Andréas Stauder

Linguistic Dating
of Middle Egyptian Literary Texts

© Andréas Stauder, 2013 | doi.org/10.37011/studmon.12

This book is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
 Lingua Aegyptia
Studia Monographica

Herausgegeben von
Frank Kammerzell, Gerald Moers und Kai Widmaier

Band 12

“Dating Egyptian Literary Texts”

Göttingen, 9–12 June 2010

edited by
Gerald Moers, Kai Widmaier,
Antonia Giewekemeyer,
Arndt Lümers & Ralf Ernst

Volume 2

Institut für Archäologie Institut für Ägyptologie

Widmaier Verlag
Humboldt Universität Universität Wien
Hamburg
Berlin Wien

© Andréas Stauder, 2013 | doi.org/10.37011/studmon.12

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 Linguistic Dating
of Middle Egyptian Literary Texts

Andréas Stauder

Widmaier Verlag ∙ Hamburg

2013

© Andréas Stauder, 2013 | doi.org/10.37011/studmon.12

This book is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
 Titelaufnahme:
Andréas Stauder
Linguistic Dating of Middle Egyptian Literary Texts
Hamburg: Widmaier Verlag, 2013
(“Dating Egyptian Literary Texts” Göttingen, 9–12 June 2010; Vol. 2)
(Lingua Aegyptia – Studia Monographica; Bd. 12)
ISSN 0946-8641
ISBN (print) 978-3-943955-12-5
ISBN (pdf ) 978-3-943955-82-8
DOI: https://doi.org/10.37011/studmon.12

© Andréas Stauder 2013

This book is published by Widmaier Verlag, Hamburg,
with open access at www.widmaier-verlag.de

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Druck und Verarbeitung: Hubert & Co., Göttingen

Printed in Germany

www.widmaier-verlag.de

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 À Julie, Albane et Isaure

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© Andréas Stauder, 2013 | doi.org/10.37011/studmon.12
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 Acknowledgments

The present study represents a revised version of an habilitation thesis submitted at the
École Pratique des Hautes Études, Paris, in 2013. This was directed by Pascal Vernus; the
jury included James Allen, Alain Lemaréchal, Antonio Loprieno, Georges-Jean Pinault,
Jean Winand, and Christopher Woods. The research was conducted at the Oriental
Institute of the University of Chicago and the Departement Altertumswissenschaften of
the Universität Basel. It was made possible by the financial support of the Swiss National
Science Foundation (2008-2013).

I am particularly grateful to Antonio Loprieno and Susanne Bickel for their unswerving
support over the years.

I would like to thank Gerald Moers, Kai Widmaier, and Antonia Giewekemeyer for
inviting me to the stimulating conference ‘Dating Egyptian Literary Texts’ held in
Göttingen in June 2010. In writing this study I have benefited greatly from discussions
with many colleagues and friends whom it is a pleasure to mention here, particularly
James Allen, Antonia Giewekemeyer, Andrea Gnirs, Dimitri Laboury, Gerald Moers,
Ludwig Morenz, Richard Parkinson, Anthony Spalinger, Julie Stauder-Porchet, Pascal
Vernus, Kai Widmaier, and Jean Winand.

I thank the editors for accepting the present study in their series, and particularly Kai
Widmaier for his enduring patience. I remain indebted to Gerald Moers and Kai Widmaier
for reading and commenting on a previous draft. Julianna Paksi and Katharina Vogt read
through the manuscript and checked references.

This study would not exist if not for the loving presence of Julie during these years and
always. Thank you for all.

Basel, 26.10.2013

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© Andréas Stauder, 2013 | doi.org/10.37011/studmon.12
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 Content overview

INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................... 1

1 ASPECTS OF THE LINGUISTIC SITUATION IN THE EARLY/MID-SECOND

MILLENNIUM BCE .................................................................................................. 3
1.1 Ongoing linguistic change documented in lower written registers ............... 5
1.2 Higher written registers in the early Eighteenth Dynasty ............................. 17
1.3 Configurations of written language in the Second Intermediate Period
and early New Kingdom ............................................................................... 27
1.4 Possible linguistic registers of literature in the early Eighteenth Dynasty.... 53

2 CONDITIONS AND STRATEGIES FOR LINGUISTIC DATING ........................................ 57

2.1 Describing linguistic change in a low-density and highly formal record ..... 57
2.2 Expressions that can provide dating criteria ................................................. 63
2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture ................................................... 69
2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature ....................................................... 96
2.5 Interim summary: Horizons of expectation................................................... 134
2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria..... 136
2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb ............................ 156
2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare .............. 175

3 NARROW DATING ‘BY SQUEEZING’ ........................................................................ 201

3.1 Introduction ................................................................................................... 201
3.2 Fishing and Fowling ..................................................................................... 207
3.3 P. BM EA 10475 ro and vso ......................................................................... 211
3.4 Hymn to Hapi ................................................................................................ 215

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 x Content overview

4 DIRECT DATING: TARGETING SPECIFIC CONFIGURATIONS IN WRITTEN

LANGUAGE ............................................................................................................ 237

4.1 Introduction ................................................................................................... 237

4.2 Berlin Leather Roll........................................................................................ 249
4.3 Sporting King ................................................................................................ 257
4.4 Neferkare and Sisene..................................................................................... 271
4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste................................................................................. 283
4.6 Heavenly Cow ............................................................................................... 301
4.7 The Royal Cycle ............................................................................................ 322

5 NEFERTI................................................................................................................. 337
5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? .................................................... 337
5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm.............................................................................. 358
5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm .............................................................................. 376
5.4 Neferti 7f, 9c: &w with non-dynamic events ................................................. 398
5.5 Lexical indications for dating........................................................................ 399
5.6 Further indications: The prologue ................................................................. 406
5.7 Dating Neferti ................................................................................................ 412
5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon ................................................ 418

6 THE TEACHING OF AMENEMHAT ............................................................................. 435

6.1 Evidence for an early dating? ........................................................................ 435
6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events ......................................... 448
6.3 Possible indications ....................................................................................... 484
6.4 Dating Amenemhat ........................................................................................ 493

7 CONCLUSION ......................................................................................................... 499

7.1 Methods and strategies .................................................................................. 499
7.2 Proposed datings and ranges for dating ........................................................ 508
7.3 Some implications ......................................................................................... 513
7.4 Prospects ....................................................................................................... 520

APPENDIX .................................................................................................................. 523

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 Contents

INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................... 1

1 ASPECTS OF THE LINGUISTIC SITUATION IN THE EARLY/MID-SECOND

MILLENNIUM BCE .................................................................................................. 3
1.1 Ongoing linguistic change documented in lower written registers.................... 5
1.1.1 The ‘underlying language’ hypothesis ..................................................... 5
1.1.2 Innovative expressions in pre-Amarna times ........................................... 9
1.2 Higher written registers in the early Eighteenth Dynasty .................................. 17
1.3 Configurations of written language in the Second Intermediate Period
and early New Kingdom .................................................................................... 27
1.3.1 ‘Spheres of written performance’ ............................................................. 28
1.3.2 Direct evidence for linguistic registers of literature in the early
New Kingdom .......................................................................................... 31
1.3.2.1 O. Nakhtmin 87/173 .................................................................... 31
1.3.2.2 Astarte ......................................................................................... 33
1.3.2.3 Teaching of Aametju ................................................................... 35
1.3.3 The textual loci of innovative expressions ............................................... 38
1.3.3.1 The Second Intermediate Period ................................................. 38
1.3.3.2 Kamose Inscriptions, Emhab, Antefnakht .................................. 43
1.3.3.3 The early Eighteenth Dynasty ..................................................... 50
1.4 Possible linguistic registers of literature in the early Eighteenth Dynasty ........ 53

2 CONDITIONS AND STRATEGIES FOR LINGUISTIC DATING ........................................ 57

2.1 Describing linguistic change in a low-density and highly formal record .......... 57
2.1.1 General models of change: The thickness of language in use .................. 57
2.1.2 Studying linguistic change in the early/mid-second millennium
record ........................................................................................................ 59
2.1.3 Demonstrating innovation and obsolescence in the record ...................... 60
2.2 Expressions that can provide dating criteria ...................................................... 63
2.2.1 Morphology .............................................................................................. 63
2.2.2 Lexicon ..................................................................................................... 64
2.2.3 Grammar ................................................................................................... 68

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 xii Contents

2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture ........................................................ 69

2.3.1 Aspects of orthography in Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts ................... 70
2.3.1.1 Written grammatical morphology ............................................... 70
2.3.1.2 Written lexical morphology: A case study in Neferti.................. 72
2.3.2 The linguistic phenomenology of Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts ........ 74
2.3.2.1 Different textual histories ............................................................ 74
2.3.2.2 Possible alterations of lexical expressions .................................. 76
2.3.2.3 Possible alterations of grammatical expressions ......................... 76
2.3.3 Assessing the textual status of grammatical expressions:
NP Hr sDm and N(P) sDm=f in Kheti ........................................................ 79
2.3.4 Identifying the original reading based on New Kingdom
manuscripts: A Man to his Son 3.1 ........................................................... 83
2.3.4.1 The competing readings ............................................................. 83
2.3.4.2 Issues of grammar ....................................................................... 86
2.3.4.2.1 N sDm.tw in Ipuwer ...................................................... 87
2.3.4.2.2 The passive counterpart of N(P) sDm=f in Middle
Egyptian ....................................................................... 90
2.3.5 Dating Ptahhotep 60-83 based on a late Eighteenth Dynasty
manuscript................................................................................................. 92
2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature ............................................................ 96
2.4.1 Different configurations of written language ........................................... 97
2.4.2 Middle Egyptian literature........................................................................ 99
2.4.3 The thickness of language in literature..................................................... 101
2.4.3.1 Contrasting registers within a composition ................................. 102
2.4.3.2 The diachronic breadth of Middle Egyptian in individual
compositions ............................................................................... 103
2.4.3.3 Digression: A very brief note on dating Ptahhotep .................... 108
2.4.4 Register in Cheops’ Court ........................................................................ 110
2.4.4.1 Preliminary: A very brief note on dating Cheops’ Court ............ 110
2.4.4.2 PA ................................................................................................. 113
2.4.4.2.1 A linguistic index......................................................... 113
2.4.4.2.2 In Middle Egyptian literature ...................................... 114
2.4.4.3 Cheops’ Court – Kagemni, Eloquent Peasant ............................ 117
2.4.4.4 Cheops’ Court – Tale of P. Lythgoe, Sasobek, Tale of Hay........ 120
2.4.4.5 Cheops’ Court – Sinuhe, etc........................................................ 122
2.4.4.6 Further elements of linguistic inclusiveness ............................... 125
2.4.4.7 Dialogues, characterization, humor............................................. 128
2.4.4.8 Summary ..................................................................................... 131
2.4.5 Play with language ................................................................................... 132
2.5 Interim summary: Horizons of expectation ....................................................... 134

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 Contents xiii

2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria ......... 136
2.6.1 Introduction .............................................................................................. 136
2.6.1.1 Background: A change in the expression of aspect .................... 136
2.6.1.2 The double criterion as originally formulated ............................. 137
2.6.2 The ante quem non criterion ..................................................................... 139
2.6.2.1 Issues of transitivity?................................................................... 139
2.6.2.2 Eloquent Peasant B1 128-134 and B1 135-138 .......................... 141
2.6.2.3 Eloquent Peasant B1 257-262 and B1 179-181 .......................... 143
2.6.2.4 Ipuwer ......................................................................................... 145
2.6.2.5 Khakheperreseneb ....................................................................... 148
2.6.2.6 Fishing and Fowling, A Man to his Son,
and Neferkare and Sisene ............................................................ 149
2.6.2.7 Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non criterion recast....................... 150
2.6.3 The post quem non criterion ..................................................................... 152
2.6.3.1 N(P) sDm=f as a ‘non-extensive’ in post-Middle Kingdom
times ............................................................................................ 152
2.6.3.2 Dissociating the ante quem non and post quem non criteria ....... 155
2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb ................................. 156
2.7.1 Introduction .............................................................................................. 157
2.7.2 A terminus post quem non earlier than the Eighteenth Dynasty? ............ 158
2.7.2.1 Middle Egyptian language .......................................................... 158
2.7.2.2 Rare literary expressions, unparalleled after the Twelfth
Dynasty ....................................................................................... 160
2.7.2.3 Khakheperreseneb and Eloquent Peasant: A common
literary tradition ........................................................................... 162
2.7.3 A terminus ante quem non lower than by Vernus’ criterion? .................. 163
2.7.3.1 Two fallacious ‘arguments’......................................................... 163
2.7.3.2 Problematic, uncertain, or insufficiently consolidated
indications ................................................................................... 166
2.7.3.3 The lexicon .................................................................................. 172
2.7.3.4 Expressions recurring combined ................................................. 173
2.7.4 Dating Khakheperreseneb ........................................................................ 174
2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare ................... 175
2.8.1 Introduction .............................................................................................. 175
2.8.2 A terminus post quem non earlier than the early Eighteenth Dynasty? ... 176
2.8.2.1 Middle Egyptian language .......................................................... 177
2.8.2.2 Rare expressions.......................................................................... 178
2.8.2.3 Subtle contrasts in meaning: N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr sDm .......... 180

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 xiv Contents

2.8.3 A terminus ante quem non? ...................................................................... 182

2.8.3.1 Merikare E 67-68 ........................................................................ 182
2.8.3.2 Merikare E 14 ............................................................................. 184
2.8.3.3 Merikare E 30-31 ........................................................................ 188
2.8.3.4 The lexicon .................................................................................. 189
2.8.3.5 Digression: A very brief note on dating Duties of the Vizier ...... 191
2.8.3.6 Other elements of language ......................................................... 194
2.8.3.7 Groups of expressions ................................................................. 195
2.8.4 Dating Merikare ....................................................................................... 198

3 NARROW DATING ‘BY SQUEEZING’ ........................................................................ 201

3.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................ 201
3.1.1 Conditions to be met................................................................................. 201
3.1.2 An illustration: Dating Eloquent Peasant ................................................ 203
3.2 Fishing and Fowling .......................................................................................... 207
3.2.1 Grammar: Broad dating ............................................................................ 207
3.2.2 Lexicon: Evidence for a narrow dating .................................................... 208
3.2.3 Dating Fishing and Fowling..................................................................... 211
3.3 P. BM EA 10475 ro and vso .............................................................................. 211
3.3.1 Tale Involving the House of Life (P. BM EA 10475 vso) ........................ 212
3.3.2 Eulogistic Account of a King (P. BM EA 10475 ro) ................................ 214
3.4 Hymn to Hapi ..................................................................................................... 215
3.4.1 Hymn 4.7: New subject pronoun .............................................................. 215
3.4.1.1 The original reading? .................................................................. 216
3.4.1.2 Marginal instances of sw-headed clauses in Middle Egyptian.... 218
3.4.1.3 Early attestations of the new subject pronoun............................. 221
3.4.1.4 The broader construction............................................................. 223
3.4.2 Hymn 2.5, 12.1-2: #r-sDm=f in the second part of a correlative
system ....................................................................................................... 224
3.4.2.1 #r-sDm=f or xr nfr sw? ............................................................... 224
3.4.2.2 The rise of xr-sDm=f ................................................................... 226
3.4.2.3 Setting sDm=f – xr-headed construction ..................................... 231
3.4.3 Hymn 6.4: &w sDm .................................................................................... 232
3.4.4 Hymn 3.7: Inchoative Ssp ......................................................................... 232
3.4.5 Dating Hymn to Hapi ............................................................................... 233
3.4.6 Appendix: Lexical notes ........................................................................... 235

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 Contents xv

4 DIRECT DATING: TARGETING SPECIFIC CONFIGURATIONS IN WRITTEN

LANGUAGE ............................................................................................................ 237

4.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................ 237

4.1.1 General conditions for a direct dating ...................................................... 237
4.1.2 A Gedankenexperiment: Dating Chapelle Rouge linguistically .............. 238
4.1.3 Another Gedankenexperiment: Dating Sinuhe (B) linguistically............. 242
4.2 Berlin Leather Roll ............................................................................................ 249
4.2.1 Berlin Leather Roll 2.4: The syntax of is ................................................. 250
4.2.2 Berlin Leather Roll 1.12 xpr=f-iT=f ‘born-conqueror’ ............................. 253
4.2.3 Berlin Leather Roll 1.19 m-rA-a ‘as well, likewise’ .................................. 254
4.2.4 Varia in the lexicon .................................................................................. 256
4.2.5 Assessing the evidence ............................................................................. 257
4.3 Sporting King ..................................................................................................... 257
4.3.1 Non-linguistic elements for dating ........................................................... 258
4.3.2 Sporting King A2.2: Mi sy-iSst ................................................................. 260
4.3.2.1 Analyzing a unique expression ................................................... 260
4.3.2.2 An expression secondarily inserted in the text? .......................... 264
4.3.3 Sporting King C1.11: M-xt nn + ‘narrative’ infinitive ............................. 266
4.3.4 Varia ......................................................................................................... 268
4.3.5 Dating Sporting King................................................................................ 270
4.4 Neferkare and Sisene ......................................................................................... 271
4.4.1 Introduction .............................................................................................. 271
4.4.2 P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11: A case of linguistic recomposition ................ 273
4.4.2.1 Interpreting an apparently aberrant construction ........................ 273
4.4.2.2 Dating an apparently aberrant construction ................................ 274
4.4.3 Innovative expressions ............................................................................. 276
4.4.3.1 P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+4-5: A segment of direct speech ............. 276
4.4.3.2 P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11-14 and T. OIC 13539 3-4:
The syntax of iw .......................................................................... 277
4.4.4 Varia ......................................................................................................... 279
4.4.4.1 A fronted temporal expression .................................................... 279
4.4.4.2 The lexicon .................................................................................. 279
4.4.4.3 Some formulations ...................................................................... 280
4.4.5 Dating Neferkare and Sisene .................................................................... 282
4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste ..................................................................................... 283
4.5.1 Introduction .............................................................................................. 283
4.5.2 Loyaliste 5.5-6: The syntax of isT ............................................................. 288

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 xvi Contents

4.5.3 Varia ......................................................................................................... 290

4.5.3.1 Loyaliste 9.9: GAy.tw ................................................................... 290
4.5.3.2 Loyaliste 11.8: Ir A, B ................................................................. 290
4.5.3.3 Possible lexical indications ......................................................... 291
4.5.4 Dating Loyaliste linguistically.................................................................. 292
4.5.5 The long and short versions compared ..................................................... 293
4.5.5.1 Loyaliste 5.1-14 ........................................................................... 293
4.5.5.2 Loyaliste 2-5 ................................................................................ 295
4.5.5.3 Loyaliste 1-6: Compositional perspectives ................................. 298
4.6 Heavenly Cow .................................................................................................... 301
4.6.0 Inconclusive expressions .......................................................................... 302
4.6.1 Narrative constructions............................................................................. 304
4.6.1.1 Heavenly Cow 133-134 and 77-79: Two expressions for
‘dawning’ .................................................................................... 304
4.6.1.2 Heavenly Cow 130: A ‘narrative’ construction of the
infinitive fully integrated with the narrative texture ................... 306
4.6.2 Heavenly Cow 132: A hybrid narrative construction ............................... 307
4.6.3 Ipn demonstratives in context................................................................... 310
4.6.4 Further elements for a direct dating ......................................................... 313
4.6.4.1 Heavenly Cow 15: The syntax of isT ........................................... 313
4.6.4.2 Heavenly Cow 2: M-xt expressing simultaneity.......................... 314
4.6.5 Varia ......................................................................................................... 316
4.6.5.1 Two more cases of possible linguistic hybridity ......................... 316
4.6.5.2 Late features ................................................................................ 318
4.6.6 Dating Heavenly Cow ............................................................................... 319
4.6.7 Appendix: Lexical notes ........................................................................... 320
4.7 The Royal Cycle ................................................................................................. 322
4.7.1 Old Egyptian expressions ......................................................................... 323
4.7.2 Further elements of Thutmoside Middle Egyptian................................... 329
4.7.3 %w-headed constructions in the Royal Cycle ............................................ 331
4.7.4 Dating the Royal Cycle ............................................................................. 335

5 NEFERTI................................................................................................................. 337
5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? ......................................................... 337
5.1.1 Introduction .............................................................................................. 338
5.1.2 A dating to the early Twelfth Dynasty? Possible historical
references and interpretive frames ........................................................... 339
5.1.2.1 ‘Ameny’ (13a) ............................................................................. 339

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 Contents xvii

5.1.2.2 The ‘Walls of the Ruler’ (15a) .................................................... 340

5.1.2.3 Interpretive frames ...................................................................... 343
5.1.3 A dating to the Middle Kingdom more broadly? A common
Middle Egyptian literary tradition ............................................................ 344
5.1.3.1 Transmission and reception......................................................... 344
5.1.3.2 Motifs in common with Eloquent Peasant and Kagemni:
The prologue .............................................................................. 346
5.1.3.3 Motifs in common with Eloquent Peasant: The lament ............. 349
5.1.4 Middle Egyptian language........................................................................ 353
5.1.4.1 A linguistic dating to the early Twelfth Dynasty? ...................... 354
5.1.4.2 A linguistic dating to the Middle Kingdom more broadly? ........ 355
5.1.5 Interim summary ...................................................................................... 357
5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm .................................................................................. 358
5.2.1 Ptahhotep 82 P: An instance of tw r sDm in a Middle Kingdom
literary text? .............................................................................................. 358
5.2.2 Bare tw r sDm as integral to the original text of Neferti ........................... 361
5.2.3 Bare tw r sDm ............................................................................................ 363
5.2.3.1 Attestation ................................................................................... 363
5.2.3.2 In a personal name ...................................................................... 364
5.2.3.3 In Neferti: Textual hierarchies and macro-syntax ....................... 365
5.2.3.4 A de facto literary construction in Neferti................................... 367
5.2.4 (X.)tw r sDm .............................................................................................. 368
5.2.5 The expression of future passive events in early/mid-Twelfth
Dynasty literary texts................................................................................ 370
5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm ................................................................................... 376
5.3.1 &w sDm in Neferti ..................................................................................... 376
5.3.1.1 Neferti 12b ................................................................................... 376
5.3.1.2 Neferti 10e ................................................................................... 377
5.3.1.3 Neferti 10e and 12b in the broader temporal articulation of
the composition ........................................................................... 379
5.3.2 &w sDm outside Neferti: Hymn 6.4 and Kheti 3.5-6.................................. 383
5.3.2.1 Hymn 6.3-4 .................................................................................. 383
5.3.2.2 Kheti 3.5-6 ................................................................................... 384
5.3.3 The construction tw sDm: Functions and status in Middle Egyptian
grammar.................................................................................................... 388
5.3.4 (X.)tw Hr sDm ............................................................................................ 390
5.3.4.1 A preliminary note on wn.(X.)tw Hr sDm .................................... 390
5.3.4.2 (X.)tw Hr sDm: Early attestations ................................................. 392

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 xviii Contents

5.3.5 The passive counterpart of NP Hr sDm in Middle Kingdom Middle

Egyptian.................................................................................................... 394
5.3.5.1 Documentation ............................................................................ 395
5.3.5.2 Setting the observations into a broader linguistic context .......... 397
5.3.5.3 Implications ................................................................................. 398
5.4 Neferti 7f, 9c: &w with non-dynamic events ...................................................... 398
5.5 Lexical indications for dating ............................................................................ 399
5.5.1 Neferti 3c xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’ ....................................................... 399
5.5.1.1 The word xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’........................................... 399
5.5.1.2 To emend or not to emend? ......................................................... 401
5.5.2 Neferti 12f bH ‘forced labor’ .................................................................... 405
5.6 Further indications: The prologue...................................................................... 406
5.6.1 Neferti 1a-b xpr.n swt wn(n) (...) .............................................................. 406
5.6.2 Neferti 1c wa m nn n hrw xpr (...) ............................................................. 409
5.7 Dating Neferti .................................................................................................... 412
5.7.1 Temporal range for dating ........................................................................ 412
5.7.1.1 Temporal resolution of individual criteria .................................. 413
5.7.1.2 Dating Neferti based on full linguistic arguments....................... 415
5.7.2 Further indications for dating ................................................................... 416
5.7.3 Some implications .................................................................................... 418
5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon .................................................... 418
5.8.1 The prologue............................................................................................. 420
5.8.1.1 The ‘Royal Tale’ ......................................................................... 420
5.8.1.2 The search motif .......................................................................... 420
5.8.1.3 The textual thematization of pleasure associated with words ..... 421
5.8.1.4 Some further details .................................................................... 423
5.8.2 The final affirmative section .................................................................... 425
5.8.2.1 ‘Announcing’ (sr) kingship: Hatshepsut’s Chapelle Rouge ....... 425
5.8.2.2 Affirmation set against previous trouble: Speos Artemidos ........ 426
5.8.3 The lament ................................................................................................ 427
5.8.3.1 Mythical elements alluded to in the lament ................................ 427
5.8.3.2 Hymns to the Nileflood ............................................................... 428
5.8.3.3 Restoration inscriptions ............................................................... 430
5.8.3.4 Royal eulogy and its literary reversal: Ahmose’s Karnak
Eulogy ......................................................................................... 431
5.8.4 Closing remark ......................................................................................... 433

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 Contents xix

6 THE TEACHING OF AMENEMHAT ............................................................................. 435

6.1 Evidence for an early dating? ............................................................................ 435
6.1.1 Introduction .............................................................................................. 435
6.1.2 A terminus post quem non by quotations or allusions? ............................ 437
6.1.3 Language .................................................................................................. 441
6.1.3.1 Middle Egyptian language: A discussion of Amenemhat 7c-f .... 441
6.1.3.2 A direct dating to the Twelfth Dynasty?
Amenemhat 6f ir.kw .................................................................... 444
6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events .............................................. 448
6.2.1 Intrusive tw’s in textual transmission ....................................................... 449
6.2.1.1 -t  tw......................................................................................... 449
6.2.1.2 Easing referent tracking .............................................................. 450
6.2.1.3 Amenemhat 11c-d ........................................................................ 453
6.2.2 The spread of tw to non-dynamic events .................................................. 454
6.2.2.1 Introduction ................................................................................. 454
6.2.2.2 Tracking the change: Issues of method ....................................... 455
6.2.2.3 The first step of the change: &w spreading to events that lack
an agentive participant in their semantic representation ............. 457
6.2.2.4 The second step of the change: &w spreading to non-
dynamic events ............................................................................ 459
6.2.2.5 Digression: Notes on Ipuwer ....................................................... 463
6.2.2.6 Digression: Notes on Kheti ......................................................... 468
6.2.2.6.1 Kheti 3.5-6 (...) tw nD-xrt=f tw hAb=f (...) ................... 469
6.2.2.6.2 Kheti 1.3 ist rf sw m xntyt (...) ..................................... 470
6.2.2.6.3 Two lexical notes ......................................................... 473
6.2.6.6.4 Dating Kheti................................................................. 475
6.2.2.7 Interim summary ......................................................................... 476
6.2.3 Functional counterparts of tw-marked forms with non-dynamic
events in early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian ........................... 476
6.2.3.1 Actor nominalization of the event ............................................... 476
6.2.3.2 Active construction with a non-specified subject s ‘a man’ ....... 477
6.2.3.3 Subjectless active construction ................................................... 478
6.2.3.4 Formulaic language in inscriptional registers? ........................... 480
6.2.3.5 Functional counterparts in early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty
literary texts ................................................................................. 481
6.3 Possible indications............................................................................................ 484
6.3.1 Interpreting a linguistic selection: Amenemhat 15c twt............................ 484
6.3.1.1 Old independent pronouns in post-Coffin Text Middle
Egyptian ...................................................................................... 485
6.3.1.2 Interpretation ............................................................................... 487

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 xx Contents

6.3.2 Lexicon ..................................................................................................... 488

6.3.2.1 Amenemhat 1d nsy ‘to rule’ ........................................................ 489
6.3.2.2 Amenemhat 7b Hw-ny-r-Hr ‘combat’ ........................................... 491
6.4 Dating Amenemhat ............................................................................................. 493
6.4.1 Temporal range for dating ........................................................................ 493
6.4.2 Further linguistic indications .................................................................... 494
6.4.3 Amenemhat and Sinuhe ............................................................................ 495

7 CONCLUSION ......................................................................................................... 499

7.1 Methods and strategies....................................................................................... 499
7.1.1 The objects to be dated: General issues.................................................... 499
7.1.2 Dating indexed on linguistic change ........................................................ 501
7.1.3 Alternative strategies ................................................................................ 505
7.2 Proposed datings and ranges for dating ............................................................. 508
7.3 Some implications.............................................................................................. 513
7.3.1 Prior circulation ........................................................................................ 514
7.3.2 Linguistic registers of Middle Egyptian literature ................................... 515
7.3.3 A gradual development ............................................................................ 517
7.3.4 The early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty ............................................................... 519
7.4 Prospects ............................................................................................................ 520

APPENDIX .................................................................................................................. 523

Texts .......................................................................................................................... 525

References ................................................................................................................. 529

Index locorum ........................................................................................................... 551

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 INTRODUCTION

Language is language in use, therefore language in use in culture. Accordingly,

language history does not provide a linear and orderly sequence to which texts, let
alone literary ones, could be straightforwardly anchored.
Strategies for linguistic dating deal with written registers of language, literary
ones and such that are otherwise documented in the preserved record. Linguistic
dating can therefore never be disentangled from the largely extra-linguistic factors
that preside over the historically shifting and synchronically fluid configurations of
written language in early/mid-second millennium BCE Egypt. In addition, the low
density of both the literary corpus and the external record weighs heavily on the
temporal resolution of linguistic criteria, often even on the possibility of devising
such. The basis for linguistic arguments then rests with dimensions that are not
unsimilar to the ones to which non-linguistic perspectives for dating are themselves
exposed: an overall low-density textual record, texts as complex cultural objects,
cultural and linguistic polyphony at any given time, and human behavior.
In dating Middle Egyptian literary texts, language is only one among several
strategies to be pursued, yet not to be dismissed either if properly addressed in all its
phenomenal complexity and with due caution. The present study is focused on
language for two reasons. Unlike other dimensions, this has attracted only limited
attention so far1 and progress at this level is therefore to be expected. Moreover,
working on language requires much concentration because it necessarily involves
multiple dimensions including the nature of language in literature, possible textual
histories in a manuscript culture, and, not least, much additional study of Middle
Egyptian grammar itself, which in many ways remains insufficiently understood. No
check-lists of linguistic criteria are given a priori, nor do texts generally present
phenomena that would lend themselves to immediate conclusions. Substantial inter-
pretive work is required in many cases and several among the main arguments to be
introduced below must be established step by step often in lengthy developments.

1 Only one dating criterion with broader application has ever been devised (Vernus 1990a: 185-90;
1990b; critical discussion below, §2.6). Isolated notes on individual expressions include Baines
1996: 160, n.20 (for the Moscow Mythological Tale; see §4.3.4.B.NB); Enmarch 2008: 20-1 (for
Ipuwer; see §6.2.2.5); Oréal 2011: 222 (for Loyaliste 5.5-6; see §4.5.2); Oréal 2011: 138, n.81 (for
mTn is in Ipuwer; see §6.2.2.5, (vi)); Oréal 2011: 234-5, Jay 2008: 102, 125-6, and Posener 1957:
132-3 (for Neferkare and Sisene; see §4.4); Parkinson 1999: 193, n.107 (for the two compositions
on P. BM EA 10475 ro and vso; see §3.3); van der Plas 1986: 189 (for Hymn to Hapi; see §3.4.1;
§3.4.3); Vernus 2006: 153 (for Ptahhotep; see §2.4.3.2, (xviii)); Winand 2013: 86-8 (for Ipuwer
12.14; see §6.2.2.5, (vii)).

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 2 Introduction

The present study falls in two parts. In a preliminary chapter, I examine aspects of
the linguistic situation after the Twelfth Dynasty down to the early Eighteenth with a
view on varing configurations of written language (§1). I go on to discuss possible
strategies for linguistic dating, and limitations thereof, for the specific time period and
types of texts here considered, that is early/mid-second millennium BCE Egypt and
Middle Egyptian literature (§2). In the second part of the study, devoted to individual
texts, the exposition is according to various situations that can be encountered, per-
mitting different types of dating: to a narrow range in time (§3), to a specific horizon
in the configuration of written language (§4), and to a broader range in time, possibly
to be narrowed down secondarily through further indications (§5-6). In several cases,
temporal ranges for dating remain fairly broad; a more precise dating may then
require the combined appreciation of all types of evidence available, linguistic and
non-linguistic alike, a communal enterprise that transcends the more limited scope of
the present study.
The goals pursued are threefold. As a report of a necessarily open ended work, the
study intends to illustrate the tenets and ramifications of linguistic dating as these
have appeared in work on texts, to delineate possibilities for and intrinsic limitations
of linguistic arguments, and to suggest lines of investigation that could be fruitfully
pursued in further studies. For individual texts, the study proposes ranges for dating,
narrow or broader ones, as these can be defined linguistically. Even when not as
narrow as ideally wished for, well defined temporal ranges are valuable as they can
make certain options, including some that have enjoyed a distinguished status in past
discussions, implausible or outright impossible. Beyond dating, the study is intended
as a contribution toward a better understanding of the diverse configurations of
Middle Egyptian in the early/mid-second millennium BCE. Inasmuch as it targets
language in high-cultural contexts, its objects include Middle Egyptian written culture
as defined and supported by the use of Middle Egyptian, and Middle Egyptian itself
as a cultural phenomenon, not just a stage in language history—which it is only in
part.
As noted, the dating of Middle Egyptian literary texts can not be a solely linguistic
matter.2 It is hoped that the concentration here pursued will permit linguistic evidence
to take its proper place, at times ambiguous in interpretation or limited in its Aussage-
kraft, yet contributing to the debate as one among several approaches and in some
matters decisive. Language in culture is an object of deception under strictly positi-
vistic approaches, because it is a rich phenomenon. The present study is then also a
plea for an interpretive approach to grammar in text, which is often directly relevant
to the study of grammar as it is to reading the texts for their place in Middle Egyptian
written culture and the significations they convey.

2 For a collection of recent studies, with references to previous discussions, Moers et al. 2013.

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 1 ASPECTS OF THE LINGUISTIC SITUATION IN THE EARLY/MID-SECOND
MILLENNIUM BCE

Middle Egyptian literature is written in Middle Egyptian—by definition of what

present-day Egyptology, and to a large extent ancient readers already, recognize as
‘Middle Egyptian’.
Since Middle Egyptian was used for composing literature in the Middle Kingdom,
it has on occasions been claimed that for literary works composed in ‘genuine’
Middle Egyptian their language would be evidence for a dating to the Middle King-
dom.3 In part equivalent to this is the expectation that early New Kingdom literature,
if any was then newly composed, should have been written in some ‘advanced’ stage
of Middle Egyptian.4 The possible literary language of post-Middle Kingdom times
has also been described as ‘Late Middle Egyptian’.5 Yet, in the absence of hardly any
literary works currently dated to the early New Kingdom,6 these are only hypotheses.
The notion of ‘Late Middle Egyptian’, for its part, remains abstract as long as not
associated with a set of linguistic features that would define it in substance, as a stage
in language history different from what would then be ‘Middle Egyptian (proper)’.7
A preliminary modeling of the linguistic situation after the Middle Kingdom is
therefore required. In highly schematic terms, situations that could obtain may be
contrasted as follows:

3 This is rarely said in such explicit terms. One exception is Jäger 2004: 190: ‘(...) so sprechen doch
die Grundtendenz des Textes (scil. The Teaching of Kheti) als Werbeschrift, seine Sprache214
(emphasis AS) und einzelne gedankliche Konzepte für eine Datierung an den Beginn des Mittleren
Reiches’, with n.214: ‘Trotz der schlechten Beleglage dürfte die Sprache als reines Mittelägyptisch
angesehen werden.’ ‘Reines Mittelägyptisch’, which is not defined any further, is thereby taken to
be a granted notion. In a similar vein, von Lieven (2007: 239-40): ‘(...) bei gutem Mittelägyptisch
ist das MR anzusetzen, bei „gemässigtem“, d.h. Frühneuägyptisch, z.B. die 2. Zw.Zt.’ Both
‘gute(s) Mittelägyptisch’ and ‘Frühneuägyptisch’ are taken to be well-defined notions. That they
are not, or at least not in the sense intended by von Lieven, is demonstrated throughout the present
study.
4 This as well is more often implicit than explicit. One formulation is by Fischer-Elfert (2003: 119):
‘(...) were still couched in the language of Classical Egyptian, albeit of a rather advanced stage.’
5 E.g. Lepper 2008: 291-2 (discussing Cheops’ Court); upon closer examination, linguistic register
in this composition turns out to be more complex than might seem at first: §2.4.4.
6 On Astarte, which is exceptional in various ways: §1.3.2.2; other literary compositions securely
dated to the early New Kingdom include the praise of a city on O. Nakhtmin 87/173 (§1.3.2.1) and
the Teaching of Aametju (§1.3.2.3).
7 It may be worth recalling that the notion of ‘Late Middle Egyptian’ (‘Spätmittelägyptisch’) was
initially introduced by Junge (1985; 1984a) in relation to a discussion of registers. As discussed in
additional details below, the features named by Junge, as well as other ones recurrently associated
with these in the same (groups of) texts, are indeed to be interpreted in terms of register (§2.4.4.2-4).

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 4 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

(a) (‘Genuine’) Middle Egyptian is demonstrably not used any more as a

vehicle for new literary productions from some point in time on, prior to the
time of the first manuscript attestation of a given literary text to be dated. If so,
a general terminus post quem non results for that text, narrowing down the
range of options for dating it.
(b) Middle Egyptian is demonstrably still used as a vehicle for new literary
productions down to the period of the first manuscript attestation of a text to
be dated. (Alternatively, the evidence available simply does not warrant any
definite claims in either direction, with similar practical consequences.) If so,
no general terminus post quem non is given, either because there is none, or
because none can be established. Linguistic dating is then to be carried out
through a detailed examination of individual expressions present, or absent, in
a given text.

As the above directly implies, issues relating to written registers and their shifting
configurations over time lie at the core of the problem at hand. For instance, an
hypothesis as in (a)—here specified for the early New Kingdom (similar structure for
any other period)—falls into two constituent parts, both of which are required for the
overall inference to be valid:8

(c) Changes would have been accumulating since the Middle Kingdom; the
linguistic distance with respect to the language of that period had become
significant by the early New Kingdom.
(d) Possible literary registers in the early New Kingdom would have accom-
modated at least some among the innovative expressions otherwise character-
istic of the language of the time. Accordingly, literary texts possibly newly
composed in the early New Kingdom would have been couched in an idiom
linguistically more advanced than ‘genuine’ Middle Egyptian.

In dating literary works composed in Middle Egyptian, but first documented in

early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty manuscript witnesses, a first step therefore consists in
assessing the linguistic background against which these texts are to be dated, during
the time span considered (roughly 2000-1450 BCE). Such discussion can not be
limited to phenomena of innovation and obsolescence conceived of in absolute terms.
Rather, innovation and obsolescence are here necessarily defined in relation to written
registers, particularly to such that are relevant to possible literary registers. The notion
of ‘genuine’ Middle Egyptian, for its part, needs to be associated with substance, or
abandoned.
In this preliminary chapter, I begin with a general review of ongoing language
change after the Middle Kingdom as this can be traced in relatively lower written

8 This twofold articulation is implicit in all hypotheses that postulate that (‘genuine’) Middle
Egyptian was not a vehicle for literature in the early New Kingdom, and that accordingly texts
composed in (‘genuine’) Middle Egyptian must date to the Middle Kingdom based on their
language. Explicitly von Lieven 2007: 222-50 (with a scope over the whole written history of
Egyptian).

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 1.1 Ongoing linguistic change documented in lower written registers 5

registers documented in the record, thereby assessing the linguistic distance to the
Middle Kingdom in post-Middle Kingdom times (§1.1). I go on to consider aspects of
the continued use of Middle Egyptian in higher written registers after the Middle
Kingdom, to which literary registers would more closely relate (§1.2). The
configuration of written registers in the Second Intermediate Period and early New
Kingdom is discussed in turn, with a view on assessing how possible literary registers,
if any literature was newly composed in the time period considered, may have been
configured (§1.3). The whole discussion is necessarily schematic at this stage: while
literary registers are not expected to be any simple, almost no single literary text is
currently dated to the early New Kingdom; most of the evidence discussed in the
present chapter must therefore be of an indirect nature.

1.1 Ongoing linguistic change documented in lower written registers

Language is constantly changing. On the other hand, much of the earlier second
millennium BCE written evidence derives from highly formal registers, which are
largely opaque to such ongoing change. Stopping at this point, one possible
hypothesis, often held, is that by the early New Kingdom the ‘vernacular language’
had already diverged significantly from Middle Egyptian, in a process largely hidden
in the extant written record.9 The present section examines this hypothesis inasmuch
as it constitutes one of the two components required for the general inference recalled
above to be valid (part (c)). As it turns out, the hypothesis relies on a series of
assumptions which are problematic, conceptually and in substance (§1.1.1). In a
second step, aspects of the limited empirical evidence provided by lower written
registers during the time period considered are reviewed, leading to a different inter-
pretation (§1.1.2).

1.1.1 The ‘underlying language’ hypothesis

A. The hypothesis of an ‘underlying language’ already much divorced from Middle

Egyptian by the early New Kingdom is based on a variety of observations that are
related to each other. In nachkonstruierter form, these may be summarized as follows:

(a) Language change is gradual and continuous, proceeding at its own pace
and by its own dynamics which are essentially independent from whatever
cultural dimensions preside over written performance in the mostly formal
written record. With an increasing chronological distance to the Middle King-
dom, the linguistic distance must have increased accordingly.

9 E.g. Kroeber 1970: XVI; taken up e.g. in von Lieven 2007; historically, the hypothesis famously
underlay Sethe’s ‘Kataklismentheorie’ and subsequent adjustments, which despite criticism has
remained influential in subsequent approaches (compare the critical review in Kammerzell 1999:
61-8). One author to explicitly challenge this approach is Kruchten (1999: 92; also 2010). On
general models of Egyptian language history, e.g. Quack 2013; Kammerzell 1999; Junge 1985;
1984a, all with references to previous discussions.

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 6 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

(b) In the context of a reconfiguration of written standards in Amarna and

post-Amarna times, some form of what may be called ‘early Late Egyptian’
appears in such written registers from which it had been largely absent, and
does so relatively suddenly. Given that linguistic change itself is gradual, some
sort of ‘proto’-Late Egyptian must have been building up for a (longer) while,
even if previously concealed under the ‘conservative’ surface of most written
registers.
(c) In less formal written registers (documentary texts, ‘Reden und Rufe’,
etc.), linguistic features conceived of as diagnostic of ‘Late Egyptian’ to come
are occasionally spotted before Amarna times, and increasingly so during the
Eighteenth Dynasty.10 Given the relative scarcity of preserved documentary
registers, such occasional ‘Frühneuägyptizismen’ should be interpreted as the
tip of the iceberg.
B. In the above model, the very notion of ‘underlying language’ is conceptually
murky. ‘Spoken language’ remains an entirely hypothetical construct, never itself
visible in the extant record, including in such textual loci that purport to feature
excerpts of spoken language (§1.3.3.3.A; also §1.3.3.2.B). Moreover, ‘spoken
language’ is internally diverse, geographically and socially; documented written stan-
dards were demonstrably not based on a single underlying spoken variety which could
then be modeled as changing in a continuous and linear fashion.11 Practically, the
notion of ‘spoken language’, not a unity, therefore dissolves into a set of innovative
expressions as these become subsequently visible in written registers. Such set is not
itself a linguistic variety, but a linguist’s collection. Individual innovative expressions
may themselves have had diverse origins in spoken varieties and need not point to a
cohesive underlying variety either.

10 A classical descriptive study is Kroeber 1970.

11 Underlying geographical variation has to be posited considering the extension of the country and
the lack of homogeneizing forces such as mass education. Such underlying diversity, however,
remains largely invisible in the pre-Coptic record, due to the centralized nature of political and
cultural models (for traces that have been interpreted as dialectal at various periods, Díaz
Hernández 2013: 121-4; Gundacker 2010: 97-103; Allen 2004; Winand 1992: 21-2; Peust 1999:
34, with references to previous studies). For what matters here, written Egyptian as documented in
the record almost always appears in a heavily standardized form. Written standards at various
periods may have been based in part on different geographical varieties, reflecting political and
cultural factors. It has been argued that Old Egyptian was based on a Northern (‘Memphite’?)
variety, while Archaic Egyptian may have been based on a different, possibly Southern, one
(Kammerzell 2005). Elements of discontinuity between Old and Middle Egyptian are emphasized
by Gundacker (2010) who interprets Middle Egyptian as a Southern variety; Díaz Hernández
(2013: 119-20, 123-4) views Middle Egyptian as the result of an encounter between the Memphite
tradition and Southern varieties. Based on different sets of diachronic isoglosses, Middle Egyptian
has been considered a Northern variety and Late Egyptian a Southern one (Schenkel 1993: 148;
Zeidler 1992: 208), or the reverse (Edgerton 1951; Allen 2004). Isoglosses between Old and Late
Egyptian, as opposed to Middle Egyptian, are discussed by Winand in press b. While
geographically induced elements of discontinuity are real, a stronger continuity between written
standards at various periods is also observed, reflecting the general continuity of high written
culture.

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 1.1 Ongoing linguistic change documented in lower written registers 7

Accordingly, more recent models of (Earlier) Egyptian language history have

recast the perspective on written language itself.12 They describe issues in the (dia-
chronic) definition of written registers, patterns in the gradual spread of innovations
across various written registers, and historical discontinuities in written standards. At
any given moment in time, a complex, multi-faceted reality of registers is thereby
posited. Language in use, both written and spoken, displays an intrinsic thickness of
registers, a plasticity that is integral to its capacity to fulfill its social and cultural
functions. Although much of this thickness is invisible in the extant record, elements
thereof are detectable in favorable occasions.13 Much more is assumed to have
existed, because second millennium BCE Egyptian, as a natural language, was no
different in this respect than other natural languages.14
Current discussions have thereby renounced any binary divides between ‘written
language’ and ‘underlying language’. What remains is merely the obvious fact that
innovations typically occur in spoken language, and typically only later spread to
written registers, if they do. Moreover, spoken varieties in Egypt may have been, and
probably were, vastly different from any written varieties at any time. Beyond such
universally valid observations, the notion of ‘underlying language’—not a descriptive
category, let alone a realistic one—is void, in substance and for all practical purposes.
C. A second major problem in the ‘underlying language hypothesis’ lies with the
assumption that chronological distance should imply linguistic distance in a roughly
linear way. To be sure, linguistic change is piecemeal, and thus characterized by its
gradualness. Yet, this does not imply that language change must be linear over time.
Linguistic change happens in social interaction, and is the overall and indirect result
of the multiple agencies of speakers, none of which aimed at changing language.15
Individual changes, to begin with these, are therefore unpredictable.16
Turning to overall grammatical change over a period of time, the pace thereof is
similarly unpredictable, for two reasons. Developments in one domain of grammar
may trigger adjustments in other domains. A whole series of (even apparently unre-
lated) developments may thus bundle together or occur in close succession to each

12 Kammerzell 1999; Junge 20083: 16-22; 1985; 1984a; taking part in a similar shift of perspective,
studies by Goldwasser (1999; 1991) on variation in Ramesside Egyptian are all on written
registers.
13 In the second millennium BCE, the evidence is densest, and the studies accordingly most
advanced, for Ramesside times. E.g. Polis in press; Gohy 2012; Goldwasser 1999; 1991; 1990;
Jansen-Winkeln 1995: 92-102; Winand 1992: 10-30; Vernus 1978. For Amarna, Kruchten 2010;
Silverman 1991. For the (mostly earlier) Thutmoside period, Stauder 2013.
14 The above remark of course bears on the general issue only. The precise configuration of registers
varies, sometimes widely, between individual languages, as well as over time within one language,
reflecting a variety of extra-linguistic factors such as literacy, social structure, the role of a high
cultural tradition (written and/or oral), the spheres of written performance, etc.
15 For invisible-hand models of linguistic change, e.g. Mufwene 2008; Croft 2000; Keller 1994.
16 Predictability in individual changes only bears on restricting the types of changes that typically
happen (e.g. Haspelmath 2004; Hopper & Traugott 20032; Bybee et al. 1994), and, more
marginally, on the favorable intra-linguistic conditions under which a given change may occur
(e.g. Harris & Campbell 1995). It does not bear on whether a specific change in a given language
will happen—it may just as well not happen—and even less so on when it will happen, should it
happen.

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 8 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

other.17 In addition, the number of possible grammatical changes is low over the
relatively short time span here considered (roughly half a millennium).18 The overall
picture therefore remains, quite literally, the sum of a limited number of individual
changes, all of which individually unpredictable. Consequently, no law of large
numbers even remotely here applies.19
In sum, linguistic change in the domains traditionally considered (morpho-syntax
mainly) can not be assumed to have been any linear in early/mid-second millennium
BCE Egyptian. Nor can growing linguistic distance to Middle Egyptian, be assumed
to map in any linear fashion over the growing chronological distance to the Middle
Kingdom.
D. ‘Frühneuägyptizismen’, traditionally defined as innovative features occasionally
documented in pre-Amarna times, have been interpreted as providing direct, if frag-
mentary, evidence to the posited underlying continuous evolution. Upon closer
examination however, such ‘Frühneuägyptizismen’ turn out to be relatively few in
number, and mostly late in attestation (§1.1.2).20 For them to be safely interpreted as
tokens of a broader phenomenon, the notion of an ‘underlying language’ is then itself
preliminary required: as discussed above, the conceptual foundations of the latter
notion do not resist scrutiny (above, B-C). No general argument can therefore be
made guaranteeing that documented ‘Frühneuägyptizismen’ would stand, pars pro
toto, as tokens of a whole innovative layer of language, underlying the otherwise
mostly formal written registers. Consequently, the nature of the evidence provided by
‘Frühneuägyptizismen’ is to be interpreted for each such expression in individual
details.

17 Illustrations in the Egyptian domain for the time period here considered include: (a) the extension
of the inflectional passive marker tw to ‘active impersonal constructions’, partly triggered by the
simultaneous (and per se entirely unrelated) process consisting in the spread of Subject-Verb
patterns previously grammaticalized from situational predicates (Stauder in press b: §4-6, 9);
(b) correlations in the rise of Late Egyptian verbal categories (Kruchten 1999; 2010; the general
tableau of correlations is largely valid even if the analysis of such correlations is problematic in
being too mechanical: see §1.1.2.C, (e)).
18 Note that in the case of Egyptian the number of changes to be considered is even more limited
given that morphological change largely lies in a dead angle due to the under-representation of
inflectional morphology in the writing system (§2.2.1).
19 In theory, some law of larger numbers may perhaps apply to lexical renewal. Yet, whatever picture
would emerge at this level would remain dissociated from the entirely independent dimension of
morpho-syntactic change on which classical accounts of language change in early/mid-second
millennium BCE Egypt are based. Moreover, the study of rates of lexical change comes with
considerable practical problems: this is again due to the short time span considered, here
compounded by the broad unreliability of patterns of attestation of all but the most common
individual lexemes (§2.2.2). In addition, ‘half-time decay’ and similar metaphors applied to
measuring lexical distance ignore the socio-linguistic factors of change (for the importance of
which, e.g. Mufwene 2008): glottochronological and related methods therefore fail to provide a
reliable mapping of lexical distance over time, even when much longer stretches of time are
considered.
20 The main case of an expression of old attestation, the pA/tA/nA demonstratives (already documented
by the later Old Kingdom, and common in Middle Kingdom documentary registers), has to be
appreciated in relation to two additional dimensions, the deictic force the expressions carried well
into the early New Kingdom (e.g. §1.3.2.1; §2.4.4.1.B; §2.4.4.2.2) and the indexical associations
they demonstrably had (§2.4.4.2.1-2).

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 1.1 Ongoing linguistic change documented in lower written registers 9

1.1.2 Innovative expressions in pre-Amarna times

As the above discussion implies, a model of ongoing language change must be based
on a detailed examination of the empirical evidence. To these ends, I briefly review
some major innovations that have been identified in previous studies as they first
appear in the extant record.21
A. With respect to scope and method, a few preliminary observations are in order. In
highly schematic terms, the spread of innovations can in most cases be represented as
follows (in more details below, §2.1):

(I) exploratory innovation by some speakers in social interaction

(II)  wider acceptance in some spoken registers
(III)  spread to ‘lower’ written registers
(IV)  spread to ‘higher’ written registers

As to be expected, first occurrences in the record as listed below are almost exclu-
sively from relatively lower written registers (III), rather than from higher ones (IV).
By definition, no direct claim can be made as to when a given innovative expression
may have been first innovated in spoken interaction (I), nor when it may have found
wider acceptance in spoken varieties of the language (II). The issue is also irrelevant
to the present study, which is exclusively concerned with written registers, lower and
higher ones (III)-(IV). In assessing the general linguistic distance to the Middle
Kingdom in post-Middle Kingdom times, the present section limits itself to discussing
the spread of innovative expressions to relatively lower written registers (III). The
spread to higher written registers (IV)—of major importance in modeling possible
literary registers—will be taken up in turn (§1.2-3).
Empirically, serious complications arise from the low density of written registers
in the extant pre-Ramesside record. As a result, the date of the first attestation of a
given expression in lower registers can not a priori be equated with the date of its
spread to that register (III), which may well have been earlier. Patterns of attestation
must therefore themselves be subjected to interpretation as to their representativeness;
various strategies can be pursued to these ends (§1.1.2.C).
Finally, the list of first occurrences provided below limits itself to those expres-
sions classically considered in studies of the transition to Late Egyptian. The picture is
thereby heavily biased toward a limited subset of mainly morpho-syntactic features.
This is conditioned by the foci of past research, the nature of the extant record, the
nature of the writing system, and the possibility of bounding uncertainties in patterns
of attestation, mainly for such expressions that relate to core functions in language
and are therefore reasonably common in attestation. In a study devoted to a
description and analysis of the rise of Late Egyptian, this skewed perspective would
be a severe limitation; for the more limited issue at hand, however, this is less prob-

21 The rise of Late Egyptian has yet to be studied and analyzed in full details. The seminal study
remains Kroeber 1970. Major subsequent contributions include Kruchten 2010; 2000; 1999;
Winand 1992: passim. See also Collombert & Coulon 2000: 211-6.

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 10 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

lematic, given that the expressions here mentioned are precisely the ones that are
usually evoked when it is suggested that literature, if any was composed in post-
Middle Kingdom times, should have displayed innovative features.
B. Expressions typically evoked in presenting the rise of Late Egyptian include the
following (only a selection is given):
(a) Pronouns and demonstratives
- Third person plural clitic =w:22
(i) as subject in Verb-Subject forms (sDm=w) – Kamose;23
(ii) with non-verbal subjects (iw=w (...)) – Hatshepsut;24
(iii) in non-subject slots (e.g. possessive N=w) – Akhenaton;25 already
Amenhotep II?26

- ‘New subject pronoun’ (tw=i, etc.) – late D.17 (§3.4.1.3).

- PA/tA/nA:27
(i) as a formal category – early Middle Kingdom documentary registers
(earlier already in Old Kingdom ‘Reden und Rufe’ and personal names);
(ii) weakening in deictic force – a gradual process, only incipient in late
Middle Kingdom documentary texts;
(iii) fully weakened into an article – during D.18, in texts of lesser for-
mality.

- PAy=f possessives:
(i) as a formal category, with deictic force – late D.12;
(ii) weakening in deictic force – D.13;
(iii) weakened into a possessive article – late D.18.28

- PAy/tAy/nAy demonstratives – Thutmosis III.29

22 After Edel 1959: 30-7; Kroeber 1970: 35-40.

23 Kamose Inscriptions St.II 18.
24 Speos Artemidos 30 (Urk. IV 388, 16); Urk. IV 54, 10 (Ineni).
25 Edel 1959: 17 (fnDw=w ‘their nose’).
26 Kroeber 1970: 39-40.
27 Kroeber 1970: 13-30; also below, §2.4.4.2.
28 In O. Nakhtmin 87/173 (temp. Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III), for example, the expression still has
clear deictic force and contrasts with suffixed possessives (§1.3.2.1).
29 Kroeber 1970: 40-1.

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 1.1 Ongoing linguistic change documented in lower written registers 11

(b) Elements in the morpho-syntax of clause-combining

- Iw as a marker of circumstantial clauses:
(in subject-initial clauses with pronominal subjects – First Inter-
mediate Period)
(i) circumstantial iw in patterns of non-existence – Ahmose,30 already
Kamose?31
(ii) circumstantial iw in subject-initial clauses with full noun subjects – not
before early/mid-D.18;32
(iii) circumstantial iw in Verb-Subject patterns – later D.18/early D.19.

- Iw introducing object clauses – incipiently by Thutmosis III/Amenhotep II

(with specific governing verbs only).33

- Sequential iw=f Hr sDm:34

(a forerunner construction – twice in a mid-D.13 text35)
sequential proper – Thutmosis III36/Amenhotep II.37

- Conjunctive:38
(Hna sDm, mainly in continuation to an imperative or to a sub-
junctive sDm=f – first in a D.8 decree;39 the overt expression of the
agent, as Hna sDm ntf, remains altogether exceptional)

30 Ahmes-Nefertari’s Donation Stela 19-20 (quoted below, §4.4.3.2, (iv)).

31 Kamose Inscriptions St.II 10-11: this is insecure, since iw may here still be assertoric (discussion:
§4.4.3.2, (iii)).
32 Early instances are Urk. IV 649, 17; 655, 14 (both from Thutmosis III’s Annals; quoted below,
§5.3.4.2, (ii) and §4.4.4, (viii), respectively); P. Berlin 10463 ro 1-2 (temp. Amenhotep II; quoted
below, §5.2.4.A, (a)). Kruchten 1999: 59 discusses an occurrence in Kamose Inscriptions St.II 31-
33 which in his view would be the earliest instances of circumstantial iw before a full noun. I
interpret differently, with iw serving a macro-syntactic function in relating the string of clauses it
introduces (all main clauses) to the preceding clause (§1.3.3.2, (xiv)). The clause preceding iw is
part of the main narrative chain of events, while the clauses following iw contribute information of
a more descriptive type. This is thereby one among various environments favorable to the develop-
ment of circumstantial iw before full nouns. However, a favorable context, including the potential
for interpretive ambiguity, is only a pre-condition for, not the initial stage of, actual change.
33 With a verb of perception (mAA), Urk. IV 1164, 13-14 (a song in Rekhmire’s tomb, quoted below,
§3.2.2.B); with a verb of desiring (mri), Urk. IV 890, 11 (Amenemhab, quoted below, §1.3.3.3.B;
Polis 2009: 223-4).
34 Kruchten 1999: 74-81; Vernus 1990a: 192-3; Kroeber 1970: 126-31.
35 Ameniseneb, Louvre C12, 4-5 and 5-8; discussed below, §1.3.3.1, (i).
36 Senimose’s Will 5-9 (Kruchten 1999: 76); in Thutmosis III’s Annals (Urk. IV 658, 1-2; 658, 10;
passim).
37 P. Berlin 10463 ro 1-2 (Kroeber 1970: 131, ex.6); Urk. IV 894, 5-10 (Amenemhab); Urk. IV 1302,
9; 1304, 2; 1307, 10-11; 1308, 5 (Amenhotep II’s Syrian Campaigns); Astarte, passim (Collombert
& Coulon 2000: 214). See Kroeber 1970: 126-31; Vernus 1990a: 192-3.
38 Winand 1992: 457-73; Kroeber 1970: 140-70; Gardiner 1928.
39 Kroeber 1970: 153-61; also §2.4.4.3, (ii)-(iii) (in literary texts); §1.3.3.1.C (in Second Intermediate
Period documentary texts).

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 12 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

(i) Hna-ntf sDm, in similar functions, with mandatory expression of the

agent, before the verbal lexeme – Amenhotep II,40 already Hatshepsut?41
(ii) mtw=f sDm, with the full functional range of the conjunctive
– Akhenaten.42

(c) Analytic paradigms

- ‘Present I’:
(NP Hr sDm as a formal category, expressing progressive aspect
– Old Kingdom)
(weakening into an unmarked relative present tense – a gradual
process begun in the late Middle Kingdom43)
with the new subject pronouns (tw=i, etc.) – Kamose.

- ‘Future III’:
(NP r sDm as a formal category – Old Kingdom)
(weakening into a future tense – Middle Kingdom44)
(i) isomorphic (/‘symmetric’) negation (nn iw=f r sDm) – Thutmosis III;45
(ii) iw as an integral component of the construction46 – combined with nn
(Thutmosis III),47 r-ntt (Thutmosis III),48 nty (Amenhotep II),49 and
circumstantial iw (Amenhotep II);50
(iii) complementary distribution with pronominal and full noun subjects,
iw P ~ iri N, with verbal and non-verbal predicates – late in the reign of
Amenhotep III or Akhenaten.51

40 P. Berlin 10463 ro 3-4 (Kroeber 1970: 162, ex.2); Astarte II.x+4-5; II.x+16; 14y (Collombert &
Coulon 2000: 212).
41 P. BM 10102 ro 13-16 (Kroeber 1970: 162, ex.1), provided the author’s dating of the document
(‘aus der Zeit der Hatschepsut’) is correct; see however Kruchten 1999: 5 (‘no precise dating’).
42 Kroeber 1970: 169-70.
43 Vernus 1990a: 183-91; also below, §2.6; §5.3.5.2.
44 Identifying future values, as opposed to modal ones, is methodologically difficult, because the
contexts for these two values largely overlap. A future value is best established in previsional
contexts implying a speaker-oriented inference, as in birth prognoses, e.g. P. UC 32057 vso III.16
iw=s r mst (...) ‘She will give birth (...)’. (I thank Stéphane Polis for discussion of this issue).
45 Paheri, pl.7, 2nd register from bottom, to the right (Kroeber 1970: 147, ex.1): mT nn iw=i r wAH=T
‘Look, I am not going to abandon you.’ In one much earlier text, nn sw r xpr is once found
(Mocalla II..1): this is probably an altogether different construction, not a negation of NP r sDm
(§5, n.140).
46 Kroeber 1970: 132, 135-9.
47 Paheri, pl.7, 2nd register from bottom, quoted two notes above.
48 Urk. IV 656, 3 (Kroeber 1970: 137, ex.2).
49 P. Berlin 10463 ro 5 (Kroeber 1970: 138, ex.4).
50 P. Berlin 10463 ro 1-2 (Kroeber 1970: 132, ex.1).
51 Kruchten 2010.

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 1.1 Ongoing linguistic change documented in lower written registers 13

(d) Synthetic and iri-auxiliated paradigms

- Past tense sDm=f – Kamose.52

- Iri-auxiliated formations:
(with long stems and verbs of directed motion – Old Kingdom53)
(i) in the negative imperative – Thutmosis III;54
(ii) in attributive paradigms – in relative forms, Akhenaten;55 in participles,
Horemheb;56
(iii) in focusing tenses – ir=f sDm, Akhenaten;57 ir.n=f sDm, early Ramesside
(a ‘transitional’ form, subsequently lost);58
(iv) in other formal categories – beginning in early Ramesside times
(gradual spread over the longue durée).59

C. Such listing of first attestations only provides raw data: in a corpus language, and
all the more so in one documented in a fairly low-density written record, patterns of
attestation need to be interpreted as to their representativeness. Various strategies for
doing so will be exposed in a subsequent chapter (§2.1) and illustrated throughout the
present study; in the present context, a series of observations inspired by these
strategies may suffice:

(a) Most of the forms and constructions listed above express core functions in
language: pronouns, demonstratives, major categories in the verbal system,
subordination. The expected text frequency of such expressions is thereby
relatively higher than for forms and constructions expressing more marginal
functions. (For the very same reason the latter are also less easily identified by
the present-day Egyptologist, and therefore typically not present in collections
such as the one above). On a general level, the patterns of attestation of the
above expressions typically evoked in describing the early rise of Late
Egyptian will therefore be relatively more reliable than the patterns of
attestation of other expressions that are less common in text.

52 Kruchten 1999: 6-13.

53 Kammerzell 1999: 179-93.
54 Vernus 2010a.
55 Kruchten 1999: 25.
56 Horemheb’s Decree 34 (Winand 1992: §573, ex.899; Kruchten 1999: 25); for iri-periphrased
forms in Duties of the Vizier, Kruchten 2010: 153-4; 1999: 25-6 (different analysis in Winand
1992: §573, n.49).
57 P. Mond 1, 16-17; P. Mond 2, 26 (Kruchten 1999: 24-5); also r-dd=k in P. BM 10102 ro 7 (dating
uncertain, see Kruchten 1999: 23); for iri-periphrased form in Duties of the Vizier, Kruchten 2010:
153-4; 1999: 25 (different analysis in Winand 1992: §447).
58 Winand 1992: §445-6; Wente 1969.
59 Kruchten 2000.

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 14 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

(b) For several expressions, first attestations cluster in time in remarkable

ways. Examples include:
- The new subject pronouns: the pattern of early attestations is dense and
consistent (§3.4.1.3).
- The sequential: early attestations, in documentary texts, in royal
inscriptions, in a private inscription, and in one text relating to ‘literature’
all cluster in the same period (Thutmosis III – Amenhotep II).
- The Future III: early attestations of iw combined with nn, r-ntt, nty, and
circumstantial iw are all from the same decades (Thutmosis III –
Amenhotep II).

(c) For several expressions, other expressions were demonstrably in use to

express similar functions in only slightly earlier times, in similar registers.60
Examples include:
- Past tense sDm=f is first documented by Kamose; in documentary
registers down to the late Seventeenth Dynasty, iw sDm.n=f is consistently
used in similar functions.61
- The sequential is first documented by the time of Thutmosis III –
Amenhotep II, notably in royal inscriptions; in earlier Thutmoside royal
inscriptions, the ‘continuative’ function is common as well, and expressed
differently, consistently with a sDm.n=f asyndetically linked to the
preceding clause.
- The isomorphic (‘symmetric’) negation of the Future (nn iw=f r sDm) is
first documented in an innovative register by Thutmosis III; not much
earlier, Kamose Inscriptions, also with registers that are otherwise open to
innovations, still have the non-isomorphic negation (St.II 10 nn wAH=i tw
(...) ‘I will not let you be (...)’).

(d) In cases when change affects function rather than form, the evolution can
be traced through time, across exponents of similar registers. The classical
example is the weakening of pA into an article, not completed before the early
New Kingdom. As a form pA is overly common in e.g. Illahun: the fact that it
is then never used then as an article therefore directly demonstrates that such
functions had not developed yet.62

(e) When individual changes are part of broader processes of change, the
former can be analyzed as to how they relate to the latter. If the relative chro-
nology of individual changes as documented in the record is consistent with
functional aspects of linguistic change, the pattern of attestation is broadly
representative. Examples among the expressions listed above include:

60 This type of argument is also recurrently made by Kruchten (1999; 2010).

61 Kruchten 1999: 6.
62 The same argument underlies Kroeber’s (1970: 13-30) exposition.

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 1.1 Ongoing linguistic change documented in lower written registers 15

- PAy/tAy/nAy demonstratives: these are first documented by Thutmosis III,

roughly the time when pA/tA/nA, itself a demonstrative in earlier times,
completes its process of weakening into an article. The correlation is
obvious.63
- The rise of the ‘Future III’, implying the recategorialization of iw in this
pattern: early occurrences for all relevant sub-constructions cluster in the
time of Thutmosis III – Amenhotep II (above, (b)). Significantly, changes
affecting the functions of iw in other domains are themselves not before
the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty (above, B, (b)).
- The gradual spread of the third person plural suffix pronoun =w across
various constructional environments: the documented sequence mirrors the
process of spread that can be reconstructed linguistically as a series of suc-
cessive extensions. (I) The morpheme, which has its origin in a ‘Präposi-
tionaladverb’, is originally restricted to the sDm.n(i) construction (with a
sDm.n=f, a form that historically incorporates the preposition n, and the
formation of which was probably still transparent enough at the time
sDm.n(i) was innovated). (II) =w is extended to other Verb-Subject forms
that do not have the morpheme -n-, or not any more; in the process, the
morpheme acquires full syntactic constituent status (first documented by
Kamose). (III) =w is freed from its erstwhile exclusively inflectional slot
and extended to other subject slots (first documented by Hatshepsut). (IV)
=w begins being extended to all slots in which the old third person plural
clitic =sn is used, including non-subject slots (first documented by
Akhenaton, perhaps already Amenhotep II).64 In the above sequence, each
step can be analyzed as involving a relaxation of distributional restrictions
inherited from the morpheme’s past history.65 The relative chronology of
developments as documented in the extant record is therefore representa-
tive.
- The process of obsolescence of the sDm.n=f, with two main steps to be
distinguished:66 (I) in positive and asserted environments, past tense sDm=f
is first documented superseding sDm.n=f by the time of Kamose; (II) in
focusing and negative environments, on the other hand, new forms (based
on the auxiliary iri) are not attested before Amarna. The first step in the

63 Similar analysis by Kroeber 1970: 40.

64 Such extension is itself very gradual, continuing during Ramesside times and completed only by
the early Third Intermediate Period: its progress then depends on constructions and registers in
complexly interrelated ways (Winand 1995).
65 Detailed analysis in Stauder in press b: §10. In terms of the broader linguistic context, the change
was probably favored by the phonological reduction of the old third person plural clitics (=sn),
increasingly resulting in formal identity (technically: syncretism) with third person singular clitics
(=s(i), sw), all similarly pronounced along the long lines of */sv/. Typologically, the overall
process is described as an instance of the rare, and remarkable, type of change referred to as
‘degrammaticalization’ (in the sense of Norde 2009), more specifically consisting here in a case of
‘deinflectionalization’.
66 Descriptive study by Kruchten 1999: 6-22.

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 16 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

process is interpreted in relation to broader changes affecting the verbal

system during the Second Intermediate Period, notably the gradual obso-
lescence of N(P) sDm=f, itself a consequence of the extension and semantic
weakening of NP Hr sDm into a general relative present tense. In the
context of a growing obsolescence of the simple (/‘aorist’) sDm=f, the
marker -n- in the sDm.n=f becomes increasingly redundant in its distinctive
function, in positive and fully asserted environments.67 Meanwhile, other
environments in which the sDm.n=f was used (negative and not fully
asserted ones) remain unaffected by this altered intra-linguistic situation.
Changes in these environments happen only later, in relation to other
developments in the verbal system, such as the obsolescence of forms
based on the long stem (mrr-) and the spread of iri-auxiliation. In short, the
stepwise replacement of the sDm.n=f by other formal categories, as
observed in the record, is consistent with a constructional analysis of the
overall process, in relation to various other processes of change occurring
in the language.

D. The above combined observations demonstrate that the above tableau of first
attestations in relatively lower written registers is not an effect of the vagaries of
attestation. To be sure, the documentation of lower written registers—to which inno-
vative expressions typically spread first—remains limited in the Second Intermediate
Period, and poor until the reign of Hatshepsut. Yet, arguments such as just made
allow to bound uncertainties in all cases evoked.
The rise of Late Egyptian is traditionally described in relation to a limited set of
mainly morpho-syntactic innovations. Of these, most did not gain acceptance in rela-
tively lower written registers until the very late Seventeenth, early Eighteenth, mid-
Eighteenth, or even late Eighteenth Dynasties, while other ones would appear yet
later. In some cases individual changes can be related to broader processes of change,
and arguments can then even be made implying that the associated innovations did
not occur much earlier in spoken interaction itself (above, C, (e)). Only two expres-
sions reach deeper in time, pA and Hna sDm, both well attested in Twelfth Dynasty
documentary registers: two expressions do not define an ‘underlying evolution’. In
addition, these are only the forerunners of actual Late Egyptian categories. Moreover,
both these expressions are strongly sensitive to register (§2.4.4.2; §2.4.4.3.B) and
accordingly only limitedly present in higher written registers of any pre-Amarna

67 I thereby concur with Kruchten that Late Egyptian past tense sDm=f is derived from earlier
sDm.n=f (similarly el-Hamrawi 2008), yet differ as to the interpretation of the process of change.
In Kruchten’s view (1999: 86), the loss of -n- is determined by ‘sound change’ (in the author’s
terms) and the differential obsolescence of the sDm.n=f in various environments would reflect the
existence of two forms of the sDm.n=f, with different syllable structure. Yet, -n- in the sDm.n=f
does not stand at the outer edge of the prosodic word, unlike in third person plural clitics
mentioned by the author in support of his interpretation (*/svn/ > */sv/). Kruchten’s line of
reasoning also takes for granted that ‘sound change’ operates blindly, a view once classical in the
wake of neo-grammarian approaches to linguistic change, but abandoned in more recent research
on morphology and morphological change. In addition, it can be demonstrated that Earlier
Egyptian did not have two forms of the sDm.n=f distinguished by syllable structure (Stauder in
press f; also Stauder in press d-e, discussing the proposal in Schenkel 2009 and 20125: 192-7).

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 1.2 Higher written registers in the early Eighteenth Dynasty 17

times, in the Twelfth and in the early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasties similarly. The two
expressions, one documented since the Eighth Dynasty, the other one even earlier, are
tokens of registers that form an integral part of Middle Egyptian itself, conceived of in
its ‘thickness’. These are not ‘Frühneuägyptizismen’.
The above is in contradiction to views that hypothesize a ‘long hidden evolution’
leading up to the emergence of Late Egyptian in the late Eighteenth Dynasty written
record.68 If narrowly defined in terms of a limited set of mostly morpho-syntactic
features, the rise of ‘Late Egyptian’ is best described as an episode of linguistic
‘punctuation’, following a longer period of relative ‘equilibrium’: the process
involved a series of changes closely following upon, and in part favoring or even
triggering, each other, during the Eighteenth Dynasty itself or only slightly before.69
(In actually studying the rise of Late Egyptian, morpho-centristic sets of features
such as the above should in fact be abandoned altogether, and work should be toward
a tableau that comprises many more expressions, syntactic, lexical, and otherwise,
also taking into account functions as these change over time. This, however,
transcends the limited scope of the present discussion, which was only concerned with
assessing traditional views at the level at which these had themselves been for-
mulated.)

1.2 Higher written registers in the early Eighteenth Dynasty

Early occurrences of innovative expressions in the Eighteenth Dynasty are from rela-
tively lower written registers (compare the references in the above tableau of such
expressions, §1.1.2.B, and the discussion below, §1.3.3). In assessing the linguistic
situation of the time, contemporaneous higher written registers are considered in turn,
in two successive steps. I first examine the typology of Middle Egyptian in such
registers (this section), then go on to discuss aspects of the broader configuration of
registers in the early Eighteenth Dynasty and before (§1.3).
The Middle Egyptian of Thutmoside royal and non-royal inscriptions is largely
free of interferences from other contemporaneous varieties. Interferences are very few
in numbers; when they occur, they are mostly cases of a targeted, and thereby
controlled, opening up of registers. This is not yet equivalent, however, to declaring
that Thutmoside Middle Egyptian is ‘genuine’ Middle Egyptian: the Thutmoside
repertoires of Middle Egyptian expressions and constructions could for example have
been reduced with respect to earlier times.

68 I thus find myself in substantial agreement with the position expressed in Kruchten (1999: 92;
2010). Our views differ on the linguistic analysis of the processes, mechanisms, and factors of
changes, with Kruchten espousing a too narrowly mechanical view on change, often interpreted in
terms of push-shift or push-drag shifts.
69 These notions of ‘punctuation’ and ‘equilibrium’, borrowed from evolutionary biology, have
gained some currency in recent discussions of linguistic change. Episodes of change clustering at
certain periods are thereby described as ‘punctuation’, contrasting with more stable periods,
described as (relative) ‘equilibrium’.

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 18 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

To be assessed is therefore whether Thutmoside Middle Egyptian was full, or not:

if a set of Middle Egyptian expressions could be identified that were demonstrably not
part of Thutmoside composers’ repertoires any more, these could immediately be
turned into a series of post quem non criteria to be applied to literary compositions
including these same expressions. If, on the other hand, the repertoires of Middle
Egyptian were to appear complete in the post-Middle Kingdom times relevant to the
present study, no such direct criteria could be devised.70 The issue would then become
one of appreciating the configuration of post-Middle Kingdom written registers,
including possible literary ones, as to how they relate to each other (§1.3).
A. Three aspects of method are preliminarily made explicit. To begin with, the
perspective is here restricted to inscriptional registers. A detailed assessment of the
linguistic typology of the Book of the Dead, for example, would be highly rewarding,
yet currently remains a desideratum. Funerary productions are also deeply embedded
in past textual tradition in ways of their own, a dimension resulting in much additional
interpretive complexity. To be sure, inscriptional productions themselves entertain
productive relations with the past textual tradition, including cases of outright
phraseological inheritance.71 The phenomenon, however, is only expected in the
context of a culture in which innovations in cultural productions, textual and non-
textual ones, are naturally embedded into, rather than opposed to, tradition;72 similar
comments extend to literature, which, no more than inscriptional productions, was an
object of free composition. Provided, therefore, that cases of formulaic language are
identified as such, and provided that phenomena to do with tradition are analyzed as
to their implications for language, inscriptional productions offer valuable evidence
for assessing the linguistic repertoires of early Thutmoside Middle Egyptian in high
registers.
Individual expressions are considered. Upon reading across Thutmoside inscrip-
tional texts, these differ from Middle Egyptian literary texts of insecure dating in what
may be termed their ‘textual flavor’: their texture is different, as are the types of
expressions commonly featured and at times the textual functions these perform. Such
differences are only expected given the differences in subject matter, cultural
functions, and associated modes of circulation and consumption of these two broad
types of written discourses. For the specific issue at hand, a perspective on individual
expressions therefore remains a valid, and practically the sole possible, strategy.
Lastly, a targeted strategy must be pursued as putting together a comprehensive
descriptive grammar of Thutmoside inscriptional productions would imply an enter-
prise of monographic proportions.73 To this end, a notion of ‘linguistic accessibility’,

70 The discussion is strictly on language in use as documented in texts, not on reflexive awareness of
linguistic structure. On the general paucity of metalinguistic discourses in ancient Egypt,
contrasting with a high sensitivity to register, rhetoric, and past varieties of the language, Stauder
in press g; Uljas 2013; Borghouts 2000; Johnson 1994; Junge 1984b.
71 With a view on the implications for analyzing language, e.g. Stauder 2013: §5.2.
72 For various approaches to these and related issues in early New Kingdom material and immaterial
culture, compare the studies gathered in Bickel 2013b, particularly Laboury 2013.
73 This remains a desideratum. Ritter 1995 concerns aspects of the verbal system only and is flawed
in treating the material as if a transitional variety between Middle and Late Egyptian, failing to
address the nature of written language in Thutmoside inscriptions (see Winand 1997). Preliminary

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 1.2 Higher written registers in the early Eighteenth Dynasty 19

informally defined, is introduced. In intuitive terms, ‘accessibility’ as here understood

may be viewed in terms of ‘salience’ or ‘concreteness’. Linguistic form (e.g. morpho-
syntax) is generally more concrete, and thereby more salient, than linguistic function
and meaning. Similarly, morphology is generally more concrete than syntax, because
it is associated with discrete segments of form while syntax has to do with relation-
ships, distributions, generalizations on these, and at times fairly abstract structure.
Crisscrossing the above hierarchies, expressions frequent in use are more salient than
less frequent ones, because their higher token frequency implies higher exposure of
language users to these.74 In the present section, the focus is set on expressions that
are least ‘accessible’: if it can be demonstrated that these are part of the repertoires of
early Thutmoside composers, expressions more easily accessible will be as well.
B. The following is a selection of expressions and constructions that are typical of
Middle Egyptian, have disappeared in Late Egyptian, and score low on the scale of
accessibility just introduced. The appreciation of their lesser accessibility is based on
the combined dimensions of lesser formal salience and lower text frequency,
compounded with the relatively more recent date by which an expression has received
a fairly adequate description in Egyptological discussion. For each expression, an
example is given in Middle Kingdom (or First Intermediate Period) Middle Egyptian
() and one in early Thutmoside inscriptional productions (); whenever available, an
instance in a Middle Egyptian literary composition of insecure dating is added ().

(a) Aspectual contrasts

(i) NP Hr sDm vs. N(P) sDm=f,75 with the associated semantic contrast:
Fully productive in Eighteenth Dynasty inscriptions, in all relevant details:
discussion below, §2.6.3; §2.8.2.3; §5.1.4.1.

(A contrast in aspect is involved, a dimension that eludes easy description.

This was described only in the later part of the twentieth century,76 three and
half decades after N(P) sDm=f had been identified as a distinct construction

remarks toward a dynamic typology of Middle Egyptian in early Thutmoside inscriptional

productions are in Stauder 2013; for ‘particles’ specifically, Oréal 2011 includes rich observations
on uses in Thutmoside inscriptions.
74 It may be worth emphasizing that the notion of ‘accessibility’ (as long as kept on an informal level
as is the case here) is cross-culturally valid, because it is ultimately grounded in very general
dimensions such as formal salience and frequency of use (and thereby intensity of exposition),
which are independent of cultural specifics. In lieu of further developments, suffice it to mention
some of the various domains in which the scale finds application: these include the gradualness in
foreign language acquisition (both naturalistic and in training); the relative ease for elicitation in
linguistic fieldwork; the availability of expressions for use as socio-linguistic indices (for a case in
Middle Egyptian, §2.4.4.2.1); the historical sequence of development of linguistics, both general
and Egyptian; etc.
75 Sigla, here and throughout the present study: N for full noun; P for pronoun; NP for noun phrase,
regardless of whether this is pronominal, a full noun, or more complex. For example N(P) sDm=f
stands as an overall label for the constructions N sDm=f (with full noun subject), (iw) sDm=f (with
pronominal subject, post-verbal), and (iw) P sDm=f (also with pronominal subject, pre-verbal).
76 Initially Vernus 1986; 1990a: 143-91.

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 20 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

on formal grounds77 and almost a century after Berlin School philologists had
made initial breakthroughs in identifying the main morphological categories
of the language.)

–––––

(b) Syntax, 1: Setting constructions of various types78

(ii) Mrr=f – NP Hr sDm:79

() Siut III (Iti-ibi), 10
i wx
sDr Hr mTn Hr rDt n(=i) iA(w)
‘Whenever the night came,
the man sleeping on the road used to praise me.’

() Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy 14-17 (Urk. IV 18, 10 - 19, 5)

prr=f [pD]t=f Hr gs=fy mi iaH (...)
HAtiw Hr ftft n=f
‘Whenever he comes forth his archery at his side like Iah (...),
the hearts are shuddering for him.’

() Merikare E 135

rmm=sn
iw=f Hr sDm
‘Whenever they cry,
he is listening.’

(A first step in the identification of the construction was reached only with
Hans-Jacob Polotsky’s work, who treated this as an ‘emphatic’ construction
and rightly, if in different terms, described its functions as having to do with
interclausal cohesion and backgrounding of the event in the first clause rela-
tive to the one in the second. A more adequate description of the setting con-
struction as related to, yet distinct from, the ‘emphatic’ construction had to
wait several decades longer.80 This has become more broadly accepted only
in the past decade.)

77 Westendorf 1953.
78 Defined as constructions in which a first clause provides a setting (temporal or otherwise) to a
following main clause.
79 Labels include ‘setting construction’ (e.g. Uljas 2007a), ‘second schème’ (Vernus 1981), and
‘Rang V-Erweiterung’ (Schenkel 20125; 1998).
80 Vernus 1981.

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 1.2 Higher written registers in the early Eighteenth Dynasty 21

(iii) Sequence pseudoparticiple – sDm.n=f (...):81

() Sinuhe B 292-294
sd.kw m pAqt gs.kw m tpt sDr.kw Hr Hnkyt
D.n=i Sa n {imiw}<nmiw>82=f (...)
‘I was clad in fine linen, I was anointed with fine oil, I slept on a bed—
I gave the sand back to the ones who fare it (...)’

() Speos Artemidos 38-40 (Urk. IV 390, 9-16)

(...) HqA=sn m-xmt ra n ir=f m wD-nTr nfryt-r Hmt=i
mn.kwi Hr nswt ra
sr.n.tw=i r Hnty rnpwt m xpr=s-it
i.kwi m Hr watt Hr nsry r xftiw=i
sHr.n=i bwt nTr aA (...)
‘(...) they ruled without Re and he did not act by divine decree until My
Majesty.
I am now established on the thrones of Re—
I have been announced from the ends of years as a born-conqueror;
I am now come as the unique Horus firing on my enemies—
I have dispelled the abomination of the great god (...)’83

() Amenemhat 10b

aHa.kw Hr Drw tA
mA.n=i qAb=f
‘Standing at the borders of the land,
I saw its heart.’

(iv) Sim., with a person other than the first singular:

() Mocalla IV.14-15
xnt pH.n=f wAwAt
xd pH.n=f tA-wr
‘Having fared upstream, he has reached Wawat;
having fared downstream, he has reached the Thinite nome.’

81 E.g. Schenkel 20125: 308-9; Vergote 1955: 352-3 (with some examples quoted in the latter study
to be analyzed differently). In this construction, the first clause is interpreted as providing a setting
to the second, an interpretation that naturally derives from the non-dynamic semantics of the
pseudoparticiple.
82 Emendation after Feder, TLA.
83 Phraseological in nature are instances in funerary contexts such as Urk. IV 119, 10-11 (Paheri)
DD.kw Hr mxAt [p]r.n=i [...] ip.kw mH.kw wDA.kw ‘Having been placed on the scale, I have came
forth (...) counted, complete, whole’; Urk. IV 10, 5-6 (Ahmose son of Abana) tni.kw pH.n=i iAwy
‘Having become elderly, I have reached old age.’

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 22 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

() Urk. IV 54, 15-16 (Ineni)

pr r pt
Xnm.n=f iTn Abx.n=f pr.n=f [im=f]
‘Having gone forth to the sky,
he joined the Sun-disk and united with the one he had come forth from.’
Sim., in a shorter variant, Urk. IV 59, 13-14 (from the same text).
The formulation is reminiscent of the royal apotheosis in Sinuhe R 7-8, which is
probably quoted in a private inscription only slightly later than Ineni, in
Amenemhab (Urk. IV 896, 1-3).84 Unlike Amenemhab, Ineni has a formulation
different from the literary text, probably not a quotation:85 this may be either an
allusion or in reference to a formulary to do with royal succession; in view of
Sinuhe R 7-8, the former is more likely. For what matters here, the formulations
in Ineni and Sinuhe are different in several ways, and the former is therefore
original, including in its language.

(The construction is very rare in text: the examples quoted above are the only
ones I am familiar with.)

(v) Sim., with a wn-headed construction:

() Shipwrecked Sailor 136-137
wn.k(w) rf dmA.kw Hr Xt=i
dmi.n=i sAtw m-bAH=f
‘Finding myself thus stretched out on my body,
I touched the ground in front of him.’
() Speos Artemidos 9-10 (Urk. IV 385, 3-4)
wn.kw [r]f m Haw wa Hna=f
sxpr.n=f wi r rDt wsr qfAt=f m tA pn (...)
‘While I was thus a unique body with him,
he raised me in order that the respect he inspires be powerful in this land (...)’

(From an inscriptional text of insecure dating:)

() Tod Inscription 26-2786
wn.k(w) r=i Hr mAA st tn r-pr pn iw=f xft-Hr xm n nTr nb nTrw wA r wnn m
<m>?Twnw m mw (...)
‘I was looking at this place, at this temple which was in front of the chapel of
the god lord of the gods, having come to be a fighting arena87 in water (...)’

84 Parkinson 2009: 177-9; Stauder 2013: §7.3; Gnirs 2013b: 144, n.134.
85 Parkinson (2009: 176) speaks of ‘a possible quotation’.
86 The inscription, which mentions ‘Senwosret’, is often ascribed to Senwosret I (e.g. Barbotin &
Clère 1991; Quack 1992: 128-30); this has been challenged by Buchberger 2006. At present, the
dating must be considered open.

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 1.2 Higher written registers in the early Eighteenth Dynasty 23

(The construction is very rare: only two further instances have been noted,
Sinuhe B 252-253 and Khentemsemti (temp. Amenemhat II), 4-5. These texts
resonate with each other on various levels, of which the present construction
is one: for Sinuhe and Khentemsemti, §4.1.3.C (with full quotations); for Tod
Inscription and Speos Artemidos, §5.1.3.3.C.)
–––––

(c) Syntax, 2: Thetic constructions88

(vi) Iw-less subject-first constructions (also below, §5.1.4.2, (i)-(iii)):

() Eloquent Peasant B1 135-136
Dd.in sxty pn
xAw n aHaw Hr siAt n=f
‘And this peasant said:
“The measurer of heaps is cheating for himself!” ’

() Urk. IV 656, 14-16 (Thutmosis III’s Annals)

iit twsic r Dd n Hm=f
mrw snb iwayt rst mHtt r-mitt
‘The coming one did to tell His Majesty:
“The coast is clear, the southern and northern garrisons likewise.” ’

() Kheti 7.1

Xaqw Hr Xaq m pHwy mSrw
‘The barber is (still) shaving at the end of the evening.’89
Stanza-initial.

(The construction has come under scrutiny only recently, once sufficient
research on iw itself had been accomplished to permit an appreciation of the
functional correlates of iw-lessness. While the correlation with paragraph- or
discourse-initiality is sufficiently clear, a full analysis of the functional profile
of the construction remains to be done.90)

87 I follow Brose, TLA (similarly already Barbotin & Clère 1991: 9, 18 with n.78). Quack (1992: 128-
9; 1993b: 63, ex.7) reads without haplography (...) m Twnw m mw ‘(...) eine Anhöhe im Wasser’.
88 A ‘thetic’ clause presents a state-of-affairs en bloc rather than relating it to a preceding segment of
discourse (for an introduction, Lambrecht 1994: ch.1). Theticity was first introduced to
Egyptological discussion by Loprieno (1995: 109-12, passim) with a view on the second
construction below (vii). A fuller study (Stauder & Uljas in prep.) is in prepration.
89 Jäger (2004: 68, 134) emends into (...) r pHt=f mSrw ‘(...) until he reaches evening’.
90 Important preliminary observations are by Vernus (1997: 45-61) and Junge (1989: 104). The
construction will be studied further in Stauder & Uljas in prep.

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 24 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

(vii) Pw-marked thetic and topic-presentative constructions:

Fully productive in the Eighteenth Dynasty: §2.7.2.1, (iv); §5.1.4.2, (iv)-(vi).

(While the constructions themselves have long been noted, their more refined
functional description is fairly recent and still being worked on.91)

––––––

(d) Particles, used in the whole range of their Middle Kingdom Middle
Egyptian functions

(viii) A, expressing restrictive identification:92

() Eloquent Peasant B2 125
wnm=i A m93 tA=k
swr=i A [Hnq]t=k r nHH
‘May I feed only on your bread,
drink only your beer, forever!’
() Thutmosis II’s Aswan Inscription 13-14 (Urk. IV 140, 12-14)94
(...) wpw-Hr wa m nn n msw nw wr n kS Xst in anx m sqr-anx Hna Xrw=sn r bw
Xr Hm=f
Dw A Xr rdwy n nTr nfr (...)
‘(...) except one of these children of the chief of vile Kush brought alive as a
prisoner with their people to the place where His Majesty was,
so that he may only be placed under the feet of the perfect god (...)’
Further examples: §6.1.3.1, (ii).

() Fishing & Fowling B4.4-5

HD tA wSa=i wAy=i Sm=i A m st-ib=i
‘At dawn, I would chew a bite, be far away, and walk only by my desire.’95
Sim. e.g. Amenemhat 7c (§6.1.3.1, (i))

91 Loprieno 1995: 109-12. Stauder & Uljas in prep.

92 Following Oréal’s (2011: 39-48) analysis, from which the examples and references quoted below
have also been drawn.
93 The m, only after wnm, not however after the following verb of ingestion swr, was secondarily
added (Parkinson 2012a: 308-9).
94 Semantic analysis: Oréal 2011: 41.
95 On this passage, lastly Widmaier 2009: 136-7.

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 1.2 Higher written registers in the early Eighteenth Dynasty 25

(ix) Discourse-connective is:96

() Sinuhe B 189-190
iw min is SAa.n=k tni
‘(Come back to Egypt ...) For today you have begun ageing.’

() Chapelle Rouge, p.99: I.16-17 (HHBT II 9, 9-10)

iSst pw mrt.n=k xpr
iry=i is xft wD
‘What do you wish to happen?
For I will act according to the decree.’

() Ipuwer 2.6-797

iw ms mwtw aSAw qrs m itrw nwy m Hat
xpr is wabt m nwy
‘But now, many dead are buried in the river, the flood being a grave,
for the wabet has become a flood.’
Sim. e.g. Neferti 2n (§5.1.4.2, (vii)); 5e; 11i; with a slightly different shade of
meaning, but falling within the same broader type of uses of is,98 e.g.
Merikare E 120-121 (§2.8.2.1, (ii)); Ipuwer 5.9, 12.1.

(x) Polemic swt, expressing divergence in dialogue:99 §5.1.4.2, (x)-(xi).

(While particles are easily identified in their form, an accurate appreciation of

their functions is far from easy as this implies dimensions such as textual
cohesion, modality, and argumentation. Significant progress on these levels
has been achieved only recently.100)

–––––

(e) Uncommon constructions

(xi) N sDm.n:101
() Abkau (Eleventh Dynasty), x+3102
inbw=s pH.n qA pt
‘Its walls, they reached the height of the sky.’

96 Oréal 2011: 134-8, 143-5, from which the references are also drawn.
97 Semantic analysis: Oréal 2011: 143-4.
98 ‘Js modalisateur’ (Oréal 2011: 138-42).
99 Oréal 2011: 423-5.
100 Oréal 2011.
101 Edel 1959: 30-7; the related negative construction (n sDm.n(i)) is not uncommon in literary texts.
102 Edel 1959: 31, ex.24.

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 26 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

() Thutmosis II’s Aswan Inscription 6 (Urk. IV 138, 14)

wnw m nDt nt nb tAwy xmt.n kAt
‘The ones who used to be subjects of the lord of the Dual Land, they have
conceived plots.’
Sim. e.g. Rekhmire 5 (Urk. IV 1073, 4) smrw xAm.n sA=sn ‘The companions, they
bent their backs’; Chapelle Rouge, p.98: I.2-3 (HHBT II 7, 11: §3.4.4, (iii);
§4.3.2.1, (v)); p.120: V.7-8 (HHBT II 19, 2: §3.4.4, (iv)).

() Kheti 8.3, reading as the text stands (§5.3.2.2, (i)).

(The construction, which was fully identified only in 1959,103 remains

undiscussed in several recent grammars of Middle Egyptian and is generally
deemed worthy a note when encountered.104)

C. The above demonstrates that the Middle Egyptian repertoires of early Thutmoside
composers of inscriptional texts were complete. More precisely, the early Thutmoside
performance of Middle Egyptian at least matches the current Egyptological descrip-
tion of Middle Egyptian. This is not surprising after all, since early Thutmoside
composers were performing in what by then amounted to a high variety of their own
language in the context of a continued textual and cultural tradition. Egyptologists, by
contrast, stand outside this tradition and can expose themselves to a limited textual
record only.
One immediate consequence is a general difficulty in devising post quem non
criteria for the time period prior to the first manuscript attestation of as yet insecurely
dated Middle Egyptian literary texts. For progress to be made in this domain, more
fine-tuned descriptive study of Middle Egyptian grammar is needed: this may lead to
identifying usages documented in the Middle Kingdom, but not any more in early
New Kingdom inscriptional registers. If so, and if it can be made plausible that the
then possibly observed lack of early New Kingdom attestation is not a mere docu-
mentary gap, post quem non criteria for Middle Egyptian literary compositions could
result. The quest will be a painstaking one: retrospectively, it now appears that the
performance of Middle Egyptian by early Thutmoside composers not only matched,
but in effect beat, the best Egyptological descriptions until the 1980’s (in the above,
e.g. (i) and (ii)) and beyond (e.g. (vi), (viii), and (ix)).
Illustrative of the practical implications of such linguistic continuity in higher
registers across Middle Egyptian written culture is a Gedankenexperiment in dating
the Speos Artemidos Inscription on strictly linguistic grounds. The text is fairly long
and internally diverse, no less than most Middle Egyptian literary texts to which this
study is devoted. One may then be tempted to argue along the following lines:

103 Edel 1959.

104 E.g. Junge 2003: 254.

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 27

- Speos Artemidos avoids any linguistically innovative features, except one,

the third person plural pronoun =w in col.30 (Urk. IV 388, 16). Had the text
been transmitted in manuscript form (as literary compositions are), this
singular instance of =w would have to be appreciated with the utmost caution
given the possibility that it could have arisen in the course of textual
transmission.105
- The Middle Egyptian in Speos Artemidos is rich. Several among the
constructions evoked above as typical of higher Middle Kingdom registers are
thus included: N sDm=f used in its all aspectual functions ((i); below, §2.6.3.1,
(iii)); strategies of asyndetic clause-combining including the sequence pseudo-
participle – sDm.n=f (iii); and the exceptional construction with an initial form
of the pseudoparticiple of wnn (v). Various other expressions, both grammati-
cal and lexical, are fairly rare and some possibly recherché.106 Linguistically,
nothing would speak against a dating to the Twelfth Dynasty.
- In view of the ‘Sinuhean’ construction in Speos Artemidos (v), compounded
with further elements in common between Speos Artemidos and Tod Inscrip-
tion (§5.1.3.3.C)—a text that is itself often assumed to date to Senwosret I—
one may even be tempted to date Speos Artemidos to the earlier Twelfth
Dynasty specifically.

Similar comments extend to other compositions of the period. Among the ones
evoked above is Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy, which for example has the aspectual
contrast between N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr sDm (§2.8.2.3, (iii)-(iv) and §5.1.4.1, (ii)) and
the setting construction mrr=f – NP Hr sDm; above, (ii)). Similarly, Thutmosis II’s
Aswan Inscription for example has A (viii) and N sDm.n: (xi)),107 while Chapelle
Rouge has is (ix) and N sDm.n (xi) (detailed discussion of this composition: §4.1.2).
The list could be easily extended.

1.3 Configurations of written language in the Second Intermediate

Period and early New Kingdom

It was argued above that the rise of Late Egyptian (as traditionally defined in terms of
a limited set of mostly morpho-syntactic features) was as an episode of ‘punctuation’,
occurring relatively late and rapidly, mostly during the early New Kingdom itself
(§1.1). The process was described based on evidence from relatively lower written
registers mostly. Complementarily, it was demonstrated that the performance of

105 This is not theoretical: for example, it has been proposed that iw=w r [...] in Moscow Mythological
Story P. Moscow 167 frg. II.11 should be emended in view of the otherwise ‘overhelmingly
classical’ linguistic typology of the composition (Quack 2004: 359).
106 Compare the notes in Allen 2002b.
107 Also significant is that Thutmosis II’s Aswan Inscription is included among Borghouts’ reading
texts (Borghouts 2010: II, 432-3, 475-7). The text’s high linguistic level is matched on the graphic
level, in several ‘studied’ spellings that breach conventional orthography (Borghouts 2010: II,
475).

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 28 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

Middle Egyptian in early Thutmoside inscriptions at least matches current

Egyptological descriptions of Middle Egyptian (§1.2). The observation was based on
inscriptional registers, which typically lie at the higher end of the continuum of
written registers at any given time.
The linguistic situation in the Early New Kingdom therefore consists in a variety
of written registers, such that accommodate recently innovated expressions to varying
degrees, and such that accommodate few or none. In modeling possible literary
registers in the same period, the issue lies in appreciating how these may have been
configurated against the general background just outlined. Answering the question is
made no easier by the fact that many literary texts, which would ideally provide the
primary evidence here needed, remain insecurely dated. Unless the discussion is to
become circular, these texts must be left out of the picture at this stage, thereby
resulting in a dearth of direct evidence: more than in the preceding sections, the
argument is therefore here to be indirect.
In the following, a series of complementary perspectives, all of which necessarily
partial, are woven together with the aim of developing some sense of possible literary
registers in the three centuries after the end of the Twelfth Dynasty (1750-1450 BCE).
I preliminarily discuss an approach which might be termed a ‘rough modeling’ of
‘spheres of written performance’ at different periods in the second millennium BCE
(§1.3.1). I go on to examine the scanty direct evidence for literary registers in the
early New Kingdom and discuss this for its representativeness (§1.3.2). The textual
loci in which innovative expressions are encountered in this period are considered in
turn (§1.3.3).

1.3.1 ‘Spheres of written performance’

The configuration of registers at any given time is typically complex and internally
dynamic, with the written record showing only a small subset of the variety that
existed. The extant pre-Ramesside record particularly presents the Egyptologist with
massive gaps on two levels: most registers are not represented at all, and those
registers that are represented are mostly represented only partially. Given such mis-
match between the question raised and the evidence available to address it, an inten-
tionally schematizing perspective may be adopted as a preliminary approximation.
This consists in considering very broad ‘spheres of written performance’, inscrip-
tional, literary, and documentary, as to how they relate to each other.108 Spheres of
written performance are defined per a set of typically correlating dimensions such as

108 The notion of spheres of written performance, long implicit, was formalized in the seminal
contributions by Junge 1985 (in particular 21-34); 1984a (in particular Tabelle 2, 1190-1). Details
in this (by then necessarily largely prospective) presentation have been subsequently refined (e.g.
Jansen-Winkeln 1995), yet the overall model stands, if appreciated at its proper level of generality
(spheres, not registers). The following discussion is partly recast in the present author’s own terms,
for the sake of expository ease in the present context. For similar practical purposes, the original
quadripartite Jungean model is simplified into a tripartite one, with the ‘theologische’ and
‘staatliche’ spheres being collapsed into a single one, termed ‘inscriptional’.

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 29

modes of publication and circulation (e.g. monumental vs. portable),109 types of

subject matters and associated constraints of decorum, cultural status and degree of
embedding into past textual tradition. Spheres of written performance are Egypto-
logical constructs, and explicitly conceived of as higher-order idealizations. They are
not actual registers, which are vastly more complex, internally differentiated, and
fluid: each sphere consists in a multiplicity of registers.
However schematic, a consideration of spheres of written performance remains
useful in providing a description of general hierarchies in written language in ancient
Egypt, and for expressing how these hierarchies changed over time. In very broad
terms, the inscriptional sphere in some periods tends to be linguistically more con-
servative, in other words to accommodate less innovations, than the literary sphere,
which in turn tends to be more conservative than the documentary sphere. What
changes over time is the linguistic thickness of each sphere, the overlaps between
different spheres in their linguistic selections, and their relative linguistic distance to
each other. Such shifting definitions relate to changes in broader cultural constella-
tions, which they reflect.
A. Beginning with the relationship between the literary and the documentary spheres,
the main observation is that the former is distinguished from the latter throughout the
second millennium BCE. In Ramesside times, literary registers include innovative
expressions while avoiding other ones. They also accommodate a whole set of older
expressions, to varying degrees depending on individual types of literary discourses,
periods, and texts. The overall result, internally variable, is a linguistic variety (‘néo-
égyptien mixte’) that differs from the one found in contemporaneous lower written
registers (‘néo-égyptien complet’).110 As Winand’s labels here evoked further express,
this variety is composite in nature: it never existed as such in spoken usage, not at the
time it was used in writing, nor at any previous time. In the Middle Kingdom alike,
literary registers are differentiated from contemporaneous lower written registers
(letters, business documents). The former by and large avoid some innovative expres-
sions that are observed spreading in the latter. They also include expressions that were
by then obsolescent and/or had never been in use at all in lower registers (§2.4.3.2).
For the Second Intermediate Period and early New Kingdom, it is therefore to be
assumed that whatever registers of literature there may have been were similarly
differentiated from contemporaneous lower written registers. Such possible registers
of literature would have accommodated only some, or none, among the innovative
features found in lower registers, while also including a series of expressions not
found in these.
B. Turning to the relationship between the literary and the inscriptional spheres,
major changes over time are observed. The contrast between the two spheres is most
strongly marked in the first millennium, a period that may have been instrumental in

109 On modes of publication and circulation as complexly correlating with registers of both language
and writing, Vernus 1990c.
110 Winand 1992: 10-30. The presentation is here simplified with respect to Winand’s, since the
contrast between the overlapping types of ‘néo-égyptien mixte’ and ‘néo-égyptien partiel’ is also
in part diachronic, resulting in a more complex actual picture.

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 30 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

suggesting the very hierarchy in the first place. This reflects a broader cultural
situation, one major linguistic correlate of which lies in the full emergence of
Traditional Egyptian proper.111 The latter, not a cohesive variety but an internally
diverse phenomenon and an inherently dynamic practice,112 is typical of many textual
productions in the inscriptional sphere. According with their entirely different cultural
loci, literary productions of the later first millennium are for their part largely immune
to these dialectics with the textual, and thereby linguistic, tradition of the past. The
result is a linguistic divorce between for example Demotic literature and contem-
porary inscriptional texts.113
Moving backwards, the contrast is already considerably less extreme in
Ramesside times. Reference may be made again to Winand’s categories of ‘néo-
égyptien partiel’, defined as accommodating a few innovative features only, and ‘néo-
égyptian mixte’, accommodating more innovative features.114 The former linguistic
type is broadly associated with the inscriptional sphere, while the latter is typically,
although not exclusively, associated with the literary sphere.115 A hierarchy is there-
fore observed at a general level, yet the contrast implies no discontinuity: signifi-
cantly, the categories overlap to a substantial degree.116 Moreover, the inscriptional
and the literary spheres both display considerable internal variation, often resulting in
a blurring, or even outright suspension, of the hierarchy in individual cases.
Ramesside textual productions in the inscriptional and literary spheres thus bear
witness to a complex and dynamic continuum of higher written registers. This
continuum is productive, in contrast to the more divorced situation that was to emerge
later in relation to the rise of Traditional Egyptian proper.
Turning to the Middle Kingdom, no such hierarchy is observed any more.
Linguistic registers of literature only occasionally accommodate expressions not
otherwise found in insciptional texts. These are in most cases associated with specific
selections in registers, such as in what has been described as a ‘low tradition’ of
Middle Egyptian narrative literature (§2.4.4).117 Inscriptional compositions, on the
other hand, occasionally display archaizing features, survivals or revivals. So, how-
ever, do literary texts, to the same extent, and often with the very same expressions
(§2.4.3.2; §2.4.3.3.B). Middle Kingdom inscriptions and literary texts share the same
linguistic repertoires, down to details (e.g. §4.1.3.C). The intense linguistic communi-
cation between the two spheres is demonstrated further by cases where both diverge
from regular standards of written Middle Egyptian, paradigmatically in Sinuhe
(§4.1.3).
While Middle Egyptian literature is a ‘differentiated’ mode of written discourse,
notably in terms of its decorum,118 the associated linguistic registers are not. The
productive tensions Middle Kingdom literature entertains with contemporaneous

111 E.g. Vernus 1996a.

112 E.g. Vernus in prep.; Engsheden 2003.
113 The actual situation is of course vastly more complex, e.g. Quack 2010a; 1995.
114 Winand 1992: 10-30. Also Jansen-Winkeln 1995.
115 Here as well, the actual situation is vastly more complex, see the studies quoted in §2.4.1.
116 E.g. Winand 1992: 30.
117 For the ‘low tradition’ as defined in literary terms, Parkinson 2002: 138-46.
118 Parkinson 2002: 15-6, 91-8, and passim.

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 31

high-cultural written discourses presuppose an intense communication with these.

This is mirrored in the language common to the two modes of written discourse. In
the Middle Kingdom, there is no specific literary variety of Middle Egyptian.
C. In schematic terms, spheres of written performance in the second millennium BCE
may then be represented as follows (‘≥’ stands for significant overlaps, ‘>’ for a
contrast, and ‘>>’ for a divorced contrast; the thickness internal to each sphere is left
unrepresented, as are all details that will be the prime object of the present study):

- Middle Kingdom: inscriptional = literary > documentary

- SIP – early NK ???
- Ramesside: inscriptional ≥ literary > documentary
[- first millennium: inscriptional >> literary (≥/> documentary?)]

Literary registers are distinguished from relatively lower written registers at all times
throughout the second millennium BCE. Moreover, they are never fully divorced
from inscriptional registers at any time in the second millennium BCE, as they would
later become. While the relationship with inscriptional registers is productive in
Ramesside times, the linguistic repertoires of the inscriptional and literary spheres are
in the Middle Kingdom the same. As the phenomena involved are inherently complex,
the gap resulting from the current dearth in literary texts securely dated to periods
from the Second Intermediate Period through the early New Kingdom can not be
filled by any simple interpolation.

1.3.2 Direct evidence for linguistic registers of literature in the early

New Kingdom

At this stage, only three literary compositions are securely dated into the early New
Kingdom, the short praise of a city inscribed on O. Nakhtmin 87/173, Astarte, and
Teaching of Aametju. Of these, the first two may at first be taken to suggest that
literary registers in that period would have broadly accommodated linguistically
innovative features. Upon closer consideration, a different picture emerges.

1.3.2.1 O. Nakhtmin 87/173

The short text inscribed on O. Nakhtmin 87/173119 is currently the earliest known
exponent of a praise to a city, a type of literary discourse that was to enjoy consider-
able popularity in Ramesside times.120 The text receives a terminus post quem non by
Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III by its archeological context.121 The composition itself is not
much older: its brevity accords with its position at the very beginning of a tradition.122
Linguistically, the composition may seem to include so-called ‘Frühneuägypti-
zismen’; a closer examination reveals otherwise.

119 Text: Guksch 1994. Studies: Ragazzoli 2008: 26, 100-1; Verhoeven 2005: 74-5. I quote following
the strophic structure of the text.
120 Study: Ragazzoli 2008.
121 Guksch 1994: 106.
122 Ragazzoli 2008: 101.

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 32 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

The text has a series of pAy=k possessives. A look at the strophic structure is here
relevant. The composition consists in a sequence of three similarly structured
strophes.123 PAy=k possessives occur in the first verses of each strophe (1; 4; 7);
suffixed possessives, for their part, are used in strophe-internal position, in the second
verses of the first and second strophes (2; 5). The contrast is deictic in nature:124 the
preposed possessives in strophe-initial position point the reader/hearer’s attention to
an entity; in strophe-internal position, this referent is already established in the sphere
of discourse. In short, the preposed possessives carry full demonstrative force, while
the suffixed possessives lack such force. Compare, in the first strophe, where the
referent of niwt(i)w in the second verse is established, if by a different word, in the
first verse (dmi):

O. Nakhtmin 87/173, 1-2

imn im wi m pAy=k dmi
nDm anx mrrw m niwt(i)w=k (...)
‘Amun, place me into this town of yours;
Sweet to live in, and beloved of your citizens (...)’

Similar uses, also strongly deictic, are documented in Twelfth Dynasty literary
registers, in Kagemni 2.3 (§2.4.4.2.2.A) and Eloquent Peasant B2 128
(§2.4.4.2.2, (iii)). In O. Nakhtmin 87/173 similarly, pAy=k is not a ‘Late Egyptian-
ism’: to be one, it would have to lack deictic force. (In addition, preposed possessives
in Kagemni and Eloquent Peasant, in both cases in the framing sections of these
compositions, are indices of register, according with the general indexical associations
of pA-based expressions (§2.4.4.2). In O. Nakhtmin 87/173 similarly, the accom-
modation of preposed possessives may have had some indexical quality, in this case
reflecting the novelty of a type of literary discourse in the process of being
innovated.)
Other apparent ‘Frühneuägyptizismen’ belong to the graphic level. Most notable
is a spelling n for the preposition m: O. Nakhtmin 87/173, 3 (...) r irt iAwt n kty niwt
‘(...) than spending old age in another town’. This is genuinely a late feature,
documented elsewhere in Eighteenth Dynasty texts,125 and perhaps only once
before.126 If encountered in a text of as yet insecure dating, this could not be safely
used for analysis: such spelling could well have arisen in the course of textual trans-
mission (§2.3.1.1, (vii), with instances in Fishing and Fowling B2.6-7, possibly also
in Merikare E 70-71).
The composition inscribed on O. Nakhtmin 87/173 is firmly dated to the early
Eighteenth Dynasty on non-linguistic grounds (archeological context and history of
the type of literary discourse it belongs to). Its linguistic typology, however, would be
compatible with a dating to any other time from the mid-Twelfth Dynasty on. (The

123 For further analysis of this brief, yet very rich, text, Ragazzoli 2008: 100-1.
124 I thank Pascal Vernus (p.c. 6/2010) for discussion.
125 Kroeber 1970: 41-4.
126 The only pre-Eighteenth Dynasty instance that comes to my mind is Seankhenre Mentuhotepi’s
Stela 5 ink nsw n-Xn wAst ‘I am king within Thebes.’

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 33

linguistically undistinctive nature of the composition is of course also in large part

due to its sheer brevity.)

1.3.2.2 Astarte
Unlike P. Nakhtmin 87/173, Astarte (P. BN 202 + P. Amherst IX)127 displays a rich
set of linguistically innovative features. The composition, previously dated to
Horemheb, has now been convincingly redated to the reign of Amenhotep II.128 Its
language, which compares with contemporaneous documentary registers, may be
characterized as a variety transitional between Middle and Late Egyptian.129 Astarte
thus provides a plain instance of a ‘literary’ text in pre-Amarna times composed in a
register that is wide open to innovative expressions. This does not, however, support
any generalization to possible literary registers overall, let alone in the pre-Amarna
period as a whole.
In non-linguistic terms as well, Astarte is highly innovative. Based on the longer
fragment in P. Amherst IX, the composition had been considered a ‘mythological
tale’, a type of written discourse that is already documented in the Middle Kingdom130
and would undergo considerable development in the New Kingdom.131 The rejoinder
of the long missing beginning of the text (P. BN 202) now imposes nuancing this
generic characterization. The royal protocole, dating, and title of the composition
converge in suggesting a specific Sitz im Leben, probably as a celebratory act of some
sort.132 In addition, explicit generic indications internal to the text relate the composi-
tion to celebrations of heroic deeds (sDd nxtw), a ‘genre’ developing precisely during
the times of Thutmosis III and Amenhotep II.133 The linguistic register of the compo-
sition is thereby to be appreciated in relation to its generic determinations: innovation
is on both accounts similarly.
It is of some further significance that the composition is dated to the reign of
Amenhotep II: this is slightly later, if by a few decades only, than the lowest datings
proposed for Middle Egyptian compositions, to the early Thutmoside era. A sizeable
amount of the innovative expressions featured in Astarte is first documented in the
reigns of Thutmosis III or even Amenhotep II, even in lower registers.134 In the
inscriptional sphere itself, innovative features are by then accommodated in texts to

127 Text and study: Collombert & Coulon 2000.

128 Collombert & Coulon 2000: 209-16.
129 Collombert & Coulon 2000: 211-6.
130 Parkinson 2002: 294-5.
131 Collombert & Coulon 2000: 224, n.172-3.
132 Collombert & Coulon 2000: 222-3; Fischer-Elfert 2003: 135-6.
133 In the editors’ (Collombert & Coulon 2000: 224) own terms: ‘Selon notre interprétation, après le
protocole royal et le titre, débute un discours aux résonances épiques qui annonce le projet général
du locuteur: le récit (sDd) et la glorification (sqA) des hauts faits (nxtw/tnr) du héros triomphateur
de la mer. Ce genre de la “geste” héroique est précisément désigné en égyptien par l’expression
sDd nxtw, lit. “récit des exploits”. Il s’est considérablement développé sous Thoutmosis III (...)’.
134 These notably comprise the bulk of innovative features in the verbal system of Astarte: the
conjunctive Hna ntf sDm (first securely documented under Amenhotep II); the iw-based paradigm of
the future III (first documented under Thutmosis III); the sequential iw=f Hr sDm (first documented
under Thutmosis III and Amenhotep II). Compare Collombert & Coulon 2000: 216-22 and above,
§1.1.2.B.

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 34 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

do with war and celebrating royal deeds and prowess (§1.3.3.3.B).135 These are
precisely the types of written discourse to which Astarte itself displays closest
connections. The reigns of Thutmosis III and Amenhotep II thus witnessed early
stages in a reconfiguration of some written registers, to which Astarte itself is a token.
The register of Astarte is essentially identical to documentary registers of its
time.136 In this, the composition differs from all literary composition in the second
millennium BCE, including all Late Egyptian literature except Wenamun. In the latter
text, the linguistic register selected, close to documentary ones,137 serves to frame this
work, which is truly literary, as a report. In Astarte, this uniqueness accords with the
subject matter and Sitz im Leben of the composition and its also otherwise highly
innovative features in terms of ‘genre’; it fits into the broader context of other such
experiments in the times of Amenhotep II as outlined above. Noteworthy in this
context are also the great many loanwords the composition includes: such abundance
is untypical for any other Eighteenth Dynasty text of any sort.138 The phenomenon
stands in obvious relation to the foreign influences otherwise manifest in the com-
position and that are here being integrated into Egyptian ideology.139 The density of
loanwords in Astarte further accords with the war-like aspects of the composition,140 a
correlation also otherwise observed:141 the indexical load of language is obvious here
as well.
Inasmuch as its linguistic register correlates with other features that are similarly
innovative, Astarte may be described as a forerunner of Ramesside modernism to
come.142 The composition also offers a glimpse on an experimentation in written
registers in the period leading up to Amarna, paralleled in other texts to do with royal
prowess of the times of Amenhotep II. Given its date, and most importantly its highly
specific nature, the composition supports no extrapolation on how possible Eighteenth

135 To give but one illustration, Amenhotep II’s Karnak Stela thus has in one sentence r-Dd
introducing an object clause after a verb of perception (Urk. IV 1312, 7), r-bl ‘out’ (Urk. IV 1312,
10), and pA’s in much weakened deictic force. Continuous quotation of Urk. IV 1312, 7-11 below,
n.220.
136 Compare e.g. with Amenhotep II’s letter to Usersatet (Urk. IV 1343-4); see Collombert & Coulon
2000: 225 and n.187.
137 On the linguistic typology of Wenamun, Winand 2011.
138 Collombert & Coulon 2000: 220-1.
139 The subject matter of the composition is derived from Eastern (Canaanite/Hurrian) traditions,
however direct or indirect one wishes to model such influence (Schneider 2004; 2003). The
composition thereby stands as a token of intensive cultural contacts in the period, among which the
promotion of foreign cults under Amenhotep II particularly in the Memphite area (Collombert &
Coulon 2000: 217-22). The editors further observe (Collombert & Coulon 2000: 226): ‘Le texte
illustre d’une manière éclatante la manière dont les apports étrangers sont intégrés à une vision
élargie de l’univers égyptien, et comment, dans ce qu’il nous faut appeler “littérature” (emphasis
AS), la mythologie est mobilisée pour ancrer dans le temps des dieux une idéologie royale fondée
sur le culte du héros guerrier (emphasis AS). En cela, la mise en évidence du Sitz im Leben propre
à ce récit invite à reconsidérer une nouvelle fois le statut de cette œuvre, et, plus généralement,
celui des “contes mythologiques”.’
140 E.g. tl ‘force’ (the earliest instance in any Egyptian text), a word borrowed from Hurrian adal,
where it occurs for instance in royal names (Schneider 1999b).
141 E.g. Schneider 2008. A famous instance of such association is of course the Satirical Letter.
142 Collombert & Coulon 2000: 225. For Ramesside modernism, Baines 1996.

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 35

Dynasty literary registers may have been configurated in general in the earlier
Thutmoside period.143

1.3.2.3 Teaching of Aametju

The fragmentarily preserved Teaching of Aametju144 is inscribed in the more display-
oriented of User’s two Theban tombs (TT 131; temp. Thutmosis III). The composition
is a component of the larger cycle, textual145 and visual,146 elaborated for the self-
presentation of the Aametju-User-Rekhmire dynasty. Its composition thereby dates to
the time of its inscription.
A. Even in its very badly damaged state, the text appears to be composed in a highly
formal register of Middle Egyptian, e.g.:

(i) Aametju 43
HAt? rA sgrH=s [...]
‘The beginning(?) of a speech makes cease [...]’147
Sim. Aametju 13 Xt nbt dg?=s imt=s (...) ‘Every belly conceals what is in it (...)’.148
In the Vizieral Cycle also e.g. Appointment 8 (Urk. IV 1381, 2) (§2.6.3.1, (ii)).
N(P) sDm=f expressing the unaccomplished unextensive aspect (§1.2, (i); §2.6.3).

(ii) Aametju 20
SsA.ti m mdwt aSAwt ib n s nb tp Dbaw=f
‘Be wise in abundant words, for every man’s heart is on their fingers.’
Asyndetic linkage of the second clause to the first; pseudoparticiple used as the
non-dynamic counterpart of the imperative.

What little is preserved of Aametju also includes various recherché expressions,

grammatical or lexical:
(iii) Aametju 24
n-wnt sp=f xft mAat
‘He has no action conforming to Maat.’

143 A similar word of caution is voiced by Jay (2008: 83, n.11): ‘(...) any conclusions drawn from the
tale must be extremely tentative.’
144 Text: Dziobek 1998: 23-43, pl.2, with the much improved readings by Vernus 20102b: 59-61, 71-2.
Studies: Gnirs 2013b: 138-42; Vernus 20102b: 59-62; Dziobek 1998: 44-54.
145 The Vizieral Cycle also includes Appointment of the Vizier (/Berufung: Dziobek 1998: 3-21; Helck
1955a), Installation of the Vizier (/Einsetzung: Faulkner 1955a; Dziobek 1998: 55-66), and Duties
of the Vizier (van den Boorn 1988; Tallet 2010; 2005; a new publication of the text in TT 29
(Amenemope) is in preparation by the Mission Archéologique de la Nécropole Thébaine). Among
these, Duties are debated as to their original date of composition: see §2.8.3.5.
146 I thank Dimitri Laboury for discussion of the visual and architectural dimensions of display
associated with the Vizieral Cycle.
147 Following Vernus 20102b: 72, n.127-8.
148 Following Vernus 20102b: 71, n.102.

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 36 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

The negation n-wnt149 goes back to the Old Kingdom, is found in Coffin Texts, in
First Intermediate Period inscriptions, and in Letters to the Dead, and recurs in
some Second Intermediate Period texts. It is, however, fairly rare in the Middle
Kingdom,150 when it is found only in two literary texts (the monostich maxims on
P. Ramesseum II vso I.6 and Sasobek B1.30; B2.10; F1.1; F1.2). In the Eigh-
teenth Dynasty, the negation enjoys considerable popularity in higher registers
specifically,151 mainly in inscriptions.152 It also features twice in the L2 version of
Ptahhotep, in 212 L2 (this verse is not in P; L1 is not preserved for this section)
and in 315 L2 (P and L1 have nn wn, as is more common in Middle Kingdom
literature). The recherché character of the construction is further demonstrated by
occasional instances where it is subjected to linguistic dissimilation with nn wn,
including once in a text that directly relates the Vizieral Cycle itself, Rekhmire 35
(Urk. IV 1082, 1-2).153 Similarly subjected to linguistic dissimilation is an occur-
rence in Amenhotep II’s Sphinx Stela 11-12 (Urk. IV 1279, 12-14).154

(iv) Aametju 42 iptn ‘these’

On the distribution of these archaizing demonstratives in the Middle Egyptian
record, §4.6.3.A; also §4.7.1 and §4.3.4.A.

(v) Aametju 43
sTs?=k ib=sn snf ib=k m nfr-ib (...)
‘You should raise(?) their spirits. It is through pleasure that your heart makes
breathe(?) (...)’
%nf is an uncommon expression.155 More remarkable is nfr-ib ‘pleasure’, which
recurs in only one other text, Amenemhat156 (6b and 14f, echoing each other:
wnwt nt nfr-ib ‘an hour of pleasure’; §2.2.2, (ix)). In Aametju, the expression nfr-
ib phonetically resonates with the preceding snf ib. The immediate context is full
of ib’s, by a trope that is common in Middle Egyptian literature (with ib’s them-

149 Detailed studies by Vernus in prep. (§20-5 in the preprint, focusing on the more specific verbal
construction, n-wnt sDm=f); Gunn 20122: 164-8; additional examples from other corpuses in TLA
#450141.
150 E.g. Bersheh II, pl.XXI, top, 14 (quoted by Borghouts 2010: I, §92c, (ii)).
151 For the verbal construction studied by him (n-wnt sDm=f), Vernus in prep. (heading the section
§20-5 in the preprint) writes of an outright ‘revival’ in higher written registers, since this
construction seems to be entirely lacking in any preserved Middle Kingdom and Second
Intermediate Period texts. The case of the non-verbal construction here considered (n-wnt NP) is
different, since this undergoes no discontinuation in use in the Middle Kingdom or Second
Intermediate Period; the suddenly fairly common use of the construction in Eighteenth Dynasty
higher written registers is no less noteworthy.
152 E.g. Tempest Stela ro 7/vso 9 (HHBT 106, 7/8); Urk. IV 159, 9; 363, 12; 388, 5; 519, 3; 973, 11;
993, 1; 994, 5; 1818, 6. After the Eighteenth Dynasty also in inscriptions by Sethi I (Vernus in
prep.: §23).
153 With Gardiner’s (1925) collation; noted by Gunn 20122: 167.
154 Stauder 2013: §5.1, n.88.
155 Noted by Dziobek 1998: 38; on snf, further Parkinson 2012a: 250.
156 Noted by Dziobek 1998: 38.

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 37

selves, compare Ptahhotep 60-83;157 with a word-play with the root ibi ‘be
thirsty’, Eloquent Peasant B2 117-119;158 Kagemni 1.5-6).

B. Expression and tropes in Aametju are also typical of Middle Egyptian teachings,
or literature more broadly:

(vi) Aametju 30
ib s nb m mkt hnw=f
‘Every man’s attention is the protection of their family(?)’
A generalized statement with s ‘a man’, here quantified, as is common in Middle
Egyptian teachings and discourses (similarly in Aametju 20: (ii)).

(vii) Aametju 19
kkw pw HDw tp-rd=s
‘The one who disobeys its (scil. Maat’s) rules is a thing of darkness.’
Semantically a classifying pattern, expressing a categorization. Compare e.g.
Merikare E 91 is aAmw Xs qsn pw n bw nt=f im ‘Behold, the vile Asiatic, he is a
painful thing for the place where he is’; Ptahhotep 81 P qsn pw HDDw Hwrw159
‘The one who destroys the wretched is a thing of pain.’

(viii) Aametju 25
[...] Hr grgw=f mAA=f st mi gsAt [n] ib
‘[...] because of his lies. He sees them like the tilting of the heart.’
A trope consisting in a paradoxical comparison with an event of ‘seeing’ or
‘finding’ in an ‘emphatic construction’.160 Compare e.g. Merikare E 55 mAA=sn
aHaw m wnwt ‘They see lifetime as an hour’; P. Ramesseum II vso II.3 gmm=f xt
mitw=f mi xpr biAt ‘He appreciates a thing of his like (i.e. commensurate with
him, or with his status) as if a wonder was happening.’

(ix) Aametju 29-32

mk tw m mkt snD sAw ib [...]
mk tw m [...]
mk tw wrH.ti Hr DfA [...]
mk tw m imDr xsf Dwt [...]
‘Look, you are a protection of the fearful, one who comforts [...]
Look, you are [...]
Look, you are anointed while nourishing(?) [...]
Look, you are a rampart, one who repels evil [...]’

157 Stauder in press c: §5.

158 Parkinson 2012a: 304-5; 2002: 127-8.
159 On the reading Hwrw, rather than Hwrw-ib, Stauder in press c.
160 Vernus 20102b: 206-7, with these, and more, examples.

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 38 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

A sequence of assimilations expressed by mk tw-headed clauses as in Eloquent

Peasant B1 199-210 (‘heralded’ by B1 192-193161). ImDr ‘rampart’ is noteworthy as
well: a very rare word, this recurs perhaps only in P. UC 32157 ro (Senwosret III’s
Illahun Hymns), II.14 (said of the king).162

C. Aametju, a ‘teaching’ (sbAyt, col.1), adopts the classical setting of this type of
written discourse, as a set of instructions spoken by an ageing father to his son to
whom he is to hand over office. The text includes various intertextual references to
the paradigmatic exponent of the ‘genre’, Ptahhotep.163 Aametju displays connections,
thematic and in phraseology, also to other Middle Egyptian teachings, notably
Merikare and A Man to His Son.164 The language and expression of Aametju accord
with such continuity in format and motifs.
The two contrasting linguistic registers of Aametju and of the slightly more recent
Astarte may be viewed as polar opposites. The former, composed in Middle Egyptian,
relates to a type of written discourse with a long written tradition. The latter is highly
innovative in its linguistic register, as it is in other relevant aspects, including its
cultural setting and ‘genre’, which does not make reference to a preceding tradition.

1.3.3 The textual loci of innovative expressions

In appreciating the spread of innovations in written registers, the textual loci in which
innovative expressions are found in the Second Intermediate Period and early New
Kingdom merit consideration. The distribution is principled.

1.3.3.1 The Second Intermediate Period

A. Second Intermediate Period inscriptional registers occasionally accommodate
innovative expressions. Examples from the (mid-)Thirteenth Dynasty165 include:

161 Parkinson 2012a: 163.

162 CT VII 484h (mentioned by HannLex 5: 274b) is to be read as imi-Drw.
163 This includes one case of a quotation adapted from Ptahhotep (Aametju 23; Ptahhotep 265-269:
see Hagen 2012a: 194-6; Vernus 20102b: 61-2; Dziobek 1998: 29-30). The same passage is also
quoted in Installation of the Vizier, which includes yet another quotation, explicitly marked as such
(Hagen 2012a: 189-94; Moers 2001: 127-8, both with references to previous literature; Fischer-
Elfert 1994: 45). Interestingly, the L2 version of Ptahhotep shows some textual amplification right
after 269. In this context, the mention of the ‘staff of old age’ (mdw iAwt: Aametju 26) is significant
as well (e.g. Gnirs 2013b: 137; on the expression more generally, Blumenthal 1987), as is an
allusion to the Ptahhotepian motif of old age in Appointment of the Vizier 8-11. The figure of
Ptahhotep is a prominent reference in the self-presentation of the Aametju-User-Rekhmire dynasty:
as an analysis of the strings of vizieral titles held by these viziers demonstrates, these compare
tightly with the titles of Ptahhotep in the Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses of the Teaching (Hagen
2012a: 223-6).
164 Dziobek 1998: 23-39, 49-52. For Merikare, also §2.8.3.7, (d).
165 In an historian’s perspective, the early and mid-Thirteenth Dynasty still belong to the late Middle
Kingdom, in view of the substantial continuity in institutions and productions of material culture
(e.g. Grajetzki 2006). Examples from the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty are included here since they
display some linguistic features not present in similar texts from the late Twelfth Dynasty.
Moreover, some of these features recur in the Seventeenth Dynasty, justifying a common
presentation in this section.

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 39

A forerunner to the sequential

(i) Ameniseneb, Louvre C12 (temp. Khendjer), 4-5166
aHa.n wD rDt m Hr=i m Dd
bAk sipty nb nty m pA r-pr
iw=i Hr irt mi wddt nbt
‘It was ordered to command me with these words:
“Carry out the inspection of everything there is in this temple!”
And I begun acting167 like all that had been ordered.’
Sim. 5-8 iw rD.n(=i) (...) iw=i Hr xrp ib=i (...) ‘I caused (...) And I begun
conducting my heart (...)’.
In Ameniseneb, the sequential is almost seen emerging from the circumstantial
function of iw=f Hr sDm in narrative context. In both instances, a strictly circum-
stantial interpretation has become impossible (thus: ‘!?It was ordered to me (...)
while I was acting (...)’),168 yet an interpretation as textual background is still
possible (thus: ‘It was ordered to me (...); I was (then) acting (...)’). The
sequential proper, where no interpretation other than in the main narrative chain is
possible, is first documented by Thutmosis III – Amenhotep II (§1.1.2.B, (b)).

Innovative uses of tw
- Nty tw r sDm:
(ii) Abydos Boundary Stela usurped by Neferhotep (early D.13), 5
ir rf nty Twsic nb r gmt=f (...)
‘As regards, however, the one who will be found (...)’
The first occurrence on stone; the construction is found in documentary texts
since the late Twelfth Dynasty (§5.2.4.A).

- aHa.n.tw – pseudoparticiple:
(iii) Ameniseneb, Louvre C11, 16-17
aHa.n mA nA n kAwt
aHa.n.tw Haw im wr r xt nbt
‘These works were inspected
One (scil. the king) was much rejoiced about them, more than anything.’
The first instance of tw combined with aHa.n and the only one before the early
New Kingdom.169

166 Noted by Vernus 1990a: 193.

167 The inchoative meaning need not reflect an early stage of development of the construction, since it
may be an effect of the atelic Aktionsart of the event (Jean Winand, p.c. 6/2013).
168 Vernus 1990a: 193.
169 This also the first occurrence of tw with the pseudoparticiple. The combination would remain rare
at all subsequent times, for semantic reasons: the pseudoparticiple, a stative-resultative form,

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 40 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

Turning to texts of the Seventeenth Dynasty, examples of innovative expressions

include:

Iw.tw r sDm
(iv) Stèle Juridique (Nebirierau, D.17), 21
iw.tw r rDt arq=sn (...)
‘They will be made to swear (...)’
The first occurrence on stone; the construction is found in documentary texts
since the late Twelfth Dynasty: §5.2.4.1.

New subject pronoun

(v) Antefnakht’s Stela (later D.17), 3
it=k m nxt-a tw=k m nsw (...)
‘May you seize as a strong-armed one. You are king (...)’
Sim. Emhab 11 (quoted below, §3.4.1.4, (iii)); Kamose Inscriptions, passim
(§3.4.1.3, (a)).
170
The first occurrence of the new subject pronouns; see §3.4.1.3.

Morphologically overt embedding of the secondary predication (iw=f Hr sDm,

rather than older Hr sDm) after an expression of ‘spending time’:
(vi) Emhab 8-9: discussed below, §3.3.1, (iii)
The second oldest occurrence of the construction.

Analytical setting construction (wnn=f Hr sDm rather than older mrr=f)

(vii) Emhab 11-12
wnn=f Hr Xdb iw=i Hr sanx
‘Whenever he kills, I sustain.’
This is the first occurrence of the construction and has accordingly attracted
commentary;171 so has the motif.172

(Varia in Kamose Inscriptions: below, §1.3.3.2.)

B. In the same periods, other texts do not include any innovative expressions. In the
early Thirteenth Dynasty, Sobekhotep I’s Abydos Stela, a text dealing with ‘religious’
or ‘ritual’ topics, has the bare construction of the first person singular pseudo-

strongly privileges topical subjects; tw, on the other hand, serves to express non-specified
reference. In Ameniseneb, the clause aHa.n.tw Haw (...) concludes the inspection of works, hence the
use of a pseudoparticiple, with, as often, paragraph-conclusive force. The inspection is conducted
by the king (10-11 xw-bAq), hence the use of a tw-marked construction to keep the royal participant
unexpressed; in such ‘honorific passive’ construction, the unexpressed participant is highly topical.
170 Noted by Vernus 1996c: 834 and n.m; subsequently Morenz 2012b: 203-5.
171 Full references in Klotz 2010: 234, n.203.
172 Klotz 2010: 234-6, 241, n.254; Baines 1987.

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 41

participle, which is associated with higher written registers in Middle Egyptian. The
text also has some antiquated flavor in the use of wnt (for by then regular ntt) to
introduce an object clause:

(viii) Sobekhotep I’s Abydos Stela 8-11

i.kw xr=k (...) i.kw xr=k (...)
i.Dd=ka n Hr wnt wi Ha.kw (...)
‘I have come to you (...) I have come to you (...)
May you say to Horus that I am excited (...)’
a) This spelling of the subjunctive is untypical of any Eleventh or Twelfth Dynasty Middle
Egyptian orthographic standards, but common in the Old Kingdom, particularly in
Pyramid Texts. In the later Thirteenth Dynasty, it recurs in Horemkhauef 5. Whether
some archaizing intent is involved in these two cases or not remains difficult to assess.

In the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty, Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela differs from e.g.
Sinuhe in narrrative style and displays connections with other literary compositions
such as Cheops’ Court that have been discussed as exponents of a ‘low tradition’ of
Middle Egyptian literature, already documented in the late Twelfth Dynasty
(§2.4.4.3). As regards language proper, however, the composition is fully in Middle
Egyptian, with no innovative features at all. In particular, the old contrast between
N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr sDm as expressions of unextensive and extensive aspect,
respectively, is significant (§2.6.3.1, (iv)).173 Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela also
accommodates the antiquated plural demonstrative ipn. As the association of the
expressions with the ‘companions’ (smrw) in dialogue with the king implies, this
selection is related to the format of the ‘Royal Tale’, of which the composition is an
early exponent (for this association, further §4.3.4.A; §4.6.3.A). In view of other more
superficially archaizing elements in the inscription, the selection of ipn may
additionally be set in relation to the search for old texts, concerned in the inscription
itself,174 and to other archaizing tendencies manifest in the reign of Neferhotep.175 A
token of stylistic elaboration lies in the linguistic dissimilation with other demon-
stratives used in similar contexts in the same composition176 (for dissimilation of
demonstratives, further §2.4.4.2.1; §4.6.3.B):

(ix) Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela:

12 Dd.in smrw ipn (...)
6, 14 Dd.in nn n smrw (...)
‘These companions said (...)’

From the (mid?-)Seventeenth Dynasty,177 Rahotep’s Coptos Stela is another early

exponent of the ‘Royal Tale’.178 Although much shorter than Neferhotep’s Great

173 Similarly in Sobekhotep IV’s Karnak Stela 5 (§2.6.3.1, (i)).

174 Stauder 2013: §10.2 and n.312-5.
175 Laboury 2013.
176 Vernus 1996b: 164.
177 The position of Rahotep in the Seventeenth Dynasty is disputed: see Bennett 2002, with references
to the previous discussion.

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 42 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

Abydos Stela and incompletely preserved, the text appears to be similarly written in a
Middle Egyptian variety with no innovative features. As a token of the high linguistic
register of the inscription, note for instance the use of discourse-connective is
(§1.2, (ix)):

(x) Rahotep’s Coptos Stela 3-4

w[D]t kA=k xprt=sn ity nb=n
Hw is pw nty m rA=k
siA [is p]w n[ty m ib=k]
‘What you Ka orders is what will happen, sovereign our lord,
for the one in your mouth is Hu,
for the one in your heart is Sia.’

Yet another token of the high standards of written Middle Egyptian cultivated in the
Second Intermediate Period is Wadi el-Hôl #8,179 from the initial stages of the Theban
Seventeenth Dynasty.180 Although the text is short and damaged, its language seems
to include no innovative expressions. From its incipt ([HA]ti-a [m ...]t.n (...)) to its
closing (rS=f pw (...)181), the inscription is replete with literary echoes and motifs, and
displays strong literarizing features.182
C. Registers that accommodate innovative expressions such as discussed first (above,
A) are to be appreciated in the context of a period that also saw the production of texts
accommodating no innovative expressions and composed in a high register of Middle
Egyptian (B).
Among texts with innovative expressions, a first group includes the Abydos
Boundary Stela usurped by Neferhotep (ii) and Stèle Juridique (iv): the innovative
expressions discussed in these texts are first documented in late Twelfth Dynasty
documentary registers (A, with cross-references). The same texts make a broad use of
pA’s and pAy=f possessives,183 which are equally widespread in the same late Twelfth
Dynasty documentary texts. This is significant in terms of register, given the indexical
load of pA’s (§2.4.4.2.1): while published on stone, Abydos Boundary Stela and Stèle
Juridique thus relate to a documentary register, which in its configuration reaches
back to the late Twelfth Dynasty (and in part beyond). Significant of such register is
also the use of the precursor construction of the conjunctive, Hna sDm. The construc-
tion, which is first documented in an Eighth Dynasty royal decree, is in common use
in Twelfth Dynasty documentary registers and letters and recurs in similar registers in
the Thirteenth Dynasty (mainly P. Brooklyn 34.1446184 and P. Berlin 10470185). In

178 E.g. Hofmann 2004: 100-4.

179 Darnell 2002: 107-19.
180 Darnell (2002: 118-9) suggests a dating to Antef V.
181 Possibly in echo to Sinuhe B 60-61; see Darnell 2002: 114, n.hh.
182 Analyzed in details by the editor in his textual notes and commentary; more general comments,
Darnell 2002: 115.
183 E.g. Abydos Boundary Stela usurped by Neferhotep 3; Stèle Juridique 5. As to be expected, the
expressions still carry deictic force by the time, e.g. Abydos Boundary Stela 3 pA tA-Dsr ‘this sacred
land’ (scil. the land which the very boundary stela is to delimit).
184 Two royal decrees, perhaps from the reign of Khendjer (HHBT 11-2): I.11; II.6; passim.

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 43

inscriptionally published documentary texts of the Second Intermediate Period, it is

found for instance in Sobekemsaf’s Medamud Endowment Inscription 6 and in
Nubkheperre Antef’s Coptos Decree 10 (negative construction) and 11 (positive
construction). As expected, the same texts also accommodate the indexically loaded
pA’s and related preposed possessives.186 According with such register, Nubkheperre
Antef’s Coptos Decree further has two early instances of tm + infinitive (6 tm sxAt; 10
tm rDt).
Two other innovative expressions discussed above—a forerunner construction of
the sequential and an innovative construction of tw—are from the mid-Thirteenth
Dynasty inscriptions of Ameniseneb (Louvre C11 and C12: (i) and (iii)), one of the
few private inscriptions of the period to go beyond phraseologically bound formu-
lations. Significantly, the Ameniseneb texts accommodate pA’s and related preposed
possessives.187 Their register is also marked by its decidedly simple narrative style.
The texts consist mostly in main clauses, which in Louvre C11 are almost invariably
based on a aHa.n-construction in direct sequence to each other. A similar type of
patterning is found in the late Twelfth Dynasty Semna Dispatches,188 in a contempo-
raneous biography that recounts military activity, Khusobek, and in literary texts
associated with what has been described as a ‘low tradition’ of Middle Egyptian
literature (§2.4.4.3, (i)). The patterning in Ameniseneb is extreme in its simplicity.
Innovative expressions are found in yet another group of texts, clustering at the
very end of the Second Intermediate Period: Kamose Inscriptions, Emhab, and
Antefnakht. Beyond linguistic register and time, these are also allied by subject matter
and therefore warrant a joint discussion (the next section).

1.3.3.2 Kamose Inscriptions, Emhab, Antefnakht

The discussion is best begun with the longest, and stylistically most elaborate, of
these texts, Kamose Inscriptions. While it is commonplace to observe that these are
replete with innovative expressions, their register turns out to be complex.
A. Kamose Inscriptions189 accommodate many innovative expressions, more than
any other text in the preceding centuries, and more than any other non-documentary
text in the following centuries until at least Amarna, if not later (with the singular
exception of Astarte: §1.3.2.2). A selection includes:

185 A legal document (Smither 1948; HHBT 50-4); passim.

186 Sobekemsaf’s Medamud Endowment Inscription 4-5 and passim; Nubkheperre Antef’s Coptos
Decree 4-5 and passim.
187 As always in the Second Intermediate Period, these are still deictic, e.g. Louvre C12, 3 ir iAwy=k
nfr m tA Hwt-nTr nt pAy=k nTr ‘Do your good old age in this temple of this god of yours’ (inscribed
on a stela relating Ameniseneb’s works for this very god in this very temple).
188 E.g. Semna Dispatches (Smither 1945) 2, x+13-14 aHa.n wSd.n=i nA n mDAyw r Dd i.n.Tn tnw aHa.n
Dd.n=sn i.n=n Hr Xnmt i[b]hyt ‘And then I addressed these Nubians thus: “Where have you come
from?” And then they said: “We have come through the well of Ibhat.” ’
189 Text: HHBT 82-98.

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 44 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

Broad use of the new subject pronouns tw=i, etc.

Passim. The occurrences in Kamose Inscriptions are among the earliest. Early
occurrences, including for two centuries after Kamose Inscriptions, are mostly from
lower written registers (compare the tableau of early attestation below, §3.4.1.3).

Past tense sDm=f

Passim (one example quoted below: §1.3.3.2, (xiv)). The occurrences in Kamose
190
Inscriptions are the first.

Balanced construction kA (...) kA (...)

(i) Kamose Inscriptions T. Carn. 7
sw Xr tA [n] aAmw tw=n X[r] kmt
kA iy nt[y] Hr [irt r=n] k[A] ir=n r=f
‘He holds the land of the Asiatics, we hold Egypt.
As the one acting against us may come, we will act against him.’
This seems to be the first occurrence in any text preserved.

Exclamative xy
(ii) Kamose Inscriptions St.II 30-31
xy pA xnt nfr n pA HqA a.w.s. Xr mSa=f r-HAt=f
‘What a beautiful sailing upstream of this ruler L.P.H. with his army before
him!’
What is probably the same particle is documented once, used interrogatively, in a
much earlier text, significantly a letter (Heqanakht I vso 4; 15). Further early
occurrences of xy in interrogative use are from the Eighteenth Dynasty, again in
epistolary contexts.191 Related to these are exclamatory uses such as the one in
Kamose Inscriptions.192 These would become common in the New Kingdom, in
texts relating to royal ideology and ‘personal piety’.193 The instance in Kamose
Inscriptions is the first.

@msi evolving toward an auxiliary (?)

(iii) Kamose Inscriptions T. Carn. 3
(...) Hms.kw smA.kw m aAmysic nHsy
‘(...) me finding myself (lit. sitting) associated with an Asiatic and a Nubian.’
@msi used as an auxiliary is not uncommon in Late Egyptian.194 In (iii), the
semantics of Hmsi as a full lexical verb still shimmer through, contributing nega-

190 Provisionally Kruchten 1999: 8-14, 19-20.

191 Vernus 2006: 156, ex.50-2.
192 That the two uses are tightly related to each other is convincingly argued by Vernus 2006: 156-7,
who also quotes the instance in Kamose Inscriptions (156, n.84).
193 Vernus 2006: 156, n.84, with further references.
194 Winand 2006: 329-33.

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 45

tive overtones of idleness,195 a topic central in Kamose’s debate with the court.
An alternative rendering, equally possible, would be as ‘(...) me sitting (idle) as-
sociated with (...)’.

Lexicon, military, e.g.:

(iv) St.II 13 tA-nt-Htr ‘chariotry(?)’ (the first occurrence);
(v) St.II 34 ‘sickle-shaped sword’ (the first occurrence: §5.5.1.1).

Lexicon, other, e.g.:

(vi) T. Carn. 4 and passim: SAa-r ‘until’ (only one earlier securely dated
occurrence, in P. Bulaq 18 (D.13): §2.7.3.3, (i)).

Very significant is also the presence of the ‘exploratory Future III’,196 a construction
consisting in the use of the new subject pronoun in the NP r sDm pattern. Not only are
the two Kamose Inscriptions occurrences the first. What is more, the expression
would rapidly disappear in those written standards that make up the preserved written
record of Egyptian, being superseded in these by the regular, iw-introduced, Late
Egyptian ‘Future III’ (documented by Thutmosis III: §1.1.2.B, (c)). The ‘exploratory
Future III’ is therefore a construction that did not catch on in written standards as
these begun being redefined in the early Eighteenth Dynasty. It offers a rare glimpse
on other, non-standard, varieties of Egyptian that existed simultaneously:
(vii) Kamose Inscriptions T. Carn. 4
tw=i r THn Hna=f sd=i Xt=f
‘I am going to engage in battle with him and I will break his body.’
Sim. St.I 10 t[w]=i [r] xd (...) ‘I am going to sail downstream (...)’.

B. These innovative features in Kamose Inscriptions cluster in dialogal exchange

(between Kamose and the courtiers, then in Kamose’s direct speech to Apopi, and in
Apopi’s letter to the Nubian ruler). Beyond linguistic register, dialogal exchange is
more broadly characterized as such in Kamose Inscriptions by other devices, evoking
a more ‘spontaneous’ performance of grammar, or ‘oral’ style. Among these,
instances of cataphoric anticipation of pronouns in questions are diagnostic, be the
cataphoric pronoun the object of the interrogation (viii), or not (ix):

(viii) Kamose Inscriptions St.II 20 (Apopi speaking)

Hr m aHa=k m HqA nn rDt rx=i
‘You stand up as a ruler on what account, without letting me know?’
The more formal phrasing would have been with the interrogative in situ, e.g.
Cheops’ Court 5.20-21 tm=t Xn [Hr m] ‘Why don’t you row?’ (note that Cheops’
Court itself also has the alternative construction as in Kamose Inscriptions:
§2.4.4.7, (i)). The construction in Kamose Inscriptions compares with e.g.

195 For Hmsi associated with idleness, e.g. Amenemhat 11d (with positive overtones).
196 Or ‘Frühneuägyptisches Futur’ in Kroeber’s (1970: 93-7) terms.

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 46 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

P. Louvre 3230B (Tay to Ahmes Peniati; temp. Hatshepsut), 2 Hr m pA nHm tA bAkt

wnt Hna=i rD.ti n ky ‘Why this taking away of the servant that was with me so that
she will be given to someone else?’197

(ix) Kamose Inscriptions T. Carn. 3 (Kamose speaking)

siA=i sw r ix pAy=i nxt (...)
‘On what shall I recognize it, this victory of mine (...)?’
Cataphoric sw, with the full lexical expression of the object phrase right-
dislocated (instead of more formal, and less easily processed, *siA=i pAy=i nxt r
ix). In another context that purports to present speech as if spontaneous, also in a
war council, compare Urk. IV 649, 15-17 (Thutmosis III’s Annals) sw mi ix Smt
Hr mTn pn nty wA r Hns iw.tw Hr smit r-Dd (...) ‘How will it be, walking on this
path which has now become narrow, when it is reported that (...)?’

Such strategies aim at a characterization, yet the result, which is stylized, does not
come anywhere close to whatever actual ‘sermo quotidianus’ may have been: the
evoked ‘dialogal register’ is itself a construct. The accommodation of innovative
features is selective: presentative/phatic mk, for instance, is used consistently
(T. Carn. 4; passim), even though ptr had long been innovated in similar usage, and
had found acceptance in some literary registers (§2.4.3.1, (i)). Moreover, tokens of
‘spontaneous performance’ are not exclusive of a high degree of formal elaboration
and matching syntactic complexity. The following broader segment of speech, for
example, includes the cataphoric construction just described (ix) and one of the inno-
vative expressions noted above (Hmsi evolving to uses as an auxiliary: (iii)), yet is
semantically balanced on various levels. Its syntax is highly complex as well: Hms.kw
smA.kw, asyndetically embedded,198 has its antecedent not in the previous clause (wr
m ...), but in the clause before (siA=i sw ...). Pronominal cohesion thereby bridges over
an intervening clause; the construction is as difficult to process (long-distance
dependency) as it is rare in the Egyptian written record:199

197 Noted by Vernus 2006: 169-70, ex.113, who draws the parallel with Kamose Inscriptions St.II 20
(169, ex.112).
198 Morphologically overt embedding is also found in Kamose Inscriptions, e.g., also with a pseudo-
participle, St.II 3 sDm.t(w) hmhmt nt pAy=i mSa iw=i mni.kw r pr-Dd-qn ib=i Aw ‘One will hear the
war-cry of this army of mine, when I am moored at Per-Djed-Qen, my heart dilated.’ The contrast
may be one of register, but it need not: in St.II 3, iw may also have some contrastive or assertoric
force.
199 A rare parallel that comes to mind is from Weni, a text of highest linguistic and stylistic
elaboration: 44-45 (Urk. I 108, 3-9): (...) wsxt (...) sp.t(i) (...) sT n wn (...) mni r (...) ‘(...) a barge
(...), assembled (...), and, although there was no (...), moored to (...)’. %p.t(i) and mni r are here
dependent on wsxt, the sequence of the two interrupted by an intervening background clause, sT n
wn (...).

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 47

(x) Kamose Inscriptions T. Carn. 3

siA=i sw r ix pAy=i nxt
wr m Hwt-wart ky m kSi
Hms.kw smA.kw m aAmy nHsy
s nb Xr fdq=f m tA kmt <Hr> psS tA Hna=i
‘On what shall I recognize it, this victory of mine,
when there is a chief in Avaris, another one in Kush,
me finding myself (lit. me sitting (idle)) associated with an Asiatic and a
Nubian
and everyone having their share of this Egypt, dividing the land with me?’

C. Just as for the great many innovative expressions they accommodate, Kamose
Inscriptions are remarkable for their high level of Middle Egyptian, of which the
following may serve as an illustration.
The first example (xi), from Kamose’s account of early military activities,
includes various instances of asyndetic dependency (mSa=i (...), pDwt (...); iAbtt (...),
mSa (...)). Long-distance inter-clausal integration is signaled by the lack of iw in the
first clause (xd.n=i (...)).200 Rather remarkably, this main verbal event (xd.n=i) is
gapped before the second set of r + infinitive (r HHy (...); r dr (...)):

(xi) Kamose Inscriptions T. Carn. 10-12

xd.n=i n nxt=i r sAsA aAmw m wD imn mty sxrw
mSa=i qn r-HAt=i mi hhy n sDt
pDwt nt mDAyw (m) Hrt TArt=n
–– r HHy sttyw r dr swt=sn
iAbtt imntt Xr aD iry
mSa Hr DfAw m xwt m st nbt
sb.n=i (...)
‘I fared downstream owing to my strength to drive back the Asiatics, as a
decreed mission of Amun of right designs,
my brave army in front of me like the fiery breath of a flame,
the Medjai-troops on top of our encampments;
–– to seek out the Setetiu-Asiatics, to subdue their places,
east and west carrying their fat,
the army feeding on things in every place.
I sent out (...)’

Kamose’s pièce de bravoure (xii) is based on parallelism, with amplification in the

second round (wbd=i (...)) and ultimate closure (1sg, 1sg, 1sg  3pl btA.n=sn):
subjunctive (wAH=i) – anterior (xbA.n=i)
subjunctive (wbd=i) – (...) anterior (btA.n=sn)

200 In an elementary form, a similar sequence is in the Eleventh Dynasty Deir el-Ballas Inscription
x+9. This probably formed a basic elements of such texts. Contrastively, this highlights the
extraordinary elaboration given to the same element in Kamose Inscriptions.

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 48 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

The patterning, which highlights xbA.n=i and btA.n=sn, is expressive of a major point
made by Kamose, his pledge to destroy the enemy’s towns in reciprocity for their
betrayal of Egypt, ‘their mistress’:

(xii) Kamose Inscriptions St.II 17-19

wAH=i st m wS{A} nn rmT im
xbA.n=i niwwt=sn
wbd=i swt=sn ir m iAwt Dsrwt n Dt
Hr pA HDt ir=sn m-Xnw tA kmt Dw st Hr sDm iAaS n aAmw
btA.n=sn kmt Hnwt=sn
‘I shall lay them void, nobody in them
when I have laid their towns waste;
I shall burn their places so that they will be turned into red mounds forever,
because of this destruction they do within this Egypt, those who have
placed themselves in the service of the Asiatics,
when they have transgressed Egypt, their mistress.’

D. The extracts quoted are illustrative of entire sections of Kamose Inscriptions

composed in Middle Egyptian. Significantly, such elevated linguistic and stylistic
register can on occasions itself accommodate innovative expressions: the linguistic
selections of Kamose Inscriptions are inclusive.
In the following passage (xiii), the second clause begins with a new subject
pronoun, a saliently innovative expression by Kamose’s times. The first clause, with
which the second clause forms a higher-order unit, has a pseudoparticiple used in
setting function (spr.kw), a construction that relates to the highest registers of Middle
Egyptian (§1.2, (iii)-(v)). The two constructions, which belong to altogether different
layers of language, are here naturally accommodated to each other:
(xiii) Kamose Inscriptions St.II 4-5
spr.kw r inyt-nt-xnt
tw=i DA.kw n=sn r wSd st
‘Having reached Inyt-net-khenet,
I crossed over to them to address them.’

The closing sequence of final return (xiv) is introduced, saliently so, by xy, an
expression associated with registers otherwise documented in letters (§1.3.3.2, (ii)).
The main event in the narrative chain (mnmn=i) is a past tense sDm=f, yet another
innovative expression, first documented in Kamose Inscriptions themselves. The
following string of clauses, which provides descriptive information (compare the non-
dynamic constructions), is introduced by iw. The exact same macro-syntactic articula-
tion is found in the opening of Sinuhe, where the five clauses on the court’s mourning
(R 8-11) are similarly related to the preceding paragraph (Amenemhat’s apotheosis: R
5-8).201 The whole section is reminiscent of earlier expedition accounts, for instance,

201 I disagree with Kruchten 1999: 59, who here views iw as circumstantial in function: if so, a similar
analysis should extend to the opening of Sinuhe as well. Further above, n.32.

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 49

in a literarized form, the opening of Shipwrecked Sailor.202 While Shipwrecked Sailor

2-6 has a progressive construction (s nb Hr Hpt (...)), Kamose Inscriptions have N(P)
sDm=f (discussed below, §2.6.3.1.C): both constructions are consistent with literary
registers of Middle Egyptian, but the one in Kamose Inscriptions of a yet higher level:

(xiv) Kamose Inscriptions St.II 30-33

xy pA xnt nfr (...)
mnmn=i r sAtw niwt tr Axt
iw Hr nb HD tA m rsf mryt abab.ti wAst m Hb Hmwt TAw iw r mAn=i
st nbt Hpt=s 2-nw=s nn Hr Xr rmyt
‘What a beautiful sailing upstream (...)!
I moved to the ground of the Town at Inundation season.
Every face was illuminated, the land in exuberance, the shore excited, Thebes
in celebration, women and men had come to see me,
every woman hugged her fellow, no face shedding a tear.’

E. The linguistic register of Kamose Inscriptions is composed: the linguistic

spectrum of Kamose Inscriptions is broad, ranging from numerous innovative expres-
sions, some of which here documented for the first time, to whole sequences in a rich
and complex Middle Egyptian. Linguistic contrasts are established between different
parts of the text, yet linguistic inclusiveness is also within individual sentences, in
dialogal and non-dialogal parts alike. The contrasts in linguistic selections are
mirrored on the level of rhythm. Sections accommodating innovative expressions in
some density typically also have a more direct rhythm, while sections composed in
interference-free Middle Egyptian display long and complexly articulated periods.
The former sections involve various participants with whom the king interacts, while
the latter consist in pledges and narratives uttered by the king to a broader, text-exter-
nal, and in part prospective audience. The sense of immediacy and urgency conveyed
in the former sections is contrastively set against, and thereby highlights, the high
diction, and august self-confidence expressed in royal speeches. Stylistically, linguis-
tic selections and rhythm combine in supporting a major component of the projected
meaning of the text.
Innovative expressions cluster in what may be termed a ‘dialogal register’, which
is entirely artificial, a construct. They also relate to what may be termed a ‘war
register’: while resonating with Middle Egyptian literature, Kamose Inscriptions are
simultaneously highly innovative in format and subject matter, with little direct ante-
cedents in Middle Egyptian written culture. Significantly, the contemporaneous bio-
graphical inscription of Emhab, in reference to the same events, is also distinguished
by the great many linguistically innovative selections it makes:

202 In addition, a modern reader may feel tempted to relate the description of the gathering of Thebes’
people to welcome Kamose ((...) Hmwt TAw iw r mAn=i) to the description of the gathering of
Retjenu to support Sinuhe before his fight with the strongman of Retjenu (B 131-133). Whether an
actual allusion is intended remains uncertain, however.

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 50 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

(xv) Innovative expressions in Emhab

- l.8-9: secondary predication with overt morphological marking after an
expression of ‘spending time’ (§3.3.1, (iii));
- l.11: new subject pronoun (§3.4.1.3, (a); §3.4.1.4, (iii));
- l.11-12: analytical setting construction (§1.3.3.1, (vii)).

The very earliest documented occurrence of the new subject pronoun is itself from a
text that strongly emphasizes similar aspects, Antefnakht’s Stela (§1.3.3.1, (v)).203
The selection of innovative expressions in Kamose Inscriptions and in contempo-
raneous texts that relate to a similar ‘war register’ indexes such novelty in a self-
conscious, and in the given historical context self-asserting, manner.

1.3.3.3 The early Eighteenth Dynasty

A. As emerges from a listing presented above (§1.1.2.B), innovative expressions
cluster in two types of texts in the early Eighteenth Dynasty: documentary ones
(letters and legal texts,204 including monumentalized publications thereof 205) and
‘Reden und Rufe’.206 The inclusion of innovative expressions in documentary
registers was already observed in the Second Intermediate Period and reaches back to
the Twelfth Dynasty (§1.3.3.1.A; C). Literary registers differ substantially from
documentary ones in all periods throughout the second millennium BCE (§1.3.1), the
single exception being Astarte (§1.3.3.2 and below, C). Documentary registers are
therefore irrelevant for modeling the configurations of linguistic registers of literature
possibly composed after the Middle Kingdom.
‘Reden und Rufe’ are not tokens of whatever ‘spoken language’ may have been207
(nor is, in fact, any other segment of written text in the second millennium208). Yet
they purport to evoke such spoken language, if in a conventionalized and highly
stylized form.209 Their linguistic selections, including a great many expressions meant
to be felt precisely for their innovative quality, are highly indexical. The language of

203 Compare the analysis of the text in Vernus 1996c.

204 Compare the corpuses in the classical studies by Kroeber 1970 and Kruchten 1999.
205 Examples include Ahmes-Nefertari’s Donation Stela (HHBT 100-3) or Senimose’s Will (Urk. IV
1065-70; temp. Thutmosis III). Noteworthy is also Amenhotep II’s letter to Usersatet,
inscriptionally published (Urk. IV 1343-4; Helck 1955b; on the closing part, also Morschauser
1997), and notorious for its linguistic register similar to contemporaneous letters.
206 E.g. Paheri (Tylor & Griffith 1894), Rekhmire (Davies 1943: pl.39), Sennefer (Urk. IV 1419-20).
See Guglielmi 1973 and compare the indices in Kroeber 1970.
207 E.g., discussing the distribution of m-ir sDm and m sDm as expressions of the negative imperative,
Vernus 2010a.
208 For later times, Winand (in press c) for example demonstrates that ‘word of thieves’ in the Tomb
Robbery Papyri are heavily edited to fit a set format. What individual thieves may have said,
probably under torture, was not committed to writing.
209 Vernus 2010c. An eloquent example of the fabricated nature of the language of ‘Reden und Rufe’
is given by Oréal (2011: 424-5): ‘Ces deux occurrences (scil. from Deir el-Bahari, AS) illustrent le
fait que les scènes du quotidien représentées dans les tombes ou les temples du Nouvel Empire
s’inscrivent dans une tradition (emphasis AS) qui inclut la reconstitution d’une langue orale plus
proche de celle qu’ont pu employer les bouchers de l’Ancien Empire que les contemporains,
comme le montre l’absence de swt dans les textes de la pratique.’

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 1.3 Configurations of written language 51

‘Reden und Rufe’ is therefore similarly irrelevant for modeling possible linguistic
registers of literature.
B. In the times of Thutmosis III and Amenhotep II, innovative expressions are also
found in some inscriptionally published texts and in one text that has literary features,
Astarte (also Amenhotep II). Beginning with the former, innovative expressions are
mainly in Thutmosis III’s Annals and Amenhotep II’s Syrian Campaigns. In Annals,
they cluster in the military council before the Megiddo battle,210 contributing to
characterize dialogal exchanges as if spontaneous.211 In narrative parts, innovative
expressions for instance include sequential iw=f Hr sDm,212 first documented in these
very same reigns in documentary registers.213
The sequential recurs in Amenemhab’s biographical inscription.214 This signifi-
cantly refers to military events under Amenhotep II in which the official played a
distinguished role, foregrounded in the inscription. The sequential occurs in the
episode of the mare,215 which is thereby linguistically emphasized:216 set against the
general linguistic inclusiveness of the text,217 the selection of such innovative expres-
sion serves to index a specific register developing at the same time in royal military
narratives.218 Linguistic selections thereby provide a correlate to the projected
meaning of the text, a self-presentation of the tomb owner as Amenhotep II’s intimate
follower in his campaigns. In Amenemhab’s own words: ‘(...) for he (scil. A.II)
desired me to be the companion of his feet’ (mr=f iw=i m iry rdwy=f, Urk. IV 890,
11—in a phrasing which itself includes a highly innovative expression, iw introducing
an object clause after mri219).
A similar constellation was observed on the eve of the New Kingdom, in Kamose
Inscriptions, Emhab, and Antefnakht (§1.3.3.2.E). In comparison to Kamose

210 Within a few clauses of each other, a selection includes the new subject pronoun sw (Urk. IV
649, 7; 649, 15); interrogative is-bn (Urk. IV 650, 3); combined r-Dd r-n[tt] introducing direct
discourse (Urk. IV 649, 4-5). A use of circumstantial iw with a clause with full noun subject is
perhaps the following, although some contrastive force is probably still involved: Urk. IV 650, 5-7
in-iw wnn [t]A HA[t] n=n-imy Hr aHA iw nA n [pHwy] aHa aA m aA-rw-nA n aHa.n=sn ‘Shall our vanguard
be fighting while the rearguard is waiting here in Aruna, unable to fight?’
211 E.g. the cataphoric construction in Urk. IV 649, 15-17 sw mi ix Sm[t Hr m]Tn pn (...) ‘How will it
be, walking on this path (...)?’ (§1.3.3.2, (ix)).
212 In Thutmosis III’s Annals, Urk. IV 658, 1-2; 658, 10; passim. In Amenhotep II’s Syrian
Campaigns (Memphis Stela), Urk. IV 1302, 9; 1304, 2; 1304, 5; 1304, 6; 1307, 11-12; 1308, 5.
213 Senimose’s Will 5-9 (temp. Thutmosis III); P. Berlin 10463 ro 1-2 (temp. Amenhotep II).
214 Urk. IV 889-97. Tomb TT 85, including its biographical inscription, is currently under preparation
for publication by Heike Heye; as the author tells me (p.c. 11/2011), changes with respect to the
text as in Urk. IV are very minor. A study of the inscription is announced by Baines.
215 Urk. IV 894, 5-10 aHa.n rD.n pA wr n qdSw pr wat ssmt iw[=s xAx.ti] Hr rdwy=s iw=s Hr aq m-Xnw pA
mSa iw=i Hr sxsx m-sA=s Hr rdwy Xr pAy=i mSw iw=i Hr wn Xt=s ‘The chief of Qadesh then made a
mare go out which was swift on its feet; it penetrated into the army and I run after it on my feet
with my dagger and I opened her belly.’ In this extract, also note the preposed possessive in the
phrase pAy=i mSw, with little deictic force.
216 Discussion in Stauder 2013: §7.3.
217 The overall linguistic typology of Amenemhab’s biographical inscription is rich, as are its
references, which may include Sinuhe: Stauder 2013: §7.3.
218 Significant of such communication with contemporaneous royal inscriptions is further the use of
the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive: Stauder 2013: §7.3.
219 Polis 2009: 223, ex.42.

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 52 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

Inscriptions, the register in military narratives of Thutmosis III and Amenhotep II is

both less innovative and much simpler. Innovative expressions in Amenhotep II’s
inscriptions are accommodated into a broader Middle Egyptian background.220 In a
different historical context, the extremely innovative selections in Kamose Inscrip-
tions (and, similarly, in Emhab) express a self-asserting claim to novelty, stronger
than in military narratives of the mid-Eighteenth Dynasty. Kamose Inscriptions are
also thoroughly complex in their language, including strong references to the highest
written standards of Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian: just as the texts themselves,
their linguistic register is composed. In this respect, Kamose Inscriptions have a
literarizing quality,221 which is also demonstrated, if secondarily, in their circulation
(compare T. Carnarvon I, on which the first stela of Kamose Inscriptions was
transmitted alongside Ptahhotep).222
Inscriptions recounting military activity are also preserved from the earlier Eigh-
teenth Dynasty (thus Thutmosis I’s Tombos Inscription and Thutmosis II’s Aswan
Inscription). These, and particularly the latter, are composed in the highest Middle
Egyptian standards.223 Linguistic register accords with the general format adopted in,
and significations expressed by, these texts, which also have antecedents in earlier
texts to do with royal ideology. In this respect, Tombos Inscription and Aswan
Inscription compare with Speos Artemidos or with Senwosret III’s Semna Stela, not
with Thutmosis III’s Annals and Amenhotep II’s Syrian Campaigns, even less with
Kamose Inscriptions.

220 With Vernus 1990a: 192, note for instance that the Karnak version of Amenhotep II’s Syrian
Campaigns has aHa.n sDm.n=f (Urk. IV 1311, 4) where the Memphis version has sequential iw=f Hr
sDm (Urk. IV 1302, 9), as two different expressions of a similar functional category (next stage in
the main narrative chain). Linguistic inclusiveness extends further in these texts, to expressions
that had by then some antiquated flavor. E.g., also in Amenhotep’s Syrian Campaings (Karnak
Stela) 11-12 (Urk. IV 1312, 7-11) ist sDm.n Hm=f r-Dd nhy [m] nA n stiw nty m dmi n jkT Hr ngmgm
r irt sxr n xAa tA iwayt n Hm=f [r-b]l m pA dmi r pna Hr pA [wr n ikT] nty Hr mw n Hm=f ‘His Majesty
had heard that some of these Asiatics who were in the town of Ikutj were in upheaval to make a
plan of throwing His Majesty’s garrison out of the city and to overturn the Chief of Ikutj who was
loyal to His Majesty.’ Alongside innovative expressions (r-Dd introducing an object clause; r-bl
‘out (of)’; also the broad use of pA as an index of register), the passage has ngmgm, based on a by
then obsolescent derivational pattern, n-ABAB (Vernus 2009a: 308-9; I thank Pascal Vernus, p.c.
11/2009, for further discussion of this passage).
221 Literarizing tendencies are manifest in similes, e.g. St.II 7-8 (...) mi wnn d[p]yw Hr Xtt Hr Dat Hwt-
wart ‘(...) as if a carrion bird were plucking over the djat’s (scil. a type of land) of Avaris.’ The
composition may also include elements reminiscent of Twelfth Dynasty narrative literature, thus,
possibly echoing the narrative of Sinuhe’s flight, T. Carn. 13-14 sxA.n=i m dpt=i ib=i nfr HD.n tA
iw=i Hr=f mi wn bik xpr.n nw n sty-rA sAsA=i sw xbA.n=i sbty=f smA=i rmT=f D=i hA Hmt=f r mryt
(...) ‘I spent the night in my boat, with a happy heart. When it was dawn, I was on him like a falcon
is. When the time of lunch came, I repelled him. I destroyed his walls, killed his men, had his wife
go down to the quay (...)’. Similarly, the successful return (St.II 32-33: §1.3.3.2, (xiv); §2.6.3.1.C)
is phrased in terms reminiscent of Middle Kingdom expedition narratives and may echo the
beginning of Shipwrecked Sailor. On echoes of Sinuhe in other Seventeenth Dynasty inscriptions,
further Darnell 2002: 115, n.47; Vernus 1989: 150-1, n.k and u.
222 On T. Carnarvon I, now Hagen 2012a: 174-9; on the phenomenon of a secondary literary reception
of royal inscriptional compositions, also otherwise documented, Vernus 2011.
223 See §1.2.C, fine; further §4.5.2, (iii); §6.1.3.1, (ii).

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 1.4 Possible linguistic registers of literature in the early Eighteenth Dynasty 53

C. In all these cases, the selection of linguistic register is thoroughly indexical. In an

extended sense of the concept, compositions that accommodate innovative expres-
sions in higher numbers may be described as precursors of ‘Ramesside modernism’ to
come.224 Their linguistic selections express a deliberate intent to move away from
previous tradition, or, equivalently, a self-conscious assertion of their broader novelty.
Astarte fits into the same picture. The composition has experimental features on
multiple levels, its linguistic register (which is more innovative than any literary text
of the second millennium BCE), its Sitz im Leben as can be modeled, and the types of
contemporaneous written discourses it relates to, which are themselves highly
innovative (§1.3.2.2). Another element in Astarte is combat, related to royal ideology:
significantly, the composition dates to the very reign (Amenhotep II) in which experi-
mentation in register is documented in military narratives as well, also with a strong
ideological component.

1.4 Possible linguistic registers of literature in the early Eighteenth

Dynasty

A. The notion of a ‘hidden language evolution’, supposedly underlying Middle

Egyptian as documented in the written record, is void conceptually and for all
practical purposes (§1.1.1). Despite the low density of the written record, it can be
demonstrated that expressions first documented in relatively lower early/mid-Eigh-
teenth Dynasty registers did not gain acceptance in any written registers until roughly
the time of their first actual attestation (§1.1.2.B). In some cases, it can even be
demonstrated that their actual innovation (in grammaticalization, extension, and other
processes of linguistic change) must itself have been recent (§1.1.2.C). The rise of
‘Late Egyptian’ as traditionally defined, based on a limited set of mainly morpho-
syntactic features, was therefore fairly rapid, occurred mostly during the Eighteenth
Dynasty itself, and can be described as an episode of linguistic ‘punctuation’
(§1.1.2.D). As regards what has been termed ‘Late Middle Egyptian’, this is a collec-
tion of expressions to do with register, not a stage in language history. Such expres-
sions are documented in the late Twelfth Dynasty, some in the Eighth Dynasty
already. From the mid-Twelfth Dynasty on, several can be accommodated into
literary texts, always in a targeted distribution indexical of register, not of time
(further, §2.4.4).
Innovative expressions occasionally encountered in the Second Intermediate
Period are from documentary registers (including in monumentally published texts),
from a private inscription which in its linguistic repertoires has elements also found in
the ‘low tradition’ of Middle Egyptian narrative literature, and, toward the very end of
the period, from a series of texts to do with military action in a context of reconquista
(§1.3.3.1). In the last group of texts, the selection of an innovative register of lan-
guage contributes indexing their novelty in format and contents on a linguistic level,
in a self-asserting manner; significantly, such highly innovative register is in Kamose

224 On ‘Ramesside modernism’, Baines 1996.

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 54 1 Aspects of the linguistic situation in the early/mid-second millennium BCE

Inscriptions combined with elements of a very elevated Middle Egyptian harkening

back to the tradition of Middle Kingdom narrative literature and according with the
literarizing tendencies also observed in this composition (§1.3.3.2). In the early/mid-
Eighteenth Dynasty, innovative expressions cluster in documentary texts (including
monumentalized ones), in ‘Reden und Rufe’, and in military narratives of the times of
Thutmosis III and Amenhotep II (§1.3.3.3.A-B). Dating to the latter reign, Astarte is
highly innovative linguistically, as it is on all other levels: the linguistic register,
which is experimental as this type of texts itself then was, relates to the more
generally modernistic character of the composition, anticipating on aspects of
Ramesside written culture to come (§1.3.2.2; §1.3.3.3.C).
The distribution of linguistic registers is therefore in all cases principled.
Linguistically innovative selections are not expected to have generally extended to
literature possibly composed in the same periods. Documentary registers, for instance,
differ from literary ones in all periods in the second millennium BCE (§1.3.1). The
stylized evocation of ‘spoken language’ in ‘Reden und Rufe’ stands for its own, as do
innovative linguistic selections in military narratives, which are similarly indexical.
Meanwhile, higher written registers, as in inscriptional compositions other than the
ones just alluded to, are overwhelmingly free from innovative expressions and display
a rich and complete Middle Egyptian, often indistinguishable from higher registers of
Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian (§1.2). A similar characterization applies to one
early Eighteenth composition framed as a teaching, Aametju (§1.3.2.3). Middle
Egyptian was the regular vehicle for written expressions of high culture down to the
early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty.
Possible linguistic registers of literature in the early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty
would probably have variable, depending on the types of literary discourses that may
then have been cultivated. As regards the insecurely dated Middle Egyptian literary
texts that form the object of the present study, these are part of a Middle Egyptian
literary tradition defined by cultural themes, intertext and motifs, elements of form,
etc., regardless of when they may have been composed. For such types of texts,
Middle Egyptian, possibly with some internal differentiation, would have naturally
been selected down to the early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty.
B. This does of course not imply that any single one among the presently insecurely
dated Middle Egyptian literary texts should date to the early Eighteenth Dynasty. It
may be the case that no new literature was composed in this period: literary produc-
tion is not necessarily homogeneous over time.225 Or it may be that new compositions
were in types of literary discourses that had patterns of circulation in society and/or in
geography such that these compositions would not become part of the now preserved
record.226 What the above discussion does imply, however, is the following: Middle
Egyptian language itself is no indication for dating any presently insecurely dated
literary text to a period prior to the early Eighteenth Dynasty, let alone to the Middle
Kingdom. In all cases, a detailed individual examination is required.

225 E.g. Baines 1996, evoking the possibility that textual creativity may have been more strongly
focused on other, non literary, types of written discourses in the early New Kingdom.
226 This possibility is discussed by Fischer-Elfert 2003: 119-20.

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 1.4 Possible linguistic registers of literature in the early Eighteenth Dynasty 55

One further implication is that a Middle Egyptian literary text possibly composed
in the early Eighteenth Dynasty would look fairly similar to Twelfth Dynasty Middle
Egyptian literary texts: linguistic differences would not be striking. In the quest for
such possible subtle differences, a first step then lies in devising strategies for dating,
in defining ways to critically assess the reliability of proposed dating criteria, and in
defining horizons of expectation with which a text to be dated can be approached.

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 2 CONDITIONS AND STRATEGIES FOR LINGUISTIC DATING

In the present chapter, I discuss the conditions under which a linguistic dating is
possible for the specific time period considered, the early/mid-second millennium
BCE, and the specific types of texts here to be dated, Middle Egyptian literary
compositions. This discussion is placed toward the beginning of the present study for
expository reasons, but consists in a reflexive consideration of a set of practices that
have gradually emerged over the years. The chapter includes many case studies,
reflecting how the general principles set out were developed and adjusted inductively
from working on the texts. All topics here addressed are discussed in more depth in
the following chapters.

2.1 Describing linguistic change in a low-density and highly formal

record

In most cases, criteria for linguistic dating are based on changes in language that
occur during the time period considered. Linguistic dating therefore presupposes a
model of how changes—innovation and obsolescence—spread across written registers
during the period relevant for dating, and of how such spread can be expected to be
reflected in the extant written record. The resolution, and at times the very possibility,
of linguistic dating is thereby contingent upon the conditions under which changes in
language can themselves be documented and described in the written record of the
time period considered.

2.1.1 General models of change: The thickness of language in use

A. Linguistic change happens in linguistic interaction: variants of extant expressions

and entirely new expressions are constantly innovated by speakers.1 Many among
these innovative variants or expressions remain at an exploratory stage, while other
ones ‘catch on’, being selected by the broader speech community. Older variants or
expressions may then enter obsolescence, or not, or they may enter obsolescence only
much later.

1 For general usage-based models of linguistic change, e.g. Keller 1994; Croft 2001; Mufwene 2008.

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 58 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

At any given time, language is thus characterized by the simultaneous presence of

variant realizations of a given expression, and of variant expressions performing
partly overlapping functions. Synchronic variation is, in other words, a necessary
component of, and indeed a condition for, linguistic change. Accordingly, the process
by which an innovative expression B supersedes an older expression A may be
represented schematically as below (exploratory expressions in small type):

(a) General model of linguistic change:

(...)  A, B (c, d, e)  B, C (d, f)  C, F (g)  (...)

B. In addition, changes spread only gradually, across registers, across constructions,

and within individual registers and constructions. A given expression B may thus have
gained a fully regular status in one register, while still being rare in another register,
and possibly lacking altogether in yet another one. Similar comments apply to the
differential rates of obsolescence of older expressions.
Illustrating this general configuration, a few well-studied cases in mid-/late second
millennium BCE Egyptian include:

- The spread of m-ir + infinitive for expressing the negative imperative,

gradually superseding m + negative complement across different written
registers during the Eighteenth Dynasty;2
- The gradual spread of =w over =sn in Ramesside written registers, a
protracted process that extended over centuries and proceeded at a markedly
different pace depending on various constructions and various registers, in
complexly interrelated ways;3
- The spread of irm over Hna ‘with’, gradual and protracted in Ramesside
times.4
For earlier times, detailed case studies are made more difficult by the low density and
high formality of the extant record. The general principle remains of course the same.
A few illustrations are the following:

- The replacement of synthetic sDm.xr=f by analytic wn.xr=f Hr sDm in the

First Intermediate Period and early Middle Kingdom: in Coffin Texts for
example, both constructions are used side by side.5 In the same period
similarly, circumstantial iw P predicate gradually superseding circumstantial
sk P predicate, a process not completed before the early Middle Kingdom
(§2.4.3.2, (xv));
- The gradual neutralization of the aspectual contrast between NP Hr sDm and
N(P) sDm=f, a process begun in the Late Middle Kingdom and extending
throughout the Second Intermediate Period and early New Kingdom (§2.6);

2 Vernus 2010a.
3 Winand 1995.
4 Winand in prep.
5 Vernus 1990a: 63-5, 68-71.

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 2.1 Describing linguistic change in a low-density and highly formal record 59

- The replacement of older xr NP sDm=f by the bound construction xr-sDm=f

during the Eighteenth Dynasty, resulting in a situation in which the two
constructions were used side by side in the same texts (§3.4.2.2.C).

Taking into account the continuum of registers present in language at any given time,
the above model (a) is then refined as follows (exploratory expressions now left out;
rare expressions in parentheses):

(b) General model of linguistic change, taking into account registers:

Reg. (x): (...) A  A, B  B  B, E (...)
Reg. (y): (...) A  A (B)  A, B  (A) B  B (...)
Reg. (z): (...) X, A (X) A  A, B  (A) B (...)

C. Language at any given time is thereby characterized by what for the present
practical purpose I propose to term a synchronic ‘thickness’ (take any vertical slice in
(b), or any synchronic situation in (a)). Such thickness, across registers and/or within
a given register, provides for the essential plasticity of natural language as a tool of
communication, allowing speakers to express themselves, and to act upon each other,
in subtly differentiated manners. For linguistic dating, the practical implications are
twofold, to be developed further in subsequent sub-sections:

- The obsolescence of a variant/expression A is to be dissociated chrono-

logically from the innovation of a variant/expression B with similar functions
(for a detailed case study, §2.6.3);
- Issues of register are an integral component of any argument for dating (see
§1.3, §2.4, and throughout the present study).

2.1.2 Studying linguistic change in the early/mid-second millennium record

Changes in language are inferred from the extant written record. In the case of
early/mid-second millennium BCE Egyptian, the task is made difficult by the nature
of this record, which is low in density, and, for the most part of it, highly formal. Only
written registers are documented. Direct empirical evidence for change therefore
points to the integration of a given variant or expression in a given written register,
not to its integration into ‘written Egyptian’ overall, let alone to its innovation in the
‘spoken language’ (§1.1).
Middle Egyptian literary texts securely dated to a period after the Twelfth Dynasty
are currently very few (§1.3.2) and the study of ongoing linguistic change must be
based mostly on other types of written discourse. In the time period here relevant, the
written record is heavily biased toward more formal registers as it is uneven across
time: some registers, notably less formal ones, are poorly documented in all periods
here relevant, and some periods, notably the often crucial Second Intermediate Period,
are poorly documented in all registers. In addition, part of the linguistic material
provided by inscriptional registers is phraseological in nature: in such cases, the date

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 60 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

of an inscription may have to be dissociated from the linguistic age of an expression it

includes.
On a practical level, only a part of grammar and lexicon is represented in the
preserved record: what is known of Egyptian is a small subset of what Egyptian may
have been and depends heavily on the contents of texts committed to writing at any
given time, and thereby, indirectly, on conventions of form and of decorum in various
types of writing discourses that were then cultivated. Incomplete attestation becomes
even more critical when potential differences between written registers are taken into
account: as already emphasized, empirical evidence for the integration of an expres-
sion in a written register does not necessarily imply its integration into ‘written
Egyptian’ overall. The reverse caveat must be voiced as well: an expression may be
lacking at some point in time in those written registers that are documented in the
record, yet may have been fully accepted in other written registers, not documented in
the record, by the same period already. In short, much of Egyptian is simply
unknown, and only part of this can be known through additional research.

2.1.3 Demonstrating innovation and obsolescence in the record

The synchronic thickness of language at any given time is compounded by

considerable practical difficulties in studying linguistic change as these result from the
nature of the written record in which this change is to be studied. This has major
practical implications for possible dating strategies; the issues at play, to be
recurrently encountered throughout the present study, are preliminarily presented here
in a general and condensed form.
A. While innovation can be difficult to demonstrate, obsolescence is even more
difficult to demonstrate. For obvious reasons, demonstrating the presence of some-
thing is empirically easier than demonstrating its absence (compare the quantifiers,
existential in the first case, universal in the second). In addition, formal registers tend
to keep to ancient expressions long after these had dropped out of use in less formal
written registers. Written obsolescence can be a very protracted process, whose
dynamics are defined by a multiplicity of ultimately high-cultural conditions; these
parameters are complex to handle, making most statements on the obsolescence of an
individual expression tentative.
Possible criteria based on obsolescence (post quem non criteria) thus come with a
considerably broader degree of temporal imprecision than possible criteria based on
innovation (ante quem non criteria). Such imbalance between ante quem non and post
quem non criteria springs from the intrinsic logic of either type of dating arguments
themselves; as regrettable as it may be, the imbalance is structural. A detailed
illustration is presented below (§2.6.3).
B. Patterns of attestation stand a better chance to be representative with expressions
that are common in the language, and therefore expected to be common in and across
the record. With such expressions, issues of representativeness that arise from the low
density of the preserved record are best kept in check, as are similar issues that stem
from the specific contents and linguistic form of the texts that make up that record. In

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 2.1 Describing linguistic change in a low-density and highly formal record 61

general, dating criteria based on frequent expressions will therefore be more reliable
and/or more precise in their temporal resolution. With ante quem non criteria
specifically, reliability will be enhanced if the first attestations of a given expression
cluster in time, and if such clustering in time can be shown not to be an effect of the
nature of the record itself, such as a higher overall density of the record at this
moment in time.
C. With an ante quem non criterion, the temporal imprecision can sometimes be
narrowed down by considering the distribution of other expressions with similar or
related functions. For an expression X first documented in a given written register by
a time T, it is to be demonstrated that before this time T some other expression Y was
demonstrably used for expressing similar meanings and/or performing similar func-
tions. If such usage of Y is consistent and exclusive, and if it extends to a time close
to T, the possibility that X was integrated into the register considered not much earlier
than its first documented occurrence at time T will be substantiated somewhat further.
While useful, this strategy does not permit to reduce all temporal imprecision: as
already discussed, language in use is characterized by its synchronic ‘thickness’.
Moreover, the strategy is applicable only to domains of linguistic meaning and func-
tion that are themselves reasonably common in language. Here again, therefore, less
common expressions are bound to remain more problematic when it comes to
assessing whether the indications they may provide for dating are reliable.
D. An additional twist associated with ante quem non criteria springs from the low
density of the record, most notably in the Second Intermediate Period. On several
occasions in the present study, an argument can be made that an expression did not
have currency in relevant registers in the Twelfth Dynasty. The earliest documented
occurrences of that same expression are, however, not in the Thirteenth Dynasty but
much later only, for example in the very late Second Intermediate Period or early
Eighteenth Dynasty. When the expression considered was first innovated then remains
unclear: possibilities range from the earliest moment in time for which it can not be
demonstrated any more that it had not been innovated (e.g. the early Thirteenth
Dynasty) to the earliest moment in time for which it can be demonstrated that it had
been innovated (e.g. the late Seventeenth or early Eighteenth Dynasty).
Two types of ante quem non criteria must therefore distinguished. These differ,
not by the nature of the linguistic phenomena considered, but by how the nature of the
record, itself an artifactual object, determines the possibilities for studying linguistic
change:

(Type-A) ante quem non

It can be demonstrated that an expression has not been innovated before time
T. There is also evidence, or significant indirect indications, that it has been
innovated by that same time T. The terminus ante quem non can then be
straightforwardly set to T.

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 62 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

Type-B ante quem non

It can be demonstrated that an expression has not been innovated before T1. It
can also be shown that it has been innovated by T2, whereby T2 may be
centuries later than T1. T1 is the latest moment in time from which on it can
not be demonstrated any more that the expression did not have currency, not
necessarily the earliest moment in time in which it actually had currency.
(Unless further specified, ante quem non criteria are of the A-type in the
present study.)

Type-B ante quem non criteria can be viewed as defining second-order termini ante
quem non. What is aimed for is a terminus ante quem non from which on an expres-
sion was first innovated, and therefore possible in a text to be dated. However, all that
can be securely established is until when this expression was certainly not innovated
(T1: defined through a double negation). In other words, a type-B terminus ante quem
non is a terminus ante quem non (set to T1) for an actual terminus ante quem non (at
some point in time not to be determined between T1 and T2).
By definition of a type-B terminus, the nature of the evidence available is of a sort
that this second-order terminus (T1) can not be reduced to a first-order one (some
point between T1 and T2). In practice, type-B ante quem non criteria must therefore be
treated as if they were pointing to T1. This is required methodologically, in order to
keep the criterion as secure as possible. In the process, it possibly loses some or much
of the temporal resolution it could have had, since T1 may well be earlier than the
actual innovation of the expression considered. Type-B ante quem non criteria are
therefore to be appreciated as possibly pointing to a later terminus than the one for
which they can be used in the present study.
E. For the sake of subsequent reference, the four general dimensions discussed above
are here summarized:

(a) Post quem non criteria (based on written obsolescence) are temporally
more diffuse than ante quem non criteria (based on first written occurrence). In
the case of Middle Egyptian literary texts, they typically point to a period no
earlier, or even later, than the first manuscript attestation of a text to be dated;
whenever this is the case, they are of course useless in practice.
(b) In devising post quem non and ante quem non criteria alike, expressions
that are common in language, and expected to be common in the extant record,
provide more reliable, and temporally more precise, dating criteria than less
common expressions. This is a heavily restrictive condition on possible dating
criteria.
(c) With ante quem non criteria specifically, an ideal situation is when for an
expression X first documented by time T, it can also be demonstrated that
some other expression Y was consistently in use before time T in similar func-
tions. Ante quem non criteria meeting this and the previous conditions are the
strongest. This is another heavily restrictive condition on possible dating

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 2.2 Expressions that can provide dating criteria 63

criteria: the condition is mostly met with common domains of meaning or

function only.
(d) With some ante quem non criteria, it can happen that a given expression is
documented since T2 and demonstrably did not have currency before T1,
whereby, due to the nature of the record, T2 and T1 can not be made to coin-
cide. For methodological reasons, such type-B ante quem non criteria have to
be treated in practice as if pointing to a terminus ante quem non by T1, even
though the expression considered may in fact have been innovated only at
some later moment in time, between T1 and T2.

2.2 Expressions that can provide dating criteria

Language could be expected to provide a wealth of indications for dating in various

domains. In the case of early/mid-second millennium BCE Egyptian, however,
various factors conspire to the effect that possible dating criteria are limited in
practice.

2.2.1 Morphology

In most languages, morphological change will provide an important set of criteria for
dating. The opposite is the case in early/mid-second millennium BCE Egyptian,
because of the nature of the writing system. Contrasts in written forms of the verb are
by and large limited to some endings (in some inflectional categories only) and alter-
nations between short and long written stems (in some inflectional classes only);
morphological contrasts on the levels of syllable structure, stress, and vowel melody
are left almost entirely unrepresented, as are the possibly changing outcomes of
morpho-phonological processes and differential behavior of inflectional classes. The
bulk of verbal morphology thus remains concealed underneath the opaque surface of
written forms.6 Similar comments extend to nominal morphology: while grammatical
endings (gender and number) and some derivational affixes (such as m-) are
represented in writing, the bulk of morphological alternations in derivational patterns
remains unrepresented in written forms.7 More generally, the Egyptian writing system
does not primarily target phonetic strings, and only partly word-forms: in significant

6 As a mere illustration of how far the phenomenon extends, the following example is given. The
Egyptian writing system at least occasionally selects mono- and bi-consonantal phonograms in
ways to reflect the syllable structure of a word (e.g. Schenkel 1981; Kahl 1994: 91-3, 121-8). It
would then have been technically possible to extend this principle to the written representation of
inflected word-forms. The step was not taken: the different syllable structures of the stem in
*/naH$’ma-/ (subjunctive) and */na$’Ha:$ma-/ (or the like: mrr=f ), etc., all display the same
written stem <n-Hm-SEMOGRAM>.
7 E.g. Schenkel 1983; Osing 1976.

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 64 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

ways, it also targets lexical representations (words)8 or yet more abstract represen-
tations (roots).9
In a writing system such as the Egyptian, morphological change remains by and
large invisible when it affects pre-existing forms. (A rare exception is the loss of -n-
in the sDm.n=f, beginning in the mid-second millennium.) Morphological change will
be visible only when it consists in the renewal of the inventory of morphological
categories, i.e. when entirely new forms arise (e.g. the ‘new subject pronouns’ tw=i,
etc.). Both types of change, which account for some of the classically evoked
contrasts between Middle and Late Egyptian, turn out to be very rare in the time
period and written registers relevant for dating Middle Egyptian literary texts. Unlike
in other languages, and unlike in other periods in Egypt itself, morphological change
by and large lies in a dead angle (compare further below, §2.3.1.1).

