Buto and Hierakonpolis in the Geography of Egypt

8/13/2019 Buto and Hierakonpolis in the Geography of Egypt

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Buto and Hierakonpolis in the Geography of EgyptAuthor(s): John A. WilsonReviewed work(s):Source: Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol. 14, No. 4 (Oct., 1955), pp. 209-236Published by: The University of Chicago PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/543019.

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JOURNAL OFN E R E STERN STU IES

VolumeXIV OCTOBER 1955 Number4

BUTO AND HIERAKONPOLISIN THE GEOGRAPHYOF EGYPTJOHN A. WILSON

HISpaperoriginatesn a feeling hatthe important shrines of Lower andUpper Egypt, Buto and Hierakon-polis, were badly located geographically.They did not lie in districts which wererich economically; they were poorly situ-ated for commerce or communications;and they were weakly located for the exer-cise of political power. It would seem thattheir predynastic and protodynastic im-portance must find its justification interms other than those of power. In orderto understand how Buto came to be therepresentative of Lower Egypt and howHierakonpolis came to stand for UpperEgypt, it seemed necessary to study thetwo parts of Egypt as geographic or-ganisms.

The specific terms used for the width ofthe arable valley, the productivity of theland in crops, and the density of popula-tion will be taken from the statistics ofmodern Egypt. The figures for ancientEgypt are impossible to establish. Itwould be useful if adequate statistics ex-isted for Egypt a century ago, but the old-est complete data available to the writerare those of 1937 and 1938. Of courseEgypt has changed markedly within thepast century, because of the enlargementof the canal system of perennial irrigation

to replace the basin sjrstemand because ofthe amazing increase in the populationwhich began about eighty years ago. Ad-mittedly figures from the past few yearsapply inexactly for the understanding ofancient Egypt. For example, the shape ofthe Delta has been changed by increasedirrigation to the west and by the disap-pearance of ancient branches of the riverto the east. Nevertheless, in the broadestterms, the analysis of Upper and LowerEgypt as organismsand the comparisonofthe different sections of Egypt in terms ofarea, population, and productivity seemto have relative meaning for the past.The factors studied include the widthof the arable valley in Upper Egypt andthe relative amounts of fertile soil on thetwo sides of the river (Table 1);1the pro-ductivity in cereals and vegetables of eachmudirlyah (province) of modern Egypt(Table 2);2 the density of population per

1 Calculated from the Survey of Egypt's Atlas ofthe Normal 1:100,000 Scale Topographical Series ofEgypt (Cairo, 1929 ff.), which also provides the con-tour-levels, in meters, above sea level.2 Taken from Egypt, Ministry of Finance, Alma-nac, 1988 (Cairo, 1938-hereafter abbreviated as Al-manac), pp. 432-34. In Table 2 the yield per fedd?tn-in barley, wheat, onions, fenugreek, and beans hasbeen given for each mudiriyah. For the most part, the

statistics on the modern crops of cotton, maize, andsugar-cane have been ignored. Some comments on theancient wine-producing regions are below in Sec-tion II.209


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0 0i XX eni Sueif

MAP I


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BUTO AND HIERAKONPOLIS 211feddan (about an acre) in each markaz,the subdivision of a mudirlyah, (Table3);3 the heights above sea level of someof the Delta sites; what is known aboutwine-producing districts of ancient Egypt;

Faiyfim district4 and about the Deltabranches of the Nile in pharaonic andclassical times.5From these materials there emerges aclearer picture of the location of Buto inTABLE 1

PRESENT WIDTHS OF CULTIVABLE AREAS(Selected Sites of Upper Egypt, Running from South to North, withWidths of Arable Land Measured in Kilometers)

Total in-North Nile cluding West EastSite Latitude Flowing the Nile Bank BankAssuan-Elephantine ................. 24005' N by NE 3.4 0.0 1.7Darw ............................. 24 24 N 12.5 2.0 9.5K6m Ombo-Omboi.................. 24 29 N 15.5 0.0 10.5Gebel es-Silsilah..................... 24 38 N 3.0 0.0 0.8er-Ridistyah Qibli ................... 24 54 N by NE 4.5 2.8 0.8Edfu-Apoll6nos polis ................ 24 58 N by NE 6.7 4.0 1.7es-Sacidah................... ....... 25 04 NW 2.0 0.5 0.3K6m el-Ahmar-Hierakonopolis ........ 25 06 NW 4.0 2.5 0.5EsnA-Lat6n polis .................... 25 18 N by NW 7.0 4.0 1.7AsfAn el-MatAcnah-Asphynis .......... 25 24 N 7.5 6.5 0.3Gebelein-Pathyris ................... 25 29 N by NW 2.8 0.5 1.2Armant-Hermonthis. ................ 25 37 NE 8.7 6.7 0.3Luxor-Thebes........ ............... 25 42 N by NE 9.8 3.5 5.7Qfs-Apoll6nos polis ................ 25 55 N by NE 14.3 2.3 11.0Qift-Koptos................... ..... 26 00 N 9.7 2.5 6.0Qena (for Denderah)................ 26 10 NW 6.5 1.3 4.3Dishn ............................. 26 08 W 9.3 3.0 5.2Nagc Hammadi..................... 26 03 NW 12.8 7.2 5.0el-BalianA (for Abydcs) .............. 26 14 N 25.5 13.5 11.2Akhmim-Panopolis .................. 26 34 SW 18.2 7.7 9.5K6m Ishqau-Aphroditopolis.......... 26 50 N by NW 17.3 15.7 0.7el-BadAri ................... ........ 27 00 N by NW 20.0 11.5 6.5Assidt-Lyk6n polis.................. 27 11 NW 12.0 3.5 7.7el-Q ssiyah-Koussae ................. 27 26 N by NW 13.3 12.2 0.5el-Ashmunein-Hermopolis ........... 27 47 N 16.7 15.5 0.5K6m el-Ahmar-Hebenu .............. 28 03 N by NW 16.5 15.0 0.1TihnA el-Gebel-Akoris ............... 28 11 N 13.7 11.5 1.0el-Qeis-K6 ................... ...... 28 29 N by NW 21.2 18.5 1.2el-Hibah ................... ........ 28 46 N 15.5 13.3 0.3DishAshah.......................... 29 00 N by NE 20.0 18.5 0.3IhnAstyah el-Medinah-Herakleopolis... 29 05 N by NE 25.7 24.0 0.2Abusr el-Malaq ..................... 29 15 N by NE 14.5 11.5 2.0Kafr cAmmr ................... .... 29 30 N by NE 5.2 2.5 1.7Dahshfr .......................... 29 48 N 8.0 3.8 3.0Mit Riheinah-Memphis.............. 29 52 N 8.5 6.2 1.8Gtzah Pyramids.................... . 29 59 N by NW 13.2 7.8 3.5Aussim-LUtopolis to el-Matartyah-Heli-opolis ............................ 30 08 NW 27.5 18.7 8.2

what is known about recent and ancientroutes from the Nile Valley into the des-ert areas; and what is known about theLower Egypt and of Hierakonpolis in Up-per Egypt.

3 Taken from Almanac, pp. 57-59, and omittingthe urban governates of Cairo, Alexandria, Damietta,Port Said, Ismailtyah, and Suez, and the desert gov-ernates and districts.

4 Following John Ball, Contributions to the Geogra-phy of Egypt (Cairo, 1939), pp. 178-289.5 Especially from John Ball, Egypt in the ClassicalGeographers (Cairo, 1942), and A. H. Gardiner, An-

cient Egyptian Onomastica (Oxford University Press,1947), esp. II, 132* if,


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MAP III213


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214 JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIESI. THE MARKAZESOF MODERNEGYPT

A. Assuin mudiriyahAt the southern limit of Egypt, the ed-Dirr markaz runs from the frontier atAdindan, about 35 kilometers north ofWadi Halfa, to Kh6r Dehmit, about 40kilometers south of Assuin. The area hasbeen greatly impoverished by the rise ofwaters produced by the Assuin dam, butit clearly was never as populated or asproductive as Egypt proper. In 1937, its280 kilometers of Nile fronted on 69,000

ductivity of cereals, and its combinedyield of barley and wheat per feddan issuperior only to that of the Beheirahmudirlyah in the northwest Delta. How-ever, the mudirlyah of Assuan ranks firstin yield of sugar cane and stands high inyield of onions, fenugreek, and beans.Generally speaking, this is a limited andprovincial region, and, on the basis ofknown factors of the width of the arableland and of the historical importance inthe texts, it was not of major consequence

TABLE 2PRODUCTIVITYOF CERTAIN CROPSIN MODERN EGYPT

(Figures for Barley, Wheat, Fenugreek, and Beans Are in Ardebs perFeddAn; Figures for Onions in Kantars per Feddin)Mudirivah Barley Wheat Onions Fenugreek Beans(Egypt) ......... (7.22) (5.88) (150) (3.60) (4.89)AssuAn.......... 6.07 4.57 151 3.99 4.53Qena............ 6.75 4.88 147 3.69 4.50GirgA........... 7.74 6.32 157 3.97 5.49Assift........... 8.80 6.59 150 4.65 5.59MinyA.......... 8.28 6.31 153 3.50 4.92Beni Sueif....... 5.79 5.73 140 2.83 4.43Faiydm......... 5.75 5.68 125 2.48 3.39

Gfzah........... 6.16 5.57 152 3.76 4.10Qalydbtyah ...... 8.87 5.84 131 3.25 4.74Min ftyah....... 9.19 6.10 118 3.34 4.98Sharqtyah....... 5.90 4.97 118 2.19 3.97Daqahltyah ...... 6.48 4.94 142 2.98 4.28Gharbtyah....... 6.22 4.89 124 2.72 3.76Beheirah........ 5.24 4.61 109 2.53 3.90feddins, or only 246 feddins to the linearkilometer, and its population averagedonly 0.78 to the feddin. In this stretch ofancient Nubia lay several New Kingdom,Ptolemaic, and Roman temples, such asAbu Simbel, Amadah, ed-Dirr, Denduir,Kalibshah, and Qirtis.The Assuin and Edfu markazes runfrom Kh6r Dehmit in Nubia to es-Sabaci-yah, more than 30 kilometers north ofEdfu. The 175 linear kilometers of Nileaverage 886 feddins to the kilometer, adecidedly narrow width of cultivation.The population of the two markazes aver-ages 1.62 to the feddin. The Assuinmudiriyah, which includes also the poorsoil of ed-Dirr, ranks very low in the pro-

in antiquity. Within the AssuAnand Edfumarkazes lie the sites of Dab6d; Biggah;Elephantine, the metropolis of the FirstUpper Egyptian Nome; K6m Ombo;Gebel es-Silsilah; Edfu, the metropolis ofthe Second Nome; Hierakonpolis; and el-Kab, the metropolis of the Third Nome.B. QendmudirtyahThe Qend mudiriyah runs from es-

