Smendes and Shoshenq I
 | ||
by
Damien F. Mackey
With “Shishak”
properly identified by Dr. I. Velikovsky … with Thutmose III,
the mighty pharaoh
of Egypt’s Eighteenth Dynasty … then pharaoh Shoshenq I
must needs be
lifted right out of the C10th BC and located some centuries later.
Conventional dates for
Smendes, considered to have been the first ruler of the 21st Dynasty, are c.
1069-1043 BC.
Conventional dates for Shoshenq
I, considered to have been the first ruler of the 22nd Dynasty, are
c. 945-924 BC.
In terms of biblical chronology,
Smendes would probably have been a younger contemporary of Samuel; whilst
Shoshenq I has famously been identified (e.g. by Jean François Champollion) as
the biblical “Shishak king of Egypt” at the time of King Rehoboam (I Kings
4:25-26).
However, I have – along with
other revisionists – rejected Champollion’s view of Shoshenq I as “Shishak”:
Shoshenq I.
A (i): Who Shoshenq I was not
With “Shishak” properly
identified by Dr. I. Velikovsky (as I believe) with Thutmose III, the mighty
pharaoh of Egypt’s Eighteenth Dynasty:
Thutmose III
best candidate for “Shishak”
then pharaoh Shoshenq I must
needs be lifted right out of the C10th BC and located some centuries later.
So significant a chronological
shift must also impact upon Smendes who would also need to be lowered down the
time scale.
But then we start to get that awful
crush of Third Intermediate Period (TIP) dynasties, 21-25, with which revisionists
have to contend.
The Third
Intermediate Period usually refers to the time in Ancient Egypt from
the death of Pharaoh Ramesses XI (reign 1107–1078/77 BC) during the Twentieth
Dynasty to the foundation of the Twenty-Sixth Dynasty by Psamtik I in 664 BC,
following the expulsion of the Nubian rulers of the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty.
Smendes, apart from being considered
as the founder of the 21st dynasty, is also thought to have been the
first ruler of TIP.
A possible solution to early
TIP would be to identify Smendes with Shoshenq I of supposedly a century later.
That there was a degree of similarity
between Smendes and Shoshenq I is apparent from this quote from N. Grimal (A History of Ancient Egypt, Blackwell
1994, p. 332): “Shoshenq I immediately sought to prove that his claim to the
throne went back to the preceding dynasty, and did so by adopting a set of
titles based on those of Smendes I”.
Names shared: Meryre; Sekhempehti; Hedjkheperre-setpenre
Similarity can – but does not
always – mean identity.
However, it is at least worth
considering that Smendes and Shoshenq I were one and the same, with the possibility
of aligning dynasty 21 with 22 to overcome at least some of the dynastic
crushing of TIP.
Part Two: Smendes
so poorly attested
“… most of what we know of Smendes predates
his rise to the throne”.
“… we can only guess at Smendes' origins”.
“… there is a great deal of confusion
concerning the origin of Smendes”.
Jimmy
Dunn
Statements like the above from
Jimmy Dunn (Tour Egypt) would suggest
that pharaoh Smendes, said to have reigned for as many as 26 years, may be
sorely in need of an alter ego – with
Shoshenq I being my suggestion for another face of Smendes.
Jimmy Dunn has written: http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/smendes.htm
Smendes, the First King of the 21st Dynasty
and the Third Intermediate Period
….
Smendes
(Smedes), who we believe founded the 21st Dynasty, ending
the New
Kingdom at the beginning of the Third
Intermediate Period, is a very difficult individual with almost intractable origins
and affiliations. His reign, which Manetho assigns
26 years, produced only a tiny handful of monuments and we have never
discovered either his tomb or his mummy (though many believe his tomb to
be NRT-I at Tanis, this
structure offers up no clues concerning Smendes).
Smendes
is a Greek rendering of this king's name. His birth name and epithet were
Nes-ba-neb-djed (mery-amun), meaning "He of the Ram, Lord of Mendes,
Beloved of Amun". His throne name was Hedj-kheper-re Setep-en-re, meaning
"Bright is the Manifestation of Re, Chosen of Re".
In fact,
most of what we know of Smendes predates his rise to the throne. From the Report of Wenamun, dating
to Year 5 of the "Renaissance Era" during the last decade of the
reign of Ramesses
XI, we learn much of what we know of this future king. While on
the way to Lebanon to obtain wood for the renewal of the divine barque of Amun-Re, Wenamun stopped at Tanis, which
he describes as "the place where Smendes and Tentamun are". Smendes
is specifically described as being the one to whom Wenamun gave his letters of
credence from Herihor, the High-Priest of
Amun and a powerful general in the south. Wenamun was then sent in a ship by
Smendes to Syria. Smendes, along with Herihor and others, was cited as having
contributed money to this expedition.