2.2.2 Lexicon

The lexicon comprises a wealth of individual items that can undergo change in
meaning, or be innovated, or enter obsolescence: unlike changes in grammar, indi-
vidual changes in the lexicon are potentially numerous. On the other hand, lexical
arguments possibly to be made are exposed to the notoriously unreliable patterns of
attestation of individual words in the record. In addition, lexical expressions do not
relate as tightly to their contexts as grammatical ones often do; this makes it compara-
tively more difficult to assess whether a given lexical expression may have been
altered in the course of textual transmission (§2.3.2.2).
A. Lexical expressions differ from grammatical ones on three accounts, all ultimately
to do with the fact the defining fact that lexical expressions have lexical meaning.
These add up to make patterns of attestation of the lexical expressions much less
reliable in general.

(a) Lexical expressions have a more specific meaning than grammatical ones,
implying a generally lower text frequency of the former. In many cases, this
makes patterns of attestation of lexical expressions particularly sensitive to the
vagaries of documentation in a low-density corpus language.
(b) Patterns of attestation of lexical expressions can be strongly skewed across
time in relation to different types of written discourse, registers, and subject
matters documented in different periods. This results in an unequal attestation
of individual words, semantic fields, and lexical registers. Grammatical
expressions, which carry a different type of linguistic meaning, are less
exposed to such issues and tend do be more homogeneously spread in the
record (as a general tendency: there are of course many exceptions).
(c) The rise or loss of words, or changes in the meaning of existing words, are
individual histories: unlike in grammatical change, these histories can not be

8 See e.g. the case of the sDm.n=f of ult.n non-II.red in Coffin Texts, Stauder in press e: §2;
Schenkel 2009: 57-8.
9 E.g. Schenkel 2003; Vernus 2003b.

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 2.2 Expressions that can provide dating criteria 65

interpreted in relation to broader processes, or contexts, of linguistic change.

Patterns of attestation of individual lexemes therefore tend to remain raw
empirical observations, often difficult to assess further as to their representa-
tiveness.

B. Particularly the semantic ranges of individual words are incompletely attested at

all times: changes at this level remain generally impossible to track, except over much
longer periods of time than the one here relevant, and only for the best documented
words. Lexical arguments are then often limited to discussing the innovation or obso-
lescence of a word, regardless of its meaning, substantially reducing the evidence that
could have been available. Patterns of attestation of words themselves often remain
unreliable; some illustration is given below, with a perspective on Middle Egyptian
literary texts of insecure dating.

(a) Artifactual conditions of preservation

(i) Isq ‘wait for’ (Neferti 7g)
The word is fairly common in the early New Kingdom10 and would therefore seem
typical of the lexicon of that period. Yet, one earlier instance is in Mentuwoser (temp.
Senwosret I), 12. A likely fate for this stela, as for every other written document in
early second millennium BCE Egypt, would have been not to survive to the present
day. Isq would then have appeared to the present-day Egyptologist as undocumented
prior to the New Kingdom.

(ii) Ftft ‘leap, twitch’ (Hymn 12.8)

In a yet more literally physical manner than the above, ftft is common in New
Kingdom hymns (§3.4.6, (iv)). Yet, it is also found once in the Middle Kingdom
(Dramatic Ramesseum Papyrus 29), just before a lacuna. Over a period of 4000 years,
this lacuna could well have extended just a few centimeters further, to include ftft.

(b) Subject matters featured at various periods

(iii) MTwn ‘(fighting) arena’ (Amenemhat 5d)
The word is not uncommon in New Kingdom royal inscriptions,11 but not securely
documented before the New Kingdom. An early attestation, however, could be in Tod
Inscription 27, if mTwn is indeed to be read,12 and assuming that this text is to be
dated to the Senwosret I, which is disputed as well.13 However, the lack of a secure
direct early attestation prior to the early New Kingdom could well be a gap in the
documentation, reflecting the fact that military subject matters addressed in non-
generic terms are themselves uncommon in the written record before the early New
Kingdom.

10 See TLA #31730.

11 DZA 24.458.930; .870; .910; .980. Outside royal inscriptions also in P. Leiden 347 III.12 (DZA
24.458.970).
12 On the reading, which has been disputed, §1.2, (v.).
13 See §1, n.86, and §5.1.3.3.C.

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 66 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

(iv) Mwnf ‘garrison’ (Amenemhat 7b and Neferti 7f)

The word is not uncommon in the Eighteenth Dynasty.14 It is attested only once in
earlier times, but with a different meaning: Siut III 3 ‘I was (...) a protector (mwnf ) of
the poor.’ Yet, this can not be taken as evidence that the military meaning developed
only later, for the reasons just discussed (iii). Not only the meaning is different in Siut
III 3, the context is as well: in an ideal-biographical context, a meaning ‘garrison’
would hardly be expected, if it then existed. It is perhaps not unsignificant that this
early occurrence of the word is in the context of a tomb, Iti-ibi’s, that also has one of
the very few pre-New Kingdom texts to develop military matters in specific terms. In
short, the meaning ‘garrison’, securely documented in much later times only, may or
may not have existed in these early times. The case of mwnf is more broadly
illustrative of the near-impossibility to track changes in meaning and in semantic
ranges in the time period here relevant.

(c) Indirect attestation

(v) MTwn ‘arena’ (above, (iii))
As mentioned, the word is not securely documented before the early New Kingdom.
However, an indirect attestation seems to be given in an Old Kingdom toponym.15

(vi) %nsi ‘praiseVERB’ (Loyaliste 2.2 long version (the short version reads
differently: §2.3.2.2, (ii)); Loyaliste 6.7 (this verse only in the long version))
This verb remains undocumented before the New Kingdom. However, the morpho-
logically derived noun snsw ‘praiseNOUN, etc.’, once in CT VII 239a, probably implies
the existence of the verb before the New Kingdom.

(d) Contingencies in working with lexical tools available at a given time

(vii) Isq (above, (i))
The word had been noted as ‘Nur Dyn 18 bis Ende nR’ in DZA16 and subsequently as
‘belegt seit D.18’ in Wb. I 133. The file may have been compiled before the
publication of Mentuwoser’s Stela (by Ransom in 1913).

C. Occasionally, individual expressions can provide a reliable dating criterion if

additional context is given, typically extending beyond language itself. This can be
the case with loanwords, provided, however, that a loanword can be securely
identified as such and that the time of borrowing can itself be securely dated; these
conditions are not always fulfilled (e.g. aAgsw ‘belt’: §6.2.2.6.3, (ii)). Another favor-
able circumstance is when the introduction of a new word or expression in the lexicon
can be related to the introduction of the real-word referent of that word (e.g. a-rsi
‘Southern Region’: §2.8.3.6.B; xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’: §5.5.1; bH ‘forced labor’:

14 E.g. Urk. IV 505, 12; 730, 17. In a literary context also later, in Satirical Letter (TLA #69290).
15 Petrie 1892: 19; FCD 121 (with references to the discussion on mTwn). For early attestations of the
root Twn, further Borghouts 2010: II, 42 (sub E 2+).
16 DZA 21.305.070.

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 2.2 Expressions that can provide dating criteria 67

§5.5.2). Strictly speaking, the argument has then ceased to be a purely linguistic one,
since the temporal anchoring is provided by a change in the cultural encyclopedia.
D. Given the uncertainties generally attached to individual lexical expressions,
lexical evidence is best appreciated as cumulative. In assessing the overall lexicon of
a composition, various quantitative approaches have been proposed.17 Such methods
are valuable for appreciating the relative lexical variety of individual texts, the lexical
distance of texts to each other, and how different types of written discourses relate to,
or differ from, each other in their lexical typology. Whether these methods can
provide indications for dating remains unclear: many factors are at play, including the
complexly interrelated dimensions of register, subject matter, and type of written
discourse. Measures of lexical variety or distance therefore do not easily project over
time, at least not for the fairly short time period relevant to the present study. In this,
lexical evidence will therefore come in the intentionally unsophisticated form of an
informally weighted list.
The list is weighted qualitatively in relation to how reliable or unreliable the
patterns of attestation of individual expressions could be. In general, the likelihood for
a lexical pattern of attestation to be reasonably reliable is highest when the following
conditions are met, ideally simultaneously: (a) the expression is common; (b) it is not
technical or otherwise specialized language and it is not semantically specific in ways
that its pattern of attestation could be over-determined by the configuration of the
record itself; (c) some other expression is documented in earlier times with similar
meaning. Illustrative of how low-frequency words in particular must be given very
little weight are the following cases in point:

(viii) Rare words in Fowler

The composition has a few rare words otherwise undocumented before the New
Kingdom.18 Yet, the text itself is documented in a late Twelfth Dynasty manuscript,
P. Butler.

(ix) Amenemhat 6b Ssp.n=i wnwt nt nfr-ib ‘I had taken an hour of pleasure.’

The expression Ssp wnwt is apparently documented only once otherwise, in a Twelfth
Dynasty ‘letter’ with satirical intent, P. UC 32204 vso 2-3 mk Ssp=n wnwt bint ‘Look,
we can have a bad hour (scil. together).’19 The expression nfr-ib (also in Amenemhat
14f, echoing 6b20) is otherwise documented only in an early Eighteenth Dynasty
composition, Teaching of Aametju 43 (discussion, §1.3.2.3, (v)). Both expressions are
equally rare, and it therefore comes as no surprise that direct parallels for these should
be in different periods.

Even in such cumulative form, lexical evidence often remains insecure. In addition to
the dimensions evoked above, this is also due to the fairly low number of individual
items that can be considered within a given composition: most texts to be dated are

17 E.g. Schweitzer 2013; Lepper 2012; Konrad 1999, all with references to previous studies.
18 Parkinson 2004: 111.
19 I thank Jean Winand (p.c. 3/2011) for drawing this parallel to my attention.
20 Parkinson 2002: 246.

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 68 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

concise. The lexical distinctiveness of texts is also reduced by the highly intertextual
nature of Middle Egyptian literature, resulting in a high amount of shared lexicon
between various compositions (some of which may themselves be insecurely dated).
Possible lexical evidence will then typically consist in relatively few words; except in
specific favorable cases, this can only be appreciated as complementary to other types
of evidence. With such caveat being made explicit, lexical evidence should be taken
into account in an appreciation of the overall linguistic typology of a composition
being studied.

2.2.3 Grammar

A. Patterns of documentation of grammatical change, in form or in function, can

often be interpreted as to their degree of reliability. Unlike most lexical ones, gram-
matical expressions can be fairly common in language and are less strongly sensitive
to the subject matters documented in different types of written discourses. Moreover,
changes in grammar can in several cases be related to broader processes of linguistic
change: a relative chronology of developments, or even an absolute temporal
anchoring of changes, can then be established. Strategies for assessing the reliability
of patterns of documentation of grammatical change have been outlined above in
general terms (§2.1.3; also §1.1.2.C) and will be exemplified further throughout
subsequent parts of the present study. An important motivation for such type of
discussion is also the requirement to make it explicit how strong or weak an
individual grammatical expression is: various situations are encountered, extending all
the way from altogether uncertain through suggestive through fully conclusive.
The present study mainly relies on grammatical criteria for dating, yet these come
with one limitation of their own, namely that they will remain fairly low in number. In
the relatively short time span here considered (ca. 2000-1450 BCE), changes in
grammar are not expected to be sweeping. The substantial linguistic continuity in
high-cultural written expressions of the period also weighs in, with only little change
expected to be manifest in literary texts and in other relevant, mostly equally formal,
registers in the non-literary record. The current state of description of Middle
Egyptian, incomplete notably as regards internal diachronic developments, further
reduces the number of criteria possibly to be devised: in some cases, these can be
established within the present study, while in other cases dedicated grammatical
studies would be preliminarily required.
B. Among grammatical criteria, the best are often the ones to do with changes in the
function rather than in the form of grammatical expressions. One important example
is Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non criterion (§2.6.2), the only criterion of wider
application that had been proposed so far. This targets a change in the functions of NP
Hr sDm, a construction that as far as form is concerned remains stable. That changes in
the mapping of form and function are often fruitful for dating relates to the fact that
linguistic function is less directly accessible to language users and therefore less open
to being manipulated by these, notably in the higher written registers here relevant.
For the very same reason, changes in linguistic function are also the ones currently

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 69

least described. The possibly best grammatical criteria are not readily given; they
must be established by additional investigation of Middle Egyptian grammar itself, in
several cases in lenghty developments.
In devising the relatively subtle grammatical criteria that will be most important to
the present study, the nature of the record can exercise some limiting effect: this
features only a selection of constructions, at times in a restricted range of uses and
functions only, and in varying, at times critically low, densities in various periods. In
practice, only a subset of changes can be identified and described with a degree of
accuracy sufficient enough to derive reliable dating criteria, and not always with the
wished for temporal resolution. Yet, work can be done: in subsequent chapters, dating
criteria based on changes in grammar—in form, and for the stronger ones often in the
mapping of form and function—are discussed or newly introduced. The emphasis on
changes in the use of tw (§5.2; §5.3; §6.2) reflects the fact that changes happened to
occur in passive voice during the time period considered, that these changes affected
the functions of a morpheme rather than its form, and that the present author has
worked on passive voice in Middle Egyptian: various levels, all contingent, here
favorably play together. In a similar vein, Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non criterion,
made possible because a change in form-function mapping happened to occur on this
level in the later Twelfth Dynasty, came only as a culmination of this author’s near
prolonged research on aspect in Middle Egyptian. Given the remaining gaps in
grammatical description as of 2013, it seems a fair guess that additional criteria based
on grammatical change will emerge as a result of further studies in descriptive Middle
Egyptian grammar.

2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture

Texts can be affected during their transmission in a manuscript culture, intentionally

and unintentionally. One very basic issue is therefore to determine what is being dated
linguistically: the surface of a text as presented by its oldest (set of) preserved manu-
script(s), its original composition, some intermediary stage in textual history, or even
a mixture of all these.
Irrespective of their date of composition, early New Kingdom copies of Middle
Egyptian compositions are tokens of an early New Kingdom literary culture and must
be interpreted as such. This basic epistemological principle, which has been recently
reemphasized by proponents of ‘material philology’ notably, holds similarly for the
compositions that are also documented in the Middle Kingdom21 and for the ones that
are not.22 When it comes to dating the original composition, however, strategies must
be defined to identify the possible effects of textual transmission. The goal can not be
to reconstruct an Urtext, an object which is often out of reach in practice, and, in some

21 E.g. Hagen 2012a (Ptahhotep); Parkinson 2009: 173-218 (Sinuhe).

22 Widmaier 2013 and Hoch 1992 (Kheti); van der Plas 1986 (Hymn to Hapi; explicitly, 25).

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 70 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

cases, possibly fictional in substance.23 What matters is to assess the textual status of
individual expressions and constructions that could be criterial for dating. As to be
discussed throughout the present study, the likelihood for an expression to be integral
to the original composition can vary considerably depending on a multiplicity of
factors; the type of expression considered, and the ways it relates to its context or not,
are essential.

2.3.1 Aspects of orthography in Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts

In orthography, Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts display a surface of their own,

different from manuscripts of earlier times. The following comments are descriptive
only: in the current stage, no argument for dating can be devised on this level, and it
remains uncertain whether one could ever be.

2.3.1.1 Written grammatical morphology

An illustration of typical features is given below; this is representative of the general

phenomenon, but selective only. Examples in Middle Egyptian literary texts of
insecure dating are set in perspective with examples in texts that securely date to the
early Eighteenth Dynasty. Most examples are from verbal morphology (i)-(vi); cases
in non-verbal grammatical morphology are presented in turn (vii)-(viii).
(i) Long written stems of II.red in the sDm.n=f:24
Sporting King A2.2 iw mAA.n=i; sim. Fishing and Fowling B3.8; Kheti 4.2; Mutter
und Kind vso 4.3
– compare Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy 10 (Urk. IV 17, 7-8) iw xfa.n=f (...)
Amm.n=f; Urk. IV 1004, 4 (Tjanuni) iw mAA.n=i; Heavenly Cow 126 aHa<.n>
mAA.n=sn;
Kheti 3.2 n mAA.n=f; sim. Kheti 4.2; Fishing and Fowling B2.7 n mA[A].n=f
– compare Urk. IV 367, 12 (from Hatshepsut’s Karnak Obelisk) n ann.n=i.
NB. Two forms in Merikare are generally cited in this context: E 33 n tkk.n and
E 68 n qbb.n. As discussed elsewhere, these may not be ‘post-classical’ at all.25

(ii) Long written stems of II.red in the subjunctive:

Neferti 2e mAA Hm=f (sim. 5c).

(iii) Subjunctive of ult.A in -Ay:

Amenemhat 1d (P. Millingen, etc.) HqAy=k
– compare Astarte I.3 sqAy[=i].26

23 In a performance culture, different, possibly authorial, versions of a composition may thus have
coexisted from the outset, none privileged over the other (e.g. Stolz 2013, for Wolfram’s Parzival;
Winand in press a, for Sinuhe).
24 Discussion by Stauder in press d: §1.6; Schenkel 2006: 63-4.
25 Stauder in press d: §1.6.B, fine.
26 Further examples in Collombert & Coulon 2000: 225.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 71

(iv) -w as a written ending of the subjunctive:

with III.inf, Neferti 3f rmw=k;27 9b nn rmw.tw;
with 3rad, Merikare E 12 smAw=k.

(v) Relative forms and passive participles in -ti:

(attested in the Middle Kingdom, but increasingly common in, and in this sense more
typical of, the early New Kingdom28)
Amenemhat 1d Dd.ti=i; Khakheperreseneb ro 5 Dd.ti=f; Neferti 3h Dd.ti
– compare Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building Inscription 16 (Urk. IV 162, 8) mr.ti
kA=f pw ir.ti ‘what his ka will desire is what will be done’; sim. Thutmosis I’s
Abydos Stela 5 (Urk. IV 96, 16) mr.ti kA=k ‘what your ka will desire’.

(vi) Infinitive for negatival complement:

Ipuwer 2.4-5 tm irt n=f tbty ‘he who could not make sandals for himself’;29 Neferti 4c
O. DeM 1188 tmmt irt (Pet. tmt ir) ‘what has not been done’
– compare Urk. IV 32, 10; 331, 12; etc.30

(vii) N for m (preposition):31

Fishing and Fowling B2.6-7 iw=i n qbw rmw=i n Sw ‘I am in the cool, my fishes are
in the sun’;32 perhaps also Merikare E 70-71 n-mitt33
– compare O. Nakhtmin 87/173, 3 (§1.3.2.1).
Conversely, m for n, only under assimilation to the following word: Merikare E 118
m-mryt (C m-mr[y]t), E 114 m-mrt (C m-mryt)
– compare Urk. IV 1796, 8; also in Book of the Dead.34

(viii) %t for sn:

Merikare E 56; 85 (st suffix pronoun);35 Heavenly Cow, passim (st in various uses);36
also st for =s (Neferti 2n xpr.t=s{t}(y))
– compare Urk. IV 658, 4 itH.tw st.

27 The identification of the form as a subjunctive, rather than a prospective, is secured by its use in
continuation of an imperative: xws ib=i rmw=k tA pn (...) ‘Stir, my heart, and beweep this land
(...)’.
28 Data in Zonhoven 1997.
29 Kroeber 1970: 172, ex.3.
30 EG, p.263, n.6.
31 Kroeber 1970: 41-4. The oldest occurrence I am aware of is Seankhenre Mentuhotepi’s Stela 5
(§1, n.126).
32 Kroeber 1970: 44, ex.8.
33 If to be read as (...) mi irt.n {n} th{t} n-mitt m-a nTr ‘(...) in accordance with what one who has
strayed thus from god did’ (proposed by Enmarch 2007: 79, 80, n.m); different interpretation by
Quack 1992: 42-3.
34 TLA #79190.
35 Quack 1992: 37, n.b.
36 See §4, n.273, (d).

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 72 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

Unlike in other traditions,37 no indication for dating can be based on such ortho-
graphic phenomena for the case of Middle Egyptian literary texts, nor has this ever
been claimed. Two illustrations may therefore suffice:

(ix) Amenemhat 1d HqAy=k

The spelling HqAy=k is in the mid-Eighteenth Dynasty P. Millingen (and in most other
witnesses). The more classical spelling, HqA=k, is found in a slightly earlier witness,
Assiut graffito 1c, 3.38

(x) Ptahhotep 208 L2 (this verse not in P) tm=f irt39

The composition is documented in Twelfth Dynasty manuscripts.

Genuine morphological change no doubt affected the verb during the time period
considered; if accessible, this could have been criterial for dating. What is visible in
written forms, however, primarily pertains to scribal conventions. As already
discussed, morphology largely lies in a dead angle for dating (§2.2.1).

2.3.1.2 Written lexical morphology: A case study in Neferti

Written lexical morphology can also be late in Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts. The
phenomenon is illustrated in a text in which it is particularly strong, Neferti.40

(a) In conformity with general trends of early New Kingdom orthography

(i) Reflecting sound change, e.g.:
Neferti 1j iAaS ‘call’ (sim. e.g. Fishing and Fowling B3.5) is a mixed, historical (iA-)
and phonological (-aS), spelling, typical of the New Kingdom; in an inscriptional
register, e.g. Rekhmire 4 (Urk. IV 1072, 16).

(ii) On the level of classification:

Neferti 5c41 has itn ‘sun-disk’ followed by a semogram of the divine (G7).42

(b) Differences in written morphology possibly not reflecting sound change

(iii) Possibly to be interpreted as by-forms that could have existed before in
other varieties of the language, but were not part of documented written
standards before the New Kingdom; alternatively, as indirectly reflecting
sound change:

37 Noam Mizrahi (p.c. 2/2011) tells me that in the Hebrew Bible the relative proportions of short and
plene writings have occasionally been considered as indicative for dating. For dating strategies in
the Hebrew Bible more generally, e.g. Hurwitz 2000.
38 Verhoeven 2012a: 207, n.29.
39 EG §344.
40 For a selective illustration in other texts, also below, n.373 (Khakheperreseneb); n.450 (Merikare);
§4, n.273 (Heavenly Cow). Noteworthy is also Fishing and Fowling B2.7 (sim. A2.10), <rrmw>
for rmw ‘fish’ (alongside B2.6 <rmw>: Kroeber 1970: 50, n.7).
41 Pet. and O. DeM 1074
42 On semograms with itn in a classifier perspective, Goldwasser 2002: 111-31.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 73

Neferti 5d Sna ‘storm cloud(?)’ is typical of the New Kingdom and later periods;43 in
an inscriptional register, e.g. Ahmose’s Tempest Stela ro 7/vso 8-9 (HHBT 106, 7-8:
verbally); in older times, the same word appears as Snit. The difference in written
morphology may reflect two different morphological formations. Alternatively, it
may reflect sound change, with a redefinition of the value of the grapheme a in final
position (redefinition of ‘grapho-phonemische Korrespondenzregeln’44).

(iv) Possibly to be interpreted as an instance of morphological renewal;

alternatively, as indirectly reflecting sound change:
Neferti 14h arat ‘uraeus’, rather than older iart, compares with similar written forms of
the word such as iarat, arawt, or arart (Book of the Dead);45 iarat is also in Ipuwer 7.3.
(I)arat may be a genuine instance of morphological renewal, as arart certainly is.

(c) Some remarkable spellings

(v) Iw- for i-:
Neferti 6a iwtrw ‘river’,46 alternating with the older itrw (8a), is a spelling typical of
the early New Kingdom. Compare e.g. in the perfective active participle of 2rad, on
Hapuseneb’s statues (Urk. IV 481, 17 iwrxw ‘who know’; Urk. IV 480, 9 iwxmw
‘who do not know’);47 in Chapelle Rouge, p.116: IV.13-14 (HHBT II 17, 7-8 iwxmw-
sk ‘the indestructible (i.e. circumpolar) stars’; iwxmw-wrD ‘the unwarying (i.e. not
circumpolar) stars’); or in the overly common iwgrt ‘Necropolis (lit., the silent
one)’.48
(vi) Early occurrences of late spellings:
Neferti 6e <rA-sw>49 is a New Kingdom spelling for rsw ‘South wind’;50
Neferti 13f pXr-iHy51 includes a late spelling iHy for AHt ‘field’.52

Neferti as documented in Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts thus presents the reader

with a distinctively Eighteenth Dynasty surface in orthography (see also §2.3.1.1 for
written grammatical morphology). Dating the original composition is an altogether
different issue, however. Among the above, elements of the type presented in (a) are
entirely unreliable, as is evidenced e.g. by a consideration of New Kingdom manu-
scripts of Sinuhe. Regarding (i), iAS in B (248) has been altered to iAaS in AOS and P2.

43 TLA #155760; Wb. IV 507.3-9; DZA 30.164.860 (‘Dyn. 18 bis griechisch’).

44 For this notion more broadly, Kammerzell 1999.
45 TLA #21780; also DZA 20.304.700-710.
46 Preserved only in Pet. The text is to be read as iwtrw (...), not as iw (i)trw (...), because subject-
initial constructions in paragraph-initial position are regularly iw-less in Neferti; compare e.g. 8a
(awt xAst r swri (...)); 10a (rA nb mH (...)); 11a (xn n mdt Hr ib (...)); 15a (tw r qd (...)). For the only
apparent exception in 9a (stanza-initial in the extant mss., but not paragraph-initial), §5.2.3.3, (v).
On aspects of iw-lessness in paragraph-initial position in Neferti, §5.2.3.
47 EG §272.
48 DZA 21.334.710-720.
49 In all witnesses (Pet.; O. DeM 1074; O. Petrie 38); noted by Helck 19922: 28.
50 DZA 26.077.040-050.
51 Both Pet. and Cairo 25224; noted by Helck 19922: 53.
52 DZA 21.912.960-970.

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 74 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

Regarding (ii), the spelling of itn without the divine semogram G7 in R 7 is kept in S,
but has been altered to include the semogram in G (as well as subsequently, with
cartouche, in AOS, C, B3). The spellings presented above in (b) and (c) are not as
easily paralleled in New Kingdom manuscripts of compositions also documented in
Middle Kingdom copies, and would, if Neferti is old, constitute more substantial
alterations, including possible by-forms in the lexicon (iii), possible instances of
genuine morphological renewal (iv), and distinctively late spellings (c). It may also be
observed that the density of recent spellings in Neferti is higher than in other Middle
Egyptian compositions. Yet, individual histories must be reckoned with when it
comes to phenomena that are ultimately scribal in nature.
In sum, any arguments based on orthography are bound to remain highly uncertain
and should be renounced at this stage, even in a case such as Neferti where the
phenomenon is dense. The situation with written lexical morphology is thus similar to
the one described above for written grammatical morphology. Inasmuch as possible
changes in morphology can only manifest themselves as changes in written morphol-
ogy, this illustrates once again how morphological change is largely trapped in a dead
angle for the case of Middle Egyptian literary texts. Only in exceptional cases can an
argument on a change in written lexical morphology be made, always to be related to
further considerations (sdAdA, §4.6.7, (i); anan, §4.6.7, (ii); Hw-n-rA-Hr, §6.3.2.2).

2.3.2 The linguistic phenomenology of Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts

While orthography remains unreliable for dating, and morphology therefore largely
inaccessible, a different situation obtains with grammar. Per se, any element in a text
could be altered in the course of textual transmission. However, the likelihood for this
to actually happen, varies greatly depending on a variety of factors. Beyond the
obvious—the quality of the witness considered—parameters include the mode of
transmission of a composition, the type of linguistic expression considered, and the
ways by which this fits, tightly or not so tightly, into its context. The following
observations mainly concern Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts, in which texts to be
discussed for dating are first documented; more substantial alterations are observed in
Ramesside manuscripts.53

2.3.2.1 Different textual histories

Textual transmission, and therefore textual (in)stability, depends on the type of texts
considered.54 The transmission of Middle Egyptian literary texts in pre-Ramesside
times was variable and not fully reproductive in all aspects, but not of an ‘open’
type.55 Ptahhotep is known in two substantially different traditions already in the

53 E.g. Parkinson 2009: 187-207 and Köhler 2009: 5-56 (Sinuhe); Burkard 1977 (for teachings); Jäger
2004: 5-192 (Kheti); Fischer-Elfert 1992 (on textual interferences between compositions). For
different versions of a Ramesside composition, also Spalinger 2002: 332-4 (Qadesh).
54 Contrast for instance with the Coffin Texts, where issues such as the ‘actualization’ of a (group of)
spell(s) on a given coffin could play a major role; see e.g. Vernus 1996b.
55 Parkinson 2002: 50-3. ‘Open transmission’ was introduced to egyptological discussion by Quack
(1994: 18-23), mainly with a view on later texts.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 75

Middle Kingdom (P and L1), while Eighteenth Dynasty versions, which tend to
follow the more regular Middle Kingdom tradition (L1), display evidence of further
redaction.56 Middle Kingdom versions of Sinuhe and Eloquent Peasant also show
some variation, but not comparable to Ptahhotep.57 This variation may in part go back
to different performance versions;58 in addition, the R tradition demonstrates regular-
izing tendencies,59 and very few instances of local interpolations.60 Early New King-
dom versions seem ‘less free and more rigidly reproductive’,61 and do not present
traces of a wholesale redaction comparable to the one to which Ptahhotep was
subjected.62 Loyaliste is the only Middle Egyptian composition to be documented in a
shorter and in a much longer version, the first inscribed on a later Twelfth Dynasty
stela, the latter documented through New Kingdom portable witnesses; this Sonderfall
affords a discussion of its own (§4.5).
Among works of as yet uncertain dating, Amenemhat is a sbAyt (1a) in name, but
only in an extended sense: the composition has narrative parts and includes many
elements of fictionality.63 Both Amenemhat and Neferti are composed in a tightly con-
centric pattern, with multiple long-distance echoes and symmetries that are integral to
the core meanings these compositions project.64 In terms of their structure and compo-
sition, Amenemhat and Neferti are therefore closer to Sinuhe, which is also concentri-
cally patterned, than to the more additively patterned teachings, Ptahhotep and
Loyaliste. Such structure is strong in Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts of Amenemhat
and Neferti and implies that the text of these compostions—whenever they may have
been originally composed—was more stable than in teachings such as Ptahhotep and
Loyaliste. No similar comment extends to e.g. Merikare, which in its more additive
structure conforms to teachings, and which could have had a more unstable text (this
is of course not to mean that this should be posited).
The above observations bear on the overall stability or unstability of a text.
Assuming, for example, that Amenemhat or Neferti were composed in the Middle
Kingdom, their textual history would have been of a substantially different sort than
the one of Ptahhotep. Accordingly, the status of late features possibly to be detected
in Amenemhat and Neferti must be appreciated differently than in e.g. Ptahhotep L2, a
composition with a generally more unstable text. This is of course not to mean that
such late features should necessarily be integral to the original composition; in all
cases an individual discussion is required. In some cases, arguments can also be made

56 Hagen 2012a: 219-39; Vernus 20102b: 103-6; Moers 2009; Heyne 2007; Burkard 1977; Stauder in
press c.
57 Parkinson 2012a; 2009: 90-112, 119-25, 162-7.
58 Parkinson 2002: 126; Winand in press a.
59 An example is the ‘narrative infinitives’, which are prominent in the first part of B, partly replaced
by (stylistically flatter) sDm.n=f ’s already in R, and further reduced in the course of the New
Kingdom (Köhler 2009: 54-5; Kahl 1998; below, §4.1.3.B, §4.1.3.D.NB; disputed by Feder 2004).
60 Parkinson 2009: 164-5; for R 13-14, §4.5.5.1.B.
61 Parkinson 2009: 182; also 160-9; Kahl 1998: 399. A few changes are observed in G (Parkinson
2009: 184-6), most famously the rewriting Sinuhe’s identity as a prince (Feder 2003). For
stemmata proposed for Sinuhe, Winand in press a; Peust 2012; Kahl 1998.
62 Similarly Vernus 20102b: 106 and n.22.
63 Lastly Gnirs 2013b: 134, 136-8.
64 Parkinson 2002: 193-200 (Neferti); 241-8 (Amenemhat).

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 76 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

on the compositional structure of the work to further assess whether an expression is

part of the original composition or not (e.g. §5.2.3.3; §5.3.1.3).

2.3.2.2 Possible alterations of lexical expressions

Turning to individual expressions, lexical expressions are in general more loosely
bound to their respective contexts than grammatical ones: with a lexical expression, it
is often difficult to assess whether it belongs to the original text or not. Given that the
issue does not lend itself to much further generalization, the following limits itself to a
selective illustration of two different situations that can be encountered (many more
will be discussed throughout the present study):

(i) Sinuhe G 15 (followed by AOS and C) isq ‘wait for’

Middle Kingdom witnesses read differently: B 5 irt, R 28 iw{t}?<d>. Neferti, not
documented before the early New Kingdom, also has an instance of isq (7g:
§2.2.2, (i)), yet the cases of Neferti 7g and Sinuhe G 15 differ. If the B and R
witnesses of Sinuhe had not survived, the secondariness of the reading in G (and later
New Kingdom witnesses) would be recognized nonetheless based on the context,
which is clearly garbled: G 15 [rDt(=i) wi] imytw bAty r isq wAt Smw=sn ‘My placing
myself between two bushes to wait for the road of their travellers.’ ‘Waiting for’ (isq)
a ‘road’ (wAt) yields little sense; in addition, the third person plural anaphoric pronoun
(=sn) lacks an antecedent. In Neferti 7g, by contrast, isq coherently fits its context:
7g-h tw r isq mAqt m grH tw r aq xnrwt tw r snbt qdd m irty ‘A ladder will be waited
for at night! Strongholds will be entered! Slumber in the eyes will be swept away!’
There is some likelihood therefore that isq in Neferti 7g is original, yet of course no
way to prove this.

(ii) Loyaliste 2.2 (New Kingdom witnesses) snsi ‘praise’

If the short version of Loyaliste inscribed on Sehetepibre’s Stela had not survived—a
statistically likely fate—there would be no way to assess the textual status of snsi in
the New Kingdom copies Loyaliste 2.2: as it stands, the text makes good sense and
the expression could well be original. Sehetepibre’s Stela happened to survive,
demonstrating that a different reading, snsn ‘fraternize’, is original; when the two
versions are compared, this reading snsn appears superior to the one in New Kingdom
witnesses.65

2.3.2.3 Possible alterations of grammatical expressions

Grammatical expressions tend to be more strongly bound to their respective contexts

than lexical ones. Principled arguments are therefore often possible in assessing the
textual status of a grammatical expression.
A. Textual secondariness can sometimes be established directly on internal grounds,
when a construction is syntactically hybrid and/or implies tensions with its context.
Different situations that can occur are preliminarily illustrated by two Gedanken-
experimente with no bearing on dating.

65 Posener 1976: 20 (quoted below, §4.5.5.2, n.a to the relevant passage).

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 77

(i) Sinuhe AOS vso 42

HD-tA iw r iAaS n (...)
‘At dawn, one came to call to (...)’

The construction in AOS is grammatically correct and fits the context semantically. It
is only when B is drawn into the picture that the AOS reading appears secondary,
effecting grammatical simplification. Compare B 248 HD.n rf tA iw iw iAS n=i (...)
‘When it dawned, one came and called to me (...)’. B has a complex serial construc-
tion66 (iw iw iAS n=i) involving two subjectless passives (iw; iAS) with a shared argu-
ment (n=i). In AOS, a preposition is inserted to reduce the construction into a non-
serial one with only one subjectless passive (iw r iAaS). The resulting construction is
much simpler and more easily processed.67
This account, however, is only possible in retrospect. If B had not survived, the
secondariness of the text in AOS could not have been established based on grounds
internal to AOS. Even less so could the original text, and subsequent processes of
textual alteration, have been reconstructed.68

(ii) Ptahhotep 59 L2
iw gmm.tw=s m-a Hmwt Hr bnywt
‘It (scil. fine speech) is found only with maidservants on the millstones.’
Iw gmm.tw=s in L2 is a hybrid construction, accommodating the conflicting
semantics of the assertive iw with a form, the mrr=f, that expresses lesser informative
salience of the verbal phrase.69 Unlike in (i), the secondariness of L2 is therefore
immediately hypothesized on purely internal grounds, without drawing any knowl-
edge of the text in P into account.
It is then further hypothesized that the original construction, if not altogether
different, would have been either iw gm.tw=s or gmm.tw=s. In a third step, it is
observed that Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses of Middle Kingdom compositions, unlike
Ramesside ones, do not display cases of intrusive iw’s. A reconstruction as iw
gm.tw=s would therefore be hypothesized on purely text-internal grounds. As it turns
out, this is just the original reading in P.
NB. The textual alteration in Ptahhotep 59 is in line with other cases in which a more
explicit formal marking of information structure, such as by a mrr=f, is made in
contexts in which an adverbial phrase has high informative salience. In Ptahhotep
itself, compare:

66 In informal terms, a ‘serial construction’ is a construction that tightly links two verbal predicates,
both semantically and syntactically. Semantically the events contribute to a joint meaning;
syntactically, they are often in the same inflected form and/or share arguments. In the Sinuhe
example, all of these apply.
67 On processing as a major parameter in textual histories, also below, §6.2.1.2.
68 Note that unlike most witnesses on which the present study is based, AOS is not from the
Eighteenth Dynasty and has a more substantially altered text in general.
69 Occurrences of this combination are exceedingly rare. Another one is Kemit 8.C iw rmm=s Tw ‘she
beweeps you.’

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 78 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

() in a general present tense context:

349 P iw in.tw aqw wn Aq ‘Intimates are brought even though there is ruin.’
 L2 inn.tw m aq wn Ahw ‘To an intimate recourse is made when there is
trouble.’ (Note the mediate object construction, only in L2.)
() in a future/modal context:
293 P pr.tw Hr irt=f ib Hr win=f ‘One will emerge from doing it while the heart
rejects it.’
 L2 prr.tw Hr irt[=f ] ib Hr win=f ‘One will emerge from doing it precisely
while the heart rejects it.’
This is more generally illustrative of how processes of textual alterations, although
ultimately individual histories, tend to follow certain recurrent paths, rather than be
fully random.

B. As these two Gedankenexperimente illustrate, a broad variety of situations can be

encountered. In some cases, the secondariness of a reading can be established on
internal grounds. Going further, the original reading can be reconstructed with some
likelihood through a consideration of how the text in a given witness could have
arisen (ii). In other cases, however, the secondariness of a reading can not be deter-
mined on similar internal grounds (i). Accordingly, the lack of an indication that a
reading is secondary falls much short of what is required to declare it original. In
establishing that a reading is original, additional arguments are required.
To these ends, a variety of strategies can be pursued, illustrated in individual
details in the subsequent chapters. Among these, very general principles are the
following. To begin with, not all grammatical constructions are equally likely to
undergo alteration in the course of textual transmission. In addition, the ways a gram-
matical construction fits the surrounding segment of text, more or less tightly, can be
indicative. An often useful strategy also consists in making the hypothesis that a
reading is secondary and in examining the possible ‘source constructions’ from which
this reading would have been altered, if indeed secondary. When no candidates can be
named, the likelihood for a grammatical expression to be integral to the original text is
high. Whenever possible, arguments are made along the above combined lines (e.g.
§5.2.2; §6.2.1). In the most favorable cases, a grammatical expression can be directly
proven to be original based on an analysis of the structural role it plays within the
overall composition. The argument is then that the type of large-scale compositional
patterning into which a construction fits and to which it contributes can not have
arisen as a chance artifact in textual transmission nor through local rewriting (e.g.
§5.2.3.3; §5.3.1.3).
In the following sections, I present three case studies which require more
substantial developments. The first illustrates how an assessment of the textual status
of an expression is impossible when only the individual clauses in which that expres-
sion occurs are considered, yet becomes possible when relevant aspects of the
articulation of a composition as a whole are brought into consideration (§2.3.3). The
second and third are complementary. In the former, I examine a verse in a composi-
tion known only through New Kingdom manuscripts, Teaching of a Man to His Son,

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 79

and discuss which among the readings that have been proposed is original (§2.3.4). In
the latter, I consider a section of a composition of which both Twelfth and Eighteenth
Dynasty witnesses survived, Ptahhotep, and discuss whether a linguistic dating based
on the main Eighteenth Dynasty witness could have resulted in wrongly ascribing the
composition to the early New Kingdom (§2.3.5).

2.3.3 Assessing the textual status of grammatical expressions:

NP Hr sDm and N(P) sDm=f in Kheti

Kheti has a great many occurrences of NP Hr sDm and a fair amount of N(P) sDm=f ’s.
The composition thereby lends itself to a case study in how the two constructions—
both expressing relative present tense yet with different aspect—can be affected, or
not, in the case of textual transmission. The issue has broader relevance because these
constructions are central to one major dating criterion (§2.6).
The following comments are not based on a stemmatological approach.70 By
definition, this provides no tool for going beyond the possibly earliest archetype,
except by an additional examination of grammar on the clausal or sentential levels.71
Yet, several grammatical constructions are often acceptable in one passage. In
particular, both NP Hr sDm and N(P) sDm=f are similarly correct in Middle Egyptian
grammar. These differ in meaning, yet not in ways that one or the other could be
declared more likely based on usual text-critical methods. In circumstantial clauses,
the contrast between the two constructions can be neutralized to a large extent, as is
demonstrated e.g. by Sinuhe B 2, where B has iw=f Hr mdt ‘as he was speaking’,
while R reads iw=f mdw=f ‘as he spoke’. Although the contrast between the two
Egyptian constructions can be aptly transposed into a similar contrast in English, the
actual difference in meaning between the two constructions is minimal in both these
languages. In main clauses, the issue is made even more complex by the issue of the
date of composition of a text, in many cases itself an unknown. In texts composed
from the late Middle Kingdom on, NP Hr sDm increasingly comes to be used in the
same contexts as N(P) sDm=f (§2.6.1-2). Moreover, N(P) sDm=f can in all relevant
periods be used where NP Hr sDm is (§5.3.5.2.A).
To circumvent these problems, the perspective is here set on the parameters by
which the alternation between NP Hr sDm and N(P) sDm=f is principled, or not, within
the composition considered. The approach thereby targets aspects of the temporality
of Kheti as a whole. On the other hand, the analysis to follow is specific to Kheti in
particular: in other texts, different issues are relevant (thus, concerning the same
alternation, §2.6.2.2-3 for Eloquent Peasant; §2.6.2.4 for Ipuwer; §2.6.2.5 for
Khakheperreseneb). As illustrated throughout the present study, the interpretation of
grammar and textual history often requires a consideration of the broader semantic,
temporal, and/or formal articulation of a composition being examined (for other
constructions, e.g. §5.2.2; §5.2.3.3; §5.3.1.3).

70 For such, Jäger 2004. Critically emphasizing how the stemmatological method when applied to
literary texts relies on partly problematic assumptions made on the transmission of these, Fischer-
Elfert 2007: 309.
71 E.g. Backes 2011; for a recent illustration, e.g. Werning 2011: I, 51-82.

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 80 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

A. In the text of Kheti as transmitted, N(P) sDm=f is found in general maxims mostly
in the final sections of the text (i). Yet, the construction recurs in a few other places
including at the beginning of ‘chapters’ (ii). NP Hr sDm, for its part, is common at the
beginning of individual ‘chapters’, more than anywhere else in the text (iii):

(i) Kheti 27.2

iw xAx-ib D=f mh ib (...)
‘(If an official sends you in mission, speak according to what he has spoken,
do not take from it, do not add to it!)
The hasty-hearted one produces negligence (...)’
Sim. 25.2. Also 14.4, in continuation to a passive sDm.tw=f (14.3) in the apodosis
to a ir-introduced hypothetical clause (14.3): for this passage, see the analysis in
§5.3.2.2.D.

(ii) Kheti 8.1

bTy xd=f r idHw r iTt n=f swnw
‘The reed-cutter fares downstream to the Delta to take away arrows for
himself.’
Sim. 3.1.

(iii) Kheti 12.1

kAri Hr int mw m mAwD qaH=f nb Xr tnw
‘The gardener is bringing water with a carrying bar; each of his shoulder
suffers of old age.’
Sim. 6.1; 7.1; 13.1; 16.1; 19.1.

Uses as in (i) are unremarkable: N(P) sDm=f is a regular expression of general or

habitual events. More noteworthy are the occurrences of NP Hr sDm at the beginning
of ‘chapters’ characterizing trades (iii): in almost no case is a temporal limitation
readily implied by the immediate context.72 As trades are characterized in general
terms in Kheti, one then wonders why N(P) sDm=f is not also used here. Moreover,
N(P) sDm=f is occasionally found at the beginning of ‘chapters’ (ii), in contexts
apparently similar to the ones in (iii) that have NP Hr sDm.
When grammar is examined only locally, at the clausal or sentential levels, this
would seem to suggest that NP Hr sDm in Kheti as transmitted can express habitual or
general events, just like N(P) sDm=f does. Two interpretive possibilities would then
offer themselves. If original, the uses of NP Hr sDm as in (ii)-(iii) could reflect a later
date of composition of the text (under application of Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non
argument, §2.6.2—note that Vernus himself did not apply his criterion to Kheti,
rightly so; see the discussion below). Alternatively, instances of NP Hr sDm could be

72 A possible exception is only 16.1 sxxti Hr prt r xAst swD.n=f xwt=f n msw=f ‘The courier is going
to a foreign country having handed over its belongings to his children’, where an initial limitation
may be implied by the circumstantial clause. Perhaps also 7.1, depending on how this is read or
emended.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 81

secondary to original N(P) sDm=f ’s in these ‘chapter’-initial positions in Kheti. As it

turns out, both these interpretations are equally wrong.
B. The NP Hr sDm’s in (iii) are with events that characterize trades. Under a purely
local examination of grammar, these could be viewed as expressing habitual or
general aspect. When, however, the broader articulation of the text is taken into
account, it appears that these characterizations of trades are set under the scope of a
presentification to the addressee. In Kheti, a father tells his son (Dd=i n=k: 10.1; 21.1;
23.1), speaking of what he has ‘seen’, i.e. experienced (mAA: 2.1; 3.2; 4.1; 4.2).
This compares with the speech situation in Neferti, a composition in which events
are presented to the addressee (simultaneously Neferti’s heart, the king, and the
audience): 4a xft-Hr=k ‘in your presence’; 3f m-bAH=k ‘before you’ (also D=i n=k (...)
‘I shall show you (...)’, recurrently in the lament). In Neferti, present tense events in
the NP Hr sDm fall under the scope of such presentification and thus express progres-
sive aspect, e.g. (iv) (on presentification in Neferti, further §5.3.1.3.C). In A Man to
His Son similarly, present tense events in the NP Hr sDm construction are mostly
dependent on a presentification. The aspectual ‘extension’ expressed by the construc-
tion is thereby related to an act of ‘seeing’ (mAA), e.g. (v):

(iv) Neferti 9f
D=i n=k sA m xrwy sn m xft
s Hr smA it=f (...)
‘I shall show you the son an enemy, the brother an opponent,
a man killing his father (...)’

(v) A Man 8.1-6

mAA=n xAst nbt Xr Hryt=f
iw wrw=sn Hr qnb n=f sn (...)
pwnt idbw HAw-nbwt iw nTr Hr nwH n=f st (...)
‘We see every foreign country dreading him:
Their great ones are inclining themselves to him (...);73
Punt and the shores of the Hau-Nebu, the god is binding them for him (...)’74

A similar type of analysis extends to Kheti: characterizations of trades as in Kheti 12.1

are not viewed under an habitual or general aspect, because they fall under the scope
of a presentification (to the speaker’s son, and thereby to the audience). In perhaps
more intuitive terms, the aspectual perspective is not ‘the X-er (habitually) does so
and so’, but ‘I have seen and I am hereby presenting you with (an image of) the X-er
do-ing so and so.’
The analysis accords with the lack of iw in all these ‘chapter’-initial constructions
of NP Hr sDm in Kheti. In contexts where iw could have been present syntactically, the
lack of the particle signals that the state-of-affairs in the clause is presented en bloc,

73 On the intertext of A Man 8.2 and Rekhmire 13-14 (Urk. IV 1075, 16), Fischer-Elfert 1999: 102
(interpreting this as a quotation from the former into the latter).
74 A similar formulation recurs in Thutmosis III’s Poetical Stela 5 (Urk. IV 612, 14): see Fischer-
Elfert 1999: 103.

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 82 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

rather than related to some preceding segment of discourse.75 Events presented en

bloc naturally come with a progressive view on the event. Significantly, the events
under the scope of presentification in Neferti, both future and present tense ones, are
also iw-less (§5.2.3.3; §5.3.1.3). Beyond literary texts, the analysis extends to iw-less
NP Hr sDm in captions to images, e.g. wHaw Hr HAm [rm]w ‘fishers are catching fish’
(Bersheh II, pl.XVI). In Kheti and in Neferti similarly, the speaker presents its
audience with images of what he has seen.
C. This leaves the two instances of N(P) sDm=f in similar ‘chapter’-initial
positions (ii) to be explained. In 8.1 (quoted above), the use of N(P) sDm=f relates to
the Aktionsart of the event: the ‘reed-cutter’ ‘fares downstream to the delta’ (xdi r
idHw), and thereby a long way: the event can not easily be captured in a snapshot. In
similar structural positions in the two preceding ‘chapters’, whb mnxwt ‘bore beads’
(6.1) and Xaq ‘shave’ (7.1) are both in the NP Hr sDm construction, just like other
characterizations of trades (above, B).
In 3.1 iw=f ir=f sArt n ky ‘He fulfills somebody else’s need’, the referent of the
subject is of direct relevance for interpretation. So is the position of the clause in the
text. The statement is about the scribe, not about any of the other trades. The clause
directly follows the quotation from Kemit (note the anaphoric subject pronoun) and
has generalizing force. Kheti 3.1, in the introductory part of the composition, does not
fall under the scope of presentification as the following characterizations of trades do.
D. The above analysis directly demonstrates that all instances of both NP Hr sDm and
N(P) sDm=f are integral to the original text of Kheti. It does so in ways that neither a
study of textual variation in extant witnesses, nor an examination of grammar solely
on the clausal or sentential levels, could. Observing that witnesses are remarkably
consistent with each other in these passages only points to a common archetype, not
necessarily to the original text. In the passages that have NP Hr sDm, N(P) sDm=f
would not have been ungrammatical or semantically inappropriate. Nor would NP Hr
sDm have in the passage which have N(P) sDm=f, depending on the time to which
Kheti is dated.
The reader will notice that the result reached happens to be very similar to Jäger’s.
As it turns out, the tradition of Kheti is remarkably stable with respect to the two
constructions considered. This, however, is the very research question here discussed
(‘how stable, or unstable, is the text with respect to the two constructions con-
sidered?’). No answer to this question can be presupposed: this must be independently
established, as it was above.
E. Once the original readings are established, and only then, comments can be made
on the textual tradition. In one place, P. Sallier II—which is Ramesside and not the
best of witnesses in general—replaces N(P) sDm=f with NP Hr sDm, yet does so only
incompletely. The result is a hybrid formation:76

75 In more technical terms, such environments are analyzed as ‘thetic’ (Stauder & Uljas in prep.).
76 Noted by Vernus 1990a: 190-1, ex.412.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 83

(vi) Kheti 3.1

P. Sallier II iw=f Hr ir=f sArt n ky
Mult. mss. iw=f ir=f sArt n ky
‘He fulfills somebody else’s need.’
For similar hybrid formations occasionally encountered elsewhere in Ramesside
manuscripts, §2.3.4.1, (iv)-(v).

Most witnesses keep the original reading, as all do in other passages. While the text of
Kheti is notoriously unstable, surprisingly little variation concerns cases where a N(P)
sDm=f construction would have been replaced by a NP Hr sDm one. The reverse
alteration is to my knowledge undocumented in any text; it would also be unexpected
as it would run counter to linguistic history (§2.6.1.1). These observations made on
Kheti—in some respects a ‘worst-case scenario text’—demonstrate that NP Hr sDm
and N(P) sDm=f tend to be stable in the course of textual tradition, particularly in
Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts on which the present study is mainly based.

2.3.4 Identifying the original reading based on New Kingdom manuscripts:

A Man to His Son 3.1

A Man 3.1 could afford an indication for dating the composition, depending on how
the text originally read. In the context of the present chapter, a discussion of this verse
is illustrative of how, when classical approaches to textual criticism fail to settle the
issue, the original reading may nonetheless be accessible through a more thorough
examination of grammar itself.

2.3.4.1 The competing readings

A. The traditional interpretation of this difficult and much discussed passage follows
the extant manuscripts, reading as in (i). The editor of the text proposes to read differ-
ently, as in (ii):

(i) A Man 3.1, traditional reading77

in iw hrw n rnnt Hr tht=f
‘Does a day of Renenet contravene itself?’
(ii) A Man 3.1, alternative reading78
in iw *hAw n rnnt th.tw=f
‘Wird etwa die *Angelegenheit (/das Ressort) der Renenet überteten (/verletzt)?’
The passage involves considerable semantic complexities.79 Both readings seem
equally acceptable at this level.80 The following remarks therefore limit themselves to
the more formal aspects, textual and grammatical, that are involved.81

77 E.g. Vernus 20102b: 292, n.27; 1990a: 186-7, ex.401, and n.83 (references to the previous
discussion); Quack 2000a: 538.
78 Fischer-Elfert 1999: 58-9, 66.

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 84 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

For the present purpose, the crucial issue resides in identifying the grammatical
construction. Among witnesses sufficiently preserved, five out of six read N Hr
thA(.tw)=f. One, IFAO 2359, has N thA.[tw]=f:

Manuscript tradition of A Man 3.1

DeM 1665I+, OG 318, OG 317, in iw hrw (n) rnnt Hr thA(.tw)=f 82
DeM 1667, P. 14374
IFAO 2359 [...] hrw rnnt thA.[tw]=f.
In the traditional interpretation (i), one witness, IFAO 2359, would present a minor
alteration, the omission of Hr. In the reading proposed by the editor of the text (ii), the
other manuscripts would result from the insertion of Hr into an original N th.tw=f:

A Man 3.1, competing textual scenarios

- @r omitted (N Hr tht=f  N tht=f ) in IFAO 2359;
- Constructional alteration (N th.tw=f  N Hr tht=f ) in the other mss.
B. Under the traditional interpretation, the loss of Hr in IFAO 2359 is unproblematic.
In the early New Kingdom, the morpheme Hr was much reduced in its phonetic
substance in the grammaticalized construction NP Hr sDm. The omission of Hr in this
construction is otherwise documented, thus already in a very early Eighteenth Dy-
nasty manuscript of another Middle Egyptian literary text:

(iii) Loyaliste 8.2

TC iw rA sbA Dr rk nTr
PL (and later mss.) iw rA Hr sbA Dr rk nTr
‘Speech is teaching since the time of god.’
In view of the earlier date of TC, one may wonder whether iw rA sbA (...) could be
faulty for an original iw rA sbA=f (...) rather than for iw rA Hr sbA (...). The reading
in PL and in other manuscripts, iw rA Hr sbA (...), would then be yet a further
reinterpretation, making the reading grammatical again, if in a different way.
However, the presence of Dr rk nTr in the clause, which defines a left temporal

79 Lastly Vernus 20102b: 289-90.

80 Compare Fischer-Elfert 1999: 58-9, advocating (ii); Quack 2000a: 538, advocating (i).
81 The alternative reading proposed by Fischer-Elfert (1999: 58) additionally implies an emendation
of hrw (all mss.) into *hAw. The emendation (originally proposed by Fecht 1978: 30-1) is not
supported by external evidence (Quack 2000a: 538 and n.9). It may still be hypothesized that all
extant witnesses derive from some common archetype. The issue has some bearing on the overall
semantic interpretation of the passage but not on identifying the following verbal construction; it is
therefore left open here.
82 DeM 1665I+ and OG 318 with a spelling tw for the ending of the infinitive; OG 317 and
DeM 1667 with the ending of the infinitive dropped; P. 14374 with the ending of the infinitive
corrupted into pw.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 85

limit, implies that the event is viewed in its extension.83 The progressive construc-
tion, iw rA Hr sbA, is therefore original.

In the alternative interpretation proposed by Fischer-Elfert, the textual alteration

would have been more substantial in nature. A secondary insertion of Hr implies a
constructional reinterpretation, from a synthetic construction, N(P) sDm=f, into an
analytic one, NP Hr sDm.84 The process is uncommon (§2.3.3), but occasionally docu-
mented in Ramesside manuscripts. One example is from no other text than A Man to
His Son itself (iv):

(iv) A Man 4.9

OL 23561 iw=f Hr sbA=f (...) (OG 317 iw=f Hr sbA [...];
IFAO unn. ro iw=f [...] sbA=f )
Var. mss. iw=f sbA=f (...)
‘He teaches (...)’
Sim. Kheti 3.1 P. Sallier II (§2.3.3, (vi)). With a secondary alteration of the
subject into a first person, also Sinuhe C 4 (Twentieth Dynasty; = B 2)85 iw=isic Hr
mdt=f; compare iw=f mdw=f ‘as he spoke’ in the R tradition (R, G, AOS; for the
reading in B, §2.3.3, intro.).

In this, the result of the alteration is a hybrid between the original iw=f sDm=f and
iw=f Hr sDm. The former construction was obsolete in the Nineteenth Dynasty. The
latter was as well in main clauses, but is morphologically close to the then regular sw
Hr sDm. As such occasional hybrids document, some Ramesside scribes—probably
not all—had problems with the old N(P) sDm=f.
Related is (v), also with an intrusive Hr, but in the context of an original cleft-
sentence with the old independent pronoun twt. The result is a hybrid as well:

(v) Amenemhat 15c

Var. mss. (incl. P. Sallier II) twt Hr wAH HDt (...)
Var. other mss. twt wAH HDt (...)
‘You wear the White Crown (...)’
That the construction was not any more understood by some Ramesside scribes is
also suggested by the spelling of twt, as if this were the word for ‘statue’.86 For a
discussion of Amenemhat 15c in context, below §6.3.1.

83 Compare Merikare E 93 iw=f Hr aHA Dr rk nTr ‘He is fighting since the time of god.’ For the role of
the left temporal limit in the aspectual interpretation of this passage as progressive, Vernus 1990a:
165, ex.342.
84 In the present case, some semantic reinterpretation would have been involved as well, since the
synthetic construction would have been passive while the secondary analytic one would have been
active and reflexive.
85 Noted by Vernus 1990a: 182, n.66.
86 Burkard 1977: 43. For textual interferences with Ramesside witnesses of Hymn 5.5 (notably
P. Sallier II), Fischer-Elfert 1992: 354-5.

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 86 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

The textual processes implied in either reading of A Man 3.1 are thereby documented.
The traditional reading is the one in the majority of manuscripts, but this is not a
strong argument since witnesses other than IFAO 2359 could derive from a common
archetype or have altered the text in similar ways independently from each other. The
textual alteration posited in the editor’s reading is less commonly documented than
the one in the traditional reading, but it is documented, and thereby possible. It is also
more substantial as it involves a constructional reinterpretation, but this too can not
serve as a reliable argument against it. In (iv) as in other cases presented above, the
result of the textual alteration is a hybrid: under the hypothesis that N th.tw=f is
original in A Man 3.1, N Hr th.tw=f could be a hybrid as well, if tw is taken as an
hangover of an original passive N th.tw=f. It could also be a spelling of the ending of
the infinitive, if N Hr tht=f is original. Witnesses without tw (OG 317, DeM 1667)
could be secondary to either of the above.
In short, the traditional reading implies hardly any textual alteration, while the
alternative reading comes with an uncommon and fairly thorough-going scenario of
textual alteration. Yet, this does not suffice to declare the traditional reading original.
Which of the two readings is original can not be decided solely at these levels.

2.3.4.2 Issues of grammar

The alternative reading proposed by the editor, with a passive construction, may at
first seem to find some support in the immediately following verses. These also have
passive constructions, not NP Hr sDm. The broader context is quoted here under
inclusion of 3.1 read as the editor proposes:
A Man 3.1-3
in iw *hAw n rnnt th.tw=f
in iw wAH.tw hrw n aHaw
in iw xbA.tw im=f rA-pw
‘Wird etwa die *Angelegenheit (/das Ressort) der Renenet überteten (/verletzt)?
Is a day added to the span of life?
Or does one subtract from it?’
There is, however, a difference between the construction in 3.2 and the one hypoth-
esized for 3.1. The second verse has a sDm.tw N construction, with the full noun after
the verb, not a N sDm.tw=f, as 3.1 would have in this reading. (Verse 3.3 is from an
intransitive verb, and therefore subjectless in the passive.)
Yet, the passive counterpart of the general present tense N(P) sDm=f is sDm.tw NP
(as e.g. in A Man 3.2)—not *N(P) sDm.tw=f. Given that this formal dissymmetry
between the active and passive paradigms is hardly discussed in grammatical
studies,87 a lengthy digression is required to establish the relevant facts.

87 A lone exception is a marginal note in Vernus 1986: 377 and n.10; the issue is also shimmering
through in EG §462-3. A more detailed treatment will be given in Stauder in prep.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 87

2.3.4.2.1 N sDm.tw in Ipuwer

At first, the possibility of a construction N sDm.tw=f functioning as a passive
counterpart to N(P) sDm=f would seem to be suggested by occasional occurrences of
the former construction in two Middle Egyptian literary texts, Sinuhe and Ipuwer. The
former has two occurrences of N sDm.tw=f in parallel to each other, while the latter
has several occurrences of a slightly different construction, N sDm.tw. After briefly
discussing the former construction, I examine the more complex problems posed by
the latter.
A. The Sinuhe passage just alluded to reads:
(i) Sinuhe B 233-234
mw m itrw swr.tw=f mr=k
TAw m pt xnm.tw Dd=k
‘The water in the river, it is drunk as you wish;
The air in the sky, it is breathed as you say.’
As is implied by the balancing of the two verses,88 the pre-verbal noun phrases (mw m
itrw; TAw m pt) are topicalized. Syntactically, they stand outside the boundaries of their
respective clauses.89 The construction in Sinuhe is therefore a marked topic construc-
tion. In A Man 3.1, no contrastive topic is involved. A marked topic construction of
another kind is also ruled out on formal grounds by the presence of in iw at the
beginning of the sentence. In short, the construction in Sinuhe B 233-234 is different
from the one that A Man 3.1 would have had under the reading here discussed.
B. The case of Ipuwer is more complex. A typical instance of a passive construction
with pre-verbal subject is:90

(ii) Ipuwer 5.6

iw ms msw srw Hw.tw r sAwt
Xrdw nw nHt D.tw Hr qAnr
‘But now, the children of officials are beaten against the wall,
children of prayer are placed on the high ground.’

The constructions in Ipuwer have presentative force. This is implied by the overall
presentative articulation of the lament, underscored by the recurrent use of iw ms NP
(...) and mTn is NP (...).91 The interpretation is confirmed by other constructions in
similar environments, for which the written form is explicit in implying that the pre-
verbal nouns must stand outside the boundaries of the clause:

88 The whole passage is balanced: B 232-234 m wi m Xnw m wi m st tn ntk Hbs Axt tn wbn itn n mrt=k
mw m itrw (...) ‘Whether I am in the Residence, or whether I am in this place: you are the one who
veils this horizon, while the sun shines for love of you; the water in the river (...)’.
89 Technically, the segmentation is: [ [mw m itrw]left-dislocated topic [swr.tw im=f]clause ]sentence. In the
spoken chain, this was probably marked by an intonational break, as is the case with similar
constructions in other languages (notably all Egyptological translation languages).
90 Translations of Ipuwer in this section are taken over or adapted from Enmarch 2008.
91 For a semantic analysis of iw ms and mTn is in Ipuwer, Oréal 2011: 274-5 and 138, respectively.

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 88 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

- In negative constructions:
(iii) Ipuwer 4.5-6
iw ms idHw r-Dr=f nn dgi.tw=f (...)
‘But now, the whole Delta, it will not be concealed (...)’
Sim. in the active 3.10-1192 iw ms Abw Tni [spAw]t? Smaw n bAk n [HA]ayt ‘But now,
Elephantine, Thinis, and the nomes(?) of Upper Egypt, they have not worked
because of strife.’

- With extraposition of a constituent other than the subject:

(iv) Ipuwer 6.8-9
iw ms sSw nw tmA dr sSw=sn (...)
‘But now, the scribes of the field registers, their writings have been obliterated
(...)’
With a sDm(w)-passive. Sim. in the active, 7.7 mtn tA Ts.n=f Xr smAy(t) qn Xsi Hr
nHm [xwt]=f ‘Look, the land, it has knotted together in gangs; the strong man, the
vile man carries off his things.’ Etc.

Significant is also the following passage, in which N sDm.tw follows sDm.tw N. The
two constructions correlate with different types of subjects. In the first, the post-verbal
subject (Xnmw, ‘dependents’) is not further defined. In the second, the pre-verbal
subject is locally defined (Hbsy p(A)qt, ‘those who used to wear fine linen’):

(v) Ipuwer 4.8-9

iw ms D.tw Xnmw Hr bnwt
Hbsy p(A)qt Hw.tw m DAwt
‘But now, dependents are put to quernstones;
Those who used to wear fine linen, they are beaten wrongly.’

C. Instances of N sDm.tw in Ipuwer are often in parallel with other passive or related
constructions: sDm N (sDm(w)-passive) and N sDm (subject – pseudoparticiple). E.g.:
(vi) Ipuwer 6.8
iw ms sSw smA.tw
Sd sSw=sn
‘But now, scribes are being slain,
their writings have been removed.’

In analyzing these alternations, aspect appears to be one relevant parameter. N sDm.tw

often seems to function as a present tense passive expressing ongoing action. The
construction contrasts with perfective passives, implying or expressing a resultant
state (sDm N and N sDm, respectively). This is reflected in the above, perhaps overly
explicit, translation of 6.8. A perfective interpretation of the passive constructions
other than N sDm.tw is illustrated in the following contexts:

92 Restoration after Enmarch 2005: 29.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 89

- %Dm N (not uncommon):

(vii) Ipuwer 2.11
iw ms (...) xbA niwt
Smaw xpr [m qA]yw Swy
‘But now, (...) a town is hacked up,
Upper Egypt has become empty fields.’
Sim. e.g. 6.7 iw ms wn xA<w> Sd wpwt=s<n> ‘But now, offices are opened and
their inventories have been removed’; 3.4-5 iw [ms] gmgm hnw nw hbni ‘But
now, chests of ebony are smashed’; passim.

- N sDm(w) (very common):

(viii) Ipuwer 2.6
iw ms mwtw aSAw qrsw m itrw
‘But now, the many dead are buried in the river.’
Sim. e.g. 2.2 iw ms Hr aAdw pDt(i) grg aDA m st nbt ‘But now, the face is pale, the
bowman settled, falsehood everywhere’; 7.4 mtn sStA n tA xmm Drw=f sHAw ‘Look,
the secret of the land the boundaries of which are unknown is stripped bare’;
passim.

D. Matters might be more complex, however, since the distribution of passive and re-
lated constructions in Ipuwer is principled along aspectual lines only in part. N sDm.tw
is comparatively less common in Ipuwer than other passive and related constructions
(sDm N and N sDm). Most occurrences of the former cluster around recurrent formula-
tions, mainly with two verbs (Hwi and rDi), and often in set phrases:

(ix) N sDm.tw in set phrases:

- With Hwi: 5.6 (above, (ii); identically 4.3-4); also 4.8-9 (above, (v));
- With rDi Hr qAnr: 5.6 (above, (ii)); 4.4 (identically 6.14); with rDi and another
adverbial phrase, 3.14-4.1;
- An exception: 6.8 (above, (vi)).

Even formulations tightly similar to these set phrases with N sDm.tw display some
textual fluctuation in the nature of the construction:

(x) N sDm (subject – pseudoparticiple) in contexts similar to N sDm.tw in (ii):

- With rDi: 6.9-10 iw ms hpw nw xn(r)t Dw r xnti ‘But now, the laws of the
labor enclosure are cast out.’
- With V Hr qAnr: 7.8 mtn nbw wabwt dr Hr qAnr ‘Look, the owner of sepulchers
are repelled onto the high ground.’
- With msw srw V: 6.12-13 iw ms msw srw xAa m mrwt ‘But now, the children
of officials are thrown into the street.’

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 90 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

The possibility of textual alterations must therefore be taken into account, all the more
so for a text documented only in a single manuscript, P. Leiden I 344 ro, dating to the
late Nineteenth Dynasty.93 As (ix) and (x) suggest, at least some instances of N sDm.tw
may be secondary to an original N sDm.
Rather than merely graphic,94 the phenomenon would have been constructional,
implying genuine reinterpretation on syntactic, morphological, and semantic levels.
Morphologically, the pseudoparticiple would have been turned into a suffixal passive.
Semantically, a perfective form of the verb would therbey have been made a present
tense one. Syntactically, the pre-verbal subject would have become an extraposed one.
The process of alteration could have been supported by the presence of other
presentative topic constructions in the composition, also with extraposed subjects.
Under such a scenario, it would not be surprising that events that naturally lend them-
selves to a dynamic interpretation—such as Hwi ‘beat’ (4.3-4; 4.8-9; 5.6: above, (ii))
and smA ‘kill’ (6.8: above, (vi))—would have been the ones primarily affected by a
reinterpretation into a non-perfective construction.
E. The Ipuwerian construction N sDm.tw remains to my knowledge unparalleled in
Middle Egyptian, both in the literary corpus and elsewhere. Among other subjectless
verbal constructions, only N sDm.n is reasonably common (§1.2, (xi)). This, however,
is a Sonderfall, since the conditioning possibility of the construction lies with the mor-
phological specificities of the tense marker -n-.95 Lacking the tense marker -n-, N sDm
is altogether exceptional: the construction is apparently documented only twice in the
Middle Egyptian record and remains unclear in interpretation (§2.4.2, (vi)). Entirely
unrelated is the only superficially similar construction in Eloquent Peasant B1 327-
328, to be read as a relative form with tw:96 srw ir.n.tw r xsf r iit (...) ‘the officials
who were appointed to outlaw evil (...)’.
There is serious doubt, therefore, that N sDm.tw ever existed as a regular construc-
tion in Middle Egyptian. The construction no doubt made sense to the copyist of
P. Leiden I 344 ro and to the readers of this stage in the tradition of Ipuwer. With a
view on language as consisting in evolving repertoires rather than in a fully stable
grammar, a description of the construction in this sense belongs to a comprehensive
grammar of Middle Egyptian yet to be written. In the same perspective, the particular
status of the constrution, possibly limited to one text and arguably an artifact of the
textual transmission of that text, must then also be emphasized.

2.3.4.2.2 The passive counterpart of N(P) sDm=f in Middle Egyptian

N sDm.tw in Ipuwer does not afford evidence in support of the existence of a construc-
tion N sDm.tw=f as implied in Fischer-Elfert’s reading of A Man 3.1. Nor does the
contrastive topic construction in Sinuhe B 233-234. Another construction is always
used as the passive counterpart of N(P) sDm=f, namely sDm.tw NP. Taking examples

93 For the date of P. Leiden I 344 ro, Enmarch 2005: 11.

94 As already observed by Enmarch (2008: 94), the later Nineteenth Dynasty is still too early for an
interpretation of <tw> in N sDm.tw as a written ending of the pseudoparticiple.
95 Edel 1959: 30-7; Stauder in press b: §10.
96 Parkinson 2012a: 263.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 91

from Middle Kingdom literary texts, the counterpart relationship is illustrated in

Ptahhotep (i)-(ii) and in the Fifth Petition of Eloquent Peasant (iii)-(iv).97 The same
counterpart relationship is also observed in A Man to His Son itself (v)-(vi):

(i) Ptahhotep 103 P

iw s Dd=f (...)
‘A man says (...)’
Sim. 373 iw Stm aq=f n iwt ‘The aggressive one ends in trouble’; 506 iw wnft-ib
sip=s aqAA ‘A joyful woman checks the aqaa-water’; 574 iw wxA mDd=f ‘The fool
presses(?)’; passim.

(ii) Ptahhotep 288 P

iw pH.tw mwt Hr rx st
‘Death is reached trying to know it.’
Sim. 349 iw in.tw aqw wn Aq ‘Intimates are brought when there is ruin’; 284 iw
ngb.tw s xA r Axt n=f ‘A thousand men are tied against what is good for them’;
with a pronominal subject, 59 iw gm.tw=s m-a Hmwt Hr bnwt ‘It is found with
maidservants on the millstones’; passim.

(iii) Eloquent Peasant B1 261-262

iw wHa xbA=f itrw
‘The fisher ravages the river.’

(iv) Eloquent Peasant B1 267

iw mH.tw ib im=k
‘You are trusted.’

(v) A Man 1.10

xn Hwrw swxA=f Dd sw
‘Bad speech makes the one who says it a fool.’
Sim. 4.1 iw=f sxpr=f xm r rx ‘he makes the ignorant one a wise one’; 4.3; 4.7;
4.9 (quoted §2.3.4.1, (iv)); 7.2; 11.1; passim.

(vi) A Man 9.3

iw Tn.tw s Hr sp Hwrw
‘A man is noticed (lit. distinguished) on a bad occasion.’98
Sim. e.g. 3.2 (below); 10.7 wSd.tw qbw r mdt? ‘The moderate (lit. the cool) is
invited to talk(?)’.

97 The distribution still holds in post-classical times: thus, in Book of the Dead (quoted in EG §463)
iw=f wnm=f swr=f (...) iw stA.tw=f (...) ‘He eats and drinks (...) he is made to enter (...)’.
98 Following Vernus’ (20102b: 284) interpretation. Another one is Fischer-Elfert’s (1999: 117, 120-
2): ‘Man suspendiert eine Standesperson wegen eines erniedrigenden Vorfalles.’

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 92 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

The same distribution extends to sequences of sentence questions similar to the one in
A Man 3.1-3 (vii)-(viii):

(vii) Eloquent Peasant B 1 179-181

in iw iwsw nnm=f (...)
in iw rf DHwti sfn=f
‘Do the scales wander? (...)
And is then Thot lenient?’99

(viii) Amenemhat 9b-d

in iw Sd.tw Xnnw m-Xnw pr
in iw wbA.tw mw add gbbw
swxA.tw nDsw Hr iryt=sn
‘Are people of tumult ever brought up in the Palace?
Is water that destroys the fields ever let forth?
Are commoners ever made into fools by their own actions?’

A Man to His Son itself has in iw sDm.tw N in the verse immediately following upon
3.1—not *in iw N sDm.tw=f. Had the construction in A Man 3.1 been a passive one,
*in iw th.tw N (with the full noun subject after the verb) would have been used—not
*in iw N th.tw=f as proposed by the editor of the text. Based on the grammatical
grounds outlined in the above discussion, the original text of A Man 3.1 can not have
been passive. Rather, the traditional reading must be upheld:

(ix) A Man 3.1-3

in iw hrw n rnnt Hr tht=f
in iw wAH.tw hrw n aHaw
in iw xbA.tw im=f rA-pw
‘Does a day of Renenenet contravene itself?
Is a day added to the span of life?
Or does one subtract from it?’

2.3.5 Dating Ptahhotep 60-83 based on a late Eighteenth Dynasty manuscript

An essential issue in working with Middle Egyptian literary compositions docu-

mented only in Eighteenth Dynasty and later copies is whether a linguistic dating
would target the original composition of a text or only the linguistic surface of the
earliest manuscripts in which that composition happens to be documented. Under
ideal conditions, this question would be discussed through a thorough examination of
a great many texts documented in both Middle Kingdom and early New Kingdom
copies: one would then date these texts based on their early New Kingdom copies and
verify if any late datings are thereby erroneously obtained. In practice, the possibility
for doing so is restricted to three compositions documented both in Middle Kingdom
and in early New Kingdom copies, Sinuhe, Loyaliste, and Ptahhotep.

99 Transl. Parkinson 2002: 153.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 93

With two of these compositions, the amount of text available for such experiment
is very limited. The two main Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses of Sinuhe, S and G,
preserve only a part of the text. In Loyaliste, the experiment must be restricted to the
portion of the text effectively documented in the Twelfth Dynasty, on Sehetepibre’s
Stela: whether the long version existed in the Middle Kingdom already is at this stage
an open question (discussion below, §4.5). Moreover, the three compositions have
different textual histories, reducing the prospects for generalization. Loyaliste is the
only Middle Egyptian literary composition documented in both a short and a long
version. Sinuhe, a tale, is fairly stable as a composition. Middle Kingdom versions of
Ptahhotep display substantial differences with each other, suggesting a more open
type of textual status and early transmission than for Sinuhe, for which differences in
Middle Kingdom versions are comparatively minor and possibly go back to different
performance versions.
A. In the early New Kingdom witnesses of both Sinuhe and the portion of Loyaliste
also on Sehetepibre’s Stela, no element would support a dating to the Eighteenth Dy-
nasty. When in a second step these early New Kingdom witnesses are compared with
the documented Twelfth Dynasty witnesses, differences appear to be minor.
In Loyaliste, differences between the short and long versions concern one word
(2.2 snsn ‘fraternize’ – snsi ‘praise’: §4.5.5.2, n.a to the relevant example) and a few
formulations, reflecting different semantic emphases in the two versions (compare the
two texts of Loyaliste 2-5, juxtaposed in §4.5.5.1-2). Loyaliste 6 is more substantially
different in relation to the different functions it has in the two versions, conclusive in
the short one, transitional in the long one. More major differences between the short
and long version of Loyaliste are thereby directly related to the fact that this
composition comes in two versions, uniquely in the Middle Egyptian literary corpus.
In Sinuhe, linguistic differences between the Middle Kingdom versions and the
Eighteenth Dynasty ones concern mainly the lexicon (e.g. B 5 iri ‘do’ (R iw{t}?<d>)
 G isq ‘wait for’: §2.3.2.2, (i); B 6 kAi ‘devise’  G nkA ‘ponder’: §2.7.3.3, (ii); R 6
ar ‘ascend’  G, S aq ‘enter’). Inasmuch as can be judged based on the surviving
Eighteenth Dynasty text of Sinuhe, grammar remains largely unaffected (e.g. the
‘narrative’ infinitives in R 6, B 2-3, and B 4-6, preserved in Eighteenth Dynasty
versions: §4.1.3.D.NB). More substantial grammatical changes are, on the other hand,
observed in the Ramesside AOS, thus the serial construction in B 248, reduced in
AOS vso 42 (§2.3.2.3, (i)); the new subject pronouns introduced in AOS vso 2-3 (= B
173-174), vso 45 (= B 254), and vso 50 (= B 263) (§3.4.1.1.B); and various other
alterations, some resulting in incorrect constructions (for a selection, §4.1.3.D.NB). In
many relevant passages, the Eighteenth Dynasty text is not preserved; however, the
changes in AOS are in line with more general Ramesside tendencies and therefore
probably Ramesside alterations of the text (e.g., for the new subject pronouns,
§3.4.1.1.B).100 Some of the differences between Eighteenth Dynasty versions and B

100 On AOS—probably the work of an apprentice (Parkinson 2009: 200)—Parkinson (2009: 202)
comments: ‘Although the large ostracon copy is often not readable in details, it would have been
an approximately legible text for someone who was familiar with the poem from other more
precisely written and coherent versions.’

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 94 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

are changes already effected in R (e.g. B 3 nfa=i – R 27 nfa.n=i, G 14 nf{t}<a>.n(=i);

B 35 Hr m iSst pw – R 58 Hr si-iSst, B1, 3 Hr s(i)-(i)Sst: §4.3.2.B; §4.3.2.D). In other
cases, early New Kingdom witnesses align with B against R (e.g. the interpolation in
R 13-14: §4.5.5.1.B). Again with the caveat that not much of the Eighteenth Dynasty
text of Sinuhe is preserved, it would seem that this does not differ from the two main
Middle Kingdom versions substantially more than the latter already differed from one
another.
B. Ptahhotep is the only composition in which a more extensive comparison between
Twelfth and Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses is possible. The composition is very long
by Middle Egyptian standards and is substantially preserved both in a later Eighteenth
Dynasty manuscript, L2 (P. BM EA 10509),101 and in Twelfth Dynasty manuscripts,
P (P BN Égyptien 183-194) and L1 (P. BM EA 10371 + 10435).102 Accordingly, a
Gedankenexperiment can be made on dating Ptahhotep based on L2 alone.
Under the assumption that P and L1 had not survived, the set question is whether a
dating based on L2 alone could have resulted in wrongly ascribing the composition of
Ptahhotep to the early New Kingdom. The present Gedankenexperiment focuses on
the triptych of the disputants, maxims §2-4 (Dévaud 60-83).103 In comparison with
other Middle Egyptian compositions, the text of Ptahhotep seems to have had a more
open status and early transmission. Within Ptahhotep L2, the section considered has
more linguistically innovative expressions than any other in the composition.
Intentionally, the Gedankenexperiment is thus set on a worst-case situation for a
linguistic dating based on Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts only.
In dating Ptahhotep, maxims §2-4, based on L2, two verses are of primary interest:
(i) Ptahhotep 72 L2
tw r wfA=f in sDmyw
‘He will be disapproved of by the hearers.’
(P reads wr wfA in sDmyw ‘Great will be the disapproval by the judges.’ In
the present Gedankenexperiment, this information is not accessible.)

(ii) Ptahhotep 82 L2
sw r irt ntt m ib=f
‘He will do what is in his heart.’
(P has ib.tw r irt ntt m ib=k ‘One will want to do what is in your heart.’104
This information is similarly inaccessible.)

Ptahhotep 72 L2 has a construction tw r sDm. As discussed in a later chapter, this

implies a terminus ante quem non by the late Twelfth Dynasty (§5.2). The dating can

101 Lastly Hagen 2012a: 179-82; a much earlier Eighteenth Dynasty witness is T. Carnarvon I (Hagen
2012a: 174-9).
102 Hagen 2012a: 131-42.
103 Studies of the triptych: Stauder in press c; Fecht 1981; Faulkner 1955b.
104 For this reading, which diverges from the traditional one, Stauder in press c; in the present study,
also §5.2.1.

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 2.3 Textual alterations in a manuscript culture 95

be narrowed down further by Ptahhotep 82 L2, which has an exploratory construction

of the Future III. The construction—which accommodates the new subject pronoun
onto the NP r sDm pattern—is only scarcely attested, mainly in Kamose Inscriptions
(§1.3.3.2, (vii)).105 A dating to a time no earlier than the late Seventeenth Dynasty is
secured by the presence of the new subject pronoun (§3.4.1.3). In addition, a lower
chronological bound can be derived from the exploratory nature of the construction.
In the written varieties of Egyptian documented in the record, sw r sDm coexisted with
iw=f r sDm during a few generations only, rapidly to be superseded by the latter in
relation to the overall stabilization of the paradigm of the Future III. This was
achieved by the times of Thutmosis III – Amenhotep II (§1.1.2.B, (c)). Two verses in
close proximity thus present late expressions. The section on disputants as in the L2
text is thereby dated to the late Seventeenth/early Eighteenth Dynasty.
C. If, however, the original composition of Ptahhotep is to be targeted, it must be
established that the constructions in 72 and 82 are integral to the original text. In the
present case, the reading in Ptahhotep 72 L2 is immediately identified as secondary
based on the hybrid nature of the construction. On the one hand, tw r wfA=f is an
‘active impersonal’ construction, with tw in the pre-verbal subject slot of a NP r sDm
constuction. On the other hand, tw r wfA=f is followed by an agent phrase (in sDmyw),
otherwise restricted to genuine passive constructions. Less than a handful similar
constructions are otherwise documented. Taking into account that the expression of
passive voice in the future is not a marginal domain of linguistic function, such scarce
attestation is in itself a strong indication of the non-regular status of such construc-
tions in grammar. Actual instances known to me are from New Kingdom royal
inscriptions, one from the time of Amenhotep II,106 the other two from the time of
Merenptah.107 The former includes yet another very rare and syntactically hybrid
feature, a doubling of tw,108 while the latter are from a high variety that is itself partly
heterogeneous and recomposed. In all cases, the agent is royal, probably motivating
such altogether exceptional and strictly speaking ungrammatical constructions. In a
Middle Egyptian literary composition such as Ptahhotep, this can not be integral to
the original text, whatever the date of composition of that text may be. It must have
arisen by some process in textual transmission.
Turning to Ptahhotep 82 L2, some suspicion on the immediate context of this
verses is raised by the fact that the preceding verse ends in Hwrw-ib (81), an expres-
sion that remains otherwise unattested.109 In isolation, the argument is admittedly

105 Further occurrences are in Heavenly Cow 232 (as a secondary reading: §4.6.0, (iii)) and O. Cairo
25372, 1-2 (§5.2.4.1, (b)).
106 Amenhotep II’s Sphinx Stela 19-20 (Urk. IV 1281, 14-15) tw sDm.tw m pr-nsw in it Hr kA-nxt xa-m-
wAst ‘One heard in the palace by the father, Horus, the victorious bull, Khaemwaset.’ (The English
rendering is ungrammatical, no more, however, than the original Egyptian.)
107 KRI IV 19, 8; 155, 13.
108 Compare the other instances noted in §3, n.109.
109 The reading Hwrw-ib in 81 P, proposed in Dévaud’s (1916: 20) and Žába’s (1956: 23) synoptic
editions, followed in almost every subsequent translation, and registered in lexicographical works,
is not an attestation, but an interpretation of P (Stauder in press c: §2.1; in the present study, also
§5.2.1.B). Under the present Gedankenexperiment, P is inaccessible anyway, as are therefore
lexicographical works that refer to this witness.

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 96 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

insufficient, as hapax legomena are otherwise encountered in literary compositions.

Important is then the observation that maxim §4, to which verses 82-83 serve as a
conclusion, itself introduces the petitioner as a Hwrw (75), not as a *Hwrw-ib.
Moreover, 82 L2 stands out as the sole instance of an exploratory construction of the
Future III in Ptahhotep, a very long text by Middle Egyptian standards. Other con-
structions are used in roughly similar semantic environments throughout the compo-
sition.
A series of observations thereby converge in casting a very strong suspicion on the
reading in 82 L2. It is then further observed that 82 L2 comes just a few verses after
72 L2. Both verses have constructions relating to the same broader pattern, NP r sDm.
In their particular form, both are found only here within the whole of Ptahhotep L2.
Both are equally exceptional, as a syntactic hybrid in 72 L2, and as an exploratory
construction in 82 L2. An immediate hypothesis is therefore that the two constructions
influenced one another textually. This accords with the various suspicious elements in
81-82 L2 already independently observed. An influence of 72 on 82, rather than the
other way around, is more likely because this reflects the sequential nature of writing.
As the secondariness of 72 L2 is already directly established on internal syntactic
grounds, the secondariness of 82 L2 follows.
D. Textual secondariness can thereby be directly established for both Ptahhotep 72
and 82 L2 on strictly text-internal grounds. Also with a possibly late construction, the
L2 reading of Ptahhotep 78-79 can similarly be identified as secondary on internal
grounds (§2.8.3.2.NB, ()). To be sure, L2 does not allow to reconstruct the original
text of Ptahhotep 72 and 82 (nor in 78-79), as was possible for e.g. Ptahhotep 59
based on L2 (§2.3.2.3, (ii)).110 This, however, is not required within the present Ge-
dankenexperiment. For the specific purpose of this, enough information is to be found
in L2 to determine that both 72 L2 and 82 L2 are secondary readings. Even if P and
L1 had not survived, linguistic dating would therefore not have resulted in wrongly
dating the original composition of the maxims on disputants to the late Seven-
teenth/early Eighteenth Dynasty.

2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature

Strategies for linguistic dating respond differently depending on types of written

discourses, cultural contexts, and periods in Egyptian linguistic history. Dimensions
already evoked include the specific linguistic situation in early/mid-second millen-
nium BCE Egypt (§1) and the contingencies in working with early New Kingdom
manuscripts (§2.3). The configuration of written language in Middle Egyptian
literature is consequential as well.

110 In retrospect, i.e. when knowledge of the text as in P is taken into account, the relevant textual
processes can of course be reconstructed and interpreted in details; see below, §5.2.1.C.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 97

2.4.1 Different configurations of written language

Strategies for linguistic dating are strongly contingent upon time and types of written
discourses in ancient Egypt. In very general terms, this is due to the high-cultural
status, and thereby linguistic formality, of most written productions, compounded
with the continued valuation of past cultural and textual, and thereby linguistic,
tradition in several types of written discourses. A few cases other than Middle Egyp-
tian literature are preliminarily evoked to illustrate contrasting configurations.
In documentary registers (epistolary, administrative, and legal), the evolution of
written standards reflects the general evolution of language in a fairly straightforward
manner. To be sure, language in documentary registers is often formal in its own ways
and administrative and legal language can be technical or formulaic. Yet, a strong
relative chronology is easily established and an absolute temporal anchoring is
possible to a large extent. It is for example immediately obvious that the Thutmoside
documentary corpus is linguistically more recent than the late Twelfth Dynasty corpus
(Illahun), which is itself easily identified as more recent than e.g. the Heqanakht
letters.111 If these were not already dated on other grounds, even differences internal
to Thutmoside documentary texts could be exploited for establishing a relative
linguistic chronology of these.112
Different is the case of Late Egyptian literary texts. In the particular ways they
accommode both innovative and older expressions in various combinations, Late
Egyptian literary registers differ linguistically from both documentary and inscrip-
tional ones.113 The Ramesside written record is the densest in the second millennium
BCE, lending itself to a more detailed description of written language, including
variation therein, than is possible for any preceding period in Egyptian language
history. The Ramesside continuum of written registers has thus been and continues to
be the object of extensive analysis, leading to an increasingly refined appreciation of
its shifting configurations,114 in literary115 and non-literary texts alike.116 A back-
ground is thereby given against which literary texts can be discussed as to heir relative

111 Compare the description by Kroeber 1970.

112 Compare the description by Kruchten 1999.
113 In general terms, Winand 1992: §2-50; Junge 20083: 17-23.
114 Gohy 2012; Goldwasser 1999; 1991; Jansen-Winkeln 1995. The concept of ‘dynamic canonicity’
(Goldwasser 1991) remains central for appreciating the dynamically shifting configurations of Late
Egyptian linguistic repertoires in various registers.
115 For different types of Late Egyptian literary texts, Ragazzoli 2008: 117-21 (praises of a city);
Quack 2001: 168-72 (Wermai); 1994: 29-47 (Ani); Mathieu 1996: 189-201 (love poetry); Goldwasser
1990 (Satirical Letter); Polis in press (texts by or associated with Amunnakht); with a view on one
specific item, Winand 2004: 105-6 (distribution of mk and ptr in narrative texts). A comprehensive
analysis of the linguistic repertoires of the Miscellanies remains a desideratum.
116 E.g. Polis in press (Amunnakht, including non-literary texts); Winand & Gohy 2011 (Papyrus
Harris Magical). For royal texts inscriptionally published, Nagai 2006; Spalinger 2002: 332-4
(Qadesh); Manassa 2003: 135-52 (Merenptah’s Karnak Inscription); Sweeney 1985 (Ramses II’s
Inscription Dédicatoire). For biographies, Frood 2007: 23-4; Vernus 1978 (Samut son of Kyky).
For Late Ramesside Letters, Sweeney 2006; 2001.

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 98 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

chronology—provided of course that the internal diversity of Late Egyptian literary

registers is taken into due account.117
An altogether different situation is afforded by Netherworld books and
cosmographic compositions documented from the early New Kingdom on. These
make reference to a deep tradition, reflected in various elements of their linguistic
repertoires. The partly esoteric character of such compositions also finds linguistic
correlates. An example is the sw-headed constructions:118 the particular distribution of
these in the record strongly suggests that they belonged to very specific repertoires,
probably hyper-restricted, and to be drawn upon only in some contexts of written
performance. Reflecting their very contents, these compositions are further
distinguished by their specific linguistic temporalities. The conspicuous rarity of NP
Hr sDm,119 for example, is primarily a matter of tensing—a progressive construction
will hardly ever be called upon in such compositions120—not an indication for dating.
These dimensions conspire in making an anchoring to the general linguistic history
difficult or impossible. Alternative dating strategies must be pursued, analyzing
phenomena of linguistic interference and form-function mismatches of various
sorts.121 Beyond individual expressions, relevant linguistic repertoires must be
reconstructed as these may cohere reflecting the specific, culturally over-determined,
written performance of language in these compositions.
In entirely different cultural and linguistic contexts, yet other approaches are
required for dating texts composed in older varieties but not documented until the
Late Period. In these, linguistic heterogeneity is not uncommon.122 In some cases, this
may reflect different compositional layers in a text,123 while in others it may reflect
the recomposed nature of Traditional Egyptian itself.124 In distinguishing between
genuinely old texts and recently composed ones, interference phenomena of various
sorts are analyzed as to the shifting linguistic and cultural horizons in which these
could have been possible. Integral to these dynamics are also phenomena of
intentional dissimilation that result in constructions or repertoires different from both
contemporaneous varieties and older ones.125 The issue is complicated further by the
fact that older texts kept being worked upon. In the process, they not only accom-
modated recent expressions but also older ones, not previously present in their tradi-
tion. In terms of the resulting linguistic phenomenology, continuous work on older

117 Teachings for example tend to be linguistically more conservative than other Late Egyptian types
of literary discourses, e.g. Vernus 2013 (Amenemope); Quack 1994: 29-47, 61-2 (Ani). A
discussion of register is also integral to a linguistic dating of Wenamun (Winand 2011: 564-9) and
Wermai (provisionally Quack 2001: 168-72).
118 Preliminary comments below, §4.7.3, with references to previous studies.
119 E.g. Werning 2013: #31; Quack 2000b: 548; Zeidler 1999: I, 207-8; Baumann 1998: 447.
120 Also suggested by Zeidler 1999. Other elements that might be relevant here are discussed by
Werning 2013: #31.
121 E.g. Werning 2013; Jansen-Winkeln 2012 (for Amduat specifically). Substantially different meth-
odologies underlie the approaches by von Lieven 2007: 223-54; Quack 2000b; Baumann 1998.
122 E.g. Quack 2010a.
123 Proposed by Quack 2008 for P. Jumilhac.
124 E.g. Engsheden 2003; for Ptolemaic Egyptian, see also the debate conducted in Quack 2013; Kurth
2011; and Quack 2010b.
125 E.g. Engsheden 2003; Depuydt 1999; Vernus 1982; also Oréal 2011: passim.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 99

texts can then come very close to texts newly composed, as both can harken back to
older traditions in genuinely productive ways.126 In some cases, one may find oneself
staring at an abyss.
In much earlier times and as a different type of written discourse, Coffin Texts do
not lend themselves to any of the above strategies. The analysis of the language of
Coffin Texts involves multiple parameters such as textual layering, issues in textual
transmission and monumental actualization, linguistic exchange with contemporaneous
funerary self-presentations, and phenomena of linguistic dissimilation.127 Middle
Egyptian literary texts, for their part, afford a situation different from all the above. For
each type of text and time period in Egyptian written history, specific dating strategies
have to be pursued. In dating Egyptian texts, there is no linguistic method of general
application, immune to the varying extra-linguistic determinations that preside over the
shifting configurations of written language; there is, in other words, no escape from
culture.

2.4.2 Middle Egyptian literature

A. The linguistic repertoires of Middle Egyptian literature are essentially similar to

the ones documented in other types of higher written discourses in the early/mid-
second millennium BCE, for example in inscriptionally published texts:128 there is no
specific linguistic register of ‘literary Middle Egyptian’. The language of Middle
Egyptian literature is part of what has been described as a ‘Kultursprache’,129 arguably
a defining element of early/mid-second millennium BCE high-culture as expressed
and supported notably by Middle Egyptian itself. Against the substantial geographic,
socio-linguistic, and diachronic variation that must have existed, this variety of
Egyptian appears to have been very strongly standardized.
Literature is differentiated from contemporaneous types of written discourses
because it is bound by partly different constraints of decorum.130 Different themes
than in other types of written discourses can thereby be addressed in literature, or
similar themes form a different perspective. As a result, some expressions, or
particular functions or meanings of expressions, are mainly or at times exclusively
documented in literature. While there is no literary register of Middle Egyptian, there
are therefore expressions that may be viewed as typical of literature because of their
privileged association with literature in the record.
Middle Egyptian literature is strongly intertextual, as are contemporaneous written
discourses with which literature communicates. Beyond intertext proper, there are
certain culturally defined ways in which certain things can be said in the relevant
registers. Expression is not free and both literary and non literary texts include

126 Vernus in prep.

127 Vernus 1996b.
128 From a different perspective, a similar general assessment now also by Díaz Hernández 2013
(differences noted mainly concern the graphic level or are diachronic internally to earlier Middle
Egyptian).
129 Moers 2000: 59-80. Beyond grammar and lexicon, a major dimension of this ‘Kultursprache’ also
lies in how texts are patterned and textured, see Collier 1996; Uljas 2007b.
130 Parkinson 2002: 91-8.

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 100 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

varying amounts of preconfigured formulations.131 Literary texts themselves are

closely similar to each other in language because they belong to the same, strongly
intertextual, Middle Egyptian literary tradition. On a textual level, these determina-
tions reflect some of the same cultural conditions of which the afore mentioned very
strong degree of linguistic standardization is another token.
B. For dating, this has a series of practical implications, all with restrictive effect.
The substantial linguistic continuity in literary and other relevant types of written
discourses throughout the early/mid-second millennium BCE considerably reduces
the prospects for identifying differences that could be interpreted diachronically. As
linguistic form is more easily manipulated by users than linguistic function, such
differences that can be identified mostly lie with rather subtle levels of linguistic func-
tion. The linguistic continuity in the relevant registers is also one of the reasons that
conspire in making post quem non criteria pointing to a period in time prior to the first
manuscript attestation of texts to be dated so difficult to devise at present.
Expressions that are mainly documented in literature, or even de facto literary, are
difficult, or impossible, to anchor to the external record. Complementarily, formula-
tions that are preconfigured in one way or another tend to be linguistically undistinc-
tive. More generally, the strongly intertextual nature of Middle Egyptian literature has
effects that hamper relative chronology. The phenomenon, which extends to all types
of literary discourses, is strongest in the most topical of these, teachings; these are
also often the least linguistically distinctive. In any Middle Egyptian literary composi-
tion, a varying quantity of text will therefore end up trapped in a dead angle as far as
dating is concerned.
C. Issues resulting from the high degree of standardization of Middle Egyptian, the
densely intertextual nature of Middle Egyptian literature, and the often observed
preconfiguration of expression in relevant written registers are discussed in their
various implications throughout the present study. Illustrating one particular issue
mentioned above, a few examples of grammatical constructions that are exclusively
found in literature may be given at this stage already:

(i) %mwn – clause

The construction132 is found in Sinuhe B 157-158, Eloquent Peasant B1 75, Cheops’
Court 4.1,133 and, later, in P. Bulaq 13 frg. X.1.134 At first, this pattern of attestation
would suggest that the construction is a specifically literary one. Yet, the textual
distribution could also be due to the type of meaning conveyed by the construction,
expressing doubt or irony, and thereby primarily to be expected in literary contexts.
The two options are not mutually exclusive: the meaning of smwn could have made
the construction tightly associated, if secondarily only, with literary registers.

131 E.g. Junge 1982; Eyre 1990: 157-60; in the present study, §5.1.3.3.C.
132 Oréal 2011: 429-32.
133 These occurrences quoted below, §2.4.4.5, (vi).
134 Text: Haykal 1983. On paleographical grounds, the manuscript is early Ramesside or only slightly
earlier (Haykal 1983: 216).

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 101

Independently from this, the textual distribution of smwn – clause also illustrates how
a relatively uncommon construction can recur in different periods in literature.

(ii) Kagemni 1.6; Loyaliste 10.3: N sDm

The construction, which is not described in any grammatical studies, is apparently
found only in the two following texts, both literary:
Kagemni 1.6
iw nfrt idn bw-nfr
iw nh n ktt idn wr
‘A good thing deputizes for goodness;
A little thing deputizes for much.’

Loyaliste 10.3
iw xrw=sn smn inbw
‘Their voices establish the walls.’135
The construction could be tentatively described as a variation on the more common
N sDm.n (§1.2, (xi)), also limited as it seems to subjects of low individuation. The
sheer rarity of N sDm makes any further appreciation, syntactic, functional, or
diachronic, difficult. By definition, the rise or obsolescence of the construction can
not be related to changes observed in the external record, because it does not feature
there.

(iii) Varia, discussed in the present study

- @A A: the construction is documented only a handful times. Heading a clause, it is
found only in literary texts (Ptahhotep; Eloquent Peasant; Fowler; Khakheperreseneb):
see §2.7.2.2.B;
- Past tense rD.tw: this has become a frozen formation in the Middle Kingdom, used
only in literature (Eloquent Peasant; Sinuhe): see §2.4.3.2, (ii);
- &w sDm: the construction is limited to three texts, all literary (Neferti; Hymn; Kheti):
see §5.3;
- &w r sDm: leaving aside instances that are textually secondary, the construction is
documented in eight places. Seven of these are from one composition, Neferti, while
the eighth is in a personal name: see §5.2;
- N sDm.tw: the construction is found in one text only, Ipuwer: see §2.3.4.2.1.B-E.

2.4.3 The thickness of language in literature

Just as Middle Egyptian literature, linguistic registers of literature are variable and
internally complex. As in other traditions and in other periods in Egyptian history
itself, variation in linguistic registers of Middle Egyptian literature is expected in rela-
tion to different types of literary discourses, as well as within individual compositions.

135 Loyaliste 4.2 was tentatively suggested by Posener (1976: 25) as a further instance of the
construction. However, the sorry state of preservation of the text prevents any secure reading.

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 102 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

Yet, a detailed study is made difficult by the still sketchy understanding of linguistic
variation in Middle Egyptian in general. Pending a fuller study yet to be done, I first
present a few easily identified cases of contrasting registers within one composition
(§2.4.3.1). I go on discussing a phenomenon characteristic of Middle Egyptian literary
texts, namely how these can accommodate expressions from different periods, and
how in doing so they linguistically communicate with contemporaneous inscriptional
texts (§2.4.3.2-3). A more in-depth study of register in one composition, Cheops’
Court, is presented in turn (§2.4.4). This also provides an occasion for discussing
possible linguistic correlates of what has been termed a ‘low tradition’ of Middle
Egyptian narrative literature, in this composition and in other ones.

2.4.3.1 Contrasting registers within a composition

Contrasting registers within a composition are most easily detected in the following
cases, which involve direct speech:

(i) Neferti 8c-d

(...) imn m Dd
ptr sDm Hr idw iw gr xft-Hr
‘(...) concealed in the saying:
“Look, the one who should be hearing is deaf; the silent is in front.” ’
Presentative ptr—as against the full verb ptr136—becomes common only in the
early New Kingdom.137 Middle Kingdom literary texts generally use presentative
mk, as late Twelfth Dynasty as documentary texts still do as well.138 Yet,
instances of presentative ptr are found in one literary composition contempo-
raneous with the documentary texts just mentioned, Sasobek,139 B1.10 ptr n xpr.n
‘Look, it can not happen’ (sim. B1.11; B4.1). This composition has at least one
other element otherwise associated with a lower register (§2.4.4.4, (iv)). In
Neferti, presentative ptr is used only in 8d, heading the saying introduced by m
Dd. It contrasts with mk used elsewhere in the same composition (3h; 3i; 4b).
NB. At a much later time, a more sophisticated exploitation of the contrast mk vs.
ptr is observed in Wenamun.140 In Ramesside literary texts, mk and ptr are found
side by side but no correlates in terms of register or expression have been detected
(yet).141

136 Documented since the Pyramid Texts, see Winand 1986.

137 See TLA #62910.
138 Compare Collier & Quirke 2002: 189-190. Also in a magical text, P. Ramesseum IV, C29 (TLA
#62910).
139 Terminus post quem non to the late Twelfth Dynasty on paleographic grounds (Parkinson 2009:
149-50).
140 Winand 2004.
141 Mathieu 1996: 192 (love poetry); Ragazzoli 2008: 119 (praises of cities); Winand 2004: 105-6
(narrative texts).

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 103

(ii) Neferkare and Sisene P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+4-5

(...) Hr mH Hr Dd ir is nt{y}-pw mAa pw pA Dd
sw (Hr) pr(t) m grH
‘(...) thinking and saying that since it was so, the word was true:
“he goes out at night!” ’
The new subject pronoun sw occurs only here in Neferkare, and recurs only in
one other place in the preserved body of Middle Egyptian literature (§3.4.1). It is
significant that this occurrence in Neferkare is in reported speech. On pA Dd as
also indexical of register, below, §4.4.3.1.

Possible modulations of registers generally remain difficult to appreciate. In the

lexicon, recherché expressions can sometimes be identified based on their rarity and
distribution in the record. In other cases, interpretation remains ambiguous, as in the
lexicon of fishing in the Fifth Petition of Eloquent Peasant. In Parkinson’s words:142
‘For example, the fifth petition includes several words to do with fishing. Some of these
may have struck the original audience as unusual, but they could have been intended to
sound either like vulgar working language or like impressively recherché diction. We do
not know which: it is impossible to chart fully the differing registers or gauge an
individual word’s resonances (...)’.

2.4.3.2 The diachronic breadth of Middle Egyptian in individual compositions

Middle Egyptian literary compositions can accommodate expressions that in an
historical grammar of Egyptian would be described as relating to different diachronic
layers. A similar phenomenon is observed notably in inscriptional texts, often with the
same expressions. Such diachronic breadth of individual compositions is another
token of the linguistic thickness here evoked: composers of Middle Egyptian literary
texts draw on various elements of language present in their textual, hence linguistic,
horizon. This constellation also provides an illustration of how literary and relevant
non-literary types of written discourses are allied with each other by common
linguistic repertoires.
Pending a fuller study yet to be made, I here present a selective exemplification of
the phenomenon in literary texts securely dated to the Twelfth Dynasty (for the dating
of Ptahhotep, §2.4.3.3). In the following, ‘antiquated expressions’ stands as a
convenient label for various expressions that were not any more part of general
written usage by the time of composition of a literary text considered. Not all these
‘antiquated’ expressions were of course ‘antiquated’ in the same ways.

(A) Eloquent Peasant

(a) Antiquated expressions

(i) Eloquent Peasant B1 219 tnm.xr=f
Diachronically, synthetic -xr-infixed forms are superseded by wn-auxiliated
constructions (wn.xr=f Hr sDm) before the Middle Kingdom; the process is begun

142 Parkinson 2012a: 3.

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 104 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

already in Coffin Texts.143 By the time of composition of Eloquent Peasant, synthetic

sDm.xr=f had become antiquated. In the Twelfth Dynasty, it recurs only once, in the
slightly later inscription of Herwerre (temp. Amenemhat III), 9 (discussion:
§4.1.2, (iii)).

(ii) Eloquent Peasant B1 159 rD.tw N (passive past tense sDm=f )

(Non-negative) past tense sDm=f is antiquated in post-Old Kingdom times (below,
(viii)). In the passive, only two secure instances are found in Middle Egyptian literary
texts, the one in Eloquent Peasant B1 159 and one in Sinuhe B 238 (below, (viii)). A
third, in Khakheperreseneb ro 11, is very uncertain (§2.7.2.2, (i)), and Shipwrecked
Sailor 34 probably to be read differently.144 The construction is literary: it is never
found in the contemporary inscriptional record.145 Significantly, both Eloquent
Peasant B1 158 and the Sinuhe B 238 are with rDi, a high-frequency verb (so is also
the one in Khakheperreseneb, should it belong here). The form is not part of a
productive paradigm any more but a frozen remnant, confined to literary usage.

(iii) Eloquent Peasant B1 352-353 gm.tw N sbw=s (and passim): prospective

sDm=f (active and passive)
Outside Coffin Texts, the prospective is strongly obsolescent in the Twelfth
Dynasty.146 It is then preserved mainly in literary registers.147

(b) Alongside recently innovated expressions

(iv) Eloquent Peasant B1 115-116 wn.in.tw Hr sDm
The construction is otherwise first documented in the late Twelfth Dynasty. The
higher-order construction to which it relates, wn.(X.)tw Hr sDm, is itself not docu-
mented before the early Twelfth Dynasty, in an expedition inscription (§3.1.2.A;
§5.3.4.1).

143 Detailed study in Vernus 1990a: 63-5, 68-71.

144 See §4, n.24.
145 Borghouts (2010: I, §56.a.1, (1)) mentions CG 20140 (ANOC 1.3, Simpson 1974: pl.2; temp.
Amenemhat III), b, 1-2 rnpt 1 xr Hm=f sic nsw bity n-mAat-ra anx Dt saHa Twsic wD pn (...) ‘Year 1
under His Majesty, the King of Upper and Lower Egypt Nimaatre, living forever. Erecting this
stela one did (...)’. This, however, is not an instance of the past tense sDm=f, but a ‘narrative’
construction of the infinitive as is usual after a regnal year. The combination with tw is remarkable,
yet not unparalleled: early in the same Dynasty, compare Wadi el-Hudi 10 (temp. Senwosret I), 1-4
Hsbt 22 prt Twsic r Hsmn n Hr anx-mswt (...) ‘Year 22. Going out for natron for the Horus Ankhmesut
(...)’. The construction, accommodating what is originally an inflectional morpheme (tw) onto a
non-finite form (the infinitive), is non-standard. A non-standard register is also demonstrated by
various further details: both texts have the abnormal spelling Tw, complemented by the plural
strokes in the latter text (interpretation: Stauder in press b: §5.1.2); the former further has a non-
standard formulation of the regnal year.
146 Classical discussion in Allen 2002a: 91-6. Among the Heqanakht cases discussed by the author,
some are with wnn or after ir. These uses are either grammaticalized or bound to specific
environments. They thereby differ from the more productive uses as in Eloquent Peasant. Further
elements on the gradual obsolescence of the prospective after the Old Kingdom now in Díaz
Hernández 2013: passim.
147 E.g., in Debate of a Man and His Soul, Allen 2011: 116-8.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 105

(v) Eloquent Peasant B1 253, 254, 322: tw with events lacking an agent in
their semantic representation
The construction is an innovation datable precisely to the the mid-Twelfth Dynasty
(§3.1.2.C; §6.2.2.3).

(vi) Eloquent Peasant, passim: PA/tA/nA148

Demonstratives of the pA/tA/nA series are in Eloquent Peasant comparatively more
common than in any other Twelfth Dynasty literary text (§2.4.4.2.2). Their uneven
presence over different parts of the composition is indexical of a modulation of
register. Eloquent Peasant also includes an instance of the related possessive expres-
sion in B2 128 nAy=k, strongly deictic in context (§2.4.4.2.2, (iii)). In documentary
texts, these possessives are common in Illahun (late Twelfth Dynasty) but absent in
Heqanakht (very early Twelfth Dynasty).

–––––––

(B) Sinuhe

(a) Antiquated expressions

(vii) Sinuhe B 45, 114 Dd.k(w) ‘I said’
The active-transitive construction of the pseudoparticiple with events other than the
lexical statives (rx and xm ‘(not) to know’) is found in a small set of Sixth Dynasty
so-called ‘event biographies’ (mainly in Weni and in Sabni son of Mekhu). In the
Middle Kingdom, it recurs in a handful funerary self-presentations, as a purely textual
revival. In literary texts, the construction is found only in Sinuhe, echoing these
revived inscriptional uses (§4.1.3.A).

(viii) Past tense sDm=f

Outside the bound negative construction n-sDm=f, past tense sDm=f shows signs of
obsolescence as early as in the later Old Kingdom, as is evidenced by its restriction to a
set of specific, textually determined, uses in Sixth Dynasty so-called ‘event bio-
graphies’. In the Middle Kingdom, the form is antiquated: it is occasionally found in
private inscriptions in direct phraseological inheritance to Old Kingdom models, and
thereby as a textual revival.149 In literary texts, passive rD.tw=f in Sinuhe B 238150 and
Eloquent Peasant B1 159 is a frozen form (above, (ii)). Active uses are less exceptional
but remain very uncommon: several are in Sinuhe.151 In Sinuhe, the construction is part

148 Occurrences in Allen 2009: 266.

149 For the latter, Vernus 1997: 70-7, especially 73-4; pace el-Hamrawi 2004 (who proposed a
dialectal scenario).
150 This is from a passage for which a garbling of verses has often been hypothesized; in details and
critically, now Schenkel in press b: §5. Unlike Schenkel, I do not interprete rD.tw as being in the
textual background: rather, the selection of a (frozen form of the) past tense sDm=f is here probably
motivated by the royal agent of rDi, as is commonly the case in biographies where the same form is
also associated with royal causation.
151 Discussed lastly by Schenkel in press a; Borghouts 2010: I, §56.a.1, (9)-(10). These forms have
been disputed (e.g. Kammerzell 1988).

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 106 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

of a broader set of expressions by which the composition echoes funerary biographies,

thereby indexing such relationship on a linguistic level (§4.1.3.A; §4.1.3.C).

(ix) Sinuhe B 281 rD.t(w)=f (prospective sDm=f )

Compare above, (iii).

(x) Sinuhe B 237 demonstrative pw

The form, which is antiquated in Middle Egyptian, is occasionally found in inscrip-
tional texts of the Middle and early New Kingdom. In Sinuhe B 237, its occurrence is
phraseologically bound (§4.1.2.B).

(xi) The lexicon, e.g. Sinuhe B 4 nftft ‘twitch’

Nftft152—as against unprefixed ftft (§3.4.6, (iv))—is rare and recherché. So is the
derivational pattern itself, n-ABAB, which is obsolescent in the Middle Kingdom.153
In Sinuhe B 3-4, the selection of the n-prefixed variant simultaneously allows for an
alliteration with the preceding verb, nfa.

(b) Alongside a recently innovated expression

(xii) Sinuhe R 15 ti sw predicate154
Only one other instance of the construction has been noted in the Middle Kingdom, in
an inscriptional text.155 The construction recurs once in a literary text dating to the
Second Intermediate Period, Eulogistic Account of A King X+7.x+3 (§3.3.2, (i)). It
becomes more common only by the early New Kingdom.
–––––––

(C) Ptahhotep

(a) Antiquated expressions156

(xiii) Ptahhotep 98 P w (enclitic negation)157
The majority of occurrences of negative w are from the Old Kingdom.158 In post-Old
Kingdom times, the negation is only found in two Coffin Text passages (CT VI 23j-l
B1Bo; CT VII 115i-k B4Bo), in Mocalla III.5-7 (inscription #8: threats, and thereby
possibly formulaic language), and in one early Twelfth Dynasty inscription,
Mentuhotep (CG 20539; temp. Senwosret I), Ib 20.

152 Study: Vernus in press.

153 Study: Vernus 2009a.
154 &i sw Hm ii=f; R 13-14 ti sw hAb (...) is an interpolation (§4.5.5.1.B).
155 Deir Rifêh, tomb 7, col.17 (Griffith 1889: pl.18); noted by Oréal 2011: 246, n.158.
156 Possibly also the construction in 600-3, if to be analyzed as in Vernus 1996b: 180-1; different
interpretation now by Oréal 2011: 140-1.
157 Similarly Vernus 20102b: 154, n.76; Junge 2003: 215; Kammerzell 1993: 27. Quack’s (2005: 14)
reading, with positive polarity and -w the ending of a prospective, is impossible: this written
ending is in the Middle Kingdom reserved to certain inflectional classes of which 2rad (here Dd) is
not part (see Schenkel 2000, extending beyond Coffin Texts).
158 Study: Kammerzell 1993.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 107

(xiv) Ptahhotep 398 L1 swt (old independent pronoun)

Beginning in the Old Kingdom, this is superseded by the new independent pronoun
ntf. After the Old Kingdom, the old independent pronoun recurs in parts of Coffin
Texts. Other Twelfth Dynasty occurrences are only in Chapelle Blanche (§6.3.1.1).

(b) Alongside more recently innovated expressions

(xv) Ptahhotep 71, 529, 631 (and passim): iw introducing a circumstantial
clause with clause-initial pronominal subject (circumstantial iw P predicate)
The construction develops during the First Intermediate Period, gradually replacing
old sk P predicate.159

(xvi) Ptahhotep 33, 39, 594, 600, 618-619, 625-626:160 ix sDm=f

Only one occurrence of the construction has been noted for the Old Kingdom.161 Ix
sDm= is well documented in Twelfth Dynasty literary compositions and other texts.162

(xvii) Ptahhotep 482 ir pr m mXr n aq.n ‘If something comes out of the
storehouse, it does not enter (again)’; sim. 514
The constructions (N) n sDm.n (negative, with full noun subject before the verb or
dependent) and the related N sDm.n (positive, with full noun subject before the verb:
§1.2, (xi)) are undocumented before the early Middle Kingdom.163 The negative
variant here considered is not uncommon in Twelfth Dynasty literary texts.164 The
positive variant is found in contemporaneous and later private inscriptions.165

(xviii) Ptahhotep 343 P166 n rx.n.tw xprt siA=f dwA ‘One can not know what
will happen to the point of perceiving tomorrow.’
The construction is innovative since the referent of the suffix pronoun in siA=f is the
same as the implied agent of the passive construction in the main clause.167 In this
particular form, the construction remains unparalleled. However, its syntax relates to
broader changes affecting the morpheme tw beginning in the Twelfth Dynasty (§5.2;
§5.3; §6.2).

159 Vernus 1987: 104-5 (with the first occurrences in Coffin Texts); Díaz Hernández 2013: passim (in
First Intermediate Period biographies); also Oréal 2011: 218-9; Kruchten 1999: 71.
160 Vernus 1990a: 102.
161 Allen 1984: §420.
162 Extensive references in Vernus 1990a: 102-3.
163 Edel 1959: 30-7.
164 E.g. Debate 104 xnmsw nw min n mr.ny ‘Friends of today do not love’; Shipwrecked Sailor 130-
131 xpr.n r=s nn wi Hna Am.ny (...) ‘It happened while I was not with them, they burnt (...)’.
165 A very early occurrence is Abkau x+3 (quoted above, §1.2, (xi.)).
166 L1 and L2, both here preserved, phrase differently (see D 345).
167 Vernus 2006: 153.

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 108 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

2.4.3.3 Digression: A very brief note on dating Ptahhotep

A Middle Kingdom dating of Ptahhotep is most commonly accepted,168 yet one to the
Old Kingdom had been suggested as well.169 Although arguments for an Old King-
dom dating have been rebutted,170 concern has been raised that a Middle Kingdom
dating is still not fully established.171 Pending a fuller study of the language of
Ptahhotep,172 the following observations confirm a Middle Kingdom dating.
A. Iw introducing a circumstantial clause with clause-initial pronominal subject (iw P
predicate, 71 and passim: §2.4.3.2, (xv)) emerges during the First Intermediate
Period, gradually superseding the older expression of the same function, sk P
predicate. The process is not completed before the early Middle Kingdom. For
example the Eleventh Dynasty Deir el-Ballas Inscription accommodates various inno-
vative expressions173 but still has sk P predicate: x+11 ir.n(=i) nn sk w(i) m nsw ‘I did
these things while I was a king.’ In Ptahhotep, the recent construction is used multiple
times, across the composition, and exclusively: whenever the linguistic function it
performs comes to order, iw P predicate is always used. This further speaks against a
scenario of textual modernization, which would have to have been systematic in a
way not otherwise documented in any Earlier Egyptian text of any type. Similar
comments extend to ix sDm=f (33 and passim: §2.4.3.2, (xvi)). While documented
once in the Old Kingdom, the construction becomes common only in Middle Egyp-
tian. It is used multiple times in Ptahhotep, here as well strongly speaking against a
scenario of textual modernization.
Negative n sDm.n (482; 514: §2.4.3.2, (xvii)) is for its part entirely undocumented
before the early Middle Kingdom. The pattern of attestation is reliable because of its
consistency and density. This construction and the related positive one N sDm.n are
found more than a dozen times in the Middle Kingdom beginning in mid-Eleventh
Dynasty inscriptions, then extending to literary texts in the Twelfth Dynasty (Ship-
wrecked Sailor, Debate of a Man and His Soul). When n sDm.n was innovated in
spoken interaction is unknown, and irrelevant. The construction emerges in the record
with the onset of the Middle Kingdom, at a time when other elements of a linguistic
discontinuity with preceding periods are observed.174 The expression thus entered the
written language when Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian was being defined as a
written standard. In Ptahhotep, n sDm.n occurs twice. I remain unaware of any

168 E.g. Hagen 2012a: 129-31; Vernus 2006: 153; Grajetzki 2005: 40-1; Junge 2003: 12-13; Parkinson
2002: 48; Eichler 2001.
169 E.g. Quack 1994: 20-1; Fecht 1986: 246-7. Full references in Hagen 2012a: 129-30.
170 Most directly Hagen 2012a: 130-1; Eichler 2001; also Junge 2003: 122-8 (for the objection raised
by Quack 1994: 20-1 specifically).
171 Quack 2005: 8-10.
172 A more detailed study is currently under preparation by Roman Gundacker (Gerald Moers, p.c.
1/2013); non vidi.
173 X+3 ixr m-xt sDm.n=f; x+10 DADA. In Middle Egyptian literature, these expressions would be
associated with compositions such as Tale of Hay (both), Cheops’ Court (both), Fishing and
Fowling (the latter), and Neferkare and Sisene (the former)—not with the likes of Sinuhe or
Ptahhotep (§2.4.4.4, (v)).
174 Another construction is discussed by Gundacker 2010.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 109

instance in the Middle Egyptian written record where the construction would have
been altered from a different source construction.
The construction in 343 P (§2.4.3.2, (xviii)), finally, is singular, and therefore not
directly to be anchored to the external record. However, its conditioning possibility
lies in broader changes affecting tw. These are themselves beginning only in the
Twelfth Dynasty.175
B. While more elements would no doubt emerge upon a closer inspection, the above
suffices to establish a terminus ante quem non for Ptahhotep to the late Eleventh
Dynasty at the earliest, a dating to the early or mid-Twelfth Dynasty being more
likely.176 Such dating is consistent with the tight intertextual connections Ptahhotep
displays with Middle Kingdom self-presentations and related types of written
discourses177—not with Old Kingdom exponents of such.
Of major interest in the context of the present discussion of language in Middle
Egyptian literature is that the two preserved Middle Kingdom versions of Ptahhotep
each have one much older expression, antiquated by the time of composition: P has an
instance of the enclitic negation w (§2.4.3.2, (xiii)) while L1 has one of the old
independent pronoun swt (§2.4.3.2, (xiv)). Both expressions are sparsely documented
in Middle Kingdom inscriptional texts, in Mentuhotep (CG 20539) and in Chapelle
Blanche respectively (both temp. Senwosret I). Such occasional archaizing features on
the linguistic level find a pendant in the archaizing script (and, according to some,
meter) of P. Prisse.178 They also illustrate how Middle Egyptian literature commu-
nicates with contemporaneous inscriptionally published written discourses: the com-
munication is not only intertextual, it extends to common linguistic repertoires.

175 Similarly Vernus 2006: 153.

176 The terminus post quem non is given by the two Twelfth Dynasty manuscripts, L1 and P. For the
dating of these, now Hagen 2012a: 134 and 142, respectively
177 Most famous is probably the intertext with Ameni’s Wadi Hammamat Graffito (#3042; temp.
Senwosret I), discussed by Vernus 1995b; now also Hagen 2012a: 156-8. Further intertext has
been noted with Rediukhnum (temp. Wahankh Antef II), 4-5; with Mentuhotep son of Hapy
(probably early D.12, see Schenkel 1964), 11-14; and with Senwosret III’s Semna Stela 13-16. See
the discussion in Hagen 2012a: 151-2, 161-4, and 159-61; for the second also Vernus 20102b: 455-
8; for the third also Eyre 1990. Not intertext in a narrow sense, yet no less significant, is a cluster
of expressions in common between Ptahhotep §2-4 (D 60-83) and Antef (Louvre C167, Simpson
1974: pl.10; temp. Senwosret I), see Stauder in press c: n.82. The topical formulation of old age in
Ptahhotep 8-9 recurs in Sinuhe B 168-9 where it implies that Sinuhe espouses the Egyptian
cultural values he has fled during the first part of the tale (Moers 2001: 128-31). If interpreted as a
direct allusion to Ptahhotep, this would imply that Ptahhotep is at least slightly earlier than Sinuhe
(the precise dating of Sinuhe is uncertain: it is probably later than the reign of Senwosret I himself
as some time is to be assumed for historical events to be turned into a fictionalized setting).
Alternatively, Sinuhe and Ptahhotep could be independently drawing on a culturally given
formulation: while the implications for interpretation would be similar, none could be derived for
relative chronology (Moers 2001: 131, n.494).
178 Parkinson 2002: 49, 313.

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 110 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

2.4.4 Register in Cheops’ Court

Cheops’ Court is often mentioned as a text composed in an innovative linguistic

register, sometimes described as ‘Late Middle Egyptian’. I here propose some
comments on the linguistic typology of the composition, which turns out to be
complex in terms of register.

2.4.4.1 Preliminary: A very brief note on dating Cheops’ Court

A. Cheops’ Court179 is preserved in a single manuscript, P. Westcar (P. Berlin
3033).180 This is classically dated to the late Second Intermediate Period,181 although
the very early New Kingdom has occasionally been evoked as well;182 a re-examination
is a desideratum.
In dating the composition, its transitional character is often evoked. In its literary
typology (formal articulation, subject matters, tone, etc.), Cheops’ Court differs from
e.g. Sinuhe and anticipates certain features of Late Egyptian narrative literature to
come. It is likely, therefore, that the former was composed later than the latter. Yet,
assessing how much later than the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty Cheops’ Court should
be remains difficult on such grounds, because developments in literary typology need
not project linearly over time. Moreover, various traditions may have been in part
contemporaneous with each other. It has thus been proposed that the ‘low tradition’ to
which Cheops’ Court relates begun developing while the ‘high tradition’ of Middle
Egyptian was still very much productive.183 A proposal to date Cheops’ Court to the
Seventeenth Dynasty based on its being ‘Kunstprosa’184 is problematic since Cheops’
Court would itself be the earliest major fully preserved exponent of what under this
hypothesis is defined as such. As fragmentarily preserved compositions such as Tale
of Hay and others demonstrate, elements associated with this type of literary form are
present in the late Twelfth Dynasty already.
The language of Cheops’ Court has been described as ‘Late Middle Egyptian’ and
it has been proposed to date the composition late in the Middle Kingdom.185 However,
what is said to be ‘Late Middle Egyptian’ remains in want of a more precise defini-
tion. As to be seen below, the label is misleading: many elements associated with the
notion of ‘Late Middle Egyptian’ are present in the late Twelfth Dynasty already, if
not before, and have primarily to do with register; they do not project over time in any
straightforward manner. Just as with literary typology, therefore, no dating can be
easily derived at this level.
On an altogether different level, it has been observed that the three kings
announced in Cheops’ Court may be in allusion to a sequence of three brothers of

179 Text: Blackman 1988.

180 Lastly, Lepper 2008: 15-21.
181 E.g. Lepper 2008: 21, 320; Burkard & Thissen 20124: 203.
182 Compare the references in Parkinson 2002: 295.
183 Parkinson 2002: 138-46.
184 Burkard & Thissen 20124: 201, 203, with references to various other proposals for a similarly late
dating.
185 E.g. Lepper 2008: 291; Parkinson 2002: 296. Both authors favor a dating by the mid-Thirteenth
Dynasty (Lepper 2008: 319-20; Parkinson 2002: 141, 296).

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 111

non-royal origin who ascended the throne in the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty,

Neferhotep I, Sahathor, Sobekhotep IV.186 The comparatively longer reigns of the first
and third of these kings mark the peak of the Dynasty and these kings explicitly pro-
claimed their non-royal ascent (as other kings of the period also did).187 An
association of Cheops’ Court with this historical constellation is possible, yet by
nature speculative. In a less direct anchoring, it has also been proposed to read
Cheops’ Court as reflecting a broader (late?) Second Intermediate Period context.188
B. With a view on a subsequent appreciation of linguistic registers, I here present
some preliminary comments on elements of language in Cheops’ Court that contribute
to a dating of the composition.189
The strongest element for dating is given by the functions of pA. As analyzed by
Kroeber, pA is routinely used with participants and entities important in the tales,
which the expression underscores and singles out from the set of all nominal
expressions. In doing so, pA keeps some deictic force. However, it does not have what
Krober termed ‘anaphoric’ functions any more. In most cases, the referents of the
nouns preceded by pA can be immediately identified by the hearer in the context of a
given story, without such reference being established in the preceding clause. In other
words, pA points to the universe of referents in the mental representation of the hearer,
but not to the immediately preceding clause any more.190 On the other hand, nouns
with referents that can be identified also outside the narrower context have pA only

186 Franke 1994: 69-70; Lepper 2008: 319, also suggesting that Cheops’ Court may include an
allusion to the throne name of the only slightly earlier ruler Khendjer (see however von Lieven
2012: 304). Lepper (2008: 320) further speculates on a final redaction by the Seventeenth Dynasty.
187 Ryholt 1997: 225-31, 298; Grajetzki 2006: 71-3.
188 Morenz 1996: 107-10.
189 Lepper (2008: 286-92) has recently proposed an internal chronology of the stories in Cheops’
Court, based notably on grammar. I disagree with the criteria on which the analysis is based. For
example, pA’s are relevant only if analyzed as to their function (strength of deictic force and type of
such: see §2.4.4.2). Counting iw’s without reference to their functions (syntactic and semantic,
changing over time) is similarly inconsequential (compare e.g. §2.4.4.5, (iii)). So is counting
‘uneingeleitete sDm.n=f Formen’, which can only be appreciated within an overall analysis of
clausal dependency and inter-clausal cohesion as a functional domain in a text being studied (see
§2.4.4.5). The distribution of ‘w-Passiva’ and ‘tw-Passiva’ is a matter of aspect (the former are
perfective, the latter aspectually unmarked) and therefore an effect of what is being said in
individual stories, not of time during the period concerned. As regards ‘Neuägyptizismen’ (Lepper
2008: 291-2), pA’s (incidentally, not yet an ‘Artikel’ in Cheops’ Court) are documented in Twelfth
Dynasty literary registers (§2.4.4.2.2). ‘%Dm pw irj.n’ and ‘aHa.n’ are documented in First
Intermediate Period inscriptions and in Twelfth Dynasty narrative literature (§2.4.4.3). Among
‘alte Formen’ (Lepper 2008: 292), (synthetic) ‘causatives’ are still productive in the early New
Kingdom, not to speak of individual verbs based on this formation, which, as lexicalized items,
were used centuries after they entered the lexicon. ‘Pwy’ demonstratives, also mentioned as ‘alte
Formen’, are first documented in the Twelfth Dynasty and were to become more common only
later: while associated with a specific register (§2.4.4.6.B), these demonstratives are fairly recent
expressions in pre-New Kingdom times.
190 Kroeber 1970: 22-4; these are in the author’s terminology the ‘relativ-realen Begriffe mit niedriger
Assoziations-Intensität’.

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 112 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

occasionally.191 Nouns with referents identified in a fully context-independent manner

do not have pA at all.192
In a Twelfth Dynasty literary text such as Tale of Neferpesedjet, pA is still strictly
‘anaphoric’: x+2-3 [...] kAwtiw Dd.in n=f nA n kAwtiw [...] ‘[...] workers. The workers
(scil. the afore mentioned workers, just introduced in discourse) said to him [...]’. The
stage of development in Tale of P. Lythgoe (pA in ro x+2; ro x+9; vso x+2) remains
difficult to judge given the fragmentary state of the text, which prevents an analysis of
referent activation. Documentary texts from the late Twelfth Dynasty are, on the other
hand, preserved in numbers sufficiently high for a full-scale functional analysis to be
carried out on these. The stage of development these bear witness to is less advanced
than in Cheops’ Court.193
While keeping some deictic force, pA’s are thus used in Cheops’ Court in ways
that imply a composition later than the late Twelfth Dynasty. When more precisely
after the Twelfth Dynasty the stage of functional development of pA as used in
Cheops’ Court was reached is unknown. The next stage of development would be
reached only in the early Eighteenth Dynasty.194 Since the stage of development as in
Cheops’ Court is first documented within this composition itself, this could therefore
have been reached at any time between the Thirteenth Dynasty and the early
Eighteenth. Such temporal uncertainty, ultimately determined by the low density of
the Second Intermediate Period record, directly bears on the terminus ante quem non
that can be defined for the composition of Cheops’ Court. This must then be a type-B
terminus, set to the early Thirteenth Dynasty for methodological reasons. The early
Thirteenth Dynasty is thereby the earliest period in time for which based on the
evidence available it can not be ruled out that pA’s could have been used in the
functions in which they are in Cheops’ Court. As with all type-B termini, this is a
conservative assessment: the relevant linguistic change may in fact have occurred at
any later time until the manuscript documentation of Cheops’ Court.
C. Other than the functions of pA, linguistic evidence for dating Cheops’ Court
appears to be extremely limited. Only one other element is readily identified, the
negative construction nfr pw N (11.23). This is first found in later Twelfth Dynasty
documentary texts in Illahun and was then used until the Eighteenth Dynasty.195 In a
literary text, the expression is found only once elsewhere, in Ipuwer (4.11-12), a
composition dating no earlier than the early Thirteenth Dynasty (§6.2.2.5). In Cheops’
Court, nfr pw N is in a maidservant’s speech, and thereby associated with a lower
register in that composition. Accordingly, nfr pw N in Cheops’ Court can not be taken
to define a terminus ante quem non later than to the first occurrences of the expression
in late Twelfth Dynasty documentary texts. The resulting terminus ante quem non is
therefore less precise than the one already defined based on the functions of pA.

191 Kroeber 1970: 24; in the author’s terminology, the ‘relativ-realen Begriffe mit hoher Assoziations-
Intensität’.
192 In Egyptian, these include encyclopedically given nouns such as ‘Ausdrücke des Cultus, des
Königthums, und Ähnliches’ (Erman 1889: §109; Kroeber 1970: 24-5).
193 Kroeber 1970: 15-7, 19-21, 25.
194 Kroeber 1970: 25-8.
195 Brose 2009.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 113

It may be worth emphasizing, finally, that the above terminus ante quem non to
the early Thirteenth Dynasty is only just that, a terminus. Moreover, it is a type-B one:
whether a dating to a time as early as the early Thirteenth Dynasty is actually possible
is unknown. Nothing linguistically, nor as it seems on any other level, speaks against
a dating of the composition close in time to its sole surviving manuscript. When after
the Twelfth Dynasty—and probably not immediately in the early Thirteenth—
Cheops’ Court was composed is therefore here left open.

2.4.4.2 PA
The above terminus ante quem non for dating of Cheops’ Court was based on an
analysis of the functions of pA, not on the fact that the composition has pA’s. To be
sure, a composition must have pA’s for an analysis of the functions of that word to be
possible in the first place. Yet, this is only a conditioning possibility for analysis, not
an argument in itself. In appreciating the presence, or conversely the absence, or the
density or rarity, of pA’s within any given composition, the ways this morpheme often
functions as a linguistic index, and thereby issues of register, must be taken into
account.

2.4.4.2.1 A linguistic index

In Middle Egyptian, pA is commonly interpreted as a token of a relatively lower
written register. This is based on the skewed distribution of the expression across the
written record. PA, already documented in Old Kingdom proper names and ‘Reden
und Rufe’, is commonly used in Twelfth Dynasty documentary texts, but much more
sparsely in contemporaneous literary texts (§2.4.4.2.2) and inscriptional ones.196 In the
Thirteenth and Seventeenth Dynasties, pA’s are also found in inscriptionally published
texts that in their lingusitic typology are similar to documentary registers,197 in private
inscriptions,198 and in Kamose Inscriptions. All of these are also otherwise linguisti-
cally innovative (§1.3.3.1-2). In Eighteenth Dynasty inscriptions, pA’s are avoided
almost entirely until the times of Amenhotep II and become more common only by
Amarna and later. Meanwhile, they are common in documentary registers and in
‘Reden und Rufe’.199 In the former, the presence of pA’s is in continuation to similar
selections already in the late Twelfth Dynasty; in the latter, they contribute to stylize
the ‘sermo quotidianus’ evoked.
That a demonstrative expression may have been made an index of linguistic
register by speakers is not surprising, in view of the high formal salience of the
expression. For an expression to function as a linguistic index, it must be easy to

196 In a royal inscription, an altogether exceptional example is Tod Inscription 23 nA [...], if this text is
to be dated to the Twelfth Dynasty (see Buchberger 2006). In an expedition inscription, and in a
lesser register, e.g. Hammamat 19 (temp. Amenemhat III), 11 nA n mnw ‘these blocks’.
197 E.g. Sobekhotep IV’s Karnak Stela, passim; Nubkheperre Antef’s Coptos Decree, passim; Stèle
Juridique, passim.
198 E.g. Ameniseneb, Louvre C12, 3; 5; 6; Louvre C11, 6; 7; 14; Sobekdedu-Bebi (Louvre C285), 15;
Iymeru-Neferkare (Louvre A125), B.2; Minnakht (Zagreb 7), B.4; B.5.
199 E.g. Paheri, pl.3, in various places.

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 114 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

recognize for speakers.200 In the present case, the contrast between pA and e.g. pn is
based on segmental morphology; moreover, it is with a linguistic function, and there-
fore with expressions, that have a high token frequency in (spoken and written)
text.201 The high salience of demonstratives is further illustrated by how these can be
subjected to linguistic dissimilation in Middle Egyptian, thus: ipf – nf (Tod Inscription
29: §4.6.3.B, (a)); ipn – nn (Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela; Appointement of the
Vizier: §4.6.3.B, (b)); and, with pA itself, Nubkheperre Antef’s Coptos Decree 4-5 pA
r-pr, against 6 r-pr pn.
This analysis of pA as a linguistic index, and as an expression accordingly to be
avoided in certain registers, is not contradicted by the fact that the vizier Antefiqer
freely uses pA’s in a letter (P. Reisner II).202 To be sure, a vizier sits at the top of the
innermost circle of court officials, yet when writing a letter he selects a register that
befits this type of linguistic performance. Conversely, Heqanakht extensively uses pA
when addressing his household, but avoids the expression when addressing a superior
in the third letter.203 In ways that are only rarely possible in the Middle Egyptian
record, a linguistic index is here observed being manipulated by a single individual.
NB. One famous early Twelfth Dynasty inscription has been interpreted as including an
explicit meta-pragmatic statement on pA: Mentuwoser 13 ink mdw r rA-a srw Swy m Dd
pAw ‘I spoke in the manner of the officials, free of saying pAw.’ This is classically taken
to be a reference to the avoidance of pA’s in the language of officials and by extension,
in higher registers.204 Such interpretation has been challenged and Mentuwoser’s
statement read differently.205 Be the reading as it may, this does not affect the present
argument, since the indexical value of pA is independently established based on its
skewed distribution in the Middle Egyptian written record (above).

2.4.4.2.2 In Middle Egyptian literature

Twelfth Dynasty literary compositions are themselves not free of pA’s. One instance is
found in Kagemni (before a noun: below, (i)), one in Sinuhe (pronominal: (iv)),206 and
one in Shipwrecked Sailor (pronominal: (v)). Eloquent Peasant, for its part, has no
less than ten occurrences of pA’s (below),207 while Debate of a Man and His Soul has

200 Incidentally, the recruitment of a demonstrative expression for meta-linguistic purposes is not un-
paralleled (Andersen & Keenan 1985: 276-7, as a designation of a whole language; I thank Pascal
Vernus for having drawn this to my attentation).
201 On an altogether different level, it is significant as well that the rise of the article pA was identified
as an important diachronic process in early Egyptology already. In a similar vein, it is significant
that there is a general awareness of pA as one item of linguistic form by which the register of
Cheops’ Court saliently differs from the register of other Middle Egyptian narrative compositions
such as Sinuhe.
202 Allen 2009: 266-7, with an interpretation different than mine.
203 James 1962: 107-8; Allen 2002a: 88; Uljas 2013.
204 Initially Fecht 1960: 205, n.580; widely followed, e.g. by Kroeber 1970: 21; Allen 1994: 11;
Loprieno 1996b: 519-20; Morenz 1996: 34-6; Parkinson 2002: 119-20; Uljas 2013.
205 Lastly by Díaz Hernández 2013: 119 and Allen 2009, with references to previous proposals.
206 Sinuhe B 217 is sometimes emended into D.tw <n>A (...) (e.g. Feder, TLA). AOS, to be sure, reads
with a demonstrative (D.tw nn (...)), but this is a secondary reading. As emerges from the semantic
analysis by Oréal (2011: 46), the reading in B (D.tw(=i) A (...)) is rich.
207 See Allen 2009: 266.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 115

four (two pronominal, two before a noun: below, D). Roughly from the same period,
Ptahhotep, a very long composition, does not have a single pA in P, and only one in
L1 (below, (ii)). That pA’s are found at all in Twelfth Dynasty literary texts may at
first seem surprising in view of the above discussion on how the expression is
indexical of register. Moreover, pA’s are very scarce in those Twelfth Dynasty literary
texts in which they occur and their distribution is very uneven over these: this as well
merits comment.
A. The discussion is best begun with the Middle Egyptian literary composition that
has the highest amount of pA’s after Cheops’ Court, Eloquent Peasant.208 In this, eight
of ten occurrences are from the narrative or dialogue situations, against only two from
the much longer petitions themselves. To some extent, this reflects the fact that
dialogue situations naturally afford deictic contexts in higher numbers than the
petitions do. Yet, when a deictic context is given, a pA or a pn could be used: that pA’s
are more common in the dialogues than in the petitions is therefore a composer’s
deliberate selection, exploiting the expression to index a different register. This
accords with the studied simplicity of the framing narrative and dialogues of Eloquent
Peasant, which contrastively highlights the petitions.209
In Kagemni similarly, a related morphological category, possessive pAy=f, is
found once in the introduction to the framing epilogue: Kagemni 2.3 nAy=f n Xrdw
‘his children’. The expression is strongly deictic in the context of a teaching, a type of
literary discourse defined by a speech situation of a father to his child(ren). The
possessive is simultaneously indexical of register, according with how the framing
epilogue is brief and direct in a highly stylized way on other levels as well
(below, (i)).
B. In Middle Egyptian literary texts in which pA’s appear only once, these singular
selections are always significant. Deictic force is particularly strong in the following
places, each time at salient junctures:
(i) Kagemni 2.4-5
ir ntt nbt m sS m pA Sfdw sDm st mi Dd=i st
‘As to all there is in writing on this roll, hear it like I say it.’
(ii) Ptahhotep 507 L1
ir sDm=k nA Dd [...]
(P ir sDm=k nn Dd.n=i n=k)
‘If you listen to this that I have said to you (...)’

Kagemni 2.4-5 introduces the vizier’s final speech in the epilogue: pA Sfdw reflexively
points to the teaching itself now put in writing in a performative way. Ptahhotep 507
similarly introduces the epilogue, with nA in L1 also pointing to the teaching. That P
has nn illustrates the composer’s role in selecting expressions.

208 Occurrences in Allen 2009: 266, with an analysis different from mine.
209 Parkinson 2002: 175-6; 2012: 4, both with an analysis of subtle differences in the narrative and the
dialogues.

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 116 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

Directly comparable to these is the single occurrence of possessive pAy=f in

Eloquent Peasant, also reflexively pointing to the written textualization of the orally
performed discourses:

(iii) Eloquent Peasant B2 126-129

Dd.<i>n imi-rA pr wr mrw sA rnsi
sA grt aA sDm=k nAy=k n sprwt
rD.in=f Sd.t(w)[=s] Hr art mAt sprt nbt r Xr[t=s]
‘The high steward Meru’s son Rensi said:
“Now wait here and listen to these petitions of yours.”
He caused them to be read out from a fresh roll, each petition according to its
content.’

In these texts in which pA occurs only once, the expression is used not only for its
intrinsic demonstrative force: the compositions otherwise have other demonstratives
that are not any deictically weaker as far as grammar proper is concerned. Rather, pA
is selected for the additional force that derives from its contrast with other demonstra-
tives used elsewhere. The expression is salient inasmuch as it stands out of the
ordinary in the overall register of these compositions. In being salient, the expression
is deictic in yet an additional sense, intra-textually defined, beyond the deictic force it
has as its conventionalized grammatical meaning.

C. Slightly different is the case of two Twelfth Dynasty narrative compositions,

Sinuhe and Shipwrecked Sailor where pA occurs only once, but as a pronoun. This use
is less innovative, and thereby less marked in terms of register, than before a noun.
Some effect associated with the selection of the pA demonstrative is manifest
nonetheless: both passages in which a pronominal pA occurs are from high points in
the compositions and deixis is accordingly strong. Sinuhe B 198-199 introduces the
conclusion to the king’s decree urging Sinuhe to return (B 178-199): in using nA, the
king points to the sum of Sinuhe’s past tribulations, the occasion for the composition
itself. In Shipwrecked Sailor, the expression is set in the serpent’s mouth, deploring
his dead children:

(iv) Sinuhe B 198-199

iw nA Aw r Hwt tA
‘This is too long to be roaming the earth!’

(v) Shipwrecked Sailor 129-132

aHa.n sbA hAw pr.n nA m xt m-a=f
xpr.n r=s nn wi Hna Am.ny nn wi m-Hr-ib=sn
aHa.n=i m(w)t.kw n=sn gm.n=i st m XAyt wat
‘Then a star came down and these went up in fire through its action.
It happened while I was not with them, they burnt while I was not in their midst.
I died for them, having found them as a single heap of corpses.’

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 117

D. More substantially different, but not less remarkable, is the case of Debate of a
Man and His Soul. The composition has four instances of pA’s (5 and 17, pronominal;
50 and 116, before a noun) alternating with four instances of pfA’s (34; 37; 77; 126). A
pn-demonstrative is selected only once (149), rather remarkably in a vocative address.
One further demonstrative expression in the text is pf, placed before the noun rather
than after it (16 pf gs ‘that side’), a construction that is reminiscent of early funerary
texts. That eight out of ten demonstratives in Debate are from the -A series (pA’s and
pfA’s) is striking. This suggests that the pA’s in Debate must be interpreted in relation
to the overall configuration of demonstratives in the composition. The recurrent selec-
tion of -f- demonstratives (five out of ten occurrences: four pfA’s, one pf ) probably has
to do with the distal semantics expressed by these, here in relation to the strong
funerary overtones of Debate.210 The interpretation naturally extends to the afore
mentioned syntax of pf gs.
E. As the above demonstrates, pA’s are in no ways banned from Twelfth Dynasty
Middle Egyptian literary texts. Nor, conversely, do they ever relinquish their indexical
force in these. In compositions where they occur multiple times, such as in Eloquent
Peasant (and Kagemni, taking into account the brevity of the epilogue), an association
with register is directly manifest. In compositions in which pA occurs only once, it
does at salient junctures, often reflexively poiting to the textual status of the composi-
tions themselves. The additional deictic force the expression carries there, going
beyond the grammatically defined one, derives from its out of the ordinary character
within the overall register of these compositions. In some places in Eloquent Peasant
and in both instances in Kagemni, both analyses apply simultaneously.
In Cheops’ Court, pA (and possessive pAy=f ) is overly common: the effect is not
differential and additionally deictic (as in e.g. Ptahhotep L1 or Sinuhe), but direct and
indexical, as in Eloquent Peasant and Kagemni. Unlike in these compositions, how-
ever, the register indexed extends over the whole composition. This accords with the
register of Cheops Court as can defined in literary terms.211 In the following, I
examine other aspects of the linguistic register of Cheops’ Court more closely.

2.4.4.3 Cheops’ Court – Kagemni, Eloquent Peasant

A. Narrative structure in Cheops’ Court is more episodic and repetitive than in
concentrically patterned Middle Kingdom tales such as Sinuhe or Shipwrecked Sailor.
This is reflected, for instance, in the common use of aHa.n sDm.n=f and wn.in=f Hr
sDm, and of fronted temporal expressions such as xr m-xt sDm=f and xr m-xt NP
pseudoparticiple as recurrent articulating devices. The syntactic texture is also less
densely-woven than in Twelfth Dynasty literary works: complex sequences of
semantically dependent clauses tend to be avoided in favor of simpler modes of
textual cohesion and articulation.
The broad use of aHa.n sDm.n=f and wn.in=f Hr sDm side by side has been
interpreted as a transitional feature of Cheops’ Court: the composition would thereby

210 A similar interpretation is reflected by Allen (2009) in his translation, where -f- demonstratives are
often rendered by ‘yon’, ‘yonder’ (e.g. ‘yon side’ for Debate 16).
211 Analyzed by Parkinson (2002: 138-46).

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 118 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

occupy an intermediary position between e.g. Sinuhe and Shipwrecked Sailor (in
which aHa.n sDm.n=f is said to be relatively more common than wn.in=f Hr sDm) and
Late Egyptian Stories (in which wn.in=f Hr sDm is more common).212 However, the
presence and distribution of these constructions must be viewed in relation to other
elements in the narrative texture of the compositions being compared. Cheops’ Court
favors more direct modes of clause linkage over complex sequences of asyndetically
joined clauses as in e.g. Sinuhe. This naturally results in an overall much higher
density of aHa.n-headed constructions and wn.in=f Hr sDm’s. As is generally the case in
Middle Egyptian, including in Sinuhe, wn.in=f Hr sDm is associated with paragraph-
final functions in Cheops’ Court.213 At the levels considered, there are no differences
in language between these compositions, only differences in what may be termed their
‘narrative style’, or better, their narrative texture.
B. Whenever multiple events in the main narrative chain directly follow each other,
this results in sequences of aHa.n-headed constructions, with no wn.in=f Hr sDm’s or
other constructions intervening. Such sequences, which are conspicuous in Cheops’
Court, are absent in Sinuhe and Shipwrecked Sailor because of the differently
articulated narrative hierarchies in these compositions. A sequence of three aHa.n-
headed constructions is, on the other hand, found in a Twelfth Dynasty composition,
in the framing epilogue of Kagemni. This has further elements in common with
Cheops’ Court:

(i) The framing epilogue of Kagemni and Cheops’ Court:

- Sequences of aHa.n-headed constructions: Kagemni 2.7-9 (3x) – Cheops’ Court 8.23-
9.1; 11.14-19 (6x each); 3.12-14; 3.23-25; 5.14-17; 6.7-10; 8.17-20; 10.7-8 (3-4x
each). Such sequences recur in spectacular form in Ameniseneb’s mid-Thirteenth Dy-
nasty biography (particularly in Louvre C11), associated with other elements of a
lesser register. Similarly in the late Twelfth Dynasty in a biography (Khusobek) and
in a documentary register (Semna Dispatches) (§1.3.3.1.C);
- aHa.n N sDm.n=f: Kagemni 2.7-8 aHa.n Hm n nsw bity Hwni mni.n=f ‘Then the Majesty
of the King of Upper and Lower Egypt Huni went to harbor.’ – Cheops’ Court: 5.15-
16 aHa.n wat ntt r Stiw Ht.n=s m Hnskt=s ‘Then the woman who was at the stroke oar
got her braid entangled.’214 The construction is very rare. That in both cases the
construction is motivated by the length of the subject makes it no less noteworthy;
- Sequences of wn.in=f Hr sDm constructions: Kagemni 2.5-7 (4x) – Cheops’ Court
12.2-3; 12.7 (2x each).
Such conjunction is noteworthy when the sheer brevity of the framing epilogue of
Kagemni is taken into account.

212 Hintze 1950: 31-6, particularly 34-5; now also Jay 2008: 80-132.
213 Similarly Schenkel in press b; for Cheops’ Court specifically, §2.1-2, §3.1, and §4.3. Schenkel
identifies the function of wn.in=f Hr sDm as providing ‘background information’ in the contouring
of a text: despite different terminologies, this is substantially the same analysis expressed here in
more descriptive terms by ‘paragraph-final position’.
214 Transl. Parkinson 1997a: 110.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 119

Not a narrative construction, but significant of a similar constellation, is the use of

Hna sDm in continuation to an imperative. In Middle Egyptian literature, this is found
only in two texts, various times in Cheops’ Court and once in the R version of
Eloquent Peasant:215

(ii) Cheops’ Court 5.9-12

im in.tw n=i st-Hmt 20 (...)
Hna rDt nn iAdwt n nn Hmwt (...)
‘Have twenty women given to me (...)
and have these nets given to these women (...)’
Sim. 4.13-14; 6.20; also 1.4 (restored). For the slightly different construction in
7.2-4, §2.4.4.7, (iv).

(iii) Eloquent Peasant R 18.1-5

[ir s]wt a n a[nx] Hmt sxti pn (...)
Hna swt irt a n anx [sxti] pn (...)
‘But make a portion of sustenance for this peasant’s wife (...)
And yet also make a portion of sustenance for this peasant (...)’216
B1 phrases differently, with a second imperative: B1 112-114 ir swt anx Hmt=f
(...) ir grt anx sxty pn (...). A subjunctive sDm=f could not be used here because,
as the presence of grt implies, the linkage between the two clauses is not merely
continuative. Inasmuch as it implies an effect on register, the text in R bears
witness to a rewriting.

The construction imperative – Hna sDm is not recent in itself, being found already in an
Eighth Dynasty decree.217 It recurs in documentary texts of the Twelfth and Thirteenth
dynasties,218 as well as in documentary texts monumentally published of the Seven-
teenth Dynasty (§1.3.3.1.C). The construction is, however, otherwise avoided in
Middle Egyptian literary texts: these use another construction instead, imperative –
subjunctive sDm=f.
Significantly, (iii) is from a dialogue in the framing narrative, as are several of the
pA’s in this composition. In both Cheops’ Court and Eloquent Peasant, the selection
of Hna sDm—rather than a subjunctive sDm=f (for the former) or an imperative (for the
latter)—thereby appears as an index of register.219 As noted, Kagemni also has an
instance of pA before a noun (§2.4.4.2.2, (i)) and one of a pAy=f possessive
(§2.4.4.2.2.A). In the framing parts of both Kagemni and Eloquent Peasant, verbal

215 Kroeber 1970: 154-5.

216 Transl. Parkinson 2012a: 94.
217 Urk. I 296, 11-12; 306, 9-10 (the same text): see Kroeber 1970: 153-4, ex.1-2.
218 Heqanakht, P. Reisner II, and P. Bulaq 18; see Kroeber 1970: 154. Also in P. Berlin 10470
(Smither 1948; HHBT 50-4), passim.
219 Similar interpretation by Kroeber (1970: 155) and Parkinson (2012: 95).

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 120 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

constructions thereby appear to index register just like pA’s do. A similar constellation
is characteristic of Cheops’ Court more generally.220

2.4.4.4 Cheops’ Court – Tale of P. Lythgoe, Sasobek, Tale of Hay

Also relating to different types of narrative texture are different fronted temporal
expressions. In Cheops’ Court, a great many are introduced by xr m-xt, providing a
common articulating device throughout the composition (for another fronted temporal
expression, wa m nn hrw xpr in 9.21, see §5.6.2). Roughly half of these are
formulaic (i), foreshadowing similar techniques in Ramesside narrative literature.221
Other than in Cheops’ Court, formulaic temporal expression in xr m-xt are uncommon
in pre-Ramesside times.222 In Middle Egyptian literary texts such as Sinuhe or Tale of
a Herdsman, different formulae, of a synthetic type, perform similar functions (ii).
The contrast is of register, rather than diachronic: the construction as in Cheops’
Court is documented in an Eighth Dynasty decree already.223

(i) Stock temporal expressions introduced by xr m-xt in Cheops’ Court:224

Cheops’ Court 3.10-11 xr m-xt mSrw xpr iwt pw ir.n pA nDs (...) ‘Now, after the
evening had set, the commoner came (...)’ (sim. 2.10-11); 12.8-9 xr m-xt hrww swA Hr
nn aHa.n Sntsic rwd-Ddt xt (...) ‘Now, after days had passed on this, Ruddjedet quarelled
(...)’ (sim. 2.3-5225); 2.15-16 [xr m-xt] tA HD 2 [n] h[rww xpr SA]s pw [ir.n pA Hr-pr] (...)
‘Now, after the land had brightened and two days had passed, the steward went (...)’.

(ii) Stock temporal expressions in e.g. Sinuhe and Herdsman:

Sinuhe B 11-12 xpr.n tr n msyt sAH.n=i (...) ‘When the time of supper had come, I
touched (...)’; Herdsman x+22-23 HD.n rf tA dwA sp 2 iw ir mi Dd=f ‘When the land
had brightened early in the morning, it was done as he said’ (with expressions of
‘dawning’, also Sinuhe B 20; B 129; B 248).226

220 At the level of a literary trope, another element allying Cheops’ Court with the framing sections of
Eloquent Peasant and Kagemni is the formula wn.in nfr st Hr ib=f ‘And they were perfect to his
heart’, passim in these three compositions. As always with literary tropes, this need not point to a
close temporal horizon, but is significant as an element of a shared literary typology.
221 Detailed analysis by Hintze (1950: 14-31).
222 A much later, almost Ramesside, occurrence is Tutankhamun’s Restoration Stela 10 (Urk. IV
2028, 2-3) xr m-xt hrww swA Hr nn xay[t Hm=f ...] ‘Now, when days had passed on this, the rising
of His Majesty (...)’ (noted by Hintze 1950: 11, n.4).
223 Hintze 1950: 9, n.4.
224 Detailed analysis in Hintze 1950: 11-4.
225 [xr m-xt] hrw [swA] Hr [nn is]t rf wn Ssp[t m S n w]bA-inr aHa.n Dd.n [p]A nDs [...] ‘Now, after days
had passed on this—there was a pavilion in Ubainer’s garden—the commoner said [...]’, with a
parenthetical clause between the fronted temporal expression and the event in the main narrative
chain (sim. Parkinson 1997a: 106; Hintze 1950: 11, n.3). Lepper’s (2008: 30) reading is ungram-
matical (a xr m-xt introduced clause can not be circumstantial to a preceding clause). In filling the
lacuna, Lepper (2008: 77) evokes the possibility of an alternative restoration, by analogy with 9.21
(wa m nn hrw xpr): this is ruled out by the fact that the expression in 9.21 has a major articulating
function in the overall composition (introducing the section on Ruddjedet’s giving birth and the
ensuing ramifications), while 2.3-5 lacks any such large-scale articulating function.
226 Closely comparing with Sinuhe B 248, also with a subjectless sDm(w)-passive: HD.n rf tA iw iw iAS
n=i (...) ‘When it dawned, one came and called to me (...)’. In what little text is preserved,

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 121

Tale of P. Lythgoe and Discourse of Sasobek—both documented in late Twelfth

Dynasty manuscripts and therefore not much younger than Sinuhe or Herdsman—
have fronted temporal expressions like Cheops’ Court (iii)-(iv).227 Both also include
other expressions associated with a register different from the one of e.g. Sinuhe:
(iii) Tale of P. Lythgoe ro x+7-8
xr m-xt m[S]rw xpr aHa.n rD.n=f [...]
‘Now, after the evening had set, he gave [...]’
Sim. vso x+9-10 xr m-xt Abdw aSA swA aHa.n nsw [...] ‘Now, after many months
had passed, the king [...]’.228
In the same composition, also pA’s in series (ro x+2; ro x+9; vso x+2).

(iv) Sasobek A.11

xr m-xt kt pXryt swA[.ti ...]
‘Now, after another long period had pass[ed ...]’
In the same composition, also presentative ptr (B1.10; B1.11; B4.1: §2.4.3.1, (i)).

Further fronted temporal expressions introduced by xr m-xt, not formulaic, contribute

to articulate the narrative in Cheops’ Court (3.17; 7.11; 7.13; 8.5-6; 8.22). The same
construction is avoided in other Middle Egyptian literary texts,229 which for similar
functions use the sDm.n=f in setting function. Here as well, the contrast is of register,
not linguistic: the construction as in Cheops’ Court is found in early Middle Kingdom
private and royal inscriptions230 and even before.231 In Middle Egyptian literature,
non-formulaic xr m-xt-introduced clauses recur only in Neferkare and Sisene (§4.4.4.1)
and in Tale of Hay (v). The latter is documented in a late Twelfth Dynasty manuscript.
Like Tale of P. Lythgoe and Sasobek (iii)-(iv), Tale of Hay also includes at least one
other expression significant of a register different than the one of e.g. Sinuhe:

Herdsman has another expression in common with Sinuhe, the transitive construction of xpi ‘meet
(someone)’ (Herdsman x+23; Sinuhe B 10).
227 Similarly noted by Vernus 1981: 88, n.46; further comments by Spalinger 2006: 67.
228 Similarly noted by Parkinson 2002: 142.
229 Another instance, in Sinuhe B 135-136, has been proposed (Hintze 1950: 8, n.3; Feder, TLA). The
reading, however, requires heavy emendation. The text, with xr a verb serving as the predicate to
the preceding clause, is coherent as it stands (e.g. Parkinson 2009: 286).
230 As xr m-xt sDm=f (with a subjunctive sDm=f, as in Cheops’ Court 7.13; 8.5-6; 8.22): Hammamat
114 (temp. Mentuhotep IV), 15 (noted by Hintze 1950: 9, n.4, also quoting an instance from an
Eighth Dynasty decree). As xr m-xt sDm.n=f (as in Tale of Hay X+1.3-4: below, (v)): Amenemhat
(CG 20541; temp. Amenemhat II), 10 (TLA #119740). In Khety (UC 14430; D.11 or early D.12),
A.x+2 (TLA #119740), the context is broken, making it impossible to identify which of the two
constructions stood in this text.
231 E.g. Deir el-Ballas Inscription x+3 ixr m-xt Hw.n=sn mnit snb [...] ‘Now, when they had moored
successfully [...]’.

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 122 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

(v) Tale of Hay X+1.3-4

xr m-xt Dd.n [...]
‘Now, when [...] had said [...]’
In the same composition, also DADA ‘head’ (X+1.7; perhaps further in X+1.17?).
While not entirely documented in earlier times,232 DADA ‘head’ is by and large
avoided in Middle Egyptian literary texts, which use tp instead; the expression
was to gain general acceptance in literary registers only in Ramesside times.233
Yet, DADA is found in Tale of Hay, in Cheops’ Court (8.19; 8.21; compare also the
personal name DADA-m-anx), and in one other Middle Egyptian literary text,
Fishing and Fowling (C2.x+11).

Such linguistic encounters are significant as Tale of P. Lythgoe and Tale of Hay are
exponents of what on literary grounds has been described as a ‘low tradition’ of
Middle Egyptian narrative literature,234 to which Cheops’ Court would also relate.

2.4.4.5 Cheops’ Court – Sinuhe, etc.

The above elements of a linguistic differentiation notwithstanding, the two traditions
of Middle Egyptian literature, the ‘low’ and the ‘high’, are substantially in the same
variety of Middle Egyptian. This is manifest for example in aspects of the syntax of
clause combining, which makes full use of complex asyndetic dependency:235
(i) Cheops’ Court 10.11-12
ia.in=sn sw
Sad XpA=f
rD Hr ifd m Dbt
‘They washed him,
his navel having been cut off,
and he was placed on a sheet in a brick.’
Sim. 10.19-20; 11.23.

(ii) Cheops’ Court 12.4-6

aHa.n rD.n=s <sw> r pds
rD m-Xnw ky xtm istn m dHr
rD.n=s st r at wnnt Xr Hnw=s xtm.n=s Hr=f

232 Deir el-Ballas Inscription x+10; Nesimontu A.13 (referring to the ‘head’ of a ‘tribe’ (pDt)). In PT
1064, P/V/E 45, DADA is used with a more specific meaning, side by side with tp: (...) ir tp=f r
DADA=f ‘(...) to his head, to his skull’.
233 A pre-Ramesside instance is Astarte I.9.
234 Parkinson 2002: 142-3.
235 Beyond the examples quoted in the main text, also e.g. Cheops’ Court 10.2 gm.n=sn sw aHa dAiw
sxd ‘They found him standing, the kilt upside down’ (sim. 12.20); 11.26-12.1: SAs pw ir.n tA wbAt
wn.n=s tA At ‘The maidservant went and opened the door’ (sim 12.4; 12.9-10; 12.12-13). The latter
is also discussed by Uljas (2007a: 251, ex.2), significantly in a paper on texture with most
examples drawn from highest written registers of Middle Egyptian.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 123

‘She put it in a box,

which was placed inside another sealed container, which was bound(?) with
leather;
she put it into the room which had her belongings and sealed it.’
In (i), the first passive event (SAd XpA=f ) is interpreted as providing a background
to the main narrative chain236 while the second (rD Hr (...)) is interpreted as part of
that chain. In (ii), by contrast, the passive events (rD m-Xnw (...); istn m dHr) are
both interpreted as part of the main chain, expressing subsequent actions, like the
following events (rD.n=s (...); xtm.n=s (...)). In either case, the linkage is
asyndetic and hearer’s inferals are called upon to complete the construal of
meaning. Such texturing is typical of high registers of Middle Egyptian.237

The syntax of iw can be complex as well, as in the following passage, the grammar of
which has merited a sizeable amount of successive interpretations:238

(iii) Cheops’ Court 5.3-7

ib n Hm=k r qbb n mAA Xnn=sn Xnt m-xd m-xnt
iw=k Hr mAA sSw nfrw n S=k
iw=k Hr mAA sxwt=f xfAAwt=f nfrw
iw ib=k r qbb Xr=s
‘Your Majesty’s heart will be cool at seeing how they row a rowing trip up
and down!
You will be seeing the beautiful pools of your lake;
You will be seeing its fields and its beautiful banks.
For your heart will be cool through it.’
The second and third clauses (iw=k Hr mAA (...)) are semantically dependent on the
first (ib n Hm=k (...)), although not necessarily circumstantial in a strict syntactic
sense. An effect of such dependency is the temporally future interpretation of the
progressive construction. Also introduced by iw, the fourth clause (iw ib=k r qbb
(...)) is not dependent in a similar way: the role of iw is here macro-syntactic,
signaling that the clause relates to the preceding segment of discourse (compare
also the anaphoric pronoun in Xr=s), to which it provides a conclusion. The first
clause is similar to the fourth but differs from it by lacking iw. As iw can serve to
connect a segment of discourse to a preceding one, not using iw allows a speaker
to present a state-of-affairs as set off from what precedes.239 This gives the clause
a thetic quality, presenting the state-of-affairs en bloc and probably with some

236 Similarly Uljas 2007a: 260-1.

237 E.g. Uljas 2007a; Collier 1996.
238 Various interpretations that have been expressed are conveniently summarized by el-Hamrawi
(2000: 142-4); I disagree with these and with the author’s.
239 An analysis of 5.3 ib n Hm=k r qbb (...) with the lack of iw signalling dependency on the precedent
segment has often been contemplated in approaches to Middle Egyptian grammar that viewed the
functions of iw as merely syntactic. Such interpretation of 5.3 is not possible grammatically
because a NP r sDm can not be in continuation to a subjunctive (here 5.1-2 Hw A wDA Hm=k (...)),
nor to an imperative (should 5.2 apr be interpreted as one rather than as a sDm(w)-passive; the latter
is more likely).

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 124 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

affective nuance.240 The syntax of iw in the fourth clause is as in e.g. Sinuhe R 8,

articulating the court’s mourning (R 8-11) to Amenemhat’s apotheosis (R 5-8)
(§1.3.3.2.D). Iw-lessness in the first clause is as in e.g. Sinuhe B 269-70 awy=k r
{r} nfrt nsw wAH Xkryt nt nbt-pt ‘Your hands are upon the beauty, enduring king,
the insignia of the Lady of heaven!’
On an altogether different level, the rare construction NP r sDm Xr=s in 5.6-7
(iw ib=k r qbb Xr=s) is noteworthy as well. Only two other instances of the
construction have been noted overall:241 Ptahhotep 407 iw sA=k r Hbs Xr=s ‘Your
back will be clothed through it’; Merikare E 49 iw tA pn r grg Xr=s ‘This land will
be founded through it.’

Cheops’ Court has various instances of serial constructions other than aHa.n-headed
ones (pr.n sDm.n=f, etc.). These recur in Sinuhe and Debate of a Man and His Soul;
beyond literary texts, they are also found in Coffin Texts. Just as Cheops’ Court
accommodates them, so does the framing epilogue of Kagemni.

(iv) Cheops’ Court 6.4

ii.n HD.n=s pAy=s rmn
‘She came to disrupt her side.’
Sim. Cheops’ Court 6.14 pr.n fqA.n=f Xri-Hb Hri-tp DADA-m-anx m bw nb nfr ‘He
finally rewarded the chief lector priest Djadjaemankh with every good thing.’

Sim. Sinuhe B 127 sDr.n qAs.n=i pDt=i (...) ‘At night I strung my bow (...)’.
Sim. CT IV 278/279d BH1Br pr.n Hpt.n ky ky ‘They finally embraced each other’
(other witness with aHa.n in place of pr.n).242

Sim. Kagemni 2.4 Dr.n Dd.n=f n=sn (...) ‘He ended up saying to them (...)’.

Related to these serial constructions are other constructions with the same verbs also
in auxiliary function, but not themselves serial. These have a similar distribution in
the record:
(v) Cheops’ Court 6.11
Dr.in=f mH [2]4 (...)
‘It (scil. the water) ended up as [2]4 cubits (...)’
Sim. Shipwrecked Sailor 130 (...) pr.n nA m xt m-a=f ‘(...) and these (scil. the
serpent’s children) went up in fire through its (scil. the star’s) action’; Debate 75-
76 Dr.in=f Hms psS=f m xrw Hr Dd (...) ‘He ended up seated, spreading out by
voice saying (...)’.

240 This analysis has its roots in Vernus’ discussion of ‘iw-lessness’ (1997: 45-61; not mentioning
Cheops’ Court 5.3-7); further analysis will be provided in Stauder & Uljas in prep. For iw-less NP
r sDm, see already in the present study §5.2.3.3.
241 First by Kaplony-Heckel 1956: 80.
242 Schenkel 20125: 256.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 125

Sim. CT IV 280/281a M1NY Dr.n xpr m bAwy=f ‘They ended up becoming The-
one-with-two-ba’s’ (other witnesses have aHa.n); CT V 97g T1C sDr.n iHw=s rxs
smn=s npd ‘At night her oxen were killed and her goose was slaughtered.’243

Illustrative is also e.g. smwn – clause (§2.4.2, (i)), which recurs in both Sinuhe and in
a dialogue in Eloquent Peasant:

(vi) Cheops’ Court 4.1

smwn msH p<w>244 nHA
‘No doubt this is a dangerous crocodile!’245
Sim. Sinuhe B 157-158 smwn=k r rDt (...) ‘Surely you will let (...)’.
Sim. Eloquent Peasant B1 75 (the officials speaking to Meru’s son Rensi) smwn
sxty=f pw ‘Surely it is but a peasant of his!’; later also in P. Bulaq 13 frg. X.1.

2.4.4.6 Further elements of linguistic inclusiveness

A. In accommodating the elements noted above, the linguistic register in Cheops’
Court appears inclusive. Beyond these, old and new expressions of the same function
can occur side by side, without any obvious correlate in terms of register to be
detected. A clear case is with the syntax of ib:
(i) Cheops’ Court 9.12
wn.in Hm=f ib=f wA r Dwt Hr=s
‘His Majesty’s heart fell into a bad mood about this.’
(ii) Cheops’ Court 6.1-2
wn.in ib n Hm=f qb n mAA Xnn=sn
‘His Majesty’s felt well at seeing them rowing.’
Sim. 5.14.
Both sentences have the same overall construction, wn.in NP pseudoparticiple,
but differ in the syntax of ib. In 9.12, the old construction, with a badal
apposition, is selected (Hm=f ib=f ). In 6.1-2 and 5.14, the innovative genitival
construction is selected (ib n Hm=f ).

B. Linguistic inclusiveness in Cheops’ Court extends to elements of a heightened

register in relation to ritual. The relevant expressions are concentrated in the episode
of the divine birth. The section is set off from the overall composition by an intro-
ductory fronted temporal expression that occurs only here in the composition and is

243 Schenkel 20125: 257.

244 Emendation after Lepper 2008: 84-5.
245 For a semantic analysis of smwn in this passage, Oréal 2011: 431-2, not emending the text and
with a translation as ‘Se peut-il que ce crocodile s’en retourne!’

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 126 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

otherwise associated with text-initial positions (§5.6.2): 9.21 wa m nn hrw xpr (...)
‘One of these days (...)’.246
The first of these expressions is pwy demonstratives. These occur in Cheops’
Court in relation to two types of referents, the names given to the three kings to come
and kingship itself:

(iii) Pwy demonstratives:

10.9 (...) m rn=k pwy n wsr-r=f ‘(...) in this your name of Userref!’ (sim.
10.16-17; 10.24);
9.24-25 (...) r irt iAt twy mnxt m tA pn r-Dr=f ‘(...) to perform this excellent
function in this whole land’ (sim. already 9.11).

The demonstratives are first documented, still sparsely, in the Twelfth Dynasty and
become more common from the Thirteenth Dynasty on and in the early New King-
dom. They are found mostly in religious or magical texts. The specific associations as
in Cheops’ Court recur notably in some Thutmoside inscriptions to do with royal
ideology, also with referents associated with kingship and names given to the king.
The same section is distinguished by a collection of synthetic -in-marked forms
(sDm.in=f ). In Middle Egyptian literature, these—as opposed to analytic wn.in=f Hr
sDm—are mostly restricted to a set of high-frequency verbs and to dialogal exchanges,
often in contexts that evoke the format of the ‘Royal Tale’.247 High-frequency verbs
found with synthetic -in-marked forms are Dd, rDi, and iri. Significantly, these are
themselves mostly found in contexts of dialogal exchange (Dd), including the acting
related to such dialogues (iri and causative rDi). Less common verbs also found in the
synthetic form include ini or sTA, as a convention associated with the ‘Royal Tale’ (for
sTA, e.g. Neferti 1h; 2g; Cheops’ Court 8.10; for ini, e.g. Cheops’ Court 4.24, by
extension also Eloquent Peasant R 7.7248). Synthetic saq.in in Eloquent Peasant B2
130 (on the petitions now entextualized being ‘presented to’ the king) has a similar
meaning and relates to a similar convention, extended further. Among other un-
common verbs found in the sDm.in=f, Dr.in=f in Cheops’ Court 6.11 is an auxiliary
(§2.4.4.5, (v)): the analytic construction could not have been used (compare *wn.in=f
Hr Dr mH 24). Ms.in=sn in Sinuhe B 269 is discussed below. Further instances of
sDm.in=f with verbs other than the usual ones (e.g. wSS.in=f and nDm.in=f in P. Ebers
52, 1-7;249 mA.in=f in CT II 334d250) are not from literature and therefore abide by
different conventions.251

246 On 9.21-22 introducing a ‘major shift’ in ‘time, place, and protagonists who suddenly include the
court of the Sungod’, further Parkinson 2002: 186-7.
247 I agree with Schenkel (in press b: §1) that the often repeated claim that synthetic sDm.in=f forms
are restricted to high-frequency verbs and/or correlate with high-status participants fails to describe
the data adequately. However, I maintain that the distribution of these synthetic forms—as
opposed to analytic ones—is in literature principled, according to conventions such as described in
the main text. As elsewhere in the present study, I use ‘Royal Tale’ as a conventional label for a
certain situation of exchange with the king, well aware of the fact that there may never have been
such a fixed ‘format’, let alone a ‘genre’.
248 In the interaction between Nemtinakht and his follower, as one among various ways by which
Nemtinakht is presented as usurping prerogatives that are not his.
249 Schenkel in press b: §2.8.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 127

Outside contexts falling under the scope of the above conventions, the analytic
construction, wn.in=f Hr sDm, is regularly used in Middle Egyptian literature.
Examples in Eloquent Peasant are with rmi ‘cry’ (B1 55-56) or srx ‘denounce’ (B1
73); in Cheops’ Court with Xni ‘row’ (5.13-14), HbAbA ‘waddle’ (8.21), Sni ‘suffer’
(9.22), ms ‘bring, present’ (10.3), swDA ‘fortify’ (10.21-22), wHm ‘repeat’ (12.2; 12.7;
12.15), or dbn ‘go around’ (12.3).252 Significantly, analytic wn.in=f Hr sDm can also
be used with the afore mentioned high-frequency verbs when the contexts are other
than dialogal exchange with the king and associated acting. For example in Eloquent
Peasant B1 115-116, the verb is rDi, but the event a mere giving, not a causing
(someone to do something): wn.in.tw Hr rDt n=f tA 10 Hnqt ds 2 ra nb ‘And one began
giving him ten loaves of bread and two jars of beer daily’; contrast with B2 128-129
(Meru’s son Rensi acting as a deputy to the king) rD.in=f Sd.t(w)[=s] Hr art mAt sprt
nbt r Xr[t=s] ‘And he caused them to be read out from a fresh roll, each petition
according to its content.’253
Against the background just outlined, the following synthetic -in-forms in Cheops’
Court are then very remarkable:

(iv) Synthetic -in-marked forms in the episode of divine birth:

10.9-10 war.in Xrd pn tp awy=sy m Xrd n mH 1 (...) ‘This child rushed out onto
her arms as a child of one cubit (...)’ (sim. 10.17; 10.24);
10.11 ia.in=sn sw (...) ‘They washed him (...)’ (sim. 10.19; 11.2);
11.8-9 iwh.in sw Xnmw m pA it ‘Khnum loaded himself with the grain.’

These forms are not with high-frequency verbs in the context of a dialogal exchange,
nor are they more generally accounted for under the conventions discussed above.
Their divine subjects play no role either: for the goddesses, compare the analytic
construction in 10.3 wn.in=sn Hr ms n=f mniwt=sn sxmw ‘They presented him with

250 Schenkel in press b: §3.6; witnesses alternate between mA.in=f and mA.n=f.
251 A similar comment extends to Eighteenth Dynasty royal inscriptions, e.g. Thutmosis II’s Aswan
Inscription 9 (Urk. IV 139, 9) xa<r>.in Hm=f (hardly a ‘narrative’ infinitive in view of the
meaning of the verb). As often, such reconfigurations are at their densest in the Royal Cycle, e.g.
Urk. IV 259, 4 sn.in=sn; 259, 7 pr.in=sn; 261, 1 nDm.in ib; 261, 11 mAT.in=sn.
252 Sim. e.g. in a Twelfth Dynasty expedition inscription, Hammamat 19 (temp. Amenemhat III), with
hd ‘attack’ (said of stones), wAsi ‘be damaged’, and sfn ‘make smooth’ (passage discussed by
Schenkel in press b: §3.5).
253 In B1 115-116 (my translation), and similarly in B1 55-56 (‘(...) began weeping’, e.g. Parkinson
2012a: 54), the analytic construction often lends itself to an inchoative translation (‘begin doing’).
These inchoative semantics are not part of the grammatical meaning of the construction (if they
were, wn.in N Hr rmyt should be observed contrasting with *rm.in N), but a side-effect of how the
Aktionsart of the events interacts with the grammatical tense. Rmi in B1 55-56 is atelic, and rDi (...)
in B1 115-116 is made atelic by the quantified temporal expression (ra nb); when used in a con-
struction with perfective aspect such as -in-marked constructions, this naturally yields a possibility
for an inchoative reading (Winand 2006: 215-7). Accordingly, the selection of an analytic
construction is not motivated by aspect, but by the principles outlined in the main text. Different is
the case of Neferti 2q, where aspect could have been a factor in the selection of the analytic
construction. This permits the expression of progressive aspect (the king will be continuously
writing while Neferti speaks his lament): wn.in{n}=f Hr irt m sS Ddt.n Xri-Hb nfrty ‘And he was
writing down what the lector priest Nefert said.’

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 128 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

their necklaces and sistra’; for Khnum, 10.21-22 wn.in Xnmw Hr swDA awt=f ‘Khnum
fortified his limbs’ (sim. 11.1-2). Rather, war.in, ia.in, and iwh.in are associated with
actions in the ritual, which they contribute to underscore within the overall composi-
tion. Their selection is therefore indexical. A similar effect is observed in Sinuhe B
269, introducing the cultic lyric performed by the royal children (B 269-279):254
ms.in=sn st n Hm=f ‘They presented them to His Majesty.’ In the parallel formulation,
Cheops’ Court for its part has the analytic construction (10.3, quoted above),
demonstrating how such selections are ultimately a composer’s choice: the composer
of Cheops’ Court chose to reserve the synthetic construction for the events in the
ritual itself.
In these selections of pwy demonstratives and synthetic -in-marked forms,
Cheops’ Court goes beyond the regular linguistic repertoires of Middle Egyptian
literature. This is not unparalleled. Reaching deeper yet, a similar phenomenon is
observed in Sinuhe, with different expressions according with the different contents
and semantics of this composition: in addition to B 269 ms.in=sn (above), compare
e.g. Dd.k(w) in B 45 and B 113 (§4.1.3.A), the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive
(passim in the first section: §4.1.3.B), or the pw demonstrative in B 237 fnd=k pw
Spss (§4.1.2.B).

2.4.4.7 Dialogues, characterization, humor

The linguistic register of Cheops’ Court also accommodates elements of language
aimed at a characterization of protagonists and at humor.255 While gauging the effects
these expressions may have had on ancient audiences often remains difficult, some
elements, possibly only the tip of the iceberg, seem fairly clear.
A. Dialogal exchanges are composed in ways to evoke the directness of spoken
interaction. Cases in point include:

(i) Cheops’ Court 9.8-9

mr=i is st nA Ddy=k pty sy tA rd-Ddt
‘I want it, what you say! Who is she, this Ruddjedet?’
Sim., in a question: 8.10-11 pty st Ddi tm rD mAn=i tw ‘What is it, Djedi, that you
don’t let me see you?’256
Constructions with subsequent cataphoric explicitation of a pronoun recur in
dialogues in Coffin Texts. Both in these and in Cheops’ Court, they alternate with
non-cataphoric ones.257 In extraposing a constituent from the clause, cataphoric

254 On this lyric and its intertext, Morenz 1997; Parkinson 2009: 177 and n.5.
255 For a proposal of a ‘socio-linguistic’ analysis, Lepper 2008: 273-85. I disagree with the criteria
(expressions in text) on which this is based.
256 Vernus 2006: 162, ex.76, observing that the cataphoric construction may also be due to the inter-
vening vocative.
257 In Cheops’ Court, 11.10-11, contrasting with 8.10-11 (Vernus 2006: 162, ex.75); also 9.13 and
11.6. In Coffin Texts, Vernus 2006: 162-3.

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 129

constructions make that clause much shorter and evoke the vividness of speech.258
A similar effect is found in Kamose Inscriptions (§1.3.3.2, (viii)-(ix)).259

(ii) Cheops’ Court 9.14

kA sA=k kA sA=f kA wa im=s
‘Then your son, then his son, then one of her.’
The segments introduced by kA are very short, as in letters: P. UC 32200, 20-21
(i)n iw.tw r gmt=i kA nfr ‘If I am going to be found, then good!’ Unlike the latter,
which can still be analyzed syntactically as a full clause (subjectless: kA ø nfr
‘then it is good’), the segments introduced by kA in Cheops’ Court 9.14 consist in
a single noun phrase: they lack any predicative relation other than the one
semantically implied. In addition, the condition against which the kA-headed
segments in 9.14 are uttered is itself left implicit.
Perhaps significant as well is the observation that in literary texts securely
dated to the Middle Kingdom, kA-headed constructions recur only in Kagemni
1.10, and perhaps in Sasobek B2.7 (§2.8.3.2). Both these compositions have
already been evoked above in relation to register (§2.4.4.3; §2.4.4.4, (iv)).

(iii) Cheops’ Court 7.8-9

Ds=k irf Hr-Dd=f sA=i int=k n=i sw
‘Yourself then, Hordjedef my son, you shall bring him to me!’
Initial Ds=k is apparently unparalleled in the Middle Egyptian written record.260
The construction could be interpreted as serving to characterize the king’s
recurrent impatience, here upon being told of Djedi’s remarkable feats.

Characteristic of direct speech is further an instance of tiw ‘yes’ (8.14). The

expression recurs in a saying in Amenemhat 14b and Ipuwer 6.14 (§6.1.2.B). In the
final part, nfr pw N (11.23) is set in the mouth of a maidservant (wbAt) in a dialogue
with Ruddjedet. As noted, the expression probably indexes a less formal register
(§2.4.4.1.C). Also in a dialogue with Ruddjedet, her brother uses xn as—or as if?—a
particle: 12.24 Hnwt=i xn s(i) iy.ti (...) ‘My lady, ...?, she has come (...)’. While the
expression is possibly related to xn ‘utterance’, a usage as in Cheops’ Court is as it
seems unparalleled: some effect is intended, the nature of which, however, remains
difficult to interpret.

258 Similarly Vernus 2006: 163.

259 Further examples and discussion, Vernus 2006: 173.
260 Gilula 1991.

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 130 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

B. Further elements contribute to a characterization of participants and lend them-

selves to an interpretation as tokens of verbal humor:

(iv) Cheops’ Court 7.2-4

iw=f Hr wnm tA 500 rmn n iwA m iwf
Hna swr Hnqt ds 100 r-mn-m hrw pn
‘He has been eating 500 loaves of bread, a shoulder of an ox for meat,
and also, drinking 100 jars of beer up to the present day.’
Hordjedef speaks to the king, telling of Djedi’s gargantuesque appetite. The use
of Hna sDm in continuation to an infinitive is significant in terms of register: the
construction is occasionally paralleled in Middle Kingdom documentary texts,
later also in Eighteenth Dynasty royal inscriptions,261 not, however, otherwise in
Middle Egyptian literature. The particular construction as in Cheops’ Court, with
Hna sDm introducing a second event in continuation to a NP Hr sDm construction,
is unparalleled altogether.

(v) Cheops’ Court 8.11-12

nisw pw iy i (i)ty a.w.s.
nis r=i mk wi iy.kw
‘The one come is one summoned, oh Sovereign L.P.H.
There has been summoning to me, and see, here I am.’
Djedi’s previous salutation, to Hordjedef, had been formal (7.23-8.21), in keeping
with general patterns of such (compare Hordjedef’s greeting Djedi: 7.17-20).
Djedi’s salutation to the king here raises formality to yet higher levels. A contrast
is intended with the preceding casual, perhaps even abrupt, questioning by the
king: 8.10-11 pty st Ddi tm rD mAn=i tw ‘What is it, Djedi, that you don’t let me
see you?’ In his response (in the main text), Djedi uses a passive twice in
reference to himself, the implied agent being the king. In ways similar to other
honorific constructions in other languages, the high-status participant is here
demoted to index such high status of his.262 What is more, the first of these
honorific passives is in a classifying pattern (nisw pw iy), which by its semantics
induces additional distancing. The result is a formulation of such high-flown
diction that it may easily be interpreted as reversing itself into irony.263
In stark contrast to Djedi’s baroque mode of salutation, the king’s response
uses very simple language: 8.12-13 Dd.in Hm=f in-iw mAat pw pA Dd (...) ‘His
Majesty said: “Is it true, the word (...)”.’ This finds its closest parallel in a
composition also associated with the ‘low tradition’ and in which parody plays a

261 Kroeber 1970: 155-6.

262 Honorific passives are not uncommon in second millennium Egypt. For another instance in
Cheops’ Court, 9.13-14 pty irf pA ib i (i)ty a.w.s. nb=i in ir.tw Hr pA Xrdw 3 Dd.n=i ‘What then is
this mood, oh Sovereign L.P.H. my Lord? Is it being done on account of the three children I spoke
about?’.
263 Similarly Parkinson (1997a: 123, n.36): ‘Djedi’s answer is respectful, but almost impertinently
polite (...) It is already clear that the king will not get what he wants, but that the commoner will
get the better of him.’

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 131

major role, Neferkare and Sisene: P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+4 (...) Hr Dd ir is nt{y}-

pw mAa pw pA Dd (...) ‘(...) saying that since it was so, the saying was true (...)’.
C. Cheops’ Court variously alludes to esoteric knowledge, in ways that are subverted
by humor.264 An instance where the phenomenon extends to language is in the
following famous passage:
(vi) Cheops’ Court 8.21-22
wn.in pA smn aHa Hr HbAbA DADA=f m mitt
xr m-xt spr=f wa r wa aHa.n pA smn aHa Hr gAgA
‘And the goose stood up and begun to waddle, its head likewise.
Now, when the one part had reached the other, the goose was standing,
gaggling.’
A ‘gaggling’ ‘goose’ probably alludes to a motif otherwise known in Coffin Texts
(and later, inheriting from this tradition, in Book of the Dead).265 The scene to
which the motif is adapted in Cheops’ Court conveys a strong sense of parody in
itself. This is here augmented by various verbal effects. Twice in close
succession, the composer selects DADA (8.19; 8.21), significantly in variation to tp
with the same referent just ahead (8.18)—a selection strongly marked for register
(§2.4.4.4, (v)). The combination of the auxiliary aHa.n with the full lexical verb aHa
(aHa.n pA smn aHa (...)) may be unique.266 At the level of sound patterns, DADA,
HbAbA, and gAgA come in close succession267—the last an expression onomato-
poetic in origin.268

2.4.4.8 Summary
Linguistic register in Cheops’ Court is complex. The composition accommodates
fronted temporal expressions like e.g. Tale of Hay and P. Lythgoe (§2.4.4.4) or
(sequences of) verbal constructions similar to ones in the dialogues of Eloquent
Peasant and the framing epilogue of Kagemni (§2.4.4.3). According with these
selections, it also accommodates pA’s (§2.4.4.2). Yet, the language of Cheops’ Court
is on most accounts substantially the same Middle Egyptian as in e.g. Sinuhe
(§2.4.4.5). Linguistic inclusiveness extends to elements of a heightened register
associated with ritual (§2.4.4.6) or to expressions that must have conveyed some sense
of humor or parody (§2.4.4.7). As in its semantics and form,269 the apparent simplicity
of the composition is deceiving.
The language of Cheops’ Court has been described as ‘Late Middle Egyptian’.
Accordingly, the position of the composition in the relative chronology of develop-

264 Parkinson 2002: 182-92 (with a comparison with Shipwrecked Sailor); Burkard & Thissen 20124:
207-8; Morenz 1996: 108-9, all with references to previous studies.
265 References in Stauder in press e: §1.8.A, §1.9.
266 Linguistically, this is a textbook example of grammaticalization (presented as such by Vernus
1997: 12), with the semantically bleached and syntactically recategorialized auxiliary aHa.n
occurring side by side with the full lexical verb from which it historically derived.
267 Similarly Lepper 2008: 185.
268 Stauder in press e: §1.8.A.
269 Parkinson 2002: 182-92; Morenz 1996: 107. On rhetorical tropes, Lepper 2008: 152-219.

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 132 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

ment of Middle Egyptian has been suggested to be relatively late. Yet, Cheops’ Court
turns out to be linguistically closer to e.g. Sinuhe than are many texts generally
described as composed in ‘(classical) Middle Egyptian’, discussed in subsequent
chapters of the present study. Cheops’ Court is almost undatable linguistically: only
the functions of pA support a sound terminus ante quem non (§2.4.4.1). If the register
of the composition had not been of a sort to accommodate pA’s, not even this terminus
could have been defined. As linguistic register is ultimately determined by literary
register, it is therefore a literary aspect of Cheops’ Court that provides the condi-
tioning possibility for a linguistic dating. Further linguistic elements that have played
a role in proposals that Cheops’ Court should be viewed as later than other presently
undated compositions in the Middle Egyptian literary corpus are yet more directly to
do with register, and therefore ultimately with literary typology. One may of course
suggest that an overall literary register such as in Cheops’ Court, including some of
the associated linguistic selections, could be viewed as indicative of a later dating,
close in time to the sole manuscript of the composition. Nothing would speak against
such hypothesis, yet this would remain an hypothesis only at this stage. Literary
typology projects over time, but only to some extent; how it does more precisely is
one of the very research questions asked in the present study.
The language of Cheops’ Court is not ‘Late Middle Egyptian’. As already noted,
‘Late Middle Egyptian’ is not a stage in linguistic history, but a collection of
expressions to do with register (§1, introduction; §1.4.A). Cheops’ Court accom-
modates some of these, yet only as one component within the overall register of the
composition. As in its literary typology, Cheops’ Court includes linguistic elements
that associate it with what has been termed a ‘low tradition’ of Middle Egyptian
narrative literature. The linguistic correlates of such ‘low tradition’ lie on the level of
individual expressions: most of these are not recent in themselves, but they are
associated with literary register in recurrent ways so that they can function as markers,
or indices, of such. As Cheops’ Court (and beyond, e.g. Eloquent Peasant and
Kagemni) demonstrate, the relationship between the ‘high’ and the ‘low’ tradition is
fluid. There are no two distinct linguistic registers of ‘Middle Egyptian’ in literature,
only elements of a differentiation, modulated differently in individual compositions.

2.4.5 Play with language

Composers of literary works not only draw on the thickness of the language of their
times (§2.4.3-4), they can also on occasions go further, twisting the linguistic
resources given to them to fit their semantic and expressive needs.
A. Lexical expressions can be invested with meanings extended from regular ones
(e.g. xwsi in Neferti 3f: §5.8.1.4, (iii)). How this can be relevant for discussions on
dating is illustrated by e.g. qnqnw ‘beatings’ in Kheti 2.1 (§6.2.2.6.3, (i)). Composers
can also create unique expressions, to evoke an image that suits the semantics of a
particular composition (i), or through play with linguistic form (ii). By definition,
such expressions can not be anchored to the external record. Their study is, however,

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 2.4 Language in Middle Egyptian literature 133

relevant to aspects of the literary interpretation of the compositions in which they

occur.

