Thursday, August 11, 2022

The Scorpion King

The Old European Culture blog makes a pretty convincing argument that the hieroglyphics used to assign the name "Scorpion King" to an ancient Egyptian pharaoh who unified lower Egypt and upper Egypt into a single kingdom were misinterpreted. 

He argues convincingly that these writings are actually symbolize the sowing season in Egypt which coincides the hibernation of scorpions in the Nile River region around December of each year. 

5 comments:

Mark B. said...

O.E.C makes a convincing argument that EVERYTHING is a sowing season marker. I have no idea how much of it holds up, but I get nervous when one thing seems to explain everything. If all his musings hold up, he should go down in history as the modern day Champollion.

Mitchell said...

The Scorpion King will be back... in several straight-to-video sequels.

andrew said...

@Mark B.

I've had essentially the same thought. But, I do lean towards him going down in history. I think his approach deserves to be a leading one in anthropology interpretation of old symbols and that he is on to a mode of symbolic interpretation that was lost somewhere along the way, perhaps in the late Roman suppression of paganism.

Tom Bridgeland said...

Right or wrong, he is always an interesting read.

DDeden said...

After reading the usual (mis)interpretations, OEC reveals the others as wild-ass guesses. Nobody does it better. For years, I wondered what's up with all these freaking chimeras. Now I know, thanks to OEC blog.