Prelude
Old Kingdom period (25th century BC).
Tekh 3, of the month before Wag :
In the time of she who riseth in the dawn with The Sun Disk Re and his majesty:
A Shu x5 =Behold the God of wind Shu x5
Un Nefert tattia = The beautiful one who wears the crown.
Hattia em ba ka em et Shu. = My beating heart in my body and soul is for Shu
A Shu ×5 = Behold the god of wild Shu x5
Djed em hattia Shu = The enduring one of my heart.
Merit anat Neteru. = Beloved God of my heart.
Tua Shu x 2 = In the adoration of Shu the God of wind ×2
Nehmes em Hotep = Awake in peace
Tua shu ×2 = In the adoration of Shu the God of wind ×2
× 12 while burning Juniper and Lavender
Prelude
It is a muddy day during the flooding season called Akhet. The Lord Re’s sun is beginning to set over the large temple of the God of wind and war, husband to the Goddess of Moisture. Lemon trees in neat rows surround a large statue of the God and beautifully crafted feasting tables painted with ostrich feathers.
The Temple was surrounded by a square moat that one would need a boat to cross. As long as the Virgin Priestesses of Shu remained, only the God himself, The Priestesses and the Pharaoh were allowed inside. The Female Pharaoh would visit tonight to pay her dues to the gods. Reket (commoners). The Lady Pharaoh’s entourage would line up in the back gardens following the stone path around the large temple. The back gardens may not have been as legendary for being pleasing to the eye as that of the Lady Hathor’s yet they had rare exotic flowers that only opened at night.
Weeks of preparation have led to this auspicious night of festival song and dance. Success would ensure the winds would bring moisture so that the flood season would last the next three months. The Priestess deep inside the Temples of Shu Prepared dried juniper berries along with sun - baked cinnamon from the distant land of Hati along with local fresh lavender bushels into bowls for burning. Every priestess was hard at work arranging flowers, making the rest of the fine dishes and pastries. The tables had to look right. The oil offering had to be the best of the year so as to not ensue the wrath of the Neteru (the Gods). Not a thing was out of its proud placement and blue lotus flowers adorned the painted bars holding up the hanging shades.
Everyone would judge The Lady Pharaoh’s performance on this night. Everyone knew that failure to invoke the Neteru’s pleasure would mean a bad growing season, even famine for the poorest parts surrounding the capital. Every priestess was hard at work arranging flowers or making the rest of the fine dishes or pastries. Not a thing was out of place. Blue lotus flowers adorned the painted bars holding up the hanging shades . The tables had to look just so, the oil offering had to be the best of the year. Anything less would bring the wrath of the Neteru (the Gods).
Rows of lamps made the garden burst and dance with light and warmth that symbolizes love. The air smelt of a coming rain and the aroma of cinnamon burned in the massive bonfires to the sides which kept the air smelling fresh and warm. Yet a black dark pitch covered Egypt like soot; Henusen sat perched over the side of the royal barge feeling death itself waving in down on her body.
For the first time in her Royal life the ornament on her head was too heavy a burden; A dazzled Ma’at pectoral glinted against the bright turquoise and onyx imported from far away lands. The Royal band that covered it was small blue lotus flowers. Her dark brown eyes glared up at the sun as she began to tug at the top of her necklace that hung in heavy rows down to her breast.
Already she could hear the shouts of alarm crowding around her from behind her. The band of lapis lazuli plummeted into the river with a soft thud like splash and her small daughter clung to her arm softly, her daughter Neferhenutmre was suddenly tugging at her, “Mawat?” Using the intimate name for mother - hardly something, you would call a Lady Pharaoh.
“Are you unwell, to have thrown your necklace away?” The young girl still had her side lock that signified her youth, but spoke like a woman. The Lady Pharaoh only smiled for her eldest child. She knew it was a sin to speak against the truth yet lied in the moment. She took her left hand from her belly and embraced the child’s cheek in her hand
“Yes, my rose petal, I am fine.” The Lady pharaoh spoke with a rasp. Henusen gazed out over the river with a half-glazed smile “The child will come early. I wish to gaze at Nephthys just a little while longer please: this will be a long process.” The river had a hush over it; she could smell the spices from the shore being burned. It was like a song calling out through smell, calling back to her childhood spent at this beloved Temple. The child looked where her mother looked and pressed against her hand. For a child of eight, it can be hard to understand that even for her mother, who was the Living Goddess on Earth, child bearing was no easy task.
Henetsun felt sure she would not have energy to call out to the Gods and who knew what that would mean for her beloved lands? A powerful lurch overtook her body and she forced her mind’s eye back to a time when she was made of all willowed legs --Tanned for the world to see, laughing with the small dwarf man.
