Through the Eras

MusicSINUHE WELCOMED HOME WITH MUSICINTRODUCTION: The Story of Sinuhe was the most importantliterary work from ancient Egypt. It is an epic poem thatdescribes Sinuhe’s flight from Egypt to the Levant after theassassination of Amenemhet I. Sinuhe left because he mistakenlybelieved he had been implicated in the plot againstthe king. During his absence, Sinuhe lived with a bedouintribe. He dressed like a bedouin even for his fearful returnto Egypt at the king’s invitation. At the end of the poem,King Senwosret I welcomed Sinuhe back to Egypt. Musicand song were integral to Sinuhe’s formal welcome as theroyal princesses sang, accompanied by sistra.Thereupon, they brought in the Royal Family;And then his Majesty said to the Queen,“Look, it is Sinuhe,come as a Bedouin created by the Asiatics!”so that she gave a very great cry,the royal children [joining in] with a single shriek.Then they said before his Majesty,“Truly, it is not he, our sovereign Lord?”Then his Majesty replied, “Truly, it is he.”So then they brought out their necklaces,With their scepters and their sistra in their hands.Then they presented them to his Majesty;“Your state is more than beautiful, King,who bears the insignia of the Lady of Heaven.The Golden Goddess offers life to your nostrils,The Lady of the Stars protects you;The White Crown goes north, and the Red Crown goessouth;And what has been joined unites in the utterance of yourMajesty;Success is given from your brow.You have delivered the poor man from evil,Having propitiated Re, Lord of the Two Lands;Praises to you, as to the Mistress of Us All!Loosen your bow, lay aside your arrow,Give breath to him who is in suffocation!Give to us this fine thingIn favor of the foreign chieftain, Son of the Northwind,The foreign bowman born in [our] beloved land.He has made a flight for fear of you,He has fled the land in terror of you.[Yet] there should be no blanching of the face whichlooks upon you,no fear in the eye which gazes at you.”Then his Majesty said, “He shall not fear henceforth …SOURCE: “The Tale of Sinhue,” in Thought Couplets in “TheTale of Sinuhe.” Trans. John L. Foster (Frankfurt am Main, Germany:Peter Lang, 1993): 60–61.their projections of the modern status of musicians—particularly female musicians—onto an ancient culture.For example, scholars assigned to female musicians ofancient Egypt the same class associations that they knewin Europe and America. One Victorian scholar suggestedthat only non-elite women became professional musicians.A mid-twentieth century scholar, on the otherhand, suggested that young, elite girls learned to play theharp in ancient Egypt much as upper-class ladies inAmerica learned to play the piano. Others suggested thatmusicians held a place of honor but were also slaves, astatement that has no basis in the evidence. In fact, thereis no evidence that explicitly comments on the social statusof musicians, although evidence from tomb drawingssuggests that musicians and singers throughout ancientEgyptian history enjoyed elite status in their society.OLD KINGDOM STATUS. In the Old Kingdom(2675–2170 B.C.E.), tomb drawings indicate that therewas no professional class of female musicians, but therewas an amateur class of high-status women who playedfor the men of the household. Women playing the harpin tomb representations were nearly always family membersof the deceased. They include a daughter in thetomb of Idu and the tomb owner’s wife in the tombs ofPepi at Meir and of Mereruka at Saqqara. The latter issignificant in that Mereruka’s wife was specifically identifiedwith her name, Watetkhethor. The Egyptians attachedgreat importance to the preservation of personalnames in a tomb, because the purpose of a tomb was toensure the survival of the tomb owner’s name for eternity.When an additional name appeared in a tomb, eventhe name of a wife, the Egyptians considered this to bean honor. Further evidence that these family memberswere relatively high status comes from the tomb of Pepiof Meir. His wife, depicted as a harp player, also borethe title “King’s Companion,” a recognition of her highstatus at court. There is some evidence to support thetheory that men could be professional musicians; themale singer Khufwy-ankh enjoyed high status at court.He was a singer, Overseer of Singers, and flutist whoowned a tomb in Giza near the Great Pyramid. Both thelocation of the tomb near such an important structureand the fact that a musician could own a tomb at all isan indication of his high social status. Clearly the OldKingdom evidence supports the idea that elite men andArts and Humanities Through the Eras: Ancient Egypt (2675 B.C.E.–332 B.C.E.) 169