C rime and P unishment in P haraonic E gypt

Author(s): Renate Müller-Wollermann

Source: Near Eastern Archaeology, Vol. 78, No. 4, Special Issue: Crime and Punishment in the
Bible and the Near East (December 2015), pp. 228-235
Published by: American Schools of Oriental Research
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 Crime and Punishment in
Pharaonic Egypt
View of Deir el-Medineh. Photograph courtesy of Wikimedia Commons user Olaf Tausch, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Deir_el-Medina_06.JPG.
C
rimes are acts, not intentions, that are directed against
other persons or the state and not tolerated by law.
Punishments are official, not private sanctions directed
against persons who committed crimes. They do not comprise
the treatment of foreign enemies or ritual killings, although the
distinction may be blurred (Assmann 1992; Muhlestein 2011).1
A distinction between civil and criminal offenses had already
been made in Ramesside times (Allam 2012).
The term for “crime” is bt3, that for a capital crime bt3 ‘3 (n
mwt), “great crime (worthy of death).” The most common words
for “to punish” are ḫsf and sb3; ḫsf is a measure that excludes
the perpetrator from society, sb3 a measure that tries to integrate
and educate him.
SOURCES
Egyptian sources for crimes and punishments are extremely di-
verse, but are primarily texts. They mainly consist of royal texts,
such as decrees, administrative texts, such as court proceedings,
and texts of private origin, such as biographies or letters. Most
legal texts are from the Ramesside period, which makes com-
parison with other times difficult. A written law code of criminal
law does not exist. Religious texts, especially Chapter 125 of the
Book of the Dead (Lichtheim 1976: 124–32), curses (Morschaus-
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78:4 (2015)
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Renate Müller-Wollermann
er 1991), and literary texts, especially didactic literature, also
give hints, but cannot be taken at face value. Representations of
crimes cannot be made out, those of punishments are rare.
CRIMES
Crimes against the state, or better: against the king comprise trea-
son, lese majesty, and desertion. Crimes against other human be-
ings include killings, injuries, adultery and rape, robbery and theft.
Treason
There is no Egyptian word for “treason,” but only paraphrases such
as “great crime worth of death,” “great abomination of the country,”
or “abomination of all gods.” The best-known case of treason is the
harem conspiracy against king Ramses III, which aimed to raise
a prince not entitled to succession to the throne (Redford 2002).
Although the king was murdered by the cutting of his throat (Ha-
wass et al. 2012)2 (fig. 1), the plot failed, a special tribunal was es-
tablished, and the culprits were punished. The punishments were
proportional to the extent the persons were involved in the crime
and with the seriousness of their guilt. The worst culprits were
sentenced to death, some were allowed to commit suicide. Others
were sentenced to have their nose and ears cut off, some were only
blamed. The tribunal has been recorded in a series of papyri.
 Another harem conspiracy has been handed down in the bi- Killings
ography of the official Wnı͗ in the 6th dynasty (Kanawati 2003). The diverse crimes of killing a person are not distinguished
Also in this case a special tribunal has been established, which in Egyptian language. “To kill” is called sm3, later ẖdb. Nearly
did not include the vizier. Nothing is known, however, about the all evidence of killings stems from the time of the end of the
outcome of the trial and subsequent punishments. New Kingdom and the beginning of the Third Intermediate
A case of treason unrelated to the harem is directed against the Period, a time of social and political unrest. Despite the num-
Theban high priest Osorkon, the later king Osorkon III of the 23rd ber of attested cases no punishment for it is known. It is high-
dynasty (Caminos 1958). Osorkon himself kills the captured per- ly likely, however, that it was sanctioned by the death penalty.
petrators on the spot and burns the corpses. A judicial trial does A passage in the Myth of the Sun’s Eye says that someone
not take place. Further cases who kills will be killed and
of treason are transmitted someone who orders to kill
in literary texts, such as the will be ruined. Therefore,
Instruction of Amenemhet, killing orders will also be
the Instruction for Merikare, punished with the death
and the Loyalist Instruction. penalty. Furthermore, not
Whether the punishments only killings themselves,
mentioned mirror judicial but also plans to kill will
punishments remains unclear. be sanctioned by the death
penalty, if a phrase on the
Lese Majesty Stela of Banishment dating
There is no direct evidence from the Third Intermediate
for cases of lese majesty and Period can be taken as a real
its punishment. According to world punishment. In an
a court protocol from Deir el- oracle consultation a priest
Medineh near Thebes (open- is “saying, ‘As for everyone
ing photograph) dating to the who will report before you
Ramesside Period, a worker is [i.e. the god] as to say: “Slay
accused of having insulted the living people!” will you de-
king; a sentence has not been stroy him, will you kill him?’
handed down to us. In the Pyr- Then the great god nodded
amid Texts the deceased king in agreement very fervently”
affirms not to have slandered (Ritner 2009: 128).
the living one. This phrase was Mummies and skeletons
transmitted in Chapter 125 of also provide some evidence
the Book of the Dead where for killings and even mur-
everybody assures not to have der. A skeleton of a woman
slandered the king. According in Abydos reveals that she
to the Instruction of a Man to Figure 1. The mummy of pharaoh Ramesses III. G. Elliot Smith. The Royal
was stabbed in the back with
his Son, someone who misuses Mummies. Le Caire: Imprimerie de L'institut Francais D'archeologie Orientale, a blade, that even hit her ribs
the name of the king will have 1912. Catalogue General Antiquites Egyptiennes du Musee du Caire. DT57. around the front of the thorax
C2 vol 59, pl LI. Source: http://www.lib.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/eos/eos_page.
no tomb. And king Thutmoses pl?DPI=100&callnum=DT57.C2_vol59&object=177. (Baker 1997: 111). A mummy
I declares at the appointment head found in Thebes shows
of his daughter Hatshepsut to that the man was struck dead
be his heir, “As for all who will hear (anything) connected with the with an instrument when he was lying down sleeping or was un-
name of her majesty, may he come immediately to report to the conscious (Parsche 1996).
king, as is done in the name of my majesty” (Ockinga 2011: 255).
Injuries
Desertion The evidence for this crime and its punishment is relatively
Only one text provides direct information about this crime. The ample and dates mainly to the Ramesside Period. The Egyptian
official Ns-Ḥr, who lived under king Apries in the 26th dynasty, word in this time is nearly without exception qnqn. Diverse sen-
relates in his biography that foreign mercenaries deserted, but tences are mentioned in texts from Deir el-Medineh, such as
that he brought them back to the king, and the king massacred3 corporal punishments as flogging or assignment to forced labor
them on the spot. There is little wonder that no judicial proce- (Müller-Wollermann 2004: 76–78). The injured person receives
dure was given, as the measure took place during wartime. In no compensation. The use of force was, however, not sanctioned
other biographies of the New Kingdom officials simply claim throughout. Force used against dependent persons and children
that they have not deserted from the king. was not only legitimate, but necessary to maintain order.

