Animal imagery in expressing royal and divine rage

in ancient Egyptian Texts

Ahmad Abo el Magd
Minia University

Abstract:
This study investigates how one may excavate and extract ancient emotion of

rage from representations of divine and royal rage in ancient Egyptian literature,
specifically hieratic and demotic narrative and poetic papyri, to create a nuanced
emotional landscape that will illuminate how the ancient Egyptians imagined the
royal or divine rage.
This paper discusses the representation of the King or the god in animal
images like lion, panther, fox or crocodile as metaphor of the rage through ancient
Egyptian literature texts, what were the gods and kings rage about and the similarity
between the divine or royal rage and such deadly animals as a step to understand the
use of metaphor in ancient Egyptian literature followed by other steps.

Keywords:
animal imagery animalistic metaphor divine rage royal rage
Introduction:
While the ancient Egyptians are long dead and gone, traces of their

civilization: art, architecture, jewelry, and daily household objects still remain in
Egypt and abroad in museums around the world. What do not remainwhat cannot
remainare tangible samples of ancient Egyptian emotion.
The literature of ancient Egypt, as the main source of understanding ancient
Egyptian life, is comprehensible even when we are missing the subtle nuances in the
different understandings or shades of emotion presented. Nevertheless, there are
profound discrepancies to be encountered, and we must keep in mind that the ancient
Egyptians had their own words and their own specific linguistic gymnastics to try to
convey an emotion.

Unfortunately, ancient Egyptian literature; to date, does not have a single text
that discusses or meditates on emotion itself. The closest texts to such a phenomenon
are the wisdom and autobiography texts which frequently make reference to the
disadvantages of having a short temper and being angry. Therefore, there is no text to
turn to that attempts to define or describe emotion(s). It is noteworthy that although
many emotions have multiple words and synonyms in Middle Egyptian and Late
Egyptian to describe them, there has yet to be found a word for emotion as a broad
concept or category, such as the Greek word pathos that is generally assumed to mean
emotion. The absence of such a text or word might be an accident of history or
preservation; perhaps in the future such a text will be discovered.
This paper focuses on the use of animal imagery or animalistic metaphor in
expressing rage of the gods and kings through examples of ancient Egyptian literature
such as The Contendings of Horus and Seth, The Instruction of Amenemope, Karnak
Inscription of Merenptah and Victory Stela of Piye.

Definition:
There are many definitions of rage as a degree or synonym of violent or
aggressive anger such as:

Rage: violent and explosive anger. Rage and fury imply intense,
explosive, often destructive emotion while wrath applies especially to
anger that seeks vengeance or punishment.(1)

Rage: violent uncontrollable anger.(2)

Rage is a feeling of intense anger. It is associated with the fight-orflight response and often times activated in response to an external cue,
such as the murder of a loved one.(3)

Discussion:
Stories, myths, and religious beliefs reveal the powerful role that anger, in
general, has played in human affairs since the beginning of recorded history where
anger is proved to the most impressive and effective emotion in modern and ancient

1 http://www.thefreedictionary.com/rage.
2 http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/rage?q=rage.
3 http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Rage_%28emotion%29.

inventories of emotions. Konstan noted that one emotion that is included without
exception in both classical and modern inventories of the passions is anger, and it may
well seem to be a prime example of an innate and universal emotion.(4)
Physiological studies of aggressive violence have proven that such a negative
affect can precipitate and accentuate aggressive behavior(5) and ancient Egyptian
literature provides many examples of violent behavior inspired by anger.
Through the study and analysis of some selected examples of ancient Egyptian
literature, the researcher will focus on the animalistic metaphor or in other words the
description of the god or the king who is in status of rage in animal images to allude
the aggressive and violent response of the god or the king.

Words and expressions of rage in ancient Egyptian language:

