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O Conto Do Naufrago. Um Olhar Sobre o Im
O Conto Do Naufrago. Um Olhar Sobre o Im
O Conto do Nufrago
Um olhar sobre o Imprio Mdio egpcio
anlise histricofilolgica
Lisboa
Centro de Histria da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa
2012
Ficha Tcnica
Ttulo
O Conto do Nufrago
Um olhar sobre o Imprio Mdio egpcio. Anlise histricofilolgica
Autor
Telo Ferreira Canho
Email: telofcanhao@gmail.com
Copyright
Centro de Histria da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa e autor do texto
Capa
sersilito Maia
FOTOGRAFIA DA Capa
pr-do-sol em Assuo, 2000
Telo Ferreira Canho
VERSO INGLESA
Eduardo Marques da Costa
Data de edio
Junho de 2012
Impresso
sersilito Maia
Depsito Legal
345596/12
ISBN
978-989-8068-10-1
Tiragem
500 exemplares
Editor
Centro de Histria
Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa
Alameda da Universidade 1600-214 LISBOA PORTUGAL
Tel.:+ 351 217 920 000 Fax: 351 217 960 063
Email: centro.historia@fl.ul.pt
URL: http://www.fl.ul.pt/unidades/centros/c_historia/index. html
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O Conto do Nufrago
Um olhar sobre o Imprio Mdio egpcio
anlise histricofilolgica
Prefcio
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
Apresentao
Prembulo
Ento o excelente companheiro disse:
Sossega o teu corao, comandante!
V, ns chegmos a casa.
O mao est empunhado, o cabeo de amarrao cravado,
a amarra da proa posta em terra.
Faamos uma orao. Louvemos deus!
Cada um abraa o seu companheiro.
A nossa equipagem regressou s e salva,
sem perdas na nossa expedio.
Atingimos os confins de Uauat e passmos Senmut.
Olha ns voltmos em paz,
ns alcanmos a nossa (prpria) terra.
Escutame () comandante,
porque eu no exagero.
Lavate! Verte gua sobre os teus dedos
e poders responder quando se dirigirem a ti.
Fala ao rei com toda a franqueza
e responde sem balbuciar.
A boca de um homem pode salvlo,
o seu discurso pode fazer com que o perdoem.
Age segundo o teu desejo.
cansativo falar contigo!
Incio do conto
Eu vou contarte uma coisa idntica
que me aconteceu a mim,
quando me dirigia para a regio mineira do soberano.
Eu descia pelo Grande Verde
num barco de cento e vinte cvados de comprimento
por quarenta cvados de largura,
com cento e vinte marinheiros a bordo, dos melhores do Egipto.
Vigiassem o cu ou a terra,
o seu corao era mais bravo (do que) o dos lees.
A tempestade e o naufrgio
Eles podiam prever um vendaval antes da sua chegada
e uma tempestade antes da sua formao.
Um vendaval eclodiu quando estvamos no Grande Verde,
antes que consegussemos alcanar terra.
O vento levantouse, ele bramia,
e as vagas atingiam os oito cvados.
O mastro partiuse arrastandome com ele
e depois o barco afundouse.
Dos que estavam a bordo, nenhum sobreviveu.
Ento fui depositado numa ilha
por uma vaga do Grande Verde.
Passei trs dias sozinho,
(s com) o meu corao por companheiro.
Estendido inerte no interior de (um abrigo de) madeira
eu recolhime sombra.
Depois estendi as pernas procura de comida.
Encontrei ali figos e uvas,
todo o tipo de excelentes legumes,
figos de sicmoro maduros e verdes,
e pepinos como se tivessem sido cultivados;
a havia (tambm) peixes e aves.
Tudo existia a!
Ento, sacieime
e pus no cho o que era difcil levar nos braos.
Agarrei num pau para fazer lume,
acendi uma fogueira e fiz um sacrifcio aos deuses.
Aparecimento da serpente
Foi ento que ouvi um barulho de trovo
e imaginei que fosse uma vaga do Grande Verde.
As rvores estalavam
e a terra tremia.
15
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
A histria do nufrago
A isto, respondilhe
(com) os braos cados diante dela,
dizendolhe: Eu, eu descia para as minas
A resposta da serpente
Ento, eu fui depositado nesta ilha
por uma vaga do Grande Verde.
Ento ela disseme: No tenhas medo,
no tenhas medo, homenzinho!
No empalideas! Tu estavasme reservado!
V, o deus fez com que tu vivesses
e conduziute ilha do Ka,
no interior da qual no h nada que no se encontre.
Ela est cheia de tudo o que bom.
Olha! Tu passars ms aps ms
at completares quatro meses de permanncia nesta ilha.
Ento, um barco vir do (teu) pas,
17
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
O regresso a casa
Ento esse barco veio,
como ela tinha predito anteriormente.
Eu fui, subi a uma rvore alta
e reconheci aqueles que estavam no seu interior.
Ento fui para contar isto ( serpente),
mas encontreia (j) sabedora do assunto.
Ento ela disseme: Adeus!
Adeus, homenzinho!
19
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
Concluso
Olha para mim depois que eu toquei terra,
depois do que vi, do que experimentei!
Ouveme, portanto!
V, bom escutar as pessoas!
Ento ele disseme:
No faas de excelente, meu amigo!
Quem dar gua ave pela alvorada
para ela ser abatida pela manh?
E acabou, do princpio ao fim,
como o que se encontrou na escritura,
na escrita do escriba de dedos hbeis,
Amena, filho de Ameni.
Possa ele viver, prosperar e ter sade!1
Traduo prpria directamente do egpcio hieroglfico, com consultas diversas ao manuscrito hiertico.
As palavras a negrito esto escritas a tinta encarnada no manuscrito (T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia
do Imprio Mdio: espelho de uma civilizao, II, pp. 133-158).
23
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
10
25
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
15
no ter corrido da melhor forma, pois teme enfrentar o fara, sendo perceptvel na sua nica fala julgar ter a vida em perigo. Para o confortar, o narrador e
heri do conto, elevado condio de companheiro excelente19, contalhe uma
histria fantstica, destinada a mostrarlhe que mesmo nas piores circunstncias
sempre possvel acontecer um volteface. Numa outra viagem em que foi o
nico sobrevivente de um naufrgio provocado por uma violenta tempestade
onde pereceram todos os tripulantes do seu barco, cento e vinte dos melhores
marinheiros do Egipto, acabou por ir parar a uma ilha maravilhosa, a ilha do
Ka, onde se deparou com o seu nico habitante, um deusserpente. Recebido
como algo de insignificante e desprezvel, acabou por ser confidente da enorme
serpente nessa terra sagrada de regras rituais precisas. No fim, o deusserpente
permitiu que o nufrago regressasse ao Egipto e alcanasse a felicidade.
Em anlises deste conto tornaramse correntes afirmaes do tipo: como
uma histria de marinheiros logo a mater de obras como a Odisseia ou As
Aventuras de Simbad, o Marinheiro20; ou, a estrutura cclica do conto em abc
dcba, em que aa o regresso do infeliz comandante, bb o naufrgio do
nico sobrevivente de uma outra viagem, cc a sobrevivncia do nufrago numa
ilha deserta e d a histria da serpente. Com bb e cc a ocuparem a maior parte
do texto, 149 das 189 linhas, e d, que ocupa apenas seis linhas, como a parte
mais relevante por encerrar a revelao divina da histria21.
latino domicil um deriva de domus, um dos tipos de habitao romana. Neste conto, a palavra khenu
(Xnw) aparece como substantivo ou elemento da preposio em-khenu (m-Xnw), entendida por ns
sempre com uma certa ambiguidade, mas que, muito provavelmente, no se punha aos leitores de ento,
conhecedores das subtilezas da sua escrita, muitas das quais ainda hoje nos escapam (R. O. Faulkner,
A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, p. 202).
19
Companheiro (chemsu, Smsw), lit.: Aquele que segue o fara. Era um dignitrio que ajudava o rei a
governar o Egipto, numa designao que, aparentemente, deriva de outra bastante mais antiga segundo
os Textos das Pirmides do tempo de Pepi I: chemsu Hor, Smsw Hr, ou seja, Aqueles que seguem
Hrus. De acordo com a mitologia egpcia, os seguidores de Hrus eram seres simblicos que
governavam o Egipto primordial, antes da transmisso do poder aos homens na pessoa do fara, e que
o recebiam quando da sua ascenso eternidade. Aqueles que seguem o fara (chemsu per-aa, Smsw
pr-aA) seriam os seus representantes na terra. Pode ser traduzido, tambm, por dependente, algum que
trabalha para outrem (R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, p. 264; M. Lapidus,
La Qute de lle Merveilleuse, p. 21).
20
Vladimir Vikentiev, por exemplo, explorou intensamente a forma de justificao deste conto atravs
de numerosas comparaes com outros contos. Talvez seja a origem deste tipo de afirmaes! Cfr. V.
Vikentiev, Voyage vers lIle Lointaine, pp. XII-XIII, 2, 6, 73-83.
21
Cfr., por exemplo, J. N. Carreira, Literatura do Antigo Egipto, pp.109-110, e J. Baines, Interpreting
the Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, p. 67.
27
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
bia (biA), para alm de regio mineira, pode significar bronze, que uma
liga, cobre, um metal, que Snchez Rodrguez pergunta se no ser ferro,
um mineral no metlico, uma regio mineira, ou firmamento e, ainda,
uma matria de origem celeste, conforme os determinativos27. De norte a
sul do Egipto, do Sinai Nbia, existiam minas de onde se extraam diversos
tipos de minrios, todas elas controladas pelo Egipto como monoplio real28.
Neste texto no h uma localizao exacta destas minas. Ser que era perto do
Punt? que o nufrago vai ser confrontado com uma personagem que se diz
governador do Punt! Na linha 151, a serpente afirma claramente Na verdade,
eu sou o governador do Punt29, terra mtica de localizao incerta mas real de
onde vinham muitas riquezas para o Egipto, que tambm vemos descritas no
conto. Esta personagem uma divindade e, portanto, omnipresente: pode
ser o governador do Punt e estar em qualquer outro lugar! Este pode ser um
daqueles subterfgios que os criadores destas fices utilizavam para generalizar:
uma ilha misteriosa em qualquer parte do universo. Por isso tambm no se
pode simplesmente afirmar que esta seja uma viagem ao Punt! O Punt aparece
exactamente para introduzir no conto toda uma carga de incerteza e mistrio.
evidente que depois de bia est en iti (n ity), claramente do soberano;
contudo, chamamos a ateno para o facto de bia poder significar firmamento
R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, pp. 80-81; A. Snchez rodrguez, Diccionario
de Jeroglficos Egpcios, p. 166.
28
J. Baines e J. Mlek, Egipto. Deuses, Templos e Faras, p. 21; B. Manley, Atlas historique de l'gypte ancienne, pp. 19,
51, e 69.
29
ink is HqA pwnt (
). A palavra HqA tem um determinativo que leva alguns estudiosos a
traduzi-la por rei ou soberano, o caracter G. G7, o falco sobre um estandarte ( ), utilizado como
determinativo em divindades e na palavra rei que, neste caso, confere um carcter divino e/ou real a
este governador, sem o igualar ao rei do Egipto. Manteremos a traduo de governador em vez de
rei, no s porque os Egpcios tinham diversas palavras para este ltimo termo, que o autor no quis
empregar aqui, talvez pelo facto de que para eles s havia um rei, o fara, ou pela inteno de fazer a
analogia com Sobek, como avanamos de seguida no corpo do texto. Exactamente da mesma maneira
que, quando este determinativo aparece a dar carcter divino e/ou real ao senhor da ilha, em 171
(
, rdi.n.i Hknw Hr mryt n nb n iw pn, Dei graas sobre a margem ao
senhor desta ilha), no traduzimos nb por rei ou soberano. A eventualidade de confuso com
qualquer outro governador do Egipto em nossa opinio no de considerar, porque as palavras ou
os determinativos certos distinguem-nos. Por exemplo,
, HqA-Hwt, governador de distrito. Tudo
isto sem, indiscutivelmente, deixar de ser o governante, o dirigente ou o chefe mximo do Punt,
o que nos leva a admitir que numa traduo literria ou num qualquer estudo, no acompanhado do
texto hieroglfico nem de transliterao, se possa usar o termo soberano. At mesmo neste trabalho,
caso no nos estejamos a referir ao texto em anlise (T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio:
espelho de uma civilizao, II, pp. 148 e 150).
27
29
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
Os Textos dos Sarcfagos, uma adaptao dos Textos da Pirmides feita durante o Primeiro Perodo
Intermedirio, so frmulas e poemas mgico-religiosos para ajudar o defunto a proteger-se no Alm,
assegurando a sua imortalidade. Inscritos em diversos sarcfagos atingiram a sua forma definitiva no
Imprio Mdio, sobretudo nas XI e XII dinastias (L. M. Arajo, Textos dos Sarcfagos, em Dicionrio
do Antigo Egipto, p. 822).
31
M. Lapidus, La Qute de lle Merveilleuse, p. 26.
32
Embora no seu dicionrio diga que bia um mineral no metlico, Faulkner traduz aqui bia por ferro e
diz que esta passagem se refere ao ritual da abertura da boca com uma enx de ferro. Sem dvida que parece
ser o ritual da abertura da boca, mas bia poder ser traduzida por ferro no Imprio Mdio (c. 2040-1780
a. C.)? A metalurgia do ferro s em meados do Imprio Novo (c. 1560-c. 1070) que surgiu no Egipto,
depois de se espalhar por todo o Prximo Oriente entre 1600 e 1200 a. C. e, ainda assim, sem substituir
de imediato o bronze. At ento existia mas, por no ter sido ainda desenvolvida metalurgia apropriada,
o que havia na natureza era muito pouco (mais raro que o ouro) e pouco malevel por falta de tecnologia
apropriada. No Egipto tm aparecido artefactos de ferro com dataes do terceiro e do segundo milnio a. C.,
havendo indcios da existncia deste metal j no quarto milnio. Mas este ltimo era de origem meteortica,
o que no acontece aos do terceiro e segundo milnios que no apresentam na sua composio nquel, como
o caso dos do quarto milnio. Contudo, o ferro no uma substncia que se obtenha do cu, a menos
que se admita a hiptese de ser, de facto, de origem meteortica. Qualquer estrela que tenha cado do cu!
H no vocabulrio respeitante a bia duas palavras que, em nossa opinio, em vez de serem traduzidas por
um mineral no metlico tm mais possibilidades de serem este ferro meteortico. So as palavras
e
que apresentam o caracter G. N14, uma estrela. Se no Conto do Nufrago poder ter ficado registado a
queda de um meteorito, bem possvel que o produto de uma estrela possa ter ficado registado no prprio
vocabulrio egpcio! Contudo, at ver prevalecem as opinies de que este ferro era um subproduto da produo de cobre (R. O. Faulkner (ed.), The Ancient Egyptian Coffin Texts. Spell 1-1185 and Indexes, vol. III,
pp. 7-8; C. C. Correia, Metalurgia, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 566-567; J. Ogden, Metals, em
P. Nicholson e I. Shaw, Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology, pp. 166-168; R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, p. 80). Para a cerimnia da abertura da boca, onde era utilizado um
instrumento apropriado, veja-se L. M. Arajo, Abertura da boca, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp.
20-21; ver tambm I. Shaw e P. Nicholson, The British Museum Dictionary of Ancient Egypt, pp. 235-236.
33
, sD biA in inpw m pt hA biA wbA imnt (A. De buck, The Egyptian Coffin
Texts, vol. VII Texts of Spells 787-1185, p. VII-15).
30
31
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
Por sua vez, a palavra iti (ity) levanos a avanar uma outra hiptese
de associao mais clara e explcita. A palavra iti aparece no Conto do Nufrago por trs vezes, por exemplo em 174,
, aHa.n aq.kwi Hr
ity, Fui ento levado presena do soberano, na sua forma dual que s
se aplicaria ao Egipto para simbolizar que o soberano era rei tanto do Alto
como do Baixo Egipto. Contudo, a palavra iti ainda tem uma dzia de
variantes, a maioria delas sem a presena do caracter G. I3, o crocodilo 37.
A mesma ideia poderia tambm ser transmitida por nesu (
ou
nsw),
traduzindose como rei do Alto Egipto, ou biti (
bity), rei do Baixo Egipto
ou, ainda, o habitual nesubit ( nswbit), o do Junco e da Abelha, isto ,
rei do Alto e do Baixo Egipto, tal como o dual pretende simbolizar. Contudo
usouse uma palavra com dois crocodilos. Terse pretendido fazer alguma
analogia com Sobek (
,
,
,
ou
sbk), o deuscrocodilo? A
ltima grafia, em particular, deveras semelhante! Senhor das guas, simultaneamente solar e ctnico, adorado em todo o Egipto. Tal como o Sol, Sobek
saiu das guas na manh da primeira vez sendo por isso considerado tambm
um demiurgo. Sobek, cujo nome significa Aquele que provoca a gravidez (ou
a fertilidade), associavase por este motivo a Osris, ou seja, fertilidade e ao
renascimento, mas tambm morte e ao sepultamento38. bom ter em conta
que Amenemhat III mandou erguer um templo em honra de Sobek em Chedet,
a antiga Crocodilpolis grega e actual Medinet elFaium, e outro a cerca de 30
km para sudoeste, em Medinet Madi, dedicado a Sobek, Hrus e Renenutet39.
Pode acrescentarse que no templo funerrio da sua pirmide de Hauara h uma
srie de salassanturios dedicadas a Sobek, onde foram mesmo encontrados
fragmentos de uma esttua de Sobek40.
33
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
aos territrios que a inundao alcanava, quer dizer o vale, incluindo o delta e o
Faium, sem excluir as regies ao sul do Nilo no Alto Egipto44. H mesmo uma
inscrio em Fil, uma procisso de Nilos, onde um Nilo fala em nome
do Hapi do Alto Egipto que reside em Biga, e fornece a divina gua fresca ao
wADwr45. Assim, a frase que o nufrago proferiu quando contou a sua histria
serpente, Eu descia para as minas com uma mensagem do soberano (8990),
torna mais precisa a direco em que seguia o seu barco: ia para norte, para o
Delta ou para o Sinai.
Procuremos ir um pouco mais longe. O exemplo 145 dos 322 que Vandersleyen apresenta, extrado do Papiro Harris I, tambm chamado Grande
Papiro Harris, ou simplesmente Papiro Harris (h outros papiros na coleco
de Harris). Este papiro, que do princpio do reinado de Ramss IV, da XX
dinastia, foi encontrado numa tumba em Deir elMedina, na regio tebana, e foi
comprado pelo coleccionador e comerciante de antiguidades egpcias Anthony
Charles Harris em 1855. Em 1872 foi adquirido pelo Museu Britnico e catalogado com a referncia BM9999. Com cerca de 42 metros de comprimento
o maior manuscrito em papiro encontrado at ao momento e apresenta 1489
linhas de texto. Redigido em escrita hiertica, dividese em cinco seces, com
113 colunas de doze ou treze linhas cada, escritas horizontalmente da direita
para a esquerda. Contm, ainda, trs desenhos representando o rei Usermaatr
meriamon, Ramss III, frente s tradas de Tebas, Helipolis e Mnfis. um
manuscrito de temtica religiosa e histrica. O texto descreve 31 anos de doaes
de Ramss III, aos deuses e aos templos de vrias cidades, com vista obteno
dos favores dos deuses. A lista de doaes ocupa a maior parte do papiro. A
ltima parte do texto narra alguns acontecimentos da XX dinastia, descrevendo
a situao catica do princpio do perodo e glorificando as faanhas deste rei.
Termina com a morte de Ramss III e a subida ao trono do seu filho Ramss
IV. Contudo, nada diz da chamada conspirao do harm nem do assassinato
do fara. Como afirma Sales, constitui, juntamente com a Pedra de Chabaka,
uma das mais belas snteses da teologia de Ptah46.
Cfr. C. Vandersleyen, Ouadj our. Un outre aspect de la Valle du Nil, pp. 8-9.
Idem, pp. 74 e 319.
46
P. Grandet, Le Papyrus Harris I, vol. 1, pp. 3-26; a propsito da Pedra de Chabaka, a Fundao Calouste
Gulbenkian editou recentemente a obra de Rogrio Sousa, O Livro das Origens. A inscrio teolgica da
Pedra de Chabaka.
44
45
Pierre Grandet traduz esta passagem por Que fundou a terra em si prprio e
rodeoua com a inundao do oceano, isto : Ptah emergiu como terra rodeado
pelo oceano. J Claude Vandersleyen prefere Planeou a terra como se fez a si
prprio percorrendoa com a inundao do Grande Verde, ou seja, Ptah emergiu
como terra percorrendoa ao mesmo tempo que a inundao do Grande Verde.
De facto, o verbo senet (snT) pode significar planear, medir (uma terra) ou
fundar (uma casa), enquanto o verbo pekher (pXr) pode assumir os significados
de voltar, atravessar (uma regio), circunvalar, deambular, rodear ou
envolver48. Preferimos a segunda frase pelos motivos que expomos de seguida,
mas alteramos a traduo para Fundou a terra em si prprio atravessandoa
com a inundao do Grande Verde, tornando este acto de criao extensvel
ao Nilo e sua inundao, razo de sucesso de tudo o que existe no Egipto. O
Nilo atravessa a colina primordial tal como atravessa o Egipto.
E Grandet que d os argumentos a Vandersleyen ao afirmar: Nwn tem
aqui muito claramente o sentido de inundao e no de guas primordiais,
assim como todas as outras menes do termo que no so acompanhadas do
determinativo divino no Papiro Harris I. Devemos rejeitar o conjunto das tradues que traduzem nwn wADwr por o Nun e o mar; consideramos os dois
termos ligados por um genitivo directo. Devemos notar que wADwr possui aqui
exactamente o sentido do grego Wceausj, o Oceano que rodeia o mundo49.
Ora, se estamos a falar de inundao estamos no Nilo e no no mar, at
porque a que, como diz Sales, emerge a colina primordial: Tatenen era o deus
da colina primordial que emerge do lodo frtil do Nilo, fundamento da vida e da
Idem, vol. 2 fotografia 21; e vol. III, pp. 35 e 87; C. Vandersleyen, Ouadj our. Un autre aspect de la
valle du Nil, p. 252.
48
P. Grandet, Le Papyrus Harris I, vol. 1, p. 284; . Snchez Rodrguez, Diccionario de Jeroglficos
Egipcios, pp. 183 e 380; R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, pp. 93 e 234.
49
P. Grandet, Le Papyrus Harris I, vol. 2, p. 164 nt. 660.
47
35
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
vai regressar ao Egipto pelo Grande Verde. Aparentemente regressa por terra atravs da SriaPalestina, saindo da Sria em direco ao sul e fazendo uma paragem
nos Caminhos de Hrus (B 242), onde o comandante que estava encarregue
de patrulhar a fronteira, enviou uma mensagem para o palcio para os informar
(B 242243)55. Desta forma no se deslocar nem pelo Mediterrneo nem pelo
Nilo: ir por terra ao encontro do Nilo, o Grande Verde, e das suas ilhas.
O nufrago, ento, seguia no Grande Verde, acompanhado pela excelente
equipagem que podia prever um vendaval antes da sua chegada e uma tempestade antes da sua formao56 (2932), mas que no previu o forte vendaval que
eclodiu com o vento a bramir e as vagas a atingirem os oito cvados57 que fez
Idem, ibidem.
sr.sn Da n iit(.f) nSny n xprt.f (Idem, p. 142). As palavras dja e necheni (Da e nSny) referem-se a mau
tempo. Enquanto o determinativo da primeira, dja, a associa a vento, sendo um vento forte e fora
do normal, j a segunda, necheni, algum muito mais forte, cujo determinativo o animal de Set (G.