“Come with me to my room child, quickly before we enter the temple.” The dark brown eyes tore from the deep blue river and a large dangerous hippo clacking its teeth at the sun. Hathor had come to meet her twin in this place. Indeed the thought was deep as she led her child with a stern hand causing her to call out. As she lurched past and out of the smell, the Lady Pharaoh let out a cry of pain. Leaning on the small child she made it into the cool of her large back rooms and onto a bed.
The child glared at her mother and her lip began to quiver. Her tears welled up looking at the goddess of truth on her mother’s crown . “Take out a writing plate, not a wax one, but a true paper box with papyrus.” The young girl’s eyes went as wide as saucer dishes, her mother had tore her into the room so fast she had failed to take in how stripped and bare this ride had been. Many paintings her mother had held sacred had been removed from this room and the outlines with a lighter shade of the wood remained as a subtle hint of the past.
An understanding now washed over the child. “Mawat why have we come to this place? Will the Neteru truly not forgive us if you fail tonight?” The child’s mind fought against this realization; she did not want the confirmation that her mother had been taking things for months to place in her tomb.
“NeferHenutmire you dear child, the Neteru always forgive humans and are also flawed in nature. That is why they come upon the earth to give The Pharaohs children.”
The small tanned girl had a genuine smile; it showed deep dimples and gleaming teeth. She could make a fine Pharaoh at the right age. The young girl reached out her dark olive toned hands and began to dig deep into a wooden box by her mother’s bed. Pulling out writing paints made for travel, she looked up, “If I spell anything improperly what will they do?”
The Lady Pharaoh’s eyes narrowed and she shook her head softly. “You mustn’t NeferHenutmire you must be swift, all of Egypt will some day rest in your hands and I fear...” A ripple overcame the small princess as her mother cried out in harsh pain. Her tanned hands began to shake as she headed the paper with her mother’s many titles.
Henutsun She Who Riseth In The Dawn With The Sun Disk Re And His Majesty: By the time she did this The Lady Pharaoh had gained her breath back: but beads of sweat now lined her malachite makeup and she looked weary causing the small princess to frown. ‘`I fear If this Letter does not reach ReHoptep we will go into a one god religion and my idea of an observatory for the god Ausair shall be ruined.’ Speaking the God of The Duat’s name had clearly made her ill for now her skin was milky and pale.
The young princess quivered with an unexpected chill as she asked “Would Abi really do that?’ Speaking of her father with a tenderness that surprised the queen, Nefer still had too much to learn from life the truths about the dwarf king most of all.
“Under his reign everyone would fear him; I lay with that man, I know his ambitions and that is dangerous: they call on turning away from the Neteru! If this child is to live, I must get to the temple.” Her voice shook with barely veiled rage. She did everything in her power to keep it even as she fought against the overwhelming emotions and rising pain. NeferHenutmire squinted at the Pharaoh and nodded as she began to fiddle with the edges of the curled Papyrus scroll. Now write:
“Dear Rehotep Scribe Of The Book Of Toth,
As this letter reaches you I will be gone from the world – protect the child until NeferHenutmire can overpower Khufu, he will come for Waset like the god Apep. You must find a way to strike him down or we will lose all we hold dear. The princess began to chew the inside of her mouth with sorrow. Her eyes tore into her mother’s for a long while.”
“Do you truly wish to give up to the gods tonight Mawat?’ It was a tender child’s worry.
This caused a second wave of sweat to pour down the Lady Pharaoh’s back as she recoiled in her chair. “What choice do I have?” The Lady Pharaoh retorted. NeferHenutmire sighed and looked down at the paper.
“ Can Rehotep be trusted? You ask much and there is little time.” Tears overcame the child and she quickly placed aside the royal scroll to the side of the bed so as not to stain it with tears. Holding back a sniffle she forced herself to keep her gaze on her mother. She could see it now too. It was like a grey film just beyond her mother’s own shadow. Death did wait for her. It was in the face and in the lines hidden behind the Ma’at pectoral at which the Lady pharaoh was pulling away.
“He is the only one to be trusted – You must take Ma’at and keep her out of the hands of lies.” It took her a great strength to say this. It caused the child to shake from her tears. “Do not weep. Death is only the start of my life and many to come.’ As she spoke this, her hands placed the slightly oversized pectoral on her head, fixing her braided side lock so that it would not obstruct. “The one thing you must do is trust in the dreams you have now as a child and raise whoever comes from the temple in my place tonight to be a warrior.”
The young princess now pulled away from her mother and began to scream. Her voice cracking from the effort making quiet tears roll from The Lady Pharaoh. “How can you be so certain death waits for you In the place of The Cruel God Shu!” Now The Lady Pharaoh let out a soft giggle and covered her lips with the back of her hand suppressing yet another scream from a ripple of pain.
