The last two lessons revisited a monument that has been well known in Egyptology for over one hundred and twenty years: the Panéhemisé sarcophagus in Vienna. After an overview of the monument's contents, an attempt was made to interpret some of its parts.
The dating of the sarcophagus is uncertain, but it seems most likely that it dates from the early Lagid period. Panéhemisé was a prophet of Amon-Rê and of various numina in a place called Chénâ. This toponym is to be located in Naucratis or its immediate vicinity, in the province of Occident, the third in the canonical list of Lower Egyptian provinces.
The decoration of the sarcophagus is characterized by the large number of guardian-gods. On the right-hand side of the lid, in 17 registers, there is a parade of 34 guardian gods, and the same applies to the left, making a group of 68 gods. To date, no parallel to this group has been published, and for many of these gods, the Panéhemisé sarcophagus constitutes the only attestation, in all Egyptian literature, of their names. Perhaps this phenomenon can be partly explained by Panéhemisé's Naucratite origin. In fact, only three similar cases are recorded. On the sarcophagus of a certain Horemheb preserved in the Cairo Museum, we find a text that parallels a long inscription on the Panéhemisé sarcophagus. At the beginning of the 21st century, these large groups of guardian gods are still relatively little studied, with the sole exception of the 77 gods of Pharbaïthos, for which there are studies by Jean-Claude Goyon and Sylvie Cauville. As for the protector gods on the great sarcophagi of the late period, a considerable number of which have long been published, notably those in the Cairo Museum, there are virtually no in-depth studies, with a few rare exceptions. Apparently, the short notes that generally accompany these gods, which are sometimes bizarre or strange in appearance, have not aroused the interest of researchers. However, these inscriptions do contain a relatively large mass of information on the life of the deceased in the afterlife, even if this is in somewhat fragmentary form. In fact, these 68 brief inscriptions should be treated as a single text comprising 68 paragraphs, which makes for an appreciable whole, all the more so as it is extremely well preserved.