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 Figure 2 (above). Quarry near Elephantine. Photograph courtesy of Wikimedia Commons user Olaf Tausch
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AAssuan_Steinbruch_01.JPG.
Figure 3 (below). Papyrus Abbott on tomb robberies. Photograph courtery of Wikimedia Commons user Captmondo,
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/76/AbbottPapyrus-BritishMuseum-August21-08.jpg.

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230  NEAR EASTERN ARCHAEOLOGY downloaded from 152.3.102.242 on Fri, 11 Dec 2015 21:53:04 UTC
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Adultery and Rape Robbery and Theft
Egyptians did not clearly distinguish between these crimes as we Both acts are dealt with together, because it seems that they were
do. In earlier times nk meant “to have intercourse,” but in the punished in the same way. In the Elephantine decree of king
New Kingdom “to commit adultery.” A word for rape cannot be Ramses III robbery and theft of cattle are punished by the same
made out. sanction; this sanction, however, is not preserved due to a lacuna
In cases where the initiative to commit adultery was taken by in the text.
the man, the punishment is
unknown. Papyrus Deir el-
Medineh 27 mentions that
a man standing trial had to
swear an oath that he will have
nose and ears cut off and sent
into exile in Nubia, if he meets
the woman again. After a new
contact he has to swear that
he will be sent to Elephan-
tine for forced labor (fig. 2),
if he meets her anew (Kitchen
2008: 447–48); that means he
has to work in the quarries
nearby. This case also reveals
the problems of drawing con-
clusions from oaths about real
punishments. If the initiative
for adultery is taken by the Figure 4 (above). Flogging scene in the tomb of Khentika at Saqqara. T. G. H. James. 1953.The Mastaba of Khentika
woman and the adultery leads Called Ikhekhi. London: Oxford University Press, pl. IX.
Figure 5 (below). Relief with a pillory in the tomb of Mereruka at Saqqara. Naguib Kanawati, Alexandra Woods, Sameh Shafik,
to divorce or repudiation, the and Effy Alexakis 2010. Mereruka and his Family. III: 1 The Tomb of Mereruka. Oxford: Aris and Phillips Ltd., pl. 23.
woman gets rid of her bride
price and remains without any
means. This can be deduced
from the marriage documents
of the Late Period. Adultery
is also a main topic of narra-
tives and especially of didactic
literature. In these texts men
are warned not to have inter-
course with married women.
One or both persons involved
are threatened with death. In
sum, intercourse with a mar-
ried woman was considered as
a crime regardless of whether
the man was married or not.
The main issue was the of-
fence of the personal right of
the husband of the woman in-
volved. The personal right of
the woman herself was irrel-
evant and, therefore, whether
the intercourse took place
voluntarily or by force – and
this means rape. This is also
the reason why these two acts
were not distinguished. Rape
was only a crime when the
raped woman was married.

