Ta-Seti

Ta-Seti (Land of the bow, also Ta Khentit, the Frontier or Borderland) was the first nome (administrative division) of Upper Egypt, one of 42 nomoi in Ancient Egypt.^{[1][2][3][4][5][6]} Ta-Seti marked the border area towards Nubia, and the name was also used to refer to Nubia itself.^{[7][8][9][10]}

Ta-Seti in hieroglyphs

This article is about the nome of Upper Egypt. Not to be confused with Nubia, which was also called Ta-Seti.

Ta-Seti (uppermost) at the "White Chapel" in Karnak

Map of all nomoi in Upper Egypt

History

Every nome was ruled by a nomarch (provincial governor), who answered directly to the pharaoh.^[2][3][4][5]

The area of the district was about 2 cha-ta (about 5.5 hectare / 4.8 acres; 1 cha-ta equals roughly 2.75 hectare / 2.4 acres) and about 10,5 iteru (about 112 km / 69,6 miles, 1 iteru equals roughly 10,5 km / 6.2 miles) in length.^[11]

The Niwt (main city) was Abu / Elephantine (part of modern Aswan) and among other cities were P'aaleq / Philae (modern Philae), Sunet / Syene (modern Aswan) and Pa-Sebek / Omboi (modern Kom Ombo).^{[2][3][4][5][6]} Every niwt had a Het net (temple) dedicated to the chief deity and a Heqa het (nomarchs residence).^[1]

The district's main deity was Horus and among others major deities were Anuket, Arensnuphis, Hathor, Isis, Khnum, Mandulis, Satet and Sobek.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} Today the area is part of the Aswan Governorate.

The Prophecy of Neferti, a literary text from the Middle Kingdom of Egypt mention the mother of Amenemhat I, founder of the Twelfth Dynasty, being from^[12] the Elephantine Egyptian nome Ta-Seti.^[13][14][15] Many scholars have argued that Amenemhat I's mother was of Nubian origin.^{[16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23]}

Nomarchs of Ta-Seti

The following is a partial genealogy of the nomarchs of Ta-Seti during the 12th Dynasty. The nomarchs are underlined.^[24]

Sarenput I

Khema

Satethotep♀

Sarenput II

Shemai

Sat-tjeni♀

Heqaib III

Amenyseneb

References

1. "The nomoi". Archived from the original on 2010-12-09. Retrieved 2010-07-14., Egypt Ancient.net, accessdate=2010-07-14
2. , Egypt tourist authority, accessdate=2010-07-14
3. "Nomes, Provinces of Ancient Egypt". Archived from the original on 2010-06-02. Retrieved 2010-07-14., Ancient Egyptian religion, Philae.net, accessdate=2010-07-14
4. , Reshafim.org, accessdate=2010-07-14
5. , Aldokan.com, accessdate=2010-07-14
6. , Digital Egypt for Universities, accessdate=2010-07-14
7. Ancient Nubia: A-Group 3800–3100 BC
8. Ancient Nubia: A Brief History. livescience.com
9. The Fitzwilliam Museum: Kemet
10. Newton, Steven H. (1993). "An Updated Working Chronology of Predynastic and Archaic Kemet". Journal of Black Studies. 23 (3): 403–415. doi:10.1177/002193479302300308. JSTOR 2784576. S2CID 144479624.
11. , Faszination Ägypten (in German), accessdate=2010-07-14
12. "Then a king will come from the South, Ameny, the justified, by name, son of a woman of Ta-seti, child of Upper Egypt""The Beginning of the Twelfth Dynasty". Kingship, Power, and Legitimacy in Ancient Egypt: From the Old Kingdom to the Middle Kingdom. Cambridge University Press: 138–160. 2020. doi:10.1017/9781108914529.006. ISBN 9781108914529. S2CID 242213167.
13. "Ammenemes himself was not a Theban but the son of a woman from Elephantine called Nofret and a priest called Sesostris (‘The man of the Great Goddess’).",Grimal, Nicolas (1994). A History of Ancient Egypt. Wiley-Blackwell (July 19, 1994). p. 159.
14. "Senusret, a commoner as the father of Amenemhet, his mother, Nefert, came from the area Elephantine."A. Clayton, Peter (2006). Chronicle of the Pharaohs: The Reign-by-Reign Record of the Rulers and Dynasties of Ancient Egypt. Thames & Hudson. p. 78.
15. "Amenemhet I was a commoner, the son of one Sen- wosret and a woman named NEFRET, listed as prominent members of a family from ELEPHANTINE Island."Bunson, Margaret (2002). Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt (Facts on File Library of World History). Facts on File. p. 25.
16. "The XIIth Dynasty (1991-1786 B.C.E.) originated from the Aswan region. As expected, strong Nubian features and dark coloring are seen in their sculpture and relief work. This dynasty ranks as among the greatest, whose fame far outlived its actual tenure on the throne. Especially interesting, it was a member of this dynasty- that decreed that no Nehsy (riverine Nubian of the principality of Kush), except such as came for trade or diplomatic reasons, should pass by the Egyptian fortress at the southern end of the Second Nile Cataract. Why would this royal family of Nubian ancestry ban other Nubians from coming into Egyptian territory? Because the Egyptian rulers of Nubian ancestry had become Egyptians culturally; as pharaohs, they exhibited typical Egyptian attitudes and adopted typical Egyptian policies."F. J. Yurco. "'Were the ancient Egyptians black or white?'". Biblical Archaeology Review. (Vol 15, no. 5, 1989): 24–9, 58.
17. General History of Africa Volume II - Ancient civilizations of Africa (ed. G Moktar). UNESCO. p. 152.
18. Crawford, Keith W. (1 December 2021). "Critique of the "Black Pharaohs" Theme: Racist Perspectives of Egyptian and Kushite/Nubian Interactions in Popular Media". African Archaeological Review. 38 (4): 695–712. doi:10.1007/s10437-021-09453-7. ISSN 1572-9842. S2CID 238718279.
19. Lobban, Richard A. Jr. (10 April 2021). Historical Dictionary of Ancient Nubia. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 9781538133392.
20. Morris, Ellen (6 August 2018). Ancient Egyptian Imperialism. John Wiley & Sons. p. 72. ISBN 978-1-4051-3677-8.
21. Van de Mieroop, Marc (2021). A history of ancient Egypt (Second ed.). Chichester, West Sussex. p. 99. ISBN 978-1119620877.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
22. Fletcher, Joann (2017). The story of Egypt : the civilization that shaped the world (First Pegasus books paperback ed.). New York. pp. Chapter 12. ISBN 978-1681774565.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
23. Smith, Stuart Tyson (8 October 2018). "Ethnicity: Constructions of Self and Other in Ancient Egypt". Journal of Egyptian History. 11 (1–2): 113–146. doi:10.1163/18741665-12340045. ISSN 1874-1665. S2CID 203315839.
24. "Burial chamber discovered". Ahram Weekly. Retrieved 2017-03-25.

• Helck, Wolfgang; Westendorf, Wolfhart: Lexikon der Ägyptologie. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 1977. ISBN 3-447-01876-3

External links

• About the nomoi of Egypt
• Detailed map of the nomois
• Hieroglyphs of the nomoi