Cattle count

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In Ancient Egypt, the cattle count was one of the two main means of evaluating the amount of taxes to be levied, the other one being the height of the annual inundation. A very important economic event, the cattle count was controlled by high officials, and was connected to several cultic feasts. In addition it served as a means of dating other events, with the entire year when it occurred being called "year of the Xth cattle count under the person of the king Y". The frequency of cattle counts varied through the history of Ancient Egypt; in the Old Kingdom it was most likely biennial, i.e. occurring every two years, and became more frequent subsequently.

Ancient Egypt ancient civilization of Northeastern Africa

Ancient Egypt was a civilization of ancient North Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in the place that is now the country Egypt. Ancient Egyptian civilization followed prehistoric Egypt and coalesced around 3100 BC with the political unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under Menes. The history of ancient Egypt occurred as a series of stable kingdoms, separated by periods of relative instability known as Intermediate Periods: the Old Kingdom of the Early Bronze Age, the Middle Kingdom of the Middle Bronze Age and the New Kingdom of the Late Bronze Age.

A tax is a mandatory financial charge or some other type of levy imposed upon a taxpayer by a governmental organization in order to fund various public expenditures. A failure to pay, along with evasion of or resistance to taxation, is punishable by law. Taxes consist of direct or indirect taxes and may be paid in money or as its labour equivalent.

Flooding of the Nile

The flooding of the Nile has been an important natural cycle in Egypt since ancient times. It is celebrated by Egyptians as an annual holiday for two weeks starting August 15, known as Wafaa El-Nil. It is also celebrated in the Coptic Church by ceremonially throwing a martyr's relic into the river, hence the name, The Martyr's Finger. Ancient Egyptians believed that the Nile flooded every year because of Isis's tears of sorrow for her dead husband, Osiris.

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Process and purpose

Cattle count after a relief in Mastaba tomb G75 at Giza. Counts tomb 75 gizeh-lepsius.png
Cattle count after a relief in Mastaba tomb G75 at Giza.

To perform the cattle count, all cattles (including productive livestock such as cows and oxen, sheep, pigs, goats and donkeys) were rounded up and counted. Following the count, the percentage of cattles to be taxed by the state would be calculated. The cattle count was performed in every nomes of Egypt. Frauds were harshly punished. From the 2nd dynasty onwards, the cattle count was connected with the "Following of Horus" (Egypt. Shemsu Hor) which occurred every two years. [1] [2] The Shemsu Hor consisted of a journey by the king and his court throughout Egypt which facilitated the assessment and levying of taxes by the central administration. [3]

Ox common bovine draft and riding animal

An ox, also known as a bullock in Australia and India, is a bovine trained as a draft animal or riding animal. Oxen are commonly castrated adult male cattle; castration makes the animals more docile. Cows or bulls may also be used in some areas.

Sheep Domesticated ruminant bred for meat, wool and milk

Domestic sheep are quadrupedal, ruminant mammals typically kept as livestock. Like most ruminants, sheep are members of the order Artiodactyla, the even-toed ungulates. Although the name sheep applies to many species in the genus Ovis, in everyday usage it almost always refers to Ovis aries. Numbering a little over one billion, domestic sheep are also the most numerous species of sheep. An adult female sheep is referred to as a ewe, an intact male as a ram or occasionally a tup, a castrated male as a wether, and a younger sheep as a lamb.

Pig genus of even-toed ungulates

A pig is any of the animals in the genus Sus, within the even-toed ungulate family Suidae. Pigs include the domestic pig and its ancestor, the common Eurasian wild boar, along with other species. Related creatures outside the genus include the peccary, the babirusa, and the warthog. Pigs, like all suids, are native to the Eurasian and African continents. Juvenile pigs are known as piglets. Pigs are highly social and intelligent animals.

Importance

The cattle count is of great importance to Egyptologists and historians, because many inscriptions report the year of the x-th occasion of the cattle count followed by the name of a pharaoh. Thus these inscriptions are used to assess the minimum duration of the reign of the pharaoh, for example assuming that the cattle count was held every two years. This last point being of paramount importance for correct datation of reign lengths, it is highly disputed up to this day. According to the Palermo stone, a black basalt stone slab recording the yearly events of cultic and religious nature from king Narmer (1st dynasty) down to king Neferirkare Kakai (3rd pharaoh of the 5th dynasty), the cattle count was performed every second year until the late Old Kingdom. After this period, however, it was performed more frequently and finally yearly. The first pharaoh during whose reign yearly cattles counts are known to have taken place with certainty is king Pepi I of the 6th dynasty. [1] [4] [5] This does not exclude that the cattle count necessarily took place every second year before Pepi I.

