UCLA Encyclopedia of Egyptology
UC Los Angeles
Peer Reviewed
Title:
Opet Festival
Author:
Darnell, John, Yale
Publication Date:
12-10-2010
Publication Info:
UCLA Encyclopedia of Egyptology, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures, UC
Los Angeles
Permalink:
http://escholarship.org/uc/item/4739r3fr
Additional Info:
Darnell, John Coleman, 2010, Opet Festival. In Jacco Dieleman, Willeke Wendrich (eds.), UCLA
Encyclopedia of Egyptology, Los Angeles. http://digital2.library.ucla.edu/viewItem.do?ark=21198/
zz0025n765
Keywords:
Luxor Temple, Karnak, Amun, Mut, Khonsu, Kingship, Sacred Marriage, Amenemope
Abstract:
The annual Opet Festival, during which the bark of Amun—and ultimately those of Mut, Khons,
and the king as well—journeyed from Karnak to Luxor, became a central religious celebration of
ancient Thebes during the 18th Dynasty. The rituals of the Opet Festival celebrated the sacred
marriage of Amun—with whom the king merged—and Mut, resulting in the proper transmission of
the royal ka and thus ensuring the maintenance of kingship.
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OPET FESTIVAL
عيد اأوبت
John Coleman Darnell
EDITORS
WILLEKE WENDRICH
Editor-in-Chief
University of California, Los Angeles
JACCO DIELEMAN
Editor
Area Editor Religion
University of California, Los Angeles
ELIZABETH FROOD
Editor
University of Oxford
JOHN BAINES
Senior Editorial Consultant
University of Oxford
Short Citation:
Darnell, 2010, Opet Festival. UEE.
Full Citation:
Darnell, John Coleman, 2010, Opet Festival. In Jacco Dieleman, Willeke Wendrich (eds.), UCLA
Encyclopedia of Egyptology, Los Angeles.
http://digital2.library.ucla.edu/viewItem.do?ark=21198/zz0025n765
1131 Version 1, December 2010
http://digital2.library.ucla.edu/viewItem.do?ark=21198/zz0025n765
OPET FESTIVAL
عيد اأوبت
John Coleman Darnell
Opetfest
Fête d’Opet
The annual Opet Festival, during which the bark of Amun—and ultimately those of Mut,
Khons, and the king as well—journeyed from Karnak to Luxor, became a central religious
celebration of ancient Thebes during the 18th Dynasty. The rituals of the Opet Festival celebrated
the sacred marriage of Amun—with whom the king merged—and Mut, resulting in the proper
transmission of the royal ka and thus ensuring the maintenance of kingship.
يني مرك في ي القدي أثناء اأسر
أص ح ااحتفا بعيد اأوبت السنو احتفا
من،ال امن عشر حيث كا ي حر خاله آمو ب رك ه وتلحقه مو وخونسو وك لك ال لك
وكانت الطقو ال اص بعيد اأوبت تحتفل بال وا.مع د ال رنك إل مع د اأقصر
ومو م ا ينتج عنه انتقا صحيح لـل، وال قد إندمج معه ال لك، ال قد آمو
. م ا ي ن بقاء ال ل ي واست را يتھا،>>كا<< ال ل يه
he Opet Festival, eponymous
celebration of the month Paophi
(second month of the Akhet
season), was an annual event at the time of its
earliest attestation during the reign of
Hatshepsut (Lacau and Chevrier 1977 - 1979:
158; no suggestion of a pre-18th Dynasty
origin is conclusive, see also Murnane 1982:
577; Waitkus 2008: 224). Opet began on II
Akhet 15 under Thutmose III and lasted 11
days (Sethe 1907: 824, line 10); by the
beginning of the reign of Ramesses III, the
festival stretched over 24 days (II Akhet 19 III Akhet 12; Epigraphic Survey 1934: pls. 153
- 156, lists 29 - 38), perhaps with three days
added to the conclusion of the festival by the
end of his reign (Schott 1950: 85, nos. 40 - 41;
Grandet 1994, Vol. 2: 89 - 90 suggests a 24
day observance at Medinet Habu, with 27
days of festivities on the east bank). The eve
of Opet was also observed (Epigraphic Survey
1934: list 28, pls. 153 - 154; Grimal 1981: 15*,
lines 25 - 26; Kruchten 1986: 69 - 71), and a
Festival of Amun that Occurs after the Opet
T
Opet Festival, Darnell, UEE 2010
Festival is also known (Epigraphic Survey
1934: pls. 157 - 158, list 39, III Akhet 17). The
final day of the festival occurred on III Akhet
2 during Piye’s visit to Thebes (Grimal 1981:
15*, line 26). The festival appears to have
continued into the Roman Period (Herbin
1994: 151 - 153, 299; compare the probable
reference at Esna, Grimm 1994: 40 - 41 and
244, n. L15a; see also Klotz 2008), and echoes
thereof may have survived in Coptic (Nagel
1983: 45) and Islamic celebrations as well
(Legrain 1914: 83 - 91).