(i) Sinuhe B 73, B 292 nmiw-Sa ‘Sand-farer’ (also R 43, as an interpolation)

The expression is unique to Sinuhe, except for one instance in a much later inscription
of Amenhotep son of Hapu (Urk. IV 1821, 12), in allusion to Sinuhe, then in
Osorkon II’s Festival Hall in Bubastis.270 The compound nmiw-Sa encapsulates one
major semantic theme in the composition, Sinuhe’s becoming an Asiatic, then
throwing this identity away as far as this is still possible. With regard to the very
expression discussed, this is formulated explicitly in the closing section of Sinuhe,
where Sinuhe ‘gives the sand back to the ones who fare it ({imiw}<nmiw>271=f ).’272
Nmiw-Sa was salient to ancient readers, as is demonstrated by its occurrence in the
interpolation in R 43, which can be interpreted as a trace of such readers’ engagement
with the text. Serious consideration must therefore be given to the possibility that
nmiw-Sa could have been an ad hoc creation by the composer of Sinuhe, taken up on a
few subsequent occasions, in Amenhotep son of Hapu’s inscription still as a
conscious reference to the literary work,273 in Osorkon II’s inscription perhaps less
consciously so. Nmiw-Sa is similar in form to expressions such as Hrw-Sa (e.g. Weni 23
(Urk. I 103, 8; 103, 10)), on which it could have been modeled.

(ii) Khakheperreseneb ro 2
(...) xnw xmmy
Tsw xppy
mdt mAt tmt swA Swt m wHmmyt (...)
‘(...) unknown utterances,
extraordinary verses,
new words which have passed, free from repetition (...)’
Repetition, and the desire to escape it, are here famously addressed. #ppy
‘extraordinary’ is a rare word—one that was itself quite out of the ordinary. The word
recurs once only,274 in a place of wonders, Thutmosis III’s Jardin Botanique: Urk. IV
775, 15 smw nb xpp (...) ‘All extraordinary plants (...)’.275 In Jardin Botanique, a
sense of wonder is also otherwise linguistically conveyed, by the very much out of the
ordinary construction sw Hm=f Dd=f ‘His Majesty says’ (Urk. IV 776, 5: §4.7.3, (v)).
In Khakheperreseneb, the selection of xppy reflexively points to the statement being
made—a rare illustration of the Jakobsonian ‘poetic function’ of language in Middle
Egyptian literature.

270 DZA 25.119.280.

271 Emendation after Feder, TLA.
272 More fully: B 291-294 iw rD sbt n xAst Hbsw n nmiw-Sa sd.kw m pAqt gs.kw m tpt sDr.kw Hr Hnkyt
D.n=i Sa n {imiw}<nmiw>=f (...) ‘The load was given back to the foreign land, clothes to the sand-
farers; I was clad in fine linen, I was anointed with fine oil, I slept on a bed, and I gave the sand
back to the ones who fare it (...)’.
273 Discussed by Parkinson 2009: 52 and n.13.
274 Vernus 1995a: 8, n.c; Gardiner 1909: 97-8.
275 Beaux 1990: 42-3.

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 134 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

In the same sequence, wHmmyt ‘repetition’ is unique.276 It may or may not echo
wHmyt ‘continued howling(?)’,277 itself as it seems unique to Shipwrecked Sailor (35;
104). While the latter, wHmyt, is, as far as written form permits to judge, based on a
regular morphological type, Khakheperreseneb’s wHmmyt has a partly reduplicated
form, a very rare pattern in nominal derivation. Reduplication is generally an
expressive device in Khakheperreseneb.278 As regards morphological reduplication
specifically, Khakheperreseneb includes four instances of the otherwise fairly
uncommon reduplicated formation of the passive participle of 2rad (§2.7.2.1, (ii)):
measured against the brevity of the composition, this is a higher concentration than in
any other Middle Egyptian literary text. Two of these are in a passage that also speaks
of repetition, ro 3 (...) Hr-ntt rf wHmw Dddt iw Dddt Dd ‘(...) for what has been said can
only be repeated: what has been said is said.’ Another one is xmmy ‘unknown’, in the
very sequence here discussed. In this, it resonates with two other reduplicated
expressions, wHmmyt, and xppy. The salient and highly iconic form of all these
expressions279 reflexively points to the object concerned by Khakheperreseneb,
‘repetition’. In the present sequence, the first expression is regular if uncommon
(xmmy, a perfective passive participle of a 2rad), the next one very recherché and
otherwise associated with wonders (xppy, above), and wHmmyt unique, possibly even
a creation by the composer.

B. As only to be expected, instances of extended meaning or outright creation are

mostly to be found on the lexical level, which is by nature more plastic in this respect.
In grammar, a case of a combination of two constructions that are otherwise seman-
tically exclusive of each other can be identified in Neferkare and Sisene (§4.4.2).
Sinuhe uses various expressions beyond what is otherwise regular in Middle Egyptian
grammar, in a complex play with the indexical overtones of these expressions
(§4.1.3.A-B).

2.5 Interim summary: Horizons of expectation

Prospects for a linguistic dating vary considerably depending on the nature of the texts
to be dated and the period in the written history of Egyptian that is relevant for dating.
In the case of Middle Egyptian literary texts, relevant contextual dimensions include
the shortness of the time period considered for dating, roughly half a millennium

276 For an analysis of how wHmmyt resonates semantically with other expressions in
Khakheperreseneb, Moers 2002: 298-9.
277 FCD 67.
278 E.g., in a passage modulating the same theme further, ro 5 n Dd Dd Dd Dd.t=fy (...) ‘The one who
spoke has not spoken in order that the one who will speak now speaks (...)’.
279 While linguistic form is arbitrary, reduplication is distinguished by its strong propensity to
correlate with a cross-linguistically recurrent set of meanings, such as intensity, plurality,
imperfective aspect, more generally ‘increased quantity’ (e.g. Moravcsik 1978: 317; Mayerthaler
1981: 115). This recurrent relation is iconic and relates to the perceptual salience of reduplication,
which is much higher than with other types of linguistic form (e.g. Kouwenberg 1997: 39;
Jakobson & Waugh 20023: 198-200).

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 2.5 Interim summary: Horizons of expectation 135

(from ca. 1950 to 1450 BCE); the low density of the record in general, making the
primary description of linguistic change more difficult; and the substantial linguistic
continuity in relevant written registers during the period concerned. Relevant
dimensions to do with the nature of the objects to be dated include issues of trans-
mission in a manuscript culture; the configuration of language in literature and
associated issues of register; the conciseness of most texts; and the densely inter-
textual nature of Middle Egyptian literature in general. In addition, morphological
change is almost entirely trapped in a dead angle, so that primary arguments for dating
must rely on grammar. Except in favorable cases, possible lexical indications have
only a complementary status in the argument.
In approaching individual Middle Egyptian compositions for a linguistic dating,
horizons of expectation must be set accordingly. That Middle Egyptian compositions
of as yet insecure dating resemble other Middle Egyptian compositions documented in
Twelfth Dynasty manuscripts by ‘language and style’ is not an argument for an early
dating of the former. If the texts had been composed later, linguistic differences would
not be readily apparent. As regards ‘style’ as a criterion for age, the notion is difficult
when applied to Middle Egyptian literature, as it presupposes style-historical suc-
cession. In all cases therefore, a direct examination of individual texts is required. As
already suggested in the present chapter, a view on the more subtle dimensions of
linguistic function can often be of value. More generally, possible indications or
arguments for dating will lie in details, not numerous but possibly converging, rather
than in an immediately apparent late or early linguistic typology of a given compo-
sition.
The remainder of the present chapter consists in three additional case studies that
flesh out some of the issues addressed so far in more general terms. The first discusses
the one major dating criterion of broader application that has been proposed so far,
Vernus’ aspectual criterion. This demonstrates how working out a criterion requires
taking into detailed account the particular semantics, temporality, and expression in
individual texts. It is also illustrative of the uneasy, yet largely structural, imbalance
between possible ante quem non and possible post quem non criteria. The second and
third case studies are on two compositions, Khakheperreseneb and Merikare, for
which a linguistic examination fails to provide a dating as precise, or as secure,
respectively, as one may wish for. For Khakheperreseneb, this may have to do with
the contents of the composition, which in a common interpretation makes Middle
Egyptian literary tradition its object: this is reflected in much language shared with
other literary texts; the conciseness of the composition is another limitative factor for
dating. Merikare, for its part, is a teaching, the least linguistically distinctive among
types of Middle Egyptian literary discourses. Indications for dating are found, but no
expressions that would support a full-fledged linguistic argument.

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 136 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual

criteria

While a few isolated notes have been made on individual compositions,280 the
linguistic dating of Middle Egyptian literary texts has by and large relied on one
single criterion of broader application, proposed by Vernus some two decades ago.281
The criterion targets a change in a domain of meaning that is very common in
language (compare condition (b) in §2.1.3.E): it would therefore apply to a large
variety of Middle Egyptian literary texts even when these are concise and regardless
of their subject matter or contents. Accordingly, the criterion has often been referred
to subsequently, acquiring classical status.282 In the present section, I critically discuss
the validity of the criterion, as well as its applicability to individual texts. This pro-
vides a practical illustration of how a dating criterion can be devised, of what
difficulties are encountered in so doing, and of how applying a criterion once this has
been devised may require analyzing not only individual clauses but elements of the
broader linguistic typology—in the present case, temporality—of a text to be dated.

2.6.1 Introduction

Vernus’ criterion is based on a change in the expression of aspect whose very first
traces are detected in the record of the late Twelfth Dynasty. For the purpose of the
discussion to follow, a short reminder of how the criterion was originally formulated
by the author is given.

2.6.1.1 Background: A change in the expression of aspect

In Middle Egyptian, mainly two formal categories are involved in the expression of
relative present tense (/‘inaccompli’, ‘unaccomplished’): NP Hr sDm and N(P) sDm=f.
Vernus’ criterion targets a change in the functional distribution of these two formal
categories during Middle Egyptian.
In earlier Middle Egyptian, NP Hr sDm is used with events that are viewed in their
extension over a typically bounded stretch of time (in Vernus’ original formulation:
‘inaccompli extensif’). The construction thereby expresses progressive aspect. In a
language such as English, where progressive aspect is fully grammaticalized as it is in
earlier Middle Egyptian, NP Hr sDm thus roughly corresponds to continuous tenses: he
is listening (or, as a relative present tense in the past, he was listening).
N(P) sDm=f, by contrast, is unmarked for such ‘extensive’ or progressive
semantics (in Vernus’ original formulation: ‘inaccompli non-extensif’). The event is
not viewed under any specific perspective. N(P) sDm=f thus roughly corresponds to
English simple tenses: he listens. In text, N(P) sDm=f is most commonly used with

280 See n.1 in the introduction to the present study.

281 Vernus 1990a: 185-90; 1990b.
282 E.g. Lorand 2011: 13, n.17 and Parkinson 2002: 316-7 (Amenemhat); Enmarch 2008: 21 and
Parkinson 2002: 308 (Ipuwer); Parkinson 2002: 304 (Khakheperreseneb); 317 (Kheti); Verhoeven
2009: 97, n.72 and Parkinson 2002: 318 (Loyaliste); Parkinson 2002: 319 (Merikare); 319 (A Man
to His Son).

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 2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria 137

general or habitual events: this is because the language has a dedicated progressive
construction, the afore mentioned NP Hr sDm, which is generally selected for events
that are neither general nor habitual.283
Beginning in the late Middle Kingdom, NP Hr sDm is observed spreading beyond
its originally restricted domain of use. By a cross-linguistically well documented pro-
cess of extension and semantic generalization, the construction is gradually extended
to general and habitual events, which had previously been the exclusive domain of
N(P) sDm=f. Ultimately, NP Hr sDm would supersede N(P) sDm=f altogether as the
sole expression of relative present tense, resulting in a full neutralization of the
original aspectual contrast. The change is completed in early Late Egyptian:

Expression of relative present tense (‘inaccompli’) in Middle Egyptian

unmarked (he listens) progressive (he is listening)

(I) earlier MEg.: N(P) sDm=f NP Hr sDm
(II) later MEg.: N(P) sDm=f/NP Hr sDm NP Hr sDm
(III) early LEg.:  NP Hr sDm 

2.6.1.2 The double criterion as originally formulated

Vernus’ aspectual criterion concerns the contrast between stage I to stage II. The
earliest dated occurrence of an innovative use of NP Hr sDm beyond the progressive
semantics to which the construction was originally restricted is from the beginning of
the late Twelfth Dynasty:284 iw bAk im Hr hAb Hr=s spw aSAw ‘This servant writes very
often about this’ (P. Berlin 10056 ro 4; temp. Amenemhat III, year 10). An habitual
reading of NP Hr sDm is here implied by the quantified temporal expression (spw
aSAw). The earliest use of NP Hr sDm in a performative statement, also implying
ongoing change, is from the very same period (Amenemhat III, year 39).285 The
earliest occurrences of NP Hr sDm in personal names point to the same period.286 In
similar registers, early Twelfth Dynasty texts (Heqanakht, Reisner papyri, Hapidjefai
contracts) display no sign of any innovation having begun.287
In literary registers, NP Hr sDm is used with general/habitual events for example in
Khakheperreseneb,288 Fishing and Fowling,289 and Ipuwer.290 Taking only the most
immediately obvious elements, the first of these texts has a terminus ante quem non to

283 Compare the more detailed presentation in Vernus 1990a: 163-91; Winand 2006: 263-312 (with a
focus on the interaction between the two constructions and the Aktionsart of events).
284 Vernus 1990a: 186, ex.398; 1990b: 1038, ex.1.
285 Vernus 1990a: 186, ex.400, with the observation that in a performative statement the event is
viewed as punctual and thereby not in its extension.
286 Vernus 1990a: 187, n.87, and ex.403. In personal names, an event can hardly be presented as
‘extensive’ or progressive. The earliest instance of a personal name with NP Hr sDm is perhaps
slightly earlier than the two occurrences in continuous text mentioned above, but not by much.
287 Vernus 1990a: 185.
288 Vernus 1990a: 188, ex.405; see below, §2.6.2.5, (ii).
289 Vernus 1990a: 186, ex.398; see below, §2.6.2.6, (i).
290 Vernus 1990a: 188-90; see below, §2.6.2.4.

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 138 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

the reign of (Khakheperre) Senwosret II;291 the second may be no earlier than the late
Middle Kingdom as it ‘reflects the increasing interest in the Fayum from the second
half of Dynasty XII onward’;292 and the third can not be earlier than the late Middle
Kingdom based on institutional evidence.293 In Vernus’ interpretation, an incipient
stage of the change, transitional between stage I and stage II, is to be detected in
Eloquent Peasant.294 This would imply that the innovative uses of NP Hr sDm here
concerned begun spreading to literary registers by the mid-Twelfth Dynasty precisely,
then generalizing in the following decades or generations.
Based on the above elements for a temporal anchoring of the earliest textual
manifestations of stage II, Vernus proposed that compositions that have NP Hr sDm
with general/habitual events (stage II) receive a terminus ante quem non by the mid-
/late Twelfth Dynasty. More precisely, according to Vernus, a text that has innovative
uses of NP Hr sDm with transitive events may date as early as that period, while a text
that has innovative uses of NP Hr sDm with all types of events, transitive and
intransitive ones alike, would get a slightly later terminus ante quem non, to the early
Thirteenth Dynasty,295 or very late Twelfth at best.296 Complementarily, Vernus
derived a post quem non criterion based on the same change. Texts in which
general/habitual events are still the exclusive domain of N(P) sDm=f (stage I) could,
according to the author, not have been composed later than the early/mid-Twelfth
Dynasty.
In its original formulation, Vernus’ two-way aspectual criterion would apply to a
great many Middle Egyptian literary texts, yielding the following upper and lower
bounds for linguistic dating:

Vernus’ aspectual criterion, as formulated and applied by the author

(a) Texts with uses of NP Hr sDm with habitual/general events: the ante quem
non criterion:
- Incipient: Eloquent Peasant
– mid-Twelfth Dynasty;
- With transitive events: A Man to His Son,297 Fishing and Fowling
– ante quem non to the later Twelfth Dynasty;
- Regularly with all types of events: Ipuwer, Khakheperreseneb, Neferkare
and Sisene298
– ante quem non to the Thirteenth Dynasty, or very late Twelfth.

291 For ‘Khakheperre-’ defining a terminus ante quem non only, Vernus 1995a: 2-3; for the dating of
Khakheperreseneb, below, §2.7.
292 Thus, Vernus 1990a: 186; for the dating of Fishing and Fowling, below, §3.2.
293 Vernus 1990a: 190, n.94, with reference to Quirke 1988; for the dating of Ipuwer, below, §6.2.2.5.
294 Dedicated study: Vernus 1990b. See below, §2.6.2.2-3.
295 Vernus 1990a: 188, #5: ‘In a further stage, which may be located during Dynasty XIII and the
onset of the Second Intermediate Period (...)’; sim. in the table on 191.
296 Vernus 1995a: 3 (discussing the date of Khakheperreseneb). On transitivity as a parameter in the
change, below, §2.6.2.1.
297 Vernus 1990a: 186-7, ex.401; see below, §2.6.2.6, (ii).
298 The last not mentioned by Vernus 1990a and 1990b; see below, §2.6.2.6, (iii).

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 2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria 139

(b) Texts in which general/habitual events are still the exclusive domain of
N(P) sDm=f: the post quem non criterion:
Ptahhotep, Kagemni, Sinuhe, Shipwrecked Sailor, Hirtengeschichte,
Debate of a Man and His Soul, Merikare, Neferti, Hymn to Hapi, Kheti,
Loyaliste, Heavenly Cow299
– post quem non to the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty.

(c) Texts in which the relevant domain of meaning is not featured:

Amenemhat,300 Cheops’ Court301
– the criterion does not apply.
At first, the above tableau seems compelling, also because several compositions it
associated with stage I are documented in Twelfth Dynasty manuscripts (e.g. Ptah-
hotep: (b)). For dating the compositions also associated with stage I but not
documented in Twelfth Dynasty (e.g. Neferti), the criterion would then be extremely
powerful. If it were correct, one could in fact dispense with a further examination of
the linguistic typology of these compositions. Yet, as to be seen, both parts of the
double criterion are in need of a revision. I first discuss the ante quem non criterion
(§2.6.2), then turn to the post quem non criterion which raises different issues
(§2.6.3).

2.6.2 The ante quem non criterion

In the elaboration of the ante quem non criterion, Eloquent Peasant played a central
role. It was based on this text that issues of transitivity were proposed to have been a
parameter in the change. It was also based on this text that a temporal anchoring of the
earliest stage of the change, even prior to its first attestation in documentary texts, was
defined. I accordingly begin the present discussion with Eloquent Peasant (§2.6.2.1-
3), then turn to other compositions (§2.6.2.4-6).

2.6.2.1 Issues of transitivity?

Vernus suggested that in an early stage of the change, ‘it (scil. innovative uses of NP
Hr sDm beyond progressive events) obtained only with transitive verbs, while
intransitive verbs resisted this evolution.’302 The analysis was based on the following
passage of Eloquent Peasant:303

299 Vernus 1990a: 185; 1990b: 1037.

300 Pace Vernus 1990a: 185; see below, §6.1.3.1, introduction.
301 In particular, Cheops’ Court 7.2-4 is uncriterial (similarly Vernus 1990a: 167, ex.344, whose
analysis is repeated here): iw=f Hr wnm tA 500 rmn n iwA m iwf Hna swr Hnqt ds 100 r-mn-m hrw pn
‘He has been eating 500 loaves of bread, a shoulder of an ox for meat, and also, drinking 100 jars
of beer up to the present day.’ NP Hr sDm is used for describing a habit of Djedi’s, but the event is
temporally bounded by the expression r-mn-m hrw pn, and thereby viewed in its extension.
302 Vernus 1990a: 188; sim. 1990b: 1046.
303 Vernus 1990a: 188, ex.404; Vernus 1990b: 1043, ex.8.

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 140 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

Eloquent Peasant B1 179-181

in iw iwsw nnm=f
in iw mxAt Hr rDt Hr gs
in iw rf DHwti sfn=f ix{r} ir=k iyt
‘Do the scales wander?
Is the balance partial?
And is then Toth lenient? If so, then you can do evil!’304

The first and third clauses have N(P) sDm=f while the second has NP Hr sDm. The
three clauses are in parallel to each other and all are analyzed by Vernus as having
general aspect. The second clause would then document the innovative use of NP Hr
sDm, extended beyond the progressive semantics to which the construction was
initially restricted. The passage would further demonstrate how this extension affected
transitive events first (rDi ‘give’ in the second clause) while intransitive verbs
‘resisted’ it (nnm ‘err’ and sfn ‘lenient’ in the first and third clauses).
This analysis is made under the assumption that clauses in parallel to each other
should have a similar aspectual profile. As to be discussed below, the underlying
methodological principle is questionable, in general and in the present case (§2.6.2.2-
3). Keeping provisionally to issues of transitivity itself, the following observations can
be made. Under the same assumption of parallelism, a series of NP Hr sDm
constructions in Eloquent Peasant B1 128-134 (below, §2.6.2.2, (i)) are analyzed by
Vernus as habitual events because they stand in parallel with an initial N(P) sDm=f.305
Among the events in B1 128-134 is rD TAw Hr gAt Hr tA (B1 131); gAw ‘to lack’,
however, is an in-transitive. In B1 179-181 quoted above itself, rDi Hr gs can hardly
be described as transitive. While rDi is transitive in many of its uses, it is not when
part of the idiom rDi Hr gs ‘lean on the side’.306
RDi Hr gs recurs in B1 129, also in the NP Hr sDm construction, here as well with
habitual/general aspect according to Vernus. In a subsequent passage (B1 135-136;
below, §2.6.2.2, (ii)), also consisting in habitual/general events according to Vernus’
analysis,307 siAt is found in the NP Hr sDm. This verb, morphologically a causative, can
be used transitively (‘encroach upon’), but also intransitively (‘cheat’), as is indeed
the case here. In short, intransitives and transitives do not behave any differently in
Eloquent Peasant with respect to their distribution over the constructions NP Hr sDm
and N(P) sDm=f.
Transitivity is therefore not a parameter in the change under consideration and the
ante quem non criterion must be recast in ways that do not make reference to
transitivity. Before doing so, however, alternations between N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr
sDm as in B1 179-181 quoted above must be accounted for, in some other way. This
implies reexamining all occurrences of NP Hr sDm that according to Vernus’ original
analysis would be witness to incipient change in Eloquent Peasant.

304 Transl. Parkinson 2012a: 153.

305 Vernus 1990b: 1044-5, ex.10.
306 On this idiom more generally, Parkinson 2012a: 107-8; Fischer-Elfert 1999: 168.
307 Vernus 1990b: 1045-6, ex.11.

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 2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria 141

2.6.2.2 Eloquent Peasant B1 128-134 and B1 135-138

Uses of NP Hr sDm in Eloquent Peasant that in Vernus’ analysis are described as
innovative are from four passages. The following two, already grouped by Vernus,
must be discussed together. The other two raise different issues and are discussed in
turn (§2.6.2.3).
(i) Eloquent Peasant B1 128-134
mk mAat {t}w<t>x=s Xr=k nS.t(i) m st=s
srw Hr irt iyt
tp-Hsb n mdt Hr rDt Hr gs
sDmyw Hr xnp it=f
siAti pw n mdt m aqA=s Hr irt r=f nwdw im=s
rD TAw Hr gAt Hr tA
srfw Hr rDt nSp.tw
psSw m awnw
dr sAir {r} m wD irt=f
dmi m wDnw=f
xsfw iw Hr irt iyt
‘Look, Truth flees from under you, exiled from its palace;
the officials are doing evil;
the standard of speech is being partial,
and the judges are snatching what it takes—
this means that he who twists speech from its rightness is making things go
wrong to it thereby;
the breath-giver is now at a loss on the ground;
he who breathes calmly is making people pant;
the approportioner is a grasper,
the dispeller of need is the commander of its making,
and the harbor is its own flood;
the punisher of wrong is doing evil.’308

(ii) Eloquent Peasant B1 135-138

Dd.in sxty pn
xAw n aHaw Hr siAt n=f
mH n ky Hr hqs hAw=f
sSm r hpw Hr wD awAt
(i)n-m irf xsf=f bw Hwrw
dr nw Hr irt nwdw (...)
‘And this peasant said:

308 Transl. Parkinson 2012a: 106-12.

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 142 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

“The measure of heaps now defrauds for himself;

the filler for another now despoils his surroundings;
he who leads lawfully now commands theft—
who then will beat off wretchedness?
when the dispeller of infirmity is going wrong; (...)” ’309

In Vernus’ argument, the interpretation of (ii)310 is dependent on the one of (i);311

I thus begin with (i). Based on the parallel with the opening N(P) sDm=f (mk mAat
wtx=s), the following sequence of NP Hr sDm constructions (srw Hr irt iyt, etc.) are
interpreted by Vernus as ‘actions vues commme de purs faits généraux (inaccompli
non extensif)’.312 The argument presupposes that the parallel use of different construc-
tions implies that these have a similar meaning—a tempting, yet questionable,
principle of method.313 N(P) sDm=f is the unmarked term in the opposition with NP Hr
sDm (‘unextensive’ vs. ‘extensive’): the opposition is privative, not equipollent.314 In
practice, N(P) sDm=f can also be used for an action that is in progress, rather than
habitual or general: the difference with NP Hr sDm lies in the fact that only the latter
construction expresses this linguistically, as a marked progressive aspect. In the
former construction, such interpretation is left to the reader/hearer.315 The parallelism
with mk mAat wtx=s does not, therefore, imply that the events expressed by the
following N Hr sDm must be viewed ‘comme de purs faits généraux’.
The passage under discussion is from a context that makes reference to the Sonst-
Jetzt type of articulation.316 The events are thereby set in relation to the present speech
situation, ‘with a strong sense of “here and now” ’.317 This was, in fact, noted by
Vernus himself as a possibility (‘des actions étroitement liées au moment de
l’énonciation’),318 yet dismissed in view of the parallel with the opening N(P) sDm=f
construction. As just seen, such argument does not hold. The NP Hr sDm constructions
in (i) express progressive aspect, with the ‘extension’ of the event-perspective being
defined in relation to the Sonst-Jetzt articulation of the passage. The correlation
between Sonst-Jetzt and progressive aspect is recurrent, e.g. Neferti 9f D=i n=k sA m
xrwy sn m xft s Hr smA it=f ‘I will show you the son an enemy, the brother an
opponent, a man killing his father.’ That the temporality in B1 128-134 implies
progressive, not general/habitual, aspect is also made clear by the nature of the non-
verbal constructions: the sequence has three A m B constructions (psSw m awnw, etc.),

309 Transl. Parkinson 2012a: 113-5, slightly adapted.

310 Vernus 1990b: 1045-6, ex.11.
311 Vernus 1990b: 1044-5, ex.10
312 Vernus 1990b: 1044-5.
313 E.g. Oréal 2011: 17, writing about her own topic of investigation (particles), but with general
relevance: ‘Il faut au moins souligner que la commutabilité apparente entre deux ou plusieurs
particules n’est nullement l’indication d’une signification commune.’
314 Similarly Vernus 1986.
315 For examples of N(P) sDm=f used with events that are not habitual or general, in contexts,
therefore, in which NP Hr sDm could have been used as well, below, §5.3.5.2.
316 Similarly Parkinson 2012a: 106; Vernus 1990b: 1044. On the Sonst-Jetzt articulation generally,
Schenkel 1984.
317 Parkinson 2012a: 107.
318 Vernus 1990a: 1044 and n.25.

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 2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria 143

not A pw B. The former also otherwise correlates with the Sonst-Jetzt articulation (e.g.
Neferti 9f, above), because it expresses a temporally contingent relationship between
A and B, in contrast with the generalizing semantics expressed by A pw B.
As regards the opening mAat wtx=s, this is the aspectually unmarked category. The
statement is related to the speaker’s here and now not through grammatical tense, but
through an indexation on the addressee’s sphere by the speech situation, by phatic mk,
and by the second person pronoun (Xr=k). The selection of N(P) sDm=f rather than
NP Hr sDm may have been motivated by the opening position of the clause in the
sequence, possibly also by its subject, mAat, which has general reference, particularly
in the context of the petitions of Eloquent Peasant.
In Eloquent Peasant B1 135-138 (ii), the articulation is similarly along the lines of
Sonst-Jetzt. The NP Hr sDm constructions then express progressive aspect here as well.
This is independently confirmed by the iw-less construction opening the discourse
(xAw n aHaw Hr siAt n=f ). The construction is thetic, presenting the event en bloc (§1.2,
(vi)); a thetic event naturally has a progressive interpretation (§2.3.3.B, fine).

2.6.2.3 Eloquent Peasant B1 257-262 and B1 179-181

Unlike B1 128-134 and B1 135-138 just discussed, the two other passages adduced by
Vernus in support of his analysis are not from Sonst-Jetzt contexts. In both of these,
NP Hr sDm constructions are used in parallel to N(P) sDm=f. As already discussed, this
is not in itself a sufficient argument to imply that NP Hr sDm can be associated with
general or habitual events (compare B1 128-134, where it is not: §2.6.2.2). Yet, some
positive account must be given for the alternation between the two constructions in
both these passages. As long as none is given, Vernus’ original interpretation that
these could here be expressing similar semantics, and thereby NP Hr sDm stand as a
token of an innovative usage, remains a valid option.
In one of the two passages,319 a series of NP Hr sDm constructions is followed by a
closing N(P) sDm=f:

(i) Eloquent Peasant B1 257-262

iw xwdw Hr [...]
[...]yw Hr smA iy
st rmw Hr xA{x}a wbbw
DAbHw r pAqrw
iw wHa xbA=f itrw
‘The netter is [...]ing the [...-fishes],
[the ...]er is killing the comer-fish,
the fish-spearer harpooning the ubebu-fish
and the trawler is after the paqeru-fishes.
The fisher ravages the river.’320

319 Vernus 1990b: 1043, ex.9.

320 Transl. Parkinson 2012a: 211-3.

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 144 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

Assuming that parallelism implies similar value, all events would be viewed under
general aspect. The formal contrast between the two constructions would then remain
entirely unaccounted for. This is obviously not a satisfying description.
Remarkable, on the other hand, are the different types of subjects with which the
NP Hr sDm constructions, respectively the closing N(P) sDm=f, are associated. In the
first four clauses, ‘the vocabulary is unusual and apparently very specific, perhaps
sometimes almost technical’321; in the fifth, by contrast, ‘wHa is a much more standard
general term for fishers than the previous terminology.’322 This principled correlation
is strongly indicative that the contrast between verbal constructions is here a contrast
of meaning, aspectually motivated in some way yet to be determined.
In Parkinson’s analysis, ‘the fivefold form alludes to the mock-titulary of B1 252-
255, which is here debased into a series of derogatory statements. (...) Rensi was once
a Nile-flood (B1 173), but he is now (emphasis AS) a petty destroyer of the river.’323
The ‘point de repère’ is thereby ‘le moment de l’énonciation’, like in two other
passages analyzed in these very terms by Vernus:324 B2 113-114 mk wi Hr spr n=k n
sDm.n=k st ‘Look I am pleading to you but you do not hear it’; B1 332 iw srw Hr rDt
n=k ‘Officials are giving to you.’ In B1 257-262 here under discussion similarly, the
three NP Hr sDm clauses have progressive aspect, while the final clause with N(P)
sDm=f and a referentially much more general subject (wHa) ‘prepares for the
generalized comparison which follows. xbA stresses the violent implications (empha-
sis AS) of the preceding verses (...)’.325 With differences in details, a similar correla-
tion was discussed in B1 128-134 (§2.6.2.6, (i)). In this passage, a N(P) sDm=f con-
struction with a referentially very general subject, mAat, opens a sequence of NP Hr
sDm constructions. In the present passage, B1 257-262, a N(P) sDm=f construction
with a referentially more general subject than in the preceding clauses, wHa, closes a
sequence of NP Hr sDm constructions.
The other passage not from a Sonst-Jetzt context on which Vernus based his
analysis is the following:326

(ii) Eloquent Peasant B1 179-181

in iw iwsw nnm=f
in iw mxAt Hr rDt Hr gs
in iw rf DHwti sfn=f ix{r} ir=k iyt
‘Do the scales wander?
Is the balance partial?
And is then Toth lenient? If so, then you can do evil!’327
For reasons exposed above (§2.6.2.1), the contrast between N(P) sDm=f in the first
and third clauses and NP Hr sDm in the second can not be accounted for in terms of

321 Parkinson 2012a: 211.

322 Parkinson 2012a: 213.
323 Parkinson 2012a: 211.
324 Vernus 1990b: 1041.
325 Parkinson 2012a: 214.
326 Vernus 1990b: 1043, ex.8; 1990a: 188, ex.404.
327 Transl. Parkinson 2012a: 153.

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 2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria 145

transitivity, as had originally been proposed by Vernus. If, based on parallelism, it is

assumed that NP Hr sDm here expresses general aspect, the formal alternation between
the verbal constructions in the three clauses remains unaccounted for.
The composition of this brief sequence is noteworthy. One level consists in a
dynamic progression a – a’ – b (iwsw; varied as mxAt; then heightened by a reference
to the divine, an intensification also marked formally by rf ). Superimposed on this is
a symmetrical arrangement of verbal constructions,  –  –  (N(P) sDm=f; NP Hr
sDm; N(P) sDm=f ). All three events could be read with general aspect as in Vernus’
reading; the formal variation would then be just that, a formal effect. They need not,
however: the second clause could be more closely indexed on the ‘situation de
l’énonciation’, and thereby on the addressee, Rensi, than the two outer ones. The
symmetrical arrangement of verbal constructions, immediately noted on the formal
level, would correlate with a similar alternation in how the events are presented
semantically. Set against the consistently progressive value of NP Hr sDm throughout
Eloquent Peasant—the occurrences discussed in this and the preceding sub-sections
as well as a great many other ones for which this had never been disputed328—
interpreting NP Hr sDm only in B1 179-180 as expressing habitual aspect is unlikely.
In the present passage, the alternation between N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr sDm arguably
correlates with alternations in meaning, themselves stylistically motivated in the
symmetrical arrangement of these verses.
In sum, Eloquent Peasant does not offer evidence for the innovative uses of NP Hr
sDm on which the aspectual ante quem non criterion here discussed is based. This does
not affect the validity of the criterion itself, as this is independently established based
on an analysis of linguistic change in non-literary texts. However, it implies recasting
the criterion in slightly different ways, without reference to Eloquent Peasant. Before
mapping these out (§2.6.2.7), I briefly examine other Middle Egyptian literary
compositions for which the criterion has been proposed to apply, as well as one for
which no such proposal has been made to date.

2.6.2.4 Ipuwer
In Vernus’ analysis, NP Hr sDm has become the regular expression of general/habitual
aspect in Ipuwer, implying that this text was not composed before stage II of the
change here discussed had been reached: the ante quem non criterion would
straightforwardly apply.329 However, much of Ipuwer is cast in the Sonst-Jetzt articu-
lation.330 As discussed in relation to Eloquent Peasant (§2.6.2.2), NP Hr sDm has
progressive aspect in such environments.331 Further elements internal to Ipuwer
support the same analysis. In addition to presentative mk, antithetic A m B formula-

328 Vernus 1990b: 1040-1, ex.3-7 and the examples in the associated footnotes.
329 Vernus 1990a: 188-90; subsequently Parkinson 2002: 308; Enmarch 2008: 21.
330 Generally on the Sonst-Jetzt articulation in laments and lamentations, lastly Enmarch 2012: 92-3,
96-7.
331 The possibility that NP Hr sDm in Ipuwer could be progressive is raised, only to be dismissed, by
Vernus himself (1990b: 1044-5, n.25). That the author dismisses this interpretation is due to his
interpretation of NP Hr sDm in Eloquent Peasant, not on grounds internal to Ipuwer. For the
relevant passages in Eloquent Peasant, see §2.6.2.2.

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 146 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

tions (including with A negative: tm sDm n=f m B), are recurrent (i)-(ii). So is the
expression wAi r (ii)-(iii). The latter is associated with resultative aspect, a temporality
that is more broadly distinctive of the perspective under which events are presented in
Ipuwer (iii). Similar comments extend to the iw ms section (e.g. (iv), where anti-
thetical formulations and resultative temporality are underscored further by xpr m):

(i) Ipuwer 7.13-14

mtn xm DADAt m nb bnt
tm Hs n=f Hr swhA mrt
‘Look, he who knew not the arched harp is now the owner of a shovel-shaped
harp;
he who could not sing for himself is vaunting Meret.’332

(ii) Ipuwer 8.11-9.1

mtn tm sft n=f Hr sft wnDw (...)
mtn nsyw? Hr wnma m rAw (...)
mtn Hmwt [...] Hr wdn ApHw (...)
mtn Spswt Hr sxs m *rwwt wa[t] (...)
mtn Spswt wAw r Hqrw (...)
‘Look, he who could not slaughter for himself is now slaughtering shorthorn
cattle (...)
Look, the nesyw(?) are now eating greylag geese (...)
Look, maidservants [...] are offering pigs (...)
Look, noble ladies are now running in one rush(?) (...)
Look, noble ladies have come to hunger (...)’
a) The verb is generally read qnqn, but a reading wnm seems preferable.333

(iii) Ipuwer 7.4-6

mtn kmt wA.ti r stt mw r tA iT.n=f nxt-a m mAir
mtn Sdw qrHt m TpHt=s sHAw sStAw n nsyw bityw
mtn Xnw Hr snD m-a gAwt (...)
mtn tA Ts.n=f Xr smAy(t) qn Xsy Hr nHm [xwt]=f
‘Look, Egypt has come to pouring water on the ground; the strong-armed man
seized from the miserable one;
Look, the Primordial Creature has been removed from its cavern; the secrets of
the Kings of Upper and Lower Egypt have been bared.
Look, the Residence is now fearful because of want (...);
Look, the land, it has knotted together in gangs; the strong man, the vile man
carries off his things.’

332 In this and the following examples, the translations are adapted from Enmarch 2008.
333 Jäger 2004: 131, n.2; originally Lichtheim 20062 (19731): 162, n.12, who also observed that the
mediate object construction in both Ipuwer instances fits wnm, not qnqn.

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 2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria 147

(iv) Ipuwer 2.8-9

iw ms tA Hr msnH mi irr nHpw
awAy m nb aHaw [xpr]w m HAqw
‘But now, the land is spinning round as does a potter’s wheel;
the robber is now an owner of wealth, having become a plunderer.’
All the above instances of NP Hr sDm, and many more in the lament, are from contexts
in which progressive aspect is implied: in this function, NP Hr sDm is expected at all
times. One may therefore wonder whether the aspectual ante quem non criterion
applies at all to Ipuwer.
In a final section of the composition (Enmarch’s ‘Meditation’), the composer
strikes ‘(...) a more impersonal and generalizing tone than the preceding Reproach I,
as well as most of the earlier strophic laments and injunctions.’334 The construction
NP Hr sDm is found here as well. Significantly, it alternates with N(P) sDm=f, which is
otherwise very rare throughout the composition:

(v) Ipuwer 13.9

[iw irf Hm] nfr aHaw Hr xnty (...)
‘Indeed it is good when ships sail upstream (...)’
– With N(P) sDm=f:
Ipuwer 13.12-13
iw irf Hm nfr awy rmTw sxws=sn mrw (...)
‘Indeed it is good when men’s hands build pyramids (...)’

(vi) Ipuwer 13.11-12

iw i[r]f [H]m nfr sr[w?...] saHw n=sn mTnw Hr irt Smt
‘Indeed it is good when offi[cials(?) ...] honor for themselves, when paths
make way.’

– With N(P) sDm=f:

Ipuwer 13.13
iw irf Hm nfr rmTw txw swr=sn *mint? ibw=sn nfr
‘Indeed it is good when people are drunk, when they drink mint(?) and
their hearts are happy.’

As it turns out, therefore, the ante quem non criterion applies to Ipuwer, if only in
extremis. Had Ipuwer not included this final part with more generalizing tone, the
composition would have been undistinctive as to whether the criterion applies. To be
sure, NP Hr sDm is exceedingly common throughout the text and N(P) sDm=f very
rare.335 Yet, this would support no conclusion, given the overall temporality of the
lament: in this, progressive aspect is called for and NP Hr sDm therefore expected to

334 Enmarch 2008: 196.

335 Vernus 1990a: 189 and n.91; 1990b: 1044-5, n.25.

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 148 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

be common, regardless of when Ipuwer was composed. Establishing that the criterion
applies requires exhibiting habitual/general contexts in which N(P) sDm=f could have
been used, yet NP Hr sDm happens to be (also) documented. These are given in only
one small section of what is a very long composition by Middle Egyptian standards.
In another sense as well, Ipuwer is illustrative of how contingent the possibility for a
linguistic dating can be. Had P. Leiden I 344 ro, the single manuscript to preserve
Ipuwer, been destroyed in its final parts only slightly more than it already is, the
relevant passages may not have survived. Even though the bulk of the composition
would have been preserved, the information that Ipuwer was composed at a time
when stage II of the change here discussed had been reached would have been lost.

2.6.2.5 Khakheperreseneb
Khakheperreseneb has three instances of NP Hr sDm in its second part (beginning with
ro 10). This is also a lament, largely cast in the Sonst-Jetzt articulation: compare e.g.
vso 2-3 DD Hr m DDw n=f Hr ‘he who used to give orders is now one to whom orders
are given’; vso 3 Xrt sf mi pA hrw ‘yesterday’s share is like today’s.’ Whether the
aspectual ante quem non criterion applies to Khakheperreseneb must therefore be
examined in individual details.
The first occurrence of NP Hr sDm, xprw Hr xpr could be read with general aspect
if standing in isolation (*‘changes happen’). In context, however, the clause follows
right after the statement introducing the lament (ink pw Hr nkA (...)), with several ex-
pressions typical of laments (xprt; sxrw xpr xt tA; shA tA: §5.1.3.3, (ii)-(iii);
§5.1.3.3.B). Moreover, the event is set in relation to a temporal limit expressed in the
two following clauses (nn mi snf; dns rnpt r 2-nwt=s): changes did not always happen
and that they now do so is new and the object of the lament. Aspect is therefore
progressive; the ante quem non criterion does not apply:

(i) Khakheperreseneb ro 10
ink pw Hr nkA{=i} m xprt sxrw xpr xt tA
xprw Hr xpr
nn mi snf dns rnpt r 2-nwt=s
shA tA (...)
‘I am pondering on what happens, on the state that is through the land.
Changes are happening:
it is not like the preceding year, a year is heavier than the other.
The land is in uproar (...)’

Different is the case of the next occurrence of NP Hr sDm.336 The lexicon is again
typical of laments in general (xprt; tnbX; see §5.1.3.3.B), but aspect is here not pro-
gressive. A first indication lies with the quantified temporal expression (ra nb):
technically, however, this is not yet a sufficient reason, since the repeated occurrence
of the event could itself be viewed over a bounded temporal extension, thus fitting the

336 This and the next one (iii) are the ones quoted by Vernus 1990a: 188, ex.405; 1990b: 1038, ex.2.

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 2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria 149

definition of progressive aspect (in an intuitive paraphrasis: *‘(...) is now happening

on a daily basis’). The full argument then implies interpretation based on world
knowledge: ‘dawn’ is a natural phenomenon and its occurrence a quintessentially
habitual event.

(ii) Khakheperreseneb ro 12
nhpw Hr xpr ra nb Hr tnbX r xprt (...)
‘Dawn happens every day, but the face swerves to what happens (...)’

A second instance of NP Hr sDm to which the criterion applies is xsf xn Hr sxpr rqw in
the following passage. The context consists in general maxims: these are not bound to
the specific temporality of the lament and its Sonst-Jetzt articulation. Significant are
the non-verbal A pw B construction (with classifying semantics, not temporally con-
tingent). As discussed, another non-verbal construction, A m B, is found in Sonst-Jetzt
contexts (compare Eloquent Peasant B1 128-134 and the discussion in §2.6.2.2;
similarly in Ipuwer, §2.6.2.4, (i)-(ii); or, in Khakheperreseneb itself, vso 2-3 quoted
above):

(iii) Khakheperreseneb vso 4-5

xAt pw gr r sDmt
ih pw wSb n xm
xsf xn Hr sxpr rqw
n Ssp.n ib mAat (...)
‘Silence against what is heard is a disease,
but to answer the ignorant is a painful thing.
To oppose an utterance creates enmity:
the heart can not accept Truth.’

2.6.2.6 Fishing and Fowling, A Man to His Son, and Neferkare and Sisene
Two more compositions have been mentioned in relation to applying the aspectual
ante quem non criterion, Fishing and Fowling and A Man to His Son. To these, a
third, Neferkare and Sisene, can be added. None is a lament, and they are therefore
free of the additional interpretive complexities associated with these.
A. Fishing and Fowling has one instance of NP Hr sDm in an environment that
implies an interpretation of the event as habitual.337 The quantified expression (r-Tnw
sp), here not in a lament, is strongly indicative. Significant is also the objectless con-
struction of Xdb, with the effect of generalizing the event (‘kill’ in general, not related
to a specific object of the killing and therefore not an individual act of killing):

(i) Fishing and Fowling B2.7-8

iw=i Hr Xdb r-tnw-sp nn Abw n mA[wt=i]
‘I kill at every occasion without my harpoon ever stopping.’

337 Vernus 1990a: 186, ex.399. On the passage in its broader context, lastly Widmaier 2009: 133-5.

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 150 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

B. A Man to His Son has various instances of NP Hr sDm expressing progressive

aspect (e.g. 8.2 and 8.6, discussed above, §2.3.3, (v)) and regularly uses N(P) sDm=f
for general/habitual aspect (§2.3.4.2.2, (v)). In one place, however, the composition
has NP Hr sDm in a context that implies general aspect.338 Unlike the outwardly
similar in iw mxAt Hr rDt Hr gs in Eloquent Peasant (B1 179-180: §2.6.2.3, (ii)), to
which this has been compared,339 the event can not be related to the speech situation
in any way. The aspectual ante quem non criterion therefore applies:

(ii) A Man 3.1 (as read in the present study340)

in iw hrw n rnnt Hr tht=f
‘Does a day of Renenet contravene itself?’
C. Neferkare and Sisene, finally, has one instance of NP Hr sDm with an event that
must be interpreted as habitual based on context (on this passage, further §4.4.3.1):

(iii) Neferkare and Sisene P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+4-5

(...) Hr mH Hr Dd ir is nt{y}-pw mAa pw pA Dd
sw (Hr) pr(t) m grH
‘(...) thinking and saying that since it was so, the word was true:
he goes out at night!” ’

2.6.2.7 Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non criterion recast

A. Based on the above discussion, Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non criterion must be
modified slightly. Issues of transitivity play no role in the linguistic change by which
NP Hr sDm is gradually extended beyond the progressive domain (§2.6.2.1). No
relative chronology of termini ante quem non based on transitivity, such as previously
assumed (§2.6.1.2, (a)), can be maintained. When a given composition presents an
innovative use of NP Hr sDm, the criterion applies, irrespective of whether the event is
transitive or intransitive.
The composition which would have presented the earliest traces of the linguistic
change here relevant, Eloquent Peasant, turns out to offer no evidence for that change
(§2.6.2.2-3). This does not affect the dating of Eloquent Peasant, which can be
established both by institutional analysis and by other elements of linguistic analysis
(§3.1.2). However, it does affect the temporal resolution of the criterion itself. Once
Eloquent Peasant is taken out of the picture, the earliest occurrences for NP Hr sDm
with habitual/general events, still isolated, are in documentary texts from the time of
Amenemhat III (§2.6.1.2). When this innovative usage first spread to higher written
registers, such as literary ones, can not be determined because literary texts that
present the innovative construction are presently insecurely dated. Some time for the
spread must probably be assumed, but this need not have been long: the linguistic
innovation here concerns the function of an expression, not its form. Accordingly, the

338 Vernus 1990a: 186-7, ex.401.

339 Vernus 1990b: 1043, n.19.
340 The editor of the text reads differently, with an altogether different construction; compare the
above discussion, §2.3.4.

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 2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria 151

innovation may have been indexical of register, but probably not strongly so.
Assuming, therefore, that the spread of the innovation from documentary to literary
registers was indeed fairly rapid, the use of NP Hr sDm with habitual/general events in
literary texts defines a terminus ante quem non by the early Thirteenth Dynasty, or the
late Twelfth at the very earliest.
B. Of the literary texts that use NP Hr sDm with habitual/general events (§2.6.2.4-6),
Ipuwer, Khakheperreseneb, and Fishing and Fowling have a terminus ante quem non
by the late Middle Kingdom based on various other linguistic and non-linguistic con-
siderations (§6.2.2.5, §2.7, and §3.2, respectively); in the case of Fishing and
Fowling, lexical evidence suggests an even later dating (§3.2). Linguistic analysis of
Neferkare and Sisene suggests that this composition dates to the Eighteenth Dynasty
(§4.4). With four out of five compositions to which the criterion applies, independent
elements of linguistic and non-linguistic evidence are thereby consistent with the
terminus ante quem non defined by the criterion.
Only A Man to His Son (§2.6.2.6.B) does not readily provide independent
linguistic indications for dating. The manuscript tradition of the Teaching, which is
dense, begins in the Eighteenth Dynasty.341 The editor of the text pointed to strong
intertextual connections and similarities in structure with Loyaliste and Kheti, and
suggested that these texts were composed to form a tripartite curriculum; assuming
that Loyaliste and Kheti date to the reign of Senwosret I, A Man to His Son would
then as well.342 However, these datings of Kheti and Loyaliste are themselves hy-
potheses only.343 Loyalism, a core theme in A Man, was an issue textually thematized
in the early Twelfth Dynasty, but also in the later part of that Dynasty, and later yet.344
Under the reading advocated in the present study (§2.3.4), A Man 3.1 provides a
clear case to which the aspectual ante quem non criterion applies.345 This defines a
terminus ante quem non to the early Thirteenth, or late Twelfth, Dynasty for the com-
position. The use of NP Hr sDm for general/habitual aspect is by no means generalized
in A Man: in places other than 3.1, events with a general or habitual interpretation are
expressed by N(P) sDm=f (§2.3.4.2.2, (v)). This need not imply a transitional stage in
the change, as N(P) sDm=f could always be used with such events even when NP Hr
sDm had begun spreading beyond its original semantic domain (§2.6.3). Other than by
the construction in 3.1, A Man to His Son is extremely difficult to date linguistically.
The often unusual philological difficulties of the text hamper linguistic analysis in
substantial ways. In addition, the linguistic typology of A Man to His Son is by and
large undistinctive, as is generally the case with teachings, which have much precon-

341 Fischer-Elfert 1999: II, VIII-XXVI. The composition is now also documented in the Assiut graffiti
(4a-d), see Verhoeven 2013, §4.
342 Fischer-Elfert 1999: 417-21; see the whole study for an extensive analysis of intertext, common
loyalist motifs, and similar elements in composition of the relevant texts.
343 For a linguistic discussion of these texts, §6.2.2.6 and §4.5, respectively; for Amenemhat, which
has played a role in the hypothesis associating the literary figure ‘Kheti’, and thereby the
composition Kheti, with the early Twelfth Dynasty, §6.
344 Gnirs 2013b: 153-6, 159-66; Schipper 1998: 176-9.
345 Similarly Vernus 1990a: 186-7.

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 152 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

figured language, all the more so in one that is so densely intertextually allied with
other texts.

2.6.3 The post quem non criterion

In Vernus’ original discussion, a twofold criterion for dating was derived from
changes affecting the functions of NP Hr sDm beginning in the late Middle Kingdom.
A composition that has innovative usages of NP Hr sDm (stage II: §2.6.1.1) receives a
terminus ante quem non by the time when this change is first documented
(§2.6.1.2, (a); discussion above, §2.6.2). Complementarily, a composition that has the
older distribution of NP Hr sDm and N(P) sDm=f (stage I) receives a terminus post
quem non to a period in time before stage II sets on (§2.6.1.2, (b); discussed in the
present section). The linguistic change concerned would, in other words, support both
an ante quem non criterion and a post quem non criterion set to the same time. If so, a
terminus post quem non by the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty would apply to various
literary texts of insecure dating, with significant consequences for dating Middle
Egyptian literary texts such as e.g. Merikare or Neferti, which have stage I.
At first, the argument would seem commonsensical, given that linguistic change
consists in obsolescence as much as it consists in innovation. For it to be valid, how-
ever, the argument would require a model of linguistic change whereby innovative
usages neatly replace older ones. Going further, it would need to imply that advanced
obsolescence (on which a post quem non criterion is to be based) is roughly simulta-
neous with initial stages in innovation (on which an ante quem non criterion is to be
based). As already discussed in general terms, this is hardly ever the case: in linguistic
change, innovative and older usages coexist over longer periods, resulting in an
inherent thickness of language, particularly of written language, at any given moment
in time (§2.1). In the particular case at hand, it can also be demonstrated on direct
descriptive grounds that the older stage I and the innovative stage II coexisted for
centuries.346

2.6.3.1 N(P) sDm=f as a ‘non-extensive’ in post-Middle Kingdom times

A. N(P) sDm=f is still used in all shades of ‘non-extensive’ meaning well after the
mid-Twelfth Dynasty. Taking well dated examples where these are to be found, in
inscriptionally published compositions, this is illustrated by the following selection:

346 Upon discussion with the present author, Vernus (p.c. 5/2010) concedes that his post quem non
criterion can not be upheld. The reasons for this are nonetheless developed below in explicit terms
because of the importance the post quem non criterion has had in dating Middle Egyptian literary
texts (§2.6.1.2, (b)). In addition, the discussion is illustrative of more general issues in devising
dating criteria and thereby provides a case study to flesh out some of the introductory
considerations of the present chapter.

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 2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria 153

(a) With an habitual event

(i) Sobekhotep IV’s Karnak Stela 5
iw=i mA=i nfrw Hm=f r-Tnw Hb nbw (...)
‘I used to see the beauty of His Majesty at each and every festival (...)’
The quantified adverbial expression (r-Tnw Hb nbw347) imposes an habitual
reading.
Sim. e.g. Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela 5 (below, (iv)).

(b) With a general event, in a gnomic context

(ii) Appointment of the Vizier 8 (Urk. IV 1381, 2)
iAwt ip=s wnwt=s
‘Old age counts its hour.’
Sim. in the Vizieral Cycle, Aametju 13; 43 (§1.3.2.3, (i)); also e.g. Ahmose’s
Karnak Eulogy 20 (Urk. IV 19, 13 - 20, 3) (§2.8.2.3, (iv)).

(c) As an unmarked synchronous tense (‘unextensive’ in the bare sense)

(iii) Tutankhamun’s Restoration Stela 7-8 (Urk. IV 2027, 11)
wnn tA m sny-mnt nTrw mkHA=sn tA pn (...)
‘The land was in calamity, the gods were neglecting this land (...)’
Sim. e.g. Speos Artemidos 24 (Urk. IV 387, 15-16) DHwty wr pr m ra swbA=f [Hr
...] ‘Thoth the great, who came from Re, instruct[ed ...]’; 27 (Urk. IV 388, 7-8) Hr
Hm=i D=f spd-Hr n rmnw nTr ‘My Majesty’s face gives alertness to those who
shoulder the god’; probably also 19-20 (Urk. IV 386, 15-16)348 p(A)xt wrt xnst
inwt Hr-ibt iAbtt w[xA=s] wAwt snm (...) ‘Great Pakhet who roams the wadis,
presiding over the East, was looking for the roads of rain (...)’; Thutmosis III’s
Poetical Stela 9 (below, (v)); Amenhotep II’s Sphinx Stela 26 (Urk. IV 1283, 5-6)
m-xt nn sxaw Hm=f m nsw wrt Htp=s st=s m wpt=f ‘After this, His Majesty was
made to appear as a king, while the Great One took his place on his forehead.’

If the post quem non criterion to date e.g. Merikare or Neferti to a time no later than
the mid-Twelfth Dynasty were valid, all the above compositions would be subject to
the same criterion.
B. Post-mid-Twelfth Dynasty compositions often have the two constructions in their
old distribution, with N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr sDm contrasting as an expression of
‘non-extensive’ aspect (habitual, general, or unmarked) with one of ‘extensive’ aspect
(i.e. progressive) (stage I: §2.6.1.1). Again taking well dated examples where these
are to be found, in inscriptionally published compositions:

347 For the rare r-Tnw NP, e.g. Beni Hassan 2 (Ameny), 16-17 (Urk. VII 15, 18) Hs.kw Hr=s m pr-nsw
r-Tnw rnpt nt irw ‘I was praised for it in the royal palace on every year of the cattle count.’
348 Restitution of the lacuna after Allen 2002b: 9.

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 154 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

(a) Mid-Thirteenth Dynasty:

(iv) Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela 4-5
rD n<=i> iAwt=i m Hri-tp tA rx=f sAy[t]=i mtr iw=i [Hr] irt mi nTr
iw[=i] rDy=ia HAw-Hr sipt n=i (...)
‘My office as head of the land was given to me, for he knows my wisdom
precisely, as I was acting like a god.
I used to give more than what was entrusted to me (...)’
a) Sic, for expected iw=i D=i.

Contrast iw=i [Hr] irt with iw[=i] rDy=i, the former expressing progressive
aspect, the latter habitual aspect.

(b) Early NK, 16th century BCE:

N(P) sDm=f: Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy 19-20 (§2.8.2.3, (iv))
NP Hr sDm: Karnak Eulogy 14-19 (§2.8.2.3, (iii)).

(c) Early NK, 15th century BCE:

(v) Thutmosis III’s Poetical Stela 9 (Urk. IV 613, 14-15)
D=i nrw nw Hm=k xt ibw=sn
Axt=i imt tp=k sswn=s st
‘I shall place dread of Your Majesty through their hearts;
the uraeus which is on my head will destroy them.’
(vi) Poetical Stela 23 (Urk. IV 618, 5-7)
snty=k D.n=i sn m sA HA=k
awy Hm=i Hr Hr Hr sHr Dwt
‘Your two sisters, I have placed them as protection around you,
while the arms of My Majesty are above, driving evil away.’

(d) Early NK, 14th century BCE:

(vii) Suti and Hor 6-7 (Urk. IV 1944, 17-20)
irt nb mA=sn im=k (...)
HDDwt=k wbA=s irty awt
‘All eyes see through you (...)
Your light opens the eyes of the flock.’

(viii) Suti and Hor 4 (Urk. IV 1944, 7)

DA=k Hrt Hr nb Hr mA=k
‘When you cross the sky, all faces sees you.’
@r nb Hr mA=k is progressive, the temporal extension of the event being defined
in relation to the setting clause (DA=k Hrt); for the general principle of such
constructions, compare above, §1.2, (ii).

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 2.6 Devising and applying a linguistic argument: Vernus’ aspectual criteria 155

As the above examples document, the old distribution of N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr sDm,
in other words stage I, is still productive well into the early New Kingdom.
C. To conclude this illustration, a comparison between two accounts of returns from
expeditions, one in a Twelfth Dynasty literary text, the other in a late Seventeenth Dy-
nasty composition with literarizing tendencies, is enlightening. Both have the motif of
people hugging each other upon successful return. In both cases, this is set after
constructions with resultative aspect or interpretation (rD Hknw dwA nTr; Hmwt TAw iww
(...)). These define a stretch in time with respect to which the event of ‘hugging’ is
unfolding. Shipwrecked Sailor expresses the implied temporal relation by using the
dedicated progressive pattern, NP Hr sDm, as is common. Kamose Inscriptions, on the
other hand, uses the unmarked pattern, N(P) sDm=f, a more recherché choice. If
linguistic history is conceived of in terms of an orderly succession, the construction in
Kamose Inscriptions would be described as older than the one in Shipwrecked Sailor:

(ix) Shipwrecked Sailor 2-6

mk pH.n=n Xnw (...)
rD Hknw dwA nTr
s nb Hr Hpt sn-nw=f (...)
‘Look, we have reached the Residence (...)
praise has been given, the god has been thanked,
everybody is hugging their fellows; (...)’

(x) Kamose Inscriptions St.II 32-33349

iw Hr nb HD (...)
Hmwt TAw iww r mAn=i
st nbt Hpt=s 2-nw=s (...)
‘Every face was illuminated (...)
women and men had come to see me;
every woman hugged her fellow (...)’

2.6.3.2 Dissociating the ante quem non and post quem non criteria
The above examples demonstrate the continued use of the old functional contrast
(stage I) centuries after innovative usages of NP Hr sDm (stage II) had begun emerging
in the late Middle Kingdom. In view of the general models of linguistic change
discussed above (§2.1.1), this is hardly surprising: while innovative uses spread, older
ones do not disappear, resulting in an overall thickness of language in use at any given
time. The situation, descriptively documented above, may be schematically repre-
sented as follows:

349 On this passage in its broader context, §1.3.3.2, (xiv).

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 156 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

Thickness in ongoing linguistic change: not as in (a), but as in (b)

innovation of B ( ante quem non)
(a) A  B
obsolescence of A?? ( post quem non??)

innovation of B ( ante quem non)

(b) A  AB  B
obsolescence of A ( post quem non)

The two termini, the ante quem non and the post quem non, must be dissociated from
each other. While initial stages in the change here concerned are observed in the late
Middle Kingdom, the overall change took several centuries to complete. Meanwhile,
texts were composed still presenting stage I, well into the early New Kingdom. While
the terminus ante quem non based on the change here concerned can be set to the
early Thirteenth, or perhaps late Twelfth, Dynasty, the terminus post quem non based
on the same change can only be defined as pointing to the late Eighteenth Dynasty.
For dating Middle Egyptian literary texts that have stage I, this is of no practical
import, as these texts are documented in manuscripts from the early or mid-Eighteenth
Dynasty.
Nor can the argument be recast differently, in terms of a relative chronology
internal to literature. As repeatedly emphasized, there is no indication that Middle
Egyptian was linguistically any distinct in literature from what it was in other types of
higher written discourses. Accordingly, the thickness of language just described
applies to literature as it does to other types of written discourses. Within this thick-
ness, composers of various texts make different selections. The composer of e.g.
Khakheperreseneb (or Ipuwer) thus accommodated the innovative usages of NP Hr
sDm, while the one of Neferti or Merikare, for whatever reason, intentional or not,
may not have. In other words, Neferti or Merikare, which display stage I, need not be
relatively older than Khakheperreseneb or Ipuwer, which display stage II. Only two
claims can be made based on the linguistic expressions here considered: (a) that
Khakheperreseneb was not composed earlier than the early Thirteenth Dynasty, or
late Twelfth at best (the ante quem non criterion, slightly modified: §2.6.2); (b) that
Neferti was not composed later than the late Eighteenth Dynasty (the post quem
criterion, redefined). Which of the two compositions is earlier can not be determined
based on the aspectual criteria here discussed.

2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb

The constraints that bear on linguistic dating (§2.1-4) add up, sometimes in critical
ways. This is illustrated by two additional case studies, now devoted to compositions
considered as a whole (this section and the next). In keeping with the tenor of the
present chapter, the presentation is focused on methodological issues that can be
encountered in dating. Accordingly, several expressions that turn out to be uncriterial

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 2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb 157

are here included because discussing these is illustrative of broader methodological

issues at stake. In subsequent sections of the present study, similar expressions will
not be included any more.

2.7.1 Introduction

Khakheperreseneb is documented on a mid-Eighteenth Dynasty writing board, T. BM

EA 5645 (the main witness),350 and on a roughly contemporaneous ostracon, O. Cairo
JE 50249 (paralleling T. BM EA 5645 ro 10-11).351 An upper chronological bound is
given by the name ‘Khakheperreseneb’ itself, which is based on the throne name of
Senwosret II (xa-xpr-ra).
A. The name ‘Khakheperreseneb’ provides only a terminus ante quem non, and does
not secure a dating into the reign of Senwosret II himself: the name may have been
given to individuals at least as long as a cult of that king was active.352 Independently
from this, it is observed that the word xpr plays a distinguished role in the lament.
This defines itself as a ‘pondering on what happens (xprt), on the conditions that
happen (xpr) through the land’ (ro 10), and is introduced by the observation that
‘changes are happening (xprw Hr xpr), it is not like last year’ (ro 10). #pr is
prominent later on as well, as in the observation that ‘dawn happens (xpr) daily, the
face has swerved from what happens (xprt)’ (ro 12). Alongside xpr-kA-ra (Senwosret I),
xa-xpr-ra is one of only two Twelfth Dynasty royal names that include the element
xpr. A reference to this name would therefore have been appropriate at all later times
in the Late Middle Kingdom; taken into account that Khakheperreseneb makes
Middle Egyptian literary tradition one of its objects, such reference would also have
been appropriate in yet later times.
Khakheperreseneb has the old expression of filiation, by a badal-type apposition
(B sA A ‘B’s son, A’, literally, ‘B, the son: A’): ro 1 sny sA xa-xpr-ra-snb Ddw n=f anxw
‘Seni’s son Khakheperreseneb, called Ankhu’. This expression of filiation is typical of
the Twelfth Dynasty, contrasting with the construction with direction annexation (A sA
B ‘A, son of B) which developed after the Twelfth Dynasty;353 the spread of the latter
construction was gradual, and the earlier construction is still found in the Thirteenth
Dynasty.354 Taken at face value, this could imply a terminus post quem non at some
time in the Thirteenth Dynasty. Making such an argument would be dangerous,
however, since in general ‘any aspect of a composition can be archaistic’;355 such
possibility is all the more real in a composition, Khakheperreseneb, that thematizes
tradition. The older expression of filiation recurs in Neferkare and Sisene (e.g.

350 Parkinson 1997b: 55-64 and pl.X-XI; for the dating of the manuscript, p.63.
351 Parkinson 1997b: 64-8 and pl.XII; for the dating of the manuscript, p.65 (‘Thutmoside’).
352 Vernus 1995a: 2-3, and n.15, 17.
353 E.g. EG §85; Borghouts 2010: I, §87.c, NB 3. In the mid-Twelfth Dynasty, Eloquent Peasant has
yet another construction (sA B A ‘the son of B, A’: sA mrw rnsi): Parkinson 2012a: 40, with
references to previous discussions.
354 E.g. Posener 1957: 131-2.
355 Parkinson 2002: 49, discussing meter in Ptahhotep P; similarly on script in literary compositions,
Parkinson 2002: 313; on linguistic selections in Middle Egyptian literary texts, §2.4.3.2.

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 158 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+3 Hn-tA sA Tti ‘Hent’s son Tjeti’); as discussed below, this com-
position probably dates to the Eighteenth Dynasty (§4.4). In Khakheperreseneb, the
expression of filiation as B sA A may point to an earlier period of composition, or it
may be archaizing in later times: in order to decide between the two alternative inter-
pretations, the dating of composition, early or late, would have to be established first,
on independent grounds.
The title born by Khakheperreseneb, a ‘ouab-priest of Heliopolis’ (wab n iwnw,
ro 1), is unparalleled. It has been observed that its form (wab + place) is typical of the
Late Middle Kingdom, and perhaps of the Thirteenth Dynasty specifically.356 Whether
this affords a reliable indication for dating remains unclear: the form of the title is not
terribly distinctive; moreover, just as other discrete elements in a literary text, titles
can be archaizing.
B. An upper bound is, on the other hand, given by Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non
criterion. As discussed, this applies to Khakheperreseneb ro 12 (nhpw Hr xpr ra nb
‘dawn happens every day’: §2.6.2.5, (ii)) and vso 5 (xsf xn Hr sxpr rqw ‘to oppose an
utterance creates enmity: §2.6.2.5, (iii)), implying a terminus ante quem non by the
early Thirteenth Dynasty, or late Twelfth at the earliest.357 The criterion does not
narrow the range for possible dating by much. It is valuable, however, in defining an
earliest possible dating that is later than the reign of Senwosret II himself.
In the present section, I discuss linguistic expressions that could be interpreted as
suggestive of a narrower range for dating Khakheperreseneb. Possible indications for
a terminus post quem non prior to the early Eighteenth Dynasty are examined first
(§2.7.2). Possible indications for a terminus ante quem non later than the one just
recalled, are presented in turn (§2.7.3).

2.7.2 A terminus post quem non earlier than the Eighteenth Dynasty?

2.7.2.1 Middle Egyptian language

Khakheperreseneb is composed in a linguistic register similar to the one of Middle
Egyptian literary texts securely dated to the Twelfth Dynasty. Yet, expressions that
are characteristic of such a register are also documented in productive use down to the
Eighteenth Dynasty, making these expressions uncriterial for establishing a terminus
post quem non earlier than this period. A selective illustration is the following:

(i) Khakheperreseneb ro 10
nn mi snf
‘It is not like last year.’
The subjectless situational construction is common in Middle Kingdom Middle
Egyptian literature, as it is in higher written registers in the early New Kingdom.
E.g. Sinuhe B 224-225 iw mi sSm rswt ‘It was like the nature of a dream’;

356 Grajetzki 2005: 45-6.

357 Similarly Vernus 1995a: 3; 1990a: 188, ex.405. Barbotin’s (2012) argument that the criterion does
not apply misunderstands the aspectual contrast that underlies the criterion.

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 2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb 159

Chapelle Rouge, p.137: IX.19 (HHBT II 27, 14) nn m gnwt imiw-HAt ‘It is not in
the annals of the predecessors.’

(ii) Khakheperreseneb ro 2 xmmy ‘unknown’

Sim. ro 3 Dddt ‘said’ (twice), ro 7 tmmt (negation)
While the finite reduplicated passive formation (sDmm=f ) was obsolescent by the
turn of the third to the second millennium, loss of productivity of the same
morphological formation was more protracted with participles, and gradual over
the lexicon. These differential rates of obsolescence reflect the fact that participial
formations are naturally prone to undergo lexicalization, and the general tendency
for frequent items to retain older formations longer. In Khakheperreseneb,
reduplicated passive participles are with common verbs, for which similar forma-
tions are well documented in the early Eighteenth Dynasty:358 (a) for the general
principle, compare with a common verb: wddt ‘ordered’ (Urk. IV 325, 17; 397, 2);
also with a less common one: Tsst ‘knotted’ (Urk. IV 47, 12); (b) with the same
verbs as in Khakheperreseneb: Dddt ‘said’ (Urk. IV 194, 1; 500, 12); rxxy ‘known’
(as the positive pendant to xmmy) (Urk. IV 119, 3); negative tmm(t) (Urk. IV 331,
12; 344, 7; 500, 8; 780, 13; 1097, 12; HHBT 109, 3-4). In Khakheperreseneb, the
presence of no less than four instances of reduplicated passive participles—a
density higher than in any other Middle Egyptian literary text—may well relate to
‘repetition’ (wHmmyt, ro 2), a major theme of the text (§2.4.5, (ii)).

(iii) Khakheperreseneb ro 3
(...) Hr-ntt rf wHmw Dddt iw Dddt Dd
‘(...) for what has been said can only be repeated:359 what has been said is
said.’
Sim. ro 13 snni wi Hr ib=i wxd sw HAp Xt=i Hr=f ‘I am in distress because of my
heart; it suffers, my body is concealed because of it.’
The nfr sw construction with a passive participle as predicate (here wHmw) is
common in Middle Kingdom literary registers; it is also productively used in the
early New Kingdom. E.g. Shipwrecked Sailor 66 arq sw r xnt ‘He was bent to the
front’; Thutmosis I’s Abydos Stela 12 (Urk. IV 99, 15-17) Dsr st r xprt m pt HAp st
r sxrw dwAt [wAS] st r imiw-nnw ‘They are more recondite than what has come to
existence in the sky, more concealed than the conditions of the lower world, more
exalted than those who are in the Nun.’ In Khakheperreseneb ro 3, the specific
type of nfr sw construction here discussed is followed by a iw NP PsP (iw Dddt
Dd) construction, with subtle semantic effect.360 The sequence is documented in
the early New Kingdom, with a similar semantic contrast: Chapelle Rouge,
p.310361 wab.wy aAbt=t iw=sn nfr ‘How pure is your offering! It is excellent.’

358 Most references drawn from EG §360.

359 Identification of the construction and discussion of its semantics, Vernus 1995a: 9-11. On Hr-ntt rf,
below (§2.7.3.2.A).
360 Semantic analysis in Vernus 1995a: 10.
361 Noted by Vernus 1995a: 10.

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 160 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

(iv) Khakheperreseneb ro 10 (= O. Cairo JE 50249, 1)

ink pw Hr nkAy{=i}362 m xprt sxrw xpr xr tA
‘(The situation is that) I am pondering on what happens, on the conditions that
happen through the land.’
Sim. vso 1.
As the somewhat pedantic English rendering attempts to express, the lament
proper is introduced by a thetic construction ink pw Hr sDm /pseudoparticiple
/sDm.n=f /sDm=f.363 The construction is productively documented in the Middle
Kingdom and in the early New Kingdom alike. E.g. Shipwrecked Sailor 89-91 ink
pw hA.kw r biA m wpwt ity (...) ‘(What happened is that) I had gone to the mine in
a mission of the Sovereign (...)’; Ahmose’s Abydos Stela for Tetisheri 7-8 (Urk.
IV 27, 14-15; quoted below, §5.1.4.2, (v)); Hatshepsut’s Northern Obelisk, Basis
D 14 (Urk. IV 364, 16-17; quoted below, §5.1.4.2, (vi)).

2.7.2.2 Rare literary expressions, unparalleled after the Twelfth Dynasty

Very few expressions in Khakheperreseneb are not paralleled in higher written
registers of the early Eighteenth Dynasty. These deserve a more detailed discussion.
A. Khakheperreseneb has a form that based on written morphology (rD-, not D-)
would seem to qualify as an instance of a past tense sDm=f:

(i) Khakheperreseneb ro 11
rD.tw mAat <r->rwti isft m Xn sH
‘Maat is put outside, Isfet is within the council.’

If this is indeed a past tense sDm=f (see below, NB), Khakheperreseneb would have a
form that is otherwise documented only in Twelfth Dynasty literary registers. This
would not, however, afford a reliable argument for dating. Passive past tense sDm=f is
exceedingly rare in Middle Egyptian literary registers: only two other secure instances
can be quoted (Eloquent Peasant B1 159; Sinuhe B 238): these are frozen remnants,
not elements of a productive paradigm any more (§2.4.3.2, (ii), (viii)). As a frozen
remant, past tense rD.tw is bound to the Middle Egyptian literary tradition, but not to
any specific period in time within that tradition. Whatever its date of composition,
Khakheperreseneb is itself part of that tradition. What is more, the composition makes
this tradition its object; the selection of rD.tw would therefore have been appropriate
as a linguistic index of this very tradition.
NB. In addition, the identification of ro 11 rD.tw as an instance of passive past tense
sDm=f is itself altogether uncertain as this is based on written morphology only. The

362 The superfluous suffix pronoun is now also documented in O. Cairo JE 50249, suggesting that the
traditions represented by the two witnesses of Khakheperreseneb are closely related (Parkinson
1997b: 66, and n.39).
363 In Khakheperreseneb, the thetic nature of the construction is manifest in that it opens a new section
in the text, the lament. That this was a significant articulation is also nicely evidenced by this being
the beginning of the section excerpted on O. Cairo JE 50249.

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 2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb 161

text goes on with what is clearly present tense: ro 11 Xnn.tw sxrw nTrw wn{t}.tw
mXrw=sn ‘The counsels of the gods are thrown into tumult, their directives are
neglected.’ Semantically, both readings of rD.tw are defensible: as a past tense, pro-
viding the setting to the non-past tense description that follows,364 or as a present
tense, with the neglect of Maat being presented as an ongoing state-of-affairs.365 As
regards written morphology itself, the stem rD- is generally characteristing of the past
tense sDm=f as opposed to the present tense sDm=f; it is also characteristic, however,
of a prosodically initial position more generally.366 In Khakheperreseneb ro 11, rD.tw
is itself verse-initial and the form of the stem may reflect this position: rD.tw may then
be a present tense form just as well. Alternatively, or complementarily, the written
form rD.tw may be literary in the sense defined above, even if a present tense sDm=f:
if so, this would be motivated by the same indexical dimensions attached to the form
discussed above.

B. Khakheperreseneb has an instance of the expression HA A, that is of HA (< Hw-A)

itself reinforced by A:

(ii) Khakheperreseneb ro 7
HA A rx=i xm.n{y} kywy (...)
‘If only I knew what others ignore (...)’

Introducing a clause as in Khakheperreseneb, HA A recurs in Ptahhotep 387 L1, Eloquent

Peasant B1 142, and Fowler 12,367 all of which are securely dated to the Twelfth
Dynasty. In later times, HA A recurs as a lexicalized noun (HA-A ‘would that!’), in
Thutmosis I’s Abydos Stela 5 (Urk. IV 96, 13)368 and in the High Steward Amenhotep’s
statue (temp. Amenhotep III), 10 (Urk. IV 1794, 19).369 This distribution would at first
suggest that with HA A one piece of evidence for a dating of Khakheperreseneb not much
later than its terminus ante quem non may finally be given.
Taking this step would be dangerous, however, since a pattern of attestation is
itself in need of interpretation. As its textual distribution suggests, HA A introducing a
clause is strongly associated with, and possibly specific to, literary registers—an asso-
ciation that may relate to the formal expressiveness of an expression consisting in HA

364 E.g. Moers 2001: 146 in his discussion of the passage.

365 E.g. Parkinson 1997a: 147.
366 Without going into the details of a notoriously complex issue, compare the case of the sDm.n=f,
which tends to display a stem rD- in the ‘emphatic construction’ (where the verb is in sentence-
initial position) and after negation, while it tends to display a stem D- after iw or a preceding clause
to which it relates. In the domain of the non-future and non-modal sDm=f formations similarly,
past tense sDm=f (used in sentence-initial position or in the bound negative construction) has the
stem rD-, while the basic (/‘aorist’) sDm=f (after iw, a noun phrase, or a preceding clause to which
it relates) has the stem D-.
367 Oréal 2011: 55; el-Hamrawi 2003: 131-2. In Fowler 12, A is in lacuna (HA [A]).
368 Nn HA-A m-xt=k ‘There is no “Would that!” after you.’ The lexicalized noun HA-A is documented in
earlier times already (Ptahhotep 387 L1; P has the related Hn-A) (Vernus 2003a: 263).
369 Nn wn Ddt HA-A r=s ‘There is nothing about which “HA(-)A” was said.’ Unlike the passage quoted in
the previous footnote, this one has a verb Dd ‘say’, and HA-A may therefore be either a quotation, or
the lexicalized expression. (For a similar ambiguity in the interpretation of the related expression
HA-n=i in Merikare E 44, Vernus 2003a: 272; sim. e.g. Urk. IV 61, 1; 506, 8)

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 162 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

(< Hw A) further reinforced by A itself. Middle Egyptian literature, on the other hand, is
highly intertextual, and two out of three other occurrences of HA A are from texts,
Eloquent Peasant and Fowler, that are intertextually allied with Khakheperreseneb;
the temporal depth of such intertextuality is presently itself an unknown. The issue
becomes acute in the case of Khakheperreseneb, a composition that, whatever its date
of composition may have been, targets the very literary tradition in which HA A
introducing a clause is used.
In addition, both HA and A are individually documented in the early New King-
dom,370 and only their combination could therefore be relevant for dating. The attesta-
tion of HA A heading a verbal clause, although cohesive, remains scarce (perhaps no
more than the four instances mentioned above). Although HA A has grammatical func-
tions, its obsolescence can not be related to a broader process of linguistic change: the
pattern of attestation of the expression is thereby exposed to the very same uncertain-
ties as is the case with mid-/low-frequency lexical expressions. These combined
uncertainties are critical, as can be illustrated by comparison with another expression,
wn.k(w) rf predicate (§1.2, (v); §4.1.3, (v)-(vi)). Just as HA A, this expression is
documented only a handful times, solely in higher written registers, and may be
specific to these. Leaving aside the instance in Tod Inscription 26-27 (of unclear
dating), only four other instances are known. Of these, three cluster in the Twelfth
Dynasty (Shipwrecked Sailor 136-137; Sinuhe B 252-253; Khentemsemti 4), just as
three out of four occurrences of HA A do. If the apparently consistent distribution of HA
A were taken as an argument for a terminus post quem non prior to the New Kingdom
for Khakheperreseneb, then, based on the similar distribution of wn.k(w) rf predicate,
a terminus post quem non prior to the New Kingdom could result for Speos
Artemidos, which also has the expression (9-10; Urk. IV 385, 3).

2.7.2.3 Khakheperreseneb and Eloquent Peasant: A common literary tradition

Khakheperreseneb shares some of its lexicon with Eloquent Peasant, a text dating to
the mid-Twelfth Dynasty, e.g. ro 12 ianw ‘woe’ (also Eloquent Peasant R 16.6; 26.5);
ro 12 tnbX ‘turn aside, swerve’ (also Eloquent Peasant B1 128; 192); vso 5 XAbb
‘crookedness’ (also Eloquent Peasant B1 138 xAbb). Among the above expressions,
tnbX and ianw are individually documented in later times as well.371 $Abb is not, but is
an exceedingly rare word:372 its pattern of attestation is therefore unreliable.
Shared lexicon between Khakheperreseneb and Eloquent Peasant may be relevant
nonetheless, if considered not in terms of individual words but in terms of a set of
words common to both compositions. Also shared between the two compositions are
the two expressions just discussed, rD.tw and HA A (Kh. ro 11; ro 7: §2.7.2.2). This
overall constellation is noteworthy given the relative brevity of Khakheperreseneb

370 For the former, e.g. Urk. IV 658, 8; for the latter, §1.2, (viii.); §6.1.3.1, (ii).
371 For tnbX, e.g. TLA #172520; for ianw, below, §5.1.3.3.B.
372 Otherwise perhaps only in P. Turin 54003 ro, §1.2 (TLA #122520). The verb XAb ‘be bent,
crooked’, another uncommon word, is also documented in Debate 2 (in the reading of Allen 2011:
24), yet recurs much later as well, both in a literary register (P. Anastasi III ro V.11 (xAb)) and in a
magical one (P. Chester Beatty VIII ro 5). On the root XAb, Coulon 1999: 111, n.41, with further
references.

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 2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb 163

and the rarity of some of these expressions (XAbb, rD.tw, and HA A). The constellation is
clearly consistent with Khakheperreseneb belonging to the same literary tradition as
Eloquent Peasant, providing a tangible illustration of this on a linguistic level. It is
also significant in relation to Khakheperreseneb’s thematizing aspects of that very
tradition.
The issue then boils down to whether this literary tradition is to be conceived of as
fairly concentrated in time (in which case an early dating could result for
Khakheperreseneb), or not (in which case no such implication could be derived). This
is presently itself an open question (further discussion below, §5.1.3).

2.7.3 A terminus ante quem non lower than by Vernus’ criterion?

I now examine Khakheperreseneb for linguistic expressions that may suggest a

terminus ante quem non later than the one based on Vernus’ argument, to the early
Thirteenth Dynasty or late Twelfth at the very earliest. Grammatical expressions are
discussed first (§2.7.3.1-2) and lexical ones in turn (§2.7.3.3).373

2.7.3.1 Two fallacious ‘arguments’

I first present two fallacious arguments: these hold only as long as the specific con-
tents of the text to be dated are not taken into account. They are thereby illustrative of
one major tenet of the present study, namely that linguistic selections are often
themselves in need of interpretation, just as the contents of a text are. (Similarly
fallacious arguments will not be included in subsequent chapters of the present study.)
A. The following has an instance of a -A demonstrative that would superficially seem
to afford an indication for dating:

(i) Khakheperreseneb vso 1

wHa=k n=i nA nty xt tA ntyw HD ptx
‘You shall explain to me those things that are through the land, the ones that
were bright cast down!’

Pronominal nA is well attested in the Middle Kingdom, both in documentary and

literary registers. Only in documentary texts, however, does nA seem to be freely used
in all sorts of positions, including as antecedent to a relative clause (e.g. Illahun,
P. Berlin 10038A vso 14 nA nty Hna=f ‘those who are with him’).374 In literary

373 The two Eighteenth Dynasty copies of Khakheperreseneb include several elements of late
orthography. As for other texts, these are entirely unreliable for dating. E.g. (a) verbal morphology:
ro 5 Dd.ti=f ‘what he will say’ (more typical of, although not exclusive to, the early New Kingdom:
§2.3.1.1, (v)); (b) ro 6 kt-xy ‘other ones, other people’ (more typical of, although not specific to,
the early New Kingdom: Urk. IV 20, 11; 736, 13; 1089, 11; see EG §98); note the alternation in
Eloquent Peasant B1 77 kt-xt = R 13.7 kt-xy (Borghouts 2010: I, §24.b.1); ro 7 kywy (more typical
of the early New Kingdom: Urk. IV 331, 12 kwy; 780, 13 kwy; see EG §98), yet already in a
Middle Kingdom manuscript: P. Butler vso (Fowler) 14 kiwy (Borghouts 2010: I, §24.b.1);
(c) lexical morphology: vso 1, vso 4 ih ‘misery’ (the New Kingdom form, common e.g. in Book of
the Dead; the older form is Ahw, e.g. Mentuwoser 9; Ptahhotep 171 P; see TLA #174).
374 Kroeber 1970: 17-20.

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 164 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

registers, the construction is found in Cheops’ Court (6.1; 11.10-11), which has a
type-B terminus ante quem non to the Thirteenth Dynasty and includes elements of a
lower linguistic register (§2.4.4). In a Twelfth Dynasty literary register, only one
occurrence of nA before a relative clause can be quoted, in the L1 version of Ptahhotep
507 ir sDm=k nA Dd[...] ‘if you hear these things which [I have] said.’ (P, which is
otherwise identical, has nn, as is usual in higher registers of Middle Kingdom Middle
Egyptian.) With the caveat resulting from the last mentioned passage, one may thus be
tempted to cautiously speculate on a possible difference between documentary and
literary registers, partly projecting over time; accordingly, one may be tempted to
derive a weak indication for a terminus post quem non for Khakheperreseneb by the
early Thirteenth Dynasty.
The argument is fallacious. As a consideration of the context implies, nA in
Khakheperreseneb vso 1 has strong deictic force, pointing to what the lament itself is
about, the events ‘through the land’. Broadly similar is Ptahhotep 507 itself: at the
opening of the epilogue, the demonstrative points to the whole teaching, and the
selection of nA in L1 does so even more strongly (§2.4.4.2.2, (ii)). Also in the Twelfth
Dynasty, a similar analysis applies to Kagemni 2.5 pA Sfdw ‘this roll’ and Eloquent
Peasant B2 128 nAy=k n sprwt ‘these petitions of yours’ (§2.4.4.2.2, (i) and (iii),
respectively). These are not before relative clauses, but the very selection of a
demonstrative of the -A series is yet again at a salient junction in the overall articula-
tion of the text, reflexive with respect to the text in which they occur. Accordingly,
the use of nA as in Khakheperreseneb vso 1 is fully consistent with what is otherwise
observed in at least some Middle Kingdom literary registers, including Twelfth
Dynasty ones.
B. Khakheperreseneb has another instance of pA which may at first seem to provide
an indication for dating:

(ii) Khakheperreseneb vso 3

Xrt sf im mi pA hrw
‘Yesterday’s share of it is like today’s.’

In Twelfth Dynasty literary registers, nominal ‘today’ appears as min or hrw pn: e.g.
Debate 104 xnmsw nw min ‘the friends of today’. Similarly after the Twelfth Dynasty,
in a text that is otherwise replete with pA’s, ‘today’ is still hrw pn: Cheops’ Court 7.3-
4 r-mn-m hrw pn ‘up to the present day’. PA hrw ‘today’, on the other hand, is
documented only twice in pre-New Kingdom texts, in Heqanakht II ro 5375 and in
P. Berlin 10063.376 In the early New Kingdom, the expression is still confined to
registers that otherwise accommodate innovative expressions.377 Of the two older
expressions, min and hrw pn, the latter is here relevant, since Khakheperreseneb vso 3
alludes to a common formula contrasting ‘yesterday’ with ‘today’: this is realized by a

375 Kroeber 1970: 57, ex.1.

376 HannLex 5: 1577b.
377 Kroeber 1970: 58, ex.2-5.

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 2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb 165

demonstrative pronoun, thus hrw pn (‘this day’, as opposed to the days before).378 In
the Middle Kingdom, the formula invariably appears as hrw pn, not pA hrw, e.g. (iii).
In the early New Kingdom, on the other hand, the formulation pA hrw is occasionally
documented, e.g. (iv):

(iii) Khentemsemti (temp. Amenemhat II), 4-5

Hs wi m hrw pn r sf
‘I am more praised on this day than yesterday.’

(iv) Urk. IV 1618, 14 (Nebamun’s installation, temp. Thutmosis IV):

(...) iw nfr sw m pA hrw r sf
‘(...) while it is better today than yesterday.’

In terms of register, Khentemsemti’s biographical inscription has various elements in

common with Middle Kingdom literature (§4.1.3.C): this text would therefore seem
relevant to assessing how the phrase may have been if Khakheperreseneb had been
composed at this period in time. As to the more modern formulation in Nebamun, this
is in a profane context, and contrasts with the older formulation nfr sw m hrw pn r sf
in a funerary context in the same tomb (Urk. IV 1622, 13). The contrast, initially a
diachronic one, has become one of registers, associated with different functions
(profane vs. funerary) in the context of an early New Kingdom tomb.379 In the tableau
sketched above, Khakheperreseb vso 3 aligns with m pA hrw as in the profance, more
innovative, version of Nebamun. Bare attestation is thereby substantiated by a
coherent distribution of registers: an indication for a late dating of Khakheperreseneb
would seem to be given.
The above reasoning is fallacious because it fails to take into account how
expression and content may relate to each other in specific ways within a given
composition. Khakheperreseneb is about ‘what happens’ (ro 10), about the fact that
‘changes are happening’ (ro 10), about the fact that ‘it is not like last year’ (ro 10). An
allusion to the formula contrasting ‘yesterday’ with ‘today’ is therefore generally
appropriate. The deixis in Khakheperreseneb’s ‘today’, however, is much stronger
than in the formula alluded to, since ‘today’ points to nothing less than the ‘changes’
‘happening’, the very object of the composition. Such enhanced deixis is realized in
Khakheperreseneb by pA, rather than by the regular and unremarkable pn. Similar

378 Min is used in Khakheperreseneb as well, in the adverbial expression m-min (vso 2). Unlike the
expression discussed in the main text, this is not contrastive. The expression m-min itself is
paralleled twice in Middle Kingdom literary registers (Debate 5; Sinuhe B 186). In the New
Kingdom, it recurs in Book of the Dead (TLA #64840). Unlike (adverbial) min, m-min is
uncommon at all times.
379 The differentiation in registers extends to other expressions, e.g. circumstantial iw before a quality
predication (nfr sw) in the profane context. As to the older formulation, this need not be a back-
translation, as was suggested by Kroeber 1977: 58 and n.5 (‘Es fällt immerhin auf, daß der
Übersetzer (scil. translating back into Middle Egyptian, AS) nicht das alte Adverb mjn gebrauchte!
War es ihm nicht mehr bekannt?’). Since the formulation is contrastive between ‘yesterday’ and
‘today’, hrw pn, not min, is the correct older expression. Accordingly, no deduction on the
direction of translation can be made. More likely is that both formulations would have been made
simultaneously, in different registers.

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 166 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

correlations have been discussed in Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian literary

compostions (§2.4.4.2.2, (i)-(v)).

2.7.3.2 Problematic, uncertain, or insufficiently consolidated indications

I go on presenting three expressions that based on their patterns of attestation in the
external record would seem to afford indications for dating, yet do not, or only
limitedly. The first is problematic because differences between various types of
written discourses must be taken into account. The second is uncertain because it may
ultimately be on patterning, rather than on grammar proper. The third remains brittle
because the current understanding of Middle Egyptian grammar is too sketchy in the
relevant domain to permit consolidating (or invalidating) the argument.
A. Khakheperreseneb has a combination of Hr-ntt with rf, which deserves some
discussion:

(i) Khakheperreseneb ro 3
(...) Hr-ntt rf wHmw Dddt
‘(...) for what has been said can only be repeated.’

In Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian, Hr-ntt is not documented in combination with

rf, neither in literature nor in documentary texts. Thus, in a literary register, with Hr-
ntt followed by the very same nfr sw construction as in Khakheperreseneb ro 3:

(ii) Horus and Seth (Middle Kingdom), X+2.5

(...) Hr-ntt dns tw r=i
‘(...) for you are too heavy for me.’

@r-ntt rf is, on the other hand, found in the early New Kingdom: the combination is
found both in documentary texts (iii)-(iv) and in a literary one (v):

(iii) P. Louvre 3230B (Tay to Ahmes Peniati; temp. Hatshepsut), 4-5

(...) Hr-nt[t] rf Srit pw n rx=s bAk
‘(...) for she is only a girl that does not know to work.’
Sim. 6-7 (...) Hr-ntt rf tAy=s mwt Hr hAb n=i Hr-Dd ‘(...) for your mother writes to
me in these words:’

(iv) P. MMA 27.3.560 (Tit to Djehuti; temp. Hatshepsut), 2-3

(...) Hr-ntt rf twt th r=f m nA n rmT iwnw
‘(This is a message to let my lord know the matter about Ptahsokary),
for it is correct that you have done damage to him with the people of
Heliopolis.
(Speak with the herald Geregmennefer and you both write a letter about him to
the Great-of-Seers.)’

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 2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb 167

In this letter, twt has often been interpreted as the antiquated independent
pronoun, here in an address to a superior, and twt th a cleft-sentence.380 Quack381
proposes to read differently, with twt a participle and twt th a nfr sw construction,
as in the above tentative translation. This may perhaps be supported by Eloquent
Peasant B1 153 t(w)t TAwt n iwtw xwt=f ‘Theft suits one without belongings.’
Under this interpretation, this would be the exact same construction as in
Khakheperreseneb ro 3.

(v) Neferhotep (TT 50; temp. Horemheb), pl.IV, third song, 1-2
(...) Hr-ntt rf nn wn wny sw
‘(...) for there is none who may avoid it (scil. the day of death)’

And further:
- Sethi I’s Year 9 Kanais Inscription C 4 (KRI I 68, 4) (...) Hr-nty rf st mi dpiw ‘(...)
for they are like crocodiles’;
- Sinuhe AOS 64-65 (...) Hr-ntt rf iw iAwt hAw ‘(...) for old age has descended’ (the
original reading of B 168 is unclear, but traditionally restored to <n->ntt <r>f, see
below).

It is observed further that Hr-ntt is not rare in the Middle Kingdom, and documented
in a variety of texts, registers, and discourse situations, consistently without rf.
Among these are letters (Heqanakht, Illahun), permitting direct comparison with early
New Kingdom letters (iii)-(iv). The contrast is not easily accounted for in terms of
different semantics in early New Kingdom (which routinely have Hr-ntt rf) and
Middle Kingdom letters (which never have it). Accordingly, Hr-ntt rf in early New
Kingdom letters seems to have developed into a semi-bound combination. One may
be tempted, then, to relate the presence of Hr-ntt rf in Khakheperreseneb ro 3 to a
similar early New Kingdom horizon.
The argument remains problematic, however. @r-ntt rf, as documented in early
New Kingdom letters, necessarily had its origins in discourse, i.e. in freer and more
strongly semantically determined uses. If the semantic analysis of Khakheperreseneb
ro 3 proposed by Oréal382 is to be followed, this may be just one such case. Be this as
it may (I remain agnostic), the possibility itself has to be taken into account, all the
more so in a text, Khakheperreseneb, that deploys a complexly articulated argument.
In this context, Sinuhe B 168, if indeed to be restored as <n->ntt <r>f, is noteworthy
as well, since this may be providing one early instance of another X-ntt conjunction
followed by rf.
B. Khakheperreseneb ro 6-7 has a construction that may be broadly described as the
use of a prepositional phrase expressing temporal extension in a nominal slot (more
precise description below):

380 Brunner 19862: 175, n.3, followed by Vernus 1990a: 65, n.33, Stauder 2013: §6.4.
381 P.c. 6/2010.
382 Oréal 2011: 88-9.

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 168 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

(vi) Khakheperreseneb ro 6-7

SAa-r Xt tpt nfryt-r iww Hr-sA sny=sn r swAt
‘From the first generation to the ones that come afterward, they imitate what
has passed.’383
The construction is not paralleled in any Twelfth Dynasty register, literary or other-
wise. It is, on the other hand, paralleled to varying degrees in the following
passages:384

(vii) Ipuwer 3.8

r-mn-m kftiw n ii.n=sn
‘From as far as Crete(?) they (scil. pine and oil) do not come.’385
(viii) Thutmosis III’s Poetical Stela 22 (Urk. IV 618, 1)
r-mn-m Sat m Ammt=k
‘As far as Shat is in your grasp.’
(ix) Urk. IV 649, 9 (Thutmosis III’s Annals)
(...) Hna SAa-r nhrn m [...]
‘(...) and until Naharina in [...]’
(x) Duties of the Vizier R 9-10 (Urk. IV 1107, 11-12)
ir wpwty nb h(A)bw TAti m wpwt n sr
m SAa-m sr tp(y) nfryt-r sr n nfryt
‘As for any messenger whom the vizier sends with a message to an official—
beginning with the first official down to the last official—(...)’
Sim. Akhenaten’s Second Proclamation A 12-13
xr ir Axt-itn
m SAa-m pA wD rsy n Axt-itn nfryt-r pA wD mHty m xAyt r-iwd wD r wD Hr pA Dw
imnt[y n] Axt-itn (...)
‘Now as for Akhetaten—
starting from the southern stela of Akhetaten to the northern stela, measured
between stela and stela on the western mountain of Akhetaten—(...)’.

In these passages and in Khakheperreseneb ro 6-7 alike, a prepositional phrase with a

preposition expressing extension functions syntactically as a noun. In (vii) and (viii),
this prepositional phrase is in the subject position, as in Khakheperreseneb ro 6-7. In
(vii), this prepositional phrase in subject position is antecedent to a following
anaphoric =sn, as in Khakheperreseneb ro 6-7. Of the above, three occurrences are
from the early Eighteenth Dynasty, while one is from a composition, Ipuwer, that

383 Interpretation after Vernus 1995a: 14, n.q.

384 The first three were already noted by Vernus 1995a: 14, n.q.
385 Reading after Enmarch 2008: 88-9; also below, §6.2.2.5, (iv).

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 2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb 169

itself remains insecurely dated, beyond a firmly established terminus ante quem non
by the early Thirteenth Dynasty (§6.2.2.5).
Caution is here recommended in view of the overall low frequency of the
construction. That the construction is not documented in Twelfth Dynasty Middle
Egyptian literary texts may have to do with a different patterning of these. Phrased
with this caveat, the distribution of the construction in the record remains noteworthy
and may be interpreted as weakly indicative of a post-Twelfth Dynasty dating of
Khakheperreseneb.
C. The following construction is illustrative, finally, of how the currently still limited
understanding of vast portions of Middle Egyptian grammar may hamper dating:

(xi) Khakheperreseneb ro 5
nn mdt ntt kA=s Dd=s
‘There is no discourse that plans how it is said(?)’

While the overall meaning, which hinges on the interpretation of Dd=s, remains
debated,386 one element is clear, namely that kA is the full lexical verb kAi ‘devise,
plan, plot’.387 The construction in Khakheperreseneb ro 5 is therefore an instance of
the rare nty sDm=f.
In Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian, finite forms after nty are by and large
limited to negative constructions, mostly passive ones.388 Among non-negative nty-
headed relative clauses with finite verbs, a single instance of nty sDm.n=f has been
quoted for Middle Egyptian: this is from an extremely specific context, which
accounts for the selection of an analytical strategy in this particular case.389 No

386 In the above tentative translation, I interpret Dd as an infinitive. Similarly for grammar, but with a
different overall interpretation, e.g. Dils, TLA: ‘Es gibt (bisher?) keine Rede, die ihr Zitiert-Werden
beabsichtigt(?).’ Not to be ruled out is an interpretation of Dd=s as a finite form in circumstantial
function, as favored by Vernus (1995a: 4): ‘Il n’y a pas de parole qui envisage l’avenir en faisant
sens.’ A full summary of the various translations, and associating interpretations, to which this
difficult verse has been subjected is given in Dils, TLA.
387 Vernus 1995a: 13.
388 EG §201. E.g. Shipwrecked Sailor 73 (...) nty n mA.t(w)=f ‘(...) one who has not been seen’;
Eloquent Peasant B1 347 (...) nty n pH.n.tw=f ‘(...) that can not be reached’. That negative
constructions can display analytic relativization strategies (i.e. nty-headed ones, as opposed to
synthetic ones, with participles and relative forms) has a straightforward rationale in processing,
since negative clauses are inherently more difficult to process than positive ones. An account in
terms of processing is further confirmed by the propensity of negative nty-headed clauses to be
more often than not in the passive, itself more difficult to process than the active.
389 Siut I 295 (...) pA tA Hnqt irrw (or irw: <iw r w>) n=i tA qnbt nt Hwt-nTr nty rD.n=i n=Tn sw ‘(...) this
bread and beer which this council of the temple makes for me, and which I have given to you.’
This altogether exceptional construction probably relates to the distance of the nty-headed relative
clause to its antecedent (pA tA Hnqt), from which it is separated by another relative construction
(ir(r)w n=i tA qnbt nt Hwt-nTr): the selection of a nty-headed clause is probably a strategy to ease
processing. Alternative accounts that have been proposed are in semantic terms: specific
expression of perfect aspect, with current relevance (Allen 2013: 197, ex.12.176), or underlining of
a pivotal element (here the destinee, n=Tn) (Borghouts 2010: I, §109.d). In any event, the
construction in Siut I 295, which remains unparalleled in Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian,
relates to the specific determinations of this passage.

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 170 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

Middle Egyptian instance of nty sDm=f is known.390 In Old Egyptian, two occurrences
have been noted:391 the construction then remains exceptional and may have served to
‘specifiy a temporal relationship between the antecedent and the action of the relative
clauses’, thus ‘denoting a situation of limited validity’.392 Any such nuance seems to
be absent in Khakheperreseneb ro 5, which has general validity.
The construction is, on the other hand, occasionally documented in post-classical
times (a), in Late Egyptian (b), and in Traditional Egyptian (c):393

(a) Early New Kingdom varieties of Middle Egyptian394

(xii) Installation of the Vizier 11
(...) wDa-mdw nty kA=f ir n=f (...)
‘(...) a judgment which he plans to do to him (scil. the appealing petitioner) (...)’

(xiii) Litany of the Sun, 6th Invocation395

(...) nty Dwi=f nTrw=f (...)
‘(...) who calls to his gods (...)’

390 At first, CT II 375c-376a (all variants: two from Saqqara, eleven from Bersheh) could be read as
(...) Dw pf n bAXw nty pt tn rhn=s Hr=f ‘(...) this mountain of Bakhu on which the sky leans’. This
would then be an instance of nty NP sDm=f, itself entirely unparalleled. A parallel passage has Dw
pf bAXw nty pt tn rhn.ti Hr=f (quoted in EG §328): as noted by Winand & Gohy (2011: 215, n.109),
this strongly suggests that CT II 376a is itself to be read as nty pt tn rhn s(i) Hr=f. While a
construction nty NP nfr sw would be odd in general, the present case, in the third person feminine
singular, is merely an instance of nfr s(i) as the morphological alternant to the third person
feminine singular pseudoparticiple.
391 Edel 1955-1964: §1058.
392 Allen 2013: 197, ex.12.173, 12.174.
393 Lastly, Winand & Gohy 2011: 213-5, with references to previous discussions (n.99-102).
394 These two parallels are already drawn by Vernus 1995a: 13, n.m. Possibly different is the case of
the following passage, which may involve a mrr=f form (although it need not: the long written
stem mAA- can in post-classical times stand for other forms than the mrr=f): Book of the Dead 90
Nu, 2-3 (quoted after EG §201) (...) irty=k ipn nty mAA=k im=sn m mAswt.k(i) ‘(...) these two eyes
of yours by which you see on your knees’. Unclear in interpretation is Heavenly Cow 8-9
(R.II+R.III) wn.in Hm=f Hr siA mdt nt kAt (or: kA.t(w), or kA.t(i)) r=f in rmT ‘His Majesty recognized
the matter that was being devised against him by the people’ (on the dating of Heavenly Cow,
below, §4.6). If the spelling of nt is followed, this may be a case of n + infinitive. This
construction, however, seems to be preferred with non-referential antecedents (this is an
impression based on text-reading, a dedicated study remains to be done)—unlike what is the case
here. This then leaves two options: either as the construction here discussed, in the passive (nt(t)
kA.t(w)), or as an analytical relative construction with a pseudoparticiple (nt(t) kA.t(i)). I fail to find
a way to decide between these options.
395 Text: Hornung 1975: 11. As regards the dating, the composition includes various Old Egyptian
expressions and a dating to the Old Kingdom has been proposed (Quack 2000b: 559). However,
these expressions could all be accounted for in later periods as well (in relevant details, Werning
2013). Moreover, the composition includes various features that upon closer analysis turn out not
to be Old Egyptian at all, but only Old Egyptian-looking; these are identified as such by an
analysis of form-function mismatches of various sorts (similarly for Amduat, Jansen-Winkeln
2012). In the case of Litany, the following have been noted: postposed isT coordinating clauses, not
nouns (Werning 2013: #26); pn N outside balanced contexts (#27; further Werning 2011: I, 190-1;
259); sw-headed constructions (Werning 2013: #33; §4.7.3 in the present study); swt is
constructions (Werning 2013: #34). These point to an early New Kindom dating of the
composition, at least in its present wording (Werning 2013: §4).

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 2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb 171

(b) Late Egyptian

(xiv) Wenamun 2.27-28 (LES 69.13)396
(...) pA nty wn=f
‘(...) the one who was there’
Sim. P. BM EA 10375, 14-15; LEM 73, 7-8; Taharqa, 4.397

(c) Traditional Egyptian398

(xv) P. Harris Magical vso I.2-5399
xtm rA n mAiw HTwt tp n iAwt nb qA sD sp-sn
nty wnm=w m iwf swr=w m snf r stwhA=w nHm msDr=w (...)
‘Seal the mouth of lions, hyenas, all type of long-tailed livestock
that eats meat and drinks blood, to bewitch them, to take their hearing (...)’
Sim. ibid, vso II.3-5; P. Brooklyn 47.218.135, V.7-8.400

In interpreting the occurrence of the same construction in Khakheperreseneb ro 5, a

first issue is whether the two isolated Old Kingdom instances of nty sDm=f are to be
related to the later occurrences of nty sDm=f, and if so, how. As mentioned above, the
former may have different semantics than the latter; the mere fact of a formal
commonality between the two need not imply continuity over time, since an analytical
construction may have emerged at two different periods independently. Alternatively,
continuity in language use could be posited: even so, however, this need not imply
that the construction was part of the written standards that defined Middle Egyptian.
A second interpretive issue lies with the pattern of attestation of the construction.
In the New Kingdom itself, the construction remains uncommon, and this although
relativization itself is an important functional domain in language. The non-
occurrence of the construction in earlier times must then be interprteted against such
general rarity. In the Middle Kingdom, the record is perhaps dense enough for this to
be significant; in the Second Intermediate Period, it is certainly not. Moreover,
diachronic studies in the domain of relativization remain a desideratum as of 2013: the
change that could here be relevant can therefore not be related to broader processes of
change affecting the domain. The overall assessment must therefore be barely
descriptive: the construction nty sDm=f in Khakheperreseneb ro 5 is not documented
with such semantics before the New Kingdom. This is noteworthy, since the

396 Dedicated discussion of the grammar of this passage: Winand 2007; for an analysis of the complex
literary implications, notably for Wenamun’s very name, Moers 2001: 92-4.
397 Winand & Gohy 2011: 214, ex.281-3.
398 Also Vernus 1982: 83, n.15.
399 Winand & Gohy 2011: 213, ex.279. As discussed by the authors, wnm and swr can not be (old)
mrr=f or (recent) i.mr=f for the morphological, respectively semantic, reasons discussed by the
authors. As also discussed by the authors, the context makes a general present tense translation
vastly preferable over a past tense one. Accordingly, this is a genuine instance of nty sDm=f with
general present tense, as in Khakheperreseneb ro 5.
400 Winand & Gohy 2011: 213, ex.280; 214, ex.284.

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 172 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

construction also remains undocumented in other Middle Egyptian literary registers.

How relevant this is for dating remains unclear.

2.7.3.3 The lexicon

Among lexical expressions in Khakheperreseneb, the following two are most note-
worthy:

(i) Khakheperreseneb ro 6-7 SAa-r (...) nfryt-r (...) ‘from (...) until (...)’
The expression is not otherwise attested in this particular form. In a slightly different
form, as SAa-n (...) nfryt-r (...), it is found twice in Illahun (P. Berlin 10074 vso 4;
P. Berlin 10225 vso 2).401 It recurs as SAa-m (...) nfryt-r (...) in the Eighteenth Dynasty,
when it is not uncommon, e.g. Urk. IV 38, 12; 125, 12; 648, 6; 776, 4; 895, 16; Duties
of the Vizier R 10 (Urk. IV 1107, 12);402 later in the Dynasty also e.g. Akhenaton’s
Second Proclamation A 12; A 13; A 24; Tutankhamun’s Restoration Stela 6 (Urk. IV
2027, 4); Neferhotep (TT 50), pl.LX, 238. The expression in Khakheperreseneb ro 6-
7 differs from these only by the first part, SAa-r.
As regards SAa-r, this has a fairly limited distribution which is itself not without
interest: the expression occurs once in the Thirteenth Dynasty P. Bulaq 18,403 several
times in Kamose Inscriptions (T. Carn. 4 and passim), then in Thutmosis III’s Annals
(Urk. IV 649, 9).404 ¥Aa-r thus appears limited to a period stretching from the
Thirteenth to the early Eighteenth Dynasty; in this period, it remains confined to texts
that are otherwise fairly innovative linguistically.
Weaving the above together, SAa-r (...) nfryt-r (...) is indicative of a terminus ante
quem non by the Thirteenth Dynasty for Khakheperreseneb. Whether this can be
narrowed down further is uncertain: one may observe that early occurrences (of SAa-n
(...) nfryt-r (...) in Illahun, and of SAa-r in P. Bulaq 18) are from documentary registers,
and that the expression may have spread only later to literary registers such as in
Khakheperreseneb. This remains impossible to confirm.

(ii) Khakheperreseneb ro 10 (= O. Cairo JE 50249 1) and vso 1 nkA ‘think

about, meditate on’
In a literary register, the expression recurs only in Fishing and Fowling A2.8.405 The
word is perhaps once attested in the pre-New Kingdom record, in an isolated and
possibly problematic Coffin Text instance.406 NkA is, on the other hand, found in

401 TLA #550077.

402 On the dating of Duties, §2.8.3.5.
403 DZA 29.946.600.
404 Later also r-SAa-r: P. Mook II.1 (temp. Thutmosis IV; quoted in EG §180); Chonsemhab O. Louvre
N667+N700 IV.x+8 (TLA #854087).
405 Parkinson 2002: 110, 229, with a discussion of the different overtones of nkA in Fishing and
Fowling and Khakheperreseneb.
406 CT VI 251b (see Faulkner 1973-1978: II, 213 and 214, n. 2). The passage is preserved only in two
witnesses, one of which (Sq6C) is presumably faulty (skA). The other one (Sq3C) has nkA, but with
a semogram (Z9) different from the expected one (A2). The other instance quoted in HannLex 5:
1351c (Sinuhe B 72 = R 96) is to be read otherwise, as nn kA=f (nn sDm=f, after a iw=f r sDm
construction), see already DZA 25.315.040.

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 2.7 The limitations of linguistic dating 1: Khakheperreseneb 173

various places in the early New Kingdom:407 Urk. IV 46, 16; 138, 14; 434, 8; 1381, 8;
Book of the Dead, passim.408 Literary texts securely dated to the Middle Kingdom, for
their part, consistently use (etymologically related) kAi ‘think about’ with roughly
similar semantic extension,409 as do contemporaneous inscriptional texts.410 Given this
pattern of attestation, the single (problematic) Coffin Text example evoked above
does not stand in the way of an assessment of nkA as typical of the early New King-
dom. Taking into account the low density of the Second Intermediate Period record,
the expression is indicative of a post-Middle Kingdom language in the literary sphere.
There can be no guarantee, however, that nkA is original in the two instances in
which it occurs in Khakheperreseneb (a similar comment extends to the instance in
Fishing and Fowling). Sinuhe G once has nkA where B and R have kAi (B 6 = R 30),411
and Ptahhotep L2 similarly once has nkA where P has kAi (117). In the same texts, kAi
is just as often, if not slightly more often, left standing: Ptahhotep 345 L2 has kAi as in
L1, and Sinuhe AOS preserves kAi in all other places (B 72, B 112, B 131; also B 144,
preserved only in P4). In Khakheperreseneb (and/or Fishing and Fowling), nkA may
thus well be original, or it may not be.

2.7.3.4 Expressions recurring combined

Several of the expressions discussed above as possibly indicative for dating recur
combined in some texts.
Kares (Urk. IV 45-9; temp. Amenhotep I)412 has nkA constructed indirectly (nkA m:
Urk. IV 46, 16; also Kh. ro 10, §2.7.3.3, (ii)).413 Just a few lines below, the same text
has the uncommon idiom HAp Xt Hr ‘to keep silent about’ (Urk. IV 47, 10; also Kh. ro
13).414
NkA recurs in the Vizieral Cycle (Appointment of the Vizier 11). In the same group
of texts tightly related to each other, an instance of nty sDm=f is found in a formula-
tion that closely compares with the one in Khakheperreseneb (Installation of the
Vizier 11; also Kh. ro 5, §2.7.3.2.C). The Cycle also has SAa-m (...) nfryt-r (...) (Duties
of the Vizier R 10;415 also Kh. ro 6-7, §2.7.3.3, (i)). In both texts, the prepositional
phrase expresses extension is used as if a noun phrase (§2.7.3.2.B). Of the above, the
second and fourth constructions are rare, and therefore remarkable.
¥Aa-m (...) nfryt-r (...) recurs in Thutmosis III’s Jardin Botanique (Urk. IV 776, 4).
The same short text also has the very rare, and therefore remarkable, expression xppy
‘extraordinary’ (Urk. IV 775, 15; also Kh. ro 2, §2.4.5, (ii)). Related to Jardin
Botanique both by contents and in space, Thutmosis III’s Annals, provides one of very

407 DZA 25.315.010: ‘nur Dyn. 18’ (NB: before de Buck’s edition of Coffin Texts).
408 TLA #89260 and the associated DZA files.
409 Sinuhe B 6; B 72; B 112; B 131; B 144 (and the equivalent passages in R); Ptahhotep 117 P; 255
P; 267 P; 345 L1; Sasobek B1 7 (references from TLA #163220).
410 E.g. Semna Stela 3. Further HannLex 5: 2541b-c.
411 G is followed by AOS, while C preserves kAi.
412 On Kares and this text, now Gnirs 2013b: 156-9.
413 Already Gardiner 1909: 101.
414 Already Gardiner 1909: 104.
415 On the dating of Duties, §2.8.3.5.

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 174 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

few instances of SAa-r (Urk. IV 649, 9; §2.7.3.3, (i)), again in the construction as if a
noun phrase.

2.7.4 Dating Khakheperreseneb

In dating Khakheperreseneb, only one full-fledged linguistic argument is given,

Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non criterion (§2.6.2.5; §2.7.1.B). This implies a
terminus ante quem non by the early Thirteenth Dynasty, or perhaps late Twelfth. By
any event, the composition is later than the reign of Senwosret II, by a few decades or
by much more.
Khakhaperreseneb includes two rare expressions that are only documented in the
Middle Kingdom (rD.tw; HA A clause: §2.7.2.2). Both are sparsely attested and in
literature only: they therefore only demonstrate that Khakheperreseneb belongs to a
common Middle Egyptian literary tradition, which according to a common interpreta-
tion the composition refers to and emulates. Unless an independent hypothesis is
made to imply that such literary tradition was fairly concentrated in time, these ex-
pressions do not afford an indication for dating.
Khakhaperreseneb also includes a series of expressions not documented in the
Middle Kingdom, and for several of these not before the early New Kingdom
(§2.7.3.2-3); in all cases, bare patterns of attestation are in need of interpretation. One
grammatical expression could very well have existed earlier than its first secure
attestation (Hr-ntt rf: §2.7.3.2.A) and does not, therefore, provide a reliable indication.
One lexical expression points to a post-Twelfth Dynasty dating, but it can not be
determined that this is original in the text (nkA: §2.7.3.3, (ii)). Another grammatical
expression is uncertain because of the low numbers involved, but would seem to point
to a Late Middle Kingdom terminus ante quem non (a prepositional phrase expressing
extension used as if a noun phrase: §2.7.3.2.B). Another one may point to a post-
Twelfth Dynasty dating, but the relevant chapter of Middle Egyptian grammar still
needs to be written for any argument to be consolidated (nty sDm=f: §2.7.3.2.C). A
stronger indication for a dating no earlier than the Thirteenth Dynasty is given by one
prepositional expression (SAa-r (...) nfryt-r (...): §2.7.3.3, (i)). Some indications thus
converge in confirming a dating no earlier than to the early Thirteenth Dynasty, but
none implies a more precise dating.
Going beyond individual linguistic items, Khakheperreseneb shares a series of
expressions, grammatical and lexical, with Eloquent Peasant, some rare and therefore
noteworthy (§2.7.3). Conversely, other similarly rare and remarkable expressions in
Khakheperreseneb recur, grouped, in a set of early Eighteenth Dynasty texts
(§2.7.3.4). As these conflicting groupings imply, no definite argument can be derived
in either direction. One could for example speculate that elements shared with
Eloquent Peasant reflect the common Middle Egyptian literary tradition to which both
compositions relate, while elements in common with certain early Eighteenth Dynasty
texts would reflect the horizon in which Khakheperreseneb was composed: this is
possible, but would be purely an hypothesis, not any more backed up by independent
linguistic argument.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 175

Linguistically, Khakheperreseneb could therefore have been composed at any

moment in time between the early Thirteenth and the early Eighteenth Dynasty. In
dating the composition further, one major issue would be until when the type of
literary discourse Khakheperreseneb is an exponent of—what has been termed
‘discourses’—remained productive. Answering this question is in no small part
dependent on the dating of Ipuwer, which remains unclear beyond a similar terminus
ante quem non to the early Thirteenth Dynasty (§6.2.2.5), and of Khakheperreseneb
itself.

2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare

2.8.1 Introduction

The Teaching for Merikare416 is first documented in early New Kingdom manuscripts:
P. Petersburg 1116 A vso (= E), P. Moscow 4658 (= M), and P. Carlsberg VI (= C).417
Of these, the first has accounts on its recto dating to Amenhotep II; the copy of the
literary text could date to a slightly later period, from Thutmosis IV to Amenhotep
III.418 P. Moscow 4658 dates to the late Eighteenth Dynasty and P. Carlsberg VI
probably to the same period, although a later dating has been proposed. In terms of
circulation, P. Petersburg 1116 A is broadly Memphite (Perunefer) and associates the
composition with Neferti, documented on P. Petersburg 1116 B vso. P. Moscow 4658
was bought in Thebes and probably derives from a single find that includes other
Middle Egyptian literary texts;419 of these, two were composed in the Twelfth
Dynasty (Sinuhe and Ptahhotep), while for two other ones (Fishing and Fowling and
Sporting King) a later date of composition deserves serious consideration (§3.2; §4.3).
P. Carlsberg VI is of unknown provenience. Unlike various other Middle Egyptian
compositions of as yet insecure dating, Merikare does not feature among the early
New Kingdom Assiut graffiti.
The dating of the composition to the time of its Herakleopolitan setting, once
contemplated, has been shown to be baseless.420 At a time when the model of an early
Twelfth Dynasty political literature was dominant, a detailed argument has been put
forward to date Merikare to the reign of Senwosret I.421 Focusing on the closing

416 Text: Quack 1992.

417 Quack 1992: 10-2.
418 Lastly Gnirs 2006: 254-5.
419 On this find, lastly Hagen 2012a: 179-80.
420 In decisive terms, Björkman 1964 and Quack 1992: 114-20. For a history of early research, also
Burkard & Thissen 20124: 111-3.
421 Quack 1992: 120-36. The argument is to be read in relation to the particular interpretive frame it
makes reference to, and upon which it is therefore contingent. Also to be taken into account is that
a series of texts adduced by the author to outline an early Twelfth Dynasty context for Merikare
are themselves of as yet insecure dating: these include Neferti (Quack 1992: 121), Amenemhat
(123), Loyaliste (124-5), Tod Inscription (128-30), and Berlin Leather Roll (131-2); for linguistic
perspectives on these texts, below (Neferti: §5; Amenemhat: §6; Loyaliste §4.5; Berlin Leather
Roll: §4.2). The remaining texts considered by Quack are firmly dated: whether these suffice to

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 176 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

hymn, a dating to the early Eighteenth Dynasty has been suggested by another
author.422 With a view on the whole composition, a detailed argument for a dating to
the same period has been proposed more recently.423 A preference for a late, rather
than early, Twelfth Dynasty dating has also been expressed,424 as has one for a dating
to the Middle Kingdom more generally;425 another author suspends his judgement
altogether.426 The text in its present shape is difficult both philologically and seman-
tically, making attempts at a linguistic dating no easier.

2.8.2 A terminus post quem non earlier than the Eighteenth Dynasty?

In attempting to define a linguistic terminus post quem non pointing to a period earlier
than the first manuscript attestation, the grammar of Merikare is considered on
various levels: first as a literary token of Middle Egyptian in general (§2.8.2.1), then
with a view on expressions that are less accesible because they are uncommon in text
(§2.8.2.2) or because they involve a subtle contrast in function (§2.8.2.3).

outline a context specific enough for dating Merikare is unclear, however. I do not agree with the
interpretation that Mentuwoser (temp. Senwosret I), 14 should be viewed as quoting Merikare E
43-44 (Quack 1992: 134; originally Kees 1928: 76-8), thereby providing a terminus post quem non
for the literary text (Quack 1992: 135-6). While Quack rightly observes that the formulation is not
common (134), this need not imply a direct dependency: Middle Egyptian written culture is
generally intertextual to a high degree. Moreover, suggesting that the literary text must have been
the ‘Vorbild’ (Quack 1992: 134) makes significant assumptions on the relationship between
various types of written discourses. More likely is a scenario by which both texts, the biographical
and the literary one, would have drawn on a similar motif (for which see also Aametju 16 (below,
n.527) and Rekhmire 37 (Urk. IV 1082, 14: Fischer-Elfert 1999: 144-5). Noteworthy is also the
encounter between Merikare E 44 and Ptahhotep L2 418-419 (Fischer-Elfert 1988: 184; 1999:
168, interpreted by the author as a quotation from the former in the latter): this further documents
the motif in an Eighteenth Dynasty horizon. Quack (1992: 12, with reference to an observation
originally made by Posener) further mentioned that some hieratic sign forms in witness E may
suggest a Middle Kingdom Vorlage. This is discussed critically by Giewekemeyer 2013: n.7; for
issues relating to the form of script in literary manuscripts and in documentary texts, further Gnirs
2013b: 128, n.4; also Parkinson 2002: 313.
422 Bickel 1994: 178-9, 214-9, based on the anthropocentristic orientation of the closing hymn and
differences in cosmology with Coffin Texts. The first of these elements was noted as innovative by
Blumenthal (1980) already, who suggested that the hymn may have originally stood as an
independent piece. Yet, as Parkinson’s (2002: 254-7) reading implies, the hymn is integral to the
overall composition, of which it is a ‘culmination’, ‘with universalized assertions’ (254). Stadler
(2009: 375) comments that the characterization of the creator god in the hymn is in fact
documented in the Middle Kingdom. This is based on BD 175a and Heavenly Cow. Yet, the dating
of the former text to the Middle Kingdom remains itself an hypothesis only, if one argued for by
the author. As regards Heavenly Cow, linguistic analysis (called for by Stadler 2009: 375, n.115)
demonstrates that this text was composed in the Eighteenth Dynasty (§4.6). More consequential is
the caveat expressed by Parkinson (2002: 254, 316), that the differences observed by Bickel could
be ‘of discourses rather than chronology’.
423 Gnirs 2006. Skepticism has been voiced on various sides (e.g. Hagen 2012a: 155, n.23; Burkard &
Thissen 20124: 112-3; Stadler 2009: 375), yet no author has so far engaged with the argument any
further.
424 Parkinson 2002: 248-9, 316 (in cautious terms).
425 Quirke 2004a: 112: ‘probably of Middle Kingdom date’.
426 Vernus 20102b: 206, upon reception of Gnirs’ (2006) proposal.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 177

2.8.2.1 Middle Egyptian language

As far as the present author was able to determine, the Middle Egyptian of Merikare
would be generally consistent both with a Middle Kingdom and an early Eighteenth
Dynasty dating. Pars pro toto, this is illustrated by two expressions:
(i) Merikare E 128-129
Ssp bit nt aqA-ib r iwA n ir isft
‘The character of the right-hearted one is more acceptable427 than the ox of the
evil-doer.’
Sim. E 91; E 102; E 130.428
The construction, a nfr sw pattern with a passive participle as predicate is
common in Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian literature; it is similarly productive
in higher written registers of the early New Kingdom (§2.7.2.1, (iii)).

(ii) Merikare E 120-121

xpr.n is m irt.n=i
rx.n(=i) st r-sA ir.tw{=i}
‘It happened through my own doing,
although I learnt about it only after it had been done.’
This would fit a Middle Kingdom dating. It would fit a later one just as well: for
discourse-connective is in the early New Kingdom, §1.2, (ix) and §5.1.4.2, (viii)-
(ix); for subjectless clauses, in the active with xpr and in the passive (here ir.tw),
e.g. Thutmosis I’s Abydos Stela 5 (Urk. IV 96, 14-15) SA xrp wD ir.tw ‘Command,
and it will occur; order and it will be done.’
Only r-sA followed by a verbal form warrants some discussion. The
construction is well documented in literary texts securely dated to the Middle
Kingdom (Debate 153; Shipwrecked Sailor 179-180; 180-181). In Merikare, r-sA
+ verb recurs, fronted, in E 7 ir r-sA xpr mdt=k r b[...] ‘When your discourse has
taken place about [...]’. The fronted construction is found in two Middle Kingdom
documentary texts (P. Reisner II, pl.5, 13; P. Berlin 10025 vso 9). Eighteenth
Dynasty inscriptional texts generally use another construction with similar
functions, m-xt sDm=f (e.g. Urk. IV 139, 10); also in fronted position, ir m-xt
sDm=f (e.g. Urk. IV 768, 11-13). Yet, r-sA + verb is documented in a literary
composition later than the Twelfth Dynasty (Cheops’ Court 6.11) and recurs in
medical texts (e.g. P. Ebers 21.13; 41.16; also, fronted, in 44.2),429 in Book of the
Dead,430 and in Duties of the Vizier R 21 (Urk. IV 1112, 4).431 Under the

427 Following Vernus’ (1995a: 10) semantic analysis.

428 Quack 1992: 55, n.a.
429 Medical texts display various antiquated expressions and may well harken back to a tradition
reaching deep in time, yet are not necessarily much earlier in their present form than their first
manuscript attestation at the turn of the early New Kingdom. A linguistic dating of medical texts
remains to be attempted.
430 See TLA #80017.
431 For the dating of Duties of the Vizier, below, §2.8.3.5.

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 178 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

hypothesis of a later date of composition of Merikare, r-sA + verb could have been
selected in a literary register for its slightly antiquated quality, instead of m-
xt + verb favored in inscriptional texts. This possibility is directly documented by
Neferkare and Sisene, a composition which is argued below to date to the
Eighteenth Dynasty (§4.4): P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+14 ir-sA aq=f Hm=f [...] ‘After
His Majesty entered [...]’. The same composition also has m-xt + verb, what is
more in the form xr m-xt (P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+9: §4.4.4.1).

2.8.2.2 Rare expressions

Expressions that are uncommon in text have a specific status. While their patterns of
attestation are comparatively less reliable, they also stand a better chance of providing
a terminus post quem non inasmuch as rarity translates into lesser exposure (compare
§1.2.A). Conversely, documenting that even rare expressions were cultivated in
relevant registers in post-Middle Kingdom times can contribute further characterizing
the grammar of Merikare as not specifically related to the Middle Kingdom.

(i) Merikare E 91
is aAmw Xsa qsn pw n bw nt=f im
‘Behold, the vile432 Asiatic, he is a painful thing for the place where he is.’

The sentence-initial particle isw is very rare and remains poorly understood in its
functions.433 In the Middle Kingdom, isw is famously attested, no less than nine times,
in one text, the Illahun Hymns to Senwosret III,434 while it apparently remains
undocumented otherwise in this period. The particle recurs in the main Eighteenth
Dynasty witness of another Middle Egyptian literary composition of as yet insecure
dating, Amenemhat (6e P. Millingen; the other early witness here preserved,
T. Carnarvon 5, probably had ist: §6.1.3.2). The expression also recurs in Mutter und
Kind VIII.4 (Spruch M), a text documented in an Eighteenth Dynasty witness
(P. Berlin 3027) and arguably a post-Middle Kingdom composition (§5.3.4.2, (iii)). In
addition, isw is found inserted in an Eighteenth Dynasty witness of Sinuhe, S 4
(followed by G and Ramesside witnesses; R 7-8 without the particle) is Haw nTr Abx m
ir sw.435 While the reading is here secondary, it contributes demonstrating that isw
was part of early New Kingdom littérateurs’ Middle Egyptian repertoires. The
expression, which apparently was never a common one, recurs in yet later times.436

432 It has been proposed to emend Xs away (Quack 1992: 55, n.b.). However, the translation associated
with this proposal (‘Wahrlich, der Asiat ist übel dran (...)’) does not fit the classifying semantics of
the qsn pw construction (similarly Vernus 20102b: 208-9).
433 Oréal 2011: 253.
434 Different interpretation by Oréal 2011: 253.
435 Discussed by Parkinson 2009: 182, n.16; Gnirs 2013a: 379.
436 TLA #851437: in Book of the Dead, passim; in Two Brothers, passim (several instances are
interrogative, as noted in TLA); perhaps in Traditional Egyptian (where the possibility that is
stands as a spelling for ist must be discussed in each case individually). In addition, isw may be
related to Coptic eis, which would imply a continuous use well after the early New Kingdom,
although not necessarily in those written standards that were committed to writing.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 179

(ii) Merikare E 87-88

nn mn n=k Hapi tm=f iw
bAk<t> m-a=k nt tA-mHw
‘The Nileflood will not be painful to you if it fails to come:
For the labor-dues of the Delta are in your hand.’
As is reflected in various translations, different grammatical analyses have been
contemplated:
() It has been proposed to view Hapi tm=f iw as a noun clause forming the
subject to mn, with a translation as ‘Nicht wird für dich schlimm sein, daß eine
Überschwemmung nicht kommt.’437 This implies a left-extraposition of a nominal
constituent (Hapi) within a noun clause embedded into a higher syntactic node.
Left-extraposition, however, is strictly limited to main clauses in Middle
Egyptian.438
() It has been proposed that nn would have scope over both mn n=k Hapi and
tm=f iw, for a translation as ‘The Nileflood will not be sick for you and fail to
come.’439 The construction nn tm=f sDm is otherwise documented,440 but no case
is known in which nn has scope over two successive clauses as would here be the
case.441
() It has finally been proposed that tm=f iw may relate to the following clause to
which it would provide a setting, for a translation along the lines of: ‘The
Nileflood will not be sick to you: (Even) when it fails to come, the labor duties of
the Delta belong to you.’442 This is possible grammatically and would yield a
meaning similar to the one in the reading here advocated. It is less likely than the
latter, however, because of the markedly irregular verse lengths that would result.
Accordingly, Hapi is the subject of mn and tm=f iw a circumstantial clause,
expressing a condition to the main clause nn mn n=k Hapi.443

&m=f sDm after the main clause generally seems to express a condition.444 It is only
sparsely documented, in the Old Kingdom (iii) and in the Middle Kingdom (iv) alike,
yet recurs later as well, if with what seems to be a somewhat different meaning,

437 Quack 1992: 53, n.b.

438 Left-extraposition is never documented in the Middle Egyptian record in any environments other
than main clauses. The functional rationale is that left-extraposition, a marked-topic construction,
has to do with topic-focus articulation, and thereby with inter-sentential cohesion; the construction
can not, therefore, occur in a clause that is embedded into a higher syntactic node. That
interpretation () is impossible is also noted by Vernus 1997: 7, n.17.
439 Parkinson 1997a: 223.
440 E.g. Sinuhe B 74-75 nn tm=f ir bw nfr ‘He will not fail to do good.’
441 In similar environments, nn is repeated, e.g. with full noun subjects, Eloquent Peasant B1 151-152
nn n=k nn n=s nn <r>=s nn r=k n irr=k (or ir=k) st n irr=<s> (or ir=<s>) st ‘what is not for you
is not for her; what not against her, not against you; you will(?) not do it, she will(?) not do it!’
(transl. Parkinson 2012a: 128-9).
442 Dils, TLA.
443 Similarly Allen 2013: 130, ex.9.114; Vernus 1997: 7, n.17; EG, p.265, n.4.
444 The listing below is by no means exhaustive, nor is the semantic description of the construction
fully clear: a dedicated study of tm=f sDm after a main clause remains a desideratum.

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 180 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

possibly contextual (v). In view of the low density of attestation of the construction at
all times, no argument can be made that it had become obsolete by the early Eigh-
teenth Dynasty, a few generations only after Nubkheperre Antef’s Coptos Decree:

(iii) Pyr. §499cW

n id=f tm=f sDm xrw=k
‘He will not be deaf if he does not hear your voice.’445
(iv) P. Ramesseum III B 10-11
rDt Ssp Xrd tm=f snqw
‘Making a child take (milk) when it does not suck.’446
And elsewhere in medical texts, e.g. P. Ebers 49.8.447

(v) Nubkheperre Antef’s Coptos Decree 5-6

imi xsf.tw n=f m iAt=f nTsic Hwt-nTr m sA n sA iwa n iwa
ptx Hr tA
nHmw aqw=f Drf<=f> wabwt=f
tm sxAt rn=f m rA-pr pn mi irrt r mity=f sbi Hr xftiw nTr=f
dr sSw=f m Hwt-nTr nTsic mnw m pr-HD Hr Sfdw nb r-mitt
‘Cause him to be punished in his office of the temple, from son to son, from
heir to heir,
being cast on the ground,
his food rations, title-deeds(?), and joints being taken away,
his name not being remembered in this temple, as is done against his like who
rebelled against the enemies of his god,
his writings being removed from the temple of Min, from the treasury and on
every roll likewise.’

2.8.2.3 Subtle contrasts in meaning: N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr sDm

In attempting to define a terminus post quem non earlier than the first manuscript
attestation of a composition to be dated, another strategy consists in looking for con-
trasts in meaning of a subtle nature. These are less easily manipulated by composers
and may thus provide better indications than the more immediately salient dimensions
of e.g. linguistic form (compare §1.2.A). An example of such subtle contrasts in
meaning is the aspectual contrast between N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr sDm. In Merikare,
the contrast is fully productive. It has therefore been proposed that Merikare should
pre-date the time when NP Hr sDm begun being used as a general relative present
tense, invading the domain once reserved to N(P) sDm=f. Merikare would thereby get
a linguistic terminus post quem non by the mid-Twelfth Dynasty.448

445 Allen 1984: §283; related is also the construction discussed in Allen 1984: §352.
446 Borghouts 2010: I, §59.d.
447 EG §347.3.
448 Vernus 1990a: 185.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 181

As discussed, the post quem non part of the aspectual criterion can not be upheld
(§2.6.3). By way of a further illustration, relevant constructions in Merikare are here
set against similar ones in post-Middle Kingdom times. In Merikare, both N(P) sDm=f
and NP Hr sDm are used in general characterizations, of the king and of the Sungod.
The contrast in meaning is of a subtle nature. With NP Hr sDm (i), the characterization
is related to, and thus temporally bounded by, some preceding segment of discourse
(in the example quoted, rmm=sn). With N(P) sDm=f (ii), by contrast, the characteriza-
tion is not related to any other segment of discourse and remains temporally un-
bounded; the preceding A pw B construction is diagnostic of such temporality as well:
(i) Merikare E 135
rmm=sn
iw=f Hr sDm
‘Whenever they cry,
he is listening.’
(ii) Merikare E 24-25
sh[A] pw n niwt Xnn[-ib]
iw=f sxpr=f mrw 2 m DAmw
‘The tumultuous man is a factor of disturbance for the town;
He raises two parties among the youth.’
The exact same subtle contrast can be found in early Eighteenth Dynasty royal
compositions, for instance in Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy (iii)-(iv):

(iii) Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy 14-19 (Urk. IV 18, 10 - 19, 12)

prr=f (...)
HAtiw Hr ftft n=f
dgg.tw=f mi ra (...)
niAw Hr ibA m inwt
‘Whenever he comes forth (...),
the hearts are shuddering for him.
Whenever he is seen like Re,
ibexes are dancing in the wadis (...)’

(iv) Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy 19-20 (Urk. IV 19, 13 - 20, 3)

nsw wa sbA.n spdt Hsy n sSAt (...)
iw=f Ssm=f sSw r tp-Hsb
wr HkAw pw nb mrwt r nsw nb (...)
‘A unique king, taught by Sothis, praised by Seshat (...)
He leads the scribes to rectitude;
He is a great of magic, a lord of love more than any king (...)’

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 182 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

2.8.3 A terminus ante quem non?

Possible indications for a terminus ante quem non are considered in turn. Elements of
late orthography in the early New Kingdom witnesses in which Merikare is first docu-
mented are entirely inconsequential for assessing the date of composition.449 Elements
of late lexical morphology go beyond the graphic level as they involve genuinely
younger forms, yet remain similarly unreliable when it comes to dating.450 Various
other elements are noteworthy, however, either descriptively or as providing possible
indications.

2.8.3.1 Merikare E 67-68

This following much disputed passage451 is probably best understood by relating the
iwty-headed clause to the immediately preceding noun phrase (xAst wAyt).452 The con-
struction is an instance of circumstantial iwty mrr=f:453

(i) Merikare E 67-68

sb twtw=k r xAst wAyt iwty DD=sn sHwy iry
‘Send your statues to a far away country of which a summary is not given.’
A. Circumstantial iwty mrr=f, a fairly rare construction,454 is more common in the
early New Kingdom than in any other times and may thus be described as ‘typical’ of
that horizon (ii)-(iii) (some cases may involve either iwty mrr=f or iwty with a
suffixed infinitive: (iv)):

(ii) Thutmosis I’s Abydos Stela 6 (Urk. IV 97, 7-8)

(...) SsA m rxt.n=f iwty thh=f rdyt m Hr=f
‘(...) one experienced through what he has learnt, who does not transgress what
has been assigned to him’

449 E.g. (a) pronominal morphology: st for sn (suffix pronoun): E 56 Tst=st; E 85 HD.n=st (Quack
1992: 37, n.b); (b) verbal morphology: E 90 subjunctive mAA=i (for classical mA=i or mAn=i);
(c) n for m: perhaps in E 71 n-mitt (§2.3.1.1, (vii)).
450 E.g. (a) snk ‘be greedy’ for skn (Quack 1992: 79, n.b. with further references on snk as the younger
form); the older form, skn, is found in Middle Kingdom literary texts (e.g. Eloquent Peasant B1
210; Ptahhotep 296); the history of the latter text illustrates the possibility of an alteration of skn
(P) into snk (L2); (b) m-mr(y)t for n-mrwt: E 118 m-mryt (C m-mr[y]t); E 114 m-mrt (C m-mryt);
for m-mryt as an Eighteenth Dynasty written form, compare Book of the Dead passim (TLA
#79190) or, in an inscriptional register, Urk. IV 1796, 8.
451 Besides the iwty-headed clause, interpretive issues concern the referent of the pronoun =sn.
Compare the proposals collected in Dils, TLA; Werning 2013: #9.
452 Lastly Werning 2013: #9; Allen 2013: 128, ex.9.102; Vernus 20102b: 188; also e.g. Quack 1992:
41; EG §443.
453 The construction remains the same if the iwty-headed clause is related to twtw=k, as in Parkinson’s
(1997a: 221) interpretation.
454 Pending a study yet to done, compare Werning 2013: #9; EG §443.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 183

Sim. Urk. IV 410, 5-6 (Senenmut)455 (...) sxm-ib iwty b(A)gg=f Hr mnw n nb nTrw
‘(...) one strong of heart, who is not negligent over the monuments of the lord of
the gods’ (a formula;456 see below, (vi)).

(iii) Chapelle Rouge, p.150: XV.8-9 (HHBT II 33, 9)

(...) iT grt iwty nHm.tw m-a=f
‘(...) one who seizes, moreover, from whom it can not be taken away’
(iv) Urk. IV 959, 14-15 (Iamunedjeh)457
(...) tm b(A)g Hr rdyt m Hr=f iwty qdd=f m grH
‘(...) one not weary about what has been assigned to him, who does not sleep
at night’
With qdd=f possibly a suffixed infinitive. Other morphologically ambiguous
cases: Urk. IV 971, 14 (Great Royal Herald Antef) iwty nma=f (...) ‘who is not
partial (...)’; DZA 24.589.140, l.9 (Thutmosis, TT 110) mdw r wSb iwty war=f
‘one who answers to a question, who does not flee’. In one case at least, a non-
finite construction is more likely: DZA 24.591.350 (Book of the Dead) iAty xsf=f
im=sn (/=s) ‘without getting refused from them/it(?)’.458

Middle Kingdom literary texts display another construction in similar functions.

Contrast Merikare E 67-68 with e.g.:
(v) Shipwrecked Sailor 148
(...) tA wA n rx sw rmT
‘(...) a far land, which people do not know.’
Yet, circumstantial iwty mrr=f is also, if only occasionally, documented in earlier
times. The association with the early New Kingdom is not exclusive:

(vi) Ini (D.13), b, col.3-4459

mnx-ib iwty bAgg=f r=s
‘(...) one excellent of heart, who does not become negligent about it’
The same formula as in (v). With another verbal form, also with general
imperfective aspect, Rudjahau (later D.11), 11-12460 (...) iwt sDr.n rmT Spt r=f ‘(...)
one on account of whom no men (ever) went to sleep angry’; in a construction
with passive meaning, either with a suffixed infinitive or a sDm(w)-passive,
Hatnub 25, 3 (...) iwt rx=f in rmT ‘(...) one who is not known by anybody.’461

455 Noted in EG §443.

456 Also e.g. DZA 24.589.770 (BM EA 160); noted by Werning 2013: #9.
457 Noted in EG §443.
458 Also from Book of the Dead, DZA 24.590.900; these examples noted by Werning 2013: #9.
459 Noted by Borghouts 2010: I, §109.d.(i).
460 Noted by Borghouts 2010: I, §27.c.
461 Noted by Werning 2013: #9 fine; Borghouts 2010: I, §40.g NB 4. Perhaps also to be mentioned is
the following instance of a construction iwty + suffixed noun: Nesimontu 11-12 wAst iw sxrwyw

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 184 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

B. Merikare E 67-68 must also be appreciated with a view on a textual alternation in

a Middle Egyptian literary text securely dated to the Middle Kingdom:462
(vii) Ptahhotep 350-351
P im=k wHm mski n mdt n sDm=k sw
‘You shall not repeat a gossipy affair(?): you have not experienced it!’

L2463 im=k wHm ms[ki] n mdt iwty sDm=k sw

‘You shall not repeat a gossipy affair(?) that you have not experienced.’

For the present purpose, the implication is twofold. The direct contrast between iwty
sDm=k sw (L2) and n sDm=k (P) is exactly similar to the one between xAst wAyt iwty
DD=sn sHwy iry (Merikare E 67-68: (i)) and tA wA n rx sw rmT (Shipwrecked Sailor
148: (v)). This strengthens what was said on the construction in Merikare E 67-68
being ‘typical’ of an early New Kingdom horizon as opposed to a Middle Kingdom
one. On the other hand, Ptahhotep 350-351 also directly illustrates how the con-
struction in Merikare E 67-68 could well have come about secondarily in textual
transmission. While the construction in Merikare E 67-68 is worth noting as a token
of an early New Kingdom phenomenology of the text as transmitted, it does not
provide a reliable criterion for dating the composition itself.

2.8.3.2 Merikare E 14
Although damaged, the following passage is one of the most consequential for dating
Merikare:
Merikare E 14
Hn n=k sw kA tm{=k}a [...]
‘Order him to you and then [...] will not [...]’
a) The suffix has been stricken through in red.464

A. KA tm=f sDm (early occurrences: Urk. IV 655, 4; P. Hearst XI.14; O. Berlin 1269
vso 3)465 is the diachronic successor of tm.kA=f sDm (e.g. CT II 174i). The lack of pre-
New Kingdom attestations of kA tm=f sDm is an accidental gap: the negative
construction was probably possible as early as kA-headed ones themselves were
(negative constructions are generally less common in text, and therefore in the record,
than positive ones). Any argument possibly to be made on kA tm=f sDm in Merikare E
14 must therefore target the positive construction, kA sDm=f.
Concerning kA sDm=f, ‘the bulk of occurrences extends from late Dynasty XII to
early Dynasty XVIII, a time when these constructions still belonged to the non-formal

iwtt mnt=s m Smaw (...) ‘Thebes, the island of planners(?), which is without precedent in Upper
Egypt (...)’ (noted by Borghouts 2010: I, §109.d (i)). CT I 170g-j B13C remains unclear in
interpretation (Werning 2013: #9), since this may also be a complement clause (Uljas 2007a: 208).
462 Noted by Werning 2013: #9, who also draws the parallel with Merikare E 67-68.
463 Caminos 1956: pl.28a.
464 Quack 1992: 165; Burkard 1977: 256.
465 Quack 1992: 17, n.b.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 185

language since they were used in administrative letters.’466 In literary registers, kA-
headed constructions are found in Cheops’ Court and in a series of texts not docu-
mented before the early New Kingdom, Khakheperreseneb, Fishing and Fowling,
Hymn to Hapi, Neferkare and Sisene, and Ipuwer. In literary texts securely dated to
the Twelfth Dynasty, kA-headed constructions recur only in Kagemni 1.10 and
probably in Sasobek B2.7.467 Outside literary texts, these constructions are common in
administrative texts from the late Twelfth Dynasty on.468 Another occurrence is in a
late Middle Kingdom address to the living.469 The possibly earliest instance is in a
Twelfth Dynasty letter to the dead.470 Coffin Texts still have synthetic sDm.kA=f
exclusively, commonly so.471 This implies that a dating of Merikare to its
Herakleopolitan setting, already rebutted on other grounds, is certainly too early on
linguistic grounds as well.
The distribution of the construction in the record further suggests that a dating to
the early Twelfth Dynasty, as has also been contemplated, may itself be too early. It
can not disprove such dating fully because securely dated early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty
literary texts such as Sinuhe or Ptahhotep and others do not have any of the kA-marked
constructions, neither synthetic (sDm.kA=f ) nor analytic ones (kA-initial). Register and,
associated with this, issues to do with the spread of change, may provide an
indication, however.
Among literary texts mentioned above, Ipuwer, Khakheperreseneb, and Fishing
and Fowling all have a terminus ante quem non by the early Thirteenth, or perhaps
late Twelfth, Dynasty by the aspectual ante quem non criterion (§2.6.2.4-6); further
linguistic indications confirm a terminus ante quem non by the Thirteenth Dynasty for
the first two (§6.2.2.5; §2.7) and suggest a yet later dating for the third (§3.2).
Cheops’ Court, where the constructions are common, has a type-B terminus ante
quem non by the early Thirteenth Dynasty (§2.4.4.1.B), while Hymn to Hapi and
Neferkare and Sisene are linguistically later still (§3.4; §4.4). This leaves only two
instances in the Twelfth Dynasty, one in Kagemni and one in Sasobek.
In Coffin Texts, only synthetic sDm.kA=f is found, commonly so. As is generally
the case and directly illustrated in earlier and later times by changes affecting the
morphologically similar -xr-marked forms and constructions, the spread of
innovations is very gradual.472 With -kA-marked forms and constructions, change is

466 Vernus 1990a: 89. The following discussion is based on data from the detailed tableau in Vernus
1990a: 88-90.
467 KA itself is partly broken; the context, however, leaves little other possibility than reading with a
kA-headed construction.
468 Compare TLA #162840.
469 Liverpool 13846, 3-7 (Vernus 1990a: 92, ex.164).
470 Cairo Bowl 6-7 ir nfr.n m-a=k kA pr=k xbA ‘If there is nothing from you, then your house will be
destroyed’ (quoted by Vernus 1990a: 90, ex.160).
471 Vernus 1990a: 86-7.
472 For the replacement of synthetic sDm.xr=f by analytic wn.xr=f Hr sDm in the First Intermediate
Period and early Middle Kingdom, Vernus 1990a: 63-5, 68-71; in Coffin Texts for example, both
constructions are used side by side. For the replacement of xr NP sDm=f by the bound construction
xr-sDm=f during the Eighteenth Dynasty, resulting in a situation in which the two constructions
were used side by side in the same texts, §3.4.2.2.C. For further well studied cases of gradualness

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 186 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

not even incipient in Coffin Texts. Only one text that has a kA-headed construction
may possibly date to the early Twelfth Dynasty, the Cairo Bowl letter to the dead. As
noted, the expression is common in documentary registers from the late Twelfth
Dynasty on through the early New Kingdom.
In the literary composition in which it is most common, Cheops’ Court, the
abundance of kA-headed constructions, as well as possibly the configuration of indivi-
dual instances thereof, may in part have to do with register (e.g. §2.4.4.7, (ii)). As
regards Sasobek and Kagemni, these also include elements that are noteworthy in
terms of register: presentative ptr and xr m-xt for the former (§2.4.4.4, (iv)),
sequences of narrative constructions similar to ones in Cheops’ Court and deictic
expressions for the latter (§2.4.4.3). In Kagemni, kA heads a A pw construction,
following imperatives: 1.10 Ssp D=f n=k m win st kA ssft pw ‘Take when he gives to
you, do not reject it! Then it will be something that soothes.’ In Ptahhotep, by con-
trast, generalizing maxims of the A pw (B) type follow imperatives directly, without
kA: this is indicative of a difference in tone between the two compositions.
The above outlines a coherent background in terms of spread of change in time
and across registers. That a kA-headed construction should be found in a register such
as in Merikare would be surprising if this had indeed been composed as early as the
early Twelfth Dynasty.

NB. Worth a merely descriptive note is also the broader construction of which kA
sDm=f in Merikare E 14 is a part, a sequence of an imperative followed by a kA-
headed verbal clause. In this precise form, the sequence remains unparalleled in any
text securely dated to the Twelfth Dynasty, literary or documentary. It recurs, on the
other hand, in the final stanza of Hymn to Hapi, repeatedly (14.5; 14.6; 14.10:
§3.4.4.NB)—a composition for which a dating to the late Seventeenth/early Eigh-
teenth Dynasty is argued below on linguistic grounds (§3.4). In non-literary texts, two
further occurrences of the same sequence are from early Eighteenth Dynasty letters:
() P. BM EA 10107 ro (Ptahu to Ahmes Peniati; temp. Hatshepsut), 6-7
mi
kA wp{t}=k [H]na=f
‘Come
and then dispute with him!’
() P. MMA 27.3.560 (Tit to Djehuti; temp. Hatshepsut), 3
mdw <Hna> wHmw grg-mn-nfr
kA hAb=tn Sat Hr=f n wr-mA
‘Speak with the herald Geregmennefer
and then write a letter about it to the High-Priest of Heliopolis.’
In later times, a few instances of an apparently similar construction are also found in
Ramesside Miscellanies; e.g., with slightly different semantics, P. Anastasi V, VIII.3-4

in the spread of innovations in second millennium Egyptian, all implying protracted periods in
time during which the older and newer expressions coexisted, §2.1.1.B.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 187

(LEM 59, 11-12)473 ir n=k tA iAt sr kA gm=k sw m-xt iAwt ‘Exercise the office of
magistrate and then you will find it after old age.’474
This does not, however, afford reliable evidence in support of a very late dating
of Merikare. In late Twelfth Dynasty letters, the sequence under consideration is not
found, even though kA-headed clauses are not uncommon; in several cases, however,
contexts are fragmentary. In securely dated Twelfth Dynasty literary texts, kA-headed
constructions are very rare in general, but include one case where a (non-verbal) kA N
pw clause follows a negative imperative (Kagemni 1.10, quoted above).475 Since
verbal clauses in continuation to an imperative are generally in the subjunctive sDm=f
in Middle Egyptian, this can not be treated as the exact same construction as the
verbal one in Merikare. It strongly suggests, however, that the sequence as in
Merikare may have been acceptable stylistically in a literary register well before the
early New Kingdom. (The issue must be phrased at this level, since on strict gram-
matical grounds the construction would have been possible as early as kA-headed
clauses themselves were.) In sum, it is a worthwhile descriptive observation to note
that exact parallels to the construction as in Merikare are in late Seventeenth/early
Eighteenth Dynasty texts, not before; venturing beyond this bare statement would be
very uncautious.
The following passage, from an Eighteenth Dynasty witness of a Twelfth Dynasty
literary composition, must also be mentioned in the context of the present discussion.
The construction is slightly different, since the kA-headed clause is here itself in the
imperative—an apparently singular combination. Yet, it also includes the feature that
is here of interest, namely the sequence imperative – kA-headed clause:
() Ptahhotep 78-79
L2 m wSb n=f
kA m sisy=k
kA m iat ib n nty m xfty=k
‘Do not reply to him,
and then do not relieve yourself,
and then do not please who happens to be your enemy!’
P m wSd sw r isy ib=k
m ia ib n nty xft=k
‘Do not address him to lighten your heart!
Do not please who is facing you!’
Just as for the construction discussed above (iwty mrr=f: §2.8.3.1), the implication is
twofold. Ptahhotep 78-79 L2 provides an additional element documenting the con-
struction as in Merikare in an early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon. Complementarily, it
also demonstrates that such a construction can arise in the course of textual

473 Noted by Vernus 1990a: 91, n.51.

474 The construction alternates with the more common ir n=k (...) gm=k (imperative – subjunctive):
Erman 19332: §675.
475 After the Twelfth Dynasty also Cheops’ Court 11.25 (a kA-headed in-cleft sentence, after an
imperative).

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 188 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

transmission. In the case of Ptahhotep, the reading in L2 could probably be identified

as secondary on internal grounds in view of the odd, otherwise undocumented,
construction consisting in kA introducing an imperative. In Merikare E 14, by contrast,
nothing on internal grounds suggests that the construction is secondary. In particular,
the kA could not have been merely inserted: if it had, the following tm would remain
unaccounted for.

2.8.3.3 Merikare E 30-31

Merikare has the following construction of indirectly reported speech that is clearly
late:476

Merikare E 30-31
smAa-xrw=k r-gs nTr
ix Dd rmT [m-xmt?]=k
xsf=k r-DAwt i[yt]=ka
‘You should justify yourself in presence of the god
so that people even in your absence may say
that you punish in accordance with theirb offence.’
a) Thus E; M is entirely lost here except for the very end of this passage, [...]WALKING LEGS=f.
b) Sic, see below.

The text in E has two second person pronouns, obviously standing for different
referents (the king, here the addressee, then the people). The structure of the Egyptian
construction can not be rendered directly in any of the customary Egyptological trans-
lation languages because it involves a construction of indirectly reported speech that,
although not unusual typologically, does not exist in these Egyptological languages.
In Egyptian, indirectly reported speech can be realized through an adaptation of the
pronoun of only one of various participants in the clause indirectly reported (Peust’s
rule of ‘Einaktantenanpassung’, (b)):477

(a) Directly reported speech

*ix Dd rmT (...) xsf=f r-DAwt iyt=k
‘so that people say (...): “He (scil. the king) punishes in accordance with your
offence.” ’

(b) Indirectly reported speech, partial adaptation (‘Einaktantenanpassung’)

ix Dd rmT (...) xsf=k r-DAwt iyt=k

(c) Indirectly reported speech, full adaptation

*ix Dd rmT (...) xsf=k r-DAwt iyt=sn
‘so that people say (...) that you punish in accordance with their offence.’

476 Noted and discussed by Kammerzell 1997; subsequently also Peust 2005: 82, ex.14.
477 Peust 1996: 53-6; discussion of further aspects of the construction, Peust 2005.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 189

(In rendering Merikare E 30-31 in Egyptological translation languages, either of

strategies (a) or (c) can be chosen.478)

The construction with partial adaptation (b) is common, if not exclusive, in Later
Egyptian, and particularly in Late Egyptian itself.479 In Old and Middle Egyptian only
the construction with full adaptation of all pronouns, as in (c), is found.480 Merikare E
30-31, with partial adaptation, has the innovative construction; in Middle Kingdom
Middle Egyptian, construction (c) would have been used. This could then be a very
serious indication for dating, assuming that the text in E is original.
Whether this is the case remains slightly uncertain. What survives of the text of
M, [...]D54=f, has a third person pronoun after what based on the walking legs
semogram seems to have been [... iyt]. One may then speculate that M had construc-
tion (c), with full adaptation of the pronouns. However, the reverse may well be true,
with M being secondary to E: if the text originally had construction (c), a third person
plural pronoun, not a singular one as in M, would probably have been expected. There
is no positive indication, therefore, that the text in E should be viewed as secondary
(unless of course a dating of Merikare to a period before the early New Kingdom is
given first, on independent grounds). Still, this is not equivalent to saying that the text
in E must be original. In short, textual uncertainties in Merikare E 30-31 prevent
turning the in itself late construction into a fully reliable argument for dating.

2.8.3.4 The lexicon

Merikare includes several lexical expressions not documented before the early New
Kingdom.
A. Some among these lexical expressions apparently first documented in the New
Kingdom are rare or very rare, making their patterns of attestation unreliable. In
appreciating the overall lexical typology of Merikare, these expressions will weigh
very little:

E 82 pdswt ‘flatland/sand-dunes’;481
E 122 sasa482 ‘deface’;483

478 Kammerzell 1997: 100. In emending E into xsf=k r-DAwt i[yt]={k}<f>, Quack 1992: 23, n.f
suggested that the pronoun =k in i[yt]=k could be due to an assimilation with the preceding
pronoun =k in xsf=k, thereby assuming that i[yt]=k could not be correct as it stands. This line of
reasoning would be impeccable in Egyptological translation languages; it also was for Egyptian
itself by the time Quack wrote (1992), before Peust’s (1996) study of the construction with
‘Einaktantenanpassung’.
479 Peust 1996: 53-6; further Peust 2005.
480 Peust 2005: 94-6; Kammerzell 1997.
481 Also Ramses II’s Inscription Dédicatoire 72 (KRI 330, 14) and DZA 23.543.870 (Medinet Habu);
rare. Note that the verb pds ‘stamp flat, flatten’, from which pdswt is derived, is old (e.g. Urk. I
103, 10).
482 Thus M and C; E has san.
483 Also Ani B 20.14 (Quack 1992: 75, n.a; 1993: 109, n.87); rare.

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 190 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

E 138 shpw ‘regulations’;484

E 139 Ts ‘rule’.485

In addition, E 107 has an instance of the rare aAgsw ‘belt(?)’, probably a loanword.
The time of borrowing of aAgsw, however, turns out to be less clear than once
assumed, making the word ultimately unreliable for dating (§6.2.2.6.3, (ii)).
B. Three other expressions in Merikare—one adverb, one preposition, and one
compound—are considerably more common than the ones just enumerated. All three
expressions remain undocumented before the early New Kingdom. Moreover, there
are indications for each of these expressions that they may indeed be specific to that
very period. These expressions therefore weigh more heavily in an appreciation of the
lexical typology of Merikare, and all the more so cumulatively:

(i) Merikare E 87, E 137 mm in adverbial use (‘there(in)’):

The expression is fairly common in the Eighteenth Dynasty (e.g. Urk. IV 157, 6; 501,
3; 776, 10; 835, 14). Mm is not documented in earlier times:486 one dubious Coffin
Text instance is probably to be read differently.487 Pre-New Kingdom Middle Egyp-
tian consistently uses another expression for similar meaning, im (among the various
meanings im has). The pattern of attestation of mm therefore stands a reasonably good
chance to be reliable.
This leaves the issue of whether mm in Merikare is integral to the original
composition. As is almost invariably the case with lexical expressions, there is no
way to prove this, nor can there be one: that the expression occurs twice in Merikare
is only weakly indicative. Another strategy consists in considering (the) putative
source expression(s) from which mm, if indeed a secondary reading, could have
arisen, namely im. Whenever an observation can be made, with literary compositions
documented in both the Middle and the New Kingdom, im stays stable in textual
transmission. This is no formal proof for mm being original in Merikare, only an
indication that this as well stands a good chance to be the case.

(ii) Merikare E 31 r-DAwt ‘in return for, in accordance with’

The expression remains undocumented in any securely dated pre-New Kingdom text.
It is, on the other hand, fairly common in the Eighteenth Dynasty: Urk. IV 66, 15
(from the tomb of Ineni); Thutmosis I’s Abydos Stela 17 (Urk. IV 101, 10: spelled r-

484 Also Oxford Wisdom Text B.x+3 (Blumenthal 1980: 20-1, n.173; Quack 1992: 83, n.a); rare.
485 For the reading, Quack 1992: 83, n.b; ‘belegt seit D.18’ according to DZA 31.294.650; rare.
486 ‘Seit D.18’ according to Wb. II 2.17; ‘apparently a mere Dyn. XVIII variant of im’ according to
EG §205.1.
487 HannLex 5: 982a. CT VII 53b iw N pn grt rx rn n anxt=k im mm sp-2 ‘This N knows the name of
what you live from among them(?) TWICE(?).’ Faulkner (1973-1978: III, 34, n.13) comments:
‘The frequent changes of person from 52u onward make it impossible to extract a coherent sense
from the text, which appears much garbled. Mm sp 2 at the end of 53b probably represents an
adverbial use of the preposition.’ Wolfgang Schenkel (p.c. 8/2012) also emphasizes the difficulty
of understanding the passages, and prefers other possibilities: ‘(...) In der digitalen Version der
Sargtexte habe ich mm als Präposition notiert, nach der ein substantivischer Ausdruck ausgefallen
wäre. Ich könnte mir auch vorstellen, daß im folgenden sp-2 der verlesene substantivische
Ausdruck steckt: “(...) der Name dessen, wovon du lebst unter (...)”.’

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 191

DAty); Urk. 439, 8 (Djehuty); Urk. 752, 17 and 754, 1 (Thutmosis III’s Annals); Duties
of the Vizier R 9 (Urk. IV 1107, 6) and R 11 (Urk. IV 1109, 8);488 Thutmosis III’s
Gebel Barkal Stela 12 (Urk. IV 1232, 7); Amenhotep II’s Amada Stela 6 (Urk. IV
1291, 13); DZA 31.542.770 (Memnon colossi); 31.542.780 (Luxor, Amenhotep III: r-
DAty); 31.542.700 (Ramose: r-DAw). Other than in Merikare, the preposition recurs in
only one Middle Egyptian literary text, Loyaliste (long version) 12.1.489 As discussed
below, some sections of this composition are demonstrably later than the Middle
Kingdom and at least one segment is as recent as the early Eighteenth Dynasty (§4.5);
even if the section that has r-DAwt were earlier, the clustering of all other occurrences
of the expression in the early New Kingdom remains no less remarkable. R-DAwt does
not recur after the Eighteenth Dynasty in this form.490 In the Middle Kingdom,
another preposition, xft, is used in similar contexts. Compare Merikare E 31 xsf=k r-
DAwt i[yt]=k ‘(...) that you punish in accordance with theirsic offence’; Ptahhotep 180
snD n=f xft xprt n=f ‘Respect him in accordance with what has happened to him.’
Unless r-DAwt in Merikare E 31 is a textual alteration, the expression may provide an
indication for a later dating of the composition. Note that xft in Ptahhotep 180 P is
unaltered in L2.

(iii) Merikare E 33 Hmw-ib ‘with a skillful understanding’

The expression, which remains undocumented before the New Kingdom, is not
uncommon in the early New Kingdom. It is apparently only documented in that
period and may therefore be specific to it. @mw-ib is often said of the king, compared
with Ptah.491 The expression recurs in a private tomb (TT 110; temp. Hatshepsut-
Thutmosis III)492 and in Appointment of the Vizier 25 (Urk. IV 1382, 15), both times
in a series of eulogizing epithets.

2.8.3.5 Digression: A very brief note on dating Duties of the Vizier

One of the texts just mentioned as including two early occurrences of r-DAwt is Duties
of the Vizier, the dating of which is controversial: a brief digression is therefore in
order. The editor of the text proposed an Ahmoside dating based on institutional
analysis, linguistic observations, and a modeling of a possible historical setting.493
However, the last part of this argument remains speculative, so that a dating to an
Ahmoside horizon specifically can not be substantiated. Further institutional analysis

488 On the dating of Duties of the Vizier, below, §2.8.3.5.

489 In A Man 14xy+10 [...] r-DA(n)r (only one witness preserved, Ramesside), the reading is probably
secondary to r-DAr=f ‘relative to his need’ (Fischer-Elfert 1999: 162, initially observed by
Faulkner).
490 Sim. DZA 31.542.630: ‘nur Dyn. 18’; EG §180: ‘common in Dyn. XVIII’. R-DA(n)r, with a similar
meaning, and documented from the late Eighteenth Dynasty on, may be a more recent (written)
form of the same preposition. E.g. Teaching of Amunnakht O. Lacau ro 11 (= O. KV 18/3.614+627
vso 5). Further, DZA 31.546.980-31.547.010.
491 In the common phrase Hmw-ib mi rsi-inb=f: Urk. IV 555, 3; DZA 20.485.900 (Amenhotep II,
Karnak); 20.485.870 (Thutmosis IV, Lateran Obelisk 36); 20.485.910 (a stela of Amenhotep III);
20.485.890 (Ramses II, Karnak Hypostyle Hall); perhaps also, in lacunous context [Hmw-ib mi] ptH
in Tutankhamun’s Restoration Stela 29 (Urk. IV 2032, 6).
492 DZA 26.753.170.
493 Van den Boorn 1988: 333-71.

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 192 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

has also demonstrated significant parallels in documented Late Middle Kingdom and
Second Intermediate Period administrative practices (in several cases down to the late
Seventeenth Dynasty); this has lead other authors to favor a dating to these earlier
periods, notably to the Thirteenth Dynasty.494
I consider the Duties of the Vizier a Thutmoside composition on the following
grounds. In content and form, the text is highly rhetorical and ideological. Duties need
not, therefore, reflect the terminology of administrative practices of their own time
faithfully. Put differently, institutions mentioned in the composition need not
necessarily be read in a strictly referential sense; in some cases, the composers may
also have drawn on (even only slightly) earlier materials for this. (The Vizieral Cycle
is more generally replete with archaizing or recherché features on various levels,
reaching from aspects of the titulary of the viziers495 to orthography496 and language,
notably the lexicon.497) In the context of the funerary self-presentation of the
Aametju-User-Rekhmire dynasty, Duties are complementary in function to other texts
of the Cycle, such as Appointment of the Vizier, Installation of the Vizier, and
Teaching of Aametju. Taking into account the afore mentioned ideological component
of the text, such well designed functional complementarity makes a scenario by which
Duties would have originally stood as an independent composition, only secondarily
to be aggregated onto the later Cycle of which they are an integral component,
unlikely on general grounds. The text also includes various linguistically innovative
features, most notably:498

(i) #r-sDm=f (passim) used alongside older xr NP sDm=f (passim)499

Duties document a transitional stage, exactly similar to the one observed in Installa-
tion of the Vizier, and more broadly typical of the early Eighteenth Dynasty:
discussion below, §3.4.2.2.C.

494 Lastly, Quirke 2004b: 18-24, particularly 23-4.

495 Hagen 2012a: 223-6.
496 Van den Boorn 1988: 293-4.
497 Compare for example in Aametju, §1.3.2.3, (iii)-(v), or imDr in (ix). In Duties themselves, e.g. R 1
(Urk. IV 1103, 17) pHDw, a type of chair (van den Boorn 1988: 25-26); further, van den Boorn
1988: 295-6.
498 The following notes are provisional: a more detailed study of the linguistic typology of Duties of
the Vizier is in preparation. Various expressions were already noted by van den Boorn (1988: 299)
as ‘features of “NK signature” ’, see below. I disagree with other observations by the author. As
rightly noted by van den Boorn 1988 (23), the uses of pA are functionally innovative and very
much compatible with an early New Kingdom dating, yet they are not innovative enough to
formally rule out an earlier dating, such as to the Thirteenth Dynasty. That they are found in a
monumental context is no definite argument pro a late dating either, as such selection can be
interpreted as indexical, just as occasional archaisms are, in a complementary way. Unlike van den
Boorn (1988: 57-8), I do not see iw in R 5 (Urk. IV 1105, 13) iw smi n=f xrt tAwy as being
circumstantial. As to R 10 (Urk. IV 1107, 12), this does not have a preposition m-SAa-m, but a
construction of SAa-m after m (below, (iv) in the main text). Listed under ‘special features’ by van
den Boorn (1988: 298) and therefore rightly not as an argument for dating is the construction of the
prospective participle in -ty with a direct object in R 21-22 (Urk. IV 1112, 6). This finds an
interesting parallel in the L2 version of Ptahhotep 49-50 (Gundacker 2012: 78, ex.10 and n.137),
but recurs in Shipwrecked Sailor 184-185 (Gundacker 2012: 75-9).
499 References given below, §3.4.2.2.C.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 193

(ii) @na sDm used in continuation to a construction other than the imperative,
the subjunctive, or the infinitive500
R 5-6 (Urk. IV 1105, 17 - 1106, 1) xr imi-rA xtm ii=f m Hs=f Hna smit n=f r-Dd ‘Then
the overseer of the treasurer comes to meet him and reports to him saying:’ (xr NP
sDm=f ... Hna sDm ...). Such extended uses of the conjunctive are a New Kingdom
development.501

(iii) #r ir m-xt sDm=f (R 7 (Urk. IV 1106, 12) and R 16 (Urk. IV 1110, 2))502
The expression is only documented in the New Kingdom, and then densely so.
Moreover, its rise can be traced in details in the record.503

(iv) ^Aa-m ... nfryt-r ... (R 10 (Urk. IV 1107, 12))

The expression is densely attested in the Eighteenth Dynasty, never before, and
apparently not later either; see §2.7.3.3, (i). The construction in which it occurs in
Duties is exactly paralleled in Akhenaten’s Second Proclamation A 12-13, both with
ir NP m SAa-m NP nfryt-r NP (...); see §2.7.3.2, (x).

(v) R-DAwt (R 9 (Urk. IV 1107, 6) and R 11 (Urk. IV 1109, 8))

This would remain typical of an Eighteenth Dynasty horizon even if Merikare and/or
Loyaliste (long version) were earlier compositions: compare the pattern of attestion in
§2.8.3.4, (ii).

(vi) anan ‘return’ (verbally R 11 (Urk. IV 1108, 6); nominally R 27 (Urk. IV

1114, 3))504
An admittedly rare word; see §4.6.7.B.

(vii) Perhaps also m-HAw-Hr ‘in addition to’ (R 13 (Urk. IV 1108, 14))505
The shorter form of this preposition, m-HAw, is used in the Middle Kingdom;506 the
longer one is apparently not documented before the early New Kingdom,507 and may
be an innovation of that period.

500 The other instance of Hna sDm, also noted by van den Boorn (1988: 299) as implying a late dating,
does not: Hna sDm=f is in continuation to what is probably a subjunctive (Dd=f ), according with a
usage already documented in much earlier times: R 10-11 Dd=f tA wpwt nt TAty iw=f aHa m-bAH pA sr
Hr Dd tA(y)=f wpwt Hna prt r aHaw=f ‘He shall tell the message of the vizier standing in front of the
official while telling his message, and he shall go out (back) to his post.’
501 Compare Winand 2001, also including references to previous discussions of such uses.
502 Noted by van den Boorn 1988: 73.
503 Neveu 2001: 108-9, more broadly 107-11; Hintze 1950: 14-31. Quirke 1988: 98, n.48 notes an
isolated instance of kA ir m-xt in a letter from Illahun: this is remarkable indeed, and not easily
paralleled in any variety of Middle Egyptian, early or late. However, this is different from xr ir m-
xt, as kA-headed clauses of various sorts are more broadly common in the Illahun letters, while
connective xr, as in xr ir m-xt, is itself a later, early New Kingdom, development.
504 Noted by van den Boorn 1998: 111-2.
505 Noted by van den Boorn 1988: 117-8.
506 E.g. Rediukhnum A19; Mentuwoser 6; Beb (Leiden V 88), 11 (after TLA #65090). The short form
of course continues to be used in the New Kingdom as well, e.g. Urk. IV 188, 2.
507 E.g. Urk. IV 843, 11.

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 194 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

2.8.3.6 Other elements of language

Although not to do with grammar or lexicon proper, two further elements of language
in Merikare merit comment well.
A. One phrasing in Merikare is worth a note of its own:

(i) Merikare E 91
Dd swt nA gr n pDt (...)
‘Now, this is also said about (lit., to) the Bow-people: (...)’

From a strictly linguistic perspective, this is entirely undistinctive: all component

parts, grammatical and lexical alike, can be paralleled in both the Middle Kingdom
and the early New Kingdom.508 What is remarkable, however, is that the exact same
formulation recurs in the following inscription:509

(ii) Statue of the High Steward Amenhotep (temp. Amenhotep III), 44

(Urk. IV 1799, 14)
Dd=i swt nA Xrwa (...)
‘Now, I will say this as well: (...)’
a) Sic, for gr (confusion of signs).

Under the traditional hypothesis of a Middle Kingdom dating of Merikare, this has
been interpreted as a ‘cheville rhétorique’, in echo to Merikare: ‘Il s’agit bien, jusque
dans la gratuité même d’une telle allusion, de faire valoir l’érudition d’un personnage,
avec la légèreté d’une sorte de clin d’œil à ses pairs.’510 To be sure, allusions to
Middle Egyptian compositions are occasionally documented in the Eighteenth
Dynasty,511 as in the quotation of Sinuhe B 309 in another private inscription from the
same reign, Amenhotep son of Hapu’s statue (Back pillar 8; Urk. IV 1825, 11).512 A
closer look at the latter is instructive. The quotation is of one of the closing (and
thereby most saliently exposed) verses in Sinuhe, encapsulating the protagonist’s
paradoxical fate: B 309 nn SwA iry n=f mitt ‘There is no vagabond for which the same
(scil. the royal favors bestowed upon Sinuhe) has been done.’ On the very same
statue, the figure of Sinuhe is alluded to yet another time, through the expression
nmiw-Sa ‘sand-farer’ (Base 12; Urk. IV 1821, 12):513 in the second millennium, this is
found only in Sinuhe itself, where it recurs no less than three times (§2.4.5, (i)),
saliently expressing one aspect of the protagonist’s problematic identity. In
Amenhotep son of Hapu’s statue, the allusion to a Middle Egyptian literary text is
therefore specific, going well. In the High Steward Amenhotep’s statue, the ‘cheville
rhétorique’ here discussed is entirely unspecific. Rather than a ‘sorte de clin d’œil’

508 Thus, for the grammatical expressions: qualifying predication (nfr sw) with a passive participle as
predicate (§2.7.2.1, (iii)); swt (§5.1.4.2, (xi)); pronominal nA (§2.4.4.2.2, (iv)-(v)).
509 Fischer-Elfert 2000: 264.
510 Oréal 2011: 408.
511 Thus, for Sinuhe, now Parkinson 2009: 176-80.
512 Parkinson 2009: 182, n.18; Gardiner 1916: 117.
513 Parkinson 2009: 52, n.13.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 195

among Thutmoside littérateurs, this may well be a token of a shared horizon in

language.514
Also to be noted in this context are instances of Dd swt (in a different grammatical
construction) introducing direct speech in Eighteenth Dynasty texts (iii)-(iv):515

(iii) Teaching of the High-Priest Amenemhat (temp. Amenhotep II),516 2

(Urk. IV 1408, 17 - 1409, 1)517
Dd=f m sbAt xr msw=f
Dd=i swt D=i sDm=tn xprt xr=i Dr hrw tpy (...)
‘He says as a teaching to his children:
“Now, I will speak to have you hear what has happened to me since the first
day (...)” ’

(iv) Chapelle Rouge, p.126: VI.15 (HHBT II 22, 3):

Dd=i swt (...)
‘Now, I will say: (...)’
Sim. p.136: IX.11-12 (HHBT II 27, 3).

B. One expression, finally, deserves a mention of its own, since its extra-linguistic
referent may itself relate to a certain horizon in time: a-rsi ‘Southern Region’. The
expression recurs no less than three times in Merikare (E 71; E 75; E 106). In the
specific sense of a designation of the southern part of Egypt,518 a-rsi is apparently not
documented before the early New Kingdom. Early occurrences include Urk. IV 124, 9
and 125, 11 (Paheri); 362, 11 (Hatshepsut’s Obelisks); DZA 21.541.340 (Nebamun,
temp. Thutmosis IV); 21.541.320 (BM EA 1022; HTBM VIII pl.4). It has been
proposed that the expression could have been coined not much earlier than the period
of its first attestation, with an initial extension covering what had been the center of
power of the later Seventeenth Dynasty.519

2.8.3.7 Groups of expressions

Up to the present point, only individual expressions, grammatical or lexical, were
discussed. With the aim of reducing the uncertainties often attached to individual
expressions, a complementary strategy could consist in considering sets of expres-
sions recurring alongside each other in specific texts or groups of texts.

514 The Chief Steward Amenhotep’s statue has another phrasing superficially reminiscent of a Middle
Egyptian literary composition (46; Urk. IV 1800, 5), compare Neferti 10c-e: §5.3.1.2, n.d to the
example): this as well is very unspecific, hardly an allusion.
515 Only formally similar is the collocation of swt with Dd in Sinuhe B 37 (...) Dd.n=i swt m iw-ms (...)
‘(...) But I spoke in untruth: (...)’. Unlike in the cases quoted in the main text, this does not serve to
introduce direct speech: Sinuhe B 37 is only parenthetically inserted in already ongoing direct
discourse. %wt is used for its regular adversative force.
516 Text: Gardiner 1910. Discussion: Gnirs 2013b: 136-8; Hagen 2012a: 187-9.
517 Also noted by Oréal 2011: 408.
518 The mere collocation of a ‘region’ with rsi ‘southern’ is of course found in earlier times, with a
mythological referent (HannLex 5: 467b) or as the ‘southern part/section’ of a place (e.g. HHBT 18, 4).
519 Gnirs 2006: 213-4.

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 196 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

As discussed above, the preposition r-DAwt ‘in return for, in accordance with’ may
be suggestive of a late dating of Merikare (§2.8.3.4, (ii)). Remarkably, this recurs in a
series of texts or groups of texts that like Merikare also have iwty mrr=f (§2.8.3.1)
(a)-(b) or adverbial mm (§2.8.3.4, (i)) (c). Iwty mrr=f itself recurs in a text that has an
instance of the rare Dd swt for introducing direct speech (§2.8.3.6.A) (d). To set
observations on language into a slightly broader context, I add notes on similar
formulations in smaller font; these are explicitly not meant to function as an argument
for dating in themselves.

(a) Thutmosis I’s Abydos Stela:

- R-DAwt (spelled r-DAty): 17 (Urk. IV 101, 10) – Merikare E 31
- Iwty mrr=f: 6 (Urk. IV 97, 7-8) – Merikare E 67-68
The beginning of the inscription also has phraseological parallels with Merikare:
- (...) m ibw an (...) m Hr:
Thutmosis I’s Abydos Stela 2 (Urk. IV 95, 8-9) hr.wy nn m ibw rmTw an.wy nn m
Hrw nTrw ‘How happy is this to the hearts of men, how beautiful is this to the
faces of the gods’;520
– Merikare E 22-23 aq m [...] m ibw an sw m Hr Dt=f ‘Who enters the hearts as
[...], he is beautiful to his people’s face.’
- Grg tA pn:521
Thutmosis I’s Abydos Stela 3 (Urk. IV 95, 15-16) (...) Dr grg.tw tA pn ‘(...) since
this land was founded.’
– Merikare E 49 iw tA pn r grg Xr=s ‘This land will be founded through it.’

(b) Royal inscriptions of Thutmosis III:

- R-DAwt: Urk. IV 752, 17; 754, 1; 1232, 7 – Merikare E 31
- Mm: Urk. IV 157, 6; 776, 10; 835, 14 – Merikare E 87; E 137
One of these texts has a formulation that recurs verbatim in Merikare:522
Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building Inscription 21 (Urk. IV 164, 15) nHH pw grt wnn
im ‘Now, being there is eternity.’
– Merikare E 56 nHH pw grt wn<n> im.

520 This formulation, which recurs in contemporaneous inscriptions, is phraseologically bound. A

variant is (...) m Hrw rmTw (...) m ibw nTrw in Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building Inscription 8
(Urk. IV 159, 5-6), a text that also resonates with Merikare (below, (c)).
521 The collocation of grg with tA in reference to Egypt recurs in Sethi I’s Nauri Decree 6 (KRI I 47, 2)
and in Wenamun 2.20. Slightly different in detail, but also in reference to Egypt, is grg kmt in
Sethi I’s Alabaster Stela 4 (KRI I 39, 5); also, partly broken, in Tutankhamun’s Restoration Stela
27 (Urk. IV 2031, 13). With a broader reference than Egypt, further Sethi I’s Kanais Inscription 11
(KRI I 67, 5) grg pt tA n ib=sn ‘who founded heaven and earth for their sake’, with a formulation
similar to Merikare E 130 ir.n=f pt tA n ib=sn ‘for their sake he has made heaven and earth’; also
P. Magical Harris 501 ro III.10 (all references drawn from TLA #168000).
522 Noted by Quack 1992: 37, n.a.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 197

(c) Chapelle Rouge:

- Iwty mrr=f: Chapelle Rouge, p.150: XV.8-9 – Merikare E 67-68
- +d swt: Chapelle Rouge, p.126: VI.15; p.136: IX.11-12 – Merikare E 91
From the same reign, also in a royal inscription, is the earliest known instance of
a-rsi as a geographical designation, in Hatshepsut’s Northern Obelisk, Basis 6
(Urk. IV 362, 11: §2.8.3.6.B).

(d) The Vizieral Cycle:

- R-DAwt: Duties of the Vizier R 9 (Urk. IV 1107, 6); R 11 (Urk. IV 1109, 8) –
Merikare E 31
- @mw-ib: Appointment 25 (Urk. IV 1382, 15) – Merikare E 33
The occurrences of Hmw-ib in Appointment 25 and Merikare E 33 are significant
are two of very few instances of the expression not in set phrases comparing the
king with Ptah. In Merikare, Hmw-ib and r-DAwt occur close to each other, in a
passage that also includes a late construction of reported speech (E 31: §2.8.3.3):
Merikare E 31-33
(...) xsf=k r-DAwt i[yt]=k (...)
Hmw m mdwt nxt=k [...] xpS pw n nsw ns=f qn mdwt r aHA nb
n ii.n.tw HA Hmw-ib
sic
‘(...) that you punish in accordance with their offence (...)
Be skillful with words, and you will be victorious [...] The strong arm of a
king is his tongue, words are stronger than any fight;
There is no coming around a man with skillful understanding.’
In terms of its contents and partly even formulation, the whole passage finds
similarities in the Vizieral Cycle:523
Duties of the Vizier R 9524 [i]n TAty xsf n=f r-DAwt iw=f ‘It is the vizier who
will punish him according to his offence.’
Aametju 20-21525 SsA.ti m mdwt aSAt ib n s tp Dbaw=f (...) [...] psH n=f spty=f
mdw [...] ‘Be experienced in many words, for every man’s heart is on his
fingers (...) [...] His lips bite for him;526 speaks [...]’
Other elements in Merikare and Aametju resonate which each other.527 Most
notable is what is presented as the respective objects of either text, the two
highest political functions in Egypt:528

523 On the dating of Duties of the Vizier, §2.8.3.5.

524 Noted by Quack 1992: 23, n.f.
525 Noted by Dziobek 1998: 28 and 50. Aametju is intertextually allied with other Middle Egyptian
teachings (Dziobek 1998: 49-52). One of these is Ptahhotep, which has paradigmatic value in the
self-presentation of the Aametju-User-Rekhmire vizieral dynasty and arguably functions as an
‘architext’ (Moers 2001: 125, n.461) for subsequent teachings. Other teachings intertextually
related to Aametju (most notably A Man to His Son) are of insecure dating.
526 I follow Vernus 20102b: 61; different interpretation by Dziobek 1998: 28-9.

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 198 2 Conditions and strategies for linguistic dating

Aametju 12 [...] iAwt [t]n mnxt D=i SsA=k m [...] ‘[...] this excellent function; I
shall make you wise in the [...]
Merikare E 116 iAwt pw nfrt nsyt (...) ‘Kingship is a beautiful function (...)’
Both texts elaborate in terms of reciprocity:529
Aametju 12 [...] wa ir sn=f r [...] ‘[... it is(?)] one who replaces(?) his second
to [...]’530
Merikare E 117-118 in wa smnx ky ir s n nty Xr-HAt=f m-mryt smnx irt.n=f in
ky iy Hr-sA=f ‘It is one (king) who makes another one efficient, a man acting
for the one who had been there before him in order that what he has done may
be made efficient (in turn) by another coming after him.’

None of r-DAwt, Hmw-ib, and Dd swt are paralleled in any text prior to the early New
Kingdom, while circumstantial iwty mrr=f is itself strongly, although not exclusively,
associated with the early New Kingdom. Given that these expressions are individually
remarkable, their recurrence in the same texts and not in other ones could cautiously
be interpreted as suggestive of an horizon in written language in common with
Merikare.

2.8.4 Dating Merikare

A. A dating of Merikare to its Herakleopolitan setting can be ruled out by the kA-
headed construction in E 14: this is the diachronic successor to synthetic sDm.kA=f by
a change that is well described and analyzed. When set against the background of the
spread of this change in time and across registers during the Middle Kingdom, the
same expression further suggests that a dating to a time as early as the earlier Twelfth
Dynasty, although not to be ruled out fully, is unlikely (§2.8.3.2).
In attempting to restrict the range for dating further, the present author was not
able to determine any distinctively early feature in Merikare that could lend itself to
defining a terminus post quem non for the composition earlier than its first manuscript
attestation (§2.8.2). This can of course not be an indication for a late dating in itself:
the present author, necessarily limited in his understanding of Middle Egyptian and
change therein, may have missed some relevant expression, or the composition may
simply not include such expressions given the contents addressed and the form in

527 Thus Aametju 16 m sfn n nb DbAw ‘Do no be lenient on the one who can bribe’; Merikare E 44
nma=f n nb DbAw=f ‘he is partial to the one who can bribe him’ (Vernus 20102b: 71, n.104;
Fischer-Elfert 1999: 144-5; Dziobek 1998: 26). The motif is of course not specific to these two
texts: it is for instance also found in Mentuwoser 14 (Kees 1928; Quack 1992: 134, 135-6: see
above, n.421).
528 Noted by Vernus (20102b: 60), who goes on: ‘Le rapprochement est significatif. Ces mises en
exergue de deux fonctions des plus importantes sont, dans une certaine mesure, les antécédents
prestigieux de la bien moins étincelante apologie du métier de scribe, si fréquente dans la
littérature “solaire”, un peu plus tard; ce métier aura, lui aussi, droit à la même gratifiante
qualitification jAw.t tn mnx.t, en l’occurrence à traduire plutôt par “profession excellente”
(Enseignement de Hori, texte n°14) (...)’.
529 Vernus 20102b: 71, n.101.
530 Following the interpretation cautiously proposed by Vernus 20102b: 60.

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 2.8 The limitations of linguistic dating 2: The Teaching for Merikare 199

which it addresses these. That post quem non criteria are inherently more difficult to
devise than ante quem non ones should also be kept in mind as an important caveat in
appreciating such descriptive result.
On the other hand, Merikare includes a series of expressions, grammatical and
lexical, that are typical of, and for several even first documented in, the early New
Kingdom. Of these, one grammatical construction has been well studied and is clearly
late. There is no indication that the construction should not be integral to the original
text of Merikare, in which case a valuable indication for dating the composition
would be given; however, it can not be proven directly that the construction is indeed
original (§2.8.3.3). Various lexical expressions are associated with the Eighteenth
Dynasty specifically. Two of these, an adverb and a preposition, are not uncommon in
those times and other expressions were demonstrably used in earlier times in similar
contexts (§2.8.3.4.B). Other elements of language, although not to do with grammar
or lexicon in a strict sense, may point to the same direction (§2.8.3.6).
B. A complementary approach, not exclusively focused on individual expressions,
may also be pursued. Several of the expressions discussed turn out to recur combined
in a series of early New Kingdom texts or groups of texts, such as Thutmosis I’s
Abydos Stela, inscriptions by Thutmosis III, Chapelle Rouge, or the Vizieral Cycle
(§2.8.3.7). Except for the murky case of iwty mrr=f, no pre-New Kingdom text ever
has any single one of these expressions. When the language of Merikare is considered
not only as the sum of its individual expressions, but in terms of its linguistic
typology, the composition relates to a coherent early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon.
As long as individual expressions are considered, alternative explanations such as
textual alteration and/or coincidental gap in attestation remain of course possible, and
must be considered. That such individual scenarios, all individually possible, should
have applied simultaneously to all relevant expressions in Merikare is not the likeliest
overall scenario, however. In particular, it would imply that the elements of a coherent
linguistic typology discussed in Merikare would have arisen through the individual
accidents of textual alteration—the results of which are usually of a different, more
erratic, kind.531
In short, the scale tilts slightly toward a late dating of Merikare. A tilting scale and
a definite linguistic argument are two different things, however. While the latter
leaves little room for interpretation, the former is a matter of weighing the relative
likelihood of competing options under the inclusion of complementary, non-linguistic,
perspectives on the question.

531 This is illustrated by the case of Ptahhotep L2. As discussed, the two distinctively late construc-
tions the L2 text includes could be immediately identified as secondary on internal grounds
(§2.3.5). The L2 text further includes two less distinctively late grammatical expressions also
found in Merikare (§2.8.3.1; 2.8.3.2.NB, ()). The second of these as well could be identified as
secondary on internal grounds. In Merikare, by contrast, there are no text-internal indications for
any of the expressions concerned that these should be secondary. Moreover, the mentioned expres-
sions in Ptahhotep L2 relate to a certain horizon in time, but only when the whole of the written
production of that time is considered. They do not, in other words, cohere in the ways the mostly
different expressions described for Merikare do.

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 3 NARROW DATING ‘BY SQUEEZING’

The most common strategy for dating a text linguistically consists in providing both a
terminus ante quem non and a terminus post quem non. The text is then dated to a
temporal range comprised between these and lower chronological bounds (for an
altogether different strategy, §4). Ideally, these termini lie close to each other in time,
defining a narrow range for dating (narrow dating ‘by squeezing’: this chapter). In
other cases, upper and lower chronological bounds that can be defined remain
centuries apart from each other: dating is then to a broader temporal range only (§2.7;
§5-6).

3.1 Introduction

The conditions for a narrow dating ‘by squeezing’ are highly restrictive and it is a
matter of favorable circumstances for them to be met in a particular composition to be
dated. I first discuss these conditions in general terms (§3.1.1), then present a practical
illustration in dating Eloquent Peasant (§3.1.2).

3.1.1 Conditions to be met

Defining termini post quem non based on linguistic evidence remains very difficult
for the types of texts to which the present study is devoted. In general, post quem non
criteria (based on advanced written obsolescence) are temporally more diffuse than
ante quem non criteria (based on innovation in written registers). In the context of a
substantial linguistic continuity in higher written registers during the early/mid-second
millennium BCE (§1.2-3), literary compositions demonstrably draw on the thickness
of language of their time (§2.4.3-4). Whatever termini post quem non can be defined
linguistically are typically later, if often not by much, than the first manuscript attesta-
tion of a composition to be dated (case study: §2.6.3); they are then of no practical
import. Unless some other element is given, a secure terminus post quem non will be
provided by a text’s first manuscript attestation only, to be interpreted in relation to
what can be modeled of the composition’s circulation. For texts that have been
composed much earlier than their first manuscript attestation, a linguistically based
narrow dating ‘by squeezing’ is then impossible for structural reasons.
Problems of a different sort affect texts that have been composed later in the time
period considered for dating. By definition of a narrow dating ‘by squeezing’, a

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 202 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

linguistic innovation possibly relevant for dating must have occurred before, but not
much before, the terminus post quem non provided by the first manuscript attestation.
Moreover, this linguistic innovation must itself be datable with some precision. This
results in the following set of conditions for a narrow dating ‘by squeezing’ to be
possible.

(a) In the time periods here considered, ca. 2000-1450 BCE, only a limited
number of linguistic dimensions underwent change in ways that could be
exploited for dating (§2.2; also §1.1). When a narrow dating is aimed for, the
time span relevant for dating a given composition becomes yet shorter and the
number of individual linguistic changes potentially available for dating
accordingly lower.

(b) The low density of the external record, compounded with its substantial
linguistic continuity in relevant written registers, may make it difficult to
describe potentially relevant innovations with sufficient temporal precision—a
problem that can become acute when, as in narrow dating, temporal precision
is aimed for. For a linguistic change to support a narrow dating, at least two of
the three following conditions should ideally be met (compare the general
discussion in §2.1.3):
(b.) Expressions that perform common functions in language often
provide better criteria because their frequency in language and in the
record will make their patterns of attestation more reliable.
(b.) For an expression documented from some point in time on, some
other expression should, if possible, be exhibited in only slightly older
texts performing the same, or a similar, function. Yet again, this condition
is difficult to meet with linguistic functions other than common ones.
(b.) Whenever possible, an argument should be made on how the
innovation considered fits into a broader process of linguistic change—a
step that can prove essential in interpreting patterns of attestations as to the
relative chronology and pace of developments. When no such argument is
possible, a type-B ante quem non criterion may result (§2.1.3.D); by
definition, this is always fairly broad temporally.