Sabiclyah to a point on the river about 6kilometers south of el-Baliana. This is astretch of 250 kilometers, with an aver-age of 1,720 feddins to the kilometer,nearly twice as wide as the AssuAn-Edfuaverage but only about 60 per cent of theaverage width of the GirgAmudiriyah to


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BUTOANDHIERAKONPOLIS 215the north. In productivity of cereals, theQena mudirlyah ranks about in the middleof the fourteen mudirlyahs of Egypt, al-though below the national average. Itsrank in productivity of vegetables is alsoabout medial. It is by no means as limitedas the Assuin-Edfu region, but it com-pares unfavorably with the rich Girgamudiriyah, as we shall see.The QenAmudirfyah includes six mar-kazes. From EsnA in the south to QenAthere is a steady rise in density of popula-tion. Esna lay generally in the Third Up-per Egyptian Nome and holds the ancientsites of Esnd, Asphynis, el-Mucallah, andGebelein. The Luxor markaz lay generallyin the Fourth Nome and includes Thebes,the metropolis of that nome, as well as et-T6d, Armant, and Medamid. Qas was inthe Fifth Nom'e and has the sites of an-cient Qis, Neqadah, and Ombos. TheQena markaz rises in density to 2.73 to thefedddn; it includes Koptos, the metropolisof the Fifth Nome, and Denderah, themetropolis of the Sixth.The Dishna markaz shows a decidedfalling away of importance. Although itswidth of arable land averages higher thanthe mudirlyah as a whole, Dishna has adensity of population of only 1.77 to thefeddan, and its stretch of nearly 40 kilom-eters includes no ancient site of impor-tance. The Dishna east-west stretch wasa kind of provincial interlude along thecourse of the Nile, between the modeststrength of the Luxor-Qis-Qena stretchto the south and the high productivity ofthe Girga mudirlyah to the north. Den-derah marks the eastern end of the Dishnastretch and Diospolis Parva the westernend as important termini of an inactivearea socially and culturally.After the Dishna stretch, the NagcHammadi markaz shows an opening outof importance, with a density of 2.72 per-sons to the fedd~n. It includes the sites of

Diospolis Parva (HA), which was themetropolis of the Seventh Nome, andQasr wa's-Sayyad. Geographically themarkaz belongs with the Girga regionwhich follows.C. GirgAmudiriyahIn the Girga, Assifit, and MinyAmudi-riyahs we come to the richest stretch ofUpper Egypt. Girga includes six mar-kazes, of which one, Akhmim, lies on theeast side of the river. The mudirlyah runsfrom a little south of el-Baliana to a pointon the west bank about three kilometers

north of Tima.6 This is about 133 linearkilometers, with an average of 2,820 fed-dAns to the kilometer, a notable openingout of fertile soil. The area is highly pro-ductive, well above the national averagein barley and wheat, the best onion dis-trict of Egypt, and among the best inmillet, lentils, fenugreek, and beans. Inmost of these respects it is surpassed inUpper Egypt only by the Assiit mudiri-yah to its immediate north.In density of population the Girgamudirlyah is exceeded only by Minifilyahin the Delta. The el-Baliana markaz at thesouth has the lowest density of the sixmarkazes; in it lay ancient Abydos, themain shrine of the Eighth Nome. TheGirga markaz contains the site of themetropolis of the Eighth Nome, This(whether at el-Birbah or nearby) andPtolemais Hermeiou (el-Minshah). Sbhag,with an average of 3.31 to the feddan, isthe most densely populated markaz ofUpper Egypt; yet in ancient times it wasadministratively subordinate to Akhmimacross the river, and its medieval famecenters around the Coptic monasteries ofthe Atripe area. Across from S6hdg on theeast bank lies the Akhmim markaz, withthe metropolis of the Ninth Nome,Akhmim-Panopolis. On the west again,6 Its frontier on the east bank is more to the south,generally opposite Tahti.


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TABLE 3POPULATIONDENSITY OF MODERN EGYPT(Figures,from Censusof 1937, Give Number of PersonsperFeddAn)

Mudirtyah Markaz Persons Mudiriyah Markaz PersonsNonurban Qalyhlbtyah. .... 2.68Egypt, as " Macmurtyah f DawAhi 3.11a whole ................... ..(1.73) " Masr

AssuAn ........ 1.36 "aiyibA 2.82" ed-Dirr 0.78 it Tekh 2.60if. Assu4n 1.44 i,," Edfu 1.87 Shibinel-QanAtir 2.27Qena.......... 2.34 Mindftyah..... 3.02" EsnA 2.08 Ashmin 2.61" Luxor 2.25 i Mindf 3.37"Qs 2.32 Shibin el-K6m 3.60" QenA 2.73 QuweisnA 2.80" DishnA 1.77 , TalA 2.75" Nagc HammAdi 2.72Girga....... 2.98 Sharqtyah.... 1.32

" el-BalianA 2.39 " Bilbeis 1.56GirgA 3.11 " Zagazig,includingthe 1.47" S6hAg 3.31 " city" Akhmim (on the east 2.96 " Minyet el-Qamh 2.48bank) HehtyA 1.75Tahta 3.20 Kafr Saqr 1.05TimA 3.04 " FAqfs 0.76Assiit. . .. . . 2.41" el-BadAri(on the east 2.26 Daqahlyah .... 1.93" bank) " Mit Ghamr 3.23" Abu Tig 2.83 " AgA 2.05Assifit, including the 3.07 " Mansirah, including 2.62city the cityAbnib (on the east 1.82 " Friskir 2.16bank) SimbellAwein 1.57Manfalit 2.09 Dikirnis 1.05Deirit 2.39 " Manzalah 1.62" MallAwi 2.54 Gharbtyah ... 1.13MinyA......... 1.93 Zifta 3.05" Abu QurqAs 1.99 Santah 2.53MinyA, ncludingthe 2.38 TantA, ncludingthe 2.78city city" Samaazt 1.61 Kafr ez-ZayyAt 2.54t Beni Mazar 1.85 i Sammanid 2.18" MaghAghah 1.97 Mehallahel-Kobra 1.72el-Fashn 1.85 TalkhA 1.40Beni Sueif...... 2.15 " Dissiq 0.89BibA 2.18 " FAwah 0.85Beni Sueif,including 2.26 " Kafr esh-Sheikh 0.53the city Shirbin 0.48WAsta 1.93 " Macmurtyah f Burullus 0.74Faiy1m..... 1.46

FaitBeheirah.......1.00Faiyfm, includingthe 2.22 Beheirah Km Hamdah 1.826m HamAdah 1.82cityi,,Sinncris 1.29 Ityi el-Barfd 1.68tIbshwai 1.49 ShubraKhtt 1.59h" Itsh 1.1249 Macmurtyahof Mah- 2.03.12 midtyahGizah........ 2.71 " DamanhOr, ncluding 1.56" es-Saff (on the east 2.59 " the city" bank) " DilingAt 0.80" el-cAiyAt 2.45 " Abu Hummus 0.78" Gizah, includingthe 4.31 " Abu el-MatAmir 0.42" city " Kafr ed-Dauwdr 0.62" ImbAbah 2.10 " Rosetta 0.67


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BUTO AND HIERAKONPOLIS 217the Tahta markaz includes no ancientsites of importance, and the TimAmarkazhas the site of Aphroditopolis (K6mIshqu), the metropolis of the TenthNome.

D. Assift mudirtyahThe mudiriyah of Assiit runs from nearTima to a point about ten kilometerssouth of Beni Hassan, with an axial lengthof about 160 kilometers and an average of3,125 feddans to the kilometer, a good,broad stretch of fields. The two richestagricultural mudiriyahs in the land areAssiuit in Upper Egypt and Minftiyah inthe Delta. In yield per feddan, Assiiitstands third in barley (22 per cent abovethe national average) and first in wheat(12 per cent above), and first in millet,lentils, fenugreek, and beans. Modernly itis the heart of Upper Egypt, and theweight of its ancient towns shows that ithad the same importance in the past.Of the seven markazes two lie on theeast bank. The el-Badari markaz on theeast bank contains the site of Antaeopolis(Qau el-Kebir), an important town of theTenth Nome, and the very old cemeteriesaround el-Badari. On the west bank, AbuTig includes Apotheke (Abu Tig), whichwas not of major importance in pharaonictimes. Then comes the Assiit markaz withthe town of Assiuit,the two combining fora density of 3.07 to the feddan. Here,close together, lay Hypsel1 (Shutb), themetropolis of the Eleventh Nome, andLyk6n polis (Assiuit),the metropolis of theThirteenth. Across the river, the Abndibmarkaz has a good stretch of fields, but adensity of only 1.82 and no ancient sites ofimportance. On the west bank again, theManfalfit markaz contains the sites ofel-QAssiyah, metropolis of the FourteenthNome, and of Meir. In the eastern cliffs ofthe Deir-it markaz lie the tombs of Deirel-Gebrdwi; back in the eastern hills was

the alabaster quarry of Hat-nub. The siteof Tell el-cAmdrnah ies across the easternboundary between the Deir6it and Mal-lAwimarkazes. The Mallawi markaz wasone of the most important areas of ancientEgypt, with the sites of el-Bersha and An-tinoe (esh-Sheikh cIbidah) on the eastside and el-AshmAnein (Hermopolis), theimportant metropolis of the FifteenthNome, with its cemetery of TAnah el-Gebel, ancient Her-wer (perhaps modernHir), and ancient Nefrusi (if near Itlidim)on the west side. Geographically thestretch from Assift to Hermopolis is thenucleus of a rich area which runs fromAbydos to el-Qeis, near modern BeniMazar.

E. MinyAmudirtyahThe Minya mudiriyah runs from apoint about ten kilometers south of BeniHassan to a point a few kilometers northof el-Fashn. Its axial length of 138 kilome-ters shows an average of 3,490 feddans tothe kilometer, which is a wonderfullybroad stretch, considering the fact thatmost of this land is on the west bank.' In

agricultural richness the mudiriyah isstrong, not as productive as Assift, butabout on a par with Girga in cereals andonly a little behind Girga in vegetables.Modernly it has the highest yield of cot-ton in Egypt.Both in concentration of populationand in the importance of ancient sites,MinyA is not as weighty as Assisit, al-though it belongs to the same general zoneof Middle Egyptian strength. In the AbuQurqas markaz the important ancientsites are on the east bank: Beni Hassanand Speos Artemidos. The Minya markazcontains the sites of K6m el-Ahmar(Hebenu), the metropolis of the SixteenthNome, and TihnAel Gebel (Akoris), both7See Table 1, K6m el-Ahmar (Hebenu) to el-Hibah.