The name of the festival, Hb Ipt, relates to
that of Luxor Temple, Ip(A)t-rsyt, which was
perhaps the Upper Egyptian counterpart of an
earlier Heliopolitan IpAt (Postel and Régen
2005: 267 - 268), the “southern” specification
relating Luxor Temple to that northern shrine
and not to Karnak; the Opet Festival’s
relationship to Heliopolitan prototypes would
explain a number of Heliopolitan toponyms
that appear in Luxor Temple as probable
references to portions or aspects of Luxor
1
Figure 1. The third bark shrine of Hatshepsut on the processional route between Karnak and Luxor
Temples, as depicted in the Red Chapel at Karnak. The name of Hatshepsut in the text beneath the prow
of the bark of Amun has been removed, along with depictions of Osiride statues of the ruler at both ends
of the shrine.
Temple itself (compare Bell 1985b: 272 - 273;
and Epigraphic Survey 1998: commentary
booklet p. 23 and pl. 171 B, line 5). The
participants may have considered the
multiple-day event to consist of various subfestivals grouped together (Epigraphic Survey
1994: 28 n. a to pl. 78).
The ancient inscriptional sources for the
events of the Opet Festival are primarily
pictorial and mostly located within Karnak
Temple (for most, see Meyer 1998: 135 - 136;
Murnane 1982: 577 - 578, n. 15; Waitkus
2008: 224 - 235 and 238 - 254): Hatshepsut
and Thutmose III—Red Chapel, Karnak, and
Deir el-Bahri; Thutmose III—Akhmenu,
Karnak; Amenhotep III—third pylon,
Karnak; Tutankhamen—colonnade hall,
Luxor; Horemheb—court between the ninth
and tenth pylons, Karnak; Sety I—hypostyle
hall, Karnak; Ramesses II—court between the
eighth and ninth pylons, Karnak; Ramesses
III—bark shrine in first court, Karnak, and
Medinet Habu (Epigraphic Survey 1940: pl.
237); Herihor—Khons Temple, Karnak.
Although no text overtly explains the
significance of the event, the Opet-procession
scenes of Hatshepsut and Thutmose III on
the Red Chapel, and those of Tutankhamen in
the colonnade hall, reveal a number of
otherwise unattested aspects of the festival,
with the scenes of Herihor in Khons Temple
supplying additional details of the navigation
Opet Festival, Darnell, UEE 2010
(Epigraphic Survey 1979: pls. 19 - 23);
textually, the most explicit and nuanced
indications of the significance of the festival
are the songs recorded in Tutankhamen’s
Opet scenes.
The earliest and one of the most informative
series of scenes appears on the south side of
the Red Chapel of Hatshepsut and Thutmose
III at Karnak (Burgos et al. 2006: 46 - 53, reg.
3, and 60 - 65, reg. 5; Lacau and Chevrier
1977 - 1979: 154 - 169, 174 - 204, pls. 7 and 9;
Troy 2006: 140 - 141). These scenes reveal the
transportation of the bark of Amun from
Karnak along a land route (Waitkus 2008: 224
- 227); stopping at six bark shrines on the way
to Luxor, Amun’s bark then returned to
Karnak by water, his riverine barge towed by
the royal barge. After a stop in the wsxt-Hbt,
the festival courtyard of the temple, priests
carried the portable bark to the chapel of
Amenhotep I, Mn-mnw-Imn. To the
accompaniment of singers, musicians, and
acrobats, the bark finally made its way toward
the Hwt-aAt (“the great mansion”) and
ultimately the inner sanctuary of Karnak.