(c) A composition to be dated narrowly must happen to include one or several

expressions that meet conditions (a) and (b) above. This comes with two
additional requirements, seldom met in practice:
(c.) A composition’s contents must be of a sort that an expression in the
process of being innovated in the time period considered may come to
order. (This may seem obvious, but often turns out to be one of the most
strongly limitative conditions of all.)
(c.) In addition, the composition’s register must be of a sort that it would
include such innovative expression. (A similar comment applies.)

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 3.1 Introduction 203

The above requirements are highly restrictive. That the present chapter devoted to
narrow dating ‘by squeezing’ is the shortest of all is significant.

3.1.2 An illustration: Dating Eloquent Peasant

While a dating of Eloquent Peasant to its Herakleopolitan setting had once been
contemplated as an option, a series of studies in the late 80’s and early 90’s
independently suggested that the text was composed in the Twelfth Dynasty, and
more precisely in the middle part of that Dynasty. One of these arguments was
linguistic, Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non criterion, which was developed largely
for dating Eloquent Peasant itself.1 This would have been a paradigmatic example of
a narrow dating ‘by squeezing’. Eloquent Peasant has a terminus post quem non in the
late Twelfth Dynasty by its first manuscripts.2 Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non
criterion in its original formulation (§2.6.1.2) would for its part have implied a
terminus ante quem non no earlier than by the mid-Twelfth Dynasty: the composition
of Eloquent Peasant would thus have been ‘squeezed’ to a relatively short period in
time during the mid-Twelfth Dynasty.
A close examination of the occurrences and contexts that would document the
innovative usage relevant for dating Eloquent Peasant by Vernus’ aspectual ante
quem non criterion reveals that the criterion does not apply to this text (§2.6.2.1-3).
Eloquent Peasant must then be dated by other ways. Among these, institutional
evidence plays a role: as pointed out by Berlev,3 Rensi is a imi-rA pr wr ‘high steward’
(R 6.6 and passim), a title first documented for Meketre at the beginning of the
Twelfth Dynasty; until then, only ‘stewards’ (imi-rA pr) are attested in similar function
(thus, Henenu, temp. Mentuhotep II-III; perhaps slightly later is Buau, with the title of
‘steward in the entire land’);4 this strongly suggests that the lack of occurrences for a
imi-rA pr wr in that earlier period is not a gap in the record. Other elements of
institutional evidence may be interpreted as confirmative evidence.5 In addition, the
composition may include an allusion to the titulary of Senwosret II, in which case a
very precise dating to that short reign could follow.6
I here offer some linguistic arguments, other than the one originally submitted by
Vernus, for dating Eloquent Peasant. Rather than a full study of the linguistic
typology of that composition, one of the most complex in the preserved corpus of
Middle Egyptian literature, these comments are aimed to provide a practical
illustration of how the above conditions for narrow dating can be met, in full or only
in part depending on various expressions considered: the discussion is therefore
intentionally more explicit than for subsequent texts.

1 Vernus 1990b; 1990a: 185-8.

2 P. Berlin P 3023 (‘B1’) and P 3025 (‘B2’), which form part of a collection of literary texts in a late
Twelfth Dynasty Theban tomb (the so-called ‘Berlin Library’, probably Amenemhat III: Parkinson
2009: 77-90; Parkinson & Baylis 2012: 1-10); roughly contemporaneous with this is further
P. Butler (P. BM EA 10274: ‘Bt’), also from a Theban funerary context. See Parkinson 2012a: 2-3.
3 Berlev 1987a.
4 Grajetzki 2009: 69-80, particularly 71-3; 2005: 48.
5 Grajetzki 2005: 47-51.
6 Parkinson 1991b; 2012: 1.

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 204 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

A. In one place, Eloquent Peasant has a construction wn.in.tw Hr sDm: B1 115-116

wn.in.tw Hr rDt n=f tA 10 Hnqt ds 2 ra nb ‘And one began giving him ten loaves of
bread and two jars of beer daily.’ In this precise form, the construction is otherwise
first documented in an expedition inscription of the reign of Amenemhat III
(Hammamat 19, twice: §5.3.4.1, (iii)). The contents and register of the narrative parts
of Eloquent Peasant are here of a sort as to include an expression that was apparently
innovated only a relatively short time before the first manuscript attestation (compare
§3.1.1, condition (c)). The pattern of early attestation of the construction is not dense:
further occurrences of the wn.in.tw Hr sDm the present author is aware of are only
from after the Middle Kingdom.7 This accords with the fairly specific nature of the
expression here considered, a passive construction of wn.in=f Hr sDm. Condition
(b.), stating that constructions common in language and text afford more reliable
criteria for dating, fails to be met.
In assessing the early pattern of attestation of wn.in.tw Hr sDm as to its reliability,
other types of wn-auxiliated analytic constructions with tw are then considered. These
are themselves first documented by the Twelfth Dynasty, in each case as isolated
‘firsts’: wn.xr.tw Hr sDm (Kahun Veterinary Payrus, P. UC 32036, 20-21:
§5.3.4.1, (iv)) and wn.tw Hr sDm (Antefiqer’s Girgawi Inscription 6, temp.
Amenemhat I: §5.3.4.1, (i)). Leaving aside the occurrence in Eloquent Peasant B1
115-116, the three other first occurrences of wn-auxiliated analytic constructions with
tw are all from the Twelfth Dynasty: although attestation remains sparse, such
clustering of first occurrences is relevant and suggests that wn.in.tw Hr sDm itself was
not innovated before that time. In addition, the rise of these wn.(X.)tw Hr sDm
constructions relates to broader processes of change affecting the functions and
distribution of tw (aspects of which are discussed below: §5.2, §5.3, and §6.2; for
wn.(X.)tw Hr sDm in this broader context, §5.3.4.1). Accordingly, these constructions
did probably not emerge much earlier than their first actual documentation. Condition
(b.) is met in substantial ways.
Independently of any of the non-linguistic elements for dating evoked above, the
presence of wn.in.tw Hr sDm in Eloquent Peasant B1 115-116 thus provides strongly
suggestive evidence for dating Eloquent Peasant no earlier than the Twelfth Dynasty,
excluding the dating to the composition’s Herakleopolitan setting once contemplated.
The argument does not suffice to establish whether Eloquent Peasant was composed
toward the beginning or the middle of the Dynasty: the expression targeted for dating
does not relate to core functions in language and does not meet all the above
conditions simultaneously.
B. In its closing section, Eloquent Peasant has one instance of a preposed possessive:
B2 128 nAy=k n sprwt ‘these petitions of yours’. This still has strong deictic force in
context (§2.4.4.2.2, (iii)), as is only to be expected in a composition that has a
manuscript terminus post quem non still within the Twelfth Dynasty. The selection of
the expression, innovative in itself, is noteworthy. Preposed possessives are common

7 E.g. Ahmose’s Tempest Stela ro 14-15/vso 17 (HHBT 108, 15/16) wn.in.tw Hr sxAt (...); Ahmes son
of Abana 11 (Urk. IV 4, 3) wn.in.tw Hr aHA (...); Chapelle Rouge, p.131: VII.12 (HHBT II 25, 5)
wn.in.tw Hr irt (...); Amenhotep II’s Amada Stela 18 (Urk. IV 1297, 9/10) wn.in.tw Hr axt (...).

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 3.1 Introduction 205

in late Twelfth Dynasty documentary texts from Illahun, but not in earlier
documentary texts. Within Middle Egyptian literary registers, a preposed possessive
recurs only once in a text securely dated to the Twelfth Dynasty, in Kagemni 2.3, also
within a framing narrative, and also strongly deictic (§2.4.4.2.2.A). Later, it recurs in
one other Middle Egyptian composition, Cheops’ Court, several times and with
already weakening deictic force. The expression used as in Eloquent Peasant can
thereby be related to a broader change, which can be traced in the record, and of
which it constitutes a fairly early stage (§3.1.1, condition (b.)); moreover, the
linguistic function associated with the expression (a type of deixis) is very common in
language (condition (b.)). The pattern of attestation is therefore reliable, provided
register is taken into due account. The presence of the preposed possessive in B2 128
implies a dating of Eloquent Peasant to the Twelfth Dynasty. It further suggests, but
only suggests, that a dating to the middle of that Dynasty is more likely than one to its
beginning.
C. In three places, Eloquent Peasant combines the ‘passive’ morpheme tw with
events that lack an agent in their semantic representation: B1 252-254 m(w)t.tw ‘one
dies’ and Htm.tw ‘one perishes’, B1 322 xr.tw ‘one falls’, and B1 131-132 nSp.tw ‘one
pants’ (fuller quotations: §6.2.2.3, (i)-(iii)). As to be discussed in details in a later
section (§6.2), this is an innovation occurring during the Twelfth Dynasty. In earlier
Middle Egyptian, only events that have an agent in their semantic representation (such
as smA ‘kill’, sHtm ‘destroy’, or sxr ‘bring to fall’) can be made passive; other con-
structions are then used whenever the core participant of an event lacking an agent in
semantic representation is to be left unspecified. Other than in Eloquent Peasant, the
earliest occurrence of tw with an event lacking an agent in semantic representation is
in a graffito dating to the time of Senwosret III (§6.2.2.3, (iv)). In a stela dated to the
beginning of the Twelfth Dynasty, on the other hand, an event of ‘dying’ still has the
older construction, a subjectless active one: Antef (BM EA 1628), 8 n rD=i m(w)t=ø
‘I did not let one die.’ This contrasts with the innovative construction in Eloquent
Peasant B1 253 m rD m(w)t.tw ‘let not die!’
In terms of the conditions outlined above (§3.1.1), the construction here
considered concerns a function that is relatively common in language (broadly: the
expression of non-specified reference of the first participant), but not maximally
common since the criterion is restricted to a specific subset of events (such that lack
an agent in semantic representation): condition (b.) is thereby met, but only in part.
However, it can be demonstrated that for similar functions some other construction
was used in only slightly earlier times: the all-important condition (b.) is thereby met
in full. Moreover, the innovative uses of tw in Eloquent Peasant can be related to a
broader process of linguistic change, of which they constitute an early stage
(§6.2.2.4): condition (b.), also contributing to an assessment of patterns of attestation
as to their reliability, is thereby met as well. The construction of tw in B1 253, B1
254, and B1 322 therefore provides strong evidence for a terminus ante quem non to
the mid-Twelfth Dynasty.
D. All three expressions discussed above imply a dating of Eloquent Peasant no
earlier than the Twelfth Dynasty, thereby independently confirming the dating pro-

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 206 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

posed some while ago based on institutional analysis. Linguistic analysis also
suggests a terminus ante quem non to the middle, rather than to the beginning, of that
Dynasty: while individual expressions do so with varying degrees of force (compare
the discussion above), their cumulative effect is here significant. Eloquent Peasant
thus provides a textbook example of narrow dating ‘by squeezing’: the terminus ante
quem non, linguistically defined, is only a few generations, or even decades, earlier
than the terminus post quem non, defined by the first manuscript attestation. Taking
into account that the presence of the composition in funerary contexts in Thebes may
imply some time of previous circulation, a dating to the mid-Twelfth Dynasty is very
likely. This is consistent with the possibility that the composition may date to the
reign of Senwosret II specifically, if it indeed includes an allusion to the titulary of
that king.
The above discussion has addressed technical aspects of how, depending on
individual expressions, conditions (b.), (b.), and (b.) may be variously met, in full
or in part. It is also illustrative of how the very possibility of one even getting to
discuss such matters can be contingent upon the nature of the composition to be dated.
Two out of three expressions considered (wn.in.tw Hr sDm; nAy=f ) are from the
narrative parts framing the Peasant’s discourses, and could only have been from these.
The first is related to the higher-order wn.in=f Hr sDm, intrinsically a narrative
construction. The second is marked for register and its presence in the narrative frame
accords with the also otherwise noticeable studied simplicity of this. The presence of
the first of these expressions in Eloquent Peasant is thereby illustrative of condition
(c.), namely that the contents of a text to be dated narrowly must be of a sort to
include certain expressions amenable to dating. The presence of the second expression
is illustrative of condition (c.), namely that for a text to be dated narrowly the
selections it makes in terms of registers must be of a sort as to include certain
expressions. In most texts in the preserved body of Middle Egyptian literature, neither
of these two expressions features, nor would they be expected to feature.
As to the one construction that is from the petitions themselves (tw accommodated
to events that lack an agent in semantic representation), its nature is also more broadly
significant, on an altogether level. The innovative aspect of the expression lies in its
function, not in its form: what is innovative is the extension of tw to events from
which it was previously banned, not the morpheme tw itself, nor its use in post-
thematic position of a synthetic form of the verb (‘sDm.tw’, which is old). As current
understanding goes, most registers of Middle Egyptian literature do not accommodate
expressions whose innovative character is too clearly perceivable as such, as is the
case, typically, with innovations in linguistic form. Accordingly, expressions whose
innovative character lies with less tangible dimensions of linguistic function will often
be the best, and at times the only, criteria for dating. (Vernus’ aspectual ante quem
non criterion, not applicable to Eloquent Peasant, but applicable to other composi-
tions, is itself of that very sort.) In Eloquent Peasant, the petitions are currently
datable linguistically only by one such criterion, targeting change in the function of an
expression which as far as form is concerned has not undergone change.

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 3.2 Fishing and Fowling 207

3.2 Fishing and Fowling

The composition presently now referred to as Fishing and Fowling is documented in a

single fragmentary manuscript (P. Moscow unnumbered) which paleographically
dates to the late Eighteenth Dynasty.8 The manuscript was purchased together with
other manuscripts of Middle Egyptian literary texts that paleographically date to the
same period. Some of these are Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses of compositions already
documented in the Twelfth Dynasty (Sinuhe G, Ptahhotep L2), while other ones are
witnesses of compositions of as yet insecure dating (Merikare M, Sporting King, and
Moscow Mythological Story). Although there is no direct evidence for this, all these
manuscripts arguably derive from a single find.9
Among these texts, Fishing and Fowling displays affinities with Sporting King
(§4.3). It has been suggested that Sporting King and Fishing and Fowling, both
fragmentary, could be parts of a single longer composition,10 but this remains very
uncertain;11 for dating, Sporting King and Fishing and Fowling must therefore be
discussed separately. The typologically transitional character of these two composi-
tions has long been noted and they have been cautiously proposed as candidates for a
possible Eighteenth Dynasty literature.12 Parkinson subsequently established this
transitional character in more precise terms13 and suggested a more broadly later
rather than earlier dating within the history of Middle Egyptian literature (full
quotation, §4.3.1.C). Cautiously again, it has also been observed that, should Fishing
and Fowling be late, the ideal image of life in the marshes projected in this
composition could be viewed as a ‘spezifische Reaktion auf die ausdifferenzierte
Stadt- und Palastkultur des Neuen Reiches’.14
I here propose some linguistic perspectives on the issue, also with a view on
discussing the general conditions for, and limitations of, ‘narrow dating’. The reader
may compare the present section with the one devoted to Eloquent Peasant (§3.1.2):
the two texts afford different situations, complementary to each other in many ways.

3.2.1 Grammar: Broad dating

The fragmentary state of preservation of the composition severely restricts the

prospects for discussing grammatical constructions possibly relevant for dating: to be
identified and interpreted, grammatical constructions generally require continuous
contexts. One feature of grammar relevant for dating is noted nonetheless, the use of
NP Hr sDm for expressing habitual aspect in B2.7-8:15 iw=i Hr Xdb r-tnw-sp nn Abw n
mA[wt=i] ‘I kill at every occasion without my harpoon ever stopping’ (§2.6.2.6, (i)).

8 Text: Caminos 1956: 1-21 and pl.1-7.

9 Lastly, Hagen 2012a: 180.
10 Quirke 2004a: 206.
11 Parkinson 2002: 312, n.18.
12 Assmann 1985: 48-9; Baines 1996: 160-1.
13 Parkinson 2002: 226-34.
14 Widmaier 2009: 96-7.
15 Vernus 1990a: 186, ex.399.

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 208 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

The criterion here applied, Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non criterion, is very
strong (§2.6.1-2). It involves a core linguistic function, the expression of habitual
aspect: this implies a high text frequency of the relevant expressions (compare §3.1.1:
condition (b.)). Moreover, the change can be firmly anchored in time not only
through an exhibition of early similarly innovative uses in other texts, but also
through the complementary exhibition of a different construction—in the present case,
N(P) sDm=f—expressing similar functions in only slightly earlier texts (condition
(b.)). Finally, the process of change to which the innovation relates has been studied
in depth and is comparatively well-understood (condition (b.)). As also discussed,
synthetic N(P) sDm=f hardly ever undergoes alteration into analytic NP Hr sDm in the
course of textual transmission; when it does, this concerns only lesser Ramesside
witnesses, generally resulting in distinctively hybrid constructions that are easily
identified as such (§2.3.3). This makes it extremely unlikely that the text in Fishing
and Fowling B2.7-8 should be secondary. Based on B2.7-8, the composition of
Fishing and Fowling therefore receives a strong terminus ante quem non to the early
Thirteenth Dynasty, or the late Twelfth at the earliest.
This does not yield a narrow dating, because the terminus ante quem non
linguistically defined still remains several centuries earlier than the terminus post
quem non given by the first manuscript attestation of the composition. Under the
hypothetical assumption that Fishing and Fowling was composed at some time in the
late Middle Kingdom, a narrow dating ‘by squeezing’ could have resulted if some
manuscript earlier than P. Moscow unn. had survived. Conversely, under the similarly
hypothetical assumption that the text was composed in the Eighteenth Dynasty, a
narrow dating ‘by squeezing’ could have resulted if in Egyptian language history the
change in the expression of aspect here considered had happened some centuries later
than it did happen. The change, however, happened at the time at which it happened,
and no manuscript earlier than P. Moscow unn. has survived. Only a broad dating of
Fishing and Fowling is therefore possible based on grammatical evidence.

3.2.2 Lexicon: Evidence for a narrow dating

Given the above limitations on analyzing grammar in Fishing and Fowling, the
perspective may be broadened to include possible elements of lexical evidence.
Lexical expressions tend to be individually less common than grammatical ones and
their innovation is an individual history, not related to a broader process of change
(§2.2.2). In general, these largely structural issues result in higher uncertainties in
assessing patterns of attestation (§3.1.1: (b.) and (b.)), compounded with difficulties
in assessing whether a given lexical expression is integral to a composition to be
dated. The latter issue specifically is illustrated in Fishing and Fowling by nkAy m
‘ponder, think about’ (A2.8), an expression that is strongly associated with the Eigh-
teenth Dynasty, recurs in a literary composition of insecure dating, Khakheperreseneb
(ro 10 and vso 1),16 yet also in Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses of Ptahhotep and Sinuhe

16 Contrasting the object and mode of nkA’ing in Khakheperreseneb and Fishing and Fowling,
Parkinson 2002: 229.

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 3.2 Fishing and Fowling 209

(§2.7.3.3, (ii)). While nkAy m is probably a token of an Eighteenth Dynasty surface of

Fishing and Fowling as transmitted in P. Moscow unn., the expression therefore fails
to provide a reliable indication for dating.
A. Two other lexical expressions in Fishing and Fowling merit more substantial
comments. The first is bxn ‘fortified house, country mansion’ in B1.13 and B1.15.17
The word18 is common; it occurs in Ramesside miscellanies,19 praises of the city,20
narrative literature,21 love poetry,22 and further in Ramses II’s First Hittite Marriage23
and in Onomasticon of Amenemope.24 In pre-Ramesside times, only two occurrences
other than the ones in Fishing and Fowling have been noted: in an hieratic note added
to EA 2725 (a letter of Tushratta to Akhenaten: Urk. IV 1995, 17) and in a song from
Rekhmire’s tomb (Urk. IV 1164, 14; temp. Thutmosis III: below, B). From the same
root, but a different word, is bxnt ‘pylon’, documented since the Eighteenth
Dynasty.26
Fishing and Fowling further has an occurrence of h(A)nw ‘wave’ (C1.x+7). Like
bxn, this remains undocumented in pre-New Kingdom times, while it is common in
Ramesside literary texts of various sorts,27 thus in a famous passage in Wenamun
(1.49 = 1.x+14). Other occurrences are in Ramesside miscellanies,28 literary letters,29
in hymns to the king,30 to the Nileflood,31 and to a god,32 in a teaching,33 in
Onomasticon of Amenemope,34 in magical texts,35 and in a letter to a coffin.36 I am
aware of only two pre-Ramesside occurrences of h(A)nw other than the one in Fishing
and Fowling, one in Great Hymn to Aton 10, and one in Pahu’s Prayer 2 (temp.
Amenhotep II – Amenhotep III).

17 For the broader context, lastly Widmaier 2009: 133-5.

18 Noted as ‘nur neuägyptisch’ in DZA 22.918.110.
19 E.g. P. Anastasi IV ro III.7; VIII.9 (= P. Lansing ro XI.3); P. Lansing ro IX.1; XII.1; P. Chester
Beatty IV vso III.4; P. Chester Beatty V ro VIII.11; these and the following references are drawn
from TLA #57030 and DZA 22.918.110.
20 In a praise of Piramses (Ragazzoli 2008: 65-8): P. Anastasi II ro I.1 (= P. Anastasi IV ro VI.1); I.5
(= P. Anastasi IV ro VI.5); in another praise of Piramses (Ragazzoli 2008: 69): P. Anastasi II
ro V.5.
21 Two Brothers 9.1, 9.2, 13.2.
22 P. Harris 500 ro II.11.
23 KRI II 255, 8 (Amara West x+29; not preserved in the duplicates).
24 P. Golenisheff V.13 (Gardiner 1947: II, 204-5 (#420)).
25 Sic, not ‘29’ as wrongly in Urk. IV and TLA.
26 FCD 84; DZA 22.918.440.
27 References drawn from TLA #97670.
28 P. Anastasi IV Ib.2; II.8; P. Koller II.6; P. Turin Cat 1882 vso III.10; P. Lansing XII.2.
29 In one witness of Satirical Letter, O. Turin 57359, 9; in Menna’s Letter, O. OIC 12074 + O. IFAO
2188 vso 5.
30 O. DeM 1222 ro 4 (to Ramses III); P. Turin 54031 ro 88.5 (to Ramses VI and VII); also in an
inscriptionally published hymn to Ramses II in Abu Simbel (DZA 26.361.380; 26.361.430).
31 O. DeM 1675 ro 4.
32 DZA 26.361.420 (to Amun: Gurob, Nineteenth Dynasty).
33 Amenemope 7.2.
34 P. Golenisheff I.8 = P. Hood II.8 (Gardiner 1947: I, 77 (#26)).
35 P. Magical Harris 501 VII.9; P. Genève MAH 15274 ro VI.4.
36 Letter to Ikhtai’s coffin, O. Louvre 689, 20.

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 210 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

Both bxn and h(A)nw have highly cohesive patterns of attestation. In pre-
Ramesside times, both recur only twice outside Fishing and Fowling, each expression
once in an Amarna text and once in a slightly earlier one. Both are tightly associated
with Ramesside literary registers: they do not occur often outside these in Ramesside
times, and are hardly ever documented in later times. That Fishing and Fowling ac-
commodates these two expressions in its lexicon is therefore consistent with other
aspects by which the composition is a forerunner of Ramesside literature.
B. Fishing and Fowling is pre-Ramesside: independently from the date of P. Moscow
unn. itself, this would be established by the general linguistic register, which is
Middle Egyptian. The above strongly suggests that the composition is not pre-
Ramesside by several centuries.
To be sure, what bxn refers to is associated with a motif that is itself uncommon in
Middle Kingdom literature, and one may therefore observe that the argument tends
toward literary history just as much as it is a lexical one. Of singular interest is then
the context of the single pre-Amarna occurrence of bxn: this is from a song of a lyre-
player in Rekhmire’s tomb, a locus subject to conditions of decorum different from
other textual productions. The song goes:

Urk. IV 1164, 13-14

tA mHyt my
mA.n.tw iw=i m pA(y)=i bxn
‘O North wind, come!
One has seen that I am in my mansion.’

The linguistic register in which bxn is first found other than in Fishing and Fowling is
innovative in several respects, including, in short sequence to each other: tA
introducing the address to the ‘North wind’; a iw-headed construction after mAA, a
construction that would later develop into one type of complement clauses in Late
Egyptian;37 and the preposed possessive pA(y)=i.
As to h(A)nw ‘wave’, its absence in earlier times can even less be a matter of
motifs only marginally present in pre-New Kingdom literary texts. Twelfth Dynasty
literary texts also tell of ‘waves’, famously Shipwrecked Sailor (40, 58, and 110) and,
very significantly for the present discussion, Fowler (P. Butler vso 37). These Middle
Kingdom texts all have another word for ‘wave’, wAw.38 Significantly, the single pre-
Amarna occurrence of h(A)nw other than in Fishing and Fowling is from a text of
lesser formality, incised in hieratic outside the Valley, Pahu’s Prayer. Among
innovatives expressions, this also accommodates the new subject pronoun (5 tw=i).

37 With a view on another verb, mri ‘wish’, with different semantics, early instances of a similar
construction are analyzed in Polis 2009: 223-4 (Urk. IV 890, 11, temp. Amenhotep II; P. Cairo
58053 ro 5-6, temp. Amenhotep III).
38 With a different semantic extension, and therefore not directly relevant to the above, is also wDnw
‘flood, torrent’ (Eloquent Peasant B1 133; B1 175; B1 188; Hymns to Senwosret III ro II.12;
Ipuwer 10.13; 13.4; further in a lamentation in the early New Kingdom tomb of Reneni of el-Kab
(Enmarch 2012: 90)).

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 3.3 P. BM EA 10475 ro and vso 211

Both h(A)nw and bxn are thus first documented in contexts that are also otherwise
innovative.
If Fishing and Fowling is to be dated to a period before the Eighteenth Dynasty, it
must be assumed that bxn and h(A)nw are secondary readings in this text. Yet, bxn is
well integrated in its contexts in both its occurrences in Fishing and Fowling (the
context of h(A)nw is fragmentary). Moreover, the presence of bxn and h(A)nw in
Fishing and Fowling is fully consistent with how in its broader literary typology the
composition anticipates aspects of Ramesside literature to come.

3.2.3 Dating Fishing and Fowling

Grammar, on which the present study is mainly based, here supports only a broad
dating: Fishing and Fowling was not composed before the late Middle Kingdom
(§3.2.1). In the lexicon, the presence of bxn ‘fortified house, country mansion’ and
h(A)nw ‘wave’ is very remarkable (§3.2.2). For reasons specific both to the expres-
sions considered and to the text under discussion, these strongly suggest that Fishing
and Fowling was composed in the Eighteenth Dynasty.
Such a late dating would be consistent with the ‘transitional’ typology of the
composition in literary terms (§3.2, introduction). It could also find some circum-
stantial support in a non-linguistic detail, the mention of Hwt-wart ‘Avaris’ (C3.14).
While the site was occupied already in the Twelfth Dynasty and the city grew
substantially from the Thirteenth Dynasty on, textual mentions of ‘Avaris’ are not
found before the late Seventeenth Dynasty, always in directly referential contexts.39
That a reference to ‘Avaris’ could have been included in a literary composition at any
pre-Eighteenth Dynasty time is therefore very unlikely; for the same reason, the
expression may even point to a period later than the beginning of that Dynasty.40
(Under the hypothesis of an early dating, one could of course speculate that ‘Avaris’
was secondarily inserted in the list of Fayum and Delta toponyms of which it is part.)
A dating of Fishing and Fowling to the Eighteenth Dynasty, i.e. to a time fairly
close to its sole surviving manuscript, is therefore the most likely option.

3.3 P. BM EA 10475 ro and vso

Two Middle Egyptian literary compositions are fragmentarily preserved on P. BM EA

10475 ro and vso, an Eulogistic Account of a King and a Tale Involving the House of
Life.41 Based on the paleography, comparable to P. Westcar, the manuscripts date to
the late Second Intermediate Period.42 As regards composition, the editor of these
texts notes: ‘(...) presumably later Middle Egyptian rather than earlier’.43 The follow-

39 Early occurrences are Tjau x+4 (Kubisch 2008: 232-4); Kamose Inscriptions St.II 2 and passim;
Emhab 14; Ahmes son of Abana 8 (Urk. IV 3, 7); Speos Artemidos 37 (Urk. IV 390, 7).
40 The next earliest literary reference to ‘Avaris’ is early Ramesside, in Apophis and Seqenenre 1.2.
41 Text: Parkinson 1999.
42 Parkinson 1999: 178-9.
43 Parkinson 1999: 193, n.107.

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 212 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

ing discussion, partly elaborating on observations made by Parkinson, confirms this

assessment and provides further elements for dating. The preserved portions of text in
either composition are not long and expectations for dating must be set accordingly.

3.3.1 Tale Involving the House of Life (P. BM EA 10475 vso)

The text has the following linguistically remarkable passage, which includes two late
constructions, iri aHa (...) iw=f Hr sDm and iw.tw Hr sDm:

Tale Involving the House of Life X+5.2-4

ir.in.tw aHaw r hrw 40 m Hb nfr n [...]
iw.tw Hr swr m [...]
‘And a period up to fourty days was spent in a beautiful festival of/for [...]
drinking from/in [...]’

A. To my knowledge, this is the sole pre-New Kingdom instance of iri aHa (or of
some other expression of ‘spending time’ such as wrS, etc.) followed by iw=f Hr sDm.
In the Middle Kingdom, the construction is always with the secondary predicate Hr
sDm directly embedded (i.e. without iw=f ), thus in a mid-Twelfth Dynasty composi-
tion, Eloquent Peasant (i). The construction with direct embedding is still the one
found in Cheops’ Court (type-B terminus ante quem non by the early Thirteenth
Dynasty: §2.4.4.1) (ii):

(i) Eloquent Peasant B1 62-63

ir.in sxty pn aHa {10} r hrw 10
Hr spr n nmti-nxt pn
‘Then this peasant spent a period of up to ten days
petitioning this Nemtinakht.’
Sim., with another expression for spending time (iri hrw (...) Hr sDm), Sinuhe B
238-239; from an inscriptional register, e.g. Hammamat 199, 7.

(ii) Cheops’ Court 2.9

wrS.n=s im
Hr swr [...]
‘and she spent time there
drinking [...]’
Sim. 7.6-7 ist wrS Hm n nsw bity xwfw mAa-xrw Hr HHi n=f nA n ipwt nt wnt nt
DHwti (...) ‘The Majesty of the King of Upper and Lower Egypt Khufu, justified,
used to spend time seeking for himself the chambers of the sanctuary of Thoth
(...)’.

Of the conditions set out above (§3.1.1), (b.) is met: some other construction (here:
direct embedding) was used in similar functions (here: secondary predication after an
expression of ‘spending time’) in only slightly earlier times than the expression under
discussion (here: up to and including Cheops’ Court). Condition (b.) is met as well

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 3.3 P. BM EA 10475 ro and vso 213

because the innovation under discussion relates to broader changes in the syntax of
iw, increasingly used as an overt marker of subordination; major steps in the process
are observed unfolding in texts of the later Seventeenth Dynasty.44
The analysis is confirmed by the fact that the second earliest occurrence of the
construction with overt subordination of the secondary predication, later than the one
in Tale Involving the House of Life, is in a text from the very eve of the Eighteenth
Dynasty, Emhab. This is also otherwise innovative in its linguistic selections
(§1.3.3.2.E):

(iii) Emhab 8-9

(...) ir=i rnpt 3 iw=i Hr sxt m qmqm ra nb
‘(...) I spent three years playing the drum daily.’

B. The passage of Tale Involving the House of Life quoted above (X+5.2-4) also
includes an early instance of iw.tw Hr sDm, i.e. of a use of tw in the subject slot of a
NP Hr sDm construction not auxiliated by wn.45 As to be discussed in details below
(§5.3), the earliest securely dated occurrences of this construction are from the early
Eighteenth Dynasty, typically in innovative registers. Moreover, securely dated
Twelfth Dynasty compositions (Sinuhe, Eloquent Peasant), as well as other literary
compositions that date to the late Middle Kingdom at the earliest (Ipuwer,
Khakheperreseneb), demonstrably use another construction in similar functions
(sDm.tw=f ). Condition (b.) is thereby met.
Condition (b.) is met as well, yet not in full: upon further linguistic analysis, the
innovation can be related to broader changes affecting the distribution of tw (detailed
discussion below, §5.3), but not in ways that are as temporally precise as for the
construction discussed first (above, A). The low density of the Second Intermediate
Period record here leads to a reduced temporal resolution in anchoring the relevant
linguistic change to time, with the effect that the resulting dating criterion is a type-B
ante quem non criterion (§2.1.3.D): the construction iw.tw Hr sDm was innovated at
some period in time not before the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty and could have been inno-
vated only later; when more precisely it was innovated remains unclear. For method-
ological reasons, the construction must then be declared possible for the earliest
period in time for which the available evidence does not permit to rule out that the
construction could have been possible, the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty. (This does of
course not mean that the construction was actually innovated by this early time
already, only that such eventuality can not be ruled out.)
C. The second expression discussed provides a type-B terminus ante quem non to the
mid-Thirteenth Dynasty; the first provides a terminus ante quem non to the Second
Intermediate Period, and probably to the later part thereof. It is therefore submitted
that Tale Involving the House of Life dates to the (later) Second Intermediate Period.
A dating to the Seventeenth Dynasty, i.e. broadly to the time of its sole surviving
manuscript, is linguistically the most likely option.

44 Provisionally Kruchten 1999.

45 Also noted by Parkinson 1999: 193, n.107.

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 214 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

3.3.2 Eulogistic Account of a King (P. BM EA 10475 ro)

A. The text has the following remarkable expression:

(i) Eulogistic Account of a King X+7.x+3

swAD.n=f tA ti sw wSr.n=f
‘He has made the land green when it had become dry.’

The subordinating particle ti46 is commonly attested only from the early New King-
dom on,47 but is also documented in at least two Middle Kingdom texts.48 If a later
dating of Eulogistic Account of a King is established first on independent grounds, the
presence of ti would be relevant to an appreciation of the linguistic typology of the
composition; for primary dating itself, it remains uncriterial.
Rather than ti itself, the main observation concerns the construction which ti here
introduces, ti sw sDm.n=f. &i generally introduces subject-initial constructions with a
pronominal subject (common patterns include ti sw AP, ti sw Hr sDm, ti sw
pseudoparticiple, or ti sw sDm=f ). The specific combination in Eulogistic Account of
a King X+7.x+3, however, which differs from all of the above, is exceedingly rare;
this finds a direct parallel perhaps in one other text only:

(ii) Thutmosis I’s Tombos Inscription 3 (Urk. IV 83, 1-3)

(...) ti Hm=f iT.n=f iwat=f Htp.n=f Tnt(A)t Hr r swsx tASw wAst (...)
‘(...) when His Majesty had taken its heritage, when He had settled on the
throne of Horus to widen the boundaries of Thebes (...)’

The pattern of attestation of ti sw sDm.n=f, apparently limited to these two instances,

is exceedingly slim and can not be assessed as to its reliability through any of the
strategies presented above (§3.1.1). Rather than being based on ongoing language
change, the argument here targets a specific type of formulation in written language.
The general context for such is given in later Middle Egyptian times, when in some
written registers ti and ist were developing various new uses.49 This suggests a later,
rather than earlier, date within the Second Intermediate Period. In terms of method,
the argument comes close to ‘direct dating’, a strategy discussed in the next chapter.
B. Noteworthy in Eulogistic Account of a King is also m-rA-a ‘likewise’ (X+7.x+5).
This is the earliest documented occurrence of the expression and the only in any pre-
Eighteenth Dynasty text (§4.2.3). In the periods when it is attested, the expression is
not uncommon, suggesting that its pattern of attestation is fairly reliable.
It may also be of some significance that one other very early occurrence of m-rA-a
is in Thutmosis I’s Tombos Inscription 2 (Urk. IV 82, 14), in the very same text
therefore that has the single other occurrence of ti sw sDm.n=f (ii).

46 Noted by Parkinson (1999: 193, n.107).

47 For various instances in early New Kingdom inscriptional registers, Oréal 2011: 247-8.
48 Sinuhe R 15 (§2.4.3.2, (xii)); Deir Rifêh, tomb 7, col.17 (Griffith 1889: pl.18; noted by Oréal 2011:
246, n.158).
49 See Oréal 2011: ch.4, the various sub-sections on ‘égyptien de tradition’.

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 215

3.4 Hymn to Hapi

Hymn to Hapi50 is first documented on T. Ashmolean 1948.91, which in all likelihood

dates to the early Eighteenth Dynasty; the tablet gives two versions of the beginning
(1.1-8), presumably by an apprentice and his teacher.51 Another witness probably
dating to the Eighteenth Dynasty is T. Louvre E 693, also with the beginning of the
composition (1.1-2.6).52 Other Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses now include the three
graffiti in Assiut N13.1, spanning most of the text (graffito 2a: Hymn 1.1-5.8; graffito
2b: Hymn 8.1-8; graffito 2c: Hymn 9.1-14.7);53 of these, the one with the beginning of
the composition (2a) is paleographically dated to the early Eighteenth Dynasty.54 The
composition enjoyed a broad reception in the New Kingdom: copies are many, on
diverse material supports, and found in various places in the country.55
Hymn to Hapi shares many motifs and elements in the articulation of the ideas
exposed with texts from Amarna on.56 The early Ramesside dating initially suggested
by the editor of the text57 is contradicted by its earliest manuscript attestation, in the
early Eighteenth Dynasty; taking these into account, the author now argues in detail
for a dating to the early Eighteenth Dynasty.58 Based on language and the Middle
Egyptian literary tradition Hymn is allied with, other authors have proposed a Middle
Kingdom dating.59

3.4.1 Hymn 4.7: New subject pronoun

In one place, the composition has an instance of the new subject pronoun (tw=i, tw=k,
etc.):60

Hymn 4.7
swa m dwAt pt tA r-xt=f b
‘He (scil. the Nileflood) is in the underworld, whilec earth and heaven are
under its authority.’

50 Text: van der Plas 1986; three additional ostraca, all Ramesside, are mentioned in van der Plas
2013: §2, n.2-4. I follow the designation argued for by van der Plas 2013: §1.
51 Hagen in press, with a detailed discussion of the paleography; the early dating was already noted in
EG, p.20, n.11; subsequently Quack 1992: 134.
52 Van der Plas 1986: I, 4. On the dating, see the references in van der Plas 1986: I, 11.
53 Verhoeven 2013: §4.
54 Verhoeven 2013: §5.b.
55 Van der Plas 1986: I, 4-16; discussion by Hagen in press.
56 Van der Plas 1986: I, 187-90, and the running commentary; van der Plas 2013. Similarly by an
author who dates to the Middle Kingdom, Assmann (19992: 547): ‘In seiner Gedankenführung
erinnert er oft an Amarnahymnen; geht es ihm doch, wie jenen, um die Deutung vielfältigster
Phänomene als Manifestationen des „dem Angesicht verborgenen“ lebenspendenden Wirkens der
Gottheit.’
57 Van der Plas 1986: I, 187-90.
58 Van der Plas 2013.
59 E.g. Assmann 19992: 547 (who duly acknowledges the shared ideas and motifs with later texts, see
the preceding note).
60 Noted by van der Plas 1986: I, 28, 189.

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 216 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

a) A different reading in the Assiut witness that preserves this verse: §3.4.1.1.A. Corruption
of the whole first part into snTr in P. Anastasi VII and P. Sallier II.
b) The second part of the verse displays some textual variation, mainly between r-xt=f
‘under its authority’ (e.g. O. DeM 1176 ro) and Hr sxnwt=f ‘on its posts’ (e.g. P. Turin
ro);61 this is inconsequential for the following discussion.
c) ‘While’ as a faute-de-mieux English rendering of the balanced patterning of the Egyptian
verse (sw m dwAt – pt tA r-xt=f ). See below, §3.4.1.4.

The new subject pronoun is not documented before the late Seventeenth Dynasty
(§3.4.1.3). Its occurrence in Hymn 4.7 would therefore imply a terminus ante quem
non by the very late Second Intermediate Period. In order to strengthen the argument,
a series of additional considerations are required.

3.4.1.1 The original reading?

A preliminary step consists in assessing whether the pronoun is integral to the original
text of Hymn, thereby pointing to its actual date of composition, or a secondary
reading, thereby pointing to some stage in textual transmission.
A. Hymn 4.7 was long documented in Ramesside witnesses only. The now earliest
witness for this passage, from an Assiut graffito (2a), turns out to read differently, m s
dwAt/sbAt?.62 However, the text in the Assiut graffito does not seem to make sense as it
stands; the verse is also problematic on more than one level, as are other elements in
the immediately surrounding context.63 The reading in Assiut graffito 2a may be too
corrupt to reconstruct the original text from it with any certainty, yet the most likely
scenario at this stage of study remains an alteration from a reading such as now
preserved in the Ramesside witnesses of Hymn, sw m dwAt. A more detailed picture is
expected to emerge when the Assiut graffiti will be fully published and analyzed.
B. In six places in New Kingdom witnesses of other compositions, the new subject
pronoun is demonstrably not original. Five of these cases, all from Ramesside
witnesses, involve a first person pronoun tw=i, not a third person sw as in Hymn to
Hapi (for the sixth case, below, C). In three cases, the pronoun is after nty/ntt:

Heavenly Cow 21564 rx=sn nty tw=i aA ‘May they know that I am here.’
(in S and R.III; T preserves the original rx=sn ntt wi aA)

Heavenly Cow 232 Dr-nty tw=i r irt Ssp (...) ‘for I am to make light (...)’
(in S and R.II; T preserves the original (...) Dr-ntt wi (r) irt Ssp (...))

Sinuhe AOS vso 2-3 sSmw pn nty tw=i im=f ‘these conditions I am in’
(B 173-174 reads sSm pn nty wi Xr=f ‘this condition I am in (lit. under)’)

61 See van der Plas 1986: I, 95-6; II, 40.

62 Provisionally Verhoeven 2013: §5.b, n.42 (without the broader context).
63 I thank Ursula Verhoeven (p.c. 10/2011) for having shared the broader context with me.
64 Numbering after Hornung 1982.

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 217

The process of textual alteration, recurrent across the traditions of two unrelated texts,
is to be accounted for in relation to the specific constructional environment in which it
occurs. This involves a strong formal similarity between the original and altered
readings, on both the written and phonetic levels: nty/ntt wi (...)  nty/ntt tw=i (...).
Ironically, this seems to mirror what in earlier times may have been one of the com-
ponents of the linguistic process that contributed to the rise of the interlocutive (first
and second person) forms of the new subject pronoun in the language itself.65
The other two instances are not in relative environments, but also involve first
person singular pronouns:

Sinuhe AOS vso 45 (badly preserved) tw=i mi s (...) ‘I was like a man (...)’
(B 254 reads iw=i mi s (...))

Sinuhe AOS vso 50 mk tw=i m-bAH [...] ‘See I am in front [...]’

(B 263 reads mk wi m-bAH=k)

While not as strongly as in relative environments, these cases again involve at least
some proximity, written or phonetic, between older and later forms (wi  tw=i;
=i  tw=i). By contrast, the third person pronoun sw, as in Hymn 4.7, shows no point
of similarity, neither in written nor in phonetic form, with whatever possible source
construction may have originally stood in Hymn 4.7 if to be emended: *iw=f m dwAt,
*wn=f m dwAt, or *wnn=f m dwAt. The chances that sw in Hymn 4.7 was altered from
any of these are therefore minimal. Nor has this in fact ever been proposed.
C. Only one instance of a textually secondary third person form of the new subject
pronoun (sw) is known to me. This is from a later Eighteenth Dynasty manuscript:

Ptahhotep 82 L2 sw r irt ntt m ib=f ‘He will do what is in his heart.’

This passage differs textually from Hymn 4.7 in various respects. Even if no prior
knowledge of P was given, a series of semantic and formal tensions in the immediate
context of Ptahhotep 82 L2 would concur in strongly suggesting that the reading in
L2 is not original (compare the Gedankenexperiment above, §2.3.5). By contrast,
Hymn 4.7 is coherent as it stands, both in itself and within its broader context.
Once P is taken into account, the presence of sw in Ptahhotep 82 L2 appears as the
outcome of a specific textual history, with two major steps: a resegmentation effecting
the regularization of a rare construction, ib.tw r sDm, and an adaptation in pronominal
referents (§5.2.1):
P (...) Hwrw 82ib.tw r irt ntt m ib=k
 *(...) Hwrw-ib 82tw r irt ntt m ib=k
 L2 (...) Hwrw-ib 82sw r irt ntt m ib=f.

65 Already suggested in a slightly different form in EG §124.Obs. (unlike Gardiner, I take the origin
of third person forms of the pronoun to be from an altogether different origin than first and second
forms).

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 218 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

None of these two steps has to do with the form of the pronoun itself, and both steps
are entirely conditioned by external factors. No similar process(es) can be posited for
Hymn 4.7, where sw, if secondary, would have been so with respect to *iw=f, *wn=f,
or *wnn=f (above, B).
D. An entirely different scenario has been proposed by an earlier editor of Hymn,
who suggested that sw should be emended into *swt, i.e. into the old independent
pronoun.66
In itself a textual change swt  sw is possible.67 In the present case however, the
proposed emendation is impossible for the following reasons. To begin with,
independent pronouns of the series Twt, swt (as opposed to ntk, ntf ) are exceedingly
rare in (post-Coffin Text) Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian (§6.3.1.1) and their
occurrence is restricted to highly specific contexts, often with particular overtones
(§6.3.1.2). Hymn 4.7 does not afford any comparable context.
Of decisive importance is a consideration of the broader constructional environ-
ment in which *swt would supposedly occur in Hymn 4.7. Instances of independent
pronouns as subjects of situational predicate construction are strictly limited to the
Pyramid Texts, where they remain extremely rare.68 In short, the construction into
which it has been proposed that Hymn 4.7 should be emended, *swt m dwAt, does not
exist in Middle Egyptian.
E. In the lack of any scenario by which, nor source construction from which, sw
might have plausibly been altered in the course of textual transmission, the
transmitted text of Hymn 4.7—sw m dwAt—stands every chance to be original. An
additional, yet more direct argument that sw is integral to the original text is given
below (§3.4.1.4), taken into consideration the particular balancing context in which
the new subject pronoun is used in the verse here under discussion.

3.4.1.2 Marginal instances of sw-headed clauses in Middle Egyptian

The new subject pronoun proper is not documented before the very late Seventeenth
Dynasty (§3.4.1.3). There are, however, three instances of clause-initial sw from
earlier times; these are discussed preliminarily.69
A. Two (possible) instances of clause-initial sw are from the Coffin Texts. The
syntactic analysis of the second one remains an object of ongoing contention:

66 Helck 1972: 26, n.d. No argument is given: the posited emendation entirely relies on the implicit
assumption that the text should display no late features such as the new subject pronoun, as it
should date to the Middle Kingdom.
67 For examples and contexts of such change, e.g. el-Hawary 2010: 119, n.449; Schenkel 2008: 105.
68 Edel 1955-1964: §914. Occurrences are Pyr.1114bP’ ink ir pt ‘I am towards heaven’; Pyr.1093aP’, M
ink/Twt m Hmw ‘I am/you are the helm.’ The former may perhaps be interpreted alternatively as ink
ir(i) pt (Friedrich Junge, p.c. 6/2010), i.e. as an instance of a ink nfr construction (for which, e.g.
Vernus 1994), with a nisba-derivate of ir as predicate. If so, the evidence for a construction
independent pronoun – situational predicate becomes even slimmer.
69 An entirely different case is afforded by sw-headed constructions (sw sDm=f, etc.) commonly
found in some so-called ‘Netherworld Books’ and related compositions documented from the New
Kingdom on (§4.7.3).

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 219

(i) CT VII 30j

ink As[t] s(i)a m-Xnw Ax-bit
‘I am Isis, as she was in Khemmis’
a) The reading is epigraphically secure.70

(ii) CT VII 219f

wsir sw sab=f s(i)
‘As to Osiris, he cleanses her.’ ()
or: ‘He is Osirian when he cleanses her.’ ()
or: ‘As to Osiris, he cleanses her.’ ()
Three different analyses have been proposed:
() As fronted topic (wsir) – N(P) sDm=f (sw sab=f s(i)).71
() As a rare instance of the (disputed) pattern NP sw, with a (here non-
referential) noun accommodated into a nfr sw pattern.72
() With slight emendation, and an analysis as fronted topic (wsir) – cleft sentence
(sw(t) sab=f s(i)).73

Of these two passages, the analysis of (ii) remains disputed. Analysis () is highly
unlikely, since this would imply double fronting;74 even if it did apply, the construc-
tion would be different from the one in Hymn 4.7.75 If analyses () or () apply, the
passage does not have a clause-initial sw, and is therefore inconsequential to the
present discussion.
Only (i) is a case of clause-initial sw. Unlike in Hymn 4.7 however, clause-initial
sw here occurs in a clause that is dependent on a preceding one (ink Ast). In general,
dependent clauses are expected to be introduced by iw=f in Middle Egyptian; that this
is not the case in CT VII 30j can possibly be accounted for along the following lines.
In very broad terms, the morpheme iw signals that a clause is related to some point of
reference, be this the speech situation, the speaker’s world of experience, or unfolding
discourse itself. As such, iw also signals that a state-of-affairs is presented as
embedded in the temporal flux.76 This is not the case in CT VII 30j, where the clause
s(i) m Ax-bit is dependent on an identifying nominal predication (ink Ast), i.e. a pattern
that expresses a state-of-affairs not contingent on time. That sw is here exceptionally

70 Roberson 2010: 186-7, pace Jansen-Winkeln 2004: 220-1.

71 E.g. Doret 1991: 59, n.22. Similarly Roberson 2010: 187-8, with additional discussion.
72 Uljas 2006a. Further discussion of the pattern NP sw in personal names and interrogative
constructions by Gundacker 2010.
73 Schenkel 2008: 106-7, e (proposed as one possibility); followed by Gundacker 2010: 109.
74 Uljas 2006a: 246-7; Schenkel 2008: 106.
75 Although clause-initial, sw would not be initial within the broader segment of speech (here the
sentence), as it is in Hymn 4.7; the use of a dependent pronoun could then be licensed prosodically
by its leaning on a preceding element, the fronted topic.
76 Some well-known distributional restrictions of iw are illustrative: in non-verbal patterns, iw is
reserved to situational (/‘adverbial’) predicate constructions, and near-universally banned from any
qualifying (/‘adjectival’) or identifying and classifying (/‘nominal’) ones. This reflects the fact that
the latter, in contrast to the former, are not embedded in the temporal flux (e.g. Vernus 1994;
Winand 2006: 151-70).

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 220 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

licensed in clause-initial position then relates to the fact that s(i) m-Xnw Ax-bit is
dependent, semantically and prosodically, on some preceding segment of discourse,
on which it leans. The altogether exceptional nature of the overall construction
directly reflects its very low naturalness in communication, requiring a context as
particular as can occasionally be found in Coffin Texts. Unlike the one in Hymn 4.7,
the construction in CT VII 30j is thus explained within the ordinary rules of earlier
Middle Egyptian grammar.
B. The other instance of a sw-headed clause prior to the late Seventeenth Dynasty is
the following:

(iii) P. UC 32201 ro 13-14

(...) rD.na pA imw hAb in bAqt sw ATp
‘(...) he had the ship sent off—Baqet had—once fully loaded.’
a) A construction rD.n=ø (...) in N, in which the agent (bAqt) is not in the subject slot but
only later introduced, by means of in. The construction is exceptional, with only one
comparable instance known to the present author: CT V 27d-e Sq6C smn Tbwt nt N pn Hr
Akr in Ast smn=s N pn in Ast Hr Akr m nTr anx ‘The sandals of this N will be established on
earth by Isis; she will establish this N—Isis will—on earth as a living god.’ Against
otherwise documented standards of Middle Egyptian, the present construction is even
more bizarre than the one in CT V 27e: unlike in CT V 27e, the subject slot is not filled
by a cataphoric pronoun, and remains empty (rD.n=ø; contrast with CT V 27e smn=s).
This is at odds with the semantic constraints that bear on zeroing in Middle Egyptian:
with nouns that are singular, referential, and agentive (as here bAqt), zeroing is generally
not licensed.77
b) Resultative construction: rDi NP pseudoparticiple. The construction is rare in pre-New
Kingdom Middle Egyptian, and possibly confined to non-standard varieties.78

As in CT VII 30j (i), sw heads a circumstantial clause (sw Atp). As such, the pronoun,
although clause-initial, is not initial within the higher-order construal, the sentence:
like CT VII 30j, P. UC 32201 ro 13-14 differs from Hymn 4.7, where clause-initial sw
is in the first member of a balanced verse, a self-standing structure that does not
depend syntactically on some preceding clause. Even if Hymn 4.7 were to be
interpreted as textually parenthetical within the sequence of epithets (participles and
relative forms) in stanza 4, this would still differ from syntactic dependency, as in
P. UC 32201 ro 13-14 and CT VII 30j.

77 Stauder in prep.
78 The very existence of the construction has been debated for pre-New Kingdom Middle Egyptian
(discussion by Schenkel 2007 and Peust 2006). P. UC 32201 ro 13-14 establishes the construction,
at least for some (probably non-standard) variety of Middle Egyptian. In a literary text, a possible
instance is Sinuhe B 201 D.n=i sw sn Hr Snbysic, HAIR=i. While this could be a secondary reading
(Schenkel 2007: 111), it is no less interesting since the text as written by the B-scribe implies a
reading Sny ‘hair’, and therefore an overall resultative reading ‘I placed it scattered on my hair.’ At
least to the B-scribe, therefore, a resultative construction was deemed acceptable: with all due
caution, this may again be a token of some non-standard variety of Middle Egyptian.

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 221

In analyzing P. UC 32201 ro 13-14 further, differences with CT VII 30j itself are
also relevant. While the construction in the latter text could be accounted for within
the general frame of Middle Egyptian grammar, the one in the former text can not: no
reason can be given for why a iw-introduced circumstantial construction is here
avoided. To explain the sw-headed clause, register has to be taken into account. The
passage under consideration is from a letter. In the present case, the narrow context of
sw Atpw features at least two other constructions (see textual notes a and b) that are
exceptional in themselves. Regarding the first of these, it is further observed that the
in-dislocated introduction of the agent is used rather differently in CT V 27d-e and in
P. UC 32201 ro 13-14. In the former text, the construction makes for stylistic
balancing (compare the full quotation above), while in the latter text, it serves to add
an afterthought-like piece of information, in a way that typically tends to occur in
more spontaneous modes of communication. Together, these features suggest that
P. UC 32201 ro 13-14 is a rare case of a slip into a non-standard variety of Middle
Egyptian. The construction sw Atpw relates to such. Clause-initial sw in P. UC 32201
ro 13-14 thus differs from Hymn 4.7 both syntactically, and in terms of the variety of
Middle Egyptian these two texts bear witness to.

3.4.1.3 Early attestations of the new subject pronoun

The new subject pronoun is not securely attested in any text prior to the very late
Second Intermediate Period.79 Early instances of the new subject pronoun up to the
time of Amenhotep II are the following.

(a) In the late Seventeenth Dynasty ‘military register’ (§1.3.3.2.E):

- Antefnakht’s Stela (later D.17), 3 (§1.3.3.1, (v));
- Kamose Inscriptions: T. Carn. 4 = St.I, 5; T. Carn. 5; T. Carn. 7 = St.I, 8
(twice); St.I, 10; St.II, 1; St.II, 5;
- Emhab 11 (§3.4.1.4, (iii));
- Similarly also later in Thutmosis III’s Annals: Urk. IV 649, 7; 649, 15;
656, 5.

(b) Registers of lesser formality:

- Early New Kingdom ‘Reden und Rufe’: Paheri (temp. Thutmosis III), pl.3,
passim;80 Intef (TT 155; temp. Thutmosis III);81 Kenamun (temp.
Amenhotep II), pl.42;82

79 For one possible earlier instance, which however remains problematic in dating and in
interpretation (O. Cairo 25372), see below in the main text (iii).
80 Pl.3, 3d register from top, central horizontal inscription: hrw nfr tw.tw qb (...) ‘A good day: one is
cool (...)’; 3d register from top, 3d vertical inscription to the right of the middle inscription, 5 (...) sy
nfr.ti wrt ‘(...) it is very good’; 2nd register from bottom, 2nd inscription from the right, 10-11 (...) xr
tw.tw Hr As=n m Smt (...) ‘(...) and they are hurrying us in (our) going (...)’.
81 See Kroeber 1970: 90, ex.14.
82 Text: Davies 1930; quoted in EG §330 and n.6; Kroeber 1970: 90, ex.15

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 222 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

- In a direct discourse: Deir el-Bahari, VI, pl.155;83

- Tija’s Sehel Graffito (temp. Hatshepsut), 7;84 an early New Kingdom graffito
in the temple of Sahure;85
- O. Cairo 25372 (temp.?),86 1-2.

(c) Documentary registers:

- O. Leipzig 13, 10 (a working report; temp. Hatshepsut);87
- P. BM EA 10103 ro 4 (Hori to Ahmes Peniati; temp. Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III);
P. Louvre 3230A 5-6 (Teti to Ahmes Peniati; temp. Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III);
P. Berlin 10463 vso 2 (Sennefer to Baki; temp. Amenhotep II).88

(d) Registers of higher formality:

- Urk. IV 181, 2 (temp. Thutmosis III); Thutmosis III’s Gebel Barkal Stela 10
(Urk. IV 1231, 19);89
- Appointment of the Vizier 25 (§3.4.1.4, (ii));
- Urk. IV 1509, 5; 1509, 10 (inscription on Kha’s golden cubit measure; temp.
Amenhotep II).90

(e) In a literary text, in direct speech:

- Neferkare and Sisene P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+5 (§4.4.3.1; on the dating, §4.4).
The expression here discussed, a pronoun, performs a function common in language,
thereby meeting the first of the conditions outlined above (§3.1.1; b.). Other expres-
sions, such as iw=f, mk sw, etc., consistently performed similar functions in older
times, and still do regularly in most contemporaneous registers: the new subject
pronoun thus also meets condition (b.). The pattern of attestation is immediately
fairly dense, suggesting that it is broadly reliable. It is also consistent in terms of
registers: the new subject pronoun is attested since the late Seventeenth Dynasty,
initially in less formal registers or such that more broadly accommodate innovative
expressions (a)-(c); still on a sporadic basis, it is first included in more formal
registers by the times of Thutmosis III (d). Even though the Second Intermediate
Period record is sparse, it therefore appears that the new subject pronoun first gained
access to written registers no earlier than the very end of that period.

83 EG §330.
84 Text: HHBT 121; reading disputed by Oréal 2011: 249.
85 EG §124, n.8.
86 The dating of the document, for which the Middle Kingdom has been proposed on paleographical
grounds, remains unclear: see the discussion below, §5.2.4, (b).
87 Kroeber 1970: 89, ex.11.
88 Kroeber 1970: 91, ex.18, 19, and 21.
89 Kroeber 1970: 88, ex.7 and 6.
90 Kroeber 1970: 87, ex.4-5.

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 223

3.4.1.4 The broader construction

In Hymn 4.7, the pronoun is used in a balanced verse that interrupts a sequence of
epithets:
(i) Hymn 4.5-9
(...) sxpr smw n mnmnt rDw sfTw n nTr nb
sw m dwAt pt tA r-xt=f
iT tAwy mH wDAw swsx Snwwt (...)
‘(...) Who generates grass for the herds; who gives slaughtered animals to
every god
—He is in the underworld, while earth and heaven are under its authority—
The seizer of the Dual Land; who fills storehouses and enlarges granaries (...)’

Such use of a sw-headed situational predicate clause interrupting a string of epithets is

paralleled in the following passage:

(ii) Appointment of the Vizier 25

(...) Hmw-ib Htp qd nfr tw(t)a
sw n={nb}<k> (m)b mdw iAwt
‘(...) skilled of heart, calm of character, good and adequate(?)
—He is to you a staff of old age.’
a) Written <t w Y1>; interpretation unclear.91
b) Haplography before the following word beginning in m.

More remarkable yet is the following passage in which a sw-headed clause, also
interrupting a descriptive sequence, is the first of two balanced clauses. The whole
patterning is just as in Hymn 4.7:92

(iii) Emhab 8-12

(...) ir=i rnpt 3 iw=i Hr sxt m qmqm ra nb
stwt=i r pAy=i nb m xn=f nb
sw m nTr iw=i m HqA
wnn=f Hr Xdb iw=i Hr sanx
‘(...) I spent three years playing the drum daily,
I lived up to this my lord in his every speech
—He is a god, while I am a chief—
Whenever he kills, I sustain.’93
On grounds that are here ultimately stylistic in nature, these parallels in patterning
point to the very same period in time that was already determined above by strict

91 I broadly follow Helck 1955a, against Dziobek 1998: 8.

92 The balanced formulation in Kamose Inscriptions T. Carn. 7 is of a different kind, not directly
comparable to the one in Hymn 4.7: sw Xr tA [n] aAmw tw=n Xr kmt ‘He owns the land of the
Asiatics, we own Egypt.’
93 On the motif, Klotz 2010: 234-6, 241, n.254; Baines 1987.

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 224 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

linguistic analysis (§3.4.1.3). They also provide a further argument that sw is original
in Hymn 4.7: the new subject pronoun is here part of a broader and highly elaborate
patterning, documented elsewhere. The likelihood that this could have arisen as the
effect of some textual alteration is accordingly minimal.

3.4.2 Hymn 2.5, 12.1-2: #r-sDm=f in the second part of a correlative system

Hymn has two probable instances of xr-sDm=f in the second part of a correlative
system:
(i) Hymn 2.5-8
wsf=f
xr Dbb/Dbw fndw xr Hr-nb nmHw
xbA.tw m pAwt nTrw
xr HHw aqw m rmT
‘When he is sluggish,
noses get chocked up, everybody is orphaned;
When there is cutting off from divine loaves,
millions have perished among men.’

(ii) Hymn 12.1-2

wbn=f/k m niwt Hqr
xr sAA(=)sn/twa m inw nfr n SAw
‘When he/you rise(s) in the city of hunger,
they/one become(s) satiated with all good produces of the fields.’
a) The manuscript tradition is split.94 Manuscripts that are traditionally considered better
ones (P. Turin, O. Ashmolean) have =sn, but are themselves not immune to textual
alteration in the very form under consideration.95 Further discussion, §3.4.2.1.

For dating, two issues must be addressed: the identification of the constructions in
Hymn (§3.4.2.1), and the diachronic status of xr-sDm=f (§3.4.2.2).

3.4.2.1 #r-sDm=f or xr nfr sw?

At first sight, the xr-headed constructions quoted above could be instances of either of
the two following constructions:

(a) xr-sDm=f (the bound combination of xr with a subjunctive

sDm=f );
(b) xr nfr sw (a (free) combination of xr with the nfr sw pattern).

94 Mss. with sn: P. Turin ro III; O. Ashm. 313; P. ChB. V ro IV; O. DeM 1050 + O. Turin 57277.
Mss. with tw: O. DeM 1176; O. Mich.; P. An. VIII ro XI; P. Sal. II ro XIV.
95 P. Turin ro III [...] smsic, implying sn; O. Ashm. 313 xr ssAA sn.

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 225

While the latter construction is well attested in the Middle Kingdom, the former, is
not securely attested before the early New Kingdom, and may therefore be criterial for
dating.
A. Formal arguments are inconclusive. In written form, the two constructions are
non-distinct with full noun subjects (2.5 fndw). In 12.2, the reading xr sAA tw in
various other manuscripts would imply an interpretation as xr-sDm=f (a). The manu-
script tradition is split, however, and it remains unclear which of the two readings—
xr-sAA.tw or xr(-)sAA(=)sn—is original; if the latter is original, the written form is non-
distinct again. Determining which of these readings is original is itself no easy task: to
my knowledge, only the alteration tw  sn is attested elsewhere96, yet this does not
suffice to rule out the possibility of a change sn  tw. As regards the written forms of
the stem in 12.2, they would imply an understanding as xr-sDm=f in several
manuscripts (most clearly O. Michaelides xr-sAy.tw, with a written form of the
subjunctive); yet the general degree of variation (sAA, sAy, sA), compounded with the
overall post-classical orthography of the manuscripts, prevents any reliable argument
on this level.
B. A look at the broader construction is therefore required. In Hymn, the xr-headed
constructions are after a setting construction (Hymn 2.5 wsf=f; 12.1 wbn=f/=k), thus
forming part of a correlative system (setting sDm=f – xr-headed construction97).
Among xr-headed constructions, xr-sDm=f, as well as xr NP sDm=f, are commonly
used in such correlative systems following a setting, condition, or topic of some sort
(§3.4.2.2). On the other hand, documented instances of xr nfr sw do not include uses
in similar correlative systems.98 If this is not a gap in the record, such lack of xr nfr sw
in correlative systems would suggest an analysis of Hymn 2.5 and 12.2 as xr-nfr=f.
C. The argument is also a semantic one. A nfr sw pattern linguistically presents a
state-of-affairs as not contingent upon time or any other circumstance. A correlative
system, on the other hand, serves to express contingency of the second clause upon
the first. When it comes to non-dynamic events, the second part of the correlative
system is realized with a subject – pseudoparticiple construction, a pattern that, unlike
nfr sw, presents a state-of-affairs as contingent. In Hymn itself: 2.5-6 wsf=f (...) xr Hr-

96 Ptahhotep 33 P ir.t(w); L2, C ir=sn. This change was probably induced by a reinterpretation of the
passage, with an attraction to the plural referents in 30-32 (sDmyw; imiw-HAt; tpiw-a). No plural
antecedent is given in Hymn 12.1, but niwt is notionally plural (as is also underscored on the
written level by the plural strokes); the attraction could have been ad sensum.
97 Morphologically, this could be a mrr=f or a subjunctive; this is left open since the issue is
inconsequential for the following argument.
98 Compare: (a) Heqanakht I vso 1-2 (in ir grt pA rDt iwt n=i sA-Ht-Hr Xr it-mH is n SwSyt wn m Dd-swt
n rDt n=i pA it-mH XAr 10 m mH mA nfr) n xr nfr Tw Hr wnm it nfr iw=i r tA ‘(Now, what is this,
having Sithathor come to me with old, dried-up full barley that was in Djedsut, without giving me
those 10 sacks of full barley in new, fresh full barley?) Don’t you have it good, eating fresh barley
while I am outcast?’ (Allen 2002a: 16, 30); (b) Sinuhe B 202-203 (ir.tw nn mi-m n bAk th.n ib=f r
xAswt DrDryt) xr Hm nfr wAH-ib nHm wi m-a m(w)t ‘(How is this done to a servant whose heart has
led him astray to foreign lands?) The mercy is assuredly good that rescues me from death’;
(c) Ptahhotep 407-410 (iw sA=k r Hbs Xr=s wn Ssp=f Hr=k r anx n pr=k) xr saH.k mrr=k anx sw
Xr=s ‘(Your back will be clothed by it, and his indulgence to you will be the life of your house.)
Your noble one, the one you love, he is alive by it.’

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 226 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

nb nmHw ‘When he is sluggish, (...) everybody is orphaned’; 2.7-8 xbA.tw (...) xr HHw
aqw m rmT ‘When there is cutting off (...), millions have perished among men.’ The
documentary lack of instances of xr nfr sw in the second part of a correlative system,
noted above, is thus consistent with a semantic analysis of its constituent parts. The
gap is unlikely, therefore, to be coincidental.
NB. Mostly in order not to leave a possible devil’s advocate’s proposal unanswered,
one may contemplate the possibility that Hymn 2.5 and 12.2 could be tokens of an
extension of use, otherwise undocumented and semantically tense, yet possibly
licensed in literary language and perhaps limited to Hymn. One could then posit a
contrast between xr nfr sw and xr NP PsP, the former expressing essential semantics
in the correlative systems of Hymn. This scenario, however, runs counter to the fact
that in Hymn no meaningful contrast is observed along such lines: 2.5 xr Dbb fndw
and 12.2 xr sAA sn/tw are not associated with semantics that are any more essential
than 2.6 xr Hr-nb nmHw and 2.8 xr HHw aqw. Alternatively, and still as a devil’s
advocate’s proposals, one may retreat into proposing that the contrast between the
hypothetical xr nfr sw and xr NP PsP, apparently neutralized in meaning, was
exploitation for rhythmical variation (as otherwise attested in Middle Egyptian
literary texts, in non-xr-headed patterns). This interpretation however would be
possible only in 2.5-6: wsf=f – xr Dbb fndw (*xr nfr sw??) xr Hr-nb nmHw (xr NP
PsP). It is impossible in 12.1-2, which has no similar balancing: wbn=f – xr sAA sn/tw.
It is also made unlikely for 2.5-6 itself when the following sequence is taken into
account: 2.7-8 xbA.tw – xr HHw aqw m rmT (NP PsP).

The above considerations, based on actually documented constructions and semantic

analysis, establish the analysis of Hymn 2.5 and 12.2 as instances of the bound
construction xr-sDm=f.99

3.4.2.2 The rise of xr-sDm=f

As has been noted in a dedicated study of xr-headed patterns,100 the bound pattern xr-
sDm=f is not securely documented before the early New Kingdom. Given the
associated implications for dating Hymn, I here contribute some further remarks on
the issue.
A. Only one instance of a sequence xr sDm=f has been noted in a text earlier than the
New Kingdom:101

99 For Hymn 12.2, this is also the interpretation selected by Vernus in his study of xr-headed
constructions (1990a: 65, n.39).
100 Vernus 1990a: 66, n.41 and 65, n.39, respectively.
101 Borghouts 2010: I, §57b.

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 227

(i) CT IV 359c-e T1L

nis.kA r=f nTr pw r=k
xaa ra m bA=f
xr nis=k r=k r mA-HA=f
‘This god shall summon to you.
Whenever Re appears with his soul,
then you shall summon the Back-looker.’
Spell 343, to which this passage belongs, is documented in many witnesses. CT
IV 359c-e, however, is only in T1L. One other witness now also has CT IV 359e,
in a slightly different reading: Sid2Sid102 back 16-18 (...) nis.kA=T r=T r mA-HA=f.
CT IV 359d, with the first part of the correlative system to be discussed below, is
only in T1L: in Sid2Sid, the construction is without a correlative system.

In written form, the correlative system in CT IV 359d-e T1L looks just like the ones
in Hymn here under discussion. These need not, however, imply that the construction
is identical, or has the same status in grammar. Given its isolated character in the
overall Middle Kingdom record, this is probably best interpreted as a free combina-
tion of the auxiliary xr with a sDm=f of some sort (subjunctive or prospective), akin to
other Middle Kingdom constructions in which xr is freely combined with a variety of
different patterns, verbal and non-verbal alike.103 It is of course from such free
combinations that the later bound construction would emerge, yet they have different
status. Also noteworthy is the future tensing in CT IV 359c-e, established by the -kA-
marked form in CT IV 359c; significantly, the partial parallel in Sid2Sid has a kA-
marked form in CT IV 359e itself. In this respect, the construction is certainly
different from the ones in Hymn.
B. In correlative systems, xr-sDm=f is documented from the early New Kingdom on,
e.g.:104

(ii) Urk. IV 690, 4-5

ist ir pA nty nb Hr m(w)t m nn n wrw
xr-D Hm=f Sm sA=f r aHa Hr st=f
‘As to every one among these chiefs who is dying,
His Majesty has his son go to stand in his place.’

#r-sDm=f is a fairly common construction: the complete lack of pre-New Kingdom

attestation is therefore meaningful (§3.1.1, condition (b.)). What is more, some other
construction is regularly used in all pre-New Kingdom times in environments similar
to the one under consideration (condition (b.)). In the Middle Kingdom and Second
Intermediate Period, xr-headed constructions with dynamic events in correlative
systems are always based on the unmarked (/‘unextensive’) synchronous pattern N(P)

102 Text: Abd el-Fatah & Bickel 2000: 22.

103 References in Vernus 1990a: 65-6.
104 Further references: Vernus 1990a: 65, n.39; Depuydt 1993: 227-31. On the construction, also Polis
2005, with reference to previous discussions.

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 228 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

sDm=f, not on the subjunctive (xr-sDm=f ). Thus, following a textual setting (iii), a ir-
marked condition (iv), and a ir-marked nominal topic (v) (for Second Intermediate
Period examples, below, (vi)-(vii)):

(iii) Heqanakht II ro 40105

minA n grt mr=k s(i)
xr=k D=k int n=i iwt-n-Hb
‘Now, if you don’t want her,
you will have to have Iutenhab brought to me.’
Sim. Stèle Juridique 25-26, quoted below, (vi).

(iv) Eloquent Peasant B1 193-194

ir gsA=f
xr=k gsA=k
‘If it (scil. the scale) tilts,
you tilt.’
Sim. Eloquent Paesant B1 182; Heqanakht I 8-9; Heqanakht II ro 35-36. In the
Second Intemediate Period, Abydos Boundary Stela usurped by Neferhotep 5-6,
quoted below, (vii). After a condition introduction by ir + preposition, P. Reisner
II pl.5, 13-15 ir grt r-sA aA=k pA imw (...) xr=k stp=k Sps 10 ‘After you plane this
imu-vessel, you have to select ten shepes-people.’106

(v) P. Berlin 10073107

ir nhw gmy=k xnt im
xr=k hAb=k Hr=s n imi-rA pr Hr-m-sA=f
‘As to the loss (of people) that you found there in front,
you will have to write concerning it to the overseer of the house Horemsaf.’

The construction xr NP sDm=f extends even to cases when the agent is non-specified:
in the Second Intermediate Period, this leads to constructions with a doubling of tw.
E.g. after a textual setting (vi) and after a ir-marked nominal topic (vii):

(vi) Stèle Juridique 25-26108

fdq wDA m sA=i N nn Xrdw=f
xr.tw D.tw pAy=i HAti-a n nxb n snw=f nw mwt=f
‘The succession having been broken in my son N who is childless,
my (office) of governor of Nekheb is to be given to his maternal brothers.’

105 For the interpretation of the first part as providing a textual setting, Allen 2002a: 45 (in details);
similarly Vernus 1990a: 73, n.74.
106 Vernus 1990a: 79, ex.146.
107 Quoted after Green 1987: 54-5.
108 Discussion: Vernus 1990a: 98-9.

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 229

(vii) Abydos Boundary Stela usurped by Neferhotep (originally Ugaf?), 5-6

ir rf nty Tw nb r gmt=f (...)
xr.t(w) wbd.t(w)=f
‘As to anyone whosoever will find it (...),
he is to be burnt.’

Such constructions are remarkable, in general and in the present context, because tw is
set twice despite the low topicality of the discourse referents tw stands for.109 That tw
is nonetheless regularly doubled in these xr-headed constructions demonstrates that
no construction other than xr NP sDm=f, and specifically not xr sDm=f, had by then
developed.
For assessing the rise of xr-sDm=f, it is of further significance that both the above
Second Intermediate Period instances are from monumentalized documentary
registers, i.e. from written registers that in the Second Intermediate Period otherwise
tend to accommodate linguistic innovations (illustration above, for these very same
texts: §1.3.3.1, (ii) for Abydos Boundary Stela; §1.3.3.1, (iv) for Stèle Juridique;
general discussion: §1.3.3.1). Yet, neither of these texts have xr-sDm=f, not even in
the passive. To be noted, finally, is that Stèle Juridique dates fairly late in the Second
Intermediate Period (mid-Seventeenth Dynasty).
C. As just discussed, xr-sDm=f is first documented by the early New Kingdom and is
not uncommon in higher registers of Late Egypian.110 A different construction was
consistently used in earlier times performing similar functions, xr NP sDm=f: this was
used exclusively down to the late Second Intermediate Period, including in written
registers that are otherwise open to innovations and in cases where this entails a
doubling of the morpheme tw.
In the early New Kingdom, both xr NP sDm=f and xr-sDm=f are used, including in
the same text. This transitional situation is here illustrated in the Vizieral Cycle,111
where xr-sDm=f is found alongside older xr NP sDm=f, both in the active and the
passive:

109 I am aware of only four cases of a doubling of tw in other constructions. All of these are syntactic
hybrids and all are from Eighteenth Dynasty inscriptions: Urk. IV 344, 9 (Punt Expedition) iw.tw
sDm.tw=f; Installation of the Vizier 17 (Urk. IV 1090, 15) mk tw Dd.tw; Amenhotep II’s Sphinx
Stela 19-20 (Urk. IV 1281, 14-15) tw sDm.tw (...) in (...) (quoted above, §2, n.106); Urk. IV 1639, 8
(Djeserkareseneb) iw.tw sxA.tw nfrw (...).
110 Neveu 2001: 219-28, particularly 225-6 for syntactic environments comparable to the ones in
Hymn.
111 On the dating of Duties, §2.8.3.5. As regards the specific construction here under discussion, three
out of four cases (a)-(c) are also documented in Installation, for which a dating to the early
Eighteenth Dynasty is not disputed. As is apparent in the examples below, Duties presents the
exact same transitional stage as Installation, which in itself provides a valuable linguistic
indication for dating Duties to the same time as Installation.

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 230 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

(a) #r-sDm=f, active:

(viii) Installation of the Vizier 12-13
[ir] sr irr mitt nA
xr rwd=f aA m tA st
‘As regards every official who acts like this,
he is successful here in this place.’
Sim. Duties R 5 [x]r mnmn TAti.

(b) #r-sDm=f, passive:

(ix) Installation of the Vizier 6-7
ir ir=f nkt [...]w r sp=f (...)
x[r] rx.tw Hr rA n wpy=f m Dd st
‘If he makes a wrongdoing(?) [...] regarding(?) his case (...)
it is then known on account of the pronouncing of his decision in these words:’
Sim. Duties R 14 xr wAH.t(w); R 15 xr iT.t(w) (twice); R 20 xr mA.t(w).

(c) #r NP sDm=f, active:

(x) Installation of the Vizier 21
ir wA=k Hr wHa
xr=k hAb=k r wHa imi-rA AHwt imi-rA Snwt wartw
ir wnn wn wHa.t=f(y) Xr-HAt=k
xr=k Sn=[k] sw
‘If you are absent from(?) investigation,
you shall send the overseers of lands, chief of sheriffs(?), and wartw to
investigate.
If there is anyone who shall have made investigation before you,
you shall question him;’112
Sim. Duties R 9 xr=f D=f; R 16 xr=f pgA=f; R 20 xr=f Sd=f.

(d) #r NP sDm=f, passive:

(xi) Duties of the Vizier R 3 (Urk. IV 1104, 15-16)
ir Dd Hry nn sDm nb r-a=i
xr.t(w) nDr.t(w)=f in wpwtyw n TAty
‘If the higher official says “No one besides me is to be heard”,
he shall be arrested by the messengers of the vizier.’
Sim. Duties R 14 (xr.t(w) smi.t(w) swD.t(w)).

Such transitional situation is typical of ongoing change. This further confirms that xr-
sDm=f was a recently innovated construction in the early New Kingdom.

112 Translation Faulkner 1955a: 23. I am not certain that this is fully correct but fail to come up with a
better interpretation.

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 231

3.4.2.3 Setting sDm=f – xr-headed construction

The above discussion, and derived dating argument, was about xr-sDm=f as a bound
form. In order to contrast xr-sDm=f with an older construction performing similar
functions (xr NP sDm=f ), the correlative systems in Hymn 2.5 and 12.1-2 were con-
sidered only in general terms, irrespective of the nature of the first of the two clauses
they consist in; this step was taken in order to make sure that relevant examples for
comparison would be numerous enough (§3.4.2.2). I now consider the more specific
type of xr-headed correlative systems in Hymn, which have a non-introduced sDm=f
of some sort (mrr=f or subjunctive) used in setting function in their first clause.
Correlative systems of this sort are very rare, and apparently paralleled in the early
New Kingdom only.113 Perhaps significantly, the most direct parallel is from a hymn,
although from slightly later times (i). Closer in time to the first manuscript attestation
of Hymn are two Hatshepsutian instances (ii)-(iii). These examples display the exact
same type of correlative system as Hymn 2.5 and 12.1-2, with a setting sDm=f in the
first clause and a -xr-marked form in the second:

(i) Suti & Hor 8 (Urk. IV 1945, 1)114

Htp=k m mAnw
xr-qd=sn mi sxrw m(w)t
‘When you set in the Western mountain,
they sleep in the manner of death.’

(ii) Urk. IV 245, 14-17

Dd=s n rmT sDmw
xr.xr [S]fSft im=[s]n
xpr.xr Hmt=s aA.ti r xt nbt
‘When she says to people “Listen!”,
respect falls upon them
and Her Majesty becomes greater than anything.’
Note the synthetic -xr-infixed construction, already obsolescent by the early
Middle Kingdom,115 here a token of Hatshepsut’s archaizing selections.116

(iii) Chapelle Rouge, p.137: IX.22-23 (HHBT II 28, 8-10/11)

wp=i mi tm (...)
wn.xr=s m-HAt wiA=f
‘When I judge like Atum (...),
she is in front of her bark.’

113 Vernus 1990a: 73-4, from which the following examples are taken. In Herwerre 9 (temp.
Amenemhat III), the xr-introduced clause is paratactically linked to the preceding one, but this
linkage does not involve a correlative system (§4.1.2, (iii)). Stèle Juridique 25-26 (quoted above:
§3.4.2.2, (vi)) has a passive sDm=f in setting position; the construction may be related to, yet is
also different from, the one here examined.
114 Quoted by Vernus 1990a: 137, n.74.
115 For the diachronics of synthetic -xr-infixed forms, Vernus 1990a: 63-5, 68-71.
116 Vernus 1990a: 65; for the dating of the Royal Cycle, §4.7.

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 232 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

3.4.3 Hymn 6.4: &w sDm

The composition has one instance of the construction tw sDm:117

Hymn 6.3-4
Sms sw DAmw Xrdw tw nD xrt=f m nsw
‘When a group of children follows him, he is greeted as a king.’

These verses will be discussed in details below in relation to other instances of the
same construction. As to be argued, the construction implies a type-B terminus ante
quem non by the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty (§5.3).

3.4.4 Hymn 3.7: Inchoative Ssp

The composition has one instance of Ssp used with inchoative force (inchoari ‘begin
to do sthg.’).
(i) Hymn 3.7
Tst nbt Ssp.n=s sbt
‘Every jawbone, it has begun to laugh.’

This remains undocumented in the Middle Kingdom. Examples have, on the other
hand, been noted in literary Late Egyptian, e.g.:

(ii) Tale of Two Brothers 18.5 (LES 28, 7)118

(...) iw=s Hr Ssp iwr m km n iAt
‘(...) and she became pregnant in one moment.’
More directly relevant to Hymn are two early examples from Hatshepsutian times, the
two first occurrences of the construction known to me:

(iii) Chapelle Rouge, p.98: I.2-3 (HHBT II 7, 11)

tA r-Dr=f Ssp.n sgri
‘The whole land, it became silent.’

(iv) Chapelle Rouge, p.120: V.7-8 (HHBT II 19, 2)

wn.in nn smrw ibw=sn Ssp.n mht
‘These companions’ hearts, they begun to forget.’

These two Hatshepsutian instances are remarkable on yet another level: they use Ssp
with inchoative force in a N sDm.n construction. The latter construction is documented
in the Middle Kingdom and early New Kingdom alike (§1.2, (xi)); it remains fairly
uncommon at all times. The combination of the two constructions in Chapelle Rouge

117 Noted by van der Plas 1986: I, 33, 189.

118 Quoted by Winand 2006: 335-6, ex.604.

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 233

is therefore noteworthy: this remains unparalleled, except in Hymn 3.7, which has an
exactly similar formulation.

NB. Hymn to Hapi has one more construction that deserves a brief descriptive note,
even though it turns out not to provide any valuable indication for dating. In the final
part of the composition, some manuscripts have the sequence imperative – kA-sDm=k:
(v) Hymn 14.5, 6, 10
(Hapy) wAD kA-iw(t)=ka
‘(Hapy), be verdant and then come!’
a) Thus in various manuscripts.119 Other manuscripts120 have (Hapy) wAD.t(i) kApw
‘(Hapy), be verdant, hidden one!’ The former reading is preferred over the latter for
the following reasons: it is found in P. Turin, which is generally superior to the manu-
scripts of the second group;121 in having a kA-sDm=f construction rather than a mere
nominal phrase kApw, it is a lectio difficilior in the linguistic horizon of Ramesside
times; finally, and perhaps more directly, the spelling of kApw as <k-A-p-w-A2>,
strongly suggests that the reading is secondary: the verb kAp ‘to cover, shelter, etc.’ is
otherwise written with the incense burner (R5) rather than phonographically122 and
never includes the A2 semogram.

In Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian as documented in the record, an imperative is

directly continued by a subjunctive sDm=k, not by a kA-sDm=k construction; the
sequence imperative – kA-sDm=k is, on the other hand, documented, if sparsely, in the
New Kingdom (§2.8.3.2.NB). Yet, for various reasons discussed above, this fails to
provide any reliable indication for dating. Still on a purely descriptive level, also note
that Merikare has a similar construction (E 14).

3.4.5 Dating Hymn to Hapi

A. The primary evidence for dating Hymn to Hapi consists in the three expressions
discussed first (§3.4.1-3). In two of three cases—the new subject pronoun and to a
lesser extent xr-sDm=f—the expression considered is common in text (§3.1.1, condi-
tion (b.)); only tw sDm is uncommon but relates to a high-order construction, (X.)tw
Hr sDm, which is not rare (below, §5.3.4). In all three cases, some other expression can
be documented to have been consistently used in similar contexts or functions in only
slightly earlier times (condition (b.); for tw sDm, below, §5.3.5).
These expressions then provide the following individual termini ante quem non
for dating Hymn:

119 See van der Plas 1986: II, 138ff: P. Turin ro IV (14.6; 14.10); O. IFAO 8332 (14.5 k[A]-iwt=f;
14.7Ab); O. Var. Lit. B (14.5 kA-iwt; 14.7Ac kA-[iwt]); O. OI 25040 ro (14.9 kA-iwt).
120 P. ChB V ro V; P. An. VII ro XII; P. Sal. II ro XIV.
121 See van der Plas 1986: I, 16 and n.35.
122 Typical spellings are of the sort <kAp-p-SEMOGRAM, not A2> (see Wb. V 104.14). Rarely, the body of
the word is written phonographically but the spelling still includes the sign of incense burner (<k-A-
p-kAp>: see Borghouts 2010: II, 117). Spellings without the incense burner sign are found only in
nominal derivatives, e.g. in kAp ‘Schutzdach’ (Wb. V 104.4).

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 234 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

(a) New pronoun sw (§3.4.1): late D.17;

(b) #r-sDm=f (§3.4.2): late D.17/early NK;
(c) &w sDm (§3.4.3; 5.3): mid-D.13.
(The last is a type-B ante quem non: the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty is the earliest
moment in time for which based on the evidence available it can not be excluded
that tw sDm could have had currency in the relevant written registers, not
necessarily the earliest moment in time when it actually had first gained currency.
When the expression was innovated between the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty and late
Second Intermediate Period remains unknown.)

The three arguments converge in ruling out a dating of Hymn to Hapi to the Middle
Kingdom. Moreover, (a) and (b) concur in implying a more specific terminus ante
quem non no earlier than the late Seventeenth Dynasty. The composition is thus
‘squeezed’ into a period in time close to its first manuscript attestation, in the early
Eighteenth Dynasty.
Within this relatively short range for dating, the early Eighteenth Dynasty is
slightly more likely. As an examination of the pattern of attestation of the new subject
pronoun shows, this is first documented in innovative registers by the late Seventeenth
Dynasty and seems to have gained acceptance in more formal ones only slightly later
(§3.4.1.3).
B. Other elements in Hymn to Hapi do not lend themselves to full arguments such as
the above but are indicative for dating nonetheless. With a view on describing the
linguistic typology of the composition more fully, these are therefore worth
summarizing as well. Inchoative Ssp (§3.4.4) is not documented before the New King-
dom, but the observation can not be strengthened into a fully developed argument
because of the generally low text frequency of the expression (conditions (b.) and
(b.) in §3.1.1 thus fail to be met).
More remarkable is a set of specific formulations or constructions in Hymn, all of
which are to my knowledge paralleled in the late Seventeenth and mostly early
Eighteenth Dynasty specifically, and only then:

(a) %w m N, as the first part of a balanced construction interrupting, or

parenthetically inserted in, a descriptive sequence (§3.4.1.4):
Paralleled only in Emhab and in Appointment of the Vizier;

(b) A xr-marked correlative system, the first clause of which consists in a

setting sDm=f (§3.4.2.3):
Paralleled only in two Hatshepsutian compositions (Youth Legend,
Chapelle Rouge) and in a later Eighteenth Dynasty hymn (Suti and Hor);

(c) Inchoative Ssp, combined with the uncommon N sDm.n (§3.4.4.1):

Paralleled only in Hatshepsut’s Chapelle Rouge (twice).

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 3.4 Hymn to Hapi 235

All these formulations in Hymn to Hapi are rare. All consistently point to the same
fairly narrow period in time. This further allies the linguistic typology of Hymn with
the early New Kingdom.
C. Based on the arguments recalled first, complemented by the additional indications
summarized next, it is therefore submitted that Hymn to Hapi was composed in the
late Seventeenth or early Eighteenth Dynasty.
The proposed dating confirms that Hymn to Hapi is not the work of a Middle
Kingdom ‘author’ ‘Kheti’, if such ever existed.123 More importantly, the proposed
dating is close in time to the first witnesses of the composition, T. Ashmolean
1948.91 and Assiut Graffito 2a, both from the early Eighteenth Dynasty. This
demonstrates that while some time for prior circulation must be posited, this need not
have been long, even for texts documented in excerpts and in two different places.
Hymn to Hapi is composed in Middle Egyptian: the text includes a few innovative
expressions—which permit dating—but is not couched in a ‘transitional variety’—
compare the fact that a dating to the Middle Kingdom was long deemed acceptable, or
even preferable, on linguistic grounds. Without entering the discussion of whether
Hymn had cultic functions or not,124 the composition is allied with Middle Egyptian
literature by its language, elements of a shared intertext, and its documented patterns
of circulation. Under the proposed dating, Hymn thus provides a very clear case of a
text allied with Middle Egyptian literature, composed in the late Seventeenth or early
Eighteenth Dynasty, and for which the composers selected Middle Egyptian in a fairly
pure form.

3.4.6 Appendix: Lexical notes

The dating of Hymn to Hapi here proposed was carried out on grammatical grounds.
The following lexical notes are for the sake of a fuller description only:

123 The ascription of Hymn to Hapi to ‘Kheti’ (references in Simon 2013: 263, n.195) is based on
occurrences of Hymn alongside Teaching of Amenemhat on the same manuscripts (e.g. P. Sallier II,
P. Chester Beatty V, P. Anastasi II) with the latter composition being itself ascribed to ‘Kheti’
based on P. Chester Beatty IV vso 6.14. The hypothesis thus relies on further hypotheses. As
Quack (2003: 184) already observed, such association of various compositions, however recurrent
or even ‘canonic’ it may or may not have become in Ramesside times, may just as well be
secondary, reflecting the importance of these works in Ramesside reception. From an entirely
different perspective, Quirke (2004a: 32) demonstrates how the implied construction of ‘Kheti’
comes suspiciously close to modern concepts of authorship. Further critical discussion of ‘Kheti’
as associated with Hymn by Simon 2013: 263, 265; on ‘Kheti’ and other compositions with which
this literary figure has been associated, §6.1.1.B; §6.2.2.6; on Ramesside literary figures, also
§5.1.3.1.A.
124 Van der Plas (1986: I, 190) comments: ‘(...) un hymne proprement dit (...) Le contenu proprement
littéraire n’exclut certainement pas une utilisation liturgique (...)’; further van der Plas 2013.
Different is Assmann’s (19992: 546) assessment: ‘Dieser Hymnus gehört unzweifelhaft zur
Literatur. Sein manierierter Stil, die zuweilen spitzfindige (...), oft verblüffend luzide
Argumentation (...)’. Further discussion now by Hagen in press.

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 236 3 Narrow dating ‘by squeezing’

(i) Hymn 12.7 xnr ‘scatter, disperse’125

#nr126 recurs in Late Egyptian literary texts,127 in a New Kingdom magical text,128
and in Late Ramesside Letters.129 Like in Hymn 12.7, the word comes in ‘group
writing’ in all but two of these texts, suggesting that xnr was generally perceived by
New Kingdom scribes as lacking an historically motivated spelling.

(ii) Hymn 14.1 tmw ‘mankind’

The expression130 recurs in Thutmoside inscriptions,131 in Book of the Dead,132 and in
Ramesside texts.133 The earliest occurrence known to me is in Sobekemsaf’s
Medamud Endowment Inscription 6.

(iii) Hymn 1.3 sSmw ‘statue, portrait, image, counterpart’134

Before the New Kingdom, sSmw135 is attested only twice, in Coffin Texts.136 It is
common in Thutmoside inscriptions,137 Book of the Dead,138 and Ramesside texts of
various sorts. The phrase imn sSmw(=f ) ‘whose image is hidden’ finds numerous
parallels in New Kingdom hymns and compositions in royal tombs.139

(iv) Hymn 12.8 ftft ‘leap, twitch’140

The word141 is attested only once in the Middle Kingdom;142 it is very common in the
New Kingdom, particularly in hymnic literature.143 Compare Hymn 12.8 pA tA r-Aw Hr
ftft ‘the whole land is twitching’ with e.g. Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy 17 (Urk. IV 19,
5) HAtiw Hr ftft n=f ‘the hearts are twitching for him’; etc.144

125 Noted by van der Plas 1986: I, 189; 2013: §6.

126 Noted as ‘nur neuäg.’ in DZA 27.878.870.
127 Ani B 18.9 = D X+1.1; Wermai 2.7.
128 Schlangenzauber Neues Reich, P. Vatikan, Spruch 1, X+1.8 (TLA #118390).
129 P. Berlin 10497, 21; P. Leiden I 370, 11 (TLA #118390).
130 Once noted as ‘belegt seit Totb. und Dyn.18’ in DZA 31.096.900.
131 Urk. IV 449, 14; 967, 16; 1817, 7.
132 See TLA #172070.
133 KRI I 38, 5; 61, 1; II 151, 7; 239, 1; 239, 3; further, TLA #172070.
134 Noted by van der Plas 1986: I, 189; 2013: §6.
135 Once noted as ‘belegt seit D. 18’ in DZA 29.606.570.
136 HannLex 5: 2357a: CT VII 496a; CT VI 2i.
137 E.g. Urk. IV 97, 13; 386, 12.
138 Passim, see TLA #145120.
139 Van der Plas 1986: I, 61-4.
140 Noted by van der Plas 1986: I, 189; 2013: §6.
141 Detailed lexical discussion by Vernus in press: §4 (list of attestations in §4.3.1).
142 Dramatic Ramesseum Papyrus 29 (Vernus in press: §4.3.1, ex.5).
143 Van der Plas 1986: I, 145-6. Further Assmann 1969: 249 ‘(...) ftft, eigentlich „hüpfen“, bezeichnet
in Hymnen des NR gern die freudige Bewegung des vom Sonnengott aus dem Todesschlaf
erweckten Lebens (...)’.
144 Further e.g. in Tomb of Tutu (Amarna; see Vernus in press: §4.3.1, ex.4) imyw mw Hr ftft n xaa=k
‘those in the water are twitching at your rising’; Tura Hymn to Amun-Re (Vernus in press: §4.3.1
ex.12) [dwA] tw pat rxyt ftft n=k [...] ‘May the patricians and the plebeians adore you; may [...]
twitch for you’; P. Leyde I 350, II.7-8 (Vernus in press: §4.3.1, ex.3); Ritual of Amenhotep I
(Vernus in press: §4.3.1, ex.10-11); etc.

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 4 DIRECT DATING: TARGETING SPECIFIC CONFIGURATIONS IN WRITTEN
LANGUAGE

Classical strategies for linguistic dating are indexed on linguistic change. Phenomena
of innovation and obsolescence in written registers are thereby examined in ways to
derive ante quem non and post quem non criteria. Ideally combined, these criteria then
define possible temporal ranges for a composition to which they can be applied
(§3; §5-6). As illustrated throughout the present study, this approach is not without
limitations of its own, both inherent and practical ones. I here present an altogether
different strategy for dating, based on expressions that did not arise in the course of
regular linguistic change as determined by linguistic interaction. Instead, specific
configurations of written language are here targeted. As the approach is not indexed
on linguistic change, implications for dating do not come in the form of upper or
lower chronological bounds. Rather, linguistic expressions are related directly to a
specific horizon in written language. When possible, direct dating thereby tends to be
fairly precise temporally.

4.1 Introduction

Conditions for a direct dating are restrictive. A composition must include a criterial
expression: many do not. In addition, the present-day philologist must be practically
able to identify this expression and to determine that it relates to one specific horizon
in written language excluding other ones. After briefly discussing these conditions in
general terms (§4.1.1), I present two preliminary case studies with texts that happen to
be well dated (§4.1.2-3). Stemming from different periods and standing for different
types of written discourse, these two texts involve different phenomena and are
thereby illustrative of some of the tenets involved in direct dating.

4.1.1 General conditions for a direct dating

In direct dating, expressions that stand outside regular usage are considered. Getting
the sense that an expression or usage could be somehow odd falls much short of
making it an indication for dating, however. An apparently odd expression may seem
so only due to the incomplete documentation and/or insufficient modern description
of the language. Moreover, language in use is defined by its plasticity: as they
ultimately make language, users may always push it into forms other than the ones

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 238 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

more commonly encountered in text. If an apparently odd expression is to support a

claim for dating, it must be demonstrated in explicit ways that this expression relates
to a specific horizon in written language. To do so, it has to be shown that the expres-
sion could not have arisen, or did not arise, in linguistic change proper. It must then be
shown that the expression has relevant and significant parallels in a certain horizon of
written language, and only in this. By definition of the nature of the expressions
considered for direct dating, direct parallels will typically be fewer than for other
dating strategies; they may even not exist at all when an expression is a unique
configuration. The relationship with a specific horizon in written language is then
established through an examination of how the principle underlying the expression
discussed and/or the component parts thereof relate to otherwise documented
configurations of written language.
The possibility for a direct dating is contingent upon whether a full argument can
be made along the lines sketched above. Quite literally, it is also contingent upon
whether a given text happens to include (an) expression(s) that supports this type of
argument. The two compositions selected below for a preliminary illustration are
exceptional in the density of relevant phenomena they include. With Middle Egyptian
literature, direct dating is generally a more marginal possibility than classical
strategies based on linguistic change. With other types of texts, a different situation
may obtain, in some cases even a reverse one. It is significant that several of the
compositions included in the present chapter do not belong to a more narrowly
defined corpus of Middle Egyptian literature.

4.1.2 A Gedankenexperiment: Dating Chapelle Rouge linguistically

A. In dating the composition inscribed on Hatshepsut’s Chapelle Rouge (in a more

damaged form also in Deir el-Bahari)1 on purely linguistic grounds, classical
strategies indexed on linguistic change fail. Only one expression, wn.in.tw Hr sDm,
supports an argument for dating based on linguistic change:
(i) Chapelle Rouge, p.131: VII.12-13 (HHBT II 25, 5)
wn.in.tw Hr irt snTr Hr smAa aAbwt n imn m ipt-swt (...)
‘The incensing was then done and the offering consecrated to Amun in
Karnak (...)’

This construction implies that Chapelle Rouge was not composed before the early
Twelfth Dynasty (see §3.1.2.A).
Conversely, the whole Middle Egyptian repertoire of Chapelle Rouge is docu-
mented in early Eighteenth Dynasty texts. Accordingly, no post quem non criteria are
given: linguistically, the text may be as late as the early New Kingdom. Classical
strategies therefore define a broad temporal range for dating Chapelle Rouge,
extending from the early Twelfth to the early Eighteenth Dynasty.

1 Text: Lacau & Chevrier 1977-1979; HHBT II 7-33.

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 4.1 Introduction 239

B. Direct dating, on the other hand, turns out to be an effective strategy with the
composition considered. Only some expressions, however, lend themselves to this
approach: this is preliminarily illustrated by the case of the old -w demonstratives,
which do not. Chapelle Rouge has two instances of these, used with nouns broadly to
do with kingship or rule, e.g. Ch.R., p.130: VII.2 (HHBT II 23, 14) nsw pw ‘this king’
(the other occurrence is quoted below). Such association implies an indexical intent in
the selection of the antiquated demonstrative. A similar association of antiquated
demonstratives with things to do with kingship recurs in Thutmosis III’s Karnak
Building Inscription (§4.7.1.C). Yet, it is observed in the Middle Kingdom as well,
e.g. Chapelle Blanche n°180 Srt=k Twsic nfrt ‘this beautiful nose of yours’, taken up in
Sinuhe B 237 fnd=k pw ‘this nose of yours’.2 The association is therefore not specific
to any horizon in particular.
The other occurrence of a -w demonstrative in Chapelle Rouge is in a clause that
also has a remarkable instance of a s-n-ABAB derivational pattern, Ch.R., p.107: III.6-
7 (HHBT II 11, 14/15-16) srwD=t xmw nTrw snbAbA=t tA pw Hr mXrw=f ‘May you
make the shrines of the gods strong, may you make this land take root on its
foundations.’3 If the dating of Chapelle Rouge to the early Eighteenth Dynasty were
given first, this could be discussed further in terms of a linguistic recherche by
Hatshepsutian composers.4 If however, as in the present Gedankenexperiment, the
composition is yet to be dated, such association remains too unspecific to support any
conclusion.
C. Other expressions are criterial. Chapelle Rouge thus uses -xr-marked construc-
tions in narrative function:
(ii) Chapelle Rouge, p.99: I.12-13 (HHBT II 9, 2-3)
iw.in r=s nbt tAwy m Xnw Dsrw nw aH=s
wn.xr=s Hr rdt iAw m xsfw nb nTrw
‘The lady of the Dual Land then came from the interior of the sacred place5 of
her palace.
And she begun giving praise at the approach of the lord of the gods.’
Sim., after a sDm(w)-passive, Ch.R., p.141: X.1-3 (HHBT II 30, 2-4) Dw Hms=i Hr
wTst-sxmty-Hr wn.xr r=s nbt tAwy Hr biAt aAt wrt aSA aSA wr wr Hr Hmt=i ‘I was
made to sit down in the Wetjeset-Sekhemty-Her. The Lady of the Dual Land then
begun giving very big oracle, numerous and important, about My Majesty.’
Sim., after a ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive, Ch.R., p.107: III.14-15
(HHBT II 13, 5/6-7/8: quoted below, (vii)).

The linguistic form of the construction, -xr-infixation, is common at all times relevant
for dating. The narrative function, on the other hand, remains entirely undocumented
in the Middle Kingdom. This lack of attestation is significant, as xr-marked forms and

2 Stauder in press a: §1.

3 For a discussion of snbAbA and for the translation, Vernus 2009a: 304-5.
4 Stauder 2013: §6.5.
5 On this phrase, Lacau & Chevrier 1977-1979: I, 104, n.w.

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 240 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

constructions are then not rare in general. In one Twelfth Dynasty segment that
apparently comes close to a narrative usage, the -xr-infixed form is after an event with
habitual aspect (wn=i wSd=i Hmwt), marking a tight relationship between the two
events: in a self-presentation, the speaker presents his ‘saying’ as if necessarily
occurring when the craftsmen asked. Such semantics is in full compliance with non-
narrative uses of -xr-infixed forms otherwise found in the Middle Kingdom:

(iii) Herwerre (temp. Amenemhat III), 9

wn=i wSd=i Hmwt (...)
Dd.xr=sn (...)
‘I used to ask the craftsmen (...)
and they would (always) say (...)’

Forms and constructions with the -xr-infix in narrative function are found from the
early Eighteenth Dynasty on, e.g.:

(iv) Ahmes son of Abana 6-9 (Urk. IV 3, 2-9)

xr m-xt grg.n=i pr aHa.n=i iT.kwi r pA imw mHty Hr qnn=i
wn.xr=i Hr Sms ity a.w.s. Hr rdwy=i (...)
wn.xr=i Hr qnt Hr rdwy=i m-bAH Hm=f
aHa.n=i dhn.kwi r (...)
‘After I founded a household, I was taken on the vessel “The Northern One”
because of my bravery.
And I followed the Sovereign L.P.H. on my feet (...).
And I acted bravely on my feet in presence of His Majesty.
I was promoted to (...)’

(v) Rekhmire 7 (Urk. IV 1073, 11-13)

dhn.kw m Hm-nTr mAat [...]
wn.xr Hswt=i mn.ti m-Hr-ib qAw H(w)aw
‘I was promoted priest of Maat [...]
And praises of me were established among high and short alike.’
Sim. Rekhmire 11-12 (Urk. IV 1075, 2-4); 29 (Urk. IV 1080, 9-11).

This extension of -xr-infixed constructions to narrative functions is a textual phenom-

enon: that the innovation did not arise in regular linguistic change is demonstrated by
the textual distribution of the construction, strictly restricted to formal contexts. The
twofold condition required for an argument per direct dating to be made is thereby
met. The construction involves a form-function mismatch whereby: (a) this new
function did not arise in regular linguistic change; (b) it can be related to a given
horizon in the use of written language, the early New Kingdom.6

6 The construction recurs in earlier Ramesside inscriptions; within the present Gedankenexperiment,
these are not relevant because they are later than Chapelle Rouge as a ‘manuscript’.

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 4.1 Introduction 241

D. In five places, Chapelle Rouge combines the ‘narrative’ construction of the

infinitive with m-xt nn, a fronted temporal expression. As discussed below, this
semantically unnatural combination lends itself to an argument by direct dating and
implies an early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon (§4.3.3). Beyond the ones quoted below
as (vi)-(vii), occurrences are in Ch.R., p.98: I.5-8 (HHBT II 8, 7/8-10); p.99: I.18
(HHBT II 9, 12); p.121: V.10-11 (HHBT II 19, 9) (all quoted below, §4.3.3, (ii)).
The following two passages go one step further, combining -xr-marked construc-
tions used narratively and m-xt nn + infinitive.

(vi) Chapelle Rouge, p.99: I.13-15 (HHBT II 9, 3-4/5)

wn.xr=s Hr rDt iAw m xsfw nb nTrw
m-xt nn rDt=s s(i) Hr Xt=s m-bAH-a Hm=f m Dd
‘And she begun giving praise at the approach of the lord of the gods.
After this, her placing herself on her belly in front of His Majesty, saying:’

(vii) Chapelle Rouge, p.107: III.14-15 (HHBT II 13, 5/6-7/8)

m-xt nn wDA pw r HA
wn.xr Hmt=s Xr-HAt it=s (...)
‘After this, it is proceeding to the outside.
And Her Majesty was before her father (...)’
Formally, this a variant construction: m-xt nn A pw (otherwise undocumented in
this usage as well). Functionally, it compares with the ‘narrative’ construction of
the infinitive as in (vi).

E. In three places, Chapelle Rouge has -kA-marked constructions with the auxiliary
wn (wn.kA=f – predicate):

(viii) Chapelle Rouge, p.248

wn.kA SfSft=t m nbwt snD=t m pDt 9
‘Awe you inspire then shall be in the Nebut, fear you inspire shall be in the
Nine Bows.’
Sim. p.107: III.9-11 (HHBT II 12, 5/6-9/19) wn.kA tA pn m xfa=T Hnmmt Xr st-Hr=T
rxyt D=sn n=t iAw ‘This land then shall be in your grasp, the henmemet-people
under your authority, the rekhyt giving praise to you’; p.124: VI.1 (HHBT II
20, 5) wn.k(A)=T n(=i) r mst iAwt (...) ‘You shall then be for me destined to fashion
offices (...)’.

The construction is exceedingly rare: beside the three instances in Chapelle Rouge,
only a single other one has been noted.7 One more can be added, in the Moscow
Mythological Story (§4.3.4.B.NB).
Unlike -xr-infixed constructions, which come both in synthetic (sDm.xr=f ) and in
analytic (wn.xr=f – predicate) form, -kA-infixed ones otherwise exist only in the
synthetic form (sDm.kA=f ). While wn.xr=f – predicate begun developing as early as

7 Busirite Ritual E V.20; see Vernus 1990a: 85-6, n.8-10.

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 242 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

the First Intermediate Period, becoming a regular construction in Middle Egyptian,

wn.kA=f – predicate did not. As a detailed descriptive study of the history of forms
and constructions with xr and kA more broadly demonstrates, these had different
historical developments in the early/mid-second millennium, some functional simi-
larity notwithstanding.8 Analytic wn.kA=f – predicate constructions thereby appear as
morphological reconfigurations, analogically modeled on the regular -xr-infixed
constructions. That these constructions, which are a purely textual phenomenon, relate
to the early New Kingdom is likely in view of the functional reconfigurations
affecting -xr-infixed constructions, also purely textual phenomena, at that same time
(above, C). With -kA-, near-exclusively in Chapelle Rouge, this results in a morpho-
logically entirely new construction.
F. The above discussion is also illustrative of how the very possibility for a direct
dating is contingent upon the linguistic selections a given text makes. Within the
Hatshepsutian corpus itself, not all texts would similarly lend themselves to a direct
dating. Of the various elements discussed above, only one for example applies to Punt
Expedition, and only indirectly. In this composition, a -xr-infixed construction is
found following a sequence of an infinitive and a sDm=f (Urk. IV 324, 3-7: below,
§4.2.1, (vi)): if not narrative, this is a functional extension similar to the one discussed
above (§4.1.2.C). A -xr-infixed construction recurs a second time in this composition,
with the subject anticipated. This is even further remote from any regular Middle
Egyptian standards:

(ix) Urk. IV 332, 7-9 (Punt Expedition; beginning of a section)

wrw nw pwnt Dd.xr=sn dbH=sn Htpw
‘The great ones of Punt, they say asking for peace’

In Speos Artemidos, no direct dating could be performed at all. As classical strategies

indexed on linguistic change also fail with this text, Speos Artemidos remains
genuinely undatable linguistically (§1.2.C).
G. Turning back to Chapelle Rouge, this can be unambiguously related to an early
Eighteenth Dynasty horizon through the above observations. The text is datable only
through direct dating: based on classical strategies indexed on linguistic change, only
a terminus ante quem non by the early Twelfth Dynasty could be defined.

4.1.3 Another Gedankenexperiment: Dating Sinuhe (B) linguistically

As a complementary Gedankenexperiment, a text for which it is known that it was

composed in the Twelfth Dynasty, Sinuhe, is examined in turn.
A. Sinuhe has two instances of the active-transitive construction of the pseudo-
participle, B 45 and B 114 Dd.k(w) ‘I said.’9 With events other than lexical statives (rx
‘to know’ and xm ‘not to know’), the active-transitive construction of the pseudo-
participle is exceedingly rare in the Middle Kingdom. The textual distribution of the

8 Vernus 1990a: 61-99.

9 Discussed in Stauder in press a: §3.

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 4.1 Introduction 243

construction is revealing as to its status. Of the only four Middle Kingdom

occurrences other than in Sinuhe, three are from funerary self-presentations;10 a fourth
is from a related type of written discourse, in an expedition account.11 In the Old
Kingdom, the construction is found in similar types of written discourses, in a subset
of stylistically much elaborated Sixth Dynasty ‘event-biographies’—three quarters of
all occurrences are from only two texts, Weni and Sabni son of Mekhu—and,
marginally, in expedition accounts. An argument can be made that this highly skewed
textual distribution in the Old Kingdom is itself deeply significant: the expression
developed in these types of texts, to which it is bound.12 In the Middle Kingdom, the
construction is textually revived in the very same types of texts, which it then
contributes indexing as such.13 A similar analysis extends to the sole literary
composition in which the construction is found, Sinuhe, where it functions as one
among several palimpsestic strategies by which the composition is framed as a
fictional autobiography.14 Except for one instance, which is different,15 the
construction is not documented in post-Middle Kingdom inscriptions any more. As
the construction is bound to certain types of written discourses, and thereby to the
associated horizons in written culture, this implies that Sinuhe dates either to the Sixth
or to the Twelfth Dynasty.
In appreciating whether Sinuhe should be related to the Sixth Dynasty or to the
Twelfth Dynasty contexts in which the active-transitive construction of the
pseudoparticiple was cultivated, the following observations are relevant. In Sixth
Dynasty so-called ‘event biographies’, the construction is used of the official acting
for to the king and in response to the king’s initiating agency. Typical events are iri
‘act’, Sa ‘cut’, ini ‘get, bring’, shA ‘bring down’, etc. In Sinuhe, by contrast, the
speaker merely ‘says’ things (Dd). The construction thus appears to have lost some of
the specific associations it had in Sixth Dynasty ‘event biographies’. The Middle
Kingdom funerary self-presentations that have the construction are not bound to these
restrictions any more. Thus, Khentemsemti 14 wd.k(w) rn=i (...) ‘I have place my
name (...)’—alongside Iykhernefret 10 ir.k(w) mi wDt.n nbt Hm=f (...) ‘I acted
according to everything His Majesty had ordered (...)’, continuing ancient
phraseology. Moreover, the construction, which derives its salience from its rarity, is
in these Middle Kingdom self-presentations reserved to major text-articulating
junctures, more strongly so than used to be the case in the Sixth Dynasty (§6.1.3.2.B).
A similar distribution is observed in the literary composition, where Dd.k(w) both
times introduces morceaux de bravoure spoken by Sinuhe, the encomium to
Senwosret and the inner monologue before the fight with the strongman of Retenu.16

10 Khentemsemti (temp. Amenemhat II), 14; Urk. VII 47, 14 (Djehutyhotep; temp. Amenemhat II-
Senwosret III); Iykhernefret (temp. Senwosret III), 10.
11 Wadi el-Hudi I, #14 (temp. Senwosret I), 10.
12 Stauder in prep.
13 Stauder in press a: §3.2.
14 Stauder in press a: §3.
15 Mutter und Kind, V.10-VI.1: discussed below, §5.3.4.2, (iii).NB; §6.1.3.2.NB. Amenemhat 6f
ir.kw, sometimes interpreted as another instance of the construction, is to be read passively
(§6.1.3.2).
16 Stauder in press a: §3.

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 244 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

In terms of method, it is emphasized that this is not a post quem non argument
based on linguistic obsolescence. The active-transitive construction of the pseudo-
participle with events other than lexical statives does not belong to the regular
repertoire of Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian. Nor did it belong to the regular
repertoire of Old Kingdom Egyptian: the construction was at all times a purely textual
phenomenon. By definition, therefore, it could not be subject to obsolescence as
happens in linguistic interaction. Rather cultural horizons in the configuration of
written language are here targeted and contrasted with each other.
B. In the first of its five sections, Sinuhe has various instances of the ‘narrative’
construction of the infinitive (R 6; B 2-3; B 3-6; B 15; B 23-24: below, D.NB). The
construction is found from the late First Intermediate Period on, yet no classical
argument based on linguistic innovation can be made. When first documented, the
construction is associated with a type of written discourse—expedition accounts—that
is itself not documented in this developed narrative form in the Old Kingdom. Nor is
any genuinely narrative type of written discourse.17 If no further considerations are
introduced, the lack of attestation of the construction before the late First Intermediate
Period could be an effect of the nature of the written record itself.18
Yet, the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive provides an important argument
for dating Sinuhe. The construction—consisting in the ‘narrative’ use of a form that is
not even predicative—is a purely textual phenomenon: its innovation is therefore
itself the result of a textual process. As can be traced in the record, the construction
has a deep-reaching textual genealogy that harkens back ultimately to infinitives used
in labeling functions from early Thinite times on. In continuous text, the construction
develops in the late First Intermediate Period and does so in direct relation to how
expedition accounts themselves develop. In Sinuhe, occurrences cluster in the
narrrative of the flight, echoing, and ironically subverting, expedition accounts. The
‘narrative’ infinitives in Sinuhe therefore presuppose the development of late First
Intermediate/Middle Kingdom expedition accounts. They do so on two accounts
simultaneously, quite literally for the construction to be possible as such, and for its
indexical overtones to effectively function as they do in the literary work.
(At this point, the reader may wonder whether the argument has not moved from
the linguistic to the literary or the cultural. It has not. For the flight episode to be
recognized as evoking, and ironically subverting, expedition accounts, the ‘narrative’
construction of the infinitive—a linguistic expression therefore—is essential. If this
was not present in such distinguished ways in the texture of the episode, this could be
read as a mere account of the hero flying Egypt. The connection with expedition

17 ‘Ereignisbiographien’ is a conventional label, expressing a contrast in form, contents, and function

with ‘Idealbiographien’: the label does not imply a genuinely narrative type of discourse.
18 Similar comments extend to aHa.n sDm.n=f (Sinuhe B 26-27 and passim). The construction is
intrinsically narrative, and no narrative texts in a strict sense are attested in the Old Kingdom.
When the construction first appears in the record, in the First Intermediate Period, it is already
fully grammaticalized (compare for example the fully bleached out lexical meaning of aHa ‘stand’).
If things are viewed solely in terms of innovation in linguistic interaction, there is no way to
exclude that the construction did not develop earlier already.

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 4.1 Introduction 245

accounts, and the additional semantic complexities and faultlines springing from the
subtext thus evoked, are established primarily on the linguistic level.)
C. Among other things a fictional autobiography, Sinuhe shares not only motifs and
formulations, but also elements of its linguistic repertoires, with Twelfth Dynasty
funerary self-presentations. The following comparison with Khentemsemti (temp.
Amenemhat II)19 is illustrative.

(a) Active-transitive construction of the pseudoparticiple (above, A)

(i) Khentemsemti 14
wd.k(w) rn=i r bw Xr nTr wsir xnti-imntiw (...)
‘I have placed my name to the place where Osiris Khentamentiu (...) is.’

(ii) Sinuhe B 45
Dd.k(w) r=i n=f wSb=i n=f (...)
‘I for my part said to him, answering him: (...)’
Sim. B 114.
Only six occurrences, including the two in Sinuhe, are known in the Middle
Kingdom. In inscriptional texts, notably in Khentemsemti 14, the expression is
used to highlight salient textual articulations. Similarly in Sinuhe, Dd.k(w) serves
to highlight the two major speeches by Sinuhe it introduces.

(b) Wn.in N sDm=f

(iii) Khentemsemti 3-4
wn.in Hm=f wSd=f wi
aD=f biAt(=i) nt ra nb
‘His Majesty used to address me,
observing my everyday’s conduct.’

(iv) Sinuhe B 174-175

wn.in Hm=f hAb=f n=i Xr Awt-a nt xr-nsw
sAw=f ib n bAk im (...)
‘His Majesty sent to me with presents of royal giving,
gladdening the heart of this humble servant (...)’
The construction is exceedingly rare (one further instance that comes to mind is
Kagemni 2.7 wn.in aHa=sn Hms=sn xft ‘Then they used to behave and live
accordingly.’). In Khentemsemti and Sinuhe, the syntactic parallel extends
further, with a sequence wn.in=f sDm=f sDm=f.

19 Text: HTBM II 8-9; Sethe 19282b: 75.

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 246 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

(c) Wn.k(w) – predicate, in setting function (§1.2, (v))

(v) Khentemsemti 4-5
wn.k(w) rf m iw=f-aA=f
Hs wi m hrw pn r sf
‘Being thus someone on the way up,
I am praised on this day more than yesterday.’

(vi) Sinuhe B 252-253

wn.k(w) rf dwn.kw Hr Xt=i
xm.n(=i) wi m-bAH=f (...)
‘Being thus stretched out on my body,
I had lost myself in his presence (...)’
Only three other instances are known (Shipwrecked Sailor 136-137; Speos
Artemidos 9-10 (Urk. IV 385, 3-4); Tod Inscription 26-27: all quoted above,
§1.2, (v)). In isolation, this would not be distinctive for dating (see the Speos
Artemidos instance). It does, however, contribute to the general horizon here
outlined.

All three constructions are highly uncommon. On the other hand, Khentemsemti is a
fairly short text. The linguistic encounters between Sinuhe and Khentemsemti can
therefore be assessed as significant enough to support a claim that the former text was
probably composed in the same Dynasty as the latter.
D. When the above is woven together, a clear picture emerges. The active-transitive
construction of the pseudoparticiple implies a composition of Sinuhe in the Sixth or
the Twelfth Dynasty; of the two options, the latter is more likely (above, A). The
‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive, for its part, implies a dating no earlier than
the late First Intermediate Period (above, B). This leaves the Twelfth Dynasty as the
only option for dating Sinuhe.
Such dating is confirmed by the shared linguistic repertoires with Khentemsemti,
which can be assessed as significant (above, C). If only these were given, a strong
indication for dating would result, not a full argument. In the present case, this indica-
tion converges with the dating already established on the above strong arguments.

NB. The above analysis of elements of the linguistic typology in Sinuhe was carried
out based on the text as preserved in a late Twelfth Dynasty manuscript, B. Had
Sinuhe survived only in the New Kingdom copies that did survive, the prospects for a
direct dating could have been weaker, or not. With the constructions discussed,
compare:
(a) Active-transitive uses of the pseudoparticiple (above, A and C, (a)):
() B 45 B Dd.k(w)
R Dd[...]
[D.18] (no witnesses)
[Ram.] AOS sDd.n=f n=i – DM4 sDd.n=f n=i

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 4.1 Introduction 247

() B 114 B Dd.k(w)

R [...]
[D.18] (no witnesses)
[Ram.] AOS [...] – DM1 [...]

(b) ‘Narrative’ construction of the infinitive, in the first part of Sinuhe

(above, B):20
R6 R ar nTr
[D.18] S aq nTr – G aq nTr
[Ram.] AOS nTr aq.n – C aq nTr – Bdt nTr aq[...]
B 2-3 B psx ib=i (sS awy=i [?])21
R psx ib=i (sS awy=i)
[D.18] G psx ib=i [sS awy=i]
[Ram.] AOS psx ib=i (sS awy=i) – C p{n}s{r}x ib(=i) (sS awy=i)
B 3-6 B nfa=i (...) rDt(=i) (...) irt(=i) (...)
R nfa.n=i (...) rDt=i (...) irt=i (...)
[D.18] G nf{t}<a>.n(=i) (...) rDt=i (...) irt[=i] (...)
[Ram.] AOS n{t}f<a>.n=i (...) rD.n(=i) (...) irr=i (...)
– C {ntwiw}<nfa>.n=i (...) rD(=i) (...) ir.n=i (...)
B 15 B rDt=i
R rD.n=i
[D.18] G [...]
[Ram.] AOS rDt(=i) – C rDt(=i) – B4 rDt(=i)
B 23-24 B Tst=i (sAq=i [?])22
R [Ts]t=i
[D.18] (no witnesses)
[Ram.] AOS Ts.n=i (sAq.n=i)
– C, B4 Ts.n=i (sAq=i) – P1 Ts.n=i (sAq[...])

(c) Wn.in N sDm=f (above, C, (b)):

B 174-175 B wn.in Hm=f hAb=f n=i (...)
R (R stops before)
[D.18] (no witnesses)
[Ram.] AOS wn.in Hm=f a.w.s. hAbsic n=i (...)

(d) Wn.k(w) – predicate, in setting function (above, C, (c)):

B 252-253 B wn.k(w) rf dwn.kw (...) – BA wn.k(w) r=i dmA.kw (...)
R (R stops before)
[D.18] (no witnesses)
[Ram.] AOS wn.in=f Hr dmi[...] – P2, P3 [...]

In Ramesside times (in effect mostly in AOS), instance of the ‘narrative’ construction
of the infinitive (b) are preserved in part, but passages relevant to (a) and (d) are

20 See also the discussion in Köhler 2009. Unlike Köhler 2009: 52, I take B 19 to be a basic sDm=f,
elaborating upon the preceding segment of discourse, not a ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive
(compare the immediately following temporal setting, HD.n tA (...)). Irt in R is secondary, probably
a contamination from the preceding rDt and irt (compare B 3-6).
21 These are generally not counted as ‘narrative infinitives’ (e.g. Köhler 2009: 51). I argue elsewhere
that psx must be recognized as such (provisionally, ‘The art of linguistic artificiality in Sinuhe’,
paper given at the Conference The Alpha and Omega of Sinuhe, Leiden, 11/27-29/2010; this part
unpublished). %S could be either a ‘narrative infinitive’ or a basic sDm=f elaborating on psx.
22 %Aq could be either a ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive or a basic sDm=f elaboration on Tst.

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 248 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

completely altered and the one relevant to (c) is in part. If Sinuhe had survived only in
AOS, a direct dating as carried out above could not be done. More relevant to the
present study is the early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty text of Sinuhe. What this may have
been like can only be assessed indirectly, as not much of Sinuhe survives in
Eighteenth Dynasty copies.
In passages relevant to (a), (c), and (d), Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses are lacking
or broken, as is R. The ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive (b) shows both
erosion and stability, depending on individual passages. In R 6 and B 2-3, the text is
stable in R, Eighteenth Dynasty copies, and still in Ramesside times (except for AOS
in R 6). In B 3-6, ‘narrative’ infinitives are kept in large part until the Eighteenth
Dynasty (rDt, irt), and altered only in Ramesside copies. For B 15 and B 23-24,
Eighteenth Dynasty, witnesses are lacking; the ‘narrative infinitive’ is still found in
Ramesside versions of B 15, while R has altered the text; in B 23-24 a roughly
reverse situation is observed. The distribution of the construction in the Eighteenth
Dynasty text of Sinuhe is therefore not as neatly patterned as it was in B. Yet, what
remains would still be enough to elicit commentary, all the more so since a similarly
dense use of the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive is unparalleled in any other
Middle Egyptian literary texts (first documented in Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts
or not).
The above argument for dating Sinuhe was based on the conjunction of various
constructions. Of these, one can be shown to be preserved fairly well in the Eigh-
teenth Dynasty text of the composition. That the other ones were as well, or not any
more, can not be assessed on empirical grounds. Accordingly, it remains unclear
whether Sinuhe could have been dated based on a full Eighteenth Dynasty witness, if
such had survived.

E. As already noted in relation to Chapelle Rouge, the possibility for a direct dating
is contingent upon a variety of factors to do with the linguistic selections and
expressive strategies in a given composition. For example, the Middle Kingdom tale
closest to Sinuhe, Shipwrecked Sailor, would not lend itself to a direct dating. Among
the constructions discussed above, wn.in N sDm=f does not feature in Shipwrecked
Sailor, nor does the active-transitive construction of the pseudoparticiple. Wn.k(w)
predicate is found in a formulation directly similar to, and possibly reminiscent of,
one in Sinuhe,23 but this is criterial in Sinuhe only in conjunction with other elements
(above, C); these are lacking in Shipwrecked Sailor. The ‘narrative’ construction of
the infinitive (above, B) is present once in Shipwrecked Sailor, significantly in a
context evoking expedition accounts.24 However, the use of the construction is by far

23 Sinuhe B 252-253; Shipwrecked Sailor 136-137. The contact is closest with the BA version of
Sinuhe, with a rare verb dmA in both texts (as against more common dwn in B): BA wn.k(w) r=i
dmA.kw Hr Xt=i (...); Shipwrecked Sailor 136-137 wn.k(w) rf dmA.kw Hr Xt=i (...). Scenarios for
modeling the contact between Sinuhe B, Sinuhe BA, and Shipwrecked Sailor are discussed by
Winand in press a.
24 Shipwrecked Sailor 34 fAt TAw ‘Rising of the wind (...)’. An alternative interpretation as fA.t(w) TAw
(past tense sDm=f: e.g. Borghouts 2010: I, §56.a.1, (3)) is unlikely because this form is in literary
Middle Egyptian a frozen remnant, otherwise confined to rDi (§2.4.3.2, (ii); §2.7.2.2.A). An
interpretation as a ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive is also supported by the textual locus of

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 4.2 Berlin Leather Roll 249

not as pervasive, and complexly patterned, as in Sinuhe. That Sinuhe can be dated on
the grounds outlined above has to do with how the lingustic typology of this
composition reflects broader palimpsestic strategies in ways that distinguish it also on
a literary level. The possibility of a dating such as can be done for Sinuhe does not
extend to other literary texts of which it is known that they were composed in the
Middle Kingdom: it does not to Ptahhotep, Debate of a Man and His Soul, or
Eloquent Peasant either.
A final word on Sinuhe may be that the dating could be established almost entirely
based on the active-transitive construction of the pseudoparticiple: on the fact that it is
present in Sinuhe (excluding any period other than the Sixth or Twelfth Dynasty), and
on how it is there reconfigured (making the latter option more likely). Perhaps
paradoxically at first, it is then a construction generally deemed typical of Old
Egyptian that affords the individually strongest argument for a dating to the Twelfth
Dynasty. The difference emerges when the details of the Sinuhean reconfiguration are
examined.

4.2 Berlin Leather Roll

The text referred to as Berlin Leather Roll is documented in a single manuscript

(P. Berlin 3029 ro), from the reign of Amenhotep II.25 The composition itself has
often been dated to the reign of Senwosret I based on a mention of that king’s name in
association with a precise dating to Year 3 (1.1). This hypothesis was famously
challenged by Derchain who suggested that the text was composed in the early New
Kingdom, possibly drawing on earlier materials; the ascription to Senwosret I would
then be a case of pseudepigraphy.26
While Derchain’s argument included observations on orthography and the lexicon,
its main thrust was on phraseological encounters with early Eighteenth Dynasty royal
inscriptions, among which various elements that are unparalleled in earlier times. As
has been noted in the subsequent discussion, several of Derchain’s observations on
orthography and lexicon could be interpreted as artifacts of textual transmission or
redaction and are therefore inconclusive;27 as regards phraseological similarities, these
extend to inscriptions dating to the reign of Senwosret I.28 This weakens the force of
Derchain’s argument, yet does not in itself disprove his hypothesis. Various other
elements by which Berlin Leather Roll finds best parallels in the early Eighteenth

the construction, opening the shipwreck narrative proper. In addition to this articulative function, a
‘narrative’ infinitive would be appropriate in Shipwrecked Sailor as a composition evoking
expedition accounts. Just such a linguistic palimpsest was observed in Sinuhe (§4.1.3.B). For
Shipwrecked Sailor and expedition accounts more generally, Enmarch 2011; Blumenthal 1977.
25 Text: de Buck 1938; for studies, compare Hofmann 2004: 58; add Hirsch 2008: 52-78.
26 Derchain 1992.
27 Piccato 1997: 139-40; the author’s discussion is directed mainly against Derchain’s broader
interpretation of the text as to the Egyptian sense of history, not as much against the dating itself.
28 Franke 1996: 294, n.59; Piccato 1997: 138-9; Hirsch 2008: 53, n.145.

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 250 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

Dynasty have been pointed out in more recent times.29 At present, the dating of Berlin
Leather Roll is therefore an open question.30 To this the present section contributes
some linguistic remarks.
Dating the composition is made difficult by the very nature of the competing
options. Under one hypothesis, the text would date to Senwosret I, possibly with some
subsequent ‘redaction’. If, on the other hand, the text is an early New Kingdom
pseudepigraphy, the composition of Berlin Leather Roll would have served to relate
the present to the past, as other cultural productions of the time did. One major
strategy for doing so would have consisted in drawing on older textual materials, be
these actual ‘sources’ or some more diffuse stock of possibly deep-reaching phrase-
ology. The two options for dating could then come fairly close to each other.31 As
regards language specifically, an additional factor of undistinctiveness lies with the
largely phraseological tenor of the composition: whole swathes of the text consist in
formulations that are preconfigured.32 The horizon of expectations for dating Berlin
Leather Roll on linguistic grounds must be set accordingly.33

4.2.1 Berlin Leather Roll 2.4: The syntax of is

The following construction is indicative for dating:

(i) Berlin Leather Roll 2.4
(...) Hm=k is irty bw-nb
‘(...) for Your Majesty is everybody’s eyes.’
A. Discourse-connective is is well documented in the Middle Kingdom and in the
early New Kingdom alike.34 Remarkable in Berlin Leather Roll 2.4 is the use of is in a
bipartite A-B pattern with two full nouns.35 This contrasts with the regular Middle
Egyptian construction A is pw B as e.g. in a Twelfth Dynasty literary composition (ii),
in a Second Intermediate Period royal stela (iii), and in an insecurely dated literary
composition (iv):

29 References in Gnirs 2013b: 146, n.148.

30 Even before Derchain’s article, already Eyre 1990: 144-6.
31 Compare Baines’ (1996: 162) formulation: ‘(...) Berlin Leather Roll (...) provides evidence either
for the study of older texts, perhaps as models, or for the composition of attributed works that
would have helped to manufacture a tradition (emphasis AS), for which genuine Dyn. XII
exemplars did exist.’
32 On phraseological boundedness more generally, Junge 1982.
33 It has been suggested that different layers in the composition could be distinguished based on
language (Hirsch 2008: 53, n.145): this is illusory.
34 Oréal 2011: 134-8, 143-5; in the present study, also §1.2, (ix).
35 As against P is N, which is regular in all relevant periods, e.g. Sinuhe B 232 (...) ntk is Hbs Axt tn
‘(...) for it is you who veils this horizon.’

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 4.2 Berlin Leather Roll 251

(ii) Debate 17
(...) pA is pw prr in=f sw r=f
‘(...) for that is the sort who goes forth and brings himself to it.’36

(iii) Rahotep’s Coptos Stela (D.17), 3-4

(...) Hw is pw nty m rA=k
siA [is p]w n[ty m ib=k]
‘(...) for the one in your mouth is Hu,
for the one in your heart is Sia.’
(iv) Ipuwer 5.937
(...) ind is pw DD=tn n=f
‘(...) for your giving to him is misery.’

B. The rise of the construction A is B can not be related to any other process of
linguistic change that would have been ongoing during the here relevant times. In
particular, nominal predicate constructions are stable throughout the Middle and early
New Kingdom. The construction A is B is therefore best interpreted as a purely
written phenomenon, restricted to higher written registers.
Other than in Berlin Leather Roll 2.4, the construction is documented in one early
Eighteenth Dynasty composition:

(v) Urk. IV 324, 12-14 (Punt Expedition)

wAD-w(y) tA xnd.n=Tn
ra isa nsw tA-mri
nn grt wAt r Hm=f anx=n m TAw n DD=f
‘How fortunate is the land you have set foot on!
For Re is the king of the Beloved Land.
But, is there no way to His Majesty that we may live from the air he gives?’
a) The segmentation in Urk. IV, as (...) ra is | nsw tA mri nn grt (...), is erroneous. Compare
the associated translation: ‘Wie glücklich ist das Gottesland, das ihr betreten habt, als ob
ihr Ra wäret! Der König von Ägypten aber, gibt es (denn) keinen Weg zu Seiner
Majestät (...)’.38

The context displays considerable formal elaboration. Just ahead is a quotation from
Sinuhe (Urk. IV 324, 8: discussed below, §4.3.2, (iii)). The immediately preceding
sequence has a very rare instance of a synthetic -xr-infixed form, strongly archaizing
on a morphological level (Dd.xr=sn: Urk. IV 324, 6). What is more, the form is used
in a function that implies a functional extension similar to the one in narrative uses of
-xr-marked constructions observed in the early Eighteenth Dynasty (§4.1.2.C):

36 Translation Allen 2011: 35.

37 Discussed by Oréal 2011: 141.
38 Blumenthal et al. 1984: 16.

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 252 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

(vi) Urk. IV 324, 3-7 (Punt Expedition)

iit in wrw nw pwnt m ksw m wAH-tp r Ssp mSa pn n nsw D=sn iAw n nb nTrw
imn-ra pAwti tAwy hb xAswt
Dd.xr=sn dbH=sn Htpw
‘Coming by the great ones of Punt in bowing down and with their heads
lowered to receive this expedition of the king, giving praise to the lord of the
gods Amun-Re, the primordial of the Dual Land who travels through the
foreign countries.
They say asking for peace:’
C. The particle is is more generally subject to reconfigurations of various sorts in the
written language of some early Eighteenth Dynasty compositions. Compare:

(vii) Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building Inscription 20 (Urk. IV 164, 5-6)

rx.n=i is nHH pw wAst Dt pw imn
‘I know that Thebes is an eternal place and that Amun is forever.’
Is at the beginning of a complement clause, rather than in clause-second position;
the regular construction would have been *nHH is pw wAst.39 Slightly later, but still
in the Eighteenth Dynasty, is Amenhotep son of Hapu, Back Pillar 5 (Urk. IV
1824, 10-11) irw n=i ir.tw n=tn Hr-ntt is ink iwa grg niwt=f dr twA=s m st nbt ‘Act
for me and they will act for you, because I am an heir who establishes his town
and drives away its evil from every place.’ In lieu of regular *Hr-ntt ink is iwa (...).

(viii) Chapelle Rouge, p.125: VI.8-11 (HHBT II 21, 5-9/10)

stp=i A is hpw=t xr=i
D=i A is wS drf n m-xt
Xn=i A is tp-rd SA.n=t
D=i A is Hr=T Hr st=i
‘May I only ruin your laws which come from me?
May I only make prophecies empty?
May I only disturb ordinances you have decreed?
May I only allow you away from my seat?’
Is is in combination with A: not otherwise paralleled.40

(ix) Urk. IV 257, 7-8 (Proclamation as Regent)

D=i sy m st-ti=i tw
is Hrt-nst=i pw
‘I wish to place her as this my royal representative;
for(?) she is my successor on the throne.’
As in (vii), is heads the clause, diverging from the otherwise regular clause-
second position of the particle (compare (ii)-(iv)).

39 Uljas 2007a: 283 and n.51; for a semantic interpretation of the phenomenon, Oréal 2011: 165.
40 Semantic analysis by Oréal 2011: 42-3.

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 4.2 Berlin Leather Roll 253

The unique combination of is with the etymologically related isk in a single sentence
in Urk. IV 260, 6 (Proclamation as Regent; discussed below, §4.7.1, (iii)) is
illustrative of the same horizon in written language.
D. The above adds up to suggest that A is B, a very rare construction, is amenable to
an argument by ‘direct dating’. The construction is not documented in any Middle
Kingdom or Second Intermediate Period text: in all periods, Middle Egyptian regular-
ly uses another construction, A is pw B, to perform similar functions (above, A). The
rise of the construction A is B can not be accounted for in terms of regular linguistic
change and is therefore best interpreted as a phenomenon in written language. The
construction is once documented in an Hatshepsutian composition, Punt Expedition:
significantly, the context displays further tokens of a high degree of formal elabora-
tion, including another element of linguistic reconfiguration (above, B). The particle
is is more broadly subject to reconfigurations of various sorts in the very same time,
and only then during the centuries relevant for dating Berlin Leather Roll (above, C).
It is therefore proposed that A is B relates to an early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon in
written language.

4.2.2 Berlin Leather Roll 1.12 xpr=f-iT=f ‘born-conqueror’

The expression xpr=f-iT=f recurs in only two other texts. One occurrence has often
been noted, Speos Artemidos 39 (Urk. IV 390, 3: as xpr=s-it).41 The other one is
Amenhotep II’s Amada Stela, upper part 5 (Urk. IV 1287, 20-21).42
A. In general, patterns of attestation of rare expressions are the most unreliable of all.
In the present case, however, a series of further observations can be made. Morpho-
logically, the expression is of the type iw=f-aA=f.43 Semantically, xpr=f-iT=f ‘born-
conqueror’ is to do with royal ideology. Together, this strongly suggests that the
expression was coined specifically to express such meaning, rather than innovated in
regular linguistic interaction. Of the two dated examples of xpr=f-iT=f, none is earlier
than the early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty; nor is any later than that period. The two
other occurrences of the expression thus cluster in a very short time span (Hatshepsut-
Amenhotep II), which happens to include the date of P. Berlin 3029 ro. Rather than a
rare word sparsely used throughout history, xpr-iT=f could then be a short-lived
neologistic expression specific to some written registers in the brief period in which it
is documented. If so, a lexical argument for a ‘direct dating’ of Berlin Leather Roll
would be given.

41 Initially perhaps de Buck 1938: 55, n.22; Gardiner 1946b: 55, n.v; a locus classicus ever since.
42 Initially Gruen 1973; subsequently Borghouts 1994: 25; Klug 2002: 287, n.2271.
43 EG §194; Vernus 1970; Borghouts 1994: 23-4.

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 254 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

B. In all three instances, the expression xpr=f-iT=f is bound to similar phraseological

contexts:

(i) Berlin Leather Roll 1.12-14

rnn.kw m xpr=f-iT=f (…) ii.kw m Hr (...)
‘I have been raised as a born-conqueror (...) I am come as Horus (...)’

(ii) Speos Artemidos 39-40 (Urk. IV 390, 13-14)

sr.n.tw=i r Hnty rnpwt m xpr=s-it i.kwi m Hr watt (...)
‘I have been announced from the ends of years as a born-conqueror; I am now
come as the unique Horus (...)’44

(iii) Amenhotep II’s Amada Stela, upper part 3-5 (Urk. IV 1287, 20-21)
sxpr.n(=i) tw r nDty=i rnn(=i) tw m xpr=f-it=f (...)
‘I have brought you into existence to be my avenger, I have raised you as a
born-conqueror.’

This could be interpreted as additional evidence for relating Berlin Leather Roll to an
early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty horizon. There is, however, another possibility. If the
text now documented on Berlin Leather Roll was composed in the Middle Kingdom,
this could have served as a textual model, drawn upon in later times. That the sole
manuscript of Berlin Leather Roll dates to the very period when xpr=f-iT=f is other-
wise attested could then be interpreted as documenting an horizon of precisely such
reception, of the composition, of the expression, and of the phraseological context to
which it is bound. In view of the above discussion of xpr=f-iT=f as a lexical expres-
sion, the former scenario would seem more likely, but the latter can not be ruled out.

4.2.3 Berlin Leather Roll 1.19 m-rA-a ‘as well, likewise’

M-rA-a in Berlin Leather Roll 1.19 is remarkable because of the dense and near-
exclusive attestation of the expression in the New Kingdom.45 Both TLA46 and a
dedicated study of m-rA-a47 mention a singular much earlier instance of the expression,
in the Old Kingdom tomb inscription of Hezy. This would imply that any argument
based on the occurrence of m-rA-a in Berlin Leather Roll 1.19 could only be
suggestive, not conclusive.48 As it turns out, the alleged instance of m-rA-a in Hezy,
which goes back to the prime editors of the text,49 is to be read differently.50 M rA-a is

44 Fuller quotation above, §1.2, (iii.).

45 Observed by a proponent of an early dating: Osing 1992a: 117, n.o; by a proponent of a late dating:
Derchain 1992: 39.
46 TLA #64970.
47 Winand 2009.
48 Thus Winand 2009: 527, n.1: ‘peut-être un indice supplémentaire d’une datation basse’.
49 Kanawati & Abd er-Raziq 1999: 38: ‘Likewise, His Majesty was discussing matters with me
amongst the noblemen (...)’.
50 Baud & Farout 2001: 51 (with a contribution by Laurent Coulon acknowledged by the authors).

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 4.2 Berlin Leather Roll 255

a prepositional phrase, with rA-a a full noun51 and the following prepositional phrase
(mm srw) dependent on rA-a (i).52 The construction is closely similar to the one in a
famous passage of Mentuwoser’s stela (ii):53

(i) Hezy, west thickness 4-554

wn Hm=f nD=f xt m-a(=i) m rA-a mm srw sk w(i) m sAb sHD sS n rx Hm=f rn(=i)
Tny r bAk nb
‘His Majesty used to take counsel with me in the manner that is done among
the officials even though I was only a state inspector of scribes, for His
Majesty knew my name to be distinguished over any servant’s.’
(ii) Mentuwoser 13
ink mdw r rA-a srw (...)
‘I was one speaking in the manner of 55 the officials (...)’
The reinterpretation of Hezy, West thickness 4-5 invites reconsidering the pattern of
attestation of m-rA-a. The expression is very common in Late Egyptian.56 Besides two
Amarna instances, TLA mentions only one pre-Amarna instance, in Eulogistic
Account of a King X+7.x+5 (§3.3.2.B).57 To these, two more early occurrences can be
added, one in Thutmosis I’s Tombos Inscription 2 (Urk. IV 82, 14),58 and a slightly
earlier one in a fragment of a stela from Karnak which ‘seems to date to around the
same period as the Third Stela of Kamose.’59 The overall pattern of attestation of m-
rA-a is very consistent: the expression is first documented in the late Second Inter-
mediate Period, then a few times during the Eighteenth Dynasty, and becomes very
common in Ramesside times.
In Berlin Leather Roll 1.19, m-rA-a is tightly integrated in its context, in which
some expression for ‘likewise, as well’ is required: it can not, therefore, be an addi-
tion. If an early dating of this passage is to be upheld, it must then be hypothesized
that m-rA-a was altered from some older expression standing in this place, most proba-
bly m-mitt. This is very unlikely in view of how productively m-mitt is still used in the
early New Kingdom:60 the expression was then not felt to be any obsolete or difficult.

51 On the risk of confusing the adverbial expression m-rA-a with the prepositional phrase m rA-a N
more generally, Winand 2009: 528.
52 There is no need to read as m rA-a(=i) or to posit a ‘zero’ (m rA-a ø), pace Baud & Farout 2001: 51.
53 Parallel drawn by Laurent Coulon in Baud & Farout 2001: 51, n.44.
54 Kanawati & Abd er-Raziq 1999: pl.33b, 59b.
55 Thus the classical translation; FCD 146 suggests ‘in the presence of’.
56 In his discussion, Winand 2009 adduces some forty examples (without laying any claim at
completeness). The list in TLA #64970 is similarly impressive.
57 TLA #64970.
58 Noted in FCD 146.
59 Van Siclen III 2010: 358, x+8.
60 E.g. TLA #64830.

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 256 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

4.2.4 Varia in the lexicon

Various other lexical expressions in Berlin Leather Roll must be appreciated with the
usual caveats.

(i) Berlin Leather Roll 2.9 rA-Hry ‘master, chief’

The word is not documented before the early New Kingdom.61 From the early
Eighteenth Dynasty on, it is fairly common: Urk. IV 58, 6 (Ineni); 208, 9
(Nebwawi I); 405, 3 (Senenmut); 420, 17 (Djehuti); etc. Other expressions are
documented in earlier times with similar meaning, chief among which Hr-tp (Hr-tp of
course continues to be used in the New Kingdom as well). In Berlin Leather Roll 2.9,
rA-Hry is in collocation with the old independent pronoun, Twt rA-Hry n-s=imy ‘Thou
are the chief thereof’: see the discussion below, §6.3.1.2.C.

(ii) Berlin Leather Roll 2.5 iwnn ‘sanctuary’

The word is not documented before the early New Kingdom.62 Early occurrences63
include Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy 6 (Urk. IV 16, 1); Speos Artemidos 4 (Urk. IV
384, 2; the same text also has xpr=s-it, discussed above: §4.2.2); Thutmosis III’s
Karnak Building Inscription 25 (Urk. IV 166, 8; the same text also has an experi-
mental construction of is, discussed above: §4.2.1, (vii)); Urk. IV 834, 2 (another
building inscription by Thutmosis III). One other occurrence is in Loyaliste 7.4; the
dating of the long version of this composition is discussed below, §4.5.

(iii) Berlin Leather Roll 1.8 bwA ‘to be highly regarded’

While a noun bwA ‘magnate’ is once found in a pre-New Kingdom text,64 the verb
formed on the same root, possibly a denominative formation, is apparently not docu-
mented before the early New Kingdom.65

In the above, the last is weak, as there is no way to exclude that the denominative
formation on bwA, if this is one, may not have existed in the Middle Kingdom already.
Of the remaining two, (i) is strongest, because the pattern of attestation of a word
meaning ‘master, chief’ is less sensitive to whatever subject matters (and therefore
semantic fields in the lexicon) were committed to writing in different periods. The
same dimension must, on the other hand, be taken into critical account in appre-
ciating (ii).

61 Wb II 390.6-9 notes ‘vereinzelt M.R.; oft seit D.18’; in Belegstellen II 577a-b, however, all
instances quoted are from the New Kingdom. Could ‘M.R.’ be in reference to Berlin Leather Roll
itself (see the next n.)?
62 Iwnn is absent from HannLex 4 and 5. Wb I 55.12 writes ‘seit M.R.’, but this is in reference to
Berlin Leather Roll 2.5 itself.
63 After FCD 13.
64 FCD 82; HannLex 4: 420b.
65 Wb. I 454.10-14.

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 4.3 Sporting King 257

4.2.5 Assessing the evidence

As discussed, the construction A is B in Berlin Leather Roll 2.4—not a regular

construction in Middle Egyptian of any times—is best interpreted as a phenomenon of
written language (§4.2.1). The construction is paralleled in the early Eighteenth
Dynasty both specifically and for its general principle, and only then. From this, a
strong indication for dating can be derived. Another strong indication is given by m-
rA-a in 1.19 (§4.2.3), an expression that lies at the boundary between the grammatical
and the lexical: m-rA-a is common and its pattern of attestation consistent; moreover,
the likelihood for the expression to be secondary in Berlin Leather Roll 1.19 can be
assessed as minimal. To various degrees, ranging from high to low, three lexical
expressions may also be suggestive of a later dating (§4.2.4). One other lexical
expression, xpr=f-iT=f in 1.12 (§4.2.2), a neologism, was discussed for ‘direct dating’:
this could be suggestive as well, yet remains ambiguous in interpretation because of
the phraseological context with which it is associated in all cases. As initially noted,
Berlin Leather Roll is expected to be fairly undistinctive linguistically (§4.2,
introduction, fine): against this background, the above collection is almost
surprisingly dense. A is B and m-rA-a in particular are strongly indicative of a late
dating.
It is therefore submitted that Berlin Leather Roll is probably an early Eighteenth
Dynasty production, not merely in a redactional sense, but in terms of actual
composition. As initially discussed, this stands in no contradiction with the possibility
that the composers may have drawn on earlier materials: such a scenario is in fact
inherently plausible in view of the cultural functions the text may have had. On what
type of material the composers drew—on actual ‘sources’ or more broadly on an
historically deep-reaching phraseological tradition—and in what amounts and what
ways would be of interest in better appreciating Berlin Leather Roll. This, however,
remains beyond the scope of a linguistic analysis; it is perhaps more generally
irrecoverable in the present case.

4.3 Sporting King

The composition now referred to as Sporting King is documented in a single

fragmentary manuscript (P. Moscow unnumbered) which paleographically dates to
the late Eighteenth Dynasty.66 The papyrus was purchased alongside other literary
papyri dating to the same period (Ptahhotep L2, Sinuhe G, Merikare M, Fishing and
Fowling, and Moscow Mythological Story). All probably derive from a single find
(§3.2, introduction).

66 Text: Caminos 1956: 22-39, pl.8-16.

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 258 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

4.3.1 Non-linguistic elements for dating

A. Sporting King mentions the throne name of Amenemhat II (nwb-kAw-ra, E2.11),

plausibly the king to which the speeches are addressed. In addition, various elements
in Sporting King recur in one passage in this king’s Annals (M23-25).67 These
encounters are relevant for interpretation, demonstrating how Sporting King relates to
royal ideology as expressed in other types of written discourses.68 They need not,
however, imply a dating of the composition to the reign of Amenemhat II himself: the
literary composition could for example have drawn on a tradition associated with
Amenemhat II at some later time.69 The text of Amenemhat II’s Annals could also
have been on display for a longer while, or a non-inscriptional copy thereof could
have been kept, later to serve as one source for a literary treatment of the subject. As
institutional analysis suggests, the literary composition probably post-dates the reign
of the king it mentions (below, B), the question being by how much.
More generally, elements of royal ritual in Sporting King are not bound to a
specific period in Egyptian history. Expressed in non-textual ways, the motif of
fishing and fowling as part of a royal ritual is documented in the First Dynasty
already.70 The title nbty wHa ‘Two Ladies Fowler’ (C1.12) recurs in Amenemhat II’s
Annals (M24), yet also on a block from the causeway of Sahure’s pyramid complex
(SC/north/2003/05),71 with a text dealing with fishing and fowling as a royal
activity.72 The title also recurs in the much later statue of a ‘Mayor of the Fayum’
Sobekhotep (Urk. IV 1587-8; temp. Thutmosis IV).73 In this, nbty wHa (Urk. IV
1588, 4) is said of the king in the context of a leisurely activity of fishing and fowling
in the Fayum (tA-S: Urk. IV 1587, 17), including a reference to the Marsh-goddess
(sxt: Urk. IV 1588, 2).
B. The main speaker, Sehetepibreankh, is said to be a sS iri a n nsw n xft-Hr ‘personal
scribe responsible of the king’s document’ (A2.1; A2.3; B2.5).74 In this particular
form, the title is not documented in any other place. It is, however, closely similar to a
title sS a n nsw n xft-Hr ‘personal scribe of the king’s document’. In the early Middle
Kingdom, a shorter form, sS a n nsw, is consistently used. The long form, with the
addition n xft-Hr, is documented only in the Thirteenth Dynasty.75 In general, titles
can undergo alteration in textual history, a classical case in point being the titulary of
Ptahhotep in Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses of the Teaching, expanded with respect to

67 Text: Altenmüller & Moussa 1991: 17-8, 36-7, and pl.1. Discussion of the elements in common
with Sporting King: Quirke 2004a: 206-7. Among further studies: Altenmüller 2008 (on the motif
of the king as a fisher and fowler); Enmarch 2007: 76-9 (on sr’ing notably).
68 Parkinson 2002: 231.
69 Various scenarios are outlined in Quirke 2004a: 206-7; Parkinson 2002: 311-2 and n.17.
70 Altenmüller 2008: 5-10.
71 El-Awadi 2009: 215-31 and pl.13.
72 On this text in relation to Amenemhat II’s Annals and Sporting King, Spalinger 2011: 363-9.
73 Noted by Altenmüller 2008: 4, n.14.
74 Dils et al., TLA, read as sS nsw iri a n xft-Hr ‘the king’s personal scribe, responsible of the
document’.
75 Grajetzki 2000: 169-77.

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 4.3 Sporting King 259

the P version and echoing, or echoed in, early New Kingdom viziers’ titles.76 In
Sporting King, the title comes in the long form in all three occurrences (A2.1; A2.3;
B2.5), making it less likely that n xft-Hr could have been just such a secondary
expansion. Accordingly it has been proposed that this title may provide an indication
for dating Sporting King to the late Middle Kingdom, as the name sHtp-ib-ra-anx
(A2.1) may as well.77
Yet, titles in literary works need not point to the period in time in which they cor-
responded to actually operating offices or functions. In literary texts and elsewhere,
they can also be used for archaizing effect. Classical examples include sAb aD-mr (...)
‘state official, governor (...)’ in Sinuhe (R 1),78 sDm Hwt wrt 6 ‘judge of the six great
estates’ in early New Kingdom versions of Ptahhotep (3 C, L2) and contemporaneous
viziers’ titularies,79 or sA nsw smsw n Xt=f ‘eldest royal son of his body’ in the Middle
Kingdom version of the same composition (44 P).80 If, as argued below, Neferkare
and Sisene dates to the Eighteenth Dynasty (§4.4), this is yet another case of a Middle
Egyptian literary composition with archaizing titles, not functional any more at the
time when the work was composed. Regarding the segment n xft-Hr specifically, one
instance of an archaizing usage is found in Mentuhotep (CG 20539; temp.
Senwosret I): this has imi-rA sSw a n nsw n xft-Hr ‘personal director of the scribes of
the king’s document’ (II.6l), a title otherwise documented in the Old Kingdom and
First Intermediate Period, not in this form in the early Twelfth Dynasty.81
C. Discussing possible forerunners of Ramesside ‘Unterhaltungsliteratur’, Assmann
proposed that Sporting King (and Fishing and Fowling) could ‘vielleicht’ date to the
Eighteenth Dynasty.82 The proposal is problematic in one part, as entertainment is
arguably a function of Middle Kingdom literature as well, expressed in different
forms.83 On the other hand, as also evoked by Assmann, Sporting King and Fishing
and Fowling display various elements of form, motifs, and intertext that make them
typologically transitional compositions.84 Other literary texts that have been discussed
in relation to Sporting King and Fishing and Fowling are Eulogistic Account of a King
and Tale Involving the House of Life,85 Neferkare and Sisene,86 and the Eighteenth
Dynasty praise of a city on O. Nakhtmin 87/173.87
An appreciation of Sporting King and Fishing and Fowling as typologically
transitional is also expressed by Parkinson in terms that are worth quoting in full:
‘Both the compositions seem to belong to a leisured poetry, a playful adaptation of
courtly liturgies, almost foreshadowing the ethos of the Ramesside love-songs. While

76 For the two interpretive options, Grajetzki 2005: 41-2; Hagen 2012a: 220-7.
77 Grajetzki 2005: 56.
78 Grajetzki 2005: 51-2.
79 Hagen 2012a: 223; Grajetzki 2005: 41-2.
80 Grajetzki 2005: 40-1.
81 Grajetzki 2000: 173 and n.5.
82 Assmann 1985: 48-9.
83 E.g. Parkinson 2002: 83-5.
84 Similarly e.g. Baines 1996: 160-1.
85 Parkinson 2002: 112.
86 Assmann 1985: 48.
87 Parkinson 2002: 230.

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 260 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

the language is courtly, the serious tone which is peculiar to much of the central canon
is lacking, suggesting that these compositions might lie in some sense on the
periphery of the high literary tradition (emphasis AS), and also exemplifying the
versatile capacity of poetry to absorb other genres. This expansion of subject matter
and tone, the length, and the presumed structure of the poems all may suggest a late
date and a transitional status (emphasis AS) between the Middle Kingdom canon and
later literature.’88
That Sporting King is later than e.g. Sinuhe is clear; the question is how late
Sporting King is, and thereby how close in time to Ramesside literature to come. This
has broader implications, as it may bear on one major issue, namely until when
Middle Egyptian literature was a productive tradition.

4.3.2 Sporting King A2.2: Mi sy-iSst

In the section introducing Sehetepibreankh’s telling of ‘what he has seen’, the king
asks a question that includes an extraordinary expression:

(i) Sporting King A2.2-3

mi sy-iSst [pw Dd=k mAA].n=k st
‘What is it like, what you say you have seen?’89
Mi sy-iSst is a hapax legomenon. As to be discussed in the present section, its lack of
attestation in any other text is not a gap in the written record: rather, the expression is
truly unique. That a unique expression should have implications for dating is at first
paradoxical, as expressions uniquely attested are by definition the ones that can least
be anchored to the external record. As it turns out, the expression can only be
accounted for in terms of a textual genealogy, not of ongoing linguistic change. It is at
this level that it becomes relevant for dating.

4.3.2.1 Analyzing a unique expression

A. Various other phrases for expressing ‘like what, how’ are commonly documented
in Middle Egyptian literature and elsewhere:

- mi m: e.g. Sinuhe B 43; Ipuwer 5.2; 14.14; Fishing and Fowling A1.1;90
Heavenly Cow 130;91
- less commonly also m m (literally ‘as what’ with often closely similar
meaning): e.g. Merikare E 137; Neferti 5b Pet.

88 Parkinson 2002: 231-2.

89 The lacuna after the interrogative permits different interpretations of the sentence: see Caminos
1956: 27; Vernus 2006: 165, ex.96, n.153. This issue is here left open as it is not further relevant
for the present section, which concerns the interrogative word itself.
90 Parkinson (2002: 229) observes that both Fishing and Fowling and the first speech in Sporting
King are introduced by a similar type of question. If so, the contrast in the expressions selected in
either text makes the peculiar interrogative construction in Sporting King all the more apparent.
91 Mi m is in Late Egyptian superseded by mi ix (as multiples times e.g. in Satirical Letter); an early
instance of mi ix is in Urk. IV 649, 15 (Thutmosis III’s Annals).

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 4.3 Sporting King 261

Against this background, the interrogative mi sy-iSst in Sporting King must have
sounded recherché.
B. This interpretation is confirmed by an examination of the pattern of attestation of
the second part of mi sy-iSst, namely the interrogative word itself, sy-iSst. At first
sight, this would seem fairly unremarkable: sy-iSst is salient in any Egyptologist’s
representation of Middle Egyptian as an expression specifically discussed in the most
commonly used reference grammar of the language.92 Moreover, the expression is one
that features prominently in the Middle Egyptian text most popular in modern
reception, Sinuhe, where it occurs in a context that is itself salient in asking one of the
central questions of the composition:
(ii) Sinuhe R 58
[pH.n=k] nn Hr si-iSst
‘Why have you reached this place?’
The question was probably salient to ancient readers already, as is suggested by
its presence on B1 (Berlin P 12341), an ostracon probably deriving from Deir el-
Ballas and dating to the end of the Hyksos period.93 This has a very short excerpt
of Sinuhe, beginning with the question only preceded by introductory aHa.n
Dd.n=f.

This salience in modern representations of Middle Egyptian only obscures the

extremely sparse effective attestation of the expression. Beyond the Sinuhe R instance
just quoted and the one in Sporting King here discussed, only three other occurrences
of sy-iSst have been noted, twice as Hr sy-iSst ‘why’, once as sy-iSst ‘what’ (quoted
below, (iii)-(v)). Just like ‘how’ (above, A), ‘why’ is regularly expressed otherwise in
Middle Egyptian, not with sy-iSst:
- Hr m: e.g. Eloquent Peasant B1 211; Cheops’ Court 6.5; 11.22; 12.22;
Kamose Inscriptions St.II 20;
- Hr ix: e.g. Heqanakht I vso 15; Ahmose’s Abydos Stela for Tetisheri 7
(Urk. IV 27, 11).

C. The three occurrences of sy-iSst other than in Sinuhe and Sporting King are
themselves worth a closer look at:

(iii) Urk. IV 324, 6-9 (Punt Expedition)

Dd.xr=sn dbH=sn Htpw
pH.n=Tn nn Hr si-iSst rsic xAst Tn xmt.n rmT
‘They say asking for peace:
“Why have you reached this place, tosic this country unknown of men?” ’

92 EG §500.4.
93 For this witness in its context, Parkinson 2009: 174-5.

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 262 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

(iv) Ahmose’s Abydos Stela for Tetisheri 6-7 (Urk. IV 27, 10-12)
sxA.tw nn Hr sy-iSst
sDd.tw mdt tn Hr ix
pty spr r HAty=k
‘Why does One think of this?
Why does One tell this discourse?
What has reached Your heart?’
(v) Chapelle Rouge, p.98: I.2-5 (HHBT II 7, 11 - 8, 3/4)
(...) tA r-Dr=f Ssp.n sgri (...) wrw aH wAH.n Hr
imiw-xt=f Hr sy-iSst
sAw-ib xpr m tp-Sw (...)
‘(...) the whole land, it became silent (...) the great ones of the palace, they
bent their heads;
his followers (scil. the god’s) were saying: “What?”
The ones with sated hearts(?) were destitute(?) (...)’

PH.n=Tn nn Hr si-iSst in Punt Expedition (iii) has long been identified as a quotation of
Sinuhe R 58 (ii).94 Beyond its identical phrasing and contextual appropriateness,95 the
question is followed by further in iw-introduced question(s) in both Punt Expedition
(Urk. IV 324, 10-11) and in Sinuhe itself (R 59). Indicative of a quotation is also the
slightly awkward syntax of pH, first constructed transitively (as in the Sinuhe
original), then expanded further by an oblique phrase introduced by r. The allusion to
Sinuhe is only one element of the considerable elaboration displayed by the
surrounding context: the question is introduced by Dd.xr=sn, a strongly archaizing
synthetic -xr-infixed form,96 here used in a functionally remarkable way (§4.2.1, (vi)).
The segment of speech continues with a construction A is B (Urk. IV 324, 12-13),
which is apparently paralleled only once otherwise (§4.2.1, (v)).
The two other passages that have sy-iSst also display a considerable elaboration. In
Ahmose’s Abydos Stela for Tetisheri (iv), the threefold sequence of interrogative
clauses comes with strong rhetorical effect. Both the first and second questions are
‘why’-questions, with two different expressions for ‘why’—a plain case of linguistic
dissimilation. In Chapelle Rouge (v), a high linguistic register is manifest in the
twofold use of the construction N sDm.n (§1.2, (xi); also §3.4.4, (iii)-(iv)). In the
lexicon, tp-Sw, a rare expression (§5.1.3.3, (viii)), is noteworthy as well.

94 E.g. EG, p.408, n.3.

95 Parkinson (2009: 177) comments: ‘The international context of these scenes also suggests that this
allusion to a poem about foreign travel might be meaningful and not simply an accidental result of
scribal training and linguistic antiquarianism. The meaning of the question, however, has been
transformed: although it was an embarrassing question in the poem, here it is a conventional
expression of wonder at a royal act (...)’.
96 Vernus 1990a: 65.

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 4.3 Sporting King 263

D. At this point, a closer examination of the relevant passage in Sinuhe itself is in

order. The interrogative word under discussion, si-iSst, is in R only. B reads
differently:

(vi) Sinuhe B 34-35

pH.n=k nn Hr m
iSst pw
‘Why have you reached this place?
What is it?’

R 58
[pH.n=k] nn Hr si-iSst
‘Why have you reached this place?’
As often, the New Kingdom tradition—B1, B3, AOS, Cl—here follows R.

The B manuscript has Hr m, the regular way for expressing ‘why’ in Middle Egyptian
(above, B). ISst pw similarly is a regular expression (e.g. Eloquent Peasant B1 160;
Ipuwer 5.10; Cheops’ Court 6.25).97 R has conflated the two questions into only one,
replacing the interrogative word m ‘what’ by si.98 This results in an interrogative word
with two WH-expressions: si-iSst ‘what/which-what’. This is analogical to the regular
construction si N ‘what/which N’, except that a second interrogative word is inserted
in the slot of what in Middle Egyptian can otherwise only be a full noun:

CT II 141e Hr si wAt ‘on what/which road?’

Sinuhe R 58 Hr si-iSst ‘on what/which what?’

%i-iSst in Sinuhe R 58 thereby appears as the result of a purely textual process. The
second WH-interrogative expression, iSst was originally part of another interrogative
clause entirely independent from the first.
E. The realization that si-iSst in Sinuhe R 58 owes its existence to a textual process,
not to a linguistic one, invites reconsidering the other instances of si-iSst. The one in
Punt Expedition (iii) is a direct quotation of Sinuhe R 58. In Ahmose’s Abydos Stela
for Tetisheri (iv), an allusion to Sinuhe is possible, in view of the linguistic
dissimilation of Hr sy-iSst with Hr m; perhaps relevant is also that Hr sy-iSst is preceded
by nn, as in Sinuhe R 58. In Chapelle Rouge, an allusion is possible as well, but
would have been subtle enough. Remarkably, all three occurrences of (Hr) sy-iSst
other than in Sinuhe R stem from the same temporal horizon: Punt Expedition and
Chapelle Rouge are Hatshepsutian, while Ahmose’s Abydos Stela for Tetisheri is only
slightly earlier. As is suggested by the apparently extremely limited distribution of the
expression, only in very high registers, and further by its formal makeup, singling it
out from all regular interrogatives in the language, (Hr) sy-iSst must have sounded

97 Beyond literary Middle Egyptian, also e.g. Chapelle Rouge, p.99: I.16 (HHBT II 9, 9); further
Vernus 2006: 151, ex.25-6.
98 The interrogative si is common notably in funerary texts such as Coffin Texts and Book of the
Dead. In a literary text, it recurs in Cheops’ Court 9.15.

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 264 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

extremely recherché. This appreciation is independently confirmed by the textual

surroundings in which the construction is found, in all three cases displaying further
elements of a strong elaboration.
Based on the fact that the expression, a double WH-interrogative, is ungrammat-
ical, its history can then be traced. %i-iSst arises through a purely textual process in the
tradition of Sinuhe now documented by R. In the early Eighteenth Dynasty, it recurs
in very few places, in all cases in highly elaborate contexts. The connection to Sinuhe
R 58 is directly demonstrated in one of these occurrences, and an allusion is likely or
possible in the other two. From uses as a conscious quotation or allusion, the expres-
sion could then have gained some autonomous life as an element of extremely
recherché language. Even when possibly not any more an allusion, the very presence
of sy-iSst in the linguistic repertoires of some early Eighteenth Dynasty compositions
is understandable only as a token of the reception of Sinuhe R 58: initially the result
of a textual process, the expression owes its further existence to a textual genalogy.
F. Mi sy-iSst in Sporting King A2.2 then itself appears to stand in the reception of
Sinuhe R 58, be this as a conscious allusion, or more indirectly as an expression made
possible by a textual genealogy ultimately harkening back to Sinuhe R 58. It comes as
no surprise, therefore, that mi sy-iSst in Sporting King should be a hapax legomenon.
That Sporting King A2.2 stands in the reception of the tradition of Sinuhe now
represented by R does not in itself suffice to define a terminus ante quem non by the
time of the manuscript R itself (probably mid-Thirteenth Dynasty99). When the textual
alteration discussed above in Sinuhe took place is unknown: it could have occurred
before R was copied.
It is tempting, on the other hand, to relate mi sy-iSst in Sporting King to the
effectively documented horizon of reception of the Sinuhean Hr si-iSst, in the early
Eighteenth Dynasty. While gaps in the written record can hardly be over-emphasized,
it must also be observed that the three documented instances of sy-iSst other than the
one in Sporting King cluster very closely in time. Moreover, the pattern of attestation
is here of an entirely different nature than for expressions that have a regular existence
in language. For these, their actual presence in the language would have been
continuous over the time of their existence, however continuously or discontinuously
they may be represented in the record. The case of sy-iSst is altogether different, since
the very conditioning possibility for this expression lies in reception and textual
genealogy, thereby in cultural phenomenona, which are not continuous in nature. The
kind of reception here observed is also of a specific kind, sited at the highest levels of
composers’ engagement with Sinuhe. The pattern of effective documentation of the
productive reception of the Sinuhean Hr si-iSst therefore stands every chance to be
significant. In all likelihood, mi sy-iSst in Sporting King A2.2 therefore points to an
early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon.

4.3.2.2 An expression secondarily inserted in the text?

It remains to be assessed whether mi sy-iSst is integral to the original text of Sporting
King or not. If the expression were textually secondary in Sporting King A2.2, the

99 For the dating of R (P. Ramesseum A), Parkinson 2012a: 3; 2009: 150.

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 4.3 Sporting King 265

source construction mi sy-iSst would in all likelihood have been altered from the
regular construction mi m, with an exactly similar meaning. Unlike for many other
constructions in other texts discussed in the present study, there are at this level no
indications that speak directly against the hypothesis of such an alteration: if one had
occurred, the text as now to be read in P. Moscow unnumbered would look just as it
does. On the other hand, such textual alteration would not have been an instance of
‘modernization’, regularization, or smoothening of the text. Quite the contrary would
be the case: an extraordinary expression would have been inserted to replace a very
ordinary one. This is not entirely impossible, if one imagines an early Eighteenth
Dynasty littérateur enhancing the text to his own taste. How likely such a scenario
would be is another issue, however.
Further considerations confirm that mi sy-iSst is most probably original in Sporting
King A2.2. Both in this composition and in Sinuhe R, the si-iSst question is asked by a
higher-status participant (the king, respectively Amunenshi) to which a lower-status
participant (Sehetepibreankh, respectively Sinuhe) responds by a longer speech. There
is therefore a great deal of contextual appropriateness in the presence of sy-iSst in
Sporting King A2.2.
Noteworthy is also the mention of itw ‘Lisht’ in Sporting King B3.3. The place is
commonly referred to as Xnw ‘Residence’, its designation as (imn-m-HAt-)iT-tAwy being
fairly rare.100 Itw in Sporting King B3.3 is one of only two instances of the fully
abbreviated form, the other one being Sinuhe B 247.101 In Sinuhe B 247, the text has
itw{tA}: the scribe had begun writing the tA-sign, then ‘realized that he could fit another
line onto the page below this and so he stopped and instead used a shorter form of the
toponym jTw—going back and squeezing in the w between the signs that he had
already written.’102 The status of itw is thus open to debate, as a short form that
existed in the language or as one that the B-scribe coined possibly accidentally in the
course of the process just described. Either way, the textual distribution of itw
suggests that Sporting King may here as well lie in the reception of Sinuhe, directly
alluding to that composition, or less consciously using a name form that had gained
currency by its presence in Sinuhe. That the influence of Sinuhe is now to be detected
probably twice in the same composition suggests that Sporting King more generally
resonates with a Sinuhean background. This provides an additional indication that sy-
iSst in Sporting King A2.2 is not the result of a secondary insertion.

100 Simpson 1963: 53-5.

101 Neither R nor any Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses preserve the passage in question. AOS, for its
part, has the fuller form, iT-tAwy.
102 Parkinson 2009: 96-8.

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 266 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

4.3.3 Sporting King C1.11: M-xt nn + ‘narrative’ infinitive

The following passage has a remarkable use of a ‘narrative’ construction of the

infinitive after a fronted temporal expression:

(i) Sporting King C1.10-11

sqdwt [...] tA m aH tA-S
m-xt nn snmt [...]
‘Sailing [...] the land in the palace of the Sea-land.
After this, feeding/consuming(?) [...]’

A. In the Middle Kingdom, the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive is never

found after a fronted temporal expression. That this lack of attestation is not a docu-
mentary gap is strongly suggested by the fact that the ‘narrative’ construction of the
infinitive is fairly common in Middle Kingdom texts (thus in various types of texts,
Hammamat inscriptions, Amenemhat II’s Annals, Khusobek, Sinuhe, etc.).
More directly, there are semantic grounds for why the combination of a ‘narrative’
construction of the infinitive with a fronted temporal expression can not occur. In the
Middle Kingdom, the construction is used in headings, related to these in absolute
paragraph-initial position, or, when events are listed in a bare form, following another
‘narrative infinitive’. Reflecting its origins in a textual genealogy ultimately harkening
back to label statements and annalistic notices, the ‘narrative’ construction of the
infinitive presents the event in a bare form. The defining function of the construction,
its very raison d’être, lies in not expressing a temporal relation with some preceding
event, more broadly in not relating the event to the temporal flow. Fronted temporal
expressions, for their part, serve to express precisely such a relation. The combination
as in (i) is ruled out, because it is semantically a contradiction.
B. The combination as in Sporting King C1.10-11 is amply paralleled in early New
Kingdom royal (ii)-(iii) and private (iv) inscriptions. According with such contexts,
the agent is a high-status participant, a king (often in progress), less commonly a god.
E.g.:

(ii) Chapelle Rouge, p.98: I.5-8 (HHBT II 8, 7/8-10)

spr Hm=f r tp-itrw (...)
m-xt nn rdt Hr m xd
‘His Majesty’s reaching to the Head-of-the-Canal (...)
After this, giving the order to go downstream.’
Sim, p.99: I.14 (HHBT II 9, 4/5), quoted above (§4.1.2, (vi)); p.99: I.18 (HHBT II
9, 12) m-xt nn rDt=f s(i) Xr-HAt=f ‘After this, his placing her before him’; p.107:
III.14-15 (HHBT II 13, 5/6), quoted above (§4.1.2, (vii)); p.121: V.10-11 (HHBT
II 19, 9) m-xt nn gmt ibw=sn ‘After this, finding their hearts.’

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 4.3 Sporting King 267

(iii) Urk. IV 836, 6-7 (a building inscription of Thutmosis III in Karnak)

m-xt nn wDA nb=i r sxA[t] it(=i) imn
wDA nTr r nmtwt=f r irt Hb=f pn nfr
‘After this, proceeding of My Lordship to make my father Amun appear.
Proceeding of the god in his journeys to make this beautiful celebration.’
A variant formulation with a finite construction is in Amenhotep II’s Sphinx Stela
26 (Urk. IV 1283, 5) m-xt nn sxaw Hm=f m nsw (...) ‘After this, His Majesty was
made to appear as a king (...)’.

(iv) Urk. IV 951, 4-7 (Iamunedjeh)

xat nsw m st wrt m aH nw iwnw-Smaw (...)
m-xt nn int inw n bAw Hm=f m xAswt rTnw Xst (...)
‘Appearing of the king on the great seat in the palace of the Southern
Heliopolis (...).
After this, bringing of the tribute to the power of His Majesty from the foreign
countries of the vile Retenu (...)’
Sim. Ahmes son of Abana 36 (Urk. IV 9, 8) m-xt nn wDA r rTnw (...) ‘After this,
proceeding to Retenu (...)’.

This early New Kingdom usage implies a reinterpretation of the ‘narrative’ construc-
tion of the infinitive. Inheriting from Middle Kingdom usage, the construction keeps
significant associations with certain types of texts, events, and agents, yet is also
extended to uses which can not be reconduced any more to the very strict conditions
to which the construction was subject in the Middle Kingdom (compare the above
illustration, (ii)-(iv)). In the early New Kingdom, the ‘narrative’ construction of the
infinitive often serves to introduce segments of text: while differing in articulative
function from other more classically narrative constructions, the construction has
thereby become an integral part of the narrative texture of the texts in which it can be
used. Put differently the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive is increasingly
treated as if this were, indeed, a narrative construction. Accordingly, a temporally
sequential relation to what precedes can be made explicit, by a fronted temporal
expression.
Such usage could not arise through a process of linguistic change, because the
‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive itself was a purely textual phenomenon all
along, existing only in certain types of written discourse to which it was bound. The
early Eighteenth Dynasty reconfiguration is therefore specific to written language.
C. The construction in Sporting King C1.10-11 is thereby an unambiguous token of
an early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon in written language. There remains the possi-
bility, however, that the construction is not original in Sporting King. Assuming the
fronted temporal construction was secondarily inserted before snmt, the original text
would simply have consisted in two ‘narrative’ constructions of the infinitive directly
following each other: sqdwt (...) snmt (...). The textual alteration would have be
undetectable in the text now preserved on P. Moscow unnumbered. Further considera-

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 268 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

tions, extending beyond C1.11 itself, are therefore required to assess whether the
construction is original or not (§4.3.5.A).

4.3.4 Varia

A. The beginning of Sporting King has an instance of the old demonstrative ipn:

(i) Sporting King A2.1

[...] in Spsw=f ipn
‘[...] by these nobles of his.’
The context is a dialogue between the king and Sehetepibreankh, perhaps other
courtiers as well. A similar association of ipn is common in other texts and constitutes
a convention of certain types of written discourses, notably the ‘Royal Tale’ (further
discussion below, §4.6.3.A). Most examples are from the Eighteenth Dynasty: smrw
ipn ‘these companions’ (Urk. IV 165, 7; 182, 8; 1241, 2; 1380, 20; 1381, 3; 1381, 16);
rmTw ipn ‘these men’ (Urk. IV 257, 2; for the dating to the Eighteenth Dynasty, §4.7);
sim. in Heavenly Cow 23, 64, 76 (for the dating to the Eighteenth Dynasty, §4.6). One
earlier instance is in Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela 12 smrw ipn ‘these
companions’ (§1.3.3.1, (ix)).103 The use of ipn as in Sporting King is therefore typical
of an early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon, although not entirely exclusive to this.
B. One element in the lexicon deserves a brief mention:
(ii) Sporting King B2.1 ihhy ‘rejoice’
The word is common throughout the New Kingdom. Ihhy104 is found in a text that
probably derives from the same find as Sporting King, the Moscow Mythological
Story (P. Moscow unn. B2.9 and frg. 25.1; see below, NB). It recurs in a Harpist’s
song in the early Nineteenth Dynasty tomb of Nefersekheru (5), in the Hymn to Aton
in Pentu’s tomb in Amarna (4), in the Hymn to Amun on P. Chester Beatty IV ro
(IV.5; XI.3), in the Ritual for Amenhotep I (P. Chester Beatty IX vso IX.6; XIII.9),
and in P. Harris Magical (II.1). The expression is not uncommon in Book of the Dead
and in private tombs, in some cases in phraseological contexts.105 It is also found in
temple inscriptions (the earliest is Urk. IV 580, 6), in royal inscriptions (the earliest is
Horemheb’s Decree 8), or in P. Harris I (passim). The attestation of ihhy in the New
Kingdom is thereby dense, yet one pre-New Kingdom occurrence of ihhy has been
noted, as have a few cases of the shorter form ih(y) and two mentions of the ihhy-
festival.106 The presence of ihhy in Sporting King remains noteworthy as the
expression is strongly associated with the New Kingdom.

103 Different is the association in a (late) Second Intermediate Period text, Tale Involving the House of
Life X+2.1 n rx=i niwtiw ipn ‘I do not know these citizens.’ Tod Inscription also has an instance of
the demonstrative (29 ipf ): in this text, the use of ipf is a case of linguistic dissimilation (Vernus
1996b: 164). The dating of the Inscription remains unclear (Buchberger 2006).
104 The following references are drawn from TLA #30360 and the associated DZA files.
105 Early occurrences are Urk. IV 917, 5 (Amenemhab); 935, 6 (Menkheperreseneb); 978, 10 (Min);
DZA 21.184.840 (Khaemhat); DZA 21.184.710 (also temp. Amenhotep III).
106 HannLex 5: 381c-382c.

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 4.3 Sporting King 269

NB. A reference was just made to the Moscow Mythological Story (P. Moscow
unnumbered + P. Moscow 167).107 The papyrus dates to the turn of the Eighteenth to
the Nineteenth Dynasty108 and the composition is one of those for which a late dating
has been evoked.109 The highly fragmentary text does not support much in ways of a
linguistic analysis. Accordingly, no systematic inquiry was done in the present study
and no definite dating is here proposed, but some observations made in passing
suggest that the later dating is more likely.
One late feature is in P. Moscow 167 frg. II.11 iw=w r [...] ‘they will [...]’.110 It
has been proposed that this could be secondary to an original iw=ø r [...] in view of
the ‘overwhelmingly classical Egyptian’ language of the text.111 Whether a
construction iw=ø r NP would be here grammatically possible can not be assessed
due to the fragmentary nature of the context.112 That the text is ‘overwhelmingly
classical’ in language is not an argument pro emendation: by the same token, iw=w
could then be emended in Speos Artemidos 30 (Urk. IV 388, 16) and in Urk. IV 54,
10 (Ineni). As these demonstrate, =w was occasionally deemed acceptable in some
Eighteenth Dynasty configurations of Middle Egyptian.113
Most remarkable is the wn.kA-headed construction in P. Moscow unn. A.3 wn.kA
sbAw [...] ‘Then the door(?) will [...](?)’. Wn.kA-headed constructions are exceedingly
rare: except for one case, all examples are from Chapelle Rouge (§4.1.2.E). In Middle
Kingdom Middle Egyptian, other -kA-marked constructions are always used: in earlier
times sDm.kA=f, in later ones kA sDm=f and kA=f sDm=f. The diachronic change
leading from the former to the latter is well studied and linguistically consistent.114
Wn.kA-headed constructions, which did not arise in regular linguistic change, are a
late development, restricted to some configurations of written Middle Egyptian only.
On a lexical level, one detail that has been mentioned as pointing to an Eighteenth
Dynasty date of composition, feminine Hmt=s ‘Her Majesty’ (P. Moscow unn. frg.
1+2.2),115 is inconsequential.116 The presence of ihhy in P. Moscow unn. B2.9 and frg.
25.1 was just discussed as suggestive of a late dating.

107 Text: Caminos 1956; Korostovtzev 1960.

108 Caminos 1956: 40; Korostovtzev 1960: 120-2.
109 Parkinson 2002: 294, n.2; Baines 1996: 160 (‘likely’); Assmann 1985: 48 (‘vielleicht’).
110 E.g. Baines 1996: 160, n.20.
111 Quack 2004: 359.
112 A construction iw=ø r NP is possible in Middle Egyptian under certain conditions, depending on
the type of referent implied in the subjectless construction, typically situational or otherwise low in
individuation. The badly damaged context does not permit to assess whether such semantic
conditions are here met.
113 That there is no reason to emend is of course not a proof that the text must be original; nor can
there be one, given the nature of the expression considered and, yet again, the sorry state of
preservation of the text.
114 Vernus 1990a: 85-90.
115 Korostovtzev 1960: 122, with a reference to Wb. III 92.12-93.8 where the word is said not to be
documented before the early New Kingdom.
116 See Hmt=s in Rediukhnum (temp. Wahankh Antef II), A10. That the expression is documented
only once before the early New Kingdom reflects the fact that appropriate contexts are then hardly
ever found in the preserved record. In Rediukhnum, such a context is exceptionally given, in the
official presenting himself as having been raised and promoted by a feminine member of the royal
family, the king’s ornament, royal daughter, and royal wife Neferukayet. This provides a neat

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 270 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

4.3.5 Dating Sporting King

A. Of the expressions discussed above, one directly relates to an Eighteenth Dynasty

horizon in written language, m-xt nn combined with a ‘narrative’ construction of the
infinitive (§4.3.3). Another one arguably does as well, sy-iSst in mi sy-iSst (§4.3.2). A
third, ipn used with the specific associations as in Sporting King is typical of,
although not fully exclusive to, that period (§4.3.4.A).
As discussed, there are strong and converging indications that mi sy-iSst is integral
to the original text of Sporting King (§4.3.2.2). In addition, both this expression and
m-xt nn combined with a ‘narrative’ infinitive are documented only in the (early)
Eighteenth Dynasty horizon. So is, if not in similarly exclusive ways, ipn as used in
Sporting King. The second and third expressions are typical of royal inscriptions: this
may be significant in view of the royal dimension central in Sporting King. Two out
of three post-Sinuhean instances of sy-iSst other than in Sporting King are in
Hatshepsutian compositions: one of these is Chapelle Rouge, a text that also
prominently uses m-xt nn combined with the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive
(§4.1.2.D). The part of the linguistic repertoire of Sporting King here discussed
thereby appears to be strongly consistent. This makes it highly unlikely that the three
expressions considered are textually secondary.
Based on the above, it is here submitted that Sporting King was probably
composed in the Eighteenth Dynasty.
B. A title and a personal name in the composition are typical of the late Middle
Kingdom (§4.3.1.B): if the dating proposed is correct, these may reflect an intent of
evoking times past. Such intent could also be manifest in the selection of the royal
name included in Sehetepibre-ankh: Amenemhat I is associated with a very major
Middle Egyptian composition, Sinuhe, and thereby further with itw,117 possibly itself
Sinuhean. The parallels with Amenemhat II’s Annals (§4.3.1.A) are important for
interpretation and the composers of Sporting King may have known of this text or of
an associated tradition: the relationship between the two texts must then be modeled
in indirect ways, as has already been made likely by others on independent grounds;
the royal rituals evoked in the literary composition are not specific to any period in
particular. Most importantly, it is here proposed that the general typological
assessment of Sporting King as transitional in form, motif, and intertext (§4.3.1.C) can
probably be specified temporally, with Sporting King having been composed not in
the late Middle Kingdom but in the Eighteenth Dynasty.

illustration of how with some words patterns of lexical attestation can be over-determined by
subject matters in the preserved record of various periods.
117 For other aspects of the later historical memory of Lisht, e.g. Parkinson 2009: 17.

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 4.4 Neferkare and Sisene 271

4.4 Neferkare and Sisene

4.4.1 Introduction

The Tale of Neferkare and Sisene118 is fragmentarily documented in probably three

witnesses. The bulk of the preserved text is from the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty
P. Chassinat I.119 One New Kingdom witness is T. OIC 13539 (late Eighteenth/early
Nineteenth Dynasty),120 another one is probably T. IFAO 1214 (early Twentieth
Dynasty);121 these give only scraps of the beginning. This documentary situation does
not help analysis: the main witness is very late122 and not much text is preserved
overall.
Neferkare and Sisene has been dated to various periods: the editor of the text
proposed a dating to the Second Intermediate Period or early New Kingdom, while
also contemplating the possibility that the Tale may have existed in the Middle King-
dom already, perhaps in an oral form;123 other authors have proposed the late Middle
Kingdom,124 the early Twelfth Dynasty,125 or the Twelfth Dynasty more broadly.126
Neferkare has also been evoked among possible candidates for an early New
Kingdom date of composition.127
These diverging proposals reflect the different priorities given to diverse types of
evidence by various authors. Among elements that have been considered for dating,
onomastics would stand in the Middle Kingdom tradition;128 an expression of filiation
as B sA A129 is otherwise typical of the Eleventh through Thirteenth Dynasties;130 titles
find parallels in actual usage in the Middle Kingdom,131 and more specifically in the
early Twelfth Dynasty.132 On the other hand, the literary typology of Neferkare and
Sisene allies the composition with Cheops’ Court,133 which was certainly not
composed before the early Thirteenth Dynasty and quite possibly later (the early
Thirteenth Dynasty is only a type-B terminus ante quem non: §2.4.4.1.B). In
attempting to reconcile all the above, a compromise would seem to be in positing a

118 Text: Posener 1957.

119 Posener 1957: 120-2; further Verhoeven 1999: 260-1. As observed by van Dijk (1994: 392-3), this
context of reception of the Tale may not be entirely coincidental in view of the ‘obsession’ of
Kushite kings with the Old Kingdom, illustrated among other things by Shabaka’s throne name,
Neferkare. Given the tone of Neferkare, some irony could have been implied for readers of this
time.
120 Posener 1957: 119-20.
121 Posener 1957: 122; on this witness probably belonging to Neferkare, further 124.
122 Discussion of the methodological implications by Posener 1957: 132-3.
123 Posener 1957: 133-4.
124 Parkinson 2002: 297.
125 Grajetzki 2005: 58-9.
126 Quirke 2004a: 168.
127 Assmann 1985: 48, with a ‘vielleicht’; with similar caution, Baines 1996: 169.
128 Posener 1957: 131 and n.8-10, 132.
129 P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+3; X+3.x+5; X+3.x+8; X+3.x+13.
130 Posener 1957: 131 and n.7, 132.
131 Posener 1957: 132 and n.10-11.
132 Grajetzki 2005: 58-9.
133 Jay 2008: 80-132; Parkinson 2002: 297; Baines 1996: 169; Posener 1957: 133.

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 272 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

late Middle Kingdom (early or mid-Thirteenth Dynasty) date of composition

(assuming of course that Cheops’ Court itself dates to such an early time).134
Cheops’ Court and Neferkare and Sisene belong to what has been described as a
‘low tradition’ of Middle Egyptian narrative literature.135 This is documented, but
only as developing, by the late Twelfth Dynasty (§2.4.4.3-4). A dating of Neferkare
and Sisene to a time earlier than the early Thirteenth Dynasty is therefore unlikely.
Yet, institutional detail would imply a dating to the early Twelfth Dynasty, not to the
Middle Kingdom more broadly. Unless the whole typological development of Middle
Egyptian narrative literature is to be revised, this implies that institutional detail can
not be taken in a directly referential sense, as strictly relating to actual usage. The
observation then also casts doubt on how reliable indications possibly afforded by a
name and an expression of filiation are. In general, ‘any aspect of a composition can
be archaistic’;136 in the case of Neferkare and Sisene, both details are in the Twenty-
Fifth Dynasty P. Chassinat I, i.e. from a time when archaism was also otherwise
cultivated. In well-balanced terms, Posener outlines the problem:137 ‘L’interprétation
de ces faits est délicate (...) Le prototype a pu subir un rajeunissement partiel, comme
il a pu être remanié dans le style archaïsant (...)’.138
In the following, I contribute some comments on language.139 As already
mentioned, the particular documentary situation of the text implies that some addi-
tional caution is required (in context, Posener’s comments just quoted also have scope
over language). Posener observed that P. Chassinat I seems generally trustworthy.140
For each construction possibly indicative for dating, this must of course be assessed
individually; constructions that could be, or demonstrably are, secondary are not
included in the discussion (e.g. instances of the past tense sDm=f ).141

134 This was already one among various options contemplated by Posener (1957: 133); subsequently
Parkinson 2002: 296-7 (despite different terminologies, Posener’s ‘Deuxième Période Inter-
médiaire’ and Parkinson’s ‘Late Middle Kingdom’ both include the early/mid-Thirteenth
Dynasty).
135 Parkinson 2002: 138-46.
136 Parkinson 2002: 49, discussing meter in Ptahhotep P.
137 Posener 1957: 132-3.
138 In the case of the expression of filiation, such ‘remaniement (...) dans le style archaïsant’, if there
was one, would have been systematic: the old expression occurs four times.
139 Previous discussions: Oréal 2011: 234-5; Jay 2008: 80-132; Posener 1957: 132-3.
140 ‘(...) on doit reconnaître que le p. Chassinat I ne présente aucun cas flagrant de modification, en
dehors de quelques détails graphiques; dans l’ensemble, le texte donne l’impression d’uniformité
et ne paraît pas remanié’ (Posener 1957: 133).
141 Discussed by Vernus 1997: 74-5, n.212; for graphic phenomena affecting the lexicon, Posener
1957: 133, n.1.

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 4.4 Neferkare and Sisene 273

4.4.2 P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11: A case of linguistic recomposition

In one place, Neferkare and Sisene has a truly extraordinary construction:142

P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11
iska wDA(.)inb Hm=f r pr n mr-mSa sA-snt (...)
‘Meanwhile, His Majesty’s proceedingc / His Majesty then proceededc to the
house of general Sisene (...)’
a) On the archaizing morphology of isk, see below, NB.
b) A ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive or a sDm.in=f, see below.
c) The intentionally awkward English renderings are to suggest some sense of the semantic
tensions in the Egyptian original, be wDA(.)in a ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive or
be it a sDm.in=f; see below.

