Beauty of Re

by Mark Gajewski

  Thut moved a few paces inside his tomb. The rest of us followed. Kha had not exaggerated; even a little ways in it was hotter than outside. I noted that the floor and ceiling were descending at a fairly steep angle. Two men were chipping away at the stone on each side some thirty feet into the hill; the sound of their blows was magnified. The wall behind them was rough and unevenly cut.

  “Those who make the rough cut will be followed by more masons. They’ll accurately align and smooth the walls and ceiling with sandstone abrasives. They’ll fill cracks with clay. Once the walls are properly prepared, craftsmen will apply a thin coat of plaster over the stone to make the walls perfectly flat for painting and carving.”

  “Will they use the same techniques I observed at Djeser Djeseru?” I asked.

  Kha nodded. “The painters will dip a long string in red ocher. One will hold each end and a third will pull it back from its center like a bowstring. When he lets it loose it will snap a straight red line onto the wall. That will create the registers within which the scenes and inscriptions will be placed. Junior craftsmen will initially draw on the walls in red ink. Senior craftsmen and scribes will make corrections in black. Then our most talented craftsmen will carve the plaster with fine copper chisels, following the inked images. Finally, the carvings will be painted.”

  “How long?” Thut asked.

  Kha shrugged. “It usually takes years to complete a tomb, Majesty, depending on its size and complexity, with fifty or sixty workers involved.”

  “I never guessed it was such a complicated process,” Thut said.

  We all returned outside. Immediately I felt cooler.

  “The rock in my tomb is good?” Thut asked.

  “I believe so, Majesty,” Kha said. “But we won’t know for sure until we get much deeper into the hill. We may hit veins of hard stone or seams of flint and have to go around them. But if we are lucky we’ll be able to follow our plan exactly.”

  “And what is that plan?”

  I unrolled the sheet of papyrus I’d been carrying and laid it atop a large flat rock close beside us.

  “There’ll be two stairways and two corridors leading from the entrance straight into the hill, at a downward angle,” Nefer said. “At the end of the second corridor will be a deep rectangular well.”

  “Its purpose?”

  “First, to keep rainwater from flooding the lower levels of the tomb. Second, to block anyone foolish enough to try to rob it. It is an innovation of Ineni’s.”

  “Beyond the well?”

  “A vestibule, with a sharp turn left to the burial chamber. Appropriate storerooms will be excavated beyond that.”

  “The decoration?”

  Kha spoke up. “The images throughout will be based on the Amduat, The Book of What is in the Underworld, narrating your, and Re’s, passage through the twelve hours of the night, from sunset and death to sunrise and rebirth. The Amduat will provide you with the knowledge you need to defeat the perils of the night unscathed. The inscriptions will be painted as simple diagrams, imitating the cursive script one finds on a funerary papyrus. The coloring will be muted, simple black figures and hieroglyphs on a cream background, with highlights in red and pink. The images will depict Your Majesty aiding the gods in defeating Apep, the serpent of chaos, thereby helping ensure Re’s daily rebirth as well as your own resurrection.”

  “No tomb has ever been decorated this way before,” Nefer said. “Its walls will tell a story, much as those of the Punt expedition at Djeser Djeseru do. We’ve modeled the inscriptions on that idea.”

  “Tell me about them,” Thut said.

  I unrolled a second papyrus. “Your burial chamber will be forty–five feet long and twenty–seven feet wide. The walls will be divided vertically into twelve sections, each corresponding to an hour of the night. Each section will be divided horizontally into three registers. They’ll represent the river of the netherworld and its eastern and western banks.”

  “The first four hours of the night will be on the west wall,” Nefer interjected, “hours five and six on the south, seven and eight on the north, and nine through twelve on the east.”

  I pointed to the papyrus. “Hour one shows the gate at the entrance to the underworld. It lists all the beings that will be found beyond it, such as solar baboons and uraeus serpents. In the middle register is Re’s ship and its escort, the Barque of the Millions. Hathor guides Re and his retinue through the hours, with Horus at the rudder to ensure the boat stays on course. Maat, Osiris, and Sakhmet are also on board.