Hatshepsut’s scenes attest six shrines (fig.
1)—embellished with Osiride figures of the
queen—along some portion of the route
between Karnak and Luxor (Cabrol 2001: 528
- 541; Konrad 2006: 134, n. 927; Waitkus
2008: 226 - 227), the first in south Karnak,
2
Figure 2. The vanguard of the Opet-procession returning to Karnak Temple at the end of the festival. The
musicians are about to enter the third pylon, with the porch of Amenhotep IV. From the festival scenes of
Tutankhamen in the colonnade hall of Luxor Temple.
possibly near the temple of Kamutef, the rest
as yet unidentified. Portions of a structure of
Hatshepsut, probably the shrine nearest the
temple of Luxor, were incorporated into the
bark shrine of Ramesses II in the first court,
perhaps near the shrine’s original location
(Bell 1986, 1997: 163 - 164, 296 notes 126 128; Gabolde 1986; Waitkus 2008: 227).
Although the assumed line of six shrines
stretching between Karnak and Luxor—
Opet Festival, Darnell, UEE 2010
indicative of an entirely terrestrial journey—is
uncertain, associations between the southern
axis of Karnak and the Opet Festival support
such a reconstruction (see Cabrol 2001: 540 541). Only the bark of Amun appears under
Hatshepsut (according to Cabrol 2001: 525, it
is not certain if other barks were present at
Luxor under Amenhotep III; see, however,
Bell 1997: 154 - 156, 290 n. 76, and 293 - 294
n. 108; and Murnane 1985), but by the reign
3
of Tutankhamen, the barks of Amun, Mut,
and Khons, along with that of the king, took
part in the festival.
for the deity traveling within the portable
bark, both on the deck of the riverine barge
and the shoulders of the priests.
The presence of Opet related scenes in the
Akhmenu suggests that under the sole rule of
Thutmose III, the festival may have begun in
that temple (see Bell 1997: 157 - 176 for a
reconstruction of the course of the festival;
note, however, Waitkus 2008: 240 and n.
1496). The bark of Amun would have exited
the third pylon, as in the Tutankhamen scene
on the west wall in the colonnade hall at
Luxor (fig. 2; Epigraphic Survey 1994: 7, 38 39). By the reign of Tutankhamen, and
perhaps already under Amenhotep III, to
judge from architectural evidence at Luxor
Temple, the bark of Khons would have joined
the procession in southern Karnak, before the
entourage reached the area of the Mut Temple
and the first of Hatshepsut’s shrines on the
land route. Under Tutankhamen, after being
joined by the bark of Mut, the procession
then proceeded to the Nile embarkation, river
west of Hatshepsut’s northernmost bark
shrine (Bell 1997: 294 - 295 n. 112; Cabrol
2001: 143 - 145; again Waitkus 2008: 243 244 disagrees). Although the New Kingdom
riverine barge Amun-Userhat existed under
Ahmose (Gabolde 2003: 422 - 428) and some
sort of vessel participated in the Beautiful
Festival of the Wadi already during the early
Middle Kingdom (Arnold 1974: 26 - 27 and
pls. 22 - 23; Gabolde 1998: 49 - 51, pls. 9 10), the Opet scenes of Tutankhamen are the
first to depict a river journey in both
directions (figs. 3 and 4); the procession
disembarked at Luxor (for a possible Luxor
dock under Ramesses III, see Cabrol 2001:
607 - 608) and entered the court of Luxor
Temple before the colonnade hall, ultimately
through the west wall entrance of the
Ramesside court (Cabrol 2001: 526). The text
on a sphinx of Nectanebo I on the route
between Karnak and Luxor (Cabrol 2001: 283
296)
describes
the
construction
(refurbishment) of the route for Amun, r
jr[=f] Xn=f nfr m Ipt rsyt, “so that he might
carry out his good navigation in Luxor”
(Cabrol 2001: 290, text 4), revealing that the
basic sense of “navigation” would be the same
Although the earliest attestation of the
festival and the earliest surviving 18th Dynasty
constructions at Luxor date to the reign of
Hatshepsut (Cabrol 2001: 522 - 523; Habachi
1965; for architrave fragments of Sobekhotep
I—possibly from Karnak—reused as statue
bases at Luxor, see Eder 2002: 140;
Pamminger 1992: 129 n. 201; Ryholt 1997:
336), one expects an ultimate 11th Dynasty
origin, as for the three other major nodes of
the Theban festival cycle (Darnell fc.;
Ullmann 2007). A platform in the area of the
ninth pylon at Karnak may date to the reign
of Senusret I, suggesting the presence of a
processional route leading south from
Karnak, along the route of the later northsouth axis, presumably connecting Middle
Kingdom Karnak with a contemporaneous
structure at or near the later Luxor Temple
(Van Siclen 2005). The reign of Amenhotep
III molded the procession and its architectural
destination into the forms we recognize.