4.4.2.1 Interpreting an apparently aberrant construction

The particle isT (here in its older form isk) heads a clause that introduces a segment of
discourse backgrounded with respect to the main narrative chain.143 Such usage is
consistent with both a Middle Kingdom dating and an early New Kingdom one. In
literary texts, it recurs notably in Cheops’ Court (7.6) and in the beginning of the
framing narrative of Eloquent Peasant (R 1.2).144 While not for dating, such distri-
bution could be significant for an appreciation of the literary register of Neferkare and
Sisene.
Of particular interest for dating is what here follows isT. As far as written form
goes, wDA(.)in could be either a ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive or a
sDm.in=f.145 Either way, the combination is extraordinary. The defining function of
the ‘narrative’ infinitive, which licenses the construction in the first place, is to
present the event in its bare form, as a heading, in a list, or at the beginning of a
segment of discourse. By definition therefore, the ‘narrative’ construction of the
infinitive is incompatible with a use in a textually backgrounded context, as is implied
by the presence of isT. If wDA.in, i.e. a sDm.in=f, is to be read, a similar comment
applies: in-marked form are otherwise limited to events in the main narrative chain;
they are, in other words, excluded from backgrounded environments, such as isT-
headed clauses.146 ‘Regular’ Middle Egyptian, i.e. Middle Egyptian as documented in
all other texts, would have had a subject – pseudoparticiple construction (thus ist
Hm=f wDA (...), with the resultative semantics of the pseudoparticiple according with,
and playing into, the backgrounding function of isT. As already observed by others,

142 Also noted by Oréal 2011: 234-5 and Jay 2008: 102, 125-6.
143 Similarly Oréal 2011: 234.
144 Oréal 2011: 233-4.
145 Oréal 2011: 234 and Jay 2008: 102 read with the latter interpretation.
146 This characterization of the sDm.in=f as associated with events in the main narrative chain may at
first seem to stand in contradiction with Schenkel’s (in press b) recent description of the form as
‘kontingenter Hintergrund’. It does not, as Schenkel and I use ‘background’ in a different sense
(mine follows Winand 2000).

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 274 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

the construction in P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11 is ‘unexpected and ungrammatical’,147

‘une aberration syntaxique’.148
In accounting for the construction, the following observations are relevant. In
itself, isT is used correctly, to signal that the following segment of discourse is back-
grounded (above); the issue therefore lies with the verbal construction that follows,
wDA in Hm=f or wDA.in Hm=f. If this is a ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive, the
selection of this construction must relate to the royal participant. If this is a sDm.in=f
form, a similar comment applies; this emerges from a comparison with the analytic -
in-marked construction just a few clauses later, used with a non-royal subject:
X+3.x+13-14 wn.in Hn-tA sA Tti Sm (...) ‘Hent’s son Tjeti went (...)’.149 Either way, the
construction wDA(.)in Hm=f must be analyzed in relation to the royal participant. The
analysis finds independent support on the lexical level: wDA ‘proceed’ is reserved to
the king throughout Neferkare, expressing solemn process; Tjeti, by contrast, does not
‘proceed’, but simply ‘goes’ (Sm).150 The construction in P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11
overrules semantic and syntactic constraints in combining isT (used regularly) with
wDA(.)in Hm=f, a construction that is here indexically over-determined. There is
probably some irony in selecting wDA, set in a ‘narrative’ infinitive or in a sDm.in=f
form, in a less than august context.151
NB 1. While semantically aberrant, the construction is therefore principled in its
makeup and in how it relates to the place in Neferkare where it occurs. This also
demonstrates that it is integral to the original composition, whenever this may have
been composed.
NB 2. Some irony is perhaps also to be seen in the archaizing morphology of the
backgrounding particle, isk rather than isT. At first one may wonder whether such
morphology, here documented in a Twenty-Fifth Dynasty witness, could not be a
token of Kushite ‘archaism’. As observed by Posener already, this is unlikely to be
the case, since isk recurs at the beginning of the same composition, documented in a
late Eighteenth/early Nineteenth Dynasty witness, T. OIC 13539, 2.152

4.4.2.2 Dating an apparently aberrant construction

Semantically aberrant, the construction in P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11 did not arise in
the course of linguistic change. As discussed, the construction consists in the combi-
nation of two semantically incompatible elements, isT and wDA(.)in, composed with

147 Jay 2008: 10.

148 Oréal 2011: 234-5: ‘La cooccurrence de la particule avec une forme verbale narrative sDm.jn, qui
sert normalement à faire avancer le récit, constitue une aberration syntaxique au regard de son
fonctionnement normal en moyen égyptien littéraire. Elle témoigne du caractère linguistiquement
artificiel et composite de la langue utilisée dans la rédaction de ce texte.’ Note that Jay and Oréal
did not have knowledge of each other’s works by the time these assessments were written.
149 Similarly Jay 2008: 102.
150 P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+5, X+3.x+10, X+3.x+13; noted by Posener 1957: 130, n.8.
151 That the composer of Neferkare was more generally sensitive to, and playing with, indexical
dimensions of language is also suggested by the following observation by Posener 157: 130, n.8:
‘Si, à la l. x+2, l’auteur se sert de Sm en parlant de la promenade nocturne du roi, il veut peut-être
souligner que Néferkarê se comporte comme un simple mortel.’
152 Posener 1957: 133, n.2.

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 4.4 Neferkare and Sisene 275

each other in written language. As regards isT, early Eighteenth Dynasty inscriptional
texts present various elements of a functional extension of this particle, which can
amout to cases of outright experimentation.153 No earlier period in the written history
of Egyptian does. The written morphology of the particle (isk) also points to the same
horizon (compare below, §4.7.1).154
Assuming that the second part of the construction is with a -in-marked form, one
similarly artificial case is:

(i) Chapelle Rouge, p.120: V.7-8 (HHBT II 19, 2)

wn.in nn smrw ibw=sn Ssp.n mht
‘These companions’ hearts, they begun to forget.’

The unique combination of wn.in with another form also marked for past tense is
semantically redundant (further discussion below, §4.6.2, (i)).
Assuming that the second part of the construction is a ‘narrative’ infinitive, the
same construction with wDA has become a set phrase for royal progress in the Eigh-
teenth Dynasty (discussed below, §4.6.1.2). Moreover, a configuration comparable in
its principle to the one in Neferkare is found in the combination of m-xt nn with a
‘narrative’ infinitive (discussed above, §4.3.3). Also an innovation of some early
Eighteenth Dynasty written registers, this combines two semantically incompatible
elements: the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive has its defining function in
presenting the event in its bare form, outside any temporal relation, while m-xt nn
expresses just such a temporal relation, making the ‘narrative’ construction of the
infinitive narrative (sic). M-xt nn + ‘narrative’ infinitive is used with a royal partici-
pant, the indexical over-determination of the construction thus over-ruling semantic
constraints that otherwise obtain. The exact same phenomenon is observed in the
construction in Neferkare.
A further illustration of the same general phenomenon consisting in combining
two constructions that are mutually exclusive on functional grounds is the following
(fuller quotation: §6.2.2.6.2, (i)):

(ii) Ahmose’s Tempest Stela ro 1 (HHBT 104, 8)

s[T] rf iwt Hm=f [...]
‘Now His Majesty’s coming [...]’

Both isT rf and the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive are paragraph-initial
constructions: they are therefore mutually exlusive. Moreover, isT has, roughly
defined, a function in backgrounding, while the ‘narrative’ construction of the
infinitive is, by definition, used only for non-backgrounded events: in addition to a
semantic redundancy, there is also a semantic contradiction. What is more, the hybrid
construction in Ahmose’s Tempest Stela consists in just the same elements found in

153 Oréal 2011: 238-49. With respect to Neferkare and Sisene, Oréal 2011: 235.
154 Similarly Oréal 2011: 235: ‘Le choix de la forme ancienne jsk, qui est absente dans les textes en
moyen égyptien littéraire, va dans le même sens, et rappelle de manière intéressante les archaïsmes
présents dans le récit du couronnement d’Hatchepsout ainsi que dans quelques témoins tardifs.’

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 276 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11: the particle isT, followed by a narrative construction of an

event motion. It thereby comes with the exact same semantic tension.155
The early Eighteenth Dynasty thus provides an horizon in which a creative
recombination such as the one in P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11 finds parallels, for the
general principle, for the specific components involved in the construction, and once
for the overall combination itself. No other period in the early/mid-second millennium
BCE does on any of these levels.

4.4.3 Innovative expressions

Neferkare and Sisene includes various innovative expressions. Some of these are only
in the very late P. Chassinat I, implying additional discussion in assessing whether
they are part of the original text or not.

4.4.3.1 P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+4-5: A segment of direct speech

The following passage is relevant for dating on two levels simultaneously:

P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+4-5
(...) Hr mH Hr Dd ir is nt{y}-pw mAa pw pA Dd
sw (Hr) pr(t)a m grH
‘(...) thinking and saying that since it was so, the word was true:
“he goes out at night!” ’
a) A reading as sw pr ‘he has gone out’ (subject – pseudoparticiple) is ruled out by context.
The omission of Hr is readily accounted for by the late date of P. Chassinat I.

NB. The formulation introducing direct speech finds a parallel in Cheops’ Court
8.12-13 Dd.in Hm=f in-iw mAat pw pA Dd (...) ‘His Majesty said: “Is it true, the
word (...)”.’ This is probably significant of how both compositions relate to what
has been described as a ‘low tradition’ of Middle Egyptian narrative literature.

A. A construction NP Hr sDm (sw (Hr) pr(t)) is here used in a context that imposes an
habitual reading (compare also the adverbial expression m grH). Vernus’ ante quem
non criterion therefore applies, defining an earliest possible dating by the early
Thirteenth Dynasty, or late Twelfth at best (§2.6.2). In earlier times, the construction
would have been *iw=f pr=f, *mk sw pr=f, or the like.
More remarkable yet is the new subject pronoun sw.156 This is undocumented
before the very late Seventeenth Dynasty, a time from which on it is densely attested;
as discussed, the pattern of attestation is reliable (§3.4.1.3).
B. Given the implications for dating, assessing whether sw (Hr) pr(t) is original in
Neferkare is of the essence. As regards the NP Hr sDm construction, it was observed
that textual alterations consisting in the replacement of a synthetic present tense
construction with an analytical one are rare and usually leave traces in yielding hybrid

155 Note that this description remains unaffected if wDA(.)in is interpreted not as an infinitive but as a
sDm.in=f form as both are similarly narrative and similarly reserved to the foreground.
156 Also observed by Posener 1957: 132.

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 4.4 Neferkare and Sisene 277

constructions, at least in Ramesside manuscripts (§2.3.3). As P. Chassinat I is post-

Ramesside, this is no sufficient argument.
More consequential is the observation that sw (Hr) pr(t) is here used in a direct
speech. The general principle of a targeted distribution of innovative expressions
within a text finds parallels elsewhere: for example, Neferti has presentative ptr only
once, in a direct speech (8d-e), while it has mk elsewhere in the text (§2.4.3.1, (i)).
That sw (Hr) pr(t) in Neferkare is precisely from such a context as well suggests that
the construction is here integral to the original composition, not an artifact of textual
transmission.

4.4.3.2 P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11-14 and T. OIC 13539, 3-4: The syntax of iw

A. In two places, Neferkare and Sisene has innovative constructions of iw, intro-
ducing a circumstantial clause headed by a full noun (i), and with a clause of non-
existence (ii):157

(i) P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11-14

isk wDA(.)in Hm=f r pr n mr-mSa sA-snt
iw wnwt 4 pXr m grH
ir.n=f kt wnwt 4 m pr n mr-mSa sA-snt aq=f r pr-aA
iw wnwt 4 wn r HD-tA
‘Meanwhile, His Majesty’s proceeding /His Majesty then proceeded to the
house of general Sisene,
four hours having elapsed in the night.
He spent another four hours in the house of General Sisene entering into the
palace,
four hours remaining until dawn.’

In dependent subject-initial clauses with full noun subjects, iw is used in the Middle
Kingdom only when some contrastive force is implied.158 Any contrastive force is
lacking in Neferkare, where the iw-headed clauses simply provide indications of time.
This construction is undocumented before the early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty
(§1.1.2.B, (b)). In pre-New Kingdom times, asyndetic embedding (without iw) is
always used in similar function.

(ii) T. OIC 13539, 3-4

[...] mr-mSa sA-snt iw nn wn st-Hmt m[-a=f ? or pr=f ?...]159
‘[...] General Sisene, in [whose house(?)] there was no wife [...]’

Iw before a clause of non-existence is documented in the Middle Kingdom, but

always with strong assertive or contrastive force.160 In (ii), iw nn wn (...) is merely

157 Also observed by Jay 2008: 125-6.

158 Thus, highlighting royal succession (§6, n.219), Sinuhe B 50 ntf dAr xAswt iw it=f m Xnw aH=f ‘He
(scil. S.I) was the one who subjugated foreign countries, while his father (scil. A.I) stayed within
his palace’ (with a stressed independent pronoun ntf (...) in balanced contrast to iw it=f (...)).
159 Possible restorations suggested by Posener 1957: 124, n.7 and Parkinson 1991c: 55, respectively.

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 278 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

descriptive, characterizing the general’s situation:161 no contrastive force is implied.

Such construction remains undocumented until the turn of the Seventeenth to the
Eighteenth Dynasties. The earliest instance could be in Kamose Inscriptions (iii); this
remains slightly insecure however, since the context, which functionally comes close
to an oath, could involve some assertoric force of iw. The earliest secure instance is
slightly later (iv); the register of the text, modeled on administrative usage, is itself
significant:

(iii) Kamose Inscriptions St.II 10-11

nn wAH=i tw nn D=i dgs=k AHt
iw nn wi Hr=k
‘I won’t let you, I won’t allow you to walk the countryside
without being on you!’

(iv) Ahmes-Nefertari’s Donation Stela 19-20

Hbs=f wi
iw nn wnysic=i
rD=f wsr=i
iw(=i) nmH.kw
‘He provides me with clothing when I did not exist;
He makes me strong when I am deprived.’

In earlier times, asyndetic embedding (i.e. without iw) is always used, e.g. Bersheh II,
pl.XXI, top, 14162 (...) smr wa n-wnt sn-nw=f ‘(...) a sole companion, who has no
equal’; similarly (with an adverbial expansion) Shipwrecked Sailor 130-131 xpr.n r=s
nn wi m-hr-ib=sn ‘It happened while I was in their midst.’
B. In view of the date of P. Chassinat I, the two iw’s discussed first (i) could have
been introduced in the course of textual transmission; they could also be original. The
iw discussed in turn (ii) is in a much earlier manuscript, T. OIC 13539 (late
Eighteenth or early Nineteenth Dynasty); in general, intrusive iw’s are not observed in
manuscripts before a later date.163 The iw in T. OIC 3-4 (ii) therefore stands a fair
chance to be integral to the original text.

160 E.g., in the context of a self-presentation, emphasizing the uniqueness of the speaker’s
achievement: Hatnub 16, 5-6 ink ir [...]s m Sdyt-SA iw nn wn rmT Hna=i wpw-Hr Smsw=i (...) ‘It is I
who acted [...] in Shedyt-sha, while there was absolutely nobody with me excepted my followers
(...)’. Sim. passim in the Hatnub inscriptions: see Kruchten 1999: 58.
161 Further, Parkinson 1995: 73.
162 Quoted in Borghouts 2010: I, §92c (ii).
163 For a spectacular case, e.g. Amenemhat 5b (P. Millingen and almost every other manuscript) ir n=i
qAmdt (...) ‘Perform for me a mourning (...)’, but P. Sallier I, P. Sallier II, O. DeM 1320 iw ir n=i
qAmdt (iw before an imperative, as occasionally in Late Egyptian). Intrusive iw’s extend to yet
more manuscripts in the next verse.

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 4.4 Neferkare and Sisene 279

4.4.4 Varia

4.4.4.1 A fronted temporal expression

The following passage presents an alternation between xr m-xt and ir m-xt that is
apparently unparalleled.164

P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+9-11
xr m-xt ir{t} Hm=f mr.n=f xr=f Sm.n Tti m-sA=f
ir m-xt wDA Hm=f r pr-aA a.w.s. Sm.n Tti r pr=f
‘When His Majesty had done with him what he wanted, Tjeti went behind
him.
When His Majesty proceeded to the Palace L.P.H., Tjeti went to his house.’
NB. On xr m-xt as associated with the ‘low tradition’, §2.4.4.4.

In general, xr m-xt and ir m-xt seem to stand in complementary distribution, the

former when the main clause is in the past tense, the latter when it is in the future
tense.165 In Neferkare, however, ir m-xt precedes a main clause that is in the past
(Sm.n Tti (...)), just as xr m-xt does. Such deviation remains undocumented in the
Middle Kingdom, while it finds at least one partial parallel in Amenhotep II’s Syrian
Campaigns (Memphis Stela) 25 (Urk. IV 1308, 2-3)166 ir m-xt tA HDw n 2-nw hrw prt
Hm=f (...) ‘When it had dawned for a second day, going out by His Majesty (...)’.167

4.4.4.2 The lexicon

In the lexicon, two possibly late expressions have been noted:168 TAi in the sense of ‘to
blame’ (P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+6; X+3.x+14) is ‘belegt Nä’ according to Wb.;169 mtmt
‘inquire’ (P. Chassinat I, X+2.x+2), a very rare expression, apparently recurs only in
one other place, in Hatshepsut’s Northern Karnak Obelisk, Basis D 14 (Urk. IV 364,
14).170 In addition, the beginning of the text has sDA [...] (T. IFAO 1214 ro 2) / sDA ib
‘take pleasure’ (T. OIC 13539, 4-5). %DA-ib, in this form uniquely here, is probably
best interpreted as a contamination of sDA Hr by sxmx ib.171 The expression in
Neferkare therefore presupposes sDA Hr, which as far as securely dated texts go is very
strongly associated with an Eighteenth Dynasty horizon (discussed below, §5.8.1.3).
On the other hand, the use of mAA (P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+3; X+3.x+6) rather than
of ptr, which was valued by Posener as indicative of an earlier dating,172 is

164 Observed by Posener 1957: 131, n.2.

165 EG, p.133 bottom.
166 Noted by EG, p.133, n.27a.
167 The past tense reading, although not morphologically marked in a ‘narrative’ construction of the
infinitive, is here contextually implied.
168 Posener 1957: 132 with n.5-6. Posener (1957: 131, n.7; 132) also suggested that ir-sA (P. Chassinat
I, X+3.x+14) could be late; however, this is the sentence-initial form of r-sA, which is not any
specifically late (§2.8.2.1, (ii)).
169 Wb. V 348.12-5; the expression is not in HannLex 4 and HannLex 5.
170 Wb. II 170.8-9; the word is not in HannLex 4 and HannLex 5.
171 Proposed by Posener 1957: 124, n.4.
172 Posener 1957: 132.

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 280 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

inconsequential in the case of a composition documented already in the Eighteenth

Dynasty. The replacement of mAA by ptr was very gradual in literary registers: in
Ramesside literary texts, the two words are still found side by side in varying relative
proportions.173

4.4.4.3 Some formulations

A. Assuming that T. IFAO 1214 belongs to Neferkare, the incipit of the composition
can be reconstructed as follows:174

(i) T. IFAO 1214 ro 1 + T. OIC 13539, 1-2

xpr swt wn Hm n nsw bity [nfr]-kA-[ra] sA-ra [pipi] mAa-xrw m nsw [...]
‘It occurred, then, that the Majesty of the King of Upper and Lower Egypt
Neferkare, the son of Re Pepi, justified, was a king [...]’

A similar incipit recurs in Heavenly Cow 1-2 (for the dating to the Eighteenth
Dynasty, §4.6), in Apophis and Seqenenre 1.1 (LES 85, 4), and in a series of Eigh-
teenth Dynasty inscriptions (Urk. IV 26, 12; 180, 15-17; Appointment 1). The closest
parallel, however, is in Neferti 1a-b,175 a composition of as yet insecure dating; the
discussion of this type of incipit is accordingly postponed to a later section (§5.6.1).
The text goes on:

(ii) T. OIC 13539, 4-5

[Smt pw]a ir.n mr-mSa sA-snt r s<mtt>{wt}b r sDA ib [...]
‘General Sisene [went] to stroll and take a recreation [...]
a) Based on the association of Sm and swt(wt) in T. IFAO 1214 vso x+6 Smt r swt[...]176
b) Based on T. IFAO 1214 ro 2 r swt r sDA[...]177

This finds a direct parallel in an early Eighteenth Dynasty inscription (iii), then in an
early Ramesside tale (iv):178

(iii) Prince Amenmes’ stone vessel (Urk. IV 91, 12-14)

prt pw ir.n sA nsw smsw mr-mSa wr n it=f imn-ms anx Dt r swtwta Hr sDA Hr [m
stt ...]
‘The oldest royal son, the great general of his father Amenmes, living forever,
went out to stroll taking a recreation [in shooting ...]
a) Written sA-wtsp 2.

The association of swtwt ‘strolling’ and sDA Hr ‘take a recreation’ recurs in

Thutmosis IV’s Sphinx Stela 5 (Urk. IV 1541, 9-12) (...) sDA Hr=f Hr xAst inb-HD

173 E.g. Winand 1986; Mathieu 1996: 192-3; Ragazzoli 2008: 119.
174 Posener 1957: 123.
175 Posener 1957: 123, n.2; subsequently Morenz 1996: 111-2; Parkinson 1996: 303; Spalinger 2009:
12-5 and n.51 (with bibliography); 2010: 117-21.
176 Posener 1957: 124 and n.8.
177 Posener 1957: 124.
178 Posener 1957: 124.

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 4.4 Neferkare and Sisene 281

(...) swtwt Hr wrrt=f (...) ‘(...) take a recreation in the desert of Memphis (...)
strolling on his charriot (...)’ (swtwt again in l.8 (Urk. IV 1542, 11).

(iv) Doomed Prince 8.7 (LES 8, 8)

wn.in pA Sri Hr pr r swtwt [r?] sDAyt (...)
‘The boy went out to stroll and take a recreation (...)’
In Ramesside times, a similar formulation also recurs in visitors’ graffiti, e.g.
Graffito M.2.3.P.19.3, 1 (Nineteenth Dynasty, probably Ramses II).179

B. Among various allusions to more restricted knowledge in Neferkare, the following

is the most famous, with a near exact parallel in Divine Birth:180

(v) P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+9

xr m-xt ir{t} Hm=f mr.n=f xr=f (...)
‘When His Majesty had done with him what he wanted (...)’
(vi) Urk. IV 221, 5 (Divine Birth; the dating to Hatshepsut is secure, see §4.7)
ir.n Hm n nTr pn mrt.n=f nbt Hna=s
‘The Majesty of this god did all he wanted with her.’
The broader passage in Neferkare includes a fronted temporal expression paralleled
apparently only once, in a Thutmoside inscription (§4.4.4.1). More significant is the
presence of isk, twice in Neferkare (§4.4.2.1.NB 2): this is typical of, and almost
specific to, some compositions of Hatshepsut and Thusmosis III, among which the
Royal Cycle itself (§4.7.1).
C. The following passage, already discussed twice for its grammar, is noteworthy on
yet another level:

(vii) P. Chassinat I, X+3.x+11-14

isk wDA(.)in Hm=f r pr n mr-mSa sA-snt iw wnwt 4 pXr m grH
ir.n=f kt wnwt 4 m pr n mr-mSa sA-snt aq=f r pr-aA iw wnwt 4 wn r HD-tA
‘Meanwhile, His Majesty’s proceeding / His Majesty then proceeded to the
house of general Sisene, four hours having elapsed in the night.
He spent another four hours in the house of General Sisene entering into the
palace, four hours remaining until dawn.’

As observed by Posener,181 ‘(le) même genre de précisions chiffrées’ (although not of

time) recurs in Cheops’ Court 6.10-12, yet another element by which the two compo-
sitions resemble each other in their typology. In Neferkare, this could also be one
among various mythical elements which the composition, again like Cheops’ Court,

179 Navrátilová 2007: 108-11, 133).

180 Originally Posener 1957: 130-1, n.9; subsequently van Dijk 1994: 391 (interpreting as a possible
quotation from Divine Birth into Neferkare); also Parkinson 1995: 72 (with a discussion of the
meaning of mri in Neferkare, 73).
181 Posener 1957: 131, n.5.

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 282 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

seems to allude to.182 As regards the expression of time itself, this finds three
parallels, all from the Eighteenth Dynasty:183

(viii) Urk. IV 655, 12-14 (Thutmosis III’s Annals)

spr.n Hm=f r rs mkti Hr spt Xnw n qynA iw wnwt 7 m pXr m hrw
‘His Majesty reached the south of Megiddo on the bank of the brook Qina
when seven hours had elapsed (lit. were an elapsed thing) in the day.’184
Sim. Book of the Dead 144 Nu 48-49 (temp. Hatshepsut-Amenhotep II) Dd-mdw
Hr=s sin wat wat m-xt ir.tw sSm pn iw wnwt 4 pXr m hrw sAA (...) ‘Recitation about
it when each one has been rubbed off after this guidance has been carried out,
while four hours have elapsed in the day: “Beware of (...)” ’; Neferhotep (TT 50;
temp. Horemheb), pl.XL, 238 (...) iw wnwt {m} 8 <m> pXr m hrw pn (...) ‘(...)
when eight hours have elapsed in this day (...)’.

The segment of Neferkare quoted above also includes two other expressions that have
been discussed for their grammar: isk wDA(.)in Hm=f (§4.4.2) and circumstantial iw
(§4.4.3.2); incidentally, the latter is also in all three examples just quoted.

4.4.5 Dating Neferkare and Sisene

A. The evidence for dating Neferkare was presented above by decreasing order of
weight. A strong—and in the present author’s appreciation individually decisive—
indication for dating the composition lies with the apparently aberrant construction
analyzed first, isk wDA(.)in Hm=f (§4.4.2). Early Eighteenth Dynasty texts afford
parallels for the general principle of such recombination, for both component parts
that are composed with each other in the Neferkare construction, and at least once for
the peculiar recombination itself. Neither the general principle, nor any of the
individual components involved, let alone the overall combination are paralleled in
any other period in the early/mid-second millennium.
Neferkare also includes a series of late constructions (§4.4.3): (a) NP Hr sDm with
habitual aspect (ante quem non: early D.13 or late D.12); (b) the new subject pronoun
sw (ante quem non: late D.17); (c) circumstantial iw and (d) iw before a dependent
clause of non-existence (both early D.18 innovations). While the particular
manuscript situation of Neferkare must be taken into account, it is also noted that (a)
and (b) are from a directly reported speech: the presence of innovative expressions in
precisely such a context is consistent with shifts in registers also observed elsewhere.
As regards the innovative uses of iw, (c) is with an expression that is also otherwise
documented with iw (§4.4.4.3.C), while (d) is from the earliest witness of the
composition, T. OIC 13539. There is a good chance, therefore, that several of the
above are integral to the original text; that all should be secondary is unlikely.
Other expressions or formulations discussed have only a circumstantial status in
the argument (§4.4.4): one fronted temporal expression, some elements in the lexicon,

182 Van Dijk 1994: 389-91.

183 Wb. I 546.5.
184 Passage discussed by Spalinger 1996, who also draws the parallel with Neferkare (74, n.37).

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 4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste 283

and a series of formulations. The last mentioned (§4.4.4.3) are suggestive because
they all point to the same period, and because these formulations are from passages
that also otherwise include some of the grammatical constructions discussed before.
This constellation coherently points to a fairly narrow horizon in time, reinforcing the
impression that the text as transmitted is not that unfaithful after all.
Based on the above, it is submitted that Neferkare and Sisene was composed in the
Eighteenth Dynasty, and more probably in the earlier part thereof.
B. In its literary typology, Neferkare and Sisene has been likened to Cheops’ Court
and thereby described in relation to the ‘low tradition’ of Middle Egyptian narrative
literature. Expressions associated with and contributing to mark such literary register
are ist rf (§4.4.2.1), nt-pw mAa pw pA Dd (§4.4.3.1), xr m-xt (§4.4.4.1), or xpr swt wn
(...) (§4.4.4.3, (i)). Like Cheops’ Court, Neferkare is also semantically complex,
includes mythical allusions and possible echoes of compositions of esoteric diffusion,
and sets these in a parodistic context.185 The linguistic register of the composition is
itself more complex that may seem at first. The straightforward and outwardly simple
narrative style is matched by the various innovative expressions the composition
accommodates, more than is usual in Middle Egyptian literature of any time. In
comparison with Cheops’ Court, this may reflect the later date of composition of
Neferkare. In comparison with other Middle Egyptian texts possibly composed in the
early Eighteenth Dynasty, this is in part to do with the type of literary discourse (tales
tend to be more linguistically innovative than e.g. teachings), but also a deliberate
selection of register. Indexical dimensions of language are pervasive in what is
preserved of Neferkare, for example in the distribution of wDA and Sm. The apparently
aberrant construction discussed first, or isk, twice in the surviving text, provide a
direct linguistic pendant to the allusion to Divine Birth. The composition of such high-
flung expressions with the generally lower tone of Neferkare is studied: in language as
on other levels, there is parody in Neferkare.

4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste

Enseignement Loyaliste186 is the only text in the preserved corpus of Middle Egyptian
literature to be documented in a short and in a much longer version. This raises issues,
methodological and substantive, that are proper to this composition.

4.5.1 Introduction

A. The long text of Loyaliste, as documented in New Kingdom manuscripts, falls in

two parts (1-7 and 8-14), distinguished by contents notably;187 various witnesses also

185 For parodistic aspects in Neferkare, van Dijk 1994; Parkinson 1995: 72; 2002: 142.
186 Text: Posener 1976.
187 Posener 1976: 12-3, 34; the two parts are articulated so as to be tightly related to one another
(Posener 1976: 34). This is further substantiated by Fischer-Elfert’s (1999) discussion of A Man to

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 284 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

reflect such bipartite articulation of the composition.188 The earliest witness of the
long text is the early Eighteenth Dynasty T. Carnarvon II vso (TC: with the second
part, 8-14),189 which derives from the same find as T. Carnarvon I (Ptahhotep and
Kamose Inscriptions).190 Other early witnesses include the mid-Eighteenth Dynasty
P. Louvre E 4864 ro (PL: beginning within the first part and running through the end,
3.6-14), the late Eighteenth Dynasty P. Amherst XII+XIII (PA: originally with the
complete teaching), and the late Eighteenth Dynasty or early Nineteenth Dynasty
P. Rifeh (PR: with much of the first part, 1-4.8).191 Loyaliste is now also documented
in the Eighteenth Dynasty Assiut graffiti, with two graffiti giving the beginning of the
composition (graffito 5a, 1.1-3.11 (fragm.); graffito 5b, 1.1-4.9) and a third one a
longer extract that spans over the two parts (graffito 5c, 5.1-10.9 (11.1?, fragm.)).192
From the mid-Eighteenth Dynasty on at the latest, and possibly before, the long
version of Loyaliste was therefore circulated as a unitary composition. That the
earliest witness, T. Carnarvon II vso, has the second part only demonstrates that the
bipartite articulation was perceived as such and reflected in ancient editorial practice,
not that the second part ever stood as an original composition. One of the Assiut
graffiti also gives the ancient title of the composition in this Eighteenth Dynasty stage,
namely a Teaching of Kairsu (sbAyt irt.n (...) kA-[ir]-s (or kA-[r]-s)).193 This Eighteenth
Dynasty teaching authority is identified with kA-ir-s, one of eight literary figures in the
Nineteenth Dynasty Eulogy of Dead Writters (P. Chester Beatty IV vso III.5-7); the
same figure recurs in the contemporaneous Daressy Fragment.194
A part of the first part of Enseignement Loyaliste is also documented in much
earlier times, on a stela of the Royal Seal-Bearer and Deputy Chief Treasurer
Sehetepibre (CG 20538, ‘verso’ 8-20; Abydos, temp. Amenemhat III).195 This short
version of Enseignement Loyaliste196 is inserted between fairly standard autobio-
graphical phrases (1-8) and an appeal to the living (20-27); the ‘recto’ of the same
stela has the titles of Sehetepibre and eulogizing epithets, also followed by an appeal
to the living.197 In various parts, but not for the Teaching, Sehetepibre’s Stela draws
on an earlier stela belonging to the Treasurer and Vizier Mentuhotep (CG 20539; also
Abydos, temp. Senwosret I),198 a major early Twelfth Dynasty figure.199 It has been

His Son, a composition with a similar bipartite articulation; as analyzed in details by the author,
encounters between these two compositions are densest in their respective second parts.
188 Posener 1976: 34.
189 Posener 1976: 3-4. The recto has a hymnic composition, published in Posener 1976: 143; see also
Gnirs 2013b: 152, n.195.
190 On the find, Hagen 2012a: 174-9.
191 Posener 1976: 4-7; further discussion by Gnirs 2013b: 152-3.
192 Verhoeven 2013: §4; 2012a: 55-7; 2010, 196-7; 2009.
193 Verhoeven 2009.
194 Verhoeven 2009: 91, 94.
195 Text: Lange & Schäfer 1908: 145-50; 1925: pl.40.
196 For studies devoted to this short version of Loyaliste, see the references in Posener 1976: 3 and
Leprohon 2009: 277; add Schipper 1998: 162-71.
197 For a study of the texts on CG 20538, Leprohon 2009. ‘Ro’ and ‘vso’ are conventional
designations which harken back to the prime editors of the stela; the ‘vso’ may actually be obverse
and vice-versa, see Gnirs 2013b: 155, n.229.
198 Lange & Schäfer 1908: 150-8; 1925, pl.41-2. Obsomer 1995: 520-31.

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 4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste 285

proposed that for the Teaching as well, Sehetepibre could have been drawing on a
monument by Mentuhotep, now lost:200 this remains speculative.201 The version of
Loyaliste on the stela has what corresponds to 1-6 of the long version only, and these
by far not in full. Following Posener, this short version documented in early times is
generally considered an extract from the long version, documented from early New
Kingdom times on.202 Posener’s hypothesis has won wide acceptance and dissenting
voices have been very few.203
B. The arguments on which the common hypothesis is based are problematic.
Posener, and others after him, rightly emphasized the balance and coherence of the
long version. There is no doubt that Loyaliste in its long version forms a coherent
whole, and must be read and interpreted as such. This, however, only implies that the
long version did not arise by the cumulated vagaries of successive textual accretions,
but was the result of a deliberate and concentrated effort to create a new text. Put
differently, it only implies that the composer(s) who created the long version did so in
skillful ways, not that they must have done it from scratch.
Posener also observed, again rightly, that a large-scale redactional history such as
would be implied if the text on Sehetepibre’s stela was primary is otherwise unknown
for any Middle Egyptian literary text. More generally, redactionalist theses, once
popular for e.g. Ipuwer, have proven a bad fit with Middle Egyptian literature,204
notably because they tend to rely on anachronistic assumptions on the unity of
‘genres’.205 However, this can not be taken to imply that such large-scale redactional
scenario must be excluded a priori for every text: the preserved corpus of Middle
Egyptian is fairly small and individual histories must be reckoned with as possible
unless demonstrated otherwise. In the case of Loyaliste specifically, the unity of
‘genre’ does not stand to question. Any redactionalist hypothesis for Loyaliste must of
course be argued for in explicit details and with better arguments than the ones that
have been voiced in the past for Ipuwer; it then becomes an empirical question
whether such indications can be found in the particular case at hand, or not (§4.5.5).
In his argument, Posener further contrasted the opening in the long and the short
versions. These read, respectively:

199 For a study of such borrowing as a process of creative adaptation, Leprohon 2009. On Mentuhotep
as a major historical figure, Grajetzki 2009: 55-7 and passim; Obsomer 1995: 172-89, 225-9;
Simpson 1991.
200 Berlev 1976: 325; subsequently Simpson 1991: 337; Obsomer 1995: 164, 177. Discussion by
Fischer-Elfert 1999: 418-20.
201 Verhoeven 2009: 94-5; Grajetzki 2005: 44-5; Quirke 2004a: 108; Parkinson 2002: 318-9; Schipper
1998: 175-6, n.56.
202 Classically Posener 1976: 11-5.
203 Gnirs 2013b: 151-67; Oréal 2011: 222; Schipper 1998.
204 Enmarch 2008: 9-18.
205 Parkinson 2002: 16.

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 286 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

Loyaliste, the incipit:

Loyaliste (early NK) 1.1-2
HAti-a m sbAyt irt.n N Dd=f m sbAyt xr msw=f
‘The beginning of the teaching that NN has made, saying in a teaching to his
children’

Sehetepibre 8-9
sbAyt irt.n=f xr msw=f
‘The beginning of the teaching that he has made to his children’

Posener argued: ‘La construction irj + xr de la stèle n’est pas très heureuse (emphasis
AS), alors que Dd + xr des copies cursives est conforme au bon usage (emphasis
AS).’206 Yet, the formulation in the short version is fully correct and not any lesser
stylistically: compare e.g. Urk. I 128, 5-6 mDAt=k tn irt.n=k xr nsw ‘this letter of
yours that you have made to the king’ (alongside e.g. Urk. I 180, 2 iw(=i) Dd(=i) xr=k
‘I am saying to you’). That the short version has iri, not Dd, is arguably to do with its
inscription for monumental publication, emphasizing the act of ‘doing’ over the
(fictional) act of ‘speaking’ as in Ptahhotep P.207 Both versions of the opening are
similarly coherent as they stand and no argument on relative anteriority can be derived
in any direction.208
Other arguments have been voiced to anchor the long version of Loyaliste more
directly into the early Twelfth Dynasty. In its intertext, broadly understood, Loyaliste
resonates with early Middle Kingdom texts,209 but also with texts of the later Twelfth
Dynasty and of the early Eighteenth.210 Similar comments extend to loyalism as a
theme, which is present in the early Twelfth Dynasty, but also in the later part of that

206 Posener 1976: 18. Similarly Verhoeven 2009: 96.

207 On these issues as they relate to Dd and iri in the incipits of Middle Egyptian teachings, Moers
2009. For Loyaliste, see Gnirs’ (2013b: 147) analysis: ‘(...) eine bewusste Ausklammerung der
Dimension des Sprechers der Lehre und damit ihrer originären Sprechsituation (...) Was in
Sehetpibres Version der Lehre im Vordergund steht, ist hingegen deren monumentale
Verschriftlichung (...)’.
208 Schipper 1998: 169 suggested that the presence of Dd=f and the double occurrence of sbAyt in the
long version would be indicative that this is secondary to the short version. The argument does not
hold, since the very same formulation recurs in the opening of the Teaching of the High-Priest
Amenemhat (mid-Eighteenth Dynasty), 1-2 (Urk. IV 1408, 8-17). Similarly Verhoeven 2009: 96;
Schipper 1998: 173; Posener 1976: 18.
209 E.g. with an Eleventh Dynasty letter to the dead (Fischer-Elfert 1994: 41-4); see also Schipper
1998: 171-4.
210 See the detailed presentation in Posener 1976: passim. Among literary texts, Loyaliste is closest to
A Man to His Son, particularly in the respective second parts of these compositions (in extensive
details, Fischer-Elfert 1999). However, the dating of A Man to His Son is insecure: Fischer-Elfert’s
proposal of a composition in the reign of Senwosret I is part of a broader hypothesis by which A
Man, Loyaliste, and Kheti would have formed a curriculum, and therefore contingent upon the
dating of Loyaliste itself (Fischer-Elfert 1999: 417-21). As noted above, linguistic evidence
suggests that A Man to His Son was not composed before the late Twelfth Dynasty (§2.6.2.6.B);
also based on language, Kheti was arguably not composed before the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty and
probably later yet (§6.2.2.6).

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 4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste 287

Dynasty,211 and, in forms directly relevant for appreciating the long version of
Loyaliste, in the early Eighteenth.212 A linguistic argument that has been proposed to
support an early Twelfth Dynasty dating of the long version213 does not apply
(§2.6.3).
Elaborating on the identification of the long version of Loyaliste as a Teaching of
Kairsu, Verhoeven observed that the vizieral titles in the long version would be
typical of the Middle Kingdom, that the name ‘Kairsu’ is documented, if rarely and
not for viziers, in the Old Kingdom, and that ‘Kairsu’ is paired with ‘Ptahhotep’,
another Old Kingdom vizier, in the Eulogy of Dead Writers.214 Like Ptahhotep and
Kagemni, two teachings indisputably dating to the Middle Kingdom, Verhoeven
argues that Kairsu should as well.215 However, the titulary of Kairsu is best paralleled
in the early New Kingdom, not in the Middle Kingdom:216 like the early New King-
dom versions of Ptahhotep, the long version of Loyaliste has vizieral titles broadly
contemporaneous with its manuscripts.217 The pairing of ‘Kairsu’ with ‘Ptahhotep’ in
the Eulogy of Dead Writers could have been for various reasons, such as the contents
of the compositions ascribed to them, which display closest affinities among the ones
to be identified;218 the Daressy Fragment, for its part, presents viziers of various
periods, including from what in the Nineteenth Dynasty was a more recent past, the
Eighteenth Dynasty.219 As regards the name ‘Kairsu’, its documentation in the Old
Kingdom remains very sparse, while there is, on the other hand, another ‘Kares’ (kA-r-
s, k-r-s, k-n-r-s) in the early Eighteenth Dynasty.220 Remarkably, Kares’ Stela (CG
34003; Urk. IV 45-9) displays clear dependency on the much older stela of
Mentuhotep (CG 20539), on which Sehetepibre (CG 20538) itself had already drawn
in the late Twelfth Dynasty: this opens rather different possibilities.221
C. Methodologically, the long version of Loyaliste must therefore be treated
separately from the short one for dating. As regards prospects for a linguistic dating,
the particular nature of the text must be taken into account. If the long version was as
old as the short one, the two would look alike linguistically (by definition). If the long
version was later than the short one, the process of Fortschreibung, making a new text
out of an older one, would naturally have been in the same register and with the same
set of constructions already found in the short version. In addition, Loyaliste is an
exponent of the type of literary discourse—teachings—which is most densely
intertextual and least linguistically distinctive in general. Expectations for dating have
to be set accordingly: assuming that the long version is secondary to the shorter one, it

211 Gnirs 2013b: 153-6.

212 Gnirs 2013b: 159-66; Schipper 1998: 176-9.
213 Vernus 1990a: 185; subsequently Verhoeven 2009: 97, n.72; Parkinson 2002: 318.
214 Verhoeven 2009: 90-4. On such pairings, also Fischer-Elfert 2003: 126-7.
215 Verhoeven 2009: 96.
216 Gnirs 2013b: 158 and n.257.
217 Lastly Hagen 2012a: 223-7, particularly 226-7.
218 Verhoeven 2009: 91-2.
219 In details, Gnirs 2013b: 158-9.
220 Gnirs 2013b: 156.
221 Gnirs 2013b: 156-8, 166-7, 172.

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 288 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

would not be expected to differ from it on a linguistic level other than in very few
details, if in any at all.
The nature of a possible process of Fortschreibung carries one further method-
ological implication: if some verse or group of verses in the long version could be
shown to be late, this observation could not simply be taken to carry over the whole of
the long version, unless additional arguments are given to that effect.

4.5.2 Loyaliste 5.5-6: The syntax of isT

In the first part of Loyaliste, the following passage, only in the long version, is
consequential:222

(i) Loyaliste 5.3-6

iwa{t} pw n{t} nTr nb{t}
nDty n qmA sw
Hww=sn n=f Sntyw=f
istwa Hm=f a.w.s. m aH=f a.w.s.
‘He is the heir of every god,
the avenger of the one who created him;
They strike his enemies for him,
while His Majesty L.P.H. is in His Palace L.P.H.’
a) The complete text of 5.5-6 is only in O. Ashm. Most of 5.6 is lost in PL, where a new line
(1.8) begins after istw. However, the beginning of 5.6 as istw, as well as 5.5 completely,
are preserved: the construction to be discussed consists in the articulation between the two
and is thereby documented in PL.

As an analysis of the semantic and argumentative structure of the passage imposes,

Loyaliste 5.6 depends on the preceding verse, 5.5.223 Loyaliste 5.5-6 thus has an
instance of isT introducing a clause following the main clause it depends on.
In its older form sk, the particle introduced subject-initial subordinate clauses in
the Old Kingdom, more commonly before, but also occasionally after, the main
clause. As early as in the First Intermediate Period, the latter, more marginal usage
was undergoing rapid obsolescence, being superseded by iw-headed subordinate
clauses (in clauses with initial pronominal subjects) and asyndetically embedded ones
(in clauses with initial full noun subjects).224 In its more recent morphology as isT, the
particle is not used to signal dependency after a main clause in any Middle Kingdom
literary composition: the construction in Loyaliste 5.5-6 does not belong to Middle
Kingdom Middle Egyptian.
IsT-marked clauses that follow the main clause they depend on are otherwise
documented only in Eighteenth Dynasty inscriptions:225

222 Oréal 2011: 222.

223 Oréal 2011: 222 and n.119.
224 References and discussion of the diachronic process in Oréal 2011: 218-9.
225 References from Oréal 2011: 219, n.112 and 221-2. Further examples, in Urk. IV 219, 4 and
Urk. IV 228, 4, are quoted below, §4.7.2, (i)-(ii) (for the dating of the Royal Cycle, §4.7).

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 4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste 289

(ii) Urk. IV 272, 9-11 (inscription on the Eighth Pylon; temp. Hatshepsut)
qmA.n=i [s]bAwt=k nbt
ist ib=k Ha xft ir=i
swD=k nsyt=i mi nb nHH
‘I have realized all your teachings,
while your heart was rejoiced in accordance with me doing it,
so that you may decree my kingship as the lord of eternity.’
(iii) Thutmosis II’s Aswan Inscription 3 (Urk. IV 137, 14-17)226
Hww=sn n=f Sntyw=f
st Hm=f a.w.s. m aH=f a.w.s. bAw=f sxm snD=f xt tA (...)
‘They strike his enemies for him,
while His Majesty L.P.H. is in His Palace L.P.H., his might strong, the fear of
Him through the land (...)’
The near-exact phraseological parallel to Loyaliste 5.3-6 has often been noted.227

(iv) Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building Inscription 1 (Urk. IV 157, 1-4)

ink sA=f wD.n=f wnn(=i) Hr nst=f
isk wi m imi-sS=f
wtt.n=f wi m mtt nt ib (...)
‘I am his son, he has decreed that I be on his seat,
while I was someone who is in his nest.
He begat me in rectitude of heart (...)’

The construction did not arise in regular linguistic change. In Middle Kingdom
Middle Egyptian, as well as still by and large in early New Kingdom Middle
Egyptian, subject-initial dependent clauses following the main clause they depend on
were introduced by iw (with a pronominal subject, or when some contrastive force is
involved) or asyndetic (with a full noun subject). Later phases of the language
generalize the overt strategy, marked by iw, to all cases. Ist-marked clauses depending
on a preceding clause are a purely textual phenomenon, as is also suggested by their
documented textual distribution (compare the registers in which they occur). Such
constructions are therefore interpreted as tokens of the partly recomposed language
associated with some high-cultural textual productions of the Thutmoside era. More
specifically, the construction recruits a regular item of linguistic form, isT, and uses it
in a function that can be broadly defined as textual backgrounding. So far, both
dimensions are germane to genuine Middle Egyptian. IsT is then textually extended to
further usage, in ways that differ from genuine Middle Egyptian on two levels: isT
introduces a clause that follows, rather than precedes, the clause it depends upon; such
clause is dependent, rather than merely a textual background.
In short, the construction in Loyaliste 5.5-6—and similar instances in Thutmoside
inscriptions—is not the outcome of linguistic change, as determined by, and emerging

226 The segmentation in Urk. IV is erroneous (Oréal 2011: 222-3).

227 Initially by Walter Reineke, p.c. to Georges Posener, see Posener 1976: 28.

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 290 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

out of, the conditions and dynamics of regular linguistic interaction. Rather, the
construction—which probably does not represent any actual stage in language
history—is a token of the linguistic recompositions carried out in written productions
of one particular period. The construction thus points to a specific cultural horizon,
the early Eighteenth Dynasty.

4.5.3 Varia

4.5.3.1 Loyaliste 9.9: GAy.tw

The following construction accommodates tw with a non-dynamic event, gAw ‘lack’:

Loyaliste 9.9
gAy.twa r=s sxm {m} SwAw
‘When there is lack thereof (scil. of mankind’s produce), poverty holds sway.’
a) PL and ostraca; the beginning of the verse is lost in TC.

As discussed below, such construction is not possible before the late Twelfth Dynasty
(§6.2). Regarding textual matters, Loyaliste 9.9 is tightly integrated into the
immediate context: the verse is complementary to 9.8 (anx.tw (...)) and serves as a
conclusion to 9.5-9 (TC, completed with PL and PA): Hn n rmT sAq {n} wnDwt TAr tn Hr
Hmw n iryw in rmT sxpr nty anx.tw m imy awy=sn gAy.tw r=s sxm {m} SwAw ‘Care for
the men and bring people together, fasten yourselves to such servants that work. It is
mankind who creates what exists; one lives on what is in their hands; when there is
lack thereof, poverty holds sway.’ This suggests that the section 9.5-9 is no earlier
than the late Twelfth Dynasty.

4.5.3.2 Loyaliste 11.8: Ir A, B

Also noteworthy is the following instance of a ir A, B construction, i.e. of a nominal
pattern with the subject anticipated (A), and no pw after the predicate (B):228

Loyaliste 11.8
ir apr im=s{t} spd-Hra
‘As to the one who is provided with it, he is a clever man.’
a) The whole verse is preserved only in TC, which also happens to be the earliest witness.
Other witnesses, notably PL and PA, preserve only the end of the verse, which is here
most relevant: in no case does a pw follow spd-Hr.

The construction ir A, B was to become fairly common in ‘literary’ Late

Egyptian,229 with early instances e.g. in Sethi I’s Kanais Inscription C 3 (KRI I 68,
1-2),230 or, in a literary text, in Ani (B 20.1; B 20.16; B 23.8-9).231 Earlier

228 Already noted by Posener 1976: 42.

229 Groll 1967: 12-5.
230 Sim. e.g. Mes N 34-35 ir sS A Sri n B ‘As regards scribe A, this is the son of B.’ An early example
of the broader construction A ø is Urk. IV 122, 15-16 (Paheri) nn aAbt nt Hwrw m At=f mdwt nDmt nt

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 4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste 291

instances of the pattern are from medical texts,232 which in the linguistic surface
they present are probably not much earlier than their earliest manuscripts, by the
eve of the New Kingdom. One other early case is from Amduat,233 a text that is
likely to date to the early Eighteenth Dynasty, at least in its final redaction.234 A
singular pre-New Kingdom instance of the construction is in Coffin Texts, in what
turns out to be a secondary reading.235 In the Middle Kingdom, a different pattern
is used, consistently so: ir A, B pw. E.g. Debate 56-59 ir sxA=k qrs nHAt ib pw int
rmyt pw m sind s Sdt s pw m pr=f xAa Hr qAA ‘As for your bringing to mind burial, it
is heartache, it is bringing tears by saddening a man, it is taking a man from his
house so that he is left on the hill.’236

4.5.3.3 Possible lexical indications

Among lexical expressions, the following may be mentioned. The usual caveats
apply:

(i) Loyaliste 7.4 iwnn ‘sanctuary’

Apparently not documented before the early New Kingdom; see §4.2.4, (ii).

(ii) Loyaliste 9.6 TC TAr tn Hr Hmw n iryw ‘Fasten yourselves to servants that
work.’ (PL reads transitively: TAr=tn Hmw (...) ‘and fix the servants (...)’.)
While TAr itself is documented at least once in earlier times (CT VII 460e), the
reflexive construction of TAr as in TC is not. Followed by a prepositional phrase intro-
duced by Hr, it finds a direct parallel237 in Thutmosis I’s Tombos Inscription 9

sDA-Hr (...) ‘There is no boasting of a humble man; these are sweet words providing pleasure (...)’.
See Winand 2013: 87-8.
231 Quack 1994: 36.
232 Westendorf 1962: §401.1 bb.
233 Short Amduat 13-14 ir rx nw n sSmw mity nTr pn aA Ds=f ‘As for the one who knows these
representations, he is the likness of the great god himself’ (quoted after Wente 1982: 163).
234 The composition is first documented in blocks found in the tombs of Thutmosis I and Hatshepsut
(discussion: Mauric-Barberio 2001). Datings both to this period and to various earlier periods have
been contemplated (for a summary of proposals, see Jansen-Winkeln 2012: 87-8; Werning 2011: 2,
n.9; Wiebach-Koepke 2003: 23-6). As regards language, Jansen-Winkeln (2012) observes that the
Old Egyptian expressions in Amduat diverge, if at times subtly, from actual Old Egyptian and
concludes that a dating to the Old Kingdom, an option contemplated e.g. by von Lieven (2007:
210, n.1145) and Quack (2000b: 552), must be renounced. Werning (2013: §4) identifies a series
of linguistic features that are best accounted for under an early Eighteenth Dynasty (or possibly
Second Intermediate Period) date of the composition, or at least of final redaction. In both Jansen-
Winkeln’s and Werning’s analyses, form-function mismatches with respect to actual Old Egyptian
play an important role.
235 CT VII 340c B1C, B1L, B2L ir rx sn gmm wAt=sn (noted by Borghouts 1986: 54; Wente 1982:
163, n.29; I thank Matthias Müller, p.c. 5/2012, for drawing this to my attention). The other
witnesses, B3C, B4C, B2Bo, B4Bo, have in rx sn gmm wAwt=sn ‘It is the one who knows them
who finds their roads.’ Ir rx in the former set of witnesses could easily have arisen through
assimilation (in rx  ir rx), or simply as a Verlesung (n  r). Either textual process would have
been facilitated by the fact that ir rx sn in itself is perfectly good Middle Kingdom Middle
Egyptian.
236 Translation Allen 2011: 62-3.
237 Posener 1976: 37.

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 292 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

(Urk. IV 84, 12) TAr sw dpy Hr wtxw ‘The crocodile fastens himself to the fugitive.’ A
further parallel is Chapelle Rouge, p.108: III.22 (HHBT II 15, 1) TAri.n=f awy=f Hr
swHt=f ‘He fastened his arms on his egg’ (with ‘arms’ an entity inalienably possessed
by the subject, and therefore semantically reflexive as well).

(iii) Loyaliste 11.9 TC sAt ‘soil, make wretched’

The word is apparently not attested before the New Kingdom, but common in the
Book of the Dead;238 it recurs in Heavenly Cow 270 (for the dating of this text to the
Eighteenth Dynasty, §4.6).

(iv) Loyaliste 11.10 TC nri ‘time, return of the year’

The word is apparently not documented before the New Kingdom.239 One other
occurrence in Middle Egyptian literature is Sporting King C1.18 (on the dating of
Sporting King, probably to the Eighteenth Dynasty, §4.3).

(v) Loyaliste 12.1 TC r-DAwt ‘in return for, in accordance with’

The preposition is common in the Eighteenth Dynasty specifically. It does not occur
in any securely dated pre-Eighteenth Dynasty text, and does not recur in this form
after the Eighteenth Dynasty (§2.8.3.4, (ii)). Other than in Loyaliste, only one occur-
rence is found in Middle Egyptian literature, Merikare E 31 (on the options for dating
this composition, §2.8).

4.5.4 Dating Loyaliste linguistically

As observed first, a variety of factors conspire to the effect that, whatever its date of
composition may have been, much of Loyaliste is expected to be linguistically
indistinctive (§4.5.1.C). A few elements can be noted nonetheless.
In the first part of Loyaliste, the construction of isT in 5.5-6 strongly points to the
early Eighteenth Dynasty. As noted by Posener, verses 5.5-6 form a ‘quatrain’ with
5.3-4.240 Semantically, the ‘quatrain’ expresses reciprocity: in 5.3 the king is an heir to
every god while in 5.5 the gods are striking for the king. The ‘quatrain’ as whole is
probably from the early Eighteenth Dynasty.
In the second part of Loyaliste, 9.9 has a construction—tw with a non-dynamic
event—that implies a terminus ante quem non by the late Twelfth Dynasty for that
verse (§4.5.3.1). The terminus probably extends to the group 9.5-9 to which 9.9 serves
as a conclusion. Also in the second part of Loyaliste, 11.8 has a yet later construction,
ir A, B (§4.5.3.2). If original, as it seems to be, this construction implies that 11.8 is
late; the argument here does not extend to the surrounding verses beyond 11.8 itself.
Possible elements of lexical evidence (§4.5.3.3) must be appreciated with the usual
caveats, particularly in a composition which appears to have had a complex textual
history.

238 Wb. IV 27.8-11; TLA #127570; see also Posener 1976: 42, who notes that in Late Egyptian the
word serves to translate msDi.
239 Wb. II 279 (‘belegt NR’); FCD 135; TLA 85100; see also Posener 1976: 42.
240 Posener 1976: 27.

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 4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste 293

Both in the first and in the second part, there are therefore strong indications that
at least some verses or groups of verses are as late as the early Eighteenth Dynasty
(5.3-6 and 11.8, respectively). Other ones in the second part could be as well, as is
suggested by the lexicon. Determining how much more of the text of the long version
of Loyaliste is late falls beyond the scope of linguistic analysis.

4.5.5 The long and short versions compared

Most expressions discussed above were from the second part of Loyaliste (§4.5.3)
while the construction most strongly indicative for dating was from the first part
(§4.5.2). This imposes reconsidering the relationship between the short and long
versions for the part of the composition where both are documented.

4.5.5.1 Loyaliste 5.1-14

The discussion is best begun with Loyaliste 5.1-14, since this includes a double verse
that is datable (5.5-6: §4.5.2). The short and long versions run:

5.1 kA pw nsw HAw pw rA=f nsw kAw pw Hw pw rA=f

5.2 sxpr pw wnnt=f sxpr.ty?=f pw {m} wnn.ty=f ? a
5.3 iwa{t} pw n{t} nTr nb{t}
5.4 nDty n qmA sw
5.5 Hww=sn n=f Sntyw=f
5.6 istw Hm=f a.w.s. m aH=f a.w.s.
5.7 tmw pw n Ts wsrwtb
5.8 iw sAw=f r HA DD bAw=f
5.9 Xnmw pw n Haw nb Xnmw pw n Hr nb
5.10 wttw sxpr rxyt wtt{y}w sxpr rxyt
5.11 bAstt pw xw tAwy bAstt pw xw tAwy
5.12 iw dwA sw r nhw a=f i{m}<w>? [...]
5.13 sxmt pw r th wdt=f smt pw thh m wDt.n=f
5.14 iw sfA=f r Xr SmAw iw s{r}<f>A=f r Xr SmA{yt}={f}
a) Tentative, based on PL and O. Ashm.
b) Thus O. Ashm. And O. Gard. 373; PA apparently has a different reading with a suffix:
[...]=f pw Ts[...] wsr=f ‘[...] his [...] binding [...] his strength/that he be strong.’

A. Loyaliste 5.5-6 was argued above to be from the early Eighteenth Dynasty, and
therefore by extension the ‘quatrain’ 5.3-6 as well (§4.5.2). The slightly broader group
of six verses, 5.3-8 disrupts the thematic continuity between 5.1-2 and 5.9-10. In
Posener’s words:241 ‘Dans le premier (scil. quatrain) (vers 1-2 + 9-10), le roi est
présenté comme le bienfaiteur de l’humanité; (...) Le deuxième et le troisième
distiques des copies cursives (vers 3-6) forment un quatrain consacré au roi enfant des
dieux, leur défenseur et leur protégé. Ce sujet n’a de lien direct ni avec ce qui précède,

241 Posener 1976: 26-7.

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 294 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

ni avec ce qui suit. Il en est de même pour les vers 7-8 (pharaon – Atoum).’ To this,
the presence of sxpr in the second verses of both distichs 5.1-2 and 5.9-10 may be
added. Schematically:

CG 20538 long version

king as benefactor 5.1-2 5.1-2
protection 5.3-6  linguistically early D.18
protection 5.7-8
king as benefactor 5.9-10 5.9-10

B. Verses 5.3-4, the first half of the inserted ‘quatrain’ 5.3-6, are patterned like 5.9-
10 in the short version. In a similar fashion, 5.7-8 are patterned like 5.11-12 and 5.13-
14 in the short version:

5.9-10 DN pw n NP  5.3-4 (-5-6)

epithet in apposition
5.11-12 / 13-14 DN pw, expanded  5.7-8
iw NP3ms, 242 r NP

The interpolation, taking up constructions in what comes next in the pre-existing text
(here 5.9-14) is similar in its principle to what is observed in the following sequence
in Sinuhe:

Sinuhe R 12-16:
An [...] iry nTr nfr [...]
R sA=f smsw m Hry iry nTr nfr s-n-wsrt
AOS sA=f sms{m} <m> Hry iry nTr=nfr s-n-wsrt
R ti sw hAb r Hwt xAswt r sqr imiw THnw

An [...] in.n=f sqrw-anx [...]

R ti sw Hm iy=f in.n=f sqrw-anx n THnw
AOS ti sw Hm iy=f in.n=f s{gAb}<qrw>-anx m timHw
Enough of An is preserved to demonstrate that the Twelfth Dynasty tradition, like
the much later Ramesside one here exemplified by AOS, did not have the first of
the two verses beginning in ti sw, which is therefore additional in the tradition
represented by R. Significantly, R displays elements of duplication (sqr; THnw),
which are bizarre in the otherwise densely textured Sinuhe. The interpolation of R
13-14 (ti sw hAb) is in line with R’s broader tendency, otherwise documented, to
include ‘explanatory’ phrases.243 The interpolated line in R takes over a
grammatical construction (ti sw predicate) already present in the then available
tradition (ti sw Hm iy=f (...)  ti sw hAb (...) ti sw Hm iy=f (...)).

242 Loyaliste 5.12 iw dwA sw r nhw a=f; 5.14 iw sfA=f r Xr SmAw; then also 5.10 iw sAw=f r HA DD
bAw=f.
243 Parkinson 2009: 164-5.

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 4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste 295

C. While based on, and taking up, constructions in the short version, the interpolation
is no less artful. Just as the king is the maker of men (5.2, also in the short version),
the king is himself related to ‘the one who created him’ (5.4, in the long version only).
More subtly, ‘the king at his most divine (in the palace [5.6, AS]) is again assimilated
with the gods; as the heir [5.3, AS] of the ancient gods, he is the present people’s god.
Atum [5.7, AS] is the All-lord creator, who created people’s bodies (joining necks,
[5.7, AS]).244
NB. Technically, only 5.5-6, and by extension the ‘quatrain’ 5.3-6, are linguistically
datable. In view of the above discussion, 5.7-8 is naturally associated with 5.3-6 and
thereby similarly late.245 One formulation in 5.7, Ts wsrwt, has been proposed to be in
allusion to the name of Senwosret I and echoed in Hor’s inscription (Wadi el-Hudi
143; temp. Senwosret I).246 However, Ts’ing ‘necks’ is fairly common in various
contexts, expressing creation, revivification, and by extension beneficial activity more
broadly.247 Interpreting as an allusion therefore remains uncertain.

4.5.5.2 Loyaliste 2-5

In Loyaliste 5, the interpolation in 5.3-8 relates to themes already present in the short
version, yet sets a different emphasis: the additional verses speak of the king as an
‘avenger’ of his creator (nDty, 5.4), of ‘his ennemies’ (Sntyw=f ) that are to be
‘stricken’ (Hwi, 5.5), of ‘his protection’ (sAw=f ), and of ‘his might’ (bAw=f, 5.8). A
comparable shift in emphasis is also observed in other parts of Loyaliste 2-5, where
segments of text only in the long version tell of the might and terror that emanate
from the king, more broadly of his destructive powers; such aspects of kingship are
not entirely absent in the short version, but less salient there. This observation could
be interpreted in two ways. If the short version were the original one, the composers
of the long version could have semantically enriched the text by emphasizing this

244 Parkinson 1997a: 243, n.11.

245 In 5.8, Posener 1976: 28 noted ‘texte rajeuni par rallongement de la préposition HA qui devient r-
HA.’ R-HA is fully preserved in O. Ashm. only, yet is already implied in the late Eighteenth Dynasty
PA (iw sAw=f r [...] bAw=f; O. Ashm. iw sAw=f r HA DD bAw=f ). With the meaning ‘behind’, r-HA is
apparently first documented in the tomb of Kheruef (temp. Akhenaton: TLA #600341). With the
meaning ‘to the outside’, the first occurrence I know of is in Thutmosis III’s Gebel Barkal Stela 15
(Urk. IV 1233, 4) and 21 (Urk. IV 1234, 19), later in Book of the Dead and the Great Hymn to
Aton (TLA #500040). However, I strongly doubt that r-HA is here to be read at all: the construction
in 5.8 is mirrored on the one in 5.10 and 5.12, also in the second of two verses, iw NP (with 3msg
pron.) r NP (above, B). As such, the r is part of the construction, introducing the predicate in a
situational predicate construction with semantics of necessity; iw NP r HA NP (sic, not ‘r-HA’) is
therefore to be read, just as in 5.12 iw NP r Xr NP is, in both cases with a preposition introducing
what is itself a prepositional phrase. The construction, which is not described in current grammars,
is exceedingly rare in the preserved record: it must be posited, because there is no alternative
interpretation for r Xr in 5.12. The possibility of using a prepositional phrase in what is otherwise a
noun phrase is also illustrated in the famous r-sA msyt pw (Amenemhat 6a; with the PP r-sA msyt in
the NP slot of a A pw construction). In short, the text as it stands in 5.8 is original, reads as r HA, not
‘r-HA’, and would be fully compatible with Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian (which of course
need not imply that the verse was actually composed in the Middle Kingdom).
246 Originally Berlev 1981: 15; subsequently e.g. Fischer-Elfert 1999: 420. Further discussion of Wadi
el-Hudi 143 in relation to Loyaliste: Fischer-Elfert 1999: 399-401, 420; Berlev 1987b: 157.
247 Posener 1976: 28.

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 296 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

complementary aspect of kingship more strongly, thereby making the text more
polyphonic. If the long version were the original one, the composer of the short
version could have cut these same dimensions out to adapt the text to the more private
context of a stela. At this level, both scenarios are equally likely.
As discussed above, 5.3-8 is arguably secondary, notably on linguistic grounds.
The possibility that the long version could also be secondary in Loyaliste 2-4 is here
examined along similar principles as for Loyaliste 5. A great many relevant
observations were already made by Posener himself, subsequently also by Schipper.

2.1 dwA nsw n-mAat-ra anx Dt dwA nsw m-Xnw Xwt=tn

m Xnw n Xwt=Tn
2.2 snsn Hm=f m ibw=Tn snsa Hm=f m ibw=tn
2.3 imy nrw=f m Xrt-hrw
2.4 qmA n=f hnw r tr nb
2.5 siA pw imi-HAt ibw siA pwb n imi-HAt ibw
2.6 iw irty=f Dar=sn Xt nbt iw irty=f Dar=sn Xt nb
a) On snsi (long version; later also in 6.7), §2.2.2, (vi). On the alternation with snsn
(Sehetepibre), Posener’s extremely perceptive analysis, extending to graphic aspects, is
worth quoting in full:248 ‘On donnera la préférence à la leçon de la stèle car snsn dans ce
contexte est original et fort. Il a gêné les copistes qui ont remplacé « fraterniser » par un
banal « prier, vénérer ». Si la lecture snsj dans 1235 est exacte alors que 1228 contient
snmH, il y aurait eu flottement dans le choix du terme de remplacement. snsj, proche de
snsn, lui emprunte le déterminatif du « nez » (D 19) ici et infra, §6, 7, graphie que Wb IV,
171 ignore. Pour snsj Hm=f, cf. Urk. IV 1818, 12.’
b) PA has siA sw [...], under attraction to the construction in 2.10 and 3.2-3.249

As has long been observed,250 the short version (2.1-2 – 2.5-6) is chiastically
articulated (Xwt, ibw – ibw, Xt). In the long version, the chiasm is stretched over a
longer period, and thereby less salient (Xt-ib – (...) – ib-Xt). This may suggest that 2.3-
4 could be secondary.251 If so, the verses would have been embedded into the pre-
existing text through a continuation of the imperatives in 2.1-2. Verses 2.3-4 first
introduce the motif of the awe that emanates from the king, making the text
semantically more complex by introducing another level of meaning right from the
beginning.252

248 Posener 1976: 20.

249 Posener 1976: 20.
250 First by Grapow 1954: 23; subsequently Posener 1976: 19; Schipper 1998: 165.
251 Schipper 1998: 165; further 169.
252 ‘La version longue offre une gamme plus complète de ces devoirs (...)’ (Posener 1976: 20).

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 4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste 297

2.5 siA pw imi-HAt ibw siA pw n imi-HAt ibw

2.6 iw irty=f Dar=sn Xt nbt iw irty=f Dar=sn Xt nb
2.7 ra pw anx Xr sSmw=f
2.8 iw nty Xr Swt r wr Xrw=f
2.9 ra pw mAAw m stwt=f ra pw mAA <m>? stwt=f
2.10 sHd-w(i) sw tAwy r itn sHD-wy sw tAwy r itn
In Loyaliste, A pw constructions with A a god recur in various places (the ones only in
the short version italicized: 2.5; 2.7; 2.9; 5.7; 5.9; 5.11; 5.13). Of these, 2.7 and 2.9,
both ra pw (...), are the only where a divine name is duplicated. This may be taken to
suggest that 2.7-8 could be secondary.253 If so, the two new verses would have been
embedded by the same process described above for 5.3-4 and 5.7-8 (§4.5.5.1.B): verse
2.7 would be taking up the construction that comes next in the pre-existing text, ra pw
expanded by a construction of the passive participle with indirect coreference (2.9
mAAw m stwt=f  2.7 anx Xr sSmw=f ). Semantically, 2.7-8 relate most directly to
2.3-4 (also in the long version only),254 but the verses are well integrated into the
context, with stwt, sHD and itn (2.9-10, in both versions) being made to resonate with
Swt (2.8, long version).

2.9 ra pw mAAw m stwt=f ra pw mAA <m>? stwt=f

2.10 sHD-w(i) sw tAwy r itn sHD-wy sw tAwy r itn
3.1 wbd hh=f r ns n sDt
3.2 snw(x) sw <m>a At=f r xt
3.3 swAD sw r Hap aA sHD-wy swb r Hapy aA
3.4 mH.n=f tAwy m nxt anx mH.n=f tAwy m xtwc n anx
a) As subtly analyzed by Posener,255 various witnesses may have understood differently.
b) Clearly only in 1056+CG347, lost in PR and PA; under attraction to 2.10.
c) The readings in both the short and the long version are equally coherent: ‘Having filled
the Dual Land with the strength of life (or: with strength and life)’; ‘Having filled the
Dual Land with the trees of life.’

In the short version, 2.9-10 and 3.3-4 chiastically relate to each other by the nfr sw
constructions with participles of active-transitive events as their predicate (sHD tAwy;
swAD sw), further expanded by a comparative expression (r itn; r Hap aA). These verses
thus form a ‘quatrain’, as 2.9-10 – 3.3-4. In the long version, the same construction is
also in 3.1 and in 3.2: the patterning is thereby chiastic as well, yet stretched over a
‘sizain’, as 2.9-10 – 3.1-2 – 3.3-4. The relationship between the short and the long
version is similar to the one observed above in 2.1-6, where a chiastically articulated
‘quatrain’ (2.1-2 – 2.5-6) is stretched, and thereby less salient, in the ‘sizain’ of the
long version. This could suggest that 3.1-2 are secondary.256 If so, they would have
been embedded by taking up the construction that comes before and after in the pre-

253 Schipper 1998: 169.

254 Posener 1976: 20 top.
255 Posener 1976: 22-3.
256 Schipper 1998: 165.

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 298 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

existing text, nfr sw followed by a comparative expression (2.10, 3.3  3.1, 3.2).
Semantically, 3.1-2 tell of the destructive power of the king, making the text more
complex by developing a thread already introduced in 2.3-4 (also in the long version
only).

3.5 qbb fndw wA=f r nSn Dbb fndw wAf r nSny

3.6 Htp=f r tpr TAw Htp=f tpi.twa TAw=f
3.7 DD=f kAw n ntiw m Sms=f DD=f DfAw n nty m Smsw=f
3.8 sDfA=f m mDd mTn=f ...? mDd mtnw=f
3.9-12 (...)
4.1-9 (...)
5.1 kA pw nsw HAw pw rA=f nsw kAw pw Hw pw rA=f
5.2 sxpr pw wnnt=f sxpr.ty?=f pw {m} wnn.ty=f ?
a) On the alteration in 3.6, §6.2.1.2, (ii).

Verses 3.7-8 and 5.1-2 are linked to each other by motif and lexicon (3.7 and 5.1 kAw
‘sustenance’; 3.8 sDfA ‘nourish’, 5.1 HAw ‘abundance’).257 In the long version, 3.9-12
continue the loyalist motif of 3.7-8, but also develop the king’s power of death over
‘his adversaries’ (3.10 rqyw=f ) and ‘his opponents’ (3.12 Sntyw=f ). A similar
development of these complementary aspects of the king’s power, of life and death,
juxtaposed, is given in 4.1-9 (long version).258 In broader terms, this was touched
upon before, in 3.1-2 (long version),259 itself introduced in 2.3-4 (long version).
Overall, the presentation of kingship is more complex in the long version. Concerning
the thematic and lexical link between 3.7-8 and 5.1-2, Posener comments:260 ‘La
version courte de la stèle est la plus cohérente. Par delà le §4 qu’elle ignore, son début
s’enchaîne aux vers qui le précèdent directement et où il est aussi question du roi
dispensateur de biens (...). On a le choix d’y voir soit le texte original bien charpenté,
soit le résultat d’un habile découpage.’

4.5.5.3 Loyaliste 1-6: Compositional perspectives

A. The short version is semantically more focused, while the long one is more
pholyphonic.261 As long as only semantic dimensions are considered, two interpre-
tations are possible: the long version could be an artful expansion of the short one;
alternatively, the short version could be a similarly artful extract of the long one. The
perspective is altered when formal matters are drawn into account.
The text on Sehetepibre’s Stela consists in an introduction (1), a main part (2-5),
and a conclusion (6). The framing introduction and conclusion contrast with the main
part in being patterned by threefold sequences. In the introduction,262 the title (HAty-a

257 Initially Grapow 1954: 25-6; subsequently Posener 1976: 27; Schipper 1998: 165-6.
258 Similarly Schipper 1998: 169.
259 Parkinson 1997a: 242, n.6.
260 Posener’s 1976: 27.
261 See the running commentaries in Posener 1976 and Parkinson 1997a: 242-5; also Schipper 1998,
particularly 170-1.
262 This is identical in the short and long version except for the title, for which see §4.5.1.B.

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 4.5 Enseignement Loyaliste 299

m sbAyt (...)) is followed by a threefold injunction to the addressees (a), then by a

sequence of three noun phrases characterizing the teaching, all beginning in s- (b).
Echoing this threefold injunction and describing the expected response to it, the
conclusion263 begins with a series of three imperatives (c). These are followed by a
sequence of three clauses with general value, justifying the above (d). A final
injunction, itself threefold, follows (e):

(a) 1.3-5 Dd=i wrt D=i sDm=Tn D=i rx=Tn

(b) 1.6-8 sxr nHH sSr anx mAaw sbt aHaw m Htp264
‘I shall speak a great matter, I shall have you hear, I shall have you learn
the counsel of eternity, the condition of living truly, the passing of a life-
time in peace.’

(c) 6.1-2 aHAw Hr rn=f twr Hr anx=f Sw Tn m sp n bgsw

(d) 6.3-5 iw mr n nsw r imAxy nn is n sbi Hr Hm=f iw XAt=f m qmA n mw
(e) 6.9-10 ir=Tn nn wDA Haw=Tn gm=Tn st n Dt

‘Fight for his name, respect his oath, be free of an occasion of wrongdoing!
The servant of the king will be a revered on, there is no tomb for the one
who rebels against His Majesty, his body is a thing trown into the water.
Do this, your bodies will be prosperous, you will find it good forever.’

By contrast, the body of the teaching (2-5) entirely consists in five ‘quatrains’ (on the
left side in the synopsis below). These are linked to one another sequentially by a
series of common elements that have a binding function (noted on the right side in the
synopsis below). The inner articulation of the ‘quatrains’ is itself principled. While
the first two are chiastically articulated, the fourth and fifth are sequentially
articulated. The middle ‘quatrain’ (3.5-8) is neutral in this respect, neither chiastic nor
sequential, consisting in a sequence of four verses all headed by a mrr=f. This
provides the high point in the symmetrical arc-form that spans the compositions.

2.1-2 – 2.5.6 aBBa

2.9-10 – 3.3-4 aBBa
3.5-8 abba
5.1-2 – 5.9-10 aBaB
5.11-12 – 5.13-14 aBaB
When the above observations are drawn together, the composition of the short version
of Loyaliste may be represented as follows:

263 Loyaliste 6 is substantially different in the long version, where it does not function as a conclusion
but leads over to the following parts of the text.
264 The syntax is elaborate: the three objects are simultaneously in apposition to wrt and supply the
withheld objects of sDm=Tn and rx=Tn.

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 300 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

1 introduction: title
opening injunctions 1sg (3)
objects (3)

2.1 Xt
2.2 ib
2.5 ib (siA pw)
2.6 Xt

2.9 (ra pw)

2.10 sHD sw tAwy r NP
3.3 swAD sw r NP (Nileflood)
3.4

3.5 mrr=f (2 clauses265) (qbb fnDw)266

3.6 mrr=f
3.7 mrr=f (kAw)
3.8 mrr=f (sDfA)

5.1 A pw (2 clauses267) (kA, HAw)

5.2 sxpr
5.9 A pw (Xnmw pw)
5.10 sxpr

5.11 A pw (bAstt pw)

5.12 iw NP3msg pron. r NP
5.13 A pw (sxmt pw)
5.14 iw NP3msg pron. r NP

6 conclusion: imperatives 2pl (3)

iw – nn – iw (3)
final injunctions 2pl (3)

The short version of Loyaliste is a thoroughly composed text, symmetrically patterned

on all levels. Much of this is obscured in the long version, which has its own qualities,
of a different sort. If the long version were original, a higher degree of texturing could
be achieved by processes of textual subtraction in individual loci—compare Posener’s
comments on 3.7-8 and 5.1-2, quoted above (§4.5.5.2, fine). However, no process of

265 Qbb fndw wA=f r nSn. That 3.5 and 5.1 consist in two clauses, while 3.6 – 3.7-8 and 5.2 – 5.9-10 do
not, independently confirms the proposed segmentation by which these verses head their respective
‘quatrains’.
266 On the ‘blocking’ of ‘noses’ in relation to the Nileflood, compare Hymn 2.5; on the motif more
broadly (also in Ptahhotep 22 and Eloquent Peasant B1 264), lastly Parkinson 2012a: 215.
267 KA pw nsw HAw pw rA=f.

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 301

textual subtraction could have led to the overall degree of symmetrical patterning
presented by the short version on all levels and throughout the text.
This implies that the long version was composed by expansion of the short one,
not the other way around. As the coherent and artful nature of the long version further
implies, the process must have been one of actual composition, not the result of the
vagaries of successive textual accretion. As described, the composition was careful,
taking up constructions in the pre-existing text, and weaving new semantic threads
into the ones already present in the short version. Far from being any mechanical,
such modes of Fortschreibung made for a smooth integration of additional segments
into the pre-existing text and contributed much to its final cohesion. The long version
of Loyaliste is semantically rich and more deeply polyphonic than the short one; for
interpretation, it must be read as such, as it stands, just as the short version must be for
its part.
B. The above discussion of compositional aspects only bears on the relative
chronology of the short and long versions in the first part of Loyaliste: in itself, it has
no implications on the absolute dating of the long version. In the first part, only one
segment of text, 5.5-6 and by extension 5.3-6, could be dated on linguistic grounds, to
the early Eighteenth Dynasty. As discussed, other segments found only in the long
version relate to the text of the short version in ways exactly similar to how 5.3-8 does
to 5.1-2 – 5.9-14. As also noted, the long version is coherent, speaking against
haphazarded accretion over time. Together, these observations make it likely that the
long version of the first part of Loyaliste, probably the result of a careful composi-
tional effort, is a product of the early Eighteenth Dynasty.
The second part of Loyaliste may also afford some linguistic indications for a
dating to this period (most notably in 11.8, §4.5.3.2; with the usual caveats, perhaps
also some elements in the lexicon, §4.5.3.3). Taking into account the coherence of the
long version in this second part as well, this could be taken to suggest that the whole
of the long version, or at least a substantial part of it, was composed in the early
Eighteenth Dynasty.

4.6 Heavenly Cow

As is implied by its mixed contents and places of inscription, the text referred to as
Heavenly Cow or Destruction of Mankind268 is not a literary composition on a par
with other compositions discussed in the present study, significant literarizing ten-

268 Text: Hornung 1982 (additional fragment: Guilhou 1998). The main versions are inscribed in the
tombs of Sethi I, Ramses II, and Ramses III; the final sections of the text are on the inner part of
the outer golden shrine of Tutankhamun and in the tomb of Ramses VI (Hornung 1982: 33-6).
Sigla used are ‘S’, ‘R.II’, ‘R.III’, and ‘T’. I quote following the verse numbering in Hornung 1982
(based on Fecht’s metrical analysis in Hornung 1982: 109-27). I take the option of referring to the
text as Heavenly Cow because the fabrication of the image of the cow is integral to the overall
composition, as are the etiologies mainly in the second part; a title as Destruction of Mankind too
narrowly focuses on the first, narrative, part of the composition.

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 302 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

dencies.269 The composition is nonetheless included here, since, depending on its

dating, it may bear on an issue that is of broader relevance to the present study,
namely the configuration of higher written registers after the Middle Kingdom. Based
on its contents mainly, Heavenly Cow has been dated by its editor to a time not much
earlier than the first documentation of its final sections on Tutankhamun’s outer
shrine.270 This dating has not found universal acceptance, however, and a dating to the
Middle Kingdom has often been evoked as well.271
The overall composition is diverse, including narrative parts, etiologies,
instructions for the fabrication of the image of a cow, and further textual material. The
text inscriptionally presents itself as a unity, and ought therefore to be treated as such
in overall interpretation. As to its composition, unity is possible as well, and may find
some circumstantial support in the patterning uncovered by Fecht’s metrical
analysis,272 if this is to be followed. The main focus is here on the first half (verses 1-
165), i.e. the narrative proper: this is more clearly cohesive, and unity of composition
is therefore probable. References to the second part of the overall composition are
made on a more occasional basis only. As always in the present study, linguistic
dating bears on the text, and therefore on the documented textualization of ideas, not
on these ideas themselves, nor on hypothetical sources that may, or may not, have
existed in some other form.

4.6.0 Inconclusive expressions

Heavenly Cow displays a series of late features in orthography:273 as elsewhere, these

do not provide any indication for dating.
A. Although inconclusive as well, a series of other superficially late features, in
syntax and morphology, are worth a brief mention. Of the following, (i) and (ii) may
well have resulted from textual alteration, as (iii) demonstrably did.

269 For these, Spalinger 2000.

270 Hornung 1982: 79-81. A few notes on language are already made in Hornung 1982: 80 (with
cross-references to individual notes) and in Spalinger 2000. These, to be mentioned below have in
part to do with orthography and/or narrative style (§4.6.0) and are therefore insufficient to date the
composition. I disagree with the approach to grammar, and derived redactional thesis, in Guilhou
1989: 135-7; see the discussion below.
271 For a summary of opinions, Stadler 2009: 374-5, who calls for a linguistic analyis of the issue.
272 In Hornung 1982: 109-27, specifically 109-10.
273 E.g. (a) Heavenly Cow 91 ii.n=s tx.ti nn siA.n=s rmT ‘She came back drunk and could not recognize
men’ (note that nn sDm.n=f is possible in the Middle Kingdom already, if with apparently slightly
different semantics: Gunn 20122: 127-30); (b) Heavenly Cow 126 aHa<.n> mAA.n=sn (long stem of
mAA in the sDm.n=f: §2.3.1.1, (i)); (c) Heavenly Cow S 2 m-xt wnn=f (§4.6.4.2 with n.b); (d) st for
sn (e.g. 42; 79) or for =s (e.g. 89; 90-91; 97; 98) (for the former, §2.3.1.1, (viii)); (e) in the lexicon,
e.g. ixxw ‘twilight’ (162) (common in Book of the Dead and contrasting with the older form axxw).

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 303

(a) Syntax
(i) Heavenly Cow 97-98
ir n=s{t} sDrt m trw (n) rnpt ip{n}=sta r mwt{=i}
‘Sleep-drinks shall be made for her at the periods of the yearly festivals and
counted to the servants.’
a) Thus S; ip st in R.II and R.III.

Ip st (...), with an anaphoric subject pronoun, is post-classical. In regular Middle

Egyptian, the construction would have been ip r Hmwt (with ip a
pseudoparticiple). No indication for dating can be derived, however, since st may
easily have been secondarily inserted.

(b) Lexical morphology

(ii) Heavenly Cow 240-241 r(-)xft-Hr(-)n ‘in the presence of’
In this form, the expression is probably late. It need not be original, however.

(c) Pronominal morphology

(iii) Heavenly Cow 215 S, R.III ntt tw=i aA ‘that I am here’; 232 S, R.II Dr-nty
tw=i r irt (...) ‘for I will make (...)’ (new subject pronouns)274
As the only slightly earlier T version demonstrates, both these instances of the
‘new subject pronoun’ are products of textual alteration: compare 215 T ntt wi aA;
232 T Dr-ntt wi (r) irt (...). For similar instances of textually secondary new
subject pronouns in Ramesside witnesses of Sinuhe, §3.4.1.1.B.

B. Late features in the Handlungsanweisungen deserve a note of their own:

(iv) Heavenly Cow 186 sn m shAi ‘These (scil. words, inscriptions) are in
retrograde script’ (new subject pronoun)
Sim. 191.275

(v) Heavenly Cow 175 r-imitw ‘between’ (as different from classical imitw);276
Sim. 200.

These can be interpreted in two ways, either as a secondary insertion of such

Handlungsanweisungen into an older text, or as a deliberate differentiation of
linguistic registers in relation to different textual loci. Only in the second interpre-
tation would these expressions be criterial for dating.

274 Noted by Spalinger 2000: 258, n.6; Hornung 1982: 66, n.154; Kroeber 1970: 96.
275 A third instance may be in 171, depending on how this difficult passage is interpreted (see Popko,
TLA).
276 EG §177.

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 304 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

4.6.1 Narrative constructions

Heavenly Cow makes a fairly abundant use of wn.in=f Hr sDm constructions (4; 8; 85;
147-148; 155),277 while both aHa.n sDm.n=f and iwt pw ir.n=f are only sparsely found
(aHa.n sDm.n=f only in 126, also aHa.in in 132 (§4.6.2); aq pw ir.n=f only in 124; the
‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive only in 130 (§4.6.1.2)). All these construc-
tions are documented in the Twelfth Dynasty and before, but Middle Kingdom
narrative texts use aHa.n-headed constructions alongside -in-marked ones in comple-
mentary functions.278 The skewed relative frequency in Heavenly Cow is also
observed in Eighteenth Dynasty inscriptions, then in Late Egyptian narrative
literature. This is suggestive of a late dating of Heavenly Cow.279
Some other more specific elements in the configuration of narrative constructions
in Heavenly Cow provide further indications for dating, to different degrees; the
indication provided by the construction discussed last (§4.6.1.2) is the strongest.

4.6.1.1 Heavenly Cow 133-134 and 77-79: Two expressions for ‘dawning’
Two expressions for ‘dawning’ are noteworthy in Heavenly Cow, for different reasons
each.

(i) Heavenly Cow 133-134 (preserved only in S)

HD rf tA dwAwy iw nn n rmTw pr Xr pDwt [...]
‘When it (had) dawned, very early in the morning, these men went out with
their bows [...]’
In similar contexts, Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian has HD.n rf tA dwA sp 2.280
Only one text dating to Middle Kingdom, Nesimontu has HD tA, but arguably in a
different context and with a different construction.281 In the form as in Heavenly

277 Synthetic sDm.in=f ’s (such as Dd.in and in.in.tw) are not relevant to the issue, as their occurrence,
notably in dialogues, is bound by conventions associated with the format of the ‘Royal Tale’,
evoked in Heavenly Cow. Among formulations typical of the ‘Royal Tale’, e.g. 10-23 Dd.in Hm=f
a.w.s. n ntyw m-xt=f nis m n=i r irt(=i) (...) in.in.tw nn n nTrw [... wn.]i[n] nn n nTr ipn Hr gs=fy Hr
dhn tA m-bAH Hm=f ‘His Majesty L.P.H. then said to those who were in his following: “Call to my
eye for me, if you please (...)” These gods were then fetched [...] these gods were then on his two
sides, touching the ground in presence of His Majesty.’ In the second part of the composition, e.g.
226-229 Dd.in Hm n nTr pn nis m n=i DHwty in.in.tw=f Hr-awy Dd.in Hm n nTr pn n DHwty ‘The
Majesty of this god then said: “Summon Thot to me, if you please!” He was then fetched
immediately. The Majesty of this god then said to Thot: (...)’.
278 Lastly Schenkel in press b.
279 Similarly Spalinger 2000: 258-9.
280 E.g. Sinuhe B 248; Hirtengeschichte 22-23; Hammamat 199; CT VII 3r T9C; similarly in a (here
possibly literarizing) Eighteenth Dynasty inscription, Urk. IV 896, 4 (Amenemhab). All references
drawn from Spalinger 2006: 51-85.
281 Nesimontu A.13 HD tA Htp.n dmi nDr.n=i DADA n pDt sSm.n=i aHA n tAwy (...) ‘When it dawned, the
town surrendered after I had captured the head of the tribe and conducted the fight for the Dual
Land (...)’. This differs from the narrative formula here discussed in various ways. Unlike in the
mentioned Middle Kingdom occurrences and in Heavenly Cow, Nesimontu A.13 is not internal to
a narrative sequence: the preceding section consists in self-eulogizing formulations, to which the
immediately preceding clause relates as a circumstance (A.13 (...) Tsm.t(w) n=i mSa m sxt ‘(...) the
army being made loyal(?) to me through beating’); the clause just quoted provides a thematic

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 305

Cow 133, the stock phrase for ‘dawning’ recurs in Traditional Egyptian.282
Altogether, this may be an indication for a later dating, but remains uncertain: in
particular, the possibility can not be ruled out that the tense morpheme -n- may
have simply been dropped in the course of textual transmission.283

(ii) Heavenly Cow 77-79

ist HD tA n smA rmTw in nTrt m sww=sn nw xntyt Dd.in Hm n ra (...)
‘Meanwhile, it dawned for the killing of men by the goddess on their days of
sailing upstream. The Majesty of Re then said: (...)’
In an initial setting, the expansion of HD tA by a n + infinitive phrase is apparently
paralleled only once, in a New Kingdom text, Merenptah’s Karnak Inscription 31
(KRI IV 5, 15-16) HD tA n THn Hna=w iw pw ir.n pA wr Xsy xrw n rbw (...) ‘When it
dawned to engage combat with them, there was coming by the wretched enemy
chief of Libu (...)’.284 The same expansion of HD tA recurs in earlier times in other
grammatical contexts,285 weakening much force the above parallel may have had.
What is more remarkable, however, is that HD tA, expressing a setting, is here
preceded by ist, itself marking a setting function on a textual level. The
combination, which remains otherwise undocumented, seems redundant; it is best
related to an early New Kingdom horizon when the conditions of uses of ist were
undergoing relaxation and the morpheme’s function redefinition in higher written
registers.286

bridge between the preceding self-eulogizing formulations and the narrative part that follows,
introduced by HD tA. Significantly, the lack of narrative continuity in Nesimontu A.13 is also
reflected in the absence of the particle rf after the expression for ‘dawning’: the expression intro-
duces the narrative section itself, not a new episode within a narrative section. This suggests that
HD tA in Nesimontu is in fact not the formulatic expression for ‘dawning’, but a free use of the
regular lexical expression for ‘dawning’ (this may also be reflected in the fact that Nesimontu
lacks the expansion dwAwy ‘very early in the morning’, which is, on the other hand, integral to the
stock formula). In the grammar of Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian, HD tA in Nesimontu is
therefore best interpreted as a relative present tense setting (with a mrr=f ), ‘when it dawned’ (i.e.
‘when it was dawning’). @D tA in Heavenly Cow, on the other hand, is a recent form of the classical
formula, the -n- of the sDm.n=f having been dropped, perhaps all the more easily in the context of a
set formula (technically, therefore, HD in Heavenly Cow is neither a sDm.n=f, as in the Middle
Kingdom, nor a Late Egyptian past tense sDm=f, but an instance of ‘formulaic language’, not
further to be analyzed morphologically).
282 E.g. Piye’s Victory Stela 20; 89; 100; 106; 147 (Spalinger 2006: 79, ex.51).
283 For the general phenomenon, compare, within Heavenly Cow itself, 126 (preserved only in S)
aHa<.n> mAA=sn (...). With the formula for ‘dawning’ specifically, compare Sinuhe B 248 HD.n rf tA
dwA sp 2, but AOS and P2 HD tA (noted by Spalinger 2006: 64, n.37).
284 Manassa 2003: 42; 44-5; Spalinger 2006: 78.
285 Shipwrecked Sailor 185-186; later also, in yet another grammatical environment, Urk. IV 1860, 13.
See Gilula 1976.
286 For the general constellation, Oréal 2011: 238-46.

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 306 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

4.6.1.2 Heavenly Cow 130: A ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive fully

integrated with the narrative texture
Heavenly Cow has one instance of a ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive (for the
fuller context, §4.6.2, (ii)):287
Heavenly Cow 130
wDA Hm=f r aH [Hr psd] n idt tn [...]
‘His Majesty’s proceeding to the palace on the back of this cow [...]’

The ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive is of course well documented in the

Middle Kingdom with a royal subject. E.g., also with wDA: Khusobek (temp.
Senwosret III), D.10-11 wDA Hm=f m xnt[yt] r sxr mntiw-stiw ‘His Majesty’s
proceeding in sailing upstream to overthrow the Nubians.’ A difference becomes
apparent, however, when broader contexts, and thereby textual conditions of use, are
drawn into the picture. In Middle Kingdom instances, the ‘narrative’ construction of
the infinitive, including multiple ones in sequence to each other, directly harkens back
to the annalistic format from which this ‘construction’ textually derives. This is imme-
diately evident in Amenemhat II’s Annals, itself an annalistic text; similar comments
extend to other textual loci in which the construction developed early, in expedition
accounts. In a private inscription such as Khusobek’s, royal actions are in the infini-
tive, while actions by other participants, including the speaker, follow, juxtaposed, in
aHa.n-headed constructions: the texture remains additive and binary, rather than
integrated.288 In the more complex case afforded by Sinuhe, a literary composition,
infinitives used ‘narratively’ have articulating and indexical functions: they serve to
underscore specific junctures in the first narrative section, and simultaneously evoke
the annalistic format of expedition accounts, one of the subtexts of the composition
(§4.1.3.B). In the Middle Kingdom, the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive thus
remains bound to its textual loci of origin.
In the early New Kingdom, uses in private and royal narratives of military
campaigns stand in the same tradition, which they continue. In other texts, however,
the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive has relinquished any such textual associa-
tions: the construction simply serves to underscore events with a royal subject (further
discussion and examples: §4.1.2.D; §4.3.3, (ii)-(iii)). In the context of a relaxation, or
broadening, of the conditions of use of the ‘narrative’ infinitive, the combination with
wDA specifically has become a set phrase for royal progress, including for instance in a

287 In 69, the text is to be emended as rD{t}.in Hm=f (compare 74 ir{t}.in.tw, where a similar
emendation is imposed by the presence of tw). In the case of the ‘narrative’ infinitive in 130, the
construction is with wDA, an event of motion; by contrast, rDi in 69 is an event for which the
sDm.in=f is routinely used in Heavenly Cow and in the ‘Royal Tale’. See also Fecht, in Hornung
1982: 124, n.i.
288 Section C (horizontally): wDA Hm=f (...) spr Hm=f (...) rDt Hm=f (...) aHa.n skmm xr s(i) (...) aHa.n
Abx.n anxw (...) aHa.n sx.n=i (...) aHa.n rD.n=i (...) aHa.n <r>D.n=f n=i (...) (although the last event is
with a royal subject, it is oriented on the speaker, in the dative). Section D (vertically): (...) xat Hm
n nsw bity (...) rDt Hm=f (...) aHa.n sspd.n=i (...) – rDt Hm=f (...) – wDA Hm=f (...) aHa.n sx.n=i (...)
aHa.n=i xd.kw (...) aHa.n rD.n=f (wi) (...) rD n(=i) (...) (although the penultimate event is with a royal
subject, it is here as well oriented on the speaker).

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 307

building inscription (Urk. IV 836, 6: §4.3.3, (iii)). The construction is then used
alongside other narrative constructions (wn.in=f-headed ones, etc.) and is tightly
integrated into the overall narrative texture. The use in Heavenly Cow 130, also fully
integrated into the narrative (compare the analysis of the broader context below,
§4.6.2.C), relates to this same horizon: in the Middle Kingdom, this would not have
been possible.

4.6.2 Heavenly Cow 132: A hybrid narrative construction

The following construction is remarkable on several accounts simultaneously. As to

be discussed, this is best described as a case of creative reconfiguration.

Heavenly Cow 132

(...) aHa.in rf tA m kk
‘(...) and the land then was in obscurity.’
A. In Heavenly Cow 132, a past tense form of the auxiliary aHa (for which see
below, B) is combined with a situational predicate construction, tA m kk. The construc-
tion is very rare,289 and for good reasons. Historically, aHa.n-headed constructions
grammaticalized out of a serial construction (aHa.n sDm.n=f ),290 with an auxiliary
derived from a verb that expresses a dynamic event when used as a full lexical verb in
the suffix conjugation (aHa ‘stand up’).291 In keeping with this source construction, the
auxiliary aHa.n is almost universally followed by a verbal event of some sort (sDm.n=f,
NP Hr sDm, NP PsP, sDm(w) N, perhaps rarely also sDm=f ). On a functional level, the
distribution reflects how the semantics of a situational predicate construction conflicts
with the narrative auxiliary aHa: just as non-dynamic constructions more generally,
situational predicate constructions contribute to provide the background to an
unfolding narrative;292 constructions headed by aHa.n, for their part, serve to express
events that push the narrative forward and therefore belong to the main chain of that
narrative. In this, aHa.n-headed constructions also differ from wn.in-headed ones,
which often have paragraph-conclusive function and are therefore expected to
accommodate situational predicate constructions on a fully regular basis, as they do.
B. Most remarkable, however, is the form of the auxiliary in Heavenly Cow 132,
aHa.in. When used as an auxiliary, aHa always comes as aHa.n:293 aHa.in in Heavenly

289 Only two instances had been noted, one in the Old Kingdom (Henqu 21-22 (Urk. I 78, 13)) and
one in the Middle Kingdom (Hatnub 20, 5), see Winand 2006: 166. Beyond Heavenly Cow 132, a
fourth can be added, Mocalla II..2: this is slightly different, because aHa, also functioning as an
auxiliary, is uniquely not in a past tense.
290 For related serial constructions, less grammaticalized than aHa.n-headed ones, §2.4.4.5, (iv).
291 On the bleaching of the lexical meaning of aHa in aHa.n-auxiliated patterns, Vernus 2003a: 238-40.
292 E.g. Winand 2000.
293 With the lone exception of present tense aHa in Mocalla II..2. This is not from a narrative context,
uniquely so and may therefore be tentatively interpreted either as an exploratory construction or as
representing a variety or register of Egyptian otherwise undocumented in the written record (the
two accounts are not exclusive of each other).

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 308 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

Cow 132 is unique in the Middle Egyptian record.294 Morphologically, aHa.in is a

sDm.in=f, otherwise common in Heavenly Cow and elsewhere. The hybrid nature of
the form becomes apparent, however, in view of the nature of aHa in Heavenly Cow
132, an auxiliary, not the full lexical verb.295 Hybridity is also manifest in the fact that
aHa.in is followed by rf, a particle that commonly follows -in-marked forms, but never
co-occurs with the auxiliary aHa anywhere else.
The auxiliary aHa, otherwise always in the form aHa.n, serves with past tense events
in narrative chains; -in-marked forms and constructions themselves serve in narrative
chains, if for functions that are different on other levels: an aHa.in auxiliated construc-
tion may then be described as an instance of redundant marking of past narrative
function. On general grounds, this strongly suggests a post-classical horizon in written
language, when auxiliaries are occasionally amenable to reconfigurations of various
sorts. A more specific parallel to the phenomenon here discussed is afforded by a case
of redundant past tense marking, also involving -in-, in the artificially recomposed
repertoire of one Eighteenth Dynasty text:

(i) Chapelle Rouge, p.120: V.7-8 (HHBT II 19, 2)

wn.in nn smrw ibw=sn Ssp.n mht
‘These officials’ hearts, they begun to forget.’

The construction N sDm.n (§1.2, (xi)) in itself marks past tense. It is here combined
with the auxiliary wn.in: the result, apparently unique, is a redundant marking of past
tense, first by -in-, then by -n-.296 Provided the text is correct, a similar type of
redundant marking, this time of future tense, could be in another construction in the
same text, also unique: Chapelle Rouge, p.124: VI.1 (HHBT II 20, 5)297 wn.k(A)=T

294 In filling the lacuna in 23, Hornung (1982: 53, n.19) evokes both [aHa.]i[n] and [wn].i[n]. Of these,
the latter is vastly more likely after an event of ‘bringing/introducing’ in 22 (similarly alluding to
the ‘Royal Tale’, compare e.g. the sequence in Neferti 1h-i). Even if the former possibility were to
be preferred, this would simply be an instance of the full lexical verb aHa ‘to stand (up)’, not of the
auxiliary, and would therefore not compare with aHa.in here under discussion. The auxiliary aHa.in
in 132 thus remains unique, in Heavenly Cow and in general.
295 Compare the blatantly absurd translation ?!‘The land then stood up in obscurity.’
296 Rare wn.in-headed constructions are also found in Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian. These
include wn.in N sDm=f (Khentemsemti 3-4; Sinuhe B 174-175; Kagemni 2.7: discussed above,
§4.1.3.C, (iii)-(iv)); wn.in nfr sw (in the literary topos wn.in nfr st Hr ib=f ‘And they were perfect
to his heart’, e.g. Eloquent Peasant B2 131 and passim in Eloquent Peasant, Kagemni, and
Cheops’ Court); and wn.in mrr=f. The latter, as it seems uniquely in Eloquent Peasant B1 30-31,
is a wn.in-prefixed emphatic construction: wn.in xnn [sdb=f Hr] mw npnpt=f Hr Sma ‘And its fringe
rested on the water, with its hem on the barley’ (transl. Parkinson 2012a: 44; sim Bt; R has the
emphatic construction without the auxiliary). In these, as in wn.in sDm.n discussed in the main text,
wn.in has developed into an auxiliary in ways that are not reconductible any more to its historical
origin in constructions such as wn.in=f Hr sDm, wn.in=f pseudoparticiple, or wn.in=f AP. This
development, completed in the Twelfth Dynasty, is a conditioning possibility for wn.in sDm.n
itself, yet this differs from all the above in one point, the double marking of tense. In wn.in N
sDm=f, wn.in nfr sw, and wn.in mrr=f, constructions with their own specific semantics are
accommodated into a wn.in-headed construction, resulting in semantically complex overall
constructions, but never in a double marking of the same category.
297 Lacau & Chevrier 1977: 127 with n.b; noted by Vernus 1990a: 86; further Stauder 2013: §9.3, and
above, §4.1.2.E.

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 309

n(=i) r mst iAwt (...) ‘You shall then be for me destined to fashion offices (...)’. These
unique doubly marked constructions in Chapelle Rouge are directly comparable in its
(/their) underlying principle to aHa.in rf (...) here under discussion. They lend further
support to the above appreciation that the construction in Heavenly Cow 132 also
relates to a post-classical, and probably early New Kingdom, horizon.
C. A further step in analysis is to account for how, and to serve what purposes, the
construction in Heavenly Cow 132 may have been coined in the particular composi-
tion in which it uniquely occurs. To these ends, the broader context is considered (the
typographical disposition reflects the proposed articulation as discussed below):

(ii) Heavenly Cow 123-134

(...) [...].in swt Hm n ra Hr psd=s
[iwt] pw ir.n nn n rmT [...]
aHa<.n> mAA.n=sn sw Hr psd n iHt
Dd.n n=f nn n rmTw [...]b[...] n=n sxr=n xftiw=k wAw mdwt r irw st
wDA Hm=f r aH [Hr psd] n iHt tn [...]wi=f Hna=sn
aHa.in rf tA m kk
HD rf tA dwAwy iw nn n rmT pr Xr pDwt [...]

‘(...) the Majesty of Re then [mounted?] on her back.

There was coming by these men [...];
and they saw him on the back of the cow.
These men said to him: “[...] to us, that we may fell your enemies who plotted
against their creator.”
His Majesty’s proceeding to the palace on the back of this cow [...] his with
them;
and the earth then was in obscurity.
When it (had) dawned, very early in the morning, these men went out with
their bows [...]’

The artificial construction in Heavenly Cow 132 is one of only two instances of aHa-
auxiliated constructions in the overall composition. These occur close to each other in
the text, suggesting that they should be interpreted alongside each other. In both cases,
aHa-auxiliated constructions follow an event of motion in an infinitive-based construc-
tion: iwt pw ir.n=f (124) and the narratively used infinitive wDA (130: §4.6.1.2). As
elsewhere, the use of an infinitive-based construction with events of motion results in
such events being presented ‘en bloc’; these thereby opening a new shorter segment of
discourse:

124-126 [iwt] pw ir.n (...) – aHa.n mAA.n=sn (...) – (...)

130-132 wDA (...) – aHa.in rf tA (...)

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 310 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

In-marked forms and constructions, on the other hand, are overly common throughout
Heavenly Cow (§4.6.1). In the extract quoted above, they appear twice, in both cases
in clauses that relate to a preceding shorter segment of discourse. This articulation is
further underscored by discourse-connective particles:

123 [...].in swt

132 aHa.n rf (...)

Moreover, both clauses that here have -in-marked constructions are just before clauses
that begin with paragraph-initial constructions. As the latter open a new segment of
discourse, -in-marked constructions are therefore in the present section associated
with signaling the end of a shorter segment of discourse:

123 [...].in (...), just before the infinitive-based, paragraph-initial [iwt] pw

ir.n (...) in 124
132 aHa.in (...), just before the setting, paragraph-initial HD rf tA (...) in 133

The hybrid auxiliary aHa.in combines the functions, locally identified, of both the
aHa.n-headed and the -in-marked constructions. It directly follows a paragraph-initial
(here infinitive-based) construction (130 wDA Hm=f (...)), as aHa.n-marked do in the
present section. As a -in-marked construction, it simultaneously signals the end of this
same paragraph, just before a new paragraph begins with a setting expression (133 HD
rf tA (...)).
As described above (B), the resulting construction in 132 is unique and hybrid. In
the context of a composition in which aHa.n-auxiliated constructions are largely
disaffected in favor of -in-marked forms and constructions, the former are open to
being reconfigured; this here happens through attraction to, or modelling on, the latter.
D. The descriptive account of Heavenly Cow 132 given above (A-B) establishes the
uniqueness and hybridity of the construction. In Heavenly Cow, the construction is
interpreted as a reconfiguration of narrative functions in the local context (C). Such
construction implies a relaxation of the conditions bearing on aHa.n-headed construc-
tions, relating it to a post-classical horizon in written language when such phenomena,
which do not arise in regular linguistic interaction, are occasionally found. What is
more, directly comparable cases of reconfiguration are documented for either type of
hybridity involved, in both cases in Hatshepsutian creative experimentations with
written language. The likelihood that a construction such as in Heavenly Cow 132
could have been coined at a time before the early New Kingdom is extraordinarily
low.

4.6.3 Ipn demonstratives in context

Heavenly Cow makes a fair use of the antiquated demonstrative ipn, also subjecting
this to linguistic dissimilation; going yet further, two instances of double demon-
strative marking are found.

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 311

A. Ipn demonstratives occur five times in the first part of Heavenly Cow (23; 64; 70;
72; 76).298 In post-Old Kingdom times, these demonstratives are limited in their
textual distribution, mainly to the following places (selective illustration):

- In one inscription of unclear dating (Tod Inscription 29);299

- Recurrently smrw ipn in the ‘Royal Tale’, as a convention—and thus,
indirectly, an index—of this type of written discourse, from Neferhotep’s
Great Abydos Stela 12 through early Ramesside times (e.g. Kuban Stela 23
(KRI 357, 9));
- Recurrently in Thutmoside royal inscriptions: (a) in relation to the ‘Royal
Tale’, smrw ipn ‘these companions’ (Urk. IV 165, 7; sim. 182, 8; 1241, 2;
Appointment 7; 8); rmTw ipn ‘these men (scil. present at the royal audience)’
(257, 2); (b) with distinguished referents, xaw=f ipn ‘these crowns of his’ (161,
4); sbAw ipn ‘these doorways’ (168, 12); mnw=T ipn ‘these monuments of
yours’ (237, 5);300
- In medical texts transmitted in early New Kingdom manuscripts,301 as an
index of (purported) old age, thereby also connoting scientific authority;
- Not uncommonly in Book of the Dead,302 as a token of antiquated language
and possibly as an index of an embedding into an age-old tradition, rather than
as genuine textual inheritance (contrast with the relative rarity of ipn
demonstratives in Coffin Texts);
- In three Middle Egyptian literary texts: Tale Involving the House of Life
X+2.1, Sporting King A2.1, and Teaching of Aametju 42 (on the first two,
§4.3.4.A with n.103). The first was argued to date to the (later) Second
Intermediate Period (§3.3.1) and the second to the Eighteenth Dynasty (§4.3);
the third is Thutmoside. Ipn demonstratives do not appear to have been part of
the regular repertoires of these. In particular they remain undocumented in any
literary text dating to the Middle Kingdom.

In Heavenly Cow, ipn demonstratives are found with participants interacting with the
(here divine) king, in an association typical of the format of the ‘Royal Tale’: 23 nn n
nTrw ipn ‘these gods’;303 64 S+R.III nn n wpwtiw ipn ‘these messengers’; 76 nTrw ipn
‘these gods’. In addition, ipn demonstratives are used twice with an entity that plays a
distinguished role in the narrative, ‘this ochre’ (70 and 72 ddty ipn). Other participants
that do not directly interact with the king are followed by regular Middle Egyptian

298 Also in the additional portion in T (col.31; Hornung 1982: 30) and in one caption (only S; see
TLA).
299 On this text, further §5.1.3.3.C.
300 Discussion in Stauder 2013: §6.3.
301 E.g. P. Smith 15, 11; P. Ebers 1, 5 (after Lefebvre 1940: §102).
302 See TLA #24430.
303 This and the following example also involve double demonstrative, marking a phenomenon
discussed below, B.

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 312 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

demonstratives (134 nn n rmT ‘these men’),304 as are entities that play a less salient
role in the narrative (76 nn n Hnqt ‘this beer’; 84 nn n sDrt ‘this sleep-drink’). The
selection of an ipn demonstrative thus stands in a principled contrast to regular nn n,
from which they are dissimilated. Incidentally this also implies that both types of
demonstratives alike are integral to the original composition in the form in which they
are transmitted.
As the above table demonstrates, ipn demonstratives are extremely rare in any
type of Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian, while they are typical of the repertoires of
some post-Middle Kingdom types of written discourses. That ipn demonstratives are
used in Heavenly Cow, and that they are distributed there in the ways just described, is
suggestive of a post-Middle Kingdom composition date of composition.
B. In addition, ipn demonstratives are subjected in Heavenly Cow to what may be
described as linguistic play. Two types of phenomena are to be distinguished. The
first is worth mentioning with a view on the overall linguistic typology of Heavenly
Cow, but does not result in a reliable indication for dating. A case of linguistic
dissimilation is observed with occurrences of the same referent in tight sequence: nn n
ddty ‘this ochre’ (68), then ddty ipn (70, 72). Although not overly common, linguistic
dissimilation is a phenomenon found in various places in Earlier Egyptian higher
registers:305

(a) Tod Inscription 29306 SwAw ipf ‘these miserable ones’, alongside nf n rstw
‘these prisoners’;

(b) in the context of the ‘Royal Tale’:

- Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela 12307 Dd.in smrw ipn ‘Then these
companions said’, alongside 6 and 14 Dd.in nn n smrw;
- Appointment of the Vizier 8 (Urk. IV 1381, 3) smrw ipn Dd=sn ‘These
companions say’ and 6-7 (Urk. IV 1380, 20) [... smrw i]pn; alongside 16 (Urk.
IV 1381, 16) nn n smrw;
(c) Book of the Dead 102 (e.g. Nu 7; Iuia 827-828),308 possibly with a
threefold dissimilation of the demonstratives pwy, nw, ipn: nHm.n=i nTr pwy
m-a nw n iri mn=f mr ipn ‘I have saved this god from these ones who cause
this difficult pain of his.’309

In lacking an association with a specific period in time, this offers no sound evidence
for dating.

304 Perhaps also 124 nn n rmT [...] (unclear, since double demonstrative marking (below, B) can not be
ruled out given the following lacuna).
305 On linguistic dissimilation in general, Vernus 1996b: 164-8.
306 Vernus 1996b: 164, ex.21a-b.
307 Vernus 1996b: 164, ex.20a-b.
308 Quoted after TLA # 24430.
309 Different interpretation by Gunn 20122: 232, who views this as an instance of double
demonstrative marking: ‘(...) these same(?) inflictors of his grievous hurt’.

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 313

More consequential for dating are two instances of double demonstrative marking
in Heavenly Cow: 23 nn n nTrw ipn ‘these gods’; 64 S+R.III nn n wpwtiw ipn ‘these
messengers’. One is at first tempted to emend these as the results of some textual
accident (such as the insertion a more recent demonstrative without suppression of the
older one).310 Yet, the double marking occurs twice, in non-contiguous passages of the
text, and a plausible textual scenario can be devised only for the first of these
instances.311 Moreover, ipn demonstratives are in Heavenly Cow subjected to
deliberate manipulation (above), further suggesting that the construction is here
original. Double demonstrative marking—of which only one other instance has been
noted, in a New Kingdom text312—is quite possibly ungrammatical in Egyptian. In
Heavenly Cow, it is interpreted in the context of the afore mentioned broader
manipulation of demonstrative expressions. The construction, in which syntactic rules
are relaxed and overruled by non-syntactic parameters such as linguistic indexicality
and dissimilation, is again suggestive of a post-classical horizon.313

4.6.4 Further elements for a direct dating

Heavenly Cow includes further expressions that lend themselves to a discussion in

terms of direct dating.

4.6.4.1 Heavenly Cow 15: The syntax of isT

The following passage has an instance of an already discussed construction of ist that
is relevant for dating:

310 Thus Hornung 1982: 53, n.19 (‘... wobei wohl die jüngere Form automatisch eingefügt wurde’).
311 With the first instance, one may be tempted to suppose that an original 22-23 *(...) nn n nTrw (...)
nTrw ipn (with linguistic dissimilation) could have been altered into the extant text through
extending nn from 22 to 23. No similar scenario is possible for the other instance (64).
312 P. Leiden I 348, XII.6 pA Xrd pn n mwt=f ‘this afore mentioned child of his mother’, quoted by
Popko, TLA, comment ad Heavenly Cow 23 (originally Katharina Stegbauer, p.c. to Lutz Popko).
313 Superficially similar is another case of a threefold formal alternation in the expression of a
functional category, in one Coffin Text spell (Spell 720, CT VI 348-349; analyzed by Vernus
1996b: 153-4, ex.11a-e): this has object clauses marked by is, by ntt, and also doubly marked by
ntt and is simultaneously. The double demonstrative marking in Heavenly Cow also results in a
threefold alternation (nn n N ipn, alongside N ipn and nn n N), but differs from the Coffin Text
case on two levels. (a) It remains unclear whether in CT 720 double marking is originally intended
or not, see Vernus’ (1996b: 154) open assessment: ‘(...) dans cette formule, la variation entre ces
trois sous-types relève soit d’un souci de dissimilation grammaticale, soit d’une modernisation
insuffisamment généralisée comme est insuffisamment généralisée dans cette même formule la
substitution de N tn à la première personne (...)’. (b) In CT 720, no correlates of any sort can be
identified to the use of is and ntt; in Heavenly Cow, on the other hand, the distribution of ipn and
nn n is principled (above, A). Only in the latter composition, therefore, are the different expres-
sions of a same category subject to deliberate linguistic manipulation, overruling the ordinary
constraints of Egyptian syntax.

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 314 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

Heavenly Cow 11-16

nis mi n=i r irt=i r Sw tfnwt gb nwt Hna itw mwwt wnnyw Hna=i
ist wi m nnw
Hna gr nTr=i nnw (...)
‘Call to my eye for me, if you please, and to Shu, Tefnut, Geb, and Nut,
together with the fathers and mothers who were with me,
while I was in the Nun,
and also my god, Nun (...)’
As the subsequent segment Hna gr nTr=i nnw (16), yet another object of the act of
‘calling’ (nis, 11), implies, ist wi m nnw does not relate to a following clause. Seman-
tically, ist wi m nnw is dependent upon itw mwwt wnnyw Hna=i (14-15), rather than
providing a mere background.314 Accordingly, Heavenly Cow 14-15 is a case of ist
introducing a clause depending on a preceding main clause. As discussed above, this
construction remains undocumented until the Eighteenth Dynasty, did not arise
through regular linguistic change, and can be interpreted as a token of the written
language of the early New Kingdom (§4.5.2).
The construction in Heavenly Cow 15 is in all likelihood integral to the original
text. If not, textual alteration would have had to be from a putative Middle Kingdom
*(...) wnnyw Hna=i iw=i m nnw (...). In the early New Kingdom, the iw-marked
construction was the one in regular use in all registers, while the ist-marked
construction is to be found in some higher written registers only. Positing the
secondariness of the transmitted text would then imply a textual alteration from a
construction that was regular in the early New Kingdom into a rare one that was then
associated with a strong recherché effect.

4.6.4.2 Heavenly Cow 2: M-xt expressing simultaneity

The incipit of Heavenly Cow reads:

Heavenly Cow 1-3

xpr [s]w[ta w]bn ra nTr xpr Ds=f
m-xt wnn=f b m nsyt
rmTw nTrw m xt waty
‘It occurred, then, that Re, the god who created himself, rose,
whenc he was holding kingship,
men and gods being a single thing.’
a) On text-initial xpr swt (...), §5.6.1.

314 Not entirely clear is Heavenly Cow 4-8 wn.in rmTw Hr kAt mdwt r xftyw ra ist rf Hm=f a.w.s. iAww
qsw=f m HD hAw=f m nbw Sny=f m xsbd mAa wn.in Hm=f Hr siA mdt (...) ‘Men begun conceiving
plot against the enemies of Re (scil. Re himself), when His Majesty L.P.H. had become old, his
bones being of silver, his body of gold, his hair of true lapis-lazuli. His Majesty recognized the
matter (...)’. As in the passage discussed in the main text, the ist-headed clause also relates to
preceding, rather than to the following, clause. What remains unclear is whether such relation
involves outright dependency, or mere backgrounding; the presence of rf after ist may also be
relevant to the issue, although in ways that I am not fully capable of appreciating.

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 315

b) Thus S; R.II has [m-xt] wn=f. The written morphology in S ist post-classical;315 this of
course remains entirely uncriterial for dating.316
c) On the interpretation as a simultaneous, rather than anterior, temporal relation, compare
the discussion below.

A. In Middle Egyptian, m-xt introducing a clause expresses anteriority.317 Accord-

ingly, an anterior meaning has been proposed for Heavenly Cow 2 as well.318 This,
however, is very unlikely. To begin with, wn(n) is hardly ever documented after m-xt,
perhaps only once, in Fowler, P. Moscow 1695 vso 1-2319 HAti-a m mdt Ddt.n sA Hri
HAm pw nt niwt rsi iwrw rn=f iAS m-xt wn=f m xnti n [...] ‘Beginning of the discourse
spoken by Hori’s son—he is a fisherman in the Southern City, Iuru by name, who had
been called after he had been in the Palace320 of(?) [...]’. This extremely scarce
documentation is no accident, since it directly reflects the semantic tension between a
preposition/conjunction expressing an anterior temporal relation (m-xt) and an event
that is as non-transformative as one can be, wn(n).
The unique instance in Fowler also differs from the one Heavenly Cow 2 in one
important semantic respect. In Fowler, the anterior situation, a location of the subject,
is presented as being over at the time of the main event. In Heavenly Cow 2, by
contrast, the clause introduced by m-xt would express the coming about of a situation
(‘after he had taken hold of kingship(?)’, i.e. after he had become king), with
continuing validity in the present. Had this been the intended meaning, a verb
expressing a transformative event, not wn(n), would in all likelihood have been made
recourse to: the construction would have been something along the lines of *xpr m
nsyt, *m-xt sw xpr m nsyt, *m-xt xpr=f m nsyt, or the like.
B. The above establishes that m-xt in Heavenly Cow 2 expresses a simultaneous tense
relation. As already mentioned, this meaning is never documented in Middle Egyptian
‘proper’, nor is it expected to be. It is, however, occasionally documented in literary
registers of the New Kingdom, and, among texts that have been investigated in this
respect, no less than six times in Ani (B 16.5; 16.12; 16.16; 20.13; 20.20; 21.18).321

315 In Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian, m-xt is usually followed by a form with the short stem, most
probably the subjunctive; with wnn itself (a very rare combination), compare Fowler, P. Moscow
1695 vso 1-2 m-xt wn=f (...) (quoted in the main text). M-xt wnn=f, for its part, is paralleled in the
Book of the Dead (EG §157.1; below, n.321).
316 In an only slightly different syntactic environment, compare the similar alternation in written forms
in the incipit of Neferti: 1a-b Pet. xpr.n swt wnn (...), while other mss. have xpr.n swt wn (...). In
the present case, the possibility of textual alteration is made even stronger by the fact that R.II
actually has the correct form (wn).
317 Lastly Uljas 2007a: 260-3.
318 E.g. Hornung (1982: 37, 51, n.3), who translates: ‘(...) nachdem er das Königtum bekleidet hatte’.
319 Parkinson 2004: 88-9.
320 Parkinson 2004: 88, n.b.
321 After Quack 1994: 41, who qualifies such interpretation as secure (‘zweifelsfrei’). A similar
simultaneous meaning is also found in Book of the Dead, e.g. m-xt wnn=f m nxn=f ‘while Horus
was in his youth’, quoted in EG §157.1. NB: For various reasons, I take the sDm=f in this
construction to be a subjunctive functioning as a mode of syntactic dependency, unlike Quack who
takes it to be a ‘Perfekt’. This secondary issue is inconsequential to the present discussion and can
therefore be left open here.

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 316 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

The change consisting in the rise of a simultaneous meaning of m-xt in the New
Kingdom was presumably not the product of linguistic interaction, but a redefinition
of functions in written language itself. This is best viewed in the broader context of
the demise of the construction preposition + finite form, which during the transition to
Late Egyptian was rapidly reduced to a limited set of bound and increasingly
grammaticalized collocations. In this context, the semantics of m-xt before a finite
form may have become less tightly defined than was the case when the overall system
of combinations preposition + finite form was fully productive.322
Be the details as they may, the construction in Heavenly Cow 2 is post-classical
and points to the early New Kingdom. It possibly even places the composition of
Heavenly Cow in the later, rather than earlier, part of the Eighteenth Dynasty.

4.6.5 Varia

4.6.5.1 Two more cases of possible linguistic hybridity

Two further cases of possibly hybrid expressions, both from the second part of the
overall text, are to be mentioned. Both these expressions seem to consist in a
dissimilation vis-à-vis fairly recent expressions. The development of the latter would
thereby be presupposed, as would a context in which such dissimilation could have
been of interest to the composer.
A. Heavenly Cow has a remarkable construction that resembles the precursor
construction of the conjunctive:323

(i) Heavenly Cow 211-213 (T, S, R.III; R.II not preserved)

sAw imit-tA-mw
Hna grt irt sSw ntk r iAt nbt n HfAwt=k ntt im r-Dd (...)
‘Beware of the-snakes-in-the-earth-and-water,
and also make a piece of writing, you, about every hill, for your snakes which
are there, saying: (...)’

The rise of the conjunctive is classically described along a path D8-D18Hna sDm (rarely
Hna sDm ntk) > D18Hna-ntk sDm > D19-…mtw=k sDm.324 The construction in Heavenly
Cow 212 obviously differs from the New Kingdom form of the construction, with
mandatory expression of the agent before the verb. It comes close to the first stage of
the path recalled above, yet in its particular form has two details of singular
interest.325
To begin with, the mention of the agent (ntk), which is co-referential with the
manipulee of the preceding imperative, is here redundant. The First Intermediate
Period, Middle Kingdom, and Second Intermediate Period precursor construction Hna

322 This account is essentially compatible with Quack’s (1994: 41, ‘Vielleicht spielt hier der Wechsel
bzw. die Kombinierbarkeit mit xft eine Rolle’), only setting the author’s more particularized
approach into a broader context of ongoing linguistic change.
323 Kroeber 1970: 160, ex.20; Hornung 1982: 64, n.140; Spalinger 2000: 260.
324 Gardiner 1928; Kroeber 1970: 140-70; Winand 1992: §709-23.
325 The following only expands on Kroeber’s (1970: 160, ex.20) insightful analysis.

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 317

sDm is infinitival: it serves in cases when the event has the same agent as a preceding
clause. Only exceptionally is an agent specified, and only when this is different from
the subject of the preceding clause.
In addition, the expression of this agent (ntk) is in Heavenly Cow 211-213 placed
after the direct object (sSw), rather than before it as seems to have been the rule in
actual instances of stage one.326 Compare, with a pronominal agent: Siut I 313327 (...)
Hna rDt ntsn tA gmHt 2 ‘(...) and that they should give these two tapers.’ More
significant yet is the following, where the agent, even though a full noun, stays in
close contact to the verb and before the object: Siut I 308328 (...) Hna rDt in wab imi
Abd=f pAq (...) ‘(...) and that the wab-priest who is in his month gives him the paq-
bread (...)’.
These combined observations have led Kroeber to describing the ‘ein wenig
monstruös anmutende Konstruktion’ in Heavenly Cow as an ‘etwas ungeschickter
Klassizismus’.329 As observed, the expression of the agent is at odds with the pre-New
Kingdom construction, both functionally and formally. The construction in Heavenly
Cow 211-213 therefore presupposes the early New Kingdom construction with
mandatory expression of the agent. In placing the agent in the wrong place, the
composer secondarily dissimilates the construction from the actual early New
Kingdom one, possibly to make it look older. The result, however, is not the original
construction, from which it differs on the two accounts discussed, the presence of the
agent and its placement. This may be interpreted as a case of failed imitation of the
old construction; more likely, however, is an interpretation in which the composer’s
intent lay with dissimilation itself. Be this as it may, the construction in Heavenly
Cow 211-213, unique as it is, presupposes the early New Kingdom construction.

NB. Grt, inserted between Hna and the infinitive, has been noted as well.330
Syntactically, this poses no problem, compare Eloquent Peasant R 18.4 (...) Hna swt
irt (...) (§2.4.4.3, (iii)). On a semantic level, one may wonder whether grt, which lacks
the adversative force of swt, is not here slightly redundant in view of the continuative
force inherent to the conjunctive itself.331 I remain agnostic and renounce interpreting
further.

326 The two examples quoted in the main text are in continuation of another infinitive, and do not
therefore qualify as precursor constructions of the conjunctive in a strict functional sense. Actual
instances of the precursor construction of the conjunctive with the agent expressed remain
undocumented, and for a very good reason: the conjunctive originated in, and further developed as,
a same-agent construction. As regards the specific point here of interest, namely the formal aspect
of how the agent after Hna + infinitive is introduced, the examples quoted are no less directly
relevant.
327 Gardiner 1928: 88, ex.12.
328 Kroeber 1970: 159, ex.18.
329 Kroeber 1970: 160.
330 Kroeber 1970: 160.
331 Kroeber 1970: 160. The combination Hna gr(t) recurs in Heavenly Cow 16, in an altogether
different syntactic environment, before a full noun. In this passage, the combination is motivated
by the sheer length of the phrase of which it is part, interrupted by an intervening dependent
clause: r irt=i r Sw (...) Hna itiw (...) – ist (...) – Hna gr (...) (full quotation: §4.6.4.1).

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 318 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

B. Heavenly Cow 234 (fully preserved only in S) reads (...) nt imiw=sn ‘(...) who are
in them’. Fecht332 has proposed that this be interpreted as a hybrid (‘Kreuzung’)
between recent nti-im(w) (> Coptic etmmau) and old imiw=sn. As Fecht further
observes, ‘proper’ Middle Egyptian would have had either imiw=sn, or ntiw im, not
ntiw im=sn.

4.6.5.2 Late features

Heavenly Cow accommodates a few recent expressions that unlike the ones initially
mentioned (§4.6.0) could provide some further indications for dating.
A. Heavenly Cow has an instance of a causative construction rDi NP Hr sDm:333

(i) Heavenly Cow 69-70

rD{t}.in Hm n nTr pn aA Hnsktt nty m iwnw Hr nD ddty ipn
‘The Majesty of this great god then caused the Curled one who is Heliopolis to
grind this ochre.’

In Middle Egyptian, syntactic causatives are with a (subjunctive) sDm=f (rDi sDm=f );
the construction is extraordinarily common. The construction rDi NP Hr sDm, for its
part, is documented in Ramesside times, if rarely.334
B. Heavenly Cow has an instance of a construction ib n N r sDm that upon closer
inspection may be indicative for dating:

(ii) Heavenly Cow 261-262

ir wnn ib n DHwti r Sd st Hr ra (...)
‘If Thot wants to recite this about Re (...)’

The construction ib=f r sDm335 is documented since the Middle Kingdom.336 What is
noteworthy in Heavenly Cow 261-262 is the syntax of the full noun DHwty, introduced
as a complement to ib (ib n DHwty). In the Middle Kingdom, a different syntax is
observed, with the full noun agent anticipated before ib:

(iii) P. UC 32205, 9-10

iw A bAk im [ib]=f r rx sxr nb n nb a.w.s (...)
‘This humble servant wants to know every condition of the lord, L.P.H. (...)’
In the Middle Kingdom, this is the only case of a construction ib=f r sDm with full
noun agent that I am aware of. The construction, however, is consistent with
aspects of the broader syntax of inalienable entities: in the Middle Kingdom and

332 In Hornung 1982: 126, n.kk.

333 Noted by Popko, TLA.
334 Wente 1967: 27, n.s; 1962: 126, n.b; Erman 19332: 210, §435.
335 Polis & Stauder in prep.
336 E.g. also in an hypothetical clause, Sinuhe B 125 ir wnn ib=f r aHA (...) ‘If he wants to fight (...)’.

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 319

later still, the possessor of an inalienable entity (such as a body port) is always
anticipated before that entity in subject-initial patterns.337

The genitival construction, as in Heavenly Cow 261-262 is common in the New

Kingdom.338 To my knowledge, its first occurrence is in a Second Intermediate Period
inscription:339

(iv) Seneferibre Senwosret IV’s Karnak Stela (late D.16?340), 1-2

[...] wnt? ib n Hm=f a.w.s. r irt mnw n imn ra [...]
‘[...] that(?) His Majesty L.P.H. wanted to make a monument for Amun-Re
[...]’

C. The beginning of Heavenly Cow 236 is corrupt, in some way or another. Of the
two scenarios sketched by Fecht,341 the first implies a recent Lautstand, while the
latter implies a hypercorrection. Either way, so argues Fecht, the implied underlying
original reading would be post-classical. I remain agnostic as to whether an indication
for dating can be here derived, or not.

4.6.6 Dating Heavenly Cow

A. Heavenly Cow includes a set of linguistic expressions that all convergently point
to an Eighteenth Dynasty date of composition. Among these, the use of a ‘narrative’
construction of the infinitive fully integrated into the narrative frame (130: §4.6.1.2) is
a very strong indication; so is the hybrid construction aHa.in rf tA m kkw (132: §4.6.2).
Weighty indications for the same dating are afforded by the distribution of ipn
demonstratives in context (passim: §4.6.3), a construction of ist (15: §4.6.4.1), and m-
xt introducing a simultaneous tense clause (2: §4.6.4.2). More weakly indicative, yet
significant as part of an overall tableau, are the distribution of narrative constructions
(§4.6.1, introduction), the hybrid construction of the conjunctive (211-213:
§4.6.5.1.A), one expression for ‘dawning’ (77-79: §4.6.1.1, (ii)), and some late
features (69-70 rDi NP Hr sDm: §4.6.5.2.A; 261-262 ib n N r sDm: §4.6.5.2.B).
Based on the above, Heavenly Cow can be declared an Eighteenth Dynasty
composition. A finer dating within the Eighteenth Dynasty is near impossible on
linguistic grounds.342 With due caution, simultaneous m-xt (§4.6.4.2) may suggest a
later rather than earlier period in the Eighteenth Dynasty.
B. A few closing remarks are due on the specific linguistic typology of Heavenly
Cow. The above dating was not based on late expressions: very few of these are found

337 E.g., among many other possible examples, Cheops’ Court 9.12 wn.in Hm=f ib=f wAw r Dwt Hr=s
‘His Majesty’s heart fell into a bad mood about it’ (also §2.4.4.6, (i)).
338 E.g. Urk. IV 181, 11; 181, 17; etc. Further references to be given in Polis & Stauder in prep.
339 Cheops’ Court 5.3-4 ib n Hm=k r qbb (...) ‘The heart of your Majesty will be cool (...)’ is a
different construction: (a) ib has full lexical value; (b) ib is clause-initial (see §2.4.4.5, (iii)).
340 According to Ryholt 1997: 157, 306.
341 In Hornung 1982: 126, n.ll.
342 Based on non-linguistic considerations, a dating to the reigns of Amenhotep III or Tutankhamun is
contemplated by Hornung 1982: 80-1.

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 320 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

in Heavenly Cow (§4.6.5.2.A-B) and none in isolation would have afforded an indica-
tion dense enough to support a claim on dating. Well into the Eighteenth Dynasty,
Heavenly Cow is still fully oriented on Middle Egyptian. Pars pro toto, the productive
use of N(P) sDm=f may be mentioned, expressing habitual aspect343 and as an
unmarked relative present tense.344 By classical strategies indexed on linguistic
change, the composition would be undatable.
Rather, the expressions discussed above have to do with written repertoires,
creative recompositions, functional redefinitions, and/or hybridity (§4.6.1.2; §4.6.2-4;
§4.6.5.1.A). That a great many such phenomena are observed in Heavenly Cow relates
to the particular contents and cultural siting of the composition. Literary texts proper
will not display similarly dense phenomena, nor are they therefore as easily datable as
Heavenly Cow is. In its linguistic typology, Heavenly Cow differs from all types of
texts discussed so far, literary and non-literary ones alike: the composition documents
yet another configuration of Middle Egyptian in the early New Kingdom.

4.6.7 Appendix: Lexical notes

Various lexical expressions in Heavenly Cow seem to be of late attestation only; some
of these carry more weight than others. These are noted here for the sake of a fuller
description of the linguistic typology of the composition: the actual dating was carried
out in the previous discussion on non-lexical grounds.
A. One word in Heavenly Cow deserves a special mention, because this is well
documented throughout Egyptian history, changed form over time, and has merited a
detailed lexicographical study:345

(i) Heavenly Cow 155 sdAdA ‘tremble’

In its original, shorter form, sdA ‘tremble’ is common since Pyramid Texts and
throughout the second millennium. The reduplicated form is first securely attested in
the Nineteenth Dynasty;346 in Ramesside times and all the more so in later ones, the
reduplicated form is increasingly the regular one (> stwt347). (Only one pre-New
Kingdom instance of a reduplicated form has been noted, as a textual variant in one
Coffin Text passage:348 the form, sAdd, is unlike later sdAdA of which it is hardly a
forerunner; the construction is also unexpectedly transitive349 and the reading

343 Heavenly Cow 192 aq=sn iw=i Hm(=i) ra nb ‘When they come in, I retreat daily’ (note the initial
setting and the quantifier); sim. 215 mk wi wbn=i n=sn ‘Behold, I rise for them.’
344 Heavenly Cow 34 mtn wi HHy=i n smA.n=i st r sDm.t{w}=i Dd.ti=tn r=s ‘Behold, I try, but I can
not kill them until I have heard what you are going to say about it.’
345 Jambon 2005: 34-58.
346 Jambon 2005: 41, table 1. One possible Eighteenth Dynasty instance (sdd, without semogram) is
uncertain: Jambon 2005: 41, n.a. For the singular sAdd in Coffin Texts, below.
347 Jambon 2005: 35.
348 Jambon 2005: 49, n.95; 50 and n.98. CT I 205f sAdd=k Axt mi ra ‘may you make the Akhet tremble
like Re’ (B12C, B17C, B16C; probably also B13C sAdd [...] and B14, without reduplication, sAd=k
Axt mi ra).
349 In itself, the causative meaning would not pose a problem as causatives of verbs with a first root
consonant s often have only one s in written representation (Schenkel 1999). See however the next
note.

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 4.6 Heavenly Cow 321

probably secondary.350) The rise of the reduplicated form in the New Kingdom is
analyzed as a process of refection on both the morphological and the graphic levels.351
The lack of pre-New Kingdom occurrences of sdAdA is therefore hardly a gap in the
record.

B. Among possible lexical indications, the following is noteworthy, since it involves

a word-play that is possible only under the more recent morphology of the two words
involved:352

(ii) Heavenly Cow 246-247

iw=i grt r rDt anan=k HAw-nbw
xpr anan pw n DHwti
‘ “I will also have you drive back (anan) the Hau-nebu.”
This is how the baboon (anan) of Thot came into being.’
Fully reduplicated anan ‘drive back’ is apparently attested only in the New
Kingdom,353 and contrasts with older an and ann. The second term of the word-
play, anan ‘baboon’, is very rare, and also contrasts with a shorter form, ian,
consistently used in older texts.354 Although the pattern of attestation of anan
‘drive back’ can not be fully assessed as to its reliability, it may therefore be
observed that anan is similar in meaning to another word from the same root, well
documented in earlier times. That anan in Heavenly Cow is part of a word-play
further implies that the recent morphology of the word (anan rather than an or ann)
is not be the product of some process of textual alteration. If the pattern of
attestation of anan ‘drive back’ is reliable, this implies that at least this etiology is
late, either as an addition to, or as an integral part of, the original composition.
The first possibility can not be excluded, since the etiology is here from the
second part of the overall text.

C. No similarly developed arguments can be made on the following expressions.

Among these, (iii) and (iv) are not entirely uncommon in general; (v) and (vi) are very
rare and their patterns of attestation are therefore impossible to assess as to their
reliability.

350 Similar assessment by Wolfgang Schenkel (p.c. 8/2013); the original reading seems to have been
the one documented in B10Cb and B10Cc sdA n=k Axt mi ra ‘may the Akhet tremble for you like
Re’, a common formulation. In accounting for how the reading in B12C, etc., may have arisen, the
n in the dative n=k could have been misread into a d in the hieratic; this d would then have been
secondarily placed before the semogram. This still leaves sAd (<s sA A d>) unaccounted for. (I thank
Wolfgang Schenkel for discussion of this passage.)
351 Jambon 2005: 46, 57.
352 On the etiology itself, Hornung 1982: 67, n.168.
353 The expression, noted as ‘nur nR’ in DZA 21.733.350, recurs in Duties of the Vizier R 11 and R 27
(discussion by van den Boorn 1998: 111-2; on the dating of Duties, §2.8.3.5), in Satirical Letter
13.2 (TLA #38290), in LEM 123.1 (DZA 21.733.410; interpreted differently in Wb. I 191.11; see
Dils, TLA, comment on Satirical Letter 13.2), and in Medinet Habu (DZA 21.733.380).
354 For Pyr. §1304a (PT 539), DZA 21.733.340 notes [a]nanw under ‘baboon’; this is to be read
differently, as [H]na nw ‘and Nu’ (Allen 2005: 169).

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 322 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

(iii) Heavenly Cow 19 Dri ‘firm, strong’

This word, which is not uncommon,355 is first securely attested in the New King-
dom.356

(iv) Heavenly Cow 60 (...) SAa-m nni-nsw ‘(...) from (as far as) Herakleopolis’
As SAa-n, the preposition occurs twice in late Twelfth Dynasty documentary registers
(Illahun); as SAa-r, it is found first in a Thirteenth Dynasty documentary register
(P. Bulaq XVIII) and remains limited in its distribution. As SAa-m, the preposition is
documented first in Thutmoside times, then in Amarna, post-Amarna, and early
Ramesside times;357 SAa-m is fairly common throughout the earlier half of the New
Kingdom (§2.7.3.3, (i)).

(v) Heavenly Cow 83 <n>hp ‘get up early in the morning’

The verb, which is rare at all times, may not be documented before the New
Kingdom,358 at least not with the meaning here relevant.359

(vi) Heavenly Cow 84 nfrw grH ‘the deep of the night’

The expression is apparently documented only in the New Kingdom.360

4.7 The Royal Cycle

The Royal Cycle, consisting in the Divine Birth, the Royal Youth, and the Procla-
mation as Regent, is first documented in Deir el-Bahari (Hatshepsut), then in Luxor
(Amenhotep III).361 The Cycle is often viewed as an Hatshepsutian composition, yet
dissenting opinions have been voiced.362
The motif of the divine birth recurs in Cheops’ Court, documented in a manuscript
that probably dates to the late Second Intermediate Period; linguistically, the
composition could be as early as the Thirteenth Dynasty (§2.4.4.1). In a visual mode
of expression, the motif is now documented in the causeway of Senwosret III’s

355 See TLA #184860.

356 ‘Belegt seit D.18’ according to DZA 31.678.260. A possibly earlier occurrence in
Khakheperreseneb vso 3 is subject to debate (see Dils, TLA), as is the dating of that composition
itself (not before the early Thirteenth Dynasty: §2.7).
357 See TLA #550077.
358 According to DZA 25.178.760, the word is ‘belegt D.18 bis Griech.’ An early occurrence is
Rekhmire 13 (Urk. IV 1075, 11).
359 TLA #85470 proposes to relate the word to nhp ‘lebensvoll sein’, which is of older attestation
(once in CT I 228d).
360 Wb. II 260.17; noted by Hornung 1982: 57, n.58.
361 Text: Urk. IV 215-62; for the Luxor version (Amenhotep III), Brunner 19862. The composition on
Chapelle Rouge, paralleled in Deir el-Bahari, is arguably part of the overall cycle; it was
extraposed for discussion above (§4.1.2).
362 E.g. Brunner 19862: 187, who favors a dating to a period before the Fourth Dynasty. According to
von Lieven 2007: 240, a dating to the time of Hatshepsut is ‘hinfällig’ and Divine Birth and Royal
Youth should be dated to the Old Kingdom.

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 4.7 The Royal Cycle 323

pyramid complex in Dahshur.363 That the motif is older than Hatshepsut is thereby
well established. Dating its textualization in the specific form first documented in Deir
el-Bahari is an altogether different issue, however: the composition may have drawn
on older motifs. The proclamation of royal names in Proclamation as Regent has also
been noted to find parallels in the fragmentary Late Twelfth Dynasty blocks Berlin
15801-15804. How specific these parallels are is disputed;364 no conclusions are
supported by what could well be a formulary.

4.7.1 Old Egyptian expressions

A. The Cycle includes a great many Old Egyptian expressions. When simply taken
note of, without further study, these expressions can be interpreted in two ways, either
as pointing to a genuinely old composition, or as reflecting archaizing practices:365

(a) Older form of a category

- Isk for isT: Urk. IV 219, 4; 228, 4; 260, 6; 260, 17; 261, 12.

(b) Older morphological categories

- Pw demonstratives: Urk. IV 221, 9; 257, 7-8; 257, 9;
- Ipn demonstratives: Urk. IV 237, 5; 257, 1;
- *wt/swt: Urk. IV 222, 10; 228, 9; 229, 12 (Twt); Urk. IV
221, 14; 257, 9; 257, 11; 257, 14; 257, 15; 257, 17;
258, 2 (swt).

(c) Syntax
- Is in a complement clause: Urk. IV 260, 6;
- %Dm.xr=f: Urk. IV 245, 16; 245, 17;
- N swt NP: Urk. IV 258, 2 (...) n swt nTr(t)=Tn sAt nTr ‘(...) for she
is your goddess, the daughter of a god’;
- NP sDm.t=f(y):366 Urk. IV 221, 14 (quoted below, C); 257, 17 (...) swt
Hm iw.t=f(y) Hr-a(wi) (...) ‘(...) he will come back at
once (...)’.

363 Oppenheim 2011.

364 Müller 2013 argues that the parallels are not as strong as sometimes assumed and mostly
phraseological in nature. Biston-Moulin 2012 (non vidi), on the other hand, finds at least one
specific detail in common between the Berlin blocks and the Deir el-Bahari text (Dimitri Laboury,
p.c. 1/2013).
365 Thus Brunner 19862: 175-6 (‘... ist methodisch ungewöhnlich schwierig’), and passim (for each
scene sub ‘Alterskriterien’). Von Lieven 2007: 240 refers to Brunner, but does not take up the
author’s methodological caveat and declares the composition ‘sprachlich altägyptisch’ without
further comment.
366 A very rare construction, see Gundacker 2012: 75-9; Doret 1989: 61; Edel 1955-1964: §950; Gunn
20122: 58-9.

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 324 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

All these expressions are paralleled, mostly directly, rarely indirectly, in later times, in
the Middle Kingdom or in the early Thutmoside period (below, B). More importantly,
the Old Egyptian expressions in the Cycle are only a selection of Old Egyptian,
strongly skewed toward such expressions that based on their outward form are
saliently old, i.e. easily recognized as such. Syntactic constructions in the Cycle (c) all
come with some distinctive element of form, immediately noted as such: there is no
case of an expression that would involve a matching of form and function specific to
Old Egyptian. All other Old Egyptian expressions in the Cycle have to do with
morphology (a)-(b): for these, their formal distinctiveness is quite literally immediate.
Such skewed selection does not define a cohesive Old Egyptian layer: the Cycle is
composed in Middle Egyptian, interspersed with high quantities of older expressions.
(Unsurprisingly, archaizing practices in the Cycle extend beyond grammar, to two
other dimensions in which the associated effects are naturally salient, the lexicon367
and orthography.368)
B. Identifying an archaizing intent does not in itself suffice for dating: without
further analysis, a text with archaizing features could have been composed at various
post-Old Kingdom times, such as in the Middle Kingdom or in the early New King-
dom. As it turns out, some of the above expressions are documented in archaizing use
in the Middle Kingdom:
- Pw demonstratives: Chapelle Blanche n°180 Srt=k Twsic nfrt ‘this beautiful
nose of yours’; alluding to such formulations, Sinuhe
B 237 fnd=k pw ‘this nose of yours’: see §4.1.2.B;
- Ipn demonstratives: Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela 12; also in Tod
Inscription 29, possibly dating to the Middle
Kingdom: see §4.6.3.A;
- *wt/swt: Chapelle Blanche n°170; 253; 259; Ptahhotep 398 L1:
see §6.3.1.1 and §6.3.1.2.A;
- %Dm.xr=f: Eloquent Peasant B1 219; Herwerre (temp.
Amenemhat III), 9: see §2.4.3.2, (i).

Only a subset of the Old Egyptian expressions in the Cycle can thus be paralleled as
archaizing features in Middle Kingdom texts. In addition, these parallels are dispersed
over a great variety of places: only one text, Chapelle Blanche, has two of the
archaizing expressions here relevant; in all other cases, the archaizing expression
remains isolated. No preserved Middle Kingdom text has anything that comes close to
the broad repertoire of Old Egyptian expressions in the Cycle.

367 For old expressions in the lexicon, Brunner 19862: passim, in each scene sub ‘Alterskriterien’.
368 Most remarkable is a singular spelling of the preposition mi with phonetic complementation by m
(Urk. IV 258, 1), typical of the Old Kingdom. Typical features of Old Egyptian orthography
further include the plural by triplication (e.g. Urk. IV 261, 3; 261, 13 rnw as <r n r n r n>), the full
complementation of xpr as <x p r xpr> (Urk. IV 245, 17; 261, 12) or the spelling of in
complemented by A27 (e.g. Urk. IV 245, 13; 260, 14; 261, 1). Also Brunner 19862: passim, in
each scene sub ‘Alterskriterien’.

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 4.7 The Royal Cycle 325

A rather different situation is observed in inscriptions for which a dating to

Hatshepsut is undisputed and in some related inscriptions of Thutmosis III:

- Isk for isT:

Hatshepsut: Urk. IV 346, 9; 347, 11 (Punt Expedition);
Thutmosis III: Karnak Building Inscription 1 (Urk. IV 157, 3);
Urk. IV 564, 2 (from a discourse by Amun about his
relationship to the king; Karnak);

- Pw demonstratives:
Hatshepsut: Chapelle Rouge, p.107: III.7 (HHBT II 11, 16); p.130:
VII.2 (HHBT II 23, 14);

- Ipn demonstratives:
Thutmosis III: Karnak Building Inscription 13 (Urk. IV 161, 4); 22
(Urk. IV 165, 7); 30 (Urk. IV 168, 12); Urk. IV 182, 8
(in another inscription by Thutmosis III in Karnak);

- *wt/swt:
Hatshepsut: Urk. IV 343, 10 (Punt Expedition) Twt;
also in Senemiah 18 (Urk. IV 503, 17: swt), a contem-
poraneous private inscription that, incidentally, explicitly
alludes to Punt Expedition (§6.3.1.1, and NB);

- Is in complement clauses:
Thutmosis III: Karnak Building Inscription 20 (Urk. IV 164, 5);
Is in complement clauses is not otherwise directly documented in
Hatshepsutian compositions; see however various other constructions with is
in the Hatshepsutian corpus, among which the strongly archaizing NP is in
similes: Northern Obelisk, Basis D 25 (Urk. IV 367, 6-7);369

- %Dm.xr=f:
Hatshepsut: Urk. IV 324, 6 (Punt Expedition: §4.2.1, (vi));
On wn.xr=f-headed constructions, common in texts of the times of
Hatshepsut and Thutmosis III: §4.1.2.C-D.
Further compare sDm.kA=f in Urk. IV 346, 16 Punt Expedition 18) and
Urk. IV 569, 10; 569, 12 (in a divine discourse; temp. Thutmosis III). On
wn.kA=f-headed constructions in Chapelle Rouge: §4.1.2.E.

369 Other constructions with is are also regularly used in the Middle Kingdom and therefore not
directly relevant to the present discussion. These include subordinating is as in Urk. IV 324, 12-14
(Punt Expedition: §4.2.1, (v)); Northern Obelisk, Basis D 9 (Urk. IV 363, 7). For is with modal
value in a main clause (also regularly in the Middle Kingdom), Chapelle Rouge, p.125: VI.8-11
(§4.2.1, (viii)).

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 326 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

The set of Old Egyptian expressions featured in the Cycle can thus be fully
paralleled370 as recurrently associated with each other in three texts that are very
concentrated in time: Chapelle Rouge, Punt Expedition, and Thutmosis III’s Karnak
Building Inscription. These expressions are not a general feature of Thutmoside
Middle Egyptian: except for ipn (a Sonderfall, for which see below, C), they are
mainly, or exclusively, found in the texts mentioned above in the Eighteenth Dynasty.
The selection of Old Egyptian expressions in the Cycle thereby appears as a coherent
repertoire, shared with other compositions contemporaneous with the inscription of
the Cycle in Deir el-Bahari. Of these, two are themselves inscribed in Deir el-Bahari
(Punt Expedition, as well as the D-version of the composition here referred to as
Chapelle Rouge). The cohesive nature of this repertoire is a strong argument to date
the Cycle to the specific horizon in written culture just evoked.
C. The analysis is confirmed when, beyond mere listing, the particular ways these
expressions are used in text are drawn into account. As it turns out, the Old Egyptian
expressions in the Cycle are used in specific ways, rather than on a general or regular
basis as would be the case in Old Egyptian itself. Moreover, the specific ways in
which they are used are directly paralleled in Punt Expedition, Chapelle Rouge, and
Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building Inscription. This is consistent with an analysis of
such uses as indexically over-determined:

- Isk for isT:

The construction in Urk. IV 219, 4 (§4.7.2, (i)) and 228, 4 (§4.7.2, (ii))—
which does not fit Middle Egyptian, nor Old Egyptian, syntax (§4.5.2;
§4.7.2.A)—is itself paralleled in Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building Inscription
(Urk. IV 157, 3: §4.5.2, (iv)).

- Pw demonstratives:
Pw demonstratives are used in the Cycle with nouns to do with kingship: Urk.
IV 221, 9 [ns]yt tw ‘this kingship’; Urk. IV 257, 9 xnd=i pw biA ‘this my
precious throne’; probably also Urk. IV 257, 7-8 st-ti=i tw ‘this my royal
representative’. The same correlation is observed in Chapelle Rouge, p.107:
III.7 tA pw ‘this land’; p.130: VII.2 nsw pw ‘this king’.
In Urk. IV 257, 9, the pw demonstrative is associated with an antiquated word,
xnd. In a similar fashion, the pw phrase is in Chapelle Rouge, p.107: III.7
associated with an extremely recherché verb, snbAbA (discussed above,
§4.1.2.B).

370 Only n swt NP and NP sDm.t=f(y) are not directly paralleled. The first is common while the second
is rare; both are associated with early funerary corpora (Pyramid Texts and Coffin Texts). These
were demonstrably cultivated by Hatshesput’s and Thutmosis III’s times (e.g. Dorman 1991)
Significantly, the association with funerary literature goes on in the early New Kingdom, with
occurrences of n swt NP in the Book of the Dead.

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 4.7 The Royal Cycle 327

- Ipn demonstratives:
Of the two instances of ipn demonstratives in the Cycle, one is Urk. IV 237, 5
mnw=T ipn ‘these monuments of yours’. This very same association recurs in
Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building Inscription 30 (Urk. IV 168, 12) sbAw ipn
‘these doors’. This is specific to the Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III horizon here
discussed.
NB 1. The other occurrence of ipn in the Cycle is according to a convention that
relates to the ‘Royal Tale’: Urk. IV 256, 17 - 257, 5 xpr [Hm]st nsw Ds=f m DAdw
n imi-wrt iw rmTw ipn Hr Xwt=sn m stp-sA sw Dd Hm=f xft=sn ‘Occurrence of a
throne session of the king himself in the audience hall of the Imi-weret-phyle.
These people were on their bellies in the palace. His Majesty speaks before them.’
Compare Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building Inscription 22 (Urk. IV 165, 7) smrw
ipn Dd=sn ‘These companions say’ (sim. Urk. IV 182, 8 smrw ipn [w]S[b=sn xr
Hm=f ] ‘These companions answer to His Majesty’). This correlation with the
Royal Tale is not specific to the Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III horizon here discussed:
it recurs in earlier and in later times as well, from Neferhotep’s Great Abydos
Stela 12 (mid-Thirteenth Dynasty) to Kuban Stela 23 (early Ramesside),
including in two other texts of the times of Thutmosis III, Gebel Barkal Stela 42
(Urk. IV 1241, 2) and Appointment of the Vizier 7; 8 (§4.6.3.B, (b)).
NB 2. A more general association with items of kingship is in Karnak Building
Inscription 13 (Urk. IV 161, 4) xaw=f ipn ‘these crowns of his’. One therefore
wonders whether the ipn demonstrative could here be functioning in a suppletive
paradigm with the pw demonstrative (above), as is also suggested by the fact that
pw demonstratives are only documented in singular forms. If this were the case,
such paradigm would readily be accounted for in terms of formal distinctiveness:
by definition, ipn demonstratives are formally distinct from Middle Egyptian
forms of the same series (pn, tn) only in the plural.

- *wt/swt:
Except for three cases in immediate succession to each other (Urk. IV 257, 14;
257, 15; 257, 17), Twt and swt are used in the Cycle in statements about
Hatshepsut claiming kingship, e.g. Urk. IV 221, 12 swt HqA.t=s(y) tAwy ‘She is
the one who will rule the Dual Land’; 229, 12 twt nsw itt xa Hr st Hr n anxw Dt
‘Thou are a king who seizes having risen on the seat of Horus of the living,
eternally.’ This directly compares with the one occurrence in Punt Expedition,
Urk. IV 343, 10 Twt nsw itt tAwy HAt-Spswt-Xnm-imn ‘Thou are the king who
seizes the Dual Land, Hatshepsut-Khenemamun.’

D. The composed nature of the language in the Cycle371 is also manifest in how
salient effects accumulate in some places, stretching grammar to its outmost, and in
some cases possibly beyond.372

371 In different terms, similar assessments on Hatshepsutian language more broadly are by Vernus
1990a: 65 (speaking of -xr-infixed constructions); Uljas 2007a: 283 (speaking of the uses of is in
the Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III horizon): ‘(...) it experienced a brief revival (...) it appears to have

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 328 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

(i) Urk. IV 257, 5-9 (Proclamation as Regent)

sw Dd Hm=f (...)
swt Hm pw Hms=s Hr xnd=i pw biA
‘His Majesty says: “(...)
It is however so that she is the one who will sit down on this precious
throne.” ’
%w sDm N—whatever its status (§4.7.3)—is a construction that is saliently
different from regular Thutmoside inscriptional Middle Egyptian. The following
clause combines two Old Egyptian morphological categories (swt; pw) and one
antiquated word (xnd). Beyond archaizing effects, the thoroughly recherché
nature of the formulation is also manifest in the contorted construction: a cleft-
sentence is here combined with Hm and additionally made thetic by another pw
(swt Hm pw (...)).

(ii) Urk. IV 243, 7 (Royal Youth)

sw swt rD mA s(i) nTrw nbw Smaw mHw
‘He makes the gods, the lords of Upper and Lower Egypt, see her.’
Apparently a combination of a sw sDm construction with the Old Egyptian
pronoun swt (adversative swt is unlikely in context); alternatively, a cleft-sentence
with swt as its subject and preceded by sw functioning as a particle. Either way, a
sw-headed construction of some sort is involved, which—again, independently of
however this is to be analyzed—is in itself remarkable and this sw-headed
construction is, somehow, combined with swt, in what is almost a grammatical
pun.

(iii) Urk. IV 260, 6 (Proclamation as Regent)

isk sn rxw i[...]a sAt nTr is pw
‘For they knew it was a divine daughter.’
a) The interpretation of the read-leaf before the lacuna is unclear. Sethe’s suggestion to read
as i[w] is ungrammatical, as noted by Sethe himself. Oréal suggested to read i[s], and
provided a semantic analysis under which this could be possible.373 Whether this would fit
the length of the lacuna can not be assessed further based on the text in Urkunden.

been employed as a conscious archaism with a particularly elevated flavour, and it seems, not
always correctly’; Oréal 2011: passim (in the sections devoted to developments in early Égyptien
de tradition).
372 The phenomenon extends to orthography, where an eloquent illustration is afforded by spellings of
in complemented by A27. These are documented in the Old Kingdom, then occasionally as
archaisms in the Middle Kingdom (e.g. on the pyramidion of Amenemhat III), then fairly
commonly in Thutmoside times. Remarkably, this type of spelling is then extended to forms of the
sDm.in=f, with which it was never found in the Old Kingdom itself; e.g. (only examples that can
not be interpreted as infinitives followed by in are given): Urk. IV 255, 11 (Dd.in n=s Hm=f); 256,
9 (D.in Hm=i); 259, 4 (sn.in=sn); 259, 7 (pr.in=sn); 259, 12 (iw.in=sn); 261, 1 (nDm.in ib); 261, 11
(mAT.in=sn). The phenomenon recurs e.g. in Chapelle Rouge, p.141: X.1 (wn.in=s).
373 Oréal 2011: 164.

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 4.7 The Royal Cycle 329

The combination of isk (in its archaizing form) with the etymologically related is
in the same sentence is remarkable.374 If Oréal’s reading is correct, the passage
would be even more virtuosic, with yet another instance of is (isk – is? – is).

4.7.2 Further elements of Thutmoside Middle Egyptian

A. In two places, Divine Birth has isT-introduced clauses depending on a preceding

clause. As discussed, the construction is an innovation of the written language of the
early Eighteenth Dynasty (§4.5.2):

(i) Urk. IV 218, 17 - 219, 5 (Thot’s response to Amun)

Hwnt Tna (...) iaH-ms rn=s nfr s(i) r Hmt nbt ntt m tA pn r-Dr=f
Hmt ity pw nsw bity aA-xpr-kA-ra D-anx Dt
isk Hm=f m inpw
Hw sDA[...] rn=s
‘This young lady (...), Iahmes by name, she is more beautiful than any woman
in this whole land.
She is the wife of the sovereign, the King of Upper and Lower Egypt
Aakheperkare, given-life forever,
while His Majesty is still a royal child.
May [...] proceed [...] her name.’
a) Sic. The hypercorrection recurs elsewhere in the early Eighteenth Dynasty,375 and at other
periods.

The isT-headed clause can not be related to the following clause (introduced by
Hw), and must therefore depend on the preceding one.

(ii) Urk. IV 228, 1-4 (Hathor presents Amun with the child)
ii.n nTr pn Sps r mAA sAt=f mrt=f nsw bity mAat-kA-ra anx.ti m-xt ms=s
isk ib=f nDm r aAt wrt
‘This august god has come to see his beloved daughter, the King of Upper and
Lower Egypt Maatkare, may she live, after she was born,
his heart being extraordinarily delighted.’
The isT-headed clause, at the end of a caption, can not relate to a following
segment of discourse, because there is none.

B. Divine Birth has one instance of fronted m-xt nn:

(iii) Urk. IV 221, 5 (Divine Birth)

m-xt nn ir.n Hm n nTr pn mrt.n=f nbt Hna=s
‘After this, the Majesty of this god did all he desired with her.’

374 Noted by Oréal 2011: 164.

375 Examples: Stauder 2013: §9.4, n.290.

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 330 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

Although this was no doubt grammatically possible in earlier times, the expression is
not attested as such before the early New Kingdom, when it is fairly common in
inscriptional texts (§4.1.2.D and §4.3.3, where fronted m-xt nn was discussed in the
more specific combination with a ‘narrative’ infinitive). This seems to be a distinctive
feature of Thutmoside Middle Egyptian in some, mostly inscriptional, written
registers.
C. The Cycle has one instance of the rare construction m-xt + sDm(w)-passive:
(iv) Urk. IV 228, 3 (Divine Birth)
(...) m-xt ms=s
‘(...) after she was born’
The construction is not documented before the New Kingdom.376 In earlier times,
m-xt NP pseudoparticiple is consistently used instead.377 That subject –
pseudoparticiple should follow m-xt, and among all prepositions only m-xt, is
accounted for in relation to the resultative semantics of the pseudoparticiple, as
these accord with the meaning of m-xt. As to m-xt + sDm(w)-passive, this is
paralleled in three places: Urk. IV 978, 15 (from the tomb of Min of This; temp.
Thutmosis III/Amenhotep II); Amenhotep II’s Sphinx Stela 23 (Urk. IV 1282, 13);
Statue of the High Steward Amenhotep (temp. Amenhotep III), 18 (Urk. IV 1795,
18).378 Taking into account the fact that another construction was consistently
used for the same function in earlier times and that the sDm(w)-passive was
gradually losing in productivity in the early New Kingdom, this textual distribu-
tion of m-xt + sDm(w)-passive suggests that the construction is a Thutmoside
reconfiguration.
NB. In one place, Divine Birth has what superficially looks like a cleft-sentence with
a relative form: Urk. IV 228, 9379 Twt (w)d.n=i sAt(=i) aSAw rnpwt (...) ‘You are the
one I have placed, my daughter with abundant years (...)’ Such construction is not
otherwise documented in Old or Middle Egyptian.380 This falls much short, however,
of what would be required for declaring it an Hatshepsutian innovation.381

376 EG §423.3; Edel 1955-1964: §566.

377 Lastly Uljas 2007a: 261-2.
378 The first two of these have been noted by Uljas 2007a: 261, n.115, the last in EG §423.3.
379 Noted by Brunner 19862: 110.
380 Ptahhotep 173 and 483, mentioned by Gunn 20122: 59.6 as instances of this construction, are to be
intepreted differently (Junge 2003: 220-1, 255). So is Urk. IV 1111, 4-6, also mentioned by Gunn.
The only parallel left to stand is then Urk. IV 446, 1 (from a prayer by Djehuti) ink mr.n=k ‘I am
one whom you loved.’ This may or may not relate grammatically to the construction ink mr=f on
which it is modelled phraseologically (on ink mr=f, Borghouts 1994).
381 Certainly not indications for dating are the following two constructions, contra Stauder 2013: §4.2
(written in 2009). (a) Urk. IV 259, 14-15 sDr sDr im wp m rn=f mnfAt mnfAt Hr [...] ‘Each chamber
therein was divided according to its name, every troop was [...]’. Iteration for expressing
distributivity (Daumas 1975-1976; Erman 19284: §502) is in fact documented in early times, in
Pyr. §25cNa,Nb ip Tw Hr rnp rnp (...) ‘May Horus count you year after year (...)’ (Pyr. §991cPN, noted
by Edel 1955-1964: §991, is different, see Allen 2005: 126). (b) iw in Urk. IV 257, 2, erroneously
analyzed as signaling dependency in Stauder 2013: §4.2, only serves to connect the clause it
introduces to the preceding infinitive construction (xpr Hmst nsw (...)); once correctly analyzed this

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 4.7 The Royal Cycle 331

4.7.3 %w-headed constructions in the Royal Cycle

A. The Cycle includes various instances of the notoriously controversial sw-headed

constructions:382

(i) Urk. IV 218, 15 (Divine Birth)

sw Sm DHwti [...] n [...]
‘Thot goes [...] to(?) [...]’

(ii) Urk. IV 219, 13 - 220, 1 (Divine Birth)

(...) rs.n=s Hr sti nTr sbT[=s] xft Hm=f
sw Sm=f a xr=s Hr-a
sw HAd=f b r=s
sw rD ib=f r=s
sw rD mA=s sw [m] irw=f n nTr (...)
‘(...) She (scil. queen Ahmes) woke up to the scent of the god, laughing before
His Majesty.
He goes to her at once,
he becomes inflamed at her.
He sets his heart against her,
he causes her to see him in his divine form (...)’
a) The Luxor version (Amenhotep III) has sw Sm.
b) The Luxor version has HAd=f, without sw.

(iii) Urk. IV 243, 7 (Royal Youth)

sw swt rD mA s(i) nTrw nbw Smaw mHw
‘He makes the gods, the lords of Upper and Lower Egypt, see her.’

(iv) Urk. IV 257, 5 (Proclamation as Regent)

sw Dd Hm=f xft=sn
‘His Majesty says before them:’

Not from the Cycle, but related to it by time of inscription, the following
instance—the only other one in any inscriptionally published text in the New
Kingdom—is worth quoting as well:

way, the construction is not any distinctive (compare e.g. Sinuhe R 8 and in Kamose Inscriptions
St.II 32: §1.3.3.2, (xiv)).
382 Main discussions of these constructions: Werning 2013: #33; Roberson 2010; Jansen-Winkeln
2004: 219-23. Further comments notably by Roberson 2013: 124; 2012: 105-11; von Lieven 2007:
276-8; Manassa 2007: 49, 307; Darnell 2004: 464; Quack 2000b: 548-9; Zeidler 1999: I, 151-2,
201-4; Baumann 1998: 158-9. Previous discussions: Barta 1985: 101-3; Brunner 19862 (19641):
171-3; Grapow 1935: 48-52; EG §424. On the early history of the discussion, Brunner 19862: 174.

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 332 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

(v) Urk. IV 776, 5 (Thutmosis III’s Jardin Botanique)

swa Hm=f Dd=f
‘His Majesty says:’
a) The editors of Urk. IV mark this with a ‘so’, probably to suggest that this may have been
verlesen from a iw. In view of the above collection of contemporaneous instances of the
construction, there is no reason that sw should not be original. Compare in particular (iv).

Unlike for other expressions discussed in the present study, the following comments
are presented as provisional only, pending a fuller study of what remains an
insufficiently understood matter.
B. %w-headed constructions recur in various forms and in varying frequencies in texts
such as Amduat, Book of Gates, Book of Caverns, Litany of the Sun, Book of the
Earth, Grundriss des Laufes der Sterne (/Book of Nut), Treatise of Memphite
Theology (incomplete listing).383 As this textual distribution implies, the constructions
had a restricted currency: they did not belong to regular written registers, lower or
higher ones, of any time. Moreover, sw-headed constructions are a phenomenon of
written language only, necessarily to be analyzed at this level.
%w-headed constructions come in diverse variants (some of which illustrated
above in the small Hatshepsutian subset thereof), a variety that points to successive
stages of ‘reanalysis’. In view of the above, ‘reanalysis’ is here understood on the sole
level of written language itself. That sw-headed constructions underwent various
processes of reanalysis does not afford an indication for dating: such processes could
have occurred at various moments in time, early or late. As the processes did not
occur in ongoing language change as determined by social interaction, they need not
imply any duration over time: various stages of written reanalysis, in text, may or may
not have been simultaneous with each other.
%w-headed constructions are documented in fairly high numbers (more than
hundred and fifty occurrences have been noted), but never in any copy of any text
before the New Kingdom.384 The dating of the original composition of several of the
texts in which they are found itself remains a matter of continued contention.385 Low
datings are increasingly favored in recent studies, notably in linguistically oriented
ones,386 but the question—in fact a series of individual questions—is not settled yet.

383 For a full table of occurrences, Roberson 2010: 187, with adjustments by Werning 2013: #33.
384 The two alleged Coffin Text instances occasionally mentioned in discussions of sw-headed
constructions (e.g. Roberson 2010: 186-8) are to be interpreted differently: §3.4.1.2.A.
385 According to Quack (2000b: 552, 558-9) and von Lieven (2007: 278), several of these texts would
date to the Old Kingdom on linguistic grounds. That no such conclusions can be derived is
discussed by Werning 2013 (all texts) and Jansen-Winkeln 2012 (for Amduat specifically, but with
wider relevance for method); see also Klotz 2010: 489-90 (for Grundriss des Laufes der Sterne)
and above, §4.7.1 (for the Royal Cycle). For an introduction, lastly Roberson 2013: 122-4, with
references to the main positions and approaches in contention.
386 Book of Caverns, early Ramesside according to Werning 2011; Book of the Earth, New Kingdom
according to Roberson 2012; Book of Gates, New Kingdom according to Zeidler 1999 (disputed by
Quack 2000b, on grounds, however, that have now themselves been disputed: see the previous
note); Amduat and Litany of the Sun, early New Kingdom at least in their final wording according
to Werning 2013; Treatise of Memphite Theology, Ethiopian according to el-Hawary 2010 (based

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 4.7 The Royal Cycle 333

In addition, the restricted nature of the construction is of importance, because it could

be one reason for the lack of any pre-New Kingdom occurrences in the now preserved
record. In short, the effective documentation of the construction—from the early New
Kingdom on, then in high numbers—is an element in the discussion,387 not to be
looked away from, but does not in itself afford a sufficient indication for dating the
rise of the construction.
C. The lever for a possible interpretation then lies in the observation that sw-headed
constructions can not be explained in Earlier Egyptian grammar of any period. Some
of the sw-headed constructions involve what seems to be an initial subject pronoun
sw, which does not otherwise exist in Earlier Egyptian. Other ones involve what
seems to be based on an initial ‘particle’ sw, which does not exist in Earlier Egyptian
either. A ‘particle’ sw can not be derived from the Earlier Egyptian particle swt: the
latter has adversative and/or argumentative force and comes in second position in the
clause; the former lacks any trace of such semantics and comes in first position in the
clause. An initial subject pronoun sw can not be derived internally to Earlier Egyptian
either: the Old Egyptian independent pronoun swt would at first seem to lend itself to
such a derivation, but this scenario would pose various problems, semantic and
formal.388
In the relevant periods of Egyptian language history, there seems to be only one
expression that could be underlying the initial development of sw-headed construc-
tions, the new subject pronoun sw. A construction such as sw sDm=f would then be
described as N(P) sDm=f with a subject pronoun sw (in lieu of iw=f ). Alternatively,
but equivalently, sw sDm=f could be described as a formal hybrid, conflating two
types of present tense constructions, sw Hr sDm, a late construction, and N(P) sDm=f, a
much earlier one. That N(P) sDm=f should be involved would not be surprising in the
case of so-called ‘Netherworld Books’ at least, as these generally avoid NP Hr sDm.389
In text, sw sDm=f often seems to be tenseless, deriving its temporal interpretation
from the context (thus in Urk. IV 219, 15-16: (ii)): this is consistent with the analysis

on grounds other than linguistic; also including a full history of the past discussions which have
been intense with this particular text: 92-111). A useful entry to the the discussion is to be found in
Werning 2013 and Jansen-Winkeln 2012, both with extensive references also to contrary opinions.
387 See also Roberson’s (2010) presentation.
388 One could thus speculate on a scenario such as swt sDm > sw sDm > sw sDm=f, where the point of
departure would be a regular cleft-sentence, the second stage the same construction with swt
shortened to sw, and the third stage a reanalysis, once a clause-initial pronoun sw had developed in
the second stage. The scenario is highly unlikely, however, because there is no reason why swt
should be shortened in the first place: the process is documented, but only as an occasional textual
slip, not in a way that could provide a basis for an entirely new construction to emerge. In addition,
sw sDm does not seem to ever have focal semantics, as would be expected under such scenario. A
further problem is how the second stage would lead to the third: sw sDm does hardly have any
formal features in common with iw=f sDm=f that could have triggered a reanalysis along such
lines. An altogether different scenario could consist in viewing the origin of sw in a Verlesung
from iw, which may have happened at any time; that a scribal slip, occasional and singular, could
have led to the rise of a new construction is very unlikely, however.
389 An often-noted phenomenon: Werning 2013: #31; Quack 2000b: 548; Zeidler 1999: I, 207-8;
Baumann 1998: 447. This is probably best interpreted in relation to the tensing of these
compositions, in which progressive aspect is hardly ever expected to be called for.

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 334 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

here developed. Formal hybrids of the type hypothesized are otherwise documented in
some of the very same texts that have sw-headed constructions.390
A construction [sw sDm=f ] (subject – sDm=f ) could then have been reanalyzed as
[sw] [sDm=f ] (sw – sDm – subject), thereby leading to the rise of a ‘particle’ sw. This
type of reanalysis is made likely by alternations such as between sw sDm N (as in Urk.
IV 218, 15; 257, 5: (i) and (iv)) and sw N sDm=f (as in Urk. IV 776, 5: (v)), apparently
with similar function. From a construction sw sDm=f, a construction sw sDm (Urk. IV
219, 17; 220, 1; 243, 7: (ii) and (iii)) could also have be derived, with sw the subject
of a structure formally analogous to—although functionally disimilar from391—a
cleft-sentence. Alternatively, or complementarily, sw sDm could have been derived by
(improper) extension of a subject – pseudoparticiple construction (as in sw Sm in the
Luxor version of Urk. IV 219, 17: (ii)). Such possible pathways are here only meant
to suggest the kind of processes of constructional reinterpretation that may have been
at play in written language: pending a fuller study, any details presently remain
hypothetical.
D. It has been claimed that a scenario including the new subject pronoun sw is
unlikely a priori, because sw-headed constructions are found only in very specific and
invariably high written registers, while the new subject pronoun was still an
innovative expression by the Hatshepsutian times when sw-headed constructions are
first documented in the record.392 This, however, implies a narrowly morphological
view, concerned with individual items, not with how these may have been perceived
in their constructional contexts. The new subject pronoun sw is a distinctively
innovative feature only when used in the constructional environments that are proper
to it in regular performance, NP Hr sDm, subject – pseudoparticiple, and situational
predicate constructions. As an element of form, sw is not any distinctively late, since
Earlier Egyptian also has a pronoun sw (the dependent pronoun). When sw is
combined with N(P) sDm=f into a sw sDm=f construction, the resulting construction is
not any ‘recent-looking’.393 The construction does not exist other than in specific,

390 An eloquent case in point is afforded by pn NP (Werning 2013: #27, from whom I take the
following analysis). Pn NP is documented in Pyramid Texts, but is there balanced with pf NP. In
non-balanced pn NP, as in some of the ‘Netherworld Books’ and related compositions, the
preposed demonstrative has deicitic functions similar to pA; the construction is therefore best
analyzed as a linguistic dissimilation (or incomplete ‘back-translation’) from an underlying pA NP.
The result is a hybrid.
391 The cleft-like constructions both in Urk. IV 219, 17 - 220, 1 and in Urk. IV 243, 7 do not seem to
have any particular constituant focusing semantics. Nor do they seem to be specifically marked for
past tense, the outward written morphology of rD in all three cases notwithstanding.
392 Brunner 19862: 175. (The author’s assessment of sw as belonging to the ‘noch nicht einmal
schriftfähige Umgangssprache’ is contradicted by the effective attestation of the new subject
pronoun in written registers since the late Seventeenth Dynasty, and, if still on an occasionnal basis
only, in higher written registers no later than by the times of Thutmosis III: §3.4.1.3).
393 Incidentally, such scenario could also account for why the construction is limited to the third
person (singular and plural): the first and second person forms of the new subject pronoun are
highly distinctive in form (tw=i, etc.). Different, but not entirely unrelated and possibly
compatible, is the scenario proposed by Werning 2013: #33. (Both types of accounts would be
complementary to another reason for the observed distribution, which is obviously to do with the
fact that in the types of texts here considered the construction will naturally come to order with
third person subjects in most cases).

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 4.7 The Royal Cycle 335

highly restricted, written registers. Moreover, the construction to which sw sDm=f

comes closest, N(P) sDm=f, has itself become a token of high registers in the early
New Kingdom (§2.6.3).
Rather, the resulting sw sDm=f—which has no kin in any early Eighteenth
Dynasty innovative registers, nor in regular higher ones of the same time, nor in any
Middle Kingdom ones documented for that period—seems to have had much of its
value in its formal ‘otherness’. Similar phenomena are documented in other languages
with long and complex written traditions.394 The analysis is consistent with the highly
restricted nature of the construction initially observed, mostly confined to composi-
tions of esoteric circulation.

4.7.4 Dating the Royal Cycle

A. The expressions discussed last, sw-headed constructions (§4.7.3), remain incom-

pletely analyzed. Pending further study, I therefore renounce basing a dating of the
Cycle on these constructions. Other constructions, however, are sufficiently clear in
interpretation for doing so.
Three constructions in the Cycle—isT-headed clause after the clause it depends on;
fronted m-xt nn; m-xt sDm(w)-passive—are distinctive of Thutmoside Middle
Egyptian (§4.7.2). Each of these individually affords a strong indication for dating the
Cycle to Thutmoside times. Their joint occurrence in the Cycle is all the more
eloquent.
The great many Old Egyptian expressions in the Cycle (§4.7.1) are a selection of
mostly formally salient expressions, not a cohesive Old Egyptian layer. While some
are paralleled individually in the Twelfth Dynasty, the same set of expression recurs
grouped only in Chapelle Rouge, Punt Expedition, and Thutmosis III’s Karnak
Building Inscription. The Old Egyptian expressions in the Cycle thereby appear to
form a specific repertoire, otherwise documented by the very time when the Cycle
was inscribed in Deir el-Bahari, and only then as a repertoire. As further analysis
demonstrates, these expressions are subjected to specific uses, indexically determined;
the very same associations are observed in the three other texts that share the
repertoire with the Cycle, and, again, only in these. This configuration provides a
direct argument to rule out a dating to the Old Kingdom, one to the Middle Kingdom,
and one to any period other than the times of Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III themselves.
B. In its linguistic typology, the Royal Cycle is based on Middle Egyptian, the high
variety of the early Eighteenth Dynasty. The Middle Egyptian in the Cycle includes a
few expressions that are typical of Thutmoside Middle Egyptian, none of which to do
with innovations that were ocurring in lower registers by the same time (§4.7.2). As
for the Old Egyptian expressions that abound in the composition (§4.7.1), the intent is
not to imitate Old Egyptian in such ways that the resulting phenomenology could be
mistaken for a genuinely old one. Rather, a claimed relationship with an age-old
tradition is indexed on the level of a set of individual expressions. The repertoire these

394 The Standard Babylonian variety of Akkadian, for instance, has some purely textual forms which
also derived much of their value from their sheer formal ‘otherness’ (Kouwenberg 2005).

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 336 4 Direct dating: Targeting specific configurations in written language

expressions form is recomposed, unique to a certain cultural constellation, and a

genuinely innovative experiment.
Alongside other compositions discussed in the present chapter, the Royal Cycle is
yet another token of the richly varied configurations of Middle Egyptian in the early
New Kingdom. In the reign of Hatshepsut herself, the composed language of the
Cycle differs for example from the very pure Middle Egyptian cultivated in Speos
Artemidos.

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 5 NEFERTI

For a narrow dating ‘by squeezing’ to be possible, a composition must happen to in-
clude expressions that have demonstrably been innovated in relevant written registers
at a time shortly prior to the first manuscript documentation of that composition. As
discussed, this requires very favorable circumstances, some to do with the conditions
under which the primary study of linguistic change can be conducted, some to do with
the contents and register of the composition to be dated; these conditions are only
seldom met simultaneously (§3). For a narrow dating ‘by direct dating’ to be possible,
a composition must include expressions that can be related to a definite cultural
horizon in the configuration of written language. As also discussed, this is contingent
upon highly specific contents and modes of expression of individual compositions,
and is only limitedly possible in literary registers (§4). In either case, therefore, the
possibility for a narrow dating remains a matter of favorable circumstances. When
these are not given, only a broader chronological range for dating can be defined on
strong linguistic grounds. Technically, the strategy is the same as for a narrow dating
‘by squeezing’ except that reliable upper and lower chronological bounds can not be
made to come as close to each other as under more favorable circumstances; an
illustration of this situation was provided above (Khakheperreseneb: §2.7).
The present chapter is devoted to a discussion of the linguistic typology of one
major composition for which only a broader range for dating can be defined on strong
linguistic grounds, Neferti. In the course of the discussion, I also introduce two
important dating criteria, the first concerning Neferti specifically (§5.2), the second of
broader application (§5.3). Various indications possibly supporting a narrower dating
of Neferti are discussed in turn (§5.5-6).

5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option?

Neferti is first documented by the mid-Eighteenth Dynasty.1 The main witness,

P. Petersburg 1116 B vso (= Pet.), which preserves the complete composition, has
accounts dating to the reign of Amenhotep II on its recto; the copy of the literary
composition on the verso may have been slightly later, but not much.2 From roughly
the same period are two writing boards: T. Cairo 25224 (= C25224), which preserves

1 Text: Helck 19922; additional witnesses mentioned by Mathieu 1993: 343, n.43.
2 Gnirs 2006: 254 and n.262, with references.

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 338 5 Neferti

the second half of the text (8a-15g),3 and T. BM EA 5647, with an excerpt of the
prologue (2a-h).4 Early witnesses of Neferti now also include three graffiti inscribed
in the tomb Assiut N13.1 (graffito 6a: 1a-3i (fragm.); graffito 6b: 6a-7a (fragm.);
graffito 6c: ?-?).5 The presence of the composition on excerpts implies some time for
prior circulation.6 As Hymn to Hapi demonstrates, this need not have been long.

5.1.1 Introduction

Neferti, a much discussed text,7 has commonly been dated to the early Twelfth
Dynasty,8 with only very few dissenting voices suggesting later periods, the Second
Intermediate Period9 and the early Eighteenth Dynasty.10 The early Twelfth Dynasty
dating is thereby distinguished in the modern tradition of interpretation and a
preliminary discussion of the possible evidence for this early dating is required. The
aim of the present section is not to argue for, or against, one dating or another, but
only to assess whether one option is distinguished as inherently more likely than other
ones.
The classical dating of Neferti to the early Twelfth Dynasty is based on a set of
observations that can be summarized as follows:
(a) ‘Ameny’ (imny, 13a) is interpreted as referring to Amenemhat I, the found
of a new dynasty. This interpretation is considered to find strong support in a
mention of the ‘Walls of the Ruler’ (inbw HqA, 15a), which recurs only in
Sinuhe (B 17).
(b) Neferti, telling of the advent of a new king, could have been intended to
eulogize Amenemhat I, and thereby the Dynasty newly founded, for broadly
contemporaneous audiences.
(c) In Ramesside times, Neferti was cultivated as a Middle Egyptian classic
alongside other works, some of which demonstrably date to the Twelfth Dy-
nasty (e.g., again, Sinuhe itself). ‘Neferti’ was then paired with ‘Kheti’ in the
Eulogy of Dead Writers (P. Chester Beatty IV vso). Earlier in the New King-
dom, Neferti features in Assiut alongside other Middle Egyptian literary
compositions, also documented as classics in Ramesside times.
(d) In its intertext and expression, Neferti belongs to a Middle Egyptian
literary tradition that includes Eloquent Peasant, Khakheperreseneb, and
Ipuwer, notably. Some stock formulations and motifs in the prologue recur in

3 ‘Mitte 18. Dyn.’ according to Helck 19922: 3.

4 ‘18. Dyn.’ according to Helck 19922: 3.
5 Verhoeven 2013: §4; 2010: 196.
6 The problem is outlined in Parkinson 2002: 46 (addressing a different issue, the presence of
literary texts in Lahun, but with broader relevance); similarly Verhoeven 2013: §5, fine.
7 For studies of Neferti, see Parkinson 2002: 304; among major studies that have appeared since:
Gnirs 2006; Pérez-Accino 2008; Giewekemeyer 2013.
8 Posener 1956: 21-60, defining a tradition of interpretation subsequently embraced by many.
9 Morenz 1996: 109-10 (Second Intermediate Period); Ryholt 1990: 109 (early Thirteenth Dynasty,
cautiously); Raue 2010 (mid-Thirteenth – early Eighteenth Dynasty).
10 Gnirs 2006: 243-53.

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 5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? 339

Eloquent Peasant, in Kagemni, and in Cheops’ Court. The reference to

‘perfect words’ (mdwt nfrt) recurs in Ptahhotep, notably, and a thematization
of the en-textualization of the work as found in Neferti is also central to
Eloquent Peasant.
(e) Neferti is composed in Middle Egyptian, as are other works belonging to
the Middle Egyptian literary tradition. In addition, a narrow dating to the early
Twelfth Dynasty specifically has been proposed to find linguistic support.11

5.1.2 A dating to the early Twelfth Dynasty? Possible historical references

and interpretive frames

Possible historical references in Neferti—‘Ameny’ (imny, 13a) and the ‘Walls of the
Ruler’ (inbw HqA, 15a)—have been interpreted as convergently pointing to an early
Twelfth Dynasty horizon. Such dating is also considered supported by what would
have been one function of Neferti, as a piece of advocacy for the kings of the newly
founded Dynasty.

5.1.2.1 ‘Ameny’ (13a)

The reference in ‘Ameny’ is multi-layered, as is the whole composition. The name
imny allies the king with the creator god (the ‘hidden one’), as do various mythical
aspects alluded to in the composition.12 In addition, the name imny probably alludes to
Menes (mni), the founder of Egyptian monarchy itself, and thereby to the culturally
constructed time of chaos before the institution of the unified monarchy.13 The advent
of a new king and the restoration of order after chaos are major cultural themes, here
addressed in paradigmatic terms.
It remains possible, of course, that referents of ‘Ameny’ simultaneously included
an historically specific one. Even if this were the case, the identification of that
possible historical referent as Amenemhat I is altogether uncertain, both at the level of
the originally intended reference, and of how (groups of) ancient readers may have
read the text;14 in particular, various later Amenemhat’s could then be candidates.15
Even if it is additionally hypothesized that ‘Ameny’ included Amenemhat I among its
intended referents, this need not imply a dating into, or close to, that reign itself: the
eulogy may just as well have ‘glorified [Amenemhat] as a dynastic ancestor rather
than as a contemporaneous ruler.’16 A reference to Amenemhat I as a founding figure

11 Vernus 1990a: 185; 1990b: 1037.

12 E.g. Parkinson 2002: 196-8; Gnirs 2006: 252-3.
13 Originally Assmann 1991: 275 (paper written in 1983); subsequently Franke 1994: 8; Pérez-
Accino 2008; Giewekemeyer 2013: §5.1.
14 Giewekemeyer 2013: §3.4, §5.1. Although identifying Ameny with Amenemhat I, Parkinson
(2002: 197-8) phrases in ways that are significant as well: ‘(...) the naming (...) also blurs his
historical identity. The obliqueness of the naming is striking in a context that generates
expectations of a direct eulogy.’
15 Ryholt (1990: 109) cautiously suggests an identification with Amenemhat V, or possibly
Amenemhat IV or III. See also Quirke (2004a: 135): ‘king Ameny, possibly one or all of the four
kings of the Twelfth Dynasty named Amenemhat, or a king of the Thirteenth Dynasty’.
16 Parkinson 2002: 304.

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 340 5 Neferti

would have been relevant in the later Twelfth and Thirteenth Dynasties,17 as it could
have been, in different ways, in the early New Kingdom.18

5.1.2.2 The ‘Walls of the Ruler’ (15a)

Among the above options, an interpretation of ‘Ameny’ as a reference to
Amenemhat I made during or in a time close to that king’s reign is classically
considered to find strong independent support in the mention of the ‘Walls of the
Ruler’ (15a).19 Inbw HqA is documented only once elsewhere, in a literary text that
evokes the early Twelfth Dynasty and is documented in manuscripts from that Dy-
nasty, Sinuhe (B 17). The pattern on which inbw HqA is formed, inb + royal name, is
very rare and itself documented only in the Twelfth Dynasty.20 In addition, Sinuhe B
17 was read in the early New Kingdom as referring to Amenemhat I, as is evidenced
by its rewriting as inbw it=i ‘the Walls of my father’ (G, AOS, C; with Sinuhe being
then understood as Amenemhat’s son).21
In the above, the last dimension is a New Kingdom reading of Sinuhe and does not
therefore bear on inbw HqA in Neferti 15a, except in indirect ways (below, B).22 The
textual distribution of inbw HqA and the pattern on which it is formed merit discussion.
A. To begin with, inbw HqA could be fictionalizing in Sinuhe.23 The formation inb-X
comes with a specific royal name in both non-literary instances in which it is docu-
mented: inbw imn-m-HAt mAa-xrw (Boston MFA 13.3967; temp. Amenemhat III)24 and
inbw sSmw-tAwy mAa-xrw (in a royal stela from el-Kab; temp. Amenemhat III).25
Contrasting with these, the compounding of inbw with a generic expression (HqA
‘Ruler’) in the two literary instances (Sinuhe B 17; Neferti 15a), and only in these, is
noteworthy. One not unsimilar expression is documented in Archaic and Old King-
dom times, inb-ity (var. Hwt-ity) ‘Wall (/Palace) of the Sovereign’.26 The toponym at
least initially had a real-world referent, probably (a part of) the royal Residence in

17 For Amenemhat I as a founding figure, epitomizing the dynasty he inaugurated, compare ‘the
kings [who followed(?)] after the [house of Sehet]epibre’ as a designation of the Thirteenth
Dynasty in later historiography (Ryholt 1997: 69).
18 For various aspects of the reference to the early Twelfth Dynasty in the early New Kingdom, see
the studies gathered in Bickel 2013b; Parkinson 2009: 175-6; with reference to Neferti in partic-
ular, Gnirs 2006: 255-63. As noted by Giewekemeyer 2013: §5.1 (the final sub-section), there are
in the early New Kingdom no direct traces of a distinguished memory of Amenemhat I himself,
unlike for Senwosret I; the reference could then have been more generally to the early Twelfth
Dynasty, founded by Amenemhat I (see the preceding note).
19 E.g. Posener 1956: 22-8; Parkinson 2002: 197.
20 Vogel 2004: 159-60, 163-4; Posener 1956: 26.
21 Feder 2003; further Parkinson 2009: 185.
22 Further discussion, Giewekemeyer 2013: §5.1, fine.
23 The following comments are strictly about the expression itself and therefore independent of the
question of the historical reality of fortification works in the Eastern Delta in the early Twelfth
Dynasty (for which e.g. Vogel 2004: 92-6; Monnier 2010: 71-91; Kemp 20062: 25 and n.15).
24 Vogel 2004: 159-60.
25 Vogel 2004: 163-4.
26 Vogel 2004: 160-1.

