Banishment Stela

Banishment Stela / Maunier Stela
Material Diorite
Size 127 cm (50 in) x 82 cm (32 in)
Writing Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs
Created c.1050 BCE
Discovered c.1860
Present location Louvre
Identification C 256

The Banishment Stela or Maunier Stela (Louvre C 256[1]) is an ancient Egyptian stela issued in c.1050 BCE. It contains an amnesty decree of the 21st Dynasty Theban High Priests of Amun Menkheperre.

History

The Banishment Stela was discovered in Luxor around 1860 by the then French Vice-Consul, Henri Maunier; it was carried to Paris in 1884 and exhibited at the Louvre where it still is.[2]
The stela is made from diorite and measures 127 cm (50 in) in height and 82 cm (32 in) in width. The upper part is poorly preserved, and only a depiction of Menkheperre praying the god Amun is still visible; the lower portion is in better condition and of the 23 lines of Egyptian hieroglyph text, only the first 4 are mostly lost.[2]

Content

The stela reports that in the regnal Year 25 of an unknown pharaoh a revolt sparked in Thebes against the Priesthood of Amun. The revolt was suffocated in the same year, and in the day 29, third month of the Season of the Harvest the rebels were banished into the Kharga Oasis by decision of the oracle of Amun. Shortly after (day 4, first month of the Season of the Inundation) Menkheperre was installed as generalissimo and High Priest of Amun “by the god Amun himself”; in Year 1(?) of another king, Menkheperre again resorted to the oracle and obtained the recall and pardon of the exiles, just before issuing the stela to celebrate this act.[3][2]

The king whose regnal Year 25 is reported on the stela could only have been the founder of the 21st Dynasty Smendes, who is generally assumed to have reigned for around 25-26 years. The king who was in charge when the stela was issued was one of his immediate successors, most likely the ephemeral and poorly known Amenemnisu, or alternatively but less likely, Psusennes I.[4]

References

  1. ↑ Full picture of the stela from Louvre official website
  2. 1 2 3 Sternberg-el Hotabi, Heike (1986). "Die Stele der Verbannten", in: Texte aus der Umwelt des Alten Testaments, II/1, pp. 112–7.
  3. ↑ von Beckerath, Jürgen (1968). "Die Stele der Verbannten im Museum des Louvre". Revue d'Égyptologie 20: 7–36.
  4. ↑ Kitchen, Kenneth A. (1996). The Third Intermediate Period in Egypt (1100–650 BC). Warminster: Aris & Phillips Limited. p. 608. ISBN 0-85668-298-5., §§ 213, 217–8

Further reading

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