Voices from the Other World

Glossary

al-Arna’uti: In Arabic, “the Albanian”—an allusion to the origins of the then-regnant Muhammad ‘Ali dynasty, installed nominally under the Ottomans as rulers of Egypt in 1805. Much of the Egyptian aristocracy was subsequently of mixed Turkish — Albanian blood. The pasha in “The Mummy Awakens” is most likely based upon Mohamed Mahmoud Bey Khalil (1877–1953), a millionaire Francophile collector of art who was attacked in the Egyptian press in the late 1930s for saying he wanted to will his large private gallery of mainly French paintings to the Louvre. It is now housed in his former mansion in Giza in a museum bearing his name.

Aswan: A city at the Nile’s first cataract in Upper (southern) Egypt. Mahfouz here uses the pharaonic Egyptian name Abu (actually Elephantine Island at Aswan), which was the country’s southernmost outpost on the border with ancient Nubia. The historical Userkaf’s capital was at Mennufer (Memphis) close to present-day Cairo, rather than Aswan, though the royal annals of the Old Kingdom recorded on the Palermo Stone show that he kept a per (house, estate) at Abu. His only known pyramid— quarried into rubble in antiquity — was built near there, in northern Saqqara, rather than at Aswan.

Broad beans: Also called horse beans (and known as ful in Arabic), these are an indispensable part of the Egyptian diet.

Fuad I University: Named for King Ahmad Fuad I (r. 1917–36), who, as a prince, was one of its founders in 1908. The institution was renamed Cairo University after the Free Officers coup of 1952. Naguib Mahfouz earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy there in 1934 (when it was then called the Egyptian University), where he briefly did postgraduate work and served in the school’s administration until 1939. During this time, he occasionally attended lectures in Egyptology, some of which were likely given by Prof. Etienne Marie-Felix Drioton (1889–1961), then head of Egypt’s Department of Antiquities — and a probable model for Prof. Dorian in the story, “The Mummy Awakens.”

‘Id al-adha: The “Feast of Sacrifice,” which commemorates Abraham’s sacrifice of a ram in place of his son Isma‘il, as related in the Qur’an. Muslims celebrate this several-day event (also known as Greater Bairam) by slaughtering animals on the first dawn of the feast, often distributing the meat to the poor.

Ka: In the complex system of pharaonic-era beliefs, when someone died, their ka, or spiritual essence, would come to visit the deceased. The ka brought with it the ba, the dead person’s soul, depicted as a human-headed bird in mortuary reliefs, often sculpted sitting on the mummy. Strictly speaking, it was Hor’s ba, not his ka, that was represented by the sparrow. Yet the ka was generally seen in the ancient religion as the agent for revenge against tomb intruders — which certainly fits “The Mummy Awakens.”

Kameni: A Fourth Dynasty high priest of the early vulture goddess Nekhbet in her temple at al-Kab on the Nile opposite Hierakonpolis in Upper Egypt, ca. 2560 BC.

Khnum: Depicted as a man with the head of a ram, Khnum was the creator-god of Elephantine (ancient Abu at Aswan).

Punt: Hailed as “God’s land” by the ancient Egyptians, Punt was probably located on the Red Sea in eastern Sudan or Ethiopia, or perhaps in northern Somalia. Egyptians apparently began traveling there during the late Fourth Dynasty (ca. 2649–2513 BC).

Qadesh: A city on the Orontes River in present-day Syria that served as a base for the Hittites against their rivals, the Egyptians, especially during the New Kingdom.

Qaqimna: The Arabic name for Kagemni, a famous Sixth Dynasty vizier. The Teaching for Kagemni, a Middle Kingdom text concerned mainly with the rules of gracious conduct, was putatively addressed to Kagemni. The Teaching itself, however, puts Kagemni in the Fourth Dynasty.

Sa‘idi: An Upper Egyptian; the word for the southern part of the country — from which the Nile flows down to the North and the sea — is al-Sa‘id, “the elevated land.” Sa‘idis are commonly seen as physically resembling the ancient Egyptians.

Zahi: Also rendered “Sahi” or “Djahi,” in ancient Egyptian this refers to the area of roughly modern Israel, Palestine, and Syria, plus parts of Iraq on both sides of the Euphrates, in addition to Lebanon (Phoenicia) and Cyprus.