Chapter 7: Udjahorresne - Statue & Tomb

The Udjahorresne Statue Inscription: The Preamble

Udjahorresne has appeared several times already in this revision, identified as a high official under Cambyses and Darius I who had previously held the office of navy commander under Amasis and Psamtik III. We have claimed, without supporting argument, that scholars have wrongly maligned him, falsely accused of collaborating with the enemy. His statuette, which found its way to Italy during the imperial Roman period and is now housed in the Vatican, contains the only inscriptional evidence, apart from Herodotus, of a chronological link between Cambyses and Amasis and Psamtik III.

This statue inscription of Udjahorresne, for the reason cited, is highly significant both for the traditional history and for the current revision. Suffice to say that were it not for the badly misinterpreted text of this monument, and particularly its alleged references to Amasis and Psamtik III, the current revision might be unnecessary. Egyptian history might already be differently structured with Amasis positioned at the end of the 5th century. The inscription begins:

The one distinguished in the service of the great Neith, mother of the god, and in the service of the gods of Sais, the eminent one, the royal chancellor, the unique companion, highly esteemed by the king who loves him, the inspector of scribes of the d'd'.t, the chief of the great scribes of the prison (?), the director of the palace, the head of the royal navy under the king of Upper and Lower Egypt Khnemibre (Amasis), the chief of the royal navy under the king of Upper and Lower Egypt Ankhkare (Psamtik III) Udjahorresne, son of the director of the palace, hrj-p priest, rnp priest, hpt-wd'.t priest, prophet of Neith who is at the head of the Saite nome Peftouoneith, ...[1]

In these introductory curriculum vitae, Udjahorresne cites among his credentials his status as admiral of the fleet under Khnemibre and Ankhkare, universally recognized as "throne names" respectively of Ahmose-sa-Neith (Amasis) and Psamtik III. Since the inscription goes on to describe Udjahorresne's activities under Cambyses and Darius I, it gives every appearance of discrediting the current thesis. For it goes without saying that if Amasis reigned in 449-405 B.C. the commander of his naval vessels could hardly have welcomed Cambyses and Darius into Egypt in 525 B.C. and 522 B.C. respectively.

How do we explain the dilemma?

If there is a solution, then clearly it must be found in an alternative identification of Khnemibre and Ankhkare. There is no possibility of redating the stela. We would not want to do that in any case, since the Udjahorresne inscription, properly interpreted, is not a witness against the revised history; it is one of its most powerful advocates.

The solution is not complex. There are clues in the inscription, providing we let the text speak for itself, and don't force it to agree with a preconceived history. We begin with the following observations:

1) The preamble in which Udjahorresne sets forth his credentials is a statement of what Udjahorresne is at the time of writing of the inscription. He is stating what he is, not what he was. That is, after all, the plain reading of the text, and it is the manner in which such lists of titles are typically read. When Posener argues that Udjahorresne held all these titles before the arrival of Cambyses, forfeiting only the admiralty at that time[2]; and when Lloyd argues that Udjahorresne held only the admiralty before the Persians came and that the other titles were substitutes for the loss of that office[3]; they are both speculating. The casual reader can do better than these experts. All we can claim with confidence is what the text actually says, namely, that at the time of writing Udjahorresne held all the titles listed. Nothing is said about what titles, if any, he held before Cambyses arrived in Egypt. In the end we will determine that he held none, but that conclusion does not follow from this inscription.

2) The text does not say that Udjahorresne was head of the royal navy. This might seem surprising in view of the translation provided above. But the translation is not ours. We are merely following expert opinion. The hieroglyphic text actually reads "commander of the royal kbnt boats" (imy-r kbnwt nsw). But the kbnt boat is not a warship. Historically the term referred to a large sea vessel, usually a cargo ship propelled both by sail and oar, thus particularly suited for long voyages. It was not designed specifically for warfare.[4] Remarks by the Egyptologist Alan Lloyd underscore the problematic nature of this title of Udjahorresne:

The title imy-r kbnt does not occur before the Saite Period. In the New Kingdom the expression for Admiral of the Fleet was (hieroglyphic text omitted) imy-r 'h'w n nsw. Why should such a consciously archaizing body of men as the Saite rulers introduce or countenance such a novel term? The answer must be that something completely new had appeared which needed a novel expression to describe it.[5]

