IFAO

L’article est consacré à la publication de 18 inscriptions démotiques provenant des galeries souterraines de la nécropole d’animaux sacrés de Tuna el-Gebel (Ibiotapheion). Ces inscriptions se trouvaient sur la face externe de sarcophages en bois, de sarcophages en céramique et de sarcophages en grès utilisés pour l’enterrement des animaux sacrés dans les galeries.

Mots-clés : Touna el-Gebel – nécropole d’ibis – Époque ptolémaïque – inscriptions démotiques – animaux sacrés – sarcophages d’animaux – onomastique.

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The present paper is dedicated to publishing 18 demotic inscriptions, from the subterranean galleries of the sacred animals in Tuna el-Gebel (Ibiotapheion). These inscriptions were written on the exterior of wooden coffins, pottery coffins, and limestone sarcophagi that had been devoted to the sacred animals in the galleries.

Keywords: una el-Gebel – Ibis necropolis – Ptolemaic Period – demotic inscriptions – sacred animals – animal sarcophagus – onomastics.

En 1977 et en 1978, 315 figurines en terre crue furent découvertes dans les fouilles de l’Ifao dans la nécropole de Qila‘ al-Dabba à Balat. Ces objets caractéristiques, d’une taille inhabituelle pour cette catégorie de statuettes (entre 20 et 30 cm), sont comparables à une figurine en terre crue similaire récemment découverte par une équipe de l’Ifao dans la nécropole de Qaret el-Toub, à Bahariya. L’étude du contexte d’invention, à Qaret el-Toub, et les apports de récentes publications, à Balat, permettent de préciser la datation de ces artefacts et de proposer des hypothèses pour en expliquer la fonction. Ces statuettes, qui remontent à la fin de la Troisième Période intermédiaire ou au début de la Basse Époque, pourraient appartenir à la catégorie des figurines de fécondité. Elles étaient peut-être utilisées dans un contexte cultuel pour demander aux « ancêtres efficaces » de la nécropole d’intervenir dans le monde d’ici-bas, par exemple pour obtenir une naissance – une pratique attestée au sein de la civilisation égyptienne ancienne à d’autres périodes et sur d’autres sites.

Mots-clés : Nécropole de Qila‘ al-Dabba – Balat (oasis de Dakhla) – Nécropole de Qaret al-Toub – oasis de Bahariya – Troisième Période intermédiaire – Basse Époque – figurines de fécondité – croyances funéraires – culte des ancêtres.

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In 1977 and 1978, 315 mud figurines were found in the Ifao excavation at Balat, in a funerary context (Qila‘ al-Dabba); their size was unusually big for this category of objects (between 20 and 30 cm). In 2005, a similar artifact was found in another oasis of the Western desert, in the necropolis of Qaret el-Toub (Bahariya) excavated by Ifao. The study of the stratigraphic context in Qaret el-Toub and recent publications on the work at Balat enable a more precise dating of these objects as well as suggesting some hypotheses about their function. It is possible that these artifacts, dating to the end of the Third Intermediate Period/beginning of the Late Period, belong to the category of the “fecundity figurines” and were used in a ritual context (votive offerings?) by people asking favours or interventions on the part of powerful ancestors of the necropolis (for example to give birth to children)–a practice known in other regions and other periods of ancient Egyptian civilization.

Keywords: Necropolis of Qila‘ al-Dabba – Balat (Dakhla oases) – necropolis of Qaret al-Toub – Bahriya oases – Third Intermediate Period – Late Period – fecundity figurines – funerary beliefs – ancestor cult.

Dans les Textes des Pyramides (TP), les mots ỉʿ, « monter », « tombe (ascensionnelle) », et sỉʿ « faire monter », sont déterminés par les signes du mastaba « à redans » et du « tronc de pyramide », tandis que les mots dérivés de la racine qrs « enterrer », « sarcophage », ainsi que le mot ḥȝt, « tombe », sont déterminés par un signe « voûté », qui doit être identifié habituellement à un sarcophage, bien qu’il puisse évoquer une tombe. La racine ỉʿ/sỉʿ renvoie à un symbolisme, un rituel et une tombe ascensionnels-solaires ; la racine qrs renvoie à une tradition funéraire chtonienne. À l’époque où les TP furent gravés, l’édifice funéraire royal et ascensionnel était la pyramide. L’article pose la question de savoir si cette réalité textuelle correspond à une réalité historique et architecturale existant avant l’âge des pyramides. L’auteur met en relation les déterminatifs évoqués et les édifices funéraires de la Ire dynastie en Abydos (mastabas d’Umm el-Qaab) et à Saqqâra-Nord (mastabas à redans et « tronc de pyramide » du mastaba 3038).

Mots-clés : Époque thinite – Ancien Empire – Saqqâra-Nord – Abydos – Textes des Pyramides – croyances funéraires – architecture – paléographie – (s)ỉʿ – qrs – « tombe ».

