Shoshenq (also commonly spelled Sheshonq, Sheshonk, Shoshenk, Shashank) was the name of many

Ancient Egypt Ancient Egypt () was a cradle of civilization concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in Northeast Africa. It emerged from prehistoric Egypt around 3150BC (according to conventional Egyptian chronology), when Upper and Lower E ...

ians with

Libu The Libu (; also transcribed Rebu, Libo, Lebu, Lbou, Libou) were an Ancient Libyan tribe of Berber origin, from which the name ''Libya'' derives. Early history Their tribal origin in Ancient Libya is first attested in Egyptian language texts ...

ancestry since the

Third Intermediate Period The Third Intermediate Period of ancient Egypt began with the death of Pharaoh Ramesses XI in 1077 BC, which ended the New Kingdom, and was eventually followed by the Late Period. Various points are offered as the beginning for the latt ...

People named Shoshenq

Several pharaohs with this name are known, as well as many important state officials:

Pharaohs

Shoshenq I Hedjkheperre Setepenre Shoshenq I (Egyptian ''ššnq''; reigned )—also known as Shashank or Sheshonk or Sheshonq Ifor discussion of the spelling, see Shoshenq—was a pharaoh of ancient Egypt and the founder of the Twenty-second Dynasty of Egy ...

, founder of the

22nd Dynasty The Twenty-second Dynasty was an Ancient Egyptian dynasty of ancient Libyan origin founded by Shoshenq I. It is also known as the Bubastite Dynasty, since the pharaohs originally ruled from the city of Bubastis. The Twenty-first, Twenty-se ...

, often identified as the ''

Shishaq Shishak, also spelled Shishaq or Susac (, Tiberian: , ), was, according to the Hebrew Bible, an Egyptian pharaoh who sacked Jerusalem in the 10th century BC. He is usually identified with the pharaoh Shoshenq I.Troy Leiland Sagrillo. 2015.Shoshen ...

'' of the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. '' Shoshenq II The designation Shoshenq II is variously associated by scholars with several different Egyptian royal names, most commonly Heqakheperre Shoshenq IIa, discussed below, but also Tutkheperre Shoshenq IIb and Maatkheperre Shoshenq IIc, and is someti ...

, of the 22nd Dynasty *Shoshenq IIb or

Tutkheperre Shoshenq Tutkheperre Shoshenq (Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''twt-ḫpr-rʿ stp/mr-n-rʿ/jmn/ptḥ ššnq mrj-jmn''), arbitrarily designated Shoshenq IIb, is an obscure Third Intermediate Period of Egypt, Third Intermediate Period ancient Egyptian pharaoh ...

, of the 22nd Dynasty *

Shoshenq III The modern designation Shoshenq III refers to King Usermaatre Setepnamun Shoshenq Sibaste Meryamun Netjerheqaon, who reigned for about four decades, c. 841–c. 803/799 BC or c. 831–c. 791/788 BC. His highest attested regnal year is Year 39. A ...

, of the 22nd Dynasty *

Shoshenq IV Hedjkheperre Setepenre Shoshenq IV was an ancient Egyptian ruler of the Twenty-second Dynasty of Egypt, 22nd Dynasty, between the reigns of Shoshenq III and Pami. In 1986, David Rohl proposed that there were two king Shoshenqs bearing the prenome ...

, of the 22nd Dynasty *

Shoshenq V Aakheperre Shoshenq V was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh of the late 22nd Dynasty. Despite having enjoyed one of the longest reigns of the entire dynasty – 38 years – and having left a fair amount of attestations, little is known about Shoshenq ...

, of the 22nd Dynasty *

Shoshenq VI Shoshenq VI is known to be Pedubast I's immediate successor at Thebes based upon the career of the ''Letter Writer to Pharaoh'' Hor IX, who served under Osorkon II and Pedubast I (see Hor IX's statue—CGC 42226—which is explicitly dated to P ...

