Rules of Gold: The Commoner in Ancient Egyptian Literature

Grace Clements

In analyses of ancient Egyptian literature, one implicit condition is often hidden under rich narrative embellishment: the intended audience is always the aristocracy. As I approach the Egyptian commoner through literary frameworks of harmony, my impulse is to use the phrase “Egyptian perspective.” But seeing as the “Egyptian perspective” is expressed only through texts written by and for a literate, elite minority, the literary voice is a stumbling block for one considering illiterate characters. How does this aristocratic lens warp the depiction of commoners in literature, and what role do commoners play in the type of moral frameworks recommended by the aristocracy? To unpack the role of commoners in paradigms of harmony, I will first discuss autobiographies of nomarchs from the Old Kingdom - a genre which rhetorically relies on a structure of harmony informed by norms of reciprocity. Next, I will look at chaos texts whose anxiety over social inversion draw from a hierarchical and aristocratic notion of harmony. And lastly, in two steps I will explore which traits a “good” commoner exhibits - by dissecting instruction texts which presuppose an existing harmonious environment and by analysing The Eloquent Peasant, in which ma’at has already been disturbed. I will argue that although tension exists between the grand structures of justice and harmony that each genre espouses, the practical application of the corresponding behaviors do not contradict one another. The Egyptian texts do concern themselves with compassionate treatment of the laboring classes, though there is virtue attached to the disempowerment of commoners.

Ma’at as a Concept

Before diving into any historical or literary analysis, we ought to first get a glimpse into what the term harmony - or more accurately ma’at - implies in Egyptian literature. The meaning of the Egyptian word ma’at is nebulous; in English, it’s translated variably as truth, order, justice, harmony, righteousness, and law, but none of these are complete renderings. Indeed, ma’at has myriad contextual implications, appearing in juridical and political literature as well as religious and moral texts. At its broadest, ma’at is a fundamental basis for Egyptian cosmology along with its counterpart isfet, usually translated as “chaos.” And Ma’at the goddess, usually depicted as a woman with an ostrich feather on her head, complicates an understanding of the term’s significance, loaning it theological weight. Those familiar with the Weighing of the Heart ceremony will recognize Ma’at and her iconography. Some Egyptians during the Second Intermediate Period and New Kingdom[1] believed that once a person died, their heart would be weighed on the scale of Ma’at against the feather of truth to determine if the deceased were virtuous enough in life to earn an afterlife. Book of the Dead papyri like those of Hunefer and Ani[2] - compilations of spells intended to help the deceased with trials in the afterlife - illustrate the potential consequences of failure: the demon Ammut, a cross between a lion, a hippopotamus, and a crocodile, waits in the wings to devour an impure soul.

Although a canonical depiction of Ma’at and her iconography may suggest doctrine, dogma, or a sense of divine moral authority to a modern Western audience, one should be careful to consider what the anthropomorphized manifestation of ma’at meant to the Egyptians.  According to Vincent Tobin, “the gods of Egypt...must be understood on a higher level as component parts in a wider mythic system of thought,” “even though they were worshipped and portrayed as individual personal deities.”[3] Considering also that, as Emily Teeter suggests, “there was no ‘secular’ realm in Egypt because all aspects of the society and culture were outgrowths of religion,”[4] it is appropriate to consider all of the aspects of ma’at, from the banal to the divine, contributions to the overall meaning of ma’at as a cosmological principle. The Egyptians’ duties to uphold harmony - from the citizen’s obligation to act lawfully to the king’s charge to champion national unity to the layperson’s moral and spiritual responsibility to act ethically - all contribute to an Egyptian cosmology concerned with the victory of order or harmony over chaos.

Historical Context

In order to provide historical context to the texts I will reference later in this paper, I will include an extremely brief overview of Egyptian history here, starting from the beginning of the Dynastic Period and ending with the fall of the New Kingdom.[5] Why is it appropriate to consider such a wide a historical window? Does ma’at as a concept retain meaning over three millennia? In Emily Teeter’s words, “with Maat’s emphasis upon tradition and unchanging values, she provided the sense of continuity that ensured the permanence of many features of ancient Egyptian culture.”[6] In this overview, I will highlight only the most important recurring political concerns in Egyptian history and patterns of shifting power, developments which shape the material reality of Egyptian commoners and participate in the conception of ma’at and isfet as competing historical forces. A more specific discussion of Egyptian intellectual history and its effect on our ability to interact with the literature will follow the chronological details.