There are a significant number of words for anger in general and rage, as
violent and explosive anger, in Middle Egyptian, and their multiple meanings and
shades of meaning occasionally reveal nuances of the concept of rage in ancient
Egypt.
The most frequent words used for rage in Middle Egyptian is

qnd(6)which means "to rage", to be angry or furious and intransitive verb

Dnd which means to be angry(7) and can be combined with ib (dnd ib) to mean wrath.(8)
The verb

qnd in Late Egyptian has been translated as to be enraged(9), to

become furious(10) to rage(11) and to be angered.(12) The nominal form

4 Konstan, D., The Emotions of the Ancient Greeks: Studies in Aristotle and Classical Literature,
Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006, p. 41.
5 Davidson, R.J., Putnam, K.M., & Larson, C.L. Dysfunction in the Neural Circuitry of Emotion
Regulation: A Possible Prelude to Ciolence, Science 289 (2000), p. 591.
6
Sethe, K., Aegyptische Lesestucke zum Gebrauch im akademischen Unterricht, Leipzig: J.C.
Hinrichs, 1928, p.80, 18; Urk. IV, p. 268, 9, p.1081, 15.
7
Sethe, Kurt. Die altaegyptischen Pyramidentexte nach den Papierabdriicken und Photographien des
Berliner Museums, neu hrsg. und erlautert. Leipzig: J.C. Hinrich, 1908-1922, 631.
8
Griffith, F. L., The Inscriptions of Siut and Der Rtfeh, London, 1855, pl.4, 224.
9
KRI II, p. 228, 7.
10
Gardiner, A., Late Egyptian Stories, Brussels: Edition de la Fondation egyptologique Reine Elisabeth,
1932, 4, 3, 7.
11
ibid., 5, 2, 80; KRI V, p.13, 6; Mumuller, W.M., Der Biindnisvertrag Ramses II und des
Cheiterkonigs. MVAG. 7 (1902), (pl. 4), 2, 12.
12
Gardiner, A. Late Egyptian Stories, I, 6, 10.

qndt is used for rage.(13) Other Late Egyptian verbs meaning to rage

(14)

include
xar
to rage", "to be furious,
Aty to become
(15)

angry

and

(16)

(17)

(18)

(19)

(20)

nSny to rage, which in Demotic means to be angry(21) while the

demotic noun nSn means rage.(22) The Late Egyptian verb

HDn has been translated in many different ways,

angry,

(23)

(24)

, to rage

The word

and to fly into a rage.

or

such as to become

(25)

xar to rage" is used in the following compounds: )(26),

xar m-qty pA ym (to rage like the sea)(27), xar r (to rage against)(28), xar Hr (to
rage on account of)(29), and gy n xar (manner of raging).(30)
It is worthy to mention that the name pA nt nA xar .f The One who Rages(31) is
the name of one of the underworld judges of the dead.
Determinatives played an important role in the animalistic metaphor in
ancient Egyptian literature in expressing rage, wrath and other forms of anger.

13

ibid.2, 3, 8; Lesko, L., A Dictionary of Late Egyptian, Second Edition, Vol. II, p. 155.
KRI II, p. 119, 7-10 (Battle of Kadesh).
15
Cerny, J., Late Ramesside Letters, (Bibliotheca Aegyptiaca IX , Bruxelles,1939, 46R4.
16
Gardiner, A.H., Egyptian Hieratic Texts, (Series1: Literary Texts of the New Kingdom, Part1, The
Papyrus Anastasi and the Papyrus Roller together with the parallel texts), Leipzig,1911, 12, 2
17
KRI II, p. 151, 4.
18
KRI V, p. 64, 13
19
KRI V, p. 35, 13.
20
KRI V, p. 42, 3.
21
Wb. II, 340-341.
22
Thissen H. J., Der verkommene Harfenspieler: Eine altagyptische Invektive (P. Wien KM 3877)
(Demotische Studien), Gisela Zauzich Verlag, 1992 , p.39.
23
Gardiner, A., Late Egyptian Stories, op.cit., 4, 4, 13; 5, 2, 46.
24
Gardiner, A.H., Egyptian Hieratic Texts, p. 10*, 6, 7.
25
ibid., (OT 2-3); Lesko, L., op.cit., p. 342.
26
Erichsen, W., Demotisches Glossar, Copenhagen: Munksgaard 1954, p. 351.
27
ibid.
28
ibid.
29
ibid.
30
Glanville, S. R. K., Catalogue of the Demotic Papyri in the British Museum, Volume II, The
Instructions of Onchsheshonqy , London: British Museum, 1955, 4/20.
31
Stadler, M., Der Totenpapyrus des Pa-Month (P. Bibl. nat. 149). Studien zum Altgyptischen
Totenbuch 6., Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2003, 149, 2/5.
14

The most frequent used determinative for rage (qnd) is the monkey
32) which

(32)

(E

The other famous determinative for rage (Dnd ) is the aggressive bull

head determinative [F2] which describes a person "rages like a bull".(33)

