Khasekhemwy

Khasekhemwy (ca. 2690 BC; Ḫꜥj-sḫm.wj, also rendered Kha-sekhemui) was the last Pharaoh of the Second Dynasty of Egypt. Little is known about him, other than that he led several significant military campaigns and built the mudbrick fort known as Shunet El Zebib.

His Horus name Ḫꜥj-sḫm.wj can be interpreted "The Two Powerful Ones Appear",^[4] but the name is recorded in many variants, such as Ḥr-Ḫꜥj-sḫm (Horus, he whose power appears), ḫꜥj sḫm.wj ḥtp nṯrwj jm=f (the two powers appear in that the ancestors rest within him) (etc.)^[5][a] He is also known under his later traditioned birth name Bebti (which is also one of the names of the god Horus) and under his Hellenized name Cheneres (by Manetho; derived from Khasekhemwy).

Khasekhemwy ruled for close to 18 years, with a floruit in the early 27th century BC. The exact date of his reign in Egyptian chronology is unclear but would fall roughly in between 2690–2670 BC.

According to Toby Wilkinson's study of the Palermo Stone in Royal Annals of Ancient Egypt, this near contemporary 5th dynasty document assigns Khasekhemwy a reign of 17.5 or nearly 18 full years.^[6] Wilkinson suggests that a reign of 18 "complete or partial years" can be attributed to Khasekhemwy since the Palermo Stone and its associated fragments record Years 3-6 and Years 12-18 of this king and notes that his final year is recorded in the preserved section of the document.^[7] Since the cattle count is shown to be regularly biennial during the second dynasty from the Palermo Stone (the year of the 6th, 7th and 8th count is preserved on the document plus full years after these counts respectively), a figure of c. 18 years is likely correct for Khasekhemwy. (or c. 18 years 2 months and 23 days from the main fragment of the Palermo Stone)

Khasekhemwy is normally placed as the successor of Seth-Peribsen, though some Egyptologists believe that he was the successor of Sekhemib-Perenmaat and that another Pharaoh, Khasekhem, ruled between them. Most scholars, however, believe that Khasekhem and Khasekhemwy are, in fact, the same person.^[8] Khasekhem may have changed his name to Khasekhemwy after he reunited Upper and Lower Egypt after a civil war between the followers of the god Horus led by himself and the followers of the god Seth led by Peribsen. Others believe Khasekhemwy only defeated Seth-Peribsen after returning to Egypt from putting down a revolt in Nubia. Either way, he ended the infighting of the Second dynasty and reunited Egypt.

Khasekhemwy is unique in Egyptian history as having both the symbols of Horus and Seth on his serekh. At the beginning of his reign he adopted the Horus name Khasekhem, "The powerful one has appeared", which clearly showed his allegence to Horus. Later, however, he added the symbol of Seth next to Horus and added the epithet to his royal serekh,   / and accordingly changed his name to the dual form Khasekhemwy, "Two powers have appeared", along with the addition "two lords are at peace with him". Some Egyptologists believe that this was an attempt to unify the two factions; but after his death, Seth was dropped from the serekh permanently. He was the earliest Egyptian king known to have built statues of himself.^[9][10]

Khasekhemwy apparently undertook considerable building projects upon the reunification of Egypt. He built in stone at el-Kab, Hierakonpolis, and Abydos. Khasekhemwy built enclosures at Nekhen, and at Abydos (now known as Shunet ez Zebib) and was buried there in the necropolis at Umm el-Qa'ab. He may also have built the Gisr el-Mudir at Saqqara.

An inscription on a stone vase records him “fighting the northern enemy within Nekheb”. This means that Lower Egypt may have invaded and almost taken the capital of Nekhen.^[11]

Khasekhemwy's wife was Queen Nimaathap, mother of the King's Children. They were the parents of Djoser and Djoser's wife Hetephernebti.^[12] It is also possible that Khasekhemwy's sons were Sekhemkhet, Sanakhte, and Khaba, the three kings succeeding Djoser.^[13][14] Nimaathap was a northern princess who he titled “King bearing mother”.^[11]

He apparently built a unique, as well as huge, tomb at Abydos, the last such royal tomb built in the Umm el-Qa'ab necropolis (Tomb V). The trapezoidal tomb measures some 70 meters (230 ft) in length and is 17 meters (56 ft) wide at its northern end, and 10 meters (33 ft) wide at its southern end. This area was divided into 58 rooms. Prior to some recent discoveries from the 1st dynasty, its central burial chamber was considered the oldest masonry structure in the world, being built of quarried limestone. Despite being entered and looted by ancient tomb robbers, the excavators discovered the king's scepter of gold and sard inside the central burial chamber, as well as several beautifully made small stone pots with gold leaf lid coverings, apparently missed by earlier tomb robbers. In fact, Petrie detailed a number of items removed during the excavations of Amélineau. Other items included flint tools, as well as a variety of copper tools and vessels, stone vessels and pottery vessels filled with grain and fruit. There were also small, glazed objects, carnelian beads, model tools, basketwork and a large quantity of seals.

The second half of the 2nd dynasty, especially starting from the reign of Peribsen, the targeted unification of Egypt under a central administration, the development of the economy, trade and culture, created the conditions for the dynamic onset of the 3rd dynasty. This is evidenced by the constructions that were realised, which in their increasingly massive size determined the development of construction technologies and their logistical support, including the necessary administrative structures associated with it. It was also the development of the craft of producing objects, as evidenced by the objects exhibited in museums, partially preserved from the funerary equipment in the tomb of Khasekhemwy. There is no doubt that his sons Sanakht, Netjerikhet and Khaba had enough inspiring ideas for their own reigns.^[15]

The era of Khasekhemwy's rule is therefore, in a historical context, an important phase in the development of Egypt's statehood. Increasing Egyptian involvement in neighbouring areas and the imposition of political control over territory beyond Egypt's borders,^{[note 1]} are important indicators of growing self-confidence. The intensity of Egypt's foreign relations in the Early Dynastic period is a complex mixture of ideology and practical economics, illuminating some of the problems and priorities faced by Egypt's early rulers.^[16]

• Khasekhemwy's tomb at Umm el-Qa'ab filled with sand
• Cartouche 14, Abydos King List. Temple of Seti I, Abydos, Egypt
• Fragment of a stele of dark greenish quartzite on which Khasekhem, last king of the 2nd dynasty, appears "smiting the foreign lands"
• Detail of granite door jamb bearing the Horus and Seth name of Khasekhemwy in Hierakonpolis
• Fragment of a granite door built in the temple of Horus of Hierakonpolis by pharaoh Khasekhemwy and now in the Egyptian Museum
• Stone vase bearing Khasekhemwy's titles, National Archaeological Museum, France
• Fragment of an alabaster vessel of Khasekhemwy, from the temple of Horus in Hierakonpolis and discovered by Quibell in 1898, now in the Ashmolean Museum.
• Limestone vessel with gold cover from Khasekhemwy's tomb
• Flint knife from the tomb of Khasekhemwy, Abydos. British Museum
• Statue of Khasekhemwy in the Ashmolean Museum
• Statue of Khasekhemwy, Egyptian Museum in Cairo
• Statue head of Khasekhemwy in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

• Toby Wilkinson, Royal Annals of Ancient Egypt: The Palermo Stone and Its Associated Fragments, (Kegan Paul International), 2000.
• Egypt: Khasekhem/Khasekhemwy of Egypt's 2nd dynasty