An Ancient Egyptian Donation

Stela in the Archaeological Museum of

Florence (Inv. No. 7207)
by
RICARDO A. CAMXNOS*

Not the least of Professor Neugebauer’s scholarly achievements is the

eIimination of deep-rooted errors and historical clichCs in various fields,
which he has accomplished by rigorously adhering to the practice under-
lying all his work, of always going back to the primary sources and
reading them: he has in fact described himself as being a mere reader
of texts*.It may then be appropriate to the present occasion, when honour
is being done to him, to examine in the flesh, so to speak, an ancient
Egyptian document which has been repeatedly quoted second-hand; a
perusal of the original will,I trust, suffice to expose an error which has
gone unchallenged hitherto and has vitiated many a discussion of the
chronology of the so-called Libyan dynasties in Egypt.
The document in question belongs to that special category of monu-
ments known to egyptologists as donation stelae: these are inscribed
stone tablets which commemorate, by graphic representation and texts,
gifts of land plots made to temples by private individuals for the most
part, but sometimes also by Pharaoh himself, for the purpose, which
may or may not be explicitly stated, of securing for the donor one form
or another of divine favour in this world and/or the hereafterz. A photo-
graph of the donation stela here dealt with appears on pl. 1;a handdrawn
facsimile is given on plate 2.3. Said to have been found at Bubastis
in the Delta, the stela has long been on exhibit in the Museo Archeologico
at Florence, where it bears the inventory no. 7207, corresponding to the
old Schiaparellino. 18064. It is a round-topped limestone slab 67 cm high,
32 cm wide, and 11 cm thick. The scene and texts it bears are all cut
in cavo rilievo of mediocre workmanship. There is no trace of colour.

* Professor of Egyptology, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, U.S.A.

Cmrauru 1969: vol. 14: no. 1 : pp. 4 2 4 6

 A n Ancient Egyptian Donation Stela 43

In the lunette are represented the divine recipient or recipients of the

gift and the donor thereof, each identified by a docket or label-text. The
principal, if not the sole beneficiary appears to be the patroness of
Bubastis, the lion-headed goddess Bast, who is shown standing in the
centre of the scene, facing right; the docket above her lotiform staff
reads: Utterance by Bast, mistress of the gods. Keeping her company,
and perhaps even sharing in the gift, is the falcon-headed god with the
Egyptian double-crown represented behind her and also facing right;
his docket reads: Utterance by Horus, son of Bast. The announced
speeches are not recorded, unless they be the injunctions in 11. 2 and 3
of the main text below. In front of the two deities is a stand which sup-
ports a flaming vase, and next to it a man, facing left, holds out a burning
bowl. He is the donor of the field, and is identified by the superscription
as being the chief of the kanty of Bast, Harkhebes, which indicates that
he was in the employ of the temple or estate of the tutelary goddess of
Bubastis, though it is impossible to tell just what his duties were because
the meaning of kanty is unknowns.
Crowning the scene is the winged solar disk, the symbol of the reigning
Pharaoh as immanent in the visible sun. Pharaoh's name and regnal year
are inscribed at the bottom of the lunette and must be read in conjunc-
tion with the main text, which is ranged in three horizontal lines directly
under the scene: Usima're'-setpenamun Pedubast-sibast-meramun. Regnal
year 23: On this day there was made a giji. of 3 arouras offield belonging
to the kantyw of Bast, Harkhebe. As for him who will disturb this stela
from its place he shaII be subject to the ferocity of the mighty king; he
shall fall at the slaughter-block of Sekhmet he who will violate this stela.
The royal name Usima're'-setpenamun Pedubast-sibast-meramun,
which is found exactly this form in at least four other records7, can
hardIy be anything but a variant of Usima're'-setpenamun Pedubast-
meramun, the well-attested name of the founder of the Twenty-third
Dynasty. The prenomina are identical, and the only difference in the
nomina lies in the epithet sibast, "son of Bast". It is well known, how-
ever, that epithetal adjuncts such as this are inconstant elements; in the
cartouches of one and the same king, and for reasons which are not
always apparent, they may vary in form when used, and they may also
drop out.8 Manetho mentions only one Pedubast, whom he reckons as
the first king of the Twenty-third Dynasty, with a 25 years' reign ac-
cording to Eusebius and a 40 years' reign according to Africanuss; his
44 Ricardo A . Caminos