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In the Pyramid Texts (PT), the words ỉʿ, “ascend”, “(ascendant) tomb”, and sỉʿ, “cause to ascend”, are determined by the signs of the “niched” mastaba and the “pyramid trunk”, while the words derived from the root qrs, “bury”, “sarcophagus”, as well as the word ḥȝt, “tomb”, are determined by a “vaulted” sign, which is usually to be identified with a sarcophagus even though it can also evoke a tomb. The root ỉʿ/sỉʿ speaks about an ascendant-solar symbolism, ritual and tomb; the root qrs speaks about a chthonic funerary tradition. When the PT were first carved, the royal and ascendant funerary building was the pyramid. The following paper questions whether this textual reality expresses an historical and architectural reality in existence prior to the pyramid age. The author relates the discussed determinatives to the First Dynasty funerary buildings in Abydos (Umm el Qaab mastabas) and North Saqqara (niched mastabas and the “pyramid trunk” of mastaba 3038).

Keywords: hinite Period – Old Kingdom – Saqqara-North – Abydos – Pyramid Texts – funerary beliefs – architecture – paleography – (s)ỉʿ – qrs – “tomb”.

In the southern part of the Suez isthmus, in an area deserted by archaeological missions that had preferred to focus on the military settlements between Qantara and Gaza, J. Clédat unearthed the remains of a Ramessid temple dedicated, according to him, to Hathor and Horus. Examining the blocks of the monument deposed in the storehouse of the museum of Ismaïlia was the starting point of this study to reexamine the material settled in the vicinity of the road to the Sinaï mines and Punt. The monument reveals a shrine housing the great gods of Egypt with a sustained Heliopolitan slant while granting a minor space to an asiatic entity, Rechpou. Discrepancies between real and virtual orientation, between the origins of the divinities mentioned on the stelae in front of the temple and the cultural reliefs, suggest that the monument was designed as a frontier temple between the Orient and Nile valleys.

It was in 1974 that Serge Sauneron, then working near the Nubian temple of Wady es-Sebua discovered opposite the temple, on the eastern shore of the Nile an unknown settlement easily identified as a C-group village. It was a fortified agglomeration situated on the edge of a cliff that overlooked the river.

Built on a plateau of Nubian sandstone, the village was protected on its north, east and south sides by a semi-circular enclosure wall, originally three metres in height with a number of loopholes pierced through it: on the western side, the cliff was impassable. Three gates gave access to homes. Built on a slight slope, these houses or huts, generally rectangular and from two to five metres wide, were constructed of upright slabs of sandstone set into the floor, to the height of about one metre and bound with earth mortar or small stones. The floor was made of beaten earth. The layout of the settlement consisted of groups of huts served by a network of small streets radiating out from the main gate on the east.

The villagers possessed a small number of cattle, cows or sheep, and lived by fishing and hunting. This population seems to have been semi-nomadic as the site showed no evidence of permanent activity.

This village was engulfed by the waters of Lake Nasser in 1975.

According to an examination of the uses of the term bjn, this verb–indicating quality–as well as its derivatives provide an account of a process of degradation. As a major word in the vocabulary of evil, it is probable that bjn shows an important aspect of this concept in Ancient Egypt.

Pharaonic inscriptions reused as part of the pavement of the Fatimid gate now called Bâb al-Tawfiq in Cairo were discovered in 2004 and 2005 during Ifao excavations. Three of them dating to the reign of Senwosret I are published here. These quartzite blocks were cut up and removed in the Middle Ages from the Heliopolitan temples’ area as we can deduce from the texts and especially from the dedication to the Bau Iunu, lords of the Hut-aat. The first document consists of a large slab on which 23 columns of originally, more developed royal annals are partly preserved. The text deals with the endowments granted yearly by the king to the Bau Iunu: for the four remaining years are listed the offerings made to the Heliopolitan gods (cattle, vases, offering tables, statues, sphinxes and cultic implements) and the buildings erected by the king (columned hall, obelisks). The text contains early mention of the goddesses Mut-who-is-under-her-mast and Hathor-Nebethetepet. The two other documents are a left doorjamb inscribed with the royal titulary and the upper part of a monumental round-topped stela decorated with a winged solar disk above the king’s titulary, combined with the names of the Bau Iunu and Atum.

A fragment of a kneeling statue belonging to Dynasty XXVI (greywacke, height 23 cm) displays a declaration on its back pillar very similar to the one inscribed on the back pillar of another kneeling statue, that of Saft el Henna, dated to Apries (New York, mma 66.99.68 + Cairo cg 895). The name of the owner is not preserved, but it is possible to deduce that the monument was dedicated by a daughter of Psamtek II, Merytnebes, to her tutor, in her later years when she settled at Heracleopolis as priestess of Herishef.

The study of two statues from the Cachette of Karnak, the recently published Caire je 37374 and the unpublished Caire je 37348, permits us to link them with two unpublished groups of coffins and cartonnages from the Louvre. This leads to a reconstruction of the family and the analysis of the career of Iufaa, son of Penmumut, a Deputy of Amun’s treasury, Third Prophet of Amun and Governor of Thebes during the reign of the Theban king Harsiese in the 22 nd Dynasty.