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Mennefer's District of
The Royal Palace
Situated in the first capital of a united Egypt, the palace of Mennefer would have been a place of great importance, not only as the royal residence and seat of government, but also as a monument to the unifying of the two great kingdoms of the land. The palace would have been alternately known as the “Great House” (Per’aa) or simply “The Residence”, both names belying the importance of the palace to the government administration and the running of the country. It would have housed the royal family, offices of the government officials and played the stage to receiving courtiers and international diplomats.
Manetho tells us that the successor of Menes, Athothis (Djer), was the builder of the earliest palace at Mennefer and while nothing remains of this first structure, one can hazard a guess to its layout. Constructed out of mudbrick, it would have contained the living rooms of the royal family, a throne room for royal audiences and perhaps off to the side or connected by a portico, offices for the officials necessary to the government administration. The one certainty is that the exterior of the palace would have presented a niched façade – the same façade depicted in the serekhs of the early Egyptian kings.
![menneferpalaceofmerneptah[1].gif](http://www.ancientworlds.net/aworlds_media/ibase_1/00/09/22/00092209_000.gif)
Throughout the dynasties the original palace of Mennefer would have been expanded to accommodate the needs of the current Pharaoh and eventually replaced by newer structures built upon the foundations of the older palace. At least during the time of Pharaoh Snefru of the Old Kingdom we know the palace had two frontal gates corresponding to the two ancient kingdoms of Upper and Lower Egypt. Each gate was given a name to indicate which kingdom it belonged to and during Snefru’s reign we find the two gates named “Exalted is the White Crown of Snefru upon the Southern Gate” and “Exalted is the Red Crown of Snefru upon the Northern Gate”. For this reason, the façade of the palace was given the name “double front” and when writing the word “palace” a scribe would frequently place the sign of two houses after it.
Later palaces built in Mennefer include one constructed by the Pharaoh Merneptah of the 19th Dynasty and during excavations by the University of Philadelphia a finely appointed throne room was found, giving evidence to the lavish construction used when building these important residences. Decoration was not strictly confined to the throne rooms or to the private royal rooms, but was found throughout the palace. It is possible that had one walked through a newly constructed palace one would find floors painted to represent pools with plants or waterbirds and ceilings patterned with spirals and interweaving designs. When Apries, of the 26th Dynasty, built his palace at Mennefer, he constructed it upon the remnants of former palaces which raised the palace’s foundations 70 feet above the ground level. W.M. Flinders Petrie, from his excavations of Apries’ palace, estimated the walls of the great court were approximately 47 ½ feet high and the portico may have been even higher. One can only imagine the impact the palace had on visitors and those approaching the city – with its foundation height and high walls it would have towered over the city and been visible for many miles.
Unfortunately not much remains of any of the grand royal residences built at Mennefer – Apries’ towering structure itself was reduced to sections of mudbrick walls used in the foundation and broken portions of columns. Most of the ancient city of Mennefer was razed when Cairo was founded and its palaces and temples dismantled to supply building material for the new city. But if you were to look close enough, one would find the remnants of the lavish palaces built to house the Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt and with a little imagination, you could find yourself walking down the finely appointed corridors filled with people rushing to and fro, some seeing to the comfort of the royal family, others seeing to the administration of the government and others visiting from far off lands.
Sources:
The Egyptians – Barbara Watterson
Memphis: The City of the White Wall – Marion T. Dimick
A History of Egypt – James Henry Breasted
Ancient Egypt – General Editor: David P. Silverman
Cultural Atlas of Ancient Egypt –
Nekhenyheru Aha
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