existence is confirmed by hieroglyphic sources, and these, as pointed out

above, give his prenomen as Usima‘re‘-setpenamun10. A second Pedu-
bast, identitiable by the prenomen Shetibre‘, is known to us from epi-
graphic records onlyl1. I cannot bring myself to see still a third king by
that name in Pedubast-sibast-meramun, merely on the strength of the
epithet sibast. Unless clear evidence to the contrary is adduced, it will
be safe to say that Pedubast-sibast-meramun, whose regnal year 23 dates
our Florence donation stela, is the same king Pedubast-meramun who
founded the Twenty-third Dynasty and whose regnal year 23, corres-
ponding to roughly 800 B.C., is mentioned in one of the Nile level
records at Karnakl2.
In the text proper beneath the lunette only a few points call for com-
ment.
The expression di hnk, lit. “to give a present,” is rare but not wholly
unparalleled in the phraseology of donation stelael3.
The gift consists of 8,205 sq.m. or slightly over 2 acres of arable land,
the location of which our stela, unlike most records of the kind, fails
to mention.
The sign of the red crown after s3-t3 3, “3 arouras”, is not necessarily
the genitival exponent (“belonging to”); it may also be n for in, “by”,
expressing the verbal agent.
As suggested on p. 45 n. 6 below, the occupational title kantyw in 1.
1 looks very much like a plural, but then hry would be expected before
it as in @arkhebe’sdocket in the lunette.
Of palaeographical interest is the word for “stela” (wcl), twice written
ideographically with a hieroglyph which, but for the context, one would
not hesitate to take for the obelisk-signl4.
The closing imprecations are commonplace enough and typical of
donation stelae, but the chiastic structure which they exhibit makes
them unusual and noteworthy’s.
The relatively large space left blank at the bottom, following the last
line of the text, is a curious feature found in a number of donation stelae.

In so far as I have been able to determine @arkhebe’s donation stela

first found its way into print in a catalogue compiled by Ernest0 Schia-
parelli which appeared in 188716. There he gave Usima‘re‘-setpenamun
Take[lothis]-siese-meramunas the reading of the cartouches in the lunette
and concluded, naturally, that the monument must be ascribed to one
of the Takelothis kings of the Twenty-second Dynasty. Schiaparelli’s
Plate 1 . Museo Archeologico, Firenze, Stela inv. no. 7207
Plate 2. Museo Archeologico, Firenze, Stela inv. no. 7207
 A n Ancient Egyptian Donation Stela 45

reading of the cartouches was endorsed by Daressy in an article published

in 189317, and ever since the stela, which has been quoted and referred
to many times and always second-hand, has consistently been assigned
to the wrong king and the wrong dynasty. The error has particularly
affected king-lists and chronological discussions of the Libyan period in
Egypt, for a document purporting to record the highest, by far, regnal
year of Takelothis I was not to be disregardedls. Now a simple, direct
reading of the original text shows that all that has hitherto been written
on, or in the light of, Florence stela inv. no. 7207 must be thoroughly
revised or discarded altogether.

Abbreviations:
BIFAO. Bulletin de I’lnstiiut frangais d’archdologie orientale. Le Caire, 1901 ff.
Journ. Amer. Res. Center. Journal of the American Research Cenier in Egypt. Boston,
1962 ff.
Mitteil. deuts. Inst. Kairo. Miiteilungen des deutschen Instituts f i r agyptische Alteriums-
kunde in Kairo. Augsburg, 1930 ff.
Rec. trav. Recueil de travaux relatifs Ci la philologie et a I’archPologie Pgyptiennes et as-
syriennes. Paris, I879 ff.
ZAS. Zeitschrift fQr iigyptische Sprache und Alteriumskunde. Leipzig, 1863 ff.

NOTES

1. Neugebauer, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 107 (1963), p. 528,

quoting Louis de la Vall6e Poussin: “je ne suis qu’un lecteur de textes.”
2. Approximately eighty donation stelae are on record. Lists of them have been com-
piled by Iversen, Two Inscriptions Concerning Private Donations to Temples (Ksben-
havn 1941), pp. 10 ff., and Schulrnan, Journ. Amer. Res. Center 5 (1966), pp. 39 ff.
Both lists are marred by inaccuracies, and both err in stating that the earliest stelae
of the kind are Ramesside. For a much earlier (Middle Kingdom) donation stela
cf. Bisson de la Roque and Clkre, Rapport sur les fouilles de MPdamoud (1927) (Cairo
1928), p. 88 fig. 64, p. 141 no. 466; quoted by Christophe, Karnak-Nord, 111 (Cairo
1951), p. 86 n. 3. Still another list of donation stelae, apparently overlooked by Schul-
man, is the one published by Lourie in Epigrafika Vosioka 5 (1951), pp. 106 ff.
3. I am deeply grateful to Professor Sergio Bosticco for the photograph and his kind
permission to publish it. The drawing, made directly from the original in 1957, is
my own handiwork.
4. Porter and Moss, Topographical Bibliography of Ancieni Egyptian Hieroglyphic Texts,
IV (Oxford 1934), p. 33 s. v. Stela of Ijarkhebi.
5. A shortened form of the common name Ijaremkhebe, lit. “Horus is in Chernmis”;
cf. Ranke, Die ogyptischen Personennamen, I (Gluckstadt 1935), p. 247, 15; I1 (Gliick-
stadt/Hamburg 1949-52), p. 378 (247, 15).
6. The meaning “sacrificer” suggested by Daressy, Rec. trav. 15 (1893), p. 175 with n. 1,
followed by Sottas, PrPservation de la propriPtP funiraire (Paris 1913), p. 147 with
46 Ricardo A . Caminos

