This is a fabulous pendant in the figure of Nekhbet, an early predynastic goddess depicted as a griffon vulture, who was the patron deity of the city of Nekheb (El Kab) before she eventually rose as the guardian of the entire Upper Egypt.
Just like Horus, she grasped the Shen Rings (or rather the Shen Orbs), standing for eternal protection, while she would often appear together with her counterpart Wadjet of Lower Egypt as the Two Ladies, the two guardians of Egypt when unified.
The displayed jewel was found in the tomb of the famous Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun (ruled between around 1332 and 1323 BC), suspended from his very neck, discovered in the Valley of the Kings by Howard Carter in 1922.
Made of solid gold, it is encrusted on the obverse with blue glass where the coverts of the wings and the tips of the tail feathers, which are furnished with red glass.
Here is a look at the layout of the complex of the Luxor Temple, or Ipet Resyt as it was in ancient Egyptian, on the east bank of the Nile in Upper Egypt.
Albeit Ipet Resyt is generally given as spelling ‘southern sanctuary,’ I feel that the proper interpretation of the name would actually be ‘Sanctuary of Ipet.’
Ipet, or Opet or Ipy, was an Egyptian goddess that was considered a protector of the Pharaoh himself as well as mother of Osiris in the local (Theban) theology.
This is a reconstruction of ancient Thebes as it would likely look during the reign of Ramesses II (or the Great) between 1279 and 1213 BC, Nineteenth Dynasty in the New Kingdom.
Since about 1500 BC, the city was likely the largest in the (at least known) world boasting a population or around 75000 people and remained so until the late 10th century BC.
Tutankhamun (c. 1341 – 1323 BC), or alternatively Tutankhamen, was the antepenultimate Pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty (Dynasty XVIII), or first Dynasty of the New Kingdom, that ascended the throne at a mere nine years old to reign until his very death at the young age of eighteen in ancient Egypt.
Lineage
He was most likely son of his predecessor Pharaoh Akhenaten (reigning c. 1353 – 1336 or c. 1351 – 1334 BC) and grandson of Pharaoh Amenhotep III (or the Magnificent, ruling between 1386 and 1349 or 1388 and late 1351/early 1350 BC) whilst his Great Royal Wife was his half sister Ankhesenamun, who was apparently (maybe even as many as seven years) older than him.
That said, his likely eldest brother Smenkhkare squeezed in a relatively short stint (1335 – 1334 BC) and female co-regent Neferneferuaten a further two years (1334 -1332 BC) at the helm in between Akhenaten and Tutankhamun himself shaping a second and third Pharaoh respectively at the end of the apostate so-called Amarna Period.
All the same, Tutankhamun’s mother wasn’t his apparent father’s Great Royal Wife famed Nefertiti but rather a female of unknown identity dubbed as ‘the Younger Lady,’ quite likely a daughter of Amenhotep III and his own first lady Tiye.
Tutankhamun’s name etymology
Tutankhamun’s name breaks down as Tut-ankh-Amun which very likely means ‘Tut is the breath of life/life/soul of Amun’ apparently on account of his actions and steps to restore Amun and the other traditional deities/cults in force during his reign following the radical reforms of his predecessor and apparent father Akhenaten, who suppressed them to establish a sole god in Aten (hence the second component of his name), in ancient Egypt.
The alternative form Tutankhamen, where Amen is a variation of Amun, also breaks down and spells likewise. For that matter, his original name was Tutankhaten, related to Aten, but after he assumed kingship at a young age he switched it to Tutankhamun (probably in the third year of his reign) so as to distance himself from Akhenaten’s ways as well as further endorsing his own religious policies.
Likewise, his half sister and royal wife Ankhesenpaaten, a daughter of Akhenaten with Nefertiti, changed her name to Ankhesenamun towards the same purposes along the way of their marriage. Actually, Tutankhamun was among few Pharaohs that were venerated as deities during their lifetime, with temples of his cult built as far as Kawa and Faras down in Nubia, as most would enjoy this privilege posthumously.
Policies, reforms and foreign affairs
Amongst his policies and reforms, the royal court moved away from Amarna, a new city built by predecessor Akhenaten as his capital, to settle back in Memphis around the fourth year of Tutankhamun’s reign while Thebes soon recaptured the prestige of principal religious hub now that Amun was reinstated as supreme god of Egypt.