Amenhotep III embellished Luxor Temple
considerably, notably with the colonnade hall,
an elaborate bark shrine as columned hall (like
the hypostyle hall at Karnak, see Rondot
1997: 151 n. 221; contra Pamminger 1992 that
it is a model of the Nile); he may also have
constructed a maru-temple in association with
the Opet Festival (Konrad 2006: 132 - 137;
Manniche 1982: 272; but see also Cabrol
2001: 600 - 607; Klug 2002: 404 n. 3160). The
architecture of the rooms immediately south
of the hypostyle hall of Luxor Temple
suggests that the bark of the king, first visible
in Tutankhamen’s Opet scenes, was already an
element of the procession under Amenhotep
III (Bell 1985b: 260 - 263; Epigraphic Survey
1994: 29 and pl. 80). The transformation of
Amenhotep III from an individual ruler to the
personification of the royal ka through a
blurring of the boundary between the person
of the king and the royal ka-nature in the rear
rooms of Luxor Temple suggests that the
Opet Festival under Amenhotep III and his
successors became amongst other things a
ritual of reconfirming the transmission of the
Opet Festival, Darnell, UEE 2010
4
Figure 3. A depiction of the barge of Queen Ankhesenamen (later usurped for Mutnodjmet) towing the
riverine bark of the goddess Mut from Karnak Temple to Luxor Temple during the Festival of Opet.
Soldiers assist with towing the divine bark, with accompanying Nubian dancers and military escort. Note
the images of Ankhesenamen accompanying Tutankhamen in smiting scenes on the fore- and after-castles
of the royal barge (she extends her own scimitar in the latter scene). From the festival scenes of
Tutankhamen in the colonnade hall of Luxor Temple.
Figure 4. The royal barge, with assisting towboats, hauling the riverine bark of Amun (not visible in this
portion of the larger scene). From the Opet Festival scenes of Herihor in the court of Khons Temple,
Karnak.
royal ka (Bell 1985b; Refai 1998, restating
Bell’s arguments with comparison to other
Theban festivals; Waitkus 2008: 263, 280 281, et passim disagrees). A later ruler might
also begin to mingle his identity with that of
an earlier incarnation of the royal ka (compare
the blending of Tutankhamen and
Amenhotep III in the texts to the scenes on
the two southernmost columns in the
colonnade hall, see Epigraphic Survey 1998:
pls. 188 - 189 and p. 42), and a statue of the
celebrating ruler’s immediate (legitimate)
predecessor may have participated in the
Opet Festival, Darnell, UEE 2010
festival (see Waitkus 2008: 232 - 233, 240 –
241, and 260).
