . .
21
Long-term predictions using astronomy are, however, usually made by using the stars. In Chapter Two we have seen how the seven-pointed star and the horns of Seshat’s headdress may represent the seven stars of the Plough (Big Dipper). According to E.C. Krupp:
Seshat was portrayed with a seven-pointed star (although some have likened it to a seven-petaled flower) supported by a rod balanced upright upon her head. Like a canopy over her star hangs what may be a pair of upturned horns of a cow or bull. This emblem was also the hieroglyph for her name. Both the horns and the seven points of the star seem to have something to do with the Big Dipper. We already know that the Bull’s Thigh, or Meskhetiu, was the Big Dipper, and the Dipper contains seven stars. It is certain that the Egyptians associated the number seven with the Big Dipper because several portrayals of Meskhetiu - at Dendera, Edfu, Esna and Philae - surround the picture of the bull’s leg with seven stars.
22
Seshat is principally known for her role in the ‘Stretching of the Cord’ ceremony, and according to Krupp the ‘procedure required the observation of a certain star at a certain time and, probably, in a certain position . . . and orientation of the Big Dipper in its circular course around the pole’.
23
Could these stars have been used to cast a sort of ‘horoscope’ that determined the length of reign for the king?
Royal Substitute?23
Could these stars have been used to cast a sort of ‘horoscope’ that determined the length of reign for the king?
It is also possible that the king-killing ritual may have in time been replaced by the killing of a substitute such as a totem animal identified with the king. Bearing this in mind, we know that there existed from earliest times in Egypt such a totem for the king in the form of a bull known as the Apis. According to Egyptologist George Hart, the cult of the Apis began during the period of ‘unification’ which took place around 3100 BC.
24
The Apis bull was kept with great care and pomp in a temple at Memphis, and was regarded as the manifestation of Ptah, the creator god of that region. But when the Apis died (or perhaps was put to death), it was identified with Osiris whose constellation, Orion, was also in some cases the astral form of the departed king. It is thus quite possible that while alive, the Apis bull was also seen as the substitute for the living king who represented Horus, the son of Osiris. This seems to be confirmed by the fact that the ‘mother’ of the Apis bull was said to be the goddess Isis, mother of Horus and also wife of Osiris. According to George Hart:
24
The Apis bull was kept with great care and pomp in a temple at Memphis, and was regarded as the manifestation of Ptah, the creator god of that region. But when the Apis died (or perhaps was put to death), it was identified with Osiris whose constellation, Orion, was also in some cases the astral form of the departed king. It is thus quite possible that while alive, the Apis bull was also seen as the substitute for the living king who represented Horus, the son of Osiris. This seems to be confirmed by the fact that the ‘mother’ of the Apis bull was said to be the goddess Isis, mother of Horus and also wife of Osiris. According to George Hart:
In the funerary cult this royal link with Apis continues . . . the bull was mummified on lion-headed alabaster tables some of which survived at Memphis. The funeral was an occasion of display and pomp, with men dragging to the tomb the sledge on which the embalmed and bejewelled bull had been placed in a couchant position. The burial place was in the northern quarters of the desert plateau of Saqqara . . . When Isis, mother of Apis, who had been brought to Memphis with her illustrious offspring, died she was given the honour of burial in the Saqqara necropolis in the vaults known as the Iseum, as yet not fully explored . . . Following concepts about the rank of the dead pharaoh in the Underworld, Apis, upon dying, becomes the god Osiris.
25
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