Egyptian Cartouche
Egyptian Cartouche
What exactly is an Egyptian cartouche and what was its purpose?
Cartouche Definition: A cartouche is an oblong, or oval,
magical rope
which was
drawn to contain the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics that spelt out the
name of a King or Queen. The "cartouche" can be found on Egyptian monuments
and papyrus documents and the
magical rope was used to surround the name and protect it.
The Magical
Protection of the Egyptian Cartouche
The survival of the name, or Ren,
was imperative to the Ancient Egyptians as they believed that the person
would live for as long as the name was spoken. A person would be
destroyed if his name was obliterated and great efforts were made to
protect it. The name of the hated heretic Pharaoh, Akhenaten which would
have b been surrounded by a cartouche were hacked out of monuments and
deleted from documents to destroy all memory of this hated king of
Egypt.
History of the Egyptian Cartouche
The use of the cartouche started
during the beginning of the Fourth Dynasty under Pharaoh Sneferu. Before
this period the names of the kings and gods were written in rectangular
frames. The cartouche was known in ancient Egypt as the shenu and is
derived from the Egyptian word 'Sheni' which means to encircle. Although
the cartouche usually contained the name of the Pharaoh occasionally the
name of a god or goddess is also in a cartouche. This was especially the
case for Osiris and Isis in temple hieroglyphic inscriptions. The
cartouche was seen as a powerful protective symbol. In the tomb of the
Pharaoh Tuthmosis III, in the Valley of the Kings, the entire burial
chamber, as well as the sarcophagus, was constructed in the form of a
cartouche. The protective significance of the cartouche symbol was also
used when creating ancient Egyptian jewelry.
The origin of the
word 'Cartouche'
The word 'cartouche' was first
applied to the cartouche symbol by the French soldiers who were part of
the 1798 military campaign led by Napoleon Bonaparte into Egypt. The
French soldiers were aware that Napoleon Bonaparte had given orders that
valuable Ancient Egyptian antiquities should be transferred to Paris and
that the French scholars who accompanied the soldiers were interested in
Egyptian history. The soldiers saw the symbol frequently appearing in
the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs and believed the symbol resembled a gun
cartridge, or bullets - the words gun cartridge was 'cartouche' in the
French language.
Egyptian Cartouche
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