Goldwasser explains that when the attacking bull is chosen as the prototypical
member, the metaphoric categorization implies angry like a bull which probably
means quiescent yet potentially lethal anger.(34) Vycichl suggests that qnd and Dnd
are probably the same word, and that the Egyptian word is connected to the Semitic
qird - monkey (Arabic) as Goldwasser observes that even if this suggestion is to be
accepted, the Egyptian speaker probably did not retain in memory the connection to
the Semitic word, and the determinative still had its metaphorical effect.(35)
The crocodile determinative

(I 3) is used for words related to rage and

anger in general. The crocodile determinative served as a prototype for

aggressiveness.(36) Goldwasser concludes that the crocodile determinative falls within
the ad hoc category of classification, for when related to the determined word the
determinative appears to be located neither on the categorical axis of the word, nor
exactly on the metonymic scheme,(37) where he places the crocodile determinative in
the ad hoc category of aggressive beings. While the crocodile did not just determine
words for emotion,(38) it seems that most words that it determines are related to greed
and anger.
The bad bird determinative

(G

37) accompanies a great number of

words that describe something that is inherently bad or evil such as

HDn

32

Goldwasser, O., A Comparison between Classifier Language and Classifier Script: The Case of
Ancient Egyptian , in: A Festschrift for Hans Jakob Polotsky, Ed. G. Goldenberg, pp. 16-39, Magnes
Press: Jerusalem, 2006, p. 25.
33
ibid.
34
Goldwasser, O., From Icon to Metaphor Studies in the Semiotics of the Hieroglyphic Script,
Gottingen: Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis: Universitatsverlag Freiburg Schweiz Vandenhoeck &
Ruprecht, 1995, p. 96.
35
ibid. with reference to Vycichl, W., La vocalisation de la langue gyptienne, Vol 1. Cairo: Institut
Franais Archologie Orientale du Caire, 1990.
36
Gardiner, A., Egyptian Grammar: Being an Introduction to the Study of Hieroglyphs,
London: Oxford University Press, 1957, 475.
37
Goldwasser, O., From Icon to Metaphor Studies in the Semiotics of the Hieroglyphic Script, op.cit,
p. 94.
38
For instance, the crocodile also determines the word sSd flash, which may be due to the quick
motions of a crocodile or its shiny scales, as proposed by Goldwasser, ibid.

The man with stick determinative

(A 24) was used for the majority of

words related to quarrel as a reaction of rage and in words containing some element of
force, activity, effort or strength such as

qndt rage.

Other determinatives for rage include the hand to mouth determinative

(A 2), the superordinate classifier of senses and emotions and the arm with stick
determinative

[D 40]

which is associated with words relating to action and

strength, tends to replace the man with stick determinative (A 24) from Middle
Kingdom on. In this case, the shortened representation is a pictorial synecdoche,
emphasizing the limb responsible for the aggression.(39)

Animal imagery in expressing divine rage:

The Contendings of Horns and Seth contain a shocking amount of rage and
violence. Isis repeatedly interferes in the action of The Contendings of Horus and Seth
on Horus behalf by using trickery, seduction, and magic. Isis is also involved in
scenes of mutilation, manipulation, sexual taboo and trickery.
Isis places a curse on the river, upon which Osiris is floating in his coffin, and
causes the river to dry up. She hides the chest in the marshes of the delta, and Seth
stumbles upon it while hunting and instantly recognizes it. The text states:
At the sight hatred and anger came upon him in a red cloud, and he
raged like a panther of the south. He tore open the chest, took the
body of Osiris, and ripped it into fourteen pieces which, by his divine
strength, he scattered up and down the whole length of the Nile so
that the crocodiles might eat them.(40)
In his rage, Seth tears the body of Osiris into fourteen pieces, demonstrating
the destructive power and wrath of his character, especially in relationship to his
brother Osiris.
Isis is torn between her allegiance to Horus, her son and Seth, her maternal
brother, when they are fighting in the water, and Seth calls out for her to remember

