Newberry, Percy E. : Beni Hasan (Band 2) (London, 1893)

20 BENI HASAN.

there is an inscription which enables us to
determine its site. It is the prayer of
a " confidential friend of the king," Khncm-
hotep, for "a good burial in Hebnu, as a
devoted servant of Horus within Hebnu." 1
This shows that the town could not have
been far distant, and we may identify it
either with the present village of Sawadeh
at the foot of the hill in which the tomb
containing the inscription has been cut, or
perhaps see the actual remains of it on the
edge of the desert half a mile south of the
tombs, at Kom el-Ahmar, where there are
important mounds and a fragment of a
column of Amenhotep III.
Heeur. Another town frequently mentioned in the
inscriptions at Beni Hasan, and one which it
is still possible to locate, is that named

<§> ^* © Herur. It contained a famous

temple dedicated to Khnem2 and another to
his consort the goddess Heqt. There can be
little doubt that the ancient name still
survives in the Arabic Hur, a village
built upon a high mound four miles to the
south-west of the modern Beni Hasan.
Speos The Set-vallev ( ^ V in which the

Artemi- * \ fN^l /

D0S- goddess Pakht was worshipped, is noticed in
two of the tombs, and was probably the

1 Tho inscription has been published by Lepsius in his
Dcnkmaler, Abth. ii., Ill, e, and runs:—

2 Khnem is often called

^ □

"Lord of Herur"

(vide PI. v.), and his consort ^ ^ ^
" Heqt of Herur " (vide PI. xv.).

3 In Tomb No. 3, the name is spelt out ^ with the
phonetic determinatives of an animal and a knife, and
the ideographic determinative of a hill or valley. Vide
Beni Hasan, Part L, PI. xxiv., Southern Architrave.

valley behind Beni Hasan, containing the
celebrated cave-temple dedicated to Pakht,
and called by the Bomans the Speos
Artemidos.4 It is known to the Arabs of
the present day by the name of Stabl
An tar.

Neferus (J ^> P ©) was also within Nei-erus.

the Oryx province, and was from an early
period of considerable local importance. It
contained as far back as the Vlth Dynasty
a temple dedicated to Hathor,6 and is men-
tioned in connection with her worship down
to Ptolemaic times.8 Maspero supposes 7 that
the modern |.JuJi>\ Atlidem is built upon its
ruins, but the only direct evidence that we
have of its position is contained in an
inscription in a tomb at Kom el-Ahmar,
which indicates that it was to the south of
that point. The inscription in question is
contained in a single vertical line of
hieroglyphs, and is explanatory of a picture
of a vessel in full sail going southward.8
Threads, e p f w $ « & «=, |J)

<5 <===> ^ P ® " Sailing southward to the
festival of the goddess Hathor, Lady of
Neferus." This southward voyage must
have started from Kom cl-Ahmar.

Two other localities connected with the Aryt,Ac
worship of Hathor are mentioned in the

inscriptions. These are Aryt/ and

^J^©1 "The island of Bu(?)." Brugsch2
would identify the former with Alyi of the

1 Itin. Anton., 167; and cp. Brugsch, Geogr. Inschr,,
line 224.

6 Vide Wilkinson's Popular Account of the Ancient
Egyptians, vol. i., p. 414.

6 Brugsch's Diet. Oeogr., p. 340.

7 Proc. S.B.A., vol. xiii., pp. 515-517.

8 It has been published by Wilkinson in his Popular
Account of the Ancient Egyptians, vol. i., p. 414.

9 Vide Beni Hasan, Part L, PI. xvii., &c.

1 L.c, p. 85.

2 Diet. Oeogr., p. 130.