  “Hour two has fertile fields, dominated by a watery expanse. The god enters the Land of Silence, is greeted joyously as his light spreads, and hears the cry of lamentation as he moves on and darkness returns.

  “Hour three shows fertile fields dominated by the Waters of Osiris.

  “In hour four, fertile land gives way to desert. Fire–spitting serpents glow in the dark, and the barque itself turns into a serpent whose fiery breath pierces the darkness.

  “Hour five contains the Lake of Fire, where evil is punished, and the Lake of Life for the blessed dead.

  “At hour six the god reaches the depths of the netherworld, the water–hole, filled with the primeval waters of Nun. Here lies the sun’s corpse, with which the god unites his ba.

  “In hour seven fiends appear, the worst Apophis in the form of a serpent, trying to bring the course of light to a standstill.

  “In hour eight, those being reborn receive new clothes. In hour nine deities appear, providing bread and beer. In hour ten, Horus leads those who drowned to a blessed existence.

  “In hour eleven preparations begin for the imminent sunrise, the emergence from the eastern mountain of heaven. Goddesses of punishment ward off any danger that might threaten the sun.

  “Hour twelve is the sun’s birth. Since that birth is a repetition of primeval creation, all the primeval gods are in attendance. The barque is pulled by twelve men and thirteen women through the body of a serpent. All the millions riding on the barque enter the tail of the serpent frail and emerge from it as little children, having been transformed while inside. At the end of the hour the solar beetle flies into the arms of Shu, god of the air, who raises the sun up to the sky.”

  “The vestibule of your tomb will also be decorated with the whole story,” Nefer said. “The oval–shaped burial chamber will be supported by two pillars, and its blue–painted ceiling decorated with yellow stars, symbolizing the cave of the god Sokar. In the middle will lie your large red quartzite sarcophagus, shaped like a cartouche.”

  “The two pillars in the middle of the chamber will contain passages from the Litanies of Re, text only, without illustration,” Kha said. “On one pillar you’ll be shown in a boat with Isis and members of your family. The other will depict you suckling Isis in the guise of a Tree Goddess.”

  Thut looked up from the papyri. “I approve,” he said with satisfaction. “With the tribute I’ve collected on my campaigns, and the regular tribute paid me by Assyria, I can afford the finest.”

  “I’ve already made Kha aware of that,” Nefer said.

  “Has work begun on the obelisks destined for Iunu?” Thut asked her.

  “Yes. As well as the changes and additions that you’ve directed be made at other temples throughout the land,” she replied. “Construction is progressing at Medamud and Armant and Kom Ombo, and Amada and Semna in Nubia.”

  “Do you have the plan for my temple of millions of years?”

  “Mery does. Let’s walk over the hill. We can see the site from there.”

  Nefer linked her arm in mine. We helped each other descend to the blazingly hot valley floor, slipping a few times on the dusty rocky path. My legs complained the whole way. We then ascended the southern slope of the Great Place on the deeply worn path the workers used when traveling to and from their homes in the Place of Truth. At the top of the hill was a guardhouse next to three stone steps; they delineated the entrance to the valley. The guard there snappe
d to attention at the king’s approach. We moved past him, along the edge of the cliff, towards the north. I noted numerous small stone shrines along the sides of the path, filled with tiny statuettes and stelae and candles.

  “They’re offerings to the mountain goddess, Meretseger,” Kha told us, “left by the workers.”

  After a half-hour walk we reached the very edge of the cliff and halted there. A cooling breeze swept across the heights, erasing the memory of the oven–like inferno that was the valley floor. The view was outstanding – the river valley stretching for miles until lost in distant dusty haze, covered from the edge of the eastern desert to the edge of the western by the inundation, the water dark red, white where it rushed around groves of palms, the sand–colored buildings of Waset and Ipet–Isut and Ipet–resyt, their foundations lapped at by the water, Hatshepsut’s brilliantly–shining obelisks, the blue line of the Red Sea Hills to the east, small brown towns and villages scattered up and down the valley. The air was clear and refreshing, the sky arcing overhead blue, the sun brilliant.