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218 JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIESon the east bank. Samalfit has no site ofancient importance. Beni Mazar containsesh-Sheikh Fadl (Kynopolis), metropolisof the Seventeenth Nome, and K6m el-Ahmar Sawaris (Het-nesut), metropolis ofthe Eighteenth Nome, on the east bank,with el-Qeis (K6) and Oxyrhynchos(Behnesa), metropolis of the NineteenthNome, on the west side. For Maghaghahno ancient sites may be listed, unlessSeper-meru s to be found near the westerndesert. The el-Fashn markaz containsel-Hfbah on the east bank. A remarkablefeature of the Minya mudiriyah is the im-portance of ancient towns on the verynarrow stretch of soil of the east bank.

F. Beni SueifmudirlyahThe Beni Sueif mudirfyah runs from apoint just below el-Fashn to a point on thewest bank nearly opposite Atfih.8 Its 65linear kilometers show the very high aver-age of 4,015 feddans to the kilometer.Again, practically all of this stretch ofarable land is on the west side, as the val-ley opens out toward the Faiyfim depres-sion.9 Agriculturally, the region is not asrich as the area to the south; the mudirl-yah is poor in the yield of barley and be-low average in wheat and vegetables. Per-haps the extraordinary western throw ofthe inundation waters, including theneeds of the Faiydim, thins the soil some-what in this area.

The three markazes show a moderatelydense population. In Biba lies the site ofDishashah. The Beni Sueif markazreaches west to include Ihnasfyah el-Medinah (Herakleopolis), metropolis ofthe Twentieth Nome. Wasta containsDallas (Nilopolis), Abusir el-Malaq, andMeidim. In contrast to the Minya mudi-riyah, the important sites lie on the westside, although it is true that Atfih-Aphro-

ditopolis (in the Gizah mudiriyah admin-istratively) lies on the east, about oppo-site Meidfim.G. Faiydmmudirtyah

Because of the nature of the Faiyfimmudirfyah as a spreading appendage tothe Nile Valley, this region cannot becompared strictly with the precedingmudirfyahs. We are here dealing with apocket depression, bounded by hills, con-nected with the Nile by the Bahr Yfisuf,and draining down in the northwest intothe lake called Birket Qardin,whose sur-face is forty-five meters below sea level.The maximum area of the arable land inthe Faiyuimis and has been more subjectto the governmental control of irrigationthan the riverine stretches of UpperEgypt. The necessity of extending the ir--Arigation waters means that the mudiriyahas a whole ranks low in agricultural pro-ductivity, next to the poorest in barley,below average in wheat, and one of thepoorest in vegetables. However, it shouldbe remembered that in classical times ithad a reputation as a good region for thecultivation of the vine.The density of population of the mudi-riyah is only 1.46 to the feddan, which isthe lowest we have seen since the FirstCataract. The four markazes are unevenin density, since the Faiyim markaz,which includes Medinet el-Faiyim, istwice as thickly populated as Itsa to thesouth, while Ibshawai to the west and Sin-niris to the north run very low in density.The past history of the Faiyim areahas been complex.1' In Paleolithic timesthe Birket Qaruinwas a huge lake, whichgradually shrank in area. Just before theperiods which we call Predynastic therewas immigration into the Faiyim, with aseries of simple, pastoral-agricultural set-tlements along a line which is now 15On the east bank it terminates further south,about opposite Ashmant.

9 See Table 1, DishZshah to Abusir el-Malaq. 10 See note 4.


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BUTO AND HIERAKONPOLIS 219meters above sea level. But the lake con-tinued to shrink, and the Faiyuim ceasedto be viable before dynastic times. It wasthe Twelfth Dynasty which reclaimed theFaiyuim by irrigation works past el-La-huin, adding an estimated 1100 squarekilometers to the fertile soil of Egypt. Thelevel of Birket Qarin then stood at an es-timated 19 meters above present sea level,and this level was nearly the same in

Qaruin, is above the 25-meter contour,that Qasres-Sagha, which may go back tothe Old Kingdom and which lies out in thedesert north of Birket Qaruin, s above the30-meter contour, and that Herakleopolisand Abusir el-Malaq, outside of the Fai-yim and nearer the Nile, lie above the 25-meter contour line. It is clear that, fromthe Middle Kingdom to Ptolemaic times,the Faiy?m habitable area was only a

TABLE 4Site Markaz Contour LevelK6m Aushim-Karanis ................... Sinniris -5 to 0Qasr Qarin-Dionysias ................... Ibshawai 0 to 5Qasr el-Benat-Euhemeria . .. .......... " 0 to 5K6m Medinet WAtfah-Philoteris ... . " 5 to 10Kharabet Ihrit-Theadelphia .............. " 5 to 10

Sinnfris-Psenuris ................. ......Sinniris 5 to 10Biyahmu.............................. " 15 to 20Abgig............................. .... FaiyUm 15 to 20K6m Medinet Macddi-Narmouthis ......... Its 15 to 20Medinet el-Faiyz'm-Crocodilopolis ....... Faiyum 20 to 25Umm el-Asl-Bacchias .................... Sinntris 20 to 25K6m el-Kharabah el-Kebir-Philadelphia . " 25 to 30Tell Umm el-BreigAt-Tebtynis ............ Its 25 to 30el-Ldhan village........ .............. Faiyim 25 to 30Hauwdrat el-Maqtah-Labyrinth .i...... . " 25 to 30K6m Medinet Ghurdb...... .......... .." 25 to 30Herodotus' day. In the early Ptolemaicperiod new controls brought the lake levelto two meters below present sea level,adding an estimated 1200 square kilome-ters of alluviated soil. These controlsgradually broke down, and the newlyfounded Ptolemaic towns were prettywell deserted by the fourth century A.D.The present size and productivity of theFaiyuimare the result of modern irrigationefforts.The ancient sites in the Faiyfim thusfall into two classes: those running fromthe Middle Kingdom onward, at or abovethe 20-meter contour line, and those fromthe Ptolemaic and Roman period, at orabove the 0-meter contour line. In Table 4the older sites are italicized.For comparative purposes it might benoted that the Ptolemaic site of MedinetDimai (Soknopae Nesos), north of Birket

little more than the present markaz ofFaiyuim.

H. GizahmudirlyahBoth in ancient and in modern terms,the Gizah mudirlyah is transitional be-tween Upper and Lower Egypt. Its south-ern reaches belong to the Twenty-first andTwenty-second Nomes of Upper Egypt;its northern area belongs to the First andSecond Nomes of Lower Egypt. Geo-graphically the markazes of es-Saff andel-cAiyat continue the valley of UpperEgypt, whereas the northwestern exten-sion of the Imbabah markaz constitutesthe southwestern angle of the Delta. Themudirlyah is further complicated by theintrusive neighborhood of the Governateof Cairo and the Town of HelwAn. Fromthe frontier with the Beni Sueif mudiri-yah, the Gizah mudiriyah runs north un-


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220 JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIEStil it meets the Governate of Cairo, andthereafter it is restricted to the west bankof the Nile and of the Rosetta Branch toa point about ten kilometers below War-dan. The valley is narrowat the south endof the mudiriyah, opens out in the pyra-mid area, but the cultivable width inlandfrom Warden is only about two kilome-ters. In agriculture, the mudirlyah is wellbelow average in productivity of cereals,but is better in vegetables, perhaps be-cause of the demand of neighboring Cairo.Population figures are distorted by theproximity of Cairo. The density of personsper fedddn ranges from Imbabah's 2.10 toGizah's 4.31. In the es-Saff markaz lies thesite of Atfih (Aphrodites polis), themetropolis of the Twenty-second UpperEgyptian Nome. In el-cAiyAt are Lisht;Kafr cAmmar, older metropolis of theTwenty-first Nome of Upper Egypt;Dahshfir; Saqqarah; and Mit Rahinah(Memphis), the metropolis of the FirstLower Egyptian Nome. The Gizah mar-kaz has Abusir and the Gizah necropolison the west bank, and on the east bankthe Helwin necropolis, Turah (Troia), el-Macadi, and Athar en-Nabi. In the Im-bibah markaz lie Abu Rawash; Aussim(L6topolis), the metropolis of the SecondNome of Lower Egypt; and the prehis-toric sites of Merimdet Abu Ghalib andMerimdet Beni Salamah. Belonging to theGovernate of Cairo, rather than to theGizah mudirlyah, are el-Fust t (Babyl6n)and Gebel el-Ahmar.

I. LowerEgyptThe mudiriyahs of Lower Egypt will betreated in two fan-like sweeps from east towest: at the southern point of the Delta,

Qalydbliyahand Mintfiyah; in the broad-er north of the Delta, Sharqlyah, Daqahl -yah, Gharblyah, and Beheirah. There-after the peripheral areas of Alexandriaand the Canal Zone will be noted briefly.

Although the Delta is now cut by manyirrigation and drainage canals, it has onlytwo main branches, Rosetta and Damiet-ta. In antiquity it was more comprehen-sively watered, with as many as sevenbranches." It is difficult to push an under-standing of the Delta back into earlierpharaonic times, but three statementsseem to be justified. First, there was aCanopic branch passing Damanhir, sothat the area of the modern Beheirahmudirlyah was better watered than today.Second, in addition to ancient correspond-ents to the modern Rosetta and Damiettabranches, there were ancient branchescutting past Xois and Mendes, betterserving the areas which have become theGharbiyah and Daqahllyah mudirlyahs.Third, an eastern branch cut past Bubas-tis and debouched at Pelusium, so that themodern Sharqiyah mudirlyah and theQantarah area of the Canal Zone weremore specifically watered than today. Theeffective shape of the Delta has changedconsiderably.

J. QalyfibyahmudirlyahThe QalyfibTyahmudirlyah is roughlydiamond-shaped. It lies on the east sideof the Nile and the Damietta Branch,from the northern suburbs of Cairo to apoint on the Damietta Branch about30031' N. Lat., and runs southeast fromthis point to the eastern desert about fivekilometers east of Shibin el-Qanatir. It iscurrently served by a series of canals. Inancient times it enjoyed the use of thatarm of the Nile which cut off from theriver just north of Cairo, divided some-where north of Shibin el-Qanatir, andthen formed the branches passing Mendesand Bubastis. Agriculturally, the mudi-

"1See note 5. In Ball, loc. cit., p. 24, there is a mapof the Delta following Herodotus; p. 69, followingStrabo; p. 120, following Ptolemy. See Gardiner, loc.cit., pp. 153* fft., for discussion of the branches earlierthan Herodotus.


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BUTO ANDHIERAKONPOLIS 221riyah is rich, as it stands 15 per cent abovethe national average in yield of barley perfeddan, is about average in yield of wheat,and ranks very high in the modern cropsof maize and rice. It is somewhat belowaverage in vegetables.The mudirlyah has a high density ofpopulation. The northern suburbs ofCairo (Macmurlyat Dawahi Masr) andthe Benha markaz have more than threepersons to the feddan, and the Shibin el-Qanatir markaz fades into the desert witha higher density than the national aver-age. The land lies above the nine-metercontour line, so that it was well above themarshy area of antiquity. Dawahi Masrcontains el-Matarlyah (Heliopolis), me-tropolis of the Thirteenth LowerEgyptianNome. In Shibin el-Qanatir markaz liesTell el-Yahfidiyah. The Benha markazhas Tell Atrib (Athribis), metropolis ofthe Tenth Nome. This, as its ancientname Hat-her-ib, "Middletown," indi-cates, was a central point of the Delta. Onthe modern map it seems too southerly tobe a geographical center, but, if one dis-counts the northern marshes, Benha-Ath-ribis does appear rather focal. It is curiousthat no important ancient sites can belocated in the Qalyib and Tikh markazes.which must have been populous in anti-quity. We shall meet this same problem inthe next mudirlyah to be examined.

