Hedju Hor was a ruler in northern Egypt from the

Predynastic Period Prehistoric Egypt and Predynastic Egypt span the period from the earliest human settlement to the beginning of the Early Dynastic Period around 3100 BC, starting with the first Pharaoh, Narmer for some Egyptologists, Hor-Aha for others, with ...

. His true existence is unknown. The name Hedju Hor means: ''The maces of Horus.'' It is thought that his reign began around 3250 BC, but almost nothing is known of his existence. He is known only from inscriptions found in the Nile Delta region and pottery shards from Tura. It has been conjectured that he was the first pharaoh of Lower Egypt, or the last; or that he was a member of

Dynasty 0 Naqada III is the last phase of the Naqada culture of ancient Egyptian prehistory, dating from approximately 3200 to 3000 BC. It is the period during which the process of state formation, which began in Naqada II, became highly visible, ...

. Hedju Hor is only known from two clay jugs on which his ''

serekh In Egyptian hieroglyphs, a serekh is a rectangular enclosure representing the niched or gated façade of a palace surmounted by (usually) the Horus falcon, indicating that the text enclosed is a royal name. The serekh was the earliest conven ...

'' appears: one from Tura in the eastern Nile Delta and one from Abu Zeidan on the northeastern tip of the Nile Delta.

Wolfgang Helck Hans Wolfgang Helck (16 September 1914 – 27 August 1993) was a German Egyptologist, considered one of the most important Egyptologists of the 20th century. From 1956 until his retirement in 1979 he was a professor at the University of Hamburg. H ...

, who was an

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 ...

, held him as 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 ...

of Dynasty 0 and identified him with

Wash WASH (or Watsan, WaSH) is an acronym that stands for "water, sanitation and hygiene". It is used widely by non-governmental organizations and aid agencies in developing countries. The purposes of providing access to WASH services include achievi ...

, who is known as the ruler defeated by Narmer on the

Narmer Palette The Narmer Palette, also known as the Great Hierakonpolis Palette or the Palette of Narmer, is a significant Egyptian archeological find, dating from about the 31st century BC, belonging, at least nominally, to the category of cosmetic palettes. ...

, an opinion later shared by Edwin van den Brink. By contrast,

Toby Wilkinson Toby Alexander Howard Wilkinson, (born 1969) is an English Egyptologist and academic. After studying Egyptology at the University of Cambridge, he was Lady Wallis Budge Research Fellow in Egyptology at Christ's College, Cambridge (1993 to 199 ...

and Jochem Kahl both argue that Hedju Hor was not a pre-dynastic Pharaoh but, rather, a ruler of a small proto-state of the pre-dynastic era and have attributed to him the title ''King''. Hedju Hor also has no known tomb and is not found in the text of the Palermo Stone, which is a stone listing the oldest kings of Ancient Egypt.Hsu, Hsu, Shih-Wei (2010) The Palermo Stone: the Earliest Royal Inscription from Ancient Egypt, Altoriental. Forsch., Akademie Verlag, 37 (2010) 1, 68–89. This makes the claims of both Helck and van den Brink even more unlikely.

References

Predynastic pharaohs Year of birth unknown Year of death unknown {{AncientEgypt-bio-stub