Abstract:
The so-called “'Autobiography' of Ankhtyfy” is one of the most elaborate, original and wellpreserved texts to survive from ancient Egypt's First Intermediate Period. Ankhtyfy is often upheld by scholars as an archetype of the ambitious and largely autonomous nomarchs who seized power in the southernmost nomes of Upper Egypt during the Ninth, Tenth and Eleventh Dynasties. Various translations of Ankhtyfy's text have been produced since its initial publication in Jacques Vandier's Moalla: La Tombe d'Ankhtifi et La Tombe de Sébekhotep in 1950, as well as numerous studies on individual sections of the 'Autobiography.' Yet in spite of this relative abundance of scholarship, fame and widely acknowledged importance, the text as a whole has not been comprehensively reviewed since the editio princeps – aspects of which are now dated. Given that the text continues to be used to provide insight into the often enigmatic First Intermediate Period, this is problematic, as the myriad challenges in working with this di8cult and frequently ambiguous text can only be convincingly addressed through holistic analysis. ⌥erefore, although recently renewed archaeological interest in Ankhtyfy's tomb and the Moalla necropolis will surely generate another complete edition of Ankhtyfy's text in time, the primary purpose of this thesis is to o:er an interim solution by providing fresh translations and detailed commentary of Ankhtyfy's entire 'autobiographical' text. Textual analysis is followed by a discussion of Ankhtyfy's strategies of self-presentation, where his use of epithets, First Intermediate Period topoi and his personal 'mythology' are considered alongside archaeological evidence from Moalla. ⌥is investigation of Ankhtyfy is completed with an excursus on the “Stela of Hetepy,” where the likelihood of Hetepy's contemporaneity with Ankhtyfy is reviewed, along with a new translation and commentary of his own 'autobiographical' text.