K. Min fiyahmudirlyahThe Minmfiyahmudirlyah is today themost densely populated and richest agri-cultural province of Egypt. It forms a tri-angle between the two branches of theNile, running from the junction of the twoto a point about 30045' N. Lat. on theRosetta Branch and a point about 30034'N. Lat. on the Damietta Branch. Itstands first in yield of barley (27 per centabove national average), above average in

wheat and beans, and first in the moderncrops of maize and rice.With 3.02 persons to the feddan, Mina-fiyah is the most densely populated mudi-riyah. The least populous of the five mar-kazes is 51 per cent above the nationalaverage; the most populous is more thantwice the national average. The area iscurrently well watered by the twobranches and canals deriving from them.In antiquity there were the same twobranches with a third in between them,the Thermuthiac River, cutting northfrom near modern Ashman.It is then a matter of surprise that noimportant ancient sites can be identifiedwith certainty in the richest section ofEgypt. The only possibility which hasbeen suggested has not been archeologi-cally tested: that Djeqac, the metropolisof the Fourth Nome, perhaps the Nikiouor Niciae of classical times, is to be foundat or near Zawiyat Razin, on the RosettaBranch, nearly opposite K6m Abu Billu(Terenuthis).l

L. SharqtyahmudirtyahThe outer Delta ring is not as rich asthe point of the Delta, since the outerring is weakened by the inroads of desertsands or salt marshes. The mudiriyah ofSharqiyah is like a U tilted toward theeast, with the base lying against the Qal-

yiblyah mudiriyah, the lower arm point-ing toward Ismailiyah, and the upper armpointing in the general direction of PortSaid. Geographically the mudiriyah isvery uneven, since its western base sharesthe wealth of Qalyiblyah, whereas theeastern width has a sparseness similar tothat of Beheirah. Nevertheless, it was animportant district in ancient times. Themudiriyah ranks low agriculturally, 18 percent below the national average in yield12H. Gauthier, Dictionnaire des noms g-ogra-phiques, VI (Cairo, 1929), pp. 134 f.


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222 JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIESof barley, 17 per cent below in wheat, verypoor in vegetables, and the weakest dis-trict in rice. This was not necessarily thecase in antiquity. Currently the mudiri-yah fails to touch the Damietta Branch bya short distance and is fed by canals. An-ciently it was served by two otherbranches in an embracing V beginningnear Shibin el-Qanatir, with the BusiriticBranch cutting north past Mendes andthe Bubastic Branch curving past Bubas-tis and Saft el-Hennah and then sweepingpast el-Qantarah to Pelusium. In addi-tion, Tanis was served by its own river-mouth. We shall see that this area wasanciently famous for the production ofwine.The Shariqiyah mudiriyah is uneven inpopulation. At the west, Minyet el-Qamhbenefits by its proximity to the DamiettaBranch and shows a density of 2.48 to thefeddan. The markazes which front on thesouthern desert, Bilbeis, Zagazig, andHehiya, show the modest density of 1.55.To the east, as one approaches the CanalZone, the density fades out, as Kafr Saqrand Faqis combine for an average of only0.86. In the Zagazig markaz lie Tell Bas-tah (Bubastis), metropolis of the Eight-eenth Nome, and Saft el-Hennah (Per-Sopdu), metropolis of the Twentieth.Minyet el-Qamh is another relatively richmarkaz which surprises us by showing noancient sites of significance; nor are anyknown for Bilbeis or Hehiya. In thesouthern part of Kafr Saqr markaz liesHurbeit (Pharbaethos). An embarrass-ment of riches appears in the Faqfis mar-kaz: Tell er-Ret ba, which may have beenthe Biblical Pithom and classical Heroon-polis; Tell el-Maskhitah, which, if it is an-cient Tjeku and Biblical Succ6th, was themetropolis of the Eighth Nome; FAquis(Phakoussa); Qantir, which may be thesite of ancient Ramesses; Tell el-Farc-inorNebeishah, seat of ancient Imet or (east-

ern) Buto, the earlier metropolis of theNineteenth Nome; San el-Hagar (Tanis),later metropolis of the Nineteenth Nome;and in the extreme northeast Sethroe,possibly to be found at Tell Belim. Inview of the relative poverty of the mar-kazes of Zagazig and Faqis, the numberof important ancient sites is interesting.It is true that some of the ancient townshave to do with external relations: foreigntrade, the Asiatic empire of the NewKingdom, and defense of the eastern fron-tier; but there can be no doubt that thearea must have been better irrigated andmore productive in pharaonic times thanat the present.

M. DaqahliyahmudiriyahDaqahliyah is another geographicallyuneven mudirlyah. It forms a V, with thebase resting against the Benha markaz,the western side running along the Da-mietta Branch, and the eastern arm cut-

ting out into the middle of Lake Manza-lah. The southern base and the westernside of the mudiriyah are more denselypopulated than the eastern side. Ancient-ly the area used both the ancestor of thepresent Damietta Branch and the Busi-ritic River, running past Mendes. It wasalso cut in two longitudinally by the east-west Butic River. Daqahliyah is belowaverage in cereal and vegetable yields, butit is still the best of the four mudiriyahson the outer perimeter of the Delta.The four markazes which lie along theDamietta Branch, Mit Ghamr, Aga, Man-sirah, and Fariskfir, show a density ofpopulation (2.53 to the feddan) nearlytwice that of the three markazes to theireast, Simbellawein, Dikirnis, and Man-zalah (1.37). The latter three may havebeen richer in antiquity, when they werecut by the Busiritic River. The MitGhamr markaz contains Tell Muqdm(Leontopolis), and perhaps the lost me-


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BUTO AND HIERAKONPOLIS 223tropolis of the Eleventh Nome, Hesbet, isto be sought in this area. On the boundarybetween Aga and Mansfirah lies Tell en-Naqfis or Tell el-Baqliyah, perhaps thesite of the metropolis of the FifteenthNome. Bilgai is in the Mansfirah markaz.The ancient importance of the Simbella-wein markaz centers around the twincities of Mendes (Tell er-Rubc), metropo-lis of the Sixteenth Nome, and Thmuis(Tell Timai el-Amdid), which lay at thejunction of the Busiritic and Butic rivers.In Dikirnis is Tell Balalah or Tell Tebil-lah, which may be ancient Ra-nufer, clas-sical Onouphis. Fariskir and Manzalahhave no ancient sites of importance.

N. GharbiyahmudirtyahGharblyah is by far the largest mudiri-yah, with more than a fifth of the arablefeddans of Egypt. It forms the northernpart of the triangle framed by the sea,the Rosetta Branch, and the DamiettaBranch, and runs north from the richMinifiyah mudirlyah into the salty coast-al marshes, from a territory lying morethan nine meters above sea level into thesea. Anciently this wedge was split by theThermuthiac River, running past the cityof Xodis.Its agricultural yield is low incereals and vegetables, although this isprobably highly varied from south tonorth, with rich productivity at theMinifiyah boundary, but a yield in thenorth as low as that of Beheirah.The south of the mudiriyah is fourtimes as densely populated as the north.At the south, the Zifta, Tanta, Santah,and Kafr ez-Zayy t markazes average2.71 persons to the feddan. The first threeshare with the Minifiyah mudiriyah thecurious absence of ancient sites. In Kafrez-Zayy t lay a very important city, Sais(Sa el-Hagar), metropolis of the FifthNome. The next group north on the Da-mietta Branch, Sammandid,Mehallah el-

Kobra, and Talkha, combine for an aver-age density of 1.65. Sammanfid includesAbu Sir Bank (Busiris), metropolis of theNinth Nome, and Sammanfid (Seben-nytos), metropolis of the Twelfth. Mehal-lah el-Kobra has nothing of importanceanciently, and Talkha includes Behbeitel-Higarah (Iseum).In the remaining markazes the densityof population falls off to an average of0.60. On the Rosetta Branch are the Dis-siq markaz, with the sites of Shabis esh-Shuhadah (Kabasa) and K6m el-Faracin(Buto), and the Fiwah markaz, with noimportant sites. In the north center arethe huge markaz of Kafr esh-Sheikh, withSakha (Xois), metropolis of the SixthNome, and K6m el-Khanziri (Pachna-mounis), and the macmibryahof Burullusaround Baltim on the coast, with no im-portant sites. The large markaz of Shirbinon the Damietta Branch has Tell el-Bala-min (Diospolis Inferior), metropolis ofthe Seventeenth Nome.13O. BeheirahmudirlyahWe come finally to the northwesternmudirlyah, Beheirah, the most meagerprovince of Egypt. It forms a kind of a Ywest of the Rosetta Branch, with a narrowstrip of land running north from the bendwest of Wardin until the arable land fansout at about 30o40' N. Lat., and then aterritory framed by the Rosetta Branchon the east, the Libyan Desert on thesouthwest, and Lakes Maryit and Idkuon the northwest. Modernly canals cutthrough this northern area, just as it wassplit anciently by the Agathodaem6nRiver running past Damanhir and emp-tying near Canopus. Nevertheless, themudiriyah is the poorest province ofEgypt agriculturally, weakest in yield ofbarley (28 per cent below national aver-age), nearly the weakest in wheat (22 per

13See Gardiner, in JEA, XXX (1944), 23-60.


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224 JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIEScent below), and among the poorest invegetables.Of all the mudirtyahs, Beheirah has thelowest density of population, 1.00 to thefeddan. At the south the K6m Hamadah,ItyAi el-Bardd, Shubra Khit, and Daman-hir markazes and the macmirlyat Mah-mudlyah average a density of 1.69. InK6m Hamadah are K6m Abu Billu(Terenuthis) and K6m el-Hisn (Imu),metropolis of the Third Nome. In Ityaiel-Barid is en-Nibeirah (Naukratis). TheDamanhir markaz has the site of Her-mopolis Parva at Damanhur. Somewherewithin these five districts should lie thesite of the lost metropolis of the SeventhNome. The contour line marking threemeters above sea level runs just north ofNaukratis and Damanhir and then cutsnorthward to a point near modern Fwah.On a purely gratuitous speculation, thatmetropolis should lie above the three-meter contour in the triangle made by thetowns of Shubra Khft, Damanh6r andFiAwah.The remaining markazes show a densi-ty half that of those already listed, fadinginto the desert or the marshes. Dilingat,Abu Hummus, Abu el-Matamir, Kafr ed-Dauwar, and Rosetta combine for anaverage of 0.65 to the feddan. Abu el-MatAmir's 0.42 is the sparsest of allEgypt. Within these markazes there arevery few sites worth notice. The town ofRosetta is of late importance. In the Di-lingAt markaz, Ramesside pieces havecome from K8m Firin. One has the im-pression that the DilingAt and Abu el-MatAmir markazes are a frontier againstthe western desert, while Abu Hummus,Kafr ed-Dauwar, and Rosetta belong tothe northern marshes.