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 5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? 341

Memphis:27 this location, altogether different from the one of the literary instances
here discussed, probably accounts for the generic designation ‘Sovereign’ selected in
this particular case.
Noteworthy in the present context are also other geographical or ethnonymic
designations in Sinuhe that could be fictionalizing, iAA (B 81; B 238)28 and nmi(w)-Sa
‘Land-farer(s)’ (R 43; B 73; B 292: §2.4.5, (i)). If fictionalizing, an expression inbw
HqA would have been effective in expressing an important semantic dimension in the
composition, ‘borders’ defined by the reach of the ‘Ruler’29 and crossed by Sinuhe
(itself a fictionalizing dimension);30 perhaps significantly, when Sinuhe later crosses
the same border in opposite direction to be reintegrated into the Egyptian world and
his normative values, he would be called upon Senwosret, the ruler, to do so.
The two competing alternatives are equally likely. Inbw HqA could have had a real-
world referent, presently not otherwise documented. Yet it need not: the initially
presented distribution of types of inb-X expressions in the record remains noteworthy
and Sinuhe, a piece of narrative literature, is strongly fictional in various respects
arguably including expressions directly comparable to inbw HqA.
B. Be the referential status of inbw HqA in Sinuhe as it may, the recurrence of the
same expression in Neferti is to be discussed. That inbw HqA occurs only in these two
texts, both literary, naturally raises the question of a possible relationship between
these. In Sinuhe B 17, inbw HqA is textually salient. The expression is associated with
border crossing, one central dimension in the composition. Among many toponyms
evoked in Sinuhe’s flight, it is significantly the only one to receive additional textual
elaboration (inbw HqA iry r xsf stiw ‘the Walls of the Ruler, made to repel the
Asiatics’).31 This elaboration is further amplified in R (as (...) r ptpt nmiw-Sa ‘(...) and
to trample the Sand-farers’)32 and the passage is partly rewritten in G (as inbw it=i:
above), demonstrating continued active engagement with inbw HqA by later readers.
Given this salience of inbw HqA both in the Twelfth Dynasty text of Sinuhe and in
subsequent readings thereof documented in later manuscripts, the possibility that
Neferti 15a could be echoing a Sinuhean expression must be considered. If so, one
intent of such an allusion to Sinuhe could have been to evoke the early Twelfth

27 The toponym is common in religious contexts, but not limited to these (it also occurs on archaic
seals). Vogel (2004: 160) interprets: ‘vermutlich (...) die Königsresidenz innerhalb der Mauern von
inbw-HD, d.h. der ersten befestigten Siedlung von Memphis’.
28 While a geographical localization of iAA has been attempted (Görg 1987), the possibility that this
land could be fictional is raised by Parkinson (1997a: 46, n.25): the author observes that iAA is
described in paradisiac terms similar to the island in Shipwrecked Sailor and that it is stylized as a
substitute for Egypt (Parkinson 2002: 157); the name could mean ‘Rushy place’ (also Parkinson
2012a: 179-80). Moreover, iAA, sitting at the heart of Sinuhe like the island does in Shipwrecked
Sailor, textually functions an image of Egypt also in terms of its foreign relations (Moers 2011).
The presence of iAA in New Kingdom lists of foreign lands could be part of a later imagined
geography, possibly shaped by Sinuhe (Parkinson 2009: 179-80).
29 E.g. Pérez-Accino 2011.
30 Moers 2001: 253-61.
31 Noted by Posener 1956: 25-6.
32 E.g. Parkinson 2009: 164.

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 342 5 Neferti

Dynasty, an era that is arguably evoked in Neferti as well;33 alternatively, the allusion
could have been more broadly to Sinuhe as a major literary work. The posterity of
Sinuhean expressions is otherwise documented, notably in the case of two afore
mentioned expressions, also salient in Sinuhe, iAA34 and nmiw-Sa.35 The inclusion of
inbw HqA in Neferti would have been meaningful, as a ‘royal rampart against chaos
(15a) which reverses the earlier image in the lament that likened society to a
defenceless fortress (7f-i)’.36
Various options therefore present themselves. If Neferti was composed in the early
Twelfth Dynasty, inbw HqA could have been directly referential, or not (A); either way,
it could have been resonating with a roughly contemporaneous composition, Sinuhe,
or not. If Neferti was composed later, inbw HqA in Neferti 15a could still have been
intended as an element of historical detail, through an evocation of Sinuhe. As the
rewriting of Sinuhe B 17 in the New Kingdom tradition demonstrates, the expression
was then associated with an early Twelfth Dynasty horizon; as its salience in Sinuhe
implies, it would have had the same potential in earlier times already. In view of the
textual distribution of inbw HqA and of its distinguished functions in the two literary
texts in which it occurs, a directly referential interpretation of the ‘historical detail’
under discussion is not intrinsically more likely than an interpretation as a more
indirect type of reference, mediated by literature itself. In the latter alternative, the
reference could have been made at any time, simultaneously to Sinuhe, somewhat
later, or much later.

NB. Two other elements of possible historical detail in Neferti deserve to be

mentioned. The first is xnrt ‘enclosure, fortress’ (7h),37 used in a military sense.38
This meaning is common in the Middle Kingdom,39 yet also documented down to the
early New Kingdom (e.g. Urk. IV 184, 15; 758, 16).40 Whatever the historical
evolution of the term’s real-world referents may have been, such continued use in text
makes it impossible to turn xnrt into a criterion for an earlier dating of Neferti.
The second is Xn-nxn (13b), a very rare designation of the southern part of Upper
Egypt. This is found once in an earlier Eleventh Dynasty private stela (Hetepi 4;
temp. Wahankh Antef II),41 as a designation of the seven first nomes of Upper Egypt.

33 ‘Arguably evoked’ (rather than just ‘evoked’) may seem a pedantic precaution, yet is one now
made necessary by the discussion in Giewekemeyer 2013: §5.1.
34 Parkinson 2009: 179-80, observing in reference to the occurrence of IAA in encyclopedic lists of
conquered lands: ‘Iaa may even have been a land that the 12th-Dynasty poet imagined (...), and that
subsequently became so familiar to composers of inscriptions that they cited it as a historical
reality in their compendious lists. (...) The poem (scil. Sinuhe) may have contributed to fashioning
the views of the literate officials and scribes (...)’.
35 Urk. IV 1821, 12 (Amenhotep son of Hapu); see Parkinson 2009: 52 and n.13 and §2.4.5, (i) in the
present study.
36 Parkinson 2002: 198.
37 Study: Quirke 1988.
38 In Middle Egyptian literary texts also in Merikare E 102. In the sense of ‘labour enclosure’,
Sasobek B2.13; Cheops’ Court 8.14; Ipuwer 6.10.
39 On the historically shifting extension of the expression xnrt, see the detailed study by Quirke 1988.
40 Quirke 1988: 95; also van den Boorn 1988: 126-7.
41 Text: Gabra 1976; also Quack 1992: 99-100.

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 5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? 343

The expression recurs in a Ramesside papyrus from the Ramesseum.42 (A further

occurrence in Piankhi’s Victory Stela 6 does not provide independent evidence as this
text is more generally replete with echoes of Middle Egyptian literature.43) Given
such exceedingly sparse pattern of attestation, any conclusions for dating must be
withheld.

5.1.2.3 Interpretive frames

In the above, no argument was made directly against interpreting ‘Ameny’ as a
reference to Amenemhat I roughly at the time of that king himself: that the reference
is rich and complex does not in itself imply that it did not also have an historical com-
ponent, nor does it imply that this possible historical reference did not include
Amenemhat I, nor that such possible historical reference to Amenemhat I specifically
was not made close in time to this king’s reign. Nor was an argument made against
interpreting the ‘Walls of the Ruler’ in relation to a Twelfth Dynasty horizon: the
expression could have had a real-world referent, or be fictionalizing, and its presence
in Neferti, possibly for evoking an early Twelfth Dynasty historical horizon, could
have been directly referential or mediated by Sinuhe, still within the Twelfth Dynasty,
or later. What emerges, however, is that strictly referential interpretations of ‘Ameny’
and of the ‘Walls of the Ruler’ do not have any distinguished status: several other
options are available. That these alternative interpretations are less direct does not
make them any less likely, as complexity in human behavior, particularly when it
comes to literary matters, is expected.
Nor do ‘Ameny’ and ‘Walls of the Ruler’ provide a cumulative argument for
placing Neferti in an early Twefth Dynasty horizon. If ‘Ameny’ is read in a directly
referential manner, then ‘Walls of the Ruler’ is as well, and the two elements support
each other. If, on the other hand, a dating of Neferti for instance to the early Thir-
teenth Dynasty is contemplated, then the allusion in ‘Ameny’ could have been along
several of the lines sketched above, for instance as including a reference to a dynastic
ancestor or more broadly to the ‘House of Sehetepibre’; ‘Walls of the Ruler’, echoing
a textual salient passage in Sinuhe, would then have been an effective strategy to
evoke just that horizon. Based on the above, further scenarios, similarly cohesive, can
be envisioned for other datings possibly to be complentated, such as the late Twelfth
Dynasty or the early Eighteenth.
A directly referential interpretation of ‘Ameny’ and ‘Walls of the Ruler’ must then
rely on a broader interpretive frame for reading Neferti, namely what is generally
labeled the ‘propaganda’ model of Middle Egyptian ‘political’ literature.44 This model
is an hypothesis only, and one that was in no small part based on a certain reading of
Neferti itself (Amenemhat, another text that played a major role in the elaboration of
the model, is discussed below: 6). In the past decade, the model has been subjected to
criticism on various fronts. Shortcomings in its accounting for the cultural functions
and contexts of Middle Egyptian literature have been emphasized.45 Its insufficient

42 DZA 28.219.570.
43 Grimal 1981: 284-6; Parkinson 2009: 212.
44 Classically Posener 1956.
45 Parkinson 2002: 13-6.

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 344 5 Neferti

addressing of the actual semantic complexity of individual texts has been pointed
out.46 Thorough-going problems associated with an historically referential reading of
Middle Egyptian literary texts have been discussed.47 The model’s relation to a
specific and therefore contingent horizon in modern Wissenschaftsgeschichte has also
been underscored.48 The model has thereby lost the character of evidence it long held:
at best, it stands as one interpretive option among several.

5.1.3 A dating to the Middle Kingdom more broadly? A common Middle

Egyptian literary tradition

Based on language, common motifs and formulations, intertext, and reception, Neferti
belongs to a common Middle Egyptian literary tradition, as was and is rightly
recognized by ancient and modern readers alike. This has been interpreted as
suggesting a dating of the composition to the Middle Kingdom.

5.1.3.1 Transmission and reception

A. ‘Neferti’ is included among literary figures of the past in the Ramesside Eulogy of
Dead Writers (P. Chester Beatty IV vso) and probably recurs in P. Athens 1826 (if
‘Nefer<ti>’ is to be read, as is likely).49 As the impressive number of manuscripts of
Amenemhat suggests, works with historical subject matters were popular in
Ramesside Deir el-Medineh.50 In such context, some readers may have read Neferti
for what in their view were the historical contents in the composition. This is also
suggested by the pairing of ‘Neferti’ with ‘Kheti’ in the Eulogy: the latter is in
Ramesside times associated with Amenemhat, a composition set in the times of
Amenemhat I possibly evoked in Neferti itself.51 These Ramesside readers may then
even have conceived of Neferti as broadly associated with another composition set in
the early Twelfth Dynasty, Sinuhe, depending on how they interpreted the reference to
‘Ameny’ in Neferti and/or based on the mention of the ‘Walls of the Ruler’ in both
these works.
Knowledge of actual dates of composition, however, was probably fairly
‘impressionistic’.52 Dating also seems to have been less of a pressing concern to
ancient readers than it has become to modern ones in the context of an altogether
different, more strongly author-centered literary culture.53 The literary figures in
Eulogy of Dead Writers are presented as ‘masters of truth’ (as an admittedly loose
evocation of the Egyptian rx-xt), enacting ‘prospective repetition’ (sr), whereby truth,

46 For Neferti, compare for instance Parkinson 2002: 193-200, whose rich reading effectively does
without ‘propaganda’, even if this historical context is still mentioned.
47 Moers 2001: 38-79, particularly 38-54; Parkinson 2002: 9-10.
48 Giewekemeyer 2013: §3.2-3.
49 Lastly Simon 2013: 266-71, with references to previous discussions.
50 E.g. Parkinson 2009: 192.
51 For the grouping of ‘Neferti’ and ‘Kheti’ possibly based on their common association with
Amenemhat I, e.g. Parkinson 2002: 45.
52 Parkinson 2009: 188-9.
53 E.g. Simon 2013: 265 (with reference to ‘Kheti’ and Amenemhat), stressing that actual authorship
would have been irrelevant in the Ramesside context of the Eulogy.

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 5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? 345

which comes from the gods, is not bound to history.54 In addition, traditions can be
invented, in Egypt55 and elsewhere:56 ‘(tradition) is subject to modification as time
passes, which sometimes amounts to invention. Traditions can thus obscure the past
as well as illuminate it. They answer current needs and are the products of ingenuous
minds (emphasis AS).’57 The conceptions underlying the literary figures documented
in the Ramesside Eulogy were arguably fairly late to emerge and probably did so in
relation to broader cultural changes in the New Kingdom.58 Incidentally, the figure
with which ‘Neferti’ is paired in the Eulogy, ‘Kheti’, was subject to associations with
works, Kheti and Hymn, that are in the present study argued to have been composed
after Middle Kingdom (§6.2.2.6 and §3.4, respectively).
B. Neferti was transmitted alongside other Middle Egyptian literary texts, in
Ramesside times and before, notably in the Assiut graffiti. Common transmission
need not imply a common temporal horizon in composition. Paradigmatically, this is
illustrated by the Chester Beatty Library (which includes Kheti and Hymn, yet also
Tale of Horus and Seth, Tale of Truth and Falsehood, or Satirical Letter); in the early
Eighteenth Dynasty similarly, the same document, T. Carnarvon 1, has a securely
dated Middle Kingdom composition (Ptahhotep) and a securely dated much later one
(Kamose Inscriptions, First Stela).59
In Ramesside times, common transmission reflects the common literary tradition,
rightly recognized, to which works composed in Middle Egyptian belong. Much in
terms of common themes, motifs, and tropes was probably sensed in reading, even
without academic study of such. Common historical subject matters may also have
played a role in some cases. Most important was arguably language itself. While
Middle Egyptian as used in literary texts had been a high variety at all times, the later
Eighteenth and early Nineteenth Dynasty witnessed major cultural changes that led to
a reconfiguration of higher written registers and more broadly to a ‘bifurcation’ in
written culture.60 In the process, Middle Egyptian became ‘classical’, contributing to
make works composed in that idiom themselves classical.61 In addition, Middle Egyp-
tian as used in literarture is highly homogeneous, reflecting the high-cultural functions
of texts that were couched in this variety: possible diachronic differences, so difficult
to pinpoint even for the present-day Egyptologist specifically targeting such matters,
would have been entirely invisible to ancient readers. In terms of language, literature

54 Moers 2002 (I thank Gerald Moers, p.c. 5/2013, for further discussion of this issue); comple-
mentary interpretation by Simon 2013: 266-71, including references to previous debates.
55 For Egyptian examples of invented traditions, in domains entirely unrelated to the present one, e.g.
Kemp 20062: 140, 143.
56 The present author may be forgiven a reference to the diverse layers of invented tradition that
coalesced into the founding myths of his native country in the process of becoming one. Sited at
their proper level and in relation to the in part fairly recent needs they served, these are fascinating
objects of study (see Maissen 20124).
57 Kemp 20062: 160.
58 Moers 2009; 2008; now also Gnirs 2013b: 130-2; Widmaier 2013: §1.1.
59 Also note O. BM 5632, with an excerpt of Loyaliste on the recto and one of Sinuhe on the verso
(Posener 1976: 8).
60 Baines 1996: 173, also 158-9.
61 E.g. Loprieno 1996b.

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 346 5 Neferti

composed in Middle Egyptian, an idiom secondarily made classical, may then have
appeared as an homogeneous body to Ramesside readers.
In the (early/mid-)Eighteenth Dynasty, the nature of the collection of Middle
Egyptian works excerpted on the walls of the tomb Assiut N13.1 (Amenemhat, Hymn,
Kheti, Loyaliste, Neferti, A Man to His Son)62 remains unclear. As the great many
manuscripts of the same works in Ramesside times implies, all were then to be
popular. The three works to be associated in Ramesside times with the literary figure
‘Kheti’ or with each other through common manuscript transmission are all present in
Assiut (Amenemhat, Kheti, Hymn). If to this the long version of Loyaliste, now
identified as a Teaching of Kairsu,63 and Neferti are added, five out of six works in
Assiut are associated with literary figures in the Eulogy of Dead Writers. In inter-
preting the selection of compositions featured in Assiut, one dimension is probably
types of literary discourses: narrative literature is conspicuously absent in Assiut, even
for compositions demonstrably cultivated in the New Kingdom (e.g. Sinuhe); it is
similarly absent in the Eulogy. Also absent in Assiut are laments such as Ipuwer and
Khakheperreseneb, documented in New Kingdom manuscripts; the latter is included
in the Eulogy. More remarkable is the absence of Ptahhotep, a teaching that enjoyed
reception in the New Kingdom and features in the Eulogy: why this is lacking, while
teachings are generally prominent in the Assiut selection, is unclear. In part at least,
associations based on contents seem to have played a role, as is suggested by the fact
that three compositions which display a dense intertext (A Man to His Son, the long
version of Loyaliste, and Kheti)64 are all present in Assiut. Resonances with elements
of the pictorial decoration of the tomb may also have played some role, as is
suggested by the placement of individual texts.65 To be noted, finally, is that some of
the works copied in Assiut are in the present study argued to be linguistically later
than then Middle Kingdom (Hymn: §3.4; Kheti: §6.2.2.6; parts of the long version of
Loyaliste: §4.5). This is of course not to mean that the other compositions in Assiut
must also be later than the Middle Kingdom: the processes by which works came to
be variously grouped with each other, in Assiut and in later times, were certainly
complex.

5.1.3.2 Motifs in common with Eloquent Peasant and Kagemni: The prologue
A. Like Eloquent Peasant, Neferti contrasts a fairly straightforward narrative intro-
duction with the more tightly patterned main part of the composition, the lament
spoken by Neferti and the Peasant’s petitions, respectively. A similar stylistic contrast
is also found in Kagemni between the end of the instructions and the brief narrative
epilogue.66 Both in Neferti (q) and in Eloquent Peasant, the framing narrative
reflexively tells of the written textualization of the work;67 so does Kagemni in more

62 For an overview, lastly Verhoeven 2013.

63 Verhoeven 2009.
64 Fischer-Elfert 1999: 383-99.
65 Verhoeven 2008: 202-4.
66 For elements in language supporting this contrast in register, §2.4.4.3.
67 Often commented upon, e.g. Hagen 2012b: 186-9; Parkinson 2002: 174-5.

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 5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? 347

succinct terms.68 The words spoken by Neferti, respectively by the Peasant, are said to
be mdt nfrt ‘perfect speech’ (Neferti 1l; Eloquent Peasant B1 106), a formulation that
recurs elsewhere in Middle Kingdom literature (famously, Ptahhotep 58-59).69
Twice in the prologue, Neferti has a characteristic formulation for a high-status
participant (here the king) asking subordinates to summon people (the Council of the
Residence, then Neferti) to him: 1f-h Dd.in Hm=f (...) i.sy in n=i (...) stA.in.tw=f (n=f )
Hr-a ‘His Majesty said (...): “Go and bring me (...)!” It (scil. the Council) was intro-
duced at once’ (sim. 2f-g). The same formulation, a literary trope, recurs in Eloquent
Peasant (B1 27-28: for fetching a thing, a ‘sheet’ (ifd)). Another stock formula in
Neferti expresses the courtiers’ response to a royal utterance: 1i wn.in=sn Hr Xt=sn
(...) ‘Then they were on their bellies (...)’ (sim. 1n, 2h). A closely similar formulation
recurs in Kagemni in the children’s response to the closing words of the vizier’s
speech (2.5-6 wn.in=sn Hr rDt st Hr Xwt=sn).
B. Commonalities are also with Cheops’ Court. This composition is later than
Eloquent Peasant by at least a century, and possibly by much more (type-B terminus
ante quem non by the early Thirteenth Dynasty: §2.4.4.1.B).
The formulation expressing the courtiers’ response recurs in Cheops’ Court 4.23-
25 and 8.9-10.70 More important are parallels in the introduction of Neferti and
Djedi.71 In either text, the existence of a ‘commoner’ (nDs), not living in the
Residence and to say things about the future, is brought to the attention of a king,
Snofru.72 That commoner’s distinguished qualities are given ample textual elabora-
tion: Neferti 2b-d i[w] Xri-Hb aA n bAstt ity nb=n nfrty rn=f nDs pw qn gAb=f sS pw iqr n
DbAw=f (...) ‘Bastet has a chief lector priest, Sovereign our lord, Neferty by name; he
is a commoner valiant of his arm, he is an excellent scribe of his fingers (...)’; Cheops’
Court 6.26-7.6 iw wn nD[s] Ddi rn=f Hms=f m Dd-snfrw mAa-xrw iw=f m nDs n rnpt
110 iw=f Hr wnm tA 500 (...) r-mn-m hrw pn (...) ‘There is a commoner, Djedi by
name, dwelling in Djedsnefru; he is a commoner a 110 years old; he has been eating
500 breads (...) until the present day (...)’.
C. While reminiscent of a similar articulation in Eloquent Peasant, the contrast
between a framing narrative and the main body of the composition is a general com-
positional device, made possible by the inclusiveness of Middle Egyptian literature,
more broadly of early/mid-second millennium written productions, in the types of
written discourses they can accommodate and combine with each other. In the case of
Neferti, the contrast relates to the ‘Royal Tale’, a major subtext of the composition.73
This is integral to the overall structure of the composition, creating horizons of expec-

68 In both Eloquent Peasant and Kagemni, this is also signalled linguistically by the strongly deictic
use of pA demonstratives, reflexively pointing to the written textualization; see §2.4.4.2.2.B.
69 E.g. Moers 2002: 296-8; 2001: 174-81; Parkinson 2012a: 87.
70 Often noted, lastly by Parkinson 2012a: 43.
71 Morenz 1996: 109-10; Blumenthal 1982: 19-21.
72 On a possible origin of such tradition of Snofru in late Middle Kingdom and Second Intermediate
Period Dahshur, Raue 2010: 89-90. If correct, this would of course only suggest a terminus ante
quem non, not implying that the literary texts must have been composed at the earliest moment
when this tradition itself first originated.
73 E.g. Gnirs 2006: 243-8.

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 348 5 Neferti

tation that are then to be decieved and foreshadowing the final restorative section (13-
15).74 While gradually developing in earlier times, the ‘Royal Tale’ in the particular
format in which it is evoked in Neferti is first documented from the mid-Thirteenth
Dynasty on (Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela) and more densely so in the early New
Kingdom (further discussion, §5.8.1.1).
Stock phrases are by their very nature fairly indistinctive as to time. This is
illustrated here with wn.in=sn Hr Xwt=sn (...) (and the like), as in Neferti (1i, 1n, 2h)
and Kagemni (2.5-6). The expression recurs in early Eighteenth Dynasty texts, in
Appointment of the Vizier 16 (Urk. IV 1381, 15), in Chapelle Rouge, p.130: VII.1
(HHBT 23, 12), and, later yet, e.g. in Ramses II’s Inscription Dédicatoire 40 (KRI II
326, 10-11); in detail, the formulation in Neferti finds its closest parallel not in
Kagemni, but in Chapelle Rouge (§5.8.1.4, (ii)). Significantly, some of these texts are
themselves modeled on the ‘Royal Tale’ and display further elements in common with
Neferti (§5.8.1.2; §5.8.2.1).
In sum, the commonalities between the framing narrative in Neferti and Eloquent
Peasant are significant, yet commonalities with later texts, themselves significant, are
observed as well (see further below, §5.8). For dating, any indication afforded by the
former remains uncertain, if not compounded with other elements.

NB. In Eloquent Peasant, aHa.n sDm.n=f is routinely used to introduce new episodes.
In Neferti, on the other hand, -in-marked constructions (and prt pw ir.n=f for events
of motion) are used throughout the prologue, while aHa.n sDm.n=f is used only twice,
in two clauses in immediate succesion to each other.75 These provide a reflexive
description of the written textualization of Neferti’s discourse: 2o-q aHa.n dwn.n=f
Drt=f r hn n Xrt-a aHa.n Sd.n=f n=f Sfdw Hna gsti wn.in{n}=f Hr irt m sS Ddt.n Xri-Hb
nfrty ‘Then he stretched his hand out to a box of writing equipment. Then he took for
himself a roll and palette. And he was writing down what the lector priest Nefert
said.’76 A similar distribution is in Ahmose’s Tempest Stela where -in-marked
constructions are used throughout the composition except in two places: the gods’
intervention, causing the tempest (ro 6-7/vso 7-8; HHBT 106, 1/2-3/4; restored77), and
the king’s response, setting up an wD (ro 16/vso 18; HHBT 109, 5/6). The first is the
occasion for the text, the second the text itself. This distribution would at first seem to
associate Neferti with Tempest Stela against Eloquent Peasant. Yet, things might be
more complex. Among the great many -in-marked verbal constructions in Neferti, all
but the last (2q) are of the synthetic type, in the dialogue of the king with his courtiers
and Neferti, and limited to a few verbs (Dd, rDi, sTA).78 That -in-marked constructions,
rather than aHa.n-headed ones, are here selected is primarily a convention of the type
of written discourse to which the prologue, evoking the format of the ‘Royal Tale’,
relates (§2.4.4.6.B). No reliable indication for a late dating can therefore be derived at
this level.

74 See the analyses in Parkinson 2002: 195, 198.

75 From a different perspective, the distribution of narrative forms in the prologue of Neferti is also
discussed by Schenkel in press b: §3.4.
76 Translation Parkinson 1997a: 135.
77 The restoration is near certain, see Wiener & Allen 1998: 10.
78 +d.in (1f; 1j; 2a; 2f; 2i; 2l; 2n); stA.in (1h; 2g); rD.in (1n).

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 5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? 349

5.1.3.3 Motifs in common with Eloquent Peasant: The lament

A. Reflecting the literary tradition it belongs to, the lament in Neferti shares motifs
and lexical selections with other Middle Egyptian discourses that are, or include,
laments. This is nowhere more evident than in a comparison with the beginning of the
Eloquent Peasant’s Fourth Petition:79
(i) Eloquent Peasant B1 228-23180
HD bw-nfr (...) ‘Destroyed is goodness (...)’
– Neferti 7a HD Hm nfAy n bw-nfr (...) ‘For destroyed are these things of goodness
(...)’81

ptx sA n grg r tA ‘and falsehood is hurled to the ground.’

– Neferti 3i mk rf wn sr m ptx {SAa.n=k im} <r> tA82 ‘Look, moreover, the official
is in a state of being cast down to the ground’; 7c bw-nfr nb rwwi ptx {m} tA n
qsnt (...) ‘All goodness is gone away, the land is cast down through pain (...)’

(...) sxpr sp m msdd ‘(...) when the deed has been made hateful?’
– Neferti 10h tw r rDt xwt m msdd (...) ‘Goods will be given with hatred (...)’

DAt itrw m sA tbwty (...) ‘Crossing the river on foot (...)’

– Neferti 6a iwtrw Sw nw kmt DA.tw mw Hr rdwy ‘The river of Egypt is dry so that
one will cross water on foot.’

Common motifs and lexical selections extend to Khakheperreseneb and Ipuwer, as is

selectively illustrated below:
(ii) Neferti and Khakheperreseneb:83
- The lexicon of laments: e.g. xprt m tA ‘what happens in the land’ (Neferti 3a; Khakh.
ro 10 (xprt xt tA); also Ipuwer 1.8 (xprt m tA)); sny-mnt ‘calamity’, said of the ‘land’
(tA) (Neferti 8e; 12a; Khakh. ro 11); shA ‘be in uproar’ (Neferti 8f; Khakh. ro 10; also
Ipuwer, passim84); ptx ‘downcast’ (Neferti 3i; Khakh. vso 1; also El. Peas. B1 228);
- Themes and motifs: Neferti 11a Pet. (...) nn wxd.n.tw pr n rA ‘(...) what comes from
the mouth can not be endured’; Khakheperreseneb vso 5 n wxd.tw smi n mdt ‘They
have had no patience with the reply to a speech.’ Neferti 11a begins with xn
‘utterance’, a word prominent throughout Khakheperreseneb (ro 1; ro 2; ro 8; vso 5).
The characterization of Neferti’s speech to come as ‘some perfect words, choice verses
(...)’ (Neferti 1l-m) is matched by the self-characterization of Khakheperreseneb’s

79 Parallels noted by Parkinson 2012a: 190-3.

80 Translation slightly adapted from Parkinson 2012a: 190-3.
81 For Hd in a nfr sw construction, also 5a HD tA pn (...) ‘Destroyed is this land (...)’.
82 This verse, surely to be emended in some way, poses various philological difficulties; see the
proposals gathered in Dils et al., TLA.
83 On other aspects of the relationship between Neferti and Khakheperreseneb, Moers 2002.
84 Enmarch 2008: 68.

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 350 5 Neferti

speech as ‘(...) unknown utterances, extraordinary verses, new words which have
passed, free from repetition (...)’ (Khakh. ro 2).85

(iii) Neferti and Ipuwer:

- The lexicon of laments: beyond xprt m tA and shA (above), also e.g. sxrw nw tA ‘the
conditions of the land’ (Neferti 4b; Ipuwer 2.4; 5.5); predicative HD ‘Destroyed is (...)’
(Neferti 5a; 7a; Ipuwer, passim;86 also El. Peas. B1 228);
- Motifs, e.g. the river being not as it should be (Neferti 6a; Ipuwer 2.10); strife in the
nuclear family (Neferti 9f; Ipuwer 1.5; 5.10).

Formulations in common between Neferti and other Middle Egyptian literary compo-
sitions also concern the ways by which Neferti characterizes his speech to come:

(iv) Neferti 4a mk st xft-Hr=k ‘look, it is in front of you’

Compare Fowler P. Butler vso 17 mk sxr=n xft-Hr=k ‘Look, our condition is in front
of you.’87

(v) Neferti 5b wnn tA pn m m ‘As what will this land to be?’

Thus Pet.; O. DeM 1074 mi? m. Compare Sinuhe B 43-44 wnn irf tA pf mi m ‘How
then will this land be?’

(vi) Neferti 5f n sr.n=i ntt n iy ‘I do not announce what does not come.’
Compare Shipwrecked Sailor 30-31 and 97-98.88

B. Common lexical selections are largely determined by subject matter and by

conventions associated with certain types of written discourses. Literary laments are
allied with each other lexically, thus, with expressions not found in Neferti, e.g. ianw
‘woe’ (Khakh. ro 12; El. Peas. R 16.6; 26.5); tnbX ‘turn aside, swerve’ (Khakh. ro 12;
El. Peas. B1 128; B1 192); XAbb ‘crookedness’ (Khakh. vso 5; El. Peas. B1 138). As
the pattern of attestation of e.g. ianw demonstrates, these expressions are more
generally associated with certain types of texts, across time.89 The case of irtiw
‘mourning, lament’ (Khakh. ro 11; Ipuwer 1.8; 4.13) is illustrative: this, a rare word,
recurs in the First Intermediate Period Mocalla inscriptions, then again in funerary
lamentations in the early New Kingdom tomb of Reneni of el-Kab.90 In their imagery
and lexically, the latter have significant elements in common with the much earlier
Eloquent Peasant.91
Among significant expressions in Neferti, xprt ‘what happens’ (Neferti 3a; also
Khakh. ro 10 and Ipuwer 1.8) recurs in a Seventeenth Dynasty inscription with

85 Discussion by Moers 2002.

86 Enmarch 2008: 89.
87 See Widmaier 2009: 82-3.
88 Another element in common between these two texts is the address by xnms ‘Friend!’ (Neferti 2i;
Shipwrecked Sailor 184), lastly Gundacker 2012: 81-2.
89 Donnat 2012: 31; TLA #21750.
90 For the former, Vandier 1950: 183-4; for the latter, Enmarch 2012: 89.
91 Enmarch 2012: 90-1.

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 5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? 351

literarizing qualities, Wadi el-Hôl #8, 4;92 this possibly includes a series of further
elements in common with Neferti.93 %ny-mnt ‘calamity’ (Neferti 8e; 12a; also Khakh.
ro 11) recurs in two other second millennium texts, and as it seems only in these:
Mutter und Kind IX.8 (arguably a post-Middle Kingdom composition: §5.3.4.2, (iii))
and Tutankhamun’s Restoration Stela 8 (Urk. IV 2027, 11). The former is illustrative
of how lexical expressions come in clusters: in Mutter und Kind IX.7-8, sny-mnt is
closely associated with another word typical of literary laments, ianw ‘woe’ (above).94
The presence of sny-mnt in Tutankhamun’s Restoration Stela is significant as well, as
restoration inscriptions provide one major inscriptional subtext on which Neferti
draws (§5.8.3.3).
C. As to common motifs, expression in formal registers is subject to strong
conventions: there are certain culturally established ways of saying certain things, to
be varied upon in individual texts; expression is (phraseologically) bound.95 Com-
menting upon parallels between Eloquent Peasant and the stela of the Eighteenth
Dynasty Great Royal Herald Antef (Urk. IV 963-75), Parkinson defines the prob-
lem:96 ‘These parallels may be due to a direct knowledge of the poem, or they may
suggest that these various texts were all drawing on traditional clusters of language
and imagery to express central concerns of elite culture.’
In the context of a significant cultural continuity (of which linguistic continuity is
itself one aspect), such ‘clusters of language and imagery’ extend over time. This can
be illustrated through a parallel reading of two major restoration inscriptions, Tod
Inscription and Speos Artemidos. Across time, restoration inscriptions share general
motifs of things ‘having fallen in ruin/dissolution’ (wAi r wAst/fx, etc.) and now being
‘build/fortified/etc.’ (qd, srwD, etc.) ‘anew’ (m-mAwt).97 More specific than these are
the following, the first a motif, the second a lexical selection, the third a grammatical
construction, all individually remarkable:
(vii) Tod Inscription 27 (...) m sXnw n iryt im ‘(...) from the destruction of what
had been made there’
– Speos Artemidos 37-38 (Urk. IV 390, 8-9) SmAw m-q(A)b=sn Hr sxn iryt ‘with
vagrants in their midst toppling what had been made’
Further, in an insecurely dated literary text making reference to such
formulations: Merikare E 78-79 m qd isy=k m sXnyt iryt r irt=sy ‘Do not build
your tomb out of the destruction of what had been made for what will be made.’98

92 Darnell 2002: 108, 113, n.bb.

93 Darnell 2002: 115-9; Gnirs 2006: 252.
94 (...) bgAw m pt ianw m dwAt sny-mnt m [tA Hr] tp=sn ‘(...) shouting is in the sky, woe is in the
Netherworld, calamity is in the land on their heads.’
95 Junge 1982.
96 Parkinson 2012a: 13.
97 E.g. Franke 2007a.
98 The parallel between Merikare and Tod Inscription, not however with Speos Artemidos, is noted in
Barbotin & Clère 1991: 19, n.82; Quack 1992: 57, n.e.

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 352 5 Neferti

(viii) Tod Inscription 28 tp-Sw mAAt=i im=s ‘Destitution(?) is what I saw in it.’
– Speos Artemidos 26 (Urk. IV 388, 6) itw-nTr m tp-Sw [...] ‘The god’s fathers
were in destitution(?) [...]’
Further, in a comparable context, yet later in time, Ramses II’s Inscription
Dédicatoire 34 (KRI II 325, 13-14) gm.n=f Hwt nw tA-Dsr n nsywt imiw-HAt
maHaw=sn imi[w] AbDw wAw r xpr m tp-Sw ‘He has found that the temple of the
Sacred Land of the former kings and their tombs which are in Abydos had fallen
into becoming destitute.’
The presence of tp-Sw in both texts is noteworthy in view of the rarity of the
word: I am aware of only one other second millennium instance of tp-Sw, in
Chapelle Rouge, p.98: I.5 (HHBT II 8, 3/4: quoted in context above,
§4.3.2.1, (v)).

(ix) Tod Inscription 26-27 wn.k(w) r=i Hr mAA (...)

– Speos Artemidos 9-10 (Urk. IV 385, 3) wn.kw [r]f m Haw wa (...)
The construction with an initial pseudoparticiple of wnn is very rare (§1.2, (v)):
only three other instances of the construction are known, all from the Twelfth
Dynasty (Sinuhe B 252-253; Shipwrecked Sailor 136-137; Khentemsemti 4-5).

If Tod Inscription is dated to the early Twelfth Dynasty, as it generally is, the above
directly illustrates temporal depth at the level of three specific elements: a motif, a
lexical selection, and a grammatical construction, all individually remarkable. If Tod
Inscription dates to a later period, as has recently been argued,99 the above is no less
illustrative of how strongly bound expression can be, notably by the type of written
discourse.
In literary texts, expression is similarly expected to be more or less tightly bound:
while early/mid-second millennium literature affords some space for play (e.g. §2.4.5;
also §2.4.3-4), it is not a space for the free play of composers, just as contempo-
raneous inscriptions as the products of the same culture are not. Significant is for
example how expression in A Man to His Son is tightly related to both Middle
Kingdom and early New Kingdom texts, inscriptional and non-inscriptional ones.100
At the level of individual motif, an illustration is the ‘blocking’ (D/qbb) of the ‘noses’
(fnDw), ‘a common image for utter helpness’:101 this is recurrent in Twelfth Dynasty
literary texts (Ptahhotep 22; Eloquent Peasant B1 264; Loyaliste 3.5 (short and long
versions)), yet also in Hymn 2.5-6, a Middle Egyptian compostion for which a dating
to the late Seventeenth or early Eighteenth Dynasty was argued in the present study
(§3.4). How far ‘clusters of language and imagery’ in Middle Egyptian literature
extend over time is more generally demonstrated by late compositions such as
Aametju (§1.3.2.3) or Hymn (§3.4.5.C).

99 Buchberger 2006.
100 Detailed presentation in Fischer-Elfert 1999.
101 Parkinson 2012a: 215.

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 5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? 353

D. In Neferti, the motif of ‘giving with hatred’ (10h) finds a parallel in Eloquent
Peasant (B1 230: compare (i) for the whole sequence B1 228-231), yet also in a much
later composition, Ani (D 8.2).102 A motif relating to the river drying out (6a) is
paralleled in Eloquent Peasant (B1 230-231), but another one relating to the same
theme (6f) is again in Ani (B 21.8-9).103 Ptx r tA in Eloquent Peasant B1 228-229 is
similar to Neferti 3i, yet the expression also recurs in Ahmose’s Tempest Stela ro 17-
18/vso 19-20 (HHBT 109, 13/14) (...) saqt sSmw r kArw=sn wnw m ptx r tA ‘(...) and
reintroduce the statues to their shrines which were in a state of being cast down104 to
the ground’.105 Like Eloquent Peasant, Ahmose’s Tempest Stela shares other motifs
with Neferti (§5.8.3.3). Said of (an) official(s), as in Neferti 3i, ptx r/Hr tA is best
paralleled in Nubkheperre Antef’s Coptos Decree 6 (quoted above: §2.8.2.2, (v)). A
temporal depth of motifs and expression is directly manifest on another level: beyond
the motifs it shares with literary laments and Eloquent Peasant, the lament of Neferti
strongly resonates with hymns to the Nileflood documented in the New Kingdom
(§5.8.3.2).
Similar comments extend to the formulations by which Neferti introduces his
speech. The question about how the land will be in Neferti 5b is like a similar question
in Sinuhe (B 43-44), but this is probably just the ordinary way of expressing such
content. ‘(Not) announcing’ (sr) situations ‘that are (not) to come’ is found in both
Neferti 5f (vi) and in a Twelfth Dynasty composition, Shipwrecked Sailor (30-31; 97-
98), but the phrasing is preconfigured, compare e.g. TT 110 (Djehuti; temp.
Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III) sr.n(=i) iyt ‘I announced what came.’106 Possibly more
significant is an occurrence associating sr with xpr.t=sy ‘what will happen’
(Hatshepsut’s Southern Obelisk, Basis 3 (Urk. IV 370, 1-2), quoted below, §5.8.2.1).

5.1.4 Middle Egyptian language

A dating of Neferti to the early Twelfth Dynasty has been argued for on linguistic
grounds. More generally, the Middle Egyptian language of the composition may have
played a role in the hypothesis that Neferti should date to the Middle Kingdom.

102 Fischer-Elfert 1992: 355-6; the reading in the B version of Ani is different, see the discussion in
Quack 1994: 197.
103 Discussion in Quack 1994: 197-8.
104 A different interpretation is in Malaise & Winand 1999: 478, ex.1236: ‘(...) réintroduire dans leurs
chapelles les statues qui étaient sur le point de se précipiter par terre’. This is unlikely on semantic
grounds, since this reading—technically with ‘mellic’ aspect—would imply that statues that were
only about to fall down, and therefore had not yet changed position, should be ‘reintroduced’ to
their shrines.
105 In details the formulation in Neferti is in fact slightly closer to the one in Ahmose’s Tempest Stela,
with ptx a passive participle as part of the predicate in a situational predicate construction, itself
headed by wnn.
106 DZA 25.169.890; the same formula already in the Middle Kingdom (DZA 29.385.060). A more
developed elaboration is in Urk. IV 481, 15-16 (Hapuseneb; temp. Hatshepsut).

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 354 5 Neferti

5.1.4.1 A linguistic dating to the early Twelfth Dynasty?

The linguistic evidence for dating Neferti into the early Twelfth Dynasty specifically
rests upon Vernus’ post quem non criterion, here applied to two passages, 3a-b and
11d.107 As discussed, the aspectual change on which Vernus’ criterion is based only
permits to define an ante quem non criterion, and no correlative post quem non
criterion for the time period concerned (§2.6.3). With a view on Neferti specifically,
this can be illustrated further by the following examples:
(A) In a characterization of general validity (after a A pw clause)
(i) Neferti 2r-3b
rx-xt pw n iAbt ni-sw bAstt m wbn=s
msw pw n HqA-anD
iw=f mHysic=f Hr xprt m tA
iw=f sxA=f qni n iAbtt (...)
‘He was a sage of the East, he belonged to Bastet in her rising,
he was a child of the Heliopolitan nome;
He ponders what happens in the land,
he recalls the sorry state of the East (...)’
(ii) Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy 19-20 (Urk. IV 19, 13 - 20, 3)
nsw wa sbA.n spdt Hsy n sSAt (...)
iw=f Ssm=f sSw r tp-Hsb
wr-HkAw pw nb mrwt r nsw nb (...)
‘A unique king, taught by Sothis, praised by Seshat (...)
He leads the scribes to the right standard;
He is a great of magic, lord of love more than any king (...)’

(B) Sim., with contextually derived future time reference

(iii) Neferti 11d
iw ra iwd=f sw <r> rmT
‘Re will remove himself from men.’
Future time reference is established by context,108 at the beginning of the stanza in
11a nn wxd.n.tw (...), then confirmed in the elaboration of 11d, in 11e-h nn rx.tw
(...) nn tn.tw (...)

(iv) Thutmosis’ III Poetical Stela 9 (Urk. IV 613, 14-15)

D=i nrw n Hm=k xt ibw=sn
Axt=i imt tp=k sswn=s st
‘I shall place dread of Your Majesty through their hearts;
My uraeus which is on your head will destroy them.’

107 Vernus 1990a: 185; 1990b: 1037.

108 Similarly Vernus 1990a: 2.

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 5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? 355

5.1.4.2 A linguistic dating to the Middle Kingdom more broadly?

Neferti is composed in Middle Egyptian. Yet, all expressions in Neferti can
individually be documented in higher written registers in later times, down to the time
of the first manuscript attestation of the compostion. A selective illustration, focusing
on the more subtle dimensions of syntax and/or linguistic function and meaning, is the
following (the list could easily be expanded to cover the whole grammar of Neferti):

(A) Iw-less subject-first construction in discourse-initial position, with thetic

force (see also §1.2, (vi))
(i) Neferti 8a (stanza-initial)
awt xAst r swr Hr itrw nw kmt
‘Foreign flock will drink at the river of Egypt’
Very common throughout Neferti (§5.2.3.3).

(ii) Nubkheperre Antef’s Coptos Decree (D.17), 4-5

(...) r-Dd
xn bin wA r xpr m pA r-pr (...)
‘(...) thus:
“A bad matter has come to occur in this temple (...)” ’109

(iii) Urk. IV 656, 14-16 (from Thutmosis III’s Annals)

iit twsic r Dd n Hm=f
mrw snb iwayt rst mHtt r-mitt
‘Coming one did to tell His Majesty:
“The coast is clear, the southern and northern garrisons likewise.” ’

(B) Pw-marked thetic constructions (see also §2.7.2.1, (iv))

(iv) Neferti 13a
nsw pw r iyt n rsy imny mAa-xrw rn=f
‘(This, the chaos described in the lament, means:) A king from the south is to
come, Ameny, justified, by name.’
Introducing the final affirmative part of the composition (13-15): the resolution is
presented as an interpretive gloss to the preceding lament.110

109 Vernus 1997: 54, n.163 placed both this and the next examples in a footnote, for methodological
reasons: being concerned with establishing the very existence of this construction in Middle
Egyptian, the author refrained from taking argument on post-Middle Kingdom texts. Once the
existence of the construction is securely established (by Vernus’ 1997 overall argument; also
Stauder & Uljas in prep.), these examples, similar to older ones both formally and functionally, can
be safely adduced in present presentation.
110 Parkinson 2002: 198.

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 356 5 Neferti

(v) Ahmose’s Abydos Stela for Tetisheri 7-8 (Urk. IV 27, 14-15)
ink pw sxA.n=i mwt mwt=i mwt it(=i) Hmt-nsw wrt mwt-nsw tti-Sri mAat-xrw
‘(The fact is:) I thought of the mother of my mother and the mother of my
father, the great royal wife, the royal mother, Tetisheri, justified.’
(vi) Hatshepsut’s Northern Obelisk, Basis D 14 (Urk. IV 364, 16-17)
ink pw snDm.n=i m aH sxA.n=i qmA wi
‘(The situation was:) I relaxed in the palace and I thought of the one who
created me.’
Beginning of Hatshepsut’s narrative of the construction of the obelisks.

(C) Discourse-connective is (see also §1.2, (ix))111

(vii) Neferti 2n
m xpr.t=s{t}(y) swt
min is xpr
swA Hr=f
‘But from what will happen;
for today has happened,
forget about it!’
112
Sim. 5e; 11i.

(viii) Rahotep’s Coptos Stela (D.17), 3-4

w[D]t kA=k xpr.t=sn ity nb=n
Hw is pw nty m rA=k
siA [is p]w n[ty m ib=k]
‘What your Ka orders is what will happen, Sovereign our lord;
for the one in your mouth is Hu,
for the one in your heart is Sia.’

(ix) Chapelle Rouge, p.99: I.16-17 (HHBT II 9, 9-10)

iSst pw mrt.n=k xpr
iry=i is xft wD
‘What do you wish to happen?
For I will act according to the decree.’

(D) Polemic swt, i.e. swt expressing divergence in dialogue113

(x) Neferti 2n
Dd.in Hm=f a.w.s. m xpr.t=s{t}(y) swt (...)
‘And His Majesty L.P.H. said: “But from what will happen (...)!” ’

111 Further, Oréal 2011: 134-8, 143-5.

112 Emendation into wnn is Hr-nb id n gA=f, following Quack 1993a: 77.
113 Further, Oréal 2011: 423-5.

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 5.1 The early dating: A distinguished option? 357

(xi) Deir el-Bahari IV, pl.107, bottom left

mk w(i) swt rx.kw st
‘But don’t you see that I know that!’

5.1.5 Interim summary

In the above, no argument was made against the commonly accepted dating of Neferti
to the early Twelfth Dynasty. Nor was any argument made in favor, or against, any
other dating. Rather, some dimensions that have played a role in previous hypotheses
were discussed, all individually. It remains to be seen whether the conjunction of
these could suggest one horizon as being more likely than other ones. According with
the elements evoked so far, the issue falls in two parts: is a very early dating, to the
early Twelfth Dynasty, more likely than later datings, to the late Middle Kingdom or
later still? Is a dating more broadly to the Middle Kingdom more likely than a very
late dating, to the early Eighteenth Dynasty?
A dating to the early Twelfth Dynasty would have to rely on a specific reading of
‘Ameny’ and on an interpretation of Neferti as a piece of advocacy for the kings of
that period. A directly referential reading of ‘Ameny’, itself an interpretation, is only
one among several possibilities, not inherently any more likely than any other one
(§5.1.2.1). A reading of the composition in ‘propagandistic’ terms is contingent upon
a broader interpretive model, also an hypothesis only, not without problems of its
own, and derived notably from precisely such reading of Neferti (§5.1.2.3). A linguis-
tic argument that has been proposed for a very early dating does not hold (§5.1.4.1).
A dating to the Middle Kingdom more broadly would have to be based on a
directly referential interpretation of the ‘Walls of the Ruler’ and/or on the literary
tradition to which Neferti belongs. The referential status of the former is entirely
unclear, as is the relation of Neferti to the only other text, itself literary, that includes
the expression, Sinuhe. Alternative scenarios by which the expression would be
fictionalizing in Sinuhe and/or would in Neferti be in echo to Sinuhe are not inherently
any less likely than a directly referential interpretation (§5.1.2.2).
As regards the literary tradition to which Neferti belongs, this is defined by
reception, language, and common themes and motifs. Of these, patterns of
transmission in the New Kingdom and Ramesside construals of Middle Egyptian
‘literary history’ (an anachronistic term) are inherently neutral to the issue (§5.1.3.1).
Linguistically, no expression in Neferti implies a Middle Kingdom dating (§5.1.4.2),
nor does the overall register of the composition: Middle Egyptian was not a ‘classical’
language in the early Eighteenth Dynasty and was made one only subsequently
(§5.1.3.1.B). Of possible consequence are only the significant commonalities ob-
served between Neferti and other Middle Egyptian literary texts, first among which
Eloquent Peasant. As far as this can be assessed on direct empirical grounds, and
taking into account that several other Middle Egyptian literary texts are themselves
not precisely dated, motifs and lexical selections—‘clusters of language and
imagery’—display significant continuity over time in the early/mid-second
millennium (§5.1.3.2-3).

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 358 5 Neferti

The question then comes down to whether production in the Middle Egyptian
literary tradition to which Neferti belongs is viewed as fairly compact or more
extended in time. If the former hypothesis were made, an early Eighteenth Dynasty
dating of Neferti could be declared unlikely, yet this would then rely on an assumption
that is itself hypothetical only. Assessing the temporal depth of the common literary
tradition of which Neferti is an exponent is one of the very research questions the
present study aims to address.

5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm

The single most salient grammatical construction in Neferti is bare tw r sDm. The
construction occurs no less than seven times (6b; 7g; 7h (twice); 8f; 10h; 15a), to
which one instance of the related iw.tw r sDm (9a) is to be added. Moreover, the con-
struction functions as a major articulating device throughout the main body of the
composition after the framing prologue (§5.2.3.3).
The present section analyzes the diachronic status of bare tw r sDm and its textual
status in Neferti. A preliminary sub-section is devoted to discussing one apparent
Middle Kingdom instance of the construction (§5.2.1). A second step lies with
demonstrating that bare tw r sDm is integral to the original text of Neferti (§5.2.2). The
status of bare tw r sDm as a construction by and large limited to the literary sphere is
discussed in turn, at first restricting the prospects to directly anchor the construction to
the external record (§5.2.3). The distribution of the broader constructional scheme
(X.)tw r sDm (i.e. with or without supporting morphological host) is then presented,
with more easily derived implications for dating (§5.2.4). Finally, the expression of
main future passive events in securely dated Middle Kingdom literary texts is
described, with yet more consequential implications for dating (§5.2.5).

5.2.1 Ptahhotep 82 P: An instance of tw r sDm in a Middle Kingdom literary

text?

Considering bare tw r sDm for dating Neferti would at first seem nonsensical given
one apparently secure instance of just that construction in an early/mid-Twelfth
Dynasty literary text:

(i) Ptahhotep 81-82 P, traditional reading

qsn pw HDDw Hwrw-ib
tw r irt ntt m ib=k
‘The one who destroys the poor-hearted is a difficult person;
What is in your mind will be done.’

This is quoted in the major reference grammar114 and in all subsequent grammars115
and grammatical discussions.116 It has thereby acquired canonical status in the

114 EG p.254, n.4.

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 5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm 359

Egyptological description of Middle Egyptian and always stood as a proof that bare tw
r sDm is possible in Twelfth Dynasty literary registers. Consequently, the presence of
(X.)tw r sDm in Neferti is considered not to contradict an early Twelfth Dynasty dating
of this composition.
A. A preliminary observation is that the classical reading of Ptahhotep 81-82 P (i)
rests on two elements: (a) that no other grammatical construction seems readily
available for reading Ptahhotep 82 P; and (b) that a similar segmentation is present in
the later manuscript L2:
(ii) Ptahhotep 81-82 L2
qsn pw HDD Hwrw-ib °
sw r irt ntt m ib=f
‘The one who destroys the poor-hearted is a difficult person;
He will do what is in his heart.’
Upon closer study of Middle Egyptian grammar, however, another grammatical
construction is possible in Ptahhotep 82 P, namely ib.tw r sDm, the rare passive
counterpart to ib=f r sDm.117 As to the segmentation in L2, this need not be original:
internally to P, nothing supports such segmentation. Ink-dippings in P, which can in
some manuscripts be analyzed as traces of a scribe’s engagement with a text,118 do not
afford information in this respect.119 In addition, 81-82 L2 has various traces of
secondariness in other respects (notably the persons of pronouns: compare (i) and
(ii)). Just a few verses ahead in L2, the other instance of bare tw r sDm in the text (72),
also a NP r sDm construction, is itself demonstrably secondary (P reads differently:
§2.3.5). Consequently, what is presented as a secure instance of bare tw r sDm in a
Middle Kingdom literary text, Ptahhotep 81-82 P, is not a positive fact, but itself an
interpretation only.
B. Going beyond the above, a series of logically independent arguments, all internal
to the text of Ptahhotep P and thereby independent of Neferti, impose that Ptahhotep
81-82 P must be segmented differently than in the traditional reading.120

- The right part of the traditional segmentation *(...) | tw r irt is problematic for
various reasons, most notably because future passive events in exactly similar
environments are expressed differently throughout Ptahhotep itself, as ir.tw=f
(prospective or subjunctive), not as *tw r irt. For instance, locally within the
triptych of maxims §2-4 (D 60-83), and within maxim §2 in a structural
position exactly similar to the one of 82 in §4, Ptahhotep 66 reads nis.t(w)=f,
not *tw r nis=f.

115 Lastly Borghouts 2010: I, §99.g, (37) and II, 467.

116 E.g. Vernus 1997: 26, n.78.
117 Stauder in press c: §1.
118 E.g. for Sinuhe B, Parkinson 2009: 90-112.
119 I am indebted to Chloé Ragazzoli (p.c. 1/2011) for checking this on the original.
120 In details, Stauder in press c: §2-3.

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 360 5 Neferti

- The left part of the segmentation *Hwrw-ib | (...) is just as problematic, for a
variety of further reasons. Among these, the heading of maxim §4, to which
Ptahhotep 82 belongs, reads Hwrw (75), not *Hwrw-ib. The latter expression
itself is not attested anywhere else—except in the L2 reading of the very same
verse.
- In addition, constructions in bare tw—both bare tw r sDm (below, this
section) and bare tw sDm (§5.3)—are found in specific syntactic environments
only: in paragraph-initial position or following a preceding setting clause
(§5.2.3.3; §5.3.3.A). As discussed below, both environments relate to broader
aspects of the syntax of iw, more precisely of iw-lessness. None of these apply
to the posited tw r irt in Ptahhotep 82 P. If the traditional reading were correct,
this would stand out syntactically isolated in the whole Middle Egyptian
record; a new chapter of the syntax of iw would also have to be written.

In view of the above, Ptahhotep 81-82 P must be segmented differently:

(iii) Ptahhotep 81-82 P, as read in the present study:

qsn pw HDDw Hwrw
ib.tw r irt ntt m ib=k
‘The one who destroys a wretch is a difficult person;
One wishes to do what is in your heart.’

C. Textual processes that led to the reinterpretation of 81-82 P into the differently
segmented reading in L2 can be described along various parameters, such as the
differential salience of competing grammatical expressions (ib.tw r sDm vs. bare tw r
sDm) in scribes’ representations of Middle Egyptian grammar, phenomena of local
attraction, and semantic reinterpretation.121
Also a textual process, of a different sort, is how the modern reading of Ptahhotep
81-82 ‘P’ (i) came about. Descriptively, this modern reading (i) appears as a back-
projection of the segmentation in L2 (ii), going back to the early synoptic editions of
the text.122 Its near-universal acceptance123 may have been favored by the following
set of circumstances:

(a) The typographical disposition of synoptic text editions, which favors

conflating readings;
(b) The fact that the reading of L2 in 82 (sw r irt) in effect presupposes a
reading *tw r irt at some point during textual transmission;
(c) The local salience of bare tw r sDm construction, which is found just a few
lines ahead, in the L2 version (!) of Ptahhotep 72;

121 In details, Stauder in press c: §4.2.

122 Dévaud 1916: 20; Žába 1956: 23.
123 A lone exception is Lichtheim 20062 (19751): 64, 77, who reads as the present author, without
however justifying her interpretation.

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 5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm 361

(d) The general salience of bare tw r sDm in present-day philologists’

grammatical awareness (not least due to the conspicuous presence of the
expression in Neferti), contrasting with the textual rarity of ib.tw r sDm, a
construction until now never described.124

Of these, only (b) is of some consequence: a reading *tw r irt is indeed to be assumed
at some stage of textual transmission prior to L2 (§5.2.2, introduction). This stage is
already posterior to P and can be dated to a period no earlier than the late Seven-
teenth/early Eighteenth Dynasty.125

5.2.2 Bare tw r sDm as integral to the original text of Neferti

As Ptahhotep 72 L2 and 82 L2 demonstrate, bare tw r sDm can arise in the course of

textual transmission:

Ptahhotep 72 (§2.3.5): P wr wfA (...) in (...)

 L2 tw r wfA=f (...) in (...)

Ptahhotep 82 (§5.2.1): P (...) Hwrw | ib.tw r irt (...)

 ‘proto-L2’ *(...) Hwrw-ib | tw r irt (...)
 L2 *(...) Hwrw-ib | sw r irt (...)

A few more instances of secondary bare tw r sDm are encountered in other texts
(below, B). If tw r sDm is to made an argument for dating Neferti, it must preliminarily
be established that the construction is integral to the original text of that composition.
A. As discussed above (§2.3.5), the readings in Ptahhotep 72 L2 and 82 L2 can be
identified as secondary on purely text-internal grounds, i.e. without taking any
external knowledge of the text in P into account. By contrast, none of the instances of
bare tw r sDm in Neferti displays any traces of secondariness, neither in itself, nor in
how it relates to its immediate textual surroundings. This makes a claim that the
Neferti instances are original the null-hypothesis.
B. In going beyond this general appreciation, the ‘source constructions’ from which
bare tw r sDm, if secondary, could have arisen are considered. In Ptahhotep, these
source constructions are very rare ones and the processes of textual change accord-
ingly specific ones:

124 &w r sDm is near-universally mentioned in reference grammars and often given some special
attention (e.g. a dedicated section in EG §333), reflecting the remarkable fact of a clause-initial tw.
By contrast, ib.tw r sDm is not referenced in any grammar nor in any grammatical study (Stauder in
press c is yet to appear).
125 Stauder in press c: §4.2.

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 362 5 Neferti

72 P wr wfA in sDmyw: nfr sw with a subject elaborated by in N

The elaboration by in N probably helped support the alteration of the P construction
into a morphologically overt passive one in L2.

82 P ib.tw r irt: ib.tw r sDm

The construction is very rare in itself; more importantly, it is much rarer than tw r sDm
in post-Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian. This practically results in a significantly
differential salience of both constructions in ancient (and modern) readers’ implicit
representations of grammar, contributing to the alteration of the less common into the
more common construction.

The textual processes leading to the rise of secondary bare tw r sDm in Ptahhotep L2
are individual histories. In Neferti, none of these source constructions is possible. Nor
is any other scenario based on individual histories of a similar sort: occurrences of
bare tw r sDm are too many in Neferti.
Other documented instances of secondary bare tw r sDm are from a source
construction tw sDm (§5.3):

&w sDm  tw r sDm:

- Kheti 3.5-6 (ca. 1/2 of mss.): see §5.3.2.2;
- Hymn 6.4 (1 ms.: O. Var.Lit.A): see §5.3.2.1;
- Neferti 10e (1 ms.: O. GC 90): see §5.3.1.2.

In all seven instances of tw r sDm in Neferti, future contexts are firmly established by
active NP r sDm constructions and (subjunctive or prospective) sDm.tw=f. A source
construction tw sDm, which has present progressive tense, is not possible for any of
these.
Beyond documented cases, another source construction one may think of is
(prospective or subjunctive) sDm.tw=f. This is very common in general, yet never
documented as undergoing textual alteration into (bare) tw r sDm. Compare for
instance the forms in the king’s evocation of the promised burial in Sinuhe B 191
(wDa.tw), B 192 (ir.tw), B 195 (nis.tw), B 195-196 (sft.tw), all of which are still fully
preserved in the post-Eighteenth Dynasty AOS version. More generally, synthetic
forms hardly ever undergo textual alteration into a morphologically unrelated analytic
category. (Rare cases of N(P) sDm=f  NP Hr sDm are not before Ramesside manu-
scripts and tend to leave traces in the form of hybrids (§2.3.3); in addition, this is an
alteration of a subject-initial category into another subject-initial one, unlike what
would be the case if tw r sDm were secondary to sDm.tw=f.)
Not a possibility either is an alteration from a source construction NO r sDm (‘N is
to be heard’: thus e.g. 15a *inbw HqA r qd  P. Pet tw r qd inbw HqA). The construction
NO r sDm is reserved to events in which the agent is minimally salient semantically
(e.g. Ptahhotep 407 P; Merikare E 49: §5.2.5.C). This does not fit the semantics of
any of the instances of tw r sDm in Neferti, where the agent, although implicit, always
remains salient (thus, with a rendering glossing the semantics, the meaning in 15a is
not ‘The Walls of the Ruler are to be built’ (by some inner necessity), but ‘One (scil.

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 5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm 363

the king himself) will build the Walls of the Ruler’). Formally, an alteration NO r sDm
 tw r sDm=f would also imply a movement of constituents in the clause (notably the
patient moving after the verb), which is highly unlikely in itself.
As it turns out, there is no source construction, documented or undocumented,
from which bare tw r sDm in Neferti could have arisen. Bare tw r sDm is therefore
integral to the original text of Neferti.
C. Additional confirmation is found with the distribution of the construction in
Neferti. Bare tw r sDm occurs no less than seven times across the composition. Had it
been adapted from some other construction, a scenario of fully systematic redaction
would be implied, at complete variance with what is otherwise observed in the textual
history of all other Middle Egyptian literary texts.126
More directly, the distribution of bare tw r sDm in Neferti is itself eloquent. In
Neferti, two constructions are mainly used with future passive events, tw r sDm and
sDm.tw=f. The former is regularly used with main events, presented for themselves,
while the latter is used with events that are subject to some further elaboration and/or
dependent on other events (in details below, §5.2.3.3, (ii)). The contrast between bare
tw r sDm and iw.tw r sDm (once, in 9a) is similarly explained within the broader
textual articulation of Neferti (§5.2.3.3, (v)). The exact same contrasts extend to active
constructions (§5.2.3.3, (i) and §5.2.3.3, (iii)-(iv), respectively). Bare tw r sDm thereby
appears to be fully integrated within the overall macro-syntactic articulation of the
lament. Such a complex, multi-dimensional distribution does not arise as the
accidental result of textual alteration.

5.2.3 Bare tw r sDm

Bare tw r sDm is a highly uncommon construction (§5.2.3.1). It is also formally

distinguished by the bareness of tw itself: this is remarkable, because tw—be it as an
inflectional morpheme, e.g. in sDm.tw=f, or a pronoun-like clitic, e.g. in iw.tw r sDm—
otherwise leans on some preceding element. The only two exceptions to this rule are
bare tw r sDm itself and the even rarer bare tw sDm, examined in the next section
(§5.3). In discussing bare tw r sDm in Neferti for dating, the status of the construction
in grammar must therefore be addressed.
In the following, a few labeling conventions are adopted: (a) ‘bare tw r sDm’ is
self-explanatory; (b) ‘X.tw r sDm’ refers to a similar construction, but preceded by
some segment, either iw or relative nty/ntt; (c) ‘(X).tw r sDm’ refers to (a) and (b)
collectively, i.e. to the higher-order construction consisting in future NP r sDm with tw
in the subject slot, bare or not.

5.2.3.1 Attestation
The textual distribution of the construction is considered first. The full tableau of
attestation is the following:

126 Compare e.g. the Ramesside Sinuhe (Parkinson 2009: 201; Köhler 2009: 55). As a case study on
the lexical level, compare nkA and kAi occurring side by side in Eighteenth Dynasty versions of
Ptahhotep and Sinuhe (§2.7.3.3, (ii)).

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 364 5 Neferti

(a) In one Middle Egyptian literary composition, integral to the original text
(§5.2.2):
Neferti: 6b; 7g; 7h (twice); 8f; 10h; 15a;

(b) In New Kingdom manuscripts of Middle Egyptian literary compositions, as

a secondary reading:
- altered from bare tw sDm:
Kheti: 3.5-6 (ca. 1/2 of mss.): see §5.3.2.2;
Hymn: 6.4 (1 ms.: O. Var.Lit.A): see §5.3.2.1;
Neferti: 10e (1 ms.: O. GC 90): see §5.3.1.2;
- altered from other constructions:
Ptahhotep: 72 L2: see §2.3.5; also implicit in 82 L2: see §5.2.1.C;
NB. Although secondary, these readings all make sense in their respective
contexts. They thereby contribute to the overall pattern of attestation of the
construction, documenting its full acceptability to early New Kingdom
scribes.

(c) In one personal name, documented from D.13 to D.18:

PN: tw(-r)-mrt=s ‘She-will-be-loved’.127

The overall pattern of attestation is very limited. Bare uses of tw are documented in
Middle Egyptian, but do not constitute a regular phenomenon (compare further below,
§5.3, for the even rarer bare tw sDm). I go on to examine the specific conditions
licensing and/or triggering the construction.

5.2.3.2 In a personal name

Personal names have a special status in language: even when consisting in a meaning-
ful segment of speech (a phrase or a clause), they do not relate to the speech situation
in which they are uttered nor to unfolding discourse. Iw on the other hand, when not
used as a default morphological host, has functions precisely in the domains of
enunciation and discourse-connectivity. Very roughly, these consist in relating an
utterance to the speech situation and/or to a preceding segment of discourse, and in
allowing the speaker to express his commitment to the truth or informativeness of the
utterance. Such functions only very limitedly come to use in personal names, the only
case of a semantically motivated use of iw in these being apparently when the state-
of-affairs expressed by a clausal name is to be limited temporally. In all other cases,
the presence or absence of iw in personal names is determined by its function as a
morphological host. Compare:

127 References gathered by Vernus 1990a: 7, n.16: (a) Alwyn Castle 1950 (Vernus 1990a: 7, ex.9) tw-r-
mrt=s (early D.13); (b) CG 20695a (Lange & Schäfer 1908: 322-3; Ranke 1935: 379.3) tw-mrt=s, tw
mr.twsic=s (D.13, cf. www.griffith.ox.ac.uk/gri/8ste250.pdf); (c) Vernus 1986: 88 and n.44 (Gitton
1984: 16-7, n. 37) iaH-ms tw-(m)r=s (early D.18).

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 5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm 365

(a) Subject a suffix pronoun (iw required as a default morphological host):

E.g. iw=f/s-r-anx ‘He/she-will-live’; iw=f/s-r-snb ‘He/She-will-be-healthy’;
iw=s-r-prt ‘She-will-come-forth’;128

(b) Subject not a suffix pronoun (no default morphological host required):
- Subject a full noun: e.g. msH-r-m(w)t=f/=s ‘He/She-will-die-by-the-
crocodile’ (lit. ‘The-crocodile-will-be-his/her-death’);129 uncommonly with iw,
e.g. iw ib(=i) mn ‘My heart is enduring’ (Old Kingdom);130
- Subject tw: tw(-r)-mr(t)=s ‘She-will-be-loved’.

5.2.3.3 In Neferti: Textual hierarchies and macro-syntax

In Neferti, the use of bare tw r sDm relates to issues in the broader textual organization
of the composition, in which various hierarchical levels are interwoven. The following
major levels of organization are here relevant.
A. Among constructions with future time reference, (iw) NP r sDm (i.e. NP r sDm,
with or without iw) contrasts with a sDm=f of some sort. The former expresses main
events in the text, while the latter provides some further elaboration to these.
Active – active
(i) Neferti 8a-b
awt xAst r swr Hr itrw nw kmt
qbb=sn Hr wDbw=sna n-gAw stri st
‘The flock of foreign countries will drink at the river of Egypt,
they will cool themselves on their banks for lack of someone to make them
fearful.’
a) Sic. It has been proposed that this is in reference to itrw nw kmt in the preceding verse,
then to be read as a plural131 (meaning the branches of the Nile in the Delta?). This is
possible, but remains insecure since nw in 8a may also have been through attraction to the
ending -w of itrw.

Passive – active; then passive – passive

(ii) Neferti 8f-9a
tw r Ssp xaw nw aHA
anx tA m shA
iwa.tw r irt aHAw m biA
dbH.tw {m} tA <m> snfw
‘Weapons of combat will be taken up,
the land will live in uproar.

128 Ranke 1935: 14.20, 15.10, 14.22, 15.12, 15.11, respectively.

129 For this name, Collombert 2006.
130 Ranke 1935: 414.17.
131 Dils et al., TLA.

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 366 5 Neferti

(And) arms/arrows will be made of copper,

bread will be asked with blood.’
a) On iw in 9a, below, B.

B. On a higher-order hierarchical level, bare subject-initial constructions contrast

with iw-headed ones. In conformity with the general anchoring functions of iw, iw-
headed clauses are thereby related to some preceding segment of discourse. By
contrast, bare constructions, which occur in paragraph-initial position, are not.132
Active – active
(iii) Neferti 14a-e
sA n s r irt rn=f (...)
iw aAmw r xr n Sat=f (...)
‘The son of a man will make his name (...);
(And) the Asiatics will fall to his slaughtering (...)’

Passive – active
(iv) Neferti 15a-e
tw r qd inbw HqA a.w.s. (...)
iw mAat r iit r st=s (...)
‘The Walls of the Ruler L.P.H. will be built (...);
(And) Maat will return to its place (...)’

Passive – passive
(v) Neferti 8f-9a133
tw r Ssp xaw nw aHA (...)
iw.tw r irt aHAw m biA (...)
‘Weapons of combat will be taken up (...);
(And) arms/arrows will be made of copper (...)’

C. In one passage, finally, bare tw r sDm constructions occur in direct succession to

each other. The construction presents events ‘en bloc’ without any intervening
elaboration of these. Contrasting with the layered texture found elsewhere, this brings
about a stringendo effect, which can be interpreted as expressing a heightened
expressive urgency:

132 On the general correlation between iw-lessness in subject-initial constructions and paragraph-
initiality, provisionally Vernus 1997: 45-61; further Stauder & Uljas in prep.
133 As the semantic continuity between 8f and 9a demonstrates, these verses go together on the level
of their macro-syntactic articulation. The placement of the rubrum in Pet. 9a reflects editorial
practices.

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 5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm 367

(vi) Neferti 7g-h

tw r isq mAqt m grH
tw r aq xnrwt
tw r snbt qdd m irty
‘A ladder will be waited for at night!
Strongholds will be entered!
Slumber in the eyes will be swept away!’

5.2.3.4 A de facto literary construction in Neferti

As emerges from the above, the bareness of tw in bare tw r sDm in Neferti directly
relates to broader macro-syntactic issues in that composition, which concern active
and passive constructions alike. Rather than having to do with bare tw r sDm itself, the
bareness of tw is to do with more general phenomena in Middle Egyptian grammar,
and ultimately with aspects of the syntax of iw itself.
Although bare tw r sDm is almost exclusively documented in literature, the
bareness of tw in tw r sDm is therefore not a literary feature in itself—as is also
independently confirmed by the personal name tw-(r-)mr(t)=s, in which the lack of iw
similarly relates to Middle Egyptian grammar more broadly. In another sense,
however, bare tw r sDm may nonetheless be appreciated as a literary construction in
Neferti. In unfolding discourse, conditions that can trigger bareness will typically be
met in texts that have a complexly articulated macro-syntax such as Neferti (docu-
mentary texts, for example, only have iw.tw r sDm: §5.2.4). This could have resulted
in a strong, if by no means inherent, association of bare tw r sDm with literary
registers. Based on this de facto privileged association, the construction would have
secondarily gained a literary flavor, as is suggested by manuscripts of literary texts in
which the construction is textually secondary to some other construction
(§5.2.3.1, (b)). Significantly, these include contexts in which the macro-syntactic
conditions triggering, or licensing, bareness are not met any more (Ptahhotep 72 L2,
82 ‘proto-L2’), demonstrating that the construction had become part of a repertoire
regardless of the syntactic conditions under which it was initially possible.
For the overall argument developed in the present section, the implication is
twofold. The subtle multi-layered textual articulation of Neferti, to which bare tw r
sDm is integral, provides a decisive argument for declaring the construction part of the
original text of Neferti (for other arguments, §5.2.2). The analysis also implies that
bare tw r sDm can not be anchored to the external record directly as such: for dating,
the higher-order construction (X.)tw r sDm, also documented outside literature, must
be considered.

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 368 5 Neferti

5.2.4 (X.)tw r sDm

A. Early occurrences of (X.)tw r sDm are the following:

(a) Documentary registers:

- Letters: - P. UC 32200, 20-21 (i)n iw.tw r gmt=i kA nfr ‘If I am
going to be found, then good!’;
- P. UC 32287, 2-3 (...) ntt tw r irt ‘(...) what is to be
done’;
Regularly from the early D.18 on, e.g. P. Berlin 10463 ro
(temp. Amenhotep II), 1-2 (...) iw iw=tw r mni r Hwt-sxm
‘(...) when one will moor in Hutsekhem.’
- Accounts: - P. UC 32190, A, III.5 (...) ntt tw r wD ‘(...) what is to
be decreed’.
- Legal texts: - P. UC 32055 ro 9 iw.tw r rDt arq pA s 2 (...) ‘The two
men will be made to swear (...)’;
- Abydos Boundary Stela usurped by Neferhotep (early
D.13, originally Ugaf?), 5 ir rf nty Twsic nb r gmt=f (...)
‘As regards, however, whosoever will be found (...)’;
- Stèle Juridique (Nebirierau, D.17), 21 iw.tw r rDt
arq=sn (...) ‘They will be made to swear (...)’.

(b) Non literary, varia:134

- A graffito: Uronarti Quay Inscription (temp. Senwosret III)135 iw.tw
r gmt mw (...) ‘One had to find water (...)’.
- A personal name: tw(-r)-mrt=s ‘She-will-be-loved’ (documented in the
period D.13-18) (§5.2.3.1, (c)).
- An ostracon: O. Cairo 25372,136 1-2 [...] tw.tw r mst [...].tw r irt mw
nw (...) ‘[...] one will give birth; [...] one will do water
of(?) (...)’.
NB. Based on its disposition in columns and the forms of some signs, O. Cairo
25372, a very short document, has been tentatively dated to the Twelfth
Dynasty.137 This is problematic in view of the presence of the new subject
pronoun in col.1 (tw.tw), which would be earlier than the second earliest docu-
mented instance of such, in the late Seventeenth Dynasty, by several centuries
(§3.4.1.3). As discussed, the pattern of early attestations of the new subject
pronoun is dense in the late Seventeenth and early Eighteenth Dynasty and very

134 In later times, increasingly commonly, e.g. Urk. IV 656, 3 and 694, 7 (Thutmosis III’s Annals);
1023, 15 (in a caption in the Theban Tomb of Amenmes, temp. Amenhotep III).
135 Noted by Vernus 1990a: 14, ex.29.
136 Text: Kroeber 1970: 95-6.
137 Georges Posener, p.c. to Burkard Kroeber (Kroeber 1970: 95, n.4).

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 5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm 369

consistent in terms of registers. Pending further paleographic examination, the

dating of O. Cairo 25372 must be left open: paleography may be archaistic.
Alternatively, a Middle Kingdom dating may turn out to be correct after all; the fact
that O. Cairo 25372 has a new subject pronoun, at complete odds with the overall
pattern of attestation of such, would then imply that the document reflects a
hitherto undocumented variety, register and/or dialect, of Egyptian, different from
the ones based on which the written standards documented in the record were
based. If so, O. Cairo 25372 would be inconsequential for appreciating literary
registers of Middle Egyptian, which relate to the otherwise documented written
registers of the language.

(c) Literary:
- Original: - Neferti, passim: tw r sDm (7x), iw.tw r sDm (1x);
- Ipuwer 4.6 ptr nt<t> tw r irt ‘What shall one do?’
(§6.2.2.5, (iii));
- Secondary: - Kheti 3.5-6 (2x, about half of mss.) (§5.3.2.2); Hymn
6.4 (one ms.) (§5.3.2.1); Neferti 10e (§5.3.1.2);
Ptahhotep 72 L2 (§2.3.5); also implied in Ptahhotep 82
L2 (§5.2.1.C).

B. The above list of earliest occurrences leads to two observations. The first is
straightforward: (X.)tw r sDm is entirely undocumented in any written register, literary
or otherwise, prior to the late Twelfth Dynasty. This strongly suggests that a dating of
Neferti to the early Twelfth Dynasty is probably too early.
The second observation concerns written registers: all securely dated early occur-
rences of (X.)tw r sDm, from the late Twelfth Dynasty on, are from documentary
registers (a) or informal registers (b). Meanwhile, the construction remains undocu-
mented in any literary text securely dated to the Twelfth Dynasty: leaving Neferti
provisionally aside, the construction recurs only in one other literary text, Ipuwer, for
which a post-Twelfth Dynasty dating can be established on independent grounds
(§6.2.2.5). In later times, the construction was demonstrably part of an Eighteenth
Dynasty repertoire of literary Middle Egyptian (c, sub ‘secondary’).
The spread of innovations is generally gradual across written registers (§2.1). For
example, preposed possessives (pAy=f ), which are common in Illahun, remain limited
in Twelfth Dynasty literary texts to only two occurrences (Kagemni 2.3; Eloquent
Peasant B2 128: §2.4.4.2.2.A; §2.4.4.2.2, (iii)), in both cases as elements of a studied
simplicity of the framing narratives. A more widespread use of the same expression is
only in Cheops’ Court (type-B terminus ante quem non by the early Thirteenth
Dynasty: §2.4.4.1.B), where the expression is again indexical of register. Against the
background of such and similar constellations, a regular use of an expression as
saliently innovative as (X.)tw r sDm in Neferti—where it is not in any way inter-
pretable as indexical of register—is remarkable. This suggests that Neferti is likely to
have been composed somewhat later than the first absolute attestations of the

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 370 5 Neferti

construction in documentary and informal registers, in the late Twelfth Dynasty. How
much later can not be assessed further on the above grounds.

5.2.5 The expression of future passive events in early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty

literary texts

In order to make sure that the lack of (X.)tw r sDm in literary texts securely dated to
the Twelfth Dynasty is not a mere accident of preservation, one additional step is
taken. This consists in showing that literary texts securely dated to the Twelfth Dy-
nasty use some expression other than (X.)tw r sDm in similar function, for expressing
the passive of future events.
A. To put the following discussion into perspective, some background on functional
counterpart relationships in earlier Middle Egyptian verbal paradigms is primarily
recalled. In general, functional counterparts need not be isomorphic (i.e. morpho-
logically symmetrical). This is illustrated for Middle Egyptian by well-known cases
throughout negative paradigms: for example, the negative counterpart of iw sDm.n=f
is provided by an altogether different morphological category, n sDm=f. As to n
sDm.n=f, formally the pendant of positive sDm.n=f, this provides the negative counter-
part of yet another morphological category N(P) sDm=f. In addition, counterpart
relationships are complex in that they are often not defined on a one-to-one basis.
Turning to voice, passive counterparts to active iw sDm.n=f are two, iw P sDm (with
the pseudoparticiple) and iw sDm N (with the sDm(w)-passive): only in the passive, a
distinction is made depending on the nature of the subject, a pronoun or a full noun,
and neither passive category is the morphological pendant to the common active one.
In addition, the anterior passive paradigm has yet a third category, the sDm.n.tw=f,
which provides the functional counterpart to a subset only of the uses of active
sDm.n=f. In the anterior domain, three entirely distinct morphological categories in the
passive are thus opposed to only one in the active.138
The formal category here relevant, NP r sDm, itself has a non-isomorphic negative
counterpart in pre-Eigtheenth Dynasty Egyptian, nn sDm=f, not *nn sw r sDm. An
isomorphic counterpart develops only in the New Kingdom:139

Middle Egyptian
(i) P. UC 32057 vso III.16 iw=s r mst ‘She will give birth’
(ii) P. UC 32057 vso III.17 nn ms=s ‘She will not give birth’

138 These non-isomorphic counterpart relationships reflect what intuitively may be conceived of as the
semantic and communicative autonomy of the ‘weaker poles of communication’ (negative polarity,
passive voice) vis-à-vis positive active events. To give but a hint of what can be at play, the higher
resolution of the passive in the anterior domain has to do with the Endpoint-orientation of the
passive, interacting with perfective aspect, itself Endpoint-oriented. The issue will be developed in
adequate details in Stauder in prep.
139 See Vernus 1990a: 126-7.

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 5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm 371

Late Egyptian
(iii) Paheri (temp. Thutmosis III), pl.7, 2nd register from bottom, to the right
nn iw=i r wAH=T
‘I won’t abandon you.’
The first known instance;140 less than a century earlier, Kamose Inscriptions
St.II 10 still have (in an oath) nn wAH=i tw (...) ‘I will not let you be (...)’.

The reason for this non-isomorphic counterpart relationship in pre-New Kingdom

times is in part historical. When they first grammaticalize, new analytic patterns do so
for expressing specific domains of meaning, initially typically with positive and active
events only. In Earlier Egyptian, this was precisely the case of NP r sDm, as well as of
NP Hr sDm (for which counterpart relationships are discussed below: §5.3.5). In an early
stage, negative and passive counterparts to these newly grammaticalizing patterns were
then provided by other formal means available in the language: in the present case the
suffix conjugation (nn sDm=f ). Full formal alignment of negative patterns on positive
ones is realized only much later; as the example illustrates, non-isomorphic counterpart
relationships can be stable for a long time, here close to a millennium.
The lack of any instances of (X.)tw r sDm before the late Twelfth Dynasty (§5.2.4)
suggests that the passive counterpart of active NP r sDm was provided by some other
formal means until then in all written registers, and possibly later still in higher
registers such as in literature. In the following, actual instances of such counterpart
relationship are exhibited, first in non-literary texts then in literary ones.
B. One environment in which active NP r sDm is regularly used is the apodosis of
threat formulae.141 These therefore provide a favorable locus for observing counter-
part relationships with the passive. (Active constructions other than NP r sDm are also
regularly found in the same environment, notably (prospective and/or subjunctive)
sDm=f, e.g. Siut I 224 (Urk. VII 53, 13) (...) xr=s[n] n dnD n DHwty ‘(...) they will fall
to the fury of Thoth.’142 The argument will therefore not be that an individual instance
does not have (X.)tw r sDm, but that no single instance ever has (X.)tw r sDm, even
though active NP r sDm is common in the exact same environment.)
In apodoses of threat formulae, (X.)tw r sDm is never documented. Constructions
used instead include the (prospective or subjunctive) sDm=f marked for passive voice

140 A singular pre-New Kingdom instance of a possible isomorphic negation of NP r sDm has been
proposed to lie in the much-discussed Mocalla II..1 (Ankhtifi, First Intermediate Period) Dr-ntt nn
xpr mit(=i) nn sw r xpr n ms mit(=i) n ms.[t(w)]=f. This is far from secure: see the different
analyses (and associated translations) by Vernus (1990a: 130-1), Allen (p.c. to Pascal Vernus,
quoted in Vernus 1990a: 130-1, n.57), and Loprieno (2003: 87). Even if Mocalla II..1 were to be a
negation to NP r sDm (which the present author doubts), the construction would be of an
exploratory nature, as follows from the temporal distance with the first secure example in the New
Kingdom, compounded with the morphological naturalness in developing isomorphic negative
counterparts (I thank Jean Winand for discussion on the issue). For the present purpose, it therefore
suffices to observe that Mocalla II..1 would be genetically disjunct from the regular isomorphic
negative paradigm emerging by the early New Kingdom.
141 Morschauser 1991: 26; Edel 1943: §13ff. (for the Old Kingdom).
142 Sim. Siut III 71 (Edel 1984: 39) (...) bwy sw tknw=f ‘(...) his relatives will abhore him’; further
Morschauser 1991: 20-37, specifically 21-5.

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 372 5 Neferti

(iv) and NPO r sDm (i.e. NP r sDm interpreted passively, without overt marking of
voice) (v).143 The first (iv) defines a counterpart relationship similar in principle to the
one in negative events (NP r sDm – sDm.tw=f; compare NP r sDm – nn sDm=f ). The
second (v) demonstrates how even when the passive construction is based on a NP r
sDm pattern, the use of tw in this pattern is avoided.

(iv) Sarenput, Stela Aswan Museum #1373, x+21-23

ir HAti-a nb (...)
sx.tw xpS=f mi iwA pn
mn.t(w) Tsw=f mi Apd (...)
‘As to any governor (...),
his arm will be cut off like this bull’s,
his neck severed like this bird’s (...)’
In the same formula, also Mocalla II..3 - III.1144 ir HqA nb (...) sx.t(w) xpS=f (...)
‘As to any ruler (...), his arm will be cut off (...)’. In a different context, also
Abydos Boundary Stela usurped by Neferhotep 6-7 ir grt sr nb (...) smi.t(w)=f (...)
‘As regards, however, any official (...), he will be reported (...)’.

(v) Siut IV 79-80145

ir swt sbi nb (...)
iw=f r p[s]t (...)
‘As to any rebel however (...),
he will be cooked (...)’
Sim. Siut III 64146 (...) [Ha]w=[s]n r tk[A] ‘(...) their bodies will be burnt.’147
Compare the formally identical construction in the active, e.g. Cairo 1651148 iw(=i)
<r> sxt Ts=f mi Apd ‘I will strike his neck like a bird’s.’149

The above establishes two counterpart relationships: active NP r sDm – (passively

interpreted) NP r sDm, and NP r sDm – sDm.tw=f. (That passive counterparts can be
more than one is almost a consequence of the notion of counterpart relationship itself.)
For the present discussion, this is suggestive, yet remains insufficient because threat
formulae can be formulaic: there is a possibility therefore that the linguistic age of some
of the above formulations may be somewhat divorced from the time of their inscription.
C. In identifying functional counterparts in Twelfth Dynasty literary registers, only a
small subset of all future passive events will be here relevant—namely the ones in
environments in which NP r sDm would necessarily have been used in the active, to

143 Yet another construction, possibly limited to the Old Kingdom, is wnn + sDm(w)-passive / wnn NP
pseudoparticiple (Edel 1943: §12.A.1, B; §20). This may impart some more specific meaning, in
relation to the perfective semantics of the forms employed.
144 On Inscription #8 more generally, Willems 1990.
145 Edel 1984: 120-7 and fig.15.
146 Edel 1984: 124-5.
147 For the fairly common Old Kingdom instances of the construction, further Edel 1943: §12.A.2.
148 Morschauser 1991: 26.
149 For Old Kingdom instances of the formula, Edel 1943: §13.

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 5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm 373

the exclusion of any other active form. Accordingly, all future passive forms in any of
the following environments are to be excluded from discussion:

(a) Events that carry modality—for which subjunctive sDm=f, not NP r sDm,
would have been used in the active:
E.g. Ptahhotep 28 wD.t(w) n bAk im irt mdw iAw ‘Let it be decreed to this servant
that a staff of old age be made’;
(b) Events that are semantically dependent upon some preceding segment of
discourse—for which subjunctive sDm=f, not NP r sDm, would have been used
in the active:
E.g. Shipwrecked Sailor 142-144 sDd<=i> rf (...) dwA.tw n=k nTr (...) ‘I shall tell
(...), and god will be thanked for you (...)’;
(c) Events that provide a textual setting to a following segment of discourse—
for which prospective sDm=f, not NP r sDm, would have been used in the active:
E.g. Eloquent Peasant B1 352-353 gmw.tw kft=s sbw=s r imAx ‘When its (scil.
Truth’s) revelation is found, it will conduct to blessedness!’150;
(d) Events that mutually depend upon each—for which prospective sDm=f, not a
NP r sDm, would have been used in the active:
E.g. Eloquent Peasant B1 213-214 gm.tw imnw mAat rD.t(w) sA grg r tA ‘The
mystery of Truth will be found, and Falsehood cast down on the ground!’;151
(e) Events that relinquish some of their rhematic load to an adverbial or
circumstantial elaboration of some sort—for which prospective sDm=f, not NP r
sDm, would have been used in the active:
E.g. Eloquent Peasant R 10.5152 in awAw.tw=i rf m DAtt=f ‘Will I be robbed in his
estate?’153

Given such highly restrictive conditions, the harvest will necessarily be limited. In
Eloquent Peasant for instance (a fairly long composition by Middle Egyptian
standards), all instances of future passive events fall under one of the above types.
Not directly relevant for different reasons is also the construction NPO r sDm (i.e.
NP r sDm passively interpreted), observed above in the apodoses of threats (above,
B, (v)). This recurs in two Middle Egyptian literary texts, one dated to the Twelfth
Dynasty: Ptahhotep 407 P iw sA=k r Hbs Xr=s ‘Your back will be clothed through it’
(sim. Merikare E 49: §2.4.4.5, (iii)). In both cases, NPO r sDm is followed by an
expression Xr=s, not an agent. The selection of a semantically oriented passive
construction (as opposed to a syntactically one, with overt marking of voice such as
by tw) correlates with a strong semantic backgrounding of the agent: the event is

150 Similar analysis in Vernus 1990a: 34, ex.69.

151 Similar analysis in Vernus 1990a: 34, n.27.
152 B1 49 has a spelling <awA> of the stem: this may be either the same form (prospective with the
ending -w left unwritten), or a genuine variant (with a subjunctive, modally colored).
153 Sim. Sinuhe B 280-281 iw=f r smr mm srw rD.t(w)=f m-qAb Snyt ‘He will be a Companion among
the officials, he will be placed right within the court.’

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 374 5 Neferti

presented as if it had no agent at all, while the phrase Xr=s expresses the means or
ways by which such non-agentive events unfold. In tw r sDm as in Neferti, the implied
agent is left unexpressed and is not always specific, yet remains fully salient in the
semantic representation of the event. Accordingly, NPO r sDm, although a genuine
passive counterpart to active NP r sDm, is not one that could have been used in
Neferti, whatever the date of the composition of this text.
D. The other construction observed in apodoses of threats, sDm.tw=f, also recurs in
Middle Kingdom literary registers. As an examination of each of the examples below
shows, the unexpressed and mostly unspecific agent is here fully part of the semantic
representation of the event. The following examples, unlike the ones just presented,
are therefore relevant for comparison with tw r sDm in Neferti.
In examples from Ptahhotep, there is a theoretical possibility to interpret the use
of a prospective sDm=f as determined by the circumstantial expression that follows
(above, C, (e)); this is fairly unlikely on semantic and contextual grounds:

(vi) Ptahhotep 292-293 P

Ts pw Xs stt xft
pr.tw Hr irt=f ib Hr win=f
‘It is a bad sentence to shoot the enemy:
one will renounce applying it, the heart rejecting it.’
The clause ib Hr win=f merely elaborates on pr.tw Hr irt=f; it is not placed under
focus.154 L2 reinterpreted the passage, turning pr.tw into prr.tw; this is consistent
with a general tendency of L2, also observed elsewhere in Ptahhotep, to read
emphatic constructions where P has none (2.3.2.3, (ii).NB).

(vii) Ptahhotep 64-67 P

sand=k Dd bin m tm xsf sw m At=f
nis.t(w)=f m xm-xt pw rmn.n dAir-ib=k aHa=f
‘It is by not opposing him in his moment that you will make little the one who
speaks badly;
He will be called “This is an ignoramus”, your self-restraint having matched
his riches.’
While the preceding sentence (sand=k (...)) is a clear case of a narrow-focus
construction, nis.t(w)=f, the conclusion of maxim §2, is fully asserted, with rmn.n
dAir=k (...) merely providing some background.

In similar environments, Ptahhotep has NP r sDm in the active. Compare for instance
(vi) with (viii):

154 Pace Vernus 20102b: 126 and n.152, who translates ‘On évitera de la mettre en œuvre, et ce même
si le jugement s’égare.’

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 5.2 Neferti, passim: &w r sDm 375

(viii) Ptahhotep 135-137

ir sr wnn=f HA tA sxr xft wD kA=f
iw=f r rDt n Hssy=f
‘As to any official who will be after food, his decision is according to his ka:
he will give to the one who praises him.’155
In Sinuhe, the following passage is entirely beyond doubt. Adverbial elements can not
be under focus if a reasonable meaning is to be preserved. The first of the series of
passives (wDa.tw) can not be in continuation of the preceding imperative (sxA)
(compare the change in agents), and is therefore initial. Finally, any optative modality
is here absent, the king speaking.

(ix) Sinuhe B 189-196

iw min is SAa.n=k tni fx.n=k bAAt sxA n=k hrw n qrs sbt r imAx
wDa.tw n=k xAwy m sft wtAw m awy tAyt
ir.tw n=k Sms-wDA hrw smA-tA (...)
ir.tw xbb nnyw r rA is=k
nis.tw n=k dbHt-Htpw
sft.tw r rA abw=k (...)
‘For today you have begun to be old, you have lost virility. Have in mind the
day of burial, the passing to blessedness!
A night-vigil will be assigned to you with holy oils and wrappings from the
hands of Tayet;
a funeral procession will be made for you on the day of joining the earth (...)
The dance of the Oblivious ones will be performed at the entrance of your
tomb;
the invocation-offerings will be recited for you;
sacrifices will be made at the entrance of your offering-chapel (...)’

In similar textual environments, Sinuhe has NP r sDm in the active. Thus, in Sinuhe’s
response to the above royal pronouncement (x), and in another solemn pronouncement
by the king (xi), comparable to the one just quoted (ix):

(x) Sinuhe B 203-204

iw kA=k r rDt iry=i pHwy Haw=i m Xnw
‘Your ka will let me make an end with my body in the Residence.’156

(xi) Sinuhe B 280-281

iw=f r smr mm srw (...)
‘He will be a companion among the officials (...)’157

155 Sim. 129-130 P mdw=k xft wSd=f tw iw Ddt=k r nfr Hr ib ‘You must speak only according to him
asking you: what you will say will be good on the heart.’
156 Sim. Sinuhe B 234-235 iw bAk im r swDt TAt ir.n bAk im m st tn ‘This humble servant will hand over to
the chicks that this humble servant has begotten in this place.’

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 376 5 Neferti

In a previous section (§5.2.4), the lack of any attestation of the isomorphic construction
(X.)tw r sDm before the late Twelfth Dynasty was noted and interpreted in terms of
written registers. The present sub-section now establishes the counterpart relationship
between active NP r sDm and passive sDm.tw=f in early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty literary
Middle Egyptian: (X.)tw r sDm is a later development.

5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm

In two places, Neferti has a construction tw sDm. The construction is not mentioned in
any grammars nor grammatical discussion and only recognized, occasionally and
mostly implicitly, by translators.158 A first step therefore consists in establishing the
existence of the construction in Middle Egyptian, in Neferti (§5.3.1) and in two other
compositions that have it, Hymn and Kheti (§5.3.2). The function of the construction,
semantic and syntactic, as well as its status in Middle Egyptian grammar, are analyzed
in turn (§5.3.3). As with tw r sDm, the construction is de facto limited to literary
registers; accordingly, the higher-order construction (X.)tw Hr sDm, to which tw sDm
relates, must be considered for dating (§5.3.4). The argument is completed by a
discussion of the passive counterpart of NP Hr sDm in securely dated Twelfth Dynasty
literary texts (§5.3.5).

5.3.1 &w sDm in Neferti

One instance of tw sDm in Neferti is generally accepted by translators (§5.3.1.1).

Another one has so far escaped notice and therefore requires more extensive
discussion (§5.3.1.2).

5.3.1.1 Neferti 12b

The one undisputed instance of tw sDm in Neferti is the following:

Neferti 12a-c
D=i n=k tA m sny-mny
sA-a m nb a
tw nD-xrt nD-xrt
D=i n=k (...)
‘I shall show you the land in calamity,
the weak of hand now a lord of force,
the one who did the greeting being greeted.
I shall show you (...)’

157 Technically an instance of NP r N; NP r sDm itself is featured in Sinuhe only in Sinuhe’s mouth ((x)
in the main text, and the associated note), not the king’s. The semantic conditions, however, are
directly comparable.
158 E.g. Parkinson 1997a: 138 and Kammerzell 1986: 109 (for Neferti 12b); van der Plas 1986: I, 33
(for Hymn 6.4; with an explicit note in van der Plas 1986: I, 189).

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 377

As the context and the Sonst-Jetzt articulation159 imply, the semantics are progressive
(here reflected in English rendering by a continuous tense). This is further confirmed
by an examination of parallel passages in Neferti. Compare:

(i) 12a-b D=i n=k tA m sny-mny

sA-a m nb-a
tw nD-xrt nD-xrt

(ii) 9f D=i n=k sA m xrwy

sn m xft
s Hr smA it=f
‘I shall show you the son as an enemy,
the brother as an opponent,
a man killing his father.’

In Neferti 12b, the construction tw sDm therefore provides the passive counterpart to
progressive NP Hr sDm.

5.3.1.2 Neferti 10e

It is here proposed that another instance of tw sDm in Neferti is to be recognized in
Neferti 10e:

Neferti 10c-e
HDDa m iryt
wS[t]{w}b m gmyt
iryt m tmmt irc
tw nHm xt s r=f rDw n nty m rwtyd
‘Destruction is in what hade been done,
what is lost is what had been found,
what is done is what had not been done,
the property of a man is being taken from him to be given to the one who is
outside.’
a) Pet. and C25224 both have HDD, which provides a coherent reading. Alternatively, the text
could be emended to HDD<t> ‘What is being destroyed is what had been done’, based on
the two following clauses, which have a Sonst-Jetzt articulation (participle m participle).
Both readings are coherent and which is original undecidable.
b) Pet. wS.[t]w; C25224 wS.tw. Both Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses read with a ‘passive’
relative form, reflecting an understanding as ‘what is being lost’ (present tense). This is a
semantically possible interpretation within the clause, yet appears to be secondary when
the broader context, particularly iryt in the next clause, is taken into account.160

159 E.g. Schenkel 1984.

160 Further discussion below, §6.2.1.1, (i); similarly Quack 1993a: 78.

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 378 5 Neferti

c) In Neferti echoing 4c iryt m tm(m)t ir; compare also Ahmose’s Tempest Stela ro 15-16/vso
18 (HHBT 109, 3/4) iryt tmmt ir.161
d) For the sequence of passive events nHm – rDi (the latter in the pseudoparticiple), compare
the Chief Steward Amenhotep’s statue (temp. Amenhotep III) 46 (Urk. IV 1800, 5)162
nHm.tw iAt=f xft-Hr Dw n s nty m xrw=f ‘His office shall be taken from before him to be
given to someone who is his enemy.’
e) The pluperfect to reflect the Sonst-Jetzt articulation of the overall passage (here Jetzt-
Einst), in the second and third clauses (not emending HDD) or in all three clauses
(emending HDD into HDD<t>); either way, the relative anterior tensing carries over to iryt
in the first clause as well.

The passage is generally read otherwise, with two different traditions in interpretation.
A. A different segmentation of 10d-e has been proposed, associating tw with ir in the
preceding verse, 10d. NHm, now initial in 10e, would then be a sDm(w)-passive. This
segmentation, adopted in the text edition in which Neferti is commonly read,163 and
reified in the typographical disposition of that text edition,164 has been influential in
subsequent interpretation.165

(...) tmmt irt{w}

nHm xt s r=f (...)
‘(...) what had not been done.
The property of a man has been taken from him (...)’

Helck’s segmentation is not supported by any positive argument in favor of it.166 It

may have been favored by the fact that the construction tw sDm is nowhere described
in any grammars or grammatical studies; yet, the construction exists, as is demon-
strated in Neferti itself by 12b (§5.3.1.1). The interpretation of nHm as a perfective
form may also have been inspired by the presence of another perfective form just a
few words later in 10e, rDw (a pseudoparticiple): this is inconsequential, compare e.g.
Urk. IV 1800, 5 (n.d to the main example above). Remarkably, Helck himself
translates nHm with a present tense,167 in contradiction to its own segmentation. In
addition, an analysis of the overall temporal articulation of the lament speaks

161 E.g. Parkinson 2002: 196; more generally on Ahmose’s Tempest Stela in relation to Neferti, Gnirs
2006: 228ff; below, §5.8.3.3.
162 Parallel noted in EG, p.341, n.1.
163 Helck 19922 (19701): 40, 42, n.d.
164 For the influence of the visual disposition of modern text editions on interpretation, compare e.g.
the modern history of Ptahhotep 81-82 (§5.2.1.C); in more details, Stauder in press c: §4.3.
165 E.g. Quirke 2004a: 137; Parkinson 1997a: 137.
166 Helck’s segmentation is also problematic in view of the supposed ir.tw after tm. The replacement
of a negatival complement by an infinitive after tm is documented, thus in Neferti itself in the
parallel passage, 4c, where Pet. has iryt m tmt ir and O. DeM 1188 [...] m tmmt irt; sim. e.g. Ipuwer
2.4-5: §2.3.1.1, (vi)). In both cases, however, the infinitive is spelled irt, not ir.tw. Moreover, both
O. DeM 1188 and P. Leiden I 344 ro are Ramesside, unlike Pet. and C25224; Pet. clearly has the
negatival complement in 4c, unaltered.
167 Helck 19922: 43: ‘(...) wird ihm geraubt (...)’.

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 379

decisively against the posited perfective form nHm (below, §5.3.1.3). Accordingly, the
element tw belongs to 10e.168
B. Once the element tw is recognized to open 10e, two possibilities remain:

(a) tw <r> nHm: future tw r sDm construction with r omitted in spelling, as

is common throughout Neferti (§5.2);
(b) tw nHm: progressive tw sDm construction, as in 12b (§5.3.1.1).
Among authors who segment the text with tw opening 10e, universal preference is
given to emending into tw <r> nHm.169 Such reading apparently finds some support
just a few verses below, where tw r sDm is used with an event of ‘giving things’,
resonating with ‘taking things’ in 10e: 10h tw r rDt xwt m msdd r sgr rA mdw ‘Goods
will be given with hatred to silence a speaking mouth.’ Interpretation (a) may also
have been inspired by the high-frequency (and resulting salience) of tw r sDm in
Neferti, compounded with the fact that tw sDm has no status in any current description
of Middle Egyptian grammar.
Yet, tw sDm is a possible construction in Neferti (12b: §5.3.1.1), demonstrating
that in this text a sequence introduced by D=i n=k can be followed by either a
progressive tw sDm (12a-b) and or a future tw r sDm construction (10f-h; 7e-f);
consequently, no emendation can be justified a priori in 10e. An omission of the
morpheme r is documented in Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses of Neferti, but remains
very uncommon, being limited to two cases in Pet. (8c; 13d) and one in C25224 (14e),
against a total of twenty-five occurrences of NP r sDm (active or passive) throughout
the text.170 Just as in 12b, Pet. and C25224 concur in having tw sDm in 10e: while a
common archetype, already faulty, can be posited, emendation should be carried out
only if positive arguments are given to that effect. The reading is coherent as the text
stands: just as in 12b, tw sDm in 10e follows a sequence of A m B constructions in the
Jetzt-Einst articulation (12a, 10c-d, respectively).

5.3.1.3 Neferti 10e and 12b in the broader temporal articulation of the composition
A decisive argument pro the here advocated reading of 10e as tw nHm is derived from
a consideration of large-scale compositional patterns and the interweaving of
temporalities in Neferti.
A. In sequences introduced by D=i n=k (...), a perfective tense (the pseudoparticiple
in most cases) is followed by tw r sDm (i)-(ii). On the other hand, 12b, a secure
instance of tw sDm, follows a NP m NP construction (iii). This is just the construction
that is found to precede the verse here under discussion, 10e (iv). Compare:

168 Also recognized by Dils et al., TLA: ‘Die Satztrennung bei Helck ist irreführend! (...)’.
169 E.g. Kammerzell 1986: 108; Dils et al., TLA.
170 To the passive instances discussed above (§5.2), add the active ones in 5f; 6c; 6d; 6e; 6f; 8a; 12e
(twice); 13a; 13c (twice); 13d (twice); 14a; 14f; 15e.

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 380 5 Neferti

(a) NP pseudoparticiple – tw r sDm:

(i) Neferti 8e-f
D=i n=k tA m sny-mn
tm xpr xpr
tw r Ssp xaw nw aHA (...)
‘I shall show you the land in calamity,
what should not happen having happened.
Weapons of combat will be taken up (...)’

(ii) Neferti 10f-h

D=i n=k nb m nhpw
rwty Htp
tm ir mH.n=f
ir Sw
tw r rDt xt m msdd (...)
‘I shall show you the lord in sorrow,
the outsider satisfied,
the one who did nothing having filled,
the one who did in want.
Goods will be given with hatred (...)’

(b) NP m NP – tw sDm:
(iii) Neferti 12a-b
D=i n=k tA m sny-mny
sA-a m nb a
tw nD-xrt nD-xrt
‘I shall show you the land in calamity,
the weak of hand now a lord of force,
the one who did the greeting being greeted.’

(iv) Neferti 10c-e

(...) HDD m iryt
wS[t]{w} m gmyt
iryt m tmmt ir
tw nHm xt s r=f (...)
‘(...) destruction is in what had been done,
what is lost is what had been found,
what is done is what had not been done,
the property of a man is being taken from him (...)’

B. A similar type of observation extends to the segments of text that follow the
respective constructions, tw r sDm and tw sDm. In both 8f and 10h, the events
expressed by a tw r sDm construction are elaborated further by subsequent sDm.tw=f’s
(v)-(vi). The pattern is the one described above (§5.2.3.3.A-B), with the tw r sDm con-

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 381

structions opening a new segment of text. In 12b, by contrast, the tw sDm construction
is subject to no further elaboration (vii). The passage here under discussion, 10e (viii),
similarly lacks any further elaboration (other than the one provided by the embedded
pseudoparticiple, rDw (...), which is not on the same level as the sDm(.tw)=f ’s in (v)
and (vi)). Compare:

(c) &w r sDm – elaboration with sDm(.tw)=f (§5.2.3.3.A):

(v) Neferti 8f
tw r Ssp xaw nw aHA
anx tA m shA
‘Weapons of combat will be taken up,
the land will live in uproar.’
(vi) Neferti 10h-i
tw r rDt xt m msdd r sgr rA mdw
wSb.tw a pr Xr xt
mdw.tw m smA sw
‘Goods will be given with hatred to silence a speaking mouth,
one will answer only with the arm stretched out with a stick,
one will speak only by: “kill him!” ’

(d) &w sDm – no further elaboration:

(vii) Neferti 12b-c
(...) tw nD-xrt nD-xrt
D=i n=k (...)
‘(...) the one who did the greeting being greeted.
I shall show you (...)’
(viii) Neferti 10e-f
(...) tw nHm xt s r=f rD n nty m rwty
D=i n=k (...)
‘(...) the property of a man being taken from him, to be given to the one who is
outside.
I shall show you (...)’

C. The distribution of tw r sDm and tw sDm in Neferti is therefore principled,

correlating in consistent ways with the construction types found in both the preceding
and the following segments of texts:

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 382 5 Neferti

8e-f D=i n=k

(...) NP PsP tw r sDm elaboration (sDm=f )
(future)

10d-e (D=i n=k (9f))

(...) NP m NP tw sDm no elaboration
(present progressive)

10f-i D=i n=k

NP PsP tw r sDm elaboration (sDm.tw=f )
(future)

12a-b D=i n=k

(...) NP m NP tw sDm no elaboration
(present progressive)

12c-f D=i n=k

NP PsP171 (...) iw NP r sDm elaboration (in-cleft)
(future)

Neferti is distinguished by its complex temporality, explicitly thematized in the

opening parts of the lament: a presentification (4a xft-Hr=k ‘in your presence’; 3f m-
bAH=k ‘before you’) of ‘future events’ (2m, 2n xpr.t=sy) to the addressee (simulta-
neously Neferti’s own heart, Snefru, the audience).172 The large-scale compositional
articulation sketched above, extending over most of the second half of the lament,
expresses just such an oscillation between future and present progressive tense. The
temporalities of prophesy and of presentification, both conjured up by the recurrent
D=i n=k (...) ‘I shall show you: (...)’,173 are interwoven.
D. For the purpose of the present argument, the implication is twofold. To begin
with, 10e, compositionally parallel to tw nD-xrt in 12b in all respects, is to be read as
the text stands, tw nHm; 10e thus provides a second instance of the construction tw
sDm in Neferti. Moreover, both instances of the tw sDm construction in 10e and 12b
are integral to the original text of Neferti: this is because a complex and thoroughly
structured large-scale compositional articulation such as the one just sketched can not
have arisen as a chance artifact of textual transmission, nor through ré-écriture,
however extensive.

171 PXr.ti in 12c is a classical crux (see the various interpretations gathered in Dils et al., TLA). The
interpretation adopted here is based on the fact that neither Xry nor Hry in the first part of 12c have
the semogram of the seated man (A1). In the second part of 12c, pXr.ti is interpreted as a pseudo-
participle, hooked on n=k in the first part. The 1sg pronoun after Xt (only in Pet., not in C25224) is
then emended. The proposed overall translation is thus as: D=i n=k Xry r Hry pXr.ti m-sA pXr Xt ‘I
will show you the lower part being up, to you who are reversed after a reversal of the body.’
172 Also Widmaier 2009: 81-2; Parkinson 2002: 196.
173 Possbly in allusion to performative D.n=i n=k (...) as in temple scenes (Parkinson 2002: 196).

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 383

5.3.2 &w sDm outside Neferti: Hymn 6.4 and Kheti 3.5-6

Besides Neferti, only two other texts, Hymn and Kheti, have the construction tw sDm.
In Hymn, the construction is immediately identified (§5.3.2.1). In Kheti, the manu-
script tradition is split and some additional discussion is therefore required (§5.3.2.2).

5.3.2.1 Hymn 6.3-4

Hymn has one instance of the construction tw sDm:

Hymn 6.3-4
Sms sw DAmw Xrdw tw nD xrt=f a m nsw
‘When a troop of children follows him, he is greeted as a king.’
a) All witnesses, except O. Var.Lit. A, which has adapted to tw r nD-xrt=f.

In identifying the grammatical function of tw nD xrt=f, the overall context of 6.3-4 is

considered: 6.4 is linked to the preceding clause (Sms sw DAmw Xrdw) both through
pronominal cohesion (sw – xrt=f ) and through the double verse structure of the
overall passage. In the lack of any other possible alternative interpretation,174 the
clause in 6.3 provides a setting to the following main clause in 6.4 (with Sms a mrr=f;
a subjunctive is unlikely).
This is confirmed by an analysis of the structure of strophe 6. Verses 6.1-2 and
6.5-6 are a series of epithets, while 6.7-8 is a setting construction followed by a main
clause. As discussed, this is just the syntax of 6.3-4. The overall structure of strophe 6
is therefore alternating:

6.1-2 (epithets)
6.3-4 Sms sw DAmw Xrdw tw nD xrt=f m nsw
6.5-6 (epithets)
6.7-8 swr.tw mw irt nbt im=f rDw HAw Hr nfrw=f
(‘When water is drunk, every eye is on him, who gives an
excess on his good things.’)

The construction in 6.3-4 is thereby identified as a variation on the construction

setting mrr=f – NP Hr sDm (§1.2, (ii)), with the second clause passive. Consequently,
tw nD xrt in 6.4 is the passive counterpart to NP Hr sDm. This value of tw sDm in Hymn
is just the one identified for the same construction in Neferti.

174 An alternative interpretation of Sms as a subjunctive form with ‘jussive’ meaning is ruled out by
the context: within strophe 6, 6.3-4 interrupts a series of epithets (6.1-2; 6.5-6). This contrasts with
stanza 13, which consists in a whole sequence of ‘jussive’ clauses.

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 384 5 Neferti

5.3.2.2 Kheti 3.5-6

As argued below, another instance of tw sDm is to be recognized in Kheti 3.5-6:175

Kheti 3.5-6
SAa.n=f a wAD iw=f m Xrd
tw (r)b nD xrt=f
tw (r)b hAb=f r irt wpt
n iy=f swc sd=f sw m dAiw
‘When he has, still a child, begun to flourishd,
he is greeted;e
He is sent to carry out missions:
before he has returned, he clads himself in a kilt.’
a) All witnesses have a sDm.n=f. This is grammatical and rich in Middle Egyptian, and
paralleled in 6.2 and 8.2. Jäger’s emendation into a sDm=f 176 is unjustified.
b) The manuscript tradition is split, roughly equally, between readings as tw sDm and
readings as tw r sDm. See below, B.
c) Sic. The presence of sw before sd=f is at first unexpected. Formally, this looks like a N(P)
sDm=f construction (unmarked unaccomplished) with a pronominal subject realized by a
dependent pronoun. %w is here not the new subject pronoun (tw=i, etc.), which in the
relevant register is not compatible with the N(P) sDm=f.177 The use of a dependent
pronoun (rather than iw=f ) seems motivated by the fact that the clause sw sd=f sw m dAiw
leans on the preceding one, n iy=f. Although not referred to in modern grammars or
studies, the construction is consistent with broader principles of Middle Egyptian
grammar, and paralleled in P. UC 32201 ro 13-14 ((...) sw ATp: §3.4.1.2, (iii)). The text is
therefore coherent as it stands and no emendation is required a priori. The heavy
emendation proposed by Jäger (‘noch bevor es dazu kommt, daß er den Schurz anlegt’)178
is ungrammatical: a complement clause can not be governed by iwi in Egyptian. Seman-
tically, the event n iy=f has not the following clause but the scribe to be as its subject: the
return of the scribe in 3.6b echoes his being sent out in the first part of the same verse (tw
(r) hAb=f ).
d) Translating as the transmitted text reads. It has been proposed that wAD is here for an
original wD, for a translation as ‘When he has, still a child, begun to give orders (...)’. This
is possible, but of no further consequence to the main argument below.
e) The translation reflects a syntactic interpretation of 3.5 with iw=f m Xrd circumstantial to
sAa.n=f wAD and the whole of 3.5a a setting to the second part of the verse, tw (r) nD xrt=f.
An alternative reading is often made, with the first half of 3.5 a whole sentence,

175 Some details are problematic due to an unstable text, most notably in the second part of 3.6.
Focusing on what is relevant to the main discussion, some elements of textual variation are here
omitted (details in Jäger 2004: XIX-XX).
176 Jäger 2004: 59.
177 The construction sw sDm=f (§4.7.3), never found in any literary register, is not an option here.
178 Jäger 2004: 60, 133.

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 385

syntactically an emphatic construction, for a translation as: ‘He has begun to flourish
although still a child.’ In favor of the former analysis, below, A.

In assessing the textual status of tw (r) sDm in Kheti 3.5-6, two issues are at stake. The
first is which of the two constructions, tw sDm or tw r sDm, is secondary to the other
one (below, B). The second is whether the analytic construction in tw (be it tw sDm or
tw r sDm) is original, or the product of an alteration from some altogether different
construction (such as synthetic sDm.tw=f ) (below, C). A preliminary issue, relevant to
both steps to be carried out subsequently, as well as to the interpretation and
translation of the passage, consists in identifying the general syntax of 3.5-6
(below, A).
A. Considered in isolation, Kheti 3.5 would lend itself to two syntactic (and hence
semantic) interpretations. Kheti 3.5a could be a whole sentence in itself, syntactically
an emphatic construction placing iw=f m Xrd under narrow focus; 3.5b would then be
a new sentence. Alternatively, the whole of 3.5a (SAa.n=f wAD iw=f m Xrd, with iw=f m
Xrd a circumstance specifying SAa.n=f wAD further) could be a setting to 3.5b (tw nD
xrt=f ); the whole of 3.5 would then be a single sentence, continued in 3.6.
The latter interpretation (reflected in the above translation) is to be prefered in
view of the overall chiastic articulation of 3.5-6: 3.5b is framed by the setting
expressed in 3.5a, just as 3.6a is itself framed by the comment in 3.6b:

3.5 X, x’ (setting) – tw sDm

3.6 tw sDm – Y, y’ (comment)
The interpretation is also externally supported, within the same text. Differently
tensed, a similar chiastic patterning with initial anterior setting recurs in 8.2-3:179

(i) Kheti 8.2-3

mH.n=f a awy=f r irt smA.na sw xnmsw
xmiw sfT.na,b sw {x}rc wnn=f Xr wDAw
‘As soon as he has set hands to work,d mosquitoes have killed him;
Sandflies have butchered him, so that he is in pieces (lit. cut).’

a) Consistently a sDm.n=f in all manuscripts, here and in 8.2b and 8.3a similarly; the con-
struction is grammatical and rich. Jäger’s emendation into present tense forms180 is
unjustified; in addition, it fails to account why under such emendation the subject should
be post-verbal in 8.2b and pre-verbal in 8.3.
b) Reading the text as it stands, with a N sDm.n construction (§1.2, (xi)); alternatively, under
emendation: sfT.n<=sn>.
c) The transmitted text has xr. Based on the generally observed secondariness of xr before
wnn throughout Kheti, xr is likely to be secondary here as well. Jäger181 proposes r, which
is semantically plausible. This would also account for how xr came about textually, as the

179 Further discussion of this philologically difficult passage by Widmaier 2009: 112-3.
180 Jäger 2004: 136.
181 Jäger 2004: 73.

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 386 5 Neferti

two expressions are close formally and semantically (r ‘so that (...)’, xr ‘consequently
(...)’).
d) MH awy is possibly problematic; I follow Jäger’s interpretation.182

B. The manuscript tradition is split roughly equally between readings as tw nD xrt=f

tw hAb=f and tw r nD xrt=f tw r hAb=f. So are modern translations, although a slight
preference for a present tense rendering is detectable.183 In their own ways, both
readings make sense, just as they already did to ancient readers. Yet, a series of argu-
ments imply that tw sDm is original relative to tw r sDm.
In general terms, Kheti is about describing situations presentified to the audience,
not about evoking future ones (further, §2.3.3.C). Significantly, NP r sDm is never
found otherwise in the whole work. It would therefore be fairly surprising if 3.5-6 was
just one instance of that construction in Kheti.
Locally, the events tw (r) nD xrt=f and tw (r) hAb=f are after a setting construction
in anterior tense (SAa.n=f w(A)D iw=f m Xrd: see A). Anterior setting constructions are
followed by present tense constructions or past tense constructions. Within Kheti
itself, the latter possibility illustrated by 8.2-3 (i); the former is illustrated by 6.2
qn.n=f mH n ixt awy=f Aq n wrDt=f ‘When he has completed one cubit of work, his
arms are perished because of his weariness(?)’ (tentative translation). Setting con-
structions that are not themselves future are not followed by future events.
Semantically, the whole point of 3.5-6 is that the scribe-to-be is ‘greeted’ and
‘sent out’ in missions while still ‘a child’, when he has only ‘begun’ to ‘flourish’ (or
‘give orders’). Even if 3.5a is not interpreted as a setting construction, a future reading
of the events of ‘being greeted’ and ‘being sent out’ would trivialize the passage for
3.5b-6a: ‘He has begun to flourish although still a child; he will be greeted and sent
out(!?) (...)’. This is implicitly recognized by most modern translators when they favor
a present tense reading.
Rather remarkably, both the two main editors of the text, although transcribing as
tw r sDm, nonetheless feel compelled to translate as a present tense.184 This
discrepancy between interpretation and transcription reflects the differential salience
of tw sDm and tw r sDm in the present-day description of Middle Egyptian grammar,
of which translations of 3.5b-6a as a future tense then appear to be a direct artifact. In
ancient times similarly, such differential salience—to be viewed practically as ancient
scribes’ differential textual exposure to the two constructions—probably played a role
in readings of 3.5b-6a with a future time reference: the change from tw sDm to tw r

182 Jäger 2004: 71 and n.187; 137, n.16.

183 For present tense renderings, e.g. Jäger 2004: 133 and n.6; Simpson 2003: 433; Hoch 1992: 89;
Helck 1970: 34; Lichtheim 20062: 186. For future tense renderings, e.g. Vernus 20102b: 244;
Parkinson 1997a: 275; Dils et al., TLA.
184 Helck 1970: 34 translates ‘(...) grüßt man ihn schon. Er wird ausgesandt (...)’, and yet assumes tw r
sDm to be original (33, n.e). Similarly Jäger 2004: 133 translates ‘(...) und man grüßt ihn schon.
Man schickt ihn (....)’, and yet gives tw r sDm in the hypothesized original text (132). Jäger
explicitly addresses the discrepancy between his transcription and translation (133, n.6): ‘Mit
vielen Bearbeitern muss diese Konstruktion wohl nicht futurisch, sondern im Sinne eines Generalis
aufgefasst werden.’ This would be the sole case of a NP r sDm construction not expressing future
tense or deontic modality in the Middle Egyptian record overall.

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 387

sDm is an alteration of a very uncommon construction to a formally very similar, more

common one. Yet, as the above discussion of Neferti 12b, 10e, and Hymn 6.4
establishes (§5.3.1; §5.3.2.1), tw sDm is a possible, if marginal, construction in a
certain variety of literary Middle Egyptian (further, §5.3.3). Once this possibility is
recognized, the tw-headed constructions in Kheti 3.5b-6a are straightforwardly inter-
preted as present tenses on the above combined grounds.
C. Technically, the above only establishes that tw sDm is prior relative to tw r sDm. It
does not establish that tw sDm is itself original: a complex textual history along the
lines of X  tw sDm  tw r sDm (mult. mss.) would be conceivable in general terms.
Some further discussion is therefore required.
The manuscript tradition is unanimous in having constructions in initial bare tw in
both 3.5b and 3.6a (significantly, no author has so far come up with a proposal to
emend the tw-headed constructions in 3.5-6 into altogether different ones). Assuming
that tw sDm is not original, possible source constructions which tw sDm could have
replaced (‘X’ in the above) are to be named. As discussed, 3.5-6 is chiastically
patterned with an initial anterior setting. The patterning, which recurs in 8.2-3 (i) is
complex, demonstrating that 3.5-6 is fairly well preserved as far as its general
syntactic articulation goes. For semantic reasons, a present tense construction is then
required in 3.5b-6a (above, B). Assuming that tw sDm is not original, this leaves only
one possible source construction, namely sDm.tw=f (thus *nD.tw=f xrt, *hAb.tw=f ).
The textual alteration would then have consisted in the replacement of a synthetic
construction (sDm.tw=f ) by an analytic one (tw sDm). This is unlikely on general
grounds, in view of the morphologically fairly heavy nature of the change then
hypothesized. In the textual history of Kheti itself, synthetic constructions only
marginally turn into analytic ones. In the active, present tense N(P) sDm=f is very
stable at this level and all instances of analytic NP Hr sDm, which are numerous, are
demonstrably integral to the original text (in details, §2.3.3). In the passive, the two
instances of the synthetic construction (sDm.tw=f ) are very stable as well. In 25.3
(discussed below, §6.2.2.4, (iv)), iw Hms.tw is preserved in most witnesses, with
changes only in O. Tur. 57082 (tw=k m Hms) and O. DeM 1039 (iw Hms=k). These
reflect an altogether different issue, namely a reinterpretation of 25.3b (a general
maxim, hence the passive) in an addressee-oriented fashion under local attraction to
the imperative in 25.3a. In 14.3 Hw.tw=f is preserved in all witnesses, except one
which alters into tw Hw.tw[=f ] (O. BM EA 29550):

(ii) Kheti 14.3

O. DeM 1037; O. DeM 1539185 (...) nn sxt ° Hw.tw=f (...)
T. Louvre 693 (...) nn sxt{tw} ° Hw.tw=f (...)
O. BM EA 29550 (...) <nn> sxt ° tw Hw.tw[=f ] (...)

This one case, in one witness, occurs under highly specific circumstances, either in
relation to the final -t of the preceding sxt or in relation to the reference implicit in the
preceding nn sxt, thus made explicit, in a wrong way and possibly under attraction to

185 Although Ramesside, these here preserve the original stage of the text.

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 388 5 Neferti

the following passive construction. In 3.5-6, by contrast, all manuscripts consistently

have a tw-headed analytic construction and no circumstance similar to any of the
above is given.
D. Beyond issues of textual criticism, Kheti 14.3 is also relevant for grammar. The
original text has a synthetic construction, Hw.tw=f, in contrast to the analytic tw sDm
in 3.5-6. These different constructions correlate with different environments. In 14.3,
the passive form is after a ir-introduced hypothetical clause; the main clause is
accordingly in the general/habitual, or perhaps better here unextensive, aspect: in the
active, the unmarked sDm=f is used. In 3.5-6, by contrast, the passive forms are after a
setting construction; this defines an extension to which the events in the main clauses
are related: in the active, the progressive NP Hr sDm is used (§1.2, (ii); §2.8.2.3).
Compare:

Hypothetical construction – unmarked aspect in the second clause (sDm=f in

the active)
(iii) Kheti 14.3 (T. Louvre 693)
ir xbA=f hrw nn sxt{tw}
Hw.tw=f m Ssm 50
‘If he wastes a day without weaving,
he is beaten with fifty whips.’

Setting construction – progressive aspect in the second clause (NP Hr sDm in

the active)
(iv) Kheti 3.5-6
SAa.n=f wAD iw=f m Xrd
tw nD xrt=f (...)
‘When he has, still a child, begun to flourish,
he is greeted (...)’

The distribution of the two passive constructions, the synthetic and the analytic, is
thereby principled on grammatical grounds. This affords yet another confirmation that
tw sDm is original in Kheti 3.5-6.

5.3.3 The construction tw sDm: Functions and status in Middle Egyptian

grammar

The above discussion establishes the existence of a construction tw sDm in Middle

Egyptian, perhaps limited to some variety thereof or even to a group of texts. With a
view on how an argument for dating can be derived, the functions of the construction
and its status in Middle Egyptian grammar are preliminarily reviewed.

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 389

A. In the extant Middle Egyptian record, the construction tw sDm is documented five
times and occurring in two environments:

(a) After presentifying D=i n=k (...): Neferti 10e, 12b (§5.3.1);
(b) After a setting construction: Hymn 6.4, Kheti 3.5-6 (§5.3.2).

In either environment, tw sDm provides the passive counterpart to progressive NP Hr

sDm. In Neferti, this is directly established by the observed parallelism with active NP
Hr sDm in exactly similar structural position (for 12b, §5.3.1.1). Further confirmation
is found with an analysis of the position and function of the construction in the large-
scale compositional articulation expressing a temporality oscillating between the
future tense of prophesy and the progressive tense of presentification (for both 10e
and 12b, §5.3.1.3). In Hymn and Kheti, a progressive value is directly established by
the use of the construction after a setting in the second part of a broader construction:
setting mrr=f/sDm.n=f – NP Hr sDm.
B. In Neferti, Hymn, and Kheti, and only in these texts, tw sDm provides the regular
passive counterpart to active NP Hr sDm. Such distribution suggests that the construc-
tion could be a literary one in some sense yet to be defined. In addition, tw sDm
displays two remarkable morphological properties, the bareness of tw (as in tw r sDm)
and the lack of the progressive marker Hr.
The bareness of tw is interpreted in relation to the environments in which the
construction is used: continuing NP m NP patterns after presentifying D=i n=k (in
Neferti) or leaning on a preceding clausal setting (in Hymn and Kheti). In either case,
the bareness of tw is therefore a literary feature inasmuch, and only inasmuch, as the
environments triggering such bareness are themselves typically found in literary texts.
Altough different in its specifics, a similar general analysis was made above for the
bareness of tw in tw r sDm (§5.2.3.3-4).
As regards the omission of Hr, this is specific to the construction: the active
counterpart NP Hr sDm does not omit Hr in the same texts and no case of a construc-
tion with a bare tw, yet with Hr written out, is documented in the Middle Egyptian
record. In the lack of any better explanation, the omission of Hr in tw sDm is
tentatively interpreted as a token of literariness, perhaps aimed at making the
construction different, and thereby distinguished, from the more ordinary (X.)tw Hr
sDm (§5.3.4).
C. Three out of five occurrences of tw sDm are with an event of ‘greeting’ (nD-xrt:
Neferti 12b; Hymn 6.4; Kheti 3.5); each of the three compositions that have tw sDm
thus has at least one instance with nD-xrt. In both Hymn and Kheti, instances of tw nD-
xrt also have Xrd ‘child’ in the immediately preceding context:

Neferti: 10e tw nHm

12b tw nD-xrt
Kheti: 3.5-6 (... Xrdw) tw nD-xrt tw hAb (...)
Hymn: 6.3-4 (... Xrdw) tw nD-xrt

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 390 5 Neferti

The possibility of a communication of some sort between these texts, at the level of
textual transmission or of original composition, must therefore be examined.
In Neferti 10e and 12b, and in Kheti 3.5-6, the construction is demonstrably
integral to the original composition (§5.3.1.3 and §5.3.2.2, respectively). In Hymn 6.3-
4, tw nD-xrt semantically fits the context; it is syntactically coherent, with tw sDm used
after a setting construction, as in Kheti 3.5-6; moreover, the overall syntactic articula-
tion of Hymn 6.3-4 is integral to the alternating structure of strophe 6 (§5.3.2.1). An
hypothesis of textual contamination during transmission is therefore extremely
unlikely for Hymn 6.3-4.186
A textual communication between Neferti, Kheti, and Hymn, if any, must then be
viewed at the level of original composition. Recurring in all three compositions, tw
nD-xrt was probably a literary trope. The construction itself, tw sDm, is also found
with other events: while in Kheti 3.5-6, tw hAb is in direct continuation of tw nD-xrt,
tw nHm in Neferti 10e is not (tw nD-xrt comes only later, in 12b). This demonstrates
the existence of a construction tw sDm beyond the trope tw nD-xrt. So does the fact
that the construction is used in all three texts whenever the passive of a progressive
event (NP Hr sDm in the active) is called for (that tw nD-xrt is over-represented is then
due to its being a literary trope). Neferti, Kheti, and Hymn, and only these, thereby
appear to share one highly specific element in their grammatical repertoires.

5.3.4 (X.)tw Hr sDm

The construction tw sDm occurs in only three texts. One of these, Hymn, can be dated
to the late Seventeenth or early Eighteenth Dynasty on independent grounds (§3.4),
but the other two, Neferti and Kheti, are still undated at this point. In defining a
terminus ante quem non for tw sDm, this must be related to the more common X.tw Hr
sDm of which it is a literary variant. A first step consists in reviewing the pattern of
early attestation of the latter construction in the external record (this section); a second
step will be to discuss the passive counterpart of NP Hr sDm in securely dated Twelfth
Dynasty literary texts and in such that are at least somewhat later than the Twelfth
Dynasty (§5.3.5).

5.3.4.1 A preliminary note on wn.(X.)tw Hr sDm

The earliest instances of an accommodation of tw into the subject slot of a NP Hr sDm
construction all involve the auxiliary wn. Four instances of wn.(X.)tw Hr sDm are
found in the Twelfth Dynasty record, including one from the early Twelfth Dynasty:

(i) Antefiqer’s Girgawi Inscription (Amenemhat I, year 29), 6-7

wn.t(w) Hr qd xnrt pn
aHa.n smA nHsw spt nbt m wAwAt (...)
‘While this enclosure was being built,
the Nubians, the whole remainder of Wawat, were killed (...)’

186 An altogether different issue is whether, internally to Hymn, 6.3-4 may have influenced 11.3-4
(Helck 1972: 37, n.b., and 69, n.b; the author’s reconstruction, however, is speculative).

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 391

(ii) Eloquent Peasant B1 115-116 (mid-Twelfth Dynasty: §3.1.2)

wn.in.tw Hr rDt n=f tA 10 Hnqt ds 2 ra nb
‘And one began giving him ten loaves of bread and two jars of beer daily.’

(iii) Hammamat 19 (temp. Amenemhat III), 10-12

aHa.n ir pA smA
wn.in.tw Hr sfn nA n mnw mi Dd(t).n=f nbt
‘The ramp was made
and (the way for) these blocks was made smooth according to all he had said.’
Sim. Hammamat 19, 3-4 wn.in={n}<t>(w) Hr hd inrw (...) ‘And one began
setting hand to the stones (...)’.187

(iv) P. UC 32036 (Kahun Veterinary Papyrus), 20-23

rD.xr.t(w)=f Hr gs=f wa
wn.xr.t(w) Hr ntS=f m mw qb
sin.xr.t(w) irty=f Hna Drw=f Hna at=f nbt
‘It (scil. the bull being examined) is to be lain on its side,
it is to be continuously sprinkled with fresh water,
and its eyes are to be rubbed along with its flanks and all its limbs.’

Like (X.)tw Hr sDm to be discussed below (§5.3.4.2), these wn.(X.)tw Hr sDm

constructions accommodate tw in the subject slot of a NP Hr sDm pattern. Yet, the
commonality between the two construction types is only formal: long before being
accommodated into any such patterns, the morpheme tw had always been maximally
‘detachable’ from its erstwhile exclusive inflectional position in synthetic verb-first
forms such as sDm.tw=f.188 The actual extraction of tw must therefore be analyzed not
in terms of a morphological possibility (which was given at all times), but in relation
to the specific semantics of individual patterns to which tw was successively accom-
modated and to the ways innovations in such individual patterns relate to broader
processes of ongoing change during Middle Egyptian.
In wn-auxiliated constructions, wn is variously inflected, as a past tense auxiliary
in (i),189 by -in- in (ii)-(iii), and by -xr- in (iv): in accommodating such inflection, it
expresses specific semantics additional to the ones already expressed by the
progressive NP Hr sDm itself. In the Girgawi Inscription (i), wn NP Hr sDm is at the

187 Emendation after Schenkel in press b: §3.5.

188 In slightly more technical terms, tw in the synthetic Verb-Subject conjugations was simultaneously
characterized by the four following dimensions, partly related to each other: (a) its singular
exponence: tw codes passive voice only without any other functions in voice (unlike e.g. the
cognate Semitic {t}) and does not have any specific aspectual correlates (unlike e.g. sDm(w)-
morphology in Earlier Egyptian); (b) the morphological transparency of forms to which tw was
accommodated: these are always analyzable componentially as active stem + tw; (c) the lack of
fusion at morpheme boundaries in such forms (a very general property of Earlier Egyptian affixal
morphology, as it seems); and (d) the position of tw at the outer edge of the inflected form, just
before personal clitics. These dimensions conspire in making tw maximally ‘detachable’ at all
times: in more details, Stauder in press b: §4.2.
189 On the past tense auxiliary wn as an inflected form (a sDm.n=f of wnn), Stauder in press e: §3.

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 392 5 Neferti

opening of the narrative part of the inscription and expresses an element of the textual
background, setting the stage for the first event in the main chain of the narrative, the
killing of the Nubians: this could not have been expressed by synthetic means. In (ii)
and (iii), wn.in.tw Hr sDm is in contexts in which synthetic sDm.in.tw=f could not be
used under the conventions to which the types of written discourses exemplified abide
in the Twelfth Dynasty (discussed above, §2.4.4.6.B). In (iv), three -xr-marked
constructions follow each other, with synthetic and wn-auxiliated analytical ones
alternating. Contrasting with the synthetic -xr-marked patterns, analytic wn.xr NP Hr
sDm additionally expresses the continuous (i.e. ‘extensive’ in Vernus’ terms) nature of
the action to be performed.190
In all cases, therefore, early instances of tw in the preverbal slot of a NP Hr sDm
pattern are from constructions that express specific semantics, associated with the
inflectional marks on the auxiliary wn. Unauxiliated NP Hr sDm, by contrast, only
expresses progressive aspect. While wn.(X.)tw Hr sDm patterns are documented in the
Twelfth Dynasty already, the rise of (X.)tw Hr sDm is an altogether different story, to
be studied in its own terms.

5.3.4.2 (X.)tw Hr sDm: Early attestations

A. In the non-literary record, early attestations of unauxiliated (X.)tw Hr sDm are the
following:

(i) Paheri (temp. Thutmosis III), pl.3, 2nd register from bottom, 2nd inscription
from the right, 10-11
xr tw.tw Hr As=n m Smt
‘And they are hurrying us in (our) going.’

(ii) Urk. IV 649, 15-17 (Thutmosis III’s Annals)

sw mi ix Smt Hr mTn pn nty wA r Hns
iw.tw Hr smit r-Dd (...)
‘How will it be, walking on this path which has now become narrow,
when it is reported that (...)?’
Sim. Urk. IV 656, 5 Hr-ntt tw.tw [Hr V...] (implied by the contrast with Urk. IV
656, 3 r-ntt iw.tw r THn).

(iii) Mutter und Kind VIII.1-2

Dd.tw rA pn iw.tw Hr Dt wnm Xrd pnw psw rA-pw mwt=ksic
‘One should recite this spell while one has either the child or his mother eat
the cooked mouse.’
Sim. in a later medical text in Middle Egyptian, P. Berlin 3038 (paleographically
D.19), 19, 7 pXrt swr irt iw.tw Hr irt pXrt ‘A potion for drinking which is made
while one is making a remedy.’

190 Similarly, Vernus 1990a: 62-3.

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 393

NB. While the manuscript of Mutter und Kind (P. Berlin 3027) dates paleographi-
cally to the mid-Eighteenth Dynasty (or possibly even slightly later),191 the text
itself has not been subjected to linguistic analysis yet. One element has been
noted, however, within the very passage here quoted: the position of rA-pw, before
mwt=k rather than after it as would have been the case in Middle Kingdom
Middle Egyptian; parallels for this innovative position are all from the Eighteenth
Dynasty.192 Another element noted in passing is in Mutter und Kind V.10-VI.1
ir.kw rf wD-nsw n gb (...) ‘I have made a royal decree of Geb (...)’. In the Middle
Kingdom, occurrences of the active-transitive construction of the pseudoparticiple
with events other than lexical statives (rx and xm)—a textual revival of Old
Kingdom uses—display a specific association with funerary self-presentations,
contributing to index these (or a reference to these in Sinuhe) linguistically.193 At
complete odds with this Middle Kingdom usage (compare §6.1.3.2), any such
association is lacking in Mutter und Kind where the expression is used merely as
a general token of elevated language (as the context suggests, here probably to
highlight the ‘royal decree’). This strongly suggests a post-Middle Kingdom
dating as well.

In the above, (i) and (ii) are from typically innovative registers (‘Reden und Rufe’ and
direct discourse in a military narrative, respectively). In either passage, X.tw Hr sDm
occurs alongside other innovative expressions, the new subject pronouns (tw.tw and
sw, respectively); the immediate context in Annals is more generally replete with
innovative expressions of various sorts.194
B. In the literary corpus, pre-Ramesside occurrences of (X.)tw Hr sDm (other than tw
sDm in Neferti, Hymn, and Kheti: §5.3.1-2) are the following:
(iv) Tale Involving the House of Life X+5.2-4
ir.in.tw aHaw r hrw 40 m Hb nfr n [...]
iw.tw Hr swr m [...]
‘And a period up to fourty days was spent in a beautiful festival of/for [...]
drinking from/in [...]’
The composition was dated to the (later) Second Intermediate Period on inde-
pendent grounds (§3.3.1). In the very sentence here quoted, note the construction
iri (time ...) iw=f Hr sDm, otherwise first documented in Emhab 8-9 (§3.3.1, (iii)),
and contrasting with earlier iri (time ...) Hr sDm in similar function (§3.3.1, (i)-(ii),
still in Cheops’ Court).

191 Yamazaki 2003: 2.

192 Kroeber 1970: 54-6 with ex.2-4.
193 Stauder in press a: §3; in the present study also §4.1.3.A.
194 See above, §1.3.3.3, n.210.

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 394 5 Neferti

(v) Astarte (temp. Amenhotep II), I.x+10

xr mk tw.tw Hr in n=f inw [...]
‘And look, one is bringing him tribute [...]’
The general linguistic typology of the composition is highly innovative and best
described as transitional between Middle and Late Egyptian.195

NB. Ipuwer 14.11 has iw.tw Hr ‘One says’, contrasting in an exactly similar with
iw Dd.tw (12.1). That both constructions could have been present in the original
text of the composition is possible, but not very likely given that they are used in
the exact same way in what is a mere quotative expression, i.e. in a context in
which stylistic differentiation is least meaningful. The reading in 14.11 could
therefore easily be a modernization (note the very late date of P. Leiden I 344 ro):
the only reliable contribution it makes to the pattern of attestation of (X.)tw Hr
sDm is to show that the construction was acceptable to Ramesside scribes, hardly
a new information.

C. In both non-literary and literary texts, the construction was to become common in
Ramesside times. To quote but one example from a literary composition:
(vi) Allen droht die Rekrutierung 3-5
tw.tw Hr snh smdt nbt
tw.tw Hr TAi nAy=sn naa
tw.tw Hr dit pA s r waw pA mnH r mgi
tw.tw Hr sxpr=f (...)
‘All dependent personnel is drafted,
the best of them is taken;
The man is made a soldier, the young man a “young fighter”,
he is raised (...)’
Some manuscripts omit Hr in one or several of the above forms, resulting in forms
tw.tw sDm.196

D. The above collection of early attestations is strongly suggestive of a late date of

innovation for the rise of unauxiliated (X.)tw Hr sDm constructions. For the argument
to be complete, one additional step is taken, namely establishing how the passive
counterpart of progressive NP Hr sDm was realized in Middle Kingdom Middle
Egyptian (the next sub-section).

5.3.5 The passive counterpart of NP Hr sDm in Middle Kingdom Middle

Egyptian

Unauxiliated (X.)tw Hr sDm is never found in any securely dated Middle Kingdom
text, literary or otherwise (§5.3.4.2). That this is not a mere gap in documentation is

195 In details, Collombert & Coulon 2000: 211-6.

196 Jäger 2004: 273.

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 395

demonstrated by a consideration of contexts in which the construction could have

been used, had it belonged to the relevant written registers of that time.

5.3.5.1 Documentation
In Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian, an instance of a passive event interpreted as
progressive is the following:

(i) Eloquent Peasant B1 332-334

iw srw Hr rDt n=k
iw=k Hr itt in iw=k m awAy
iw stA.tw n=k skw Hna=k r psSt Sdwt
‘Officials are giving to you;
Yet you are still taking—So are you a robber?
People are ushered in before you, and troops are with you for the division of
land-plots!’197

The same situation is still observed in Ipuwer and Khakheperreseneb, two composi-
tions that have a linguistic terminus ante quem non in the early Thirteenth Dynasty
(§6.2.2.5 and §2.7, respectively):

(ii) Ipuwer 6.9-12

iw ms hpw nw xn(r)t Dw r xnty
Sm.tw {m}ms Hr=s<n> m iwyt
Hwrw Hr ngt im m-Xnw mrwt{A}
iw ms (...)
iw ms xn(r)t-wr m pr-hA=f
Hwrw Hr Smt iit m Hwwt wryt
‘But now, the rulings of the Labor Enclosure are cast out,
one walks on them in the alleys,
and wretches tear them up in the streets.
But now, (...)
But now, the Great Labor Enclosure is in commotion,
wretches come and go in the great domains.’198
With the same event, contrast for example passive Sm.tw and active Hwrw Hr Smt.

197 Translation slightly adapted from Parkinson 2012a: 269-70.

198 Translation slightly adapted from Enmarch 2008: 228.

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 396 5 Neferti

(iii) Ipuwer 2.5-10

iw ms [ib] sxmw (...)
wnxyt Hr Dd n(n) tkn im=s
iw ms tA Hr msnH mi irr nHp (...)
iw ms itrw m snf swr.tw im=f
niw.tw m rmTw
ib.tw mw
‘But now, the heart is fierce (...)
the (mummy)-binding speaks without approaching it.
But now, the land spins round as does a potter’s wheel (...)
But now, the river is blood and one drinks from it,
one pushes people aside,
one thirsts for water.’199
Sim. passim in Ipuwer.

(iv) Khakheperreseneb ro 11 (also on O. Cairo JE 50249, 3-4)

rD.twa mAat <r>-rwty
isft m Xn sH
Xnn.tw sxrw nTrw
wn{t}.tw mXrw=sn
‘Maat is put outside,
Isfet is within the council;
The counsels of the gods are thrown into tumult,
their directives are neglected.’
a) On rD.tw, §2.7.2.2.

In either of these texts, sDm.tw=f is used as the regular counterpart to NP Hr sDm.

What is more, sDm.tw=f is used as the regular counterpart to NP Hr sDm expressing
progressive tense. In the relevant passages in Ipuwer, this springs from the fact that
the overall temporality is based on the Sonst-Jetzt schema, which has NP Hr sDm in
the active (§2.6.2.4). Compare e.g. in (ii), with the same event of ‘going’, iw ms (...)
Sm.tw (...), then iw ms (...) Hwrw Hr Smt iit (...). In Khakheperreseneb similarly, ro 11
is part of the lament, not a generalizing statement. Compare e.g. the following verse,
ro 11-12 wnn tA <m> sn{t}y-mny irtiw m st nbt (...) ‘The land is in calamity,
mourning is in every place (...)’. This lament is presented as a ‘meditation’ (nkAy) on
what ‘happens’ (xprt, ro 10), introduced by the observation that ‘changes are
happening’ (xprw Hr xpr, ro 10). Significantly, this is with NP Hr sDm expressing
progressive aspect, like Xnn.tw and wn{t}.tw in (iv).
The above establishes that in two literary texts that were not composed before the
early Thirteenth Dynasty and perhaps only later, sDm.tw=f—not (X.)tw Hr sDm—is
used as the regular passive counterpart to NP Hr sDm for expressing progressive tense.

199 Translation slightly adapted from Enmarch 2008: 222-3.

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 5.3 Neferti 12b, 10e: &w sDm 397

5.3.5.2 Setting the observations into a broader linguistic context

A. In earlier Middle Egyptian, the expression of the unaccomplished aspect is
realized by two formal categories in the active, N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr sDm. The latter
is a dedicated progressive pattern, while the former is unmarked in this respect. Given
the presence in the language of a dedicated pattern marked for progressive aspect (NP
Hr sDm), the unmarked pattern (N(P) sDm=f ) is most commonly used for general and
habitual events, yet can also on occasions be used with events that do not allow a
general or habitual reading, if the speaker so chooses:

(a) In reference to the ongoing speech situation

- Selection of the unmarked option:
(i) Shipwrecked Sailor 73-75
iw mdw=k n=i nn wi Hr sDm st
‘You speak to me, yet I am not listening.’

- Selection of the dedicated progressive pattern:

(ii) Eloquent Peasant B2 113-114
mk wi Hr spr n=k n sDm.n=k st
‘Look, I am pleading to you, yet you do not hear it.’

(b) In a topos associated with the return from an expedition

- Selection of the unmarked option:
(iii) Kamose Inscriptions St.II 33 (fuller context: §2.6.3.1, (x))
(...) st nbt Hpt=s 2-nw=s
‘(...) every woman hugged her fellow.’

- Selection of the dedicated progressive pattern:

(iv) Shipwrecked Sailor 6 (fuller context: §2.6.3.1, (ix))
(...) s nb Hr Hpt sn-nw=f (...)
‘(...) everybody is hugging their fellows; (...)’

In the above examples, the same text, Shipwrecked Sailor, once selects the unmarked
option (i) and once the dedicated progressive pattern (iv). Phrased in venerable
structuralist jargon, the opposition between NP Hr sDm and N(P) sDm=f is privative,
not equipollent.
Turning to passive voice, the morphologically symmetrical counterpart to NP Hr
sDm, (X.)tw Hr sDm, did not develop until much later than the original
grammaticalization of NP Hr sDm itself (already in the Old Kingdom). For reasons
exposed above in relation to NP r sDm (§5.2.5.A), the new analytic NP Hr sDm initially
developed for active, positive events, i.e. for those events that are most common in
speech. NP Hr sDm, which has the lexical verb in the infinitive, does not provide an

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 398 5 Neferti

inflectional slot to which the by then still solely inflectional morpheme tw could be
directly accommodated. For passive events to be interpreted as progressive, recourse
was then made to the unmarked active pattern, N(P) sDm=f, turned passive by
insertion of tw in the regular inflectional slot (with only the minor difference that the
passive subject is not anticipated to the left of the verb, reflecting the non-prototypical
nature of passive subjects). The overall unaccomplished paradigm in Middle Kingdom
Middle Egyptian is as follows:

general/habitual events ongoing events

active: N(P) sDm=f marked progressive NP Hr sDm
unmarked N(P) sDm=f
passive:  sDm.tw NP 

Similar asymmetrical paradigms are not uncommon in natural language. In Middle

Kingdom Middle Egyptian itself, the other analytic Subject-Verb pattern grammat-
icalized from a situational predicate construction, NP r sDm, also has non-isomorphic
functional counterparts, both for negative polarity and for passive voice (nn sDm=f
and sDm.tw=f, respectively: §5.2.5), with morphologically symmetrical counterparts
documented only later (in the early New Kingdom and in the late Middle Kingdom,
respectively).

5.3.5.3 Implications
The overall implication is that the morphologically symmetrical counterpart to
progressive NP Hr sDm, (X.)tw Hr sDm did not develop until some time after the
Middle Kingdom. When exactly it first developed remains unclear due to the low
density of the Second Intermediate Period record. Ipuwer and Khakheperreseneb, two
literary texts that can not date before the early Thirteenth Dynasty, still have sDm.tw=f
as a counterpart to NP Hr sDm. The first, isolated, occurrence of (X.)tw Hr sDm is in a
literary composition of the (later) Second Intermediate Period (Tale Involving the
House of Life, §5.3.4.2, (iv)); the next earliest are from the early Eighteenth Dynasty,
often in innovative registers (§5.3.4.2, (i), (ii), (v)). The presence of tw sDm in Neferti
10e and 12b therefore carries major implications for dating this composition (further
discussion below, §5.7.1.1.C and §5.7.1.2.C).

5.4 Neferti 7f, 9c: &w with non-dynamic events

In three places, Neferti has tw used with non-dynamic events, in 7f (gAw ‘lack’), in 9c
(sDr ‘lie’), and in 9c (Hqr ‘be hungry’, in a secondary predication depending on an
agent represented by tw in the main clause) (§6.2.2.4, (vi), (v), and (i), respectively).
These instances are possibly to be augmented by Neferti 5d and 12d, if anx ‘live’ as
used in these places is non-dynamic (uncertain: §6.2.2.4, (x)-(xi)). As will be
discussed in details below (§6.2), this construction is not documented in any securely
dated Middle Kingdom literary composition. Moreover, early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty

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 5.5 Lexical indications for dating 399

literary registers demonstrably use another, subjectless, construction whenever the

first participant of a non-dynamic event is to be left unexpressed (e.g. Ptahhotep 10 P
sDr=ø). Constructions as in Neferti 7f and 9c are therefore subject to a terminus ante
quem non by the late Twelfth Dynasty.

5.5 Lexical indications for dating

Some elements of the lexicon of Neferti are typical of an early New Kingdom horizon,
but not fully specific to this: they do not afford a reliable indication for dating
(§2.2.2, (i), (iv)). In its written form, the lexical morphology in Neferti also includes
many late features, more than in other compositions, and some cases individually
remarkable: yet, this does not afford a reliable indication for dating either (§2.3.1.2).
Against the generally low reliability of possible lexical evidence, two expressions in
Neferti stand out, in relation to their extra-linguistic referents.

5.5.1 Neferti 3c xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’

In the mid-Eighteenth Dynasty P. Petersburg 1116 B, the single witness here fully
preserved, Neferti 3c reads:

Neferti 3c Pet.
(...) xp{w} aAmw m xpS{wt}T16, a=sn (...)
‘(...) while the Asiatics wander with their sickle-shaped swords (...)’
a) The only other witness preserving part of 3c, the Ramesside O. DeM 1187, has the bull’s
foreleg (F23) and reads xp{w}SF23 aAmw [...]. This is garbled, perhaps for a rewriting as
‘while the strength of the Asiatics [...](?)’.

Neferti 3c is generally, and without further comment, emended into ‘indem die
Asiaten in ihrer Macht kommen’, ‘the Asiatics journeying in their strength’.200 Yet,
the transmitted text has the ‘sickle-shaped sword’ semogram (T16).201 #pS ‘sickle-
shaped sword’ is not subject to the usual uncertainties in interpreting patterns of
attestation, since the introduction of the word can be dated in relation to the intro-
duction of its extra-linguistic referent in Egypt (§5.5.1.1). The issue then becomes one
of assessing whether the reading in Pet. is original or secondary (§5.5.1.2).

5.5.1.1 The word xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’

The sign of writing (T16) is first documented in the times of Thutmosis III,202
alongside other signs (also ‘repeaters’/‘specific determinatives’) associated with new
words relating to warfare, the chariot (T17)203 and the horse (E6).204 A few genera-

200 Helck 19922: 20; Parkinson 1997a: 135 (pars pro toto: most translations stand in this tradition).
201 Also noted by Kammerzell 1986: 105, n.18b.
202 Urk. IV 726, 17; Davies 1930: I, 20 (Qenamun); after EG, p.513.
203 Urk. IV 704, 15; 712, 10 (after EG, p.513).

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 400 5 Neferti

tions earlier, the first occurrence of the word xpS (below) is without the sign T16,
suggesting that the sign of writing may have been coined slightly later than the word
was introduced into the lexicon.
The first documentation of the word itself is in Kamose Inscriptions St.II 34,
followed by further occurrences in the Eighteenth Dynasty,205 and then commonly in
Ramesside times.206 Unlike other words associated with warfare first documented in
the early New Kingdom (wrryt ‘chariot’,207 ssmt ‘horse’208), xpS ‘sickle-shaped
sword’ is derived from native Egyptian stock, namely from age-old xpS ‘foreleg, arm,
strength’. Such inner-Egyptian derivation notwithstanding, the association with a new
referent, and thereby the new meaning, make xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’ a new word.
NB. Wb. and DZA describe the word as ‘belegt seit MR’,209 based on one occurrence,
Siut V 16. This, from a self-eulogizing context with multiple phraseological parallels
in the First Intermediate Period and Middle Kingdom, reads differently: ink nxt pDt qn
m xpSF23=f ‘I am one strong of bow, valiant with his strong arm’ (for pDt ‘bow’ and
xpS ‘foreleg’ in parallel, compare e.g. Sinuhe B 105: §5.5.1.2, (v)). In a famous
passage of an insecurely dated literary text, xpS has also been translated by ‘sword’:
Merikare E 32 xpSF23 pw n nsw ns=f, e.g. ‘Das Schwert eines Königs ist seine Zunge’;
‘C’est l’épée d’un roi que sa langue.’210 This tradition of interpretation was no doubt
suggested by the context: Hmw m mdwt nxt=k xpS pw n nsw ns=f qn mdwt r aHA nb
(...) ‘Be skilful with words, and you will be victorious [...] The sword of a king is his
tongue, words are stronger than any fight (...)’. In a broad sense, this hits the intended
meaning, also conjuring up an imagery that has a long tradition and strongly resonates
with Western readers.211 The Egyptian text is more subtle, deriving its force from an
allusion to a topos in self-eulogies, also often said of the king (§5.5.1.2), thus: ‘The
strong arm of the king is his tongue.’212

The real-world referent of the word, the weapon itself,213 originated outside Egypt: it
is archeologically documented in Western Asia in the third millennium214 and in
Southern Mesopotamia by the early second.215 Its first documentation on Egyptian
soil, once thought to be in the New Kingdom,216 is now earlier, in a tomb from

204 Urk. IV 652, 10; 663, 9; 663, 10; 697, 16 (EG, p.459).
205 Urk. IV 726, 17; Davies 1930: I, 20 (Qenamun); Urk. IV 1562, 8.
206 See TLA #116460.
207 Schneider 1999a.
208 Vernus 2009b.
209 Wb. III 270.1-3; DZA 27.796.750.
210 E.g. Quack 1992: 25; Coulon 1999: 103; Fischer-Elfert 2000: 263.
211 Some elements sketched in Fischer-Elfert 2000: 263.
212 Similarly e.g. Vernus 20102b: 206; Moers 2000: 69; Parkinson 1997a: 218.
213 On the xpS weapon, Vogel 2006; Warnick 2004 (Thomas Schneider and Anthony Spalinger, p.c.
2/2012).
214 Philip 2006: 80-1, 151 (Andrea Gnirs, p.c. 2/2012).
215 The sickle-shaped sword is known since the early second millennium (Susa and Tello), while the
sickle-shaped axe is attested since the mid-third millennium (Schrakamp 2011; Thomas Schneider,
p.c. 2/2012).
216 Schott 1980: 819.

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 5.5 Lexical indications for dating 401

stratum F (Thirteenth Dynasty) in Tell el-Dabca.217 The spread of the sickle-sword

from the Eastern Delta to Southern Egypt is probably to be related to the spread of
‘Hyksos influence’ at some probably later point during the Second Intermediate
Period. A referential use outside a narrowly military context, as in Neferti 3c Pet.,
implies a further time lag.218

5.5.1.2 To emend or not to emend?

As mentioned, Neferti 3c Pet. is near-universally emended into m xpS=sn ‘in their
strength’. The two words, xpS ‘strong arm’ and xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’, are
distinguished in writing by their semograms only (F 23, a bull’s foreleg, and T 16, the
weapon, respectively), which are very similar in contour. A confusion of the two
semograms is therefore possible, in either direction. The only other witness of the
passage, O. DeM 1187 (Ramesside), has the bull’s foreleg semogram, but the reading
is clearly secondary on other accounts. In the lack of any evidence supporting the
common emendation of Neferti 3c Pet. xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’ into xpS ‘strength’,
this entirely rests on the assumption that an emendation is necessary a priori, because
the original text of Neferti, dated to the Middle Kingdom, should not include an
expression as recent as xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’. When the dating of Neferti ceases
to be presupposed, this becomes circular.
On the other hand, noting that an emendation lacks any foundation is of course not
tantamount to demonstrating that the text as it stands is necessarily original. Some
positive indications against the emended reading are therefore adduced in the
following. In Neferti 3c, xpS ‘strength’ would be a word-play with xpi ‘walk around’,
but so would xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’ (by definition, since both words are from the
same root):219 no argument as to which reading is original can therefore be derived
from this. To provide a sounder setting to the following discussion, an examination of
uses of the phrase m xpS=f (=k/=i) ‘in his (your/my) strength’ elsewhere in Middle
Egyptian texts is instructive.

(a) In First Intermediate Period funerary self-presentations

(i) Ir m xpS=f ‘acting with his (own) strong arm’: a topos not uncommon in First
Intermediate Period stelae, e.g. Heqaib (BM EA 1671), 2; Antef son of Myt 3;
(ii) Related to this but with contextually stronger military overtones is Siut V, 16 nxt
pDt qn m xpS=f ‘one strong of bow, valiant with his strong arm’;

217 Forstner-Müller 2001 (Andrea Gnirs, p.c. 2/2012).

218 Andrea Gnirs (p.c. 2/2012): ‘(...) da nicht davon ausgegangen werden kann, daß bereits beim ersten
Auftreten einer neuen Waffenart diese sofort ausserhalb eines engeren militärischen Rahmens
referenziell verwendet werden konnte.’
219 Another instance of a word-play on the same root, also literary, is in Amenemhat 10c, quoted
below in the main text (vi).

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 402 5 Neferti

(b) Said of the king

(iii) In Illahun Hymns to Senwosret III, II.4 (Ha.wy) kmt m xpS=k mk.n=k iswt[=s?]
‘How rejoiced is Egypt in your strength, when you have protected its(?) old
traditions!’;
(iv) In royal inscriptions: e.g. Thutmosis I’s Tombos Stela 11-12 (Urk. IV 85, 8) xnd
pHwy=fy m xpS nxt ‘who treads on its two ends with his strong arm’; Thutmosis III’s
Gebel Barkal Stela 2 (Urk. IV 1228, 18) it m xpS=f ‘who seizes with his strong arm’;
15 (Urk. IV 1233, 7) hd=f tA nb Hrsic xpS=f ‘he attacks every land on his strength’;

(c) In literature
(v) Sinuhe: B 51-52 nxt pw grt ir m xpS=f pr-a nn twt n=f (...) ‘He is a strong one who
acts with his strong arm, a hero without peer’; B 104-106 smA.n=i rmT im=s m xpS=i
m pDt=i m nmtwt=i m sxrw=i iqrw ‘I killed the people in it with my strong arm, my
bow, my movements, and my excellent plans’;
(vi) Elsewhere: Amenemhat 10c in.n=i {r} Drw xpwSt m xpS=i m xprw=i ‘I have
reached the limits of the Great Bear through my strength and through my
manifestations’;220 Merikare E 80 qd=k m xpS=k ‘You can sleep (secure) by your
strength’; with a different preposition, Ipuwer 1.6 mi Hr xpS ‘Come with strength!’

(d) Once in Coffin Texts

(vii) CT I 4/5a-6/7a Axw itpw innw mw irrw H(a)p(y) m xpS n itw=sn ‘the akh’s who
bring water, who make the flood with the strong arms of their fathers.’

A. In all cases, the phrase m xpS=f/=k/=i is associated with strongly agentive and/or
transformative events: iri ‘act’ (passim), smA ‘kill’ (Sinuhe B 104-106), xnd ‘tread’
(Urk. IV 85, 8), hd ‘attack’ (Urk. IV 1233, 7), mki ‘protect’ (Hymns to Senwosret III,
II.4), ini Drw ‘reach the limits’ (Amenemhat 10c), ini (...) iri (...) ‘bring (...) make (...)’
(CT I 4/5a-6/a), in an implicit way also in the nominally phrased qn ‘be valiant’ (Siut
V, 16), with a different preposition also mi ‘come!’ (Ipuwer 1.6). To these events the
phrase m xpS=f is associated as the distinguished instrument by which agency is
carried out. The only apparent exception, qd ‘sleep’ (Merikare E 80 (vi)) confirms the
tableau with a pointe: the strength of the king, evoked by the phrase m xpS=f (and
thus by the underlying iri m xpS=f ) is what allows him not to act, to be in the event
least agentive of all, ‘sleeping’.
Against this background, Neferti 3c, if emended into m xpS=sn ‘with their
strength’, sounds slightly odd: xpi (although agentive in a linguistic sense) is not
strongly agentive as the above events are, nor transformative at all, and thereby scores
much lower than these in semantic transitivity. Among events of motion, contrast xpi
(Neferti 3c), a mere ‘going about’ (not implying any endpoint nor even direction),
with Amenemhat 10c ini Drw ‘reach the limits’, an event in which the endpoint is
lexically expressed (Drw); also, with a variation on the prepositional phrase, with
Ipuwer 1.6 mi Hr xpS, where the endpoint is implied by the speeker-oriented motion.

220 On this passage, lastly Gnirs 2013b: 146.

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 5.5 Lexical indications for dating 403

As far as the record goes, one acts with salient effects (‘kill’, ‘protect’, ‘reach the
limits’, ‘come (to the speaker)’) ‘with one’s strong arm’; one does not just ‘walk
about’ (xpi).
B. An observation of the contexts in which the phrase m xpS=f is used is suggestive
as well. The phrase has its origins in First Intermediate Period funerary self-presen-
tations (i)-(ii), emphasizing how the speaker did or acquired things by his own,
without relying on support from a higher authority.221 It was subsequently extended to
the king (iii)-(iv), also in eulogizing contexts. Literary uses in Sinuhe (v) are under-
stood within this same Middle Kingdom context, when the phrase had been extended
to the king (B 52, said of the king; B 105, said of Sinuhe, but in a context that echoes
phraseology otherwise associated with the king); the inheritance from funerary self-
presentations remains clear: B 52, literally iri m xpS=f; B 105, where m xpS=i is
associated with pDt (as in Siut V, 16: (ii)). Whatever its dating, Amenemhat 10c (vi) is
in a context similar to the one in Sinuhe B 105, royal deeds. Merikare E 80 (vi), also
said of a king (to be), itself implies royal contexts such as the above for the rhetoric
pointe to function (above, A), as does the reference to xpS in Merikare E 32
(§5.5.1.1.NB). In Middle Egyptian literature, the phrase m xpS=f/=k/=i expresses the
instrument of royal agency, in direct or indirect reference to the set phrase that had
spread to the royal sphere after its initial development in non-royal funerary self-
presentations.
In Neferti 3c, if to be emended, the association with Asiatics would stand isolated
in the preserved body of Middle Egyptian literature; it must then be read as an
element of the inverted world (along the lines of Asiatics being characterized by what
otherwise belongs to the king). However, Neferti 3c is introductive, before the actual
lament formally begins (3f-g xws ib=i (...); 4a m wrd (...)): the context implies no
element of inversion (3c-e, quoted below; contrast with the antithetical formulations
to follow: 3h-i; 4b-...). Why an expression otherwise used of the king should here be
extended to the Asiatics would therefore remain unclear.
C. If, on the other hand, the text is not emended, both oddities vanish. The verse is
from a passage (3a-e) at the transition from the framing narrative (1-2) to the lament
to follow (3f-12). It provides a first broad description of the ‘events in the land’ (3a),
phrased in concrete terms (compare 3d Smw ‘harvest’; 3e Htrw Hr skA ‘ploughing cattle
spans’). The ‘wandering’ (xpi) ‘Asiatics’ are characterized through one item culturally
conceived of as distinctively associated with them, their weapons:222

221 Coulon 1997: 121 and n.61.

222 Perhaps to be compared with Merikare E 106-107 pDt pw Sspt aAgsw ‘It is Bow-People, who take
up the war-belt(?)’. Whatever the exact meaning of aAgsw, this seems to have no satisfying
etymology within Egyptian and therefore stands a good chance to be a loanword, borrowed at
some point in time not easily determined (§6.2.2.6.3, (ii)). In context, aAgsw may have been
selected as an apt characterization of the ‘Bow-People’.

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 404 5 Neferti

(viii) Neferti 3a-f

iw=f mH=f Hr xprt m tA
iw=f sxA=f qni n iAbtt
xp{w} aAmw m xpS{wt}=sn
sh=sn ibw n ntyw Hr Smw
nHm=sn Htrw Hr skA
Dd=f xws ib=i (...)
‘He ponders the events in the land,
he evokes the state of the East:
Asiatics going around with their sickle-shaped swords (/in their strength?!),
disturbing the hearts of those on the harvest,
taking away ploughing cattle-spans.
He says: ‘Stir, my heart, (...)’
Internally to Neferti, 3c Pet. xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’ resonates with another
passage, in the lament itself:

(ix) Neferti 8f-9a

tw r Ssp xaw nw aHA (...)
iw.tw r irt aHAw m biA (...)
‘Weapons of combat will be taken up (...).
And arms/arrows will be made of copper (...)’
For the expression xaw nw aHA, compare Thutmosis III’s Poetical Stela 14 (Urk. IV
615, 8) Ssp=k xaw aHA ‘You shall take up weapons of combat’; the expression recurs
in Amenhotep II’s Syrian Campaigns (Karnak Stela) 6 (Urk. IV 1311, 6).223

Similar long-distance echoes abound in Neferti providing one dimension of the

composition’s thorough-going architecture. To give but a few examples, 15a tw r qd
inbw HqA a.w.s. (...) ‘The Walls of the Ruler L.P.H. will be built (...)’ echoes, and
reverses, 7f gA.tw xnrt (...) ‘one will lack an enclosure (...)’.224 Similarly, 15d (...) r rDt
swr awt=sn ‘(...) to make their (scil. the foreigner’s) flock drink’, echoes 8a awt xAst r
swr Hr itrw nw kmt ‘The flock of foreign countries will drink on the river of Egypt
(...)’ (itself in echo to 6a-d, where the ‘river of Egypt’ is ‘dry’ (Sw)). Extending to
Neferti’s initial address to his heart, 11g nn ibHw irty m mw ‘Eyes will not be moist
with water’ echoes 3f (...) rmw=k tA pn (...) ‘(...) and beweep this land (...)’. If Neferti
3c is read as the text stands, an initial literary characterization of the Asiatics through
a weapon culturally conceived of as distinctive of them is echoed in the main part of
the composition by other, less culturally specific, designations of weapons, when the
lament is raised to more general terms. If Neferti 3c is emended, this is lost.

223 aHA, for its part, is documented from the Middle Kingdom on, both in the sense of ‘weapon’ and of
‘arrow’ (TLA #40050); on archeological correlates, Raue 2010: 81, n.20.
224 Parkinson 2002: 198.

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 5.5 Lexical indications for dating 405

5.5.2 Neferti 12f bH ‘forced labor’

In earlier times, the second part of Neferti 12f used to be read as bAkw bHqA, positing a
hapax legomenon bHqA, contextually translated as ‘und die Diener sind oben auf’,225 or
the like. As convincingly argued by Quack,226 the correct reading is almost certainly
bAkw bH ‘Arbeiter vom Corveedienst’, providing the subject to the common verb qAi
‘to be exalted’ with its usual semogram (A28). The old reading as bHqA may have been
suggested by the lack of a semogram after bH in both Pet. and C25224, perhaps also
by the unexpectedness of bH in a text then dated to the Middle Kingdom. The reading
proposed by Quack, and adopted by most subsequent scholars,227 is superior on two
accounts. It does without positing an otherwise entirely undocumented word.
Moreover, the meaning is stronger in the inverted world context of the passage, with a
more specifically characterized subject bAkw-bH ‘forced laborers’, rather than just
generic bAkw ‘workers’, being ‘exultant’ (qAi):

Neferti 12e-f
iw Hwrw r irt aHa wr{t} r [...] r xpr
in SwAw wnm=sn tA bAkw-bH qAw
‘The wretches will make heaps, the great ones will [...] to exist;
Only poor people will eat bread, forced laborers are high up.’

The word bH228 is first documented in a mid-Eighteenth Dynasty administrative

document (O. Berlin P 10615, 1; Urk. IV 1374, 9)229 in which, incidentally, it occurs
alongside bAkw ‘work’ (Urk. IV 1374, 10). A later Eighteenth Dynasty occurrence is
from Amenhotep IV’s Gebel Silsilah Stela 5 (Urk. IV 1962, 15).230 Various further
occurrences are from Ramesside times,231 among which one that has a combination
rmT bH ‘men of forced labour’,232 similar to Neferti’s bAkw bH. The pattern of lexical
attestation is consistent. If this can be trusted, as seems to be the case, and if Quack’s
reading is correct, as it almost certainly is, Neferti 12f would provide an other element
in support of a very late dating.

225 Helck 19922: 50 with n.d: ‘(...) kann nur aus dem Zusammenhang erraten werden.’
226 Quack 1993a: 78-9.
227 E.g. Parkinson 1997a: 138; Dils et al., TLA.
228 Noted as ‘nur neuägyptisch’ in DZA 22.905.220.
229 Noted in FCD 83.
230 FCD 83; TLA #550264;
231 Nauri Decree (passim: see TLA #550263); P. Mallet III.6; IV.3; DZA 22.905.300 (P. Turin 1887);
DZA 22.905.230 (a New Kingdom model letter); TLA #56800 (Book of the Dead).
232 DZA 22.905.240 (P. Anastasi VI).

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 406 5 Neferti

5.6 Further indications: The prologue

5.6.1 Neferti 1a-b xpr.n swt wn(n) (...)

The incipit of Neferti reads:

Neferti 1a-b
xpr.na swt wnnb Hm n nsw bity snfrw mAa-xrw m nsw mnx m tA pn r-Dr=f
‘It occurred, then, that the Majesty of the King of Upper and Lower Egypt
Snefru, justified, was an efficient king in this entire land.’
a) Thus Pet.; OL (O. Liverpool 13624 M) xpr is secondary, adjusting to Ramesside usage,
compare (vi)-(vii) below and KRI II 324, 10.
b) Thus Pet.; Ramesside witnesses have wn. Both wnn (a mrr=f ) and wn (a subjunctive) are
grammatical: see below.

As far as grammar proper is concerned, the construction xpr.n swt wnn (...) is possible
since early times. The discourse particle swt is documented since the Old Kingdom,
including in its ‘emploi progressif’ to which the use in Neferti relates.233 #pr.n intro-
ducing finite clauses234 is well documented in the Middle Kingdom and at least once
before,235 both with a subjunctive236 and a mrr=f,237 as well as with other construc-
tions.238 The argument is therefore not one indexed on ongoing linguistic change, but
one on a specific usage of a construction and the associated textual convention that
made such development possible.
A. The combination xpr swt itself is documented once in a pre-New Kingdom text,
the Fifth Dynasty inscription of Kaiemtjenenet: Urk. I 184, 12 xpr swt sqdwt m wiAwy
aAwy (...) ‘Then occurred (or: Occurrence, then, of) the sailing in the two big boats
(...)’; sim. 182, 14 (quoted below, (i)). (The English rendering is intended to suggest
how the phrasing in Kaiemtjenenet probably emerged out of annalistic style; for
similar relations in later times, below, B).
A closer inspection reveals that the usage of xpr swt in Kaiemtjenenet and in
Neferti differ. While the fragmentary state of preservation of Kaiemtjenenet’s inscrip-
tion does not permit a full-scale narrative analysis of the text, it can be observed that
none of the two instances of xpr swt quoted above are from the (now lost) beginning
of their respective narrative sequences. More significantly yet, the text preceding the
first of the two instances quoted above is sufficiently preserved to show that an earlier
event, also of impersonal motion, is introduced by xpr, without swt. The broader
sequence thus reads:

233 Oréal 2011: 399-409.

234 Studies: Uljas 2006b; 2007a: 194-202.
235 Merer (Cracow MNK-XI-999; First Intermediate Period), 12. The construction in Kaiemtjenent
(Fifth Dynasty) to be discussed below is with a verbal noun.
236 Dramatic Ramesseum Papyrus 117; Merer 12; Debate 9-10 (with nn xpr).
237 Dramatic Ramesseum Papyrus 53; 114.
238 With a sDm(w)-passive: passim in Dramatic Ramesseum Papyrus (occasionally also with a tw-
passive); with an asyndetically linked clause: Shipwrecked Sailor 130.

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 5.6 Further indications: The prologue 407

(i) Urk. I 182, 11-14 (Kaiemtjenenet)

xpr sDAt r mA=f ky sp (...)
xpr swt iwt r=f [...]
‘There occurred (or: Occurrence of) the proceeding to see him another time
(...)
Then occurred (or: Occurrence, then, of) the coming [...]’
As Oréal analyzes:239 ‘L’emploi de swt dans ce type de contexte marque en revanche
(scil. differing from adversative uses of the same particule) l’addition d’un nouvel
épisode à celui qui précède immédiatement. (...) swt porte sur un enchaînement
d’événements considérés dans leur succession’ (emphasis AS). In Neferti, by contrast,
xpr swt is in absolute text-initial position. To be sure, this also relates more broadly to
the ‘swt d’épisode’, from which it is derived:240 as already noted, no argument can be
made on the level of grammar itself. Rather than grammar, what is at stake is when
text-initial xpr swt—a distinctive element of a convention in expression, ‘une marque
textualisante, dont la fonction consiste à marquer l’appartenance à un genre’241—
developed in actual usage.
B. Text-initial xpr—without swt—is perhaps documented once in the Middle King-
dom,242 then becomes more common in the early New Kingdom.243 In all these cases,
xpr is morphologically an infinitive used in ‘labeling’ or ‘heading’ function, as befits
the monumental context. The use of xpr, emphasizing occurrence and/or epi-
sodicity,244 is generically bound, with occurrences typically to do with a throne
‘session’ (Hmst) or an ‘appearing’ (xat) of the king. This usage is hardly remarkable,
given the Egyptian lexicon (xpr is the ordinary expression of ‘occurring’245) and the
prior development of the ‘labeling infinitive’ construction (to which Kaiemtjenenet’s
inscription, itself modeled on annalistic style, also relates, if in different ways). Yet, in
being itself a convention, such usage, beginning in the Middle Kingdom, constitutes a
step toward the text-initial xpr swt that is here of interest.
Text-initial xpr swt is documented in royal and other monumentally published
inscriptions in the Eighteenth and early Nineteenth Dynasty:
(ii) Ahmose’s Abydos Stela for Tetisheri 1 (Urk. IV 26, 12)
xpr swt snDm Hm=f m DAdw (...)
‘Occurrence, then, of the relaxing of His Majesty in the audience-hall (...)’

239 Oréal 2011: 400.

240 See the overall analysis in Oréal 2011: 399-401.
241 Oréal 2011: 400.
242 Piccato 1997: 139; Baines 1996: 162. Text published by Habachi 1985b.
243 E.g. Urk. IV 156, 13; 256, 17; 349, 10; also Berlin Leather Roll 1.1-2 (for the dating, §4.2).
244 Vernus 1995a: 154, n.652; Loprieno 1996a: 284-5.
245 On the semantics of the root xpr more broadly, Buchberger 1993.

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 408 5 Neferti

(iii) Urk. IV 180, 15-17 (an inscription of Thutmosis III telling of his rise to
kingship)
Hsbt 1 tpi Smw sw 4
xpr swt xat sA nsw [...]
‘Year 1, first month of Winter, day 4:
Occurrence, then, of the rising of the royal son [...]’
Beginning of the narrative proper, after a brief first person introduction spoken by
Thutmosis.

(iv) Appointment of the Vizier 1 (Urk. IV 1380, 12)

xpr swt Hmst nsw m DAdw (...)
‘Occurrence, then, of a royal session in the audience-hall (...)’
Later in Ramses II’s Inscription Dédicatoire 25 (KRI II 324.10);246 then also in
the Chronicles of Prince Osorkon, harkening back to earlier textual models in this
and in other respects.247

In the Second Intermediate Period, no such usage is documented, even though

similar contexts are occasionally given (v) (contrast with (iii)):

(v) Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela 1-2

Hsbt 2 xr Hm n Hr grg-tAwy (...)
xat Hm=f Hr st Hr m aH (...)
‘Year 2 under the Majesty of Horus Geregtawi (...):
Rising of His Majesty on the throne of Horus in the palace (...)’

C. Occurrences of text-initial xpr swt in literary texts have long been noted.248 Their
possible significance, however, has not been fully appreciated due to the early datings
often made of several of the compositions here relevant. Leaving Neferti aside, all
instances are from the Eighteenth and early Nineteenth Dynasty, contemporaneous
with similar usage in royal and other inscriptionally published compositions:
(vi) Neferkare and Sisene T. IFAO 1214 ro 1 + T. OIC 13539, 1-2249
xpr swt wn Hm n nsw bity [nfr]-kA-[ra] sA-ra [pipi] mAa-xrw m nsw [mnx m tA pn
r-Dr=f ]
‘It occurred, then, that the Majesty of the King of Upper and Lower Egypt
Neferkare, the son of Re Pepi, justified, was an efficient king in this whole
land.’
The close parallel with Neferti has long been noted.250

246 Now Spalinger 2009: 17-8.

247 Caminos 1958: 33; noted by Oréal 2011: 400, n.12.
248 E.g. Spalinger 2010: 117-21; 2009: 12-5 and n.51 (with bibliography); Parkinson 1996: 303;
Morenz 1996: 111-2; Posener 1957: 123, n.2.
249 For the reconstruction, Posener 1957: 123; for the dating of Neferkare to the Eighteenth Dynasty,
§4.4.
250 First by Posener 1957: 123, n.2.

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 5.6 Further indications: The prologue 409

(vii) Heavenly Cow 1-2 (S + R.II + R.III)251

xpr [s]w[t w]bn ra nTr xpr ds=f (...)
‘It occurred, then, that Re, the god who has created himself, rose (...)’

(viii) Apophis and Seqenenre 1.1 (LES 85, 4)

xpr swt wn.in tA n kmt m iAdt (...)
‘It occurred, then, that the land of Egypt was in a sad state (...)’

NB. Preserved works of Middle Kingdom narrative literature have incipits of

various types,252 none with xpr swt: dd.in (...)253 ‘Then said (...)’ (Shipwrecked
Sailor 1; similarly in the inscription of Khnumhotep III254); s pw wn (...) ‘There
was a man (...)’ (Eloquent Peasant R 1.1; Neferpesedjet 1);255 complex palimp-
sestic framing strategies: Sinuhe. However, no surviving Middle Kingdom
narrative composition has a king-oriented beginning, the expression of which
could then be compared with xpr swt in Neferti, Neferkare, and Heavenly Cow.
The appreciation of the possible significance of xpr swt in Neferti can therefore
not be made against what would in effect be an e silentio argument: it can only be
made in relation to the overall history of the expression, as discussed above.

D. Summing up, the use of swt in text-initial xpr(.n) swt relates to broader functions
of the particle documented since early times, of which it is an extension. While no
argument on grammar can be made (in itself, such extension would have been
possible at all times), one can on the contexts in which such extension—a convention
in expression, partly a signal of a certain textual type—actually occurred, as these are
otherwise documented in the record.
Text-initial xpr, without swt, is documented once in the Middle Kingdom: this is
hardly remarkable in itself, but provides a first step in the historical genealogy of the
expression considered. The next step, text-initial xpr swt, is documented from the
early Eighteenth to the early Nineteenth Dynasty in royal inscriptions and in other
monumentally published compositions; the period of attestation is the same for
literary compositions other than Neferti. The pattern of attestation is fairly concen-
trated in time and consistent across various types of written discourses. With due
caution, this could suggest that Neferti as well may relate to the same horizon as early
attestations of the construction, in the early Eighteenth Dynasty.

5.6.2 Neferti 1c wa m nn n hrw xpr (...)

Directly following the incipit just discussed, the next sequence, introducing the
courtiers, begins with a fronted temporal expression:

251 For the dating of Heavenly Cow to the Eighteenth Dynasty, §4.6.
252 Parkinson 2012a: 23; 1996: 303.
253 A sDm.in=f or an infinitive with agential in. The former interpretation is more likely in view of the
episodic quality of the narrative to follow.
254 Allen 2008.
255 In Ramesside times, also in the inscriptions of Samut son of Kyky and possibly in Menna’s Letter
(Parkinson 2009: 208-9; Morenz 1998; Vernus 1978: 115-9).

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 410 5 Neferti

Neferti 1c-e
wa m nn n hrw xpr
aq pw ir.n qnbt nt Xnw r pr-aA a.w.s. r nD-xrt
prt pw ir.n=sn nD<.n>a=sn xrt mi nt-aw=sn nt ra nb
‘One of these days,
the Council of the Residence entered the Palace L.P.H. to pay their respects;
They went out having paid their respects according to their daily custom.’
a) Thus Pet., followed by OL, DeM 1182, and 1185; DeM 1183 reads nD.n=sn. The latter
reading is generally given preference.256

A. Fronted temporal expressions are typical of narrative literature in general,

provided a language permits these on grammatical grounds. In early/mid-Twelfth
Dynasty narrative literary texts such as Sinuhe, they are found as e.g. xpr.n tr n msyt
‘When supper-time had come’ in Sinuhe.257 Different types of fronted temporal
expressions were associated with different literary registers (§2.4.4.4). The synthetic
expressions in Sinuhe (sDm.n=f ’s in setting function) thus contrast with the
morphologically more overt ones favored in Tale of P. Lythgoe or Cheops’ Court, e.g.
Tale of P. Lythgoe ro x+7-8 xr m-xt m[S]rw xpr aHa.n rD.n=f [...] ‘Now, after the
evening had set, he gave [...]’. To some extent, the contrast is also diachronic:
Cheops’ Court is later than Sinuhe and fronted temporal expressions of the more
analytic type become more common over time to the point of developing into a
characteristic articulating device in Ramesside narrative literature.258 The expression
in Neferti 1c is itself of the more analytic type.
B. The expression in Neferti 1c is otherwise documented in the following texts:259

(i) Sobekhotep VIII’s Inundation Stela (late Thirteenth Dynasty), face A, 2

wa m nn n hrw xpr
wn.in Hm=f Hr wDA r pr n imn (...)
‘One of these days,
His Majesty proceeded to the temple of Amun (...)’

(ii) Cheops’ Court 9.21-22

wa m nn hrw xpr
wn.in rd-Ddt Hr Snt=s
‘One of these days,
Ruddjedet was suffering.’

256 Gardiner 1914: 102, n.1 (cautiously); subsequently Posener 1956: 148; Helck 19922: 10.
257 For expressions of ‘dawning’ specifically, Spalinger 2006: 51-85, with references to previous
studies.
258 For a detailed analysis of this development, Hintze 1950: 10ff.
259 Occurrences (ii)-(v) were already noted by Hintze 1950: 13, n.13; (i) was by Parkinson 2009: 168;
2002: 140-1.

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 5.6 Further indications: The prologue 411

(iii) Thutmosis IV’s Sphinx Stela 8 (Urk. IV 1542, 10-12)

wa m nn n hrw xpr
iwt pw ir.n sA nsw Dhwti-ms Hr swtwt Hr tr n mtrt
snDm pw ir.n=f nsic Swt nt nTr pn aA
‘One of these days,
the royal son Thutmosis went out strolling at the time of noon;
He relaxed in the shadow of this great god.’

Also in two early Ramesside inscriptional compositions:

(iv) Ramses II’s Inscription dédicatoire 30 (KRI II 325, 5-6)260
wa m nn hrw xprw m Hsbt 1 Abd 3 Axt 23 (...)
‘One of these days in year 1, third month of Inundation, day 23 (...)’
(v) Kuban Stela 8 (KRI II 355, 1)
wa m nn hrw xpr ist Hm=f Hms Hr bHdw n Dam (...)
‘One of these days, His Majesty was sitting on the throne of electrum (...)’

In all cases, the expression wa m nn n hrw xpr is in episode-initial position, as in

Neferti. In Sobekhotep VIII’s Inundation Stela, it immediately follows the initial date
(l.1), heading the narrative. In Cheops’ Court, it introduces the final sequence with
Ruddjedet.261 In Thutmosis IV’s Sphinx Stela, it opens the main narrative, after the
date, titles, and epithets (Urk. IV 1540), and after the background provided by the
fourfold sequence of isT-headed sequences (Urk. IV 1541, 1; 1541, 8; 1541, 16;
1542, 5).
C. The sequence of tenses in Neferti compares most directly with the one in
Thutmosis IV’s Sphinx Stela, with wa m nn n hrw xpr in both cases followed by two aq
pw ir.n=f constructions. In the two other pre-Ramesside occurrences, by contrast, the
construction that follows is wn.in=f Hr sDm: in Sobekhotep VIII’s Inundation Stela
particularly, the use of a wn.in=f Hr sDm construction rather than a aq pw ir.n=f one is
noteworthy, as wDA is an event that could have been expressed by the latter con-
struction:

Neferti: wa m nn n hrw xpr aq pw ir.n=sn (...)

prt pw ir.n=sn (...)

T. IV’s Sphinx Stela: wa m nn n hrw xpr iwt pw ir.n sA nsw (...)

snDm pw ir.n=f (...)

S. VIII’s Inundation Stela: wa m nn n hrw xpr wn.in Hm=f Hr wDA (...)

(Cheops’ Court: wa m nn n hrw xpr wn.in rd-Ddt Hr Snt=s)

D. In interpreting the above for dating, two observations can be made. In securely
dated texts, the expression in Neferti 1c, wa m nn n hrw xpr, is otherwise documented
from the late Thirteenth to the early Nineteenth Dynasty (above, B). Perhaps earlier is

260 See Spalinger 2009: 13 and n.53.

261 Further Parkinson 2002: 186-7.

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 412 5 Neferti

only the occurrence in Cheops’ Court (type-B terminus ante quem non by the early
Thirteenth Dynasty: §2.4.4.1.B). When the sequence of tenses is included into
consideration, the closest parallel to Neferti is in a mid-Eighteenth Dynasty compo-
sition, Thutmosis IV’ Sphinx Stela (above, C). This is suggestive of a broadly later,
rather than earlier, dating of Neferti.
Taking things from a different angle, Neferti 1c has a fronted temporal expression
of a more analytic type. This is generally indexical of a register different from e.g.
Sinuhe; in the prologue of Neferti, it provides one among several elements of an
intended stylistic contrast with the lament to follow. In Middle Egyptian literature, wa
m nn n hrw xpr recurs only in Cheops’ Court, which has further elements in common
with the prologue of Neferti (§5.1.3.2.B; §5.8.1.1). Like the narrative construction
discussed before (1a-b xpr.n swt (...): §5.6.1), the one in 1c allies the narrative
prologue of Neferti with what has been termed a ‘low tradition’ of Middle Egyptian
narrative literature. As far as the documentation and current understanding go, this
tradition begun developing only by the late Twelfth Dynasty. An early Twelfth
Dynasty dating of Neferti is therefore too early.

5.7 Dating Neferti

Linguistic evidence for dating Neferti falls in two parts, grammatical constructions to
which full-fledged linguistic criteria apply (§5.2-4) and expressions that provide
additional indications for dating (§5.5-6).

5.7.1 Temporal range for dating

The linguistic repertoire of Neferti accommodates three constructions on which fully
developed linguistic arguments for dating can be based:

&w r sDm: 6b; 7g; 7h (twice); 8f; 9a (as iw.tw r sDm);

10h; 15a (§5.2);
&w sDm: 10e; 12b (§5.3);
&w with non-dynamic events: 7f; 9c (twice) (also 5d; 12d?) (§5.4; §6.2).

For all three of these constructions, their first documentation in the record is later than
the early Twelfth Dynasty to which Neferti is often dated. What is more, for all three,
other constructions are demonstrably used in similar functions in early/mid-Twelfth
Dynasty literary texts:

Early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty literary texts

(X.)tw r sDm (subjunctive or prospective) sDm.tw=f (§5.2.5);
(X.)tw (Hr) sDm (basic/‘aorist’) sDm.tw=f (§5.3.5);
%Dr.tw sDr=ø (subjectless active construction) (§6.2.3.3;
§6.2.3.5).

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 5.7 Dating Neferti 413

That tw r sDm, tw sDm, and tw with non-dynamic events are not documented in the
early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty can therefore not be dismissed as an accidental gap in the
preserved record.
The expressions discussed are all integral to the original text of Neferti. &w r sDm
and tw with non-dynamic events occur in significant numbers in the composition. If
these expressions were the results of textual alteration in Neferti, such must have been
of a fully systematic nature, not otherwise paralleled. Complementarily, possible
source constructions from which tw r sDm and tw with non-dynamic events could have
arisen if textually secondary were considered: all the possible source constructions
can be ruled out in Neferti, further demonstrating that the relevant expressions are
integral to the original text of this composition (§5.2.2; §6.2.1).
In addition, tw r sDm has a major articulating function in Neferti, alternating with
sDm.tw=f ’s (§5.2.3.3). The distribution of the two constructions, and of their
respective active pendants, is principled in such ways that it can not have arisen in
textual transmission nor through réécriture. As regards tw sDm, this alternates with tw
r sDm in a complex large-scale articulation that extends over much of the second part
of the lament (§5.3.1.3). This articulation expresses an oscillating temporality in the
lament, also announced in explicit words at the opening of that lament when Neferti
begins speaking. Moreover, the articulation functions on multiple levels simulta-
neously and is thorough-going in terms of the distribution of all verbal and non-verbal
forms and constructions found in the second part of the lament. This can only have
been composed, directly demonstrating that both tw sDm’s and tw r sDm’s in Neferti
must be integral to the original text.

