Ba, also known as Horus Ba, is the
serekh-name of an
early Egyptian or
ancient Egyptian
king
King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen regnant, queen, which title is also given to the queen consort, consort of a king.
*In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contempora ...
who may have ruled at the end of the
1st Dynasty, the latter part of
2nd Dynasty
The Second Dynasty of ancient Egypt (or Dynasty II, c. 2890 – c. 2686 BC) is the latter of the two dynasties of the Egyptian Archaic Period, when the seat of government was centred at Thinis. It is most known for its last ruler, K ...
or during the
3rd Dynasty
The Third Dynasty of ancient Egypt (Dynasty III) is the first dynasty of the Old Kingdom. Other dynasties of the Old Kingdom include the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth. The capital during the period of the Old Kingdom was at Memphis.
Overview
A ...
. Neither the exact length of his reign nor his chronological position is known.
Name sources
The only sure name sources for a king "Ba" are a fragment of green
schist
Schist ( ) is a medium-grained metamorphic rock showing pronounced schistosity. This means that the rock is composed of mineral grains easily seen with a low-power hand lens, oriented in such a way that the rock is easily split into thin flakes ...
, found in the underground galleries beneath the
Pyramid of Djoser
The pyramid of Djoser (or Djeser and Zoser), sometimes called the Step Pyramid of Djoser, is an archaeological site in the Saqqara necropolis, Egypt, northwest of the ruins of Memphis. The 6-tier, 4-sided structure is the earliest colossal stone ...
at
Sakkara
Saqqara ( ar, سقارة, ), also spelled Sakkara or Saccara in English , is an Egyptian village in Giza Governorate, that contains ancient burial grounds of Egyptian royalty, serving as the necropolis for the ancient Egyptian capital, Memphi ...
, and the (
6th Dynasty
The Sixth Dynasty of ancient Egypt (notated Dynasty VI), along with the Third, Fourth and Fifth Dynasty, constitutes the Old Kingdom of Dynastic Egypt.
Pharaohs
Known pharaohs of the Sixth Dynasty are listed in the table below. Manetho acc ...
)
mastaba
A mastaba (, or ), also mastabah, mastabat or pr- djt (meaning "house of stability", " house of eternity" or "eternal house" in Ancient Egyptian), is a type of ancient Egyptian tomb in the form of a flat-roofed, rectangular structure with inwar ...
tomb of the high official ''Ny-Ankh-Ba''.
Identity
Very little is known about king Ba. The few
archaeological
Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...
evidences only assure the existence of such a ruler, but they give no further information.
In 1899 the scientist Alessandro Ricci published a drawing of a ''
serekh
In Egyptian hieroglyphs, a serekh is a rectangular enclosure representing the niched or gated façade of a palace surmounted by (usually) the Horus falcon, indicating that the text enclosed is a royal name. The serekh was the earliest conven ...
'' with a single leg (Gardiner-sign ''D58'') as
hieroglyph
A hieroglyph ( Greek for "sacred carvings") was a character of the ancient Egyptian writing system. Logographic scripts that are pictographic in form in a way reminiscent of ancient Egyptian are also sometimes called "hieroglyphs". In Neoplatoni ...
inside. The picture was seen in Volume No. 35 of the ''Zeitschrift für Ägyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde'' series. According to Ricci the ''serekh'' was found in a rock inscription at
Wadi Maghareh
Wadi Maghareh (also spelled Maghara or Magharah, meaning "The Valley of Caves" in Egyptian Arabic), is an archaeological site located in the southwestern Sinai Peninsula, Egypt. It contains pharaonic monuments and turquoise mines dating from ...
,
Sinai. The Egyptologists
Jaroslav Černý and
Michel Baude found out, that Ricci was referring to the rock inscription of the 3rd Dynasty king
Sanakht
Sanakht (also read as Hor-Sanakht) is the Horus name of an ancient Egyptian king ( pharaoh) of the Third Dynasty during the Old Kingdom. His chronological position is highly uncertain (though he is more likely to have reigned towards the end of t ...
. Ricci simply had misinterpreted the signs used for Sanakht's name – an upright sign of a rope loop, the zig-zag shaped sign for water and a branch-sign below – as a single leg-symbol.
Egyptologists such as Černý and
Peter Kaplony
Peter Árpád Kaplony (June 15, 1933 in Budapest – February 11, 2011 in Zurich) was a Hungarian-born Swiss egyptologist.
Life
Kaplony, son of a Hungarian military officer, emigrated to Switzerland as a child in December 1944. He became a Sw ...
think that king Ba might be identical to the likewise sparsely attested king
Horus Bird. This ruler wrote his name with the sign of a goose-like bird, but since the depiction of the bird-sign in question lacks artistic details allowing any identification, Egyptologists are disputing the correct reading and meaning of Horus Bird's name. Černý and Kaplony think that both king's names have the same transcription: "Ba". In this case Horus Ba and Horus Bird would be the same historical figure. Černý and Kaplony's theory is not commonly accepted.
In contrast, Egyptologists such as
think that Horus Ba was an immediate successor of the 2nd Dynasty king
Nynetjer. He points to the name form of Nynetjer in the
Abydos kinglist, which begins with the same hieroglyphic sign (a
ram
Ram, ram, or RAM may refer to:
Animals
* A male sheep
* Ram cichlid, a freshwater tropical fish
People
* Ram (given name)
* Ram (surname)
* Ram (director) (Ramsubramaniam), an Indian Tamil film director
* RAM (musician) (born 1974), Dutch
* ...
; Gardiner-sign ''E11'') like the ''serekh'' name of Horus Ba. Swelim therefore believes that the Horus name of Ba was erroneously intermingled with the birth name of Nynetjer.
[Nabil Swelim: ''Some Problems on the History of the Third Dynasty - Archaeological and Historical Studies Band 7''. The Archaeological Society of Alexandria, Alexandria 1983, page 27–32, 180 & 219.]
Ba's burial site is unknown.
See also
*
List of pharaohs
The title "Pharaoh" is used for those rulers of Ancient Egypt who ruled after the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt by Narmer during the Early Dynastic Period, approximately 3100 BC. However, the specific title "Pharaoh" was not used to ad ...
References
External links
Francesco Raffaele: Horus SNEFERKA - Horus Bird - Horus SEKHET (?) - Horus BA
{{authority control
27th-century BC Pharaohs
Pharaohs of the First Dynasty of Egypt
Pharaohs of the Second Dynasty of Egypt
Pharaohs of the Third Dynasty of Egypt
3rd-millennium BC births
3rd-millennium BC deaths