A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past, and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned ele gostava de comer colherzinha with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is concerned with events preceding written history, the individual is a historian of prehistory. Some historians are recognized by publications or training and experience. "Historian" became a professional occupation in the late nineteenth century as research universities were emerging in Germany and elsewhere.

Basalt A magnesium- and iron-rich extrusive igneous rock

Basalt is a mafic extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of magnesium-rich and iron-rich lava exposed at or very near the surface of a terrestrial planet or a moon. More than 90% of all volcanic rock on Earth is basalt. Basalt lava has a low viscosity, due to its low silica content, resulting in rapid lava flows that can spread over great areas before cooling and solidification. Flood basalt describes the formation in a series of lava basalt flows.

Religion is a cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that relates humanity to supernatural, transcendental, or spiritual elements. However, there is no scholarly consensus over what precisely constitutes a religion.

An example of conflicting evaluations for a reign duration via cattle count is the case of king Khufu (4th dynasty). The highest known numbers of cattle counts under Khufu are found in workmen's graffiti inside the relieving chambers of the Khufu pyramid. The ink inscription reports the "17th occasion of the cattle count". Since the Palermo stone inscriptions hold that the cattle count was performed every second year during the 4th dynasty, it would prove that Khufu ruled at least 34 years. This calculation is rejected by several Egyptologists, because another ancient Egyptian source, the Turin canon, credits Khufu with a reign of merely 23 years. At the opposite, the ancient Greek historian Herodotus claims that Khufu ruled for 50 years, which is now seen as an exaggeration. Meanwhile, today Egyptologists such as Thomas Schneider assume that either Khufu indeed ruled for a little over 34 years, or that the author of the Turin canon simply did not take into account the 2-year-cycle of cattle counts and in fact credits Khufu with 23 cattle counts, which is a reign of 46 years. [4] [5]

Khufu Fourth Dynasty ancient Egyptian pharaoh

Khufu, known to the Greeks as Cheops, was an ancient Egyptian monarch who was the second pharaoh of the Fourth Dynasty, in the first half of the Old Kingdom period. Khufu succeeded his father Sneferu as king. He is generally accepted as having commissioned the Great Pyramid of Giza, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, but many other aspects of his reign are poorly documented.

Fourth Dynasty of Egypt dynasty of ancient Egypt

The Fourth Dynasty of ancient Egypt is characterized as a "golden age" of the Old Kingdom of Egypt. Dynasty IV lasted from c. 2613 to 2494 BC. It was a time of peace and prosperity as well as one during which trade with other countries is documented.

Great Pyramid of Giza oldest and largest of the three pyramids in the Giza Necropolis and it is one of the seven wonders in the world

The Great Pyramid of Giza is the oldest and largest of the three pyramids in the Giza pyramid complex bordering present-day El Giza, Egypt. It is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and the only one to remain largely intact.

See also

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References

  1. 1 2 Hermann A. Schlögl: Das Alte Ägypten (= Beck'sche Reihe, Band 2305). C.H. Beck, Hamburg 2011 (3. Ausgabe), ISBN   3406623107, p. 41.
  2. ↑ Richard A. Parker: The calendars of ancient Egypt (= Studies in ancient Oriental Civilization. Vol. 26, ISSN 0081-7554). University of Chicago Press, Chicago IL 1950.
  3. ↑ Toby Wilkinson: The Rise and Fall of Ancient Egypt, Random House Trade Paperbacks; Reprint edition, ISBN   0553384902, see p. 59
  4. 1 2 Siegfried Schott: Altägyptische Festdaten (= Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Literatur. Abhandlungen der Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaftlichen Klasse. Bd. 10, 1950, ISSN 0002-2977). Verlag der Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Literatur, Mainz u. a. 1950.
  5. 1 2 Thomas Schneider: Lexikon der Pharaonen. Albatros, Düsseldorf 2002, ISBN   3-491-96053-3, p. 100–102.
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