Product Code Database
Sahure (also Sahura, meaning "He who is close to Re") was a pharaoh of ancient Egypt and the second ruler of the Fifth Dynasty. He reigned for about 13 years in the early 25th century BC during the Old Kingdom Period. Sahure's reign marks the political and cultural high point of the Fifth Dynasty. He was probably the son of his predecessor Userkaf with Queen NeferhetepesII, and was in turn succeeded by his son Neferirkare Kakai.
During Sahure's rule, Egypt had important trade relations with the coast. Sahure launched several naval expeditions to modern-day Lebanon to procure cedar trees, slaves, and exotic items. His reign may have witnessed the flourishing of the Egyptian navy, which included a high-seas fleet as well as specialized racing boats. Relying on this, Sahure ordered the earliest attested expedition to the land of Punt, which brought back large quantities of myrrh, malachite, and electrum. Sahure is shown celebrating the success of this venture in a relief from his mortuary temple which shows him tending a myrrh tree in the garden of his palace whose name means "Sahure's splendor soars up to heaven". This relief is the only one in Egyptian art depicting a king gardening. Sahure sent further expeditions to the turquoise and copper mines in Sinai Peninsula. He also ordered military campaigns against chieftains in the Western Desert, bringing back livestock to Egypt.
Sahure had a pyramid built for himself in Abusir, thereby abandoning the royal necropolises of Saqqara and Giza, where his predecessors had built their monuments. This decision was possibly motivated by the presence of the sun temple of Userkaf in Abusir, the first such temple of the Fifth Dynasty. The Pyramid of Sahure is much smaller than the pyramids of the preceding Fourth Dynasty but the decoration and architecture of his mortuary temple is more elaborate. The valley temple, causeway and mortuary temple of his pyramid complex were once adorned by over of exquisite polychrome reliefs, representing the highest form reached by this art during the Old Kingdom period. The Ancient Egyptians recognized this particular artistic achievement and tried to emulate the reliefs in the tombs of subsequent kings and queens. The architects of Sahure's pyramid complex introduced the use of palmiform columns (columns whose capital has the form of Arecaceae), which would soon become a hallmark of ancient Egyptian architecture. The layout of his mortuary temple was also innovative and became the architectural standard for the remainder of the Old Kingdom period. Sahure is also known to have constructed a sun temple called "The Field of Ra", and although it has not yet been located, it is presumably also in Abusir.
Sahure was the object of a funerary cult, the food offerings for which were initially provided by agricultural estates set up during his reign. This official, state-sponsored cult endured until the end of the Old Kingdom. Subsequently, during the Middle Kingdom period, Sahure was venerated as a royal ancestor figure but his cult no longer had dedicated priests. For unknown reasons, during the New Kingdom Sahure was equated with a form of the goddess Sekhmet. The cult of "Sekhmet of Sahure" had priests and attracted visitors from all over Egypt to Sahure's temple. This unusual cult was celebrated far beyond Abusir, and persisted up until the end of the Ptolemaic period nearly 2500 years after Sahure's death.
This contradicts older, alternative theories according to which Sahure was the son of queen Khentkaus I, believed to be the wife of the last pharaoh of the preceding Fourth Dynasty, Shepseskaf and a brother to either Userkaf or Neferirkare.
Netjerirenre bore several religious titles corresponding to high-ranking positions in the court and which suggest that he may have acted as a vizier for his father. This is debated, as Michel Baud points out that at the time of Sahure, the eviction of royal princes from the vizierate was ongoing if not already complete.
Sahure appears in two further historical records: on the third entry of the Karnak king list, which was made during the reign of Thutmose III (1479–1425 BC) and on the 26th entry of the Saqqara Tablet dating to the reign of Ramses II (1279–1213 BC). Neither of these sources give his reign length. The absolute dates of Sahure's reign are uncertain but most scholars date it to the first half of the 25th century BC, see note 1 for details.
The same relief strongly suggests that interpreters were on board the ships, tasked with translations to facilitate trade with foreign lands. A relief, unique to Egyptian art, depicts several Syrian brown bears, presumably brought back from the coast by seagoing ships as well. These bears appear in association with 12 red-painted one-handled jars from Syria. The Egyptologists Karin Sowada and William Stevenson Smith have proposed that, taken together, the bears and jars are likely to constitute a tribute.
