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Title:

Deir el-Gabrawi

Author:

Moreno Garcia, Juan Carlos, CNRS

Publication Date:

06-12-2012

Series:


Publication Info:


Permalink:

https://escholarship.org/uc/item/99j1g8zh

Keywords:

geography, rock tomb, necropolis, roman, 12th upper egyptian nome, nomarch, Geography, ArtHistory, Criticism and Conservation, Near Eastern Languages and Societies

Local Identifier:

nelc_uee_8743

Abstract:

Deir el-Gabrawi, the most important Old Kingdom necropolis of the Upper Egyptian 12th

nome,is formed of two cliffs, the northern one near the village of Arab el-Atiyat and the southern onenear the village of Deir el-Gabrawi. Its tombs date back to the late Old Kingdom, although anearlier chronology has been suggested. However, no trace of a contemporary town has yet beenfound. Later on, a late Roman locality called Hierakon and the quartering of a Roman cohort werebuilt in its close vicinity, and the dead from these settlements were buried in the tombs of theold necropolis.A rather peculiar characteristic ofDeir el-Gabrawi is that some local governors

simultaneously controlled the 12th

as well as the 8th

Upper Egyptian nomes during the 6th

Dynasty.

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DEIR EL-GABRAWI

Juan Carlos Moreno Garca

EDITORS

WILLEKEWENDRICHEditor-in-Chief

Area Editor GeographyUniversity of California, Los Angeles

JACCO DIELEMANEditor

University of California, Los Angeles

ELIZABETH FROODEditor

University of Oxford

JOHN BAINESSenior Editorial Consultant

University of Oxford

Short Citation:Moreno Garca, 2012, Deir el-Gabrawi. UEE.

Full Citation:Moreno Garca, Juan Carlos, 2012, Deir el-Gabrawi. In Willeke Wendrich (ed.), UCLA Encyclopedia ofEgyptology, Los Angeles. http://digital2.library.ucla.edu/viewItem.do?ark=21198/zz002c4jx4

8743 Version 1, June 2012http://digital2.library.ucla.edu/viewItem.do?ark=21198/zz002c4jx4


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Deir el-Gabrawi, Moreno Garca, UEE 2012 1

DEIR EL-GABRAWI

Juan Carlos Moreno Garca

Deir al-GabrwiDeir el-Gebraoui

Deir el-Gabrawi, the most important Old Kingdom necropolis of the Upper Egyptian 12thnome,is formed of two cliffs, the northern one near the village of Arab el-Atiyat and the southern onenear the village of Deir el-Gabrawi. Its tombs date back to the late Old Kingdom, although anearlier chronology has been suggested. However, no trace of a contemporary town has yet beenfound. Later on, a late Roman locality called Hierakon and the quartering of a Roman cohortwere built in its close vicinity, and the dead from these settlements were buried in the tombs of theold necropolis. A rather peculiar characteristic of Deir el-Gabrawi is that some local governorssimultaneously controlled the 12th as well as the 8th Upper Egyptian nomes during the 6thDynasty.

.

.

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.

eir el-Gabrawi is the nameconventionally given to the mainOld Kingdom necropolis of the

Upper Egyptian 12th nome (Beinlich 1975).Recent surveys in the neighboring areas have

brought to light tombs dating back to thesame period (Kurth and Rssler-Khler1987). However, their decoration andinscriptions have almost completelydisappeared, except in the case of the rocktomb of 2nw, a high dignitary living duringthe 6thDynasty and linked to the office of thevizier as his titles of Hrj-sStA n Hwt-wrt, chief ofsecrets of the Great hut (the Viziers bureau)

and jmj-r wsxt, overseer of the Court, show(Kurth and Rssler-Khler 1987: 133 - 185).Consequently, Deir el-Gabrawi remains themain Pharaonic provincial cemetery in thisarea. It is actually formed of two cliffs, the

northern one near the village of Arab el-Atiyatand the southern one near the village of Deirel-Gabrawi (Kanawati 2005: 7).

Research History

Although the tombs had been known toEgyptologists since the middle of the 19 thcentury, it was not until the archaeological

D


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expedition directed by Davies in 1900 (Davies1902a, 1902b) that they were published. Sincethen, and only in the last years, moremethodical digging and publication, under the

auspices of the Australian Centre forEgyptology, have added new evidence as wellas improved the overall interpretation of thesite and suggested a different chronology, notuniversally accepted by specialists (Kanawati2005, 2006, 2007; Moreno Garca 2007).