  Nefer began pointing out the landmarks to Thut. “Directly below us are Djeser Djeseru and Glorious are the Seats of Nebhepetre, the memorial temples of my mother and the second Mentuhotep.”

  Thut glanced at me, smiled slightly. Twenty–four years it had been since we’d first confessed our love to each other at Mentuhotep’s temple. And I still recalled every word and look and touch that had passed between us that day.

  “As you can see, the cliffs curve in a semi–circle, from northeast to southeast, forming a bay. The closest hill on the plain in the bay is Qurna, and the one beyond it Qurnet Murai. The Place of Truth, built by Amenhotep to house those who work in the Great Place, lies behind it. He and his mother, Ahmes–Nefertari, are worshiped by the workers who live there.”

  “The shrine of the king and his mother is close to one for Hathor, the Lady of the West, just outside the northeast wall of the village,” Kha said. “They are the village’s patron deities. Most households have shrines with small statues of them. During the Great Feast each winter the workers get drunk on beer and wine and make merry before their shrine for four whole days.”

  “Amun, of course, is the villagers’ principal god,” I added, “and a small temple dedicated to him has been located there from the village’s founding. The workers also worship Thoth, patron of scribes, and Ptah, patron of craftsmen.”

  “I remember scrambling among those dark openings in the cliffs and hills to the north when we were young, exploring,” Thut said. “We used to get away with a lot, didn’t we Mery?”

  “If your father had only known,” I said.

  “Those tombs are from before the time of Mentuhotep,” Nefer said.

  She’d never accompanied us on our expeditions. Climbing hills and crawling in the dust had not been enjoyable activities for her, as they had been for us.

  “On the next hill south are tombs from the time of Seqenenre Tao and Kamose, the kings who preceded our family, and their priests and officials. Your nobles are mostly siting their tombs on Qurna. The stone wall that juts above the crest of the hill was the original tomb of Senenmut, my tutor.”

  “Your mother’s lover,” Thut said.

  Nefer let the comment pass without reply.

  I thought it unusually cruel of him to speak so. It was a clear sign that Thut and Nefer were not yet close to resolving their differences.

  “You no doubt recognize the two memorial temples next to each other on the edge of the desert to the south,” Kha said hastily.

  Thut nodded. “Father’s and grandfather’s – ‘the Mansion of the Ka of Aakheperkare’ and ‘Aakheperenre in the Mansion called Seizing Life.’ I’ve spent many an hour in each of them, as Mery can attest.”

  “Terrorizing priests and temple workers,” I said.

  “Your memorial temple will be on the same line, partway between the temple of your grandfather and the causeway of Djeser Djeseru,” Kha continued. “It shall be called Henketankh – ‘Offering Life.’ There will be a barque shrine some distance in front, where your statue and Amun’s will rest during the Beautiful Feast of the Valley, a court with an altar dedicated to Re, and a room with a vaulted ceiling decorated with the hours of the night.”

  “And directly below us, between the mortuary temples of Mentuhotep and my mother, will be your mortuary temple, Djeser Akhet, ‘Amun is Holy of the Horizon,’” Nefer said. “The three of them, lying side by side, will appear to be one large unbroken surface to everyone who visits.”

  I handed Nefer another rolled up papyrus and she lay it flat on another stone.

  “As you can see, Djeser Akhet will have two terraces, each approached by a ramp, rising higher against the cliff face than Mother’s temple, but narrower, since there is little space between it and Mentuhotep’s temple. In fact, we’ll have to carve the cliff both vertically and horizontally and level the whole area below the temple’s footprint before we can begin actual construction. I’m afraid it will take years to prepare the site.”

  “I trust the result will be worth it.”