5.7.1.1 Temporal resolution of individual criteria

The above suffices to disprove a dating of Neferti to the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty.
In going further, the criteria based on the above expressions must be discussed indi-
vidually as to their temporal resolution.
A. In terms of bare attestation, tw with non-dynamic events (e.g. sDr.tw, 9c) is not
documented in any manuscript before the early Eighteenth Dynasty (§6.2.2.4). This
does not imply, however, that the construction was innovated as late as the time of its
first attestation. The construction is found in a series of Middle Egyptian literary texts,
all of which have a sound linguistic terminus ante quem non by the late Twelfth or
early Thirteenth Dynasty, or even later, on independent grounds: some of these may
have been composed in the late Middle Kingdom already. On the other hand, the
expression was not innovated before the late Twelfth Dynasty: early/mid-Twelfth
Dynasty literary texts (Sinuhe, Ptahhotep, Debate of a Man and His Soul) consistently
have another construction to perform the same function, sDr=ø (§6.2.3.3; §6.2.3.5).
The extension of tw to non-dynamic events is part of a broader change of which it is
the second stage (§6.2.2.4): the first stage of the overall change, consisting in the
extension of tw to events lacking an agent in their semantic representation, can be
dated precisely, to the mid-Twelfth Dynasty (§6.2.2.3). As stage II must have
occurred not much later than stage I, it follows that tw with non-dynamic events must

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 414 5 Neferti

have been innovated no later than by the late Twelfth Dynasty, even if not
documented then in any securely dated text.
Once innovated, tw with non-dynamic events probably spread to higher written
registers rapidly. Unlike for example tw r sDm and tw sDm, the change under con-
sideration involves an extension in the functions of an already existing formal
category. (As a morphological category, e.g. sDr.tw (9c)—i.e. a form with tw in the
post-thematic inflectional slot—is not any innovative in itself: compare e.g. pr.n.tw in
Mocalla). That the relevant innovation in function should have been invested
indexically, possibly delaying its spread to linguistic registers of literature, is therefore
unlikely. The analysis is confirmed by occurrences of innovative constructions
relating to stage I of the same change in a mid-Twelfth Dynasty literary text (Eloquent
Peasant): just as the innovation in stage I, the one in stage II was probably acceptable
in literature almost immediately. In sum, tw with non-dynamic events must have been
possible in a literary text such as Neferti as early as the late Twelfth Dynasty.
B. In the form in which it is found in Neferti, tw r sDm is literary construction, not
inherently but the facto (§5.2.3.4). For anchoring the rise of the construction in time,
the result is the same: the higher-order construction (X.)tw r sDm, of which tw r sDm is
a variant, must then be considered. This is first found in documentary texts of the late
Twelfth and early Thirteenth Dynasty (§5.2.4). In early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty literary
texts (Sinuhe, Ptahhotep), another construction, subjunctive or prospective sDm.tw=f,
is consistently used as the functional counterpart to active NP r sDm (§5.2.5.D).
How fast (X.)tw r sDm spread from the documentary registers in which it is first
attested to more formal ones such as in literature can not be assessed on direct
descriptive grounds. In literary texts other than Neferti, the construction is first
encountered as a secondary reading in Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts, but this can
be no more than a terminus post quem non for the spread. On the other hand, the
contrast between (X.)tw r sDm and subjunctive/prospective sDm.tw=f is morphologi-
cally salient (as a contrast between an analytic and a synthetic category). This
suggests that the former, when initially innovated, could have been marked for
register for some while. It suggests, in other words, that the spread of (X.)tw r sDm to
higher written registers may have taken time and that the construction was probably
not acceptable in literature in such early times as the late Twelfth Dynasty.
To err on the side of maximal caution, it is here nonetheless assumed that the
spread could have been immediate. The terminus ante quem non imposed by the
presence of tw r sDm in Neferti is thus set to the late Twelfth Dynasty. This is
probably too early, as register is then entirely left out of account. Methodologically,
the loss in possible temporal resolution is made up by the gain consisting in making
the criterion fully reliable.
C. Like tw r sDm, tw sDm is also a de facto literary expression (§5.3.3.B-C). It must
therefore be appreciated in relation to the higher-order construction (X.)tw Hr sDm of
which it is a variant. The latter is first attested in a literary text dating to the later
Second Intermediate Period. Further attestations are in the early New Kingdom, by
this time still mostly in registers that are also otherwise innovative in the expressions
they accommodate (§5.3.4.2).

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 5.7 Dating Neferti 415

In the mid-Twelfth Dynasty, Eloquent Peasant has another construction as the

passive counterpart to active NP Hr sDm, basic/‘aorist’ sDm.tw=f. Two literary texts
that were not composed before the early Thirteenth Dynasty, Ipuwer and Khakheper-
reseneb, similarly have sDm.tw=f as the functional counterpart to active NP Hr sDm—
consistently so and including in contexts that imply a progressive reading (§5.3.5.1).
The contexts are similar to the ones in Neferti, also from laments, also in the Sonst-
Jetzt articulation: while Ipuwer and Khakheperreseneb have sDm.tw=f, Neferti has
(X.)tw (Hr) sDm.
(X.)tw (Hr) sDm was therefore not innovated before the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty.
More precisely, the construction was innovated at some point after the early Thir-
teenth Dynasty and before the later Second Intermediate Period. When exactly it was
innovated can not be established because of the low density of the Second
Intermediate Period record.

5.7.1.2 Dating Neferti based on full linguistic arguments

The above considerations provide the basis for defining a temporal range for dating
Neferti. As initially noted, the present author was unable to identify any element in the
linguistic typology of Neferti that could lend itself to defining a linguistic terminus
post quem non earlier than the first manuscript attestation of the composition, in the
mid-Eighteenth Dynasty (§5.1.4). On the other hand, various expressions, all demon-
strably integral to the original composition, imply various termini ante quem non. As
just discussed, the temporal resolution of these varies:

(a) &w with non-dynamic events (securely 3x, possibly 5x, in Neferti):
terminus ante quem non by the late Twelfth Dynasty;
(b) &w r sDm (7x in Neferti; also once iw.tw r sDm):
terminus ante quem non set to the late Twelfth Dynasty;
This is a conservative assessment, disregarding issues to do with the spread of the
relevant innovation across different written registers. When these are taken into
account, the effective terminus ante quem non is probably somewhat later;

(c) &w sDm (2x in Neferti):

type-B terminus ante quem non by the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty;
This is the earliest moment in time for which it can not be excluded that the
construction could have become possible. The construction may in fact have been
innovated only later, at some moment in time between the mid-Thirteenth
Dynasty and late Second Intermediate Period.

NB. Technically, criterion (a) has not yet been established (below, §6.2). Inasmuch as
the dating of Amenemhat, where the construction recurs, is still an open issue at this
stage, the following comments can also be read without (a) being part of the
argument: when the dating of Neferti is dated based on (b) and (c) alone, the result is
the same.

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 416 5 Neferti

If only one of the above is not entirely wrong, Neferti can not date to a period in time
before the late Twelfth Dynasty.
For Neferti to date as early as the late Twelfth Dynasty, three conditions must be
simultaneously fulfilled:

(i) The discussion of the criterion based on tw sDm and of its temporal
resolution (§5.3; §5.7.1.1.C) must be outright wrong;
(ii) &w r sDm must have spread to literary registers almost immediately after it
first emerged in documentary ones (compare the discussion in §5.7.1.1.B);
(iii) For both tw used with non-dynamic events and tw r sDm, Neferti must
have been composed right at the time when these were being first innovated.
If only one of the above conditions is not fulfilled, a dating of Neferti to the late
Twelfth Dynasty is too early still.
If the discussion of tw sDm is correct, this construction implies a terminus ante
quem non by the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty. More precisely, the mid-Thirteenth
Dynasty is the earliest moment in time that can not be excluded based on the evidence
available: the low density of the Second Intermediate Period record prevents assessing
when more precisely between the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty and late Second Inter-
mediate Period the construction was actually innovated. Practically, setting a terminus
ante quem non for (X.)tw (Hr) sDm by the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty requires making
hypotheses (), (), and (). Dating Neferti to a time as early as the mid-Thirteenth
Dynasty then requires making the same hypotheses and ():

() Ipuwer was composed at the earliest moment in time linguistically

possible, the early Thirteenth Dynasty;
() Khakheperreseneb was composed at the earliest moment in time
linguistically possible, the early Thirteenth Dynasty;
() (X.)tw (Hr) sDm was innovated shortly after Khakheperreseneb and Ipuwer
were composed;
() Neferti was composed right at the time when (X.)tw (Hr) sDm was
innovated.

That (), (), (), and ()—all individually hypothetical—should simultaneously

apply is unlikely. Accordingly, the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty is probably still too early.

5.7.2 Further indications for dating

Further expressions in Neferti are strongly indicative for dating. These come with
uncertainties that can not be fully reduced and are therefore to be appreciated at a
different level than the grammatical constructions just summarized.
A. #pS ‘sickle-shaped sword’ in Neferti 3c Pet. is a late word, as is established by a
discussion of the spread of its real-world referent (§5.5.1.1). That the text in Pet. is
original as it stands is strongly suggested by a set of converging observations relative

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 5.7 Dating Neferti 417

to what would be the alternative reading of 3c, under emendation, with xpS ‘strong
arm’ (§5.5.1.2). Events with which the phrase m xpS=f ‘with his strong arm’ is other-
wise associated are different in nature from xpi ‘walk around’ in Neferti 3c. The
contexts in which the phrase m xpS=f is otherwise found in non-literary and literary
texts alike have implications or overtones different from the ones in Neferti 3c. In
Neferti 3c, xpS ‘sickle-shaped sword’ reads as a culturally specific designation for a
weapon and in context serves to characterize the Asiatics. It is echoed by other, not
culturally specific, designations of weapons in the lament when this raises to more
general levels. If the text is emended to xpS ‘strong arm’, the semantics of xpi m
xpS=sn are odd, the expression differs in its overtones from uses in all contexts other-
wise documented, and the long-distance echo internal to Neferti is lost. Were it not for
the immediate implications for dating, the text as it stands would probably have been
accepted without discussion.
Another lexical expression probably providing an indication for a late dating is bH
‘forced labor’ (12f: §5.5.2). The word is documented only in the New Kingdom and
its pattern of attestation seems generally reliable in view of the nature of its extra-
linguistic referent.
B. Among set formulae in the prologue, wa m nn n hrw xpr (Neferti 1c: §5.6.2) is
indexical of register, both in itself and in its type, as a non-synthetic fronted temporal
expression. The expression is thereby a tokebn of the studied simplicity of the
prologue, and one by which this evokes elements of what has been described as a ‘low
tradition’ of Middle Egyptian literature. The formula is not attested in any securely
dated text before the late Thirteenth Dynasty. It recurs in Cheops’ Court (type-B
terminus ante quem non to the early Thirteenth Dynasty; composed probably later
than this terminus) and has its most direct parallel in a mid-Eighteenth Dynasty
inscription. Taking into account issues of register, this distribution suggests a broadly
later, rather than earlier, dating of Neferti.
The other set formula, xpr swt (...) in text-initial position (Neferti 1a-b), is
documented from the early Eighteenth to the early Nineteenth Dynasty (§5.6.1). The
pattern of attestation is concentrated in time and comprises royal compositions, other
monumentally published texts, and literary ones. Moreover, the gradual rise of the
formula can be traced in the record, emerging in association with certain types of
written discourses as these themselves developed. The expression is therefore strongly
indicative of a very late dating of Neferti.
C. The expressions summarized in the present section are all suggestive of a very late
dating, yet all come with some irreducible element of uncertainty. While such
uncertainties must be duly noted, not all options are equally likely. When appreciated
in terms of a differential likelihood rather than of direct proof, these expressions make
Neferti tilt strongly toward a very late dating. Most weighty in this respect is text-
initial xpr swt, probably bH as well; wa m nn n hrw xpr is for its part suggestive of a
more broadly later dating. #pS stands for its own: the presence of this word in Neferti
is either individually decisive for a very late dating (if integral to the original text, as it
probably is) or irrelevant (if secondary, which can not be fully excluded). These

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 418 5 Neferti

individually probabilistic indications add up into a cumulative indication, still

probabilistic yet substantial and dense, for a very late dating.

5.7.3 Some implications

It was argued in the present chapter that the linguistic typology of Neferti implies a
temporal range for dating that extends from the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty at the very
earliest to the early Eighteenth Dynasty. Within the temporal range thus defined,
further linguistic indications are strongly suggestive of a very late dating, to the early
Eighteenth Dynasty. Even if one considers the former arguments only, the range for
dating here proposed is not inconsequential for interpreting the text, since it implies
that Neferti was not composed as a piece of advocacy for the early Twelfth Dynasty.
On a more general level, the dating proposed implies that the Middle Egyptian literary
tradition to which Neferti relates extended over a fairly long period in time.
When Neferti is detached from the early Twelfth Dynasty, the composition reads
no less coherently, with many relevant observations already made in previous studies.
Neferti, a concise and dense composition, draws on multiple subtexts and references.
The overall dynamics leading from chaos to restoration echo restoration inscriptions
(§5.8.3.3) and the final formulations draw on inscriptional texts affirming kingship
more broadly (§5.8.2). Chaos is formulated in motifs and themes that compare with
other exponents of the Middle Egyptian literary tradition (§5.1.3.3), with restoration
inscriptions (§5.8.3.3), with formulations in royal eulogies here reversed (§5.8.3.4)
and with hymns to the Nileflood (§5.8.3.2). The semantics of the composition are
enriched by mythical allusions (§5.8.3.1) and probably by one to Menes, the founder
of Egyptian monarchy (§5.1.2.1). The reference in ‘Ameny’ is multi-layered; whether
it also included a specific historical referent remains unclear. In view of the later date
of Neferti, the reference to the ‘Walls of the Ruler’ (§5.1.2.2) is probably best
interpreted as an echo to Sinuhe, be the expression fictionalizing or not in that com-
position.
In the prologue, famous for its reflection of literature, ‘choice’ language is ex-
plicitly presented as a source of ‘enjoyment’ (§5.8.1.3). Announced at the beginning
of Neferti’s speech, the oscillating temporality of presentification and prophesy is
spun throughout the second part of the lament in compositionally and linguistically
complex ways (§5.3.1.3). Nothing comparable is found in any inscriptional composi-
tion, including such that form major subtexts of Neferti: this oscillating temporality,
complexly composed, is proper to the literary work.

5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon

The present appendix gathers notes on intertext (broadly understood: not as quotations
or allusions, but as defined by a broader horizon in written culture, or, in another
formulation, as a ‘universe of texts’ communicating with and echoing each other).
These notes, non systematic in nature, were made in passing while reading a series of

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 5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon 419

late texts that turned out to be relevant for assessing the linguistic typology of Neferti.
They are explicitly not presented here as an argument for dating Neferti: intertext (in
the above broad sense) falls beyond the scope of the present study which for actual
argument concentrates on language exclusively. Dating based on intertext (in a
narrow or in a broader sense) is also a difficult matter in general, as intertext can be
deep in time rather than specific to one horizon in particular, and always requires
interpretation in ways that can not be pursued in the present context.262 Rather than
directly for dating, the following notes have another function. As argued in the present
chapter on strict linguistic grounds, the temporal range for dating Neferti extends from
some point in the Second Intermediate Period (mid-Thirteenth Dynasty at the earliest)
to the early Eighteenth Dynasty: it thereby includes the Ahmoside/early Thutmoside
period as one option. As also discussed, further linguistic indications suggest that this
period is in fact the most likely one. The hypothesis of a dating of Neferti to the
Ahmoside/early Thutmoside period, defined on linguistic grounds, must then be
examined as to its broader plausibility, or lack thereof, against elements of the
documented horizon of textual productions of this time.
A fair amount of the elements presented below is from inscriptionally published
texts. On the other hand, Neferti resonates with various Middle Egyptian literary texts,
some dating to the Twelfth Dynasty (e.g. Eloquent Peasant), some later but still
earlier, or possibly earlier, than the early New Kingdom (Cheops’ Court; Ipuwer and
Khakheperreseneb, respectively) (§5.1.3.2-3). One could then be tempted to interpret
the inscriptional texts as ‘literarizing’ and the earlier literary texts as the ones to which
Neferti, itself a literary text, would primarily relate. This would be dangerous. Several
among the formulations noted below are topical, but so are the ones in the literary
tradition to which Neferti belongs: as noted, ‘clusters of language and imagery’ can
extend deep in time, and often do (§5.1.3.3.B-D). In addition, the literary intertext
(broadly understood) of Neferti is by no means limited to the Middle Kingdom: one
very important component is hymns to the Nileflood, a tradition presently not docu-
mented before the late Seventeenth/early Eighteenth Dynasty and productive in the
New Kingdom (§5.8.3.2). Finally, the literary and non-literary spheres, while
differentiated notably in terms of decorum, are not autonomous from each other:
Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian literature draws a substantial part of its semantic
tensions from contemporaneous inscriptional subtexts it evokes and reconfigurates
(paradigmatically, Sinuhe). That early New Kingdom Middle Egyptian literature
would do similarly is then a fair hypothesis; as Neferkare and Sisene suggests
(§4.4.5.B), this could have been the case more generally.
A final preliminary note concerns the issue of ‘firsts’. Several among the elements
noted below are first documented, or first documented in the here relevant form, in the
early Eighteenth Dynasty. These need not all have been ‘absolute firsts’: textual
productions of the Middle Kingdom and Second Intermediate Period have been lost,
perhaps in higher numbers than early New Kingdom ones. In the present Appendix,
which does not directly concern dating, the issue does not lie with possible ‘absolute

262 For an introduction to various aspects of intertext as relevant to the study of Middle Egyptian
literature, Hagen 2012a: 143-51; Parkinson 2002: 55-63; Moers 2001: 106-54, all with references
to previous discussions.

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 420 5 Neferti

firsts’: the aim is only to provide some sense of a productive textual and cultural
horizon, effectively documented in a period that constitutes one option, linguistically
defined and linguistically distinguished, for dating Neferti.

5.8.1 The prologue

Two narrative expressions in the prologue were discussed above as indicative for
dating: text-initial xpr swt (1a-b) and wa m nn n hrw xpr (1c) (§5.6). While the latter
only suggests a more broadly later rather than earlier dating, the former is not
otherwise documented before the early Eighteenth Dynasty and arguably an inno-
vation of that period. The prologue includes a series of further motifs and formula-
tions that find good, or for some even best, parallels in an early Eighteenth Dynasty
horizon.

5.8.1.1 The ‘Royal Tale’

As has often been noted, the prologue of Neferti (1-3) evokes, and subverts, the
format of the ‘Royal Tale’.263 This developed gradually: an early exponent is the
Eleventh Dynasty Deir el-Ballas Inscription and a forerunner in some aspects is on a
block in the causeway of Sahure’s pyramid complex.264 The oldest securely dated text
to make reference to the format of the ‘Royal Tale’ in a form more specifically com-
parable to the one evoked in Neferti is Neferhotep’s Abydos Stela (mid-Thirteenth
Dynasty);265 another pre-New Kingdom instance is in the evocation of the ‘Royal
Tale’ in Cheops’ Court, a composition dating to some time between the early Thir-
teenth Dynasty and the late Second Intermediate Period (§2.4.4.1). From the Seven-
teenth Dynasty and early New Kingdom, a significant amount of texts is preserved
that relate to the format of the ‘Royal Tale’ in ways comparable to Neferti.266 Among
these is probably also Berlin Leather Roll: as observed in the present study, there are
serious indications that this text, while drawing on older materials, is in large parts,
and therefore plausibly in the format in which these materials are couched, an early
New Kingdom production (§4.2). The late Second Intermediate Period and early New
Kingdom would thus provide a dense context for the ‘Royal Tale’ in the form in
which this is evoked in Neferti. (It may be worth repeating that the present
Appendix’s perspective is about outlining possible contexts, and therefore not
primarily about absolute ‘firsts’.)

5.8.1.2 The search motif

In the prologue of Neferti, the existence of a ‘commoner’ (nDs) not living in the
Residence and to say things about the future is brought to the king’s attention, with
ample elaboration on that commoner’s distinguished qualities (Neferti 2b-d). As has

263 E.g. Gnirs 2006: 243-8; Parkinson 2002: 195. The term ‘Royal Tale’ is here used for the sake of
convenience only with the understanding that this is not a cohesive type of written discourse, let
alone a ‘genre’.
264 Text: el-Awadi 2009: 217-8 and pl.13; discussions: Spalinger 2011; Farout 2012.
265 See the analysis in Gnirs 2006: 244-5 and n.207 specifically.
266 Hofmann 2004: 105ff.

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 5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon 421

often been noted, this motif recurs in Cheops’ Court (6.26-7.6: §5.1.3.2.B).267 Equally
noteworthy are the parallel formulations in Neferti and Appointment of the Vizier.268
These are also about the introduction of a lower-status, yet distinguished, individual to
the king. In both texts, a search (Dar) is to be conducted for the king (n=i) with the
aim of finding someone relating to the broader group of addresses (2pl pronoun as a
partitive genitive), distinguished by its various qualities (expressed with ample textual
elaboration). Compare:

(i) Neferti 1j-n

Dd.in Hm=f a.w.s. n=sn
rHw mtn rD.n=i iAS.tw n=tn r rDt Dar=tn n=i sA=tn m sA sn=tn m iqr xnms=tn
wd sp nfr Ddty=f nhy n mdwt nfrt Tsw stpw DAy Hr n Hm=i n sDm st
rD.in=sn Hr Xwt=sn (...)
‘His Majesty L.P.H. said to them:
“Comrades, look, I have had you summoned to have you seek out for me a son
of yours who is wise, a brother of yours who is excellent, a friend of yours
who may utter a perfect occasion, who will tell some perfect words and choice
verses which My Majesty may be entertained to hear.”
They then put themselves on their bellies (...)’

(ii) Appointment of the Vizier 12-16 (Urk. IV 1381, 10-15)

[Dd].i[n]=f xft=sn
Hw Dar=tn n=i [...] n Hmw=Tn mXA-ib Hr spw nw [...] m stkn wDawt siAm=f
xrw[=f ]
wn.in=sn Hr Xwt=sn (...)
‘His Majesty said before them:
“May you seek out for me [...] of your skillful ones, who is inclined to the
occasions of [...] in bringing about a decision, making his voice pleasant.”
They then were on their bellies (...)’

Neferti and Appointment of the Vizier share at least one other common motif, the
courtiers’ initial introduction to ‘pay respects’ (nD-xrt: Neferti 1d; Appointment 4).
More noteworthy, because less common, is also that both texts similarly begin with
text-initial xpr swt (Neferti 1a-b; Appointment 1: §5.6.1).

5.8.1.3 The textual thematization of pleasure associated with words

The prologue of Neferti famously thematizes the aesthetic pleasure to be experienced
in literature: Neferti 1l-m (...) Dd.ty=f n=i nhy n mdwt nfrt Tsw stpw DAy Hr n Hm=i n
sDm st ‘(...) who will tell me some perfect words and choice verses which My Majesty

267 Morenz 1996: 109-10.

268 Also Gnirs 2006: 246, who further emphasizes elements of the historical context; on further
aspects of the relevant passage in the context of early Eighteenth Dynasty culture, Gnirs 2013b:
140-1.

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 422 5 Neferti

will be entertained to hear’ (sim. 2j-k). The expression used, DAi Hr (1m; 2k) and the
related sDA Hr269 are common in early Eighteenth Dynasty private tombs in captions to
pictorial representations,270 in various less formulaic contexts,271 and in royal
inscriptions with narrative parts, e.g. Urk. IV 676, 10 (Thutmosis III’s Annals);
Amenhotep II’s Sphinx Stela 27 (Urk. IV 1283, 11); Thutmosis IV’s Sphinx Stela 5
(Urk. IV 1541, 9); also on the crown prince Amenmes’ vessel (Urk. IV 91, 14) and on
a private statue (Urk. IV 1587, 16), both times in reference to royal activity.272 In
literature, sDA Hr is documented throughout Ramesside times.273 A single earlier
instance is in Neferkare and Sisene (§4.4.4.2; for the dating to the Eighteenth
Dynasty, §4.4).
Prior to the early New Kingdom, a single instance of the expression DAi Hr is
known, as a textual variant of sDA Hr in one Coffin Text passage (CT IV 73a);274 sDA Hr
itself is documented only twice, once in the same Coffin Text place and once in a
caption in a Middle Kingdom stela.275 Weighed against this extreme paucity of earlier
attestation, the dense attestation of DAi (/sDA) Hr in the early New Kingdom horizon is
significant; while the expression existed before, what it refers to, ‘pleasure, enter-
tainment’ was apparently less often thematized textually in earlier times, and, when it
was, generally expressed differently, notably by sxmx ib.276 In several places in the
early New Kingdom, not before in the record, sDA Hr is said of the ‘pleasure’
associated with words, as it is in Neferti.277 In Nefersekheru’s early Ramesside tomb,

269 On the more precise meaning of (s)DA Hr, lastly Widmaier 2009: 128.
270 +Ai Hr: Urk. IV 976, 13 (Min); 956, 5 (Iamunedjeh); in much later times, DZA 31.539.740 and
31.539.780 (Iymiseba; temp. Ramses IX). %DA Hr: Urk. IV 1161, 4 (Rekhmire; in the same
formulation, Widmaier 2009: 128 (Antef, TT 155); DZA 29.880.880-930); Urk. IV 955, 16
(Iamunedjeh; in the same formulation, Urk. IV 1397, 4 (Qenamun) and DZA 29.880.980-881.000);
Urk. IV 122, 16 (Paheri); DZA 29.881.040; Urk. IV 456, 2; DZA 29.881.140-150; 29.880.810
(sDA).
271 +Ai Hr: O. Leipzig 42 ro 1-3 (magical; DZA 31.539.820); DZA 31.539.830 (a New Kingdom stela).
%DA Hr: O. Glasgow D 1925.69 ro 1 (Vernus 2011: 82 and n.215); P. Leiden I 350 ro III.19.
272 Further, sDA alone: Urk. IV 1322, 8 (block from the Third Pylon; temp. Amenhotep II); DZA
29.880.820 (temp. Amenhotep III); sDA Hr also later, e.g. in Kuban Stela 30 (KRI II 358, 13).
273 Satirical Letter, P. Anastasi I, 8.7 (quoted below, n.279); Doomed Prince 8.7 (sDAyt: quoted above,
§4.4.4.3, (iv)); P. Turin 1966 ro I.14; II.11; Amenemope 23.16 (reading s{t}DA Hr with Dils et al.,
TLA); 27.8 (quoted below, n.279).
274 D1C DA=i Hr n [ir] nkn=k ‘I (scil. Horus) rejoice on account of the one who has done you harm.’
B6C has sDA Hr: sDA(=i) Hr n ir nkn n N pn; so has the third witness of this passage, B2Bo, which is
possibly garbled: sDAy=sn Hr n=i ir nkn=k. Both D1C (with DAi Hr) and B6C (with sDA Hr) have the
boat semogram (sign-list P1). This is probably a playful writing, with P1 used as a so-called
‘phonetic determinative’ (taken over from DAi ‘to ferry across’ and accommodated onto the
homophone word DAi ‘extend’).
275 Louvre C18 (HannLex 5: 2402c; DZA 29.881.020). In Tale of Hay X+1.4, sDA, noted as a possible
early case of the shortened form of sDA Hr in DZA (29.880.730), is an instance of ‘departing’ (as an
euphemism for death); similarly Dils et al., TLA.
276 On the meaning of sxmx-ib, Widmaier 2009: 130, n.b to ex.28c; Toro Rueda 2004: 218-9, 239,
243, and 250; Cannuyer 2002. %xmx-ib is documented since the Old Kingdom (see TLA #142430),
then in the Middle Kingdom (e.g. Tjetji (BM EA 614), 5; Sehetepibre (CG 20538), I.c.2), and
continues to be used in the New Kingdom, notably in parallel to (s)DA-Hr in the captions to pictorial
representations mentioned above.
277 The present comments are of course not meant to suggest that literary experience was not
associated with enjoyment well before the early New Kingdom: if need be, Eloquent Peasant

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 5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon 423

the sDAy Hr of future readers is famously thematized.278 From the same period, a
section in the Satirical Letter begins by characterizing itself as an occasion for sDAy
Hr.279 In the early Eighteenth Dynasty already, one funerary formula describes how
‘sweet words’ provide sDA Hr: Urk. IV 122, 16-17 (Paheri) mdwt nDmt280 nt sDAy Hr n
sA.n HAty m sDm=s ‘These are sweet words providing pleasure: the heart can not be
sated from hearing them.’281
In terms of repertoires, finally, it may perhaps be worth observing that some of the
early New Kingdom texts that have sDA Hr also have one or the other of the two
narrative formulae discussed in the prologue of Neferti. Neferkare and Sisene
(T. IFAO 1214 ro 2 sDA [...]; T. OIC 13539, 4-5 sDA ib) has the very same incipit as
Neferti (T. IFAO 1214 ro 1 + T. OIC 13539, 1-2 xpr swt wn Hm n nsw bity [nfr]-kA-
[ra] sA-ra [pipi] mAa-xrw m nsw [mnx m tA pn r-Dr=f ]; compare Neferti 1a-b: §5.6.1).
Thutmosis IV’s Sphinx Stela (5 sDA Hr) has the same narrative formula that in Neferti
directly follows the incipit (8 wa m nn n hrw xpr: compare Neferti 1c: §5.6.2).

5.8.1.4 Some further details

Further details in the prologue of Neferti are well, and for some of these even best,
paralleled in an early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon.

(i) Neferti 1f xtmw nty r-gs=f

The prominent mention of a ‘sealer on his (scil. the king’s) side’ recurs in Kamose
Inscriptions St.II 36-38, in Thutmosis I’s Abydos Stela 5 (Urk. IV 97, 2), and in
Berlin Leather Roll 2.7 (for the dating, §4.2). Such distinguished role of the ‘sealer’
also finds significant epigraphic and archeological parallels in the Second Inter-
mediate Period, particularly in the late Seventeenth Dynasty.282

(ii) Neferti 1i, 1n, 2h: The courtiers lying on their bellies
As noted above (§5.1.3.2.A), the set phrase wn.in=sn Hr Xt=sn (and variants: Neferti
1i, 1n, 2h) is paralleled in Kagemni (2.5-6). The expression recurs in early Eighteenth
Dynasty texts, such as Appointment of the Vizier 16 (Urk. IV 1381, 15), Chapelle
Rouge, p.130: VII.1 (HHBT II 23, 12), later e.g. Ramses II’s Inscription Dédicatoire
40 (KRI II 326, 10-11). Against this general background, a closer look at the exact
formulation in Neferti is worthwhile: 1i wn.in=sn Hr Xt=sn m-bAH-a Hm=f a.w.s. m

demonstrates that it was. In more elaborate ways, see the discussion in Parkinson 2002: 83-4 and
Vernus 2011: 78-83, with which I side fully; for a discussion, both comparative and contrastive, of
literary pleasure in Neferti and Eloquent Peasant, Parkinson 2002: 174-5. What is at stake here is
only whether, and if so how, ‘pleasure’ was textually thematized, or not, at various times.
278 Osing 1992b, pl.4, east wall southern half, l.3; see Parkinson 2002: 84.
279 P. Anastasi I, 8.7 i.ir=i n=k m sxy mi sDAy Hr xpr.ti m sx{s}<m>x-ib n Hr-nb ‘I make a
composition for you as an entertainment so that you (or: it) will be made an amusement to
everybody.’ In later times also Amenemope 27.7-8 ptr n=k tAy 30 n Hwt se (m) sDAy-Hr se (m) sbAyt
‘Look at these thirty chapters: they are an occasion of pleasure, they are an occasion of
instruction.’ See Vernus 2011: 81-3.
280 With a A ø construction, a very early example of such: see Winand 2013: 87.
281 Sim. Senemiah 32 (Urk. IV 510, 14-15); also in TT 260 (of the Overseer of fields of Amun User,
temp. Thutmosis III); see Vernus 2011: 39, n.62 and 80 with n.203.
282 Full discussion in Gnirs 2006: 247-8.

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 424 5 Neferti

wHm-a ‘They then were on their bellies in the presence of His Majesty L.P.H. once
again’ (1n rD.in=sn Hr Xwt=sn m-bAH-a Hm=f a.w.s. m wHm-a; 2h wn.in=f Hr Xt=f m-
bAH-a Hm=f a.w.s.). M wHm-a ‘again’ (Neferti 1i and 1n) is apparently only docu-
mented in the New Kingdom: in an early Eighteenth Dynasty narrative, Ahmes son of
Abana 11 (Urk. IV 4, 2) wn.in.tw Hr rDt n=i nbw n qnt m wHm-a ‘I was given the gold
of bravery again’; in an early Eighteenth Dynasty funerary text: Urk. IV 114, 1
(Paheri) (...) xpr anx=k m wHm-a ‘(...) so that it happens that you live again’;283 and in
Book of the Dead.284 (This is of course no lexical indication for dating: used verbally,
the expression wHm a is already documented in the Middle Kingdom,285 implying that
the adverbial expression m wHm-a, although not directly attested then, could have
existed already.) As regards m-bAH-a ‘in front of’ in the same formulation (Neferti 1i,
1n, and 2h), the expression, which remains fairly rare in the overall pre-New
Kingdom record, 286 is abundantly used in Chapelle Rouge (HHBT II 9, 4; 26, 1; 26,
17; 27, 1), as well as occasionally in Thutmosis III’s times (Urk. IV 776, 14; 897,
9).287 In one case, it occurs in a context directly similar to the ones in Neferti:
Chapelle Rouge, p.99: I.14 (HHBT II 9, 4288) m-xt nn rDt=s s(i) Hr Xt=s m-bAH-a Hm=f
‘After this, her putting herself on her belly in the presence of His Majesty.’ In a
Middle Kingdom literary composition, the shorter expression, m-bAH, is used in a
comparable context: Shipwrecked Sailor 67-68 iw=i Hr Xt=i m-bAH=f ‘while I was on
my belly in front of him (scil. the Serpent, a high-status participant).’

(iii) Neferti 3f, 4a xws ib=i (...) m wrd (...) ‘Stir, my heart, (...) Do not tire (...)’
As observed by Posener,289 Neferti 3f tightly compares with Urk. IV 1154, 5
(Rekhmire) xws awy=Tn rHw ‘Remuez vos bras, camarades!’ Following Posener’s
penetrating comments, xwsi—a verb generally used for building activities—could
have more basically meant ‘mélanger dans un récipient’ (an activity also visually
expressed by the sign A34). This meaning, metaphorically extended to the heart
(Neferti) or to the arms (Rekhmire), would have been available at all times; what the
occurrences in Rekhmire and Neferti document is only the actual usage of what based
on the extant record seems to have been a rare meaning. Neferti goes on addressing
his heart a second time: 4a m wrd (...) ‘Do not tire (...)’. Similar addresses are found
in the Harpists’ Songs: Antef’s Song A, P. Harris 500 ro VI.11 + Paatonemhab 8-9 m
bAgAy ib=k; Antef’s Songn C (Paser, TT 106), 4 m wrd [ib=k …] (more fully
preserved in version D (Inherkhau, TT 359), 8-9).

283 Sim. perhaps DZA 22.554.010 (My; partly broken); also in a funerary context, in early Ramesside
times, DZA 22.553.990 (Paser) n m(w)t bA=f m wHm-a ‘without his ba dying a second time’.
284 DZA 21.516.880; .890; 22.554.000; .020; .030.
285 Such uses are either in finite constructions or in labelling/heading infinitives. Still with full lexical
meaning of the component parts, Sinuhe B 61-62 titi=f n wHm.n=f a ‘when he tramples, he does not
repeat his blow’; lexicalizing into a compound: Kheti (Gardiner 1917: pl.IX; late D.11?), 5
wHm.n(=i) a m kt Htt (...) ‘I made a trial a second time with another gallery (...)’; sim. P. Reisner II
(Simpson 1965: 32; pl.12, 18); Wadi el-Hudi 4 (temp. Mentuhotep IV), 3; Wadi el-Hudi 14 (temp.
Senwosret I), 17. References drawn from HannLex 5: 718c.
286 E.g. Pyr. §1189b; CT IV 300a; Nesimontu A16; Cairo 20542 a7.
287 In the latter text alongside m-bAH (Urk. IV 897, 7): a neat case of linguistic dissimilation.
288 The Deir el-Bahari parallel has the shorter expression, m-bAH (HHBT II 9, 4).
289 Posener 1956: 149-50.

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 5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon 425

5.8.2 The final affirmative section

The final affirmative section of Neferti (13-15) is phrased in topical terms that recur in
various periods, in the Middle Kingdom, in the early New Kingdom, and in other
times: the section would thus fit into diverse temporal horizons. How it would fit into
an early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon specifically is here selectively illustrated by two
Hatshepsutian compositions that ‘announce’ (sr) kingship, Chapelle Rouge—already
evoked above in relation to one very minor detail tightly paralleled in Neferti
(§5.8.1.4, (ii))—and Speos Artemidos.

5.8.2.1 ‘Announcing’ (sr) kingship: Hatshepsut’s Chapelle Rouge

Several Hatshepsutian compositions ‘announce’ (sr) Hatshepsut’s kingship. While the
word sr is common since Pyramid Texts and across Egyptian textual history,290 its
frequent occurrences in Hatshepsutian texts could291 relate to this queen’s particular
‘Sendungsbewusstsein’,292 also manifest in her recurrent concern with later
reception.293 In the most immediate of the many readings it supports, Neferti is about
‘announcing’ (sr; 5f) a ‘king to come’ (13a; more broadly 13-15); Hatshepsut’s
Chapelle Rouge is also about ‘announcing’ ‘kingship’: Ch.R., p.133: VIII.1 (HHBT II
25, 9-10) ‘[... giving a] very important [oracle] in presence of this perfect god,
announcing for me the kingship of the Dual Land (Hr sr n=i nsyt tAwy)’.294 In another
place, sr is associated with ‘what will happen’ (xpr.t=sy), an expression that famously
recurs in Neferti (2m; 2n): Hatshepsut’s Southern Obelisk, Basis 3 (Urk. IV 370, 1-2)
(...) Dd=sn n=s xpr.t=sy n sr.t[.. n?]=s ‘(...) to whom they say what will happen, to
whom(?) they did not announce [...]’. Both Neferti and Chapelle Rouge include
statements of effective occurrence in their closing sections.295
In Neferti 13 and Chapelle Rouge alike, the announced king’s assuming kingship
is expressed as a sequence of ‘lifting’ (wTs) a crown, ‘uniting’ (smA/Abx) the powers
embodied by crowns, and ‘appeasing’ (sHtp) these. Compare: Ch.R., p.116: IV.16-17
(HHBT II 17, 14-15) wTs=s Xkrw ra Sma=s mHw=s Abx m tp=s sHtp=s m wpt=s ‘She
will lift the ornaments of Re, the Southern and Northern Crown being united on her
head; She will appease what is on her forefront’; Neferti 13c-d (...) iw=f r wTs dSrt

290 On the root sr in general, Cannuyer 2010; on sr with a perspective on Middle Egyptian literary
texts specifically, Enmarch 2007; Moers 2002: 299-300.
291 Various occurrences in royal texts are mentioned below. In a private inscription, in a context that is
not phraseologically bound, Senemiah 11-12 (Urk. IV 500, 11-14) wnw m sDm mk st xpr srwt Dddt
r=s n xpr mitt Dr rk nTr Dr gnwt nt imiw-HAt wpw-Hr sAt imn n Xt=f [...] ‘What had been heard, see it
has happened. The prophesies that had been said about her, nothing alike had happened since the
time of the god, since the annals of the ancestors, except Amun’s bodily daughter [...].’ On
Senemiah in relation to Hatshepsutian royal compositions, §6.3.1.1.NB.
292 Assmann 2006.
293 E.g. Northern Karnak Obelisk, Basis 16-17 (Urk. IV 365, 6-10); Speos Artemidos 8 (Urk. IV 384,
12); Urk. IV 350, 8 (Punt Expedition): full quotations below, §6.2, n.b on Amenemhat 11c-d.
294 Also Ch.R., p.133: VIII.4 (HHBT II 25, 15/16).
295 Ch.R., p.150: XV.13 (HHBT II 33, 13) rx.kwi ntt mrt.n=f xpr ‘I know that what he has wished has
occurred’; compare Neferti 15g (...) mAA=f Ddt.n=i xpr ‘(...) when he sees that what I have said has
occurred’.

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 426 5 Neferti

iw=f r smA sxmty iw=f r sHtp nbwy ‘He will lift the Red one; He will unite the Two
Powers; He will appease the Two Lords.’296
In Neferti 14 and Chapelle Rouge, the announced kingship is related to, and
justified by, ‘disorder’ and ‘strife’ to be suppressed: Ch.R., p.107: II.11-12 (HHBT II
12, 11/12-13/14) ‘(...) you will establish laws and you will dispell disorder and end
(lit. cut off the arm of) the condition of strife’ ((...) smn=t hpw dr=t Xnnw bHn=T a xrt
HAayt; compare Neferti 14c and 14h). This happens through the ‘awe’ (/‘wrath’,
‘terror’, etc.) emanating from the king: Ch.R., p.248: ‘then the awe you inspire
(SfSft=t) shall be in the Nebut and the fear you inspire (snD=t) in the Nine Bows’297
(compare Neferti 14d-f snDw=f, Sat=f, dndn=f, SfSft=f ). Royal awesomeness is
materialized in the king’s ‘flame’ (Ch.R., p.106: III.1-4 (HHBT II 11, 3-7) sDt, hh,
snws, wAwAt, xt;298 compare Neferti 14f nswt), directed against ‘those who conceived
of rebellion’ (kAw sbi): Ch.R., p.107: III.7-9 (HHBT II 12, 1/2-3/4): ‘(...) so that the
wrath you inspire seizes who acts in crime, so that the ones who conceived of
rebellion belong to the power of your striking-force’ ((...) iT Sat=T ir m xbnt kAw sbit n
pHw At=t; compare Neferti 14c). The outcome is ‘pacification’ (shryt: Ch.R., p.144:
XI.6 (HHBT II 32, 3); Neferti 14h).

5.8.2.2 Affirmation set against previous trouble: Speos Artemidos

Another Hatshepsutian composition ‘announcing’ (sr) kingship is Speos Artemidos.299
This is all the more relevant to Neferti as it is also a restoration inscription (below,
§5.8.3.3). Moreover, Speos Artemidos presents destruction in relation to ‘Asiatics’
(aAmw), as epitomizing general forces of chaos and in an historically specific reference
(37-38; Urk. IV 390, 7-10). ‘Asiatics’ are similarly prominent in Neferti, associated
with the outer world of chaos threatening creation (3c-e; 7d-e; 15b: note the targeted
distribution over the composition, in the prologue, in the lament, and in the final
affirmative section).300
Beginning with a detail, the motif of the uraeus pacifying is phrased in almost
identical terms in Speos Artemidos and Neferti.301 Compare: Speos Artermidos 12
(Urk. IV 385, 12) iw art tpt HAt=i Hr shryt n(=i) tAw nb [...] ‘For the Uraeus on top of
my front is for me pacifying all lands’; Neferti 14h iw arat imt xnt=f Hr shryt302 n=f
XAkw-ib ‘For the Uraeus on his forehead will be pacifying for him the discontent.’
While the motif itself is common at all times, only one fairly close parallel to the

296 Further Ch.R., p.136: IX.4 (HHBT II 26, 10) wTs=i HDt Xnm=i nt ‘I will lift the White Crown, I will
unite with the Red Crown’; with different events, p.148, XIV.5-6 (HHBT II 31, 9-10).
297 Further e.g. Ch.R., p.115: IV.8-9 (HHBT II 16, 13-14) D=i SfSft=s Hr tAw nbw Hryt=s xt xAswt nbt ‘I
place the awe she inspires on all lands, the terror she inspires through all foreign countries’; p.107:
III.8 (HHBT II 12, 1/2) (Sat=t); p.142: X.7 (HHBT II 30, 11) (Hryt=i).
298 Further Ch.R., p.142: X.7-8 (HHBT II 30, 13) (nbiw).
299 Gnirs 2006: 237.
300 In addition, it has been argued that in Neferti as well, the ‘Asiatics’ could be in allusion to actual
historical events (Gnirs 2006: 248-51 and further, 224-8).
301 Noted by Vernus 1990a: 1-2.
302 Thus Pet., like Speos Artemidos (and further Ch.R., p.144: XI.6 (HHBT II 32, 3)); C25224 has the
shorter spelling, shrt.

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 5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon 427

formulation in Speos Artemidos and Neferti has been noted,303 Ipuwer 7.3-4 mtn is wA
r sbiw Hr iarat nxt nt ra shr tAwy ‘For look, it has come down to rebellion against the
powerful uraeus of Re which pacifies the Dual Land.’ Unlike in Ipuwer, the uraeus in
Speos Artemidos and Neferti is the king’s, pacifying ‘for’ the king. On the level of a
specific grammatical detail, the pacification by the uraeus is in Speos Artemidos and
Neferti similarly introduced by iw, here with both assertive and connective force,
relating the statement to the preceding declarations of forceful pacification through
terror emanating from the king.304
Most importantly, Speos Artemidos and Neferti have the same argumentative
articulation. In both texts, the affirmation of kingship is related to restoration after
chaos.305 In Neferti, the ‘announced’ advent of a new king is set against a previous
situation in which the Sungod had come to be lacking. Without the elaboration that
makes for the specific poetry of the literary text, the very same articulation, and
thereby argument, is read in the inscriptional composition:

‘This land is destroyed (5a HD tA pn) (...) The sun disk is veiled and will not
shine (5c itn Hbs nn psd=f ) (...)
Re will separate himself from men (11d iw ra iwd=f sw <r> rmT)
—This (scil. the whole lament spoken by Neferti)306 all means that a king is
to come (13a nsw pw r iyt) (...)’.

‘(...) they ruled without Re (m-xmt ra) and he did not act by divine decree
—until My Majesty (nfryt-r Hmt=i): I am now established on the thrones of
Ra: I have been announced (sr.n.tw=i) from the ends of years as a born-
conqueror; I am now come (i.kwi) as the unique Horus (...) This is the
regulation of the father of the fathers, now come at his dates, Re (iw r
sww=f ra).
Destruction will not occur (n xpr HDt) (...) the sun disk shines (psd iTn) (...)’
(Speos Artemidos 38-42; Urk. IV 390, 9 - 391, 3).

5.8.3 The lament

5.8.3.1 Mythical elements alluded to in the lament

The lament associates chaos with the withdrawal of the Sungod (11d) who has to re-
create (4c); salvation will come from the south (13a-b), probably in an allusion to the
myth of the return of the distant goddess. The absence of the Sungod is also a central

303 Vernus 1990a: 2, n.2.

304 Speos Artemidos 11-12 (Urk. IV 385, 10-12) (...) kmt dSrt Xr Hryt=i bAw=i Hr sks xAswt iw art (...)
‘(...) the Black and the Red Land are under the effect of the terror I inspire, my power making the
foreign countries bow down. For the uraeus (...)’; Neferti 14g-h (...) iw sbiw nw dndn=f XAkw-ib nw
SfSft=f iw arat (...) ‘(...) The rebels belong to the anger he inspires, the discontent to the awe he
inspires. For the ureaus (...)’.
305 Similarly Gnirs 2006: 253.
306 On the pw-marked thetic construction introducing the final resolution as an interpretive gloss to the
preceding lament, §5.1.4.2, (iv); Parkinson 2002: 198.

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 428 5 Neferti

motif in Speos Artemidos, set in relation to the Hyksos (38; Urk. IV 390, 9-10:
§5.8.2.2). The withdrawal of the Sungod from its creation and the myth of the return
of the distant goddess find their first extensive textual expression in Heavenly Cow,307
an Eighteenth Dynasty composition (§4.6).308
(These need not all have been ‘absolute firsts’: for example, the rebellion of
mankind—a theme not found in Neferti but associated with the withdrawal of the
creator-god in Heavenly Cow—is present in texts that could be earlier than the early
New Kingdom.309 Moreover, ideas or representations may have existed before their
first documented, or even first actual, textualization.310 It may be worth repeating,
then, that the present Appendix’s perspective is about outlining documented contexts,
and therefore not about possible ‘absolute firsts’: for the mythical elements alluded to
in Neferti, the mostly densely documented context is the Eighteenth Dynasty.)

5.8.3.2 Hymns to the Nileflood

In a seminal note, Fischer-Elfert observed that hymns to the Nileflood provide an
important element of intertext for Middle Egyptian literary laments, with the latter
reversing the positive imagery of the former down to details.311 Developing this
observation, Parkinson noted the ‘association between the cycle of the year and
political events’ in a later New Kingdom text also mentioning the Nileflood,312 and
proposed that ‘a core social context is perhaps the transition from king to king—the
interregnum which threatens individual death, social disruption and cosmic
chaos (...)’.313 Neferti is also a lament, and one leading to the advent of a new king.

307 E.g. Gnirs 2006: 252-3.

308 Incidentally, note that Heavenly Cow and Neferti both have the xpr swt type of incipit (§5.6.1, (vii)
for the former composition).
309 The theme finds a literary treatment in Merikare: this text has traditionally been dated to the
Middle Kingdom but an early Eighteenth Dynasty date of composition has recently been argued
for in extensive details (Gnirs 2006; also, for the final section, Bickel 1994: 178-9, 219); there are
also linguistic indications for such late dating, although these remain too weak to be decisive
(§2.8). The rebellion of mankind recurs in BD 175a, a text not documented before the New
Kingdom, but for which it has been speculated that it could be drawing on earlier material: this
hypothesis is based on the observation that BD 175b draws on earlier material and that BD 175a
may then have as well (Stadler 2009: 370-80). Securely earlier than the early New Kingdom is
only a possible allusion, in reference to Horus, in CT V 150c-151a (...) n Hr nb m prt=f r pt Spt r
rmT ‘(...) for Horus, the lord, in his going out to the sky, angry against men’ (Parkinson 2002: 131).
Whether Horus’ anger against men and withdrawal can be read as implying the rebellion of
mankind is uncertain, however.
310 For example Shipwrecked Sailor includes allusions to esoteric knowledge otherwise first
documented in text in Litany of the Sun and Book of the Dead (Parkinson 2002: 139, with
references to previous studies). (On Litany of the Sun as dating to the early New Kingdom, at least
in its present wording, Werning 2011: §4 and above, §2, n.395).
311 Fischer-Elfert 1986: 45, n.1: ‘(...) Ich bin der Meinung, daß der GrN (scil. Hymn to Hapi) wie der
hier behandelte Text (scil. another hymn to the Nileflood, O. DeM 1675; see below, B) das exakte
positive Gegenstück zu den Schilderungen in den Admonitions als der markantesten
Repräsentation von Chaosbeschreibungen darstellen (...)’.
312 The text is Amunnakht’s hymn for the coronation of Ramses IV (Bickel & Mathieu 1993: 41-3).
313 Parkinson 2002: 59.

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 5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon 429

A. Neferti laments the ‘land’ (tA) which goes through ‘calamity’ (sny-mny: 8e; 12a).
‘Goodness’ (bw-nfr) is ‘destroyed’ (7a) or ‘gone’ (7c; 10a) and ‘the whole land is
perished’ (4d tA Aq r-Aw); ‘lack’ is all-pervasive (gAw: 5e; 6g; 8b). Hymn to Hapi, by
contrast, describes a world of plenty (passim, e.g. 2.3-4; 4.1-2; 4.9-10; 12.1-6) in
which ‘one does not lack (gAw) it (in context: wood)’ (5.2). ‘Goodness (bw-nfr) is
spread in the streets, the whole land (tA r-Aw) twitching’ (12.7-8). %ny-mnt itself is
implicit in Hymn where the Nileflood is said to be the one ‘who creates rapacity so
that the whole land (tA) suffers (mn)’ (3.2).314
At the level of individual motifs, Neferti laments that ‘one will laugh (sbt) loud at
disease’ (9b), reversing the positive imagery associated with ‘laughing’ in Hymn 3.7-
8.315 The coming of the Nileflood is required for organs and society to function, for
‘when it (scil. the Nileflood) delays, noses are blocked, everybody is orphaned’ (2.5-
6); in the literary lament, ‘the river of Egypt is dry’ (6a) and people are ‘deaf’ (8d;
also, in a different context, 5e),316 society is upturned (passim, e.g. 12e-f). The
imagery associated with ‘fish’ (rmw), ‘migratory birds/water fowl’ (qbHw), and ‘birds
coming down’ (Apd hAi) (Hymn 2.1-2) is taken to an entirely different sense in Neferti
(6f-g and 7e; see below, B). Forces of the outer world, associated with chaos, are
tamed in Hymn: ‘(...) so that one captures for you the lions in the desert (xAst)’ (13.5);
in Neferti, they have intruded Egypt to its very core: ‘the flock of desertic countries
(xAst) will drink water on the river of Egypt’ (8a).
As argued above, Hymn to Hapi dates to the late Seventeenth or early Eighteenth
Dynasty (§3.4). While motifs and imagery present in Hymn may have existed in
earlier times, these are thereby documented as productive in the early Eighteenth
Dynasty horizon here under consideration.
B. Another composition worth reading in conjunction with Neferti is the hymn to the
Nileflood preserved on O. DeM 1675 ro+vso.317 This Ramesside hymn draws on
motifs in Hymn, yet develops these in further ways, thereby bearing witness to the
productive nature of this tradition in the New Kingdom.318
In the hymn on O. DeM 1675, ‘the whole land is grown green’ (ro 9 tA (r)-Awt=f
AxAx), contrasting with Neferti, where ‘the whole land is perished’ (4d tA Aq r-Aw; also
10b). In the literary lament, ruin in such that the ‘Re must begin to re-create’ (4c SAa ra
m grg). In the hymn, by contrast, the land is in its primeval state of creation: ‘the land
is a Nun’ (ro 4 tA m nwn).319
As in Hymn to Hapi, ‘goodness’ (bw-nfr) is found and a source of joy (ro 12):
rejoicing is easy (in extensive variation, ro 7-11), laughing plain (ro 10-11). In Neferti,
‘goodness’ is ‘destroyed’ (7a) or ‘gone’ (7c; 10a), speech is difficult and painful
(11b), laughing ill-directed (9b). In the hymn, plenty is described as an abundance of

314 Noted by van der Plas 1986: I, 85, n.269.

315 Parkinson 2002: 59, n.12, also noting Ipuwer 3.13 ‘Laughter has perished.’
316 The motif recurs in other literary compositions, see Parkinson 2002: 172-3. In Neferti, it may
resonate both with these and with the tradition of hymns to the Nileflood.
317 Text, translation, and study: Fischer-Elfert 1986: 31-62.
318 Fischer-Elfert 1986: 60.
319 Fischer-Elfert 1986: 34, n.k: ‘Ägypten (...) befindet sich in demselben Zustand wie zu Beginn der
Schöpfung (...)’.

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 430 5 Neferti

fish and birds, animals and vegetation, besung in extensive details (vso 6-11); food is
plenty (e.g. ro 9-10) and people sated (ro 10). These are the ‘things of goodness’ (7a)
that Neferti laments as things past: food, confiscated by Syrians (7d), is only to be
asked by blood (9a); people are in need: ‘the grain is little’ (11c) and ‘every mouth is
filled with: I am in want’ (10a).
When the Nileflood comes, sensory organs function properly: ‘the ears snatch
(again) what is called’ (ro 15) (also Hymn to Hapi 2.5); in Neferti, people are ‘deaf’
(id) (8d; also 5e). The world of the hymn extends to social aspects: ‘the poor (SwAw)
are (like the) magnates, the great (wrw) are (like the) small, who has reached poverty
is strong’ (vso 13-14).320 In the literary lament, ‘the wretches will make heaps, the
great ones (wrw) will [...] to exist; only poor people (SwAw) will eat bread, forced
laborers are high up’ (12e-f). In the hymn, ‘the small respect (tri) the great (wrw)’ (ro
16); in Neferti, ‘respect’ is lacking: ‘look, what should be spoken against will be
respected (m stryt)’ (3h).
The motif of migratory birds is in the hymn a sign of the Nileflood (also Hymn to
Hapi 2.1-2):321 ‘The migratory bird (qbHw) is descended (hAi)322 and finds the
Southern Part as a lake; it settles on the tells of Upper Egypt, Chemmis having
become theirsic nest (SA)’ (vso 6-8). In Neferti, this motif is taken to an altogether
different meaning: ‘Alien birds (Apdw DrDrit) will breed in the lagoons of the Delta,
having made itssic nest (SA) upon its neighbors (...)’ (6f-g). The motif is probably spun
further just a few verses below, with, in one possible interpretation, the ‘alien birds’
being specified as the ‘Asiatics’ (aAmw) who ‘have descended (hAi) to Egypt’ (7e). In
the hymn, ‘the flock in the valley flees in fear’ (vso 11-12 awt m int ifd=f sw m Aaa):
wildlife, associated with chaotic forces, is at its proper place, the fringes, just as it is
tamed in Hymn to Hapi (13.5).323 In the literary lament, the ‘flock (awt) of desertic
countries (xAst)’324 has intruded to the core of Egypt, its river (8a).

5.8.3.3 Restoration inscriptions

Neferti has restoration inscriptions as one of its subtexts. Better than with Middle
Kingdom exponents sometimes evoked,325 this may be preliminarily illustrated by a
text slightly later than the first manuscript of Neferti, Tutankhamun’s Restoration
Stela (Urk. IV 2025-32). Distinctive formulations found in the Stela and Neferti (and

320 The translation follows the interpretation by Dils, TLA. Fischer-Elfert 1986: 54 and 56 interprets
differently, as ‘(...) die totale Umkehr der sozialen Schichtung in den Jahren eines „trägen Nils“
(s. rt. 2).’
321 Fischer-Elfert 1986: 52.
322 Spelled <hnwy>; see Fischer-Elfert 1986: 51, n.a.
323 Fischer-Elfert 1986: 57, who already draws the parallel with Neferti 8a.
324 For another interpretation of awt xAst in 8a, Gnirs 2006: 250-1: the two interpretations are not
mutually exclusive.
325 Parkinson 2002: 194 mentions Tod Inscription and Sarenput I’s inscription in the Heqaib chapel in
Elephantine. Both tell of ruin and restoration in ways characteristic of this type of written
discourse, but so do other restoration inscriptions across the second millennium. The dating of Tod
Inscription to Senwosret I, commonly hypothesized, is not secure (Buchberger 2006).

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 5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon 431

in other texts) concern the ‘destruction’ (HDi) of ‘what had been made’ (iryt).326
Restoration itself is expressed in highly topical terms, with Isfet dispelled and Maat
reestablished.327 The outcome is ‘jubilation’ (rSw, and other expressions), of the gods
in the Stela, of the people in Neferti.328 In common to the two texts is further the motif
of the gods ‘neglecting’, or ‘separating themselves’ from, the land.329 So is the rare,
and therefore significant, sny-mnt ‘calamity’, said of the ‘land’ (tA).330
Also a restoration inscription, Speos Artemidos was discussed above as a text that
associates destruction with ‘Asiatics’ (aAmw) and ‘announces’ (sr) the advent of a king
(here a queen), setting this against the background of the previous absence of the
Sungod (§5.8.2.2). More specific than with any other exponent of this type of written
discourse are motifs shared between Neferti and Ahmose’s Tempest Stela.331 Like
Neferti, Tempest Stela combines elements typical of restoration inscriptions with the
format of the ‘Royal Tale’. Both texts include the motif of ‘being cast to the ground’
(wnn (...) m ptx r tA: Tempest Stela ro 17-18/vso 20; Neferti 3i: §5.1.3.3.D).
Destruction of ‘what had been done’ (iryt) is phrased in near-identical terms: ‘What is
done is what had not been done’ (Tempest Stela ro 15-16/vso 18 iryt tmmt ir; Neferti
4c iryt m tmmt ir (sim. 10d)).332 In both texts, water is not at its rightful place, if in
opposite ways: ‘Their corpses were floating on the water like clumps of papyrus
(even) in the doorway and the inner apartments (of the palace) for a period of up to
[...] days’333 (Tempest Stela ro 9/vso 10-11); ‘The river of Egypt is dry (...) its way
having become a sandbank; The bank will be a flood, the place of water will be what
was the place of the bank’ (Neferti 6a-d). The sky is obscured, making it impossible to
see: ‘(...) with darkness in the western part of the sky, clouded (Sna.ti) without
interruption (...) a torch could not illuminate the Dual Land’ (Tempest Stela ro 7-
10/vso 8-12); ‘The sun disk is veiled and will not shine so that the people can see;
One can not live when clouds cover (Sna)’ (Neferti 5c-d; the motif further in 11d-i:
§5.8.3.4).

5.8.3.4 Royal eulogy and its literary reversal: Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy
Neferti’s final affirmative section (13-15) twice appeals to the people to ‘rejoice’ in
response to the king’s advent, thus: ‘Rejoice,334 the one who will have witnessed it,

326 Restoration Stela 10 (Urk. IV 2027, 20) (...) HD=sn iryt ‘(...) destroying what had been made’ (iryt
further in 17 (Urk. IV 2029, 8), as something to be ‘surpassed’ (sni) in restoration); Neferti 10c-d
HDD m iryt (...) ‘Destruction is in what had been done (...)’ (see §5.3.1.2).
327 Restoration Stela 5 (Urk. IV 2026, 17-18) dr.n=f isft xt tAwy mAat mn.ti [m st=s] ‘He has dispelled
Isfet through the Dual Land, Maat being established in its (rightful) place’; Neferti 15e iw mAat r iyt
r st=s isft dr sy r rwty ‘Maat will return to its (rightful) place, Isfet being dispelled to the outside.’
328 Restoration Stela 23-25 (Urk. IV 2030, 13-19); Neferti 14a; 15f: further below, §5.8.3.4.
329 Restoration Stela 8 (Urk. IV 2027, 12) nTrw mkHA=sn tA pn ‘the gods neglected this land’; Neferti
11d iw ra iwd=f sw <r> rmT ‘Re will separate himself from the people.’
330 Restoration Stela 7-8 (Urk. IV 2027, 11), quoted above §2.6.3.1, (iii); Neferti 8e; 12a. Discussed
above, §5.1.3.3.B; previously noted by Blumenthal 1982: 5, n.38; Gnirs 2006: 250, n.242.
331 Also Gnirs 2006: 228ff, 243.
332 Similarly Parkinson 2002: 196; for the broader context in Neferti, §5.3.1.2, introduction.
333 Translation Wiener & Allen 1998: 3.
334 In the parallel 14a (preserved only in Pet.), rSy has the plural strokes, implying a reading as an
imperative. In the present passage (preserved in both Pet. and C25224), no plural strokes are

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 432 5 Neferti

the one who will be following (Sms) the king!’ (15f; sim. 14a). As already noted, such
response is also called for in restoration inscriptions (Tutankhamun’s Restoration
Stela 23-24 (Urk. IV 2030, 13ff.); Speos Artemidos 35 (Urk. IV 390, 2)), a type of
texts overtly evoked in Neferti. In the closing section of a eulogy, a similar appeal,
including an appeal to loyalism, is voiced in Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy (Urk. IV 14-
24), a composition that also evokes internal dissent and rebellion:335 ‘Listen,
patricians, mankind, common folks, everybody! Follow (Sms) the king in his
strides (...)!’ (21-22; Urk. IV 20, 9-10). This appeal, in similar structural positions in
Neferti and Karnak Eulogy, gains some significance in view of what it is set against in
either text. In one passage in particular, these directly resonate with one another:

(i) Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy 17-19 (Urk. IV 19, 6-12)

dgg.tw=f mi ra wbn=f mi psdw iTn mi xa xpri m irty
stwt=f m Hrw mi itm m iAbt pt (...) mi psd iAxw m-Hr-ib hrw (...)
‘When he (scil. the king) is seen like Re as he rises, like the shining of the sun
disk, like the appearing of Khepri in the eyes,
his rays are in the faces like Atum in the eastern part of the sky (...) like the
shining of the Radiant One at midday (...)’

(ii) Neferti 11d-i

iw ra iwd=f sw <r> rmT
wbn=f wn wnwt nn rx.tw mtrt (...)
nn bAq Hr dgA.tw nn ibH irty m mw
wnn=f m pt mi iaH (...)
wnn is stwt=f m Hr m sp msic imiw-HAt
‘Re will separate himself from people:
He will rise when it is time, yet one will not know noon; (...)
No face will be bright when he is seen, no eyes will be moist with water;
He will be in the sky, but only as the moon-god; (...)
For his rays on the face are an occasion of the ancestors.’

In Neferti, 11d-i (toward the end of the lament) echoes 5c-d (toward the beginning of
the lament), which resonates with another Ahmosean composition, Tempest Stela
(§5.8.3.3): the two sequences frame the lament. As to 11d-i itself, what in Ahmose’s
Karnak Eulogy is stated in affirmative terms is in Neferti reversed in every detail:

written and an alternative interpretation as a subjunctive is possible: ‘May he rejoice, the one (...)’.
In analogy to 14a, I interpret 15f as also an imperative.
335 L.25-26 (Urk. IV 21, 10-17).

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 5.8 Appendix: The early New Kingdom horizon 433

- Shining/not shining:
mi ra wbn=f mi psdw iTn mi xa xpri m irty
 wnn=f m pt mi iaH

- Seeing/not seeing:
dgg.tw=f (...) m irty
 nn bAq Hr dgA.tw nn ibH irty m mw

- Shining at midday/noon not to be known:

mi psD iAxw m-Hr-ib hrw
 wbn=f wn wnwt nn rx.tw mtrt (...)

- ‘Rays in the faces’/now a thing past:

stwt=f m Hrw
 wnn is stwt=f m Hr m sp msic imiw-HAt

While the inscriptional composition is an eulogy of the king, the literary one tells of a
situation when the king, yet to come, is absent.

5.8.4 Closing remark

For reasons stated in the introduction to this Appendix, the cultural and textual
horizon outlined above is not here exploited as evidence for dating Neferti. A different
question was asked, namely whether the early New Kingdom could provide a possible
horizon for the composition of Neferti. The question naturally arises because this
period is one option within the reliable range for dating argued for above on linguistic
grounds (mid-Thirteenth Dynasty (at the very earliest) – early Eighteenth Dynasty:
§5.2-4; §5.7.1). Moreover, it is the one option that a series of further linguistic indica-
tions suggest to be the most likely (§5.5-6; §5.7.2).
As outlined in this Appendix, the cultural themes, motifs, imagery, and formula-
tions in Neferti are densely present in the early New Kingdom. Significant encounters
are particularly in Ahmosean and Hatshepsutean compositions (Karnak Eulogy,
Tempest Stela, Chapelle Rouge, Speos Artemidos), further in hymns to the Nileflood
which, as far as current documentation go, are themselves a late development. Other
relevant texts include for example Appointment of the Vizier, Neferkare and Sisene, or
Heavenly Cow. In all its parts—the prologue (§5.8.1), the final affirmative section
(§5.8.2), and the central lament (§5.8.3)—Neferti can be related to an early New
Kingdom cultural and textual horizon, more densely than to any other horizon docu-
mented in the record. To the specific question asked in this Appendix, a definite
positive answer can be given.

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 6 THE TEACHING OF AMENEMHAT

In the present chapter, I discuss the typology of a composition for which only a broad
dating can be defined on strong linguistic grounds, the Teaching of Amenemhat. In
doing so, I also introduce one criterion of wider application based on the use of the
passive morpheme tw with non-dynamic events (§6.2). It is argued that this construc-
tion implies a terminus ante quem non by the late Twelfth Dynasty for compositions
that include it. Linguistic indications for a narrower dating of Amenemhat, not fully
secure in interpretation, are examined in turn (§6.3).

6.1 Evidence for an early dating?

6.1.1 Introduction

A. The Teaching of Amenemhat1 is documented from the early Eighteenth Dynasty

on. Attestation is immediately fairly dense, on various supports, and in more than one
place in the country.2 Early Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses include writing boards,
T. Brooklyn I A+B and T. Brooklyn II ro+vso (‘fr. 18. Dyn.’), and ostraca, O. Qurna
85/69 + O. Cairo JdE 95601a-c (‘fr. 18. Dyn.’) and O. Senmut 142-145 (Hatshepsut).
The main early witness, P. Millingen, now lost, has been dated to the mid-Eighteenth
Dynasty; also from the Eighteenth Dynasty is another writing board, T. Carnarvon 5
ro+vso. To this, three excerpts inscribed on the walls of the tomb Assiut N13.1 are
now to be added, one with a very substantial part of the composition (graffito 1a:
Amenemhat 1a-3d; graffito 1b: Amenemhat [1a?-]3b-10c; graffito 1c: Amenemhat 1a-
2e).3 Graffiti 1a and 1c have been dated paleographically to the early Eighteenth Dy-
nasty4 and are therefore among the earliest witnesses of Amenemhat currently known.
The presence of the text in excerpts in different parts of the country implies some time
of previous circulation,5 but the time depth of this can not be assessed. Hymn to Hapi
is also documented on an early Eighteenth Dynasty writing board and in a very early
graffito in Assiut, yet the composition dates to the late Seventeenth/early Eighteenth

1 Text: Adrom 2006. For studies, Parkinson 2002: 317 and additional references in Gnirs 2013b.
2 Adrom 2006: IX-XVII (from which the datings given in the text are drawn); further discussion by
Gnirs 2013b: 132-4.
3 Verhoeven 2013. Graffito 1c is published and discussed in Verhoeven 2012a.
4 Verhoeven 2013: §5.b; 2012a: 208-9.
5 Verhoeven 2013: §5, fine.

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 436 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

Dynasty on linguistic grounds: this demonstrates that previous circulation need not
have been long.
Amenemhat has near-universally been dated to the early Twelfth Dynasty based
on a reading of the composition in direct relation to the history of that period.6 More
recently, a dating to the early Eighteenth Dynasty has been proposed based on an
analysis of multiple encounters in contents and form with early Eighteenth Dynasty
textual productions.7 The dating to the early Twelfth Dynasty, long unquestioned and
thus distinguished in modern interpretation, deserves a preliminary note. Just as in the
similar section on Neferti (§5.1), the aim is here not to argue against this dating, nor
for that matter in favor of or against any other dating, but only to assess what general
options are given before the issue is considered from a perspective on language.
B. The common dating of Amenemhat to a period close in time to the events it refers
to is based on a reading of the composition as a piece of advocacy for Senwosret I. In
P. Chester Beatty IV vso 6.14, the Teaching is said to have been composed by ‘Kheti’
‘when he was at rest’, with the anaphoric pronoun commonly interpreted in reference
to the old king (the reading is not unchallenged8). A linguistic argument has been
proposed to define a terminus post quem non by the mid-Twelfth Dynasty.9 A dating
more broadly to the Middle Kingdom, as opposed to a later one, takes argument on
the common Middle Egyptian literary tradition to which Amenemhat belongs, includ-
ing various elements by which the composition resonates with Sinuhe. Possible quota-
tions from Amenemhat into other texts have also been evoked as evidence for a
broadly earlier, rather than later, dating (§6.1.2).
How the composition may have alluded to historical events can not be deter-
mined. Reference to historical events in literature is generally complex and oblique,
rather than direct.10 The text of Amenemhat itself includes a series of explicit fiction-
alizing elements.11 What has been called the ‘propaganda model’ of Middle Egyptian
literature is an hypothesis only (§5.1.2.3): Neferti, a text that has been interpreted

6 As with other Middle Egyptian literary works, Posener 1956: 61-86 is a milestone in the history of
interpretation (for the subsequent discussion, see Gnirs 2013b: 129-30). Internally to this tradition
of a very early dating, possible coregencies in the early Twelfth Dynasty have been discussed in a
debate opposing proponents of a dating of Amenemhat to Senwosret I with Amenemhat speaking
post mortem (e.g. Burkard 1999) and proponents of a dating to the late reign of Amenemhat I with
the old king speaking after what is then hypothesized to have been a failed attempt on his life (e.g.
Jansen-Winkeln 1991; 1997; Thériault 1993). Under the same assumption of a securely established
dating of the composition to the early Twelfth Dynasty, Amenemhat has more broadly been
exploited as a source, direct or indirect, for the history of that period (e.g. Obsomer 1995; Lorand
2011; see Giewekemeyer 2013).
7 Gnirs 2013b: 129-51. Some time before the debate on dating inflamed for good, Grimal 1995 also
proposed a dating to the early Eighteenth Dynasty based on the manuscript tradition and a possible
relevance of the subject matter of Amenemhat to the historical constellation Hatshepsut-
Thutmosis III. That a dating of Amenemhat to the early Eighteenth Dynasty could be ‘immerhin
denkbar’ and one to the early Twelfth Dynasty not as secure as was then generally assumed, was
simultaneously observed by Blumenthal 1996: 131.
8 Quack 2003: 184.
9 Vernus 1990a: 185; subsequently Parkinson 2002: 316-7; Lorand 2011: 13, n.17.
10 Moers 2001: 38-79, particularly 38-54; also Parkinson 2002: 8-10, critically discussing various
historicist interpretations of Amenemhat.
11 Emphasized by Parkinson 2002: 241-8.

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 6.1 Evidence for an early dating? 437

within this frame alongside Amenemhat,12 was argued above not to have been com-
posed before the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty and probably later still (5): if so, the main
other text on which the model was initially based and subsequently developed does
not support that model.
The ascription of the work to ‘Kheti’ in P. Chester Beatty vso 6.14 and the
mention of the same literary figure in Eulogy of Dead Writers are relevant to the study
of the Ramesside reception of the work, not to its composition.13 Shared patterns of
transmission and reception not uncommonly group works that were demonstrably
composed in different periods (§5.1.3.1.B). Amenemhat belongs to a common Middle
Egyptian literary tradition, but this need not have been compact in time (e.g. §1.3.2.3;
§3.4.5.C; §5.1.3.2-3). Resonances between Amenemhat and Sinuhe are significant but
interpreting these as implying a common horizon in composition is only one among
several options (§6.4.3). Possible quotations from Amenemhat into other texts and the
Middle Egyptian language of the composition merit individual discussion (§6.1.2-3).

6.1.2 A terminus post quem non by quotations or allusions?

In attempting to define a terminus post quem non earlier than the first manuscript
attestation of the composition, possible quotations of Amenemhat into other texts have
been evoked. As a general note, caution is required in identifying possible quotations
or allusions due to the densely intertextual nature of Middle Egyptian written cul-
ture.14
A. It has been suggested that Amenemhat 11a-d is alluded to in Bebi’s funerary
inscription (Second Intermediate Period):15
(i) Amenemhat 11a-d
ink ir it mr npri
tri.n wi Hapy Hr pgA nb
n Hqr.tw m rnpwt=i n ib.tw im
iw Hms.tw m irt.n=i Hr sDdt im=i
‘I am a maker of barley, beloved of Nepri;
The Nileflood honored me on every open space(?).
There was no being hungry in my years, no being thirsty then;
One could relax through what I had done, telling of me.’

12 Following Posener 1956, e.g. Burkard 1999: 164: ‘Sie (scil. the Teaching of Amenemhat) kann
meines Erachtens nur den Sinn haben, die Nachfolge durch Sesostris I. zu legitimieren, so wie
Amenemhet I. selbst sich durch den “Neferti” legitimierte.’
13 Simon 2013: 262-5; Moers 2009; 2008; Quirke 2004a: 31-3; Gnirs 2013b: 130-2; §5.1.3.1.A in the
present study. On compositions that have been asssociated with ‘Kheti’, also §3.4 (Hymn) and
§6.2.2.6 (Kheti).
14 E.g. Hagen 2012a: 143-51 (in general) and 151-73 (applied to Ptahhotep); Parkinson 2009: 126;
2002: 48-9; Moers 2001: 106-54; all with references to previous discussions.
15 Morenz 2006: 55-6; 1996: 178-9; 2012a: 141-2; initially Posener 1956: 77, n.6.

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 438 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

(ii) Bebi 3-4a (horizontally) + 4b (vertically) (tomb el-Kab 8bis)

ink ir it mry nfrsic
rs-tp m prt qn a m SmAsic
Atw n Tt HqA bbi wHm-anx Hmt=f mrt=f Xkrt-nsw Xkr-rs
iw Hq(r) xprw m aSAw n rnpwt
rD.n(=i) it n niwt(=i) m Hq(r) nb (...)
‘I am a maker of barley, beloved of Nepri,
vigilant in the winter, with a strong arm in the summer
—the officer of the ruler’s guard Bebi repeating life, his beloved wife the
king’s ornament Khekerres.
Hunger happened through a great many years;
I gave barley to my town in every famine (...)’

The famine motif (Bebi 4b; Amenemhat 11c-d) is among the most generic in Earlier
Egyptian texts, also developing into an idealbiographical topos.16 The phrasing ink ir
it mr npri (Bebi 3; Amenemhat 11a) is generic as well: in particular, references to npri
are not uncommon in the times of Bebi’s inscription, the Second Intermediate
Period.17 Thus, in another funerary inscription (iii), and in a literary text, said of the
king, with the god’s name to denote grain, as in Amenemhat:18

(iii) Horherkhutef 1
nfrsic ir bdt
‘Nepri, who makes emmer’

(iv) Eulogistic Account of a King X+3.x+5

srd=f npri
‘he makes Nepri flourish’

Rather than as an allusion, common elements in Amenemhat and Bebi are therefore
better interpreted as more broadly intertextual, reflecting a common repertoire of
motifs, shared ‘clusters of language and imagery’ (Parkinson): these had currency
over a protracted period of time.19
B. It has also been suggested that Amenemhat 14a-c is quoted in Ipuwer 6.12-14. If
so, the latter composition would provide a terminus post quem non for the former.
Under the often evoked dating of Ipuwer to the late Middle Kingdom (see, however,

16 E.g. Moreno García 1997: part II (with a focus on the original development of the motif in the late
Old Kingdom and First Intermediate Period).
17 Similar motifs of course recur in other times as well, thus in an idealbiographical context in
Mentuhotep son of Hapy (probably early D.12, see Schenkel 1964), 7-9 rD.n=i tA n Hqr Hbsw n HAy
ink sA npri hi n tAyt (...) iw xpr.n Hap Sr rnpt 25 n rD=i Hqr spAt=i (...) ‘I have given bread to the
hungry, clothes to the naked. I am a son of Nepri, a husband of Tayt (...) There occurred a small
Nileflood in year 25: I did not let my nome be hungry (...)’. Similarly noted by Vernus 20102b:
458, n.4 (‘phraséologie analogue’).
18 Parkinson 1999: 184, n.43.
19 Similarly Gnirs 2013b: 148.

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 6.1 Evidence for an early dating? 439

below: §6.2.2.5), Amenemhat must then have been composed in the Middle Kingdom
(early or late), not later. Compare:

(v) Amenemhat 14a-c

iw ms msw/msywta aSAwt m mrwt
rx Hr tiw wxA Hr m-biA
Hr-ntt n rx=f st Sw m Hr=k
‘But now, the children(?) of the masses are in the streets;
The wise going “yes”, the fool going “no”;
Because he does not know it, being deprived of your sight.’
a) The reading of this crucial word is unclear, with variation both in the spelling of the stem and
in the semogram (see below).

(vi) Ipuwer 6.12-14

iw ms msw srw xAa m mrwt
rx Hr tiw wxA Hr m-biA
nty n rx=f s(i) an m Hr=f
‘But now, the children of officials are thrown into the streets;
The wise going “yes”, the fool going “no”;
He who does not know it, it is fair in his sight.’

The similarities are here of a specific nature and a quotation in one direction or
another has long been evoked. A century ago, Gardiner observed that while iw ms
recurs multiple times throughout a long section of Ipuwer which it contributes
defining, it occurs only once in Amenemhat. Accordingly, Gardiner found it natural to
view Amenemhat 14a-c as a quotation from Ipuwer 6.12-14.20 Helck and Fecht, how-
ever, argued that the quotation was the other way around, from Amenemhat into
Ipuwer.21 This view subsequently won wide acceptance, probably also due to the
realization that Ipuwer was not composed before the late Middle Kingdom, i.e. later
than the dating then assumed for Amenemhat based on the events it refers to. While
the hypothesis of a quotation of Amenemhat into Ipuwer went unchallenged for a long
while,22 rather different perspectives have now emerged from Oréal’s and Enmarch’s
critical discussions.23
(a) The issue is made complex by the textual instability in the crucial msw/msywt?.
Helck emends the text into iw ms *msdt aSAt m mrwt ‘But now, there is much hate in
the streets.’ Fecht, for his part, does not emend and reads with msywt as found in part
of the manuscript tradition; the author then relates this to a word not otherwise
directly attested, *msjwjt ‘complaint’ (iw ms msywt aSAt m mrwt ‘But now, there is
much complaint in the streets’). Both Helck’s and Fecht’s proposals account for the

20 Gardiner 1909: 3, n.1

21 Helck 1967: 466; Fecht 1972: 11-3, 153, 225.
22 In a fairly recent textbook (Burkard & Thissen 20124: 139; first edition 2003), the hypothesis could
still be presented as: ‘das ist communis opinio.’
23 Oréal 2011: 276-7; Enmarch 2008: 23. Note that contrary to what the publication dates might
suggest the two authors did not have knowledge of each other’s works.

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 440 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

A2 semogram found in most witnesses (including, probably, in P. Millingen), which

would have to be secondary under the alternative reading as msw ‘children’. On the
other hand, there is no evidence internal to the text supporting Helck’s emendation.
As to Fecht’s position, this is not supported by P. Millingen, the sole Eighteenth
Dynasty witness here preserved: unlike several Ramesside witnesses that have msywt,
P. Millingen has msw (whatever msw may be). Both interpretations that posit a
quotation from Amenemhat into Ipuwer thus come with a rather speculative reading
of the supposed donor, by emending and/or by positing what would be a hapax
legomenon.24 That Amenemhat should be the donor can then only be based on an
argument external to the issue under consideration: ‘A somewhat more secure ground
for asserting that Ipuwer quotes Amenemhat is the probability, based on subject
matter, that Amenemhat was composed under Senwosret I (...)’.25
(b) The text is problematic in all extant witnesses. None clearly has msw ‘children’:
some have a stem msw, but with the unfitting A2 semogram, while other ones that
have a semogram of ‘giving birth’ (possibly secondary) have a stem msyt. The lack of
any coherent spelling of msw ‘children’ could then suggest that the text was not
altered into, but from, msw ‘children’;26 this is admittedly slightly speculative, yet
significantly closer to the textual evidence as it stands.27 In itself, a reading msw
‘children’ in Amenemhat 14a would be neutral as to whether a possible quotation was
from or to Amenemhat. Assessing this is made difficult by the thorough-going
integration of Amenemhat 14a-c and Ipuwer 6.12-14 into the respective contexts of
either composition. However, a slight indication might be given in the old
Gardinerian observation that iw ms is in Ipuwer a core articulating device of the
lament, while it occurs only once in Amenemhat.28 A plausible scenario has also been
recently proposed by which Amenemhat 14a-c would be quoting from a composition,
Ipuwer, that provides a paradigmatic illustration of the inverted world:29 this quota-
tion, and the thereby evoked subtext and associations, could have served to introduce
the current speaking situation of a king who, despite the just exposed positive and
normative actions of his reign (10-13), was still subject to the most untoward event of
all, a regicide. Differences in textual detail between Ipuwer 6.12-14 and Amenemhat
14a-c are directly accounted for under this scenario.30
(c) If this interpretation is correct, Ipuwer would provide a terminus ante quem non
for Amenemhat, not the other way around. Although the precise dating of Ipuwer
remains insecure, the composition has a linguistically defined range for dating
extending from the early Thirteenth to the mid-Eighteenth Dynasty (§6.2.2.5). A pre-
Thirteenth Dynasty dating of Amenemhat could then be maintained only under
additional hypotheses:

24 In more details, Oréal 2011: 276 and Enmarch 2008: 23.

25 Enmarch 2008: 23-4.
26 On issues to do with changes in semograms, further Enmarch 2008: 23 (NB: not fully congruent
with Adrom 2006: 75-6).
27 Similarly, Oréal 2011: 276; Enmarch 2008: 23; Parkinson 1997a: 208.
28 Oréal 2011: 276.
29 Oréal 2011: 276-7.
30 In details, Oréal 2011: 277.

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 6.1 Evidence for an early dating? 441

() Rather than as a quotation or an allusion, the similar formulations in Ipuwer

6.12-14 and Amenemhat 14a-c could be interpreted in broader intertextual terms,
with the two texts drawing independently on a common motif. This is unlikely: in
isolation, rx Hr tiw wxA Hr m-biA in Amenemhat 14b / Ipuwer 6.13 could well be,
and possibly is, a common saying, and the motif of children cast into the streets
(Amenemhat 14a / Ipuwer 6.12-13) could as well. The direct sequence of the two
motifs in both texts is already more remarkable. The similarities between the two
texts extend further, to elements in Amenemhat 14c and Ipuwer 6.13-14 (Hr-
ntt/nty n rx=f st/s(i) Sw/an m Hr=k/=f ).
() Under a redactionalist hypothesis for Ipuwer, one could speculate that the
section from which Amenemhat would be quoting is part of an older layer in
Ipuwer.31 The most recent study of Ipuwer, however, provides strong arguments
against a redactionalist hypothesis for this composition.32
() Alternatively, a quotation from a common unpreserved source could be
proposed. This can of course not be ruled out, yet remains entirely ad hoc in the
present context.

In sum, the relationship between Ipuwer 6.12-14 and Amenemhat 14a-c does not pro-
vide a terminus post quem non for the latter composition: if anything, it would rather
seem to provide a terminus ante quem non, with immediate implications for the dating
of Amenemhat (post-Ipuwer, itself not composed before the early Thirteenth Dynasty
and possibly later). As is often the case in the study of quotations, however, the
argument is not fully secure. In addition, quotations and allusions do not fall under the
self-defined restrictive scope of the present study. In the present context, a con-
servative assessment of the issue is therefore made, namely that the contact between
Ipuwer 6.12-14 and Amenemhat 14a-c can not be taken to provide evidence for an
early dating of the latter composition. Whether it provides evidence for a later dating
of Amenemhat, which could well be the case, is here left open.

6.1.3 Language

6.1.3.1 Middle Egyptian language: A discussion of Amenemhat 7c-f

As mentioned above, a linguistic terminus post quem non to the mid-Twelfth Dynasty
has been proposed for Amenemhat. However, the criterion involved—Vernus’ aspec-
tual post quem non criterion—does not apply, because all synthetic present tense con-
structions in Amenemhat are passive (9b-d: quoted above, §2.3.4.2.2, (viii)): these
have a diachronic evolution different from active ones (§5.3.4-5). In addition, the
criterion would only define a terminus post quem non to the mid-, or even late, Eigh-
teenth Dynasty, not an earlier one (§2.6.3).
The forms, constructions, and particular functions of these in Amenemhat are all
documented in productive use in higher written registers down to the time of the first

31 This is the solution selected by Oréal (2011: 276-7), who assumes an early dating of Amenemhat.
32 Enmarch 2008: 9-18; more generally also Parkinson 2002: 16.

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 442 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

manuscript attestation of the composition, in the early Eighteenth Dynasty. Pars pro
toto, this is illustrated by the following much discussed passage:33

(i) Amenemhat 7c-f

ir Ssp=ia A stb xaw m Drt=i
iw D.n=i xt Hmw (...)c
nn swt qn m grH nn aHA wa{t}
nn xpr sp mar m-xmt mkw
‘If I onlyd took them up with weapons in my hand,
I would—I sweare—have made the cowards retreat (...)
But there is no brave one at night, no one who could fight alone;
Success will not occur without a helper.’
a) Thus in P. Millingen; on the sDm.n=f in Ramesside copies, see the discussion below.
b) Often read as As{t} ‘quickly’;34 this, however, is a Ramesside reinterpretation (compare
the semogram in Ramesside manuscripts, lacking in P. Millingen). The text of
P. Millingen is coherent as it stands, and semantically much stronger (see below).35
c) The phrase at the end of the verse poses an unsolved philological problem;36 I have no
original proposal to contribute.
d) As an English rendering of the ‘A of restrictive identification’ (see below).
e) For this rendering of the here strongly assertive value of iw, see below.

The ir-headed clause in 7c has been read as a past unfulfilled condition, based on
the text in Ramesside witnesses (ir Ssp.n=i). This is unsatisfactory, as
P. Millingen clearly has ir Ssp=i. An interpretation of ir Ssp=i as a temporal
clause has also been proposed,37 but this construction remains undocumented in
Middle Egyptian.38 Alternatively, it has been suggested that the whole of 7c-f
should be viewed as a ir A B (pw) glossing pattern, with ir introducing the two
verses 7c-d as a topic (A) to the subsequent verses 7e-f, functioning the way
glosses otherwise do (B).39 This reading adequately captures some of the
semantics of the overall passage (see below), but is not possible on grammatical
grounds.40 The ir-headed correlative system must then extend over 7c-d only,

33 The passage has been central in discussions as to whether the attempt on the king succeeded or not
(Burkard 1999: 159-61; Jansen-Winkeln 1997: 128-30; 1991: 252-5; Obsomer 1995: 118-20). I
follow the interpretation convincingly argued for by Oréal (2011: 47-8), adding further comments.
34 E.g. Dils et al., TLA; Vernus 20102b: 221; Burkard 1999: 159.
35 Oréal 2011: 47-8 and n.61.
36 Detailed reviews of proposals in Burkard 1977: 308-9; Dils et al., TLA.
37 Jansen-Winkeln 1997: 129-30; 1991: 253-5.
38 Burkard 1999: 159-60.
39 Burkard 1999: 159-61; Burkard & Thissen 20124: 119-20, with a translation as: ‘Was das “Ich
ergriff schnell die Waffen mit meiner Hand, und schon habe ich die Feiglinge durch Gegenwehr
zurückgetrieben” betrifft: Es gibt aber doch keinen Tapferen in der Nacht, nicht den Kampf eines
Einzelnen, nicht gelingt Glückliches ohne Helfer!’ (Burkard 1999: 161). In this interpretation,
Ssp=i is taken to be a ‘narrative’ infinitive (Burkard 1999: 160, comparing with Sinuhe). In 7d,
‘das sDm.n=f im folgenden Vers setzt diese Form dann fort (...)’ (Burkard 1999: 160).
40 In 7c, Ssp=i can not be a ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive, because this is only used in the
textual foreground, opening a segment in a narrative chain at text-articulating junctures (provi-

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 6.1 Evidence for an early dating? 443

with ir Ssp=i (...) (however to be analyzed) the protasis and 7d iw D.n=i (...) the
here iw-headed apodosis. For Ssp=i, it has been proposed that this could be a
verbal noun, introduced by ir.41 As the particle A would require some finite verb,
this would entail that 7c must have originally read As ‘quickly’ (as in Ramesside
witnesses), not A st (as in P. Millingen).42 However, Ramesside witnesses have a
secondary text in 7c, extending to the form of Ssp itself, always Ssp.n=i, not
Ssp=i. Accordingly, Ssp=i (P. Millingen) must be interpreted as a subjunctive, as
is overly common in ir-headed protases. Following the reading convincingly
argued for by Oréal,43 the particle A, which expresses ‘restrictive identification’,
here bears not as much on the verb itself (Ssp=i) as it does on the following
circumstantial determination (xaw m Drt=i). In the context of an hypothetical
clause (ir Ssp=i A st xaw m Drt=i), this results in an interpretation as counter-
factual.44 The rather complex grammar of Amenemhat 7c-d was not understood by
Ramesside scribes who altered the text of 7c into ir Ssp.n=i, thereby expressing
broadly similar semantics—a past unfulfilled condition—in simpler grammar. (In
addition, the alteration may also have been supported by a regressive
harmonization to the sDm.n=f in 7d iw D.n=i.)

The above sketch of a long debate illustrates the complexity of the grammar in
Amenemhat 7c-d, which caused substantial problems to Ramesside readers already.
Yet, the passage has nothing in it that is not also found in productive use in early
Eighteenth Dynasty compositions. The central issue lies with the semantics of A in 7c,
used for ‘restrictive identification’.45 For this expression, compare:

sionally Feder 2004). The ‘narrative’ infintive is also indexically over-determined elsewhere in
Middle Egyptian literature, notably in Sinuhe itself (§4.1.3.B). As regards 7d iw D.n=i, a reference
to the ‘confirmative’ function of iw (Burkard 1999: 160) is relevant (see below), but iw D.n=i can
not be continuative with respect to the preceding Ssp=i (similarly Oréal 2011: 421, n.49). Similar
comments by Vernus 20102b: 227, n.37.
41 Vernus 20102b: 227, n.37.
42 Vernus 20102b: 221 (‘je me précipitai’).
43 Oréal 2011: 47-8.
44 Oréal 2011: 47: ‘(...) A joue un rôle dans l’interprétation de la protase comme inactuelle. C’est là un
effet de sens qui résulte de sa valeur fondamentale conditionnée par un contexte déjà marqué
comme hypothétique.’ And further (47-8): ‘L’intention est d’atténuer l’idée, potentiellement
scandaleuse, que le souverain ne soit pas invincible en insistant sur les circonstances de
l’agression, qui a surpris la victime à l’heure du repos, dépourvue des armes nécessaires au
combat. (…) Sa défaite se trouve alors présentée comme liée au fait qu’il a été pris en traître, la
lâcheté de ses assaillants ne lui laissant aucune possibilité de combattre.’
45 Oréal 2011: 39-48, from which the examples and references given below are also drawn.

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 444 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

(ii) Thutmosis II’s Aswan Inscription 10-11 (Urk. IV 139, 12-16)

anx=i mr (w)i ra (...)
nsic D=i A anx m TAy=sn
wAH=i A mwt im=sn
‘As truly as I live and as Re (...) loves me,
I will not leave even one person alive among their male men,
I will lay only death among them.’
Sim. 14 (Urk. IV 140, 14: quoted above, §1.2, (viii.)); Chapelle Rouge, p.125:
VI.8-11 (HHBT II 21, 5-9/10: quoted above, §4.2.1, (viii)); Thutmosis III’s
Karnak Building Inscription 6 (Urk. IV 158, 9).

In Amenemhat 7d, iw, which is not syntactically required, imparts some additional
force to the statement. Based on a comparison with similar contexts, it appears that
Amenemhat 7c-d is loosely modeled on formulations such as in oaths—an interpre-
tation that is consistent with the overtly apologetic tone of the context. This construc-
tion is itself common in the early Eighteenth Dynasty:
(iii) Ahmes Pennekhbet 4-5 (Urk. IV 38, 10-11)
wAH pA HqA anx Dt
iw n TS=i r nsw Hr pri (...)
‘As the Ruler, living forever, endures,
I did not swerve from the king on the battlefield (...)’
Sim., also with a negative construction, Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building Inscrip-
tion 2 (Urk. IV 846, 17 - 847, 3); with iw preceding a subjunctive sDm=f (sic), Urk.
IV 651, 2-6 (Thutmosis III’s Annals); with iw set twice, first before a ir-headed
nominal topic, then before a ni-P N adjectival pattern expressing possession,
Hatshepsut’s Northern Karnak Obelisk, Basis D 18-23 (Urk. IV 365, 14 - 366,
17);46 before a sDm.n=f, Urk. IV 751, 17 - 752, 4 (Thutmosis III’s Annals); Urk. IV
843, 6-10 (an inscription of Thutmosis III in Karnak); Heavenly Cow 53-55; before
subject – pseudoparticiple, Heavenly Cow 53-55; 104-105.47 While the construc-
tion is particularly common in the early Eighteenth Dynasty, it is of course not
exclusive to that period, compare for example the much earlier Mocalla V..1.

6.1.3.2 A direct dating to the Twelfth Dynasty? Amenemhat 6f ir.kw

Ir.kw in Amenemhat 6f deserves a discussion of its own. The immediate context is as
follows:

(i) Amenemhat 6e-f

iswa spXr xaw nD-rA Hr=i
ir.kw mi sA-tA n smt
‘...?b, the weapons were made to circulate (...?)c on me,
who was/had been made (/who acted?) as a worm in the desert.’

46 On the doubling of iw in this passage, Borghouts 2006: 93, ex.18.

47 Except the ones in Heavenly Cow, these examples are drawn from EG §468.1.

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 6.1 Evidence for an early dating? 445

a) Thus P. Millingen, the only Eighteenth Dynasty witness here fully preserved; the
Eighteenth Dynasty T. Carnarvon 5, partly broken, probably had ist, as Ramesside
witnesses consistently have. An emendation of P. Millingen into ist has been proposed,48
but isw in P. Millingen is correctly determined by the A2 semogram and has the much
rarer of the two particles. Ist, the lectio facilior, may therefore be secondary.49
b) The meaning of is(w), here and in general, remains unclear: the traditional rendering of
is(w) as a particle with presentative and/or ‘super-assertive’ force (‘behold’, ‘siehe’) is
possible, yet blissfully vague.50 Analysis is not helped by the fact that the expression is
uncommon (§2.8.2.2, (i)).
c) The much discussed sequence nD-rA Hr=i has so far eluded a definite interpretation.51 As
this does not directly bear on the issue discussed below, no attempt at deciding between
various proposals is made.

The specific issue to be discussed here is whether ir.kw is passive52 or active.53 If the
latter were true, an argument for a dating to the Twelfth Dynasty could be given.
A. At first, an active reading seems more likely in view of the following preposition.
Used passively with a meaning ‘made into’, iri is typically followed by the preposi-
tion m.54 Followed by mi, as in Amenemhat 6f, iri is typically active. Compare:

(ii) Wepwawetaa, Munich Gl. WAF 35, 16

(...) ir.kw m aq nn Dd=f
‘(...) made someone who could enter without being told.’

(iii) Iykhernefret 10
ir.k(w) mi wDt.n nbt Hm=f (...)
‘I have acted in conformity to everything His Majesty has ordered (...)’

Assuming that 6f ir.kw is correctly read actively, this could be turned into a valuable
criterion for dating based on the following considerations. The active-transitive
construction of the pseudoparticiple with events other than lexical statives (rx ‘to
know’ and xm ‘not to know’) is exceedingly rare in the Middle Kingdom (seven cases
in total) and does not belong to the standard repertoire of Middle Kingdom Middle
Egyptian.55 The construction is then associated with funerary self-presentations (five
instances), which it contributes indexing as a type of written discourse. It recurs in
Sinuhe (B 45, B 114), as one among several strategies framing this composition as a

48 E.g. Oréal 2011: 253, n.179. This is based on the author’s broader analysis of the functions of
is(w), not on internal evidence in Amenemhat.
49 Similarly Burkard 1977: 166; Dils et al., TLA.
50 The traditional analysis of is(w) is challenged by Oréal 2011: 252-3. The author’s discussion is
based on a set of mostly older examples which may either involve another particle, or the same
particle with partly different functions.
51 Various proposals discussed in Dils et al., TLA; further Vernus 20102b: 234.
52 E.g. Vernus 20102b: 220; Parkinson 1997a: 207.
53 E.g. Burkard 1999: 158; EG §312.
54 Also observed by Jean Winand (p.c. 5/2011).
55 Stauder in press a: §3.

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 446 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

fictionalized self-presentation (§4.1.3.A). Amenemhat is itself, among other things,

framed as a fictionalized self-presentation. If to be read actively, ir.kw in Amenemhat
6f could then be related to a cultural horizon in the use of written language similar to
the one documented in Sinuhe, and beyond, in Twelfth Dynasty funerary self-presen-
tations (see further below, B). The argument, technically one by ‘direct dating’ (§4),
would then point to a Twelfth Dynasty dating for Amenemhat.

NB. Assuming that Amenemhat 6f is correctly read as active, only two objections
could be raised against the above argument for dating the composition to the Twelfth
Dynasty. As the brief discussion below shows, both could be dismissed.
(a) One other instance of the construction is in Mutter und Kind V.10-VI.1 ir.kw rf
wD-nsw n gb (...) ‘I have made a royal decree of Geb (...)’. The text is arguably later
than the Middle Kingdom (§5.3.4.2, (iii)) and the construction thereby documented, if
only once, after the Twelfth Dynasty. This, however, would not weaken the above
hypothetical argument: in Mutter und Kind, the antiquated construction of the active-
transitive pseudoparticiple is used merely as a general token of elevated language,
lacking the specific associations observed in Middle Kingdom self-presentations and
in Sinuhe. Amenemhat 6f, by contrast, would be displaying precisely such associa-
tions.
(b) Another objection that could be raised is that the construction in Amenemhat 6f
may not relate to Middle Kingdom self-presentations directly, but could rather be
inheriting from the similar usage in Sinuhe itself, by a textual genealogy internal to
literature. The construction in Amenemhat 6f would then lose its anchoring to the
Twelfth Dynasty horizon in written culture here relevant. (This possibility has to be
discussed, as several elements of a dense relation between these two literary works
are otherwise observed: §6.4.3.) However, such scenario would be unlikely: when the
use of the active-transitive pseudoparticiple in Sinuhe and in contemporaneous self-
presentations is set in perspective, it appears that the web of cultural significations
associated with the construction was established only in the Twelfth Dynasty.56 Even
if Amenemhat had gotten the active-transitive ir.kw from Sinuhe directly rather than
from Twelfth Dynasty funerary self-presentations, it must still have gotten it during
the Twelfth Dynasty, or not much later.
The two above objections being thus dismissed, Amenemhat 6f would provide
valuable evidence for a Twelfth Dynasty dating of the composition—if to be read
actively.

B. Upon closer inspection, an active reading of Amenemhat 6f turns out to be impos-

sible. The clause introduced by ir.kw (6f) continues the preceding one (6e) with ir.kw
itself being hooked on a first person singular pronoun in that clause ((...) Hr=i). In all
documented Middle Kingdom occurrences, the active-transitive construction of the
pseudoparticiple is exclusively found in absolute sentence-initial, or even paragraph-
initial, positions. Moreover, this empirically observed correlation is an intrinsic
feature of the construction for the following reasons. In the Old Kingdom already, the

56 Stauder in press a: n.52.

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 6.1 Evidence for an early dating? 447

active-transitive pseudoparticiple was used in absolute sentence-initial, or even

paragraph-initial, positions exclusively, with strong text-articulating functions. Middle
Kingdom uses, which directly inherit from Old Kingdom ones by a textual genealogy,
also inherit this association with paragraph-initiality, exploiting it for text-articulating
purposes of their own.57 Compare:

(a) Old Kingdom textual models

(iv) Weni 5 (Urk. I 99, 10-12) (introducing the sequence dealing with Weni’s
funerary equipment):
[d]bH.k(i) m-a Hm n nb(=i) in.t(i) n(=i) inr HD qrs m rA-Aw
‘I asked from the Majesty of my Lord that there be brought to me a coffin of
white stone from Tura.’

(b) Textual revival in Middle Kingdom self-presentations

(v) Iykhernefret:
Part A (ll.2-9): royal order of mission;
Part B (ll.10-24): Iykhernefert carrying out the royal mission; introduced by
l.10 ir.k(w) mi wDt.n nbt Hm=f (...) ‘I acted according to everything His
Majesty had ordered (...)’

(vi) Khentemsemti:
Part A (ll.2-10): general honors and praise by the king;
Part B (ll.11-14): appointment to inspect temples, trip to Elephantine and back
to Abydos;
Part C (ll.14-22: funerary contents): introduced by l.14 wd.k(w) rn=i (...) ‘I
have placed my name (...)’

(c) In Middle Kingdom narrative literature

(vii) Sinuhe B 45, B 114, Dd.k(i) (...) ‘I said (...)’, introducing the encomium to
Senwosret and the inner monologue before the fight with the strongman of
Retenu, respectively.

In no case is an active-transitive pseudoparticiple with an event other than lexical

statives ever dependent on a preceding segment of discourse. This restriction is not a
gap in attestation, because it directly relates to the very status of the construction in
grammar: as discussed, this is not a regular construction, but the product of a textual
genealogy. No similar restriction bears on the passive construction of the pseudo-
participle, which is routinely used in dependency of a preceding segment of discourse,
anaphorically hooked on some preceding expression. Compare, from an otherwise
similar register:

57 Stauder in press a: §3.2.

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 448 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

(viii) Wepwawetaa, Munich Gl. WAF 35, 15-16

isT wi xd=i r nD xrt (...)
xtmtyw (...) Hr mAA stA=i r pr-nsw
ir.kw m aq nn Dd=f
‘Now I used to fare downstream to pay homage (...);
The sealers (...) were watching me being introduced to the palace,
made someone who can enter without being told.’
Unlike in (iv)-(vii), the pseudoparticiple in (viii) (and in similar examples) is depen-
dent on a preceding segment of discourse, semantically, syntactically, and anaphor-
ically. The exact same syntax is in Amenemhat 6e-f. On grounds of grammar, no
reading other than a passive one is therefore possible. As to the preposition mi in
Amenemhat 6f, this may be untypical after a passively interpreted construction of iri
(above, A, beginning), yet is readily accounted for as a token of literary language:
similes are common in fictional literature, a type of discourse in which state-of-affairs
discussed may be ‘as’ something else than they usually are.58
Unlike the active-transitive one, the passive construction of the pseudoparticiple is
common at all periods relevant for dating, making ir.kw in Amenemhat 6f entirely
uncriterial.

6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events

In Amenemhat, the following passage combines tw with non-dynamic events, Hqr ‘be
hungry’, ibi ‘be thirsty’, and Hmsi ‘sit’:

Amenemhat 11c-d
n Hqr.tw m rnpwt=i n ib.tw im
iw Hms.tw m irt.n=i Hr sDdt im=ia
‘There was no being hungry in my year, no being thirsty then;
One could relax through what I had done, telling of me.’
a) The extant witnesses read Hr sDdPLUR.tw im=i, for an original Hr sDdtPLUR im=i
(§6.2.1.1, (ii)). The phrase itself is fully preserved only in Ramesside manuscripts. That it
was already part of the pre-Ramesside text of Amenemhat is demonstrated by T. Brooklyn
II vso, which preserves the end of the phrase, [...]m=i.

For the motif in the second part of 11d, compare Hatshepsut’s Northern Karnak
Obelisk, Basis D 16-17 (Urk. IV 365, 6-9) ist ib=i Hr itt-int Hr kAt mdw rxyt
mAA.t=sn mnw=i m-xt rnpwt sDd.t=sn m irt.n=i ‘My heart was wavering, con-
ceiveing of the words of the people who will see my monuments after the years,

58 One is reminisced of the density of mi’s in Sinuhe, e.g. B 224-225 iw mi sSm rswt ‘It was like the
nature of a dream’ (Parkinson 2006; 2002: 280); dream-like elements recur as a fictionalizing
device in Amenemhat as well (Parkinson 2002: 242). For the simile in 6f specifically, Parkinson
2002: 244.

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 449

who will tell from what I have done.’ In the Hatshepsutian context, the motif
relates to this queen’s concern with posterity, e.g. Speos Artemidos 8 (Urk. IV
384, 12) ib=i nTr Hr Dar n m-xt ‘My divine heart is looking for posterity’; Urk. IV
350, 8 (Punt Expedition) iw=i r rDt Dd.tw n m-xt ‘I will cause that they speak (of
it) in the future.’ The motif of the reception of royal deeds recurs in the closing of
Thutmosis III’s Gebel Barkal Stela 48 (Urk. IV 1242, 15) sDdt.n rmT [...] ‘What
people have told [...]’.

As to be discussed below, this construction, in Amenemhat and in various other

Middle Egyptian literary compositions, is relevant for dating.

6.2.1 Intrusive tw’s in textual transmission

Instances of intrusive tw’s are occasionally found in New Kingdom manuscripts of

Middle Egyptian literary compositions.59 In considering Amenemhat 11c-d for dating,
a preliminary requirement is therefore to assess whether the tw’s are here integral to
the original composition, or not.

6.2.1.1 -t  tw
Secondary tw’s are mostly found in contexts in which they arise from a reinter-
pretation of an ending -t of a non-finite form. This ending -t can be from an original
participle or from an original infinitive.

Feminine participle  ‘passive’ relative form:

(i) Neferti 10c-d60
HDD m iryt
wS.twa m gmyt
iryt m tmmt ir
‘Destruction is in what had been done,
what is being lostb is what had been found,
what is done is what had not been done.’
a) Thus in both Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses: Pet. wS.[t]w; C25224 wS.tw.
b) Translating as the text stands.

The text as it stands has a ‘passive’ relative form, in itself a rare construction. In
addition, wS is mostly used as an intransitive verb; this makes a ‘passive’ relative
form, which would have to be derived from the rare transitive uses of wS, unlikely.
The secondariness of wS.tw is also apparent in view of the following clause, which has
iryt, a perfective participle. The reading wS.tw in Pet. and C25224, although coherent
within its own clause, thus conflicts with the broader articulation of the passage. The
alteration of wSt (a participle) into wS.tw (a ‘passive’ relative form, with haplography
for wS{t}.tw) was facilitated by the feminine ending -t of the participle; it was also

59 For instances of intrusive tw’s in Ramesside copies of Late Egyptian texts, Gardiner 1937: 142.
60 On textual issues in this passage, also §5.3.1.2; Quack 1993a: 78.

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 450 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

helped semantically, since the first part of each of the three clauses is about the
present situation. In the original text, this was expressed in the third clause by a
perfective participle with resultative interpretation and thereby present relevance
(iryt). In the altered text, wS.tw makes the present tense explicit.

-t marked infinitive  ‘passive’ relative form

(ii) Amenemhat 11d
iw Hms.tw m irt.n=i Hr sDdPLUR.tw im=i
‘One could relax through what I had done, on account of what was told of me.’
The text as preserved in the extant witnesses does not yield a satisfactory meaning.
The relative form is secondary to an original infinitive, with Hr sDdt ‘telling of me’
hooked on the implied agent of the main passive predicate, Hms.tw. The alteration Hr
sDdtPLUR  Hr sDdPLUR.tw duplicates the formal expression of the unspecified agent in
Hms.tw, the third in a sequence of tw’s in 11c-d.

6.2.1.2 Easing referent tracking

A secondary tw can also emerge as the result of a broader constructional reinter-
pretation, generally accompanied by a change in meaning. The following cases are
instructive as to the contexts in which such processes, much rarer than the ones just
discussed, can take place.
A. Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses of Loyaliste present the following alternation:

(i) Loyaliste 9.4

TC m Ax r=sn xr [Hmwt=tn]
‘(Another occasion for fortifying(?) your hearts), more efficient than those
(scil. the words or maxims previously spoken) with your servants’
PL m Ax<t>a.tw r=s xr Hmwt=tn
‘(...) as something about which one becomes efficient with your servants’
a) Haplography. The feminine ending, implied by the feminine resumptive pronoun, is
written out in the later O. BR+OV m Axt.tw im=s xr Hmwt=tn ‘(...) as something by which
one becomes efficient with your servants’ (with an additional alteration, r  m).

An attributive form, the feminine of the adjective Ax, is here reinterpreted into another
attributive form, the ‘passive’ relative form Ax<t>.tw/Axt.tw. If an intermediary stage
m Ax ‘efficient’  *m Axt ‘as something efficient’ is posited, the change could relate
to the type discussed above (feminine participle  ‘passive’ relative form: §6.2.1.1,
(i)). Be this as it may, the crucial observation is that the intrusive tw is not merely
inserted, but comes with a reinterpretation of the overall construction and meaning of
the passage. This is manifest in the change from TC r=sn  PL r=s  O. BR+OV
im=s. In TC, the pronoun =sn in 9.4 was anaphoric to 9.2 iry, itself anaphoric to 9.1
nn ‘these’ (scil. the words previously spoken). In PL and the later tradition, the altered
pronoun =s is anaphoric to the implied antecedent of Ax<t>.tw, an attributive form
with ‘neutral’ reference. In the process, the meaning of the passage is altered signifi-

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 451

cantly: a comparison with the previously spoken words is lost. The slightly unnatural
use of the preposition r in PL is significant as a textual hangover, regularized only in
later versions (r  m).
The semantically thorough-going process of textual alteration of which the inser-
tion of tw is the most visible part has to do with the complex chain of reference still
preserved in TC. The anaphoric expression in 9.4, =sn, has its antecedent not in 9.3,
but further up, in 9.2 (iry). This antecedent (iry) is itself an anaphoric expression, with
an antecedent in 9.1 (nn), some three verses before =sn (9.4). In 9.1, nn itself,
although not an anaphoric expression, is a demonstrative one, not a full noun: this
points to the maxims or words previously spoken. In the text as preserved in TC, the
chain of reference extends over a long distance and referent tracking is complex. By
contrast, the antecedent of =s in PL and the later tradition is straightforwardly
identified.
B. In the same composition, now comparing the Middle Kingdom version
(Sehetepibre) with the long one documented in New Kingdom copies (Kairsu), the
following alternation is observed:

(ii) Loyaliste 3.6

Sehetepibre Htp=f r tpr TAw
‘He calms down for air to be breathed.’
Kairsu Htp=f tpi.twa TAw=f
‘He calms down so that one can breathe his air.’
or: ‘When he calms down, one breathes his air.’b
a) PR inserts iw: Htp{w}=f iw tpi.tw TAw=f
b) Both translations are equally acceptable grammatically, the former as an emphatic
construction, the latter with Htp=f a setting to tpi.tw the main clause. The insertion of iw in
PR suggests that some readers at least preferred the latter interpretation. This may, but
need not, extend to other New Kingdom witnesses, which are morphologically undistinc-
tive in this respect.

Descriptively, the non-finite construction in Sehetepibre (r + infinitive) is turned into

a finite one in Kairsu (tpi.tw). In the process, the mono-clausal syntax in Sehetepibre
is made bi-clausal in Kairsu. Major changes in syntax do not here entail any signifi-
cant shift in meaning, unlike in the case just discussed (above, A). The process is no
less interesting as to the dynamics of textual change at play, which imply two major
dimensions.
The first lies with the participants involved. In Sehetepibre, the participant implicit
in r tpr, the people/mankind, differs from the clausal subject, the king (=f in Htp=f ).
The construction r + infinitive is here of the less common type in which the partici-
pant implicit in the infinitive is not co-referential to the clausal subject (sDm=fi (...) r
sDmj (...)). In altering the construction into a finite one (r tpr  tpi.tw), Kairsu makes
it formally explicit that the participant who is to breathe is distinct from the clausal
subject. Another aspect of the change lies in TAw  TAw=f, also making for an easier

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 452 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

identification of participants in Kairsu. The construction is thus made easier for the
reader to process.
In appreciating the change, the broader context is relevant as well. In Sehetepibre,
the distich 3.5-661 reads:

(iii) Loyaliste 3.5-6 (Sehetepibre)

qbb fndw wA=f r nSnw
Htp=f r tpr TAw
‘Noses are blocked when he falls into storm;
He calms down for air to be breathed.’
In terms of the participants involved, the articulation is chiastic: 3.5 the people
(metonymically evoked by fndw) – the king; 3.6 the king – the people (implicit in r
tpr). The syntax, for its part, is bi-clausal in 3.5, but mono-clausal in 3.6. In Kairsu,
the syntax of 3.6 is itself made bi-clausal and thereby harmonized to the one in 3.5.
The chiastic symmetry of participants is thus reproduced on the level of syntax. By
the same change by which referent tracking is eased, the articulation of the distich is
also regularized.
C. A different case of intrusive tw is finally the following, documented in a
Ramesside witness of Sinuhe (no Eighteenth Dynasty witness is here preserved):

(iv) Sinuhe B 51
B (...) smi=f SAt.n=f xpr
‘(...) he (scil. Senwosret) reported that what he (scil. Amenemhat) had
determined had occurred.’
R (...) smi=f n=f SAt=f xpr
‘(...) he (scil. S.) reported to him (scil. A.) that what he (scil. A.) ordered had
occurred.’
AOS, DM2 (...) smi.tw SA{a}.n=f xpr
‘(...) it was reported that what he (scil. A.) had determined had occurred.’

Both clauses in B 51 have third person singular anaphoric pronouns (=f ) as their
subject (smi=f ) or in it (SAt.n=f ). The two pronouns have different antecedents in the
previous pair of clauses (Senwosret and Amenemhat, respectively). This results in an
overall construction that is difficult to process, due to the double, simultaneously
running, chain of anaphoric reference: B 50-51 ntf dAr xAswt iw it=f m-Xnw aH=f smi=f
SAt.n=f xpr ‘It is he (scil. S.) who subjugated foreign countries, his father (scil. A.), for
his part,62 stayed inside his palace; he (scil. S.) reported that what he (scil. A.) had
determined had occurred.’
Already R displays one minor change, the insertion of a third person dative after
smi=f. As it is clear that the son reports to the father, not the other way around, this
change makes the clause slightly easier to process: ‘(...) he reported to him (...).’ In

61 For these verses forming a distich, Posener 1976: 23.

62 As a rendering of iw, here with contrastive force.

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 453

AOS, the process of simplification is pushed further with the replacement of the first
of the two anaphoric pronouns by tw. As a result, only one anaphoric pronoun is left
in AOS, suppressing any difficulty for the reader.
D. As will be demonstrated below, subjectless constructions are regularly used in
early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian with events similar to the ones in
Amenemhat 11c-d (§6.2.3.3). When this can be observed directly, subjectless con-
structions are stable in textual transmission into the Eighteenth Dynasty and beyond:

(v) Sinuhe B 59
B n rD.n=f HmsA17=øA1-PLUR, a HA ib=f
R n rD.n=f Hms[A17]=ø HA ib=[f ]
G [...Hms]A17=øb HA ib=f
AOS nn rD.n=f HmsA17=ø HA ib=f
‘He does not allow one to rest around his heart.’
a) For the sequence <A1 PLUR> as a secondary correction in B, below, §6.2.3.3, (ii).
b) Although the word stem is in lacuna, the presence of the semogram makes an
identification of the construction as a subjectless one secure.

Subjectless constructions involve the exact same issues in referent tracking as tw-
marked ones. As both constructions are just as easily processed, the insertion of tw
would not come with any gain. That subjectless constructions such as the one above
are stable in textual transmission therefore comes as no surprise.

6.2.1.3 Amenemhat 11c-d

As the above discussion demonstrates, intrusive tw’s are not merely inserted in the
course of textual transmission. Rather, contexts matter a great deal. Cases of tw
arising from an ending -t (§6.2.1.1) are the most common, tend to affect the meaning
the least, and can occur fairly spontaneously in later manuscripts where appropriate
semantic contexts are given. Cases of secondary tw not arising from an ending -t
(§6.2.1.2) are more sporadic. They often affect the meaning of a passage, slightly
(§6.2.1.2.C) or more profoundly (§6.2.1.2.A). They can also effect stylistic regulariza-
tion (§6.2.1.2.B). Such changes are part of broader constructional changes: in the
cases presented above, these all result in easing referent tracking. Contexts discussed
include a case of a long-distance anaphoric chain (§6.2.1.2.A), an infinitival construc-
tion with the implied participant not co-referential to the subject of the main clause
(§6.2.1.2.B), and a case of a double, simultaneously running, anaphoric reference
(§6.2.1.2.C). Conversely, when no gain in referent tracking would be obtained by
inserting tw, constructions without tw remain stable (§6.2.1.2.D). That changes
implying the insertion of tw should correlate with issues to do with referent tracking is
not surprising: in serving to express non-specified reference, tw itself has functions in
the grammar of reference. In the case of Amenemhat 11c-d, the tw’s—twice after the
negation n, then after iw—can not have arisen from an ending -t. Nor does the context
involve any difficulty in referent tracking. Accordingly, none of the above docu-
mented scenarios of textual alteration applies to Amenemhat 11c-d.

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 454 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

6.2.2 The spread of tw to non-dynamic events

6.2.2.1 Introduction
In Old and earlier Middle Egyptian, tw is exclusively an inflectional marker of the
passive. Its occurrence is then subject to the general condition of passivization in
Earlier Egyptian, also observed with sDm(w)-passives. This states that an event to be
passivized—be it syntactically a transitive or an intransitive verb—must have an
agentive participant in its semantic representation.63 With events that do not fulfill this
condition, some other construction is used instead. With semantically different types
of syntactically intransitive verbs, compare in Ankhtifi:

(a) Events with an agentive participant in their semantic representation—

e.g. verbs of directed motion (pri, spr r)64
&w-passive:
(i) Mocalla II..2
n pr.n.t(w) n snD=f
‘There was no coming out (scil. by the enemy troops) for fear of him.’
Sim. II..2

%Dm(w)-passive:
(ii) Mocalla II..3
spr r(=i) r=s
‘One had reached me about it.’

(b) Events with no agentive participant in their semantic representation—

e.g. mwt
(iii) Mocalla IV.17-18
n-sp D(=i) xpr m(w)t n Hqr m spAt tn
‘Never did I allow that there would be starving in this nome.’
An event of mwt’ing can not be combined with tw in the stage of language
represented in Ankhtifi. Instead, the event is nominalized and set as the subject of
an expression of ‘occurring’ (xpr).

In the course of the first half of the second millennium BCE, tw is gradually extended
to events that do not fulfill this semantic condition of passivization, including Hqr ‘be

63 Stauder in press b: §2.2.3; in prep.

64 English only marginally licenses the passivization of syntactic intransitives, hence the various
translational equivalents provided here, with an event-nominalization in a presentative construc-
tion (i) or with an impersonal subject (ii). In Earlier Egyptian, the condition for passivization is
defined in solely semantic terms and thereby more inclusive than in English. Incidentally, the
alternative Egyptian construction in (iii) is not unsimilar structurally to the one in the English
rendering of (i).

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 455

hungry’, ibi ‘be thirsty’, and Hmsi ‘sit’ as in Amenemhat 11c-d. The issue is therefore
to date the relevant part of the change more precisely.65

6.2.2.2 Tracking the change: Issues of method

With many events and event-types, agentivity is not a lexically specified feature in
Earlier Egyptian. Accordingly, agentivity must be appreciated in actual context and in
individual occurrences. In particular, translational equivalents can be, and often are,
misleading. This is preliminarily illustrated below.
A. Contrary to what some equivalents in translational languages could suggest, gr ‘be
silent, cease, etc.’ is more often than not agentive in Middle Egyptian. Compare the
use in the imperative (i), a construction that is restricted to agentive events in Middle
Egyptian,66 or in the prt pw ir.n=f construction (ii), a construction that strongly
correlates with such:67

(i) Eloquent Peasant B1 110-111

in-mrwt wn=f Hr Dd gr
‘In order that he keeps speaking, be silent!’68
Further note the agent-oriented prepositional phrase (in-mrwt (...)).
Sim. e.g. Heqanakht II ro 37; with a negative imperative, e.g. Ptahhotep 375 P.

(ii) Eloquent Peasant B1 80-81

gr pw ir.n imi-rA pr-wr mrw sA rnsi
‘Then the high steward Meru’s son Rensi was quiet.’69

Outside such constructions that are directly diagnostic in themselves, agentivity must
be assessed in context. In the following passage, gr is agentive because it expresses
self-control (‘control’ is a defining property of agentivity):

(iii) Semna Stela (Senwosret III’s), 8

pHw pH.t(w)=f
grw gr.t(w)
‘Who attacks when attacked,
who remains silent when one remains silent;’

An agentive reading of gr is further substantiated by the subsequent elaboration,

where the event of gr’ing is equated with a (prototypically agentive) s-causative:
Semna Stela 9-10 ir gr m-xt pH ssxm ib pw n xrwy ‘As to remaining quiet after the
attack, this is strengthening the heart of the enemy.’ Gr.tw in Semna Stela 8 is there-
fore consistent with uses of tw as an inflectional passive marker. It offers no evidence

65 For an analysis of the factors and mechanisms of the change, Stauder in press b; in prep.
66 The correlation is observed in text. It recurs in many languages and finds a functional basis on a
pragmatic level: for a manipulative speech act to be felicitous, the manipulee better be agentive.
67 Winand 2006: 80.
68 Note that the imperative triggers an agentive reading of ‘be X’ clauses in English.
69 An apt rendering in French could be as ‘(...) fit silence’.

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 456 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

for dating the linguistic change here discussed (extension of tw to non-passivizable

events).
B. Control is also relevant to the semantics of aHa in the following passage in
Sinuhe’s encomium to Senwosret:
(iv) Sinuhe B 55-56
n aHa.n.tw m hAw=f
‘One can not maintain one’s position in his presence.’70

Outside actual context, aHa can mean ‘stand, be standing’ (not agentive, and therefore
not passivizable) or ‘stand up’ and ‘keep standing’ (in this case implying an agent in
its semantic representation, and therefore passivizable). In Sinuhe B 55-56, the con-
text implies an agentive reading: not ‘be standing’, but ‘maintain oneself in standing
position’ in the overwhelming presence of the king. Put differently, what one can not
do is keep control of oneself in the presence of the king.71 While aHa and Hmsi (as in
Amenemhat 11d) may be presented as antonyms in a lexicon, the strong implication of
control in Sinuhe B 55-56 is lacking entirely in Amenemhat 11d. Accordingly, the
former passage is an inflectional passive, the latter not any more.
C. Agentivity can finally vary depending on the argument structure of a verb. While
anx ‘to be alive’ is typically non-agentive, anx m ‘live on (sthg.)’, i.e. ‘feed on (sthg.)’,
is agentive. This is illustrated for example in the following passage, where anx m is in
parallelism with a verb of ingestion, wSb m:72 Pyr. §394bWT (...) m nTr anx m itiw=f
wSb m mwwt=f ‘(...) as a god living on his fathers, feeding on his mothers’. A similar
construal applies to the following tw-marked examples in Middle Egyptian literary
texts:
(v) Sinuhe B 236
anx.tw m TAw n DD=k
‘One lives on the breath of your giving.’
(vi) Loyaliste 9.8
anx.tw m imy awy=sn
‘One lives on what is in their arms.’
In both cases, the m-introduced phrase is part of the argument structure of anx
(anx m ‘live on’). A different case is when m introduces a location, as in Neferti
12d. The prepositional phrase then expresses a mere circumstance and the event is
not agentive: §6.2.2.4, (xi).

70 Sim. Ipuwer 10.11 n{n} aHa.n.tw [...]. The context is too damaged to support a semantic analysis.
71 Compare B 252-253 wn.k(w) rf dwn.kw Hr Xt=i m.n(=i) wi m-bAH=f (...) ‘Being thus stretched out
on my body, I had lost myself in his presence (...)’. More generally, Sinuhe’s changing positions
form a major semantic thread throughout the composition (Stauder in press a: Appendix).
72 Semantically, events of ingestion are not highly transitive because they do not affect their second
participant and because their first participant is itself self-affecting. Yet, their first participant is
still agentive.

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 457

Accordingly, anx.tw m in Sinuhe B 236 can not be taken as evidence to date the
linguistic change under consideration. Conversely anx.tw m in Loyaliste 9.8 does not
provide evidence for dating the long version of that composition.

NB. In a similar vein, translation equivalents of wxd as ‘suffer’ can be misleading as

they may suggest that this verb is non-agentive. Compare, with wxd used after rx ‘to be
able (to do sthg.)’, implying an at least weakly agentive reading, Khakheperreseneb ro
13-14 HA n=i ib m rx wxdw ‘If I only had a heart that knows how to endure!’ In
Middle Egyptian literature, the two tw-marked instances of wxd are from transitive
constructions of wxd with meanings such as ‘have patience with, endure (sthg.)’ and
thereby themselves at least weakly agentive: (a) Khakheperreseneb vso 5 n wxd.tw
smi n mdt ‘They have had no patience with the reply to a speech’; (b) Neferti 11a nn
wxd.n.tw73 pr n rA{=i} ‘What comes from the mouth can not be endured.’ As they
comply with the semantic condition for passivization, these instances of wxd
combined with tw do not contribute to dating the change under discussion. Nor,
conversely, are they criterial for assessing the date of composition of the two texts in
which they occur.

6.2.2.3 The first step of the change: &w spreading to events that lack an agentive
participant in their semantic representation
The morpheme tw is observed spreading to events that lack an agentive participant in
their semantic representation during the Twelfth Dynasty. The earliest occurrences are
from Eloquent Peasant (i)-(iii), a text dated to the mid-Twelfth Dynasty (§3.1.2).
Another very early instance of the construction is found in an only slightly later
graffito (iv):

(i) Eloquent Peasant B1 252-254

sanxw m rD m(w)t.tw
sHtm m rD Htm.tw
‘Lifegiver, let not die!
Destroyer, let not perish!’
(ii) Eloquent Peasant B1 321-322
iw xr.tw n Hnt wA
‘One falls far for greed.’
(iii) Eloquent Peasant B1 131-132
srfw Hr rDt nSp.tw
‘He who breathes calmly is making people pant.’

73 Thus Pet.; C25224 is garbled: n wSA?.n.tw m prw {m pr} rA{=i}.

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 458 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

(iv) Antef’s Sehel Graffito (temp. Senwosret III), 8-9

Ax st n irr st r irrw n=f st
n wrd.n.tw Hrsic=s TAw pw m rA
‘It is more beneficial to who does it than to him for whom it is done;
one can not become weary because of it; it is the breath in the mouth.’
Other, contemporaneous and later, instances of the same formula74 have nn nw m
wrdt Xr=s ‘this is not something through which one becomes weary’, with an
extended construction of the passive participle with indirect co-reference, not a
finite form. Antef’s Graffito deviates from the standard phrasing, as is also
manifest in the preposition (Hr for Xr); such deviation is perhaps to be interpreted
as reflecting a less formal register.

Earlier in the Twelfth Dynasty, a subjectless active construction is used in an exactly

similar function. Contrast rD m(w)t=ø in (v) with innovative rD m(w)t.tw in Eloquent
Peasant (i):
(v) Antef (BM EA 1628; temp. Amenemhat I?75), 8
n rD=i m(w)t=ø
‘I did not let die.’

NB. One additional passage must be discussed in the present context:

(vi) Ptahhotep 447 (only in P)
anx(.)tw tr n sft=f
‘You are alive for the time he is merciful.’ ()
or: ‘One lives only for the time he is merciful.’ ()
In interpretation (), the construction would be a nfr sw pattern (‘adjectival predicate
construction’) with a second person singular dependent pronoun subject. In inter-
pretation (), the construction would be with a finite tw-marked form (here a mrr=f ).
If the latter interpretation is correct, Ptahhotep 447 would be yet another instance of
tw accommodated to an event lacking an agent in its semantic representation.
Depending on the exact date of composition of Ptahhotep (range for dating, (late
Eleventh) – mid-Twelfth Dynasties: §2.4.3.3), this could then be slightly earlier than
the above instances (i)-(iv). Following the option taken in the main edition of the
text,76 interpretation () has subsequently been adopted by most modern readers of the
text, although the issue has never been discussed for itself. The preference for
interpretation () may have been induced by the fact that passives are not uncommon
in Ptahhotep in general—not an argument in itself. It may have been additionally
favored by to the fact that passive anx.tw (with different semantics) recurs in several
places in Middle Egyptian literature (Sinuhe B 236; Loyaliste 9.8; Neferti 5d;

74 Study: Vernus 1976.

75 Franke 2007b: 167-74.
76 Žába 1956: 96.

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 459

12d)77—not an argument either. Read for itself, Ptahhotep 447 is equally coherent
under either interpretation: while interpretation () could find some weak support in
the generalizing context of 446-448, interpretation () could find some weak support
in the interplay of participants in the maxim, the superior and the addressee.78
Noteworthy, on the other hand, is 410 anx sw Xr=s ‘he lives through it’, which, in a
different context, has anx in a nfr sw construction, as would be the case under
interpretation (). Also noteworthy is 403 L1, in context: 401-403 L1 [i]m xr sAA=k
[H]r km=f iw Ssp r wDwt sf nfr tw Xr=s anx […] ‘Cause your wisdom to fall upon its
completion! For the image stands in relation to the orders of the merciful. You are
good through it, alive […]’. In sum, while Ptahhotep 447 is not fully clear,
interpretation () is probably to be preferred.

As the above passages collectively demonstrate, tw was being extended to non-

agentive events by the mid-Twelfth Dynasty.

6.2.2.4 The second step of the change: &w spreading to non-dynamic events
The construction just discussed comes close to the one in Amenemhat 11c-d, yet still
differs from it: the tw-marked events in Amenemhat 11c-d—Hqr ‘be hungry’, ibi ‘be
thirsty’, and Hmsi ‘sit’—are not only non-agentive, they are also non-dynamic. While
non-dynamicity necessarily implies the lack of an agentive argument in semantic
representation, the reverse does not hold true: an event can lack an agent in its
semantic representation, yet be dynamic, as in the examples above: mwt ‘die’, Htm
‘perish’, xr ‘fall’, nSp ‘pant’, wrD ‘become weary’ (§6.2.2.3, (i)-(iv)). Events that in
addition to being non-agentive are also non-dynamic therefore lie one further step
away from the semantic condition of passivization. This is schematically expressed in
the following scale:
Events with an agent in their semantic representation (e.g. pri, spr)
Fully regular use with all inflectional passives (tw-passives and sDm(w)-
passives alike): §6.2.2.1, (i)-(ii).

(I) Dynamic events lacking an agent in their semantic representation (e.g.

mwt, Htm, xr, nSp, wrD)
Extension of use of tw, by the mid-Twelfth Dynasty: §6.2.2.3.

(II) Non-dynamic events (e.g. Hqr, ibi, Hmsi)

Further extension of use of tw: the present section.

77 Of these, the first two are still agentive (§6.2.2.2, (v)-(vi)) and thereby different from Ptahhotep
447 if to be interpreted as under (). For the two Neferti instances, below, §6.2.2.4, (x)-(xi).
78 Ptahhotep 441-448 Xms sA=k n Hr-tp=k imi-rA=k n pr-nsw wnn pr=k mn Hr xwt=f DbAw=k m st iry
qsn pw itnw m Hr-tp anx tw tr n sft=f n xAb.n qaH n kft=f ‘Bow your back to your superior, your
overseer in the palace. Your house will be enduring on his goods, your rewards be at their proper
place. An opponent who is a superior is a painful situation: you are alive (/one lives only) for the
time he is merciful. The arm of the one who uncovers himself can not bend(?).’

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 460 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

The overall change consisting in the accommodation of tw to events from which it

was previously excluded is a process of extension. Extension is gradual, proceeding
step by step to the next, semantically most closely related, event types. The increased
distance to the condition of passivization expressed in the above scale thereby
translates diachronically into a relative chronology of spread: when beginning to be
extended to non-passivizable events, tw was first extended to dynamic events lacking
an agent in their semantic representation (stage I), only subsequently to events that are
not even dynamic (stage II).
This analysis is independently confirmed by an examination of the textual
distribution of constructions bearing witness to stage II. Other than in Amenemhat
11c-d, early occurrences of tw with non-dynamic events (stage II) are the following,
here presented by events:

@qr ‘be hungry’ (as in Amenemhat 11c n Hqr.tw m rnpwt=i):

(i) Neferti 9c
nn sDr.tw Hqr n m(w)t
‘the night will not be spent starving to death’
@qr, a pseudoparticiple, is in a secondary predicate construction dependent on tw
in the main clause and therefore relevant in the present context.

Ibi ‘be thirsty’ (as in Amenemhat 11c n ib.tw im):

(ii) Ipuwer 2.10
ib.tw mw
‘one thirsts for water’
Note the rare transitive construction of ibi.

@msi ‘sit’ (as in Amenemhat 11d iw Hms.tw m irt.n=i Hr sDdt im=i):

(iii) Ipuwer 5.11
Hms.tw Hr bAwt
‘one sits in bushes’

(iv) Kheti 25.3

iw Hms.tw Hna ksm-Xt
‘for one sits with the defiant man’
Thus in all but two witnesses, one of which obviously corrupt.79 The last editor of
the text emends into {iw} Hms tw Hna ksm Xt ‘sondern sitze ruhig da und bezwinge
dein Inneres.’80 This is impossible on grounds of grammar. @na + infinitive in
continuation to an imperative is a Middle Egyptian construction, but with strong

79 Divergent are only O. DeM 1039 iw Hms=k (...) and O. Tur. 57082 (...) {m}°tw=k m Hms Hna (...)
or (...) m{°}tw=k {m} Hms (...). That the latter is corrupt is immediate; for the former as secondary
as well, see the discussion.
80 Jäger 2004: 114.

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 461

associations in terms of registers. The construction can be found in Middle

Egyptian literary texts (§2.4.4.3, (ii)-(iii)), yet never in the maxims of any Middle
Egyptian teachings: these always have subjunctive sDm=f in similar function. The
proposed emendation is also ruled out on contextual grounds, as it relies on the
claim that a second person construction (either iw<=k> Hms.ti or Hms tw) should
here be required. An examination of the context, however, demonstrates
otherwise, with 25.3b parallel to 25.2b: both express general maxims after a
negative imperative. A passive, not a second person, therefore fits this context. Iw
is original in 25.3b just as it is in 25.2b:81
25.2 m Dd mdwt n HAp iw HAp-Xt ir=f n=f ikm
25.3 m Dd mdwt n pr-ib iw Hms.tw Hna ksm-Xt
‘Do no speak words of secrecy; for the discrete man makes himself a shield.
Do not speak words of recklessness; for one sits with the defiant man.’
(A different situation is in 6.3, where only two witnesses, P. Sallier II and
O. Leipzig 20, have a passive form of Hmsi (iw Hms.tw and Hms.tw, respectively).
As the three anaphoric pronouns in 6.2 imply, 6.3 is itself phrased in the third
person, not in the passive, thus Hms=f (...).82 In 6.3, unlike in 25.3, Hms.tw is
secondary.)

%Dr ‘lie’:
(v) Neferti 9c
nn sDr.tw Hqr n m(w)t
‘the night will not be spent starving to death’

GAw ‘lack’:
(vi) Neferti 7f
gA.tw xnrt
‘a stronghold will be lacking’
Note the transitive construction of gAw.83

(vii) Loyaliste (long version), 9.9

gAw/gAy.tw r=s sxm SwAww
‘when one lacks it, poverty reigns’

(viii) Hymn 5.2

nn gAy.tw r=s
‘without one lacking it’

81 Similarly Vernus 20102b: 250; Dils, TLA.

82 Similarly Jäger 2004: 134, who however wrongly reads iw Hms=f (iw only in P. Sallier II): the con-
struction is ‘emphatic’, with initial Hms=f.
83 Kammerzell 1986: 106, n.33c.

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 462 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

^w ‘be free of’:

(ix) Ipuwer 10.6
nn Sw.tw m [...]
‘one will not be free of [...]’

NB 1. In the following constructions of anx, the event is non-agentive but it remains

unclear whether it is also non-dynamic:
(x) Neferti 5d
nn anx.tw Hbs Sna
‘one will not stay alive when clouds cover’
(xi) Neferti 12d
anx.tw m Xrt-nTr
‘one will live in the necropolis’
Unlike the instances of anx m ‘live on’ discussed above (§6.2.2.2, (v)-(vi)), the events
of ‘living’ here do not imply an agent in their semantic representation. They therefore
bear evidence to stage I having been reached by the time Neferti was composed.
Whether the events of anx’ing in Neferti 5d and 12d are also non-dynamic, thereby
possibly bearing witness to stage II, remains unclear. This is because anx can be
construed both dynamically and non-dynamically in Egyptian, compare e.g.
Pyr. §1724aPM anx anx.ti it wsir N m rn=k pw xr nTrw ‘Live, be alive, father Osiris N,
in this name of yours by the gods!’ (anx dynamic (and agentive) in the imperative,
then non-dynamic in the pseudoparticiple as a stative pendant to the imperative).

NB 2. In the following passage, uncertainty comes from an unstable text:

(xii) Hymn 12.2 (about half of mss., e.g. O. DeM 1176 ro)
xr sAA.tw m inw SAw
‘then one is sated with the products of the fields.’
The manuscript tradition is split, roughly evenly, between readings as sAA.tw and as
sAA(=)sn (in details, §3.4.2.1). Accordingly, Hymn 12.2 sAA.tw can not be used as
evidence for dating the composition of Hymn itself. Just as in Kheti 6.3 ((iv), fine),
this passage only shows that a construction sAA.tw was acceptable to New Kingdom
scribes—hardly a new result by this stage.

As the above collection demonstrates, there is no single occurrence of tw with a non-

dynamic event in any text securely dated to the Twelfth Dynasty, let alone to the
earlier part thereof. All occurrences of the construction other than the ones in
Amenemhat are from compositions that based on independent linguistic grounds have
a solid terminus ante quem non by the early Thirteenth Dynasty, or later:

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 463

Neferti ((i), (v), (vi); also (x)-(xi)?)—dating, §5:

- tw r sDm: ante quem non by the late Twelfth Dynasty (§5.2);
- tw sDm: type-B ante quem non by the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty (§5.3);
- various further indications for a yet later dating (§5.5-6);

Ipuwer ((ii), (iii), (ix))—dating below, §6.2.2.5:

- NP Hr sDm used with non-progressive events: ante quem non by the early Thirteenth
Dynasty, or late Twelfth at the earliest (§2.6.2.4);
- various further indications for a dating no earlier than the early Thirteenth Dynasty
(§6.2.2.5);

Kheti (iv)—dating below, §6.2.2.6:

- tw sDm: type-B ante quem non by the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty (§5.3.2.2);
- ist + progressive construction before the main clause: ante quem non by the Second
Intermediate Period, exact parallels only in the early Eighteenth Dynasty (§6.2.2.6.2);

Loyaliste, long version (vii)—dating, §4.5:

On compositional grounds, the long version of Loyaliste (Kairsu) is secondary to the
short one (Sehetepibre) (§4.5.5). At least one construction in the first part of Kairsu
points to an early Eighteenth Dynasty date for the section in which it is found
(§4.5.2). Further indications in the second part of Kairsu also suggest a late dating for
various sections thereof (§4.5.3). Whether the whole long version was composed at
once can not be demonstrated on linguistic grounds.

Hymn to Hapi ((viii); also (xii)?)—dating, §3.4:

- sw m N in a balanced context: ante quem non by the late Seventeenth Dynasty
(§3.4.1);
- xr-sDm=f in the second member of a correlative system: ante quem non to the same
period (§3.4.2);
- tw sDm: type-B ante quem non by the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty (§5.3.2.1);
- one further indication suggesting an early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon (§3.4.4).

6.2.2.5 Digression: Notes on Ipuwer

The construction here under discussion recurs three times in Ipuwer (2.10 ib.tw; 5.11
Hms.tw; 10.6 Sw.tw): a note on Ipuwer is therefore in order. Ipuwer is the composition
on which the debate on dating first inflamed half a century ago, when against the then
prevalent First Intermediate Period dating one to the Second Intermediate Period was
proposed.84 Redactionalist approaches, developing at roughly the same time, have
now been rejected by most authors.85 In recent times, the late Middle Kingdom (late
Twelfth to mid-Thirteenth Dynasty) has been favored, notably based on institutional

84 Van Seters 1964, based on an analysis of historical detail and context; now also van Seters 2013;
pursuing this tradition in a more strongly archeological perspective, Raue 2010, particularly 80-1.
85 Summary and critical discussion by Enmarch 2008: 9-18; in more general terms, also Parkinson
2002: 16.

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 464 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

analysis.86 Most often mentioned are xnrt ‘labor enclosure’ (6.10) and xnrt wr ‘great
labor enclosure’ (6.12).87 The latter is not documented before the reign of
Senwosret III,88 which has been taken as a terminus ante quem non for Ipuwer. By the
same token, a terminus post quem non before the early New Kingdom is generally
considered to be established, as xnrt wr is last documented in a directly referential
usage in a securely dated text by the Seventeenth Dynasty (Stèle Juridique 12).89
However, the expression recurs, if perhaps not any more in a directly referential
usage, in Duties of the Vizier R 14 (Urk. IV 1109, 3),90 a composition that on
linguistic grounds was argued to date to the time of the Aametju-User-Rekhmire
vizieral dynasty (§2.8.3.5); simple xnrt, for its part, is not uncommonly found in the
New Kingdom.91 Other institutions mentioned in Ipuwer—notably Hwwt wrt ‘great
domains’ (6.12) and imi-rA niwt ‘overseer of the city’ (10.7)—are ‘compatible with a
late Middle Kingdom or Second Intermediate Period dating’,92 yet both recur for
example in the titularies of early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty viziers.93 Illustrating how
brittle a terminus post quem non to the later Second Intermediate Period would be,
both xnrt wr and Hwwt wrt are from 6.12, a line that also has pr-hA=f ‘bustling
activity’, here with a contextual interpretation as ‘commotion’: this expression is
paralleled closely only in Speos Artemidos 23 (Urk. IV 387, 13),94 an inscription that
is itself contemporaneous with documented occurrences of both xnrt wr and Hwwt wrt.
Despite the length of the composition, a linguistic dating of Ipuwer remains
difficult.95 The sole preserved manuscript, P. Leiden I 344 ro, is late (probably later
Nineteenth Dynasty)96 and the text is at times unstable (compare for example the
difficulties encountered in interpreting the Ipuwerean construction N sDm.tw:
§2.3.4.2.1). The composition itself is densely intertextual and relies heavily on a
limited set of recurrent grammatical expressions: both factors reduce linguistic dis-
tinctiveness. In lieu of a full-fledged linguistic analysis of Ipuwer, yet to be provided,
the following notes are mainly aimed at establishing a broad terminus ante quem non
for the composition, as is relevant to the diachronic appreciation of the linguistic
change discussed in the present section. As regards a terminus post quem non, the
consistent Middle Egyptian linguistic register in a literary composition strongly

86 E.g. Quirke 2004a: 140; similarly Enmarch 2008: 18-24, including a discussion of linguistic
elements (see below). Quirke 2004a: 140 also mentions the name ‘Ipuwer’ as pointing to a Middle
Kingdom dating; see however Enmarch 2008: 29.
87 Initially van Seters 1964: 18.
88 Quirke 1988: 96-7.
89 Enmarch 2008: 21.
90 Van den Boorn 1988: 125-8 and passim; Quirke 1988: 98; 2004b: 94.
91 Van den Boorn 1988: 126-7 and n.27.
92 Enmarch 2008: 21.
93 For the former, see Hagen 2012a: 223-4, 226.
94 Gardiner 1909: 51. Pr-hA=f is of course not meant as a criterion for dating Ipuwer either, as the
pattern of attestation of the expression remains all too slim. For related yet different expressions,
common in earlier times already, Borghouts 1994: 28.
95 Various notes by Winand 2013: 86-8; Oréal 2011: 138, n.81; Enmarch 2008: 20-1; Vernus 1990a:
188-90; 1990b: 1044-5, n.25; see below.
96 Enmarch 2005: 10.

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 465

speaks against any post-mid/late Eighteenth Dynasty dating of Ipuwer, or of parts

thereof. So do individual expressions (e.g. (i) and (ii) below).
(i) Passim, NP Hr sDm weakened into a general relative present tense97
By Vernus’ aspectual ante quem non criterion (§2.6.2), this implies a terminus ante
quem non to the early Thirteenth Dynasty, or late Twelfth at the very earliest.
NB. Only a subset of all instances of NP Hr sDm in Ipuwer are relevant for dating
because most are from the lament, in contexts in which the temporal articulation
is based on the ‘Sonst-Jetzt’ schema. In these, NP Hr sDm expresses progressive
aspect, as it already did in earlier times. Compare the discussion above, §2.6.2.4.

(ii) Ipuwer 4.11-12 nfr pw pXrt iry ‘There is no remedy thereto’98

The nfr pw negation99 is first attested in late Twelfth Dynasty documentary registers,
then continuously until the Eighteenth Dynasty. In literary registers, the expression
recurs only once, in Cheops’ Court, significantly in a maidservant’s speech (11.23)
100
(§2.4.4.1.C; §2.4.4.7.A). The presence of nfr pw in Ipuwer therefore suggests a
terminus ante quem non by the Thirteenth Dynasty.

(iii) Ipuwer 4.6 ptr nt<t> tw r irt ‘What shall one do?’101
Nty/ntt tw r sDm is first attested in late Twelfth Dynasty documentary registers, then
in an early Thirteenth Dynasty royal inscription modeled on legal registers, and was
to become standard in later times (§5.2.4). The reading in 4.6 is probably original.102
In a literary register, this is suggestive of a dating no earlier than the early Thirteenth
Dynasty and excludes a dating before the late Twelfth Dynasty (§5.2).

(iv) Ipuwer 3.8 r-mn-m kftiw n ii.n=sn ‘From as far as Crete(?) they (scil. pine
and oil) do not come’103
The preposed construction of a prepositional phrase expressing extension is directly
paralleled only in Khakheperreseneb ro 6-7 SAa-r Xt tpt nfryt-r iww Hr-sA sny=sn r swAt

97 Vernus 1990a: 188-90; 1990b: 1044-5, n.25.

98 Noted by Enmarch 2008: 21.
99 Study: Brose 2009.
100 On Ipuwer 4.11-12 possibly alluding to Cheops’ Court 11.23-24, Enmarch 2008: 102.
101 Noted by Enmarch 2008: 98.
102 As noted by Enmarch 2008: 98, similar rhetorical questions are in 3.7 ptr irti=n r aSw n saHw=n
(...) ‘What will we do about pines for our mummies (...)’ and 3.13 ptr irt=n r=s (...) ‘What will we
do about it (...)’. This is no indication of a secondariness of 4.6, since contexts partly differ: in 3.7,
the first person plural pronoun is also used later in the clause. &w in 4.6 may also point to ‘a lower
linguistic register (...), possibly indicating greater urgency in the speaker’s discourse’ (Enmarch
2008: 98).
103 This passage has been the subject of debate (Enmarch 2008: 88-9 with a critical review of previous
proposals); I follow the reading argued for by Enmarch on convincing semantic grounds (similar
interpretation already in Vernus 1995a: 14, n.q). (NB: In 2006-2007, when his manuscript was
submitted, Enmarch also argued that a reading of r-mn-m as rmnn ‘Lebanon’ is unlikely because
this toponym is undocumented before Thutmosis III. This argument, in itself a weak one, does not
hold any more, as two early instances of rmnn ‘Lebanon’ have now surfaced in Khnumhotep III’s
inscription in Dahshur (temp. Senwosret III), 3A5 and 3D2 (Allen 2008: 11, 13). Other parts of
Enmarch’s argument remains unaffected by this new find.)

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 466 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

‘From the first generation to the ones that come afterward, they imitate what has
passed.’ Related constructions are found in the early Eighteenth Dynasty (§2.7.3.2.B,
(viii)-(x)). The dating of Khakheperreseneb itself remains uncertain (early Thirteenth
– early Eighteenth Dynasty: §2.7.4).

(v) Ipuwer 12.4 Hw-ny-r-Hr ‘combat’

The expression is found in only one other literary text, in Amenemhat 7b. In the non-
literary record, it is not documented before the Eighteenth Dynasty. For reasons
discussed in details below, the expression was certainly not innovated before the late
Middle Kingdom; for related reasons, the expression does not easily arise in the
course of textual transmission and is therefore most likely to be original in Ipuwer
(§6.3.2.2).

(vi) Ipuwer 7.1 and passim, mTn is

The combination of mk with is, recurrent in Ipuwer 7.1-9.7 and beyond,104 may be
documented only twice in the Middle Kingdom, both times in magical texts (P. Turin
N. 54003 vso 19; P. Ramesseum IV C 12-15).105 It is, on the other hand, fairly
common in the early New Kingdom, in various types of texts such as Hetep’s Letter
to Ipuresti,106 in the tomb of the High Priest Amenemhat (TT 97), or in Horemheb’s
Decree.107 From the same period, another example is Rekhmire 10 (Urk. IV 1074, 11)
mk is irty=i Hr hAb=i n HAty=i ‘For, see, my eyes are sending me to my heart.’ It has
been proposed that this clustering of occurrences in the Eighteenth Dynasty may be
indicative of a late date of composition of the relevant sections in Ipuwer.108

(vii) Ipuwer 12.14 in-iw rf mniw mr m(w)t ‘What does it mean, a shepherd
who loves death?’ or: ‘Is that really a shepherd, the one who loves death?’109
Under either interpretation, in-iw is the compound interrogative particle. While
documented in emphatic constructions in earlier times, this spreads to non-verbal
clauses only in the Second Intermediate Period and becomes more common only in
the Eighteenth Dynasty.110 Under the second interpretion, the pattern is of the A ø
type, itself not securely documented before the New Kingdom.111

104 Enmarch 2008: 151-2; for a semantic analysis of the combination in Ipuwer, Oréal 2011: 138.
105 Oréal 2011: 138 and n.79.
106 Text: Buchberger 1991.
107 References in Oréal 138 and n.80-1. In A Man 3.5, also quoted by Oréal, the text is unstable.
108 Oréal 2011: 138, n.81 (under a redactionalist perspective for Ipuwer): ‘Il est à noter que
l’appartenance commune de plusieurs de ces exemples représente un indice en faveur d’une
datation dans la XVIIIe dynastie du passage concerné des Admonitions, dont la composition
diachroniquement hétérogène à partir d’un noyau ancien est d’ailleurs considérée comme
probable.’
109 These interpretations are discussed by Winand 2013, who concludes that both are possible. The
author also convincingly argues that alternative interpretations that have been proposed (to the
ones mentioned by Winand, add Quack 2004: 359) are problematic, either grammatically or
semantically. The passage shows some hesitation by the scribe, also discussed by Winand.
110 Winand 2013: 86, 88.
111 Winand 2013: 87-8.

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 467

(viii) Ipuwer 12.14 xr kA wD=k irt wSb ‘And then you should order the making
of an answer.’
The combination of xr and kA is to my knowledge unique. It is most naturally
interpreted as consisting in kA sDm=f preceded by xr with connective force. While kA
sDm=f is common both in the Twelfth and in the Eighteenth Dynasty, the particle xr
can be made to precede virtually any construction in Late Egyptian.112 If so, an
indication for an early New Kingdom dating of Ipuwer could be given. Under the
hypothesis of a pre-New Kingdom dating of Ipuwer, either xr or kA must then have
been secondarily inserted in 12.14: this is not impossible in view of the date of
P. Leiden I 344 ro.

NB. It has been suggested that analytic strategies for relativizing verbal clauses,
not uncommon in Ipuwer, could be an indication for a dating to the late Middle
Kingdom or Second Intermediate Period.113 Diachronically, analytic (i.e. nty-
marked) strategies for relativizing verbal clauses were to supersede synthetic ones
(i.e. participial constructions and relative forms). Yet, the process was gradual,
proceeding at different paces depending on various environments. Cases of
analytic verbal relativization in Ipuwer are: (a) negative, nty n sDm=f (6.13); (b)
with non-dynamic semantics, nty pseudoparticiple (2.2; 3.14; 5.1); and (c) with
the analytic future, nty r sDm (4.6; 14.12). For all of these, instances of analytic
verbal relativization are documented in literary texts securely dated to the Twelfth
Dynasty, compare: for (a), e.g. Shipwrecked Sailor 73 nty n mA.t(w)=f ‘one who
has not been seen’; for (b), e.g. Debate 49 ky bA nty Hqr ‘another soul which is
hungry’; for (c), e.g. Ptahhotep 50 nty r tht st ‘who will transgress them’. That in
all these cases analytic verbal relativization strategies develop early is explained
on semantic and functional grounds. Nty pseudoparticiple (b) expresses non-
dynamicity in more explicit ways than a mere participle would do. Although the
details are still poorly understood, a similar semantic explanation probably
accounts for the comparatively early development of nty r sDm (c). As regards (a),
the early development of analytic relativization with negative events has to do
with processing, which is always more difficult with negative than with positive
events, and is eased by an analytic strategy (as opposed to a synthetic one, here
with tm).

In the above, (i) is a full-fledged argument, individually implying a terminus ante

quem non by the early Thirteenth Dynasty, or the late Twelfth at the very earliest. A
terminus ante quem non to the Thirteenth Dynasty is confirmed by (ii) and (iii). The
expression in (iv) also speaks to such terminus, perhaps even to a later one depending
on when Khakheperreseneb is dated; similar comments extend to (v). The expressions
in (vi)-(viii) could be interpreted as suggestive of a yet later date of composition, but
the indications they provide remain too weak to support any firm conclusion. Pending
a fuller study of the linguistic typology of Ipuwer, a range for dating comprising the
period from the early Thirteenth Dynasty to the mid-Eighteenth is therefore proposed.

112 See Neveu 2001.

113 Enmarch 2008: 21.

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 468 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

6.2.2.6 Digression: Notes on Kheti

The construction here under discussion, tw with non-dynamic events, also recurs in
Kheti (25.3 Hms.tw), where it is original (§6.2.2.4, (iv)). In appreciating the rise of the
construction with a view on dating Amenemhat, a brief discussion of Kheti is therefore
required as well. The Teaching of Kheti114 is documented from the Eighteenth Dy-
nasty on, in various papyri, two writing boards, three ostraca, and two graffiti in the
tomb Assiut N13.1.115 Of these, T. Louvre 693 dates to the beginning or middle part
of the Dynasty, while O. Senmut 147 and 148 were found by the tomb of Senenmut;
Assiut graffiti 3a (with the beginning of the composition, Kheti 1-6) and 3b (with its
end, Kheti 30)116 await paleographical analysis.
The composition is commonly dated to the early Twelfth Dynasty.117 This is based
on a reading of the text in relation to an educational model of early Twelfth Dynasty
literature, the Ramesside ascription of Amenemhat to a literary figure ‘Kheti’, and the
additional understanding that Amenemhat should date to the events it refers to.118
Pointing to encounters in phrasing, contents, and structure with A Man to His Son and
Loyaliste, it has been suggested that these compositions and Kheti could have formed
a scribal curriculum composed in successive stages during the reign of Senwosret I.119
A dating to the late First Intermediate Period has also been proposed, based on one
passage in Siut IV supposedly resonating with Kheti.120 A linguistic argument has
been voiced that Kheti should have been composed before the mid-Twelfth Dy-
nasty.121
Yet, the dating of Amenemhat to the early Twelfth Dynasty is itself an hypothesis
only, contingent upon a directly referential reading of that composition. The literary
figure ‘Kheti’ must be interpreted in its Ramesside context and can not support a
dating of any composition.122 The interpretation of Kheti in relation to an educational
context has a long Egyptological tradition, but is uncertain.123 Among texts resonating
with Kheti, A Man to His Son has a linguistic terminus ante quem non by the late
Twelfth Dynasty (§2.6.2.6.B; §2.6.2.7.B). The long version of Loyaliste, which is
most relevant for comparison with Kheti, is in some parts at least late (§4.5). As to the
linguistic argument proposed for an early dating, the relevant constructions in Kheti
are demonstrably integral to the original text (§2.3.3), but the criterion itself only
implies a terminus post quem non to the mid-Eighteenth Dynasty (§2.6.3), later there-

114 Text: Jäger 2004. ‘Kheti’ was conclusively identified as the teaching authority by Verhoeven 2010:
196, putting a long lasting debate to rest.
115 Detailed presentation: Widmaier 2013: §2.1.
116 Verhoeven 2013: §4.
117 Detailed presentation and reflection of the Forschungsgeschichte by Widmaier 2013: §1.
118 References in Widmaier 2013: §1.1; Jäger 2004: 189.
119 Fischer-Elfert 1999: 381-99, elaborating on observations initially made by Posener 1956: 117-41.
120 Jäger 2004: 189-91. The passage is Siut IV 66-67; for this, further Widmaier 2013: §1.2, with
n.68-70.
121 Vernus 1990a: 185.
122 From various perspectives, Widmaier 2013: §1.1; Gnirs 2013b: 130-2; Simon 2013: 264-5, 266-
71; Moers 2009; 2008; Quirke 2004a: 31-3; in the present study also §3.4.5.C and §5.1.3.1.A.
123 With a detailed discussion of the Forschungsgeschichte, Widmaier 2013: §1.2. Critically on educa-
tional contexts for literature, also Hagen 2006; Parkinson 2002: 235-41 (in general), 273-7 (for
Kheti specifically).

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 469

fore than the first manuscript attestation of the composition. Accordingly, Kheti is
presently undated.124 Significantly, the most recent study of the composition
renounces dating altogether and focuses instead on interpreting the text in relation to
the New Kingdom contexts in which it was surely read and circulated.125
Some marginal notes on what language can contribute to the issue are here
presented. Like for Ipuwer, these do not provide a full linguistic study of the text and
are only aimed at establishing a broad terminus ante quem non as is relevant to the
diachronic appreciation of the linguistic change discussed in the present section
(§6.2). A linguistic analysis of Kheti is hampered by the often technical vocabulary,
the limited variety in grammatical constructions, and the state of preservation of the
text. As regards the last, the transmitted text is in many ways linguistically late, in
orthography (e.g. 20.2 Hl (<HAnr>) for ancient HA126) and in grammar (e.g. xr routinely
before wnn in most Ramesside witnesses in 8.3; 10.2; 13.3; 19.5; 22.1).127 Several
such features can be identified as secondary, either on internal grounds or by com-
parison with Eighteenth Dynasty witnesses where such are preserved (e.g. T. Louvre
693 in 22.1, without xr128). Yet, this often still falls short of providing a reliable sense
of what the original text was, thereby reducing the amount of text available for
linguistic analysis. On the other hand, various important elements can also be shown
not to be secondary, thus, among constructions already discussed in other contexts:
the distribution of N(P) sDm=f and NP Hr sDm throughout Kheti (§2.3.3); tw sDm in
3.5-6 (§5.3.2.2); Hms.tw (original in 25.3, secondary in 6.3 in the two manuscripts in
which it occurs: §6.2.2.4, (iv)). Some discussion of the linguistic typology of Kheti is
therefore possible.

6.2.2.6.1 Kheti 3.5-6 (...) tw nD-xrt=f tw hAb=f (...)

A. The construction tw sDm was argued above to point to a terminus ante quem non
by the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty (§5.3). As also discussed, the construction is integral
to the original text of Kheti (§5.3.2.2). The ante quem non is a type-B one: the mid-
Thirteenth Dynasty is not necessarily the earliest moment in time in which the con-
struction became possible, but only the earliest for which based on the evidence
available it can not be excluded any more that it may have been possible. The actual
innovation may have taken place later between the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty and late
Second intermediate Period (§5.7.1.1.C; §5.7.1.2.C).
B. Thus far goes the argument when strictly indexed on what can be described of
ongoing linguistic change—with the conditioning possibility for the de facto literary
construction tw sDm (§5.3.3) being related to the rise of the higher-order and not
exclusively literary (X.)tw Hr sDm (§5.3.4-5). On an explicitly more speculative level,
the very literary nature of tw sDm deserves a comment of its own. Beyond Kheti, the

124 Similarly already Parkinson 1997a: 274.

125 Widmaier 2013.
126 For Hl as a late orthography, e.g. KRI II 362, 1; in manuscripts of a Middle Egyptian composition,
Hl also e.g. in A Man 19.12.
127 On xr wnn in Late Egyptian, Neveu 2001: 67-78.
128 Jäger 2004: 104; Burkard 1977: 107. For a case of xr wnn identified as secondary on internal
grounds, e.g. Kheti 8.3 (§5.3.2.2, (i)).

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 470 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

construction recurs in Hymn to Hapi and Neferti, and only in these (§5.3.1-2). The
former composition was argued above to date to the late Seventeenth/early Eighteenth
Dynasty (§3.4); for the latter, no such precise dating could be obtained based on full
criteria strictly indexed on ongoing linguistic change but various additional indica-
tions concur in suggesting that the early Eighteenth Dynasty is the most likely period
of composition (§5.5-6; §5.7.2). In all three compositions in which tw sDm occurs, this
involves at least one instance of tw nD-xrt ‘one is greeting’, arguably a literary trope
(§5.3.3). The presence of tw sDm in Hymn to Hapi, Neferti, and Kheti, and only in
these, could then be interpreted as an element of a literary horizon shared by these
three compositions.
Under the hypothesis of a pre-New Kingdom date of composition of Kheti, a
scenario must then be contemplated by which this composition (or another one now
lost) would have been the first to innovate tw sDm; tw nD xrt would then have become
a literary trope when subsequently taken up in Hymn to Hapi and Neferti. This is very
unlikely in view of the thorough-going integration of the construction tw sDm in the
large-scale temporal articulation of Neferti (§5.3.1.3). There is therefore some likeli-
hood in the hypothesis associating tw sDm with a late Seventeenth/early Eighteenth
Dynasty literary horizon. This is no proof, however: as noted in another context,
assessing how compact or extended in time elements of a literary tradition may have
been remains difficult in general (§5.1.3.2-3). In the present case, the situation is more
favorable because a literary trope (tw nD xrt) here involves a grammatical construction
(tw sDm) that is itself highly specific. Even so, no full certainty can be achieved.

6.2.2.6.2 Kheti 1.3 ist rf sw m xntyt (...)

After the title, Kheti has a brief opening narrative, the first clause of which is remark-
able on various accounts.

Kheti 1.1-2.1
HAti-a m sbAyt irt.n s n TArt dwA=f sA Xty rn=f n sA=f ppi
ist rf sw m xntyt r Xnw r rDt=f m at-sbA nt sSw m-qAb msw srw imiw-HAt nt Xnw
aHa.n Dd.n=f n=f (...)
‘Beginning of the teaching made by a man of Sile(?), Duaf’s son Kheti by
name, to his son Pepi.
Now, he was travelling upstream to the Residence to put him into the school of
scribes in the midst of the children of the foremost officials of the Residence.
He then said to him: (...)’

A. Ist rf is well documented in Middle Kingdom narrative literature (e.g. Sinuhe

R 11; B 268; Eloquent Peasant B1 102). In these texts, the expression serves to
introduce a new segment of text, linking this to and simultaneously detaching it from
what precedes, in ways that vary depending on individual contexts.129 Against this
background, the use in Kheti 1.3—at the very beginning of the ‘micro-narrative’, not

129 Oréal 2011: 235-8.

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 471

relating to any preceding segment—stands out. What comes closest to it in Middle

Kingdom narrative literature is Sinuhe R 11 ist rf sb.n Hm=f (...) ‘Now, His Majesty
had sent (...)’. Although near the beginning of the tale, this already follows a
preceding segment of narrative text, the royal apotheosis and courtly mourning (R 5-
11). In Kheti by contrast, ist rf directly follows the title: it does not provide a textual
‘pivot’ with respect to some preceding segment, as there is none.
Ist in absolute initial position is, on the other hand, found in early Eighteenth
Dynasty inscriptions.130 This use—the result of a development the steps of which can
be traced—seems to be an innovation of that time.131 In the early Eighteenth Dynasty,
ist rf can thus be used to launch a narrative, as in Ahmose’s Tempest Stela132 where it
occurs just after the royal titulary (which in effect functions as a title):

(i) Ahmose’s Tempest Stela ro 1-3/vso 1-4 (HHBT I 104-105, 1/2)

Hr aA-xprw (...) anx Dt titulary
a b
s[T] rf iwt Hm=f [...] (...) sT (with an event of directed
ist grt Hms.n Hm=f (...) motion, compare Kheti 1.3)
ist rf i[mn ...] (...)
in Hm=f xnt (...) structurally, compare Kheti 2.1
‘Horus Aakkheperu (...) living forever.
Now His Majesty’s coming [...] (...)
Now His Majesty sat down (...)
Now Amun (...)
His Majesty sailed upstream (...)’
a) %T133 is here a mere variant spelling of ist, distinguished from the following two for
stylistic effect (compare the sequence sT rf ... ist grt ... ist rf ...).134
b) The presence of an infinitive after sT is remarkable as sT otherwise serves to introduce
finite constructions only. The construction is interpreted as a hybrid, combining sT with
the ‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive, both of which are paragraph-initial
constructions and thereby otherwise mutually exclusive; see further §4.4.2.2, (ii).

One is tempted, therefore, to relate ist rf in Kheti 1.3 directly to such uses in early
Eighteenth Dynasty inscriptions. Before doing so, however, one must contemplate the
possibility that Kheti, a literary text, could here be displaying an extended use of isT,

130 Oréal 2011: 243-4.

131 Oréal 2011: 242-3.
132 Noted by Oréal 2011: 244.
133 In view of the following infinitive (iwt), the possibility has been discussed that xft, not sT, should
be read here (Wiener & Allen 1998: 6, evoking this as an hypothesis then dismissed): this is ruled
out by the fact that xft + infinitive can not begin a text; accordingly, sT must to be read (similarly
Beylage 2002: 80; Klug 2002: 37; Wiener & Allen themselves).
134 For such sequences of isT-headed clauses after what functionally amounts to a title, e.g.
Thutmosis IV’s Sphinx Stela (Urk. IV 1541, 1; 1541, 8; 1541, 16; 1542, 5).

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 472 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

going beyond what is otherwise documented in Middle Egyptian literature.135 Accord-

ingly, the argument must be strengthened by further analysis.
B. In Kheti 1.3, text-initial isT is followed by a progressive construction, in the form
that befits xnti, as NP m xntyt (ist rf sw m xntyt). A different construction is found in
the Twelfth Dynasty:
(ii) Sinuhe R 15-16
ti sw Hm ii=f in.n=f sqrw-anx n THnw mnmnt nbt nn Drw=s
smrw nw stp-s(A) hAb=sn r-gs imnty (...)
‘Now, he was coming back having gotten prisoners from Tjehenu and all sorts
of cattle without number;
The companions of the Palace, they sent to the western side (...)’
In (ii), the event after isT is ongoing, as in Kheti 1.3. Yet the aspectually unmarked
N(P) sDm=f—not a marked progressive construction, as in Kheti 1.3—is used.136 This
finds an explanation along the following lines. NP Hr sDm, an ‘extensive unac-
complished’, can only be used when some frame is given to which this aspectual
‘extension’ can be related. IsT, on the other hand, has backgrounding functions in the
Middle Kingdom. In a textually backgrounded clause, the aspectual ‘extension’ ex-
pressed by NP Hr sDm must then be related to some event in the preceding discourse.
Significantly, NP Hr sDm can occur in isT-headed clauses in the Middle Kingdom, but
only when these follow the textually foregrounded clause to which they relate:

(iii) Hammamat 192 (temp. Mentuhotep IV), 20-21

(...) rxs bHsw sft anxw D snTr Hr sdt
ist mSa n 3000 m Xnww spAwt tA-mHw Hr Sms=f m Htp r tA-mri
‘(...) Veals were slaughtered, goats butchered, incense put on the fire.
Meanwhile, an expedition of 3000 sailors of the nomes of Upper Egypt was
following him in peace to Egypt.’

Against this background, the construction sw m xntyt in Kheti 1.3 is odd. This can not
be explained in relation to event-semantics or Aktionsart: just like Sinuhe R 15-16,
Kheti 1.3 is with an event of directed motion, also with telic Aktionsart (xnti, iwi);

135 Oréal (2011: 235) discusses Kheti 1.3 in the section devoted to Middle Kingdom narrative
literature, without however arguing why the passage should relate to these rather than to later
usages documented in the inscriptional sphere (the author’s discussion only bears on the
understanding of Kheti 1.3 in context, also with a view on the presence of rf after isT). Oréal’s
classification may have been based on types of written discourses, treating literary texts as a group.
136 There are of course also other instances of isT-headed clauses with N(P) sDm=f in Twelfth Dynasty
Middle Egyptian that do not lend themselves to a progressive interpretation. Compare
Wepwawetaa, Munich Gl. WAF 35, 15-16 isT wi xd=i r nD xrt (...) xtmtyw (...) Hr mAA stA=i r pr-
nsw (...) ‘I used to fare downstream to pay homage (...); The sealers (...) were watching me being
introduced to the palace (...)’. In a construction formally similar to the one in Sinuhe R 15-16, the
interpretation is here habitual, not progressive. That the same construction can be interpreted as
progressive or habitual accords with the aspectually unmarked nature of N(P) sDm=f. The
interpretation is a context-based one: as Sinuhe R 15-16, also with a telic event (iwi), demonstrates,
the telic Aktionsart of the event (xdi) plays no role (pace Malaise & Winand 1999: 507, ex.1344).

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 473

yet, only the latter has a progressive construction. As also discussed, the reading in
Kheti 1.3 can not be accounted for as textually secondary: N(P) sDm=f is stable in this
text and the progressive construction in 1.3 thereby original (§2.3.3). The progressive
construction in Kheti 1.3 can not, therefore, be accounted for under a Middle King-
dom dating of this composition.
C. In early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty Middle Egyptian, things have changed: NP Hr
sDm is now found after isT, not only in clauses that follow the clause they relate to,137
but also in such that precede it. This innovation is interpreted in relation to broader
changes affecting the functions of isT, which can now launch the narrative (compare
above, (i) and Kheti 1.1-2.1 itself), or a new section thereof. In such text- or
paragraph-initial uses, isT-headed clauses have acquired a more autonomous status,
not directly dependent on another clause. NP Hr sDm can be used in such contexts
because the aspectual ‘extension’ it expresses is not related to some other segment of
discourse (contrast with B) but measured with respect to the semantics of the event
itself, as ongoing.
This is illustrated by the following examples. Both have isT NP Hr sDm before the
clause this relates to, as in Kheti 1.3-2.1. In addition, the first example illustrates the
broader sequence of tenses isT NP Hr sDm – aHa.n sDm.n=f, as in Kheti 1.3-2.1. The
second illustrates isT NP Hr sDm after a title (here the infinitive), as in Kheti 1.1-3; that
it further has NP m xntyt, as Kheti 1.3 itself has, is almost anecdotal at this point.

(iv) Urk. IV 842, 16-17 (inscription on a column of Thutmosis III in Karnak)

sT pAy{t} Hr wAyt r xpr im=sn
aHa.n smnx.n st Hm=i m inr n rwDt (...)
‘Now, this was about to happen to them.
My Majesty then perfected it with sandstone (...)’

(v) Amenhotep II’s Syrian Campaigns (Memphis Stela), 13-14 (Urk. IV 1304,
15-18)
rDt Htpw n Hm=f in dmi pn
ist Hm=f m xntyt m-Xnw pA aAmqw sAwrinA
gm.n=f wpwti (...)
‘Proposing peace to His Majesty by this town.
Now, His Majesty was sailing upstream in the valley of Saurina.
He found a messenger (...)’

6.2.2.6.3 Two lexical notes

The lexicon of Kheti includes many technical terms of various sorts. While some of
these are of later attestation only, no reliable indication for dating can be derived as
the patterns of attestation of such words are over-determined by the nature of the
written record at various periods (‘what things are talked about in what types of

137 E.g. Urk. IV 663, 2; 1305, 11; 1312, 4-5; also Urk. IV 365, 6 (following another clause, itself
introduced by isT).

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 474 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

written discourses documented in what periods?’). Two lexical expressions deserve a

special note, however.

(i) Kheti 2.1 qnqnw ‘beatings’

As observed by Jäger,138 qnqn seems to be documented in pre-New Kingdom times
only as a technical term to do with textile working and in medical texts; the more
general meaning of ‘beating’ becomes common only with the New Kingdom.139 Qnqn
in Kheti 2.1 could then be interpreted as suggestive of a late dating. Working under
the hypothesis that Kheti should have been composed much earlier, Jäger went on to
suggest that qnqn could have carried some specific expressive overtones in Kheti,
associated with the word’s by then still technical sense.140 That Jäger’s proposal was
made under an a priori assumption on dating does not affect the fact that it delineates
a real possibility, in a literary text. Accordingly, qnqn in Kheti 2.1 is bound to remain
somewhat uncertain in its appreciation for dating.

(ii) Kheti 9.3, 10.3 aAgsw ‘belt(?)’

This very rare word recurs in another literary text of insecure dating, Merikare (E 107
= C III, 4, M not preserved). The exact meaning of aAgsw remains unclear, due to the
word’s low frequency.141 The word is generally identified as a loanword and it has
been proposed that the loan dates to the New Kingdom.142 If securely established, this
would be consequential for dating, because aAgsw stands a strong chance to be integral
to the original text of Kheti. It occurs twice, in all witnesses of either passage, and is
therefore integral at least to the archetype(s) from which all extant witnesses of the
composition derive.143 In addition, the referent of aAgsw, whatever its exact nature,
would seem to fit tightly the meaning of the two passages in Kheti in which the word
occurs.144 Yet, the source of borrowing that has been proposed for aAgsw turns out to
be problematic upon closer inspection, both semantically and phonologically.145
While in the absence of an inner-Egyptian derivation the aAgsw may well be a
loanword, the date of its borrowing therefore remains unclear.

138 Jäger 2004: 131, n.2.

139 HannLex 5: 2526c (#34456). Ipuwer 8.10 and 8.12 are generally read with qnqn, but this is better
read as wnm (§2.6.2.4, (ii)). An indirect attestation of the non-technical meaning is perhaps found
in some derivatives (HannLex 5: 2526c-2527a: #49947 and #34472).
140 Jäger 2004: 131, n.2.
141 Discussions in Seibert 1967: 134-6; Quack 1992: 63, n.c.; Jäger 2004: 74, 76-7, 137, 139.
142 Hoch 1994: 82, #102.
143 I thank Kai Widmaier (p.c. 5/2011) for discussion of the issue.
144 For Kheti 9.3, this is also explicitly the impression expressed by Jäger (2004: 74): ‘Wenn auch die
genaue Bedeutung dieses Ausdrucks (scil. aAgsw, AS) nicht klar ist, so kann wohl doch am
überlieferten Text festgehalten werden, zumal es wie im Vers zuvor um Kleidung gehen dürfte.’
145 I thank Thomas Schneider (p.c. 8/2011) for the following comment: ‘Hoch befürwortet die
Etymologie von Helck für den Lautstand des NR, aber die Etymologie kann nicht richtig sein. Das
Wort (scil. the source for the borrowing proposed by Hoch, AS) bezeichnet nicht das Flechten von
Textilien, sondern moralische „Verdrehtheit“ – mit einem Gürtel hat das kaum etwas zu tun.
Ausserdem besteht ein Problem mit der Wiedergabe des Sibilanten.’

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 475

6.2.2.6.4 Dating Kheti

In the above, the two pieces of lexical evidence mentioned last are perhaps indicative
of a late dating but remain ultimately uncertain in interpretation (§6.2.2.6.3): in good
method, they are better left out of consideration.
A. Different is the case of the construction in Kheti 1.3 ist rf sw m xntyt (§6.2.2.6.2).
In its various relevant dimensions (textual function, selection of verbal forms), the
construction is not documented in the Middle Kingdom. It is, on the other hand,
documented in the early Eighteenth Dynasty, in all relevant details. Moreover,
Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian demonstrably uses another verbal construction in a
comparable environment with the exact same types of events, and does so for reasons
that can be explained on principled semantic grounds. In addition, the rise of the con-
struction as documented in the early Eighteenth Dynasty can be related to changes in
the functions of isT itself, also on principled semantic grounds. In a conservative
assessment, the construction in Kheti 1.3 therefore implies a post-Twelfth Dynasty
date of composition.
Whether the construction more narrowly points to an early Eighteenth Dynasty
date of composition is bound to remain slightly uncertain as far as direct attestation is
concerned: as so often, the low density of the Second Intermediate Period written
record is critical. The exact parallels found in the early Eighteenth Dynasty are
suggestive, however.
B. Such analysis of Kheti 1.1-2.1 is consistent with the analysis made before of the
construction in Kheti 3.5-6, tw sDm (§5.3; §5.3.2.2 for its use in Kheti). On strict
linguistic grounds, this implies a terminus ante quem non by mid-Thirteenth Dynasty
for Kheti. This is a type-B ante quem non: the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty is the earliest
moment in time for which based on the evidence available it can not be ruled out that
the construction may have become possible, not necessarily the earliest moment in
time when it actually was
Based on additional considerations to do with the literary nature of tw sDm, the
construction in Kheti 3.5-6 seems indicative of an early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon,
but this can not be proven beyond doubt (§6.2.2.6.1.B).
C. Kheti thereby includes two constructions that both point to a type-B terminus ante
quem non by the early, or mid-Thirteenth Dynasty, respectively. As also discussed,
both constructions are integral to the original text of the composition. In addition, both
constructions individually suggest that a dating to the early Eighteenth Dynasty is
more likely.
As a recent study, not concerned with dating, demonstrates in details, Kheti reads
well in an early New Kingdom context.146 In terms of literary history, the type of
literary discourse first exemplified by Kheti was to enjoy considerable popularity in
Ramesside ‘Berufstypologien’,147 itself part of a broader then developing ‘scribal

146 Widmaier 2013.

147 Jäger 2004.

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 476 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

literature’.148 Although no argument is here taken on these levels, it may be observed

that a very late dating of Kheti, as suggested by language, would fit this horizon well.

6.2.2.7 Interim summary

Early attestations of tw with non-dynamic events (§6.2.2.4) are all from texts that
based on independent arguments have a terminus ante quem non no earlier than the
Thirteenth Dynasty (Neferti, Ipuwer, Kheti, Hymn, the long version of Loyaliste).
Moreover, the relevant linguistic innovation was analyzed as stage II of a change of
which stage I can itself be dated precisely to the mid-Twelfth Dynasty (§6.2.2.3). The
pattern of attestation of the overall change is therefore consistent, suggesting that
stage II of this change was not reached before—and probably not later than—the late
Twelfth Dynasty.
To strengthen the argument further, one additional step is taken in the next
section. This consists in demonstrating that some other construction was consistently
used in the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty when the reference of the main participant of a
non-dynamic event was to be left unspecified.

6.2.3 Functional counterparts of tw-marked forms with non-dynamic events in

early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian

In the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian, various constructions serve as the

functional counterparts of tw-marked constructions with non-dynamic events. (That
these functional counterparts should be more than one is almost a direct consequence
of the definition of ‘functional counterpart relationship’ itself.) However, not all of
these constructions are equally relevant for appreciating Amenemhat, a literary text.

6.2.3.1 Actor nominalization of the event

In general terms, tw-marked constructions may be conceived of as serving to leave the
reference of the first, or sole, nuclear participant of an event unspecified. It comes as
no surprise, therefore, that actor nominalization can provide one functional counter-
part to tw-marked constructions with non-dynamic events:
Beni Hassan I 8, 19-20 (Urk. VII 16, 8-11; Ameny, temp. Senwosret I)
iw xpr.n rnpwt Hqrw
aHa.n skA.n=i AHwt nbt nt mA-HD (...)
n xpr HqrA2-A1 im=f
‘Years of hunger occurred.
I cultivated all fields in the Oryx-nome (...)
No one happened to be hungry therein.’149

The construction is broadly related to, yet different from, the construction nn +
participle. The latter is common throughout Middle Egyptian with all types of events,

148 Widmaier 2013: §4; Ragazzoli 2010.

149 An interpretation as an actor nominalization—rather than as a subjectless construction (§6.2.3.3) or
an event nominalization (e.g. §6.2.2.1, (iii))—is imposed by the ‘seated man’ semogram (A1).

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 477

expressing non-existence. E.g., in the same sequence, BH I 8, 19 (Urk. VII 16, 6-7)
(...) nn wn mAr n hAw=i nn Hqr n rk=i (...) ‘(...) there was no wretched one in my
surroundings; there was no hungry one in my time (...)’ (the last of a series of seven
statements of negative existence: BH I, 18-19; Urk. VII 16, 1-7). In the passage
quoted above, by contrast, the actor-nominalized event is the subject of a predicate
expressing non-occurrence (n xpr) and thereby part of the main narrative chain. Only
this construction can be viewed as a functional counterpart to tw-marked constructions
with non-dynamic events.

6.2.3.2 Active construction with a non-specified subject s ‘a man’

The non-specified reference of the main participant of the event can also be realized
by inserting s ‘a man’ in the subject slot. In this construction—syntactically an active
one—s is interpreted non-referentially:

(i) Mentuwoser (temp. Senwosret I), 11-12

n sDr s Hqrw r dmi=i
‘The night was not spent hungry in my town.’

A. A very brief digression is here in order. The active construction with s ‘a man’ is
regular in Middle Egyptian of all periods, whenever the non-specified subject is an
antecedent to a subsequent anaphoric reference. In such cases, the construction with s
also provides the functional counterpart to a tw-marked form, because tw can not
generally support a subsequent anaphoric reference.150 Compare, directly following
each other:

(ii) Debate 109-111

Dd=i n m min
sxar s m sp=f bin
ssbt=f bw-nb iw=f Dw
‘To whom can I speak today?
When someone causes anger by their bad deed,
they make everyone laugh even though it (scil. their bad deed) is evil.’

(iii) Debate 111-113

Dd=i n m min
iw HaDA.tw
s nb Hr iTt snw=f
‘To whom can I speak today?
There is plundering,
everybody robbing their brothers.’

In both (ii) and (iii), the events sxar and HaDA are passivizable, since they fulfill the
condition of having an agentive participant in their semantic representation. In (iii), the

150 For an altogether exceptional case where tw seems to function as the antecedent to a subsequent
anaphoric reference, Ptahhotep 343 (§2.4.3.2, (xviii)).

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 478 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

non-specified agent is not an antecedent to a subsequent anaphoric reference and a

construction with tw is used (HaDA.tw). In (ii), by contrast, the non-specified agent of
sxar is an antecedent to a subsequent anaphoric reference (=f in sp=f, then in ssbt=f ),
preventing the use of tw with sxar. The active construction with s ‘a man’ is then made
recourse to.
B. While formally identical, the construction in (i) differs from the one in (ii). In the
latter, the event is passivizable and the avoidance of tw is solely dictated by the
subsequent anaphoric reference, as is directly shown by the contrast with (iii). In (i),
there is no subsequent anaphoric reference and the construction with s is selected
because sDr ‘lie’, a non-dynamic event, does not fulfill the semantic condition for
passivization. Accordingly, the construction with s is another functional counterpart of
tw-marked constructions for non-dynamic events.

6.2.3.3 Subjectless active construction

The non-specified nature of the first participant can be realized by a subjectless con-
struction, also syntactically active. This is the very same construction that was already
noted above to provide the functional counterpart to non-agentive dynamic events in
the early Twelfth Dynasty (before stage I of the overall change: §6.2.2.3, (v)). With
non-dynamic events (before stage II of the change), compare:

(i) Ptahhotep 10 P
sDr=ø n=f Xdr ra nb
‘Because of it one lies anguished, every day.’
The passage has caused considerable philological difficulties, to New Kingdom
editors of the text151 and to modern readers alike.152 Various issues are at play.
(a) By lack of an alternative possibility, the antecedent of =f must be sought in 9
iHw ‘weakness’ (or, equivalently, in the overall series of negative qualities
described in the preceding verses: 8-9 tni, iAw, wgg, iHw).153 Compare the similar
construction in 17 qs mn n=f n Aw ‘the bone aches because of it continuously.’
(b) The reading Xdr, which has often been emended into Xrd ‘be a child’, is
supported by the spelling (both the ordering of phonograms and the ‘bad bird’
semogram (G 37)). The word is paralleled in Eloquent Peasant B1 169-170, in a
context that also tells of anguish: (...) Xdr.kw m hAw ir Dr=k ‘(...) for I am
anguished at your very side!’
(c) With n=f referring to the cause of the situation and Xdr expressing ‘anguish’ or
the like, three possibilities remain for interpreting the verse:

151 Both extant New Kingdom versions, L2 and C, reinterpreted the verse as well as moved it (to D
15); see Burkard 1977: 193-4.
152 See the great many translations and associated interpretations gathered in Dils et al., TLA, with full
references.
153 A reading of 10 as ‘weil man (< er) sich täglich verjüngend die Nacht verbracht hat’ (Junge 2003:
188) is not possible because an anaphoric pronoun can not have indefinite reference in Earlier
Egyptian. An interpretation as ‘Das Schlafen fällt ihm schwer jeden Tag’ (Burkard 1977: 193-4) is
not possible either, due to the context and the lack of an antecedent to =f in this reading.

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 479

- () sDr is a participle, subject to Xdr, itself a pseudoparticiple: ‘The one

spending the night for it is anguished every day’;
- () sDr is a mrr=f form, with Xdr, a participle, as its subject: ‘The anguished
one is lying because of it every day’;
- () sDr is a subjectless mrr=f form and Xdr a pseudoparticiple embedded in a
secondary predication: ‘Because of it one lies anguished, every day.’
Of the above, () and () are to be rejected, because the syntax would imply that
the prepositional phrase relates to sDr, not to Xdr. This stands in contradiction
with the fact that n=f, in reference to the evils of old age just described (8-9) is
semantically the source of ‘anguish’, not of the lying position. Although not quite
as directly, there is also a stylistic objection to both () and (): these readings
would place a human participant (sDr, respectively Xdr) in subject position, at
complete variance with the overall tenor of the broader passage (Ptahhotep 7-27),
which is oriented on situations (tni, iAw, wgg, iHw, pHty, bw-nfr, dpt, bin) or on
body parts (irty, anxwy, rA, ib, qsw, fndw), not on human participants. This leaves
reading () as the only possibility.
Equivalently, now phrased in positive terms, the argument runs as follows.
Syntactically, n=f can only have scope over sDr (compare the position of the
prepositional phrase, before Xdr, not after it). Semantically, however, n=f is the
source of Xdr. To resolve the apparent paradox, Xdr must itself be embedded into
a higher clause, of which sDr must then be the predicate.
A construction of sDr with a non-specified subject (differently realized) on
which a pseudoparticiple is dependent as a secondary predicate is well paralleled,
e.g. Mentuwoser 11-12 n sDr s Hqrw (...) (§6.2.3.2, (i)); Neferti 9c nn sDr.tw Hqr
(...) (§6.2.2.4, (v)).

(ii) Sinuhe B 59
n rD.n=f HmsA17=øA1-PLUR HA ib=f
‘He does not allow that one rests around his heart.’
The sequence <A1-PLUR> was secondarily inserted in B, which apparently reads
as ‘resteners’ (actor-nominalization).154 That the original construction is subject-
less is imposed by the following considerations. (a) All later witnesses (R, G,
AOS: above, §6.2.1.2, (v)) have the subjectless construction, suggesting that the
semograms were inserted by the B-scribe. (b) The whole passage is verbally
composed, compare in particular the contrast aHa – Hmsi in B 55-59:
ia-Hr pw tSA wpwt n aHa.n.tw m hAw=f (...)
wmt-ib pw mAA=f aSAt n rD.n=f Hms=ø HA ib=f
‘He is vengeful, a smasher of foreheads, one can not maintain one’s position
in his presence (...);
He is stout-hearted when he sees the multitude; he does not allow that one
rests around his heart.’

154 Parkinson 2009: 283.

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 480 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

(iii) Debate 108

Htp=ø Hr bin
‘There is contentment about evil.’
This is the reading adopted by the initial editors of the text155 and in most recent
treatments thereof.156 Other interpretations that have been proposed are: () Htp Hr
bin ‘the bad face is satisfied’ (a nfr sw construction) and () Htp-Hr bin ‘the one
happy of face is evil’ (a subject – pseudoparticiple construction).157 Reading ()
is ruled out by the contrast of bin with bw nfr in the next verse,158 as well as by
the bizarreness of the formulation that would result under such reading.159
Reading () sets a posited Htp-Hr in parallel to nxt-Hr in the preceding verse,160
but also results in a bizarre idiom,161 as well as in a meaning that is awkward
when the broader context is taken into account.

(iv) Debate 123-124

iw Sw=ø m aq-ib
‘There is a lack of intimates.’
Two interpretations are possible in theory, both with subjectless constructions:
() iw Sw=ø m aq-ib (a subjectless sDm=f as in (i)-(iii)) and () iw ø Sw m aq-ib (a
subjectless subject – pseudoparticiple construction). As far as the context goes,
both these interpretations are equally possible.162 However, the constructional
semantics of a subjectless – pseudoparticiple construction iw ø nfr(w) ‘it (scil. the
situation) is good’ would imply a basic meaning of Debate 123-124 along the
lines of: ?!‘It (scil. the here described situation) is free of intimates.’ This makes
reading () highly unlikely, probably impossible.

The above examples establish subjectless active constructions as yet another func-
tional counterpart of tw-marked constructions with non-dynamic events.

6.2.3.4 Formulaic language in inscriptional registers?

Among the passages presented above, Mentuwoser 11-12 and BH I 8, 20 (Ameny)
have formulations tightly similar to ones in Neferti and Amenemhat. The inscriptional
texts are from the reign of Senowsret I, the very period to which Neferti and
Amenemhat have often been dated as well. In closely comparable formulations, the
texts securely dated to the early Twelfth Dynasty consistently avoid tw with non-
dynamic events, while the ones to be dated consistently use it. Contrast:

155 De Buck 1947: 28; Faulkner 1956: 38, n.90

156 E.g. Allen 2011: 92; Dils et al., TLA.
157 Full references in Allen 2011: 92; Dils et al., TLA.
158 Allen 2011: 92.
159 Dils et al., TLA: ‘man fragt sich jedoch, ob das Böse in der ägyptischen Bildsprache ein Gesicht
hat.’
160 See however Allen 2011: 91 for the possibility of an alternative reading of the latter.
161 Dils et al., TLA: ‘(...) normalerweise das Herz und nicht das Gesicht zufrieden ist.’
162 Compare, respectively, 112 iw HaDA.tw ‘There is plundering’ and 107 iw sf Aq ‘Mercy has perished.’

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 481

(i) Mentuwoser 11-12 – temp. Senwosret I:

n sDr s hqrw r dmi=i (‘The night was not spent hungry in my town.’)

(ii) Neferti 9c – temp. ?:

nn sDr.tw Hqr n m(w)t (‘The night will not be spent starving to death.’)163

(iii) BH I 8, 20 (Ameny) – temp. Senwosret I:

n xpr Hqr im=f (‘No one happened to be hungry therein.’)

(iv) Amenemhat 11c – temp. ?:

n Hqr.tw m rnpwt=i (‘One was not hungry in my years.’)

This suggests that Neferti and Amenemhat are later than the reign of Senwosret I to
which Mentuwoser and Ameny date. However, language in inscriptional self-
presentations can be formulaic to various degrees, with the practical effect that the
date of inscription (here Senwosret I) can not be equated with the actual linguistic age
of a formula. Strict methodological caution therefore requires that the evidence from
inscriptional registers be appreciated as circumstantial only, adding up to the evidence
found in literary registers themselves (the next section).

6.2.3.5 Functional counterparts in early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty literary texts

A. In the same period, literary texts—Ptahhotep, Sinuhe, Debate164—themselves
consistently avoid tw-marked constructions with non-dynamic events. In these texts, a
subjectless active construction is always used when the main participant of a non-
dynamic event is to be left unspecified (§6.2.3.3, (i)-(iv)). This establishes the
following counterpart relationship for intransitive events in early/mid-Twelfth Dy-
nasty literary registers of Middle Egyptian:

Early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian:

Intransitives with non-specified reference of their main participant
Dynamic: pr.tw
mwt=ø (... – early D.12)  mwt.tw (mid-D.12 – ...)
Non-dynamic: sDr=ø

163 Neferti 9e also has s with a non-dynamic event. Unlike in Mentuwoser 11-12, this is due to the
subsequent anaphoric reference: Hms s r qaH=f sA=f ‘One will sit bowing their back’; for this
construction, §6.2.3.2.A.
164 As discussed, Ptahhotep dates to a period from the late Eleventh to the mid-Twelfth Dynasty;
within this range, the Twelfth Dynasty is more likely (§2.4.3.3). Sinuhe and Debate of a Man and
His Soul both have the same terminus post quem non by Amenemhat III (on the date of the Berlin
Library, Parkinson 2009: 76). The former text was probably composed later than the reign of
Senwosret I himself because some time is required for historical events to be turned into the setting
of a fictional work. As to Debate, Allen’s (2011: 121) dating to the ‘first half of Dynasty XII’ is
based on Vernus’ post quem non criterion, which can not be upheld (§2.6.3); the place of Debate in
the Twelfth Dynasty therefore remains unclear.