From the genesis of the Egyptian state, Egyptian royal ideology was styled in the language of unification and reunification, or ma’at embodied in the single state. The famous first representation of Egyptian unification, the Narmer palette, celebrates both the victory of King Narmer over foreign enemies and the political merging of Upper and Lower Egypt around 3100 BCE.[7] With the help of geographical luck and a literate administrative class, the early Egyptian state rapidly developed into a complex, centrally-organized political entity during the Early Dynastic Period. This classically harmonious state witnessed over nine centuries[8] of material prosperity, self-sufficiency, and political stability by the end of the Old Kingdom. It was during this time that some of the most enduring symbols of Egyptian culture and stability, the pyramids at Giza and Saqqara, were constructed, and the names of their commissioners would be enshrined in Egyptian religion and literature as guardians of ma’at for millennia. Toward the end of the Old Kingdom, an administrative shift and a weakened economy eventually led to the collapse of the Sixth Dynasty’s authority from Memphis, and nomarchs, the regional governors of Egypt’s provinces, gradually grew in power and influence until their localized rule all but supplanted any royal claim to dominion by 2150 BCE.[9]

A century of fractured rule between provincially focused nomarchs and two competing dynasties, the Herakleopolitan in the north and the Theban Eleventh Dynasty in the south, followed the collapse of the Old Kingdom.[10] The First Intermediate Period would be characterized by later literature as an epoch of isfet, starvation, and immorality, although there is little evidence to suggest that the era was particularly difficult or chaotic. In fact, surveys of graves from the late Old Kingdom and First Intermediate period indicate that during this time, the economic status of provincial regions improved, as objects found in funerary contexts showcased relatively expensive and high-quality goods used in day-to-day life.[11] As Stephan Seidlmayer remarks, "Texts deriving from the First Intermediate Period itself are entirely lacking in that very note of despair that is the hallmark of Middle Kingdom 'pessimistic' literature. They do talk about crisis, but crisis brilliantly overcome."[12] Eventually, the commoner-oriented First Intermediate Period and any Herakleopolitan claim to authority came to an end when Mentuhotep II brought all of Egypt under the control of the Eleventh Dynasty, officially founding the Middle Kingdom before 2050 BCE.[13]

The Middle Kingdom ruling class had learned its lesson from the collapse of the Old Kingdom and took measures to avoid a similar fate. First, Mentuhotep reduced the number of nomarchs in the land and  limited their authority to individual towns, shifting power away from the provinces and reinstating a rigid hierarchy with commoners far from centers of priority.[14] Secondly, the royal family asserted more direct authority over government officials through the creation of new administrative offices. This way, the Eleventh Dynasty defended their divine right to uphold ma’at and initiated a royal renaissance, undertaking grandiose construction programs and resuming military and diplomatic campaigns into neighboring lands. These ambitious programs, like the Faiyum irrigation scheme, required an updated system of taxation based on agricultural yields and corvée labor. Such measures cultivated what Gae Callender calls the “growth of the ‘middle class’ and the scribal sector of society, which increased literacy to unprecedented levels.”[15] Perhaps most importantly, culture shifted toward the personal “in the pervading sense that individual human beings had become more significant in cosmic terms, whether in terms of their obligations to the state… or their increased presence in the literature.”[16] These remarks sum up important cultural shifts by the end of the Middle Kingdom: while the provincial political focus of the First Intermediate Period had been replaced by bureaucratic royal rule - evidenced by the return of Old Kingdom literary traditions - focus in literature fell on the individual, allowing the now larger literate class to sympathize with protagonists from a variety of classes.

