Abusir Papyri
Encyclopedia
Papyrus
Papyrus is a thick paper-like material produced from the pith of the papyrus plant, Cyperus papyrus, a wetland sedge that was once abundant in the Nile Delta of Egypt....
findings to date from the Old Kingdom
Old Kingdom
Old Kingdom is the name given to the period in the 3rd millennium BC when Egypt attained its first continuous peak of civilization in complexity and achievement – the first of three so-called "Kingdom" periods, which mark the high points of civilization in the lower Nile Valley .The term itself was...
in Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt was an ancient civilization of Northeastern Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in what is now the modern country of Egypt. Egyptian civilization coalesced around 3150 BC with the political unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh...
. The first papyri were discovered in 1893 at Abu Gorab
Abu Gorab
Abu Gurab is a sun temple built by the people of ancient Egypt. It was excavated by Egyptologists between 1898 and 1901 by Ludwig Borchardt on behalf of the Berlin Museum and is located near the city of Memphis...
near Abusir
Abusir
Abusir is the name given to an Egyptian archaeological locality – specifically, an extensive necropolis of the Old Kingdom period, together with later additions – in the vicinity of the modern capital Cairo...
in northern Egypt. Their origins are dated to around the 24th century BC
24th century BC
The 24th century BC is a century which lasted from the year 2400 BC to 2301 BC.-Events:*c. 2900 BC – 2334 BC: Mesopotamian wars of the Early Dynastic period continue.*c. 2360 BC: Hekla-4 eruption....
during the Fifth dynasty of Egypt
Fifth dynasty of Egypt
The fifth dynasty of ancient Egypt is often combined with Dynasties III, IV and VI under the group title the Old Kingdom. Dynasty V dates approximately from 2494 to 2345 BC.-Rulers:...
, making them, even though often badly fragmented, also some of the oldest surviving papyri to date. Later on a large number of additional manuscript fragments were discovered in the area.
Contents
The Abusir papyri are considered the most important finds of administrative documents from the Old Kingdom. They give detailed information about the running of a royal mortuary temple and include duty rosters for priests, inventories of temple equipment, and lists of daily offerings to the two solar temples at Abu Gorab, north of Abusir, as well as letters and permits. The fragments bear the remains of two different writings.The introduction is written in hieroglyphs
Egyptian hieroglyphs
Egyptian hieroglyphs were a formal writing system used by the ancient Egyptians that combined logographic and alphabetic elements. Egyptians used cursive hieroglyphs for religious literature on papyrus and wood...
and begins with a date (dates at that time were expressed in the number of national cattle-counts) referring to the reign of Djedkare Isesi
Djedkare Isesi
Djedkare Isesi in Greek known as Tancheres from Manetho's Aegyptiaca, was a Pharaoh of Egypt during the Fifth dynasty. He is assigned a reign of twenty-eight years by the Turin Canon although some Egyptologists believe this is an error and should rather be thirty-eight years...
, thus dating the manuscripts near the end of the Fifth Dynasty.
The fragmented papyri are written in columns divided into three horizontal registers.
- the first register lists dates and names of officials
- the second register lists names of recipients
- the third register lists the kind of meat cuts supplied; this section is largely destroyed
The hieratic
Hieratic
Hieratic refers to a cursive writing system that was used in the provenance of the pharaohs in Egypt and Nubia that developed alongside the hieroglyphic system, to which it is intimately related...
text on the right summarizes allocations of grain.
History
The Abusir Papyri are a collection of administrative papyri dating to the 5th dynasty. The papyri were found in the temple complexes of Neferirkare KakaiNeferirkare Kakai
Neferirkare Kakai was the third Pharaoh of Egypt during the Fifth dynasty. His praenomen, Neferirkare, means "Beautiful is the Soul of Ra". His Horus name was Userkhau, his Golden Horus name Sekhemunebu and his Nebti name Khaiemnebty.- Family :...