Smendes,
together with Tentamun, are therefore shown to be of great importance in
Egypt's Delta, equals at least of the High-Priest of Amun in the south. Consider the fact
that Ramesses
XI at this time presumably lived at Piramesses, only about 20
kilometers to the southwest of Tanis, and yet
Wenamun came to Smendes for assistance rather than to the king. In fact, Herihor assumed some royal titles even
while Ramesses XI was still alive, and the implication would seem to be that
Smendes had a similar standing in the north.
Nevertheless,
we can only guess at Smendes' origins. It has been suggested that he was a
brother of Nodjmet, the wife of Herihor, but it has also been suggested that
Nodjmet could have been a sister of Ramesses
XI. However, Tentamun, who was presumably Smendes' wife, may have
been a member of the royal family. She could have been a daughter of another
woman named Tentamun, who may have been the wife of Ramesses XI (or possibly
another Ramesside king). The older Tentamun was certainly the mother of
Henttawy, who later became the wife of the High-Priest of Amun, Pinedjem I, who also acquired kingly status in
the south. As a royal son-in-law, Smendes' status is more easily understood,
though perhaps not his total eclipse of the king.
Obviously
there is a great deal of confusion concerning the origin of Smendes.
Nevertheless, it is very probable that the families of Smendes and Herihor, or at least their descendants, were
linked.
Whatever
his original status, after the death of Ramesses
XI, Smendes became a king of Egypt, and is recorded as such in
most reference material. However, only two sources specifically name him as
pharaoh, consisting of a stela in a quarry at Dibabia near Gebelein
(Jebelein), and a small depiction in the temple of Montu at Karnak.
Interestingly, while there are no known unambiguously dated documents from his
reign, the contemporary High-Priests of Amun used year numbers without a king's
name, and it is generally believed that, at least through year 25, these refer
to Smendes' reign.
In fact,
Smendes probably never ruled over a united Egypt as such, a condition which
probably also existed at the end of the reign of Ramesses
XI. During much of what we refer to as the 21st Dynasty, there
was also a dynasty of High-Priests of Amun at Thebes who
effectively ruled Upper Egypt, while the kings at Tanis ruled
the north. However, there appears to have been a rather delicate balance of
powers, and perhaps even a formal arrangement for this division of Egypt. The
Priests at Thebes seem
to have held sway over a region which stretched from the north of el-Hiba
(south of the entrance to the Fayoum) to the southern frontier of Egypt, and
their aspirations became apparent around year 16 of Smendes' reign, when Pinedjem I apparently began to take on
full pharaonic titles, yet at all times he continued to defer to Smendes as at
least a senior king.
….
Part Three:
May Psusennes I and II be the actual same person?
“On the Dakhleh Stela of the Twenty-second Dynasty reference is made to
the 19th year of ‘Pharaoh Psusennes’. …. As Gardiner observes, one cannot determine
from this statement whether Psusennes I or II is intended”.
Beatrice L. Goff
If our suspicion in this series that Smendes of the 21st Egyptian dynasty was the same pharaoh as Shoshenq I of the 22nd (Libyan) dynasty, then this is going to assist in the necessary curtailing of the troublesome Third Intermediate Period (TIP), so-called, of Egyptian history.
It will the open the door for further shrinkage, enabling, for instance, for the Psusennes I at the time of Smendes to have been the same as the Psusennses II at the time of Shoshenq I – as some have already suspected. Conventionally, the 21st dynasty is set out something like this:
KingsYears BCE
| |
Smendes
|
1069-1043
|
Amenemnisu
|
1043-1039
|
Psusennes 1
|
1039-991
|
Amenemope
|
993-984
|
Osorkon the Elder
|
984-978
|
Siamun
|
978-959
|
Psusennes 2
|
959-945
|
About three decades separate Psusennes I from Psusennes II.
Then follows the 22nd dynasty, commencing with Shoshenq I, a known younger contemporary of Psusennes (so-called II).
According to the following site:
some have been suggesting an identification of Psusennes I and II:
While some authors, including New Chronology followers claim that Psusennes I may actually be identical with Psusennes II, this is impossible because Psusennes II is clearly distinguished from Psusennes I by Manetho and is given an independent reign of 15 years in the author's Epitome. Moreover, Psusenness II's royal name has been found associated with his successor, Shoshenq I in a graffito from tomb TT18, and in an ostracon from Umm el-Qa'ab. This shows that Shoshenq I was Psusennes II's successor. In contrast, Psusennes I died almost 40-45 years before Shoshenq I's appearance as Chief of the Ma, let alone King of Egypt.
[End of quote]
“Psusennes I died almost 40-45 years before Shoshenq I …” according to the conventional calculations.
But that would no longer apply if Smendes were Shoshenq I, and Psusennes I and II were also the same person.
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