P. The GovernatesCurrent administrative instruments inthe Suez Canal area are the Governates of

Port Said, Ismailiyah, and Suez. Theyserve an area now infertile. Yet the an-cient Bubastic River cut this area some-where near el-Qantarah to debouch atPelusium. That branch served K6m Da-fanah (Daphnae); Tell Abu Seifah (Tjaruor Sele), metropolis of the FourteenthNome; and Tell el-Farama (Pelusium).Near Port Said lies K8m Tennis (Tennis).Near Suez, Klysma at Qalcat el-Qulzummust have been only a fortress for a desertshipping point. Generally speaking, thewhole area served as a frontier against theAsiatic Beduin, as is shown by the deter-mination of the frontier fortress city ofTjaru with the city sign, with the foreign-country sign, or with both.14It is worthnoting that the Greek settlements ofDaphnae and Naukratis were both onfrontier land toward the two desert ex-tremes of the Delta.There is little to say about Damiettaand Alexandria, except to voice an opin-ion that they were of little weight beforePtolemaic times. The pharaonic rivermouths had to be guarded, yes, so thatthere were probably garrisons out in thisregion of the Hau-nebut, but the effectiveports lay south of the swamps along thebranches of the Nile: Hermopolis Parva,Xois, Sebennytos, Mendes, and Tanis.Tamiathis, for Damietta, appears in listsof Byzantine times.'5 Canopus as a rivermouth was known to Herodotus, but notAlexandria, which came into effective be-ing with Alexander the Great. This doesnot gainsay the possibility that pharaonicEgypt had frontier fortresses in the area,but no great commercial city is indi-cated.16

14 Gauthier, op. cit., VI, 67.15 Ball, op. cit., p. 175.16 Gardiner, in JEA, V (1918), 135, locates afortress of Ramesses III "a short way out in thedesert near Lake Mareotis."


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BUTOANDHIERAKONPOLIS 225II. THE WINE REGIONSOFANCIENT EGYPT

The ancient texts have given us someindication of the regions of Egypt whichwere favorable for the cultivation of thegrape vine and the production of wine,and the locations of those regions are gen-erally confirmed by classical writers.7 Inthe Delta they include the "WesternRiver," which is shown by the specificnames, Mareotis and Anthylla betweenCanopus and Naukratis, to have been theregion west of the western branch; the"Water of Re" or Bubastic River, withthe areas lying to its north: Pelusium,Tjaru, Nebeishah,is and a location nearthe Residence-city of Ramesses; and agroup of sites in the north central Delta,somewhat higher than the marshes: Busi-ris, Sebennytos, Iseum, and Mendes. Fur-ther, there was prized wine from the Fai-yfim and the oases of Baharlyah andKhirgah. Finally, there is occasional men-tion of wine from Memphis, Hardai-Kynopolis, and Thebes. Except for thelast group, the regions named are thosewhich are now low in density of popula-tion and in productivity of cereals andvegetables: in the northwestern Delta,Lower Egyptian Nomes Three and Seven,now in the Beheirah mudirlyah; in thenorthern Delta, Nomes Nine, Twelve, andSixteen, now the southern parts of theGharblyah and Daqahliyah mudirlyahs;in the eastern Delta, Nomes Eight, Four-teen, and Nineteen, now in the Sharqiyahmudirlyah and the Suez region; UpperEgyptian Nome Twenty-one, now theFaiyfim mudirlyah; and the westernoases. The location of these vineyards in

marginal areas confirms the general im-pression that a geographic description ofmodern Egypt fits ancient conditions withgeneral justice.III. COMMUNICATIONSWITHIN ANDOUT OF THE NILE VALLEY

Within the Nile Valley, including theDelta, travel and communications andcommerce were of course by water, witha generally free movement north andsouth. The map shows important check-points at Elephantine, Gebel es-Silsilah,Gebelein, Denderah, Diospolis Parva,This-GirgA, Aphroditopolis, Hyps4l1, As-sifit, el-Qisslyah, Hermopolis, TihnA andGebel et-Teir, el-Hibah, and Atfth, placeswhere the Nile narrows or makes a markedbend. Further, Luxor, Akhmim, Aphro-ditopolis, Assiit, Hermopolis, el-Qeis, andHerakleopolis were well located to serveas commercial metropolises for thrivingareas. At the point of the Delta the tri-angle of Memphis-Heliopolis-L~topoliswas a focal center of communications.In the Delta, if one accepts Ptolemy'sdescription from the second century A.D.as being generally valid for earliest times,traffic could move effectively by water.The north-south axes of the river branchesconnected LUtopoliswith Terenuthis, Her-mopolis Parva, and Canopus; connectedLUtopolis with Xois and Pachnamounis;connected Athribis with Busiris, Seben-nytos, and Iseum; connected Leontopoliswith Mendes-Thmuis and Onouphis; andconnected Bubastis with Sel6 and Pelusi-um. The east-west Butic River connectedHermopolis Parva with Xois, Iseum,Mendes-Thmuis, and Tanis.Nevertheless, the Antonine Itinerariesfrom the end of the third century A.D.show travel by land in and around thedesert margins of Lower Egypt, and itcould be claimed that the same preferenceappears in the route taken by Si-nuhe in

17Hayes, JNES, X (1951), 88 ff.; Gardiner, Ono-mastica, II, 235* f.; Strabo xvii, passim; Pliny xiv,passim; etc.18 "Wine of Imet" (irp nmty) comes from this"Buto," not from the Buto in the northwest Delta:Gardiner, op. cit., II, 171*,


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226 JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIESpharaonic times.19The Antonine itineraryfrom Alexandria to Memphis ran to thewest of the westernmost branch of theNile: Alexandria to Damanhfir to Nikiouto Letopolis to Memphis. The route fromPelusium to Memphis also moved outsideof the watered area, this time to the east:Pelusium, Daphnae, Shibin el-Qanatir,Heliopolis, and Memphis. A similar itin-erary ran from Babyl6n to Suez: Babyl6n,Heliopolis, Shibin el-Qanatir, the WadiTfimilat to a point southwest of Ismaili-yah, and then south to Klysma (Suez).The most interesting itinerary is thatwhich cuts across the Delta from Pelusi-um to Alexandria: from Pelusium south-west to Herakleopolis Parva near el-Qan-tarah, thence west along the line of the oldButic River to Tanis and Mendes, thencesouthwest toward Busiris, continuingsouthwesterly to Andropolis, which wassouth of Naukratis on the western desertmargin, thence northwest through Da-manhfir to Alexandria. This made a veryflattened W of a route, to avoid themarshy areas of Xois and Buto.Communications with the western andeastern deserts also had their ancient im-portance. Egypt has always been a coun-try in which customs toll and bureaucraticinspection might be avoided by leavingthe river and seeking the desert wastes. Inrelatively modern times a well-knownroute has led from Egypt through thewestern oases and water holes to that partof the SaidAnwhich supplied gum, incense,ivory, and slaves. This old slave andsmugglers' route was the Darb el-Arbacin,"the Route of Forty (Days' March),"starting at AssiAtand running 200 kilome-ters to the Khargah Oasis; thence toBaris, about 90 kilometers south at the

end of the Khargah chain; thence by over400 kilometers of water holes to the Self-mah Oasis, generally southwest of the Sec-ond Cataract; and thereafter by difficultmarches southwest ultimately to reach el-Fasher in Darfur, more than 1700 kilome-ters from Assifit. This may well have beenthe "roads of the highlands" used byHar-khuf in the Sixth Dynasty.20 It wasprobably the route of the Tjemeh-Libyans,who, by the Sixth Dynasty, paralleled theNile at least as far south as the SecondCataract.21The Khdrgah Oasis might also bereached from Abydos in about 180 kilome-ters, chiefly along the line of the modernrailway, orfrom Asfin el-Matacnah, northof Esnd, in about 200 kilometers. TheBArisend of the Khargah chain could alsobe reached from Esna in about 220 kilom-eters. From Khargah itself a route leadswest to the DAkhlah Oasis, which was ajumping-off point for Gebel Uweinat, andultimately Tibesti.From the west bank at Elephantine aroad leads west-southwest to the KurkurOasis in about 65 kilometers, thence ashort distance south to the Dunqul Oasis,and thence south to the Selimah Oasismentioned above. This may have beenHar-khuf's route to the Darb el-Arbacin.From Dunqul it is possible to cut back to-ward the river to the diorite quarries inwhich the name of Khufu has been found,at 22046' N. Lat., 31o13' E. Long., north-west of Abu Simbel. An old road has beentraced from these quarries to Tishkah onthe Nile.22Another desert route from the First

19The Antonine Itineraries are conveniently sum-marized in Ball, Egypt in the Classical Geographers, pp.138 ff. For Si-nuhe's route see A. H. Gardiner, Noteson the Story of Sinuhe (Paris, 1916), pp. 165 f. It is ofcourse true that Si-nuhe was a refugee and wanted toavoid settlements.

20 Breasted, Ancient Records, I, ??333-36.21 W. H61scher, Libyer und Aegypter ("Aegyptolo-gische Forschungen... MUinchen," IV [Gltickstadt,1937]), pp. 24 ff. For the Darb el-Arbacin, see TheAnglo-Egyptian Sudan, ed, by Gleichen (London,1905), II, 189-94; W. B. K. Shaw, in Sudan Notes and

Records, XII (1929), 61-71.22R. Engelbach, Annales du Service, XXXVIII(1938), 369-89.


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BUTO AND HIERAKONPOLIS 227Cataract ran southeast from Assuan inabout 35 kilometers to the amethystmines of the W4di el-Hfidi.23Koptos was an ancient starting pointfor quarries and ports to the east of theNile. The Antonine Itineraries give aroute of about 400 kilometers from Kop-tos through el-Laqeitah, and thencesoutheast through Bir Minih, Bir Beizah,Dweiq, and Abu Qireiyah, to Berenike onthe Red Sea Coast. This was also the re-gion of the "emerald" (that is, beryl)mines of Ptolemaic and Roman times. Anancient alternative was to leave Edfu ander-Ridisfyah for the temple area of Seti Inear Bir Abbdd, thence join the Koptosroad near Dweiq, and so on to BerenikA.This is at least 55 kilometers shorter thanthe Koptos road.24Also from Koptos ran the old roadthrough el-Laqeitah and the WAdiHam-mAmAt quarries to Leukos Lim~n (el-Qosseir), in 175 kilometers. This Red Seaport we assume to be a starting point forthe land of Punt, the Somali Coast andArabia Felix. Some 80 kilometers north ofel-Qosseir lay Philoteras (Mirsa Gasfis),which was not so important or so early aport. The route from Qena northeast toMons Porphyrites and thence to MyosHormos (Abu ShacrQibli) on the Red SeaCoast may not have been important untilthe Roman demand for porphyry.25Once again in the western desert, aroute of about 230 kilometers from el-Qissiyah ran out to the Farafrah Oasis,the ancient Ta-ihu, "Land of Cows." Thedistance from Assiit to FarAfrah s about30 kilometers longer. From FarAfrahonemodern desert route leads along the edgeof the Great Sand Sea to the Sfwah Oasis.

