The anthropological summaries prompt us to consider how relations between human and animal were expressed in Egypt 3000-525 BC. The evidence for special treatment of animals alongside humans seems strongest at the outer limits of this time span. For the period leading up to state formation, perhaps 3200 Bc, current excavations at Nekhen have revealed an unparalleled range of animal burials, including the most formidable creatures outside the agricultural and pastoral circle: African wild bull, large feline (leopard?), elephant, and hippopotamus. The significance of the astonishing assemblage remains uncertain. However, as Nekhen is a major center of kingship in the late fourth to third millennia BC, the animal burials might collectively demonstrate the variety of creation under the power of the ruler (Friedman, Van Neer and Linseele, 2011, Figure 2.1).
After 700 BC, so at the other end of the period studied here, certain species of animals and birds begin to be embalmed, wrapped, and deposited in mass burials on a spectacular and unprecedented scale. Although these mummified species are among the most familiar and popular sights in modern museum displays, we know extraordinarily little about the history and social setting of this religious practice. Possibly,
Figure 2.1 The animal burials around Tomb 16, at site H6, Nekhen. Drawing by Wolfram Grajetzki after the preliminary report by Friedman, RF, W. Van Neer, and V. Linseele, 2011. The elite Predynastic cemetery at Hierakonpolis: 2009-2010 update, in Friedman, R. F. & Fiske, P. N. (eds.), Egypt at its Origins 3. Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 205. Peeters, Leuven, 157-191. Drawing © Wolfram Grajetzki.
Species were identified as emblems of the powers in solar creation and renewal, for rituals of the solar New Year which required an immortalized presence, so a mummified (eternally alive) rather than a living (mortal, to die) example. Innumerable votive inscriptions and later manuscript documents attest to the devotion of individuals in dedicating the mummified creature. Yet the construction of catacombs and temples to house them and maintain cult for them seems to be an operation on a grander scale, equal to the building of great temples for deities in the same periods. On this scale, the operative ancient Egyptian institution is kingship; many inscriptions and images indeed attest to the central role of kings in founding and maintaining estates and buildings for cult of divine animals (Kessler 1989). New research is needed into how and why the practice of mummifying such large numbers of animals and birds began and whether it continued uninterrupted over the following eight centuries into the early first millennium AD. Within that time span, at least at some periods, the mass mummification of species involved a cull: X-rays of mummified cats in different collections show that the individuals were mainly very young, most often with neck wrung, and in these instances, the provision of a mummified animal for a ritual or festival was evidently the overriding concern, not any devotion to the individual animal in the manner of a modern, or ancient, pet (Figure 2.2).
Two special cases emphasize the central role of the bull in particular throughout Egyptian history: at lunu/Heliopolis, the creator sun-god Ra could be approached
Figure 2.2 Rock-cut catacombs for burials of mummified animals and birds, northern cemeteries of Mennefer (Saqqara), first millennium BC. Excavation photograph, © Egypt Exploration Society.
Through a bull in the role of herald (the Egyptian word is wehemu), called Menwer (in Greek Mnevis), and similarly at Mennefer/Memphis, the creative force Ptah had a herald bull named Hep (in Greek Apis). These special cults were closely tied to kingship, with a race of the Hep among kingship rituals from the third millennium BC. At least from the time of Amenhotep III (after 1400 Bc), Hep bulls were buried in massive hard-stone sarcophagi, like kings, at first separately, after Ramses II (from 1290 Bc), grouped along great corridors, at Saqqara. The herald bulls may have served as a model for the later practices of mass animal and bird mummification. However, unlike those, the Hep and Menwer remained individual animals, rather than special treatment of large numbers of a species, and with a more specific link to the creator-gods they served as heralds, Ptah and Ra.
World History
