The Mysterious Rise of Userkaf and the Political Shift of the Fifth Dynasty
In fact, the monuments do not provide us with sufficient information about this change. We see that Userkaf, the first king of this dynasty, left the Abu Sir region and went to the Saqqara region and chose a place near the Step Pyramid, but his pyramid group and the inscriptions found in his temple do not differ from the pyramids and inscriptions of the Fourth Dynasty in anything important.
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| The ruined pyramid of Userkaf at Saqqara and Head of Userkaf , recovered from his sun temple in Abusir |
Religious Power and the Role of Khentkaus I in Legitimatizing the Throne
We do not know anything about Userkaf's origin or his relationship with the priests of the sun, although it is possible that he held a high position in the temple of the sun and, with the help of the priests, was able to reach the throne and marry Khentkaus I, thus legitimizing his sitting on the throne in the eyes of the people.
Whether this is true or merely conjecture, the unquestionable fact is that Khentkaus I was the mother of two kings, each of whom ruled in his own right. She was the mother of two kings who ruled one after the other, and there is near unanimity among historians that the two kings who ruled after Userkaf were Sahure and Neferirkare.
Palermo Stone mentions that Userkaf built temples in various parts of Egypt, such as Buto in the Delta to worship the goddess Hathor, and that he donated land to the temple of the god Ra.
Userkaf’s Architectural Legacy: The Forgotten Sun Temples of Abusir
As for the Userkaf pyramid, it is in Saqqara, as we said, and in its temple, a large granite statue of this king was found. We know from many sources that he was the first to build a temple to the sun in Abusir, and it is very likely that it is the temple excavated by the Swiss Institute for the Study of Ancient Egyptian Architecture in Cairo in the middle of the last century.
In the last season of excavation in 1957, they found a head of schist stone that was a statue and it is very elaborate representing a king holding the crown on his head, but it is regrettable that the destruction of the temple was complete and no inscriptions were found in it or the name of its owner was found written on any monument so that this temple and this head can be attributed to Userkaf without hesitation or doubt.
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| The pyramid of Userkaf.Source |
Sahure’s Reign: The Expansion of Trade, Military Campaigns, and Temple Innovation
Userkaf ruled for only seven years, then he was succeeded on the throne by Sahure, who ruled for fourteen years, and was the first king of the Fifth Dynasty who chose the Abusir region to build his pyramids, and not far from Userkaf's temple, Sahure built his pyramid on the Abusir plateau between the pyramids of Giza and Saqqara. On the Abusir plateau between the pyramids of Giza and Saqqara, four of his successors, Nefer Ar Kare, Shepseskare, Neferfraf Ra, also built their pyramids there, and at least two of them built sun temples close to their pyramids.
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| The ruined Pyramid of the Pharaoh Sahure.Source |
Why Sahure’s Temples Marked a Turning Point in Ancient Egyptian Architecture
Sahure did not take much care in the construction of his pyramid, as it is not impressive in construction and is small in size when compared to the pyramids of the previous dynasty, but he compensated for this by building a grandiose temple that used the most precious architectural materials and decorated its halls and halls on granite columns with crowns).
The architects of the Fifth Dynasty cared for the architecture of this temple and other temples to a great extent that we did not know before, if they did not neglect anything and took precautions against everything that might affect the integrity of the building, so they did not neglect the rain and made it flow from the gutters, each of which is shaped like a lion's head that drops water from its mouths to small channels a little deeper in the floor, and then the water runs downhill to the outside.
As for the water that was used inside the temple chambers in its various parts, it ran from pipes under the floor of the temple, and these pipes were made of copper and glued together with lead, and ran to the outside of the temple where the water was emptied in one of the low places in a place out of sight.
There is no doubt that the art of temple architecture and construction advanced a lot during the Fifth Dynasty, and the inscriptions on the walls of these temples increased and diversified, and this may undoubtedly explain their departure from interest in the pyramids.
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| Columns of the funeral temple of Sahourê in Abousir |
The Military Campaigns of Sahure: From Libya to Phoenicia and Punt
we know from the remains of the inscriptions that covered the walls of the Sahure temples and the road connecting them a lot of the activity of this king, especially in the field of war, as Egypt was invaded in his days from the west when some Libyan tribes came with their leaders, women and animals to attack the delta and settle in the Nile Valley, and Sahure defeated them.
We also know from the inscriptions of his temple in Abusir that he sent a fleet to the shores of Phoenicia, then his return and the king's reception of him surrounded by his senior staff, which led some researchers in Egyptian history to believe that this fleet was not sent for war or trade but was on a friendly trip and may have returned with one of the princesses of those countries to become one of Sahure's wives.
He did not limit his activities to western Egypt and the Phoenician coast, but also sent another expedition to the south, as its leader left the name of a queen inscribed on a rock near the shore of the Nile in Nubia, and we know from the Palermo Stone that he sent an expedition to the country of Punt.
This expedition returned with a lot of incense, gold, and quite a few sticks of wood that the Egyptians were interested in obtaining, some or most of which may have been ebony.
Neferirkare: The Kind-Hearted Pharaoh and the Rise of Priestly Power
King Neferirkare was no less ambitious than his brother, and he contemplated building a pyramid larger than Sahure's, but he died before completing all parts of his pyramid complex.
This king was not like his predecessors in his warlike activity, but he was a kind-hearted person who loved to make gifts to the temples, with a genuine sense of love for those around him and admitting his mistake if he made a mistake.
As for his love for priests and temples, it is enough to look at his actions recorded in the Palermo Stone and see that most of them in the first year of his reign are nothing more than granting endowments to the gods, once to the people and again to the spirits of Heliopolis.