A modern alternative name for theBahariyah Oasis is WAh el-BehnesA(Oasis of BehnesA), and the shortest routewould be the 165 kilometers from BehnesA(Oxyrhynchos). An alternative at least 50kilometers longer runs from Medinet el-Faiy-im. In the Twentieth Dynasty,Papyrus Harris mentions vineyards in theBahariyah (Oasis Minor) and KhArgah(Oasis Magna) oases.26From Memphis a route cuts into thedesert and runs southwest to the outerFaiyfim; for example, a little over 55kilometers to K6m Aushlm (Karanis).To the west of the Faiyfim and the Del-ta lay the land of the Tjehenu-Libyans,and beyond them the region of the west-ern Libyans of the Meshwesh type. Weshall considerthese contacts in terms of theSiwah Oasis and of the Libyan coast. Forthe journey to the coast there is suggestedbelow a route through the WAdiNatrfin.One of the chief routes to the Siwah Oasisprobably started at Medinet el-Faiyim,passed Qasr Qarin at the west end of theBirket Qariin, ran northwest to the wellsat Mogharah (30?22' N. Lat.; 28053' E.Long.), ran along the north side of theQattarah Depression, and then cut south-west to Siwah.Another western route might start atMemphis, cut into the desert near AbuRaw~sh, run northwest through the WAdiNatrin, continue by the Darb el-Hagg el-Megharbah northwest to the sea near el-Hammam (ancient Halmyrae), and thenfollow the coast to Mirsa Matrih (Parae-tonium). From Mirsa Matrih one routefollows the coast past Sollim (Katabath-mos) into Cyrenaica, another cuts south-west to Siwah. There are modern alterna-tives which come closer to the Delta, suchas the automobile desert roadfromCairotoAlexandria, but the Route of the WesternPilgrimage is sufficiently attested in re-

23 A. Fakhry, The Inscriptions of the AmethystQuarries at Wadi el Hudi (Cairo, 1952).24 G. W. Murray, JEA, XI (1925), 143-45; D.

Meredith, JEA, XXXIX (1953), 98-101.25Murray, op. cit., pp. 145-48; Meredith, JEA,XXXVIII (1952), 94-111; XXXIX (1953), 97 ff. 26Breasted, Ancient Records, IV, ?213.


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228 JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIEScent times to suggest a pattern of Libyanapproach in ancient times.On the eastern side of the Delta, it hasalready been mentioned that an Antonineitinerary lay to the east of the BubasticRiver or along the WAdiTtfmilat, for con-tact of Memphis with Pelusium, with thefrontier post of Tjaru, or with Suez. It ispossible that the ancient connection withthe Sinai mining area went through theWAdiTfimildt and then down to Suez, toproceed by land and water to the mines.The god Sopdu functioned for easternlands, at Saft el-Hennah and in Sinai. Analternative route to Suez would cutstraight east through the desert on the re-cent Darb el-Hagg from a point north ofHeliopolis.There is no textual or archeological evi-dence for a route across central Sinai toNakhl, with branches from that postnortheast to Beersheba or east to el-cAqabah. Undoubtedly such a route wasused by Beduin, and in recent centuries itwas a used Pilgrimageroad,but we know ofno ancientEgyptianinterest in such a route.An ancient road between Egypt andPalestine is given in an Antonine itineraryas following the north Sinai coast fromPelusium along the narrow strip of sandnorth of Lake Bardawil to el-cArish andthence to RAfah.27The evidence from theNineteenth Dynasty would be that theofficial road ran south of Lake Bardawil:from Tjaru near el-Qantarah, northwestto Tell el-Heir (Magdolo), and thencegenerally eastward to el-cArish, Rafah,and Gaza.28

IV. SUMMARY OF THE NOMESOF EGYPTOn the basis of what has been stated orassumed, we shall now try to characterizethe nomes of ancient Egypt in geographicterms.

A. UpperEgyptThe twenty-two nomes of Upper Egyptappear to us as a fixed list by the TwelfthDynasty. Nevertheless, it is possible tomake a few comments. The names of U.E.13 and U.E. 14 as "Southern Nedjefet-tree" and "Northern Nedjefet-tree" re-spectively and the names of U.E. 20 andU.E. 21 as "Southern Naret-tree" and"Northern Naret-tree" respectively sug-gest an early splitting apart of units, likethat of L.E. 4 and 5. The Faiyuimarea wasprobably a later addition to U.E. 21, afterthe Twelfth Dynasty irrigation works.The transfer of the Nome capital fromKafr cAmmar to Medinet el-Faiyuimmaynot have occurred until the Ptolemaic de-velopment of the Faiyuim area.The nome of the southern frontier,U.E. 1, had an uneasy attachment toEgypt. To begin with, Nubian sandstonecarries down to a point near EsnA almost160 kilometers north of Elephantine be-fore giving way to the characteristic lime-stone cliffs of the Nile Valley. Further, thetown of Dardw, about 35 kilometers northof Elephantine, is modernly the lowerlimit of Nubian speech, customs, andcrafts. For ancient times, it is worth re-marking that the name Abu, Elephantine,was determined with the foreign-countrysign or with an oval fortress.29The MiddleKingdom list of southern frontier for-tresses runs from the Second Cataractdown to and including Gebel es-Silsilah.30This attachment to Egypt and Nubia atthe same time is also illustrated by thename of the First Nome, Ta Zeti, whichwe translate "Nubian Land." Finally, inclassical times the nome capital movednorthward to K6m Ombo, so that theformer metropolis became known as"Elephantine of the Ombite Nome." Ifit were not for the positive fact of theFirst Cataract, the southern frontier of7C. S. Jarvis, Yesterday and To-day in Sinai(Edinburgh, 1932), p. 177: "still one of the maintracks to El Arish and Palestine."

28 A. H. Gardiner, JEA, VI (1920), 99 ff.29 Gauthier, op. cit., I, 3.so Gardiner, Onomastica, I, 9-11.


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BUTO AND HIERAKONPOLIS 229Egypt would probably be Gebel es-Sil-silah.The southernmost segment of Egyptconsisted of U.E. 1 (Elephantine), 2(Edfu), and 3 (el-KAb). It was a narrowand provincial area, blending into meagerNubia to the south, without any one ab-solute line of division. It was poor in agri-culture but rich in granite and amethyst.It was important as a frontier and as astarting point for desert routes.The stretch of U.E. 4 (Thebes), 5 (Kop-tos), and 6 (Denderah) showed a modestenrichment, bounded by Gebelein to thesouth and the Dishna bottleneck to thenorth. The cultivable area was moderatelywide and moderately productive, permit-ting a reasonably high density of popula-tion. The area was also important for itseastern desert routes, leading to stonequarries, gold mines, and to Red Seaports. It is clear, however, that economicand geographic factors are insufficient toaccount for the sudden rise in power ofThebes in the Eleventh Dynasty, and itsreturn to power in the Seventeenth. Spir-itual motives, lying too deep for our recog-nition, must have been powerful.The rich and vital area of Middle Egyptmay be separated into three stretches: asouthern section of increasing potential,consisting of U.E. 7 (Disopolis Parva) and8 (This); a central section of abundantwealth, consisting of U.E. 9 (Akhmim), 10(Aphroditopolis), 11 (Hypsel1), 12 (Hiera-k6n), 13 (Assiit), 14 (el-Qfissiyah), and 15(Hermopolis); and a northern section ofgood but slightly diminishing value, con-sisting of U.E. 16 (Hebenu), 17 (Kynopo-lis), 18 (HippB6nn), and 19 (Oxyrhyn-chos). Broad fields are the rule, particu-larly on the west bank, but also on theeast bank down to and including U.E. 13.Agricultural productivity and density ofpopulation are high, particularly in thecentral section. The whole area is richerthan its neighbors to the south or north,

and its only rival for richness lies in theDelta region of L.E. 4 and 5. There wasfine alabaster in the eastern desert, andthe whole stretch from Abydos to Oxy-rhynchos was important for its contactswith the western desert oases and caravanroutes. On the geographic basis aloneAkh-en-Aton chose wisely when he movedthe capital of Egypt to Tell el-cAmarnah.The final stretch of Upper Egypt wasintermediate between the richness ofMiddle Egypt and the richness of theDelta. It was conditioned by the openingout of the Faiyfm pocket and by the nar-rowing of the alluviated valley nearWAsta. It included U.E. 20 (Herakleopo-lis), 21 (Nilopolis), and 22 (Aphroditopo-lis). The soil is not so productive, particu-larly in the stretches of the Faiyfim mudi-riyah beyond the central markaz of Fai-yim. The whole history of the Faiyim hasbeen greatly conditioned by governmentalcontrol of irrigation in that pocket. How-ever, the Faiyim was an important pointof communications with the western des-ert and the ancient Libyans. From WAstato Memphis the narrowed valley was akind of bottleneck, but the neighboringdeserts offered superb accommodationsfor a series of cemeteries.

