Egypt - Dynasty II

  General Description   The Second Dynasty of Egypt (c. 2900‒2687 BCE) was a relatively geographically constricted state, centred near the Nile delta of Egypt and extending as far south as Aswan and the First Cataract of the Nile. Founded by Hotepsekhemwy, the kings of the Second Dynasty initially ruled over a centralized state, but as the period progressed they had to contend with disorder and civil war that lasted until the last ruler, Khasekhemwy (c. 2714‒2687 BCE). ^{[1] [2]} The restoration of central authority after this period ushered in the classic Old Kingdom period, widely considered a high point of ancient civilization.
Population and political organization
Controlled by a god-king who presided over an administration with specialized overseers, ^[3] Memphis is considered the main administrative centre of the Early Dynastic period because tombs of administrative officials are located nearby. ^[4] Also known as the White Walls, ^[5] apparently after the colour of the palace enclosure walls, ^[6] Memphis probably had at least 6,000 residents at a population density of 193 per hectare. ^[7] The government of the Early Dynasties is thought to have developed significant divisions of labour and a more hierarchical structure under King Djer, who introduced permanent institutions, ^[8] although Egyptologist Hratch Papazian stresses that a true hierarchical bureaucracy emerged ’only during the latter parts of the Old Kingdom’. ^[9] Writing in this period was now well established; it had been present since the late Predynastic period (’Dynasty 0’), ^[10] when hieroglyphs were used for labels such as those found in the tomb of U-j at Abydos, dating to around 3150 BCE. ^[11]
Regional centres of the Second Dynasty included Hierakonpolis, Abydos, and minor centres further south at Naga-el-Deir and Aswan. Evidence for a system of territorial organization comes from thousands of seal stamps discovered in the tomb of Khasekhemwy, the last king of the dynasty; they mention some historical provinces along with ’administrative titles and the names of the king’. ^[12] However, Second-Dynasty Egypt was likely not yet divided into the clearly demarcated provinces, controlled by local governors, that we find in later periods. ^[13] Abydos appears to have been the most significant cult centre. Its royal cemetery reveals the increasing elaboration of the ideology of kingship through the mortuary cult, and its monumental architecture has been interpreted as the expression of a ’state religion’ on a grander scale than in previous periods. ^[14]
The Egyptian population during the Early Dynastic period is difficult to determine, but the archaeologist Bruce Trigger estimated that there could have been over 2 million people living in the Nile Valley at this time. ^[15]

[1]: (El-Shahawy 2005, 31) A El-Shahawy. 2005. The Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press.

[2]: (Dodson 2016, 9) Aidan Dodson. 2016. ’Go West: On the Ancient Means of Approach to the Saqqara Necropolis’, in Mummies, Magic and Medicine in Ancient Egypt: Multidisciplinary Essays for Rosalie David, edited by Campbell Price, Roger Forshaw, Andrew Chamberlain and Paul Nicholson, 3-18. Manchester: Manchester University Press.

[3]: (Moreno García 2014) Juan Carlos Moreno García. 2014. ’Invaders or Just Herders? Libyans in Egypt in the Third and Second Millennia BCE’. World Archaeology 46: 610-23.

[4]: (Bard 2000, 64-65) Kathryn A. Bard. 2000. ’The Emergence of the Egyptian State (c. 3200-2686 BC)’, in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw, 57-82. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[5]: (Malek 2000, 104) Jaromir Malek. 2000. ’The Old Kingdom (c. 2686-2160 BC)’, in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw, 83-107. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[6]: (Thompson 2012, 1) Dorothy J. Thompson. 2012. Memphis under the Ptolemies. 2nd ed. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

[7]: (Mumford 2010, 331) Gregory D. Mumford. 2010. ’Settlements - Distribution, Structure, Architecture: Pharaonic’, in A Companion to Ancient Egypt, Volume 1, edited by Alan B Lloyd, 326-49. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.

[8]: (Engel 2013, 20-38) Eva-Maria Engel. 2013. ’The Organisation of a Nascent State: Egypt until the Beginning of the 4th Dynasty’, in Ancient Egyptian Administration, edited by Juan Carlos Moreno García, 19-40. Leiden: Brill.

[9]: (Papazian 2013, 67-68) Hratch Papazian. 2013. ’Departments, Treasuries, Granaries and Work Centers’, in Ancient Egyptian Administration, edited by Juan Carlos Moreno García, 41-83. Leiden: Brill.

[10]: (Bard 2000, 75) Kathryn A. Bard. 2000. ’The Emergence of the Egyptian State (c. 3200-2686 BC)’, in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw, 57-82. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[11]: (Bard 2000, 60) Kathryn A. Bard. 2000. ’The Emergence of the Egyptian State (c. 3200-2686 BC)’, in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw, 57-82. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[12]: (Moreno García 2013, 190) Juan Carlos Moreno García. 2013. ’Building the Pharaonic State: Territory, Elite, and Power in Ancient Egypt during the 3rd Millennium BCE’, in Experiencing Power - Generating Authority: Cosmos and Politics in Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, edited by J. A. Hill, Ph. H. Jones, A. J. Morales, 185-217. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.

[13]: (Moreno Garcia 2013, 190-192) Juan Carlos Moreno Garcia. ’Building the Pharaonic state: Territory, elite, and power in ancient Egypt in the 3rd millennium BCE’ in Ancient Egyptian Administration edited by Juan Carlos Moreno Garcia. Leiden: Brill.

[14]: (Bard 2000, 66-67) Kathryn A. Bard. 2000. ’The Emergence of the Egyptian State (c. 3200-2686 BC)’, in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw, 57-82. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[15]: (Trigger 1983, 51) Bruce G. Trigger. 1983. ’The Rise of Egyptian Civilization’, in Ancient Egypt: A Social History edited by Bruce G. Trigger, Barry J. Kemp, David O’Connor and Alan B Lloyd, 1-70. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.