We see him offering an altar to the god Ra and another to Hathor. We also see him offering peasants who work on the land owned by the temples, and even a statue made of a mixture of gold and silver metal. Unfortunately, the preserved part of the Palermo Stone ends there, so we don't know what he offered to the priests and gods in the following years.
But this beginning is enough to make us realize that the era of this king was the beginning of the full emergence of the power of the priests and their exploitation of his kindness to obtain everything they want, and we are not surprised after that if we see him issue a royal decree during his reign that records the exemption of clergy and temple peasants from doing any other work required by the reform projects in any of the regions, and threatens all government employees who violate this, so Nefer Ar-Kare helped, by this action, to strengthen and enrich the priests.
If we keep in mind that those at the top of the priestly ranks were at the same time the country's top officials, we can easily understand why the king's authority began to weaken over time, why the centralized power of the government began to disintegrate, and why the power of the top officials and provincial governors began to increase.
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| Pyramid of Neferirkare.Source |
The Tale of Rawer and the Compassionate Decree of King Neferirkare
We mention some of what the history of that era has preserved for us about the kindness of that king's heart. In 1929, Cairo University excavations were uncovering the ruins of the area to the south of the road connecting the two temples of Khafre in the Giza pyramids.
These excavations revealed the tomb of a senior official of the king named Rawer, who held among his many titles the title of director of the royal palace, confidant of the king's secrets and at the same time was the priest of the gods of the Upper Egyptian face and the priest of the gods of the Northern. This official had a minor incident with the king.
Rawer was walking, along with his master on the day of the official celebration of the opening of a special festival, and it happened that the king was moving his staff and accidentally hit Rawer's leg, and when the king realized what he had done, he was very upset and said that he loved him and apologized for what he had done, and the king was not satisfied with that, but he wanted to make this fact known to all people and inscribed on a stone tablet, and this tablet was found in the tomb of that employee.
The king wanted to make this fact engraved on a stone slab, and this slab was found in the tomb of Rawer, and it is enough to mention that the number of its rooms, halls and corridors is not less than fifty, and if we count the remaining parts of his statues, we can be sure that there were more than a hundred of them in this tomb.
If we take a look at the stones with which its walls were built, especially the facade stones, we would realize the wealth of the priests, which was matched only by the kings, and if we compare the tomb of Rawer with the tombs of the sons of Sneferu or Khufu, we would see that it exceeds them in the number of rooms or halls and the grandeur of the buildings.
The Opulent Tombs of Fifth Dynasty Officials: A Sign of Rising Elite Power
Rawer's tomb is not the only tomb in which we glimpse the wealth of high priests and officials, but we find many examples among the tombs of Abusir, Giza and Saqqara. The high priests and officials became very wealthy and influential, and they built tombs for themselves that were many times larger and more luxurious than the tombs of the sons of the kings in the Fourth Dynasty.
Nyuserre: The Pharaoh Who Perfected the Sun Temples and Festival Ceremonies
Shepseskare and Neferefre ruled after Neferirkare, but they did not leave important monuments, although at least the second of them started building a pyramid in the Abusir region.
Then another king came to the throne, Nyuserre, whose days on the throne were longer than thirty-two years and built a pyramid in Abusir, and also built a temple of the sun in the same area and decorated its walls with many scenes, perhaps the most important of which are those scenes that give us the most important details of the ceremonies of the Thirtieth Festival that have reached our hands.
We also see among the scenes that were in his temple evidence of the wars he carried out in Syria and other wars against the Libyans, although there is some doubt that he did not carry out such wars, but the artists were imitating the scenes of the temple of Sahure, which was near him.
Many important tombs have been found from the reign of this king, perhaps the most important of them all is the tomb of Ti, in Saqqara, which is rarely visited by anyone visiting that area and gives a true idea of the social life in that era.
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| The pyramid of Nyuserre Ini in Abusir |
The Legacy of Djedkare Isesi: Administrative Reforms and Expeditions to Nubia
After Nyuserre came a king called Menkauhor, who ruled for about eight years and about whom little is known. Then a strong king ruled: Djedkare Isesi, who ruled for a long time, not less than twenty-eight years.
This king was interested in securing his borders and exploiting mines and quarries, so he sent a campaign to Nubia, another to Wadi Hammamat, and one or more campaigns to Wadi Maghareh, where four inscriptions were left in his name.
Djedkare Isesi's name was always one of the famous names in the history of the Fifth Dynasty, and his name was associated with the names of many senior officials whose tombs were found, including the famous sage Ptahhotep, who was supervising his upbringing. He left his collection of advice and guidance, which is a repertoire of wisdom and guidance to good behavior that the Egyptians cherished in all their eras.
The Pyramid and Temple of Djedkare Isesi: Hidden Treasures of Saqqara
In 1948, the Antiquities Authority uncovered the area around the pyramid called Haram el-Shawaf in the Saqqara area above the plateau in front of which the houses of the town of Saqqara were built in the valley, and many important inscriptions appeared in that temple, so we now know where Djedkare Isesi's pyramid and his temple, and in 1952-1953, the Antiquities Authority also uncovered another pyramid and temple for his wife in the same area.
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| pyramid of the Djedkare-Isesi |
No inscriptions were found inside the pyramid of Djedkare Isesi, while the temple was no less than any other temple of the Fifth Dynasty in its grandeur and the beauty of its inscriptions, and some architectural elements appeared in it that we did not know about before, such as decorating some of the entrances with columns in the form of the Djed sign, which is very related to the worship of the god Osiris, and statues of lions, bulls and statues of some foreign captives also appeared in the excavations of the temple.
Written by H. Moses
All rights reserved ©Mythology and History
All rights reserved ©Mythology and History
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