B. LowerEgyptThe nomes of Lower Egypt, in theirfinal Ptolemaic numberof twenty, arrangethemselves thus:

177 6 12 165 15 193 9 11 144 1810 20 82 131The history of the compilations of thesenomes is a complicated one, which awaitsthe publication of pre-Ptolemaic lists dis-


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230 JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIEScovered in recent years.31Here it may bestated that L.E. 4 and 5 once constituteda single nome, later divided into "south-ern" and "northern." L.E. 7 and 8 areperipheral and bear similar names; theymay have been added to an original list,with L. E. 8's devotion to the god Atumexplained if the nome were a subdivisionof L.E. 13. Similarly, L.E. 17 was addedin the New Kingdom to the list of nomes,although appearing as the site of an ultimaThule in the Middle Kingdom. The pre-Ptolemaic lists show the order to be: 1 2 34 5 6 7 8 9 11 10 12 15 16 13 14 17; thatis, 1-7 down the western river, 8 added ascomparable to 7, 9-12 and 15-16 down acentral river, 13-14 down the easternriver, and 17 added as the youngest mem-ber. Finally, in Ptolemaic times, L.E. 18and 20 were separated out of 13, and L.E.19 was separated out of 14. The secondarynature of some of these nomes has geo-graphic significance.The Lower Egyptian nomes may be di-vided into (1.) a metropolitan and pivotalregion at the south, (2.) an agriculturalcore in the middle, (3.) a marginal frameto the west and east of the central core,and (4.) a marginally poor fringe on thenorth and southeast.1. The metropolitan pivot to the southof the Delta consisted of L.E. 1 (Mem-phis) and 13 (Heliopolis).32 The continu-ing importance of Memphis, Babyl6n, el-Fustat, and Cairo, with their suburbs, il-lustrates the significance of the area for ametropolis of traffic and communicationsand for a capital which links Upper andLower Egypt. Agriculturally, the region isnot of importance, but it is well served bythe Delta areas to its north. Building stonewas abundant in the quarriesof Turah, el-

Macsarah, and Gebel el-Ahmar, and riverand desert communications were activelypossible.2. The productive central core of theDelta in pre-Ptolemaic times lay withinthe V made by the western (Agathodae-m6n) River and the Busiritic River, andfor the most part south of the east-westButic River. At present most of this re-gion lies above the six-meter contour line,so that it is separated from the northernmarshes. The core consisted of L.E. 4(Pros6pis), 5 (Sais), 9 (Busiris), 12 (Se-bennytos), 10 (Athribis), 11 (Kabasa),and 15 (Hermopolis Parva). To thesemust be added the Ptolemaic subdivisionof L.E. 18 (Bubastis), lying to the east ofthe Busiritic River. This area of eightnomes includes the richest agricultural soilof Egypt and the densest rural concentra-tion of population. The surprising lack ofknown sites in and around L.E. 4 proba-bly results from this agricultural devo-tion: the soil has been so well watered andso accumulative of alluvial deposit and sogreatly in demand that the ancient evi-dence has been obliterated. As UpperEgypt had a vigorous central zone, soLower Egypt has this productive centralcore.3. Another type of land was made upof regions which were marginal to the cen-tral core, with L.E. 2 (Letopolis) and 3(Apis) fronting the desert to the west ofthe western river, with L.E. 14 (Tjaru)lying on the eastern side of the Delta, andwith L.E. 16 (Mendes) marginal into thenorthern swamps. To these should beadded the Ptolemaic subdivisions of L.E.20 (Arabia), cut off from L.E. 13 at thewest end of the Wadi Tuimilat, and L.E.19 (Tanis), separated from L.E. 14 in thenortheast marsh area. With the BusiriticRiver cutting past Mendes and the Bu-bastic River past Tjaru, some of thesenomes may have been better irrigated in

31A. H. Gardiner, JEA, XXX (1944), 33-41.32 Geographically the town of LUtopolis in L. E. 2should be added as a pendant to Heliopolis, but theL.E. 2 nome will be treated as a whole below.


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BUTOANDHIERAKONPOLIS 231antiquity than today. However, L.E. 16,19, and 14 lie below the six-meter contourline and push below the three-meter con-tour, so that they must anciently havebeen infected by the northern marshes.Today the land ranges from the medialto the poor in productivity, and it mayhave been little better in antiquity. How-ever, the eastern and western sections werevery important for communications withAsia and Libya. In addition, it seems like-ly that the effective harbors of northernEgypt were not on the sea coast, but layinland along the rivers, as at Mendes andTanis, which would suggest great com-mercial activity in this area.4. Finally, the outer margins of theDelta lie in and against the northernmarshes, L.E. 7 (Metelis), 6 (Xois), and17 (Diospolis Inferior), and in the areapinched by the desert, the Wadi Taimilt,L.E. 8 (Pithom). L.E. 7 and 17 lie wellbelow the three-meter contour line andmust have been water-logged in antiquity.The southern part of L.E. 6 is on higherground, the northern part runs into themarshes. L.E. 8 may have been wateredby a canal, but it is pinched within itsWAdi. This whole area is now the poorestland of Egypt, and in antiquity it musthave suffered from excess or deficiency ofwater. The three northern nomes, afterone has counted Hermopolis Parva, Buto,Xois, and Diospolis Inferior, have fewsites of genuine historical importance. Themany k6ms and tells rising out of theswamps may not have been significant be-fore Ptolemaic times. The Wadi TuimilAthas several known sites and must havebeen an artery of traffic. Similarly rivertraffic moved through the three northernnomes toward the richer south. This mar-ginal area was by no means desolate, butit corresponds in provincial fading out tothe first three nomes of Upper Egypt atthe extreme south of the land.

V. BUTO AND HIERAKONPOLISAS A PAIRA. Buto

Buto has been identified at K6m (orTell) el-Faracin, 31012' N. Lat. by 30045'E. Long., a few hundred meters from themodern village of Ibtui, which retains theclassical and Coptic name BoutB-Pout6,derived from Per-Wadjit, "House of (thegoddess) Uto."33The site lies in the north-western quarter of the Delta, elevenkilometers northeast of Dissfiq and elevenkilometers directly north of Shabas esh-Shuhadah (Kabasa). K6m el-Faracin isthe only mound in this section of Egyptsufficiently large and with monumentssufficiently imposing to "satisfy the geo-graphical data concerning Buto."34 Thek6m is saddle-shaped, consisting really oftwo mounds, which may possibly corre-spond to ancient Pe and Dep, with a latetemple visible in the trough between thetwo. The nine meters of debris above cur-rent water level contain evidence fromPtolemaic and Roman times, so that theearlier history of the site is archeologicallyunknown. However, fragments of stonevessels of Protodynastic type in the Ro-man town suggest a similarity to Hiera-konpolis.35The mound lies just inside thecontour line which marks two metersabove sea level, with the general latitudeof the three-meter contour line about fiveor six kilometers to the south.36In classi-

x3 D. G. Hogarth, in Journal of Hellenic Studies,XXIV (1904), 2-4; Gardiner, Onomastica, II, 187" ff.;Porter and Moss, Topographical Bibliography, IV(Oxford, 1934), 45; Gauthier, op. cit., II, 35, 65; VI,90.34Hogarth, op. cit., p. 4.35W. M. F. Petrie and C. T. Currelly, Ehnasya1904 (London, 1905), pp. 36-38; Pls. XLIII-XLIV.36Two corrections of data need to be mentionedhere. If around 3000 B.C. the level of the sea was sixmeters lower than at present (Ball, Contributions to theGeography of Egypt, p. 193), then a two meter level to-day would correspond to an eight meter level at thattime. But if the increase in the level of the alluviatedsoil has been constant at the rate of .09 m. per centu-ry, then the land level around 3000 B.c. will have been


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232 JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIEScal times it lay about midway between theTaly and Thermuthiac branches of theNile and a few kilometers north of theeast-west Butic River."'Of the Delta towns which lie on groundlower than the three-meter contour line,Buto is the only one which may be calledboth early and important. Of course Alex-andria, Canopus, and Damietta were ofclassical foundation. Sethroe may be at-tested as early as the Fourth Dynasty.38Tanis, as Avaris, is known from the Sec-ond Intermediate Period. Diospolis Infe-rior, as Behdet, is known from the FifthDynasty.39 Other sites such as Pelusium,Pachnamounis, and Metelis are known tous only from late times. The eastern fron-tier town of Tjaru is of special nature as aborderpost and is thus not comparable; inany case, its name is not recorded beforethe Eighteenth Dynasty. Only Buto, un-der the names of the two sections Pe andDep, is clearly indicated as having been ofhigh significance in earliest times. Theevidence from the texts suggests thatButo, like Hierakonpolis, was of predy-nastic importance. It has therefore beenargued that these two were predynasticpolitical capitals. 40

All other early and important cities ofthe Delta lay on higher ground. Betweenthe three- and six-meter contour linesthere are: Xois, Iseum, and Mendes fromearlier times, and from later times: Her-mopolis Parva, Naukratis, Kabasa, Onou-phis, Qantir, and Phakoussa. Several im-portant sites lie between the six- and nine-meter contours: K6m el-Hisn, Sais,Sebennytos, Busiris, Leontopolis, andPharbaethos. On even higher ground wereBubastis, Terenuthis, Athribis, Letopolis,and Heliopolis. Buto appears to be on ex-ceptionally low ground for a Delta city ofpre-Ptolemaic times.The tradition that Buto lay in a marshyarea seems to be well founded.41 The Pyra-mid Texts and Coffin Texts both associatewell-watered land with this place.42Theclassical writers agree that there was an"island" at or near Buto.43The town defi-nitely belongs to the northern marshes,even though it may have been one of thesouthernmost towns of that inhospitablearea.44

Today the site of Buto lies in the Dis-si^qmarkaz of the Gharblyah mudirlyah.

about 4.5 m. below eight meters (ibid., pp. 175 f.). Thereality of the marsh area in the building up of theDelta may be indicated in another way. Four linesmay be carried across the Delta from LUtopolis topoints on the seacoast: the Rosetta mouth, the Burul-lus lighthouse, the Damietta mouth, and Port Said.On these four lines the average interval between the15 m. contour and the 12 m. contour is 20 kilometers;between twelve and nine is 24 km.; between nine andsix is 25 km.; between six and three is 26 km.; where-as the interval between the three meter contour andsea level averages 56 km. Thus, as the Nile wasslowed in its seaward flow by marshes, a sloping shelfhas been built out more than twice the width of theother intervals.37 So Ball, Egypt in the Classical Geographers, p.120, following Ptolemy. On p. 24, following Herodo-tus, Ball curves the Sebennytic branch to pass byButo. His footnote admits that this is a supposition,and on p. 69, following Strabo, he makes the Seben-

nytic branch flow a considerable distance east of Buto.38Gardiner, op. cit., II, 175* f.39Gardiner, in JEA, XXX (1944), 23.

40 K. Sethe, Urgeschichte und dlteste Religion derAegypter (Leipzig, 1930), esp. pp. 137 if. H. Kees'smodification of Sethe's viewpoint in Der Gitterglaubeim alten A egypten ("Mitteilungen der vorderasiatisch-ligyptischen Gesellschaft," XLV [1941]), p. 178 andIndex, retains the concept of political capitals in pre-dynastic times.41 Gardiner, in JEA, XXX (1944), 52-58; Ball,

Egypt in the Classical Geographers, p. 22.42 K. Sethe, Die altdgyptischen Pyramidentexte(Leipzig, 1908), I, ??188-92, with Dep and a "City ofthe Lakes"-see Sethe's Uebersetzung und Kommentar(Gltickstadt, n.d.), I, 94-97, on this. A. de Buck, TheEgyptian Coffin Texts, II (Chicago, 1938), 326-48,Spell 157, "Knowing the Souls of Pe," starting outwith an address to "swamp-dwellers"-see Zeitschriftfir dgyptische Sprache, LVIII (1923), 6-7.43Herodotus ii. 156; Strabo xvii. 1, 18.44 For a description of the sodden fens of the northfifty years ago, see D. G. Hogarth, Accidents of anAntiquary's Life (London, 1910), pp. 99-107. Ho-garth's quotation from Heliodorus shows that the situ-ation in the fourth century A.D. was like the present.The reputation of the northern swamps as a place ofrefuge and of lawlessness presents interesting analo-gies to the marshes of southern Mesopotamia.