39

Goldwasser, O., From Icon to Metaphor Studies in the Semiotics of the Hieroglyphic Script, op.cit,
p. 88.
40
Murray, M. A., Ancient Egyptian Legends, London, 1920, p. 49 also available on line:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/79043206/Ancient-Egyptian-Legends

that he is her maternal brother. After she causes her harpoon to release its bite on
Seth, Horus becomes exceedingly furious. Horus is described as:
"Horus, son of Isis, became furious at his mother Isis and
came out with his face as erce as an Upper Egyptian
panthers, holding his cleaver of sixteen Deben -weight in his
hand. He removed the head of his mother Isis, put it in his
arms, and ascended the mountain".(41)
As punishment, Horus cuts off his mother's head and carries her up the
mountain because, in that section of the legend, she felt very compassionate toward
her maternal brother Seth.
In addition to the panther, the raged persons, gods or human beings, were
compared to wolves and crocodiles, such as in The Instruction of Amenemope:
"He is like a wolf cub in the farmyard,
And he turns one eye to the other (squinting),
For he sets families to argue.
He goes before all the winds like clouds,
He changes his hue in the sun;
He crocks his tail like a baby crocodile,
He curls himself up to inflict harm".(42)
The raged personages in this example are like a scheming wolf cub in the
farmyard that cannot be trusted, and his ways set families against one another. He is
endowed with trickster and somewhat magical qualities, such as the ability to change
hue and to go before all of the winds like clouds. The animal imagery continues with
the reference to his baby crocodile-like tail, and the curling of his body to inflict
harm.
The gods were capable of showing extreme rage in ancient Egyptian literature,
and this rage was not reserved for one or two gods alone; rather, multiple gods and

41

Simpson, W. K., The Literature of Ancient Egypt: An Anthology of Stories, Instructions, Stelae,
Autobiographies, and Poetry; Third Edition, Yale University Press, New Haven & London, 2003, p.98.
42
ibid., p. 232. For the Instruction of Amenemope:
https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/jrblack/web/diss.html

goddesses are mentioned as being rageful or capable of rage.43 For example, The
Instruction of Amenemope discusses how the gods deal with hot-tempered mortals.
The text specifically mentions the god Khnum:
Even Khnum will straightway come against him, even Khnum will
straightway come against him,(44)
The potter of the ill-tempered man...
Is to knead and bake the hearts that he moulds.(45)

Animal imagery in expressing Royal rage:

The pharaoh was often viewed as a source of rage or potential rage in various
literary texts and royal inscriptions. The rage of the pharaoh is actually portrayed as a
positive, if fearful, aspect of the king and his rule, and the word used to denote rage
was usually

qnd.(46)

In terms of the military, pharaohs were often praised for their power and might
in battle and when dealing with foreign enemies and captives. For example,
Merenptah raged when he was reported the chief of the Rebu, Merey, reached the
western borders. Merenptah is outraged that not every single troop member has been
exterminated, and, as a result, he chooses to finish the job himself:

ist Hm .f Xarw Hr .sn mi mAi

Now his majesty raged like a lion because of them.(47)

After the king hears of the Temehu attack, his rage "like a lion" is tantamount
to saying that he manifests himself like Sakhmet.(48)

43

O'Dell, E. J., Excavating the Emotional Landscape of Ancient Egyptian Literature, Ph.D. thesis,
Department of Egyptology and Ancient Western Asian Studies at Brown University, Providence,
Rhode Island, May 2008, p. 155.
44
Peterson, B. J., "A New Fragment of The Wisdom of Amenemope", JEA 52 (1966), p. 125.
45
Simpson, W. K., The Literature of Ancient Egypt, op. cit., p. 232.
46
O'Dell, E. J., Excavating the Emotional Landscape of Ancient Egyptian Literature, op.cit, p. 144.
47
Karnak Inscription of Merenptah Lines 15-16: KRI, IV, 4, 4; Manassa, C., The Great Karnak
Inscription of Merneptah: Grand Strategy in the 13th Century B.C., New Haven, Conn.: Yale
Egyptological Seminar, 2003, pp. 27-28.
48
For discussion of the king's relationship to Sakhmet, especially in her lioness form, see Grimal, N.,
Les termes de la propagande royale gyptienne: de la XIXe dynastie la conqute dAlexandre,
tudes sur la propagande royale gyptienne 4, Mmoires de lAcadmie des Inscriptions et BellesLettres, Nouvelle Srie 6, Paris 1986, pp. 396-408.

