Norm-transgressive Behaviour of Deities in Ancient Egypt

Basic data for this project

Description

The social norms of Ancient Egypt are wellknown. They can be deducted both from (auto)biographical inscriptions (mostly in tombs) as well as from so-called wisdom teachings. In research, these principles are known as "Ma’at" (truth, correct world-order).However, within Egyptian mythology, there is quite a number of deities, who do not act according to these rules. Of course, in many mythologies all over the world, it is not unusual, that there are different behavioural rules for deities in comparison to human beings. At least in theory, that is not the case in Egypt. Often, the respective deeds are branded as morally wrong by the Egyptians themselves. Alternatively, in more narrative versions of myths, the reaction of the other deities does not leave much room for doubt about the valuation of a specific act.What is significant, though, is the fact, that the perpetrators are not just gods anyway known as "evil". To the contrary, also gods otherwise presented as utterly positive are among the culprits as well. Moreover, the same behaviour can be treated as an extremely despicable act in the case of one deity, while with another one, it can be judged very leniently. Only very few gods are explicitly demonised in actual religious practice.Obviously, it is necessary to ask for the reasons of this imbalance: what conclusions about Ancient Egyptian society and its mentality, as well as about the functions of myth in such a complex culture can be drawn from this?To answer these questions, the proposed project draws up a catalogue of which deities are transgressing norms at all. In a second step it investigates which types of transgressions are attested for deities. How myths deal with these acts is then compared to the way real-life documents (especially legal texts) deal with similar acts among humans. Any discrepancies between those two poles have then to be explained.In drawing conclusions, facts internal to myth as well as external have to be considered. Among the former, questions concerning status, age, gender or other hierarchies could be named, but facts like whether certain relatives of the respective deity are thought of as still alive or as dead at the time are also relevant. Among the external aspects, the time a source was composed or how it was used is crucial, but so are questions of textual transmission and ultimate placement or deposition.Ultimately, the myth will be taken serious as a source (even a filtered one) on the social ideas of its culture of origin, in this case Ancient Egypt.