Tutankhamun further saw a restoration process underway over monuments damaged during the Amarna Period and braced up the orders of priests of the major cults of Amun and Ptah as well as inaugurating building projects that involved laying out of the sphinx avenue leading to the temple of Mut at Karnak and applying the finishing touches to the decorations on the entrance colonnade of Amenhotep III at the Luxor Temple.
On top of the above, he also successfully sought to restore diplomatic relations with foreign kingdoms, neglected by Amarna, and in particular the Hurrian-speaking Mitanni in the Levant although he didn’t quite succeed to evade warfare against the likes of the Nubians and Asiatics in the end despite his pains.
Due to the young of his age, Tutankhamun most likely ruled assisted by a retinue of advisers that featured Ay and General Horemheb, who eventually succeeded him in that order as the last two pharaohs of the Eighteenth Dynasty but also usurped many of his projects, especially the latter.
Tutankhamun’s death
The young pharaoh probably died through a combination of health issues and a broken leg compounded by malaria, though there has been much debate over that, and was buried in an unusually small burial place for his stature – maybe down to his premature death.
Tutankhamun’s tomb, burial treasures and discovery
However, combined with the fact that it came covered in debris during the construction of the nearby tombs of Ramesses V amd Ramesses VI later, that turned fortunate for Tutankhamun’s burial as it lay low and screened from the eyes of potential robbers and plunderers for thousands of years to retain its treasures, comprising over 5000 artefacts, almost intact until discovered by British Egyptologist Howard Carter in early November 1922.
Which, in turn, came to render Tutankhamun from a largely overlooked ruler in ancient times into probably the most famous pharaoh of them all in the modern world as fate would have it.
This is the magnificent golden throne of Pharaoh Tutankhamun (c.1341 – c.1323 BC), or King Tut otherwise, who was the last of his royal family to rule over ancient Egypt towards the end of the 18th Dynasty in the New Kingdom.
The throne is made of wood covered with gold and silver, studded with semi-precious stones and coloured glass, while it features two lion heads either side that protect the seat and arms in the shape of winged uraei or rearing cobras wearing the double crown of Egypt, guarding the cartouche of the Pharaoh.
The masterpiece was fashioned around 1325 BC and remarkably retains its colours as robust well over 3000 years on, which attests to the exquisite skill and craftmanship of the Egyptian craftsmen of the time.
For that matter, the throne appears to be called ‘Ist’ in Egyptian hieroglyphs after goddess Isis, often depicted wearing a throne on her head as her trademark.
It was unearthed along with the rest of Tutankhamun’s burial by Howard Carter and his team in 1922, found beneath a hippopotamus funerary bed in the antechamber, and is housed in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo nowadays.
When you think of Egypt, what is the first thing that comes to your mind? I gather, for the vast majority, that would be the Giza Pyramid Complex, or the Giza Necropolis, and that enigmatic monolithic statue of the Great Sphinx that lies before them on the Giza Plateau on the west bank of the Nile, facing east.
But what was the Sphinx in the first place and what purpose(s) did it serve? To begin with, given that mainstream Egyptology has it as built in the time of Pharaoh Khafre (c.2603-2578 BC or c.2558 – 2532 BC), the name itself and the Sphinx Temple held during the Old Kingdom is unknown.
Moving on, it appears as Hor-em-Akhet (Horus-of-the-Horizon or Harmachis in Koini (Common), an aspect of god Horus) through the New Kingdom, attested as such in the Dream Stele that was erected between the front paws of the Great Sphinx by Pharaoh Thutmose IV in the first year of his reign (early 14th century BC).
The name Sphinx emerged in the Classical Era and was Hellenic in origin interpreted by many as ‘squeezing’ out of the verb ‘σφίγγω’ (sphingo, squeeze, clench). Nevertheless, it may instead be likelier a Hellenic/Koini corrupted form of the Egyptian ‘Shezep Ankh’ that means ‘living image,’ with Ankh also a hieroglyphic symbol that means ‘life.’
The latter makes far more sense since sphinxes were regarded as spiritual guardians of ferocious strength to temples and sacred places, passageways or even burial places in ancient Egypt so many Pharaohs had their heads carved on top of guardian statues, bearing a headdress as well, to demonstrate a close relationship to powerful solar deity Sekhmet, who had the body of a lioness.