“Someone has to die in order for life to be born.” The nervous giggling had now left The lady Pharaoh and she rose to her feet kicking off her golden sandals. She limped, swinging her swollen belly, to her blue wooden vanity and began to discard at least a dozen royal and heavy rings she would not need in the place of the Gods. “Shu is not cruel, and he will be my comfort tonight- find me in the one who loves the wind.” The lady Pharaoh gazed in the glass at her rugged and sweaty complexion. Children and a lifetime of calculated choices had torn away the beauty of her youth.
Watching her mother who had spent her entire life showing barely any emotion, staring at herself critically in the mirror brought rippling fear to the young princess. The world around her was lapping up at her feet like a monster with gnarly teeth in a diseased frenzy.
Blood was pounding in her ears and the young princess clung to the rolled-up scroll against her chest. Her eyes were filled with fear. “Will I be going into the temple with you Mawat?’It was a rhetorical useless question, one that would have been better left unasked, but she had to try.
“No, NeferHennutmire, you will not.”
Tension and hatred had burned between the two for many years, but there was also a great love interlocked deep within their eyes. The curse of the throne had definitely robbed her children from her. Her beloved daughters most of all and she had to make choices that made her seem hardhearted, even disgusting. Often she admitted it during punishments.
“You will understand someday when you are older and you wear the Pashent Crown upon your own head.” Another gripping bubble of pain took the Lady Pharoah as she bent over screeching to the gods in physical pain.
The birds on the edge of the Riverside barge suddenly flew away without looking back. Perhaps it was the pain that spooked them, or perhaps they had selfish reasons of their own.
Her last heir would be brought into this world today. Her own life would be extinguished. This would be the start of decades of one god religion. Setmeritten, Khufu’s mistress, would soon also give birth. It was now a race to The Priest of Re and The new king to come .
Though she could not quite comprehend it, this small princess’s world would change and so would Egypt, especially Waset. Even now as she watched, many ladies carried her mother off into the dark mysterious temples. She had looked forward to seeing them for over six months, practicing dances and prayers that would now go to waste. Her mother would refuse her entry and so she would refuse her mother a goodbye to the shore line. The last days of her mother was spent screaming in agony surrounded by her ladies dragging her out of the room.
Nonetheless, she still looked beautiful and regal, even without a single royal possession. Only now that she was gone from the room could Neferhenutmire fully realize all of the details that she had missed from her mother’s room. Many statues of the twin Gods had vanished.
Not only that, but senet tables, art tapestries, love poems and even the better bedding sheets had been removed for this hasty journey. Neferhenutmire turned her face away in anger, her lips curling as The pectoral viced around her head . Breathing in deeply she gave a soft glare and smirked softly. “Mawat will return and plead forgiveness as always.” it was a soft whisper.
Yet looking at the scroll she knew better. This was the end. She pulled herself from her seat. “If I am not allowed inside I will go about outside and look at the earth.”
The princess took to the center of the ship now and held the scroll tight in her hands. Her mind races in and out of old memories, there were some good times with Mawat as well. In the dark lit gardens time seemed to pass more slowly. Now the slightly red moon was just a sliver in the sky. Here away from the city, the princess could see a breath of stars and it pleased her dull heart. A soft smile stole the corners of her narrow face. Now she looked to the left of her shoulder and made her way to her own room to get a cloak for the moonlight.
Fear rose within her. This would be a time when the gods would not have a festival, how many Reket or common men would be out and about tonight? Her nose scrunched up as she pushed her way through the dark ash wood doors.
NeferHenutmire then began to make her way to a large wicker bed and she pulled a malachite cloak from her pillow and wrapped it around her blue dress. Tears filled her eyes as she saw her mother’s face in her mind’s eye while pulling her hood up. The princess turned on her heels and began to push her way past a few gossiping ladies her head down.
“I pray The Neteru smite The Child and not the Lady Pharaoh, or Egypt is doomed.” Barely more than a whisper, but enough to make the young woman narrow her oval shaped eyes swirling with soot color. This was a sin to even speak against Ma’at, The princess felt a cold chill sweep over her frame as she made her way past the loading plank to the sandy shore line below in sound.
She immediately regretted it. The sand began to slip into the tips of her toes. The crown princess often had others around to carry her; seldom did she walk for herself. She then made her way past a bustling crowd of talking ladies half naked for the moon to see.
Seasonal Patterns:
Akhet (Inundation Season): July–November
Peret (Growing Season): November–March
Shemu (Harvest Season): March–Jul
Duat; The place the afterlife is held. You only get there if you are a Neteru or you’re heart is lighter than Ma’ats feather.
Kemet = Egypt.
Re is the modern God Ra. You say it the same.
Waset = Now known as Cairo.
Neter/ Neterjer = Words for Gods.
Iteru = The river Nile.
H;q mw means to rejoice in water.
Ausar = God of the dead Orisis.
Hwt-Hrw = Kemetic word for Hathor.
Ta mui’s = Female cat.
Shu= Leaser known god of wind and war-