Opet was not, however, solely a festival of
royal identification with Amun. The riverine
procession and the divine birth chamber
become in late temple ritual the navigation of
a god or goddess to the other to consummate
the union that will result in the divine birth of
the child god depicted—in borrowing from
royal iconography of the New Kingdom—in
the birth chamber of the temple, the mammisi
(Brunner 1986: 213 - 215; Finnestad 1997:
303, n. 13). Opet was also a hieros gamos
5
Figure 5. Sety I (with a depiction of the north entrance to the colonnade hall behind him) offers to the
barks of Amun, Mut, and Khons in Luxor Temple, during the Festival of Opet. From the festival scenes in
the colonnade hall of Luxor Temple. Though carved under Sety I, the scenes appear to belong to an initial
cartoon from the reign of Tutankhamen. Note the absence of the royal bark in the depiction of Luxor
Temple, although the bark appears in the scene of the divine barks departing Luxor Temple on the return
journey to Karnak.
(Pamminger 1992: 94; Wolf 1931: 72 - 73), a
divine marriage, the result of which was the
renewal of Amun in the person of his everrenewing human vessel, the reigning king. As
the Amun-Min procession related the physical
ruler to his predecessors (Epigraphic Survey
1940: pls. 213 - 214; see also Gauthier 1931:
204 - 206; Redford 1986: 34 - 37), so the Opet
Festival celebrated the renewal of the ka-force
of Amun, and the transmission of the spirit of
kingship in the eternal present. As a festival of
annual renewal, the Opet Festival could
reconfirm the royal coronation, which under
Horemheb actually occurred at the time of the
Opet Festival (Gardiner 1953: pl. II, lines 13 15; Spalinger 1995; for the coronation of
Arikeamenote coinciding with the Opet
Festival, see Kormysheva 1998: 84 - 89). The
final major festival of Luxor, the Decade
Festival with its visit to Medinet Habu,
brought Amun of Luxor into contact with the
entropic forces of death through his meeting
with the primeval and transcendental forms of
Amun and the Ogdoad on the west bank of
Luxor.
By the late 18th Dynasty, both legs of the
procession traveled on the Nile, with
Opet Festival, Darnell, UEE 2010
accompanying elements keeping pace on land.
Tutankhamen’s scenes allude to the terrestrial
route by depicting two empty royal chariots,
attended by charioteers (Epigraphic Survey
1994: pls. 22 and 95)—elements from the
daily Amarna chariot ride of the royal Atenist
couple in and out of Akhetaten, transported
to Thebes and incorporated into the Opet
Festival (Darnell and Manassa 2007; Kákosy
1977: 39 - 40, 80). The bark of the king makes
its first appearance in the Opet-procession
scenes of Tutankhamen at Luxor Temple (see
Epigraphic Survey 1994: pls. 11 and 117) as a
carrier for the processional image of the
divine ruler (in evidence from the time of the
Second Intermediate Period, see Darnell 2002:
104; Pamminger 1993: 85 and n. 16). The bark
of the king leaves Karnak and returns thereto,
but is not present in Luxor Temple in
Tutankhamen’s scenes of the festival (fig.
5)—apparently the king has merged with
Amun during the procession into Luxor
making the royal bark superfluous (Bell 1985a;
Murnane 1982: 576). Amun of Luxor appears
to have been a fecundity figure, both ramheaded and ithyphallic anthropomorphic,
related to Nubia and the inundation
(Pamminger 1992, 1996: 437 - 439; Waitkus
6
Figure 6. Priestesses and priests singing the “Songs of the Drinking Place” during the Opet Festival. From
the festival scenes of Tutankhamen in the colonnade hall of Luxor Temple.
2008: 216 - 222, 264 - 266, 299 - 300),
appropriate both to the southern node of the
east bank Theban festival cycle and to the
ram-form of the deified ruler in Nubia (Bell
1985a; Pamminger 1993).
The union of a god with his temple may
appear as a sexual union (Darnell 1994: 40 44), and the nautical element of the Opet
Festival is appropriate to a divine marriage
ritual (Altenmüller 1998: 753 - 765). Although
absent from later Opet scenes, Hatshepsut’s
Red Chapel records a harpist singing a song
(Burgos et al. 2006: 64) referring to the
ithyphallic form of the double-plumed Amun,
raised of arm (Dsr-a). Songs in the tomb of
Amenemhat also refer to the appearance of
the god from the temple (wbn, appropriate for
Amun appearing in festival; so regarding the
Beautiful Festival of the Wadi in Spiegelberg
1921: pl. 107, no. 968; and for the goddess
Mut as well, see Epigraphic Survey 1994: pl.