E20), senhor do deserto, causador das tempestades. provvel que seja uma daquelas tempestades de
areia a que os rabes hoje chamam de khamsin, capaz de provocar grandes estragos. Encarado como uma
manifestao do poder divino, o vento pode ser ouvido e sentido, mas apenas os seus efeitos podem
ser vistos. Ns prprios, por duas vezes nos vimos envolvidos em acontecimentos dessa natureza em
2001, quando participmos na primeira expedio arqueolgica portuguesa autorizada pelo Conselho
Supremo de Antiguidades Egpcias para escavar o palcio do fara Apris da XXVI dinastia. Uma das
vezes na regio da moderna Mit Rahina (Mnfis), em Kom Tuman, no campo de trabalho, e outra
em Sakara, na casa junto duna de Sakara que a misso portuguesa ocupou durante a campanha de
2001, pelo menos. Na primeira encontrvamo-nos no campo arqueolgico e os trabalhos ficaram
por a nesse dia. Uma brisa inicial evoluiu progressiva e rapidamente para vento muito forte. A nossa
inexperincia com fenmenos desta natureza ainda fez com que tentssemos continuar, mas acabmos
por ver que era impossvel a manipulao de qualquer equipamento. O vento arrastava as pessoas e
tirava-lhes as coisas das mos, era impossvel abrir os olhos e, mesmo abrindo-os, no se via nada a no
ser gros de areia a deslocarem-se a grande velocidade e a fustigarem os olhos. As pessoas mal se viam
umas s outras, tinham dificuldade em comunicar com o barulho ensurdecedor do vento, mal podiam
respirar e os gros de areia magoavam. No final, a grande tenda de apoio rasgou-se de alto a baixo, as
varetas tombaram e algumas espias soltaram-se, tendo os seus restos mortais que ser desmontados
para irem a coser. Algum equipamento dispersou-se. As reas escavadas tiveram que voltar a ser limpas,
pois ficaram cobertas de areia. O segundo caso foi durante a noite e estvamos dentro de casa. As
janelas, que durante a noite ficavam abertas, acordaram-nos a bater fortemente contra as paredes, no
havia electricidade, mesmo dentro de casa era difcil respirar, a boca enchia-se-nos de areia. s escuras
fechmos as janelas mas, mesmo assim, sentamos areia por todo o lado e ouvamos o forte barulho do
vento. Ainda o melhor stio para estar era debaixo do lenol: mais valia suportar um ambiente ainda
mais abafado do que levar com a areia. Na manh seguinte estava tudo calmo, mas o interior da casa
era quase como se no houvesse paredes: havia uma camada de areia por todo o lado que, nos cantos
opostos s janelas, chegava a ter alguns centmetros. Depois de passarmos a manh do dia seguinte em
limpezas no campo arqueolgico e a tarde no museu de Mnfis em catalogao, o trabalho que sempre
acabava por se concluir em casa seria a dobrar nesse dia!
57
A unidade de comprimento egpcia era o cvado (lat. cubitu), equivalente a cerca de 52,5 centmetros.
As suas fraces mais comuns eram o dedo, djeba ( Dba), equivalente a 1/28 do cvado, isto , 1,88
55
56
37
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
58
61
59
60
39
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
Vinson apresenta a imagem de um barco de viagem do tmulo de Khnumhotep, de Beni Hassan, da XI dinastia, transportando uma srie de pessoas
em p entre as duas filas de remadores, cada uma de 14 membros, mais um
homem proa, provavelmente com a funo de piloto. No grande leme r
no h ningum. uma equipagem de 25 marinheiros64. No tmulo tebano de
Intef, da XI dinastia, h pinturas de trs barcos com homens de arco e flechas,
escudos e outros tipos de armas, a lutarem a partir dos barcos. Mas so barcos
mais pequenos e manobrveis. Alm dos soldados pouco numerosos provavelmente para poderem manobrar vontade, quatro a seis a lutarem entre as duas
filas de remadores, as equipagens so de 11, 15 e 19 homens65. Se recuarmos
VI dinastia e considerarmos um dos barcos em plena navegao representado na
mastaba de Mereruka, vizir dos reis Teti e Pepi I, vemos uma equipagem de 44
homens66. Com uma equipagem de 120 homens, o barco do nufrago se tivesse
quarenta homens a remar, ainda tinha 80 para lutar. Poderia ser muito confuso
e era, de certeza, um barco muito lento para esta finalidade.
Conforme o que tinham a transportar, os barcos de transporte variavam
muito de tamanho e equipagem. Este barco alm de, aparentemente, ter medidas exageradas, parece tlas completamente desproporcionadas: 63 metros de
comprimento por 21 de largura. Esta largura um tero do comprimento, o
que, provavelmente, poder estar muito alm da realidade. Tendo em conta a
proporcionalidade da grande barca solar de Khufu, para um comprimento de
63 metros, a largura seria de cerca de 8,8 metros. Mesmo que para ganhar estabilidade um barco desta envergadura visse a sua largura aumentada para 10/11
metros, estamos a falar de um valor que cerca de metade do apresentado no
texto. Ser que pode ser um barco de transportes especiais, como diramos hoje?
Na sua autobiografia, Ueni, da VI dinastia, afirma que o rei Merenr lhe
financiou a construo de um barco de 31,5 metros de comprimento por 15,75
metros de largura (60 x 30 cvados), de accia para transportar uma mesa de
oferendas de alabastro (travertino). E o que dizer do transporte dos colossais
obeliscos de Assuo para Karnak, que ficaram registados nas paredes do templo
funerrio de Hatchepsut? Sem serem concludentes, os clculos efectuados por
barcos de pesca artesanal, uns de madeira e outros de papiro, barcos-cozinha e barcos de viagem (S.
Vinson, Egypyian Boats and Ships, p. 30; D. Jones, Boats, pp. 30-31).
64
S. Vinson, Egypyian Boats and Ships, p. 33.
65
Idem, p. 35.
66
D. Jones, Boats, p. 38.
Idem, p. 65.
C. Vandersleyen, En relisant le Naufrag, p. 1023. H contudo quem pense que a ilha do Ka seria
uma pennsula (ver B. Radomska, Die Insel des Schiffbrchigen eine Halbinsel?, pp. 27-30; contestado por W. Westendorf, Die Insel des Schiffbrchigen keine Halbinsel, pp. 1056-1064).
67
68
41
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
cheia seguinte podem desaparecer sem deixar rasto69. Por sua vez, no Livro de
Amduat, um texto funerrio do Imprio Novo cujo nome significa O que est
no Alm, ou seja, na Duat (dwAt)70, ao serem referidos os domnios de Sokar
no Alm, dizse que est no seu banco de areia, visvel sobre a barca henu no
seu hierglifo. Embora apenas implcita, poder esta ser uma via de associao
do Conto do Nufrago a Sokar?
Ora, toda esta histria aconteceu no percurso de Ititaui para norte, provavelmente no Delta, como alguns pretendem, pois no houve at aqui qualquer indicao de inverso de marcha. Contudo, o senhor da ilha diz ser o governador do
Punt, regio que fica no lado oposto do Nilo, ao qual se podia chegar tanto pelo
mar Vermelho como pelo rio Nilo. Sabese que o Punt foi objecto de numerosas
expedies egpcias entre a V dinastia e a poca GrecoRomana, muitas das quais
sobreviveram em vrios tipos de relato. A regio era considerada como origem da
mirra, do incenso e de outras substncias aromticas, bem como de ouro, marfim,
madeiras exticas, entre as quais o bano, e diversas espcies animais, locais ou
provenientes de outras regies africanas. Para alm do exotismo, esta terra era tambm mtica, pois da vinham diversos produtos para o culto, desde os aromticos
e ornamentais s peles rituais dos sacerdotes, o que levou os Egpcios a designla
por Pas de Deus. Apesar de tudo isto, apenas se sabe que deveria ficar na frica
Oriental, beira de um rio (seria o Nilo?)71, desconhecendose a sua localizao exacta.
Idem, ibidem.
Aparecendo pela primeira vez no tmulo de Tutms I, o Livro de Amduat um texto funerrio que
permitia ao defunto atravessar o Alm na barca de R. Est dividido em doze seces correspondendo
s doze horas da viagem nocturna do Sol, iniciando-se no Ocidente e terminando com o renascimento
solar a Oriente. Com excepo da primeira hora que contm uma introduo e o registo central subdividido em dois, apresentando por isso quatro registos, as restantes apresentam trs registos em que o
central o local por onde circula a barca de R e os laterais so como as margens de um rio. Antes de
entrar na Duat e atravessar as suas doze seces, o defunto tinha de atravessar previamente sete portas.
Todo o percurso cheio de perigos que vo sendo ultrapassados para permitir que o Sol e o defunto
possam renascer (L. M. Arajo, Livro de Amduat, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 512-513; C.
Carrier, Grands livres funraires de lgypte pharaonique, p. 67)
71
Esta afirmao tem por base a imagem que se encontra numa parede do templo funerrio de Hatchepsut
integrada na descrio de uma viagem comercial ao Punt. A, entre rvores de mirra e palmeiras, vem-se
claramente cabanas de tipo africano em palafitas. Este tipo de habitaes desenvolveu-se em lagos e rios, e
at no mar, onde a corrente no era muito forte, o que no parece ser o caso do Nilo e dos seus afluentes,
pelo menos na poca da inundao. Por isso, essa imagem que tem a gua desenhada como se fosse um rio
levanta a dvida se ela representa s junto gua ou se significa junto a um rio. Com as caractersticas do
Nilo, faria mais sentido que pudesse ser num lago onde se fizesse sentir a subida da gua mas no houvesse
periodicamente nenhum tipo de vaga repentina e brutal. E no Atbara, no Nilo Azul e no Nilo Branco, tambm existem lagos onde isso era possvel (J. Baines e J. Mlek, Egipto. Deuses, Templos e Faras, pp. 12-13).
69
70
43
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
era a fora da corrente que ajudava. Ora, sabemos tambm que antes da barragem
de Assuo as guas baixas do Nilo na estao de Chemu (de meados de Maro a
18 de Julho74) fluam com uma velocidade mdia de um n, uma milha nutica
ou 1,85 km por hora; e que na estao de Akhet (de 19 de Julho a meados de
Novembro) as guas altas da inundao aumentavam a sua velocidade at cerca
de 4 ns, em mdia, quatro milhas nuticas ou 7,4 km por hora75. O caudal
do Nilo atingia o seu mnimo entre Abril e Junho e o mximo entre Agosto
e Setembro. Se considerarmos que o rio Nilo percorre cerca de 1200 km de
distncia da fronteira sul do Egipto ao Mediterrneo, para ir de Elefantina a
Ititaui, algures entre o lago Faium e Mnfis, teriam que se percorrer cerca de
800 a 900 km. Sem considerarmos o impulso dos remadores, temos que para
atingir a maior dessas distncias na estao de Chemu seriam precisas cerca de
487 horas. Se a equipagem se revezasse e a viagem fosse contnua, chegariam
no 21 dia. Se considerarmos seis horas de descanso dirio, s acrescentaremos
cinco dias (120 horas) a este nmero: chegariam no 26 dia. Se considerarmos
a estao de Akhet, ento teremos estes nmeros a dividir por quatro: chegada
no 6 dia para o primeiro caso e no 7 dia para o segundo.
Num livro juvenil publicado originalmente pela Oxford University Press, h
excelentes desenhos com a esquematizao de uma viagem no tempo de Ramss
II de Elefantina a PiRamss, localizada no Delta Oriental junto aos pntanos
e lagos de confluncia com o mar Mediterrneo. Com diversas paragens, a
viagem foi calculada em 30 dias, ainda que se diga ser um calendrio muito
apertado76. E a regio onde se situaria Ititaui foi atingida depois do 18 dia e
antes do 22, sem que saibamos a poca em que foi feita a viagem mas, pelos
clculos anteriores, aparenta ter sido feita na estao de Chemu.
Ora ns at sabemos quando que o regresso do nufrago teria sido realizado!
Se a tempestade coincidiu com a vaga de oito cvados que provocou o naufrgio, a nuit (nwyt), e se ela era a chegada rpida e brutal da inundao, seria,
portanto, no dia 19 de Julho ou por a perto! Sabemos que o nufrago passou
trs dias sozinho antes da serpente chegar ao p dele e que, depois, esta lhe disse:
Olha! Tu passars ms aps ms at completares quatro meses de permanncia
nesta ilha (117119). Se cada estao tinha quatro meses de trinta dias cada,
Para o calendrio cfr. T. F. Canho, O calendrio egpcio: origem, estrutura e sobrevivncias, pp.
39-61.
75
S. Vinson, Egyptian Boats and Ships, p. 7.
76
S. Ross (texto) e S. Biesty (desenhos), Egipto em pormenor, pp. 8-10.
74
ele esteve toda a estao de Akhet na ilha. O barco que o levaria de regresso a
casa teria chegado ilha no incio de Peret (de meados de Novembro a meados
de Maro), a estao da sada das guas, quando estas estariam a meio caminho
entre a sua velocidade mxima e a sua velocidade mnima. Teremos que privilegiar
um nmero de dias entre os nmeros mais pequenos e os nmeros maiores para
a quantidade de dias de viagem. Em todo o caso, todos estes nmeros tornam
os 60 dias excessivos.
Assim somos levados a pensar que na imaginao do criador do conto,
independentemente deste poder ter tido uma fase de divulgao oral antes de
ser um conto escrito, esta parte da narrativa situarseia a sul de Elefantina. Do
ponto de vista comercial, no Imprio Mdio os Egpcios passaram Buhen e a
segunda catarata, que so cerca de 30 km de rpidos muito navegveis77. Depois
estabeleceram um centro de negcios em Mirgissa para o comrcio directo com
Kuch78 e, mais para sul ainda, ergueram uma srie de fortalezas ao longo do Nilo,
a mais setentrional designada por SemnaSul. Aqui tero chegado as campanhas
de Senuseret III e estabelecido a fronteira egpcia mais a sul do Imprio Mdio.
Mas a expanso econmica continuou e, depois de outra zona de difcil navegao, a catarata Dal, ainda se estabeleceu novo centro de negcios na ilha de
Sai, igualmente para o comrcio directo com Kuch. Alm disso, os comerciantes
egpcios podem ter tambm passado a terceira catarata, antes de Kerma, j na Alta
Nbia, uma vez que h notcias de agentes comerciais egpcios activos em Kerma
no Imprio Mdio, centro cultural e econmico de Kuch nesta poca79. E aqui
tanto eram adquiridos produtos locais como produtos que vinham mais do sul.
S depois da poca provvel do conto que os Egpcios e a sua influncia
passaram a quarta catarata junto a Napata, capital da Alta Nbia (Kuch) durante
alguns sculos80, e a quinta catarata, chegando a Mero, que viria a ser a segunda
capital da Alta Nbia e, depois, capital do prprio reino de Mero, j no sculo
J. Baines e J. Mlek, Egipto. Deuses, Templos e Faras, p. 40.
C. Desroches-Noblecourt, Le Secret des Temples de la Nubie, p. 45; B. Manley, Atlas historique de
l'gypte ancienne, p. 50.
79
B. Manley, Atlas historique de l'gypte ancienne, pp. 50-51.
80
Com o enfraquecimento dos ltimos ramsssidas e o desmembramento do poder que se seguiu, nos finais
do Imprio Novo Kuch tornou-se um reino independente. Kerma, a anterior capital nbia, deu lugar a
Napata e nova dinastia reinante apoiada tambm na metrpole religiosa de Guebel Barkal, a montanha
sagrada perto da qual diversos faras do Imprio Novo mandaram edificar vrios santurios, destacando-se
um templo dedicado a Amon que foi restaurado e ampliado por Seti I e Ramss II. Napata atingiu o lugar
de maior posto comercial nbio do Nilo onde chegavam, por barco ou por terra, grande quantidade de
produtos da frica Negra (L. M. Arajo, Napata, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 600-602).
77
78
45
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
III a. C. Entre estes dois ltimos pontos fica a foz do Atbara no Nilo Branco.
O Atbara estendese at regio a ocidente do planalto da Abissnia, que tem a
oriente a Eritreia. Continuando pelo Nilo Branco passase a sexta catarata e chega
se a Cartum, onde se encontra a foz do Nilo Azul no Nilo Branco. Dirigindose
tambm para ocidente do planalto da Abissnia, mais a sul do que o Atbara, o
Nilo Azul quem mais se aproxima da principal regio onde se imagina o Punt, a
zona de Djibuti, ou mesmo a parte mais setentrional da Somlia81. Sendo mais
distantes do que Uauat, qualquer destas regies poderia ser o Punt e fazer chegar
os seus produtos a Kerma, ilha de Sai e Mirgissa.
Entre a primeira catarata e Kerma o Nilo tem uma imensido de ilhas, muitas
delas anualmente desfeitas e refeitas pelas cheias, e suficientemente longnquo para
constituir um lugar propcio nossa narrativa. Ser por a que podemos imaginar
estar numa ilha fluvial, num banco de areia onde Sokar podia dominar, perto ou
no da misteriosa regio do Punt. Mas que ilha era essa? Aparentemente ela surgiu
do nada com o objectivo bem definido de permitir que o nufrago se salvasse, e,
cumprido esse objectivo, desapareceu. Depois de contar a sua histria serpente,
esta respondeulhe: Tu estavasme reservado! V, o deus fez com que tu vivesses e
conduziute ilha do Ka82 (113114). Mas, na verdade, no h conhecimento da
existncia de qualquer ilha com esta designao. Alis, se ela desapareceu depois
da sada do nufrago seria impossvel voltar a encontrla. Aparentemente tratase
de uma ilha imaginria83. E se, de facto, uma tal ilha nunca existiu, tambm o
barco que para l se dirigia no teve existncia real. Assim sendo, qualquer tipo
de barco poderia ser referido, de preferncia um que impressionasse no tamanho
e na equipagem, de forma a sobrevalorizar a sobrevivncia do nufrago. Estamos,
indiscutivelmente, perante uma histria ficcionada onde o que mais interessa no
a correspondncia com a realidade, ainda que se procure uma aparente realidade,
mas os objectivos a atingir com o seu relato.
De onde surge a designao de Ka? Ela evoca uma reserva de energia vital! A
noo que os antigos Egpcios tinham de ka escapa s nossas categorias racionais:
ela congregava todas as noes relativas s foras vitais, tanto nos seus aspectos
J. Baines e J. Mlek, Egipto. Deuses, Templos e Faras, pp. 12-13.
pH.n.kwi m knT r rdi.n.f anx.k ini.f tw r iwpn n kA (T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio:
espelho de uma civilizao, vol. II, p. 146).
83
Por isso, segundo o nosso raciocnio, no fazem qualquer sentido localizaes do tipo da que Wainwright
faz, que julga que a ilha do Ka St. Jones (Zeberged em rabe) no mar Vermelho, ao p de Berenice
na costa de Uauat (cfr. G. A. Wainwright, Zeberged: the shipwrecked Sailors Island, pp. 31-38).
81
82
espirituais como materiais, incluindo a eternidade da sua vida sexual. Era ao mesmo
tempo uma energia conservadora e criadora de vida. Era alimento e vitalidade de
Maat, que mantinha tanto a ordem csmica quanto a ordem entre os homens,
vivos ou mortos. Era um dos elementos integrantes do ser humano, tal como o ba
e o akh, os dois outros princpios espirituais que os Egpcios acreditavam constituir
a totalidade harmnica do ser, humano ou divino, tal como o corpo ou o nome,
sem os quais tambm no era possvel viver. Ao morrer um homem passava ao
seu ka, que residiria no seu corpo mumificado depositado na cmara funerria.
Mas era esculpida ainda uma esttua funerria sua, que seria um outro receptculo
onde essa energia passaria tambm a habitar, designandose por isso por esttua
do ka84. Nos tmulos do Imprio Antigo e do Imprio Mdio, tanto nas capelas
funerrias das pirmides como nas mastabas, existia o serdab, que era o local onde
se colocava a esttua do ka. Era um cubculo completamente fechado, isolado de
todo e qualquer outro espao, onde s existiam dois pequenos orifcios redondos
ou uma ranhura altura dos olhos da esttua, para que o ka do defunto pudesse
assistir ao seu culto funerrio e ver as oferendas que lhe eram feitas, uma vez
que era um espao vizinho da capela funerria. Num mundo simblico poderemos
admitir que o serdab possa ser considerado como uma ilha para o Ka?
Nesta ilha nada faltava. Primeiro foi o nufrago que, depois de contabilizar
uma srie de produtos, disse: No havia nada que no estivesse l! (5152);
depois, foi a prpria serpente que, ao referirse ilha, disse: No interior da
qual no h nada que no se encontre. Ela est cheia de tudo o que bom
(115117). Da primeira vez foram enumerados alimentos: vrios tipos de figos,
uvas, todo o tipo de legumes, pepinos, peixes e aves; da segunda, uma srie de
produtos tipicamente africanos que normalmente eram importados do Punt:
mirra, canela, hekenu, iudeneb, tichepes, chaasekh 85, galena86, caudas de girafa,
Cfr. L. M. Arajo, Akh, Ba e Ka, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 40-41, 131-132, 469-470;
L. M. Arajo, Os Grandes Faras do Antigo Egito, pp. 281-284.
85
O hekenu era um leo sagrado, um perfume ou um incenso (para Parkinson malabathrum), iudeneb
era uma substncia aromtica de origem africana (para Parkinson terebintina), tichepes (Parkinson
pensa que seja cnfora) e sobre chaasekh no se encontrou nenhuma referncia (G. Lefebvre, Romans et
Contes gyptiens de lpoque Pharaonique, p. 37; M. Lapidus, La Qute de lle Merveilleuse, p. 47; P. Le
Guilloux, Le Conte du Naufrag (Papyrus Ermitage 1115), p. 55; R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary
of Middle Egyptian, pp. 15, 179, 205 e 234; W. K. Simpson, The Literature of Ancient Egypt, p. 55; B.
Menu, Petite Grammaire de lgyptien Hiroglyphique lusage ds dbutants, pp. 27, 28, 155, 173 e 192;
R. B. Parkinson, The Tale of Sinuhe and Other Ancient Egyptian Poems, pp. 96-97).
86
Faulkner e Menu traduzem por tinta preta para os olhos, mas Menu acrescenta galena. E Lise
Manniche, numa pgina onde apresenta uma fotografia de um recipiente de cana, para tinta para os
84
47
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
resina de terebintina, incenso, dentes de marfim, ces de caa, macacos, babunos e todo o tipo de riquezas de qualidade. Uma terra onde nada falta e tudo
do melhor um paraso. Num mundo simblico poderemos equiparar a ilha
do Ka a uma viso do paraso? Parkinson diz que sim87. H mesmo contacto
de um humano com uma divindade! Do paraso egpcio, evidentemente, do
Juncal, o Sekhet Iaru (sxt iArw), o centro do reino de Osris onde viviam os
bemaventurados governados por RHorakhti, na companhia de Osris e da sua
comitiva. Refirase que o Juncal era apenas uma das sete manses da Duat que
o defunto tinha de atravessar para ser finalmente recebido pelo deus em pessoa.
Nas restantes seis manses do reino dos mortos, para alm dos ambientes de
horror que era preciso atravessar, viviam vrias serpentes, todas malficas, que
procuravam sistematicamente impedir que a barca de R, o demiurgo, que foi
fazendo uma sntese gradual com o deus ctnico Osris88, conclusse o seu priplo
nocturno. No Juncal a eternidade era garantida.
A propsito do Conto dos Dois Irmos, escrito no tempo de Seti II, Rogrio
Sousa emite a seguinte opinio: Recorrendo a muitos elementos simblicos,
o texto parece pertencer ao conjunto de composies elaboradas de modo a
terem uma dupla leitura: para alm de um sentido literal estendese, atravs
da articulao dos smbolos, um sentido metafrico. Tratase, tambm de um
excelente exemplo para ilustrar o jogo de ocultao, que na literatura egpcia
frequente, entre a realidade literal que veicula a ordem do mundo das aparncias,
e a realidade ltima prpria dos iniciados. Na verdade, os elementos simblicos
utilizados no conto tecem uma trama cuidadosamente elaborada que est na base
de incongruncias ou anomalias detectadas na sequncia objectiva do conto.
olhos, com a inscrio
(msdmt mAat nfrw), isto , verdadeira e excelente tinta preta
para os olhos, esclarece: A tinta preta para os olhos era usualmente baseada em galena, um minrio
de chumbo cinzento-escuro que podia ser facilmente extrado em numerosas localidades no Alto Egipto
entre Quseir e o mar Vermelho tal como perto de Assuo. () Nos tempos romanos e medievais foi
usado um antimnio composto, um minrio que em bruto no se encontrava no Egipto. Em latim era
designado por stibium, uma palavra derivada da egpcia mesdemet, que era uma designao da tinta para
os olhos em geral. () Registos antigos mencionam tinta para os olhos importada. () Os Asiticos,
o povo de Naharina para l do Eufrates e os habitantes do distante Punt, provavelmente na regio da
Eritreia, eram os fornecedores da corte egpcia. (R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, p. 118; B. Menu, Petite Grammaire de lgyptien Hiroglyphique, p. 104; L. Manniche, Egyptian
Luxuries. Fragrance, aromatherapy, and cosmetics in pharaonic times, pp. 135-137).
87
A propsito da terra da felicidade chamada Iaa, onde Amunenchi instalou Sinuhe, Parkinson diz: isto
um abundante paraso, descrito de forma similar para a ilha do Conto do Nufrago (R. B. Parkinson,
Poetry and Culture in Middle Kingdom Egypt, p. 157).
88
Cfr. J. C. Sales, As Divindades Egpcias, p. 100.
