Teti (Part II): The Murder of a King?
All is not well within the court. Although Teti has ensconced himself on the throne, conspiracies may have formed against him. The Greek Manetho (c.280 BCE) writes that Teti was murdered, the first king of whom such an account exists.
Was Teti really assassinated? Some Egyptologists think so. We go in search of an answer.
Bibliography
- Nicolas Grimal, A History of Egypt, 1994.
- Naguib Kanawati, Conspiracies in the Egyptian Palace, 2011.
Great episode, brings up my enquiry, I’m curious about the spelling of What could be written as Kenti shé, who are mentioned in this episode and if there’s much other literature on them not behind a paywall, maybe a later episode I haven’t gotten to yet, or are they limited to the old kingdom?
Hi Zephaniah, the khenty-she are a Fifth Dynasty phenomenon. You will find them discussed in M. Verner’s book “Suns of the Sun”
Hello,
I had a thought about this episode also… Is it possible that his guards didn’t consider him to have the right of kingship, not being a member of the royal family? If you believed the king was a god, it seems like it would be foolish to murder him, since angering a god is usually considered pretty stupid form… so maybe they didn’t think he really was a king/god?
Dear Dominic,
thanks again and again for this incredible project of your podcast. As if you recreate the Ancient universe. I am going no again through all episodes, making notes on issues I privately research.
At the episode, I just wanted to offer another speculation based on the evidence you listed.
Why not reading the same erased tombs and promotions and enlarged body guards the following:
Maybe Teti was an insecure King with some (self)doubts to his legitimacy.
The enlargements of bodyguards of fearful despots is known widely in history (just think of Hitler’s ‘bodyguards’ Schutzstaffel (SS) etc.. And maybe these guys were not so nice and he really had some suppression going on. Also the fact that he seemingly promotes willingly and gifted people to elite ranks, and thus maybe showing distrust in the existing elites and nobility, in my view could support such a more rude and ‘unorthodox’ style of rule. I would even see here some parallels to the later Akhenaton and his regime and supporters and opponents.
So, if we take this hypothesis and we also suggest, that Teti was indeed successfully murdered, as claimed by Manetho, than I would read it quite the other way around: The systematically ‘punished’ graves of Teti’s (maybe hated and hardline) bodyguards, as well as one of the military leader, and two other close aides of Teti that might have been promoted for extreme loyalty against other Elite’s or groups, were not motivated by people loyal and friendly to Teti, since they conspired in his murder, but – as should be more expected when following a successful murder – are the repercussions and cleansing of the group that succeeded in taking out Teti and his ‘evil’ regime against his most hated representatives. Otherwise, why a successful conspiracy against a king (and regime) should lead to punishment of the perpetrators?
Also this moves could foreshadow post Akhenaton backlash and cleansing, even in regard of his heir: Pepi might be first put aside, so a king of the cleansing faction could put things back ‘in order’ and then ‘educate’ Pepi not to follow the evil path as Teti, while at the same time, preserving (and not killing) Pepi, since he had legitimate claims on the Throne, just bring him back to the line of ‘maat’ (as with later Tut).
And this hypothesis would also, in my view, give a better explanations, how Egyptians at all could ‘allow themselves’ to murder a king of Egypt: I think, not private gain, but also deep conviction that you serve ‘maat’ and bring back the real and holy ways of Egypt against a transgressor, could justify such deed much more easily.
What do you think?