Piye was an ancient pharaoh to the Kushite Empire, now known as one of the great black pharaohs. Though, as a great Kushite King, he ushered in what was to be known as the Twenty-Fifth Egyptian Dynasty in Africa, racism kept Piye’s depiction as light, and pale in many of his statues and paintings . This was standard for many of the African pharaohs. Piye ruled from 747 BCE to 722 BCE, from a stronghold in Napata, located in Nubia. Today the region is known as Sudan .
Pharaoh Piye came from royalty himself, as the son of Kashta, a king in the Kushite dynasty, and Pabajtma, a Nubian Queen. He was destined to lead as a pharaoh. It is unclear throughout history, but Piye had at least three and as possibly as many as five wives throughout his life . His wife, Abar, mothered his successor, Taharqa. Having had so many wives, he also fathered many children, several of them going on to take places of royalty themselves, however the only one that has been confirmed other than Taharqa is Shebitku, the twenty-third king of Egypt
` During his as pharaoh, Piye took on two titles: Sneferre, and Usimare . Of all the gods his people worshipped, Piye was most devoted to his worship of the god Amun; many Nubian kings before and after Piye were obsessed with Amun, but Piye took on a particularly unhealthy obsessiossion with his worship. A temple to worship the god, the Great Temple of Amun, first constructed under the watchful eye of pharaoh Thutmose III, was completely renovated when Piye took the throne . He enlisted several surrounding stonemasons and sculptors to help give the temple the look and appeal Piye believed was deserving of Amun.
An essential part of being ruler, to Piye, was conquest. Piye found the bickering between Egypt’s various rulers advantageous, and saw it as an opportunity to expand his power beyond Thebes . The leaders of the area responded quickly, beginning with Tefnakht of Sais, who joined the other Kings of the Delta Region in an effort to form an alliance with Piye. An alliance was agreed upon but throughout various military coups, and the fact that Piye was able to invade middle and Lower Egypt has he had planned, it is documented that his conquests allowed him to eventually control Upper Egypt.
It is likely that Piye viewed the conquests and subsequent wars as a venture for the gods. It is documented that he commanded his army to wash themselves ritualistically in the river before each battle. Typical to his feelings toward the god, Piye himself would offer sacrifices before each battle to Amun in hopes of pleasing him, but also in hopes of gaining luck and favor for the upcoming battle. After several battles, and a successful conquest of most of Egypt, Piye marched his troops north toward Herakleopolis, where he received total victory against local troops. His army demolished Memphis, and surrounding cities, gaining further alliance of the resistance kings of the Delta region. Hermopolis, a particularly resistant king who had held out against Piye’s forces and requests for almost seven months by this point, finally fell during this last battle . Other kings, such as Tefnakht, actually showed their submission through letter, having been defeated so egregiously. Despite the crushing blow he had dealt to the surrounding rulers, Piye’s authority only extended so far, and kings in parts of lower Egypt had never felt his defeat; they were still free to do what they wanted. The area remained in Piye’s control until his death. His successor eventually attacked all of lower Egypt later in the year of Piye’s death, gaining control for the Kushite kingdom.
After Piye’s death, he was buried just eastward of his pyramid, located still in what is known today as Sudan . The tomb took years to craft. His body was discovered lying down a handcrafted stone stairway of nineteen steps. They lead up, facing east, as is the custom. The burial chamber was cut directly into the bedrock using traditional tools in the shape of an open trench. Piye’s body was laid on a stone bed constructed in the middle of the chamber, also typical of many tombs in this area. Nearly everything about his tomb and his burial are the same, but one thing is different. He is the first pharaoh who was found in nearly five-hundred years with his favorite four horses buried next to him after he died. The tomb was also filled with later rulers of the same dynasty.
In sum, Piye was a pharaoh in what is known as Sudan. He was a Kushite ruler who took conquest and worship very seriously. Despite the time in which he lived, one might call him “old-school,” as he was the first pharaoh in his area in nearly five-hundred years to have his horses slaughtered upon his death and buried near him. Unfortunately, racism was still latent at the time of his rule, therefore, there are precious few true depictions of Piye. He was a black King, and the few accurate depictions of him show him as a darker skinned individual, while most of history has tried to whitewash him as a light-skinned ruler. If we are to attempt to get the rest of his life’s fact, even the number of his wives, as accurate as possible, we must attempt to understand the shade of his skin, as well.
Works Cited
Hopkins, Peter. Kenana Handbook Of Sudan. London: Routledge, 2014. Print.
O. Collins, Robert and James M. Burns. A History of Sub-Saharan Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Print.
Pischikova, Elena, Julia Budka and Kenneth Griffin. Thebes in the First Millennium BC. Cambridge: Thebes in the First Millennium BC, 2014. Print.