, portanto, necessrio distinguir a leitura literal, com todas as suas incongruncias, e a leitura metafrica, articulada atravs dos smbolos distribudos ao longo
do conto, que justifica e d sentido s anomalias. As incongruncias entre os
vrios planos de leitura ilustram a necessidade do texto em criar barreiras que
preservem afinal a essncia ltima do mistrio que pretendiam descrever. Tratase,
por esta razo, de um verdadeiro texto esotrico89. Numa nota de rodap no
mesmo local, o autor acrescenta uma leitura metafrica de certos contos egpcios
tem vindo a ser reconhecida ao longo das ltimas dcadas, e apresenta outros
exemplos: o Conto do Rei Neferkar e do General Sisen e o Passeio nutico do
Papiro Westcar90. So palavras que, quanto a ns, se aplicam perfeitamente ao
Conto do Nufrago.
Alis, Parkinson um dos egiptlogos que h j algum tempo reconheceu
a multiplicidade de leituras possveis no Conto do Nufrago, bem como a sua
envolvncia esotrica. Diz ele: Os mltiplos nveis de acepo em contos como
O Conto do Nufrago e Sinuhe, ambos contos de aventuras e narrativas simblicas, sugerem que eles foram idealizados para audincias de variados nveis
de sofisticao. Tanto no corpus, como no uso de material esotrico no Conto
do Nufrago e de aluses a formas especficas de escrita, poderiam apenas ser
totalmente apreciadas pela elite alfabetizada, mas isso no impediria um nvel
de apreciao, por exemplo, numa hipottica aldeia91.
Depois de termos apresentado a nossa interpretao das viagens do Conto do
Nufrago, analisemos agora as personagens deste conto que so trs: o comandante de um navio acabado de regressar ao Egipto, o nufrago de uma outra
viagem, seu passageiro, e a serpente, senhora da ilha do Ka. De acordo com
uma localizao geogrfica incerta e misteriosa, tambm as personagens no so
identificadas por qualquer nome. Das trs, a mais rica e central , sem dvida,
a serpente, que no malvola, pois, do alto da sua altivez, protege e conduz o
nufrago, e que tanto assume uma designao feminina a serpente como
masculina o governador do Punt, num aparente registo de dualidade, to
caracterstico da cultura faranica. De uma forma geral, e tambm para os antigos
Egpcios, a serpente era um animal que simbolizava a imortalidade, pois no s
R. Sousa, Iniciao e Mistrio no Antigo Egipto, pp. 70-71.
Idem, p. 70, nt. 113.
91
R. B. Parkinson, Poetry and Culture in Middle Kingdom Egypt, pp. 80-81.
89
90
49
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
92
51
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
93
53
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
que na sua cabea cuspia fogo e destrua os seus inimigos, e Apopis e todas as
outras serpentes malficas que tentavam impedilo de renascer em cada manh.
Atum, senhor primitivo de Helipolis, no Baixo Egipto, era uma divindade
solar prdinstica. Originalmente uma divindade ctnica, foi associado ao Sol
encarnando o seu aspecto declinante, como vimos. De incio localizado a norte,
o seu culto espalhouse por todo o Egipto, como aconteceu com R. Embora
o culto de R se tivesse superiorizado ao seu, este nunca foi eliminado e Atum
manteve sempre a primazia de deus demirgico, que na sua manifestao mais
poderosa saiu do Nun, o caos primordial, quando ainda nada havia sido criado.
E foi pela masturbao para uns, cuspindoos para outros, que iniciou a Divina
Enade de Helipolis, fazendo surgir Chu e Tefnut, que gerariam Nut e Geb,
que criariam Osris, Set, sis e Nftis. Assumiu mesmo uma posio privilegiada
que lhe permitiu conservar todas as suas prerrogativas e potencilas ao assumir a
forma sincrtica de AtumR, que tambm pode aparecer RAtum, sem que isso
signifique qualquer alterao nas prerrogativas de qualquer das divindades. A sua
representao principal era a de um rei com barba postia usando a coroa dupla
(pasekhemti), unio simblica do Alto e do Baixo Egipto. Alis, como demiurgo,
ele era o ltimo sustentculo do poder faranico. Aquele que existe por si s,
como fundador da ordem divina do universo deu a Osris o domnio universal,
que este partilharia depois com R, como antes vimos. A serpente era um dos seus
animais sagrados. O icnumone94, o leo, o leopardo, o touro e o carneiro, por ser
o deus solar do mundo dos mortos, eram os outros animais sagrados de Atum95.
Pelo exposto, inclinamonos para que a serpente fosse uma manifestao de
AtumR, uma divindade demirgica, simultaneamente ctnica e solar, dominando
tanto o reino dos vivos quanto o reino dos mortos. Diz ao contar a sua histria:
Na totalidade ramos 75 serpentes, e no me esquecerei de te mencionar uma
filhita que obtive por meio de preces (127129). Em textos egpcios encontramos
diversos grandes conjuntos de divindades, em que os maiores so coincidentes
com os nmeros 21 e 42. Os conspiradores de Set, com Set e Osris, so apenas
74 como vimos. Vikentiev chegou a sugerir que o nmero estaria errado, que
Mangusto europeu, africano e asitico estimado pelos antigos Egpcios por ser considerado um grande
devorador de ovos de crocodilo e por ser um grande lutador contra serpentes. Da, tambm, as designaes de rato-do-egipto ou rato-do-fara.
95
Cfr. Todas as divindades mencionadas nos pargrafos anteriores em J. C. Sales, As Divindades Egpcias,
pp. 97-103; 121-134; 198-202; 292-300; 312-317; 318; 327-329; 362-363; 399-402; para Atum
ver tambm L. M. Arajo, Atum, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 125-126; para Sata ver R.
S. Antelme e S. Rossini, Dictionnaire ilustr des dieux de lgypte, pp. 112-113.
94
tinha sido um lapsus mani do copista, mas o nmero para o qual se inclinava
era outro. Para ele, originalmente seriam 77 serpentes, porque lhe convinha o
77 por causa de uma comparao com o conto rabe Yamlika96.
Mas, na realidade, existe na mitologia egpcia um caso em que o nmero 75
pontua: na Litania de R, tambm designada por Litanias do Sol, mas cujo nome
original Livro de Oraes a R no Leste orando para o Unido no Leste. um texto
funerrio do Imprio Novo de uso reservado a faras e elite mais privilegiada.
Escrito entrada do interior dos tmulos, em especial nas tumbas do tempo
de Seti I, para ser usado pelo defunto no outro mundo, era composto de duas
partes: uma srie de oraes nas quais o fara assumia partes da natureza e das
divindades, em particular do deus Sol, antecedida de uma outra que invocava o
Sol de 75 maneiras diferentes. Os 74 mortos poderiam ser as restantes vises de
R, sendo o sobrevivente a sua forma sincrtica RAtum. Se aqui que est a
origem do conjunto de serpentes da ilha do Ka, ento este texto j era conhecido
no Imprio Mdio. Alis, Baines, Assmann e Wente acreditam que a Litania de R
foi escrita no Imprio Mdio, mas que o seu texto at j seria conhecido antes97.
Por outro lado, de todos elas s uma destacada e, mesmo assim, sem que
seja referido o seu nome. A teologia heliopolitana considerava como filha de R,
ou de Atum, a deusa Maat: R ou Atum eram a vida e Maat era o seu alimento
e essncia, representando o equilbrio, a verdade, a ordem, a justia e a rectido
csmica, social e individual. Era ela que ajudava Osris no seu tribunal na pesagem
dos coraes. Mais adiante, nesse tribunal, existia a Sala das Duas Maat onde
tudo se decidia para o defunto. Como esposa de Tot, acompanhavao, a ele e a
R, na barca solar Mesektet, como smbolo da ordem que impedia o regresso
ao caos anterior criao. Pelo menos at ao final do Imprio Mdio, Maat era
considerada a base da civilizao do Egipto, pois representava o seu equilbrio.
Provavelmente seria esta a to chorada filhita da serpente, obtida por meio de um
acto de f ou de magia, uma vez que tambm ela podia ser uma manifestao
de R: R vive em Maat ou R vive de Maat, ou seja, Maat era o alimento,
a essncia de R. Era o seu flego vital ao estar nas narinas de R, chegando
a ser tambm identificada com o Olho de R98.
V. Vikentiev, Voyage vers lIle Lointaine, p. 55.
J. Baines, Interpreting the Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, p. 63.
98
Cfr. J. C. Sales, As Divindades Egpcias, pp. 405-414. O conhecido nome Maatkar (que era o prenome
de Hatchepsut) ilustra a importncia da ideia de que Maat o ka de R, com a palavra ka aqui a ser
interpretada como essncia vital e como alimento.
96
97
55
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
Mas depois diz que caiu uma estrela e que todos esses deuses morreram
carbonizados; ele s no os seguiu porque nessa altura no estava com eles.
O autor, ou pelo menos o mentor do conto, pode ter observado ou sabido da
queda de algum meteorito, e essa observao astronmica ter ficado registada
desta forma. Mas aqui h outra questo bem mais significativa: que episdio
este em que desapareceram todas as divindades e apenas sobreviveu o demiurgo?
Parece tratarse de uma referncia ao fim do cosmos que conhecemos do captulo 175 do Livro dos Mortos. uma prece dirigida a diversas divindades.
Naquela em que o defunto se dirige a Atum este fala na ilha do Abrao, que
o Egipto, onde ver Osris. Quando o defunto lhe pergunta quanto tempo tem
de viver, Atum responde: Tu ests destinado a milhes de milhes de anos,
um tempo de vida de milhes de anos. Mas eu, eu destruirei tudo o que criei;
este pas voltar ao estado do Nun, ao estado da inundao primordial, como o
seu primeiro estado. Eu sou o que restar, com Osris, quando me transformar
novamente em serpente, que os homens no podem conhecer, que os deuses no
podem ver. O que bom o que eu fiz por Osris, mais do que (por) todos os
deuses! Eu deilhe a zona desrtica (as necrpoles), e o seu filho como herdeiro
no trono da ilha do Abrao; eu preparei o seu lugar na barca dos milhes, e
Hrus est estabelecido no seu trono para se ocupar das suas obras99. Sendo
esta serpente o criador de tudo, era natural que fosse tambm o governador
do Punt e senhor de todos os produtos a existentes, no valendo a pena ao
nufrago fazerlhe qualquer tipo de oferta!
Tambm na frmula 1130 dos Textos dos Sarcfagos, temos um relato do
fim do cosmos. O processo de criao deu origem separao entre o Nun, as
guas primordiais, que continuavam a existir margem da criao para permitir
que o processo pudesse sempre ser reiniciado, e o que foi criado pelo demiurgo.
Mas na constante luta entre o bem e o mal tudo estava sempre sujeito a voltar
no existncia. A frmula 1130 (Palavras ditas por ele, queles cujos nomes
so secretos, um discurso do deus criador RAtum, depois de dizer que foi o
criador de tudo (dos quatro ventos, da inundao, da humanidade, dos deuses,
das cobras RAtum diz mesmo: eu domino a vida porque eu sou o seu
senhor), advoga o regresso ao nada devido ao mau comportamento da espcie
humana (eu no lhes ordenei para fazerem mal mas os seus coraes desobedeceram ao que eu lhes tinha dito): desaparecer o que foi criado: as colinas sero
P. Barguet, Le Livre des Morts des Anciens Egyptiens, pp. 261.
99
cidades (pois sobre elas que se constri); as cidades sero colinas: (quando
se desmoronarem as construes); e cada homem que conhece este discurso
ser como R no cu e Osris no mundo inferior, aos quais se une pela destruio provocada pelo fogo, chegando mesmo RAtum a intitularse senhor do
fogo. Depois de milhes de anos o caos voltar. S o deus primordial RAtum
e Osris vivero unidos para sempre no espao e no tempo100. Foi pelo fogo que
as 74 companheiras da serpente desapareceram e foi pelo fogo que a serpente
pressionou o nufrago a dizerlhe quem o tinha levado at sua ilha: eu farei
com que tu te lembres reduzindote a cinzas e tornandote invisvel! (7273).
A parte que assinalmos no Conto do Nufrago com a letra d, onde se faz a
revelao divina, comporta na realidade uma srie de aluses ao conhecimento
esotrico: a serpente uma metfora do criador, h a referncia s 75 formas
de R, Maat a filha do demiurgo, e temos ainda o mito do fim do mundo101.
Eram conhecimentos que no estariam ao alcance da maioria dos Egpcios e
que s os iniciados em determinadas prticas associadas a estes conhecimentos
poderiam entender cabalmente.
Quem ento este nufrago? Ele tinha que morrer na sua cidade, na sua
terra, pois s assim teria direito eternidade, que se atingia cumprindo os preceitos religiosos, do tratamento do corpo ao descanso eterno, sem esquecer a
necessria manuteno do culto funerrio. Mas o nufrago no estaria j morto?
Depois de lhe contar a sua histria, a serpente dizlhe: alcanars o lar onde
vivias no meio dos teus irmos e existirs de novo (135136)102. E no fim a
serpente volta a dizerlhe: Olha! Chegars a casa em dois meses, abraars os
teus filhos e rejuvenescers no interior da tua sepultura (167169)103. Se era
importante para os Egpcios morrerem e serem enterrados no Egipto, os rituais
funerrios implicavam e visavam o renascer e, portanto, o rejuvenescimento
eterno do defunto num mundo intemporal. O abraars os teus filhos, que
antes foi expresso pela serpente de forma mais completa, Abraars os teus filhos,
beijars a tua mulher, vers a tua casa. E estas coisas sero o melhor de tudo!
R. O. Faulkner (ed.), The Ancient Egyptian Coffin Texts. Spell 1-1185 and Indexes, III, pp. 167-169.
R. B. Parkinson, Poetry and Culture in Middle Kingdom Egypt, p. 139; cfr. J. Baines, Interpreting the
Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, pp. 62-63.
102
pH.k Xnw wn.k im.f m-qAb n snw.k wn.k r. (T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio: espelho
de uma civilizao, II, p. 147).
103
mktw r spr r Xnw n Abd 2 mH.k qni.k m Xrdw.k rnpy.k m-Xnw qrst.k (Idem, II, p. 150).
100
101
57
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
momento possa pensar que se est a misturar uma viagem em que se defende
que o seu interveniente est morto, a segunda viagem, com outra em que os
seus intervenientes parecem estar ambos vivos, a primeira viagem, sendo que se
defendeu que um deles estava morto na outra viagem, daremos uma resposta
com duas possibilidades: ou um simples expediente literrio para permitir o
lanamento da viagem principal, onde esto vinculadas as principais ideias que
se pretende transmitir; ou pode ter sido tambm tida em conta a ideia de que
eram barqueiros vivos que conduziam os defuntos das cidades dos vivos para
as cidades dos mortos, isto , da margem oriental do Nilo para as necrpoles
que ficavam na margem ocidental. Ou, ainda, ser uma unio das duas possibilidades: ao observar na vida real a segunda hiptese, o seu criador imaginou a
estrutura do conto desta forma. Se perguntarem: e o morto falava? S poderemos
responder: e uma cobra podia falar? Em textos literrios do Imprio Mdio nem
sequer indito um morto falar: foi depois de morto que Amenemhat I instruiu
o seu filho Senuseret I. A o expediente literrio parece ter sido o sonho109. Mas
na Histria de Sinuhe o narrador, que a personagem principal da histria, o
prprio Sinuhe, no final, ao jeito de uma instruo tumular, informanos que
todo o seu relato uma narrativa post mortem. Diz Sinuhe em B 309310: Eu
obtive os favores do rei at ao dia da morte110.
E tanto a introduo quanto a concluso tm um tom sapiencial. Na primeira
apresentado um comandante com medo de ser punido, a quem o excelente
companheiro diz Sossega o teu corao, comandante! (23), aparentemente
indolhe contar algo para o animar. Depois, quando o excelente companheiro
diz Escutame () comandante,/porque eu no exagero (1213) faz um apelo
ao equilbrio que continua com Fala ao rei com toda a franqueza/e responde
sem balbuciar (1517) porque A boca de um homem pode salvlo,/o seu discurso pode fazer com que o perdoem (1719). O tom sapiencial transformase
em ideologia e estamos perante a ideia geral de ordem social que foi idealizada
sobre princpios de autoregulao que premiavam os cumpridores e castigavam
os transgressores, sendo a paz social a recompensa de quem respeitava a ordem
estabelecida e cumpria as regras da instituio que a regulava: maat, literalmente
aquela que guia111. A referncia a uma filhita que foi obtida por meio de
Cfr. T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio: espelho de uma civilizao, II, pp. 383-411.
iw.i Xr Hswt nt nsw xr r iwt hrw n mni (Idem, p. 118).
111
J.-M. Kruchten, Law, em The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, 2, p. 277. A palavra mAat tem
o mesmo radical do verbo mAa (guiar, dirigir), distinguindo-se deste pela imposio do feminino
109
110
59
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
61
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
Com a afirmao Age segundo o teu desejo (1920), que foi antecedida de
Lavate! Verte gua sobre os teus dedos/e poders responder quando se dirigirem
a ti (1315), procuravase apresentar um bom carcter, que devia ser imutvel
e que, para os que o possuam, permitia manter o princpio da reciprocidade,
fazendo desta imutabilidade uma regra bsica da retribuio, aspecto central de
maat117. Qualquer aco, directa (o insucesso da viagem) ou indirecta (forma
como se apresentava o comandante), devia provocar uma resposta. Tanto o
insucesso da viagem parecia exigir uma punio, como a forma como se apresentava o comandante exigia um exame atento. a teoria da aco, encadeado
permanente de causa (aco)/efeito (reaco), onde a memria social assumia
papel relevante. No se tratava de uma engrenagem automtica, devendo ser
mantida num constante jogo de aces (passado)/reaces (presente), onde o
ontem ao ser o alimento do hoje tornava o presente (a reaco) dependente
do passado (a aco). Se algum por qualquer motivo no reagisse, estava a
esquecer o ontem e a pr em causa o encadeado da comunicao. Ora, para
no interromper a engrenagem da aco criando uma existncia num permanente hoje irresponsvel que motivava a desorganizao social, o rei teria que
responder ao comandante para unir a reaco aco, encadeando a aco na
continuidade do tempo. Era tomar conscincia de que o que foi feito ou dito
ontem continuava a ser vlido hoje, tornando possveis a confiana e o xito.
E isto representava a ordem que, longe de ser um automatismo, era uma funo
da memria social118.
Depois, no final, o comandante diz: No faas de excelente, meu amigo!
Quem dar gua ave pela alvorada, para ela ser abatida pela manh? (183187).
Esta a nica fala do comandante, onde denota que se sentia j condenado pelo
resultado de uma viagem que no ter tido o alcance almejado. Tambm aqui
se mantm o tom sapiencial. Com este ltimo provrbio parece querer dizer ao
nufrago que no valia a pena tentar animlo com o relato, uma vez que, de
Esta reciprocidade era um preceito geral de vida. A propsito dos contratos celebrados entre Hapidjefa,
governador de Assiut na XII dinastia, e aqueles que iriam assegurar a sua eternidade, os sacerdotes do
templo de Upuaut, os sacerdotes do templo de Anbis e o pessoal da necrpole, Thodorids informa-nos
que eles oferecem um esquema comum cujos elementos constitutivos so colocados numa ordem fixa:
Contrato concludo entre A e B,
de tal modo que B d x a A,
enquanto A d y a B.
Eis aqui que B ficou satisfeito.
(A. Thodorids, Vivre de Mat. Travaux sur le droit gyptien ancien, premire partie, pp. 228 e 272).
118
J. Assmann, Mat, lgypte Pharaonique et lide de justice sociale, pp. 37-42.
117
63
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
127
128
65
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
e hostil, por onde o morto s podia circular se fosse guiado por algum esprito
benvolo, que, com a ajuda das frmulas certas, mantinha afastados os deuses
malficos e os demnios. Esta alegoria passagem do Sol pelo mundo subterrneo
entre o ocaso e a aurora, tinha uma nica regio desejvel: o Sekhet Hetep (sxt
Htp), os Campos da Paz ou Campos Elsios (como lhes chamaro os Gregos),
onde se situava o Sekhet Iaru, o Campo dos Juncos ou o Juncal, governado por
RHorakhti e local de residncia de Osris e respectiva comitiva. Para o transpor
era necessrio ultrapassar os sete trios, cada um guardado por trs divindades
(o porteiro, o vigia e o inquiridor), que deviam ser invocadas pelos respectivos
nomes. O prprio Juncal estava dividido em quinze regies, cada uma presidida
por um deus. E com excepo do Sekhet Iaru, todas tinham algo de malfico para
os defuntos: ou eram regies de fogo, ou residncia de espritos que comiam as
suas sombras, ou de serpentes terrveis como a Satitemui, ou outros malefcios.
O Conto do Nufrago no uma fixao no comportamento individual de
um nufrago, como o foi em Rensi no Conto do Campons Eloquente (Diz maat.
Pratica maat porque ela grande. Ela eficaz. Ela duradoura. Ela decide a
teu favor. Ela d credibilidade. Ela conduz ao estado de bemaventurado, B1
351353)129, mas fixase na viagem do defunto. A apresentao do lado terrvel
da morte atribuda aqui a uma srie de calamidades naturais (tempestades,
queda de meteoritos, etc.) que, provavelmente mais tarde, sero substitudas
por divindades malficas, como as que encontramos no Conto do Campons
Eloquente, por exemplo, Sekhmet, senhora da pestilncia que com a ajuda dos
seus massacradores disseminava miasmas, pestes e doenas, e Khenti-kheti, o
temvel deuscrocodilo que tinha sua disposio os mensageiros, entidades
malficas prontas a espalhar o mal.
Podem estar subjacentes a esta viagem as ideias de imortalidade e de eternidade. Por um lado apresentase com clareza o significado natural da finitude
do homem, da sua separao do mundo terrestre: ricos ou pobres, todos a
alcanaro. Mas, subjacente, subsiste uma outra revelao de cariz social: a distino entre os homens da eternidade, o sobrevivente, e os mortos comuns, os
marinheiros. Os primeiros, os ricos, tinham um tmulo com inscries maioritariamente filantrpicas (as estelas funerrias onde eram descritas todas as suas
aces caritativas: dar de comer a quem tem fome, dar de beber a quem tem
sede, dar roupa a quem anda nu, etc.) e posses para cuidar da sua manuteno
Ver nota 108.
129
130
67
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
julgamento, onde o seu corao, que representava a sua alma, seria confrontado
com a justia e a verdade, ou seja, Maat, simbolizada por uma pena de avestruz.
Para atingir a imortalidade o melhor resultado era o equilbrio entre os dois
pratos da balana. Para tal, o morto recitava a confisso negativa, enunciando
um conjunto de interdies morais sob a forma de enunciados negativos numa
declarao de inocncia. A aco pertencia a isefet, mas cada frase pronunciada
era um passo em direco a Maat. Devidamente organizada, seguia uma ordem
estabelecida, pois a preciso era fundamental para que Maat actuasse. A estavam
includas diversas frases respeitantes solidariedade, quer activa (fazer maat) como,
por exemplo, Eu no fui avarento, quer comunicativa (dizer maat), do tipo
Eu no difamei um servidor junto do seu superior. Esta declarao abordava
uma infinidade de temas, onde sobressaam as questes pessoais, profissionais
e religiosas, tendo como funo mgica a obteno de autorizao por parte de
Osris para entrar no seu reino. O julgamento de Osris funcionava, portanto,
como um rito inicitico, em que o morto, ao ser conduzido pela sala da dupla
Maat131 at ao rei dos mortos, participava num acto de socializao submetendo
Nos papiros do final da XVIII e princpio da XIX dinastias que contm as crenas funerrias de carcter
mgico-religioso dos Egpcios e que vulgarmente denominamos Livro dos Mortos, os captulos que
apresentam os encantamentos (as frmulas) so antecedidos de dois ou mais hinos e de uma cena de
julgamento. No Papiro de Ani, um papiro em egpcio hieroglfico que pertenceu a um nobre tebano do
Imprio Novo, o mais belo e bem conservado de todos os que se conhecem, encontra-se na gravura 1 um
Hino a Khepri, seguido de um Hino a Osris na gravura 2. Nas gravuras 3 e 4 aparece uma grande cena
de julgamento numa iluminura maravilhosa, alis, como todas as deste papiro. Esta cena corresponde
ao captulo 30b captulo para no deixar o corao de Ani criar oposio contra ele nos domnios dos
deuses e a cena do julgamento pertence ao captulo 125, organizado em trs partes: a introduo,
lida quando chegava sala da dupla Maat, a confisso negativa, feita perante os deuses que estavam na
sala, e um texto final recitado aos deuses quando o defunto chegava ao mundo inferior. Na cena inicial
do julgamento aparecem em p, por de trs de Osris, sis e Nftis, mas a forte presena das restantes
divindades, em particular de Osris, Hrus, Tot e Anbis, conferem-lhes uma posio secundria. Contudo, estas duas deusas, assumindo os atributos de Maat, tinham um papel fundamental no julgamento.