, of the 23rd Dynasty *

Shoshenq VII Hedjkheperre Setepenre Shoshenq (VII/VIa) Si-Ese Meryamun may have been an Egyptian king of the 23rd Dynasty, ruling Thebes in the period between the death of Takelot III and the Egyptian campaign of the Nubian king Piye, c. 755–730 BCE. The ...

(existence doubtful)

Officials

Shoshenq A Shoshenq A, sometimes also called Shoshenq the Elder, was a ''Great Chief of the Ma'' during the 21st Dynasty of ancient Egypt. He is mainly known for being an ancestor of the 22nd Dynasty pharaohs. Biography His wife was the ''King's mother'' Me ...

, grandfather of Shoshenq I *

Shoshenq C Shoshenq or Shoshenq-meryamun (Egyptian ''ššnq mrj-jmn''), designated Shoshenq Q, was the son of the 22nd Dynasty pharaoh Sekhemkheperre Osorkon I and Maatkare B, and served as the High Priest of Amun at Thebes during his father's reign. He i ...

, a Theban High Priest of Amun, son of pharaoh

Osorkon I Sekhemkheperre Osorkon I was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh of the 22nd Dynasty. Osorkon's territory included much of the Levant. The Osorkon Bust found at Byblos is one of the five Byblian royal inscriptions. Biography According to the stela of P ...

Shoshenq D Shoshenq was a High Priest of Ptah during the 22nd Dynasty. Shoshenq was the eldest son of Osorkon II and Queen Karomama. He presided over the burial of the twenty-seventh Apis bull in Saqqara. For unknown reasons Shoshenq did not succeed to hi ...

, a

High Priest of Ptah The High Priest of Ptah was sometimes referred to as "the Greatest of the Directors of Craftsmanship" ('' wr-ḫrp-ḥmwt''). This title refers to Ptah as the patron god of the craftsmen.Dodson and Hilton, ''The Complete Royal Families of Anci ...

, son of pharaoh

Osorkon II Usermaatre Setepenamun Osorkon II was the fifth pharaoh, king of the Twenty-second dynasty of Egypt, Twenty-second Dynasty of Ancient Egypt and the son of King Takelot I and Queen Kapes. He ruled Egypt from approximately 872 BC to 837 BC from Ta ...

*Shoshenq,

Chief steward of the God's Wife The high steward (also called chief steward or great overseer of the house; Egyptian: ''imi-r pr wr'') was an important official at the royal court in Ancient Egypt in the Middle Kingdom and in the New Kingdom. He was the main person in charge of ...

of Amun

Ankhnesneferibre Ankhnesneferibre was an ancient Egyptian princess and priestess during the 26th Dynasty, daughter of pharaoh Psamtik II and his queen Takhuit. She held the positions of Divine Adoratrice of Amun and later God's Wife of Amun between 595 and 525 ...

, buried in

TT27 The Theban Tomb TT27 is located in El-Assasif. It forms part of the Theban Necropolis, situated on the west bank of the Nile opposite Luxor. The tomb is the burial place of the ancient Egyptian official, Sheshonk. Sheshonk was the chief steward ...

Renderings of ''Shoshenq'' in English

Because vowels are not generally written in the ancient

Egyptian language The Egyptian language, or Ancient Egyptian (; ), is an extinct branch of the Afro-Asiatic languages that was spoken in ancient Egypt. It is known today from a large corpus of surviving texts, which were made accessible to the modern world ...

, the exact pronunciation of this name has caused some amount of controversy, and it is common to see both ''Shoshenq'' and ''Sheshonq'' used in English-language publications. There is, however, some evidence indicating that ''Shoshenq'' is preferable. The name "Shoshenq" originates in an ancient

Libyco-Berber The Libyco-Berber alphabet is an abjad writing system that was used during the first millennium BC by various Berber peoples of North Africa and the Canary Islands, to write ancient varieties of the Berber language like the Numidian language. Th ...

language, perhaps related to the

Numidia Numidia was the ancient kingdom of the Numidians in northwest Africa, initially comprising the territory that now makes up Algeria, but later expanding across what is today known as Tunisia and Libya. The polity was originally divided between ...

n Berber language used during the time of the

Roman Empire The Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. The Roman people, Romans conquered most of this during the Roman Republic, Republic, and it was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of ...