n. 4, seems to me uncertain in the extreme. The word is found again in 1. 1 of the

text proper under the lunette, probably in the plural. I can quote no other instance.
7. The four records are listed by Schulman, Journ. Amer. Res. Center 5 (1966), p. 37
with nn. 4a-6. Like other scholars before him Schulman was not aware that the name
is also t o be found on the Florence stela of earkhebe. In Schulman's opinion King
Pedubast-sibast-meramun is not t o be identified with Pedubast-meramun, the founder
of the Twenty-third Dynasty.
8. On one and the same monument Tuthmosis 1's nomen appears as Tuthmosis-kha'mire'
and Tuthmosis-kha'neferu, and similar epithetal variations may be noted in his
prenomen and in his Horus name; cf. Gauthier, Livre des Rois d'ggypte, I1 (Cairo 1912),
p. 216 (xii). On Tuthmosis 111's obelisk on the Thames embankment his nomen
cartouche occurs four times, and each occurrence exhibits a different epithetal adjunct;
cf. Budge, Cleopatra's Needles (London 1926), pp. 168 ff. In the temple at Semna the
same king's nomen reads Tuthmosis-neferkhepru on a wall, Tuthmosis-bekama'e on
another wall, and plain Tuthmosis, with no epithetal adjunct, on yet another; cf.
Dunham and Janssen, Semna Kumna (Boston 1960), pls. 26 (A), 29, and 32 respectively.
Note also the conspectus in Sethe, Urkunden der 18. Dynastie, I1 (Leipzig 1906),
p. 601, 7-13. On a scene in the temple of Osiris yekadjet at Karnak are to be found
two nomen cartouches which read Takelothis-siese-meramun,and one which reads
Takelothis, with no epithet; yet all three refer to one and the same king; cf. Legrain,
Rec. tray. 22 (1900), p. 132. Examples of this kind could be easily multiplied.
9. Waddell, Manetho (Cambridge-London 1940), pp. 161-63.
10. Drioton and Vandier, L'Egypte4 (Paris 1962), p. 561 (D) with references, pp. 673-74.
11. Labib Habachi, ZAS 93 (1966), pp. 69-74.
12. Record no. 29; latest publication, Beckerath, Journ. Amer. Res. Center 5 (I966),
pp. 47 and 52.
13. Cf. Moret, Catalogue du M u s k Guimet. GaIerie dgyptienne (Paris 1909), p- 100 1.
2 of text, and pl. 43.
14. Cf. the obelisk-sign (for mn) in 1. 4 of an inscription temp. Pedubast-sibast-meramun
at Copenhagen; best published photographs in Koefoed-Petersen, Recueil des in-
scriptions hidrogiyphiques de la Glyptoth2que Ny Carlsberg (Bruxelles 1936), pl. 5 ; id.,
Glyptorh2que N y Carlsberg. Les StPles dgyptiennes (Copenhague 1948), pl. 54.
15. The main discussions on the use of the chiasmus in Egyptian writings are quoted by
Caminos, Literary Fragments in the Hieratic Script (Oxford 1956), p. 31, n. 6.
16. Schiparelli, Museo archeologico di Firenze. Antichit& egizie, I (Roma 1887), pp. 516 f.
17. Daressy, Rec. trav. I5 (1893), p. 175.
18. These are but a few random references: Daressy, Rec. trav. 18 (1896), p. 52 with n. 1;
Budge, History of Egypt, VI (London 1902), p. 80; Petrie, History of Egypt, 111
(London 1905), p. 244; Breasted, Ancient Records of Egypt, IV (Chicago 1906), p. 339
n. e; Miiller, Sitzungsberichte der konigl. preuss. Akademie der Wissenschaften 1910,
p. 945 n. 2; Sottas, Prdservation de la propridti fundraire (Paris 1913), p. 146; Daressy,
Rec. trav. 35 (1913), pp. 143 (bottom), 144 (top); Gauthier, BZFAO 11 (1914). p. 205
n. 5; id., Livre des Rois d'ggypte, I11 (Cairo 1914). pp. 333 n. 3, 389 with n. 3, 390
with n. 1 ; Meyer, Gesehichte des Altertums, 112, part 2 (Stuttgart-Berlin 1931), p. 58
with n. 4; Anthes, Mitteil. deuts. Inst. Kairo 12 (1943), p. 48 with n. 7 ; Scamuzzi in
Salmi (editor), Scritti dedicati alla memoria di Ippolito Rosellini (Firenze 1945), p. 44
n. 2; Lourie Epigrafika Vostoka 5 (1951), p. 107 no. 12; Drioton and Vandier, L'Egyp-
te4 (Paris 1962), pp. 569 (top), 673; Helck, Geschichte des Alten Agypten (Leiden
1968), p. 223 n. 6.