83) and describe the temple of Karnak as a
woman, drunk in religious ecstasy and attired
in erotically Hathoric coiffure, awaiting with
bed linens the arrival of the god (Darnell
1995: 59 - 62)—although that song is not
clearly specific to Opet, the content may
mirror that of the unrecorded song of the Red
Chapel’s Opet harpist.
The Tutankhamen scenes record the texts of
three songs accompanying the navigations
(fig. 6), chanted by priests and priestesses (see
the author’s text edition in Epigraphic Survey
Opet Festival, Darnell, UEE 2010
1994: 12 - 14; Junker 1942: 43 - 44; Sethe
1929: 1 - 5; Wolf 1931: 16 [7], 35 [6], 56 - 57,
73 - 74; parallel texts for the second song,
from the Red Chapel of Hatshepsut and the
Akhmenu of Thutmose III, appear in Lacau
and Chevrier 1977 - 1979: 187 - 189 [§§265 268]; see also Altenmüller 1998: 764; Burgos
et al. 2006: 60 - 61). The songs are apparently
quite ancient (the sky as wings evokes the 1st
Dynasty comb of Wadj, see Westendorf 1966:
22 - 24), and the recitation for the bark in the
third song appears already in the 6th Dynasty
tomb of Mereruka at Saqqara (Epigraphic
Survey 1939: pl. 141; cited by Barguet 1962:
176 n. 3; Barta 1983: 102).
First Song:
“Oh Amun, Lord of the Thrones of the Two
[Lan]ds, may you live forever!
A drinking place is hewn out, the sky is folded back
to the south;
a drinking place is hewn out, the sky is folded back to
the north;
that the sailors of Tutankhamen (usurped by
Horemheb), beloved of Amun-Ra-Kamutef, praised
of the gods, may drink.”
Utterance of Neith.
The directions, south and north, may allude
to the southeast to northwest flight of the sun
(Westendorf 1966: 23). The implied south to
north journey of this song—like the actual
return to Karnak from Luxor at the end of the
Opet Festival—relates to the royal New
Year’s Festival and the return of the
7
wandering solar goddess from the south
(Kessler 1988). The drinking place would be
one of the booths that celebrants erected
during nautical festivals (Darnell 1991: 76 80; Epigraphic Survey 1994: pls. 67 and 68;
Fischer-Elfert 1999). Such booths are
consistent with the aspect of sexual union
inherent in the Opet Festival (compare
references in the love poetry, see Derchain
1975: 82 - 86; Fox 1985: 14 - 16, 46, and 48 n.
q); Neith probably appears in her role as
“Lady of inebriation in the (season of) the
fresh inundation waters” (Žabkar 1988: 107,
pl. 21, fig. 8, and p. 181 n. 25). The journey by
land and a return by river—as the Opet
Festival appears under Hatshepsut and
Thutmose III—would thus evoke the dry
period prior to the union of the god and
returning solar goddess, the return to the
north by river likewise emphasizing the
returning flood. The journey to the south by
land, and the towing of the barks against the
current in the southerly riverine journey, also
mirrored the nocturnal journey of the sun in
the dry realms of the Land of Sokar (for the
bark of Amun on its journey from Karnak to
Luxor during the Opet Festival compared to
the night bark of Ra, see Epigraphic Survey
1994: 7 and pls. 22 - 23; Herbin 1994: 152).
The sails of the barks appear to have been red
in color, the return journey to Karnak thus
evoking the red light of dawn, the veil of the
new born solar deity (for the red cloth, see
Darnell 2004: 72, 133 - 137, and 197 n. 139;
for the red sail, see Epigraphic Survey 1979:
pl. 20, line 6).
Second Song:
Recitation:
“Hail, Amun, primeval one of the Two Lands,
foremost one of Karnak,
in your glorious appearance amidst your [riverine]
fleet,
on your beautiful Festival of Opet—
May you be pleased with it.”
Third Song:
Recitation four times—Recitation for the
bark:
“A drinking place is built for the party, which is in
the voyage of the fleet.