After four hundred years of Middle Kingdom bureaucracy, the state succumbed again to fractured, individually-ruled spheres of control. The Second Intermediate Period was characterized even more intensely than the First by authoritative division. By 1650 BCE the Hyksos, a group of Asiatics likely hailing from the Levant, had taken over Lower Egypt and ruled from Avaris.[17] In the south, Kerma Nubians enjoyed their status as a powerful and expansive military force, having overtaken Middle Kingdom cataract forts.[18] From Thebes, the Seventeenth Dynasty Egyptian ruler Kamose expressed his dismay: "Why do I contemplate my strength while there is one Great Man in Avaris and another in Kush, sitting united with an Asiatic and a Nubian while each man possesses his slice of Egypt?"[19] Within a generation his heir Ahmose and his military would trigger the Hyksos’ mass exodus from Avaris and reunify Egypt once again, laying the foundation for the most expansive and imperial era of Egyptian history. Though the Hyksos have been described as "peculiarly Egyptian,” they represent in later literature the essence of isfet, an embodiment of foreign loathsomeness and chaos, even centuries after they were repelled around 1550 BCE.

The early New Kingdom featured many of the same bureaucratic elements of the Middle Kingdom, with additional steps taken to secure ma’at and insulate the royal family from threats to their hegemonic power.[20] Amenhotep I’s successors in the Eighteenth Dynasty include some of the most well-known kings in Egyptian history, thanks to expansionist imperial ambitions which exceeded the aspirations of any other preceding dynasty. For instance, Thutmose I’s profitable campaigns in Kerma-controlled Nubia and the Mitanni-controlled Levant enabled Hatshepsut to forge her kingly legacy through diplomacy and trade with Punt. Their successors continued to venture north and south - Thutmose III even crossed the Euphrates! - while campaigning to expand Egypt’s borders and control trade routes in the Levant.[21] At the end of Amenhotep III’s reign, the Egyptian Empire was following an upward trajectory, enjoying the spoils of war, diplomatic peace, and a huge sphere of influence in the Near East - all favorable indications of the traditional cosmological harmony. His son Amenhotep IV (Akhenaten), however, would shepherd in an entirely new era, one which would change the religious and cultural landscape of Egypt for the rest of pharaonic history. Akhenaten’s religious and political reforms were numerous and bizarre, and his exclusive worship of the sun disk Aten was only one aspect of his radical program of political overhaul.

The Amarna period lasted a mere twenty or so years, and Akhenaten’s  immediate successors hastened to restore ma’at, reverting the state religion and capital back to their previous, harmonious conditions, but the cultural shift which Aten-centered henotheism had set in motion was irreversible.[22] Throughout the Ramesside period to follow, an era characterized still with conquest and material wealth until its decline, the king would never again be able to claim the role of intermediary between the people and the gods, and funerary culture and religiosity among commoners changed dramatically to favor personal piety and the cult of Osiris.[23] Considering that the latest text I will reference comes from the Ramesside era, we should conclude the historical overview here before the Third Intermediate Period and the Late Bronze Age Collapse.

Scribal Practices

Knowledge of chronology is essential if we want to understand the cultural context of the texts we read. It’s no surprise that the material reality of a period - for example, that class distinctions in the First Intermediate Period were less pronounced - would determine the tone of the literature produced during it, but there are a few scribal practices which complicate interpretation and periodization of Egyptian texts. First, the tendency of state-sponsored scribal schools was often to produce literature in archaic traditions in order to appeal to a sense of permanence and stability. Just as Middle and New Kingdom rulers would intentionally style architectural projects after Old Kingdom buildings, Middle and New Kingdom texts would set narratives, especially propagandistic or “prophetic” stories, in a bygone era. The second trend which complicates dating and illustrates the dangers of taking literary texts as literal representations of history is the penchant for texts written during a newly-reunified period to depict the preceding intermediate period in apocalyptic terms. It is not hard to imagine why a government which conceived of its power to maintain ma’at as the basis for its authority would commision literature mourning the state of Egypt under fractured or foreign rule. “The Prophecy of Neferti,” a text written to legitimize the rule of Amenemhat I, a Twelfth Dynasty king of the Middle Kingdom, employs both of these literary devices. The tale takes place in the court of  Snefru in the Old Kingdom as the sage Neferty laments the calamity to come - that is, the First Intermediate Period - and predicts the coming of a great king from the south named Ameny who “shall united the Two Powers…[so] Ma’at will return to her throne and Isfet will be driven off.”[24] Here we see the cultural hegemony of the Egyptian ruling class expressed through literature through archaism and pessimism toward a time when the king did not reign over both Upper and Lower Egypt.

