In the Old Kingdom, the First Intermediate Period and the beginning of the Middle Kingdom, many elite women became priestesses of the goddess Hathor, although few women served in the cults of other deities. By the New Kingdom, the priesthood was all male, with the sole exception of the royal woman who held the position of the "God's wife of Amun" at Thebes. Instead of being priestesses, many elite women of this period held the title of musician of a particular deity, and their role was to per-from the musical accompaniment to temple ritual. They are often shown holding the sacred rattle (sistrum), which they shook rhythmically as they chanted. Scenes from a temple building of Queen Hatshepsut at Karnak depict groups of women shaking sistra as part of the musical ensemble that accompanied the sacred boat of the god Amun as it went in precession from the temple of Karnak to the temple of Luxor and back. In charge of the musicians there would have been a woman of high social status who bore the tile "The Superior of the Musical Troupe".
The ritual enacted in the hidden sanctuaries deep within state temples had little to offer on the level of personal religion. Nevertheless, both men and women visited the outer areas of temples to pray and to present votive offerings to the gods. Many such offerings have been recovered from shrines dedicated to the goddess Hathor at Deir el-Bahari. Although few reveal the identity of the dedicator, some include depictions of female donors. Because Hathor was closely connected with sexuality, fertility, pregnancy and childbirth, she was a particularly important deity for women, many of whom undoubtedly visited her shrines with gifts and petitions. One fragmentary statue of a man found at Deir el-Bahary contains a text addressed specifically to women who visit the temple. In it, the man promises that in return for offerings he will intercede with the goddess on the women's behalf for "happiness and a good [or perhaps 'potent'] husband''.
Women also played an important role as mourners in burial rites. Representations of the funeral procession to the tomb show the dead man's wife and groups of other women mourning the deceased. Their hair is disheveled, their breasts bared and tears spill from their eyes. Two women, standing at either and of the bier that carried the deceased to the tomb, enacted the parts of the goddesses Isis and Nephthys mourning the death of their murdered brother Osiris. Although the funerary processions of women are rarely depicted, we know from excavated burials that women were afforded similar, if usually less rich, funerary equipment as men of equal status, and that they expected to share the same afterlife, with its attendant needs and dangers.
Women also participated in funerary cults. These were ideally carried out by the eldest son of the deceased, but depictions on funerary stelae suggest that female family members commonly played a part. They are shown burning incense, pouring libations and dedicating offerings.
In the Twenty-Fifth and Twenty-Sixth dynasties, one of the most important positions in the temple of Amun at Karnak, Eastern Thebes, was that of the "God's Wife of Amun" It was usually held by a daughter of the king, who never married, but would adopt her successor. Although we do not know the exact details of this princess's role, part of her function was to carry out ritual actions before the god, including shaking the sacred rattle or sistrum, in order to stimulate the deity constantly to re-enact creation and maintain the created world.
The role of God's Wife had its origins at the beginning of the New Kingdom, when the title was bestowed by King Ahmose on his queen, Ahmose Nefertari, together with a financial endowment to support the office. Later, Queen Hatshepsut was prominent as God's Wife before she became pharaoh, and she may have used the authority of the position to help her rise to power . After her death, the God's Wife declined in importance for several hundred years .
The importance of the God's Wife is reflected in the decoration of a series of chapels in the precinct of Karnak. Here, she is depicted on an equal footing with the pharaoh in scenes which, before the Twenty-Fifth and Twenty-Sixth dynasties, showed only the king. She adores and makes offerings directly to deities, who embrace, crown and suckle her divine partner, Amun, is seen in a faience statuette from Karnak that shows the God's Wife Amenirdis I on the lap of the deity, who holds her in his arms.
0 Comments