The Poppy Garden

(Warning: this gets ranty)

There has been much debate recently about the status of two 5th Dynasty (c. 2445-c. 2421 b.c.e.) royal manacurists, Niankhkhnum and Khnumhotep, who are depicted in their tomb paintings walking hand-in-hand, embracing, and touching noses as if kissing. Such depictions are normal for married heterosexual couples, but to see two men shown this way is unususal to say the least. Discovered in 1964, the men were assumed to be brothers, possibly twins. This is partly because until very recently, historians and archaeologts had a definite bias when dealing with sexuality, particularly homosexuality, in cultures that were more sexually open than ours. (Especially considering a lot of the early scholars were Victorians; for a particularly bad example of Victorian editing, look here.)

However, another thing to take into consideration is the fact that homosexuality as we define it is unique to our culture; therefore we must tread lightly when we label the sexual identities of two men living over 4000 years ago in a very different culture. So the debate has stood: Egyptologists are unwillling to say that these men were not close brothers or twins, while the gay rights community has seen this tomb as evidence of gay couples being accepted in one of our planet's first civilizations. If these men were gay partners, they would be the world's oldest example of such a couple.

With that said, a friend recently emailed me an artice about the latest news concerning Niankhkhnum and Khnumhotep's tomb. It appears that new scholarship is being presented at the Swansea University in Wales that supports the theory "that a gay relationship was "probable," although nobody could be sure."

However, another argument has been put forward, that Niankhkhnum and Khnumhotep were in fact conjoined (siamese) twins, hence their closeness in the tomb paintings. I think this argument is reaching to say the least.

First off, let's use Occam's Razor here: which do you think would have been seen as more strange in the Pharaoh's court: a same-sex couple or conjoined twins? True, Seneb the dwarf was a high-ranking official from about the same time who had a disability, but other than his stature, he was able to function normally in the noble society. I imagine twins joined at the waist were not.

Secondly, I feel there is a decent amount of evidence supporting an intimate relationship. In the picture above, the men are shown not only in an embrace, but with the belts of their kilts tied together. They also had their names written as one name, a significant thing since in Ancient Egypt, names were considered a part of the soul. They magically became one by joining their names.

Niankhkhnum and Khnumhotep are shown in their tomb along with their wives and children, and this has been used to support the twins/brothers hypothesis. However, I have seen counter arguments to that as well. All evidence indicates that marriage in ancient Egypt was a civil affair, used to create legitimate heirs and inheritance ties. There has yet to be found an ancient Egyptian marriage ceremony, for example. The institution of marriage was not about love or the sacred union of souls, but about making babies and joining families. Having children (biological or adopted) was a duty for all Egyptians in a time and place where infant and child mortality was high. Therefore, it has been theorized that Niankhkhnum and Khnumhotep, having fulfilled their societal obligation to reproduce, were free to pursue a romantic relationship with each other. After all, men did take female concubines in addition to their wives, and not having our own puritanical heritage, the Egyptians considered sex something healthy to be enjoyed for its own sake, not just for the making of children (although as far as they were concerned that was a nice fringe benefit.)

And finally, unlike dwarves, twins did not seem to be favored in Ancient Egypt. There is relatively little mention of them before 1000 b.c.e. (late in Egypt's history) and the Papyrus Westcar says "...we shall fill her womb with male and female children, and save her from giving birth to twins..."*

I guess what gets me the most about this whole thing is that we seem to still cling to the ethnocentric attitudes from 100 years ago when Lady Charlotte Guest translated a sex-free Mabinogion. And this is not just about ancient homosexuality, for those who would accuse me of being in league with the nefarious "Gay Agenda". Another example from Egypt is the tomb of the 1st Dynasty queen Meryt-Neith. When her tomb was first discovered in 1900, it was immediately assumed to belong to a Pharaoh, due to its size and the elaborateness of its grave goods. However, when it was discovered that Meryt-Neith is in fact a feminine name, her status dropped to that of a queen, a decision based purely on her gender. Never mind that there were female Pharaohs, most notably Hatshepsut. Had she turned out to have indeed been male, we would learn about Pharaoh Meryt-Neith.*

So a person in a kingly tomb is not a king because she turns out to have been female. Two people shown in their tomb in the manner of husband and wife are now being called conjoined twins because they are both male. The Egyptians thought and acted exactly like us, just in funny jewelry and makeup a long, long time ago, right?? What a much richer, more interesting world we could live in if we see things in the terms of other cultures and circumstances than our own?

*I could not find any good online resources, this information comes from the book Daughters of Isis by Joyce Tyldesley.

Too often, when pagan or "magickal" calendars are presented, they are the standard Wiccan "Wheel of The Year" calendars superimposed on a given ancient religion, regardless of what environmental or symbolic needs the people of said cultures had in their respective climates and time periods. For example, in the ancient Middle East, summer was not the season when the sun "represents the slow surety of spring’s coming again with gradual warmth with all the power of the sun." With temperatures reaching 104 degrees, rains scarce to non-existent, and rivers dropping to all times lows, summer was the time of drought and death.

For us modern practitioners, this presents a bit of a problem. Unless we live in a place like Arizona or California, our seasons do more closely reflect the standard Wiccan model. Our cultural festivals synch with it, too. It's easier to celebrate Yule when everyone else is celebrating Christmas; you are not doing something so different as everyone else. It's not so easy to give Wep Renpet gifts and celebrate the ancient Egyptian New Year in Early August; you'll likely be doing it alone or with family and maybe friends. Some have simply taken the Egyptian festivals and re-arranged them to fit with the flow of the seasons in a temperate climate, whereas others simply celebrate the December holidays as purely cultural ones and keep their religious holidays seperate.

Here are some ancient Middle Eastern calendars to use to see the rhythm of the seasons in that part of the world. It is interesting to note that in all three calendars, months start on the new moon.

The Mesopotamian calendar. The Mesopotamian calendar is mostly lunar (months are based on the phases of the moon), as are the modern Jewish and Muslim calendars (this is why Hanukkah seems to fall on a different day every year--it falls on the same day of the month on a lunar calendar.) To the Mesopotamians, there were two seasons, summer and winter. New Year's occurred on the Vernal Equinox, or the first day of spring as the day is also known. It was known as the Akitu festival. This is a reconstructed calendar for modern use.

The Egyptian calendars. The Egyptians used a lunar calendar at first, but quickly devised a more accurate solar calendar. As a result, the Egyptians ended up with both a secular and a religious calendar which were used simultaneously, the lunar one being used to calculate religious festivals. Periodically an extra month was added to the lunar calendar to keep it up to date, similar to our practice of having leap years. The Egyptian calendar also consisted of three seasons: Akhet, Peret, and Shomu, with New Year's occurring around the Summer Solstice in ancient times, but closer to August now due to the Earth rotating on its axis in the past few thousand years. It always coincides with the appearance of the Dog Star Sirius, associated with the ancient goddess Sopdet. New Year's was known as Wep Renpet, or "The Opening of the Year".

The Canaanite Calendar. Also a lunar calendar, this is also a reconstruction of the one used in ancient times, and it is very similar to the modern Jewish calendar. Like the Egyptian calendar, it has three seasons and three "new years" based on harvest cycles unique to the Levant. However, as with the Mesopotamian calendar, the "true" New Year falls on the new moon closest to the Vernal Equinox, called the "Head of the Year".