'Fhere is no certain evidence of the practice of human sacrifice in Egypt from the Old Kingdom (2686-2181 Bt.:) ouAvards, although the practice is knoAvn from kf. r.ma in Nubia at a time roughly contemporary with the Second Intermediate Period (1650-1550 bc).
In the Protodynastic and Early Dynastic period (i'.3200-2686 bc), there may be archaeological indications of the funerary sacrifice of scTA'ants. It has been argued that the apparent shared roof covering many ‘subsidian burials’ surrounding the tombs of certain lst-D asty rulers at Abydos and Saqqara (3100-2890 U(_;) is an indication that large numbers of foA'al retainers were killed simultaneously in order to accompam - the pharaoh into the afterlife. This practice would no doubt later have been superseded b the more widespread use of representations of servants at work (in ihe form of wall decoration and three-dimensional models), anti the CA'cntuai provision of .siiABTJ figures, Avhosc role appears to have been to undertake agricultural vA’ork on behalf of the deceased.
From the late Predynastic period onAvard. s, A'otiyc objects and temple AA’alls A cre frequent-h decorated AA'ith scenes of the king smiting his enemies while gripping them bv their hair, but these acts of ritual execution are usualh depicted in the context of AA’arfare. 'I'he actual sacrifice of prisoners at temples — as opposed to the depiction of foreigners as bound captives - is attested by textual CA'idence from the reign of Amenhotep ti (1427-1400 Bt.). He claims to have executed seven Syrian princes in the temple of Amun at Karnak, displaying the bodies of six of them on its walls, and hanging the body of the scAenlh on the aaaiIIs of NARVIA.
The tale of the 4th-Dynasty ruler Klnifu (2589—2566 bc) and the magician Djcdi, composed in the Middle Kingdom (2055-1650 Bc) and presciwcd on Papyrus Westcar (Berlin), provides a good illustration of the Egyptians' apparent abhorrence of human sacrifice. Khufu is portrayed as a stereotA'pical tyrant AA'ho asks for a prisoner to be decapitated so that DJedi can demonstrate his magical ability to restore seA’cred heads, but, according to the story, the magician insists that the demonstration be made on a goose rather than a human.
It is also VA'orth noting that the iwramii) TEXTS include possible references to cannibalism in the form of the so-called ‘cannibal hymn’ (Utterances 273-4), which describes the king ‘eating the magic’ and ‘swallowing the spirits' of the gods. HoAAXver, it is difficult to knoAv in this instance Avhethcr the concept <*t the king eating the gods was purely metaphorical or based on some early sacrificial act.
M. Lici ITI iia. M, Ancient Egyptian literature i (Berkeley, 1975), 36-8, 217-20. [‘cannibali. sni hymn' and PapA rus Westcarl A. J. Spencer, Early Egypt (London, 1993), 63-97.
World History
