The Naos of Herakleion by Jean Yoyotte, Prof.

at the Collge de France Paris, June 7, 2001 The two vertical panels surrounding the door in the recess carried vertical hieroglyphic inscriptions, normally oriented (hieroglyphs converge toward the aperture inside where the divine image is situated). The upper part of the two texts is so highly corroded that nothing can be read (at least on the currently available imprints). What remains further down contains on both sides the titles of a divinity. As the last sign on both sides shows the word mry, "beloved of ", we may deduct that at the top of each column figured the name of the dedicating pharaoh, in the usual manner: "King X, beloved by the divinity Y". The signs are often too damaged to allow a definition of the texts without in-deep examination, but the graphics and the sign modules point in any case at the Ptolemaic period. On the lower part of the right-hand panel are clearly readable the two last titles of the divinity for which this great monolithic chapel had been made: "[...], who presides the mekes case, the noble god of the House-of-Rejoicing (Prhy)". On the left side we can read: "[] god of Lower Egypt (?), who has elevated (sh) him king, by (?) designating (dhn) him.? of the land (t3) ", where the pronoun 'him refers of course to the ruler indicated higher up in the deteriorated part. These few well-secured words allow for a resolution the problem presented by the indigenous name of the main temple of Heracleion. 1. The Egyptian version of the honorary decree taken by the Egyptian priests assembled in Canopus in honour of Ptolemy III, indicates the expression "the House of Amun-Gereb at the mouth of the Hon." 2. Further, an Egyptian diocete stationed in ptolemaic Alexandria in the course of the 2nd or 1st century, enumerates among his priestly benefits those of "prophet of Khonsu-Child and Amun-Gereb, hierogrammate of the temple of AmunGereb, scribe of Osiris in the temple of Pe-Gouti (= Canopus)" 3. A demotic papyrus dated around the 2nd century, found at Saqqara, and containing an index of Egyptian divinities enumerates among some 30 versions of Amun the name of "Amun-Gereb". It is well known that the first Greeks settling in Egypt had assimilated Amun-R, king of the Egyptian gods and patron of famous Thebes, with their own Zeus, king of the Olympian gods. Also, and more curiously, the young lunar god Khonsou, son of Amun of Thebes, had been assimilated with Herakles, son of Zeus, and had even sited several stages and minor exploits of the famous hero traveller on the coast of the Delta. We know that from the 10th century onward, Khonsu had acquired great popularity as a saviour, healer and soothsayer. This would no doubt go a long way towards explaining that in the town of Canopus his cult had exceeded that of Amun to the extent that the foreigners there considered his temple as a sanctuary of Herakles. In the three texts mentioning the specific Amun of Heracleion, the word which defines this local form of the king of gods, gereb, is alphabetically written, without a determining addition to suggest its meaning. However, there is in the texts of the ritual scenes of Ptolemaic temples a word gereb, which also recurs in demotic legal documents and which indicates a particular category of written document. The contexts of the ritual scenes connect these written gereb documents with the gods remittance to the king of the object called mekes, which is a case supposed to contain the inventory (imyt-per) of the royal domain, an inventory whose transmission implies and sustains the devolution of power. In these conditions, the designation of the Amun of Heracleion should read Imn (n)Grb, "the Amun of gereb", and referred certainly to the supreme god, creator and master of the universe acting as the power who invests the new rulers by giving them the title of sovereignty over Egypt and the universe. The readable part of the titles of the divine occupant of the great naos found on the presumed site of Heracleion precisely confirms this supposition. The god, in fact 1. does possess the mastery of the mekes, 2. is supposed to have installed the king by designating him 3. is supposed to reside in the "House-of-Rejoicing", the locality thus nemed being a palace containing the pharaohs throne and his glorifying ceremonial appearances. Needless for now to speculate over the circumstances which brought the Egyptians before the period of the Ptolemies or their time ? to create this particular cult of Amun investing the king, a form manifestly tied to dynastic ideology Further exploration of the site will provide, inshAllah, more information about this deity and his son Khonsu-Herakles, as well as about the kings who embellished their temple(s). The two twin steles are both splendid examples of the art of engraving on hard stone in which the artists around the 4th century provide a rich collec-tion of information for historians. The way in which the Sais workshops managed to manually produce two practically identical monuments is truly surprising.