Autobiographies and Norms of Reciprocity

At the risk of leaning into the banal, a relevant moral framework which should initiate our discussion of literary harmony is the “Golden Rule,” the basis for moral arguments we find in Old Kingdom autobiographies. Though its expression may change across cultures and time, what the Golden Rule always expresses is a norm of reciprocity, the notion that by virtue of possessing personhood and empathy, if one wishes to be treated with respect or dignity, one ought to treat others with the same. Apparently noble and internally consistent, adherence to norms of reciprocity emerges as a highly-regarded personal trait in ancient Egyptian texts as early as the Sixth Dynasty. In autobiographies of Old Kingdom nomarchs, a popular boast meant to prove fitness of authority is the responsible and compassionate allocation of wealth and resources to the benefit of all in the nome, especially the poorest of subjects. Harkhuf, an Upper Egyptian nomarch whose autobiography is famous for its mention of a pigmy from Punt, testifies “I gave bread to the hungry and I clothed the naked. I brought to land the one who had no rowboat.”[25] The same trope appears more intensely in the autobiography of Qar, nomarch of Edfu, who claims “I gave bread to the hungry and clothing to the naked of those I found in my nome, I gave jugs of milk. I measured out southern grain from my own estate.”[26] He continues to boast of his magnanimity: “As for every man whom I found in this nome with a loan against him…it was I who repaid it to its owner from my (own) estate. It was I who buried every man of this nome.”[27] We see that these leaders use their generosity toward commoners as a rhetorical demonstration of their legitimacy as local rulers, behavior which maintains harmony if we rely on a moral framework informed by norms of reciprocity.

It is important to keep in mind however, that these autobiographical accounts are mainly found in funerary contexts and are highly idealized, programmatic texts addressing living passers-by.[28] Therefore, we might want to take these braggadocious accounts of largesse as indications of morality-as-rhetoric rather than reflections of the truth. This is not to diminish the role of the Golden Rule in the Egyptian idea of justice. After all, autobiographies are not the only Egyptian genre which expresses this norm! Scholars point to the Middle Egyptian text The Eloquent Peasant as one of the first works of literature to include a version of the Golden Rule: “Do for one who may do for you, that you may cause him thus to do.”[29]

Catastrophe Texts and Inversion

A telling indicator of what the Egyptians believed constructed ma’at can be found in the expression of its counterpart isfet in literary narratives of national calamity. Though the genre of catastrophe texts, described as the “world turned on its head” by Paul Kruger, is particularly important to ancient Near Eastern literature, the allegorical world in disarray will be recognizable to a modern reader who has never heard of the likes of Ipuwer or Telipinu. From Shakespeare’s Macbeth or Hamlet to Oedipus Rex to Arthurian legends like the Fisher King, cosmic disorder projected onto a topsy-turvy or barren world is a powerful literary device. The root of chaotic degeneration in these stories is also fundamentally similar in Near Eastern renditions of the trope: the natural structures of power are out of order. As Kruger observes, ancient Syro-Anatolian sources tend to cast divine abandonment as the source for  literary calamities, whether they be droughts or plagues.[30] Hittite myths like the story of the vanishing god Telipinu describe the anger of a deity, his departure, and the ensuing inversion of all aspects of the natural world: “the fertility of animals and seeds...he took away...Cattle, sheep, and human beings didn’t become pregnant anymore and the pregnant ones didn’t give birth.”[31] In the Old Testament and Sumerian city laments as well, it is often as the result of human error that the earth finds itself punished by divine forces. In chapter 14 of the book of Jeremiah, we see Judah mourn as the ground is cracked and wells dry due to the impiety of the people of the land.[32] In all of these Near Eastern chaos texts, the victims of the reversal of the natural world are everyone. The misfortune strikes all classes, and even erases some class distinctions. In Egypt, however, the victims in calamity texts are exclusively aristocrats while the poor tend to benefit from the reversal of the natural order. And rather than emerging as a response to the sinful or displeasing character of the entire population, chaos in Egypt presented itself in “der Zustand, in dem sich das Land ohne Maat befindet...ohne Königtum [the instance in which the land was without ma’at...without kingship].”[33]  Comparing the chaos genre as it manifests in Near Eastern cultures serves to underscore the cosmological importance of royal authority and social hierarchy in the Egyptian worldview, as other civilizations tend to place blame elsewhere and witness a universally devastating calamity.

