The Famine Stele: hieroglyphs on pyramids construction

Yet, generally, the element RWD refers to Egyptian sandstone (INR RWDT not listed here), more precisely the stone material found in the quarries of Southern Egypt, and used to built the temples of the New Kingdom and Late Periods at Karnak, Luxor, Edfu, Esne, Denderah, Abu-Simbel. This material, Egyptian sandstone is a soft material, which, in some cases can be easily scratched by the fingernail (Rozière, 1801). It is the contrary of a hard stone. It is two times softer than Giza limestone, four times softer than Carrara Marmor or eight times softer than Aswan granite. It becomes obvious that the element RWD does not mean hard stone.

On the other hand, the ideograph RWD also means: germinate, grow, and the causative verb, S-RWD, to make solid or to tie strongly. Gravel and pebble contain also the ideograph RWD. Finally, sandstone, quartzite, in some cases granite, and other stones qualified with RWD, are the natural solid stones resulting from the geological solidification of aggregates, such as sand or quartz particles.

Key-word AAT: Col. 16 gives the different names of AAT. According to Harris (p.21) AAT is to be regarded as a word for minerals, and refers to ores. In col. 19, these ores are processed for the first time, yielding the invention of building with stone materials.

Key-word TESH: The composite word AAT NEB RWD UTESHAU, at the end of col. 11 is of particular interest. Barguet translates: ‘matières precieuses et pierres dures des carrières’, but states in a note that his reading may be doubtful due to the strange writing of this word, in hieroglyph. Instead of TESHAU, Barguet reads SHETI.

The root TESH has the general meaning of: crush, separate, split, and the verb BETESH indicates the action of dissolving, disaggregation. A stone which is crusched, or disaggregated, or split, is called an aggregate.

This leads us to conclude that the word RWD UTESHAU indicates any natural aggregate, or naturally split material, such as weathered and naturally disaggregated material. RWD could be extrapolated as being the ideograph describing agglomeration, here at the beginning of the word, or of agglomerated stone (geologically or man-made) when put at the end.

If our assumption is right, the stony materials listed in col.15 should be in a loose form, or easy to disaggregate. Two names contain the root TESH, four names do not.

The BEKHEN stone has been found in inscriptions located in the Wadi-el Hammamat, in the desert South-East of Aswan, and is referred to as being either black basalt, or diorite, or sandy skist, or porphyry, or greywacke, or psammite gneiss (Lucas and Rowe, 1938; Morgan, 1894). Yet, according to the Hammamat Inscriptions (Couyat-Montet), quarrying of BEKHEN at the Wadi-Hammamat was carried out in a very primitive way. The chosen blocks were generally thrown down to the bottom of the mountain where they arrived split into numerous lumps.

The MTHAY stone is more interesting to discuss. This name seems to contain the root of the word MAT which means granite. Harris (p.72) agrees with Barguet when he notes that it is strange that granite is not otherwise mentioned in the text. Since it was the most typical stone of this region, it is therefore the more likely that this remarkable form of writing conceals MAT, i.e. granite. However, except for the peculiar hieroglyphic orthography which occurs in the Famine Stele, the referenced writings for granite always contain the same hieroglyph, the sickle MA, with different adjectives. In col. 15, the letter ME is not the sickle, but a denuded bird, without wings and feathers. This way of writing the letter ME is to be found in the word MUT, to kill himself. The word METH also means to die. On the other hand, the granite MAT is often written with the ideogram heart, life, suggesting the idea of living granite. Assuming that the writer of the Famine Stele wanted to stress, in a condense form, that the granite is a weathered, loose, disaggregated material found in some geological outcrops, he could have tried to emphasize the idea of dead granite.

Key-word AIN: Col. 15 begins with: Learn the names of AIN (stone). The hieroglyphic word for solid stone, constructional stone and block, is AINR. The majority of solid rocks is called AINR, with an adjective. Harris makes no distinction between AIN and AINR, the coptic word for stone, ONE, being very similar to AIN. However AINR is essentially applied to stone used in building. AIN should be recognized as a generic word for stone, as a substance, i.e. a stony material, in opposition to other materials like wood or metal.

Key-word ideograpgh: The phonetic value of this ideograph is not known; from the dictionary, it is a determinative for smell and odor, but is not associated with perfumes. It essentially relates to substances which give out smells, effluxes or emanations. Yet, these odors are not necessarily bad, and it does not mean to stink. Sometimes this ideograph has been associated with the notion of pleasure.

Found in Col. 12, it is for Brugsch a word for unguent (in German “salbe”). Barguet and Lichtheim do not translate it using the general term “products” in connection with those cited in col. 11, ‘aat nb rwd uts3u’ the minerals and stones.

The ideograph could represent a bladder or a vase containing a liquid, which gives out an odor, but is not a perfume. In other words it could be the determinative for chemical product. The majority of chemicals have a characteristic smell, and chemists have learned how to detect, recognize and associate any peculiar odor. According to col. 11 and 12, those products which smell are the ores and stone materials which are essential for the building of temples and pyramids.

Lexicographs studying ancient minerals make the assumption that their names should derive from their color. They rely on the fact that, in ancient Greek, various gem names are closely associated with a color, for example the semi-precious stones containing the root chryso, yellow. The minerals, ores and stone materials, featured in Barguet’s, Harris’ and Lichtheim’s translations of the Famine Stele, demonstrate that this type of lexicographical research is not successful. The majority of hieroglyphic names has not found any contemporary equivalence. We think that, by introducing the concept of odor, and perhaps later that of taste, we are simply following the ancient and classical methods of characterization of chemicals, namely the determination of their color, odor and taste.