Prince Hornakht (or Harnakht) was the son of

pharaoh Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian: '' pr ꜥꜣ''; cop, , Pǝrro; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') is the vernacular term often used by modern authors for the kings of ancient Egypt who ruled as monarchs from the First Dynasty (c. 3150 BC) until the ...

Osorkon II Usermaatre Setepenamun Osorkon II was the fifth king of the 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 Tanis, the capital of that dynasty. After ...

of the

22nd Dynasty The Twenty-second Dynasty of Egypt is also known as the Bubastite Dynasty, since the pharaohs originally ruled from the city of Bubastis. It was founded by Shoshenq I. The Twenty-first, Twenty-second, Twenty-third, Twenty-fourth, and Twenty-f ...

. He was appointed by Osorkon II to the office of chief priest of Amun at

Tanis Tanis ( grc, Τάνις or Τανέως ) or San al-Hagar ( ar, صان الحجر, Ṣān al-Ḥaǧar; egy, ḏꜥn.t ; ; cop, ϫⲁⲛⲓ or or ) is the Greek name for ancient Egyptian ''ḏꜥn.t'', an important archaeological site in the ...

to strengthen this king's authority in Lower Egypt. However, this was primarily a political move on Osorkon II's part since Hornakht died before the age of 10. When Hornakht died at this young age, Osorkon II made provisions to ensure that his son would be buried in this king's own tomb at Tanis. While tomb robbers managed to penetrate the burial of Hornakht in antiquity, his sarcophagus still preserved parts of the tomb treasures which were once placed upon the prince's mummy since a large

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies under ...

block placed over Hornakht's burial prevented them from lifting its lid completely. Secondly, most of the

grave robber Grave robbery, tomb robbing, or tomb raiding is the act of uncovering a grave, tomb or crypt to steal commodities. It is usually perpetrated to take and profit from valuable artefacts or personal property. A related act is body snatching, a term ...

s attention were focused upon the sarcophagus of Osorkon II which would have featured vastly more splendid treasures. The grave robbers succeeded in removing the gold funerary mask which covered Hornakht's face as well as some ornaments which adorned his neck; however, they abandoned their efforts to steal the remainder of the prince's funerary treasures. Therefore, when

Egyptologist Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Greek , '' -logia''; ar, علم المصريات) is the study of ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, architecture and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end of its native religiou ...

Pierre Montet Jean Pierre Marie Montet (27 June 1885 – 19 June 1966) was a French Egyptologist. Biography Montet was born in Villefranche-sur-Saône, Rhône, and began his studies under Victor Loret at the University of Lyon. He excavated at Byblos ...

discovered the burial of Hornakht, they found a series of gold amulets which covered parts of the prince's mummy. They are small in size but enjoy a high quality finish; some are made of gold partitioned lapis lazuli and other semi-precious stones which represent various mythical symbols intended to safeguard the sanctity of Hornakht's

mummified A mummy is a dead human or an animal whose soft tissues and organs have been preserved by either intentional or accidental exposure to chemicals, extreme cold, very low humidity, or lack of air, so that the recovered body does not decay furt ...

body. According to the analysis of his skeleton performed in 1942 by Dr. Douglas Derry, Hornakht died aged 8–9. On the remains some peculiarities were noted, such as an unusually large and developed skull for his age, the presence of a pair of

cervical rib A cervical rib in humans is an extra rib which arises from the seventh cervical vertebra. Their presence is a congenital abnormality located above the normal first rib. A cervical rib is estimated to occur in 0.2% to 0.5% (1 in 200 to 500) of th ...

s, and an abnormal

lumbar vertebra The lumbar vertebrae are, in human anatomy, the five vertebrae between the rib cage and the pelvis. They are the largest segments of the vertebral column and are characterized by the absence of the foramen transversarium within the transverse ...

; however, Derry excluded that these anomalies may have led to Hornakht's premature death. Part of the face was damaged by embalmers during the brain removal by the nose. A block statue from the Serapeum at

Saqqara Saqqara ( ar, سقارة, ), also spelled Sakkara or Saccara in English , is an Egyptian village in Giza Governorate, that contains ancient burial grounds of Egyptian royalty, serving as the necropolis for the ancient Egyptian capital, Memphis ...

may well have been dedicated to Hornakht. The statue is decorated with relief images of queen Karomama I, Hornakht’s mother, and of the god

Amun-Ra Amun (; also ''Amon'', ''Ammon'', ''Amen''; egy, jmn, reconstructed as ( Old Egyptian and early Middle Egyptian) → (later Middle Egyptian) → ( Late Egyptian), cop, Ⲁⲙⲟⲩⲛ, Amoun) romanized: ʾmn) was a major ancient Egypt ...

(besides other divinities). The sculpture now has a figure of

Osiris Osiris (, from Egyptian ''wsjr'', cop, ⲟⲩⲥⲓⲣⲉ , ; Phoenician: 𐤀𐤎𐤓, romanized: ʾsr) is the god of fertility, agriculture, the afterlife, the dead, resurrection, life, and vegetation in ancient Egyptian religion. He wa ...

at the front (re-cut from what appears to have represented a '' naos'' once) and was probably set up not long after the prince’s premature death.Helmut Brandl: Untersuchungen zur steinernen Privatplastik der Dritten Zwischenzeit: Typologie, Ikonographie, Stilistik. MBV, Berlin 2008, , pp. 243-245 → Dok. U-5.1, pl. 141, 184.f. (Dissertation, Humboldt-Universität Berlin 2003)

References

External links

The Tomb of Hornakht
National Gallery of Art {{DEFAULTSORT:Hornakht People of the Twenty-second Dynasty of Egypt Ancient Egyptian princes 9th-century BC deaths Prophets of Amun Royalty and nobility who died as children