Sesostris

New publications of Egyptian texts, especially from the Late period, have increasingly demonstrated how Herodotus' description of Egypt can be matched with original sources. This article presents some cases drawn from demotic Egyptian material.

Malgré la publication de la Chapelle Blanche de Senouseret Ier qui remonte à environ cinquante ans, l’image d’Amon reflétée dans celle-ci n’a jamais fait l’objet d’une étude détaillée, conformément à sa complexité. La meilleure approche pour la comprendre c’est la sémiologie, en analysant chaque figure d’Amon comme s’il s’agissait d’un syntagme nominal. Ainsi, nous distinguons sept types iconographiques du dieu dans ce monument, que nous décomposons dans leurs différents éléments ou attributs (couronnes, vêtements, etc.), en les abordant comme si c’étaient lexèmes. De par cette approche sémantique, nous pouvons lire les images, en les énonçant comme lesdits syntagmes nominaux, constitués d’un substantif (= Amon) plus épithètes (= attributs iconographiques). L’étude de la distribution des sept formes du dieu et leurs attributs dans la Chapelle s’avère également significative puisqu’elle nous révèle d’autres nuances, complémentaires à celles abordables individuellement. De cette façon, nous pouvons entrevoir quelques aspects de la politique cultuelle de Senouseret I, et sur le degré de développement théologique concernant le dieu Amon au début de la XII Dynastie.

A very selective preliminary bibliography, prepared for my postgraduate seminar on Persian and Egyptian stories in the "Historiēs Apodexis" of Herodotus. The bibliography is hardly exhaustive and does not aspire to cover the entire (and vast) field of Herodotus' Persian and Egyptian logoi. It includes general works of reference on Herodotus and the East, and several specialized studies regarding the Persian and Egyptian sections of the "Historiē".

Furthermore, particular bibliographical lists are given with regard to certain individual stories about Persian or Egyptian rulers and magnates (these are the stories on which the seminar discussions and presentations focus). The Egyptian narratives that receive such particular treatment are the following: the saga of Pharaoh Sesostris (Hdt. 2.102-110); the tales of Rhampsinitus (2.121-122); the tale of Pheros (2.111); the story of Sethos (2.141); the traditions about Pharaoh Amasis  (2.172-182, 3.1-4, 3.40-43); the legend of Helen in Egypt, in the court of Proteus (2.112-120); and the traditions about the Pharaohs of the Giza Pyramids (2.124-134).

The Persian stories which become the focus of attention are the following: the birth legend of Cyrus (1.107-122); the story of the mad king Cambyses (3.1-38, 3.61-66); the conspiracy of the Magi and Darius' ascension to the throne (3.61-79, 3.86-88); the debate on political constitutions carried out by the three Persian noblemen (3.79-82); the novella of Masistes and his wife (9.107-113); the story of the doctor Democedes and queen Atossa (3.125, 3.129-137); the conquest of Babylon by Zopyrus (3.150-160); and Xerxes' council and ominous dreams before the expedition to Greece (7.8-19). Finally, a few works are collected concerning Herodotus' logoi about Babylon and India.

The article treats scholia to a fragment of Apollonius of Rhodes’ Argonautica (IV 272-276), which reproduces the evidence by Aristotle’s pupil Dicaearchus of Messana on the ancient king of Egypt, the successor of gods, the greatest warrior and the founder of Egyptian society. It is argued that the original text by Dicaearchus is preserved with more authenticity in codex Laurentianus XXXII.9, where this legendary king is denoted “Sesonchosis”; the statements of scholia containing this denotation and referring directly to Dicaearchus describe his deeds of a founder-king and bear rather well-traced Egyptian connotations. In codex Parisinus 2727 this king is also denoted “Sesonchosis” in the start of this scholia’s fragment; later on the scholiast gives a reference to Theopompus’ calling him “Sesostris”, and in the tradition that formed codex Parisinus 2727 this better-known name-form seems to have replaced the authentic but more scantily spread name-form “Sesonchosis” in the subsequent text of the scholia. It is also shown that the evidence on the Egyptian founder-king known to Aristotle and Dicaearchus are rather different in their contents and actually belong to different epochs of the Greek reception of the Egyptian civilization; thus, Dicaearchus would not necessarily reproduce the name-form “Sesostris” used by his teacher to denote this personality. The observations of this article are important to interpret the comparison of Alexander the Great to the king Sesostris in the Alexandrian prototype of the Alexander Romance in the first half of the 3rd century B.C.

The article deals with the famous topos of the Classical historiography about the stelae posited by the legendary Egyptian king-conqueror Sesostris wherever he waged war, with the inscribed account of the war if the people subdued in it was valiant and with female genitalia added to the account if the foe showed cowardice. The earliest and at the same time the lengthiest evidence of the fable is Herodotus’ narration (II. 102). The prevailing opinion that the prototype for Sesostris was Senwosret III is undoubtedly true; more reasons can be found to connect Herodotus’ account with the background of his reign is found in his Nubian inscription of Year 16 (the Semna Stela BM 1157, ll. 9-12 = the Uronarti Stela Khartoum 3, ll. 6-10), where any unhelpful general retreating from Nubian foes is described as Hm (Wb. III. 80.7; actually, an obscenity written with the hieroglyphic sign GG(SL) N41 that symbolized exactly the female genitalia and likely to be translated as “effeminate”, “unvirile”; note the root Hm “to retreat” cf. Wb. III. 79 similar in phonetic and writing and also present in the same passage of the inscription). There are reasons to believe that the Nubian inscriptions of Senwosret III praising his military effort were lavishly propagated in his reign, which contributed to shaping his image of the great conqueror (not quite up to reality, as his effort was certainly greater than the extent of his conquests). Eventually, the Late Egyptian historiography contaminated the reminiscences of all the stages of Egyptian expansion in the 2nd Millennium B.C. within the story of Senwosret III/Sesostris and probably attached to it the recollections about the stelae posited at the Euphrates’ frontier by Thutmosis I and III. Hence the inclusion in the story of Sesostris of his vast conquests in Asia, added with his advent to Europe (Thrace and Scythia), probably, as it has been suggested by the students of the topos, under the influence of the Persian time, in order to position Sesostris as a much more successful conqueror that the Achaemenids.


The false name of the paper in its English abstract in the .pdf-version is due to the unhelpful editing in the Nauka ('Science') Publishing House.

Das Pharaonenbild und der Imaginationsraum, der sich um einzelne Pharaonen entfaltete, haben neben den architektonischen und künstlerischen Hinterlassenschaften wesentlich die westeuropäische Ägyptenrezeption mitbestimmt und im Laufe der Zeit neue Symbole, die ich als kulturelle Hieroglyphen bezeichnen möchte, geschaffen. Dieser Aufsatz behandelt die Rezeption des Pharao Sesostris.

Das Pharaonenbild und der Imaginationsraum, der sich um einzelne Pharaonen entfaltete, haben neben den architektonischen und künstlerischen Hinterlassenschaften wesentlich die westeuropäische Ägyptenrezeption mitbestimmt und im Laufe der Zeit neue Symbole, die ich als kulturelle Hieroglyphen bezeichnen möchte, geschaffen. Dieser Aufsatz behandelt die Rezeption des Pharao Sesostris.