Opet Festival, Darnell, UEE 2010
The ways of the Akeru are bound up for you;
Hapi is high.
May you pacify the Two Ladies, oh Lord of the
White Crown/Red Crown.
It is Horus, strong of arm, who conveys the god with
she the good one of the god.
For the king has Hathor already done the best of good
things.”
The ways of Aker allude to the east/west
axis of the solar journey, parallel to the first
song’s “royal” south/north axis (see Cauville
1983; Loeben 1990: 67; compare also the
double axis of Luxor, the north/south
processional forecourts, and the east/west
orientation of Room XVII in the southern,
solar temple—see Brunner 1977: 79 - 82). The
songs associate the festival journey to the
course of the sun (recognition of the solar
aspect already by Foucart 1924: 123 - 126; see
also the discussion of the first song above),
and at the same time allude to sexuality (Barta
1975: 112 relates these songs to a hieros gamos
intended to release the fertility of the
Inundation). The “best of good things” finds
echoes in New Kingdom love poetry (Fox
1985: 22), a term for the consummation of
sexual union. A further detail confirming the
sexual aspect of the festival is a statement of a
priest who bends forward and addresses the
bark of Amun as it emerges from Luxor
Temple at the end of the Opet Festival: “How
weary is the cackling goose!” (Epigraphic
Survey 1994: 26 and pl. 67). This short
statement alludes to the cry of creation
uttered by the great cackler in the eastern
horizon, appropriate to the smn-goose form of
Amun as the deity prepares to sail to Karnak.
Accompanying the singing priests and
priestesses are dancing foreigners: soldiers
dressed as Libyans and using throwsticks as
clappers, and Nubians leaping and swaying in
a type of military dance with clubs (fig. 7;
Darnell and Manassa 2007: 204 - 206;
Epigraphic Survey 1994: pls. 25, 28, 32, 38,
91, 94, 96, 99). The presence of Nubians and
Libyans is probably meant to evoke the
groups amongst whom the solar eye goddess
has recently sojourned, members of whom
8
Figure 7. Dancing Nubians and military escort accompanying the Opet-procession. From the festival
scenes of Tutankhamen in the colonnade hall of Luxor Temple.
join her entourage for the return to Egypt
(Darnell 1995: 64 - 79). Also acrobatic dancers
accompany
the
festival
procession
(Epigraphic Survey 1994: pls. 37 - 38), the
backward-leaning dance at once an evocation
of the dance of the four winds (Kurth 1994)
and a display of eroticism (compare Sauneron
1968: 286 - 287, text no. 344 on column no.
14; 1962: 41ff.).
Soldiers and sailors are the most numerous
of the festival participants in the colonnade
hall scenes, and a number of military and civil
officials participated in the preparations and
execution of the Opet Festival; Ramesses II
listed amongst those responsible for arranging
the festival: members of the civil
administration, provincial governors, border
officials, heads of internal economic
departments, officers of the commissariat, city
officials, and upper ranks of the priesthood
(Hirsch 2006: 153, refs. n. 91, and p. 198, tab.
18; contra the objections of Spalinger 1998).
In addition to overseeing aspects of the food
preparation (Epigraphic Survey 1994: pls. 36
and 40) and rowing and towing the divine
barges, at least one military official
pronounces a hymn in honor of the king in
front of the Opet-procession as it heads to
Luxor on the west interior wall of the
colonnade hall (Epigraphic Survey 1994: pl.
20; compare an Aswan rock inscription of
Sety I: “Nobles and meshkeb-officers hurry
along the shore, while the king’s eldest son is
before them, performing akhu-beatifications,”
see Habachi 1973: 119 - 122).
The general populace appears to have been
able to observe from the riverbanks (Darnell
2003: 44), and at least some may have had
limited access to the forepart of the temple
(Bell 1985b: 270 - 271, 275; Kruchten 1986:
257 - 258). Celebrants may also have observed
the event at other locations, such as the
mortuary temple of Ramesses III at Medinet
Habu (Haring 1997: 187), and a
transplantation to Abydos appears to have
occurred (Cabrol 2001: 741). Oracular
manifestations of Amun could also occur
during the festival (compare Kruchten 1986:
252 - 265, 337 - 354), further relating events
of the festival procession to the populace.