Lloyd admits that imy-r kbnwt nsw is not the usual way to describe the admiral of the fleet. Therefore there must be something in the historical circumstances of the Saite period in which the title arises, and in the nature of the kbnt boat itself, which gives rise to the new title. Lloyd is correct, thus far. But he goes on to suggest that the new thing which produced the new title was a change in the structure of the kbnt boat, or at least the use of that archaic term to describe a highly efficient warship patterned after the Greek trireme, a warship of innovative design making its first appearance within Egypt during the Saite dynasty. But in spite of Lloyd's argument, there is absolutely no evidence that during the Saite dynasty the old name was assigned to the trireme, or that the kbnt boat was structurally modified for military purposes.[6]

3) Khnemibre is indeed the throne name (prenomen) of Amasis, but he is not typically known by that name in the monuments. Where Amasis' throne name is recorded in inscriptions it is almost always accompanied by his personal name (nomen) in a double cartouche. More often than not only the personal name 'Ahmose-sa-Neith is employed. Ankhkare, on the other hand, is not even the throne name of Psamtik III, or of any other Egyptian pharaoh, in spite of all scholarly opinion. We do not question the existence of a Saite dynasty prince or king named Ankhkanre Psamtik. In a later chapter we will note his connection with the time of Psamtik II and Apries. But his throne name is Ankhkanre, not Ankhkare. The minor change in orthography may or may not be important. The meaning of the name in each case is the same. But the fact is that there is not a single occurrence within Egypt proper of the cartouche name Ankhkare, with orthography identical to that employed by Udjahorresne, throughout the several millenia of Egyptian dynastic history. Only in Nubia does that spelling of the royal name occur, and there at least five kings bear the name.

Based on the assumption that Khnemibre and Ankhkare are kings under whom Udjahorresne functioned in the capacity of "commander of the kbnt boats", apparently with the sanction of or perhaps by order of Cambyses and Darius I, we should seek their identity outside of Egypt. The small hint provided by the spelling of Ankhkare directs our attention to Nubia.

Napatan and Meroitic kingdoms

Nubian History

When Taharka died in 664 B.C. (543 B.C. in the revised history) he was entombed at Nuri, five miles upriver from Napata, five hundred miles south of Thebes. G.A. Reisner excavated the cemetery in 1916-17.[7] It contained the pyramid tombs of Taharka and nineteen of his successors. Using an ingenious comparative method, Reisner managed to give chronological order to the twenty kings. Taking account of changes over time in style and workmanship in tomb construction, noting similar changes in quality and character of the few funerary artifacts left by the tomb robbers, following the natural lines of expansion as the cemetery filled up - with later tombs located at less favourable sites - and, finally, utilizing inscriptional information from the tombs and elsewhere, Reisner not only placed the kings in succession but managed to assign a reign length to each king. Then, beginning with the “known” dates for Taharka, he affixed absolute dates for the rulers of his “Napatan kingdom”, from Taharka (688-663 B.C.)[8] down to Nastasen (328-308 B.C.). He acknowledged a large margin of error in these dates[9], though his successors have written them in stone. These Napatan kings ruled over lands that extended at least as far south as Meroe, and northward beyond the 1st cataract. The capital, according to Reisner, remained at Napata throughout the period in question.

Between the years 1920-22[10] Reisner excavated other cemeteries at Begarawiyeh, ancient Meroe, four hundred miles upriver (south) from Napata. They were found to contain royal burials. The Meroitic South cemetery contained the tombs of three kings, Arikakaman, Yesruwaman, and Kaltaly, as well as six queens. Several hundred yards to the north, the Meroitic North cemetery held an additional 30 kings and 6 queens, successors of the South cemetery group.

It was Reisner’s understanding that these 33 Meroitic kings began ruling in the years almost immediately following the Napatan kings, i.e., in 300 B.C., and that they ruled continuously into the fourth century A.D.[11] There was only one minor adjustment to be made. One cemetery remained unaccounted for.

A burial ground near Gebel Barkal, not far from Napata, contains, inter alia, two groups of pyramids tombs (known as the Barkal Pyramids) succinctly described by Dunham as follows:

At Gebel Barkal there are two groups of pyramids. In the largest tomb of the older group (Barkal, Pyramid XI) Reisner places a nameless king who, he suggests, intervened between Nastasen, last king buried at Nuri, and Arikakaman, first king buried at Meroe South Cemetery. Since there was no room at Nuri for further royal pyramid construction after Nastasen, owing to the unsuitable quality of the underlying rock which precluded excavation of the necessary subterranean chambers, the earlier Barkal group may well represent a king of the Napatan clan, and a few of his descendants, who refused to abandon the old burial tradition, and who set up a short-lived kingdom at Napata in rivalry with the branch of the family represented by Arikakaman and his successors. The second group at Barkal Reisner assigned to a line of l9 local rulers of Napata who reigned there independently of the main line at Meroe during the 1st century B.C. ...[p. 386-7]

Reisner called these two independent groups of kings his “first and second Meroitic kingdoms at Napata”.[12] According to him the first group ruled from 308-225 B.C. with a brief interregnum (283-275 B.C.) following the initial king, and the second ruled from 100-22 B.C. An Ethiopian chronology was thus established consisting of a Napatan dynasty lasting till 308 B.C., ending with Nastasen, followed immediately by the first group of Barkal kings in Napata and, after a brief pause, by the kings of a Meroitic kingdom who, with the two exceptions noted, governed the whole of Ethiopia for the balance of the pre-Christian era and beyond into the 4th century A.D. This chronology has prevailed to the present.