. Unfortunately, unlike some other Libyan rulers of Ancient Egypt, there is no name in the corpus of Old Libyco-Berber text that might be an equivalent to the Egyptian rendering of the name.

Egyptologist Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Greek , ''-logia''; ) is the scientific study of ancient Egypt. The topics studied include ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, architecture and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end ...

s conventionally

transliterate Transliteration is a type of conversion of a text from one script to another that involves swapping letters (thus '' trans-'' + '' liter-'') in predictable ways, such as Greek → and → the digraph , Cyrillic → , Armenian → or L ...

the name in hieroglyphs as ''ššnq''. In ancient Egyptian texts, writings without the and/or (less commonly) the are not uncommon. For example, the name is recorded in the Neo-Assyrian dialect of Akkadian as ''šusanqu'' and ''susinqu'', indicating an initial rounded vowel. It is generally considered that the evidence suggests rendering it as "Sheshonq" should be avoided, in favour of "Shoshenq".

Kenneth Kitchen Kenneth Anderson Kitchen (1932 – 6 February 2025) was a British biblical scholar, Ancient Near Eastern historian, and Personal and Brunner Professor Emeritus of Egyptology and honorary research fellow at the School of Archaeology, Classics and ...

(1996). ''The Third Intermediate Period in Egypt (1100–650 BC).'' 3rd ed. Warminster: Aris & Phillips Limited. , § 58, note 356 The writings of

Manetho Manetho (; ''Manéthōn'', ''gen''.: Μανέθωνος, ''fl''. 290–260 BCE) was an Egyptian priest of the Ptolemaic Kingdom who lived in the early third century BCE, at the very beginning of the Hellenistic period. Little is certain about his ...

, as recorded by the

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

historians

Sextus Julius Africanus Sextus Julius Africanus ( 160 – c. 240; ) was a Christian traveler and historian of the late 2nd and early 3rd centuries. He influenced fellow historian Eusebius, later writers of Church history among the Church Fathers, and the Greek sch ...

Eusebius of Caesarea Eusebius of Caesarea (30 May AD 339), also known as Eusebius Pamphilius, was a historian of Christianity, exegete, and Christian polemicist from the Roman province of Syria Palaestina. In about AD 314 he became the bishop of Caesarea Maritima. ...

, and

George Syncellus George Syncellus (, ''Georgios Synkellos''; died after 810) was a Byzantine chronicler and ecclesiastical official. He lived many years in Palestine (probably in the Old Lavra of Saint Chariton or Souka, near Tekoa) as a monk, before coming to Cons ...

use two general forms (with variations depending on the manuscript). Africanus spells the name Σεσωγχις 'Sesōnkhis'' while Eusebius (as quoted by George Syncellus) uses Σεσογχωσις 'Sesonkhōsis'' The alteration in the vowels and is probably due to metathesis.

References

{{reflist

Sources

*Aidan Dodson (1995). “Rise & Fall of The House of Shoshenq: The Libyan Centuries of Egyptian History.” ''KMT: A Modern Journal of Ancient Egypt'' 6 (3):52–67. * Troy Leiland Sagrillo. 2015. "Shoshenq I and biblical Šîšaq: A philological defense of their traditional equation." In ''Solomon and Shishak: Current perspectives from archaeology, epigraphy, history and chronology; proceedings of the third BICANE colloquium held at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge 26–27 March 2011,'' edited by Peter J. James, Peter G. van der Veen, and Robert M. Porter. British Archaeological Reports (International Series) 2732. Oxford: Archaeopress. 61–81. *

Jürgen von Beckerath Jürgen von Beckerath (19 February 1920 – 26 June 2016) was a German Egyptology, Egyptologist. He was a prolific writer who published countless articles in journals such as '':fr:Orientalia, Orientalia'', ''Göttinger Miszellen'' (GM), ''Journa ...

(1997). ''Chronologie des Pharaonischen Ägypten'', Mainz: Philip Von Zabern. Ancient Egyptian given names Berber words and phrases