Trade contacts with Byblos took place during Sahure's reign. Excavations of the temple of Baalat Gebal yielded an alabaster bowl inscribed with Sahure's name. The layout of the fourth phase of this temple might even have been influenced by the architecture of Sahure's valley temple, although this remains debated. There is further corroborating evidence for trade with the wider Levant during the Fifth Dynasty, several stone vessels being inscribed with cartouches of pharaohs of this dynasty discovered in Lebanon. So much so that the archeologist Gregory Mumford points to the fact that "Sahure is the best attested king for international relations" and has the highest number of texts inscribed in Sinai proportionally to his reign length.
In his last year, Sahure sent the first documented expedition to the fabled land of Punt, probably along the Somalian coast. The expedition, which is conjectured to have departed Egypt from the harbor of Mersa Gawasis, is reported on the Palermo Stone where it is said to have come back with 80,000 of an unspecified measure of myrrh, along with malachite, 6000 measures of electrum and 2600 or 23,020 staves, possibly made of ebony. In his last year Sahure sent another expedition abroad, this time to the copper and turquoise mines of Wadi Maghareh and Wadi Kharit in Sinai Peninsula, which had been active since at least the beginning of the Third Dynasty. This expedition, also mentioned by the Palermo stone, brought back over 6000 units of turquoise to Egypt and produced two reliefs in Sinai, one of which shows Sahure in the traditional act of smiting Asiatics and boasting "The Great God smites the Asiatics of all countries". In parallel with these activities, diorite quarries near Abu Simbel were exploited throughout Sahure's reign.
Sahure's pretensions regarding the lands and riches surrounding Egypt are encapsulated in several reliefs from his mortuary temple which show the god Ash telling the king "I will give you all that is in this Libya land", "I give you all hostile peoples with all the provisions that there are in foreign lands" and "I grant thee all western and eastern foreign lands with all the Iunti and the Montiu bowmen who are in every land".
Further indication of religious activities lies in that Sahure is the earliest known king to have used the Egyptian title of Nb írt-ḫt. This title, possibly meaning "Lord of doing effective things", indicates that he personally performed physical cultic activities to ensure the existence and persistence of the Maat, the Egyptian concept of order and justice. This title remained in use until the time of Herihor, some 1500 years later. Sahure's reign is also the earliest during which the ceremony of the "driving of the calves" is known to have taken place. This is significant in the context of the progressive emergence of the cult of Osiris throughout the Fifth Dynasty, as this ceremony subsequently became an integral part of the Osiris myth. In subsequent times, the ceremony corresponded to Seth's threshing of Osiris by driving calves trampling fields of barley.
Sahure reorganized the cult of his mother, NepherhetepesII, whose mortuary complex had been built by Userkaf in Saqqara. He added an entrance portico with four columns to her temple, so that the entrance was not facing Userkaf's pyramid any more.
The stones for Sahure's buildings and statues were quarried throughout Egypt. For example, the limestone cladding of the pyramid comes from Tura, while the black basalt used for the flooring of Sahure's mortuary temple comes from Gebel Qatrani, near the Faiyum in Middle Egypt. South of Egypt, a stele bearing Sahure's name was discovered in the diorite quarries located in the desert north-west of Abu Simbel in Lower Nubia.
Further mining and quarrying expeditions may be inferred from indirect evidence. An inscription of Sahure in the Wadi Abu Geridah in the Eastern desert as well as other Old Kingdom inscriptions there suggest that Hematite was mined in the vicinity since the times of the Fourth Dynasty. The lower half of a statue with the name of the king was discovered in 2015 in Elkab, a location possibly connected with expeditions to the Eastern desert and south of Egypt to Nubia. Sahure's cartouche has been found in graffiti in Tumas and on seal impressions from Buhen at the second cataract of the Nile in Lower Nubia.
The extensive nautical scenes from Sahure's mortuary complex are sufficiently detailed to show that specialized racing boats for the military and perhaps for ceremonial training were built at the time. They also give the earliest depiction of specific rope uses aboard ships, such as that of a Hog chains. They permit precise estimates regarding shipbuilding, for example indicating that the mid-ship freeboard for seagoing vessels was of , and that the masts employed at the time were bipodal, resembling an inverted Y. Further rare depictions include the king standing in the stern of a sailing boat with a highly decorated sail, and one of only two reliefs from ancient Egypt showing men aboard a ship paddling in a wave pattern, possibly during a race.