But this contrived chronology is unreliable for many reasons. We note specifically that

1) Reisner begins his Napatan kingdom with dates for Taharka which we consider to be seriously in error;

2) Reisner’s assigned reign lengths are arbitrary and several have subsequently been proved incorrect;

3) many aspects of kingship in Ethiopia, such as the practice of brother to brother succession and of overlapping reigns were not fully understood before the excavations at Kawa shortly after Reisner’s death[13]; and

4) Reisner himself noted that the cemeteries at Napata, Meroe and Barkal contain too many kings to fit in the historical time frame allowed, an important consideration which suggests the possibility that the Meroitic and Napatan kingdoms overlapped one another for a much longer period of time than suggested by Reisner.

This final problem is exacerbated in the revised chronology, which lowers the dates of Taharka and his immediate successors by over a century while leaving unchanged the known historical conclusion of the Meroitic kingdom.

With these considerations in view we argue for changes to Reisner’s chronological scheme. However, before we make changes to a long-standing tradition, we make one preliminary enquiry. Since Udjahorresne served under Cambyses and Darius I, whose reigns must have been coterminous with one or more of Reisner's Napatan kings, we wonder whether there exists any evidence of Persian involvement in Ethiopian affairs which might guide our suggested revision and provide a context for Udjahorresne’s "naval command"? We answer our own query.

Persian Suzerainty over Ethiopia and the Emergence of Meroe

It is clear from two strands of evidence that Cambyses invaded Ethiopia soon after his arrival in Egypt. In the first place, his successors Darius and Xerxes claim Ethiopia as a vassal state, a fact that can be most easily explained if Cambyses conquered Ethiopia. Secondly, classical authors state explicitly that Cambyses was militarily active as far south as Meroe.

Wainwright summarizes the Persian references:

At Persepolis, Darius includes Ethiopia (Kusa) as part of ‘the kingdom which I hold’ and again at Hamada. At Naqs-i-Rustam he includes the Ethiopians as well as the Egyptians among those who ‘bore tribute to me’ and again at Susa. Another inscription of his at Susa says that the ivory used in decorating the palace there ‘was brought from Ethiopia’ among other countries, and the great tribute procession at Persepolis includes Ethiopians who bring a giraffe. Herodotus says (vii, 69) that the Ethiopians sent a contingent to the armies of Xerxes, the successor of Darius, and at Persepolis Xerxes not only lists the Egyptians but also the Ethiopians among ‘the countries of which I was king. Thus, we have evidence of Ethiopian subservience to Persia during some forty-five years which would not have been the case if at least some part of the country had not been conquered.[14]

While we can reasonably infer from these references that Persian suzerainty over Ethiopia originated with Cambyses, the case is strengthened by historical traditions preserved by several classical authors. Again we look to Wainwright for the details:

By the first century B.C. Cambyses had become so intimately connected with Meroe that Diodorus (l:33) says that he founded the city and called it after his mother, while Strabo (17:1:5) merely says that it was he who gave it its name. Strabo, however, adds that he did this because his sister Meroe or as some say, his wife, died there. Later again, about A.D. 90, Josephus says that Cambyses changed the name of the city from Saba to Meroe after the name of his own sister. (Antiquities of the Jews, 2:10) This idea of the founding or naming of the city by Cambyses seems clearly to have grown out of the knowledge that Meroe rose to power at about the time of the Persian invasion.[15]

This evidence of Persian activity in Nubia finds no place in Reisner’s chronology. According to him the successors of Taharka ruled from Napata with no apparent interference from Persia. Meroe does not come into prominence until the death of Nastasen in 300 B.C., when Arikakaman became its first resident king. Something is amiss.

