King Hedjkheperre Setepenamun Harsiese or Harsiese A, is viewed by the Egyptologist Kenneth Kitchen

Kenneth Kitchen

Kenneth Anderson Kitchen is Personal and Brunner Professor Emeritus of Egyptology and Honorary Research Fellow at the School of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology, University of Liverpool, England...

 in his Third Intermediate Period in Egypt, to be both a "High Priest of Amun

Amun

Amun, reconstructed Egyptian Yamānu , was a god in Egyptian mythology who in the form of Amun-Ra became the focus of the most complex system of theology in Ancient Egypt...

" and the son of the High Priest of Amun Shoshenq C

Shoshenq C

Shoshenq C was the eldest son of the 22nd Dynasty pharaoh Osorkon I and queen Maatkare, the daughter of Psusennes II, and served as the High Priest of Amun at Thebes during his father's reign. Consequently, he was the most important official in Upper Egypt after the king himself...

. The archaeological evidence does suggest that he was indeed Shoshenq C's son. However, recent published studies by the German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 Egyptologist Karl Jansen-Winkeln in JEA 81(1995) have demonstrated that all the monuments of the first (king) Harsiese show that he was never a High Priest of Amun in his own right. Rather both Harsiese A and his son [...du] —whose existence is known from inscriptions on the latter's funerary objects at Coptos —are only attested as Ordinary Priests of Amun. Instead, while Harsiese A was certainly an independent king at Thebes during the first decade of Osorkon II's kingship, he was a different person from a second person who was also called Harsiese: Harsiese B

Harsiese B

Harsiese B was a High Priest of Amun in 874 BC. Earlier Egyptologists assumed he was both the High Priest of Amun and son of the High Priest Shoshenq C, who may have become a king at Thebes...

. Harsiese B was the genuine High Priest of Amun who is attested in office late in Osorkon II's reign, in the regnal year

Regnal year

A regnal year is a year of the reign of a sovereign, from the Latin regnum meaning kingdom, rule.The oldest dating systems were in regnal years, and considered the date as an ordinal, not a cardinal number. For example, a monarch could have a first year of rule, a second year of rule, a third, and...

 6 of Shoshenq III

Shoshenq III

King Usermaatre Setepenre or Usimare Setepenamun Shoshenq III ruled Egypt's 22nd Dynasty for 39 years according to contemporary historical records. Two Apis Bulls were buried in the fourth and 28th years of his reign and he celebrated his Heb Sed Jubilee in his regnal year 30...

 and in regnal years 18 and 19 of Pedubast I

Pedubast I

Pedubastis I or Pedubast I was an Upper Egyptian Pharaoh of Ancient Egypt during the 9th century BC. Based on lunar dates which are known to belong to the reign of his rival in Upper Egypt Takelot II and the fact that Pedubast I first appeared as a local king at Thebes around Year 11 of Takelot...

, according to Jansen-Winkeln.

While Harsiese A may have become king at Thebes prior to Year 4 of Osorkon II, contra Kitchen, he certainly ruled Thebes during the first decade of Osorkon II's reign as Kitchen notes. Osorkon II's control over this great city is only first documented by 2 separate Year 12 Quay Texts which means that Harsiese had died by this time. If Harsiese was already ruling at Thebes earlier under Takelot I, it might help explain why Takelot I's own Year 5, Year 8, and Year 14 Nile Quay Texts, which mention the serving High Priests Iuwelot and Smendes III—who were all brothers of Takelot I--consistently omit any mention of Takelot's name, as Gerard Broekman aptly notes in a JEA 88(2002) article. Takelot I's name is left deliberately blank here. This might indicate a possible rivalry between Takelot I and Harsiese A at Thebes. The Amun Priests may have chosen not to involve themselves in this dispute by omitting any mention of the reigning king's name.

Burial

According to a 1994 book by the English Egyptologist Aidan Dodson, King Harsiese:

"was buried in a tomb within the temenos

Temenos

Temenos is a piece of land cut off and assigned as an official domain, especially to kings and chiefs, or a piece of land marked off from common uses and dedicated to a god, a sanctuary, holy grove or holy precinct: The Pythian race-course is called a temenos, the sacred valley of the Nile is the ...

 at Medinet Habu

Medinet Habu (location)

Medinet Habu is an archaeological locality situated near the foot of the Theban Hills on the West Bank of the River Nile opposite the modern city of Luxor, Egypt...

, in the trough of a granite coffin (JE 60137) made for Ramesses II

Ramesses II

Ramesses II , referred to as Ramesses the Great, was the third Egyptian pharaoh of the Nineteenth dynasty. He is often regarded as the greatest, most celebrated, and most powerful pharaoh of the Egyptian Empire...

's sister, Henutmire, (and) closed with a hawk-Headed lid. When cleared, four canopic jar

Canopic jar

Canopic jars were used by the Ancient Egyptians during the mummification process to store and preserve the viscera of their owner for the afterlife. They were commonly either carved from limestone or were made of pottery...

s were found....No trace of any lids have survived, suggesting that such items may have been of [perishable] wood,"(p.92).

Dodson notes that Harsiese's coffin is similar in style to the Hawk Headed, silver coffin of Shoshenq II

Shoshenq II

Heqakheperre Shoshenq II was an Egyptian king of the 22nd dynasty of Egypt. He was the only ruler of this Dynasty whose tomb was not plundered by tomb robbers. His final resting place was discovered within Psusennes I's tomb at Tanis by Pierre Montet in 1939. Montet removed the coffin lid of...

, and to the surviving – "traces of the gilded coffin and cartonnage of Osorkon II

Osorkon II

Usermaatre Setepenamun Osorkon II was a pharaoh of the Twenty-second Dynasty of Ancient Egypt and the son of Takelot I and Queen Kapes. He ruled Egypt around 872 BC to 837 BC from Tanis, the capital of this Dynasty. After succeeding his father, he was faced with the competing rule of his cousin,...

," (pp. 88–89).