Seankhenre Mentuhotepi was an ancient Egyptian

pharaoh Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian: ''pr ꜥꜣ''; cop, , Pǝrro; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') is the vernacular term often used by modern authors for the kings of ancient Egypt who ruled as monarchs from the First Dynasty (c. 3150 BC) until the an ...

during the fragmented Second Intermediate Period. According to egyptologists

Kim Ryholt Kim Steven Bardrum Ryholt (born 19 June 1970) is a professor of Egyptology at the University of Copenhagen and a specialist on Egyptian history and literature. He is director of the research centeCanon and Identity Formation in the Earliest Litera ...

and Darrell Baker, he was the fifth king of the 16th Dynasty reigning over the Theban region in

Upper Egypt Upper Egypt ( ar, صعيد مصر ', shortened to , , locally: ; ) is the southern portion of Egypt and is composed of the lands on both sides of the Nile that extend upriver from Lower Egypt in the north to Nubia in the south. In ancient ...

.Kim Ryholt, The Political Situation in Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period c.1800-1550 B.C, Museum Tusculanum Press, (1997), pp. 154, 160, 202 Alternatively,

Jürgen von Beckerath Jürgen von Beckerath (19 February 1920, Hanover – 26 June 2016, Schlehdorf) was a German Egyptologist. He was a prolific writer who published countless articles in journals such as '' Orientalia'', ''Göttinger Miszellen'' (GM), ''Journal of t ...

sees him as the fifth king of the

17th Dynasty The Seventeenth Dynasty of Egypt (notated Dynasty XVII, alternatively 17th Dynasty or Dynasty 17) was a dynasty of pharaohs that ruled in Upper Egypt during the late Second Intermediate Period, approximately from 1580 to 1550 BC. Its mainly Theba ...

.Jürgen von Beckerath: ''Chronologie des pharaonischen Ägyptens'', Münchner Ägyptologische Studien 46, Mainz am Rhein, 1997

Attestations

Mentuhotepi is attested by a stela from

Karnak The Karnak Temple Complex, commonly known as Karnak (, which was originally derived from ar, خورنق ''Khurnaq'' "fortified village"), comprises a vast mix of decayed temples, pylons, chapels, and other buildings near Luxor, Egypt. Construct ...

and a

scarab seal Scarabs were popular amulets and impression seals in ancient Egypt. They survive in large numbers and, through their inscriptions and typology, are an important source of information for archaeologists and historians of the ancient world. They ...

of unknown provenance bearing a prenomen variously read Sewahenre, Sewadjenre and Seankhenre. Furthermore, two limestone sphinxes of Mentuhotepi were discovered in 1924 in the ruins of the Temple of Horus in

Edfu Edfu ( egy, bḥdt, ar, إدفو , ; also spelt Idfu, or in modern French as Edfou) is an Egyptian city, located on the west bank of the Nile River between Esna and Aswan, with a population of approximately sixty thousand people. Edfu is the site ...

, one bearing the prenomen Seankhenre and the other the nomen Mentuhotepi. Finally, Mentuhotepi is attested in the

Turin canon The Turin King List, also known as the Turin Royal Canon, is an ancient Egyptian hieratic papyrus thought to date from the reign of Pharaoh Ramesses II, now in the Museo Egizio (Egyptian Museum) in Turin. The papyrus is the most extensive list av ...

under the prenomen Seankhenre.

Name

The identification of Mentuhotepi has evolved over the years:

lists Mentuhotepi as a king of the

under the name Mentuhotep VII and

Wolfgang Helck Hans Wolfgang Helck (16 September 1914 – 27 August 1993) was a German Egyptologist, considered one of the most important Egyptologists of the 20th century. From 1956 until his retirement in 1979 he was a professor at the University of Hamburg. H ...

as Mentuhotep VI. The recent reconstruction of the Turin canon by Ryholt established this king as Seankhenre Mentuhotepi.

Reign

If Ryholt's identification of Mentuhotepi in the Turin canon is correct, then he took the throne following Sekhemre Sankhtawy

Neferhotep III Sekhemre Sankhtawy Neferhotep III Iykhernofret was the third or fourth ruler of the Theban 16th Dynasty, reigning after Sobekhotep VIII according to Egyptologists Kim Ryholt and Darrell Baker.Darrell D. Baker: The Encyclopedia of the Pharaohs: Vo ...

and reigned for only 1 year. Mentuhotepi's short reign was probably marked by the constant conflict with the

Hyksos Hyksos (; Egyptian '' ḥqꜣ(w)- ḫꜣswt'', Egyptological pronunciation: ''hekau khasut'', "ruler(s) of foreign lands") is a term which, in modern Egyptology, designates the kings of the Fifteenth Dynasty of Egypt (fl. c. 1650–1550 BC). T ...

kingdom of the

15th Dynasty The Fifteenth Dynasty was a foreign dynasty of ancient Egypt. It was founded by Salitis, a Hyksos from West Asia whose people had invaded the country and conquered Lower Egypt. The 15th, 16th, and 17th Dynasties of ancient Egypt are often combin ...

. At the time, the 16th Dynasty was already in a weakened position and reigned over little more than Thebes itself. In his stela from

, Mentuhotepi emphatically states: "I am the king within Thebes, this is my city" and calls Thebes the "mistress of the entire land, city of triumph". He reports driving back the "foreign lands", probably a euphemism for the Hyksos or possibly for the

Nubia Nubia () (Nobiin: Nobīn, ) is a region along the Nile river encompassing the area between the first cataract of the Nile (just south of Aswan in southern Egypt) and the confluence of the Blue and White Niles (in Khartoum in central Sudan), or ...

ns. Mentuhotepi's military might is emphasized, the king being likened to Sekhmet who kills his enemies with his "flaming breath". Mentuhotepi was succeeded by

Nebiryraw I Sewadjenre Nebiryraw (also Nebiriau I, Nebiryerawet I) was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh of the Theban-based 16th Dynasty, during the Second Intermediate Period. Reign On the Turin Canon he is credited with a 26-year-long reign and was succeeded ...

, who ruled Upper Egypt for over 25 years.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mentuhotepi 17th-century BC Pharaohs Pharaohs of the Sixteenth Dynasty of Egypt