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AboutThe Prophecy of Neferty is a prophecy from ancient Egypt. Set in the Old Kingdom, it tells the story of the pharaoh Snofru, who one day decides he wants other people to entertain him for a change (as if his harem weren't enough). His advisors, having gone all the way to the palace and then left, are suddenly called back again by his nibbs. Probably more out of spite than honesty, they decide to bring in reinforcements in the form of a man called Neferty. Snofru asks Neferty to tell him a campfire story, and Neferty decides to really put the fear of Ra into Snofru. Neferty proceeds to predict the First Intermediate Period, a time of disunity and lawlessness when those Damn Meddling Asiatics come and annoy honest hard-working Egyptians. At the end, however, Neferty gets all messianic and predicts the coming of a king named Ameny, who will revitalise Egypt's mojo and restore order.The Prophecy is ostensibly written down by Snofru himself, although it is a clear piece of propaganda for the Middle Kingdom 12th Dynasty pharaoh Amenemhet (i.e., Ameny). Unless you're of the spiritual persuasion, you will probably take the text to have been written in Amenemhet's time. I found this text after studying for my Egyptian exam on the Story of Sinuhe. When I read a translation of The Prophecy, I was really grabbed by the description of chaos and the world turned topsy-turvy. It's not that long a text, so I shanghaied the copy in the library and proceeded to translate. It's quite an easy read after Sinuhe, although there are a number of troublesome passages. I've put in footnotes on the difficult bits and referred to published commentaries where relevant. The text is completely and excellently preserved in Papyrus Petersberg, with the exceptions of just a few lacunae. Thankfully, most of these were very easy to fill with just a glance at the other copies of the text. One or two, however, were more troublesome and one was almost impossible to fill. As you may or may not have gathered, I'm a lowly student and I'm hardly a fluent Egyptian scribe spouting Hieroglyphs at strangers on the street (ah, maybe for my retirement...). I read The Prophecy to improve my own Egyptian by practice, and I think it's done wonders. But there are likely some grammar mistakes and mistranslations I have made. If you find any, please drop me a line (simian@saintsimian.com). I'm always up for a little discussion and any errors you find will only improve my Egyptian further. |