A similar though much less detailed anecdote is reported by Khufuankh, who was overseer of the palace and singer of the king. Other officials include Hetepka, who was keeper of the diadem and overseer of the hairdressers of the king, Pehenewkai, priest of the cult of Userkaf during the reigns of Sahure and Neferirkare Kakai, then vizier for the latter; Persen, a mortuary priest in the funerary cult of Sahure's mother Nepherhetepes; and Washptah, a priest of Sahure, then vizier of Neferirkare Kakai. The high-official Ptahshepses, probably born during the reign of Menkaure, was high priest of Ptah and royal manicure under Sahure, later promoted to vizier by Nyuserre Ini.
Two viziers of Sahure are known: Sekhemkare, royal prince, son of Khafre and vizier under Userkaf and Sahure; and Werbauba, vizier during Sahure's reign, attested in the mortuary temple of the king.
Concurrently with these developments, architectural and artistic innovations relating to tombs of private individuals can be dated to Sahure's reign. These including torus molding and for false doors, first found in Persen's tomb. This feature would subsequently become common and here demonstrates the particularly high esteem in which Persen must have been held by the king. Another innovation is the depiction of small unusual offerings such as that of seven sacred oils on false doors, first found in Niankhsekhmet's tomb. The canonical list of offerings was also developed during or shortly before Sahure's time in the tombs of the royal family, and spread to those of non-royal high-officialsthe earliest of whom was Seshemnefer Iunder Sahure.
New analyses of the verso of the Palermo stone performed in 2018 by the Czech Institute of Archeology enabled the reading of further inscriptions mentioning precisely the architecture of the temple as well as lists of donations it received, establishing firmly that it was a distinct entity from the earlier sun temple of Userkaf, the Nekhenre but leaving its ultimate fate uncertain. Further precision as to the architecture of the temple may be inferred from the absence of the obelisk determinative in some hieroglyphic variants of the name Sekhetre and its presence in others. For Anthony Spalinger this possibly indicates that Sahure's sun temple was effectively built and acquired such an obelisk at some point after its construction, perhaps after Sahure's reign.
In terms of the size, volume, and the cheap construction techniques employed, Sahure's pyramid exemplifies the decline of pyramid building. At the same time, the quality and variety of the stones employed in other parts of the complex increased, and the mortuary temple is considered to be the most sophisticated one built up to that time. With its many architectural innovations, such as the use of palmiform columns, the overall layout of Sahure's complex would serve as the template for all mortuary complexes constructed from Sahure's reign until the end of the Sixth Dynasty, some 300 years later. The highly varied colored reliefs decorating the walls of the entire funerary complex display a quality of workmanship and a richness of conception that reach their highest level of the entire Old Kingdom period.
Many surviving fragments of the reliefs which decorated the walls of the mortuary complex are of very high quality and much more elaborate than those from preceding mortuary temples. Several of the depictions are unique in Egyptian art. These include a relief showing Sahure tending a myrrh tree ( Commiphora myrrha) in his palace in front of his family; a relief depicting Syrian brown bears and another showing the bringing of the pyramidion to the main pyramid and the ceremonies following the completion of the complex. The high craftmanship of the reliefs is here manifested by the finely rounded edges of all figures, so that they simultaneously blend in with the background and stand out clearly. Reliefs are sufficiently detailed to permit the identification of the animals shown, such as and , and even show personified plants such as corn represented as a man with corn-ears instead of hair.
The many reliefs of the mortuary, causeway and valley temples also depict, among other things, Sahure hunting wild bulls and , Sahure being suckled by Nekhbet, the earliest depictions of a king fishing and fowling, a counting of foreigners by or in front of the goddess Seshat, which Egyptologist Mark Lehner believes was "meant to ward off any evil or disorder", the god Sopdu "Lord of the Foreign Countries" leading bound Asiatic captives, and the return of an Egyptian fleet from Asia, perhaps Byblos. Some of the low relief-cuttings in red granite are still in place at the site. Among the seminal innovations of Sahure's temple are the earliest relief depictions of figures in adoration, either standing or squatting with both arms raised, their hands open and their palms facing down.
The mortuary temple featured the first palmiform columns of any Egyptian temple, massive granite architraves inscribed with Sahure's titulary overlaid with copper, lion-headed waterspouts, black basalt flooring and granite dados.
While the core was under construction, a corridor was left open leading into the shaft where the grave chamber was built separately and later covered by leftover stone blocks and debris. This construction strategy is clearly visible in later unfinished pyramids, in particular the Pyramid of Neferefre. This technique also reflects the older style from the Third Dynasty seemingly coming back into fashion after being temporarily abandoned by the builders of the five great pyramids at Dahshur and Giza during the Fourth Dynasty.
