The wab-Sekhmet
Jan. 12th, 2011 05:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ikhet_sekhmetA few notes from The Physicians of Pharaonic Egypt and The House of Life (Per Ankh): Magic and Medical Science in Ancient Egypt, both by Paul Ghalioungui.
In Physicians, Ghalioungui lists numerous flavours of physicians, including specialists like oculists, dentists, and "embalmers and bandagers", as well as "medical auxiliaries", such as the manicurist. There's a lot of overlap between the categories. The main types were the lay physician (swnw), magician-physician, and priest-physician, including priests of Sekhmet. He gives several examples of these wab-Sekhmet who were also doctors.
Magic and Medical Science opens with a detailed discussion of magic and how it works, and the difference between magic and "sacerdotal medicine". "The [magician] constrains the spirits by his charms. The [priest] gains the assistance of the gods by negotiating it in return for his submission to certain rules of behaviour." (p 14) Gods involved in healing, other than Sekhmet, included Thoth, Isis, Horus, Khonsu, the deified Imhotep, and Duau of Heliopolis, patron of "numerous oculist-priests". Seth, usually out of favour, was seen as "a source of sickness and epidemics". Tawaret and Neith protected mothers. (p 15-16)
Then there's the per-ankh, or House of Life. In Physicians, Ghalioungui says that "opinions as to its role are at variance. Gardiner (1938b) believed that these institutions were mere scriptoria where books were compiled, and centres where religious texts and ceremonies were discussed. On the other hand, Volten (1942)... described them as colleges of scholars" actively protecting the gods and the pharaoh. The per-ankh at Bubastis employed several priests of Sekhmet as royal scribes. There was also the Hw.t 'nh, or Mansion of Life; possibly the physicians there were practising doctors while those at the per-ankh were "professors".
The House of Life has this to say:
"If no material causes could be found to account for a disease, then occult agencies were assumed... These evil spirits had a chief who introduced them into the body and guided them in its interior. The Egyptians called him the 'great slanderer', like the Greeks who called him diabolos, the slanderer. These devils, these envoys of Sekhmet, carried with them 'the wind of the pest of the year'." They disguised themselves and "hid in the corners of the house", necessitating the exorcism of doors and windows. But often, an illness sent as a punishment could only be cured by the responsible god. (p 62)
Physicians (p 9) makes a comparison I don't think I've encountered before:
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Ghalioungui, Paul. The House of Life (Per Ankh): Magic and Medical Science in Ancient Egypt. Amsterdam, B.M. Israel, 1973.
— The Physicians of Pharaonic Egypt (Sonderschrift (Deutsches Archaeologisches Institut. Abteilung Kairo) 10). Cairo, Al-Ahram Center for Scientific Translations; Springfield, Va, Available from the U.S. Dept. of Commerce, National Technical Information Service, 1983.
In Physicians, Ghalioungui lists numerous flavours of physicians, including specialists like oculists, dentists, and "embalmers and bandagers", as well as "medical auxiliaries", such as the manicurist. There's a lot of overlap between the categories. The main types were the lay physician (swnw), magician-physician, and priest-physician, including priests of Sekhmet. He gives several examples of these wab-Sekhmet who were also doctors.
Magic and Medical Science opens with a detailed discussion of magic and how it works, and the difference between magic and "sacerdotal medicine". "The [magician] constrains the spirits by his charms. The [priest] gains the assistance of the gods by negotiating it in return for his submission to certain rules of behaviour." (p 14) Gods involved in healing, other than Sekhmet, included Thoth, Isis, Horus, Khonsu, the deified Imhotep, and Duau of Heliopolis, patron of "numerous oculist-priests". Seth, usually out of favour, was seen as "a source of sickness and epidemics". Tawaret and Neith protected mothers. (p 15-16)
Then there's the per-ankh, or House of Life. In Physicians, Ghalioungui says that "opinions as to its role are at variance. Gardiner (1938b) believed that these institutions were mere scriptoria where books were compiled, and centres where religious texts and ceremonies were discussed. On the other hand, Volten (1942)... described them as colleges of scholars" actively protecting the gods and the pharaoh. The per-ankh at Bubastis employed several priests of Sekhmet as royal scribes. There was also the Hw.t 'nh, or Mansion of Life; possibly the physicians there were practising doctors while those at the per-ankh were "professors".
