“Towers of Strength and More”: A Thematic Analysis of Royal Titularies in Ancient Egypt

Abstract

In ancient Egypt, kings were believed to have both cosmic and political roles. One of the tools they employed to announce such roles was their royal titularies. This paper conducted a thematic analysis of the titularies of all native ancient Egyptian kings over the seven dynastic periods (from 3150 B.C. to 332 B.C.). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to conduct this thematic analysis of 1,164 titularies embraced by 260 native Egyptian kings in the fields of Onomastics or Egyptology. We examined the linguistic repertoire used in these titularies employing two methods: manual and via Word Counter and Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) program. The analysis yielded three main themes: Relation to the divine, theme of war and conflict, and relation to the land. Findings revealed a marked consistency in the thematic distribution across periods and titulary categories. Findings also showed significant changes in the use of theonyms and toponyms in all periods.

Keywords

• kings’ titularies
• toponyms
• theonyms
• ancient egypt
• thematic analysis