Abstract
To date, no unequivocal textual reference to the Great Sphinx has been identified prior to Egypt’s New Kingdom. Here, we present evidence that the monument we now know as the Great Sphinx was called Mehit and that this name was part of an exclusive title held only by the highest officials of the royal Egyptian court going back to at least early dynastic times, i.e. prior to the time of the Great Sphinx’s generally presumed construction during the 4th Dynasty. Furthermore, the symbolic origins of this title precede the 4th Dynasty by at least five centuries, going back to the very cradle of writing during the earliest dynastic era of the early Nile civilization. Based on this philological evidence corroborating geological and archeo-astronomical evidence previously published, we conclude that a lion-like stone monument existed on the Giza Plateau long before the Great Sphinx is generally believed to have been made and that early dynastic Egyptians referred to it in writing.
Highlights
Controversy lingers as to when the Great Sphinx was made
We have presented written, hieroglyphically recorded evidence that: a) two, heretofore incompletely translated, tandem titles conferred to Hemiunu, Wepemnefret, and Hesy-Re are semantically interwoven within the context of overseeing the creation and secure storage of scribal documents; b) secure storage was concretely symbolized by a key-like device metaphorically “locking” the Upper Egyptian goddess Mehit; c) this mythical metaphor of Mehit’s aspect as a recumbent lioness guardian so symbolized was based on her physical, Figure 12
We have presented early dynastic and predynastic textual and physical evidence that a lion-like monument stood where the Great Sphinx still rests today and that this monument had a name: Mehit
Summary
How to cite this paper: Seyfzadeh, M., Schoch, R. A New Interpretation of a Rare Old Kingdom Dual Title: The King’s Chief Librarian and Guardian of the Royal Archives of Mehit.
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