Era efectivamente na sala da dupla Maat, que eram sis e Nftis como smbolos da justia e da verdade,
que o defunto fazia a sua confisso negativa a cada um dos 42 deuses que se encontravam de p ou
sentados. Conforme o papiro, o arranjo desta sala varia. No Papiro de Ani (gravuras 31 e 32) figura uma
sala que se estende sobre o comprimento e com 42 deuses sentados ao meio. Por cima da cabea de cada
um inscreve-se o endereo do falecido e por baixo a declarao negativa. Em cada extremidade da sala
observa-se meia porta de dois batentes que fazem dela uma sala de passagem e, no tecto, uma cornija
onde alterna a iaret com a pena de avestruz, numa mistura de simbologias divinas protectoras a cobra
protectora, smbolo real e divino, para afastar inimigos e perigos e as penas de Maat para apelarem
verdade e justia. No centro da cornija encontra-se uma representao do deus Heh (HH), que, com a
mo direita sobre o olho de Hrus (o uDAt, o olho santo, o olho completo, o mais poderoso smbolo
do Egipto Antigo, o olho esquerdo de Hrus arrancado por Set e recuperado por Tot) e a esquerda sobre
uma lagoa (as guas primordiais), simbolizava os milhes de anos, a eternidade, que se desejava ao
131
69
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
134
135
71
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
desaparecendo depois dos cus do Egipto de forma que os seus habitantes achavam
algo misteriosa, s regressando no ano seguinte com a nova inundao. Como bons
observadores que eram da natureza, a partir deste ciclo da ave, os Egpcios criaram
um mito associado a R. A ave Benu teria pousado na pedra Benben, manifestao
do deus primordial Atum, quando este se ergueu das primeiras guas do Nun, o
caos aquoso, ou, segundo uma outra interpretao, a colina primordial em que
Atum primeiro tinha aparecido136, conforme a ideia de que ela pusera a o ovo
de onde nasceu o Sol, um crculo incandescente.
O seu nome deriva do verbo ueben (wbn) que significa brilhar ou erguer,
associandose o seu brilho e o seu erguer ideia de renascimento, ao que no
foi estranho certamente o facto de ser uma ave migratria, pois o seu reaparecimento peridico era para os Egpcios um sinal de renovao, de renascimento
em cada ciclo migratrio. Foi essencialmente esta ideia que os Gregos captaram
e aplicaram no mito da Fnix, tendo ambas as aves um renascimento muito
semelhante. Sobretudo a partir do Imprio Mdio, foi tambm por esta via que
a ave Benu foi considerada uma manifestao do ba de Osris e, por conseguinte,
dos prprios defuntos. Isso mesmo ser registado no Imprio Novo no Livro
dos Mortos, onde a frmula 83 se intitula Frmula para tomar o aspecto de
uma ave Benu, e a frmula 84 tem o ttulo de Frmula para tomar o aspecto
de uma gara137. Na frmula 13, o defunto entra no Ocidente como falco e
renasce a como Benu, isto , como um Osris ressuscitado. A frmula designa
se por Frmula para entrar no Ocidente e sair, e o defunto diz: Tudo me
pertence (porque) tudo me foi dado. Eu entrei (no Ocidente) como falco, eu
sa como Benu. Estrela da manh abreme o caminho para que entre em paz
no Belo Ocidente!138.
A prpria fuso com Osris aparece na frmula 17 que tem o extenso ttulo
de Aqui comeam as transfiguraes e glorificaes da sada do mundo inferior
dos mortos e do regresso a ele; entrada de um bemaventurado no Belo Ocidente;
sada luz de todas as formas de existncia que se deseje; jogar senet sentado na
sala; e do sair como alma viva. Entre as diversas formas que o defunto assu L. M. Arajo, Benben, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 147-148.
E. Castel, Egipto. Signos y smbolos de lo sagrado, p. 80; P. Barguet, Le Livre des Morts des Anciens
Egyptiens, p. 44.
138
E. Castel, Egipto. Signos y smbolos de lo sagrado, p. 80; P. Barguet, Le Livre des Morts des Anciens Egyptiens, pp. 121-122. 44; R. O. Faulkner, O. Goelet e C. Andrews, The Egyptian Book of The Dead.
The Book of Going Forth by Day, p. 101.
136
137
mir, encontramos: Quem, pois, este? Osris. [Outra verso:] o seu nome
glria de R, a alma de R, com a qual ele copula. Sou Benu que est em
Helipolis, aquela que tem em conta (tudo) o que existe e tudo o que existir.
Quem, pois, este? Osris; o seu cadver e a sua imundice139. Finalmente,
o prprio defunto que se assume como Benu na frmula 29B, em Barguet, ou
29C, em Budge, intitulada Frmula de um corao de cornalina por ter sido
escrita num escaravelho do corao feito de cornalina. Palavras ditas por N.: Eu
sou Benu, a alma de R, que conduz os bemaventurados pela Duat, que faz
com que Osris saia terra para fazer o que deseja o seu ka, e que faz com que
Osris N. saia (tambm) terra para fazer o que deseja o seu ka140.
Com mais estes contributos reforamos a convico de que estamos em
ambiente funerrio, no s no prprio Conto do Nufrago mas tambm no que
respeita sua concepo, como julgamos ter reunido um conjunto de provas
circunstanciais do seu funcionamento em ambiente esotrico, uma vez que ir
mais longe do que o circunstancial bastante difcil pela natureza da matria em
questo. Acima de tudo, considerese que neste tema teremos sempre presentes as
palavras de Hornung: possvel ocuparmonos do esoterismo cientificamente141.
Definase esoterismo por cincia, doutrina ou prtica baseada em fenmenos
sobrenaturais ou, de uma forma onde a cientificidade j tem cabimento, por
uma atitude doutrinria, pedaggica ou sectria segundo a qual certos conhecimentos (relacionados com a cincia, a filosofia ou a religio) no podem ou no
devem ser vulgarizados, mas comunicados a um pequeno nmero de iniciados142,
o Egipto faranico acreditava no poder da magia. Acreditavam que era possvel
influenciar o natural desenrolar dos acontecimentos e produzir efeitos no naturais, irregulares e que no parecem racionais, valendose da interveno de seres
fantsticos e da manipulao de algum princpio controlador oculto supostamente
presente na natureza, seja por meio de frmulas rituais ou de aces simblicas
metodicamente efectuadas143. As frmulas que acabmos de ver do Livro dos
Mortos eram isso mesmo.
E. Castel, Egipto. Signos y smbolos de lo sagrado, p. 80; P. Barguet, Le Livre des Morts des Anciens
Egyptiens, pp. 57-58; E. A. W. Budge, O Livro Egpcio dos Mortos, pp. 186-187.
140
E. Castel, Egipto. Signos y smbolos de lo sagrado, pp. 80-81; P. Barguet, Le Livre des Morts des Anciens
Egyptiens, p. 74; E. A. W. Budge, O Livro Egpcio dos Mortos, p. 214.
141
E. Hornung, Lgypte sotrique, p. 13.
142
Dicionrio Houaiss da Lngua Portuguesa, III, Lisboa: Crculo de Leitores, 2003, p. 1582, col. central.
143
Idem, IV, p. 2346, col. direita.
139
73
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
Obviamente que a mitologia egpcia est cheia de casos mgicos como, por
exemplo, a concepo com mortos, como foi o caso de sis e Osris que conceberam Hrus depois da morte de Osris, graas a um processo de ressuscitao
aplicado por sis ao seu esposo e irmo. Ou a reconstituio de Osris depois
de ter sido retalhado em pedaos e espalhados por todo o Egipto. Ou a criao
da humanidade pela palavra, saliva ou smen divino. Para no falar do barro ao
qual Khnum deu vida criando o homem e toda a vida em geral. evidente que
a mitologia egpcia no exclusiva nos poderes e capacidades sobrehumanas
atribudas s suas divindades, mas nesta civilizao, em geral, parece ter havido
uma maior concentrao delas. A prpria literatura do Imprio Mdio tem bons
exemplos da crena na magia. O extraordinrio Papiro Westcar apresenta um
autntico duelo de mgicos, como lhe chama Hornung144, que fazem crocodilos de cera tornaremse crocodilos verdadeiros recitando certas frmulas, que
sobrepem metade de um lago outra metade e voltam forma inicial, ou que
repem cabeas em seres vivos previamente cortadas. Para l do Imprio Mdio,
mesmo em textos posteriores, como o caso do Conto dos Dois Irmos, a magia
aparece explcita e activa: um homem que vive sem o corao que escondeu
num cedro e s morre quando cortam o cedro; que ressuscita quatro anos depois
pelo facto de a baga de cedro que representava o seu corao ter sido hidratada;
depois assume a forma de um touro e morto novamente; renasce ainda com
a forma de duas rvores nascidas de duas gotas do sangue do touro; ao serem
abatidas, soltase de uma delas uma lasca de madeira que engolida pela mulher
que o traiu e que engravida com ela; esta mulher simultaneamente sua esposa e
sua me; quando no fim do conto nasce a criana, no outra seno o homem
inicialmente morto. E estes no so todos os momentos mgicos do texto, que
termina tendo como ltima frase do seu clofon a seguinte expresso: Quem
disser mal deste texto, Tot far dele um inimigo145.
Hornung conta que por volta de 1360 a. C., Amenhotep filho de Hapu,
favorito de Amenhotep III, que dirigiu notavelmente a instalao dos colossos
de Memnon e foi mais tarde venerado, semelhana de Imhotep, como sbio
divino e deus curador, disse sobre uma das suas esttuas proveniente do templo
de Karnak: Fui iniciado no livro do deus, eu vi as glorificaes de Tot e penetrei
nos seus segredos (Urk. IV 1820, 1213)146. Estas palavras dos Documentos da
E. Hornung, Lgypte sotrique, p. 70.
L. M. Arajo, Mitos e Lendas do Antigo Egipto, pp.199-208.
146
Idem, p. 15.
144
145
XVIII dinastia coligidos por W. Helck, mostram que havia, de facto, conhecimentos que eram restritos a alguns. H nelas uma forte carga de hermetismo. O
livro com a sabedoria de Tot, um livro divino que teria sido escrito e revelado
pelo prprio deus, o Livro dos Dois Caminhos, concebido na XII dinastia pelos
sacerdotes do templo de Tot, em Hermpolis Magna. O nome egpcio da cidade
era Khmunu, A cidade dos Oito, tendo Tot como principal deus tutelando a
Ogdade. Tot, o omnisciente e omnipresente deus da sabedoria, da escrita e da
magia, foi mais tarde identificado pelos gregos como Hermes Trismegisto, Hermes triplamente grande, a quem atriburam a concepo do corpus hermtico de
escritos msticos, que acabou por estar na origem do nome clssico desta cidade,
capital da 15 provncia do Alto Egipto, um importante centro de peregrinao
na poca Grecoromana147. tambm a origem da palavra hermetismo e todas
as suas derivadas.
O Livro dos Dois Caminhos, que pode ser considerado o mais antigo livro
hermtico, a primeira descrio do Alm, o precursor dos livros da Duat do
Imprio Novo. No Imprio Mdio era nos sarcfagos que aparecia reproduzido
e quase todos os casos conhecidos so provenientes de sarcfagos da XI dinastia
encontrados em Deir elBercha, a necrpole da 15 provncia onde foram sepultados os seus governadores que viviam em Hermpolis Magna, os verdadeiros
filhos de Tot148. Esta obra inicitica destinavase a propiciar ao defunto alcanar
a eternidade, e deve o seu nome cartografia apresentada nesses sarcfagos, cujo
percurso tem o incio num lago de fogo de onde partem dois caminhos para o
outro mundo149. Os textos so acompanhados por vinhetas que descrevem as
regies do Alm apresentadas cartograficamente. Mais uma vez temos o ressurgir
no Alm associado ao fogo, tal como o Sol ou a Fnix.
Tot era adorado por todo o Egipto como deus lunar, inventor da escrita
hieroglfica e da lngua falada pelos homens, das artes, da cincia e do cmputo,
das invenes e da sabedoria/conhecimento, senhor da adivinhao e da magia,
mensageiro, arquivista e escriba dos deuses, patrono dos escribas (por isso conhecidos como chemsuDjehuti, os seguidores de Tot), mdicos e mgicos, Tot era
tambm venerado como o primeiro legislador e juiz (sedjemi). Estes atributos
J. Padr, Hermpolis Magna, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, p. 417; ver tambm J. Sales, Hermetismo, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 416-417.
148
E. Hornung, Lgypte sotrique, pp. 15-16.
149
L. M. Arajo, Livro dos Dois Caminhos, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, p. 513.
147
75
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
Bibliografia
J. P. Allen, Middle Egyptian. An Introduction to the Language and Culture of Hieroglyphs, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
R. S. Antelme e S. Rossini, Dictionnaire Illustr des Dieux de lgypte, Mnaco: ditions du
Rocher, 2003.
L. M. Arajo, O Clero do Deus Amon no Antigo Egipto, Lisboa: Edies Cosmos, 1999.
L. M. Arajo, Mitos e Lendas do Antigo Egipto, Lisboa: Centralivros, 2005.
L. M. Arajo, Os Grandes Faras do Antigo Egito, Lisboa: Editora A Esfera dos Livros, 2011.
L. M. Arajo (dir.), Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, Lisboa: Editorial Caminho, 2001.
J. Assmann, Mat, lgypte pharaonique et lide de justice sociale, Paris: ditions La Maison de
Vie, 1999.
J. Baines, Interpreting the Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, em Journal of Egyptian Archaeology,
76, Londres: Egyptian Exploration Society, 1990, pp. 55-72.
J. Baines, Restricted Knowledge, Hierarchy, and Decorum: Modern Perceptions and Ancient
Institutions, em Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, XXVII, Nova Iorque:
American Research Center in Egypt, 1990, pp. 1-23.
J. Baines e J. Mlek, Egipto. Deuses, Templos e Faras, Lisboa: Crculo de Leitores, 1991.
P. Barguet, Le Livre des Morts des Anciens Egyptiens, Paris: Les ditions du Cerf, 1967.
A. Barucq e F. Daumas, Hymnes et Prires de lgypte Ancienne, Paris: Les ditions du Cerf, 1980.
A. M. Blackman, The Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, em Middle-Egyptian Stories, Bruxelas:
Bibliotheca Aegyptiaca II, dition de la Fondation gyptologique Reine lisabeth, 1972,
pp. 41-48.
E. A. W. Budge, O Livro Egpcio dos Mortos, So Paulo: Editora Pensamento, 1999.
E. A. W. Budge, Egyptian Tales and Legends. Pagan, Christian and Muslim, Nova Iorque: Dover
Publications, Inc., 2002.
T. F. Canho, Datao e temtica do Conto do Campons Eloquente, em Cadmo, 15, Lisboa:
Instituto Oriental da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa, 2005, pp.163-187.
T. F. Canho, O Conto do Campons Eloquente, em Cadmo, 16, Lisboa: Centro de Histria
da Universidade de Lisboa, 2006, pp. 11-54.
T. F. Canho, O calendrio egpcio: origem, estrutura e sobrevivncias, em Cultura, XXIII/II
srie, Lisboa: Centro de Histria da Cultura da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 2006, 39-61.
T. F. Canho, Kom Ombo: o antigo domnio de Sobek, em J. A. Ramos, L. M. Arajo e A.
R. dos Santos (org.), Arte Pr-Clssica, Lisboa: Instituto Oriental da Faculdade de Letras
da Universidade de Lisboa, 2007, pp. 259-278.
77
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio: espelho de uma civilizao, Lisboa: Universidade
de Lisboa, 2010 (tese de doutoramento policopiada apresentada Universidade de Lisboa).
T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio: espelho de uma civilizao, em L. M.
Arajo e J. C. Sales (eds.), Novos trabalhos de Egiptologia Ibrica, I, Lisboa: Instituto Oriental
e Centro de Histria da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa, 2012, pp. 185-201.
J. N. Carreira, Cantos de Harpista, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, Lisboa: Editorial Caminho,
2001, pp. 176-177.
J. N. Carreira, Literatura do Antigo Egipto, Mem Martins: Publicaes Europa-Amrica, 2005.
C. Carrier, Grands livres funraires de lgypte pharaonique, I (Melchat 1), Paris: ditions Cybele,
2009.
C. C. Correia, Metalurgia, em Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, Lisboa: Editorial Caminho, 2001,
pp. 566-567.
E. Castel, Egipto. Signos y smbolos de lo sagrado, Madrid: Alderabn Ediciones, 1999.
ern, Paper and Books in Ancient Egypt, Chicago: Ares Publishers Inc., 1985.
J. C
A. De Buck, The Egyptian Coffin Texts, vol. VII Texts of Spells 787-1185, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1961.
C. Desroches-Noblecourt, Le Secret des Temples de la Nubie, Paris: ditions Stock/Pernoud, 1999.
M. T. Derchain-Urtel, Die Schlange des Schiffbrchigen, em Studien zur Altgyptischen
Kultur, 1, Hamburgo: Helmut Buske Verlag GmbH, 1974, pp. 83-104.
A. Erman, Ancient Egyptian Poetry and Prose, Nova Iorque: Dover Publications, Inc., 1995.
R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, Oxford: Griffith Institute, Ashmolean
Museum, 1996,
R. O. Faulkner (ed.), The Ancient Egyptian Coffin Texts. Spell 1-1185 and Indexes, Oxford:
Arise Phillips, 2007.
R. O. Faulkner, O. Goelet e C. Andrews, The Egyptian Book of The Dead. The Book of Going
Forth by Day. The First Authentic Presentation of the Complete Papyrus of Ani. Featuring
Integrated Text and Full Color Images, Cairo: The American University in Cairo Press, 1998.
N. Favry, Ssostris Ier et le Dbut de la XIIe Dynastie, Paris: Pygmalion Grard Watelet, 2009.
J. Foster, Ancient Egyptian Literature, Austin: University of Texas Press, 2001.
J. Foster (texto) e L. P. Brock (desenhos), The Shipwrecked Sailor. A Tale from Ancient Egypt,
Cairo: The American University in Cairo Press, 2000.
A. Gardiner, Egyptian Grammar, 3 ed., Oxford: Griffith Institute, Ashmolean Museum, 1994.
H. Goedicke, The Snake in the Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, em Gttinger Miszellen, 39,
Gttingen: Universitt Gttingen, 1980, pp. 27-31.
79
O CONTO DO NUFRAGO
Forewords
knowledge, the data of the material history and the documents librarianship, as
if it were a critical edition. He is interested in the meaning of all details, be they
the narratives concrete elements, or be they the assumptions and coordinates in
which its logic and dynamic are grounded. Undertaking in such a way this series
of terms and concepts, he gives us the Egyptian semantics dictionary in detail,
which, even if tangentially rendered, can be of a profound rooting into the texts
narrative. The translator, as if taking unto himself the tales own phenomenologys
itinerancy rhythm, constructs a sequential and fluid hermeneutic voyage that
starts at the most immediate elements and stretches until the subtlest, but always
concrete, definition of intentionalities that in a second reading might have
presided to the Egyptian creation of this exceptional text.
It is particularly interesting to accompany the authors study of the geographical
and historical data presumed in this storys construction, and of the features
that grant its verisimilitude. The narratives vital references and coordinates, the
frequency of its strengths in ancient Egypts historical topography, the shipwrecks
geographical imagining framing and its historical plausibility; the causes and specific
modulation for such voyages, as are suggested by the narrative, in a discreet but
relevant way, are the matter of acute inquiry. All seems to happen in a returning
voyage from Nubia towards home, in Egypt; seemingly descending the Nile
northwards. Its in the reflux that can be uncovered the synthesis epistemological
space, like in Ingmar Bergmans The Seventh Seal. Be it actually a synthesis or
still only a question, in the interior of the implicit references inhabit motivations
that maintain multiple directions, which seems natural, where the relation with
time has freed itself in the name of multiple symbolic valences. These dimensions
of geography and space are clearly situated between the real and the mythical,
without ceasing to ensure the Egyptian reality of undeniable nature.
The Author invested in quite a special, elaborate and original way in the
defining of the Great Green concept, which represents the nuclear framing of
the mythical Egyptian geography. It is this framing that expresses, in a wider
space, the topics and resonances that the story keeps suggesting, in a more
or less explicit way, throughout the narrative. This formulas resolution does
not constitute merely a question of historical scholarship, but is essential for
the tales meaning, according to the hermeneutic which is applied here. The
possibility of identifying the Great Green concept with the geographical and
imagining interiority of the Niles valley defines with relevant intensity the net
of meanings resonance that keep echoing throughout the entire narrative. We
85
are in the efficient transition from the establishing of scholarship to the subtleties
of a hermeneutic reading. If the tales narrative strategy contributes to define
the fictions primordial contents, the actual definition of the reference geography
serves as another synthesis process to the meanings that are at stake in it.
A sharp approach to the field of hermeneutic meanings is focused, as would
be expected, in the characters interpretation; in such a way is this aspect visible,
intense and suggesting in the tale itself. The hermeneutic analysis focused itself
in a longer way in the character of the serpent; and it is with all good reason
that such is done, since it is precisely with this character, and its placement in
a central position, that the contents, which the hermeneutic reading can define
with more likelihood and interest, appear to be related.
Yet, in the readers eyes remained especially carved the main character of the
narrative, the human shipwrecked sailor, with his own intensity and a dose of
appropriated existential truth, even if with less picturesque. This reference seems
to give enough legitimacy so that the title The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor
can be taken consensually by many authors, one of which is the translator of
egyptian original, as the most adequate formulation for this storys title. It was, in
fact, in this livingly main voyager that the experiences collected by the adventurous
voyage were gathered, and his voice is the one that places them, in the text, in the
communications circuit with which the story is remade and revived.
Actually, it even seems that the three characters, two Great Green sailors and
a divine voyager of the profound mythical time are analogously marked by a kind
of shipwreck possibility common condition. The manner in which each story
so naturally interconnects with the story of each other character demonstrates
it. If the serpents hermeneutic lies in a divine character interpretation, as all
narratives evidences seem to makes us think, this reading about a semantic of
shipwreck possibility common to the three can acquire even more pertinence.
The disaster that the serpent-god recounts, and of which he states to be the
main victim, equals a cosmic shipwreck, or a metaphysical one, that stroke the
crowd of his relatives.
This convergence of tragic experiences emphasizes, once more, some complicity
between human and divine, just like the texts interpreters tirelessly emphasize.
This gives further meaning to the tonalities of tenderness and affection with
which the tale describes the relation between human and divine.
On another hand, the mythical shipwreck that stroke the serpent-god
seems to translate a movement of erosion and degradation with which the
87
Presentation
Preamble
Then the worthy companion spoke:
Appease your heart, commander!
See, we have arrived home.
The mallet is seized, the mooring bollard fixed,
the prow rope placed on land.
Let us pray. Let us praise god!
Each one embraces his companion.
Our crew has returned safe and sound,
without losses in our expedition.
We reached the limits of Wawat and passed Senmut.
Look, we have returned in peace,
we have reached our (own) land.
Listen to me (O) commander,
because I do not exaggerate.
Wash yourself! Pour water over your fingers
and you may reply when addressed.
Speak to the king with all candour
and answer without stammering.
A mans mouth can save him,
his speech can make one forgive him.
Act according to your wish.
Talking to you is tiresome!
93
95
97
Conclusion
Look at me after having touched land,
after what Ive seen, what Ive experienced!
Listen to me, then!
See, it is good to listen to people!
Then he said to me:
Do not pretend to be excellent, my friend!
Who shall give water to the bird at dawn
so it can be slaughtered by morning?
And it ended, from beginning to end,
like what was found in the scripture,
in the writing of the scribe of skilful fingers,
Amenyaa, son of Ameny.
May he live, prosper and be healthy!1
The authors own translation directly into Portuguese from the Egyptian hieroglyphic, with several
consults to the hieratic manuscript. The highlighted words are written in red ink in the manuscript.
(T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio: espelho de uma civilizao, II, pp. 133-158).
The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor appears in a single manuscript, the Papyrus
St. Petersburg 1115, also called Papyrus Leningrad 1115, or, even, Papyrus Hermitage
11152, written with or without an H, which was in the Imperial Museum of
St. Petersburg for undetermined time, and is today in the Pushkin Museum of
Moscow3. The almost complete absence of echo regarding this tales existence
during its time prevents us from judging its impact amongst contemporaries4.