Layout of the Site

No Pharaonic town or administrative andresidential center related to the necropolis hasyet been found, but it could well have beenlocated quite apart from Deir el-Gabrawi,

closer to the surrounding areas where otherOld Kingdom tombs have been observed.However, a survey carried out in an oldsettlement at Al-Maabda, where the tomb of

2nw was discovered, has not produced anyevidence of third millennium levels (Rssler-Khler and Dingenotto 1994). Anotherapproach consists of considering some cultsattested in the nome during the late OldKingdom and the beginning of the MiddleKingdom. Thus the governor 0now and hisson 7mjjare both described as jmAxwxrMAtjt,

the honored one before Matit, while 0nowwas further called jmAxw xr MAtjt nbtJAkmt,the honored one before Matit, the mistressof Iakmet, and jmAxw xr Nmtj [Hrj-jb] prwnw

Mam, the honored one before Nemty, who isin the domains of Mam (Kanawati 2005: 71 -72). Hardly any more is known about theseplaces, and even their status as capitals ofthe nome is dubious (Helck 1974: 101).Nevertheless, the province appears in theadministrative sources of the third millenniumas the place where several agriculturaldomains were founded by king Sneferu

(Jacquet-Gordon 1962: 131) and where someproperty was held by prince Nikaura, son ofKhafra, which was later transferred to his wife(Strudwick 2005: 200 [111]). These elementssuggest an economic interest of the crown inthe local agricultural resources; they probablylaid the foundations of the later 6 th Dynastyestablishment of a network of local agents ofthe king and managers of the pharaohs

agricultural Hwtcenters (Moreno Garca 1994,1999: 262, 275). As for Deir el-Gabrawi, themain phases of occupation of the site werethe late Old Kingdom, when the rock tombs

(about 120) were built, of which only 16 weredecorated. Then, in the Late Antiquity, thelocality of Hierakon is attested in documentsfrom 288 CE, as well as the quartering of aRoman cohort in its vicinity. Deir el-Gabrawiwas located between the two centers, and thedead from these settlements were buried inthe tombs of the old necropolis. Finally, animportant Christian community was based inthe area (Kurth and Rssler-Khler 1987: 186- 194).

Significance and Historical Context

Although Egyptologists agree that the OldKingdom tombs date from the late OldKingdom, the recent archaeological work ledby Naguib Kanawati has been accompaniedby a thorough revision of the traditionallyaccepted chronology, with importantconsequences for the comprehension of theprovincial political history during the 6thDynasty and afterwards. Thus, Kanawatifollows the suggestion made by Davies morethan a century ago and proposes, mainly on

an iconographic basis, that the tombs of thenorthern group should be dated to thebeginning and not the end of the 6thDynasty.Nevertheless, the appearance of early 6thDynasty Memphite iconographic motifs in thetombs of Deir el-Gabrawi does not mean thatthey should be strictly contemporaneous(Moreno Garca 2007). One can think, forinstance, of some scenes from the tomb ofIbi, which occur again in the Theban tombTT 36 that belonged to a man of the samename from the reign of Psammetichus I,about 1600 years later (Baines and Malek

2000: 122). In other cases, some rare scenes inMemphite tombs of the reigns of Tety andPepy I only appear in the provincial centers ofDeir el-Gabrawi and El-Hawawish, but in alate 6th Dynasty context (Moreno Garca2007); even 7tj:KAj-Hp of El-Hawawish (tombM8), an official who served kings Pepy I andMerenra, copied a scene only known from theMemphite tomb of Debeheni, a courtier who


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lived under Menkaura. Other argumentsproposed by Kanawati in order to support hisnew chronology seem more solid, especiallywhen considering the anthroponyms, the

paleography, and the phraseology in thetombs (Kanawati 2005: 16 - 19). But hereagain, the phraseology as well as some themesdealt with in the inscriptions display patternsmore commonly found in other provincialinscriptions of the late Old Kingdom; this isparticularly evident in the tomb of Henqu(Kloth 2002: 44; more cautious, see Grunert2008, 2009).

