Neferkaure was a

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 an ...

of ancient Egypt during the

First Intermediate Period The First Intermediate Period, described as a 'dark period' in ancient Egyptian history, spanned approximately 125 years, c. 2181–2055 BC, after the end of the Old Kingdom. It comprises the Seventh (although this is mostly considered spurious ...

. According to the Abydos King List and the latest reconstruction of the

Turin canon The Turin King List, also known as the Turin Royal Canon, is an ancient Egyptian hieratic papyrus thought to date from the reign of Pharaoh Ramesses II, now in the Museo Egizio (Egyptian Museum) in Turin. The papyrus is the most extensive list av ...

Kim Ryholt Kim Steven Bardrum Ryholt (born 19 June 1970) is a professor of Egyptology at the University of Copenhagen and a specialist on Egyptian history and literature. He is director of the research centeCanon and Identity Formation in the Earliest Litera ...

, he was the 15th king of the

Eighth Dynasty The Eighth Dynasty of ancient Egypt (Dynasty VIII) is a poorly known and short-lived line of pharaohs reigning in rapid succession in the early 22nd century BC, likely with their seat of power in Memphis. The Eighth Dynasty held sway at a time re ...

: ''The Late Old Kingdom in the Turin King-list and the Identity of Nitocris'', Zeitschrift für ägyptische, 127, 2000, p. 99 This opinion is shared by the Egyptologists

Jürgen von Beckerath Jürgen von Beckerath (19 February 1920, Hanover – 26 June 2016, Schlehdorf) was a German Egyptologist. He was a prolific writer who published countless articles in journals such as '' Orientalia'', ''Göttinger Miszellen'' (GM), ''Journal of t ...

, Thomas Schneider and Darell Baker.Jürgen von Beckerath: ''Handbuch der ägyptischen Königsnamen''.

Deutscher Kunstverlag The Deutscher Kunstverlag (DKV) is an educational publishing house with offices in Berlin and Munich. The publisher specializes in books about art, cultural history, architecture, and historic preservation. History Deutscher Kunstverlag was fo ...

, München/ Berlin 1984, , p. 59, 187.Darrell D. Baker: The Encyclopedia of the Pharaohs: Volume I - Predynastic to the Twentieth Dynasty 3300–1069 BC, Stacey International, , 2008, p. 272-273 As a pharaoh of the Eighth Dynasty, Neferkaure's seat of power was

Memphis Memphis most commonly refers to: * Memphis, Egypt, a former capital of ancient Egypt * Memphis, Tennessee, a major American city Memphis may also refer to: Places United States * Memphis, Alabama * Memphis, Florida * Memphis, Indiana * Memp ...

and he may not have held power over all of Egypt.

Attestations

Neferkaure is named on the 54th entry of the Abydos King List, a king list redacted some 900 years after the

during the reign of

Seti I Menmaatre Seti I (or Sethos I in Greek) was the second pharaoh of the Nineteenth Dynasty of Egypt during the New Kingdom period, ruling c.1294 or 1290 BC to 1279 BC. He was the son of Ramesses I and Sitre, and the father of Ramesses II. The ...

. Neferkaure's name is lost in a lacuna of the

affecting column 5, line 11 of the document. The length of Neferkaure's reign is nonetheless preserved with "4 years, 2 months and 0 days".Jürgen von Beckerath: ''The Date of the End of the Old Kingdom of Egypt'', JNES 21 (1962), p.143 Neferkaure is also known from a contemporary inscription, a fragmentary decree inscribed on a limestone slab known as Coptos Decree h and concerning offerings for the temple of

Min Min or MIN may refer to: Places * Fujian, also called Mǐn, a province of China ** Min Kingdom (909–945), a state in Fujian * Min County, a county of Dingxi, Gansu province, China * Min River (Fujian) * Min River (Sichuan) * Mineola (Am ...

Coptos Qift ( arz, قفط ; cop, Ⲕⲉϥⲧ, link=no ''Keft'' or ''Kebto''; Egyptian Gebtu; grc, Κόπτος, link=no ''Coptos'' / ''Koptos''; Roman Justinianopolis) is a small town in the Qena Governorate of Egypt about north of Luxor, situated und ...

. One of the two existing fragments of this decree was given by

Edward Harkness Edward Stephen Harkness (January 22, 1874 – January 29, 1940) was an American philanthropist. Given privately and through his family's Commonwealth Fund, Harkness' gifts to private hospitals, art museums, and educational institutions in the Nort ...

to the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

, where it is now on display in Gallery 103.The decree on th
catalog of the MET
/ref> The decree is dated to the fourth regnal year of Neferkaure, which is the highest attested date of any king of the Eighth Dynasty.

William C. Hayes William Christopher Hayes (March 21, 1903 – July 10, 1963) was an American Egyptologist. His main fields of study were history of Egyptian art and translation/interpretation of texts.W. C. Hayes, ''The Scepter of Egypt'', part II, 4th print ...

: ''The Scepter of Egypt: A Background for the Study of the Egyptian Antiquities in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Vol. 1, From the Earliest Times to the End of the Middle Kingdom '', MetPublications, 1978, pp.136-138
available online
/ref> The first sign of the king's

Horus name The Horus name is the oldest known and used crest of ancient Egyptian rulers. It belongs to the " great five names" of an Egyptian pharaoh. However, modern Egyptologists and linguists are starting to prefer the more neutral term: the "serekh nam ...

is clearly present while the second sign is debated. von Beckerath commits only to the first sign and reads ''Kha ..', while Baker and

read ''Khabau''. The decree is addressed to the then governor of

Upper Egypt Upper Egypt ( ar, صعيد مصر ', shortened to , , locally: ; ) is the southern portion of Egypt and is composed of the lands on both sides of the Nile that extend upriver from Lower Egypt in the north to Nubia in the south. In ancient ...

Shemay Shemay (also Shemai) was an ancient Egyptian official and later vizier toward the end of the 8th Dynasty (22nd century BCE) during the First Intermediate Period, mainly known for being the beneficiary of most of the Coptos Decrees. His career ha ...

, and requires that fixed amounts of offerings be given at regular intervals to the god Min and then possibly to a statue of the king.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Neferkaure 22nd-century BC Pharaohs Pharaohs of the Eighth Dynasty of Egypt