The entrance at the north side is a short descending corridor lined with red granite followed by a passageway ending at the burial chamber with its Gable comprising large limestone beams of several tons each. Today all of these beams are fractured, which weakens the pyramid structure. Fragments of a basalt sarcophagus, likely Sahure's, were found here in the burial chamber when it was first entered by John Shae Perring in the mid 19th century.
The mortuary complex immediately around the pyramid also includes a second smaller cult pyramid which must have stood nearly high, originally built for the Ka of the king.
Subsequent generations of artists and craftsmen tried to emulate Sahure's reliefs, using them as templates for the tombs of later kings and queens of the Old Kingdom period. The layout of Sahure's high temple was also novel and it became the standard template for all subsequent pyramid complexes of the Old Kingdom. Some of its architectural elements, such as its palmiform columns, became hallmarks of Egyptian architecture.
This trend continued to hold in later times. For example, in the Middle Kingdom, Senusret I had reliefs for his temple directly copied from those of Sahure. He also chose to follow the innovative layout of Sahure's complex once again. At the time, Senusret I's decision was in stark contrast with the burial customs of the 11th Dynasty pharaohs, who were buried in saff tombs. These consisted of an open courtyard fronting a row of entrances into subterranean corridors and chambers dug in the hillsides of El-Tarif and Deir el-Bahari, near Thebes.
Several priests serving the mortuary cult or in Sahure's sun temple during the later Fifth and Sixth Dynasties are known thanks to inscriptions and artifacts from their tombs in Saqqara and Abusir. These include Tjy, overseer of the sun temples of Sahure, Neferirkare, Neferefre and Nyuserre; Neferkai priest of Sahure's funerary cult; Khabauptah priest of Sahure, Neferirkare, Neferefre, and Niuserre, Atjema, priest of the sun temple of Sahure during the Sixth Dynasty; Khuyemsnewy, who served as priest of the mortuary cult of Sahure during the reigns of Neferirkare and Nyuserre; Nikare, priest of the cult of Sahure and overseer of the scribes of the granary during the Fifth Dynasty. Further priests are known, such as Senewankh, serving in the cults of Userkaf and Sahure and buried in a mastaba in Saqqara; Sedaug, a priest of the cult of Sahure, priest of Ra in the sun-temple of Userkaf and holder of the title of royal acquaintance; Tepemankh, priest of the cults of kings of the Fourth to early Fifth Dynasty including Userkaf and Sahure, buried in a mastaba at Abusir.
Sahure's legacy had endured sufficiently by the Middle Kingdom period that he is mentioned in a story of the Westcar Papyrus, probably written during the 12th Dynasty although the earliest extent copy dates to the Seventeenth Dynasty. The papyrus tells the mythical story of the origins of the Fifth Dynasty, presenting kings Userkaf, Sahure and Neferirkare Kakai as three brothers, sons of Ra and a woman named Rededjet destined to supplant Khufu's line.
In the second part of the Eighteenth Dynasty and during the Nineteenth Dynasty numerous visitors left inscriptions, stelae and statues in the temple. These activities were related to a cult then taking place in the mortuary temple of Sahure since the time of ThutmoseIII. This cult was devoted to the deified king in a form associated with the goddess Sekhmet named "Sekhmet of Sahure". For example, the scribe Ptahemuia and fellow scribes visited Sahure's temple in the 30th year of RamsesII's reign (c. 1249 BC) to ask Sekhmet to grant them a long life of 110 years. The reason for the appearance of this cult during the New Kingdom is unknown. In any case, the cult of Sekhmet of Sahure was not a purely local phenomenon as traces of it were found in the Upper Egyptian village of Deir el-Medina, where it was celebrated during two festivals taking place every year, on the 16th day of the first month of Peret and on the 11th day of the fourth month of that season.
During the same period, prince Khaemwaset, a son of Ramesses II, undertook works throughout Egypt on pyramids and temples which had fallen into ruin, possibly to appropriate stones for his father's construction projects while ensuring a minimal restoration for cultic purposes. Inscriptions on the stone cladding of the pyramid of Sahure show that it was the object of such works at this time. This renewed attention had negative consequences as the first wave of dismantlement of the Abusir monuments, particularly for the acquisition of valuable Tura limestone, arrived with it. Sahure's mortuary temple may have been spared at this time due to the presence of the cult of Sekhmet. The cult's influence likely waned after the end of RamsesII's reign, becoming a site of local worship only.
The dismantlement of Sahure's pyramid started in earnest in the Roman period, as shown by the abundant production of mill-stones, presence of lime production facilities and worker shelters in the vicinity.
|
|
