Babylonian Seal in Egypt
According to the Egyptian records, the Hyksos were the ultimate barbarians and their rule in Egypt was a period of unmitigated slaughter and destruction. To a large extent this picture appears to be borne out by archaeology, for many temples were destroyed during the Hyksos period and royal tombs were looted by people who had the leisure to find a way through or past the sophisticated traps and defenses with which they were provided.
If we look beyond the words of the Egyptian claims, however, we gain hints of a different reality. For example, there are in the Cairo Museum two rather odd-looking sphinxes adorned with mane-like beards rather than the normal bandaged object that the Egyptian pharaohs regarded as facial hair. Originally created for one of the Amenemhets, they were usurped by a Hyksos king who went to the trouble of having his name carved on them in hieroglyphs. In other words, instead of destroying them, the Hyksos used them to adorn his palace or act as public confirmation of his right to rule.
Even the story of how the Hyksos were driven out - the tale of the Hyksos king sending a message to Pharaoh Sekenenre in Luxor to complain about the noise of the hippopotami in the river at Luxor - shows a king who not only communicated using the normal diplomatic channels of ambassadors and letters, but who went to some trouble to find a casus belli rather than simply attacking.
The Austrian Archaeological Institute, which has been working at Tel el-Dab'a, the site of ancient Avaris, since 1966 has now turned up evidence that the Hyksos maintained an international diplomatic correspondence. Dr Irene Forstner-Muller, head of the Institute in Egypt, reports that the Austrians have recently discovered a cuneiform tablet which indicated that there were contacts between the Hyksos and Babylon.
The latest discovery, however, is even more interesting, for the Austrians have found a seal from Babylon. The object itself is not all that interesting: we do not recognise the name of the person on it and the picture is simply part of the vast corpus of Babylonian iconography. The point is that if there is a Babylonian seal in Avaris, the Babylonian owner of that seal can't have been far away!
In other words, at least one Babylonian - whether trader or ambassador - came to Avaris, bringing his personal seal with him, and stayed there long enough to die there. (We hope he died of natural causes; unnatural causes would simply confirm Egyptian tales of Hyksos barbarity!)
According to Dr Forstner-Muller, the Austrians are to build a museum at Avaris, funded by the Egyptian government and other sponsors, in which the seal and the other discoveries made at the site can be displayed.
Unfortunately, either the report which I have read of Dr Forstner-Muller's remarks is grossly inaccurate, or the Austrians are about to be expelled from Egypt, for not only did she not lard her comments with fawning flattery of Zahi Hawass, the attention-hungry head of Egypt's Antiquities Authority, but he isn't even mentioned! His usual response to anyone who makes press statements without him is to close them down and expel them, so for the sake of archaeology at Tel ed-Dab'a we have to hope that the journalists involved made the omission rather than Dr forstner-Muller.
© Kendall K. Down 2009