If the hallmark of Near Eastern chaos literature is the lamentation of the direct inverse of the ideal world, then we can assume that the complaints made against the status of commoners in Egyptian calamity texts reflect a moral desire for commoners to assume a specific and static role in a social hierarchy. We see such complaints in the text Admonitions of an Egyptian Sage, in which the sage Ipuwer ruminates on Egypt’s descent into chaos, likely based on the speculative disorder of the First Intermediate Period,[34] though the text’s periodization is still disputed.[35] Mourning lawlessness and social upheaval, Ipuwer criticizes the nameless king for neglecting to honor established traditions and shirking his royal responsibility to correct chaos: “What Ipuwer said when he answered the majesty of the Lord of All: You have deceived the whole populace! It seems that (your) heart prefers to ignore (the troubles).”[36] What is most enlightening in this text in reference to the role of the commoner is the reversal of social status which characterizes the cataclysm. It is not enough for the noble classes to be cast into poverty, for the soft-handed to toil as menial laborers, for the once well-fed to experience hunger! Just as disturbing as the plight of “the possessors of wealth [who] now sell their children in exchange for provisions” and “the children of magistrates...in rags”[37] is the good fortune of the former peasants and laborers. The mere fact that now “he who (once) begged dregs for himself has overflowing bowls,” and that “he who could not build for himself a (single) chamber is now the owner of a mansion” is cause for dismay because it breaks the paradigm of social hierarchy that informs the Egyptian concept of justice. Similar sentiments are expressed in the Lamentations of Khakheperre- Sonbe, a text likely composed in the Middle Kingdom or the Second Intermediate Period.[38] Also written to describe a state of unrest and evil, Khakheperre-Sonbe describes a descent into chaos with language of social reversal, remarking that “the one who gives commands / is (now) one to whom commands are given...everyone is based in crookedness.”[39] These calamity texts conjure up quite a different spirit of harmony than texts which conform to norms of reciprocity. In the calamity texts, we see that Egypt in proper order relies on commoners remaining commoners, and on the nobility’s power not only to distribute resources but to simply possess wealth and enjoy luxury as their right. We might characterize this new moral framework as another Golden Rule, or perhaps more appropriately a Rule of Gold, in which the stability of Egypt is predicated on an aristocratic or royal ideology of divinely sanctioned wealth.

Instruction Texts and Humility

Now that we have constructed two frameworks for morality with which autobiographical texts and cataclysm texts interact, we can ask the question more generally “what behaviors - both by and toward commoners - do authors recommend to support social harmony?” The most useful, though admittedly broad, approach is to analyze instruction texts from the Old Kingdom to the New Kingdom. After all, the purpose of this genre is to provide a model for upright conduct. The Maxims of Ptahhotep, likely written in the Sixth Dynasty, provides a set of commendable traits which appear as culturally valued attributes in Egyptian texts for thousands of years. The vizier Ptahhotep here outlines good behavior, notably emphasizing humility, advising “do not be haughty because of your knowledge, but take counsel / with the unlearned man as well as with the learned”[40] and patience or dutifulness by asserting that “it is God who promotes one’s position, and that men should force their way is not done.”[41] As seen in the calamity texts, The Maxims of Ptahhotep also provides support for the wealth of the nobility and the fixed lower status of the common classes, by characterizing a covetous commoner, who “says,/ ‘I will procure (wealth) for myself.” But in the long run it is ma’at which endures, “And an (honest) man may state: ‘This is my ancestral property.’”[42] 

