A New Letter to the Dead

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[JNES62 no. 4 (2003)] 2003 by The University of Chicago.All rights reserved.00222968/2003/6204-0004$10.00.

REVEALED BUT UNDISCOVERED: A NEW LETTER TO THE DEAD*

JIR&

JANK, Charles University, Prague

In 1930, Alan H. Gardiner published his article A New Letter to the Dead in theJournal of Egyptian Archaeology.1 It concerns the letter inscribed in First IntermediatePeriod hieratic on a red-pottery vessel (a stand without a bottom and with a lip at the top)that is now in the Oriental Institute Museum in Chicago (No. 13945). The text is arrangedin eight vertical columns with a short column added between columns 6 and 7. It reads asfollows:

This is a reminder of what I told you in reference to myself: You know what Idu saidin reference to his son: As for whatever has been or will be there, I will not let him sufferfrom any affliction. Do the same for me!

Behold, this vessel has been brought in order that your mother will perform the litiga-tion. It would be nice if you supported her.

Moreover, grant that there be a healthy son born to me. You are indeed a mighty akh!And behold, it is those two, the maid-servants, Nefertjentet and Itjai, who have causedSeni to be afflicted. Confound them. Prevent for me every affliction that is directed againstmy wife; you know that a wrong is done thereby. Prevent it completely!

As you live for me, the Great One shall praise you, the face of the Great God shall beglad over you, and he shall give you pure bread with his two hands.I also beg for a second healthy son for your daughter.2

I have divided the text into five paragraphs. Each of them addresses a single theme orproblem. The first presents an introduction and an attempt to persuade the dead person tobe helpful. The writer, who is probably the son of the deceased, reminds his father of anappeal for help, similar to the help a man called Idu had promised his son. The secondpart refers to the indefinite litigation that the mother of the deceased should make in the

* I am indebted to my colleagues Renata Landgr-fov, Filip Coppens, and Vivienne G. Callender fortheir useful comments and assistance.

1 JEA 16 (1930): 1922, which presents photographsof the hieratic text by J. H. Breasted and the hiero-glyphic transcription and English translation of the letterby Gardiner.

2 Other translations: A. H. Gardiner, A New Letterto the Dead, inJEA, pp. 1922; G. Roeder,Der Aus-

klang der gyptischen Religion mit Reformation, Zau-berei und Jenseitsglauben, Die gyptische Religion inTexten und Bildern, Band 4 (Zurich and Stuttgart,1961), pp. 26973; M. Guilmot, Lettres aux morts danslgypte ancienne, inRevue de l histoire de religions170 (1966): 1618 (only a portion of the text is trans-lated); B. Brier, Ancient Egyptian Magic (New York,1980), p. 202; E. Wente, trans., Letters from AncientEgypt, ed. E. S. Meltzer (Atlanta, 1990), pp. 21314;S. R. Keller, An Egyptian Analogue to the PriestlyBlessing, in M. Lubetski, C. Gottlieb, S. R. Keller,eds., Boundaries of the Ancient Near Eastern World:A Tribute to Cyrus Herzl Gordon, Journal for theStudy of the Old Testament, Supplement Series 273(Sheffield, 1998), p. 339.


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afterlife. The main section of the text follows. It deals with a request for a healthy son.It is probable that the author is convinced that his wife Seni is unable (or unwilling) tobear a child due to an affliction, which he blames on two maid-servants. Thus, he asks hisdeceased father to prevent the affliction. It is, however, also possible that the request for

a son and the preclusion of the affliction are two different pleas. The fourth portion of theletter contains a blessing that is granted to the dead person for his aid. The supplement, asentence inserted between columns 6 and 7, represents a request for a second healthy sonfor the daughter of the deceased. G. Roeder,3 however, offers a different interpretation. Heunderstands the final sentence as a summary and has another interpretation of the relation-ships among the persons involved. In his translation, Seni is still the wife of the writer, butshe is also the daughter of the deceased, who is thus the writers father-in-law.

What is striking about this letter is the content and the form of the second paragraph.The previously suggested translations are as follows: Behold now there is brought (tothee) this vessel in respect of which thy mother is to make litigation. It were agreeable that

thou shouldst support her;4 Siehe aber, dieser Krug soll gebracht werden, wegen dessendeine Mutter ein Urteil der Rede macht;5 Behold now, this pottery vessel is broughtwith respect to a litigation which thy mother is causing. It would be good if thou wouldsupport her;6 Now I have brought this jar stand over which your mother should institutelitigation. May it be agreeable for you to support her;7 Behold, now this vessel isbrought (to you, that) your mother will litigate concerning it. It would be pleasant that youshould support her.8 The original text can be transliterated as follows: m.k grt in.t tmnttrt mwt.k wq-mdw r.s nqm wf.k s(y).

I believe the only reason for mentioning the mothers litigation is to inform the de-ceased about it and to ask him to join her. If it were an actual call for litigation, it should

have been much more precise. Thus, this sentence should be understood as a reference toan unknown action that the writers grandmother is to perform for him in the afterworld.9

After briefly examining the content, we should note the term mntt, used to describe avessel. In the earlier translations, it is identified with the stand, though sometimes withuncertainty.10 The term mnttis rare and probably was used for a vessel (a bowl) that heldwater or some other liquid.11 It would thus be very odd to call a bottomless stand mntt.The assumption is that the term mntt refers to the yet undiscovered bowl, which wasoriginally placed upon the stand and which actually held another letter. This would alsoexplain the brevity of the litigation note, for the story behind it would have been told inthe undiscovered letter.

Thus, we can partially reconstruct the undiscovered letter now. It comes from the timeof the First Intermediate Period. The text was inscribed upon a vessel (probably a bowl)12

that was placed on the top of a stand and was written by a man to a woman who was prob-

3 Cf. Roeder,Der Ausklang, pp. 26973.4 Gardiner, A New Letter to the Dead, p. 20.5 Roeder,Der Ausklang, p. 272.6 Brier, Ancient Egyptian Magic, p. 202.7 Wente, trans.,Letters, p. 213.8 Keller, An Analogue, p. 339.9 Briers suggestion that the mother is still alive

(cf. Brier, Ancient Egyptian Magic, p. 202) is less

probable.10 Cf. A New Letter to the Dead, p. 21.11 Cf. Wb. II, p. 92; Gardiner, A New Letter to the

Dead, p. 21.12 Since the use of a bowl for this purpose was

common, it is probable that a bowl was also used inthis case.


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ably his grandmother. The reason for composing it was to convince the recipient to litigateon behalf of the sender at the afterworld trial. This type of motif was common in the let-ters to the dead.13 There must have been a third person, most probably also dead, who hadbeen a menace to the man. It was this malefactor against whom the woman was to litigate.

We can also assume that the matter of the legal action was serious, such as, for example,depriving the person of his inheritance, as was the case in other letters.This example adds to the number of known letters to the dead but, unfortunately, not the

number of preserved ones. Perhaps it is in some private collection or yet to be discovered.

13 Cf. M. ODonoghue, The Letters to the Deadand Ancient Egyptian Religion, in theBulletin of theAustralian Centre for Egyptology 10 (1999): 99101.


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A New Letter to the Dead