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 482 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

Internally to individual texts, this counterpart relationship is illustrated by the follow-

ing contrasts:

(i) Ptahhotep
293 P pr.tw Hr irt=f (...) ‘One will renounce applying it (...)’165
10 P sDr=ø n=f Xdr ra nb ‘Because of it one lies anguished, every
day.’

(ii) Sinuhe
Aq/B 1 nis.n.tw n wa im (...) ‘One among them was summoned
(...)’166
B 59 n rD.n=f Hms=ø HA ib=f ‘He does not allow that one rests around
his heart.’
Sim., directly echoing each other, B 55-59:
(...) n aHa.n.tw m hAw=f
(...) n rD.n=f Hms=ø HA ib=f
‘(...) one can not maintain one’s position in his presence;
(...) he does not allow that one rests around his heart.’
(For aHa.n.tw as implying an agent, §6.2.2.2, (iv).)

(iii) Debate, Second Litany (108-125)

Dd=i n m min Htp=ø Hr bin (...)
Dd=i n m min iw HaDA.tw (...)
Dd=i n m min n sxA.t(w) sf
n ir.t(w) n ir m tA At (...)
Dd=i n m min iw Sw=ø m aq-ib
inn.tw m xmm r srxt n=f (...)
‘To whom can I speak today? There is contentment about evil, (...)
To whom can I speak today? There is plundering, (...)
To whom can I speak today? Yesterday has not been remembered,
there has been no acting in this time for the
one who acted. (...)
To whom can I speak today? There is a lack of intimates,
one resorts even to an unknown man to
complain to him (...)’

165 Sim. e.g 480 n wh.n.tw m SA sw ‘One can not escape from who has fated it’; 586 swA.t(w) Hr spw=f
(...) ‘His deeds will be passed over (...)’.
166 Sim. e.g. B 38 wHm.tw n=i ‘it was reported to me’; B 40-41 n psg.t[w r Hr]=i ‘my face had not
been spat upon’; etc.

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 6.2 Amenemhat 11c-d: &w with non-dynamic events 483

B. Against the background of the change discussed in the present section, the
grammar of Amenemhat 11c-d is then sited as follows:

(a) Physical and mental states

Amenemhat 11c n Hqr.tw m rnpwt=i
n ib.tw im
Neferti 9c (...).tw Hqr
Ipuwer 2.10 ib.tw

early/mid-D.12 literary: Htp=ø Hr bin (Debate 108)

(early D.12 inscriptional:
n xpr Hqr im=f (BH I 8, 20; Ameny))

(b) Bodily positions

Amenemhat 11d iw Hms.tw (...)
Ipuwer 5.11 Hms.tw
Kheti 25.3 Hms.tw
Neferti 9c sDr.tw

early/mid-D.12 literary: n rD.n=f Hms=ø HA ib=f (Sinuhe B 59)

sDr=ø n=f Xdr ra nb (Ptahhotep 10 P)
(early D.12 inscriptional:
n sDr s Hqrw r dmi=i (Mentuwoser 11-12))

And further, beyond Amenemhat, e.g. events of ‘lacking’

Neferti 7f gA.tw xnrt
Hymn 5.2 gAw.tw r
Loyaliste 9.9 gAw.tw r
Ipuwer 10.6 Sw.tw m

early/mid-D.12 literary: iw Sw=ø m aq-ib (Debate 123-124)

In short, the tw-marked forms in Amenemhat 11c-d are not early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty
literary Middle Egyptian.

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 484 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

6.3 Possible indications

Other elements in Amenemhat could be suggestive for dating. While these do not have
full conclusive force in themselves, they are worth discussing within an overall
assessment of the linguistic typology of the composition.

6.3.1 Interpreting a linguistic selection: Amenemhat 15c twt

The closing section of Amenemhat has an instance of the old independent pronoun:
Amenemhat 15a-c
mk ir.n=i HAta Ts=i n=k pHwy
ink mni n=kb nty m ib=i
twtc wAH HDt (nd) prt-nTr
‘See, I have made the beginning so that I can tie the end for you.
I have come to harbor for you, my heart’s desire;e
You nowf wear the White Crown of the offspring of the god.’
a) The word is not preserved in P. Millingen. Among Ramesside witnesses, three have HAt
while six have Xr-HAt. The former is probably original in view of the balancing HAt –
pHwy.167 The latter reading is coherent as well: ‘I have acted before (...)’.
b) The verse is not preserved in P. Millingen. The dative phrase n=k is missing in some
witnesses.
c) The beginning of 15c, lost in P. Millingen, is preserved only in Ramesside witnesses. That
twt is original is implied by the two balanced focus constructions in 15b-c ink mni (...) twt
wAH (...) ‘I (scil. Amenemhat) have come to harbor (...); you (scil. Senwosret) wear (...)’.
To Ramesside readers, the twt-headed cleft construction often proved difficult, as shown
by its reinterpretation into a ‘Present I’-type construction in some witnesses
(§2.3.4.1, (v)).
d) N (written with the sign for negation, D35) is only in P. Millingen. With or without n, prt-
nTr could be genitival to HDt. Without n, prt-nTr could also be a vocative, echoing nty m
ib=i in 15b.
e) I read with mni intransitive and nty m ib=i in apposition to the dative n=k, referring to
Senwosret.168 Under a transitive reading of mni, nt{y}<t> m ib=i would refer to the old
king’s desire, ‘I alone have brought to harbour my heart’s desire for you.’169
f) ‘Now’ as a rendering of the balanced focus constructions in 15b-c ink mni (...) twt wAH
(...).

The old independent pronouns twt and swt are uncommon in post-Coffin Text Middle
Egyptian and antiquated in the Middle Kingdom already. No post quem non criterion
indexed on linguistic change can here be derived: if one were, Amenemhat would pre-

167 Similarly Burkard 1977: 102, 309-10.

168 Similarly e.g. Gnirs 2013b: 145. Intransitive mni as an euphemism for passing away said of a king
also in Kagemni 2.7-8.
169 E.g. Parkinson 1997a: 208.

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 6.3 Possible indications 485

date the Middle Kingdom. Rather, the object of inquiry is the raison d’être for the
remarkable selection of an old independent pronoun rather than a common Middle
Egyptian one, ntk.

6.3.1.1 Old independent pronouns in post-Coffin Text Middle Egyptian

In post-Coffin Text Middle Egyptian, occurrences of the old independent pronouns
are in the following texts and types of texts:170

- MK, inscriptional: Chapelle Blanche n170; 253; 259;171

- MK, literary: Ptahhotep 398 L1172 (P reads differently173);
- Early D.18, royal: in the Royal Cycle, as part of a broader repertoire
of archaizing expressions: common (§4.7.1);
(for the dating of the Cycle to Hatshepsut, §4.7);
- Early D.18, private: Senemiah (temp. Hatshepsut), 18 (Urk. IV
503, 17):174 see below, NB;
- Early NK, funerary: in Book of the Dead: not uncommon;175
in Netherworld Books documented from the early
NK on, alongside other archaizing expressions:
not uncommon;176
- Probably early D.18: Berlin Leather Roll 2.9;
(for the dating, probably to the early Eighteenth
Dynasty, §4.2; in 2.9 itself, note the late rA-Hry
(§4.2.4, (i)): Twt rA-Hry n-s=imy ‘Thou are the
chief thereof.’);
- Dating uncertain: Hymns to the Diadem (1.5; 19.3; 20.2);
(manuscript dating to the late SIP/early D.18;177
date of composition unclear, possibly recent178).

170 P. MMA 27.3.560 (letter of Tit to Djehuti, temp. Hatshepsut), 2-3 has been quoted as one further
instance of twt, in an early Eighteenth Dynasty documentary register (Brunner 19862: 175, n.3;
Vernus 1990a: 65, n.33). As Joachim Quack points out (p.c. 6/2010), this remains uncertain and
another interpretation is probably to be preferred (§2.7.3.2, (iv)).
171 Lacau & Chevrier 1956: 73, 93, 95.
172 %wt kA DD mrwt ‘He is the ka, who gives love.’
173 KAw pw r(w)d mrwt ‘Growing love is sustenance.’
174 The interpretation of the passage is difficult: swt pw wnn iSst iry(=i) D=f r HAt. Vernus (2006: 165,
ex.90 and n.143) reads: ‘le fait est que c’était bien lui celui qui avait disposition et propension à
agir (litt.: celui qui existait “quoi? je vais agir?”) si bien qu’il se portait en avant.’ Gardiner (EG
§500.5: ‘we can only guess (...)’) proposed: ‘He was one who, whatever was done, advanced (the
matter)’.
175 See TLA #130830.
176 Werning 2013: #8.
177 Erman (1911: 6) notes paleographical similarity with P. Westcar, P. Rhind Mathematical, and
P. Ebers.

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 486 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

NB. The occurrence of an old independent pronoun in Senemiah, a private

inscription, is singular. The pronoun is here as well in reference to Hatshepsut and
thereby indexical in context. Senemiah significantly includes a mention of the
queen’s expedition to Punt;179 Punt Expedition is among Hatshepsutian compositions
to have the same pronouns. Senemiah accommodates other tokens of a high linguistic
elaboration. Among these are instances of the construction N sDm.n in complex
sequences: as N sDm.n sDm.n (14 (Urk. IV 501, 15-16)) and as N pseudoparticiple
sDm.n (twice: 11 (Urk. IV 500, 9-10); 12 (Urk. IV 501, 4-5)). The construction
N sDm.n is documented in specific high registers of the Middle Kingdom (§1.2, (xi);
in a variant, §2.4.3.3.A), then in the early Eighteenth Dynasty again, notably in
Chapelle Rouge, p.98: I.2-3 (HHBT II 7, 11: §3.4.4, (iii); §4.3.2.1, (v)); p.120: V.7-8
(HHBT II 19, 2: §3.4.4, (iv)).180 Noteworthy in Senemiah are also instances of the
reduplicated passive participles in 11 (Urk. IV 500, 8; 500, 12). In the early
Eighteenth Dynasty, these recur notably in Punt Expedition (§2.7.2.1, (ii)). Very
remarkable is finally 21 (Urk. IV 505, 4) snktkt. As emerges from a study of ktkt,181
snktkt is probably a neologistic formation, based on a long obsolete derivational
pattern.182 In the early Eighteenth Dynasty, this formation is exceedingly rare; it
recurs in Hatshepsutian compositions (snbAbA: Chapelle Rouge, p.107: III.6-7
(HHBT II 11, 14/15-16), see §4.1.2.B; sim. Urk. IV 260, 1 niwiw). The singular
selection of the old independent pronoun in Senemiah thus accords with other
selections in this composition (N sDm.n; reduplicated passive participles; (s-)n-
ABAB), all pointing to the same Hatshepsutian horizon.

178 While no attempt at a linguistic dating of Hymns to the Diadem can be undertaken in the present
study, a few elements noted in passing may be mentioned. Regarding the old independent
pronouns themselves, the masculine form twt is consistently used even though a feminine entity is
always addressed: 1.5-2.1 twt nbt xaw ‘Thou are the Lady of crowns’; 19.2-3 in.n sbk Sdty Hr hry-ib
iwnw irt=f twt Hat.n nTrw m-xt=s (...) ‘Sobek of Crocodilopolis, Horus who presides over
Heliopolis, has gotten his Eye—Thou—behind which the gods have rejoiced (...)’; 20.2-3 twt it
n=f mAa-xrw ‘It is Thou who seizes triumph to him.’ That twt, not Tmt, is used speaks for paradigm
reduction, and therefore points to a time when the obsolescence of the old pronouns was well
under way, certainly after the Old Kingdom. The use of masculine forms for feminine referents is
directly paralleled in Hatshepsutian texts (see above). The text also includes various instances of
the formal pwy demonstratives: irt twy nt Hr (1.1; 5.5-6.1); rn=t pwy n iart (10.2), rn=ssic pwy n
qbHyt (10.3), rn=s pwy n sxmty (11.3). Pwy demonstratives are first attested in the Twelfth
Dynasty and their documentation remains sparse throughout the Middle Kingdom. They recur in
Cheops’ Court (§2.4.4.6, (iii)), then in the early New Kingdom. In the latter, they are fairly
common in some registers, thus in Book of the Dead and in some early Thutmoside inscriptions to
do with kingship, notably of the times of Thutmosis III. In Hymns to the Diadem, the formal pwy
demonstratives are used alongside the also formal pw demonstratives (the latter in 16.3; 19.1; 2; 3;
5). A similar constellation is observed in Book of the Dead and in some Thutmoside inscriptions.
The above comments are not to belittle the very real possibility that Hymns to the Diadem may
have drawn on much earlier textual material, possibly abundantly so. They only suggest that the
composition in its present form may be fairly recent, particularly as regards the matter here of
interest, pronouns.
179 Enmarch 2007: 77, n.h.
180 Close in time are further Thutmosis II’s Aswan Inscription 6 (Urk. IV 138, 14) and Rekhmire 5
(Urk. IV 1073, 4): both quoted above, §1.2, (xi.).
181 Vernus in press: §5.1.
182 Discussion by Vernus 2009a: 305; Stauder 2013: §6.5.

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 6.3 Possible indications 487

The early New Kingdom is distinguished by a strikingly higher density of occur-

rences: the difference with the Middle Kingdom is too marked for this to be accounted
for simply by the fact that more texts have survived from the early New Kingdom. On
the other hand, the presence of swt in Ptahhotep 398 L1 demonstrates that the old
independent pronoun was not entirely unknown to Middle Kingdom littérateurs either.
In making sense of the selection of the independent pronoun in Amenemhat 15c, an
interpretive approach is therefore required, both of the pattern of attestation of the old
independent pronouns and of Amenemhat 15c itself.

6.3.1.2 Interpretation
A. In the Middle Kingdom, occasional uses of the old independent pronoun in
Chapelle Blanche partake to general archaizing tendencies of this monument, also
observed on other levels such as orthography. As to Ptahhotep 398 L1, this remains
isolated in the whole body of Middle Kingdom literature and is accordingly difficult
to interpret; in the lack of any better explanation, swt may perhaps relate to archaizing
tendencies characteristic of Ptahhotep on other levels as well (§2.4.3.2, (xiii);
§2.4.3.3.B). In literature, pronouns of the recent series (ntk, ntf ) are regularly used
otherwise, including in an address to the king (Sinuhe B 232-233 ntk is Hbs Axt tn ‘For
it is you who veils this horizon.’).
In the early Eighteenth Dynasty, by contrast, the old independent pronouns
experience a textual revival in two types of texts mainly, funerary literature and texts
to do with royal ideology and legitimization. Both define associations that are of a
rather more specific nature than mere archaism.
B. In Amenemhat, the old independent pronoun is in the closing section, which has
strong funerary overtones. &wt is used just after mni ‘come to harbor’ (15b) and just
before the old king’s descending into the Sun-barque (15e hA.n=i m wiA n ra).
The funerary dimension is salient throughout the composition, with various echoes
of motifs or expressions that are best paralleled in the Book of the Dead. These
include sA-tA ‘worm’ as a being the deceased is likened to or identified with (6f; cf.
Book of the Dead 87 Nu 3);183 sTA, a rare expression for ‘attack, attempt’ (8a; cf. Book
of the Dead 17 Nu 75; 84);184 and xpS, a recherché designation of the ‘Great Bear’, for
common msxtiw (10c, cf. Book of the Dead 17 Nu 47).185 As mentioned, the textual
revival that the old independent pronouns experience in the early New Kingdom
concerns notably the Book of the Dead.
C. The old independent pronouns are also common in Hatshepsutian texts to do with
royal ideology and legitimization.186 The subject is mostly, although not exclusively,
the queen herself. The association with rising to kingship is given by the contents of

183 Parkinson 2002: 244, observing: ‘(...) this image may evoke the potential crises of the solar cycle:
in the later Book of the Dead spell 87, the deceased wishes to identify himself with a ‘worm’
which ‘sleeps and is (re)born daily’, like the Sungod (...)’. The author further notes the contrast
with CT VII 98i, where the sA-tA worm is presented as an enemy (n.7).
184 Gnirs 2013b: 147.
185 Gnirs 2013b: 147.
186 For a discussion in terms of the repertoires these pronouns relate to, §4.7.1.

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 488 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

these texts, and in some places directly expressed: Urk. IV 221, 14 swt HqA.t=s(y)
tAwy187 ‘She is the one who will rule the Dual Land’; Urk. IV 229, 12 twt nsw itt xa Hr
st Hr n anxw Dt ‘Thou are a king who seizes having risen on the seat of Horus of the
living, eternally.’188 The association with kingship recurs in Berlin Leather Roll 2.9
Twt rA-Hry n-s=imy ‘Thou are the chief thereof.’
In Amenemhat 15c, twt is in an address by a father to his son who is to rise to
kingship, just as in Hatshepsutian texts (the divine father speaking to the queen). In
the closing section of Amenemhat, twt occurs alongside a series of expressions (15a
HAt, pHwy; 15b mni; 15c prt-nTr) that recur in Ineni’s account of Hatshepsut’s acces-
sion to the throne (Urk. IV 60, 5-8).189 In the two examples from Hatshepsut’s Royal
Cycle quoted above, HqA and xai are textually associated with the old independent
pronouns; in Amenemhat, the same expressions are in the opening address to
Senwosret (1d), while the old independent pronoun is in the closing address (15c),
thus framing the composition.190
D. The above identifies a specific configuration of written language in which the
selection of twt in Amenemhat 15c makes sense. This horizon is effectively documen-
ted, the only one to be so, and semantically dense. While there is no way to fully
exclude other possibilities, this constellation seems suggestive.

6.3.2 Lexicon

Lexical evidence in Amenemhat is not plenty, nor is it expected to be given the

conciseness of the composition and the high amount of vocabulary shared with other
literary texts.191 Three expressions mentioned before would fit well into an early Eigh-
teenth Dynasty context, but no reliable indication for dating can be based on these
because the first two are indirectly attested in earlier times and all three are uncom-
mon: mTwn ‘(fighting) arena’ (5d: §2.2.2, (iii), (v)), mwnf ‘garrison’ (7b: §2.2.2, (iv)),
and nfr-ib ‘pleasure’ (6b; 14f: §2.2.2, (ix)). In literary texts, mwnf recurs only in
Neferti (7f), a composition for which a very late dating was argued to be likely (§5);
this lexical encounter may also be due to the shared contents to do with combat. More
remarkable is nfr-ib, which recurs in only one text overall, Teaching of Aametju (43:
§1.3.2.3, (v)): this text, an Eighteenth Dynasty composition, is relevant to Amenemhat
on non-linguistic levels as well.192 Of some significance are possibly also the three
afore mentioned expressions otherwise found in Book of the Dead: sA-tA ‘worm’ (as a
being the deceased is likened to or identified with: 6f), sTA ‘attack, attempt’ (8a), and

187 On the exceedingly rare cleft construction independent pronoun – sDm.t=f(y), §4, n.366.
188 Sim. Urk. IV 343, 10 Twt nsw itt tAwy HAt-Spswt-Xnm-imn ‘Thou are the king who seizes the Dual
Land, Hatshepsut-Khenemamun.’
189 Analyzed by Gnirs 2013b: 145; also below, §6.3.2.1.
190 Framing strategies are dense in Amenemhat, making the opening section (1) and the closing one
(15) resonate with one another in multiple ways. Beyond the above, also Gnirs 2013b: 144-5 and
below, §6.3.2.1. Further, Parkinson 2002: 242, on xai ‘rising’ (1d) echoed by hAi ‘descending’
(15e).
191 Konrad 1999; Lepper 2008: 253-61; further discussion by Gnirs 2013b: 147.
192 Gnirs 2013b: 142-4.

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 6.3 Possible indications 489

xpS, ‘Great Bear’ (10c) (§6.3.1.2.B).193 The last two, both rare, recur at a small
distance from each other in BD 17. Measured against the conciseness of the composi-
tion, such elements possibly pointing to a late lexical horizon are noteworthy:
collectively, they are perhaps suggestive, with the understanding that they of course
remain insufficient to support any firm claim in themselves.
Two further lexical expressions in Amenemhat are less subject to the usual
uncertainties associated with the lexicon and therefore merit individual discussion:
nsy ‘to rule’ (1d) and Hw-ny-r-Hr ‘combat’ (7b).194

6.3.2.1 Amenemhat 1d nsy ‘to rule’

Nsy ‘to rule’ is a denominative formation on nsw ‘king’. Another denominative
formation on the same noun is documented once in Pyramid Texts, swt(i) ‘be
kingly’:195 this is distinct, morphologically and semantically, from nsy ‘to rule’. The
latter, as in Amenemhat 1d, is not otherwise documented before the Eighteenth Dy-
nasty and is fairly common in the New Kingdom.196 Rather than nsy, pre-New King-
dom texts use other expressions for ‘to rule’, mostly HqA, also iri nsyt m ‘perform
kingship in’ and iri nsw ‘act as a king’.197
In Amenemhat, nsy is part of a formulary that is itself documented only in the New
Kingdom:198

193 Gnirs 2013b: 147.

194 On another expression, snnw anxw ‘living representations’ (5a), Gnirs 2013b: 141 and n.112;
Bickel 1994: 216; Blumenthal 1985: 106-7; Ockinga 1984: 52-6; Westendorf 1981. Refering to
mankind as a representation of the god, the expression is not found in any securely dated pre-New
Kingdom text; in Middle Egyptian literature, it recurs only in Merikare E 132, a composition for
which some indications could suggest an early Eighteenth Dynasty date of composition, yet not in
ways strong enough to support any definite conclusion (§2.8). The idea of the king as a ‘represen-
tation’ (snnt) of the god is more common, e.g. Thutmosis III’s Stèle Poétique 13 (Urk. IV 615, 2)
snn=i ‘my representation’ (sim. in Divine Birth, noted by Gnirs 2013b: 141, n.112); expressed
with other words, also e.g. Iykhernefert Neferhotep III’s Karnak Stela 9 (HHBT 45, 15) twt anx n
ra; Rahotep’s Coptos Decree 8 Xnty=f.
195 Pyr. §2169bN wr.t(i) mr nsw swt.t(i) mr ra ‘be great like the king, be kingly like Re’; also in the
parallel passage Pyr. §1343a-bP wr N pn mr nsw swty mr ra ‘This N is great like the king, kingly
like Re.’ (Faulkner’s (1969: 211, n.1) interpretation as ‘a nisba from swt’ is compatible with one as
a denominative, since denominatives can be nisba’s morphologically.)
196 ‘Belegt seit D.18’ according to DZA 29.820.090. Occurrences in inscriptional contexts include
Urk. IV 58, 16 (Ineni); 236, 5 (in a legend to Hatshepsut’s Royal Cycle in Deir el-Bahari); 372, 3
(Hatshepsut’s Karnak Obelisk); LD III 72, 18 (Klug 2002: 380; temp. Amenhotep III);
Tutankhamun’s Restoration Stela 26 (Urk. IV 2031, 7). In Ramesside times, also Mariette, Abydos,
App. B, tableau, Csic (temp. Sethi I); KRI II, 476, 7; van Dijk 1979: 23, 2 (in a Luxor Building
Inscription of Ramses III); DZA 29.820.860 (an inscription of Ramses III in Medinet Habu); DZA
29.820.850 (Stela Vienna 142). Beyond inscriptions, also DZA 29.820.760 (Amduat, sixth hour;
discussed by Gnirs 2013b: 147, n.154); Book of the Dead 17, in a gloss: pty sw ra m SAa=f hqAt
irt.n=f SAa ra pw nsw (...) (Lapp 2006: 12-4) ‘Who is he, Re when he begins to rule (hqA) what he
has created? This means that Re begins to rule (nsw) (...)’. The gloss, absent in CT 335 and still
lacking in queen Mentuhotep’s coffin (Thirteenth Dynasty), is first documented in early Eighteenth
Dynasty versions of the spell (in details, Bickel 2013a: 205-7).
197 E.g. Stela of Sankhenre Mentuhotepi 2 iri nsw ‘act as a king’; sim. 4; Cheops’ Court 10.13 iri nsyt
m ‘perform kingship in (...)’; sim. 10.21; 11.1.
198 Detailed analysis: Gnirs 2013b: 144-5.

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 490 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

(i) Amenemhat 1d-e

(...) nsy=k tA HqA=k idbw ir=k HAw Hr nfr
‘(...) and be king of the Land, rule the Banks, make an addition to the good.’

(ii) Urk. IV 58, 16 - 59, 1 (Ineni: accession of Thutmosis II)

(...) nsy=f kmt HqA=f dSrt it.n=f idbwy
‘(...) in order that he be king of the Black Land, that he rule the Red Land,
having seized the Two Banks (...)’
Sim. Mariette, Abydos, App. B, tableau, Csic (temp. Sethi I) nsy=k pt tA HqA=k
idbwy ir=k HAw Hr nfr ‘May you be king of heaven and earth, may you rule the
Two Banks, may you make an addition to the good.’

It can not be ruled out that such formulary existed in earlier times already, even if not
documented then in the extant record. The point here to be made then lies in the
conjunction of the two observations, nsy as part of such formulary and the pattern of
attestation of nsy as an expression in the lexicon. The word is not documented before
the early New Kingdom and is associated with a specific formulary in both
Amenemhat and early New Kingdom texts. As the meaning and textual distribution of
nsy suggest, the locus of its innovation can hardly have been in ordinary linguistic
interaction: like swt(i) ‘be kingly’ in much earlier times, the word is probably a
neologistic formation. Together, this points to nsy being a new word innovated
precisely in the context of such discourse about kingship, of which the formulary
would itself be another token.
This interpretation gains further substance in view of how another accession to the
throne is phrased in Ineni. A few lines after the accession of Thutmosis II (ii), the
accession of Hatshepsut is phrased with prt-nTr ‘the offspring of the god’, HAtt ‘bow
warp’ (of Upper Egypt), mnit ‘mooring post’ (of the southern countries), and pHwyt
‘stern warp’ (of the Delta) in close succession (Urk. IV 60, 5-8). Reinterpreted, the
same expressions recur in immediate collocation in the closing section of
Amenemhat:199 15a-c ‘See, I have made the beginning (HAt) so that I can tie the end
(pHwy) for you. I have come to harbor (mni) for you, my heart’s desire; You now wear
the White Crown of the offspring of the god (prt-nTr).’ @Att ‘bow warp’ and pHwyt
‘stern warp’ are thereby echoed as HAt ‘beginning’ and pHwy ‘end’, to express one
core theme of Amenemhat, sucession of the two kings (the allusion to the formulary is
strenghtened by Ts ‘tie’, said of pHwy, in Amenemhat 15a). Mnit ‘mooring post’ is
echoed as mni ‘come to harbor’, according with the strong funerary overtones of the
closing section of Amenemhat. Among the above, prt-nTr may itself not be docu-
mented before the early New Kingdom.200
Both in its opening and its closing sections, Amenemhat thus displays very signifi-
cant encounters with early Eighteenth Dynasty formulations of throne succession.
Nsy, an expression not documented before the early Eighteenth Dynasty, is itself
associated with such formulations in Amenemhat. Such framing function of the web of

199 In details, Gnirs 2013b: 144-5.

200 Gnirs 2013b: 145.

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 6.3 Possible indications 491

expressions of which nsy is part then also demonstrates that nsy is integral to the
original text of Amenemhat.

6.3.2.2 Amenemhat 7b Hw-ny-r-Hr ‘combat’

The word has a rich history consisting in successive processes of demotivation and
remotivation,201 the earlier stages of which are here of interest. The expression—
originally either ‘striking the face’ or ‘striking in front’—is first attested in the Middle
Kingdom. Already fully lexicalized, it then appears in the form Hwn-Hr (<H-n-Hr>202
and <H-n-HrA24>203). In a later stage of development, the same word appears as Hw-ny-
r-Hr (<HA24-ny-r-HrD40>, with variants). In securely dated texts, this stage is first
documented in the Eighteenth Dynasty, in Thutmosis III’s Gebel Barkal Stela 7 (Urk.
IV 1230, 13)204 and in Amenhotep II’s Amada Stela 3 (Urk. IV 1290, 11)205 and 7
(Urk. IV 1292, 7-8).206 Possibly earlier is an instance in Ipuwer (12.4), depending on
when this composition is dated.
Crucial for interpretation is the observation that the recent form of the word, Hw-
ny-r-Hr, is not merely the result of a graphic change, but also and mainly of a
morphological one. Changes leading to the newer form include: (a) graphic moderni-
zation:207 <H-n> > <H-ny>; (b) semantic reinterpretation or morphological moderniza-
tion:208 Hr > r-Hr; (c) semantic demotivation, leading to a new segmentation, itself
graphically reflected (Hwn > HwA24-ny).209 Of the above, (c) certainly, and (b)
possibly, are linguistic in nature.
Amenemhat 7b and Ipuwer 12.4 thereby have a recent form (in the linguistic
sense) of what in itself is an older word. While not securely documented before the
early New Kingdom, this new form of the word could have developed earlier, during
the Second Intermediate Period or even in the late Middle Kingdom: the low density
of the record does not permit to assess this further. It did not develop before, however,
since earlier Middle Kingdom instances of the same word come with a different
morphology.
This leaves the issue of assessing whether Hw-ny-r-Hr is integral to the original
text of Amenemhat or not. The expression is not merely a modern spelling of an old
word, but a morphologically new form of that word. Should Amenemhat have been
composed at a time when the old form of the word was in use, one must assume that

201 Detailed study by Vernus 2003a: 274-6, based on a rich documentation initially gathered in Wilson
1932. The following is largely inspired by Vernus’ analyses, except for Amenemhat 7b itself,
which the author does not mention.
202 Berlin 22820, 3.
203 Hatnub 26, 5.
204 The text as inscribed (hd tAw nbw m Hw tA r Hr=f ) makes no sense (see Klug 2002: 196, who
leaves it untranslated); Hw-ny!-r-Hr is read with a very minor emendation only (originally Barns
1972: 162; followed by Beylage 2002: 182, n.558).
205 Broken in the Elephantine duplicate.
206 Further DZA 26.647.690 (Luxor Hypostyl Hall; Amenhotep III); the expression is not uncommon
in Ramesside times, see TLA #650061.
207 Vernus 2003: 275.
208 Depending on whether Hr is originally a noun (‘face’) or an adverb (‘in front’), see Vernus 2003a:
274-5.
209 Vernus 2003: 275.

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 492 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

later scribes would have been aware of the historical relationship between Hwn-Hr(A24)
and HA24-ny-r-HrD40, a relationship patiently reconstructed by Egyptologists interested
in such matters. This is not entirely impossible, but unlikely.

NB. The two earliest securely dated occurrences of Hw-ny-r-Hr are in two texts—
Thutmosis III’s Gebel Barkal Stela and Amenhotep II’s Amada Stela—that resonate
with Amenemhat in further ways as well. As a standard formulation of royal progress,
the former text has Hsi210 (as in Amenemhat 10a) and both have ini Drw ‘reach the
limit’211 (as in Amenemhat 10c).212 Yet another standard expression in such texts is sp
mar,213 as in Amenemhat 7f which against such background can be read as reversing
the topical formulation:
Gebel Barkal Stela 20 (Urk. IV 1234, 14) sp mar xpr m-a=i im=sn ‘Success has
occurred on them through my agency.’
Amenemhat 7f nn xpr sp mar m-xmt mkw ‘Success will not occur without a
helper.’214
The encounter extends to the preceding verse, which sounds as a reversal of a related
topical formulation: Gebel Barkal Stela 4 (Urk. IV 1229, 14) nsw pw aHA wa ‘He is a
king who fights alone’; Amenemhat 7e nn aHA wa{t} ‘There is no one who could fight
alone.’215 This is one among various elements by which Amenemhat resonates with
early Thutmoside inscriptions.216

210 Gebel Barkal Stela 14-15 (Urk. IV 1232, 20); 36 (Urk. IV 1239, 4).
211 Gebel Barkal Stela 3 (Urk. IV 1229, 5); also Amada Stela 6-7 (Urk. IV 1292, 3-4).
212 That these are standard formulations in the early New Kingdom is shown by the fact that Hsi and
ini Drw tA recur alongside one another in other texts as well, e.g. Thutmosis I’s Tombos Stela 10
(Urk. IV 85, 4) and 11 (Urk. IV 85, 7), respectively. On the expression Drw tA in Amenemhat,
further Gnirs 2013b: 146-7.
213 Beyond the passage quoted below, indirectly (mar; wAH sp) also 26 (Urk. IV 1236, 8) and Amada
Stela 8 (Urk. IV 1293, 1-2).
214 Compare the fuller quotation above, §6.1.3.1, (i).
215 As one among several layers of meaning, this stands in no contradiction to the observation that
internally to Amenemhat wa in 7e also resonates with 2c, where the loneliness of the king allies him
with the Sungod (Parkinson 2002: 247).
216 On the motif of the reception of royal deeds (Amenemhat 11d), recurrent in early Thutmoside royal
inscriptions including in Gebel Barkal Stela (48; Urk. IV 1242, 15), see §6.2, comment to the main
example. Other elements are discussed by Gnirs 2013b: 149-51. One detail is Smt Tsmw ‘dog-walk’
(Amenemhat 12c), paralleled in Punt Expedition (Urk. IV 321, 10-11) and in an inscription of
Thutmosis III in Wadi Halfa (Urk. IV 809, 10-11), see Gnirs 2013b: 150 (also observing that the
parallel is more specific than with the formulation in Sinuhe B 222-223). A later occurrence of the
phrase is in Merenptah’s Amada Stela 12-13 (KRI IV 2, 6), see Manassa 2003: 36-7.

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 6.4 Dating Amenemhat 493

6.4 Dating Amenemhat

6.4.1 Temporal range for dating

The linguistic dating of Amenemhat is primarily based on the construction of tw with

non-dynamic events, three times in 11c-d (Hqr.tw, ib.tw, Hms.tw). As emerges from a
preliminary discussion of the conditions under which tw’s can intrude a text in the
course of textual transmission, there is no plausible scenario by which the construc-
tions in Amenemhat 11c-d could be textually secondary (§6.2.1). As the subsequent
discussion demonstrates, a full-fledged linguistic argument can be based on this
construction (§6.2.2-3). The construction of tw with non-dynamic events is never
attested in any text, literary or otherwise, in the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty, nor in
earlier times. Other than in Amenemhat 11c-d, first attestations are in a series of
Middle Egyptian literary compositions all of which have a sound terminus ante quem
non by the early Thirteenth Dynasty or later based on independent grounds (Ipuwer,
Neferti, Kheti, Hymn, the long version of Loyaliste: §6.2.2.4).
The rise of the construction of tw with non-dynamic events can be related to a
broader process of linguistic change consisting in the extension of tw to events that do
not meet the semantic condition for passivization in Earlier Egyptian. Stage I of the
change—the extension of tw to events that lack an agent in their semantic repre-
sentation—can be dated precisely to the mid-Twelfth Dynasty (§6.2.2.3). The here
relevant stage II—the further extension of tw to non-dynamic events—was reached
later only, although not much later considering the nature of the change, probably
therefore by the late Twelfth Dynasty already.
Early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty texts consistently use a set of other constructions with
non-dynamic events whenever the reference of the main participant is to be left
unspecified (§6.2.3). Among these, constructions in inscriptional texts are suggestive
in formulations closely parallel to the ones in Amenemhat and Neferti: while these two
compositions have tw, early Twelfth Dynasty inscriptional texts have altogether
different constructions. In appreciating the evidence provided by such inscriptional
registers, a caveat resides in that they may in part reflect formulaic language. No
similar note of caution extends to literary texts. In Sinuhe, Ptahhotep, and Debate of a
Man and His Soul, subjectless constructions (e.g. sDr=ø, Htp=ø) are consistently used
with non-dynamic events as the functional counterparts to tw-marked constructions in
the same texts (e.g. pr.tw, HADa.tw). Amenemhat 11c-d, by contrast, has the tw-marked
construction extended to non-dynamic events, Hqr.tw, ib.tw, Hms.tw.
The construction considered thereby meets all conditions required for a full-
fledged linguistic argument indexed on linguistic change to be devised: exhibiting a
consistent pattern of early attestation, demonstrating that some (set of) other con-
struction(s) was (were) used in earlier times to perform similar functions, and relating
the relevant innovation to a broader, well analyzed and temporally well anchored,
process of change. Accordingly, the constructions in Amenemhat 11c-d—and similar
ones in Ipuwer, Neferti, Kheti, Hymn, and the long version of Loyaliste—are not
early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian.

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 494 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

As the construction of tw with non-dynamic events involves a functional extension

of an already existing formal category (tw after the verbal stem: pr.tw sDr.tw), there
is no reason to assume that it was any particularly indexical of register when inno-
vated. Unlike for other constructions discussed in the present study, tw with non-
dynamic events may therefore have been acceptable in literary registers very rapidly.
The construction could then have been first used in a literary text almost immediately
when stage II in the overall change was reached, as early as the late Twelfth Dynasty.
As also discussed, Amenemhat includes no expression that would point to a dating
earlier than the first manuscript attestation of the composition (§6.1.3). This was
notably demonstrated by considering one of the grammatically most complex
sequences in the whole text: as it turns out, all components that made for the difficulty
of this passage both in ancient and in modern times are documented in productive use
in higher written registers of the early Eighteenth Dynasty. Accordingly, the temporal
range for dating defined on strong linguistic grounds extends from the late Twelfth
Dynasty (the earliest possible date for the construction in 11c-d) to the early Eigh-
teenth Dynasty (the earliest manuscript attestation of the composition).

6.4.2 Further linguistic indications

In assessing whether some period within the broad temporal range just defined is
more likely than other ones, further expressions are suggestive (§6.3).
A. In the lexicon, Hw-ny-r-Hr ‘combat’ (7b: §6.3.2.2) is the recent form of a word that
is documented as Hwn-Hr in the Middle Kingdom. Based on the fact that the contrast
between the two forms involves semantic reinterpretation and morphological
reanalysis, an argument can be made that the expression is almost certainly original in
Amenemhat 7b. While not securely documented in this recent form before the early
Eighteenth Dynasty, Hw-ny-r-Hr may perhaps have been innovated earlier, but not
before the late Middle Kingdom: this confirms that Amenemhat was not composed in
the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty.
Another lexical expression, nsy ‘rule’ (1d), is probably a neologistic formation
coined in the context of discourses on kingship (§6.3.2.1). The expression is not
documented before the early New Kingdom. Nor is the broader formulary with which
it is associated in Amenemhat and in other texts. The structural position of nsy in
Amenemhat, as one among several elements of a formulary spread over and thus
framing the overall composition, implies that it is integral to the original text.
While not at the level of individual expressions, a series of further elements are
noteworthy in appreciating the broader lexical typology of Amenemhat. These include
a series of specific lexical encounters with Book of the Dead, all concerning rare
expressions. The lexical collocations in the formulary just mentioned, echoed in
Amenemhat 1d-e and 15a-b, may also be indicative, as collocations. Of interest is
finally nfr-ib (6b; 14f), which recurs in only one other text, the early Eighteenth
Dynasty Teaching of Aametju, a text that may also be relevant to other, non-linguistic,
aspects of Amenemhat.

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 6.4 Dating Amenemhat 495

B. In the closing section, the selection of the old independent pronoun twt (15c) is
remarkable (§6.3.1). These pronouns are only sparsely documented in the Middle
Kingdom and experience a textual revival in the early New Kingdom, in funerary
literature and in discourses about rising to kingship. The exact same associations and
overtones, which go well beyond mere linguistic antiquarianism, are observed in
Amenemhat itself, in singular details. The selection of the old independent pronoun in
Amenemhat 15c makes sense in relation to a specific early Eighteenth Dynasty
configuration in written language. In what is preserved in the record, the same selec-
tion is uninterpretable against any other background.
C. Based on the cumulated indications summarized above, the present author finds a
very late dating within the temporal range previously defined (late Twelfth Dynasty –
early Eighteenth) the most likely option. This is an hypothesis only, if one based on a
detailed examination of the overall linguistic typology of the composition. Only the
terminus ante quem non to the late Twelfth Dynasty rests on fully secure grounds.

6.4.3 Amenemhat and Sinuhe

Even if broad, the range for fully reliable dating here proposed (late D.12 – early
D.18: §6.4.1) is not inconsequential for interpretation: Amenemhat is later than the
events it evokes by at least a century, perhaps by much more. (Beyond language,
similar implications would also spring from the pervasive fictionalizing dimensions in
the composition:217 for an historical setting to be fictionalized, some time is generally
required.) The composition does not support a ‘propaganda model’ of the functions of
Middle Egyptian literature. Nor can it be read against such an interpretive frame.
Under the range for dating here proposed, Amenemhat is also later than another
literary composition that refers to the same early Twelfth Dynasty horizon, Sinuhe.
(Beyond language, issues of decorum would also point to this direction: the events
that in Sinuhe remain unspeakable of are in Amenemhat directly represented.) En-
counters between Sinuhe and Amenemhat abound: the possible relationship between
the two compositions must therefore be reassessed.
A. Both Sinuhe and Amenemhat offer a literary treatment of the demise of
Amenemhat I. Both compositions thereby concern royal succession, presented in
paradigmatic terms on an occasion that is deeply problematic. In either text, the
contrastive parallelism between the two kings, Amenemhat and Senwosret, is high-
lighted: in Sinuhe for example in the first introduction of the two kings218 or in the
encomium;219 in Amenemhat for example by the very speech situation or directly in

217 Parkinson 2002: 242, 244, 248; the discussion in Moers 2001: 38-79 carries similar implications.
218 The first textual mentions of the two kings echo one another, notably in the contrast between nTr
and nTr nfr underscored by the common cataphoric construction: R 6 ar nTr r Axt=f nsw bity sHtp-ib-
ra ‘Ascending of the god to his horizon—the King of Upper and Lower Egypt Sehetepibre’; R 12-
13 (...) sA=f smsw m Hry iry nTr nfr s-n-wsrt ‘(...) his oldest son at its head—the young god
Senwosret’.
219 Sinuhe B 50-51 ntf dAr xAswt iw it=f m-Xnw aH=f smi=f SAt.n=f xpr ‘It is he (scil. S.) who
subjugated foreign countries, his father (scil. A.), for his part, stayed inside his palace; he (scil. S.)
reported that what he (scil. A.) had determined had occurred.’ In the first part of the passage

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 496 6 The Teaching of Amenemhat

the closing section.220 Royal succession is projected as one major large-scale framing
strategy. In Sinuhe, the court’s initial mourning of the old king’s death is ultimately
reversed in Sinuhe’s epiphanic reintegration into the new king’s court;221
Amenemhat’s initial apotheosis, phrased in monumental terms (R 5-8: compare the
‘narrative’ construction of the infinitive ar ‘ascending’ after the date), is echoed in
Sinuhe’s own becoming a ‘statue’ (B 307 twt). In Amenemhat, the young king’s
‘rising’ to kingship (1d xa) counterbalances the old king’s ‘going down’ into the solar
barque (15e hAi);222 the opening and the closing sections resonate with each other
through elements of a common formulary distributed over these (1d-e; 15a-c).223
Both Sinuhe and Amenemhat are framed as fictionalized self-presentations and
integrate phrases from the stock of the ideal biography.224 In both compositions, these
are subverted by context. An example in Sinuhe is B 26-27 (the foreign sheikh giving
water to Sinuhe), resonating with B 96 (Sinuhe giving water, abroad); the subversion
of funerary self-presentations occasionally extends to language itself (B 45, B 114: the
active-transitive construction of the pseudoparticiple introducing Sinuhe’s speeches to
the foreign king).225 In Amenemhat, topoi of the ideal biography are similarly
subverted, by being set in the mouth of a king, by the overall apologetic context of
their utterance (e.g. 3c-d; 4; 11), and by their integration with elements of royal deeds
(10; 12; further 7e-f226 and 11d227). In the central lyric at the apex of the overall arc-
form in Sinuhe (B 149-156), topoi from the ideal biography and Sinuhe’s actual
situation are opposed in strongly antithetical formulations, expressing intensified
inner conflict.228 Amenemhat’s dark questioning of the events is similarly phrased in
antithetical formulations in which topoi of the ideal biography are made to clash with
actuality (4). Both texts present narrative elements of the fashioning of a life-story, yet
one that does not bring about the expected accomplishment (in Sinuhe, during his stay
abroad; in Amenemhat, 10; 12); rather, they lead up to a highly dramaticized turning
point (Sinuhe B 149-156; Amenemhat 14a-c229). Both compositions include a final, or
near-final, ekphrasis of the tomb (Sinuhe B 300-308; Amenemhat 13230).
Both Sinuhe and Amenemhat have central climactic episodes consisting in the
fight with unnamed representatives of the ‘outer’ or ‘chaotic’ world (the strongman of

quoted, the parallelism is underscored by the here contrastive iw. In the second part, this is carried
forth through the complex double anaphoric chain (see §6.2.1.2, (iv)).
220 Compare the balanced cleft-constructions in 15b-c ink mni (...) twt wAH (...) ‘I (scil. A.) have come
to harbor (...), you (scil. S.) wear (...)’ (§6.3.1).
221 To single out one detail, R 9 rwty wrty xtmw ‘the Great Double Portal was closed’ is echoed in
B 285 Sm.n m-xt r rwty wrty ‘and afterwards we went to the Great Double Portal’ (now open).
Rwty wrty may further be echoed in bAty ‘the two bushes’ (B 5, in Sinuhe’s flight), a rare dual
formation with a noun that does not come in natural pairs (Hanna Jenni, p.c. 12/2011).
222 Parkinson 2002: 242.
223 See above, §6.3.1.2.C; §6.3.2.1, fine.
224 For Amenemhat, lastly Gnirs 2013b: 134-51.
225 Stauder in press a: §3.2; in the present study also §4.1.3.A.
226 See §6.3.2.2.NB.
227 See §6.2, note to the main example.
228 Stauder in press a: §2; Moers 2001: 256-7.
229 See §6.1.2.B.
230 Gnirs 2013b: 135; Blumenthal 1984: 87-8.

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 6.4 Dating Amenemhat 497

Retenu; the plotters231)—a centrality that was well recognized by ancient readers of
either work.232 In both compositions, anomic elements happen at night-time (marked
by msyt and xAw in both texts): in Sinuhe’s flight233 and in Amenemhat’s weakness in
the face of the assailants.234 Extensive apologetic discourses follow, phrased in
strikingly similar terms.235 Dream-like elements are pervasive in both texts, signaling
their fictional nature.236
B. The conjunction of the above elements is strongly suggestive of a contact between
Sinuhe and Amenemhat. In itself, this could be interpreted in various ways, as
reflecting a common context of composition or as a literary dependency in one direc-
tion or another.237 Based on the terminus ante quem non proposed for Amenemhat on
linguistic grounds, it is submitted that the composition of Amenemhat is part of the
literary reception of Sinuhe.238 The reception of Sinuhe, well documented in
general,239 thereby appears to have extended beyond allusions of various sorts, to
inform aspects of a new literary composition: in ancient as in modern times, literature
is a stimulus for more literature.
Under this scenario, the literary reference to the early Twelfth Dynasty in
Amenemhat is not directly to the events themselves but to their cultural memory, as
mediated notably by another text, itself literary, Sinuhe. Amenemhat, a semantically
dense composition and a ‘teaching’ only by extension, addresses core high-cultural
contents such as royal succession and the intrusion of the anomic in a virtuosic play
with multiple subtexts, including funerary self-presentations, funerary literature,
hymns to the Nileflood, texts to do with the accession to kingship, and narratives of
royal deeds. As emerges from the present discussion, one additional subtext of the
composition is in previously composed narrative literature itself.

231 For a narratological study of Amenemhat 6-8, Suhr-Gordon 2008.

232 On the centrality of the combat episode in the Ramesside reception of Sinuhe, Parkinson 2009:
193; similarly in the Ramesside reception of Amenemhat, Morenz 2012a: 142-3; Gnirs 2013b: 135
and n.64.
233 Sinuhe B 11-20 xpr.n tr n msyt (...) ir=i Smt tr n xAw (...) ‘When it became supper-time (...) I made
my way at night-time (...)’.
234 Amenemhat 6a r-sA msyt pw xAwy xpr (...) ‘It was after supper, night-time had come (...)’.
235 E.g. Sinuhe B 223-224 is wart tn irt.n bAk <im> n xmt<=i> s(i) nn s(i) m ib=i n qmd=i s(i) (...)
‘Now, this flight which this humble servant made, I had not planned it, it was not in my heart, I
had not plotted it (...)’. Extensively in Amenemhat as well (7e-9; 14a-c), e.g. 8d-e Hr-ntt n Hr=i st n
xmt=i st n in ib=i wsfAt nt bAkw ‘For I had not feared it, I had not planned it, my heart had not
thought of the negligence of servants.’
236 In Sinuhe, Parkinson 2006; 2002: 160-1; in Amenemhat, Parkinson 2002: 242, 244.
237 See for example the scenarios discussed by Winand (in press a) relative to a contact between
Sinuhe and Shipwrecked Sailor.
238 Independently from the present author and from one another, Moers (in press) and Winand (in
press a: §8) now also evoke the possibility of a dependency of Amenemhat upon Sinuhe.
239 E.g. Parkinson 2009: 173-87, particularly 176-80, 182.

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 7 CONCLUSION

7.1 Methods and strategies

Possible strategies for linguistic dating vary greatly depending on the nature of the
objects to be dated and on the time period for possible dating. In the case of Middle
Egyptian literary texts, relevant issues to do with the objects themselves include
textual transmission in a manuscript culture, the configuration of language in
literature and associated issues of register, the conciseness of most texts, and the
densely intertextual nature of Middle Egyptian literature in general. Relevant con-
textual dimensions include the shortness of the time period for dating (from ca. 1950
to 1450 BCE), the low density of the contemporaneous written record, and the sub-
stantial linguistic continuity in relevant written registers during that period. These
contextual dimensions conspire to make the primary description of linguistic change
often difficult. In addition, morphological change is almost entirely trapped in a dead
angle due to the nature of the writing system, so that dating must mainly rely on
grammatical change. Except in a few favorable cases, possible lexical indications can
only have a complementary status in the argument.
Like other dimensions that can be considered for dating Middle Egyptian literary
texts, linguistic approaches thus come with limitations of their own. Individual
linguistic arguments that can be made weigh differently, ranging from the merely
suggestive to the individually decisive: an explicit discussion of the force, or weak-
ness, of individual arguments or indications is in all cases essential in appreciating the
linguistic typology of a Middle Egyptian literary text being studied. Several of these
limitations are intrinsic and will therefore remain, while other ones can be worked on
in future research.

7.1.1 The objects to be dated: General issues

Any linguistic dating is contingent upon the stability or fluidity of texts. Eighteenth
Dynasty witnesses, on which the present study is based for the most part, generally
display a much better text than Ramesside ones do, yet are not immune to textual
alterations either. As Ptahhotep directly demonstrates, an Eighteenth Dynasty manu-
script of a text originally composed in the Twelfth can include distinctively late
linguistic features (§2.3.5). In the case of Ptahhotep, these late features of the L2 text
can be shown to be secondary on text-internal grounds, i.e. without drawing any

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 500 7 Conclusion

knowledge of the text in P, nor even of the existence of P and L1, into account. A
linguistic dating of Ptahhotep based on the L2 text would therefore not have resulted
in wrongly ascribing the composition to the Eighteenth Dynasty. More generally,
working on Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts requires that principled strategies for
assessing the likelihood for a given expression to be original, or not, must be devised.
The goal is not to reconstruct an Urtext but to assess the textual status of individual
constructions that could be relevant to dating. The possibility for doing so varies
widely, depending on what (type of) expression(s) is considered and on the particular
context in which a given expression is used in a given text.
A very general strategy is to examine how tightly an expression fits its context. A
textually secondary expression can sometimes be identified as such directly by traces
the alteration has left in the immediate textual surroundings or by a particular hybrid
form under which that expression presents itself in a manuscript being studied (e.g.
§2.3.2.2, (i) for a lexical expression; §2.3.3.F, §2.3.5, and §2.8.3.2.NB for grammat-
ical ones). Conversely, when an expression fits its context in very specific ways, an
argument can be derived that it is in all likelihood original (e.g. §3.4.1.4). A further
step consists in considering how likely an expression, or type of expression, is to
undergo alteration in general. Grammatical expressions vary widely in their propen-
sity to do so (e.g. §2.3.3). Moreover, some expressions can be shown to undergo
alteration only under very specific conditions, not randomly (e.g. §6.2.1). While
individual histories are always possible (e.g. §5.2.1), such combined considerations
can support claims phrased in terms of at times strongly differential likelihood.
An additional strategy is to ask what the original text could have been assuming
that the transmitted one is secondary in the expression considered, and by what
processes such hypothesized older text could have been altered to the documented
one. With grammatical expressions, possible ‘source constructions’ (in a textual
sense) are considered: when no plausible candidate for such can be proposed, the
likelihood for the expression in the transmitted text to be original is assessed as high
(e.g. §5.2.2.B and passim throughout the present study: a common strategy). Making a
similar type of argument with lexical expressions is considerably more difficult, yet
occasionally possible based on their meaning (e.g. §5.6.1; §5.6.2) or their morphology
(§4.6.7.A; §4.6.7.B; §6.3.2.2).
In some cases, strong arguments can be derived from an examination of a compo-
sition as a whole. The argument is then that the expression in the text as it stands is
consistent with how the text functions as a whole in the relevant dimension (e.g.
§2.3.3, in relation to the overall temporality of Kheti; §3.2.2.B, fine, in relation to the
lexical and literary typology of Fishing and Fowling). As a variant to this, the status
of a given construction as integral to the original text can occasionally be established
through an analysis of the role of the construction considered in large-scale compo-
sitional patterns extending over much of the text discussed. The argument then con-
sists in identifying such a complex large-scale pattern in a composition which
included one, in showing that the construction concerned is an integral component of
this pattern, and in demonstrating further that the pattern identified is too complex or
thorough-going to have arisen as a chance artifact of transmission or through localized
réécriture (§5.2.2 and §5.2.3.3; §5.3.3).

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 7.1 Methods and strategies 501

As regards language in literature, important consequences for dating spring from the
densely intertextual nature of Middle Egyptian literature, from the high degree of
standardization of Middle Egyptian in general, and from the substantial cultural, and
thereby linguistic, continuity in textual expressions of Middle Egyptian culture more
broadly. Both in literature and in the external record, this results in recurrent con-
figurations of language that are only limitedly distinctive of time. In dating, these
dimensions are felt at their strongest in teachings, which are composed with a relative-
ly limited set of grammatical constructions, include much pre-configured language,
and are typically the least linguistically distinctive among types of Middle Egyptian
literary discourses (e.g. §2.6.2.7.B; §2.8; §4.5). Significantly, the main indication for
dating the long version of Loyaliste resides in a construction that is not indexed on
linguistic change (§4.5.2). In Amenemhat, the core argument for dating concerns an
expression in a section modeled on funerary self-presentations, an expression, there-
fore, that is not part of the general stock of formulations associated with teachings
(§6.2).
Further blurring factors lie with expressions, or uses of expressions, that are
mainly, or uniquely, documented in literature (e.g. §2.4.2; §2.4.5); by definition, these
are difficult, or impossible, to anchor to changes documented in the external record.
Moreover, linguistic registers of Middle Egyptian literature are internally variable,
including within the same composition (§2.4.3.1). They also display an at times con-
siderable breadth, with expressions of different ages coexisting alongside each other
within the same composition (§2.4.3.2). Differences in linguistic register only
limitedly project over time, and not linearly (§2.4.4). More generally, language in
literature is subject to manipulation by compositions, expressive or indexical. No
linear relative chronology reflecting ongoing linguistic change can therefore be
established for Middle Egyptian literature. In all cases linguistic selections must be
interpreted (e.g. §2.4.4; §3.1.3; §4.4.5.B; §6.3.1).

7.1.2 Dating indexed on linguistic change

The most common strategy for linguistic dating consists in providing a terminus ante
quem non and a terminus post quem non, thereby defining a temporal range within
which a text could have been composed. Criteria for establishing such upper and
lower chronological bounds are then based on innovation and obsolescence in written
language. They are, in other words, indexed on ongoing linguistic change as reflected
in relevant written registers (linguistic change in spoken language is both inaccessible
empirically and irrelevant to the issue). By definition, these strategies are directly
contingent upon the precision with which ongoing linguistic change can be described
and analyzed in the early/mid-second millennium written record. As the record is
itself an ultimately artifactual object, patterns of attestation must be assessed as to
their reliability in all cases. The low density of the record makes the task no easier. In
addition, innovative expressions do not simply supersede older ones in similar
functions, but coexist with these, often over protracted periods in time (e.g. §2.6.3).
This results in an inherent thickness of language, in general and particularly so in the
early/mid-second millennium written registers relevant to the present study.

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 502 7 Conclusion

Conditioned by such difficulties, the current description of Middle Egyptian remains

incomplete in many ways, especially when it comes to changes within Middle Egyp-
tian and to the more subtle dimensions of linguistic meaning and function that are
often the ones most relevant for dating.
In assessing patterns of attestation as to their reliability, various strategies, ideally
to be combined, can be pursued. Patterns of attestation are most likely to be reliable
when the expression is frequent in language, and therefore in text; when in earlier
times another expression can be shown to have been used in similar functions; and
when the change under consideration can be interpreted in relation to a broader
process of change of which it is a part. In terms of the above conditions, lexical
expressions often fare badly: many are low in text frequency and changes affecting
them are individual histories, not to be related to broader processes of linguistic
change. In addition, patterns of attestation of lexical expressions can be over-
determined by whatever subject matters and types of written discourse, and thereby
semantic fields and registers, happen to be documented in the record in various
periods. Only in some cases does a lexical expression individually provide a valuable
indication for dating: when an expression is common in text and has a meaning less
subject to the vagaries of attestation (thus with prepositions or adverbial expressions,
e.g. §2.8.3.4, (ii); §4.2.3); when a pattern of attestation can be interpreted as
coherently pointing to a certain horizon in time (e.g. §5.8.1.3); when change can be
traced in some details in the record (e.g. §2.7.3.3, (i); §4.6.7.A; §6.3.2.2); or when the
first documentation of a lexical expression can be related to the introduction of a new
referent (e.g. §5.5.1; probably §5.5.2; possibly §2.8.3.6.B). In most cases, possible
lexical evidence can only be treated as cumulative, with various expressions weighing
differently. The lexicon is then appreciated as a complementary indication, not as a
self-standing argument, within the overall linguistic typology of a composition being
studied.
Grammatical expressions differ from lexical ones in having a more general
linguistic meaning or function. Accordingly, they are less subject to the vagaries of
attestation, some are fairly frequent in text, and changes affecting them can in various
cases be analyzed in relation to broader processes of changes: in short, their patterns
of attestation can often be subjected to a principled discussion. However, changes
affecting grammatical expressions are not many in the time period considered, and not
all can be described in the record in ways that are as detailed as would be required for
a temporally precise dating criterion to result. Unsurprisingly, strong dating criteria
based on changes that can be interpreted in the broader context of other changes are
themselves very few. Among these, the best are often the ones that target changes in
the functions of expressions, rather than in their form: examples include criteria based
on a change in the expression of aspect (§2.6.2), in the functions of pA (§2.4.4.1.B),
and in the expression of passive voice (§5.2; §5.3; §6.2). With all of these, linguistic
form is uncriterial, since it remains stable over the time period concerned; as regards
the mere presence or absence of pA in a Middle Egyptian literary text, this is a matter
of register, not of time (§2.4.4.2). Only very few criteria can be based on changes in
linguistic form, for example the rise of the new subject pronoun. This is of limited
practical application (only two texts: §3.4.1; §4.4.3.1), unsurprisingly so: in being

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 7.1 Methods and strategies 503

highly innovative on the level of linguistic form, the new subject pronoun is
demonstrably subject to restrictions to do with register well into the early/mid-Eigh-
teenth Dynasty. More generally, expressions that are saliently innovative in their form
tend to be indexical of register in all Middle Egyptian times and registers here rele-
vant: while they can be found in other contemporaneous types of written discourses,
at times even in regular use, they are generally not expected to be selected by
composers of Middle Egyptian literary texts of any period. One immediate con-
sequence is also that their absence in a given composition is not an indication for an
earlier dating.
Post quem non criteria are considerably more difficult to devise than ante quem
non ones. Equivalently, post quem non criteria can be devised, but will typically come
with a considerably lesser temporal resolution than ante quem non ones. This is
largely for structural reasons: obsolescence (on which the former are to be based) is
inherently more difficult to track empirically than innovation (on which the latter are
based). Moreover, the innovation of a new expression, or of a new function of an
existing expression, does not entail the immediate obsolescence of an older expression
used in similar function, or of an older function of the same or of another expression.
Accordingly, obsolescence can not be established through a consideration of a related
innovation in the same linguistic domain, but must be established directly for itself.
The study of obsolescence is then necessarily subject to the limitative conditions
mentioned first (detailed case study, §2.6). This situation becomes critical in the
period relevant for dating Middle Egyptian texts, which is fairly short in linguistic
terms and characterized by a strong linguistic continuity in relevant registers. In
practice, post quem non criteria point to periods later, if sometimes not by much, than
the first manuscript attestation of the texts to be dated (§2.6.3; §2.7.2; §2.8.2; §5.1.4;
§6.1.3.1); an exception is only Ipuwer, for circumstantial reasons (the very late date of
the sole preserved manuscript of the composition). In the future, a refined diachronic
description of Middle Egyptian grammar could perhaps lead to identifying some
expressions not documented any more in productive usage in early New Kingdom
times. However, such expressions would probably have to be fairly specific ones:
other ones, including uncommon or subtles ones, have already been shown not to
support post quem non criteria for the time period relevant. As suggested below,
arguments for excluding late datings are best based on altogether different strategies,
not indexed on linguistic change directly or not based on expressions considered
individually.
Ante quem non criteria come with strong limitations of their own, which are also
in large part structural. As mentioned, various conditions are required to assess the
reliability of patterns of attestation in the record and changes that meet the full set of
these conditions are not many during the time period concerned. Moreover, several of
these changes happened to occur, or to begin, during the late Twelfth or early
Thirteenth Dynasty, not later, not earlier (e.g. §2.6.2; §5.2; §6.2). In other cases, the
low density of the written record, particularly in the centuries after the Twelfth and
before the Eighteenth Dynasty, makes it difficult to assess when exactly an expression
was innovated in relevant written registers. In several cases, an expression first
documented in the early Eighteenth Dynasty can be demonstrated not to be Twelfth

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 504 7 Conclusion

Dynasty Middle Egyptian based on an interpretation of patterns of attestation, the

exhibition of other expressions used in Twelfth Dynasty Middle Egyptian to perform
similar functions, and an analysis of broader processes of linguistic change to which
the change concerned relates. The relevant innovation could then have occurred at any
time between the early Thirteenth and early Eighteenth Dynasty: when it actually did
remains beyond empirical description. For methodological reasons, the terminus ante
quem non must then be set to the early Thirteenth Dynasty, as the earliest moment in
time for which given the evidence available it can not be ruled out any more that the
innovation may have taken place (type-B terminus ante quem non). As the double
negation expresses, this is only a terminus ante quem non for the actual terminus ante
quem non: the relevant innovation may in fact have taken place later than the time to
which the terminus had to be set (e.g. §2.4.4.1.B; §5.3; 6.2.2.6.2).

Compounded with the conciseness of many compositions and other factors reducing
their linguistic distinctiveness, these restrictive conditions to which ante quem non
and post quem non criteria are subject directly determine the temporal ranges for
dating that can be defined. To make such temporal ranges as reliable as possible, these
are based strictly on the ante quem non criteria that meet the full set of conditions
recalled above (frequency, documentation of other expressions used in similar
function in earlier times, possibility of an analysis in relation to broader process of
change). Moreover, various expressions are treated as type-B ante quem non criteria,
thus as pointing to a terminus set to a time possibly earlier than the actual time of the
innovation they concern. As current post quem non criteria point to periods later than
the first manuscript attestation of most compositions to be dated, it is the latter that in
practice provides the terminus post quem non.
That the early Eighteenth Dynasty is often included in temporal ranges for dating
does not in itself mean that a composition must necessarily be as late. The case of
Ptahhotep may serve as a reminder: if no Middle Kingdom copies had survived, late
features in the text could be identified as secondary on criteria internal to L2 and no
erroneous claim would be made that Ptahhotep was composed in the Eighteenth Dy-
nasty. However, it would be difficult to declare the early Eighteenth Dynasty
impossible on linguistic grounds. Conversely, that earlier periods are included in
temporal ranges for dating does not mean that a composition must necessarily be as
early. For example, no terminus ante quem non later than to the early Twelfth
Dynasty could be defined for Chapelle Rouge: based on criteria indexed on linguistic
change, the composition is dated to a broad period ranging from the early Twelfth
Dynasty to its ‘manuscript’ terminus post quem non, under Hatshepsut. Yet, the
compostion can be securely dated to the early Eighteenth Dynasty based on other
linguistic strategies (§4.1.2); it is much later, therefore, than its linguistic terminus
ante quem non. With a literary composition similarly, no terminus ante quem non
other than to the Middle Kingdom could be defined for Sporting King by the above
strategies indexed on linguistic change, yet there are strong linguistic indications of an
altogether different sort that this is in all likelihood an Eighteenth Dynasty
composition (§4.3).

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 7.1 Methods and strategies 505

When only a broader dating is possible based on criteria indexed on linguistic

change, this mainly reflects the conditions under which linguistic dating has to be
carried out. Put differently, all periods within the range for dating must be considered
equally likely unless specified otherwise. In subsequently assessing if any period
within a temporal range proposed is distinguished as more likely than others, further
indications for dating can often be drawn into account. These can be valuable, individ-
ually or collectively, but have a secondary status with respect to the main argument:
unlike the full-fledged linguistic criteria based on which the basic temporal ranges for
dating are proposed, these indications are of a sort that does not permit to bound all
uncertainties associated with them. In favorable cases, however, such uncertainties
can be considerably reduced. In addition, altogether different strategies can sometimes
be pursued (the next section).

7.1.3 Alternative strategies

In dating indexed on ongoing linguistic change, the varying degrees of temporal

resolution that can be achieved are externally imposed by diverse factors, several of
which structural, other ones ultimately determined by chance. Complementarily, an
altogether different approach is sometimes possible when a composition includes one
or several expressions that diverge from regular usage and when such divergence can
be meaningfully related to a specific horizon in written language. Uncommon, or even
unique, constructions, often hybrid or otherwise aberrant in their semantic or syntactic
makeup, are thereby considered. These—which could not have arisen under the
conditions of regular linguistic interaction—are related to configurations of written
language where similar phenomena are documented. They are then further interpreted
in relation to the broader cultural contexts they may reflect. When an at first aberrant
construction can be shown to be principled in its makeup, or when it can be shown to
fit the particular expression or linguistic typology of a text being studied, an argument
also results to imply that this construction is not a secondary artifact of textual
transmission. Dating then directly targets the relevant horizon in written language; in
most cases, fairly precise datings result (‘direct dating’: §4).
No more than general guidelines can be defined for ‘direct dating’: in all cases,
individual interpretive strategies must be pursued to accord with the particular
expression, not solely linguistic, of a text being studied. For example Heavenly Cow,
which can be dated by such strategy (§4.6), differs in its linguistic typology from all
other texts included in the present study. Among literary texts, Sporting King has a
construction that accommodates the conflicting semantics of two other constructions:
the overall construction is paralleled in early Eighteenth Dynasty times, only then, and
is demonstrably an innovation of some written discourses of that period. The same
composition includes a construction that is aberrant in its form: this is unique, purely
textual in origin, and places Sporting King in the reception of the R tradition of Sinuhe
as otherwise documented in the early Eighteenth Dynasty (§4.3). A construction in
Neferkare and Sisene is aberrant in how it accommodates two semantically and
syntactically incompatible elements, yet makes perfect expressive sense in the specific
context of the Tale. Texts of the early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty afford direct parallels

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 506 7 Conclusion

for this construction, for the relevant components thereof, and for the general
principle presiding over such recombination; no other period in the early/mid-second
millennium BCE does (§4.4). If Sinuhe had to be dated linguistically, the most power-
ful argument for a dating into the Twelfth Dynasty would be with an examination of
the indexical over-determinations of some constructions as these are used in the Tale,
expressing and twisting webs of cultural significations established in other types of
written discourses. The relevant webs of significations are observed to be fully active
in the Twelfth Dynasty only (§4.1.3).
That a composition should accommodate constructions lending themselves to a
‘direct dating’ is contingent upon its particular contents and expression. In Sinuhe,
this is to do with how this composition in particular evokes biographies and
expedition accounts, in a palimpsest that extends to the linguistic level. Altogether
different is the case of Neferkare and Sisene, where the presence of the aberrant
expression mentioned is interpreted as a token of the parodistic tone also otherwise
observed in this text. In general, only a few Middle Egyptian literary texts include
elements supporting similar approaches; other types of written discourses that are
more strongly over-determined in their language may include more.

All the above strategies have in common to target individual expressions, for how
they relate to ongoing linguistic change as reflected in written registers, or for how
they relate to specific configurations, culturally determined, in written language. A
complementary strategy, only limitedly explored in the present study, consists in
looking at coherent sets, or if possible even repertoires, of expressions. This approach
permits to circumvent some of the difficulties and limitations associated with
strategies that target individual expressions, the low number and at times unprecise
temporal resolution of ante quem non criteria, the current and in part structural
difficulty in devising post quem non criteria pointing to a period earlier than the first
manuscript documentation, and the necessarily limited number of expressions that
lend themselves to a ‘direct dating’. The perspective is thereby on groups of indi-
vidually noteworthy expressions in a text to be dated that recur alongside each other
in other texts as well. When sets of expressions can be shown not only to recur along-
side each other but to cohere, they also contribute a direct indication that the expres-
sions considered are integral to the original composition. While textual alteration can
result in elements typical of some later period than the composition, a repertoire that
is cohesive, either in itself or with respect to the specific expression of a text to be
dated, can only have been composed.
‘Dating by repertoires’, as the strategy may be termed provisionally, has to do
with a refined study of registers. It is also related to ‘direct dating’ inasmuch as a
certain horizon in the configuration of written language is directly targeted in either
approach. The intimate connection between the two strategies is illustrated in the
present study by the case of the Old Egyptian expressions in (Hatshepsut’s) Royal
Cycle. These do not form an Old Egyptian layer, but consist in a selection of mostly
formally salient expressions. While some of these individually recur in the Middle
Kingdom, their collection is paralleled only in inscriptions dealing with kingship of
the times of Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III. Significant of the coherence of such repertoire

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 7.1 Methods and strategies 507

is that several of these expressions are used in the Cycle carrying specific indexical
overtones, just as they do in other inscriptions of Hatshepsut/Thutmosis III (§4.7.1).
In a similar vein, one of the indexically over-determined expressions that permit a
linguistic dating of Sinuhe to the Twelfth Dynasty is part of a set of expressions
shared between this composition and Khentemsemti’s mid-Twelfth Dynasty
biographical inscription. The linguistic communication between the two texts can be
assessed as significant because several of the expressions involved are otherwise very
uncommon and because Khentemsemti is a short text (§4.1.3.C). In Merikare, ele-
ments of a communication with a series of early Eighteenth Dynasty texts are not
similarly dense and concern expressions that, if individually noteworthy, are less
strongly remarkable than the ones shared by Sinuhe and Khentemsemti. While there
could be some indication for dating Merikare, this can not support a claim as strong as
could be made for Sinuhe (§2.8.3.7; §2.8.4.B).
Speaking prospectively, repertoires could be considered on a broader scale as well
as set in relation to what might be termed the overall syntactic texture of a composi-
tion to be dated. It is the present author’s impression that the petitions of Eloquent
Peasant or Debate of a Man and His Soul could probably be identified as having been
composed in the Middle Kingdom on these levels: on the dimensions just evoked,
these differ from compositions for which a post-Middle Kingdom dating is proposed
in the present study. The experiment may seem biased, since Eloquent Peasant and
Debate are not documented in early New Kingdom manuscripts; yet, as Ptahhotep,
Sinuhe, and Loyaliste collectively suggest, the dimensions to be concerned are only
limitedly altered in textual transmission during the centuries here relevant. If suffi-
ciently refined, such approach could in part replace post quem non criteria in
supplying the relevant information that these currently and possibly for structural
reasons fail to provide.
Like in other domains of inquiry, some matters may remain undecidable. For
example Ptahhotep, a teaching, may turn out less linguistically distinctive than
Eloquent Peasant or Debate of a Man and His Soul under the approach just outlined.1
In a similar way, Aametju, another teaching, is linguistically undatable: its linguistic
typology, just as its ‘style’, would fit a Twelfth Dynasty dating perfectly (§1.3.2.3).
While Aametju was composed in the Eighteenth Dynasty, Ptahhotep was in the
Twelfth. That linguistically defined ranges for dating other teachings such as A Man
to His Son or Merikare extend from the late (/later?, respectively) Twelfth Dynasty to
the Eighteenth relates to the same phenomenon of linguistic undistinctiveness, highest
in this type of literary discourse. This may prove intrinsic.

1 The undecidability here discussed concerns the productive period of the Middle Egyptian literary
tradition. The question of whether Ptahhotep could have been composed before the Twelfth
Dynasty is for its part easily answered on linguistic grounds (§2.4.3).

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 508 7 Conclusion

7.2 Proposed datings and ranges for dating

The following datings or ranges for dating are proposed. When not specified other-
wise, no period in a temporal range proposed is linguistically distinguished as more
likely than any other one.

A Man to His Son: late D.12 – early D.18 (§2.6.2.7.B)

Only one construction in A Man to His Son, a philologically difficult text, was
discussed (§2.3.4 for the reading). This implies a terminus ante quem non to the early
Thirteenth, or perhaps late Twelfth, Dynasty (§2.6.2.6.B; §2.6.2.7.B). As no overall
examination of the composition was carried out, the terminus is here set to the highest
date that can not be excluded. Pending further examination, the linguistic typology of
A Man—a teaching, and highly intertextual—seems largely undistinctive.

Amenemhat: late D.12 – early D.18 (§6)

(more probably early D.18?)
One construction supports a full-fledged argument implying a terminus ante quem
non to the late Twelfth Dynasty (§6.2).
The lexicon displays possibly significant encounters with some early Eighteenth
Dynasty texts (§6.3.2). A dating to this time could also be supported by one
specific linguistic selection in the composition (§6.3.1). The expression concerned
carries overtones in Amenemhat that make sense in relation to configurations of
written language otherwise documented in the early Eighteenth Dynasty; in the
preserved record, the same selection is uninterpretable against any other
background. A dating to the early Eighteenth Dynasty—here presented as an
hypothesis only—thus seems the option most consistent with the overall linguistic
typology of the composition.

Cheops’ Court: early D.13 or later – late SIP (?) (§2.4.4)

The terminus ante quem non is based on the functions of pA, already weakening in
deictic force (§2.4.4.1.B): in Cheops’ Court, pA displays a more advanced stage of
development than in late Twelfth Dynasty documentary texts. This is a type-B ante
quem non: the next stage of development in the functions of pA would only be reached
by the early Eighteenth Dynasty. When between the early Thirteenth and early
Eighteenth Dynasty the stage of development as in Cheops’ Court was actually
reached can not be established since it first documented in Cheops’ Court itself. A
terminus ante quem non to the early Thirteenth Dynasty may therefore be too early.
(Elements that have been described as ‘Late Middle Egyptian’ in Cheops’ Court
are primarily to do with the linguistic register of the composition, as determined
by its literary register: they do not support conclusions for dating.)

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 7.2 Proposed datings and ranges for dating 509

Eloquent Peasant: mid-D.12 (§3.1.2)

The one linguistic argument classically evoked in dating Eloquent Peasant to the
mid-Twelfth Dynasty turns out not to apply to this composition (§2.6.2.1-3).
However, a series of other constructions concur in pointing to the Twelfth Dynasty
and one to the mid-part thereof precisely (§3.1.2).

Eulogistic Account of a King: (late?) SIP (§3.3.2)

In what is preserved of the composition, one construction suggests a dating close in
time to the single manuscript (§3.3.2). So does one adverbial expression (§4.2.3).

Fishing and Fowling: probably D.18 (§3.2)

While the fragmentary state of the composition does not support much in ways of a
grammatical analysis, one construction implies a terminus ante quem non to the early
Thirteenth, or perhaps late Twelfth, Dynasty (§2.6.2.6.A; §3.2.1). Two lexical
expressions in the text are otherwise typical of Ramesside literature to come, have
highly consistent patterns of attestation, and are arguably integral to the original text.
Their presence in Fishing and Fowling makes a dating to the Eighteenth Dynasty the
most likely option (§3.2.2).

Hymn to Hapi: late D.17 – early D.18 (§3.4)

Two grammatical expressions both individually define termini ante quem non to the
late Seventeenth Dynasty (§3.4.1-2). A third implies a type-B terminus ante quem non
to the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty (§3.4.3; §5.3). A fourth suggests a composition during,
or close to, the early Eighteenth Dynasty (§3.4.4). In addition, a series of these
expressions are combined with other ones in ways that also point to an early
Eighteenth Dynasty horizon in written culture (§3.4.5.B).
Based on the last observation and on how the expression mentioned first is
documented spreading across written registers, a dating to the early Eighteenth
Dynasty is slightly more likely than one to the late Seventeenth.

Ipuwer: early D.13 – mid-D.18 (§6.2.2.5)

One construction implies a terminus ante quem non to the early Thirteenth, or perhaps
late Twelfth, Dynasty (§2.6.2.4). A series of indications confirm a dating no earlier
than the Thirteenth Dynasty (§6.2.2.5). Indications for a dating to the Eighteenth
Dynasty are either weak or possibly textually secondary. The consistently Middle
Egyptian language of the composition speaks against a composition after the mid-
Eighteenth Dynasty, as do individual expressions in the composition (e.g. §6.2.2.5, (i)
and (ii)). The text is often unstable, reducing prospects for a linguistic analysis.

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 510 7 Conclusion

Khakheperreseneb: early D.13 – early D.18 (§2.7)

One construction, the same as in Ipuwer, implies a terminus ante quem non to the
early Thirteenth, or perhaps late Twelfth, Dynasty (§2.6.2.5). Various indications
confirm a dating no earlier than the Thirteenth Dynasty (§2.7.3). Possible indications
for a dating close in time to this terminus ante quem non are inconclusive (2.7.2);
similarly inconclusive are possible indications for a dating close in time to the first
manuscript attestation of the composition (§2.7.3). In interpreting the linguistic
typology of the Khakheperreseneb, its claimed concern with tradition may be
relevant.

Kheti: (mid-D.13 or later) – early D.18 (§6.2.2.6)

Two constructions support full-fledged linguistic arguments. One implies that a
dating to the Twelfth Dynasty is linguistically too early (§6.2.2.6.2). The other one
implies a type-B terminus ante quem non to the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty (§5.3): the
construction may in fact have become possible only later (compare the comments
below on Neferti, which has the same construction).
Both constructions further suggest that a dating to the early Eighteenth Dynasty is
significantly more likely than an earlier dating within the temporal range defined.

Loyaliste, long version: early D.18 probably in large parts (§4.5)

The composition—a teaching, and highly intertextual—is largely undistinctive
linguistically. On compositional grounds, the long version of Loyaliste (a Teaching of
Kairsu) is secondary to the short version (Sehetepibre) (§4.5.5). One expression in the
first part of Kairsu directly dates the verse in which it occurs and the ones that
surround it to the early Eighteenth Dynasty (§4.5.2). Other expressions mostly in the
second part of Kairsu also suggest an early Eighteenth Dynasty dating for the verses
in which they occur (§4.5.3). On strict methodology, linguistic arguments or
indications for dating can have scope only over individual (groups of) verses in
Kairsu, not necessarily extending to the long version as a whole. Whether Kairsu as a
whole is an early Eighteenth Dynasty production therefore falls beyond the scope of
the present study.

Merikare: (later?) D.12 – early D.18 (§2.8)

(late in this temporal range??)
One element of morphology implies a secure terminus ante quem non to the Twelfth
Dynasty, ruling out a dating of Merikare to its Herakleopolitan setting. When set
against the background of the spread of the relevant change in time and across
registers during the Middle Kingdom, the same expression suggests that a dating to a
time as early as the earlier Twelfth Dynasty, although not to be ruled out fully, is
unlikely (§2.8.3.2). Other than this, grammatical expressions do not provide reliable
indications neither for an earlier dating nor for a later one within the broad temporal
range thus defined (§2.8.2-3).

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 7.2 Proposed datings and ranges for dating 511

A few lexical expressions could be indicative of a late dating (§2.8.3.4).

Moreover, these and other noteworthy expressions recur alongside each other in a
series of early Eighteenth Dynasty texts (§2.8.3.7). Such constellation could be
interpreted as suggestive of a late dating of Merikare, but is not dense enough to
support any firm conclusion.

Neferkare and Sisene: D.18 (§4.4)

One hybrid combination—aberrant in Middle Egyptian grammar, yet principled in
how it functions in context—directly relates the composition to an early Eighteenth
Dynasty horizon in written culture (§4.4.2). In addition, Neferkare includes a series of
innovative expressions with termini ante quem non by the very late Second
Intermediate Period (§4.4.3). Given the mostly late manuscripts of the composition,
not all of these expressions are necessarily original, but some arguably are. The
construction mentioned first is for its part so specific that it must be original.

Neferti: (mid-D.13 or later) – early D.18 (§5).

Three constructions in Neferti support full-fledged linguistic arguments. One implies
a terminus ante quem non to the late Twelfth Dynasty (§6.2). The second implies a
terminus ante quem non to the early Thirteenth Dynasty, or perhaps late Twelfth,
depending on how spread across registers is modeled (§5.2). The third implies a
terminus ante quem non to the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty (§5.3).
The last is a type-B ante quem non, determined in its temporal resolution by the
low density of the Second Intermediate Period record. Earliest occurrences of the
construction are otherwise from the late Second Intermediate Period and early
Eighteenth Dynasty; the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty is only the earliest period for which
based on the written evidence available it can not be ruled out any more that the
construction may have then been first innovated. The construction was therefore
innovated at some point between the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty and the late Second
Intermediate Period.
Additional indications for dating consist in two remarkable lexical expressions
and in two narrative formulae (§5.5-6). Individually and collectively, these very
strongly suggest that Neferti was composed in the early Eighteenth Dynasty.

Ptahhotep: (late D.11) – early/mid-D.12 (§2.4.3.3)

Any dating earlier than the Middle Kingdom is ruled out linguistically. A dating to
the late Eleventh Dynasty is less likely than one to the Twelfth.

Sporting King: probably D.18 (§4.3)

The dating is based on two expressions, none of which could have arisen in regular
linguistic change and both to be related to a definite horizon in written culture. The
first places Sporting King in the reception of the R tradition of Sinuhe, as documented
for the very expression concerned in other early Eighteenth Dynasty texts and only in
these (§4.3.2). The second expression, consisting in the combination of two elements

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 512 7 Conclusion

otherwise semantically exclusive of each other, is demonstrably an innovation of

early/mid-Eighteenth Dynasty royal inscriptions (§4.3.3). For Sporting King to have
been composed before the Eighteenth Dynasty, both these expressions must be
textually secondary: based on further considerations, this is very unlikely.

Tale Involving the House of Life: (late?) SIP (§3.3.1)

Two constructions place the composition in the Second Intermediate Period, probably
in the later part thereof, and thereby close in time to its manuscript attestation.

(Not discussed in the present study: Djedefhor; Oxford Wisdom Text; Tale of a
King and the Ghost of Snefer.2)

Although not literary texts in a narrow sense, three other compositions were included
in the main discussion:

Berlin Leather Roll: probably D.18 (§4.2)

Various expressions strongly suggest that Berlin Leather Roll is genuinely a product
of the early Eighteenth Dynasty, not merely in redactional terms. A newly composed
text, Berlin Leather Roll probably drew on earlier materials, textual or phraseological,
according with what the functions of a pseudepigraphy in early New Kingdom times
seem to have been. What these earlier materials were, in what amounts they were
drawn upon, and how they were integrated by early Eighteenth Dynasty composers
are essential questions in appreciating what ‘composition’ here textually means.
Answering these questions in details remains beyond the reach of a linguistic analysis
and possibly of any type of analysis.

Heavenly Cow: D.18 (§4.6)

A whole series of expressions unambiguously relate the composition to a distinctively
Eighteenth Dynasty horizon in written culture. When more precisely during the
Eighteenth Dynasty Heavenly Cow was composed is difficult to assess based on
linguistic grounds: a few indications weakly speak to a later rather than earlier dating
within the Dynasty.

The Royal Cycle: Hatshepsut (§4.7)

The dating to Hatshepsut is established through an examination of the particular
configuration of Old Egyptian expressions in the Cycle (§4.7.1). Not archaizing, a
series of other expressions are also distinctive of an early Thutmoside horizon of
Middle Egyptian (§4.7.2). Whether sw-headed constructions provide yet another
argument for an early New Kingdom dating is left open in the present study (§4.7.3).

2 The second and third of these compositions are highly fragmentary. The text of the first is unstable,
and the third is preserved in a very late manuscript only. In addition, Djedefhor and Oxford
Wisdom Text are teachings, reducing their linguistic distinctiveness.

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 7.3 Some implications 513

By ways of Gedankenexperimente, three more compositions were subjected to

linguistic dating:

Chapelle Rouge: early D.18 (§4.1.2)

Various constructions relate the composition to an early Eighteenth Dynasty horizon
in written culture (§4.1.2.C-E). This is the only way to date Chapelle Rouge: based on
classical strategies indexed on linguistic change, only a terminus ante quem non to the
early Twelfth Dynasty could be defined (§4.1.2.A).

The L2 text of Ptahhotep 60-83: D.18 (§2.3.5)

The section on disputants (D 60-83) includes various late constructions. These can be
identified as textually secondary based on criteria internal to the L2 text, without
taking any knowledge of the Twelfth Dynasty versions of Ptahhotep into account.
Dating Ptahhotep 60-83 based solely on L2 would therefore not have resulted in
wrongly ascribing the original composition to the Eighteenth Dynasty. On the other
hand, the stage of the text now documented in L2 can be dated linguistically to
Thutmoside times for the section on disputants—in itself an interesting result
regarding the history of the composition.

Sinuhe: D.12 (§4.1.3)

The composition is directly dated to the Twelfth Dynasty based on a configuration of
written language that includes constructions otherwise found in contemporaneous
inscriptional texts, funerary self-presentations and expedition accounts. The overall
web of cultural significations associated with these expressions, evoked and subverted
in the literary composition, was active in the Twelfth Dynasty; it was not at any other
times. A dating to the Twelfth Dynasty is also suggested by a set of uncommon
expressions shared with one biographical inscription of that period. The language of
Sinuhe is highly composed, in relation to broader palimpsestic strategies that are
essential to the meaning of this composition in particular.
(Whether Sinuhe could have been dated similarly if preserved only in Eighteenth
Dynasty copies can not be directly assessed, as too little of it is preserved.)

7.3 Some implications

The importance traditionally given to dating the original composition of literary texts
to some extent reflects the need that could be felt for historical contexts for inter-
pretation, in strategies emphasizing the original (and thereby, if often implicitly, the
intended) meaning. Instead, recent research has increasingly concentrated on the
plural histories of texts in their documented contexts of circulation and consumption,
emphasizing issues such as the significations the texts may have had to various
audiences in various periods, and the ways these audiences, including scribes, may

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 514 7 Conclusion

have engaged with the texts, contributing to shape them further.3 The present study is
itself part of this broader shift in perspective, in showing that very precise datings may
in some cases remain elusive, and in submitting that the historicist-functionalist
datings traditionally contemplated in all cases conflict with what linguistic analysis
suggests.
Yet, as the latter point already illustrates, a discussion of when texts may, or may
not, have been originally composed has not lost all interest either—even if the
question may seem somewhat peripheral in paradigms that emphasize the plural
histories of texts, and despite the fact that original composition is a concept
thoroughly alien to and irrelevant in the literary tradition being studied. Even when
datings are not fully precise, some interpretive options relating to original contexts
can be ruled out, opening to way to a renewed examination of other lines of inter-
pretation. Some assessment of possible periods of composition is also relevant to the
diachronic study of linguistic registers in literature, thereby to literary registers them-
selves, and further to aspects of Middle Egyptian written culture in various periods
more generally. Dating the texts also contributes to a study of their lives: it is for
instance only through establishing elements of a relative chronology of composition
of texts that hypotheses about how some texts could have been composed in the
literary reception of other ones, resonating with these, can begin being mapped out.

7.3.1 Prior circulation

The preservation of a literary manuscript over several thousand years may be favored
by certain conditions—the geology of the Theban necropolis being a case in point—
but is ultimately a matter of chance. Patterns of early attestation of literary texts are
always relevant for interpretation as they define contexts in which these texts were
read. Whether they are representative for composition is an altogether different issue,
however. This can only be an empirical question, necessarily to be addressed at the
level of individual cases.
Under the datings proposed above, several compositions have a linguistically
defined terminus ante quem non close in time to their first manuscript attestation.
Examples in the Middle Kingdom are Ptahhotep, and even more tightly so Eloquent
Peasant; in the late Second Intermediate Period and early Eighteenth Dynasty, Hymn
to Hapi, probably also Eulogistic Account of a King and Tale Involving the House of
Life. For other compositions, alternative linguistic strategies or additional indications
permit to establish, or make likely, a dating close in time to their first manuscript
attestation as well. In the Middle Kingdom, this is the case of Sinuhe; in the early
New Kingdom, an example is Neferkare and Sisene, probably also Fishing and
Fowling, Sporting King, Neferti, and Kheti.
Some of these compositions are documented in single manuscripts: in the late
Second Intermediate Period and early New Kingdom, probably Eulogistic Account of
a King, Tale Involving the House of Life, Fishing and Fowling, and Sporting King; in

3 E.g. for Twelfth Dynasty compositions, Hagen 2012a (Ptahhotep); Parkinson 2009 (Sinuhe); for a
composition first documented in early Eighteenth Dynasty manuscripts, Widmaier 2013 (Kheti); in
a similar perspective more generally, Gnirs 2013a; 2008; Loprieno 2006: XXIX-XXX.

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 7.3 Some implications 515

the Middle Kingdom similarly, Shipwrecked Sailor, Debate of a Man and His Soul,
and several more. Other ones are near-immediately documented in more than one
manuscript: in the Middle Kingdom, Sinuhe, Ptahhotep, or Eloquent Peasant; in the
early New Kingdom, Hymn to Hapi, probably also Kheti and Neferti. Among these
are compositions documented in more than one place in the country, often also in
excerpts: in the Middle Kingdom, Sinuhe; in the early New Kingdom, Hymn to Hapi,
probably also Kheti and Neferti.
By definition, the presence of a composition on a manuscript implies some time of
prior circulation. Yet, no general argument can be made to further imply that this prior
circulation must have been over a longer period in time: depending on individual
cases, it may, or may not. Presenting this, not as a premise, but as a result, indepen-
dently established, it turns out that in several cases patterns of early attestation are not
that divorced from what can be said about original periods of composition. However
fragmentarily in terms of contexts (geographical, social), patterns of early attestation
do in these cases reflect the general time of early circulation of literary texts in fairly
faithful ways.

7.3.2 Linguistic registers of Middle Egyptian literature

As suggested by a preliminary discussion of aspects of the linguistic situation in the

early/mid-second millennium (§1) and now confirmed and fleshed out by those texts
that could be dated more precisely in the present study, Middle Egyptian remained the
ordinary vehicle for composing new literature down to the early, and perhaps even
mid-, Eighteenth Dynasty. Among the texts that could be dated to periods after the
Middle Kingdom, some do not include any innovative expressions at all: dating was
possible only through strategies other than classical ones indexed on linguistic
change. Those texts that include innovative expressions generally do not include
many: they can not therefore be described as couched in some transitional variety.
Moreover, the relevant innovative expressions—often to do with linguistic function
rather than with form—are of an altogether different type than the ones that are some-
times mentioned in relation to the notion of ‘Late Middle Egyptian’. The latter are
found in the mid-/late Twelfth Dynasty already, including in literature, display close
associations with register, and are an integral part of Middle Egyptian itself,
conceived of in its intrinsic thickness (§2.4.4).
While the inception of Middle Egyptian written literature goes back to the
early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty, a few elements of a differentiation in linguistic register
are observed since the later Twelfth Dynasty (e.g. Tale of P. Lythgoe and Tale of Hay:
§2.4.4.4). Although not many, these seem to provide a linguistic counterpart to what
has been described as a then burgeoning ‘low tradition’ of Middle Egyptian narrative
literature. Eloquent Peasant and Kagemni also include discrete elements of such
registers as a component of the studied simplicity of their framing sections and
dialogues (§2.4.4.2.2.A-B; §2.4.4.3). In later times, Cheops’ Court demonstrates that
the distinction between the ‘low’ and ‘high’ traditions was fluid as far as language is
concerned: the repertoires of Cheops’ Court, which are more complex than may seem
at first, relate to Sinuhe as much as they do to Tale of Hay (§2.4.4). There are no two

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 516 7 Conclusion

different varieties of Middle Egyptian in literature, only elements of a differentiation,

diversely modulated in various compositions.
In the early New Kingdom, linguistic registers of Middle Egyptian literature also
display elements of a subtle internal differentiation, although charting these in details
is hampered by the lack of a precise dating for several major compositions that could
be relevant. Bound to a specific context (the Vizieral Cycle) and possibly never
published in any form other than the presently documented inscriptional one, yet no
less literary in its form and intertextual references, the poorly preserved Teaching of
Aametju is composed in a very pure Middle Egyptian with no innovative expression at
all and some thoroughly recherché ones (§1.3.2.3). This accords with Aametju being a
teaching, a type of Middle Egyptian literary discourse that more than any other is
deeply bound to tradition in ways that are simultaneously intertextual, formal, and
linguistic. Similar comments extend to the long version of Loyaliste as documented
from the early Eighteenth Dynasty on, parts of which at least are late in composition.
Also a teaching, Loyaliste is largely undistinctive linguistically; the composition
includes only a few innovative expressions and the strongest indication for dating is
significantly afforded by a construction that did not originate in linguistic change.
Hymn to Hapi, dating to the late Seventeenth/early Eighteenth Dynasty, includes
more innovative features. These suggest that its linguistic format was less tightly
bound to older models than was the case for teachings. Perhaps relevant is also the
innovative character of contemporaneous hymnic productions on non-linguistic levels.
Neferkare and Sisene—a tale, and one continuing the tradition previously documented
in Cheops’ Court—accommodates a few saliently innovative features (some of which
at least seem integral to the original text) and displays one remarkable element of
outright linguistic hybridity. The former are probably to be interpreted in relation to
the lowly subject matter and parodistic tone of the composition; the latter seems to be
in ironic reference to similar usages in extremely high contemporaneous registers,
evoked and contextually subverted in Neferkare. Probably dating to the early Eigh-
teenth Dynasty, Neferti accommodates a high amount of linguistically innovative ex-
pressions, more than any of the compositions mentioned above. While resonating with
earlier exponents of the Middle Egyptian literary tradition, the composition also
differs from these in many ways, in its form, in elements of its intertext, and in its
language.
In all cases, including those compositions that accommodate comparatively more
innovative expressions (Hymn, Neferkare and Sisene, Neferti), the language is Middle
Egyptian. A similar comment extends to compositions that on grounds of aspects of
their literary typology have been described as forerunners of Ramesside literature to
come: Tale Involving the House of Life, Eulogistic Account of a King, Fishing and
Fowling, and Sporting King. The first two, dating to the (later) Second Intermediate
Period, accommodate a few innovative expressions, but not many. Sporting King,
probably dating to the Eighteenth Dynasty, does not have any features that would be
innovative in terms of linguistic change; the linguistic dating is based on two expres-
sions, both artificial, that directly relate the composition to a specifically Thutmoside
horizon in Middle Egyptian written culture. Fishing and Fowling, probably from the
same time, does not have any grammatically innovative features either: the dating is

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 7.3 Some implications 517

based on two saliently recent lexical expressions, according with other elements in the
composition by which this can also be viewed as anticipating aspects of Ramesside
literature to come. Not traditionally mentioned in this context, yet relevant, is also
Kheti. The composition—dating to a period no earlier than the mid-Thirteenth Dy-
nasty, and probably as late as the early Eighteenth—is framed as a teaching in the
Middle Egyptian tradition, yet also an early exponent of a type of literary discourse
that would enjoy considerable popularity in Ramesside times (‘Berufstypologien’,
more broadly ‘scribal literature’); linguistically, Kheti includes very few innovative
expressions.
Also a forerunner of Ramesside written culture, Astarte (temp. Amenhotep II)
differs from all the above in being composed in a variety genuinely transitional
between Middle and Late Egyptian. On non-linguistic levels similarly, Astarte is
highly innovative, with little direct antecedents in earlier textual productions
(§1.3.2.2). In its general principle, such configuration compares with one component
in the register of Kamose Inscriptions (§1.3.3.2). In these, a very high level of Middle
Egyptian, reminiscent of an older tradition of narrative literature, coexists with a
dense web of highly innovative expressions. The latter accord with a novelty in
contents, format, and type of discourse, asserted in a self-conscious manner not least
through language itself.
In no period during the productive development of Middle Egyptian literature was
there a specifically literary variety of Middle Egyptian (§2.4). In the Twelfth Dynasty,
the linguistic repertoires of literature are essentially the same as in other textual pro-
ductions of the time, drawing on various registers in these. Among Middle Egyptian
literary texts composed after the Middle Kingdom, some accommodate innovative
expressions not found in inscriptional registers, but these remain isolated: occasional
linguistic selections do not define a variety. In its language, as in other aspects,
Middle Egyptian literature is deeply embedded in a broader Middle Egyptian culture,
drawing on this for articulating the cultural significations and semantic tensions it
expresses. One particular dimension of this configuration lies in occasional direct
references to specific elements of language that go beyond ordinary usage in inscrip-
tional texts, both in the Twelfth Dynasty (e.g. Sinuhe: §4.1.3; Ptahhotep: §2.4.3.3.B)
and in the Eighteenth (e.g. Neferkare and Sisene: §4.4.2; Sporting King: §4.3.2-3). A
specifically literary use of language is only when such direct references are
additionally played with, often ironically, in the literary texts, resulting in what
semantically may be termed a ‘linguistic dissonance’ (in Sinuhe and Neferkare), itself
a sign of literature.

7.3.3 A gradual development

The study of Middle Egyptian literature has traditionally concentrated on the Middle
Kingdom as the main period of production. A strong focus has often been on the early
Twelfth Dynasty, while recent studies have also increasingly emphasized the late
Middle Kingdom as a possible context for productive creation; the early New King-
dom has only marginally been evoked, being more commonly described as a context
of reception, however rich this may itself have been. The datings and ranges for

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 518 7 Conclusion

dating proposed in the present study alter this perspective in various ways, with
respect to the general development of Middle Egyptian literature, to possible frames
of interpretation for individual works, and to issues of reception.
Under the datings here proposed, the development of Middle Egyptian literature
as documented in the body of preserved works appears to have been more gradual and
polyphonic. While the earliest compositions date to the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty,
the production of new Middle Egyptian literary texts continued until the early Eigh-
teenth Dynasty with various traditions running in parallel. What on grounds of literary
typology has been described as a ‘low tradition’ of Middle Egyptian narrative
literature has early roots in the late Twelfth Dynasty and is documented in a more
substantially developed form in later times (Cheops’ Court), then in the early New
Kingdom (Neferkare and Sisene). Meanwhile, teachings in the full Middle Egyptian
tradition were also composed: from the early Eighteenth Dynasty are Aametju,
arguably Kheti, and the long version of Loyaliste probably in substantial parts.
Framed as a teaching, yet also strongly relating to narrative literature and echoing
Sinuhe, Amenemhat was not composed before the late Twelfth Dynasty, and possibly
much later. Among works addressing central theodic concerns, Ipuwer was not
composed before the Thirteenth Dynasty, nor was another lament in the same
tradition, Khakheperreseneb. Making reference to a Middle Egyptian literary tradition
of which Eloquent Peasant (mid-Twelfth Dynasty) is one much earlier exponent,
Neferti was not composed before the mid-Thirteenth Dynasty, and probably only in
the early Eighteenth. As teachings paradigmatically do, Neferti demonstrates the time-
depth of the Middle Egyptian literary tradition, as defined by ‘clusters of language
and imagery’, themes and motifs, later patterns of transmission and reception, and
language.
While the above presentation is necessarily sketchy, what emerges is a general
tableau in which literary typology does not project over time in linear ways: several
productive threads are in part contemporaneous. What also emerges is a perhaps more
gradual transition to Ramesside literature. Middle Egyptian and Late Egyptian
literature contrast in types of literary discourses, in cultural themes and decorum, and
in their relationship to other types of written discourses; they also contrast in cultural
status and functions, in modes of circulation of texts, and in different lifes of these
after the end of the New Kingdom; not least, they contrast in language. On the other
hand, there was a productive tradition of Middle Egyptian literature down to the early
New Kingdom; in particular, several texts that on grounds of aspects of their literary
typology have been described as forerunners of Ramesside literature to come were
then composed: Neferkare and Sisene, Sporting King, Fishing and Fowling, and the
short praise of a city on O. Nakhtmin 87/173. Not much older are Tale Involving the
House of Life and Eulogistic Account of a King.
Under the datings here proposed, other compositions of the early New Kingdom
include Hymn to Hapi and probably Kheti. Hymns to the Nileflood, not presently
documented before the New Kingdom, would be popular in Ramesside times. A
similar comment extends to ‘Berufstypologien’, more broadly ‘scribal literature’, of
which Kheti is the earliest exponent. Although lacking any direct descendants in
Ramesside times, Neferti, probably also an early Eighteenth Dynasty composition,

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 7.3 Some implications 519

strongly resonates with hymns to the Nileflood, as it does with inscriptional

compositions of its time, aspects of which were developed further in early Ramesside
times. The prologue in Neferti has elements that are not found in any pre-Eighteenth
Dynasty literary composition and recur in early Ramesside works, such as Apophis
and Seqenenre (§5.6.1, (iii)), or Doomed Prince and Satirical Letter (§5, n.273). In
significant ways the prologue also relates to what has been described as a ‘low tradi-
tion’ of Middle Egyptian narrative literature, documented by Cheops’ Court and
Neferkare and Sisene notably; this tradition was itself continued, if differently, in Late
Egyptian narrative literature.
Neferti also strongly resonates with Middle Egyptian laments, Khakheperreseneb
and Ipuwer. One major question that does not find an answer in the present study is
when the type of literary discourse these are exponents of, lacking direct descendants
in Late Egyptian literature, ceased to be productive. This is contingent upon the dating
of Ipuwer and Khakheperreseneb, which remains frustratingly uncertain: both could
have been composed close in time to their linguistic terminus ante quem non in the
early Thirteenth Dynasty, just as they could have been composed in significantly later
times.

7.3.4 The early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty

The long and important reign of Senwosret I has been described as a golden age of
literary production in Egypt, with literature dated to the early Twelfth Dynasty being
read in terms of loyalism, legitimization, or advocacy, and as a way to foster the
widening scribal elites’ support to the new dynasty while also presenting them with
normative cultural values. The datings and ranges for dating proposed in the present
study conflict with such functionalistic interpretation of the early development of
Middle Egyptian literature. It was submitted that A Man to His Son, parts of Loyaliste,
and Kheti all linguistically date to periods later than the early Twelfth Dynasty.
Possible contexts for these texts are therefore to be sought in other periods in which
loyalism was also an important issue, to be thematized in a literary form. For interpre-
tation, previous analyses of loyalistic themes and motives, and of the dense intertext
notably between A Man to His Son and the long version of Loyaliste, remain essential
and untouched by the later datings here proposed. More consequential for interpreta-
tion are the datings submitted for Amenemhat and Neferti, with a terminus ante quem
non by the late Twelfth Dynasty for the former and a still later one for the latter. Both
texts are thereby significantly later than the events in the early Twelfth Dynasty they
evoke (Amenemhat) or may evoke (Neferti): neither composition can be read as a
piece of advocacy for the rulers of that period, nor exploited as source material,
however subtly mediatized, for its history. These texts must be read for their semantic
density, their composition, and their language (here not solely in a linguistic sense).
As their rich intertext (broadly understood) demonstrates, layers and significations
that can be sensed are many.
Although deprived of a significant share of the compositions that had been
ascribed to it, the early/mid-Twelfth Dynasty remains a foundational period. If in a
rather less explosive initial development than has sometimes been assumed, the period

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 520 7 Conclusion

did witness the inception of written literature. The contexts for such developments
have been analyzed in relation to social changes and expanding literacy during the
Middle Kingdom, and/or in relation to changes in written discourses that occurred in
the preceding First Intermediate Period.4 The early Middle Kingdom also witnessed a
reconfiguration of styles of writing and a new standardization of higher registers of
language, of which Middle Kingdom Middle Egyptian, and possibly what in a native
phrasing was refered to as the ‘speech of officials’, were a product. Typical of several
early works of Middle Egyptian literature is a strongly reflexive focus on rhetorics,
and thereby on language, which is significant in this context (e.g. Ptahhotep, Eloquent
Peasant). Also typical of early Middle Egyptian literature is the often noted thorough-
going relationship with other types of written discourses, such as biographies,
expedition accounts, royal inscriptions and hymns, or funerary corpora (for the last,
e.g. Debate of a Man and His Soul, Herdsman). On a linguistic level as well, works
such as Sinuhe and Ptahhotep richly resonate with contemporaneous inscriptional
texts, extending to specific archaizing tendencies and aspects by which written lan-
guage can be over-determined in these, then partly reconfigured in the literary com-
positions (§2.4.3.2; §4.1.3). This is significant as both texts stand at, or very close to,
the beginning of a tradition of written literature in Egypt. Beside whatever oral
sources it may also have had, this naturally drew on previously existing types of
written discourses.
As also emerges from the present study, the influence of Sinuhe was profound,
extending beyond occasional allusions in inscriptions to new literary compositions
themselves. Amenemhat was composed in the literary reception of Sinuhe (§6.4.3),
and echoes of Sinuhe are found in Neferti and Sporting King (§5.1.2.2; §4.3.2). By
such process, events in the early Twelfth Dynasty alluded to in Sinuhe were made a
classical literary setting for later compositions to weave their own discourses on: a
tradition of the early Twelfth Dynasty was invented in literature. As the Ramesside
pairing of ‘Neferti’ with ‘Kheti’ may further suggest, perhaps even a tradition of an
actual early Twelfth Dynasty historical literature was then invented.

7.4 Prospects

As emphasized from the outset of the present study, a refined dating of Middle
Egyptian literary texts requires that all relevant dimensions be made to contribute:
language (taking into account the specific configurations of written language in
literature); intertext and cultural themes (taking into account the ways these are
addressed in literature and thereby issues of decorum); social contexts and functions
as these can be modeled (with the difficulty that such modeling is done against the
background that several texts are insecurely dated); archeological evidence, institu-
tional analysis and possible historical detail (not necessarily to be read in strictly
referential terms and therefore also in need of due interpretation); manuscript

4 Syntheses in Parkinson 2002: 64-6 and Moers 2001: 167-70, both with references to previous
discussions.

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 7.4 Prospects 521

documentation and issues of circulation (under a full realization of the fragmentary

nature of the preserved record). As this somewhat Borgesian listing implies, these
dimensions have to be weighed against each other, in ways yet to be defined and
individually for each text. Studying the linguistic aspect is important, not because
language would be a positive given (it is not), but because language is a dimension of
literature that can be manipulated by composers in various ways, or left out of such
manipulation, resulting in configurations that can be subjected to a principled set of
interpretive strategies.
The possibility of a linguistic dating of Egyptian texts more broadly has only
recently merited more intensive study. According with this state of the art, contra-
dictory positions on method have been voiced and the question is sometimes asked
whether Egyptian texts can be linguistically dated at all. The present author finds this
question ill-defined: different types of Egyptian written discourses make different
types of linguistic selections, come with different patterns of transmission and textual
histories, and are composed against the background of different linguistic situations.
The issue therefore lies in defining a set of strategies commensurate to each type of
texts to be dated: inasmuch as language is embedded in culture, no universal method
can be given.
As regards Middle Egyptian literary texts specifically, a perhaps disarmingly
simple observation is that major prospects for progress still lie in much additional
descriptive study of Middle Egyptian grammar itself, in text. Among the main
arguments used in, or specifically devised for, the present study, almost none would
have been available until the late 1980’s or much later yet, well half a century or more
after Middle Egyptian grammar had been first codified in its Gardinerian form. In the
decades when the common dating of Middle Egyptian literary texts to the Middle
Kingdom gradually emerged, subsequently to win wide acceptance, this was largely
consistent with what was then known of Middle Egyptian (mostly as an inventory of
easily identified forms, taking little account of linguistic function) and with how
early/mid-second millennium Egyptian language history itself was then viewed
(mostly as a linear sequence, taking little account of differences in registers, more
broadly of cultural factors that preside over the configuration and performance of
written language). Going beyond the communal grammar of the 1980’s, a study of
aspect, initially independent of any ambition at dating texts, resulted in a powerful
ante quem non criterion; so did a detailed description of -xr-marked construction,
even though the full implications for dating were not immediately realized. More
recently, a study of changes in passive voice has led to various criteria based on these,
while a study on ‘particles’ has contribued further insights relevant for dating. It is
therefore a legitimate extrapolation to assume that additional descriptive work in
Middle Egyptian grammar will result in further criteria for dating, currently
unavailable. Another post hoc observation is that several of the arguments here
discussed have to do with linguistic function rather than with linguistic form; this is
not surprising, as function is often less directly manipulated by composers than form.
As linguistic function is more difficult to study, it has also been investigated relatively
less, leaving more space for progress.

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 522 7 Conclusion

Beyond individual expressions, recurrent clusters of such could also be increas-

ingly considered, implying extensive comparative studies of the linguistic repertoires
of various types of written discourses, literary and not. This will be a time-intensive,
yet promising, effort: for example, there is some indication that post quem non
arguments for dating, so badly lacking at present, could be defined at these levels. As
the present study has already illustrated, such study of repertoires can not consist in a
mere listing of expressions and must be thoroughly interpretive at once. Linguistic
function is in text and involves multiple dimensions of meaning, including the cultural
and the indexical. Grammar, which is no algorithm, is itself to be read: for how
language is configured in a group of texts, and for what it does in an individual
composition.
Progress in linguistic dating is slow, because of the great many dimensions
simultaneously involved, because methods and strategies are themselves yet to be
defined and refined, and because investigations must extend well beyond the group of
texts primarily considered. It is the present author’s experience, however, that the
endeavor of dating texts by their language is a thoroughly rewarding one. In requiring
that all aspects relevant to language in use are drawn into the picture, this provides a
powerful motivation to address a whole series of issues from a fresh perspective and
to devise methods and strategies for doing so: grammar itself, to begin with, but also
aspects of the dynamics of textual alteration in transmission, the ways by which
different types of written discourses relate to or differ from each other linguistically
and therefore more broadly, and elements of the cultural and individual significations
conveyed by texts as expressed and supported by language. While the immediate
result is not always a fully precise dating of texts, much is being learnt in the process.

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 APPENDIX

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© Andréas Stauder, 2013 | doi.org/10.37011/studmon.12
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 TEXTS

A fragmentary stela from Karnak van Siclen III 2010: 368.

Aametju Dziobek 1998: 23-43, pl.2; for the
readings, also Vernus 20102b: 59-61, 71-2.
Abkau Barbotin 2005: 140-1.
Abydos Boundary Stela usurped by Neferhotep Leahy 1989; HHBT 18-9.
Ahmes-Nefertari’s Donation Stela HHBT 100-3.
Ahmose’s Tempest Stela Wiener & Allen 1998; HHBT 104-10.
Akhenaten’s Second Proclamation Murnane & van Siclen III 1993: 69-109.
Allen droht die Rekrutierung Jäger 2004: 272-4.
A Man to His Son Fischer-Elfert 1999.
Amenemhat Adrom 2006.
Ameniseneb (Louvre C11 and C12) Baines 2009; Kubisch 2008: 139-45;
Simpson 1974: pl.80; HHBT 7-9.
Ani Quack 1992.
Antef (BM EA 1628) Franke 2007b.
Antef’s Sehel Graffito Habachi 1953.
Antefiqer’s Girgawi Inscription (RILN 73) Žába 1974: 98-109.
Antefnakht’s Stela Vernus 1996c; HHBT 77.
Apophis and Seqenenre LES 85-9.
Appointment of the Vizier Helck 1955a; Dziobek 1998: 3-21, pl.1.
Astarte Collombert & Coulon 2000.
bis
Bebi, el-Kab tomb 8 Kubisch 2008: 274-9.
Book of the Dead (Nu) Lapp 2006.
Berlin Leather Roll de Buck 1938.
Chapelle Blanche Lacau & Chevrier 1956-1969.
Chapelle Rouge Lacau & Chevrier 1977-1979;
HHBT II 7-33.
Cheops’ Court Blackman 1988.
Debate of a Man and His Soul Allen 2011.
Deir el-Ballas Inscription Darnell 2008.

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 526 Appendix

Doomed Prince LES 1-9.

Duties of the Vizier van den Boorn 1988.
Eloquent Peasant Parkinson 1991a.
Emhab Klotz 2010; Kubisch 2008: 238-44;
HHBT 97-8.
Eulogistic Account of a King Parkinson 1999.
Fishing & Fowling Caminos 1956: 1-21; pl.1-7.
Fowler Parkinson 2004.
Hammamat 19 (Meri) Goedicke 1964;
Couyat & Montet 1912: 41-2, pl.5.
Hammamat 192 (Vizier Amenemhat) Couyat & Montet 1912: 98-100, pl.37.
Hatnub Anthes 1928.
Hay (Tale of) Collier & Quirke 2004: 44-7.
Heavenly Cow Hornung 1982.
Heqanakht Allen 2002a.
Herdsman Schneider 2007.
Herwerre (Sinai 90) Gardiner, Peet & Černy 1952: pl.25a-26;
1955: 97-9.
Hezy Kanawati & Abd er-Raziq 1999: pl.33, 59.
Horemkhauef Kubisch 2008: 310-4; HHBT 49-50;
Hayes 1947.
Horherkhutef of Edfu Kubisch 2008: 203-6.
Horus and Seth (Middle Kingdom) Collier & Quirke 2004: 20-5.
Hymns to the Diadem Erman 1911.
Hymn to Hapi van der Plas 1986.
Ini (BM EA 334) HTBM III pl.6.
Inscription Dédicatoire (Ramses II’s) Spalinger 2009; KRI II 323-36.
Installation of the Vizier Faulkner 1955; Dziobek 1998: 55-66,
pl.3a-b.
Ipuwer Enmarch 2005.
Iykhernefret Schäfer 1913: 169-75; Simpson 1974: pl.1;
Sethe 19282b: 70-1.
Kagemni Gardiner 1946a.
Kamose Inscriptions HHBT 82-97.
Khakheperreseneb Parkinson 1997b.
Khentemsemti HTBM II, 8-9; Simpson 1974: pl.61;
Sethe 19282b: 75.
Kheti Jäger 2004.

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 Texts 527

Khusobek Peet 1914; Baines 1987; Sethe 19282b:

82-3.
Kuban Stela KRI II 353-60.
Litany of the Sun Hornung 1975.
Loyaliste Posener 1976.
Mentuhotep (CG 20539) Lange & Schäfer 1908: 150-8; 1925:
pl.41-2.
Mentuhotep son of Hapy (UC 14333) Goedicke 1962; Stewart 1979: pl.18.
Mentuwoser (MMA 12.184) Ransom 1913; Sethe 19282b: 79-80.
Merikare Quack 1992.
c
Mo alla (Ankhtifi) Vandier 1950.
Moscow Mythological Story Caminos 1956: 40-50, pl.17-23;
Korostovtzev 1960.
Mutter und Kind Yamazaki 2003.
Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela HHBT 21-9.
Neferhotep (TT 50) Hari 1985.
Neferkare and Sisene Posener 1957.
Neferpesedjet Collier & Quirke 2004: 42-3.
Neferti Helck 19922.
Nesimontu Obsomer 1993; Simspon 1974: pl.14;
Barbotin 2005: 142-4.
Nubkheperre Antef’s Coptos Decree HHBT 73-4.
O. Cairo 25372 Kroeber 1970: 95-6.
O. DeM 1675 ro+vso Fischer-Elfert 1986: 31-62.
O. Nakhtmin 87/173 Guksch 1994; Ragazzoli 2008: 26.
Paheri (tomb of) Tylor & Griffith 1894.
Pahu’s Prayer Darnell 2010.
P. Berlin 10056 Vernus 1990a: 186.
P. Berlin 10073 Luft 1992.
P. Berlin 10463 (Sennefer to Baki) Caminos 1963.
P. BM EA 10107 ro (Ptahu to Ahmes Peniati) Glanville 1928.
P. Harris Magical Leitz 1999.
P. Leiden I 348 Borghouts 1971.
P. Louvre 3230B (Tay to Ahmes Peniati) Peet 1926.
P. Lythgoe (Tale of) Simpson 1960.
P. MMA 27.3.560 (Tit to Djehuti) Hayes 1957: 89-90, fig.1-O, pl.XIII.2.
P. Ramesseum II Barns 1956: 11-4, pl.7-9; Parkinson
2012b.

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 528 Appendix

P. Ramesseum III Barns 1956: 15-23, pl.10-5; Parkinson

2012b.
Ptahhotep Žába 1956.
P. UC, Illahun (non literary) Collier & Quirke 2002; 2004; 2006.
Rahotep’s Coptos Stela Stewart 1979: 17-8; HHBT 59-60.
Rudjahau Faulkner 1951.
Rekhmire Gardiner 1925; Urk. IV 1071-85.
Sarenput, Stela 9 (Aswan Museum #1373) Franke 1994: 154-7; Habachi 1985a:
pl.24.
Sasobek Barns 1956: 1-10, pl.1-16; Parkinson
2012b.
Satirical Letter Fischer-Elfert 1983.
Seankhenre Mentuhotepi’s Stela Vernus 1989; HHBT II 3.
Semna Stela (Senwosret III’s) Sethe 19282b: 83-4.
Seneferibre Senwosret IV’s Karnak Stela HHBT 41.
Shipwrecked Sailor Blackman 1932: 41-8.
Sinuhe Koch 1990.
Siut Griffith 1889; Edel 1984.
Sobekemsaf’s Medamud Endowment Inscription HHBT 62.
Sobekhotep I’s Abydos Stela Barbotin 2005: 88; HHBT 5.
Sobekhotep IV’s Karnak Stela HHBT 31-4.
Sobekhotep VIII’s Inundation Stela HHBT 46-7; Baines 1974; 1976.
Speos Artemidos Allen 2002b; Urk. IV 383-91.
Sporting King Caminos 1956: 22-39, pl.8-16.
Stèle Juridique Lacau 1949; HHBT 65-9.
Tale Involving the House of Life Parkinson 1999.
Teaching of the High-Priest Amenemhat Gardiner 1910; Urk. IV 1408-11.
Tod Inscription Barbotin & Clère 1991.
Two Brothers LES 9-30.
Uronarti Quay Inscription Dunham 1967: pl.XXV.
Visitors’ graffiti in the Memphite necropolis Navrátilová 2007.
Wadi el-Hôl #8 Darnell 2002: 107-19.
Wadi el-Hudi I Sadek 1980.
Wenamun LES 61-76.
Wepwawetaa, Munich Gl. WAF 35 Simpson 1974: pl.30; Sethe 19282b: 73-4.

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14.5.2011, Lingua Aegyptia Studia Monographica, Hamburg.
Winand, Jean & Stéphanie Gohy. 2011. La grammaire du Papyrus Magique Harris, in: Lingua Aegyptia
19, 175-245.
Yamazaki, Naoko. 2003. Zaubersprüche für Mutter und Kind: Papyrus Berlin 3027, Berlin.
Žába, Zbynĕk. 1956. Les maximes de Ptahhotep. Texte, traduction et commentaire, Prague.
–––. 1974. The Rock Inscriptions of Lower Nubia, Prague.
Zeidler, Jürgen. 1992. Review of Karel Petracek, Vergleichende Studien, in: Lingua Aegyptia 2, 189-
222.
–––. 1999. Pfortenbuchstudien, Göttinger Orientforschungen, IV. Reihe, Ägypten 36, Wiesbaden.
Zonhoven, Louis. 1997. Studies on the sDm.t=f verb form in Classical Egyptian, Göttingen.

Abbreviations beyond the usual ones:

FCD = Raymond Faukner. A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, Oxford 1972.

HannLex 4 = Rainer Hannig. Ägyptisches Wörterbuch I. Altes Reich und Erste Zwischenzeit, Hannig
Lexika 4, Mainz 2003.
HannLex 5 = Rainer Hannig. Ägyptisches Wörterbuch II. Mittleres Reich und Zweite Zwischenzeit,
Hannig Lexika 5, Mainz 2006.
HHBT = Wolfgang Helck. Historisch-biographische Texte der 2. Zwischenzeit und neue Texte der 18.
Dynastie, Kleine ägyptische Texte, Wiesbaden 19832.
HHBT II = Wolfgang Helck. Historisch-biographische Texte der 2. Zwischenzeit und neue Texte der
18. Dynastie. Nachträge, Kleine ägyptische Texte, Wiesbaden 1995.

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 Ahmes-Nefertari’s Donation Stela
19-20 4.4.3.2, (iv)

Ahmose’s Tempest Stela

ro 1 4.4.2.2, (ii)
INDEX LOCORUM ro 1-3/vso 1-4 6.2.2.6.2, (i)
ro 6-7/vso 7-8 5.1.3.2.C.NB
ro 7-10/vso 8-12 °5.8.3.3
ro 9/vso 10-11 °5.8.3.3
ro 14/vso 17 3, n.7
(The index includes passages and refer-
ro 15-16/vso 18 °5.8.3.3
ences discussed in the text but ignores
ro 16/vso 18 5.1.3.2.C.NB
references that have a mere supporting
ro 17-18/vso 20 °5.1.3.3.D; °5.8.3.3
function. Passages more extensively com-
mented upon or central to the main argu-
ments are boldfaced. When the reference is Akhenaten’s Second Proclamation
to a single word, this is indicated in paren-
A 12-13 2.7.3.2, (x);
theses. References which are for intertext or
2.8.3.5, (iv)
for other comments are preceded by a °.)

Allen droht die Rekrutierung

Aametju 3-5 5.3.4.2, (vi)
discussion: 1.3.2.3
12 °2.8.3.7, (d) A Man to His Son
13 1.3.2.3, (i) discussion: 2.6.2.7.B
16 °2, n.527
19 1.3.2.3, (vii) 3.1 2.3.4; 2.6.2.6, (ii)
20 1.3.2.3, (ii) 3.1-3 2.3.4.2; 2.3.4.2.2, (ix)
20-21 °2.8.3.7, (d) 3.5 6, n.107
24 1.3.2.3, (iii) 4.9 2.3.4.1, (iv)
25 1.3.2.3, (viii) 8.1-6 2.3.3, (v)
29-32 1.3.2.3, (ix) 9.3 2.3.4.2.2, (vi)
30 1.3.2.3, (vi)
42 1.3.2.3, (iv); 4.6.3.A Amenemhat
43 1.3.2.3, (i); 1.3.2.3, (v)
discussion: 6
43 (nfr-ib) 1.3.2.3, (v); 2.2.2, (ix)
1d (xai, HqA) °6.3.1.2.C
1d (nsy) 6.3.2.1
Abkau 1d 2.3.1.1, (ix)
x+3 1.2, (xi.) 1d-e °6.3.2.1, (i)
5a (snnw anxw) °6, n.194
5d (mTwn) 2.2.2, (iii); 2.2.2, (v);
Abydos Boundary Stela usurped by 6.3.2, intro.
Neferhotep 6a °6, n.234
5 1.3.3.1, (ii); 6b (Ssp wnwt) 2.2.2, (ix)
5.2.4.1.A, (a) 6b (nfr-ib) 1.3.2.3, (v); 2.2.2, (ix);
5-6 3.4.2.2, (vii) 6.3.2, intro.
6-7 5.2.5, (iv) 6e 2.8.2.2, (i)
6e-f 6.1.3.2
6f (sA-tA) °6.3.1.2.B; 6.3.2, intro.

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 552 Appendix

7b (Hw-ny-r-Hr) 6.3.2.2 Antefiqer’s Girgawi Inscription (RILN 73)

7b (mwnf) 2.2.2, (iv); 6.3.2, intro.
6-7 5.3.4.1, (i)
7c-f 6.1.3.1, (i)
7e °6.3.2.2.NB
7f °6.3.2.2.NB Antefnakht’s Stela (BM EA 1645)
8a (sTA) °6.3.1.2.B; 6.3.2, intro. discussion: 1.3.3.2.E
8d-e °6, n.235
9b-d 2.3.4.2.2, (viii); 6.1.3.1 3 1.3.3.1, (v); 1.3.3.2.E;
10a (Hsi) °6.3.2.2.NB 3.4.1.3, (a)
10b 1.2, (iii.)
10c (ini Drw) °6.3.2.2.NB Apophis and Seqenenre
10c (xpS) °6.3.1.2.B; 6.3.2, intro.
1.1 5.6.1, (viii)
11a-d °6.1.2, (i)
11c 6.2.3.4
11c-d 6.2 Appointment of the Vizier
11d 6.2.1.1, (ii)
1 5.6.1, (iv); 5.8.1.2
14a-c °6.1.2, (v)
°4 5.8.1.2
14f (nfr-ib) 1.3.2.3, (v); 2.2.2, (ix);
6 4.6.3.A
6.3.2, intro.
7 4.6.3.A; B; 4.7.1.C
15a (HAt, pHwy) °6.3.1.2.C; °6.3.2.1
8 2.6.3.1, (ii); 4.6.3.A-B;
15a-c 6.3.1; °6.3.2.1
4.7.1.C
15b (mni) °6.3.1.2.C; °6.3.2.1
11 (nkA) 2.7.3.4
15c 2.3.4.1, (v); 6.3.1
12-17 °5.8.1.2, (ii)
15c (prt-nTr) °6.3.1.2.C; °6.3.2.1
16 4.6.3.A; °5.1.3.2.C
25 3.4.1.3, (d); 3.4.1.4, (ii)
Ameniseneb 25 (Hmw-ib) 2.8.3.7, (d)
discussion: 1.3.3.1.C
- Louvre C11 Astarte
16-17 1.3.3.1, (iii) discussion: 1.3.2.2
- Louvre C12 I.x+10 5.3.4.2, (v)
3 1, n.187
4-5 1.3.3.1, (i); 1.3.3.1.C Bebi, el-Kab tomb 8bis
5-8 1.3.3.1, (i); 1.3.3.1.C
3-4a + 4b °6.1.2, (ii)

Ani
Berlin Leather Roll
D 8.2 °5.1.3.3.D
discussion: 4.2
B 16.5 4.6.4.2.B
B 20.1 4.5.3.2 1.1-2 5, n.243
B 21.8-9 °5.1.3.3.D 1.8 (bwA) 4.2.4, (iii)
1.12 (xpr=f-iT=f) 4.2.2
1.12-14 4.2.2, (i)
Antef (BM EA 1628) 1.19 (m-rA-a) 4.2.3
8 3.1.2.C; 6.2.2.3, (v) 2.4 4.2.1
2.5 (iwnn) 4.2.4, (ii)
2.7 °5.8.1.4, (i)
Antef’s Sehel Graffito 2.9 6.3.1.1; 6.3.1.2.C
8-9 3.1.2.C; 6.2.2.3, (iv) 2.9 (rA-Hry) 4.2.4, (i)

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 Index locorum 553

Book of the Dead (Nu) Cheops’ Court

17.47 (xpS) °6.3.1.2.B discussion: 2.4.4
17.75, 17.84 (sTA) °6.3.1.2.B 2.9 3.3.1, (ii)
87.3 (sA-tA) °6.3.1.2.B 2.15-16 2.4.4.4, (i)
144.48-49 4.4.4.3, (viii) 3.10-11 2.4.4.4, (i)
3.17 2.4.4.4
Chapelle Blanche 4.1 2.4.2, (i); 2.4.4.5, (vi)
4.23-25 °5.1.3.2.B
n°170, 253, 259 4.7.1.B; 6.3.1.1 5.3-7 2.4.4.5, (iii)
n°180 4.1.2.B; 4.7.1.B 5.9-12 2.4.4.3, (ii)
5.15-16 2.4.4.3, (i)
Chapelle Rouge 6.1 2.7.3.1.A
6.1-2 2.4.4.6, (ii)
discussion: 4.1.2 6.4 2.4.4.5, (iv)
p.98: I.2-3 1.2, (xi.); 3.4.4, (iii) 6.11 2.4.4.5, (v); 2.8.2.1, (ii)
p.98: I.2-5 4.3.2.1, (v) 6.14 2.4.4.5, (iv)
p.98: I.5 (tp-Sw)5.1.3.3, (viii) 6.26-7.6 °5.1.3.2.B
p.98: I.5-8 4.1.2.D; 4.3.3, (ii) 7.2-4 2.4.4.7, (iv); 2, n.301
p.99: I.12-13 4.1.2, (ii) 7.6-7 3.3.1, (ii)
p.99: I.13-15 4.1.2, (vi) 7.8-9 2.4.4.7, (iii)
p.99: I.14 4.3.3, (ii); 5.8.1.4, (ii) 8.9-10 °5.1.3.2.B
p.99: I.16-17 1.2, (ix.); 8.10-11 2.4.4.7, (i); (v)
5.1.4.2, (ix) 8.11-12 2.4.4.7, (v)
p.99: I.18 4.1.2.D; 4.3.3, (ii) 8.12-13 2.4.4.7, (v); 4.4.3.1
p.107: III.6-7 4.1.2.B 8.14 2.4.4.7.A
p.107: III.7 4.7.1.B-C 8.19, 8.21 (DADA) 2.4.4.4, (v);
p.107: III.9-11 4.1.2, (viii) 2.4.4.7, (vi)
p.107: III.14-15 4.1.2, (ii); 4.1.2, (vii); 8.21-22 2.4.4.7, (vi)
4.3.3, (ii) 8.23-9.1 2.4.4.3, (i)
p.108: III.22 4.5.3.3, (ii) 9.8-9 2.4.4.7, (i)
p.116: IV.16-17 °5.8.2.1 9.12 2.4.4.6, (i)
p.120: V.7-8 1.2, (xi.); 3.4.4, (iv); 9.14 2.4.4.7, (ii)
4.4.2.2, (i); 4.6.2, (i) 9.15 4, n.98
p.121: V.10-11 4.1.2.D; 4.3.3, (ii) 9.21-22 2.4.4.6.B; 5.6.2, (ii);
p.124: VI.1 4.1.2, (viii); 4.6.2.B 5.6.2.C
p.125: VI.8-11 4.2.1, (viii) 9.24-25 2.4.4.6, (iii)
p.126: VI.15 2.8.3.6, (iv); 10.3 2.4.4.6.B
2.8.3.7, (c) 10.9 2.4.4.6, (iii)
p.130: VII.1 °5.1.3.2.C 10.9-10 2.4.4.6, (iv)
p.130: VII.2 4.1.2.B; 4.7.1.B-C 10.11 2.4.4.6, (iv)
p.131: VII.12-13 3, n.7; 4.1.2, (i) 10.11-12 2.4.4.5, (i)
p.133: VIII.1 °5.8.2.1 11.8-9 2.4.4.6, (iv)
p.136: IX.11-12 2.8.3.6, (iv); 11.10-11 2.7.3.1.A
2.8.3.7, (c) 11.14-19 2.4.4.3, (i)
p.137: IX.22-23 3.4.2.3, (iii) 11.23 2.4.4.1.C;
p.141: X.1-3 4.1.2, (ii) 2.4.4.7.A; 6.2.2.5, (ii)
p.144: XI.6 °5.8.2.1 12.4-6 2.4.4.5, (ii)
p.150: XV.8-9 2.8.3.1, (iii); 12.8-9 2.4.4.4, (i)
2.8.3.7, (c) 12.24 2.4.4.7.A
p.248 4.1.2, (viii)
p.310 2.7.2.1, (iii)

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 554 Appendix

Coffin Texts R 10 (SAa-m ... nfryt-r ...) 2.7.3.3, (i);

2.7.3.4; 2.8.3.5, (iv)
I 205f 4, n.348
R 10-11 2, n.500
II 375c-376a 2, n.390
R 11 (r-DAwt) 2.8.3.5, (v); 2.8.3.7, (d)
IV 73a D1C 5.8.1.3
R 11 (anan) 2.8.3.5, (vi)
IV 278/9d BH1Br 2.4.4.5, (iv)
R 13 (m-HAw-Hr) 2.8.3.5, (vii)
IV 280/1a M1NY 2.4.4.5, (v)
R 14 3.4.2.2, (ix);
IV 359c-e 3.4.2.2, (i)
3.4.2.2, (xi)
V 27d-e Sq6C 3.4.1.2, (iii)
R 14 (xnrt-wr) °6.2.2.5
V 97g T1C 2.4.4.5, (v)
R 15 3.4.2.2, (ix)
VI 23j-l B1Bo 2.4.3.2, (xiii)
R 16 2.8.3.5, (iii);
VII 30j 3.4.1.2, (i)
3.4.2.2, (x)
VII 115i-k B4Bo 2.4.3.2, (xiii)
R 20 3.4.2.2, (ix);
VII 219f 3.4.1.2, (ii)
3.4.2.2, (x)
VII 340c 4, n.235
R 21 2.8.2.1, (ii)
R 21-22 2, n.498
Debate of a Man and His Soul R 27 (anan) 2.8.3.5, (vi)
5, 7, 50, 116 2.4.4.2.2.D
16 2.4.4.2.2.D Eloquent Peasant
17 4.2.1, (ii)
discussion: 3.1.2
56-59 4.5.3.2
75-76 2.4.4.5, (v) B1 27-28 °5.1.3.2.A
108 6.2.3.3, (iii); B1 62-63 3.3.1, (i)
6.2.3.5.B, (a) B1 75 2.4.2, (i); 2.4.4.5, (vi)
108-125 6.2.3.5, (iii) B1 80-81 6.2.2.2, (ii)
109-111 6.2.3.2, (ii) B1 110-111 6.2.2.2, (i)
111-113 6.2.3.2, (iii) B1 115-116 2.4.3.2, (iv); 2.4.4.6.B;
123-124 6.2.3.3, (iv); 3.1.2.A; 5.3.4.1, (ii)
6.2.3.5.B, (c) B1 128-134 2.6.2.2, (i)
B1 131-132 3.1.2.C; 6.2.2.3, (iii)
B1 135-136 1.2, (vi.)
Deir el-Ballas Inscription B1 135-138 2.6.2.2, (ii)
x+3 2, n.231 B1 142 2.7.2.2.B
x+10 (DADA) 2, n.232 B1 159 2.4.3.2, (ii); 2.7.2.2.A
x+11 2.4.3.3.A B1 179-181 2.6.2.1; 2.6.2.3, (ii)
B1 193-194 3.4.2.2, (iv)
B1 213-214 5.2.5.C, (d)
Doomed Prince B1 219 2.4.3.2, (i); 4.7.1.B
8.7 4.4.4.3, (iv) B1 228-231 °5.1.3.3, (i)
B1 252-254 2.4.3.2, (v); 3.1.2.C;
6.2.2.3, (i)
Duties of the Vizier
B1 257-262 2.6.2.3, (i)
discussion: 2.8.3.5 B1 267 2.3.4.2.2, (iv)
R3 3.4.2.2, (xi) B1 321-322 2.4.3.2, (v); 3.1.2.C;
R5 3.4.2.2, (viii) 6.2.2.3, (ii)
R 5-6 2.8.3.5, (ii) B1 327-328 2.3.4.2.1.D
R7 2.8.3.5, (iii) B1 332-334 5.3.5.1, (i)
R9 3.4.2.2, (x) B1 352-353 2.4.3.2, (iii);
R 9 (r-DAwt) 2.8.3.5, (v); 5.2.5.C, (c)
2.8.3.7, (d) B2 113-114 5.3.5.2, (ii)
R 9-10 2.7.3.2, (x); 2.7.3.4 B2 125 1.2, (viii.)
B2 126-129 2.4.4.2.2, (iii)

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 Index locorum 555

B2 128 2.7.3.1.A; 3.1.2.B Hammamat 192 (Vizier Amenemhat)

B2 130 2.4.4.6.B
20-21 6.2.2.6.2, (iii)
R 7.7 2.4.4.6.B
R 10.5 5.2.5.C, (e)
R 18.1-5 2.4.4.3, (ii) Hatnub
R 18.4 4.6.5.1.A.NB 16, 5-6 4, n.160
25, 3 2.8.3.1, (vi)
Emhab
discussion: 1.3.3.2.E Hay (Tale of)
8-9 1.3.3.1, (vi); 1.3.3.2.E; X+1.3-4 2.4.4.4, (v)
3.3.1, (iii) X+1.7 (DADA) 2.4.4.4, (v)
8-12 3.4.1.4, (iii)
11 1.3.3.2.E; 3.4.1.3, (a)
11-12 1.3.3.1, (vii); 1.3.3.2.E Heavenly Cow
discussion: 4.6
Eulogistic Account of a King 1-2 5.6.1, (vii)
1-3 4.6.4.2
discussion: 3.3.2 2 4.6.4.2
X+3.x+5 °6.1.2, (iv) 4-8 4, n.314
X+7.x+3 3.3.2, (i) 8-9 2, n.394
X+7.x+5 (m-rA-a) 3.3.2.B; 4.2.3 11-16 4.6.4.1
15 4.6.4.1
Fishing & Fowling 19 (Dri) 4.6.7, (iii)
23 4.6.3.A-B
discussion: 3.2 34 4, n.344
A2.8 (nkA) 2.7.3.3, (ii); 60 (SAa-m) 4.6.7, (iv)
3.2.2, intro. 64 4.6.3.A-B
B1.13, 15 (bxn) 3.2.2 69-70 4.6.5.2, (i)
B2.6-7 2.3.1.1, (vii) 70 4.6.3.A-B
B2.7 (rrmw) 2, n.40 72 4.6.3.A-B
B2.7-8 2.6.2.6, (i); 3.2.1 76 4.6.3.A
B4.4-5 1.2, (viii.) 77-79 4.6.1.1, (ii)
C1.x+7 (hAnw) 3.2.2 83 (<n>hp) 4.6.7, (v)
C2.x+11 (DADA) 2.4.4.4, (v) 84 (nfrw grH) 4.6.7, (vi)
C3.14 °3.2.3 97-98 4.6.0, (i)
123-134 4.6.2.C
130 4.6.1.2
Fowler
132 4.6.2
- P. Moscow 1695 vso 133-134 4.6.1.1, (i)
1-2 4.6.4.2.A 155 (sdAdA) 4.6.7, (i)
175 (r-imitw) 4.6.0, (v)
- P. Butler vso 186 4.6.0, (iv)
12 2.7.2.2.B 191 4.6.0, (iv)
17 °5.1.3.3, (iv) 192 4, n.343
200 (r-imitw) 4.6.0, (v)
Hammamat 19 (Meri) 211-213 4.6.5.1
215 3.4.1.1.B; 4.6.0, (iii);
3-4 5.3.4.1, (iii) 4, n.343
10-12 5.3.4.1, (iii) 232 2, n.105; 3.4.1.1.B;
4.6.0, (iii)

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 556 Appendix

234 4.6.5.1.B 5.2 6.2.2.4, (viii);

236 4.6.5.2.C 6.2.3.5.B, (c)
240-241 (r-xft-Hr-n) 4.6.0, (ii) 6.1-8 5.3.2.1
246-247 (anan) 4.6.7, (ii) 6.3-4 5.3.2.1; 5.3.3.C
261-262 4.6.5.2, (ii) 6.4 3.4.3; 5.2.3.1; 5.3.3
270 (sAt) 4.5.3.3, (iii) 12.1-2 3.4.2
12.2 6.2.2.4, (xii)
12.7 (xnr) 3.4.6, (i)
Heqanakht
12.7-8 °5.8.3.2.A
I vso 4 and 15 1.3.3.2, (ii) 12.8 (ftft) 2.2.2, (ii); 3.4.6, (iv)
II ro 40 3.4.2.2, (iii) 13.5 °5.8.3.2.A
14.1 (tmw) 3.4.6, (ii)
Herdsman 14.5, 6, 10 3.4.4.NB; 2.8.3.2.NB

22-23 2.4.4.4, (ii)

Hymns to the Diadem

Herwerre (Sinai 90) 1.5, 19.3, 20.2 6.3.1.1

1.1, 5.5-6.1, 6, n.178
9 2.4.3.2, (i); 4.1.2, (iii); 10.2, 10.3, 11.3
4.7.1.B
Ini (BM EA 334)
Hezy
b, col.3-4 2.8.3.1, (vi)
West thickn. 4-5 4.2.3, (i)
Inscription Dédicatoire (Ramses II’s)
Horemkhauef
25 5.6.1, (iv)
5 1.3.3.1, (viii) 30 5.6.2, (iv)
34 (tp-Sw) 5.1.3.3, (viii)
Horherkhutef 40 °5.1.3.2.C

1 °6.1.2, (iii)
Installation of the Vizier

Horus and Seth (Middle Kingdom) 6-7 3.4.2.2, (ix)

11 2.7.3.2, (xii); 2.7.3.4
X+2.5 2.7.3.2, (ii) 12-13 3.4.2.2, (viii)
17 3, n.109
Hymn to Hapi 21 3.4.2.2, (x)

discussion: 3.4
Ipuwer
1.3 (sSmw) 3.4.6, (iii)
2.1-2 °5.8.3.2.A discussion: 6.2.2.5
2.5 3.4.2 2.2 2.3.4.2.1, (viii)
2.5-6 °5.1.3.3.C; °5.8.3.2.A 2.4-5 2.3.1.1, (vi)
2.5-8 3.4.2, (i) 2.5-10 5.3.5.1, (iii)
2.8-9 2.6.2.4, (iv) 2.6 2.3.4.2.1, (viii)
3.2 °5.8.3.2.A 2.6-7 1.2, (ix.)
3.7 3.4.4 2.8-9 2.6.2.4, (iv)
3.7-8 °5.8.3.2.A 2.10 6.2.2.4, (ii);
4.5-9 3.4.1.4, (i) 6.2.3.5.B, (a)
4.7 3.4.1 2.11 2.3.4.2.1, (vii)

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 Index locorum 557

3.8 2.7.3.2, (vii); 2.3 2.4.4.2.2.A

6.2.2.5, (iv) 2.4 2.4.4.5, (iv)
3.10-11 2.3.4.2.1, (iii) 2.4-5 2.4.4.2.2, (i); 2.7.3.1.A
4.5-6 2.3.4.2.1, (iii) 2.5-6 °5.1.3.2.A
4.6 5.2.4.1.A, (c); 2.5-7 2.4.4.3, (i)
6.2.2.5, (iii) 2.7 4.1.3, (iv)
4.8-9 2.3.4.2.1, (v) 2.7-9 2.4.4.3, (i)
4.11-12 6.2.2.5, (ii) 2.8 2.4.4.3, (i)
5.6 2.3.4.2.1, (ii);
2.3.4.2.1, (ix)
Kairsu  Loyaliste
5.9 4.2.1, (iv)
5.11 6.2.2.4, (iii);
6.2.3.5.B, (b) Kamose Inscriptions
6.7 2.3.4.2.1, (vii) discussion: 1.3.3.2
6.8 2.3.4.2.1, (vi)
6.8-9 2.3.4.2.1, (iv) - T. Carnarvon
6.9-10 2.3.4.2.1, (x) 3 1.3.3.2, (iii);
6.9-12 5.3.5.1, (ii) 1.3.3.2, (ix);
6.12 (xnrt-wr) °6.2.2.5 1.3.3.2, (x)
6.12 (pr-hA=f) 6.2.2.5 4 1.3.3.2, (vii)
6.12-13 2.3.4.2.1, (x) 4 (SAa-r) 1.3.3.2, (vi); 2.7.3.3, (i)
6.12-14 °6.1.2, (vi) 7 1.3.3.2, (i)
7.1 6.2.2.5, (vi) 10-12 1.3.3.2, (xi)
7.3-4 °5.8.2.2 13-14 °1, n.221
7.4 2.3.4.2.1, (viii)
- Stela I
7.4-6 2.6.2.4, (iii)
7.7 2.3.4.2.1, (iv) 10 1.3.3.2, (vii)
7.8 2.3.4.2.1, (x) - Stela II
7.13-14 2.6.2.4, (i)
3 1, n.198
8.11-9.1 2.6.2.4, (ii)
4-5 1.3.3.2, (xiii)
10.6 6.2.2.4, (ix);
10 5.2.5, (iii)
6.2.3.5.B, (c)
10-11 4.4.3.2, (iii)
10.11 6, n.70
13 (tA-nt-Htr) 1.3.3.2, (iv)
12.4 (Hw-ny-r-Hr) 6.2.2.5, (v); 6.3.2.2
17-19 1.3.3.2, (xii)
12.14 6.2.2.5, (vii);
20 1.3.3.2, (viii)
6.2.2.5 (viii)
30-31 1.3.3.2, (ii)
13.9 2.6.2.4, (v)
30-33 1.3.3.2, (xiv)
13.11-12 2.6.2.4, (vi)
31-33 1, n.32
13.12-13 2.6.2.4, (v)
32-33 2.6.3.1, (x)
13.13 2.6.2.4, (vi)
33 5.3.5.2, (iii)
14.11 5.3.4.2.B.NB
34 (xpS) 1.3.3.2, (v); 5.5.1.1
36-38 °5.8.1.4, (i)
Iykhernefret
10 4.1.3.A; 6.1.3.2, (iii); Khakheperreseneb
6.1.3.2, (v)
discussion: 2.7
ro 1 °2.7.1.A
Kagemni ro 2 2.4.5, (ii); 2.7.2.1, (ii);
1.6 2.4.2, (ii) 2.7.3.4
1.10 2.4.4.7, (ii); 2.8.3.2; ro 3 2.4.5, (ii); 2.7.2.1, (ii);
2.8.3.2.NB 2.7.2.1, (iii); 2.7.3.2, (i)

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 558 Appendix

ro 5 2.7.3.2, (xi); 2.7.3.4 25.3 6.2.2.4, (iv);

ro 6-7 2.7.3.2, (vi); 2.7.3.4 6.2.3.5.B, (b)
ro 6-7 (SAa-r ... nfryt-r ...) 2.7.3.3, (i); 27.2 2.3.3, (i)
2.7.3.4
ro 7 2.7.2.1, (ii);
Khusobek
2.7.2.2, (ii); 2.7.2.3
ro 10 2.6.2.5, (i); °2.7.1.A; C-D 4.6.1.2
2.7.2.1, (i);
2.7.2.1, (iv); °2.7.3.1.B Kitchen Ramesside Inscriptions
ro 10 (nkA) 2.7.3.3, (ii); 2.7.3.4
ro 11 2.7.2.2, (i); 2.7.2.3; I 68, 1-2 4.5.3.2
5.3.5.1, (iv) I 68, 4 2.7.3.2, (v)
ro 11 (sny-mnt) 2.4.2, (i); 5.1.3.3.B (II 323-36  Inscription Dédicatoire)
ro 12 2.6.2.5, (ii); °2.7.1.A; (II 353-60  Kuban Stela)
2.7.1.B
IV 5, 15-16 4.6.1.1, (ii)
ro 13 2.7.2.1, (iii)
IV 19, 8 2, n.107
ro 13 (HAp Xt Hr) 2.7.3.4
IV 155, 13 2, n.107
vso 1 2.7.2.1, (iv); 2.7.3.1, (i)
vso 1 (nkA) 2.7.3.3, (ii); 2.7.3.4
vso 3 2.7.3.1, (ii) Kuban Stela
vso 4-5 2.6.2.5, (iii); 2.7.1.B
8 5.6.2, (v)
vso 5 °5.1.3.3, (ii);
23 4.6.3.A; 4.7.1.C
6.2.2.2.C.NB
vso 5 (XAbb) 2.7.2.3
Litany of the Sun
Khentemsemti 6th invocation 2.7.3.2, (xiii)
discussion: 4.1.3.C
3-4 4.1.3, (iii) Loyaliste
4-5 1.2, (v); 2.7.3.1, (iii); discussion: 4.5
4.1.3, (v) 1.1-2 4.5.1.B
14 4.1.3.A; 4.1.3, (i); 1-6 4.5.5.3
6.1.3.2, (vi) 1.3-8 4.5.5.3.A
2-5 4.5.5.2
Kheti 2.2 (snsn/snsi) 2.2.2, (vi); 2.3.2.2, (ii);
4.5.5.2, n.a
discussion: 6.2.2.6
2.3-4 4.5.5.2
1-2.1 6.2.2.6.2 2.7-8 4.5.5.2
2.1 (qnqn) 6.2.2.6.3, (i) 3.1-2 4.5.5.2
3.1 2.3.3.C; 2.3.3, (vi) 3.5-6 6.2.1.2, (iii)
3.5-6 5.2.3.1; 5.3.2.2; 5.3.3; 3.6 6.2.1.2, (ii)
6.2.2.6.1 5.1-14 4.5.5.1
6.3 6.2.2.4, (iv) 5.3-6 °4.5.2, (iii)
7.1 1.2, (vi.) 5.3-8 4.5.5.1
8.1 2.3.3, (ii); 2.3.3.C 5.5-6 4.5.2
8.2-3 5.3.2.2, (i) 5.7 °4.5.5.1.C.NB
8.3 1.2, (xi.) 5.8 4, n. 245
9.3 (aAgsw) 6.2.2.6.3, (ii) 6 4.5.5.3.A
10.3 (aAgsw) 6.2.2.6.3, (ii) 6.7 (snsi) 2.2.2, (vi)
12.1 2.3.3, (iii); 2.3.3.B 7.4 (iwnn) 4.2.4, (ii); 4.5.3.3, (i)
14.3 5.3.2.2, (ii); (iii) 8.2 2.3.4.1, (iii)

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 Index locorum 559

9.4 6.2.1.2, (i) E 87 (mm) 2.8.3.4, (i); 2.8.3.7, (b)

9.5-9 4.5.3.1 E 87-88 2.8.2.2, (ii)
9.6 4.5.3.3, (ii) E 91 2.8.2.2, (i); 2.8.3.6, (i);
9.8 6.2.2.2, (vi) 2.8.3.7, (c)
9.9 4.5.3.1; 6.2.2.4, (vii); E 106 (a-rsi) °2.8.3.6.B
6.2.3.5.B, (c) E 107 (aAgsw) 6.2.2.6.3, (ii)
10.3 2.4.2, (ii) E 116 °2.8.3.7, (d)
11.8 4.5.3.2 E 117-118 °2.8.3.7, (d)
11.9 (sAt) 4.5.3.3, (iii) E 120-121 2.8.2.1, (ii)
11.10 (nri) 4.5.3.3, (iv) E 122 (sasa) 2.8.3.4.A
12.1 (r-DAwt) 2.8.3.4, (ii); 4.5.3.3, (v) E 128-129 2.8.2.1, (i)
E 130 °2, n.521
E 132 (snnw anxw) °6, n.194
Mentuhotep (CG 20539)
E 135 1.2, (ii.); 2.8.2.3, (i)
Ib.20 2.4.3.2, (xiii); 2.4.3.3.B E 137 (mm) 2.8.3.4, (i); 2.8.3.7, (b)
E 138 (shp) 2.8.3.4.A
Mentuhotep son of Hapy (UC 14333) E 139 (Ts) 2.8.3.4.A

7-9 °6, n.17

Mocalla (Ankhtifi)

Mentuwoser II..1 5, n.140

II..2 4, n.289
11-12 6.2.3.2, (i); 6.2.3.4 II..3 6.2.2.1, (ii)
13 2.4.4.2.1.NB; 4.2.3, (ii) II..2 6.2.2.1, (i)
14 °2, n.421 II..3 - III.1 5.2.5, (iv)
III.5-7 2.4.3.2, (xiii)
Merikare IV.14-15 1.2, (iv.)
IV.17-18 6.2.2.1, (iii)
E7 2.8.2.1, (ii)
E 14 2.8.3.2
E 22-23 °2.8.3.7, (a) Moscow Mythological Story
E 24-25 2.8.2.3, (ii) discussion: 4.3.4.NB
E 30-31 2.8.3.3
E 31 (r-DAwt) 2.8.3.4, (ii); - P. Moscow unn.
2.8.3.7, (a), (b), (d) A.3 4.3.4.NB
E 31-33 °2.8.3.7, (d) B2.9 4.3.4, (ii)
E 32 5.5.1.1.NB frg. 1+2.2 4.3.4.NB
E 33 (Hmw-ib) 2.8.3.4, (iii); frg. 25.1 4.3.4, (ii)
2.8.3.7, (d) - P. Moscow 167
E 43-44 °2, n.421; °2, n.527
frg. II.11 4.3.4.NB
E 49 2.4.4.5, (iii);
°2.8.3.7, (a); 5.2.5.C
E 55 1.3.2.3, (viii) Mutter und Kind
E 56 °2.8.3.7, (b)
V.10-VI.1 5.3.4.2.A.NB;
E 67-68 2.8.3.1, (i); 2.8.3.7, (a);
6.1.3.2.A.NB
2.8.3.7, (c)
VIII.1-2 5.3.4.2, (iii)
E 70-71 2.3.1.1, (vii)
VIII.4 2.8.2.2, (i)
E 71 (a-rsi) °2.8.3.6.B
IX.8 (sny-mnt) 5.1.3.3.B
E 75 (a-rsi) °2.8.3.6.B
E 78-79 °5.1.3.3, (vii)
E 80 °5.5.1.2.A
E 82 (pdswt) 2.8.3.4.A

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 560 Appendix

Neferhotep’s Great Abydos Stela 1l °5.1.3.2.A

1l-m °5.1.3.3, (ii); °5.8.1.3
discussion: 1.3.3.1.B
1m (DAy Hr) 5.8.1.3
1-2 5.6.1, (v) 1n °5.1.3.2.A-C;
4-5 2.6.3.1, (iv) 5.8.1.4, (ii)
12 1.3.3.1, (ix); 2.4.4.2.1; 2b-d °5.1.3.2.B; °5.8.1.2
4.6.3.A-B; 4.7.1.B-C 2f-g °5.1.3.2.A
2h °5.1.3.2.A-C;
Neferhotep (TT 50) 5.8.1.4, (ii)
2j-k °5.8.1.3
pl.IV, 3d song, 1-2 2.7.3.2, (v) 2k (DAy Hr) 5.8.1.3
pl.XL, 238 4.4.4.3, (viii) 2m (xpr.ty=f) °5.3.1.3.C; °5.8.2.1
2n 5.1.4.2, (vii);
Neferkare and Sisene 5.1.4.2, (x)
2n (xpr.t=s{t}) °5.3.1.3.C; °5.8.2.1
- T. IFAO / T. OIC
2o-q °5.1.3.2.A;
T. IFAO ro 1 + T. OIC 1-2 °5.1.3.2.C.NB
4.4.4.3, (i); 5.6.1, (vi) 2q 2, n.253
T. IFAO ro 2 / T. OIC 4-5 (sDA Hr) 2r-3b 5.1.4.1, (i)
4.4.4.2; 5.8.1.3 3a (xprt) °5.1.3.3, (ii); °5.1.3.3.B
T. OIC 2 4.4.2.1.NB.2 3a-f 5.5.1.2, (viii)
T. OIC 3-4 4.4.3.2, (ii) 3c (xpS) 5.5.1
T. OIC 4-5 4.4.4.3, (ii) 3f (xwsi) °5.8.1.4, (iii)
- P. Chassinat I 3h °5.8.3.2.B
3i °5.1.3.3, (i);
X+3.x+4-5 2.4.3.1, (ii);
°5.1.3.3, (ii);
2.4.4.7, (v);
°5.1.3.3.D; °5.8.3.3
2.6.2.6, (iii);
4a °5.1.3.3, (iv);
3.4.1.3, (e); 4.4.3.1
°5.3.1.3.C;
X+3.x+9 °4.4.4.3, (v)
°5.8.1.4, (iii)
X+3.x+9-11 4.4.4.1
4c °5.3.1.2, n.c; °5.8.3.2.B
X+3.x+11 4.4.2
°5.8.3.3
X+3.x+11-14 4.4.3.2, (i);
4d °5.8.3.2.A-B
4.4.4.3, (vii)
5a °5.8.2.2
X+3.x+14 2.8.2.1, (ii)
5b °5.1.3.3, (v); °5.1.3.3.D
5c °5.8.2.2
Neferpesedjet 5c-d °5.8.3.3; °5.8.3.4
x+2-3 2.4.4.1.B 5d 6.2.2.4, (x)
5d (Sna) 2.3.1.2, (iii)
5e 5.1.4.2, (viii);
Neferti °5.8.3.2.A-B
discussion: 5 5f °5.1.3.3, (vi);
°5.1.3.3.D; °5.8.2.1
1a-b 5.6.1; °5.8.1.2
6a °5.1.3.3, (i);
1c 5.6.2
°5.1.3.3, (iii)
1c-e 5.6.2
6a-d °5.8.3.3
1d °5.8.1.2
6b 5.2
1f °5.8.1.4, (i)
6e (rAsw) 2.3.1.2, (vi)
1f-h °5.1.3.2.A
6f °5.1.3.3.D
1i °5.1.3.2.A-C;
6f-g °5.8.3.2.A-B
5.8.1.4, (ii)
7a °5.1.3.3, (i)
1j-n °5.8.1.2, (i)
7c °5.1.3.3, (i)

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 Index locorum 561

7e °5.8.3.2.B 12b-c 5.3.1.3, (vii)

7f 6.2.2.4, (vi); 12c-f 5.3.1.3.C
6.2.3.5.B, (c) 12d 6.2.2.4, (xi)
7f (mwnf) 2.2.2, (iv) 12e-f 5.5.2; °5.8.3.2.A-B
7g 5.2 12f (bH) 5.5.2
7g (isq) 2.2.2, (i); 2.3.2.2, (i) 13a 5.1.4.2, (iv); °5.8.2.1;
7g-h 5.2.3.3, (vi) °5.8.2.2
7h 5.2 13a (imny) °5.1.2.1; °5.1.2.3
7h (xnrt) 5.1.2.2.NB 13b (Xn-nxn) °5.1.2.2.NB
8a 5.1.4.2, (i); 13c-d °5.8.2.1
°5.8.3.2.A-B 13f (pXr-iHy) 2.3.1.2, (vi)
8a (iwtrw) 2.3.1.2, (v) 14a-e 5.2.3.3, (iii)
8a-b 5.2.3.3, (i) 14 °5.8.2.1
8c-d 2.4.3.1, (i) 14h °5.8.1.2; °5.8.2.2
8d °5.8.3.2.A-B 14h (arat) 2.3.1.2, (iv)
8e (sny-mnt) 5.1.3.3, (ii); 5.1.3.3.B; 15a 5.2
°5.8.3.2.A 15a (inbw-HqA) °5.1.2.2; °5.1.2.3
8e-f 5.3.1.3, (i); 5.3.1.3.C 15a-e 5.2.3.3, (iv)
8f 5.2; 5.3.1.3, (v) 15e °5, n.327
8f-9a 5.2.3.3, (ii); 15f °5.8.3.4
5.2.3.3, (v);
°5.5.1.2, (ix)
Nesimontu
9a 5.2
9b °5.8.3.2.A-B A.13 4, n.281
9c 6.2.2.4, (i); (v); 6.2.3.4;
6.2.3.5.B, (a); Nubkheperre Antef’s Coptos Decree
6.2.3.5.B, (b)
9e 6, n.163 4-5 5.1.4.2, (ii); 2.4.4.2.1
9f 2.3.3, (iv); 5-7 2.8.2.2, (v)
°5.1.3.3, (iii); 6 2.4.4.2.1; °5.1.3.3.D
5.3.1.1, (ii) 10 1.3.3.1.C
10c-d 6.2.1.1, (i); °5, n.326 11 1.3.3.1.C
10c-e 5.3.1.2; 5.3.1.3, (iv);
5.3.1.3.C O. Cairo 25372
10d °5.8.3.3
10e 5.2.3.1; 5.3 1-2 2, n.105; 3.4.1.3, (b);
10e-f 5.3.1.3, (viii) 5.2.4.1, (b)
10f-h 5.3.1.3, (ii)
10f-i 5.3.1.3.C O. DeM 1675 ro+vso
10h 5.2; °5.1.3.3, (i);
°5.1.3.3.D ro 4 °5.8.3.2.B
10h-i 5.3.1.3, (vi) ro 9 °5.8.3.2.B
11a °5.1.3.3, (ii); 6.2.2.2.C ro 16 °5.8.3.2.B
11d 5.1.4.1, (iii); °5.8.2.2; vso 6-8 °5.8.3.2.B
°5, n.329 vso 11-12 °5.8.3.2.B
11d-i °5.8.3.4, (ii) vso 13-14 °5.8.3.2.B
11i 5.1.4.2, (viii)
12a (sny-mnt) 5.1.3.3, (ii); 5.1.3.3.B; O. Nakhtmin 87/173
°5.8.3.2.A
12a-b 5.3.1.1, (i); 1-2 1.3.2.1
5.3.1.3, (iii); 5.3.1.3.C 3 1.3.2.1; 2.3.1.1, (vii)
12b 5.3

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 562 Appendix

Paheri (tomb of) P. Ramesseum III

pl.3 5.3.4.2, (i) B 10-11 2.8.2.2, (iv)
pl.7 5.2.5, (iii)
Ptahhotep
Pahu’s Prayer
10 6.2.3.3, (i); 6.2.3.5, (i);
2 (hnw) 3.2.2.A-B 6.2.3.5.B, (b)
33 2.4.3.2, (xvi); 2.4.3.3.A
49-50 2, n.498
P. Berlin 10463 (Sennefer to Baki)
59 2.3.2.3, (ii)
ro 1-2 5.2.4.1.A, (a) 64-67 5.2.5, (vii)
71 2.4.3.2, (xv); 2.4.3.3.A
P. Berlin, Illahun 72 2.3.5; 5.2.2; 5.2.3.1
78-79 2.8.3.2.NB, ()
10056 ro 4 2.6.1.2 81-82 5.2.1; 5.2.2; 5.2.3.1
10073 3.4.2.2, (v) 82 2.3.5; 3.4.1.1.C
98 2.4.3.2, (xiii); 2.4.3.3.B
P. BM EA 10107 ro 117 2.7.3.3, (ii)
(Ptahu to Ahmes Peniati) 135-137 5.2.5, (viii)
180 2.8.3.4, (ii)
6-7 2.8.3.2.NB, () 212 1.3.2.3, (iii)
288 2.3.4.2.2, (ii)
P. Harris Magical 292-293 5.2.5, (vi)
293 2.3.2.3, (ii).NB
vso I.2-5 2.7.3.2, (xv) 315 1.3.2.3, (iii)
343 2.4.3.2, (xviii);
P. Leiden I 348 2.4.3.3.A
349 2.3.2.3, (ii).NB
XII.6 4, n.312 350-351 2.8.3.1, (vii)
387 2.7.2.2.B
P. Louvre 3230B (Tay to Ahmes Peniati) 398 2.4.3.2, (xiv);
2.4.3.3.B; 4.7.1.B;
2 1.3.3.2, (viii)
6.3.1.1; 6.3.1.2.A
4-5 2.7.3.2, (iii)
407 2.4.4.5, (iii); 5.2.5.C
447 6.2.2.3, (vi)
P. Lythgoe (Tale of) 482 2.4.3.2, (xvii);
2.4.3.3.A
ro x+2 2.4.4.1.B; 2.4.4.4, (iii)
507 2.4.4.2.2, (ii); 2.7.3.1.A
ro x+7-8 2.4.4.4, (iii); 5.6.2.A
514 2.4.3.2, (xvii);
vso x+9-10 2.4.4.4, (iii)
2.4.3.3.A

P. MMA 27.3.560 (Tit to Djehuti)

P. UC, Illahun (non literary)
2-3 2.7.3.2, (iv)
32200, 20-21 2.4.4.7, (ii);
3 2.8.3.2.NB, ()
5.2.4.1.A, (a)
32036, 20-23 5.3.4.1, (iv)
P. Ramesseum II 32055 ro 9 5.2.4.1.A, (a)
vso I.6 1.3.2.3, (iii) 32057 vso III.16 5.2.5, (i)
32057 vso III.17 5.2.5, (ii)
32157 ro II.14 (imDr) 1.3.2.3, (ix)
32190, A, III.5 5.2.4.1.A, (a)

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 Index locorum 563

32201 ro 13-14 3.4.1.2, (iii); Shipwrecked Sailor

5.3.2.2, n.c
2-6 1.3.3.2.D; 2.6.3.1, (ix)
32204 vso 2-3 (Ssp wnwt) 2.2.2, (ix)
6 5.3.5.2, (iv)
32205, 9-10 4.6.5.2, (iii)
34 4, n.24
32287, 2-3 5.2.4.1.A, (a)
66 2.7.2.1, (iii)
Pyramid Texts 73-75 5.3.5.2, (i)
89-91 2.7.2.1, (iv)
§499c 2.8.2.2, (iii)
129-132 2.4.4.2.2, (v)
§1093a 3, n.68
130 2.4.4.5, (v)
§1114b 3, n.68
136-137 1.2, (v.); 4.1.3, (vi);
4, n.23
Rahotep’s Coptos Stela 142-144 5.2.5.C, (b)
3-4 1.3.3.1, (x); 148 2.8.3.1, (v)
5.1.4.2, (viii) 184-185 2, n.498
4 4.2.1, (iii) 185-186 4, n.285

Rudjahau Sinuhe

11-12 2.8.3.1, (vi) R 5-11 1.3.3.2.D

R6 4.1.3.B; 4.1.3.D.NB
R 7-8 °1.2, (iv.); 2.8.2.2, (i)
Sarenput, Stela 9 (Aswan Museum #1373) R 11 6.2.2.6.2.A
x+21-23 5.2.5, (iv) R 12-16 4.5.5.1.B
R 15 2.4.3.2, (xii)
R 15-16 6.2.2.6.2, (ii)
Sasobek R 43 (nmiw-Sa) 2.4.5, (i); °5.1.2.2
A.11 2.4.4.4, (iv) R 58 4.3.2.1, (ii); 4.3.2.1.C;
B1.10 2.4.3.1, (i); 2.4.4.4, (iv) 4.3.2.1, (vi)
B1.30 1.3.2.3, (iii) B2 2.3.3, intro.;
B2.7 2.4.4.7, (ii); 2.8.3.2.A 2.3.4.1, (iv)
B 2-3 4.1.3.B; 4.1.3.D.NB
B 3-6 4.1.3.B; 4.1.3.D.NB
Satirical Letter B 4 (nftft) 2.4.3.2, (xi)
P. An. I 8.7 °5.8.1.3 B5 2.3.2.2, (i)
B6 2.7.3.3, (ii)
B 11-12 2.4.4.4, (ii)
Seankhenre Mentuhotepi’s Stela B 15 4.1.3.B; 4.1.3.D.NB
5 1, n.126 B 17 (inbw-HqA) °5.1.2.2
B 23-24 4.1.3.B; 4.1.3.D.NB
B 34-35 4.3.2.1, (vi)
Sehetepibre (CG 20538)  Loyaliste
B 45 2.4.3.2, (vii); 4.1.3.A;
4.1.3, (ii); 4.1.3.D.NB;
Semna Stela (Senwosret III’s) 6.1.3.2, (vii)
B 50 4, n.158
8 6.2.2.2, (iii) B 50-51 6.2.1.2.C; °6, n.219
B 51 6.2.1.2, (iv)
Seneferibre Senwosret IV’s Karnak Stela B 55-56 6.2.2.2, (iv)
1-2 4.6.5.2, (iv) B 55-59 6.2.3.3, (ii); 6.2.3.5, (ii)

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 564 Appendix

B 59 6.2.1.2, (v); Sobekhotep I’s Abydos Stela

6.2.3.3, (ii);
8-11 1.3.3.1, (viii)
6.2.3.5, (ii);
6.2.3.5.B, (b)
B 73 (nmiw-Sa) 2.4.5, (i); °5.1.2.2 Sobekhotep IV’s Karnak Stela
B 81 (iAA) °5.1.2.2 5 2.6.3.1, (i)
B 114 2.4.3.2, (vii); 4.1.3.A;
4.1.3, (ii); 4.1.3.D.NB;
6.1.3.2, (vii) Sobekhotep VIII’s Inundation Stela
B 127 2.4.4.5, (iv) A, 2 5.6.2, (i); 5.6.2.C
B 157-158 2.4.2, (i); 2.4.4.5, (vi)
B 168 2.7.3.2, (v)
B 173-174 3.4.1.1.B Speos Artemidos
B 174-175 4.1.3, (iv); 4.1.3.D.NB 9-10 1.2, (v.); 4.1.3, (vi);
B 189-190 1.2, (ix.) 5.1.3.3, (ix)
B 189-196 5.2.2.B; 5.2.5, (ix) 12 °5.8.2.2
B 198-199 2.4.4.2.2, (iv) 17 2.6.3.1, (iii)
B 201 3, n.78 19-20 2.6.3.1, (iii)
B 203-204 5.2.5, (x) 23 (pr-hA=f) 6.2.2.5
B 233-234 2.3.4.2.1, (i) 24 2.6.3.1, (iii)
B 236 6.2.2.2, (v) 26 (tp-Sw) 5.1.3.3, (viii)
B 237 2.4.3.2, (vii); 4.1.2.B; 30 1.2.C
4.7.1.B 37-38 °5.1.3.3, (vii)
B 238 2.4.3.2, (viii); 2.7.2.2.A 38-40 1.2, (iii.)
B 238 (iAA) °5.1.2.2 38-42 °5.8.2.2
B 247 (itw) °4.3.2.2 39-40 4.2.2, (ii)
B 248 2.3.2.3, (i)
B 252-253 1.2, (v); 4.1.3, (vi);
4.1.3.D.NB; 4, n.23; Sporting King
°6, n.71 discussion: 4.3
B 254 3.4.1.1.B A2.1 °4.3.1.B; 4.3.4, (i);
B 263 3.4.1.1.B 4.3.5.A; 4.6.3.A
B 269 2.4.4.6.B A2.2 4.3.2; 4.3.5.A
B 280-281 5, n.153; 5.2.5, (xi) A2.2-3 4.3.2.1, (i)
B 281 2.4.3.2, (ix) A2.3 °4.3.1.B
B 292-294 1.2, (iii.) B2.1 (ihhy) 4.3.4, (ii)
B 292 (nmiw-Sa) 2.4.5, (i); °5.1.2.2 B2.5 °4.3.1.B
B 309 °2.8.3.6.A B3.3 (itw) °4.3.2.2
C1.10-11 4.3.3; 4.3.5.A
Siut C1.12 °4.3.1.A
C1.18 (nri) 4.5.3.3, (iv)
I 295 2, n.389
III 10 1.2, (ii.)
III 64 5.2.5, (v) Stèle Juridique
IV 79-80 5.2.5, (v) 21 1.3.3.1, (iv);
V 16 5.5.1.1.NB 5.2.4.1.A, (a)
25-26 3.4.2.2, (vi)
Sobekemsaf’s Medamud Endowment
Inscription
6 1.3.3.1.C

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 Index locorum 565

Tale Involving the House of Life 27, 14-15 2.7.2.1, (iv);

5.1.4.2, (v)
discussion: 3.3.1
X+2.1 4, n.103; 4.6.3.A (Ahmes Pennekhbet)
X+5.2-4 3.3.1; 5.3.4.2, (iv) 38, 10-11 6.1.3.1, (iii)

(Kares)
Tod Inscription
46, 16 (nkA) 2.7.3.4
23 2, n.196 47, 10 (HAp Xt Hr) 2.7.3.4
26-27 1.2, (v.); 4.1.3, (vi);
5.1.3.3, (ix) (Ineni)
27 °5.1.3.3, (vii) 54, 15-16 1.2, (iv.)
27 (mTwn) 2.2.2, (iii) 58, 16 - 59, 1 °6.3.2.1, (ii)
28 (tp-Sw) 5.1.3.3, (viii) 59, 13-14 1.2, (iv.)
29 2.4.4.2.1; 4.6.3.A-B; 60, 5-8 °6.3.1.2.C; °6.3.2.1
4.7.1.B
(Thutmosis I’s Tombos Inscription)
Two Brothers 82, 14 (m-rA-a) 3.3.2.B; 4.2.3
83, 1-3 3.3.2, (ii)
18.5 3.4.4, (ii) 84, 12 4.5.3.3, (ii)

(Prince Amenmes’ Inscription)

Urkunden I
91, 12-14 4.4.4.3, (iii)
(Weni) 91, 14 (sDA Hr) 5.8.1.3
99, 10-12 6.1.3.2, (iv)
108, 3-9 1, n.199 (Thutmosis I’s Abydos Stela)
95, 8-9 °2.8.3.7, (a)
(Kaiemtjenenet) 95, 15-16 °2.8.3.7, (a)
182, 11-14 5.6.1, (i) 96, 13 2.7.2.2.B
184, 12 5.6.1.A 96, 14-15 2.8.2.1, (ii)
97, 2 °5.8.1.4, (i)
Urkunden IV 97, 7-8 2.8.3.1, (ii); 2.8.3.7, (a)
99, 15-17 2.7.2.1, (iii)
(Ahmes son of Abana) 101, 10 (r-DAwt) 2.8.3.7, (a)
3, 2-9 4.1.2, (iv)
4, 2 (m wHm-a) 5.8.1.4, (ii) (Paheri)
4, 3 3, n.7 114, 1 (m wHm-a) 5.8.1.4, (ii)
9, 8 4.3.3, (iv) 119, 10-11 1, n.83
10, 5-6 1, n.83 122, 15-16 4, n.230
122, 16-17 (sDA Hr) °5.8.1.3
(Ahmose’s Karnak Eulogy) 124, 9 (a-rsi) °2.8.3.6.B
18, 10 - 19, 5 1.2, (ii.) 125, 11 (a-rsi) °2.8.3.6.B
18, 10 - 19, 12 2.8.2.3, (iii)
19, 6-12 °5.8.3.4, (i) (Thutmosis II’s Aswan Inscription)
19, 13 - 20, 3 2.8.2.3, (iv); 137, 14-17 4.5.2, (iii)
5.1.4.1, (ii) 138, 14 1.2, (xi.)
20, 9-10 °5.8.3.4 139, 12-16 6.1.3.1, (ii)
140, 12-14 1.2, (viii.)
(Ahmose’s Abydos Stela for
Tetisheri) (Thutmosis III’s Karnak Building
26, 12 5.6.1, (ii) Inscription)
27, 10-12 4.3.2.1, (iv) 157, 1-4 4.5.2, (iv)
157, 3 4.7.1.B-C

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 566 Appendix

157, 6 (mm) 2.8.3.7, (b) 257, 14 4.7.1.A, (b)

161, 4 4.6.3.A; 4.7.1.B-C 257, 15 4.7.1.A, (b)
164, 5 4.7.1.B 257, 17 4.7.1.A, (b);
164, 5-6 4.2.1, (vii) 4.7.1.A, (c)
164, 15 °2.8.3.7, (b) 258, 2 4.7.1.A, (b);
165, 7 4.6.3.A; 4.7.1.B-C 4.7.1.A, (c)
168, 12 4.6.3.A; 4.7.1.B-C 259, 14-15 4, n.381
260, 6 4.7.1.A, (a);
(an inscription of Thutmosis III 4.7.1.A, (c); 4.7.1, (iii)
telling of his rise to kingship) 260, 17 4.7.1.A, (a)
180, 15-17 5.6.1, (iii) 261, 12 4.7.1.A, (a)
181, 2 3.4.1.3, (d) 272, 9-11 4.5.2, (ii)
181, 11 4, n.338
181, 17 4, n.338 (Punt Expedition)
182, 8 4.6.3.A; 4.7.1.B-C 324, 3-7 4.1.2.F; 4.2.1, (vi)
324, 6 4.2.1.B; 4.7.1.B
(Hatshepsut’s Royal Cycle) 324, 6-9 4.3.2.1, (iii)
discussion: 4.7 324, 8 4.2.1.B
218, 15 4.7.3, (i) 324, 12-14 4.2.1, (v)
218, 17 - 219, 5 4.7.2, (i) 331, 12 2.7.2.1, (ii)
219, 4 4.7.1.A, (a); 4.7.1.C 332, 7-9 4.1.2, (ix)
219, 13 - 220, 1 4.7.3, (ii) 343, 10 4.7.1.B-C
221, 5 °4.4.4.3, (vi); 344, 7 2.7.2.1, (ii)
4.7.2, (iii) 344, 9 3, n.109
221, 9 4.7.1.A, (b); 4.7.1.C 346, 9 4.7.1.B
221, 14 4.7.1.A, (b); 346, 16 4.7.1.B
4.7.1.A, (c); 4.7.1.C; 347, 11 4.7.1.B
6.3.1.2.C (Hatshepsut’s Karnak Obelisks)
222, 10 4.7.1.A, (b)
362, 11 (a-rsi) °2.8.3.6.B; 2.8.3.7, (c)
228, 1-4 4.7.2, (ii)
363, 7 4, n.369
228, 3 4.7.2, (iv)
364, 16-17 2.7.2.1, (iv);
228, 4 4.7.1.A, (a); 4.7.1.C
5.1.4.2, (vi)
228, 9 4.7.1.A, (b);
365, 6-9 °6.2, n. to ex.
4.7.2.C.NB
367, 6-7 4.7.1.B
229, 12 4.7.1.A, (b); 4.7.1.C;
370, 1-2 °5.8.2.1
6.3.1.2.C;
237, 5 4.6.3.A; 4.7.1.A, (b); (383-91:  Speos Artemidos)
4.7.1.C
243, 7 4.7.1, (ii); 4.7.3, (iii) (Senenmut)
245, 14-17 3.4.2.3, (ii) 410, 5-6 2.8.3.1, (ii)
245, 16 4.7.1.A, (c)
245, 17 4.7.1.A, (c) (Senemiah)
256, 17 - 257, 5 4.7.1.C discussion: 6.3.1.1.NB
257, 1 4.7.1.A, (b) 500, 8 2.7.2.1, (ii)
257, 2 4.6.3.A; 4, n.381 500, 9-10 6.3.1.1.NB
257, 5 4.7.3, (iv) 500, 12 2.7.2.1, (ii)
257, 7-8 4.2.1, (ix); 4.7.1.A, (b); 501, 4-5 6.3.1.1.NB
4.7.1.C 501, 15-16 6.3.1.1.NB
257, 7-9 4.7.1, (i) 503, 17 4.7.1.B; 6.3.1.1
257, 9 4.7.1.A, (b) (bis); 505, 4 (snktkt) 6.3.1.1.NB
4.7.1.C
257, 11 4.7.1.A, (b)

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 Index locorum 567

(a discourse by Amun about his (Iamunedjeh)

relationship to the king) 951, 4-7 4.3.3, (iv)
564, 2 4.7.1.B 959, 14-15 2.8.3.1, (iv)
569, 10 4.7.1.B
569, 12 4.7.1.B (Great Royal Herald Antef)
971, 14 2.8.3.1, (iv)
(Thutmosis III’s Poetical Stela)
613, 14-15 2.6.3.1, (v); (Rekhmire)
5.1.4.1, (iv) 1073, 4 1.2, (xi.)
615, 8 °5.5.1.2, (ix) 1073, 11-13 4.1.2, (v)
618, 1 2.7.3.2, (viii) 1074, 11 6.2.2.5, (vi)
618, 5-7 2.6.3.1, (vi) 1075, 2-4 4.1.2, (v)
1080, 9-11 4.1.2, (v)
(Thutmosis III’s Annals) 1082, 1-2 1.3.2.3, (iii)
649, 4-5 1, n.210 1082, 14 °2, n.421
649, 7 1, n.210
649, 9 2.7.3.2, (ix); (1086-93:  Installation of the
2.7.3.3, (i); 2.7.3.4 Vizier)
649, 9 (SAa-r) 2.7.3.3, (i) (Rekhmire’s Reception of the Tribute
649, 15 1, n.210 of Punt)
649, 15-17 1.3.3.2, (ix);
5.3.4.2, (ii) 1097, 12 2.7.2.1, (ii)
650, 3 1, n.210 (1103-17:  Duties of the Vizier)
650, 5-7 1, n.210
655, 12-14 4.4.4.3, (viii) (Rekhmire, ‘Reden und Rufe’ and
656, 5 5.3.4.2, (ii) songs)
656, 14-16 1.2, (vi.); 5.1.4.2, (iii) 1154, 5 5.8.1.4, (iii)
676, 10 (sDA Hr) 5.8.1.3 1164, 13-14 3.2.2.A; 3.2.2.B
690, 4-5 3.4.2.2, (ii)
752, 17 (r-DAwt) 2.8.3.7, (b) (Thutmosis III’s Gebel Barkal Stela)
754, 1 (r-DAwt) 2.8.3.7, (b) 1229, 14 °6.3.2.2.NB
1230, 13 (Hw-ny-r-Hr) 6.3.2.2
(Thutmosis III’s Jardin Botanique)
1231, 19 3.4.1.3, (d)
775, 15 (xpp) 2.4.5, (ii); 2.7.3.4 1232, 7 (r-DAwt) 2.8.3.7, (b)
776, 4 2.7.3.4 1234, 14 °6.3.2.2.NB
776, 5 2.4.5, (ii); 4.7.3, (v) 1241, 2 4.6.3.A; 4.7.1.C
776, 10 (mm) 2.8.3.7, (b) 1242, 15 °6.2, n. to ex.
(a building inscription of (Amenhotep II’s Sphinx Stela)
Thutmosis III in Karnak)
1279, 12-14 1.3.2.3, (iii)
835, 14 (mm) 2.8.3.7, (b) 1281, 14-15 2, n.106; 3, n.109
836, 6-7 4.3.3, (iii) 1283, 5 4.3.3, (iii)
1283, 5-6 2.6.3.1, (iii)
(inscriptions of Thutmosis III on
1283, 11 (sDA Hr) 5.8.1.3
columns in Karnak)
842, 16-17 6.2.2.6.2, (iv) (Amenhotep II’s Amada Stela)
1287, 20-21 4.2.2, (iii)
(Amenemhab)
1290, 11 (Hw-ny-r-Hr) 6.3.2.2
890, 11 1.3.3.3.B 1292, 7-8 (Hw-ny-r-Hr) 6.3.2.2
894, 5-10 1, n.215 1297, 9/10 3, n.7
896, 1-3 °1.2, (iv)

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 568 Appendix

(Amenhotep II’s Syrian Campaigns) 2027, 11-12 2.6.3.1, (iii)

- Memphis Stela 2027, 12 °5, n.329
2028, 2-3 2, n.222
1302, 9 1, n.220
1304, 15-18 6.2.2.6.2, (v)
1308, 2-3 4.4.4.1 Urkunden VII
- Karnak Stela (Ameny)
1311, 4 1, n.220 16, 8-11 6.2.3.1; 6.2.3.4
1311, 6 °5.5.1.2, (ix)
(Djehutihotep)
1312, 7-11 1, n.220
47, 14 4, n.10
(1380-4:  Appointment of the Vizier)

(Teaching of the High-Priest Uronarti Quay Inscription

Amenemhat) 5.2.4.1.A, (b)
1408, 17 - 1409, 1 2.8.3.6, (iii)

(Thutmosis IV’s Sphinx Stela) Visitor’s graffito in the Memphite

necropolis
1541, 9 (sDA Hr) 5.8.1.3
1541, 9-12 4.4.4.3, (iii) M.2.3.P.19.3 4.4.4.3, (iv)
1542, 10-12 5.6.2, (iii); 5.6.2.C
(Nebamun) Wadi el-Hôl #8
1618, 14 2.7.3.1, (iv) 4 (xprt) °5.1.3.3.B
1622, 13 2.7.3.1.B

(Djeserkareseneb) Wadi el-Hudi I, #14

1639, 8 3, n.109 10 4, n.11

(High Steward Amenhotep)

Wenamun
1794, 19 2.7.2.2.B
1799, 14 2.8.3.6, (ii) 2.27-28 2.7.3.2, (xiv)
1800, 5 °5.3.1.2, n.c
(Amenhotep son of Hapu) Wepwawetaa, Munich Gl. WAF 35
1821, 12 (nmiw-Sa) 2.4.5, (i); 15-16 6.1.3.2, (viii); 6, n.136
°2.8.3.6.A 16 6.1.3.2, (ii)
1824, 10-11 4.2.1, (vii)
1825, 11 °2.8.3.6.A –––––––

(Kheruef)
A fragmentary stela from Karnak
1860, 13 4, n.285
x+8 4.2.3
(Suti and Hor)
1944, 7 2.6.3.1, (viii)
A personal name
1944, 17-20 2.6.3.1, (vii)
1945, 1 3.4.2.3, (i) tw-(r-)mrt=s 5.2.3.1; 5.2.3.2;
5.2.4.1.A, (b)
(a hieratic note on EA 27)
1995, 17 3.2.2.A

(Tutankhamun’s Restoration Stela)

2027, 11 (sny-mnt) 5.1.3.3.B

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 Lingua Aegyptia Studia Monographica
Recent Publications and Backlist
ISSN: 0946-8641

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 Studia Monographica 9

Lexical Semantics in Ancient Egyptian

Eitan Grossman, Stéphane Polis & Jean Winand (eds.)

This volume is the first to be devoted specifically to the study of lexi- LingAeg StudMon 9,
cal semantics in Ancient Egyptian. While much research has been vi, 490 pages
dedicated to a wide range of grammatical issues in past decades, ISSN: 0946-8641
lexical semantics has rarely been treated in a systematic fashion. The ISBN: 978-3-943955-09-5
papers collected here treat a range of semantic phenomena, from
Hamburg 2012, € 69
the lexical semantics of spatial expressions, to the problems of ana-
(subscribers’ price: € 59)
lyzing polyfunctionality and even to the semantics of the Egyptian
writing system. The scope of these issues goes well beyond the indi-
vidual ‘word’ or lexical item, as a number of papers address the semantics of syntactic constructions.
Some authors call into question the distinction between lexicon and grammar, or analyze the lexical
semantics of items usually considered ‘grammatical’ or ‘function’ words, such as discourse particles.
This volume also spans a number of theoretical frameworks and methodologies that have not been
prominent in Egyptian linguistics and philology, such as typologically-oriented semantic maps and
other visual tools.
The papers in this volume do not aim to define the ‘state of the art,’ but rather seek to stimulate the
study of meaning in Ancient Egyptian, to point to innovative avenues for future research, and to
engage in a broader dialogue between Egyptian linguistics and philology, on the one hand, and the
research frameworks and agendas of general linguistics, on the other.

Studia Monographica 10

The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant: A Reader’s Commentary

R. B. Parkinson

The book provides a commentary on one of the best known poems LingAeg StudMon 10,
from the Middle Kingdom, The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant, from xii, 384 pages
c. 1840 BC. An introduction covers issues of composition and (incl. 26 figures)
reception in the Middle Kingdom; language and imagery; natural- ISSN: 0946-8641
ism, artifice and immediacy; cultural themes; and later and modern ISBN: 978-3-943955-10-1
receptions. The commentary includes the text in transliteration
Hamburg 2012, € 59
and translation with a line by line commentary discussing points
(subscribers’ price: € 49)
of philology, lexicography, style, intertext, context, meaning and
possible emotional and aesthetic impact. The volume is intended
to assist anyone wishing to read the poem in its original language, and is laid out with text and
commentary on the same page to enable an integrated experience of reading, following the precedent
of other academic commentaries on classic works of world literature. Figures are included to help
embed the poem in its material culture and landscape. An index of words is also provided. The book
complements the existing text edition of the poem and the new photographic publications of the
main manuscripts by the author.

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 Studia Monographica 11

Dating Egyptian Literary Texts

Gerald Moers, Kai Widmaier, Antonia Giewekemeyer,
Arndt Lümers & Ralf Ernst (eds.)
“Dating Egyptian Literary Texts” Göttingen, 9–12 June 2010, Volume 1

A central issue of Egyptological research is the question of dating the LingAeg StudMon 11,
original composition of religious or literary texts. Very prominent is ca. 660 pages
a lively debate about the date of composition of a number of liter- (incl. 17 b/w figures and
ary texts, traditionally dated to the Late First Intermediate Period or 11 color illustrations)
the Early Middle Kingdom but known only from New Kingdom ISSN: 0946-8641
manuscripts. Over the last years, several attempts have been made ISBN: 978-3-943955-11-8
to date the production of some of these texts much closer to their
Hamburg 2013, € 95
first physical appearance. More recently the discussion has heated
(subscribers’ price: € 79)
up considerably with contributions that argue for a New Kingdom
origin of Merikare, Neferti, and Amenemhet—a reassessment based
on conceptions of Egyptian cultural history or on linguistic analysis. On the other hand, there is an
equally strong tendency to retain at least the early datings or to propose even earlier ones for some
literary and many more religious texts.
This volume presents both overviews and in-depth case studies of current Egyptological dating
practises and methods. While giving the ‘state of the art’ of dating Egyptian literary texts, the book
also addresses important methodological issues to provide a basis for future research.

Con ten ts
Introduction: Gerald Moers, ‘Vom Verschwinden der Gewissheiten’
I Materiality
Andreas Dorn, ‘Kulturelle Topografie literarischer Texte. Versuch einer Funktions- und Bedeutungs-
bestimmung literarischer Texte im Mittleren Reich anhand ihrer archäologischen Kontexte’ — Ogden
Goelet, Jr., ‘Reflections on the Format and Paleography of the Kemyt. Implications for the Sitz im Leben
of Middle Egyptian Literature in the Ramesside Period’ — R. B. Parkinson, ‘Sailing Past Ellsinore.
Interpreting the Materiality of Middle Kingdom Poetry’ — Ursula Verhoeven, ‘Literatur im Grab – der
Sonderfall Assiut’
II Linguistics
Alexandra von Lieven, ‘Why Should We Date Texts by Historic Linguistic Dating?’ — Simon D.
Schweitzer, ‘Dating Egyptian Literary Texts: Lexical Approaches’ — Pascal Vernus, ‘La datation de
L’Enseignement d’Aménemopé. Le littéraire et le linguistique’ — Daniel A. Werning, ‘Linguistic Dating
of the Netherworld Books Attested in the New Kingdom. A Critical Review’
III Texts and Methods: The Egyptological Discussion
Antonia Giewekemeyer, ‘Perspektiven und Grenzen der Nutzung literarischer Texte als historische
Quellen. Zu Versuchen, ‚Geschichte‘ aus der Geschichte über die Vorhersagen des Neferti herauszulesen’
— Andrea M. Gnirs, ‘Geschichte und Literatur. Wie „historisch“ sind ägyptische literarische Texte?’
— Joachim Friedrich Quack, ‘Irrungen, Wirrungen? Forscherische Ansätze zur Datierung der älteren
ägyptischen Literatur’ — Dirk van der Plas, ‘Dating the Hymn to Hapi. An Update of the Late Date’ —
Kai Widmaier, ‘Die Lehre des Cheti und ihre Kontexte. Zu Berufen und Berufsbildern im Neuen Reich’
IV Texts and Methods: Comparative Perspectives
Michael Stolz, ‘Early versions in medieval textual traditions. Wolfram’s Parzival as a test case’ — John
Van Seters, ‘Dating the Admonitions of Ipuwer and Biblical Narrative Texts. A Comparative Study’ —
Stuart Weeks, ‘Texts without Contexts. The Dating of Biblical Texts’

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This book is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
 Lingua Aegyptia Studia Monographica
Backlist
Back issues (published by the Seminar für Ägyptologie und Koptologie Göttingen) are now
distributed by Widmaier Verlag and available at reduced prices:

2 Gerald Moers (ed.), Definitely: Egyptian Literature: Proceedings of the symposion

“Ancient Egyptian literature: history and forms”, Los Angeles, March 24–26, 1995.
1999 (hardcover, X+142 pages), € 36, now € 25
3 Dörte Borchers, Frank Kammerzell & Stefan Weninger (eds.), Hieroglyphen –
Alphabete – Schriftreformen:
Studien zu Multiliteralismus, Schriftwechsel und Orthographieneuregelungen.
2001 (hardcover, VI+270 pages), € 49, now € 30
4 Stephan Jäger, Altägyptische Berufstypologien.
2004 (hardcover, X+340+xlvi+XCIV pages), € 79, now € 45
5 José M. Galán, Four Journeys in Ancient Egyptian Literature.
2005 (hardcover, V+186 pages), out of print
6 Anthony Spalinger, Five Views on Egypt.
2006 (hardcover, VIII+176 pages), € 49, now € 35
7 H.J. Polotsky, Scripta Posteriora on Egyptian and Coptic,
edited by Verena M. Lepper & Leo Depuydt.
2007 (hardcover, VI+230 pages), € 49, now € 35
8 Petra Andrássy, Julia Budka & Frank Kammerzell (eds.), Non-Textual Marking
Systems, Writing and Pseudo Script from Prehistory to Modern Times.
2009 (hardcover, VIII+312 pages), € 59, now € 49

Starting with volume 9, Lingua Aegyptia Studia Monographica

is published by Widmaier Verlag, Hamburg.
All prices include German VAT (7%).
For orders, subscriptons and further information please contact:
[email protected]
North American customers may also contact the official distributor Eisenbrauns
(for issues since volume 9):
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This book is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.