The advice in The Maxims of Ptahhotep is echoed in the voice of the Everyman in The Instruction of a Man for his Son (First Section) which espouses loyalty to the king and a dutiful soft-spokenness, explaining that the virtuous man is a “silent, just man, well disposed, who bends the arm, one who carries out what is said.”[43] In the Ramesside text The Instruction of Amenemope, these motifs of acceptance of status - “do not exert yourself to seek out excess and your allotment will prosper for you”[44]- and thoughtful sincerity - “take care of speaking thoughtlessly; when a man’s heart is upset, words travel faster than wind over water”[45]- appear in conjunction with advice for treatment of commoners. As Amenemope holds a job as a tax-collector, an occupation reputed to fleece the vulnerable, his care to condemn taking advantage of the poor is especially meaningful.[46] Among his advice for those of higher status interacting with commoners with compassion, he advises “do not covet the property of the dependent nor hunger for his bread,”[47] and “if you find a large debt against a poor man, make it into three parts; release two of them and let one remain.”[48] Even outside of instruction texts, we see these personal values stated repeatedly as obvious iterations of the natural order of things. For example in the Israel Stela, detailing Amenhotep III’s triumph over Libyans in the Delta, we see the assumption that those who possess wealth naturally deserve it and that the authority of the king protects this state of justice: “See, only in the vicinity of the energetic one do people dwell at ease...Wealth is made to flow only to the just person.”[49]

The Eloquent Peasant and Self-Advocacy

So far we have remarked that the Egyptian worldview as expressed through the lens of aristocratic literature values traits of patience and humility. We have also witnessed that an imagined social cataclysm from the aristocratic perspective necessarily involves the elevation of the class of commoners over the fallen nobility. These values seem to rely on ma’at as a form of social hierarchy which is defended by the aristocracy and more specifically, by the unifying power of the king. But what happens when the powerful fail to properly defend ma’at? Are there situations in which a commoner is justly defiant of status? In The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant, the text where we began our analysis of norms of reciprocity, the commoner is empowered to find fault with authority and take measures to defend harmony. In this Middle Kingdom text, a peasant named Khunanup has been robbed of his belongings on his way to town by Nemtynakhte, a man of superior status. From this instance of injustice on, the narrative revolves around Khunanup’s search for the restoration of ma’at by appealing to the Chief Steward Rensi, and by extension, the king. Quite clearly, those in power are abusing the wronged commoner, making him perform eloquent speeches under duress for their enjoyment while intending all along to restore justice after their fun has been had. This is expressed by the king explicitly when he remarks to Rensi after the peasant’s first petition, “cause him to remain here...And so that he may keep on/ speaking, remain silent.”[50]  The reader is meant to sympathize with Khunanup and his frustrations, and indeed cheer him on, even as he subverts the traditional values of obedience and gentle humility. Khunanup’s great gift of gab and grasp of “how things should be” excuse him from the normal expectations of demure decorum, especially because he begins his petitions politely, albeit ironically,[51] by addressing the Chief Steward as “a noble unpolluted by vice,...one who nurtures Ma’at, one who answers the plea of him who raises his voice,”[52] and only after correctly assessing the refusal of his superiors to restore justice does he raise his voice, pleading “let your eyes see! Let your heart be instructed! Do not be tyrannical in your power.”[53] In the case of Khunanup, we see the most active role a commoner may take in restoring ma’at: only after a demonstrated inability of those in power to recognize injustice and defend order from the chaos of tyranny, and only when the commoner in question holds an extraordinary command of language of justice and harmony himself, is it appropriate to break from the prescriptive norms of humility and soft-spokenness to actively seek justice and reciprocity.

