Carnarvon Tablet

The Carnarvon Tablet is an ancient Egyptian inscription in hieratic recording the defeat of the Hyksos by Kamose.[1]

Contents

On the reverse side of tablet no. 1 is inscribed the beginning of The Maxims of Ptahhotep.[2] On the obverse side of this tablet is a description of Kamose's victory over the Hyksos. The inscription is copied from a stela in Karnak.[3] In the inscription, Kamose exclaims (in a translation by James B. Pritchard):

Let me understand what this strength of mine is for! (One) prince is in Avaris, another is in Ethiopia, and (here) I sit associated with an Asiatic and a Negro! Each man has his slice of this Egypt, dividing up the land with me. I cannot pass by him as far as Memphis, the waters of Egypt, (but), behold, he has Hermopolis. No man can settle down, being despoiled by the imposts of the Asiatics. I will grapple with him, that I may cut open his belly! My wish is to save Egypt and to smite the Asiatics![3]

Sir Alan Gardiner provides the following alternative translation, noting the control of Upper Egypt by the Kerma culture of Nubia:

I should like to know what serves this strength of mine, when a chieftain in Avaris, and another in Kush, and I sit united with an Asiatic and a Nubian, each in possession of his slice of Egypt, and I cannot pass by him as far as Memphis... No man can settle down, when despoiled by the taxes of the Asiatics. I will grapple with him, that I may rip open his belly! My wish is to save Egypt and to smite the Asiatic!"[4]

On tablet no. 2 there is a heavily damaged inscription.[2]

Discovery

It was found in 1908 by Lord Carnarvon on two wooden tablets covered stucco in fine plaster.[2] It was discovered amongst pottery debris on a ledge close to the entrance of a tomb near the mouth of the Deir el-Bahari valley.[2] Howard Carter believed this tomb to date from the Seventeenth Dynasty.[2]

Notes
  1. Alan H. Gardiner, ‘The Defeat of the Hyksos by Kamōse: The Carnarvon Tablet, No. I’, The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 3, No. 2/3 (Apr. - Jul., 1916), pp. 95-110.
  2. Gardiner, p. 95.
  3. James B. Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament. Third Edition (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969), p. 232.
  4. Gardiner, Sir Alan. Egypt of the Pharaohs, 1961, reprint Oxford University Press, 1979, p.166
gollark: I guess?
gollark: I could make it print those when a PotatOS Incident Report is sent.
gollark: There's startup quotes, yes, no notification handling.
gollark: A more important question, maybe, is: when should potatOS *use* libhydraz?
gollark: It would probably be workable to just make `libhydraz` contain only the table of quotes as strings, and to make `autohydraz` or whatever do all the work.

References
  • Alan H. Gardiner, ‘The Defeat of the Hyksos by Kamōse: The Carnarvon Tablet, No. I’, The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 3, No. 2/3 (Apr. - Jul., 1916), pp. 95-110.
  • Battiscombe Gunn and Alan H. Gardiner, ‘New Renderings of Egyptian Texts: II. The Expulsion of the Hyksos’, The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 5, No. 1 (Jan., 1918), pp. 36-56.
  • James B. Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament. Third Edition (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969).

Further reading
  • The Earl of Carnarvon and Howard Carter, Five Years' Explorations at Thebes (London: Henry Frowde Oxford University, 1912), plate xxvii, xxviii and pp. 36-37.
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