We believe that, at least, the archetype is a 12th Dynastys papyrus, since in its
colophon it is shown a specific situation created in the Middle Kingdom, after
the 12th Dynasty, which is the appearance of the inverted method to express
lineage in hieratic writing, resorting to the contraction of G. G39 ( ) and its
See, for instance, P. Le Guillouxs work title Le Conte du Naufrag (Papyrus Ermitage1115), that weve
included in the bibliography. Vikentiev also uses such naming (V. Vikentiev, Voyage vers lIle Lointaine,
p. IX.)
3
We chose the first designation because it was in St. Petersburg that Golnischeff found the papyrus in
1881, when Lenin was still only nine years old, and because it was referred as such when it was first
published in 1913 (W. Golnischeff, Les papyrus hiratiques, ns 1115, 1116 et 1116A de lErmitage
imprial Saint-Ptersbourg, pp. 1-2). The second designation would imply following the names that
the city, founded by Peter, the Great, in 1703, has had throughout its short history. The name the czar
gave Russias new capital was due, first of all, to his devotion to the apostle Peter. Later, in 1914, its
name changed to Petrograd when, being at war with Germany, the Russians realized that burg was
a word of German origins. After the 1917 revolution, with the death of Lenin in 1924, once again
the name was changed and it became designated Leningrad. Finally, with the soviet regimes fall in
1991, the citys inhabitants approved the return to its original name. On the other hand, the Pushkin
Museum, established in 1896, began constructing its collection, since its beginning, at the expenses of
various other collections, mainly that of the St. Petersburg Imperial Museum; acquiring quite early on
the Egyptologist Golnischeff s collection. In 1918, and between 1924 and 1930, thousands of pieces
from the St. Petersburg Imperial Museum were incorporated into this museum. These are the most
likely dates for the transition of the papyrus to Moscow. Since it is not known when it entered the St.
Petersburg Imperial Museum, it is unknown for how long it remained there.
4
This tales only known reference is in a ramesside ostracon and it isnt even an exact quotation; T. F.
Canho, Datao e temtica do Conto do Campons Eloquente, p. 170.
2
101
10
12
103
R. B. Parkinson, Poetry and Culture in Middle Kingdom Egypt, p. 129; see J. Baines, Interpreting the
Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, pp. 55-72; see A. Loprieno, The Sign of Literature in the Shipwrecked
Sailor, pp. 209-217.
16
J. Foster and L. P. Brock, The Shipwrecked Sailor. A Tale from Ancient Egypt, p. 8.
17
See T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio: espelho de uma civilizao, pp. 161-178.
15
In the text presented here, the boats commander has just arrived to Egypt18,
probably to Elephantine, coming from a voyage to Nubia. It seems the expedition
didnt work out the best way, since he fears to face the Pharaoh, being noticeable
from his only speechline that his life is in danger. To console him, the narrator
and tales hero, raised to the condition of worthy companion19, tells him a
fantastic story, intended to show him that even in the worst circumstances it is
always possible to have a turnabout. In another voyage he was the sole survivor
of a shipwreck caused by a violent storm. All the crew members, one hundred
and twenty of Egypts best sailors, of that boat died. He ended up coming to
shore on a marvellous island, the island of the Ka, where he found its only
inhabitant, a serpentgod. Welcomed as something insignificant and despicable,
he ends up becoming the huge serpents confidant in this sacred land of precise
ritualistic rules. In the end, the serpentgod allowed the shipwrecked sailors
return to Egypt and accomplish happiness.
In this tales analysis, statements like the following became common place:
since it is a story of sailors then it is the mater of works like The Odyssey or
Sinbad the Sailor20; or, the tales cyclic structure in abcdcba, in which aa
is the commanders unhappy return, bb is the shipwreck of another voyages
sole survivor, cc the survival of the shipwrecked sailor on a deserted island and
The word khenu (Xnw) literally signifies interior, being commonly used in contexts where it signifies
royal palace. Nonetheless, it can also signify house, with the meaning of home, or can even be
translated by this last meaning, which in this context would mean country of origin, homeland or
kingdom. In any case we shall avoid the word home which has, in Portuguese, a quite stressed Latin
origin that in its singular (lar, laris) mostly signified household, whose Latin etymological word domicil
um derives from domus, a kind of roman house. In this tale, the word khenu (Xnw) appears has noun
or element of the preposition em-khenu (m-Xnw), always understood by us with a certain ambiguity,
but that, most likely, wasnt so to the readers of the time, knowing has they did such writings subtlety
(R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, p. 202).
19
Companion (shemsu, Smsw), literally: That which follows the Pharaoh. He was a dignitary that
helped the king rule Egypt, in a designation that, apparently and according to the Pyramid Texts of
the time of Pepi I, derives from another, quite older: shemsu Hor, Smsw Hr, which means, Those that
follow Horus. According to the Egyptian mythology the followers of Horus were symbolic entities
that ruled the primordial Egypt, before the transmission of power to men in the pharaohs person, and
that would receive him at the moment of his ascension to eternity. Those that follow the Pharaoh
(shemsu per-aa, Smsw pr-aA) would be his representatives on earth. It can also be translated as dependent,
someone that works for another (R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, p. 264;
M. Lapidus, La Qute de lle Merveilleuse, p. 21).
20
Vladimir Vikentiev, for instance, through numerous comparisons with other tales he intensely explored a way
to justify this tale. Maybe he is the reason for this kind of statements! See V. Vikentiev, Voyage vers lIle Lointaine,
pp. XII-XIII, 2, 6, 73-83.
18
105
d the serpents story. With bb and cc occupying the most part of the text, 149
of the 189 lines, and d, that occupies merely six lines, as the most relevant part,
because it encloses the storys divine revelation21.
We will begin by trying to place both voyages geographically. Indeed, there
are two voyages, one within the other. The first, that which was previously referred
as aa, is perfectly framed in the first stanzas last three verses: We reached the
limits of Wawat and passed Senmut./Look, we have returned in peace,/we have
reached our (own) land. (810)22. Wawat (wAwAt) corresponded to the region
of Northern Nubia, stretching from the first until the second cataract. Between
the Nile and the Red Sea, it was already a Southern Nubia country during the
end of the Old Kingdom, having been several times under Egyptian rule for a
long period of its history, mostly from the Middle Kingdom on, when it was
annexed for the first time to strengthen Thebes power and the security of its
southern border. Beyond the politicalmilitary matters, there were the economical
matters connected with the continuous flow of minerals, mainly gold, and other
exotic goods of this region, or that crossed it. Serving as a buffer zone between
Egypt and Kush23, part of the old Wawat country rests now under the waters
of Lake Nasser24. Senmut (snmwt) is the ancient name of the island of Biga,
situated south of Aswan by the side of island of Agilka and the island of Fil,
nowadays submerged. It is evident that to reach the Wawat borders it would
be necessary to pass by this island, situated further north from that region25.
And if they had passed beyond them and were returning and had just reached
their (own) land, it is likely that they were at Elephantine, Egypts southern
entrance door, by the first cataract, about 559 miles from Itjtawy, and of great
religious, military and economical preponderance. Elephantine, that in those
days was known by the name Abu, the Elephant city, was the Upper Egypts
See, for instance, J. N. Carreira, Literatura do Antigo Egipto, pp. 109-110, and J. Baines, Interpreting
the Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, p. 67.
22
pH.n.n pHwy wAwAt sni.n.n snmwt/mk rf n ii.n m http/tA.n pH.n sw (T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia
do Imprio Mdio: espelho de uma civilizao, II, p. 141).
23
When the Nubian kingdom became independent from Egypt it began to be called Kingdom of Kush,
yet in the New Kingdom Wawat as well as Kush were reintegrated into the economic and cultural
Egyptian area (L. M. Arajo, Napata, in Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 600-602).
24
J. Baines and J. Mlek, Egipto. Deuses, Templos e Faras, pp. 32-33 and 183; B. Manley, Atlas historique
de l'gypte ancienne, pp. 26-27, 37, 41, 43, 45, 50-51, 54-55, 60-61, 68-69, 90, 106 and 124.
25
J. Baines and J. Mlek, Egipto. Deuses, Templos e Faras, pp. 72-73.
21
capital of the first province until it lost its superiority towards Aswan (Siena in
front of Elephantine) in the GrecoRoman times.
If the first voyage does not raise any doubts, the second, bb, on the other
hand raises several. The shipwrecked sailor says: when I was headed to the
sovereigns mining region26 (2324). Where was the shipwrecked sailor headed?
The word bia (biA), besides mining region, can also signify bronze, which
is an alloy, copper, a metal, which Snchez Rodrguez asks if it isnt iron, a
nonmetallic mineral, a mining region, or firmament and, still, a mater
of celestial origin, depending on the determiners27. From north to south Egypt,
from Sinai to Nubia, there were mines where all kinds of ore were extracted,
all of them controlled by Egypt as part of the royal monopoly28. In this text
there is no precise location for these mines. Were they near Punt? Because the
shipwreck sailor is going to encounter a character that claims to be governor
of Punt! In line 151, the serpent clearly states In truth, I am the governor of
Punt29, mystical land of unknown location but real, from where came many
richness to Egypt, that we can also find described in the tale. This character is
a deity and, so, omnipresent: he can be the governor of Punt and be in any
other place! This might be one of those subterfuges that these fictions creators
Sm.kwi r biA n ity (T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio: espelho de uma civilizao, II,
p. 142).
27
R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, pp. 80-81; A. Snchez Rodrguez, Diccionario
de Jeroglficos Egpcios, p. 166.
28
J. Baines e J. Mlek, Egipto. Deuses, Templos e Faras, p. 21; B. Manley, Atlas historique de l'gypte ancienne,
pp. 19, 51, e 69.
29
ink is HqA pwnt (
). The word HqA has a determiner that makes some scholars translate
it as king or sovereign, the character G. G7, the falcon on top of a banner ( ), used as determiner in
deities and in the word king which, in this case, grants a divine and/or royal nature onto this governor,
without making him equal to Egypts ruler. We will keep the translation of governor instead of king,
not only because the Egyptians had several words for this last term, which the author did not chose
to employ here, maybe due to the fact that for them there was only one king, the pharaoh, or maybe
because he wanted to make an analogy with Sobek, as well state next on the main body of text. Exactly
in the same way that, when this determiner appears giving a divine and/or royal nature to the lord of
the island, in 171 (
, rdi.n.i Hknw Hr mryt n nb n iw pn, I prayed on
the shore to the lord of the island), we do not translate nb by king or sovereign. The possibility
of confusion with any other Egyptian governor cannot, in our opinion, be considered, because the
correct words and determiners distinguish them. For instance,
, HqA-Hwt, district governor. All
of this without, incontestably, cease to be the ruler, the leader or the head chief of Punt, which
makes us admit that in a literary translation or in any study, not accompanied by the hieroglyphic text
nor by a transliteration, it can be used the word sovereign. Even in this study, if we are not referring
to the text at hand (T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio: espelho de uma civilizao, II,
pp. 148 and 150).
26
107
used to generalize: a mysterious island anywhere in the world. For this reason
we cannot simply state that this is a voyage to Punt! Punt appears precisely to
insert into the tale all its incertitude and mystery.
It is obvious that after bia there is en iti (n ity), clearly of the sovereign,
yet, we call attention towards the fact that bia might also signify firmament and
mater of celestial origin in connection with the deceaseds voyage to the west.
In the Coffin Texts30 formula 816, Anubis separates from the sky a portion
referred to as bia to help the deceased direct himself towards the Western land
and, according to Lapidus, the deceased must recite: O bia, sustain me, make me
rise so that I enter the Western land31. But Faulkner translates the first part of
this formula as The iron is broken by Anubis in the sky. Ho, iron which opened
up the West! This is the iron which is on my mouth, which Sokar spiritualized
n [Iunu, that is, Heliopolis], which makes the water of my mouth to rise;
in O
the iron is washed, and it is sharp and strong32. The small divergences amongst
The Coffin Texts, an adaptation of the Pyramid Texts made during the First Intermediate Period, are
formulas and magical-religious poems to aid the deceased in protect himself in the afterlife, guarantying
his immortality. Inscribed on several coffins they reached their definite format in the Middle Kingdom,
especially in the 11th and 12th Dynasties (L. M. Arajo, Textos dos Sarcfagos, Dicionrio do Antigo
Egipto, p. 822).
31
M. Lapidus, La Qute de lle Merveilleuse, p. 26.
32
Even thou in his dictionary he claims bia to be a non-metallic mineral, here Faulkner translates bia by
iron and says that this section refers to the mouth opening with an iron adze ritual. Without a doubt
that it seems to be the mouth opening ritual, but can bia be translated as iron in the Middle Kingdom
(c. 2040-1780 BC)? Only by the middle of the New Kingdom (c. 1560-c. 1070 BC) did iron metallurgy
appear in Egypt, after it spread throughout the Near East between 1600 and 1200 BC; and, even then,
without replacing bronze immediately. Until then it existed but, because a proper metallurgy had not been
developed, what existed in nature was quite few (rarer then gold) and little malleable due to the lack of
appropriated technology. In Egypt iron artefacts dating from the third and second millennium BC have
appeared, existing evidences of this metals existence as early as the fourth millennium. But this last one
was of meteoritic origin, which is not the case of those of the third and second millenniums, which did
not show in their composition nickel, as is the case of the fourth millennium ones. Yet, iron is not a
material that one gets from the sky, unless we admit the possibility of it being, truly, from meteoritic
origin. Any star that has fallen from the sky! There is in bia related vocabulary two words that, in
our opinion, instead of being translated as a non-metallic mineral have a better chance of being this
meteoritic iron. These are the words
and
which exhibit the G. N14 character, a star. If
in the The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor a recording of the fall of a meteorite might have been made,
it is quite possible that the product of a star might have been recorded in the Egyptian vocabulary
itself! Yet, until this day the opinions that this iron was a byproduct of the copper production are
predominant (R. O. Faulkner (ed.), The Ancient Egyptian Coffin Texts. Spell 1-1185 and Indexes, vol. III,
pp. 7-8; C. C. Correia, Metalurgia, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 566-567; J. Ogden, Metals,
P. Nicholson and I. Shaw, Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology, pp. 166-168; R. O. Faulkner,
A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, p. 80). To the ceremony of opening of the mouth, with the
30
translations made us look at the original. We found for the first two phrases of
formula 816: Bia was broken from the sky by Anubis. O bia, may you open
(me) to the West33!
Be it iron, copper, bronze or, simply a metal or a mineral, what is
for certain is that it is a celestial material since it was separated from the sky by
Anubis34. And, be it or not, the opening of the mouth ritual, it seems without a
doubt to be connected with the funeral ceremonies and the deceaseds entrance
into the kingdom of the dead. On the other hand, it is invoked Heliopolis where
the Sun was worshiped in its manifold demonstrations: Khepri, the rising Sun, Re,
the midday Sun, and Atum, the setting Sun. Atum was the first to be worshiped
in Heliopolis, but Re supplanted him from the 4th Dynasty onward, specially
ReHorakhty, in which Horakhty is Horus of the two horizons, syncretic deity
that included all solar demonstrations, since if the sun would move in between
two horizons, it roamed from the rising (Khepri) towards the setting (Atum)
passing by the zenith (Re)35. Even when Res cult overcame Atums, this one
never lost his primacy as demiurge god and increased his prerogatives through
the syncretic deity ReAtum. And, according to the above mentioned formula
816, it was at Heliopolis that Sokar, funeral god, consecrated the mentioned
celestial material.
Sokar, (skr),
, ,
,
, whose name means that which is closed
was a god of the dead that presided Duats fourth division. His main cultural
centre was Memphis necropolis, Sakkara, having a mummiform anthropomorphic
representation with a falcon head or being represented by a falcon, usually
lying down. Since the Old Kingdom Sokar had been related with the god of
Memphis, Ptah, and because he was a funeral deity this association extended to
Osiris, creating the syncretic deity PtahSokarOsiris, union which symbolized
the total life cycle: Ptah gave life, Sokar took care of death and Osiris represented
use of an apropriate ritual object, see L. M. Arajo, Abertura da boca, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto,
pp. 20-21; also in I. Shaw and P. Nicholson, The Britsh Museum Dictionary of Ancient Egypt, pp. 235-236.
33
, sD biA in inpw m pt hA biA wbA imnt (A. De Buck, The Egyptian Coffin
Texts, vol. VII Texts of Spells 787-1185, p. VII-15).
34
In a text where the reference is without a doubt to a metal, not being known if it is copper, bronze
or iron, we believe it to be best to use simply metal as a translation. In a situation in which it
appears as a celestial material, since there are no metals in the atmosphere, we believe it to be more
reasonable to leave the word untranslated.
35
L. M. Arajo, Atum, R and R-Horakhti, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 125-126 and
740-743.
109
rebirth. In the great annual festivity that his followers made in his honour in
Memphis, sixteen priests would carry him on their shoulders in the henu boat,
his sacred boat whose unique design is perfectly recognizable in his hieroglyph36.
Is it possible to relate Sokar to TheTale of the Shipwrecked Sailor?
On the other hand, the word iti (ity) makes us bring forward another
clearer and more explicit relation hypothesis. The word iti appears three times
in The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor, for instance, in 174,
,
aHa.n aq.kwi Hr ity, Then I went to the presence of the sovereign, in its dual
way which was only used in Egypt to symbolize that the sovereign was king of
not only Upper but also Lower Egypt. Yet, the word iti also as a dozen variants,
the majority of which without the presence of character G. I3, the crocodile37.
The same idea could also be conveyed by nesu (
or
nsw), translated
by king of Upper Egypt, or by biti (
bity), king of Lower Egypt or,
even, the customary nesubit ( nswbit),the Rush and the Bee, that is,
king of the Upper and Lower Egypt, exactly what the duality is meant to
symbolize. However, the word was used with two crocodiles. Might there have
been the intention of making some analogy with Sobek (
,
,
,
or
, sbk), the crocodilegod? The last writing, in particular, is truly
similar! Lord of the waters, simultaneously solar and chthonic, worshiped in all
Egypt. Just like the Sun, Sobek left the waters in the morning of the first time,
being because of this also considered a demiurge. Sobek, whose name means
that which causes pregnancy (or fertility), relates itself for this reason to Osiris,
that is, to fertility and rebirth, but also to death and burial38. It is good to take
in consideration that Amenemhat III ordered the construction of a temple in
the honour of Sobek in Shedyet, the ancient Greek Crocodilopolis and present
L. M. Arajo, Sokar, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 794-795; J. C. Sales, As Divindades Egpcias, pp. 346-350; A. Snchez Rodrguez, Diccionario de Jeroglficos Egpcios, p. 401; R. O. Faulkner, A Concise
Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, p. 251. Images of the syncretic deity Ptah-Sokar-Osiris (a mumiform
figure), could be apreciated in the Egyptian collections of Museu Nacional de Arqueologia and Museu
de Histria Natural da Universidade do Porto.
37
Other variants of ity:
, ,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
,
, , R. O. Faulkner,
A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, pp. 32-33; A. Snchez Rodrguez, Diccionario Jeroglficos
Egpcios, p. 107.
38
T. F. Canho, Kom Ombo: o antigo domnio de Sobek, in J. A. Ramos, L. M. Arajo and A. R. dos
Santos (ed.), Arte Pr-Clssica, pp. 262-263; R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian,
pp. 79 e 139; A. Snchez Rodrguez, Diccionario Jeroglficos Egpcios, pp. 167 and 247. Sales shows an
interesting image of mummified Osiris being transported on Sobeks back (J. C. Sales, As Divindades
Egpcias, pp. 261-264).
36
111
would be the shipwrecked sailors route for those that claim that Wadjwer
signifies sea. However, the locution Wadjwer is a geographical reference to the
valley of the Nile and not to the Red Sea. It is Vandersleyen, which researched
and reflected upon this question for over twenty five years, who guarantees this.
With an excellent argumentation, supported by the hieroglyphic transliterated
and translated reproduction of 322 documents, he proved that that term had
never meant the sea: wadj wer could not be but a view of the Nile, the areas
it irrigated, which it made green, areas, for this reason, strictly confined to the
territories reached by the inundation, which means the valley, including the
Delta and the Fayum, not excluding the regions south of the Nile in the Upper
Egypt44. There exists even an inscription in Fil, a procession of Niles, where
a Nile speaks on behalf of the Upper Egypts Hapy that lives in Biga and
provides the divine fresh water to wADwr45. This way, the statement that the
shipwrecked sailor spoke when he told his story to the serpent, I was going down
to the mines with a message from the sovereign (8990), makes the direction
the boat was taking clearer: It was going north, to the Delta or to the Sinai.
Let us try to go a bit further. The example 145 of the 322 presented by
Vandersleyen is extracted from the Papyrus Harris I, also designated Great Papyrus
Harris, or merely Papyrus Harris (there are other papyri in Harris Collection).
This papyrus, which is from the beginning of Ramesses IV reign, from the XX
dynasty, was found in a tomb at Deir elMedina, in the Theban region, and was
purchased by a Anthony Charles Harris, a collector and Egyptian antiquities dealer,
in 1855. In 1872 it was acquired by the British Museum and catalogued with
the reference BM9999. With about 150 feet of length it is longest manuscript in
papyrus found until this moment and has 1489 lines of text. Written in hieratic
writing, it is divided into five sections, with 113 columns each of twelve of thirteen
lines, written horizontally from the right to the left. It also has three drawings
depicting the king Usermaatre Meryamun, Ramesses III, before the triads of
Thebes, Heliopolis and Memphis. It is a manuscript of religious and historical
theme. The text describes 31 years of Ramesses III donations to the gods and
temples of several cities with the objective of acquiring the gods favour. Most
of the papyrus is the donation list. The texts final part narrates some events of
the XX dynasty, depicting the chaotic situation of the early period and glorifying
See C. Vandersleyen, Ouadj our. Un outre aspect de la Valle du Nil, pp. 8-9.
Idem, pp. 74 and 319.
44
45
the kings doings. It ends with the death of Ramesses III and the rise to power
of his son Ramesses IV. Yet, it doesnt speak of the, so called, harems conspiracy,
nor of the pharaohs murder. As Sales states, it creates, together with the Shabaka
Stone, one of the finest syntheses of Ptah theology46.
In the introduction of the words spoken by the king Usermaatre Meryamun
to the syncretic creator god PtahTatenen, whose second deity, the emerged
land, is the oldest Memphis god, that as he was assimilated and supplanted by
Ptah, became his theological name personifying the primordial hill, two phrases
appear (PHI 44,5)47:
snnty tA m ir.n.f Ds.f pXr sw m nwn wADwr
Pierre Grandet translates this passage by that founded the land in him
and surrounded it with the oceans inundation, that is: Ptah emerged as land
surrounded by ocean. Claude Vandersleyen, on the other hand, prefers Planed
the land as he made himself, covering it with the Great Greens inundation,
that is, Ptah emerged as land covering it at the same time as the Great Greens
inundation. In fact, the verb senet (snT) can signify plan, measure (a land)
or establish (a house), while the verb pekher (pXr) can take the meanings of
return, cross (a region), circumvallate, roam, surround or involve48.
We prefer the second phrase because of the following motives, but change the
translation to Founded the land in himself going through it with the Great
Greens inundation, making this act of creation extensive to the Nile and its
inundation, reason of the success of all in Egypt. The Nile goes through the
primordial hill as through Egypt.
And it is Grandet that gives Vandersleyen his arguments when saying: Nwn
has here quite clearly the meaning of inundation and not of primordial waters,
just like all other usages of the term in the Papyrus Harris I are not accompanied
by the divine determiner. We must reject the group of translations that translate
nwn weDwr as the Nun and the sea; we consider the two terms connected by
P. Grandet, Le Papyrus Harris I, vol. 1, pp. 3-26; to the Shabakaa Stone see Rogrio Sousa, O Livro
das Origens. A inscrio teolgica da pedra de Chabaka, Lisboa: Fundao Calouste Gulbenkian, 2011.
47
Idem, vol. 2 photography 21; and vol. III, pp. 35 and 87; C. Vandersleyen, Ouadj our. Un autre aspect
de la valle du Nil, p. 252.
48
P. Grandet, Le Papyrus Harris I, vol. 1, p. 284; . Snchez Rodrguez, Diccionario de Jeroglficos
Egipcios, pp. 183 and 380; R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, pp. 93 and 234.
46
113
a direct genitive. We must notice that wADwr possess here exactly the meaning
of the Greek Wceausj, the Ocean that surrounds the world49.