From taking a look at the literature above, I have begun to develop a framework to judge the code of behavior involving the commoner: while attestations of charity or compassion for the commoner serve mainly as tropes and the Egyptian national catastrophe is characterized by the comfort of the laboring class, there is yet an active role for the commoner in maintaining harmony. As we see in various instruction texts and the Eloquent Peasant, a good subject is one who dutifully attends to his or her daily goings-on, and a good ruler is one who takes care of commoners. But if this duty is breached, a commoner may firmly assert an authority’s duty to serve his people, or at least as a literary figure this commoner figure would be commended. While the social elevation of, and perhaps to a certain degree respect for, commoners threatens the Egyptian notion of harmony, the rights of a commoner are nonetheless to be upheld, and that justice is to be served is the responsibility of the nobility. In conclusion, norms of reciprocity upheld by the Golden Rule may seem in direct conflict with a “Rule of Gold,” by which the concept of ma’at is at least in part rooted in the naturally ordained supremacy of one class over another. But only in extreme circumstances is the behavior recommended by either framework contradictory. In keeping with a traditional Egyptian contentment with two notions which, to the modern observer, might seem mutually exclusive, these rather different moral frameworks work hand-in-hand in the majority of every-day cases: as long as there is no danger of breaching social class or a reversal of roles in society, the preservation of the dignity of all Egyptians, common or noble, is essential to maintaining ma’at.

Bibiliography

Bommas, Martin. Das Alte Ägypten. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchsgesellschaft, 2012.

Coogan, Michael David., Marc Zvi. Brettler, Carol A. Newsom, and Pheme Perkins. The New Oxford Annotated Bible. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.

Faulkner, Raymond O., trans. The Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead. New York: Barnes & Noble, 2005.

Goelet, Ogden. "Memphis and Thebes: Disaster and Renewal in Ancient Egyptian Consciousness." The Classical World 97, no. 1, 2003: 19-29.

Kruger, Paul Albertus. "A World Turned on Its Head in Ancient Near Eastern Prophetic Literature: A Powerful Strategy to Depict Chaotic Scenarios." Vetus Testamentum 62, no. 1, 2012: 58-76.

Parkinson, R. B. "Literary Form and the "Tale of the Eloquent Peasant." The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 78, 1992: 163-78.

Parkinson, R. B. "The Text of "Khakheperreseneb": New Readings of EA 5645, and an Unpublished Ostracon." The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 83, 1997: 55-68.

Quirke, Stephen, and A. Jeffrey. Spencer. The British Museum Book of Ancient Egypt. New York: Thames and Hudson, 2001: 97-102.

Reyhan, E. “The Missing God Telipinu Myth: A Chapter from the Anient Anatolian Mythology.” Date and publisher unknown, 88-93.

Schlögl, Hermann A. Das Alte Ägypten. 4th ed. Munich: Verlag C.H. Beck, 2015.

Shaw, Ian J., ed. The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.

Simpson, W.K. ed., The Literature of Ancient Egypt: An Anthology of Stories, Instructions, Stelae, Autobiographies, and Poetry, New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003.

Sitsler, D. “Vorwurf gegen Gott.” Ein religiöses Motiv im Alten Orient (Ägypten und Mesopotamien, Studies in Oriental Religions 32, Wiesbaden, 1995, 38.

Teeter, Emily. “The Presentation of Maat: Ritual and Legitimacy in Ancient Egypt,” Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization 57, Chicago: The Oriental Institute, 1997.

Teeter, Emily. Religion and Ritual in Ancient Egypt. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011: 3-15.

Tobin, Vincent Arieh. "Mytho-Theology in Ancient Egypt." Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt 25, 1988: 169-83.

Van De Mieroop, Marc. A History of the Ancient Near East: c. 3000-323 BC. Blackwell Publishing, 2016.

Van Seters, John. "A Date for the 'Admonitions' in the Second Intermediate Period." The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 50, 1964: 13-23.

Von Lieven, Alexandra. "Zur Funktion Der ägyptischen Autobiographie." Die Welt Des Orients 40, no. 1, 2010: 54-69.

Washington, Harold C., Wealth and Poverty in the Instruction of Amenemope and the Hebrew Proverbs, SBL Dissertation Series 142, Atlanta, 1994: xi-207.