During the second regnal year of a late 21st
Dynasty ruler, the bark of Amun refused to
leave his sanctuary for the Opet Festival,
which finally took place sixty-five days later
than usual, on day 23 of Khoiak, after the
priest whose offenses occasioned the delay
had appeared before a tribunal (Kruchten
1991: 182 - 184).
Bibliographic Notes
The chief pictorial and textual sources for the Opet Festival appear in Burgos et al. (2006),
updating Lacau and Chevrier (1977 - 1979), and Epigraphic Survey (1979: pls. 20 - 23; and 1994).
The only well documented overview of the festival remains Murnane (1982), with additional
commentary on the significance of the ritual events in Bell (1985b, 1997); Waitkus (2008) is
overall skeptical of much of the evidence for the festival. The lengthiest texts associated with the
Opet Festival, Darnell, UEE 2010
9
Opet Festival are the “Songs of the Drinking Place,” with translations and commentary in
Epigraphic Survey (1994: 12 - 14). Discussions of specific aspects of the festival include Cabrol
(1999, 2001), Kruchten (1991), Meyer (1998), and Pamminger (1996).
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Image Credits
Figure 1. The third bark shrine of Hatshepsut on the processional route between Karnak and Luxor
Temples, as depicted in the Red Chapel at Karnak. The name of Hatshepsut in the text beneath
the prow of the bark of Amun has been removed, along with depictions of Osiride statues of
the ruler at both ends of the shrine. Photograph by the author.
Figure 2. The vanguard of the Opet-procession returning to Karnak Temple at the end of the festival.
The musicians are about to enter the third pylon, with the porch of Amenhotep IV. From the
festival scenes of Tutankhamen in the colonnade hall of Luxor Temple. (Epigraphic Survey
1994: pl. 105, reproduced courtesy of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago.)
Figure 3. A depiction of the barge of Queen Ankhesenamen (later usurped for Mutnodjmet) towing the
riverine bark of the goddess Mut from Karnak Temple to Luxor Temple during the Festival of
Opet. Soldiers assist with towing the divine bark, with accompanying Nubian dancers and
military escort. Note the images of Ankhesenamen accompanying Tutankhamen in smiting
scenes on the fore- and after-castles of the royal barge (she extends her own scimitar in the latter
scene). From the festival scenes of Tutankhamen in the colonnade hall of Luxor Temple.
(Epigraphic Survey 1994: pl. 28, reproduced courtesy of the Oriental Institute of the University
of Chicago.)
Figure 4. The royal barge, with assisting towboats, hauling the riverine bark of Amun (not visible in this
portion of the larger scene). From the Opet Festival scenes of Herihor in the court of Khons
Temple, Karnak. (Epigraphic Survey 1979: pl. 20, reproduced courtesy of the Oriental Institute
of the University of Chicago.)
Figure 5. Sety I (with a depiction of the north entrance to the colonnade hall behind him) offers to the
barks of Amun, Mut, and Khons in Luxor Temple, during the Festival of Opet. From the
festival scenes in the colonnade hall of Luxor Temple. Though carved under Sety I, the scenes
appear to belong to an initial cartoon from the reign of Tutankhamen. Note the absence of the
royal bark in the depiction of Luxor Temple, although the bark appears in the scene of the
divine barks departing Luxor Temple on the return journey to Karnak. (Epigraphic Survey 1994:
pl. 56, reproduced courtesy of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago.)
Figure 6. Priestesses and priests singing the “Songs of the Drinking Place” during the Opet Festival. From
the festival scenes of Tutankhamen in the colonnade hall of Luxor Temple. (Epigraphic Survey
1994: pl. 26, reproduced courtesy of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago.)
Figure 7. Dancing Nubians and military escort accompanying the Opet-procession. From the festival
scenes of Tutankhamen in the colonnade hall of Luxor Temple. (Epigraphic Survey 1994: pl. 94,
reproduced courtesy of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago.)
Opet Festival, Darnell, UEE 2010
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