In any case, the titles attested at Deir el-Gabrawi are rather exceptional because theyshow that some local governors controlled

simultaneously the 12th as well as the 8thUpper Egyptian nomes. Such an uncommonsituation is probably best understood whenconsidering the peculiarities of the Thinitenome, when two of its governors (the Hrj-tpaAn 6A-wr, great overlord of the Thinite nome,Ggj and 2w-bAwj,) were buried not in theirprovince but in the Memphite cemeteries,under the reign of Pepy II. Later on, duringthe First Intermediate Period, the nome wasoccasionally governed by officials from otherprovinces, like ab-jHw, who controlled the 6th-

8th

nomes of Upper Egypt (Fischer 1968: 203- 205) orJnHrt-nxt, nomarch of the 8thand 10thprovinces of the same region (Goedicke 1999:149 - 152). But from the reign of Merenra on,three governors of Deir el-Gabrawi (Jbj,

9aw:5mAj, and9aw) directed the Thinite nome.Perhaps this situation was also related to theposition of provincials holding the vizierate:these three governors were not viziers,precisely at a point in time when a powerfulfamily issued from the Thinite area (Abydos)became related by marriage to the pharaohsand displayed the title of vizier but never that

of Hrj-tp aA, great overlord, of the nome. Atthe end of the Old Kingdomif thetraditional chronology is acceptedDeir el-Gabrawi was administrated by two governorswho were also viziers,1m-Ra:Jzj [I] and 0now[II], during a period when Thinis had its ownHrj-tp aA n 6A-wr, great overlord of the Thinitenome, like Ggj and 2w-bAwj, buried in

Memphis, or 7mrrjand1Agj, whose tombs arelocated at Naga el-Deir (Moreno Garca2007). Given the scarcity of the data, anyhistorical narrative would be inevitably

speculative. But it is difficult to avoid seeingsome relation between the exceptional fates ofAbydos and Deir el-Gabrawi during the exactsame period of the 6thDynasty. At that time,the social elevation of a family from Abydos,who included two queens and many viziers(including the well-known Weni and quiteremarkably, the lady Nebet, the only femalevizier of the Old Kingdom), wascontemporaneous with the exceptional careersof three nomarchs of Deir el-Gabrawi (andThinis) who, unlike their successors of the lateOld Kingdom, never held the vizierate. Lateron, when Deir el-Gabrawi officials were bothnomarchs and viziers, the local focus ofpower in the Thinite region seems to haveshifted from Abydos to Naga el-Deir, fromwhere the governors of the Late OldKingdom and First Intermediate Period wereissued.

When considering the ephemeral relevanceof Deir el-Gabrawi in Pharaonic times, itsfate, only during the late Old Kingdom,appears inseparable from other provincial

centers from the beginning of the 6th

Dynastyon. As the new royal lineage relied greatly onthe support of the provincial potentates, thepharaohs paved the way to social promotion,monumental visibility, and enrichment of aformerly rather obscure sector of theEgyptian elite, made up of provincials(Moreno Garca 2002, 2005). Many educatedmembers of the Deir el-Gabrawi ruling familyappeared at the royal court (Moreno Garca1997: 115 - 117), proudly displayed theirmerits in their autobiographical inscriptions(Strudwick 2005: 363 - 368), and accumulated

substantial power as viziers, high officials, andsupra-regional leaders. Nevertheless, theirprominence was also related to the politics oftheir time and to the service to the king.When the united monarchy collapsed at theend of the Old Kingdom, the potentates ofDeir el-Gabrawi faded away with it.


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Bibliographic NotesThe necropolis was first published by Davies (1902), and only recently has Kanawati (2005, 2007)accomplished a full excavation and publication of the tombs, including scenes and archaeological

material neglected in previous work. The wealth of private titles and inscriptions from the OldKingdom has been widely used in discussions about the provincial administration of the OldKingdom (Fischer 1968; Moreno Garca 1994, 1999, 2007), the composition of autobiographiesduring this period (Grunert 2008, 2009; Kloth 2002), and artistic conventions found in thenecropolis (Romano and Robins 1994; Vasiljevi2004). Regional archaeological surveys have alsocontributed to a better understanding of the role played by Deir el-Gabrawi in its regionalhistorical context (Kurth and Rssler-Khler 1987; Rssler-Khler and Dingenotto 1994).

ReferencesBaines, John, and Jaromir Malek

2000 Cultural atlas of ancient Egypt. New York: Checkmark Books.

Beinlich, Horst1975 Deir el-Gabrawi. Lexikon der gyptologie, Vol. 1 (columns 1027 - 1028), ed. Wolfgang Helck, and

Wolfhart Westendorf. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz.

Davies, Norman de Garis1902a The rock tombs of Deir el Gebrawi. Part I: Tomb of Aba and smaller tombs of the southern group. London:

Egypt Exploration Society.1902b The rock tombs of Deir el Gebrawi. Part II: Tomb of Zau and tombs of the northern group. London: Egypt

Exploration Society.

