The High Priesthood of Memphis during the Old Kingdom and the First Intermediate Period: An Updated Study and Prosopography

Abstract

The inscriptions recovered from the looted necropolis of Kom el-Khamaseen, located in southwest Saqqara and dated between the end of the Old Kingdom and the beginning of the First Intermediate Period, document a hitherto unknown high priest of Memphis: Imephor Impy Nikauptah. This character must be incorporated into our prosopographical repertoires and placed in his historical and cultural context. This provides a good opportunity to return to the issue of the Memphite pontificate during the third millennium B.C. as a whole. The aim of this article is therefore to offer, on the one hand, a systematic and updated overview of the subject by integrating the new data from Kom el-Khamaseen, drawing upon the complete sources, and critically reviewing the literature on the matter. On the other hand, it is also about providing a new reasoned chronological list and a prosopography of the Memphite high priests of the Old Kingdom and the First Intermediate Period.