The portrayal of the king as a raging lion is a common motif in Egyptian

texts(49) and is further exploited in the "rage" section of the Knigsnovelle.(50) The
animal imagery creates a rich pictorial reference and implicitly relates the king to the
constellation of leonine deities, both male and female.
The rage of the pharaoh is compared in the Victory Stela of Piye to the rage of
a panther. The text states:
Then His Majesty raged against it like a panther, saying: As I live, as
Re loves me, as my father Amon favors me, I have discovered that this has
happened for it by the command of Amon.(51)
Also, in the same inscription, Piye is also described as raging like a panther:
They sent word explicitly to report to the Majesty of the King
of Upper and Lower Egypt, Piye, beloved of Amon, given life,
detailing every attack which they had made, detailing every victory
of His Majesty. Then His Majesty raged because of it like a
panther: Have they allowed a remnant to remain among the troops
of Lower Egypt as to let go an escapee among them to relate his
campaign, not killing them to exterminate the last of them? As I
live, as Re loves me, as my father Amon favors me, I shall go
northward myself.(52)
Then King Piye continues in his description for his rage as a panther, for the
third time in his text:
"Then His Majesty burst forth to revile his army, raging at it like a
panther: Do they endure while your combat is such that my business is
delayed? It is the year for finalizing a conclusion, for placing fear of me in
Lower Egypt, and for inflicting upon them a severe and painful defeat by
striking.(53)

49

Wit, C. de, Le rle et le sens du lion dans l'Egypte ancienne (Leiden, 1953), pp. 16-34.
Spalinger , A., Aspects of the Military Documents of the Ancient Egyptians, Volume 9 of Yale Near
Eastern Researches, Yale University Press, 1982, pp. 114-119.
51
Simpson, W. K., The Literature of Ancient Egypt: An Anthology of Stories, Instructions, Stelae,
Autobiographies, and Poetry; Third Edition, Yale University Press, New Haven & London, 2003, p.
380.
52
ibid. p. 373.
53
ibid., p.374.
50

Conclusion:

Animalistic metaphors form an especially important group among the

metaphorical classifiers. It is quite possible that the animal hieroglyphs may
offer themselves more readily than other icons to the metaphorical use in
the script due to their high level of iconicity, which gives the metaphor
instant pictorial lucidity and attractiveness.

The conceptual metaphor ANGER IS A DANGEROUS ANIMAL or, in

more detailed formulation, The aggressive behavior of the dangerous
animal is angry behavior, in all probability has its roots in a culturallybased conceptual metaphor. When it surfaces in the Egyptian script, this
cross-cultural conceptual metaphor is already tuned to the specific animal
domain of the Nile valley.

The gods were capable of showing extreme rage in ancient Egyptian

literature, and this rage was not reserved for one or two gods alone; rather,
multiple gods and goddesses are mentioned as being rageful or capable of
rage.

The animal imagery creates a rich pictorial reference and implicitly relates
the king to the constellation of leonine deities, both male and female.

Both pharaohs and the gods are capable of raging like a panther.

It is notable that the panther was not the only animal to which humans, or
even gods for that matter, were compared in ancient Egyptian literature in
the context of anger or temper but also lions, wolves and crocodiles.

In terms of the military, pharaohs were often praised for their power and
might in battle and when dealing with foreign enemies and captives.

There is no text that explicitly discusses the adverse effects of ruling under
the influence of anger.

Determinatives played an important in the animalistic metaphor in ancient

Egyptian literature in expressing rage, wrath and other forms of anger.

Psychological approach in the study of Egyptology is a fertile field for

more studies in such a promising trend in Egyptology.

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Ph.D. thesis, Department of Egyptology and Ancient Western Asian Studies at Brown
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pp. 120-128.
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Leipzig: J.C. Hinrichs, 1928.
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Photographien des Berliner Museums, neu hrsg. und erlautert. Leipzig: J.C. Hinrich,
1908-1922.
Simpson, W. K., The Literature of Ancient Egypt: An Anthology of Stories,
Instructions, Stelae, Autobiographies, and Poetry; Third Edition, Yale University
Press, New Haven & London, 2003.
Spalinger , A., Aspects of the Military Documents of the Ancient Egyptians, Volume
9 of Yale Near Eastern Researches, Yale University Press, 1982.
Stadler, M., Der Totenpapyrus des Pa-Month (P. Bibl. nat. 149). Studien zum
Altgyptischen Totenbuch 6., Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2003.
Thissen H. J., Der verkommene Harfenspieler: Eine altagyptische Invektive (P. Wien
KM 3877) (Demotische Studien), Gisela Zauzich Verlag, 1992.
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Web sites:
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/rage?q=rage.
http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Rage_%28emotion%29.
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/rage.
https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/jrblack/web/diss.html