Writing an article about epidemics in 2021 will probably only force a weary smile with most readers. After the unexpected revival of non-fiction books about the Spanish flu and Albert Camus' “The Plague” last year, I may be a little late to “pick up” anyone with this topic. Nevertheless, the topic offers some exciting aspects and even the possibility of including the current devastating floods in Germany.
“Pestilence” is actually a word that no longer occurs in our language usage. We use the terms epidemic or, on a larger scale, pandemic. Pestilence sounds like the plague of the Middle Ages, or a biblical plague that (not surprisingly) is said to have occurred in Egypt when Pharaoh refused to let Moses and his Hebrews go. The word that the ancient Egyptians used was jad.t, which can mean not only plague, but also calamity, misery or catastrophe in general. In earlier translations the word “plague” was often used, but that often limited its meaning to the actual disease "plague". Whether the plague is really mentioned in the medical papyri is disputed and so far no paleopathological proof of the pathogen Yersinia pestis has been found. Other endemic infectious diseases such as tuberculosis, malaria, schistosomiasis or trachoma (a bacterial eye disease) could, however, be detected with certainty in mummies, and may not have been rare in the Egyptian climate.
We come across one term repeatedly when we deal with the subject of epidemics: The "pestilence of the year", jad.t-rnp.t. This expression suggests that once a year a situation occurred in which epidemics could become more common in Egypt. In addition, in this context there is always talk of a certain goddess who, together with her demons, was responsible for this plague: Sekhmet, “the mighty one”, who was depicted in the form of a lion and who was the mistress of war and disease. She could send her demons to punish people for wrongdoing, but she was also worshiped to protect against diseases. If her priests said the right rituals and prayers, the angry lioness Sekhmet could become a peaceful kitten again, namely the goddess Bastet ...
During the reign of Amenhetep III. probably no fewer than 365 (!) Sekhmet statues were erected in his mortuary temple; it is assumed that a particularly violent epidemic could have raged at this time, which prompted the king to do so and which made it necessary that Sekhmet had to be appeased in a very special manner.
Sekhmet statues in the British Museum, London.
18th dynasty, reign of Amenhetep III.
Own picture, September 2018.
How do we have to imagine this pestilence of the year? This is where the subject of "flooding" comes into play: Egypt's agriculture and prosperity have depended for millennia on the Nile breaking its banks once a year, around June or July of our calendar, and flooding the otherwise poorly watered country. With the flooding, nutritious Nile mud came onto the fields and constituted a natural fertilization. The Nile flood was always associated with a festival and was so important that the ancient Egyptians (and still today the Copts) connected their calendar with it: the onset of the Nile flood marked the beginning of the new year.
On the other hand, the Nile flood was of course associated with a problem: in the heat of summer, flooded fields are an ideal breeding ground for pathogens of all kinds, especially when the water “stands” and no longer flows before it can finally seep into the ground. Rodents such as mice and rats, which either drowned in the flood and contaminated the water, or fled from the water to human settlements and spread diseases, were also part of the problem. The pestilence of the year now describes precisely this problematic period that occurred shortly after the Nile flood and lasted for about 60 days, year after year.
How did the Egyptians try to protect themselves from this? As is so often the case, especially with magic: in addition to soothing rituals for the goddess Sekhmet, amulets, which were inscribed with certain protective formulas and used as necklaces, were particularly helpful. The Papyrus Leiden I 346 contributes the following to this:
Saying over a bandage made of the finest linen: The gods wrote on it and made 12 knots in it. The sacrifice for them should be bread, beer and incense on the fire. It shall be given to a man on his neck, that the man may be saved from the pestilence of the year.
Unfortunately, "real" medical prescriptions are missing here as well as in other papyri dealing with the pestilence of the year. Only the "home remedies" of the Ebers papyrus could fit into this context: Recipe 840 describes that fleas can be removed from the house with natron-enriched water, while Recipe 847 recommends driving away mice with the fat of a male cat. Even if there is no reference to the other text sources, it would indeed be too tempting to see early measures for epidemic prophylaxis here ...
Literature
- Wolfhart Westendorf, Seuchen im Alten Ägypten, in: Axel Karenberg, Christian Leitz (Hrsg.), Heilkunde und Hochkultur I, Berlin 2020.
- Christian Leitz, Tagewählerei, Wiesbaden 1994.
- Simon Connor, Le statue della dea Sekhmet, Turin 2017.
Cover Picture
Nile at sunset in Luxor. Own picture, October 2019.
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