Sphinxes were mythical creatures that had the body of a lion and the head of a human, usually male but could also be female as evidenced by the Sphinx of Hatshepsut (housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), that also acquired the wings of a falcon as their culture spread east into nearby Phoenicia and Asia.
The Dream Stele erected between the front paws of the Great Sphinx by Pharah Thutmose IV in the first year of his reign.
The general consensus among Egyptologists is that the Great Sphinx of Giza bears semblance to Pharaoh Khafre and reckon that it was constructed during his reign of about 26 years (c.2603 – 2578 BC or c.2558 – 2532 BC), although Manetho talks of a far longer 66 years with both Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus settling on a little shorter 56 years.
Yet, as Selim Hassan (Professor of Egyptology, University of Cairo) pointed out, “Taking all things into consideration, it seems that we must give the credit of erecting this, the world’s most wonderful statue, to Khafre, but always with this reservation: that there is not one single contemporary inscription which connects the Sphinx with Khafre.”
Nevertheless, the Inventory Stela (estimated to have been fashioned in the 26th dynasty), unearthed by Auguste Mariette in around 1857, relates that Khafre’s father Pharaoh Khufu (or Cheops) came upon the Great Sphinx that was buried in the sand, suggesting that it was constructed in a considerably earlier time instead.
Although the majority of Egyptologists dispute its validity as fake, certain facts mentioned thereon it seem to be accurate instead as if to dispute them the other way round. Moreover, Gaston Maspero (19th century) concluded that the presence of the cartouche of Khafre indicated that he was responsible for the excavation of the Sphinx, which therefore predated him and possibly his whole line (dynasty).
Let there be noted that both the Inventory and the Dream Stela (c.1401 BC) indicate two sphinxes rather than one standing on the Giza Plateau for that matter.
A further mystery in the whole case is that there is no record over the construction of the Great Sphinx whatsoever, even though there are inscriptions over the construction of the whole pyramid complex, where ancient Egyptians are renowned over the meticulous way they recorded building projects.
Some ‘fringe’ Egyptologists retain that the face on the Great Sphinx isn’t actually Khafre’s and forensic officer Det. Frank Domingo, hired by Dr. Robert M. Schoch and Egyptologist John Anthony West, concluded that generated profiles of the face on the Great Sphinx and a statue of Khafre don’t match come to that.
The Sphinx, unfortunately, misses its nose which is attributed by some to cannonballs fired by troops of Napoleon using it for target practice, though drawings by Frederic Louis Norden decades earlier show it already missing, and by others to the Mamluks, a Muslim medieval caliphate and later Sultanate that spanned between around 1250 and 1517 AD, as a result of iconoclastic attacks to monuments.
It also apparently bore a ceremonial pharaonic beard that was possibly a later addition that now is lost as well.
There is a single (female) sphinx mentioned in the so-called Greek mythology, called ‘Phix’ by Hesiod, that was guarding the entrance to the ancient Thebes in Boeotia, founded by Phoenician Cadmus and named after its Egyptian counterpart in honour of his father Agenor, asking passers-by a riddle that they had to answer otherwise the forfeit would be their very life.
The Phix was actually summoned more likely by Hera from her distant homeland in Aethiopia (I think Herodotus mentions Egypt for that matter), according to the legend, by means of punishment on Thebes until she was eventually bested by Oedipus, who answered the riddle, to her own death.
Roman Pliny the Elder (23 or 24 to 79 AD) says that Aethiopia produced plenty of sphinxes with brown hair and breasts which is supported by archaeological findings.
This is the magnificent Lotus Chalice or Alabaster Chalice, carved out of a single piece of alabaster in the shape of white lotus in full bloom, that was found in the tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamun (14th century BC) in the Valley of the Kings in November 1922.
The lotus was of special significance in Egyptian mythology and religion as it was the very first thing that arose shining out of the primeval waters of Nu, the deity that personified the primordial watery abyss of the Ogdoad cosmogony.
The flower came to symbolize the sun, since the sun god Nefertum (perfect Atum) himself rose out of it, as well as creation and rebirth as it retracts into the water at night and re-emerges fresh in the morning just like the sun disappears in the night only to return in the sky the next day.
Breaking through History 