Then, if we are talking of inundation we are in the Nile and not in the sea,
so much so because it is there that, as Sales states, the primordial hill emerges:
Tatenen was the god of the primordial hill that emerges from the Niles fertile
mire, foundation of life and vegetation, originating from him, in consequence,
all beings and all things. In fact, Sales proceeds, in this notion of god of
vegetation and fertility, he appears depicted with his limbs and face painted in
green, by excellence the colour of creation and regeneration. To be green, uadj
(
ou wAD), was the same as to be fresh, fertile, vigorous50. It is a typical
phenomenon of Egyptian creation myths: selfcreation. The Nile was created in
the primordial hill that, for its turn, was created by the Nile itself. Let us keep
in mind, also, that to this chthonic god was also attributed the function of
guarding the royal deceaseds path to the underworld51.
The ancient Egyptians, who in their imaginations constructions made
constant appeal to the natural elements that surrounded them, knew perfectly
well that their country wasnt surrounded by the sea. Westward they never reached
any sea; the western desert converges with the Libyan desert, and towards the
south Wawat and Kuch, in the Nubian desert, were, in the Middle Kingdom,
its boundaries. It is for this reason that the primordial hill appears in the Nile
and cannot be Egypt surrounded by the ocean. Egypt was not an island but
the Nile had islands! Once again it is the environment in which they live that
inspires them: the primordial hill emerges as a nilotic island.
Integrating itself accurately into this question, Sinuhe has also something to
say about the Great Green, the inundation and the Niles islands. In The Story
of Sinuhe, after a life of glory in exile, the tales hero demonstrates a desire of
returning to Egypt so that he can live his last days there and his able to have a
funeral that allows him the living of eternity. In his reply to the decree Senusret
sends trying to convince him to return to his homeland free of any guilt, Sinuhe
make appeal to a number of deities so that they protect the king. In B209,
P. Grandet, Le Papyrus Harris I, vol. 2, p. 164 nt. 660.
J. C. Sales, As Divindades Egpcias, pp. 280-281 and 291-292. To the word uAdj see J. Padr, La
Lengua de Sinuh, p. 279; see also A. Gardiner, Egyptian Grammar, p. 560; R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, p. 55; A. Snchez Rodrguez, Diccionario de Jeroglfos Egipcios,
p. 137; J. P. Allen, Middle Egyptian, p. 456.
51
Idem, p. 292.
49
50
for instance, he appeals to the council that is above the inundation52 and, in
B210211, to all the gods of the Beloved Land and of the islands of the Great
Green53. The gods here invoked are the gods of Egypt54, which is the Beloved
Land where the inundation and the Great Green exist. The Great Green is part
of the Beloved Land. Sinuhe is not returning to Egypt by the Great Green. It
seems hes returning by land through SyriaPalestine, leaving Syria towards south
and making a stop on the Paths of Horus (B 242), where the commander
that was entrusted with the frontier patrolling, sent a message to the palace
informing them (B 242243)55.This way he will not travel neither through the
Mediterranean nor the Nile: He will go through land towards the Nile, that is,
the Great Green and its islands.
Then the shipwrecked sailor was in the Great Green, in the company of
an excellent crew that could predict a gale before its arrival and a storm before
its formation56 (2932), but which could not predict the strong gale that came
DADAt tpt nw. The deities that aid Hapy, God of the Niles waters (T. F. Canho, A literatura do Imprio
Mdio: espelho de uma civilizao, II, p. 109).
53
nTrw nbw tA-mri iww nw wAD-wr (Idem, ibidem).
54
Re, Montu, Amun, Sobek-Re, Horus, Hathor, Atum, the Ennead, Sopdu-Neferbau-Semseru, MinHorus, Wereret, Nut and Haroeris-Re (Idem, ibidem).
55
Idem, ibidem.
56
sr.snDa n iit(.f) nSny n xprt.f (Idem, p. 142).The words dja and necheni (Da and nSny) relate to bad
weather. While the first person determiner, dja, links it to wind, a strong, out of the ordinary wind,
the second word, necheni, is something stronger, whose determiner is Seths animal (G. E20), the lord
of the desert, the cause of the storms. It is likely that it is one of those sand storms, capable of causing
great damages, which nowadays the Arabs call khamsin. Taken as a demonstration of divine power, the
wind can be seen and felt, but only its effects can be seen. Twice did we found ourselves in this kind of
events in 2001, when we were part of the first Portuguese archaeological expedition authorized by the
Egyptian Antiquities Supreme Council to excavate the palace of the 26th Dynastys pharaoh Apries. One
time in the region of modern Mit Rahina (Memphis), at Kom Tuman, on the work camp; and another
time at Sakkara, on the house by Sakkaras dune which the Portuguese mission occupied, at least, during
the 2001 campaign. The first we were at the archaeological camp and work was immediately stopped
that day. An initial breeze progressively and rapidly evolved into a quite strong wind. Our inexperience
with such events made us still try to keep working, but we ended up understanding it im-possible to
use any equipment. The wind dragged people and took from their hands everything. It was impossible
to keep ones eyes open and, even if we opened them, we could not see anything besides grains of sand
passing at great velocity and lashing our eyes. People could barely see each other, they had difficulty
in communicating due to the deafening winds noise, they could barely breathe and the grains of sand
hurt. In the end, the big support tent ripped from top to bottom, the rods tumbled and some warps
came loose, having its deadly remains to be taken away to be sewed. Some equipment was scattered
around. The excavated areas had to be cleaned again, since they were covered with sand. The second
time was at night and we were inside the house. The windows, that were kept opened at night, woke
us up as they stroke against the walls. There was no electricity, and even inside the house it was hard
to breathe, the mouth filled up with sand. In the dark we closed the windows but, even after, we felt
52
115
to be, with the winds howling and the waves reaching eight cubits57, and that
sunk the boat killing all58. The sole survivor of the shipwreck was placed on an
island by a wave of the Great Green (3941), island which has both sides in
the water (8586). The eight cubits are about 13.8 feet. Some have questioned
how it would be possible for such waves in a river. However, Vandersleyen has
the answer: it corresponds to the rapid and brutal arrival of the inundation:
the word wAw [uau, wave] has but that meaning in the other text where it
appears. As for the eight cubits wave that caused the shipwreck, it is called nwyt
and belongs completely to the Nilotic vocabulary59. Neither did the inundation
always come calm and peaceful; neither are all the Niles regions wide enough
for the waters to rise progressively.
Those that have sailed the Nile know that in Upper Egypt the river has quite
narrow and rocky passageways, where it is not hard to imagine such a scene
happening prior to Aswans dam construction. Furthermore, Niles difference
between dry period and the maximum flooding raised the waters more than
seven meters high. However, some passageways are so narrow, as is the case of
the first cataract, that quite a lot of good will is needed to imagine such a boat
sailing there. Middle Kingdom texts narrating punitive expedition against the
Nubians mention that the narrow spots, the whirlpool and other cataracts perils
were overcame by removing the boats from the water, carrying them on the back
sand everywhere and we heard the strong winds noise. Still, the best place to be was under the sheets: it
was better to endure an even more airless atmosphere then to be beaten up by the sand. The following
morning it was all peaceful, but the houses interior was like there were no walls: there was a layer of
sand all around that, on the corners opposite to the windows, would be of a few inches. After spending
the following days morning cleaning up in the archaeological camp and the afternoon in the Memphis
museum cataloguing, the work that had always to be finished up at home would be twice as much that
day!
57
The Egyptian unity of length was the cubit (lat. cubitu), which was equivalent to about 20.7 inches. Its most
usual fractions were the finger, djeba ( Dba), equivalent to 1/28 of a cubit, that is, 0.7 inches, the palm, chesepe
(
, , Szp ), equivalent to four fingers or 1/7 of a cubit, that is, 2.9 inches, measuring the cubit
seven palms or twenty eight fingers. Its most usual multiples were the rod, khet ( xt), equivalent to
a hundred cubits, about 172.2 feet, and iteru (
itrw ), the river, with a length of 20 000
cubits, that is, 6.5 miles (J. P. Allen, Middle Egyptian, p. 101). Here are the measures that appear in
the text in cubits converted into feet: the boat 120 by 40 cubits, measured 206.7 feet long by 68.8
feet wide; the waves 8 cubits, would be 13.8 feet, the serpent 30 cubits, measured 51.7 feet; the beard
more than 2 cubits, measured more than 3.4 feet.
58
Such was the noise made by this storm that, further on, when the shipwreck sailor heard the noise of
thunder, he first thought that it was a wave of the Great Green (56-59).
59
C. Vandersleyen, Ouadj our. Un outre aspect de la Valle du Nil, pp. 74 and 319.
through land and placing them again on the water further ahead60. Nonetheless,
during the Middle Kingdom the first cataract was already bypassed by an artificial
canal made especially for navigation in the 6th Dynasty61. Anyway, this seemingly
overstatement might be a literary device to seize the reader or listener, since to
die 120 persons or to die 3 or 4 has a totally different impact!
Even so, let us look for a while at the subject of the boats size and the
crews dimension. The Egyptians were never enthusiastic about long voyages
in open sea, contrary to some of their Mediterranean neighbours such as the
Phoenicians, the Cretans or the Mycenaeans. That does not mean that huge ships
were not used, as can be confirmed in embossed works of the funerary temple
of Sahure at Abusir. Here, in The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor, we are, sure
enough, speaking of the boat in general (depet), but sailing in the Nile, which
also excludes the boat or barque (uia) more connected with the deities cult or
the funeral ceremonies, like, for instance, the largest known boat which is the
solar boat of Khufu, with 19.4 feet from side to side and 142 feet of length62.
The Nile was the meeting point of a huge diversity of boats, which varied a
lot in size, crew and function. Plenty of drawings and rock embossing, in temples
or tombs, and especially in the Middle Kingdom, and tridimensional models
found at several tombs show us simultaneously with an enormous variety of small
boats huge boats with abundance of oars and, as a consequence, a numerous
See L. M. Arajo, Barco, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 142-143.
B. Manley, Atlas historique de lgypte ancienne, p. 51; S. Vinson, Egyptian Boats and Ships, p. 8.
62
See L. M. Arajo, Barco, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 142-143. The huge solar boat of Khufu was
found in a shipform pit near the Great Pyramid of Giza. The boat was make in cedar from Lebanon.
Still regarding sea navigation, recent Red Sea excavations, at Ain Sukhna, in front of the Sinai at about
43.50 miles from present Suez city, uncovered two Middle Kingdom boats, victims of a violent fire that
completely charred them but, due to the fires characteristics, they kept their original form, including
the rigging and the planks joints. They made the turquoise and copper ore transport from the Sinai
mines, of the Serabit el-Khadim region, where there are also engravings of two kinds of vessels similar
to the Nilotic vessels. They were not similar to those referred boats from Abusir, they only differentiated
themselves from those boats sailing in the Nile by the use of thicker wooden planks and reinforced
joint systems (binders, notches and pegs) so that they could sail at sea, eventually a more agitated and
troublesome aquatic environment. the inscriptions engraved on the mines rocky walls speak of maritime
expeditions in Mentuhotep IV, late 11th Dynasty, and of Amenemhat I, Senusret I and Amenemhat
III in the 12th Dynasty. Found disassembled in two galleries, just like Khufus great funerary boat,
they measured between 44.29 and 49.21 feet long and were mostly made of cedar wood, with some
pieces of oak. The anchors and the helms do not seem to have been differentiated whether for river or
sea (P. Pomey, Les Bateaux dAyn Soukhna. Les Plus Vieux Vestiges de Navires de Mer Actuellement
Connus, pp. 3-12; C. Zazzaro, Les ancres de Mersa Gawasis, pp. 13-20; E. Nantet, Le Gouvernail
gyptien. Le Gouvernail gyptien Constituait-il le Vice originel de la Marine Antique?, pp. 21-28).
60
61
117
crew. A part of these boats was made of papyrus, another part of sycamore,
acacia or even wood from Lebanon, as would be the case of the bigger boats
and, particularly, of those for heavy transport like obelisk and blocks of stone
for the construction of pyramids and temples, for instance63.
Vinson presents an image of a journey boat from Khnumhoteps tomb, of
Beni Hasan, of the 11th Dynasty, carrying a series of standing persons between
two series of rowers, each with 14 men, plus another at the bow, most likely
working as a pilot. No one is at the great helm astern. It is a crew of 25 sailors64.
In the Theban tomb of Infet, from 11th Dynasty, there are paintings of three
boats with men with bow and arrow, shields and other sorts of weapons, fighting
out of the boats. But these are smaller and easily maneuverable boats. Besides
the soldiers fighting between two series of rowers, four to six of them, few so
that they could maneuver at ease, the crews are of 11, 15 and 19 men65. If we
think back to the 6th Dynasty and take into account one of the sailing boats
depicted in the Mereruka mastaba, vizier of kings Teti and Pepi I, we see a crew
of 44 men66. With a crew of 120 men, if the shipwrecked sailors boat had forty
men rowing, it still had eighty men to fight. It could be quite confusing and
was, surely, a quite slow boat for this objective.
According to what they were meant to carry, the transport boats varied
quite a lot in size and crew. This boat besides, apparently, having exaggerated
measures, seems to have them totally disproportioned: 207 feet of length by 69
of width. This width is exactly a third of the length, which is, most likely, quite
beyond reality. Taking into account the proportionality of the Khufu solar boat,
to a length of 207 feet the width would be of about 29 feet. Even if to acquire
stability a boat of this size had its width enlarged to 33/36 feet, we are speaking
of values that about half of the ones presented in the text. Could it be a boat
for special transportation, as wed say nowadays?
In his autobiography, Weni, of the 6th Dynasty, states that the king Merenre
financed him the construction of a boat, with 103.3 feet of length by 51.67
feet of width (60 x 30 cubits), of acacia to transport an alabaster (travertine)
In the tomb of Meketre, for instance, an officer of Mentuhotep the 11th Dynastys king, amongst
several other models, were found twelve boat models that illustrate four kinds of boats: the small-scale
fishing boats, some of wood others of papyrus, kitchen-boats and journey boats (S. Vinson, Egyptian
Boats and Ships, p. 30; D. Jones, Boats, pp. 30-31).
64
S. Vinson, Egyptian Boats and Ships, p. 33.
65
Idem, p. 35.
66
D. Jones, Boats, p. 38.
63
offerings table. And what to say about the transport of the colossal obelisks
from Aswan to Karnak, that were recorded in the walls of Hatshepsut funerary
temple? Without being conclusive, the estimates made by experts varied between
207 feet of length by 82 of width, being able to sustain about 1476 tons, and
275 feet of length by 92 feet of width, being able to sustain 2622 tons. Later
reevaluations of these studies arrived, still, at some unbelievable 312 feet of
length by 105 feet of width, sustaining 7189 tons67.
Yet, during the reign of Thutmose I, of the 18th Dynasty, Ineni supervised
the construction of a boat with 207 feet of length by 69 of width (120 x 40 cubits)
to transport obelisks to the Karnak temple, which are still there and weight 366
tons. These are the exact measures we have in The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor
(2527). And if we consider the tasks they had to do, embark and disembark
weights of about 366 tons, 120 men would not be too many. So, the shipwrecked
sailor was travelling in a special boat, since it was meant for special transports.
We believe that this is also foreseen in the text itself, given that he begins his
story saying that he was going to the sovereigns mining region (2223). It
obvious that also the quarries were part of the sovereigns mines! The question
of the seeming navigability of a boat of this size so far south will be regarded
further on.
Let us return to the place where the shipwrecked sailor arrived after the
accident, which island which has both sides in the water (8586). An island
which has both sides in the water is a fluvial island. On a sea island its both
sides would never be in the water. Generally, due to the sea currents, sea islands
have a harsher side and a more sheltered opposite side, that might be of sand, that
is, in the water. Only a river, by passing on both sides of a neck of land, can
create an island that can have two opposite sides of sand. More, the expression
both sides can only be understood if we consider the current as the one giving
meaning to this orientation68. On the other hand, Punts governor, when he says
to the shipwrecked sailor that he will leave the island, says: youll depart this
place and never again will you see this island which will disappear (153154).
This phrase also makes us believe that it is a fluvial island. Islands that appear and
disappear are a Niles feature: passed the inundation, the alluvium can produce
Idem, p. 65.
C. Vandersleyen, En relisant le Naufrag, p. 1023. However some think that the island of the Ka
could be a peninsula (see B. Radomska, Die Insel des Schiffbrchigen eine Halbinsel?, pp. 27-30;
contested by W. Westendorf, Die Insel des Schiffbrchigen keine Halbinsel, pp. 1056-1064).
67
68
119
the appearance of islands that, due their alluvium traits, during the rise can
disappear without a trace69. In the Book of Amduat, in turn, a funerary text
from the New Kingdom whose name means What is in the afterlife, that is in
Duat (dwAt)70, as Sokars domains in the afterlife are mentioned, it is said that
he is on is sandbank, visible on top of his henu boat in the hieroglyph. Even
if only implicit, could this be a way of relating the The Tale of the Shipwrecked
Sailor with Sokar?
Well, this entire story happened in the route from Itjtawy towards the north,
most likely in the Delta, as some intend it, since there was not, until now, any
suggestion of a change of route. Nonetheless, the islands master claims to be
the governor of Punt, region which is located in the Niles opposite side, and
which could be reached as much through the Red Sea as through the Nile. We
know that Punt was the subject of several Egyptian expeditions between the 5th
Dynasty and the GrecoRoman times, accounts have survived of many of them.
The region was regarded as the source of myrrh, incense and other fragrances, as
well as of gold, ivory, exotic timber, amongst which ebony, and several species of
animals, either local or from other African regions. Beyond the exoticism, this
land was also mythical, since it was from here that several cult substances came,
from fragrances and ornamental ones to the ritual furs of the priests, which made
Egyptians name it Land of God. Even with all this, it is only known that it
should be located in Oriental Africa, at a riverside (was it the Nile?)71, being its
exact location unknown.
Idem, ibidem.
Appearing for the first time in Thutmose I tomb, the Book of Amduat is a funerary text that allowed
the de-ceased to cross to the underworld on Res boat. It is divided into twelve sections matching the
twelve hours of the Suns nocturnal journey, starting in the west and ending with solar rebirth in the
Orient. With the exception of the first hour, which contains an introduction and the central record
subdivided into two, so having four records, the remaining have three records, in which the central
one is the place where Res boat navigates and the lateral are like the shores of a river. Before entering
Duat and crossing the twelve sections, the deceased had first to cross seven doors. All the pathway is
full of hazards that are overcome so as to allow the Sun and the deceased to reborn (L. M. Arajo,
Livro de Amduat, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 512-513; C. Carrier, Grands livres funraires de
lgypte pharaonique, p. 67).
71
This statement is based on an image that exists on a wall of Hatshepsut funerary temple, integrated in
the depiction of a commercial voyage to Punt. There, amongst the myrrh and the palm trees can be
clearly seen African huts on stilts. This kind of houses developed on lakes and rivers, and even at sea,
where the current was not too strong, which does not seem to be Niles and its effluents case, at least
during the inundation season. Because of this, this image, which has the water drawn as if it was a river,
raises doubts if it represents only by the water or if it means by a river. Given the Niles features,
it would make more sense if it were by a lake where the rise of the waters was felt but there were no
69
70
121
We know that Nile is a sailors friendly river. From north to south, even if
they used rowers, there was during most of the year the aid of the wind which
blew from the Mediterranean towards Africas interior. From south to north it
was currents strength which helped. Well, we also know that before Aswans
dam the Niles low waters during the Shemu season (from middle March until
18th July74) flowed with an average speed of one knot, one nautical mile; and
that during Akhet season (from 19 July to middle November) the high waters
of the inundation increased its speed to about 4 knots, in average, four nautical
miles75. The Niles inundation rate reached its minimum between April and June
and its maximum between August and September. If we consider that the Nile
flows for about 745 miles, between Egypts southern border and Mediterranean,
to go from Elephantine to Itjtawy, somewhere in between the Fayum Lake and
Memphis, it would have to be about 490 to 600 miles. Not taking into account
the rowers impulse, to make such a distance during the Shemu season, when it
would take the longest, would require about 487 hours. If the crew took turns
and the journey was without stops, they would arrive on the 21st day. If we take
into account six hours of daily rest we only add up five days (120 hours): they
would arrive on the 26th day. If we suppose it happening during the Akhet season,
then these numbers have to be divided by four: for the first case it would be 6
days and for the second 7 days.
In a youth book originally published by the Oxford University Press, there are
excellent drawings with a scheme of a journey from Elephantine to PiRamesses,
located on the Oriental Delta by the confluence swamps and lakes of the
Mediterranean Sea, from the time of Ramesses II. With several stops, the journey
was thought to be of 30 days, even if it is said to be a very tight calendar76. And
the region where Itjtawy should be was reached after the 18th day and before the
22nd, without us knowing when the journey was made but, by the above mentioned
calculations, it seems to have been during the Shemu season.
Well, we know when the shipwrecked sailors return took place! If the storm
coincided with an eight cubits wave that caused the shipwreck, the nuit (nwyt),
and if it was the inundations quick and brutal arrival, it would be, the 19th
of July, or near! We know that the shipwrecked sailor spent three days alone
before the serpent came to meet him and that, later, she said Look! You shall
For the calendar see T. F. Canho, O calendrio egpcio: origem, estrutura e sobrevivncias, pp. 39-61.
S. Vinson, Egyptian Boats and Ships, p. 7.
76
S. Ross (text) and S. Biesty (drawings), Egipto em pormenor, pp. 8-10.
74
75
spend month after month until you complete four months of permanence in
this island (117119). If each season had four months of thirty days each, he
was on the island during all of Akhet season. The boat that would take him
back home would have arrived on the island in the beginning of Peret (from
mid November to mid March), the season of the flow out of the water, when
it would be midway between its maximum and minimum velocity. We have to
prefer a number of days somewhere between the shortest and longest for the
journey. Anyway, all these numbers make 60 days excessive.
Because of this we came to think that in the mind of the tales author, not being
relevant if it might have had an oral transmission period before becoming a written
tale, this part of the narrative would take place south of Elephantine. From a trades
point of view, the Egyptians passed Buhen and the second cataract, which is around
18 miles of easily sailable rapids77. After establishing a business centre in Mirgissa for
direct commerce with Kush78 and raising, further south, a number of strongholds
along the Nile, naming SouthSemna the one more to the north. Senusret III'
campaigns are thought to have reached this far and established the further southern
Egyptian border of the Middle Kingdom. But the economic expansion proceeded
and, after another harsh sailing area, the Dal cataract, a new business centre was, still,
established in the island of Sai, equally for a direct commerce with Kush. Besides
that, the Egyptian traders may have passed the third cataract, before Kerma and
already in the Upper Nubia, since there are reports of active Egyptian commercial
agents in Kerma, at the time Kushs cultural and economical centre79, in the Middle
Kingdom. Here local goods as much as goods from further south were acquired.
Only after the tales likely epoch did the Egyptians and their influence
passed the fourth cataract, near Napata, Upper Nubias (Kush) capital for some
centuries80, and the fifth cataract, reaching Meroe, which would come to be
J. Baines and J. Mlek, Egipto. Deuses, Templos e Faras, p. 40.
C. Desroches-Noblecourt, Le Secret des Temples de la Nubie, p. 45; B. Manley, Atlas historique de
l'gypte ancienne, p. 50.
79
B. Manley, Atlas historique de l'gypte ancienne, pp. 50-51.
80
With the weakening of the last Ramesside and the breakdown of power that followed, in the end of
the New Kingdom Kush became an independent kingdom. Kerma, Nubias previous capital, gave up its
place to Napata and the new ruling dynasty, also supported in the religious metropolis Guebel Barkal,
the Holy Mountain near which several New Kingdom Pharaohs ordered the construction of various
sanctuaries, standing out a temple consecrated to Amun that was restored and enlarged by Sety I and
Rameses II. Napata became the biggest Nubian commercial post of the Nile where to arrived, by boat
or land, a large amount of products from Black Africa (L. M. Arajo, Napata, in Dicionrio do Antigo
Egipto, pp. 600-602).
77
78
123
the second Upper Nubias capital and, later on, already in the III century B.C.,
the capital of Meroes kingdom. Between these two, afore mentioned places, is
Atbaras mouth in the White Nile. The Atbara stretches out until the region
west of Abyssinias plateau, which has eastward Eritrea. Proceeding along the
White Nile one overcomes the sixth cataract and arrives at Khartum, where the
mouth of the Blue Nile is found in the White Nile. Also going west of Abyssinias
plateau, further south then Atbara, it is the Blue Nile which gets closer to the
region that is imagined to be Punt, the Djibouti area, or even the northern part
of Somalia81. Being more distant than Wawat, any of these regions could be Punt
and make its goods reach Kerma, the island of Sai and Mirgissa.
The Nile has a wide amount of islands between the first cataract and Kerma,
many of them are annually undone and redone by the inundation, and its a
remote enough place to be an ideal one to build our narrative. It must be there
that we can imagine the fluvial island being, on a sandbank where Sokar could
dominate, near or not to the mysterious Punt region. But what island was that
one? Seemingly it appeared out of nothing with the precise objective of allowing
the shipwrecked sailor to be saved, and, fulfilling this objective, it vanished.