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 In most cases “to rob” is mentioned in texts of Rames-
called ‘w3ı͗ or ı͗ tı͗ m ‘w3, al- side Thebes. The penalty con-
though other words are used sists of the payment of double
as well from time to time. or triple the value of the object
Cases of robbery are not at- stolen. This sum has to be paid
tested directly, but there are to the harmed person in addi-
allusions to it in several texts. tion to the stolen object (Černý
No punishment is known. 1937). Theft of temple property
The vocabulary for “to steal” is mainly transmitted in royal
is also manifold, the verbs more decrees and punished much
often used are ı͗ tı͗ and nḥm. harder. It may be payment of a
Many cases of theft have come hundred times the value of the
down to us and their respec- stolen item, beatings, or in ex-
tive punishment, too. Theft of treme cases the death penalty.
private property, especially of Sanctions for theft of ordinary
things of daily life, is frequently state property are not clear.
Figure 6 (above). Naked man with a yoke in the tomb of Henqu at Deir el-Gebrawi. Naguib Kanawati 2005.
Deir el-Gebrawi I. The Northern Cliff. Oxford: Aris and Phillips Ltd., pl. 55.
Figure 7 (below). Old Kingdom houses on Elephantine. Photograph courtesy of Wikimedia Commons user Olaf Tausch,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Elephantine#/media/File:Elephantine_04.JPG.

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 A special problem that widely occurred is plundering of tombs, bone fractions, which can only be interpreted as the results of
those of ordinary people as well as of kings. Both kinds of crime harsh beatings. Many fractions were not lethal, but the severity
are known from the archaeological evidence as well as from texts. of the wounds amounts to torture (Gresky 2013). Branding and
Plundering private tombs does not seem to have been punished, mutilations can of course not be detected on skeletons, but we
as court proceedings suggest. Instead tombs were secured by have a sculptor’s model of a man with his nose cut.
threat formulae (Morschauser
1991). Evidence for plunder-
ing royal tombs derives from
the so-called Tomb Robbery
Papyri (fig. 3) from the times
of the kings Ramses IX and XI
(Peet 1930). One can deduce
from one passage that this
crime was punished by the
death penalty.

Punishments
The death penalty was carried
out by impalement. The body
was put on the pointed top of
a wooden stake and due to the
weight the pale slowly pierced
the body. We have no repre-
sentations of this procedure,
but a hieroglyph depicting a
body on top of a stake after
the phrase “to give on the
wood” (see Muhlestein in this
issue, fig. 6). The execution
seems to have taken place in
the public, and one text even
says besides a temple.
Corporal punishments con-
sisted of beatings or mutila-
tions. Texts speak of thrash-
ings with a wooden stick
given 10, 20, 50, 100, or even
200 times. They also mention
branding and the mutilation
of nose and ears. Tomb reliefs
often show beatings of people,
but in most cases this will be
a private coercion of subordi-
nates, not an official penalty
(Kanawati 2009: 263–65; fig.
4). Sometimes the culprits are
bound to a pillory (fig. 5). A
unique scene depicts a na-
ked man with a kind of yoke Figure 8. Torture instruments at the entrance of the Karnak temple. Clère, Pierre 1961. Le porte d’Evergète à Karnak. 2e
around his neck (fig. 6). These partie. Cairo: Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale du Caire, pl. 22.
punishments were all carried
out in the public, and, therefore, of course, meant also a loss of Forced labor seems to have been widespread, as it was more
honor and a degradation of the culprits. The result of these mea- useful to use culprits for work than to imprison them. Banish-
surements can be seen on many skeletons. A large percentage ment to Nubia is often mentioned as a threat in texts of the New
of the common population of Elephantine of the Old Kingdom Kingdom, and one assumes that these people had to work in
and First Intermediate Period (fig. 7) had suffered from multiple the gold mines of the Eastern desert. Imprisonment, however,