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[1] Quirke and Spencer. The British Museum Book of Ancient Egypt, 99.

[2] Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead, 60-61.

[3] Tobin, "Mytho-Theology in Ancient Egypt," 70.

[4] Teeter, Religion and Ritual in Ancient Egypt, 4.

[5]  This historical overview is mainly for readers unfamiliar with ancient Egyptian history. If you would like to skip ahead to literary analysis, go to the section titled “Scribal Practices.”

[6] Teeter, “The Presentation of Maat: Ritual and Legitimacy in Ancient Egypt,” 1.

[7] Schlögl, Das Alte Ägypten, 24.

[8]  Malek, The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt ed. Shaw, 107. I use Shaw’s dates in the rest of the paper.

[9]  Bommas, Das Alte Ägypten, 32-36.

[10] Quirke and Spencer. The British Museum Book of Ancient Egypt, 37-38.

[11]  Seidlmayer, The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt ed. Shaw, 113.

[12]  Seidlmayer, The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt ed. Shaw, 135.

[13]  Schlögl, Das Alte Ägypten, 45-46.

[14]  Bommas, Das Alte Ägypten, 47-50.

[15] Callender, The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt ed. Shaw, 170.

[16]  Callender, The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt ed. Shaw, 171.

[17]  Van De Mieroop, A History of the Ancient Near East, 132 and 141.

[18]  Quirke and Spencer. The British Museum Book of Ancient Egypt, 40.

[19] Bourriau, The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt ed. Shaw, 172.

[20]  Bryan, The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt ed. Shaw, 212-213.

[21] Bryan, The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt ed. Shaw, 222-254.

[22] Teeter, Religion and Ritual in Ancient Egypt, 188.

[23]  Schlögl, Das Alte Ägypten, 82-98.

[24] Tobin, “The Prophecies of Neferty,” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 209.

[25] Simpson,“Three Autobiographies...(Harkhuf)” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 408.

[26] Simpson, “Three Autobiographies...(Qar)” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 413.

[27] Simpson, “Three Autobiographies...(Qar)” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 413.

[28] Von Lieven, "Zur Funktion Der ägyptischen Autobiographie," 54-69.

[29] Tobin, “The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 32.

[30] Kruger,  "A World Turned on Its Head in Ancient Near Eastern Prophetic Literature.”

[31] Reyhan, “The Missing God Telipinu,” 88.

[32] The New Oxford Annotated Bible, 1069-1161.

[33] Sitzler, “Vorwurf gegen Gott,” 38.

[34] Goelet, "Memphis and Thebes: Disaster and Renewal in Ancient Egyptian Consciousness,” 21.

[35] Van Seters, "A Date for the 'Admonitions' in the Second Intermediate Period,” 13-23.

[36] Tobin, “The Admonitions of an Egyptian Sage” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 209.

[37] Tobin, “The Admonitions of an Egyptian Sage” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 200.

[38] Parkinson,"The Text of "Khakheperreseneb," 68.

[39] Simpson, “The Lamentations of Khakheperre-Sonbe” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 213.

[40] Tobin, “The Maxims of Ptahhotep” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 131.

[41] Tobin, “The Maxims of Ptahhotep” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 136.

[42] Tobin, “The Maxims of Ptahhotep” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 132.

[43] Simpson, “The Instruction of  a Man for his Son” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 176.

[44] Simpson, “The Instruction of Amenemope” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 230.

[45] Simpson, “The Instruction of Amenemope” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 231.

[46] Washington, Wealth and Poverty in the Instruction of Amenemope, 101.

[47] Simpson, “The Instruction of Amenemope” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 233.

[48] Simpson, “The Instruction of Amenemope” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 235.

[49] Wente, “The Israel Stela” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 359.

[50] Tobin, “The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 31.

[51] Parkinson,"Literary Form and the "Tale of the Eloquent Peasant,” 165-168.

[52] Tobin, “The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 29.

[53] Tobin, “The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant” in Literature of Ancient Egypt ed. Simpson, 37.