After telling his story to serpent, she answered: You were reserved to me! See,
god made you come and led you to the island of the Ka82 (113114). But, in
fact, there is no knowledge of an island with such a name existing. More, if it
vanished after the shipwrecked sailor departure it would be impossible to find
it again. It seems to be an imaginary island83.
And if, indeed, such an island has never existed, in the same way the boat
that was sailing to it had no actual existence. So being, any kind of boat could be
mentioned, preferably one whose size and crew were impressive, overestimating
the sailors survival. We are, undoubtedly, faced with a fictitious story in which
what is relevant is not its accordance with reality, even if an appearance of reality
is desired, but with the objectives the tale was supposed to achieve.
Where does the designation Ka come from? It calls up a vital energy reservoir!
The notion that ancient Egyptians had of ka evades our rational categories:
J. Baines and J. Mlek, Egipto. Deuses, Templos e Faras, pp. 12-13.
pH.n.k wi mk nTr rdi.n.f anx.k ini.f tw r iw pn n kA (T. F. Canho, A literatura egpcia do Imprio Mdio:
espelho de uma civilizao, vol. II, p. 146).
83
For this reason, according to our thinking, it is without sense attempts like that of Wainwright, believing
that island of Ka is St. Jones (Zeberged in Arabic) in the Red Sea, near Berenice on the shore of Wawat
(see G. A. Wainwright, Zeberged: the Shipwrecked Sailors Island, pp. 31-38).
81
82
it gathers all notions relating to vital forces, in its spiritual as well as material
aspects, including their sexual lives eternity. It was simultaneously a preserving
and life creating energy. It was the nourishment and vitality of Maat, which
kept the cosmic order as well as the order amongst men, living or dead. It was
one of the human beings elements, just like ba and akh, the other two spiritual
principles that the Egyptians believed created the beings harmonious totality,
human or divine, just like the body or the name, without which it was not
possible to live. As a man died he passed unto his ka, which would inhabit in
his mummified body laid down in the funerary chamber. But a funerary statue
of him was sculpted still, which would be another container where such energy
would also inhabit, for this reason called statue of ka84. In the Old and Middle
Kingdoms tombs, as in the funerary chapels of the pyramids as well as in the
mastabas, there existed the serdab, which was where the statue of ka was placed.
It was a completely sealed cubicle, isolated from all other space, where only two
small round openings or a groove at the eyes height existed, so that the deceaseds
ka could witness his funeral cult and see the offerings that were given to him,
since it was the funerary chapels neighbouring space. Can we suppose that the
serdab might be considered as an island for Ka in a symbolic world?
In this island nothing lacked. First it was the shipwrecked sailor that, after
quantifying a number of goods, said: All things existed there! (5152); then,
it was the serpent itself that referring to the island said: within which there is
nothing that cannot be found. It is full all things which are good (115117).
Nourishments were listed the first time: several kinds of figs, grapes, all sorts of
vegetables, cucumber, fishes and birds; the second time, a number of typically
African goods usually imported from Punt: myrrh, cinnamon, hekenu, iudeneb,
tichepes, chaasekh 85, galena86, giraffe tails, turpentine resin, incense, ivory tusks,
See L. M. Arajo, Akh, Ba and Ka, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 40-41, 131-132, 469-470;
L. M. Arajo, Os Grandes Faras do Antigo Egito, pp. 281-284.
85
Hekenu was a sacred oil, a perfume or an incense (to Parkinson it is malabathrum), iudeneb was an
aromatic substance of African origin (to Parkinson it is terebinth), tichepes (Parkinson thinks that it can
be a camphor) and regarding chaasekh no reference was found (G. Lefebvre, Romans et Contes gyptiens
de lpoque Pharaonique, p. 37; M. Lapidus, La Qute de lle Merveilleuse, p. 47; P. Le Guilloux, Le
Conte du Naufrag (Papyrus Ermitage 1115), p. 55; R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle
Egyptian, pp. 15, 179, 205 and 234; W. K. Simpson, The Literature of Ancient Egypt, p. 55; B. Menu,
Petite Grammaire de lgyptien Hiroglyphique lusage des dbutants, pp. 27, 28, 155, 173 and 192; R.
B. Parkinson, The Tale of Sinuhe and Other Ancient Egyptian Poems, pp. 96-97).
86
Faulkner and Menu translate it as black eye-paint, but Menu adds galena. And Lise Manniche,
on a page where she displays a photograph of a cane recipient for eye-paint with the inscription
84
125
hounds, monkeys, baboons and all sorts of quality richness. A land where
nothing lacked and all is of the best quality is a heaven. Could we equate the
island of Ka with a heavens vision? Parkinson says yes87. There is even contact
between a human and god! Obviously of the Egyptian heaven, of the rush bed,
the Sekhet Iaru (sxt iArw), Osiris kingdom centre where the blessed, governed by
ReHorakhty with the companionship of Osiris and his entourage, lived. To be
noted that the rush bed was only one of seven Duat mansions that the deceased
had to cross so as to be at last welcomed by god in person. In the remaining
six mansions of the kingdom of the dead, besides dreadful settings that had to
be cross, lived several serpents (all evil) that systematically tried to prevent the
nocturnal journey of Res boat, the demiurge, that has made a gradual synthesis
with the chthonic god Osiris88. Eternity was assured in the rush bed.
Regarding The Tale of the Two Brothers, written in the times of Sety II,
Rogrio de Sousa states the following opinion: Making use of a lot of symbolic
elements, the text seems to belong to the group of compositions created so as to
have a double meaning: beyond a literal meaning extends, through the symbols
articulation, a metaphorical meaning. It is also an excellent example to illustrate
the deceiving game, which is usual in Egyptian literature, between the literal
reality that transmits the world of appearances order, and the final reality suiting
the initiated. Actually, the symbolic elements used in the tale weave a carefully
constructed web that is at the base of detected inconsistencies or anomalies in
the tales objective sequence. It is, then, necessary to distinguish the literal reading,
with all its inconsistencies, and the metaphorical reading, articulated through
the symbols distributed along the tale, which justifies and gives meaning to the
anomalies. The inconsistencies between the several reading layers illustrate
(msdmt mAat nfrw), that is, genuine, very excellent kohl, and clarifies: Black eye paint
was usually based on galena, a dark grey ore of lead which could easily be extracted from a number of
localities in Upper Egypt between Qseir and the Red Sea as well as near Aswan. () In Roman and
Medieval times an antimony compound was used, a raw material not found in Egypt itself. In Latin,
this was called stibium, a word derived from the Egyptian mesdemet, which was a designation for eye
paint in general. () The ancient records mention imported eye paint. () The Asiatics, the people
of Naharina beyond the Euphrates and the inhabitants of distant Punt (probably in the Eritrea region)
were the suppliers to the Egyptian court. (R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, p.
118; B. Menu, Petite Grammaire de lgyptien Hiroglyphique, p. 104; L. Manniche, Egyptian Luxuries.
Fragrance, aromatherapy, and cosmetics in pharaonic times, pp. 135-137).
87
On the subject of the land of happiness called Iaa, where Amunenshi installed Sinuhe, Parkinson
says: this is an abundant paradise, described in similar terms to the island of The Shipwrecked Sailor
(R. B. Parkinson, Poetry and Culture in Middle Kingdom Egypt, p. 157).
88
See J. C. Sales, As Divindades Egpcias, p. 100.
the texts necessity to create barriers that, after all, preserve the ultimate essence
of that mystery they desired to describe. Because of this reason, it is truly an
esoteric text89. In a footnote at the same place, the author adds during the last
decades a metaphorical reading of certain Egyptian tales has been coming to be
recognized, and gives other examples: The Tale of King Neferkare and General
Sisene and The boating party from the Papyrus Westcar90. These are words that,
in our opinion, are perfectly applicable to The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor.
In fact, Parkinson is one of the Egyptologists that have, for some time now,
recognized The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailors multiplicity of possible readings,
as well as its esoteric atmosphere. He says: The multiples levels of meaning in
tales such as The Shipwrecked Sailor and Sinuhe, which are both adventures tales
and symbolic narratives, suggest that they were intended for audiences of varying
levels of sophistication. Much in the corpus, such as the use of esoteric material
in The Shipwrecked Sailor and the allusions to specifically written forms, could
only be fully appreciated by the literate elite, but this would not hamper some
level of appreciation, for example, in a hypothetical village setting91.
After presenting our interpretation of The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailors
journeys, we will, now, analyse the tales characters, which are three: the
commander of a ship just returned from Egypt, its passenger, another voyages
shipwrecked sailor, and the serpent, lord of the island of Ka. In agreement
with a geographically uncertain and mysterious location, the characters are also
not identified by name. Of the three the most rich and central is, without a
doubt, the serpent; which is not evil, since, from its haughtiness it protects and
leads the shipwrecked sailor. It both takes a neutral (feminine in Portuguese)
designation the serpent as a masculine the governor of Punt, in an
apparent duality facet, so characteristic of pharaonic culture. In general, also for
the ancient Egyptians, the serpent was an animal symbolizing immortality, since
it not only hides in underground shelters from where it emerges from time to
time, as it seems to be reborn after each skin change.
First of all its shape: It measured thirty cubits and its beard was over two
cubits long. Its body was covered in gold, and its eyebrows were of real lapis
lazuli (6466). Not only is the serpent shown as a god, visible in its features, the
R. Sousa, Iniciao e Mistrio no Antigo Egipto, pp. 70-71.
Idem, p. 70, nt. 113.
91
R. B. Parkinson, Poetry and Culture in Middle Kingdom Egypt, pp. 80-81.
89
90
127
beard, the gold (colour of the sun and the gods) and the lapis lazuli (the colour
of the celestial firmament), without us having any indication that its head was
a human head92; also the shipwrecked sailor takes on a manner of respect and
devotion like those towards the gods, specially the pharaoh: while I remained
over my belly before it (6768). Is it possible to determine which god this was?
Let us see amongst the main Egyptian gods who could take the form of a serpent,
and/or might have other implicit or contextual characteristics. Not the Pharaoh.
Also, we cannot that into account neither Sokar nor Sobek. The first was
represented as a hawk and the second as a crocodile. But in regard to these two
gods we should clarify the following: if it is inexistent Sokars intromission in
The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor, regarding Sobek it might be deliberate. Sokar
is never referred in the text or implied, and the sand bank issue we brought
forth in this studys first part is not sufficient to consider him. But the case of
the use of the iti variant engraved with two characters G. I3 might have been a
symbolic or magical application, so common in ancient Egyptian writing.
It couldnt also be Apophis. Even if he was usually a serpent, not only
has he never appeared with a god configuration, as he was an evil entity, the
personification of darkness and evil, permanent, systematic and lethal adversary
of Re, and his solar boat, in his nocturnal journey. The Egyptians believed the
storms to be isolated and passing victories of the serpent Apophis. In the same
way it couldnt be all those other evil serpents that would come to Re during
his journey through Duat, like, for instances, the 6th districts AmAkhu, the
devourer of spirits.
It also doesnt appear to be Renenutet, the harvests cobragoddess. Even if
she had a feminine anthropomorphic representation with an iaret (uraeus in its
Latinized version) cobra head, she could be represented simply as a sacred serpent.
But we are not in a lady of the grain or lady of the harvest appropriated
context, even if we could conceive being faced with The feeder or The serpent
that feeds, given she safeguarded the childrens breastfeeding or, in another
vision, she took the role of a Theban necropolis goddess and breastfed the souls
of the dead. But that would only happen in the New Kingdom.
Meretseger (or Meretseguer) was likewise a cobragoddess. She who loves
silence could be represented as a woman with a cobra head, as an iaret serpent
with woman head or as a three headed snake. She could also appear as a venomous
H. Goedicke, The Snake in the Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, GM 39 (1980), 27-28.
92
scorpion with a woman head. The Theban necropolis protector, she inhabited the
escarpment over the Valley of the Kings. She was a quite susceptible and irritable
goddess, forcing all those that worked in the region to maintain a high respect and
consideration for her. To those who made false oaths, or other crimes, she hunted
and punished them either with blindness or her poison, even killing them. It was
a concept created in the light of what to the necropolis workers was the reality
of serpents and scorpions. But Meretseger had another facet: she was benevolent,
fair and, even, beneficial for her devotees, to whom she gave efficient protection
against other serpents. More than Renenutet, this goddess was excessively linked
with the Theban necropolis and was in focus especially in the New Kingdom.
Wadjet was an Egypts, and particularly the monarchy, tutelary goddess with a
cobragoddess shape. Everything else makes her an implausible possibility. Mostly
she was related with Lower Egypt: she was worshiped in Buto (Per Wadjit) in
the Delta, the name means the truth or the coloured papyrus, references to
the cobras and the Delta papyrus colour, which she created; she was the lady
of the northern sky, Nekhbets counterweight, Upper Egypts white vulture. She
was connected to an island, but located in the Delta, Khemmis floating island,
where Horus would have been born. At times she would encircle Res solar disk,
becoming his protector and killing all who tried to stop his nocturnal journey,
the hostile serpents in particular.
Wadj Wer would be suitable but he never took a serpents shape. The
Great Green, was always depicted in androgynous form, with large breasts and
belly, and a body full of water signs. He was a fertility and fecundity god easily
mistaken with the god Hapy.
Hapy, the divinized Niles flood, was also a good possibility, since he would
reveal the Egyptians dependence of the Nile, and, above all, their dependence
of the rivers yearly inundation. His representation was similar to that of the
previous god: large pending breasts and ample sagging belly, as if having given
birth, androgynous form, he was considered the father of the gods because
all, gods and men, were his dependent: he alone controlled the growth of all
nourishment. His hymn says that he was in the waters, that he fed Egypt and
made each one live from his ka. It also says he was everyones joy when he emerged
from his cave: inundation day. He was the only fertility god that had independent
existence, since he had created himself and sustained everything and everyone.
He was associated with Osiris, also a vegetation and rebirth god, which was the
Niles fertilizing force, whose waters were personified by Hapy. His worshipers
129
placed him at the same level as Re, or even above him. Worshiped throughout all
Egypt it was said he lived in the island of Biga, where he had his main sanctuary
by the first cataract. As a matter of fact, this is where we can find Hapy squatted
in his cave, making water gush from two jugs hes holding with his hands, in an
interesting representation of the Niles fountains. What is curious is the fact that
its a snake drawn circularly around Hapy which represents this shelter. Anyway,
Hapy was always represented either in a similar way as Wadj Wer, with a body
full of water signs, or with green or blue colour, fertilitys colours.
Khnum should be close to where the shipwreck would have happened,
since he was Elephantines main god. Related to south Egypt and Nubia he was
the lord of the cataracts, which he watched after so that the Niles water was
equitably distributed by Upper and Lower Egypt during good inundations. He
was never a serpent, nor was connected with one. He was the ramgod with long
curved horns, linked to the Niles and even the humanspecies fertility. He was
a demiurge, a creator of gods and men from clay, and of Egypt.
Osiris, The Powerful, lord of Duat, was in its origin an agricultural worlds
god, connected to natures fertility and fecundity. He was also a symbol of the Nile,
providing the natural equilibrium of natures cycle. He even represented solar light
that vanished everyday to be reborn in the following, allowing lifes regeneration.
Represented by green or black colour, he was the fields humbleness which allowed
seeds to grow. First born son of Geb and Nut, he inherited a universal kingdom, Egypt,
which he handed over to the pharaohs that came afterwards. The treason of Seth,
his brother, and 72 other conspirators, besides promoting a number of mythological
developments, led Osiris, magically vivified, to become lord of the kingdom of the
dead, a funerary god of resurrection and life beyond death. The lord of eternity was
the supreme judge of the dead. Osiris had the deities fake beard in his mummiform
representation, swathed in white linen and with a green or black face. When united
with Re he was still represented as a swathed body, but with a rams head and horns,
and a solar disk over them. There is a chthonic Heliopolitan god Sata (sAtA), Son
of the Earth, whose representation shows a cobra with human legs and feet, which
became the personification of one of Osiris epithets, and which was a protective
god of his kingdom, participating in the suns protection throughout his nocturnal
journey. It doesnt seem to us enough relation to justify the tale93.
One of Osiris epithets was Wennefer, Who which is always happy, from where probably came the Portuguese
name Onofre (see, for instance, L. M. Arajo, Osris, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 651-652).
93
Re, lord of the world, universal creator, source of all life, was master of multiple
forms. Most Egyptian gods were syncretic with him. His main representation
was of a man with a human head or a falcon head with a solar disk and an iaret
serpent over it. It was his representation as ReHorakhty. He could emerge with
a real childs look from a primordial lotus flower. His appearance as Efu Re, the
sacred ram in the west, was usually reserved to his nocturnal journey in his solar
boat. He was the dead Sun, a mummy form with a rams head topped by the
solar disk. Re personified the midday Sun, when it is at its zenith. But he could
appear as a beetle, or with human body and beetle head, being named Khepri,
the rising Sun. Or as Atum, whose main representation was an anthropomorphic
figure of a king with a fake beard which symbolized the setting Sun. Protector
of humanity, especially of the pharaohs, Re didnt live on earth. He was born in
the oriental horizon, in his diurnal boat, the Mandjet, with which he travelled
the sky and, after setting westward, travelled the underworld, the Duat, in his
nocturnal boat, the Mesektet. At first he also ruled the underworld, but quickly
did he transfer this governance to Osiris, with whom a gradual synthesis came to
be. Every morning he reappeared once again in the east and repeated the never
ending solar cycle. He could embody a falcon, a lion, a cat, a Meruer bull and a
Benu bird, but never a serpent. The only serpents he came across with was iaret,
which in his head spat fire and destroyed his enemies, and Apophis and all the
other evil serpents that tried to prevent his rebirth each morning.
Atum, primitive lord of Heliopolis, in the Lower Egypt, was a predynastic
solar god. In his origins a chthonic deity, he was connected to the Sun embodying
its declining facet, as weve seen. At first his cult was localized in the north, it
spread throughout all Egypt, as happened with Re. Even if Res cult overcame his
own, his was never eradicated and Atum always kept his precedence as demiurge
god, which in his most powerful expression emerged from Nun, the primeval
chaos, before anything had been created. And it was by masturbation, to some, by
spiting, to others, that he began Heliopolis divine Ennead, originating Shu and
Tefnut, which would generate Nut and Geb, who created Osiris, Seth, Isis and
Nephthys. He even took on a privilege position that allowed him to maintain all
his prerogatives and strengthen them by assuming the syncretic form AtumRe,
which can also appear as ReAtum, not meaning this any change any of their
prerogatives. His main representation was of a king with fake beard wearing a
double crown (pasekhemti), symbolic union of Upper and Lower Egypt. Indeed,
as a demiurge, he is the pharaohs powers last support. He that exists due to
131
himself alone, was the founder of the universes divine order giving Osiris his
Universal domination, which this one would later share with Re, as seen above.
The serpent was one of his sacred animals. The Ichneumon94, the lion, the
leopard, the bull and the ram, because he was the solar god of the kingdom of
the dead, were Atums other sacred animals95.
Given the above, we are inclined to believe the serpent to be an AtumRes
expression, a demiurgic deity, simultaneously chthonic and solar, ruling both the
kingdom of the living and that of the dead. He tells his story to the sailor: In
total we were 75 serpents, ... And I will not forget to mention a little daughter
I had obtained through prayer (127129). In Egyptian texts we can find wide
groups of gods, the biggest being coincident with the numbers 21 and 42. Seths
conspirators, with Seth and Osiris, make only 74, as weve seen. Vikentiev even
suggested that the number might be wrong, that it had been a scribes lapsus
mani, but the number he was pending to was another. To him, there were
originally 77 serpents, because the 77 suited him due to a comparison with
the Arab tale Yamlika96.
But, in fact, there exists a case in Egyptian mythology in which the number
75 is relevant: in The Litany of Re, also known as The Litany of the Sun, but
which had the original name of Book of Praying to Re in the West, Praying to
the United One in the West. It is a New Kingdoms funerary text reserved to the
pharaohs and the more privileged elite. To be used by the deceased in the other
world, it was written at the entrance of the tombs interior, especially in those
of Setys I times. It was composed of two parts: a number of orations in which
the Pharaoh assumed parts of nature and of the gods, particularly the Sun god;
another, preceding the first, which invoked the Sun in 75 different ways. The
74 dead could have been the remaining visions of Re, being the survivor the
syncretic form ReAtum. If here rests the origin of the island of Kas group of
serpents, then this text was already known in the Middle Kingdom. Indeed,
European, African and Asian mongoose treasured by ancient Egyptians because it was considered a
great crocodile eggs eater and because it was a great serpent fighter. Hence also the names: Egypts rat
or Pharaohs rat.
95
See all deities mentioned in the paragraphs above in J. C. Sales, As Divindades Egpcias, pp. 97-103;
121-134; 198-202; 292-300; 312-317; 318; 327-329; 362-363; 399-402; for Atum see also L. M.
Arajo, Atum, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 125-126; for Sata see R. S. Antelme and S. Rossini,
Dictionnaire illustr des dieux de lgypte, pp. 112-113.
96
V. Vikentiev, Voyage vers lIle Lointaine, p. 55.
94
Baines, Assmann and Wente believe that the The Litanies of Re was written in
the Middle Kingdom, but its text was already previously known97.
On the other hand, of all the gods only one stands out, and even then,
unnamed. The Heliopolitan theology thought as daughter of Re, or of Atum,
the goddess Maat: either Re or Atum were life, and Maat was its nourishment
and essence, representing balance, truth, order, justice and cosmic social and
individual rectitude. She was the one that aided Osiris weighing the hearts in
his court. Further on, in this court, there was the Hall of the two Maat where
all was decided for the dead. As Thoths wife, she accompanied him and Re, in
the solar boat Mesektet, as symbol of the order that prevented the return of the
chaos prior to creation. At least until the end of the Middle Kingdom, Maat
was taken as Egypts civilization pillar, since she represented its equilibrium. This
was probably the much cried serpents little daughter, obtained by means of an
act of faith or magic, given that she could also be a Res expression: Re lives in
Maat or Maat lives of Re, that is, Maat was the nourishment, Res essence.
She was his vital breath being in the nostrils of Re, coming to the point of
being identified as the Eye of Re98.
But afterwards he says that a star fell and all these gods died charred; he
escaped because he wasnt with them then. The author, or at least the tales
mentor, might have observed, or heard about, some meteorites fall, registering
in this way his astronomical observation. But there is a quite more meaningful
question here: which episode is this in which all deities died and lived only the
demiurge? It seems to be a reference to the end of cosmos, which we know from
chapter 175 of the Book of the Dead. It is a pray directed at several gods. In
the one in which the diseased directs himself to Atum, he talk about the island
of Embrace, which is Egypt, where hell see Osiris. When he asks him how long
he must live, Atum answers: You are destined to millions and millions of years,
millions of years of life time. But I, I shall destroy all I have created; this country
shall return to the condition of Nun, the primordial inundation condition, like its
first condition. I am what shall remain, with Osiris, when I transform myself into
a serpent again, that men cannot know, that the gods cannot see. What is good
is what I have done for Osiris, more than (for) all gods! I gave him the desert
area (the necropolis), and his son as heir to the island of Embrace; I prepared
J. Baines, Interpreting the Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, p. 63.
See J. C. Sales, As Divindades Egpcias, pp. 405-414.
97
98
133
his place in the boat of millions, and Horus is established on his throne to
take care of his works99. Being this serpent creator of everything, it was natural
he would be also be governor of Punt and lord of all existing products within
it, not being worth for the shipwrecked sailor to offer him anything!
Also in formula 1130 of the Coffin Texts, we have an account of the end
of the cosmos. The creation process gave rise to the separation between Nun,
the primordial waters which still existed aside from creation to allow the process
to be restarted, and what the demiurge created. But in the neverending battle
between good and evil everything was always at risk of returning to nonexistence.
Formula 1130 (words spoken by him whose names are secret, a ReAtums,
the god creator, speech after saying he was the creator of everything (of the four
winds, the inundation, mankind, the gods, the snakes ReAtum even says:
I possess life, because I am its lord), due to mankinds wrong behaviour he
argues for a return to nothing (I forbade them to do wrong, but their hearts
disobeyed what I had said): what was created shall disappear: mounds will be
towns (since is on top of them constructions are made); towns will be mounds:
(when the constructions collapse); and as for anyone who knows this spell he
will be like Re in the sky and Osiris in the underworld, with whom he comes
together by the fire caused destruction, ReAtum being even called Lord of fire.
