Ptahshepses (high priest)

Ptahshepses was an ancient Egyptian official at the end of the Fourth and the beginning of the Fifth Dynasty. His main title was that of a great one of the leaders of craftsmen, that in later periods is the main designation of the High Priest of Ptah.

False door of Ptahshepses

Ptahshepses is mainly known from a false door that is today in the British Museum (Inv. no. EA 862), but coming from his tomb. A smaller fragment of the door is kept in the Oriental Institute Museum (Inv. no. 11084) in Chicago[1] He is also known from statues and had a mastaba at Saqqara (mastaba C 1).[2]

His false door bears a long biographical inscription and reports main events in his life. Ptahshepses was born under king Menkaure and educated at the palace. Under Userkaf, he married the eldest king's daughter Khamaat. He lived at least till the reign of Niuserre as he was priest at his sun temple, named Shesepibre. The name of the latter king is not preserved in the biography.

On the lintel of the false door appears the underworld god Osiris in the offering formula. Osiris is otherwise not well attested in the Fifth Dynasty and there is a scholarly debate going on, about the first mentioning of Osiris in Ancient Egyptian sources. Depending on the life time of Ptahshepses, his inscriptions might be the earliest evidence for this deity. However, it is also possible that Ptahshepses died after Niuserre.[3]

References
  1. Peter F. Dormanː The Biographical Inscription of Ptahshepses from Saqqaraː A Newly indentified fragment, inː Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 88 (2002), 95-110
  2. Auguste Mariette, Gaston Maspero: Les mastabas de l'Ancien Empire: Fragment du dernier ouvrage de A. Mariette, publié d'après le manuscrit de l'auteur. F. Vieweg, Paris 1889, 110-114
  3. Mark Smith: Following Osiris, Perspectives on the Osirian Afterlife from Four Millennia, Oxford 2017, ISBN 978-0-19-958222-8 118-120


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