Fischer, Henry George1968 Dendera in the third millennium B.C., down to the Theban Domination of Upper Egypt. Locust Valley: J. J.

Augustin Publisher.

Goedicke, Hans1999 Two inlaid inscriptions of the earliest Middle Kingdom, in Gold of praise: Studies on ancient Egypt in

honor of Edward F. Wente, Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization 58, ed. Emily Teeter, and JohnLarson, pp. 149 - 157. Chicago: The Oriental Institute.

Grunert, Stefan2008 Nur fr Erwachsene: Political correctness auf Altgyptisch?: Neue Lesungen und

Interpretationen der biographischen Inschrift des Gaufrsten Henqu. Studien zur AltgyptischenKultur37, pp. 131 - 146.

2009 Erlebte Geschichte: Ein authentischer Bericht. In Das Ereignis: Geschichtsschreibung zwischen Vorfallund Befund, Internet-Beitrge zur gyptologie und Sudanarchologie 10, ed. Martin Fitzenreiter,pp. 125 - 135. London: Golden House Publications.

Helck, Wolfgang1974 Die altgyptischen Gaue. Beihefte zum Tbinger Atlas des Vorderen Orients: Reihe B

(Geisteswissenschaften) 5. Wiesbaden: L. Reichert.Jacquet-Gordon, Helen

1962 Les noms des domaines funraires sous lAncien Empire gyptien. Bibliothque dtude 34. Cairo: Institutfranais d'archologie orientale.

Kanawati, Naguib2005 Deir el-Gabrawi. Volume I: The northern cliff. The Australian Center for Egyptology Reports 23.

Oxford: Aris and Phillips.2006 Recent work in the tomb of Djau at Deir-el-Gabrawi. Bulletin of the Australian Center for Egyptology

17, pp. 69 - 78.


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2007 Deir el-Gabrawi. Volume II: The southern cliff: The tomb of Ibi and others. The Australian Center forEgyptology Reports 25. Oxford: Aris and Phillips.

Kloth, Nicole2002 Die (auto-)biographschen Inschriften des gyptischen Alten Reiches: Untersuchungen zu Phraseologie und

Entwicklung. Studien zur Altgyptischen Kultur (Beihefte) 8. Hamburg: Helmut Buske Verlag.Kurth, Dieter, and Ursula Rssler-Khler

1987 Zur Archologie des 12. obergyptischen Gaues: Bericht ber zwei surveys der Jahre 1980 und 1981. GttingerOrientforschungen IV. Reihe gypten, 16. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz.

Moreno Garca, Juan Carlos1994 1wty la retribucin de los funcionarios provinciales en el Imperio Antiguo: El caso de Ibi de Deir

el-Gabrawi (Urk.I 144:3 - 145:3).Aula Orientalis12, pp. 29 - 50.1997 tudes sur ladministration, le pouvoir et lidologie en gypte, de lAncien au Moyen Empire. Aegyptiaca

Leodiensia 4. Lige: Universit de Lige.1999 1wtet le milieu rural gyptien du IIIe millnaire: conomie, administration et organisation territoriale. Paris:

Honor Champion.2002 Review of Naguib Kanawati and Mahmud Abder-Raziq: The Teti cemetery at Saqqara. Volume

VI: The tomb of Nikauisesi. Bibliotheca Orientalis59, pp. 509 - 520.2005 Deux familles de potentats provinciaux et les assises de leur pouvoir: Elkab et el-Hawawish sous la

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LXXXIII, pp. 141 - 145.

Romano, James, and Gay Robins1994 A painted fragment from the tomb of Dschaw at Deir el-Gabrawi.Journal of the American Research

Center in Egypt31, pp. 21 - 32.

Rssler-Khler, Ursula, and Christian Dingenotto1994 1. Vorbericht ber die Grabungsaktivitten des Bonner gyptologischen Seminars in der antiken

Stadt bei Al-Maabda in Mittelgypten.Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archologischen Instituts, AbteilungKairo50, pp. 253 - 268, pls. 42 - 43.

Strudwick, Nigel2005 Texts from the Pyramid Age. Writings from the Ancient World 16. Atlanta: Society of Biblical

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Vasiljevi, Vera2004 An unusual representation of tomb owners wife (Deir el-Gabrawi tomb no. 67). The Journal of

Egyptological Studies1, pp. 117 - 126.

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