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BUTO AND HIERAIONPOLIS 233As has been argued above, this is one ofthe poorer regions of Egypt, with a densi-ty of population only about half that ofthe national average and less than a quar-ter of that of southern. Delta areas. Themudirlyah is about 20 per cent below thenational average in yield of cereals andvegetables, and one can assume that thissituation is even worse for the northernpart of the mudirlyah in which Buto lay,on the analogy of other over-wateredparts of the Delta.The earliest writings for the names ofButo are Pe and Dep, written phonetical-ly.45 No early etymology has been sug-gested for Dep, but the name Pe has beenconnected with a word "Throne.""4Against this it may be argued that a wordp does mean some kind of a (rush?) seat orpossibly the matting upon which a thronerested but that the term does not mean"throne" before Greek times, and that thename Pe is never determined with anysign suggesting a rush or wooden or stonebasis for a throne. It is safer to confessthat we knowthe originand meaningof theterm Pe for Buto no more than we knowthe origin and meaning of the term Depfor Buto.

B. HierakonpolisK6m el-Ahmar, the site of Hierakon-polis, lies at 25006' N. Lat. by 32?46' E.Long., at the edge of the western desert,about 17 kilometers northwest of Edfu.The ancient name of Hierakonpolis, likethose of Buto, occurs in texts which goback to the beginning of history. Acrossthe river, near el-KAb, lies the site of an-other ancient town, Nekheb. The predy-nastic and protodynastic importance ofK6m el-Ahmar has been demonstrated byexcavation.47

As the site of Buto lies on the edge ofthe northern marshes, so the site of Hiera-konpolis lies near the southern end of thealluviated Nile valley, just north of theNubian sandstone. Table 1 shows Ele-phantine, Gebel es-Silsilah, and es-Sacidahas a series of valves to the south of Hiera-konpolis, in terms of the effective widthsof the alluviated plain. It cannot be ar-gued that Hierakonpolis was the fully ef-fective frontier in the same sense as Ele-phantine, which had both the cataractregion and the narrow banks of Nubia toits south. Nevertheless, Hierakonpolisdoes appear as one terminal point for theagricultural productivity of Middle andUpper Egypt. The area to its south mighteffectively be called Ta Zeti, "NubianLand."K6m el-Ahmar is in the Edfu markaz ofthe Assuin mudirfyah, with a density ofpopulation 63 per cent higher than thetwo markazes to its south, 17 per centlower than the two markazes to its north.The Assuin mudirlyah ranks moderatelywell in the production of vegetables, butit is about 20 per cent lower than the na-tional average in production of cerealsandmarkedly lower than the average of theQena mudirlyah to its north. Both in pop-ulation and in agriculture the Hierakon-polis area shows a definite fading away ofthe riches to its north.

As we have seen, the First Upper Egyp-tian Nome was somewhat loosely attachedto Egypt. Near Hierakonpolis lay theseats of the Second and Third Nomes. ForEdfu, as Behdet, there is textual evidenceas early as the Third Dynasty, with thehieroglyphic writing showing the shrine ofUpper Egypt.48 It is possible that Hiera-konpolis was a late predynastic and pro-todynastic southern limit of Egypt, that45 Sethe, Pyramidentexte, I, ??56b, 188a, 260c, 725d,

etc.; Sethe, Urkunden des alten Reichs, I, 1:17; 241:15;etc.46 Sethe, Urgeschichte, p. 139: "Thron, Sitz;" Kees,Gotterglaube, p. 178: "also Thronstftte 'der Sitz' (P)."

47References in Porter and Moss, op. cit., V, 191 ff.Cf. also Gardiner, Onomastica, II, 7* f.48 Gardiner, in JEA, XXX (1944), 32.


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234 JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIESEdfu became the legitimate heir of Hiera-konpolis in the early Old Kingdom, andthat the effective frontier was pushed toElephantine only in the later Old King-dom.The site of Hierakonpolis shows, on thedesert edge, a late predynastic and proto-dynastic village, with cemetery and"fort." Toward the river on the cultivatedland there is a complex consisting of awalled town containing houses and atemple. The brick town walls and houseshave been dated to the first three dynas-ties. Although the brick temple has beententatively dated to the Eighteenth Dy-nasty, deposits associated archeologicallywith it come from the very beginning ofthe dynasties (Kings "Scorpion"and Nar-mer) down to the Sixth Dynasty (PepiII). Clearly there was here a shrine of theOld Kingdom. Underlying the templethere was a stone structure in the shape ofa fat oval, which we shall consider in moredetail.49The rounded oval was formed by astone revetment more than two meters inheight and with a steep outer slope. Thepurpose of this revetment was to containan artificial mound of sand. This stoneand sand oval lay well above the originaldesert floor, upon which appeared predy-nastic artifacts, and it showed none of thematerial of the Second and Third Dynas-ties. To the excavators the evidence wasthat it was constructed "somewhere at thebeginning of the Ist Dynasty.""5 Its loca-tion and the abundance of royal depositsfrom the Old Kingdom in its neighbor-hood make it practically certain that theoval mound had great religious signifi-cance. What may have stood on top of thesand mound was unfortunately obliterat-

ed by the construction of the later temple.Two interesting analogies, which mayor may not be mutually exclusive, sug-gest themselves. The first is that this ovalmound may have been built as a creationhill, rather specifically a "high sand.""5The second is that we seem to have here asacred oval, possibly once crowned by theshrine of Upper Egypt, and that templeovals, resting upon sand fill, are knownfrom roughly contemporaneous times inMesopotamia.52Neither of these possibili-ties will be pursued here. We are here con-cerned with the ancient name of Hiera-konpolis.The earliest writings of the name ofHierakonpolis show a circle or a flattenedoval, commonly with two slanting strokesinside.51This name has been read Nan.Although its etymology is commonlytreated with some reserve, the word hasbeen connected with another n4n meaning"child."54No connection with a word meaning"child" can really be established, sincethe word for "child" is never writtenwith the circle or oval containing twostrokes, the city name is never writtenwith a child determinative, and the twoare never brought into punning relation-ship. Indeed the original sounding of thename of Hierakonpolis as N n is open tosome doubt. The older texts do not pre-sent the consonants for the name of Hiera-konpolis or for similar words written withthe circle (or oval) with two strokes. We

49 J. E. Quibell and F. W. Green, Hierakonpolis,II (London, 1902), See also G. Brunton, in Studies pre-sented to F. Ll. Griffith (Oxford University Press, 1932),pp. 272-76.

50 Quibell and Green, op. cit., p. 5.

51Most recently, I. Frankfort, Kingship and theGods (Chicago, 1948), pp. 151-54.52 P. Delougaz, The Temple Oval at Khafdjah (Chi-cago, 1940).53Sethe, Pyramidentexte, ??276a, 478a, 725d, etc.,with the circle sometimes empty; Sethe, Urkunden desalten Reichs. I, 123:12; 132:5, 9, etc., with the flat-tened oval sometimes empty.64 Sethe, Urgeschichte, p. 154: the name seems toshow "eine Rundbauanlage ..., bzw. einen mitRingwall umgebenen Platz, ihnlich wie das Zeichender 'Stadt.' " Kees, Gotterglaube, p. 178: "eine 'Kind-heits(stidtte)' des Urgottes."


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BUTO AND HIERAKONPOLIS 235are not provided with the consonantsuntil we reach writings of the New King-dom, with the terminal -n, sometimes pre-ceded by h, in the Eighteenth Dynasty.Some writings suggest that the wholeword was 6n, and no initial n- appearsuntil the Twenty-first Dynasty.55 Fur-ther, somewhere around the Twenty-third Dynasty, the initial consonant ofthe name might be written m-.56 AnEighteenth Dynasty writing for a costlystone, ? ,, may be readhnt, a term fora red or yellow mineral, or 4nmt, a redcostly stone, or mbn, a blue costly stoneor glaze, or m nmt, a costly stone, possiblyred in color.57The only point of certaintyis that all of these words, like the name ofHierakonpolis, contain the elements 6n.Coffin Texts Spell 158 is entitled"Knowing the Souls of Hierakonpolis."'58The spell deals with a myth about thehands of Horus, which have been cut offand are to become a sacred relic. A keyword in this passage is most commonlywritten ", with the rarer variants Iand 7. This will be rendered in the trans-lation as X. The translation does not at-tempt to deal with all of the uncertaintiesabout individual terms or syntax."Then Re said: 'A X is to be given tohim as the place for his hands. Let hishands be exhibited in this X which I havegiven to him, (but?) what is in them shallbe shut up ( --) on the month-feastand half-month-feast.' Then Horus said:'But give me also Dua-mutef and Qebeh-

senuf, who shall guard them-it is a hos-tile body-and who shall still be there aslong as the X is mine,' while Re said: 'Putthem into the crypt(?) of the X. "Thus Ihave done what should be done by himwho is in his broad hall, since they arewith me"-so shalt thou say. Then theyshall end up with thee until Seth haslearned that they are with thee, so that hewill wail.' 0 that which is in the X, giveme effective power I know the mystery ofthe X. It is the two hands of Horus andwhat is in them."

From this text it seems certain that theword for Hierakonpolis was related tosome kind of a structure in which sacredrelics might be safe and yet open to view.May it not have been the oval at K6m el-Ahmar, at or near which rulers of the OldKingdom deposited so many fine ob-jects?59Further, the word for this struc-ture seems to be brought into punning re-lationship with the word 6nr, "shut up,enclose." It has long been known that aword written like the name of Hierakon-polis, either undetermined or determinedwith a house sign, was some kind of astructure.60 There is no evidence that thiswas etymologically related to 6nr and somay be translated "enclosure." There is,however, a distinct possibility that theword basically includes or consists of theroot hn, which might be made into an m-formation (Man) or an n- formation(Nhn). Instead of listing the word for thisstructure and the name for Hierakonpolisunder Nin, with cross-referencesto Mhnand to Hn, one could say of it: "earliestwritten without consonantal indications,later written Un, and later still Nhn orMhn."A suggestion which cannot be pressedbut which emerges as a possibility is that

56K. Sethe et al, "Die Sprfiche fiur das Kennen derSeelen der heiligen Orte," in Zeitschrift fiur dgyptischeSprache, LVIII (1923), 60, 23* fr.56 Gardiner, Onomastica, II, 7*; perhaps 'as earlyas the Twenty-first Dynasty on the basis ofjthe cor-ruption shown in ibid., I, 23* (No. 83).57 Erman and Grapow, Worterbuch der dgyptischenSprache, III, 301:7-8; 294:4; II, 132:2 and 4. Cf

Documents

Buto and Hierakonpolis in the Geography of Egypt