After millions of years chaos will return. Only the primordial gods ReAtum
and Osiris shall live forever united in space and time100. It was by fire that the
74 serpents companions vanished and it was by fire that the serpent compelled
the shipwrecked sailor into telling her who had taken him to the island: I will
make you remember by reducing you to ashes and making you invisible! (7273).
The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailors part weve marked with the letter d, where
divine revelation happens, can sustain a number of allusions to esoteric knowledge:
the serpent is a metaphor of the creator, there is Res 74 forms reference, Maat
is the demiurges daughter, and we have the end of the world myth101. This was
knowledge that would be at most Egyptians hand and that only the initiated
into certain practices related to this knowledge could fully understand.
Who is the shipwrecked sailor then? He had to die in his town, in his land,
given only then could be entitled eternity, not forgetting the funerary cults
P. Barguet, Le Livre des Morts des Anciens Egyptiens, pp. 261.
R. O. Faulkner (ed.), The Ancient Egyptian Coffin Texts. Spell 1-1185 and Indexes, III, pp. 167-169.
101
R. B. Parkinson, Poetry and Culture in Middle Kingdom Egypt, p. 139; see. J. Baines, Interpreting the
Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, pp. 62-63.
99
100
135
appeals to balance, and proceeds with Speak to the king with all candour/and
answer without stammering (1517) because A mans mouth can save him,/his
speech can make one forgive him (1719). The sapiental tone becomes ideology
and we are faced with the social orders general ideal which was built on top of
selfregulation principles that would prize the obedient and punish transgressors;
since social peace was the reward for those who respected the established order
and obeyed the rules of the institution that regulated them: maat, literally that
which guides111. The reference to a little daughter obtained obtained through
prayer and, who the serpent did not forget to mention to the shipwrecked sailor,
is not a coincidence: this tale has in itself, like in the The Tale of the Eloquent
Peasant, even if in a weaker and unstructured way, part of the maatic ideology.
Regulated by maat, order and harmony were fundamental traits of Egyptian
society. Since the 5th Dynasty biographies witness maats central role in their
civilization. At first it was from the countrys central entity the king that
emanated all order to action which only ceased with his acknowledgement. The
pharaoh was the State. For this reason, if in the Old Kingdom the obedience
and hierarchic respect that created order and social harmony began and ended
in the Sovereign, then he was maats incarnation and institutionalization, being
its realization the kings own will: maat became an Egyptian States determinant
element. And when this began to be in crisis for the first time, the need arose to
define maats nature, because what had, until then, seemed like a natural evidence
ceased to seem so. Therefore, if it was not the kings will, it was necessary to
approach the problem and build it a coherent ideological body that, besides
all else, kept the idea of a monarchic, centralized and hierarchical State. And
it was this need that sprout speeches regarding maat. In historical terms, the
first moment in which order and harmony appeared more shaken was the Old
Kingdoms disintegration and collapse. The events that took place between the
Old and the Middle Kingdoms the First Intermediate Period created the ideal
moment of reflection; and this reflection, which coincided with the discovery
of role of the heart (ib) and character (qd) in mens interior construction,
constituted the intellectual ground that thought and conceptualized maat in
J.-M. Kruchten, Law, in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, 2, p. 277. The word mAat has
the same radical than the verb mAa (guide, direct), distinguishing itself from this by the feminines
imposition and specific determiners use (R. O. Faulkner, A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, pp.
101 and 102).
111
137
both by men, that in their daily lives lived of words themselves, as in the afterlife,
since those who lived in the kingdom of Osiris lived from Res words. This way
maat was the good word, the invigorating word, the solidarity showing and
integrating speech in which and by which all should live. Given this, Assmann
states that man, to live from what he said according to the integrating quality
of his words, relied on a good listening116.
With the statement Act according to your wish (1920), which was
preceded by Wash yourself! Pour water over your fingers/and you may reply
when addressed (1315), it was tried to present a good character, that ought
to be immutable and that, for those who possessed it, allowed to maintain the
principle of reciprocity, making such immutability retributions basic rule,
maats central aspect117. Any action, direct (the journeys failure) or indirect
(that commanders way of presenting himself ), should instil an answer. Both the
journeys failure seemed to demand a punishment, as the commanders way of
presenting himself demanded a close examination. It is the theory of action, a
constant interconnection of cause (action)/effect (reaction), where social memory
took on a relevant role. It is not an automatic mechanism, being necessary to
keep the constant game of actions (past)/reactions (present), where (yesterday)
by being todays nourishment made the present (the reaction) dependent of the
past (the action). If someone, for any reason, did not react, he was forgetting the
yesterday and putting into question communications interconnection. So, not
to interrupt the actions mechanism creating an existence in an irresponsible
constant today which motivated social disorganization, the king had to answer
to the commander so as to unite reaction to action, interconnecting action in
times continuity. It was to become aware that what was made or said yesterday
remained valid today, allowing confidence and success to be possible. And this
116
117
139
represented order which, far from being an automatism, was a social memorys
function118.
Later, in the end, the commander says: Do not pretend to be excellent,
my friend! Who shall give water to the bird at dawn so it can be slaughtered
by morning? (183187). This is the only line of the commander where it is
shown that he already felt condemned by the outcome of a journey that mustnt
have had the desired outcome. Here also the sapiential tone is kept. With this
last proverb he seems to be trying to tell the shipwrecked sailor that it was
worthless trying to cheer him up with his account, given that, he would, in any
circumstance, soon be punished119. Because the colophon follows it, it wouldnt
be at the end that this questions answer would be. Like it happens with other
tales, it is likely that there really was an introduction where the participants and
the tales problematic could be presented.
This sapiential aspect of the tales end had already been heard two phrases
previously when the shipwrecked sailor said: See, it is good to listen to people!
(182). It is the repetition of one of the initial ideas, the importance listening
had to Egyptians: the wise listened before talking and the careless talked before
listening! Moreover, as Nunes Carreira states, in this tale the sapiential tones
are undeniable: the plea to selfrestraint and the correct use of speech, the
confrontation with a god, the mastering of the word120. But this tales richness
goes beyond its time and, discreetly, it inserts a new conception of god and cult,
which went on developing since the First Intermediate Periods events. After, the
shipwrecked sailor, as if in gratitude, says he shall talk of him to his sovereign
and shall make a number of rich offerings. The serpentgod121, even if without
J. Assmann, Mat, lgypte Pharaonique et lide de justice sociale, pp. 37-42.
It does not seem to us to be more than this and, given this, we do not share Loprienos idea, who sees
here a real death sentence (A. Loprieno, The Sign of Literature in the Shipwrecked Sailor, p. 216).
120
J. N. Carreira, Literatura do Antigo Egipto, p. 112.
121
mi irrt n nTr mrr rmT m tA wA n rx sw rmT. It doesnt matter if we chose men or man-kind, we
translate this moment by: as we ought to do for a god that loves mankind, in a far away country
which mankind does not known (147-148). Loprieno raises here a translation problem by saying that
grammatically it is possible to translate this passage either as a god who loves mankind or a god
whom mankind loves. But we cannot chain ourselves only to the co-text, that is, to that which exists
from a linguistic point of view in the text aiding in the understanding of a sentence. We also have to
take into consideration the context, that is, that which existing in reaction to the subject situates the
sentence, without having anything to do with linguistics. If it is a far away country which mankind
does not known, how could mankind know that there existed a god? And how could they love a god
whose existence they did not know? The first translation makes much more sense: the shipwrecked
sailor is in a faraway, and unknown to mankind, country where he found a deity that helps and protects
118
119
explicitly refusing them, tells him: Have my name be good in your city! Look,
it is (all) I ask you do for me! (159160). It is the appearance of personal
piety, the Middle Kingdoms countercurrent where it is transferred to God the
loyalty demands due to the pharaoh (Loyalist Instructions) and Gods proximity
is expressed in the appearance of an anonymous god to a shipwrecked sailor lost
in a deserted island (The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor) and in the conduct and
protection of an exile in Asia by a gods plan (Sinuhe)122.
Lets look into another question. If we desire a graphic representation of
this interconnection of stories, it doesnt seem to us that it is a linear continuum
from a to d and returning to a 123, even if Kurths ladder representation (
)124
might mean that the inferior levels and inside the superior ones, but in concentric
circles, keeping the same structure from a to a; that is, the text was structured
so as to involve a tale inside another tale, which are, in their turn, involved by a
third tale. In fact, we recall the geometrical image advanced by Assmann to the
justification of the righteous of voice meaning, maakheru (mAaxrw), which
develops in the human realm in three concentric circular fields125. Here, even if
the subject might also be death, this is the only affinity with that image. Some
will say that it is just a matter of form, but, in fact, it is not quite so. They are
not interconnections of stories, that is, a group of stories that come together one
after the other to create a single story126, but stories that exist inside one another.
him. Because of this reason it is a god that loves mankind worthy of the biggest and best possible
offerings. Mankinds ignorance of him is also proved, in a way, by the gods request to the shipwrecked
sailor in 159-160 (A. Loprieno, The Sign of Literature in the Shipwrecked Sailor, p. 216).
122
J. N. Carreira, Piedade pessoal, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 684-685.
123
M. A. Valdez, Trs personagens procura de intrprete, p. 111.
124
D. Kurth, Zur Interpretation der Geschichte des Schiffbrchigen, p. 176.
125
The expression righteous of voice, or justified, was an epithet that always accompanied dead kings
after they reached passing through Osiris court and reached eternity, which happened after their
declaration of innocence, kheru (xrw), had been accepted as correct, maa (mAa). Assmanns geometrical
image proposals explanation: The most interior and smallest circle is earthly life, where justification is
fundamentally dependent on social solidarity so that mens happiness might be achieved. The second,
which envelops the previous one, is survival after death but prior to the reaching of eternity, and it
holds those that escaped the first judgment. The judgments authority is still society, being society that
shall permit or not the posthumous survival on earth. The widest of all is that of afterlife immortality,
where the deceased will preserve all his identity and will live transformed into a living god. None of
these layers undermines the others, developing amongst them the principle of continuity and all of
them being dependent of the same maat, which act always with the same rules over them (J. Assmann,
Mat, lgypte Pharaonique et lide de justice sociale, pp. 92-93).
126
D. Kurth, Zur Interpretation der Geschichte des Schiffbrchigen, p. 176.
141
a-a
b-b
c-c
d
127
passage, of journey, constructing the parallelism between the journey of a lie and
that of any Egyptians life, which is stretched beyond death. Probably preceding
The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant, the real treatise about Maat, as Assmann128
called it, in The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor we might be standing before a first
approach to this theme. More: We might be standing before a deceaseds journey
towards the other world, Osiris world. The other world, a kingdom of magic
ruled by Osiris, where the deceased, after acceptance, moved around with the
aid of the Book of the Dead (rw nw prt m hru, lit.: speeches to exit to the
light), Duat was an horrifying, sinister and unfriendly region, through which
the deceased could only move about if guided by some benevolent spirit, that,
with the correct formulas help, kept evil deities and demons away. This allegory
to the Suns passing through the underworld between sunset and daybreak had
only one desirable region: the Sekhethetep (sxt Htp), the Fields of Peace or the
Elysian Fields (as the Greeks will name it), where Sekhet Iaru was located, the
Field of Reeds or the Reed Bed, governed by ReHorakhty and local residence to
Osiris and his entourage. To cross it was necessary to overcome the seven halls,
each safeguarded by three deities (keeper, guard and announcer), that should
be summoned by their respective names. The Reed Bed itself was divided into
fifteen regions, each presided by a god. And with the exception of Sekhet Iaru,
all had an evil element for the deceased: either they were fire regions, or home for
spirits that ate their shadows, or dreadful serpents like Satitemuy, or other evils.
The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor is not the recording of a shipwrecked sailors
individual behaviour as was the case of Rensi in The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant (Say
maat. Do maat she is great. She is effective. She is lasting. She rules in your behalf.
She gives credibility. She leads to the state of blessedness, B1 351353)129, but it is
registering a deceaseds voyage. The presentation of deaths dreadful face is ascribed here
to a number of natural calamities (storms, meteorites fallings, etc.) which, probably
latter on, were replaced by evil deities, like the ones we find in The Tale of the Eloquent
Peasant; for instance, Sekhmet, lady of pestilence that with her messengers help
spreads miasmas, plagues and illness, and KhentyKhety, the dreadful crocodilegod
that had at his disposal the messengers, evil entities ready to spread evil.
The ideas of immortality and eternity might be underlying this voyage. On one
hand mens finitude, natural signification, his separation from the terrestrial world,
J. Assmann, Mat, lgypte Pharaonique et lide de justice sociale, p. 36.
See footnote 108.
128
129
143
is clearly presented: rich or poor, all shall reach it. But, underlying remains another
social revelation: mens distinction in eternity, the survivor against the common
deceased, the sailors. The first, the rich, had a tomb with mostly philanthropic (the
funerary steles where all his actions of charity were described: feeding the hungry,
giving water to the thirsty, giving clothing to the naked, etc.) inscription and
possessions to care for his maintenance and mummification, as a way of perpetuating
along the times his existence through social memory; the second, the poor, were
buried in the deserts sand without their bodies being mummified and devoid of
any attention, becoming forgotten little after their death, this way, deprived of
social memory, they were prevented from reaching eternity, in an attitude that
called into being the idea of immortality, the ground stone of Egyptian thought. It
also proves that even the Egyptians were aware that this privilege was only granted
to the rich and powerful; first merely at the godkings reach, and later, also,
accessible to his relatives and high dignitaries, to whom the democratization of
the First Intermediate Period of gave similar treatment.
Egyptians, by believing in the existence of life after death, by believing in
the souls immortality, conceived eternal life, which made each person occupy
part of his earthly existence preparing his life in Duat, Osiris kingdom. From
the bodys preservation, for the realization of ka (which would allow bas return),
and steles evoking the deceaseds qualities, all was made to keep life in the
afterlife. It wasnt a dark and morbid conception, but a joyful one, impregnated
with happiness, because if the funeral rituals were conveniently long all of
afterlifes dangers would be removed and eternity lived in complete happiness
in Osiris company. It is clear that immortality was only at the pharaohs, and
those most powerful, reach, since the expenses with the tombs construction, kas
realization, mummification and the maintenance of funeral rituals, put aside from
such a reality the majority of the Egyptian population, which saw themselves
in the contingency of being simply buried in the ground, breaking the bodys
incorruptibility. Besides this, knowledge restricted the access to magical texts; not
only due to lack of understanding but, even, because some initiating practices
were only possible after certain levels of knowledge. It is not by chance that in
the Coffin Texts and in the Book of the Dead there are formulas which start
with: Regarding the man that knows these magical words130.
130
J. Baines, Restricted Knowledge, Hierarchy, and Decorum: Modern Perceptions and Ancient Institutions,
p. 14.
The trials of the dead, that is, the court of Osiris and its functioning were
magicalfunerary conceptions where actions developed through magical practices.
By the hand of Anubis or Maat the deceased was presented to trial, where his
heart, which represented his soul, would be faced with justice and truth, that is,
Maat, symbolized by an ostrich feather. To attain immortality equilibrium of the
scales plates was the best outcome. For such, the deceased recited the negative
confession, enunciating a group of moral interdictions as negative enunciations
in a declaration of innocence. Action belonged to isefet, but each spoken phrase
was a step towards Maat. Duly organized, it followed a preestablished order,
because precision was fundamental for Maat to act. There several phrases
concerning solidarity were included, be it active (do maat) as, for instance, I
wasnt greedy, be it communicative (say maat), of the kind I didnt slander a
servant to his superior. This statement addressed infinitude of subjects, of which
stood out personal, professional and religious questions, having the magical
function of obtaining from Osiris the authorization to enter his kingdom. The
trial of Osiris worked, then, as an initiating ritual in which the deceased, as he
was guided through the hall of the two Maat131 until the kingdom of the dead,
In late 18th and early 19th Dynasties papyri which contain funerary beliefs of Egyptians magical
religious character and which vulgarly are denominated by us as Book of the Dead, the chapters that
present the enchantments (the formulas) are preceded of two or more hymns and a scene of trial. In
the Papyrus of Ani, a papyrus in Egyptian hieroglyphs which belonged to a Theban noble from the New
Kingdom, the most beautiful and well preserved of which are known, there is in plate 1 an Hymn to
Khepri, followed by a Hymn to Osiris in plate 2. In the plates 3 e 4 is presented a great scene of trial in
a marvellous illumination, in fact, as all in this papyrus. This scene matches chapter 30b chapter not
to allow the heart of Ani create opposition against him in the dominium of the gods and the scene
of trial belongs to chapter 125, organized in three parts: introduction, read when arriving at hall of the
two Maat, negative confession, made before the gods that were in the hall, and a final text to be recited
to the gods when the deceased arrived at the inferior world. In the trials initial scene Isis and Nephthys
stand, behind Osiris, but the strong presence of the remaining deities, particularly Osiris, Horus, Thoth
and Anubis, grants them a secondary position. However, these two gods, taking Maats attributes, had
a fundamental role in the trial. It was in the hall of the two Maat, which were Isis and Nephthys as
symbols of justice and truth, which the deceased gave his negative confession to each of the 42 gods
either seated or standing. According to the papyrus, this halls arrangement varied. In the Papyrus of Ani
(plates 31 e 32) appears a hall which is displayed at length with 42 gods seated at the middle. On top
of each ones head the deceaseds address is inscribed and on the bottom the negative declaration. At
each of the halls extremities is seen half of a two doorjambs door which make it a passage hall, and, on
the ceiling, a cornice where alternate the iaret, with an ostrich feather, in a mixture of protective divine
symbols (the protective cobra, royal and divine symbol, to push away enemies and dangers), and Maats
feathers to make appeal to truth and justice. At the cornices centre is a representation of the god Heh
(HH) that, with a right hand over Horus eye (o uDAt, the holy eye, the complete eye, Old Egypts most
powerful symbol, the left eye of Horus torn off by Seth and recovered by Thoth) and the left one over
a lagoon (the primordial waters), symbolizing the millions of years, eternity, which was desired to the
131
145
134
147
On the other hand, recalling Rogrio Sousas words, with which we concluded
this studys first part, and other references we called this tale esoteric, but it can
also be that instead of having been created for a more widespread transmission, it
could have been of a more restricted and closed circulation, being accessible only
to a minority initiated in the funerary practices. Not being a text of religious or
liturgical character but, without a doubt, being pervaded by theodicy arguments,
it might have been used in the ritualists initial education, firstly in oral tradition
and, afterwards, in written form. A kind of parable, a figurative narrative where,
by means of comparison, the unity of all elements invoked another reality where
real and fantastic got mixed up, to defend and justify the belief in the demiurges
omnipotence and supreme kindness before the presence of evil and those who
doubted it. An instrument of the priestly class, or merely of part of it, of those
that had as a goal the maintenance of the cult of the dead, the sem (sm) or setem
(stm), the hemka (HmkA), the kherihebet (XryHbt) and the ut (wt)priests135, in
a temple, or in more than one, allowing the priests to understand that all their
effort had the objective of overcoming and helping the deceased overcome all
the adversities that might prevent him from reaching eternity. In favour of this
hypothesis is the fact that only one copy of this text is known, one whose origin
is unknown; and appearing only in one ramesside ostracon which has a reference
to him, which is not even an exact quotation. We must emphasize that this is
not a conclusive statement since that happens with other texts.
But, above all, it is in favour of this idea the fact that, seemingly, a number
of issues that seem to have been inspired in the sacred texts are present in this
one. Texts which even points to Heliopolis, one of the Pharaohs Egypts most
important and ancient cultural centres, where the Sun, in all its manifold
manifestations, was worshiped, incarnating in the Egyptian Fenix, the Benu
bird, when the Sun became Atum, and was considered its ba. The nowadays
extinct greyish bird was similar to a heron of the Ardea cinerea or Ardea purpurea
kind, which in the pharaoh times had the characteristic of appearing with the
inundations first waters, going disappearing from Egypts skies afterwards and
only returning the following year with the new inundation, something that the
Egyptians found somewhat mysterious. Being good observers of nature, from
this birds cycle, the Egyptians created a myth related to Re. The Benu bird
would have landed in the Benben stone, Primordial god Atums manifestation,
L. M. Arajo, O Clero do Deus Amon no Antigo Egipto, pp. 195, 202205.
135
when he rose from the first waters of Nun, the aqueous chaos, or, according to
another interpretation, the primordial hill where he first appeared136, according
to the idea that it had put an egg there from where the Sun, an incandescent
circle, was born.
Its name derives from the verb ueben (wbn) which means shine or rise,
relating its shine and rise to the idea of rebirth, to which it wasnt certainly
strange the fact that it was a migrating bird, given that for Egyptians its seasonal
reappearance was a sign of renovation, of rebirth at each migration cycle. It was
this idea essentially that the Greeks captured and applied to the myth of the
Fenix, having both birds a very similar rebirth. After the Middle Kingdom it
was also mainly due to this idea that it became a manifestation of Osiris ba,
and, as a consequence, of the deceased themselves. Precisely that was record in
the New Kingdom in the Book of the Dead, where the formula 83 is entitled
Formula to take the aspect of a Benu bird; and in the formula 84 entitled
Formula to take the aspect of a heron137. In formula 13 the deceased enters
into the west as a falcon and there is reborn as Benu, that is, as a resuscitated
Osiris. The formula is named Formula to enter into the west and leave, and
the deceased says: All belongs to me (because) all was given unto me. I entered
(into the west) as a falcon, I left as a Benu. Morning star open unto me the path
so that I enter peacefully into the Beautiful West!138.
The actual fusion with Osiris appears in formula 17, which has the extensive
title of Here begin the transfigurations and glorifications of the exit from the
inferior world of the dead and the return to it; entrance of a blessed one into
the Beautiful West; exit to the light of all form of existence desired; play senet
seated in the room; and of the exiting as living soul. Amongst the several forms
the deceased will assume, we find: who, then, is this? It is Osiris. [Another
version:] its name is glory of Re, it is Res soul, with whom he copulates. I am
Benu that is in Heliopolis, the one which considers (all) that exists and all that
will exist. Who, then, is this? It is Osiris; its corpse and its filth139. Finally, it
L. M. Arajo, Benben, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 147148.
E. Castel, Egipto. Signos y smbolos de lo sagrado, p. 80; P. Barguet, Le Livre des Morts des Anciens
Egyptiens, p. 44.
138
E. Castel, Egipto. Signos y smbolos de lo sagrado, p. 80; P. Barguet, Le Livre des Morts des Anciens
Egyptiens, pp. 121122. 44; R. O. Faulkner, O. Goelet and C. Andrews, The Egyptian Book of The
Dead. The Book of Going Forth by Day, p. 101.
139
E. Castel, Egipto. Signos y smbolos de lo sagrado, p. 80; P. Barguet, Le Livre des Morts des Anciens Egyptiens,
pp. 5758; E. A. W. Budge, O Livro Egpcio dos Mortos, pp. 186187.
136
137
149
151
J. Padr, Hermpolis Magna, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, p. 417; see also J. Sales, Hermetismo,
Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 416-417.
148
E. Hornung, Lgypte sotrique, pp. 1516.
149
L. M. Arajo, Livro dos Dois Caminhos, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, p. 513.
150
J. C. Sales, Tot, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 830832.
147
and, we recall, it him that in judge role was the laws keeper in The Tale of the
Eloquent Peasant151.
According to our belief, all this seems to have been at the heart of The
Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailors creation, which, as weve said, might have been
a priest educational instrument. And, if we had to bet on a temple where it
could have been born and used, looking at the Middle Kingdom sarcophagus
concentration that presents the Book of Two Ways in the referred Deir elBersha,
one of the Hermopolis necropolis, we might point towards Thoth temple in
Hermopolis Magna, Thoth cult main centre, whose 12th Dynastys remains are
poor ruins nowadays. As weve stated before, we do not believe that literature
had a merely entertaining use in those times. Maybe some harpist songs and love
poems could come close to that vocation but even these had certain objectives
beyond being used simply as distraction or entertainment! The harpist songs
were, even if only, used to put in evidence a new conception of the afterlife.
[In the Middle Kingdom] the eternal blessedness of the dead and the efficacy of
the rituals and material care with the deceased were doubted. As a consequence,
the invitation to enjoy life appears, at the same time as the afterlifes gloomy
perspective receives the formulations of the funeral laments152. The love poems
(from New Kingdom) had the objective of exhibiting the loved one before the
other, declaring or strengthening their passion and creating the attention they
thought deserved. And The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor, which for several is
simply a sailors story to entertain, seems that it might have had a quite more
meaningful and exciting existence and fruition.
Cfr. E. Hornung, Lgypte sotrique, p. 16; T. F. Canho, O Conto do Campons Eloquente, pp.
1154.
152
J. N. Carreira, Cantos de harpista, Dicionrio do Antigo Egipto, pp. 176177.
151
153
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