Dows Dunham - a colleague of Reisner during most of the Nubian excavations - only shortly after Reisner’s death in 1942 modified some aspects, though not the underlying chronological structure, of Reisner's Nubian history. He argued that already very early in the 25th dynasty period Meroe emerged as an important provincial center rivalling but subservient to Napata. According to him Meroe was at this time controlled "by people of the same stock, whether governors appointed by the ruling family at Napata or nominally independent cousins of the same racial origin." Following the close of the 25th dynasty, "with loss of control over Egypt and the resultant falling off in the lucrative traffic with that country, the economic basis of prosperity began to shift and the city of Meroe assumed a growing importance"[16]

It is, I believe, clear that the Kings of Kush, fairly soon after they had lost control over Egypt, began to make Meroe their habitual residence. Very probably the centre of administration followed economic pressure and Meroe became the political capital of the country at this time. But Napata, the traditional centre of Amon-worship, remained the religious capital long after the government had moved to a more convenient location. The king, according to custom, was buried in the royal cemetery at Nuri ...DHK 386

The shift of capital from Napata to Meroe, according to Dunham, came about gradually, but was essentially completed by the time of Malenaqen, whose dates are 553-538 B.C. in Reisner's chronology. During the whole of this transition period there existed in Napata and Meroe two rival clans or families, the dominant Napatan kings ruling in Napata, and their non-royal brethren who governed Meroe. Reisner's artificial Napatan kingdom/Meroitic kingdom distinctions thus become blurred, though his chronology remains unchanged. Dunham's comments on the matter are worth quoting:

Reisner has named the period between the close of the 25th Dynasty and the death of Nastasen the Napatan Kingdom, because these kings had their tombs at Nuri and he assumed that Napata was the seat of government. I believe this assumption to be incorrect and that we are not justified in making so clear-cut a distinction between two kingdoms. While there was undoubtedly a shift of the capital from Napata to Meroe, I am convinced that the change was a gradual one, and that in everything but the burial place of the kings and the observances of the Amon cult, it took place much earlier than was formerly supposed. The ruling class was divided into two clans or families, one with headquarters at Napata and the other living at Meroe. They were closely related and shared a common culture. The Napatan group was the dominant one during the early period, and from it sprang the kings buried at El Kurruw and Nuri. ... During this early period the Meroitic group were not royal, and they were buried in unpretentious graves in the West Cemetery close to the city. At the same time there resided at Meroe a considerable group of people of the Napatan family, representatives of the politically dominant group, many of them no doubt holding positions of authority in the provincial city on behalf of the central government. They buried their dead in the more isolated South Cemetery. When the growing economic importance of Meroe induced the kings to spend an increasing part of their time there, and eventually to govern from that city, they doubtless began also to marry women from the Meroitic aristocracy in addition to wives from their own Napatan clan. ... If, as I believe, the South Cemetery was that of the Napatan residents at Meroe, it would be the logical place to build their tombs once the traditional pull back to Nuri had become sufficiently weakened to be no longer compelling. On this assumption, therefore, I suggest that the three kings buried in the South Cemetery were of Napatan origin. DHK 386

According to Dunham's hypothesis Meroe was the de facto capital of Nubia by the time of Nalmaye, the seventh king after Taharka. Nalmaye’s dates in Reisner’s scheme were 538-533 B.C. This conceptual change in the importance of the two prominent Nubian cities brought about a semblance of correspondence between Nubian history and the Greek historians. By the time of Cambyses, according to Dunham's interpretation of the data, Meroe was indeed the Nubian capital. Reisner’s chronology, meanwhile, remained intact. Dunham's changes related only to the location from which the Napatan kings ruled, not to the time in which they lived.

Dunham’s modest changes have not blunted the criticism raised earlier. There are still too many kings in Reisner's scheme, reign lengths remain arbitrary and at times excessively long, and Cambyses and the Persians are still out of the picture. Change is necessary, and any change must begin with the reduction of Reisner’s dates by 121 years. Table 13 below lists the kings of Reisner’s Napatan kingdom and the initial kings of his Meroitic kingdom, alongside of the revised dates that result from the 121-year reduction introduced by the revised history. This should provide the stage on which further changes can be imposed. It is surprising how little will need to be changed.