The House of Life has this to say:
"Little is known for certain, however, on the nature of medical tuition... candidates paid frequent visits to the per-ankh or 'Houses of Life' attached to temples. These were not, according to Gardiner and to Lefebvre schools with definite programs of study sanctioned by formal examinations; they rather functioned like 'centres of documentation' or 'scriptoria' akin to the 'Mouseion' of Alexandria, where books were collected or copied.There's also the hn (literally "chest") or House of Books:
"On the other hand Volten described them as collegia of learned people, created at the start for the express protection of the gods, and naturally, of their representatives on Earth, the pharaohs... among the arts and sciences that were taught and practised in these institutions [were] all the disciplines needed in the protection of Pharaoh: writing, theology, magic, art, medicine, astronomy, etc. Later these institutions extended their care to common mortals. [...] But although these institutions are known to have existed in the vicinity of the large temples, the relation between the two, and the degree of their interdependence are not yet clear." (pp 65-66)
"The close relationship between the pr-anx and the hn is clear in Bubastis, where, on the lintel of Iyroy's gateway, the local divinities Atum and Sekhmet-Bastet are qualified, the first being Master of the pr-anx, the second was Consort of the House of Books." (Physicians, p 92)The House of Life opens with a detailed discussion of magic and how it works, and the difference between magic and "sacerdotal medicine". "The [magician] constrains the spirits by his charms. The [priest] gains the assistance of the gods by negotiating it in return for his submission to certain rules of behaviour." (p 14) Gods involved in healing, other than Sekhmet, included Thoth, Isis, Horus, Khonsu, the deified Imhotep, and Duau of Heliopolis, patron of "numerous oculist-priests". Seth, usually out of favour, was seen as "a source of sickness and epidemics". Tawaret and Neith protected mothers. (p 15-16)
"If no material causes could be found to account for a disease, then occult agencies were assumed... These evil spirits had a chief who introduced them into the body and guided them in its interior. The Egyptians called him the 'great slanderer', like the Greeks who called him diabolos, the slanderer. These devils, these envoys of Sekhmet, carried with them 'the wind of the pest of the year'." They disguised themselves and "hid in the corners of the house", necessitating the exorcism of doors and windows. But often, an illness sent as a punishment could only be cured by the responsible god. (p 62)
Physicians (p 9) makes a comparison I don't think I've encountered before:
"At least in two instances a healing statue of her [Sekhmet's] Asian counterpart, Ishtar, was sent to Egypt, and Jonckheere (1951, 31) laid stress on the similarities between the two goddesses: same weapons, same husband (Ptah) and worship in the same city, Memphis." (p 9). [That's: Jonckheere, F. A la recherche du chirurgien Egyptien. Chronique d'Egypt 51 1951 pp 28-45. I'm all over it.]ETA: According to Ghalioungui, two female physicians are known by name: the swnw.t Peseshet, who had the title imy(.t)-r3 swnw.t, "Lady Overseer of Lady Physicians"; and the t3-syn Tawe, a midwife from around 300 BC.
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Ghalioungui, Paul. The House of Life (Per Ankh): Magic and Medical Science in Ancient Egypt. Amsterdam, B.M. Israel, 1973.
— The Physicians of Pharaonic Egypt (Sonderschrift (Deutsches Archaeologisches Institut. Abteilung Kairo) 10). Cairo, Al-Ahram Center for Scientific Translations; Springfield, Va, Available from the U.S. Dept. of Commerce, National Technical Information Service, 1983.