  “It will be spectacular,” I interjected. “Your temple will contain a barque hall and offering room and sanctuary. Unlike Djeser Djeseru, with its uncovered upper court, your upper terrace will hold a great basilica, the second in the land after Brilliant of Monuments in Ipet–Isut.”

  Thut studied the drawings and the landscape for a long time. “I approve your plan, Neferure,” he said finally.

  “Majesty, I’ll ensure the statues and decorations and inscriptions make your mortuary temple the finest in the land,” Kha vowed.

  “Once its complete, it shall replace Djeser Djeseru as the focus of the Beautiful Feast of the Valley,” Thut announced.

  “As you wish, Majesty.”

  That was a direct slam at Hatshepsut, at whose temple Amun’s barque currently rested during the feast. Nefer did not react.

  Thut surveyed the valley for a long time. Then he pointed to the quays at Waset, every inch lined with boats from which cargo was being unloaded. “Even during the inundation, the wealth of Wawat continues to pour into the southern capital,” he said. “As does that of Setjet and Retenu. All of that tribute comes here now because the warehouses at Mennefer have nearly reached capacity. We’ll soon run out of space in Waset as well.” He addressed Nefer. “I need you to build me more warehouses and granaries in Waset to hold my growing wealth. I’ll use that wealth to pay the workers I need to build even more widely the length of Kemet – shrines, temples, fortresses.”

  “And Ipet–Isut?” Nefer asked.

  “I’ve given that sacred precinct much thought,” Thut replied. “Two days ago I met with Ineni and described my vision for it. Even now he’s beginning to set my thoughts to papyrus.” Thut pointed. “While he works on that plan, Neferure, I want you to complete the small temple your mother began here on the west bank that’s used for Amun’s Decade Festival, the one directly across the river from Ipet–resyt on the Mound of Djeme.”

  “I’ll see to it, beginning tomorrow,” Nefer promised. “Someday, you’ll be remembered as Kemet’s greatest builder, Majesty. I’ll make sure of it.”

  “Indeed you shall, Neferure. For that is the task I henceforth entrust to you.”

  1447 BC

  Regnal Year 33 – Thutmose III

  I crouched next to Thut behind a screen of tall grass in the darkness, atop a slight rise overlooking the camp of Saustatar, King of Mitanni. The twinkling campfires of the haphazardly laid out enemy tents stretched to our right far down the plain, the closest a quarter mile from our position near the east bank of the Euphrates River. Above our heads another river, of stars, flowed across the sky.

  “They don’t look ready for a fight,” Thut whispered. “I don’t see any sentries posted. They must not know that my army is near. The gods are with us so far.”

  I knew Thut was eager for battle. After waging seven campaigns, he’d gained control of most of Setjet and Retenu. Naharin
a, the land between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers ruled by the Mitanni, was his current target, a land his grandfather had reached but not entered. Subjugating it would extend Thut’s empire far to the east, garnering much wealth for Kemet in plunder now and tribute in the future.

  Our presence on the riverbank tonight was the fruition of Thut’s long, patient empire–building strategy. His subjugation of the King of Megiddo and his allies eleven years ago had been followed by several campaigns through Retenu and Setjet, during which he’d simply collected tribute. Then he’d taken Ardata, leaving a garrison behind at the captured port of Djahy. That had enabled Thut, in subsequent campaigns, to move troops and supplies north from Kemet by water. News of Thut’s growing might had eventually reached the emerging kingdom of Assyria; its rulers now sent annual gifts to Kemet in order to maintain good relations with him. Those gifts had included lapis lazuli from Babylon, and many horses. Another year Thut had sailed directly to Byblos, bypassing Retenu entirely, then moved north and pillaged the lands surrounding Kadesh. To his annoyance, his nemesis, Durusha, had escaped him there once again. After that, Thut had turned west and taken Simyra, then quelled a rebellion in Ardata. He’d taken two more foreign wives at the end of that campaign – Merti and Menhet. They resided now in the Faiyum harem, along with their respective retinues.