With reference to table 13 we make the following observations:

1) Reisner has divided both the Napatan and Meroitic kingdoms into subgroups of kings having greater than usual affinity with one another. This division into groups suggests the existence of some discontinuity between one group of kings and the next. Reisner provides no explanation of the cause of these alleged breaks in the tradition. He simply notes their existence. We can do no more than place his remarks on record. According to Reisner

all the royal tombs at Nuri are constructed on the same general plan ... nevertheless, certain differences in form, construction, and material arrest the attention. An examination of these differences results in the division of the pyramids into four groups which are indicated ... by the letters a,b,c and d. This grouping is borne out by the objects found in and about the pyramids as well as by other evidences, and thus becomes a matter of prime importance for the chronological order of the pyramids.[17]

Table 13: Napatan & Meroitic Kingdoms According to Reisner/Dunham[18]

Napatan Kings	Reisner Dates	Revised Dates	Napatan Kings	Reisner Dates	Revised Dates
Group a			Group d
Taharka	688-663 B.C.	570-543 B.C.	Malewiayaman	453-423	332-302
Tanuatamon	663-653	543-532	Talakhaman	423-418	302-297
Atlanersa	653-643	532-522	Aman-nete-yerike	418-398	297-277
Senkamenseken	643-623	522-502	Baskakeren	398-397	277-276
			Harsiotef	397-362	276-241
Group b			(Piankhalara)	362-342	241-221 (omit)
Anlamani	623-593 B.C.	502-472 B.C.	Akhratan	342-328	221-207
Aspalta	593-568	472-447	Nastasen	328-308	207-187
Amtalqa	568-553	447-432
Melanaqan	553-538	432-417	Barkal Kings:
Nalma'aye	538-533	417-412	1st Meroitic	308-283	187-162
			Kingdom @ Napata	275-225	154-104
Group c
Netaklabataman	533-513	412-392	Meroitic Kings:
Karkaman	513-503	392-382	Group a
Astabarqaman	503-478	382-357	Arikakaman	300-280	179-159
Sa'asheriqa	478-458	357-337	Yesruaman	280-265	159-144
Nasakhma	458-453	337-322	Kaltaly	265-255	144-134

The relative ordering of three of these groups is certain. According to Reisner “the presence of the pyramid of Tirhaqa in group a, of that of Aspalta in group b, and of those of Harsiotef, Piankhalara, and Nastasen in group d, leaves no room for doubt as to the order of these three groups.”[19] The placement of group c between groups b and d was based on more subjective considerations.

2) Reisner arbitrarily assigned reign lengths in multiples of five years - as much as thirty-five years for Harsiotef and thirty years for Anlamani and Malewiayaman; as little as five years in the case of Nalma'aye, Nasakhma and Talakhaman. Eight kings are said to have ruled for twenty or twenty-five years. There is no justification for many of these large numbers.[20] These excessively large reign lengths will arguably result in increased error the further we progress into the Napatan kingdom. In the earlier period Reisner's dates should provide a workable framework in which to incorporate further changes.

3) Several of the kings listed can be safely omitted from the table. We cannot be certain that Tanuatamon ruled in Nubia. According to our revision Cyrus expelled him from Lower Egypt in 543 B.C. and, depending on the date when Mentuemhet began his restoration in Thebes, he may have ruled in Thebes or in upper Nubia for the balance of his life. It is important to note that his tomb is located in the Barkal cemetery, not at Nuri with the rest of the successors of Taharka. Apparently he does not belong in the lineage of Taharka.[21] Since his inclusion has depressed dates of subsequent kings by ten years, all following reign lengths can be increased by that amount. Reisner’s inclusion of Piankalara is another error that can be immediately corrected by simply omitting him from the list and increasing subsequent dates by a further twenty years. His very existence is questioned, though he is usually identified as the occupant of a tomb built on the outskirts of the El Kurruw cemetery along with the ancestors of Taharka. Though not buried in the Nuri cemetery, Reisner included him among his Napatan kings based solely on a questionable interpretation of a stela inscription of Nastasen.

4) Dunham’s suggestion that the Napatan kings completely transferred capitals from Napata to Meroe only shortly before the reign of Nalmaye no longer harmonizes the Nubian chronology with the tradition associating Cambyses with the rise of Meroe. In the revised chronology Nalmaye lived a century after Cambyses. Instead, the reduction of dates produced in table 13 places Cambyses’ arrival in Egypt coincident with the reign of Senkamenseken. It might even have brought that reign to its end. If the classicists are correct we should look for the emergence of an independent Meroitic kingdom around the time of Anlamani, the successor of Senkamenseken.

The stage is set to propose three alterations to the existing structure of Ethiopian history. We begin by reversing the order of Reisner’s’ groups c and d. We have already noted that while the relative order of groups a, b, and d is firmly established, the placement of group c by Reisner was not so clearly defined. We continue by reducing the reign lengths of the kings in each group, a reduction which has the effect of moving back the absolute dates of the individual kings, the size of the displacement increasing the further removed those kings are from the beginning of the dynasty. These two alterations are inconsequential for the argument that follows. They are included to be referenced in later chapters of this revision.

The third change is the only one critical for what follows. In order to harmonize the Persian and classical sources with Nubian history it is necessary to assume the beg