, Neferefre
Neferefre
Neferefre was a Pharaoh of Egypt during the Fifth dynasty. His name means "Beautiful is Re" in Egyptian.-Family:Neferefre was the son of king Neferirkare Kakai by queen Khentkaus II, and the elder brother of pharaoh Nyuserre Ini....
and queen Khentkaus II
Khentkaus II
Khentkaus II was a Queen of Egypt. She was a wife of Egyptian Pharaoh Neferirkare Kakai of the Fifth Dynasty. She was the mother of Pharaohs Neferefre and Nyuserre Ini.-Biography:...
.
The first fragments of the Abusir papyri were discovered in 1893 during illegal excavations at Abusir. They contained manuscripts with regards to Neferirkare Kakai
Neferirkare Kakai
Neferirkare Kakai was the third Pharaoh of Egypt during the Fifth dynasty. His praenomen, Neferirkare, means "Beautiful is the Soul of Ra". His Horus name was Userkhau, his Golden Horus name Sekhemunebu and his Nebti name Khaiemnebty.- Family :...
and were subsequently sold to various Egyptologists
Egyptology
Egyptology is the study of ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end of its native religious practices in the AD 4th century. A practitioner of the discipline is an “Egyptologist”...
. and museums German Egyptologist Ludwig Borchardt
Ludwig Borchardt
Ludwig Borchardt was a German Egyptologist who was born in Berlin.-Life:Borchardt initially studied Architecture and later Egyptology under Adolf Erman. In 1895 he journeyed to Cairo and produced, with Gaston Maspero, the Catalogue of the Egyptian Museum...
later identified the find location to near the pyramid temple of the Fifth Dynasty king Neferirkare
Neferirkare
*For the better known Fifth dynasty pharaoh by this name, see Neferirkare KakaiNeferirkare was an Eighth dynasty king of Ancient Egypt during the First Intermediate Period. His name is only clearly attested in the Abydos King List but it is assumed that the reign length figure for the last 8th...
. This theory was confirmed by Borchardt's discovery of more fragments during excavations at the temple. The papyri from Neferirkare Kakai's complex were found in storerooms located in the southwestern part of the complex.
Based on information in the first Abusir Papyri, in the mid-1970s Czech archeologists under the leadership of Miroslav Verner
Miroslav Verner
Prof. Dr. Miroslav Verner, DrSc. is a Czech Egyptologist, who specializes in the history and archaeology of Ancient Egypt of the Old Kingdom....
were able to find the funerary monument of Neferefre
Neferefre
Neferefre was a Pharaoh of Egypt during the Fifth dynasty. His name means "Beautiful is Re" in Egyptian.-Family:Neferefre was the son of king Neferirkare Kakai by queen Khentkaus II, and the elder brother of pharaoh Nyuserre Ini....
with an additional 2,000 separate pieces of papyri. They were mainly located in the storage rooms in the northwest section of the structure. There is evidence that the papyri originally were fastened with leather straps and stored in wooden boxes.
Further excavations by the Czech expedition on the site also discovered papyri at the funerary monument of Khentkaus (the mother of Khentkaus II
Khentkaus II
Khentkaus II was a Queen of Egypt. She was a wife of Egyptian Pharaoh Neferirkare Kakai of the Fifth Dynasty. She was the mother of Pharaohs Neferefre and Nyuserre Ini.-Biography:...
).
Apart from the extensive excavations in the Abusir pyramid field conducted by the Czech Institute of Egyptology of the Charles University
Charles University in Prague
Charles University in Prague is the oldest and largest university in the Czech Republic. Founded in 1348, it was the first university in Central Europe and is also considered the earliest German university...
since the 1970s, the Institute of Egyptology of Waseda University
Waseda University
, abbreviated as , is one of the most prestigious private universities in Japan and Asia. Its main campuses are located in the northern part of Shinjuku, Tokyo. Founded in 1882 as Tokyo Senmon Gakko, the institution was renamed "Waseda University" in 1902. It is known for its liberal climate...
started excavations at the site in September 1990.