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is not known as a kind of punishment, but only as custody
pending trial.
Degradation as a punishment of its own is not attested, but many
forms of punishment also meant a loss of honor. There is only one
case of a deprivation of the name as an accompanying punishment.
Punishments regarding the property lack standardization and
consisted of a manifold of the object(s) concerned, the depriva-
tion of property, or the removal from office. The payment of a
fixed fine, however, is not attested.
In general, the author of the Instructions for Merikare ad-
vises moderate punishments, “Do justice, then you endure on
earth; calm the weeper, don’t oppress the widow, don’t expel a
man from his father’s property, don’t reduce the nobles in their
possessions. Beware of punishing wrongfully, do not kill, it does
not serve you. Punish with beatings, with detention, thus will the
land be well-ordered; except for the rebel whose plans are found
out, for god knows the treason plotters, god smites the rebels in
blood” (Lichtheim 1973: 100).
OUTLOOK
The natural sciences, from non-invasive CT scanning to DNA
sampling, have come to play an increasingly important role
in the study of human remains from ancient Egypt, able to
detect medical conditions and related phenomena that no
one had taken into consideration before. This concerns family
relationships, physical anomalies, and injuries, and will also
open up new avenues for the study of crime and punishment
in ancient Egypt.
Notes
1. For a comprehensive study of crimes and punishments see
Müller-Wollermann 2004; for an article on adultery see Eyre 1984.
2. I owe this reference to Professor Thomas Schneider.
3. This verb can only be read in a very old copy of the text, see Maspero
1884: 89.
4. On the procedure in the workmen’s community Deir el-Medineh in
Thebes see Allam 1973 and McDowell 1990.

PROCEDURE
Crimes were prosecuted by officials whose tasks were not exclu-
sively judicial, but administrative as well.4 Serious crimes, e.g.
murder, had to be prosecuted, and the chairman of important
court sessions was the vizier. Death sentences seem to have been
confirmed by the king. Confessions were often forced by torture,
as the Tomb Robbery Papyri attest. The term for “to torture” is
smtr, which means in the literal sense of the word “to investi-
gate” – be it with or without using force. The ultimate aim was
the establishment of truth. Some torture instruments can be de-
tected on a Ptolemaic temple entrance in Karnak (fig. 8). On
the small table at the bottom one can see two inkwells, seven
brushes, and two whips and under the table a gag wood on the
right and on the left something that looks like two jaws and was
probably used to tie the members of the culprit up. In the main
field the king presents the scribe’s palette to the god Khons-
Thot, a god with judicial functions. The entrance of a temple
is also known as a place for judgement in other cultures of the
Ancient Near East.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Renate Müller-Wollermann is an Egyptologist working at the Eberhard-Karls-Universität in

Tübingen. She received her Ph.D. with a study on the end of the Old Kingdom (Krisenfaktoren im
ägyptischen Staat des ausgehenden Alten Reichs, 1986). Subsequently, she published the results
of a survey in Middle Egypt together with Farouk Gomaà and Wolfgang Schenkel (Mittelägypten
zwischen Samalūṭ und dem Gabal Abū Ṣīr, 1991) and the rock inscriptions of Elkab together with
Hans Vandekerckhove (Die Felsinschriften des Wadi Hilâl, 2001) and published a book on crimes
and punishments (Vergehen und Strafen, 2004). Other research interests concern the geography
and economy of Ancient Egypt.

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Center for Applied Isotope Studies at the University of Georgia
Radiocarbon Dating, Stable Isotopes, Elemental Analyses
Radiocarbon and Stable Isotope Price List
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Drying and Grinding Samples
Weighing Samples
cais@uga.edu (706) 542–1395
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