Jürgen von Beckerath: Encyclopedia - Jürgen von Beckerath

Jürgen von Beckerath

Jürgen von Beckerath (born 19 February 1920) is a prominent German Egyptologist. He is a prolific writer who has published countless articles in journals such as Orientalia, Göttinger Miszellen (GM), Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt (JARCE), Archiv für Orientforschung (AfO) and Studien Zur Altägyptischen Kultur (SAK) among others. Together with Kenneth Kitchen, he is viewed as one of the foremost scholars on the New Kingdom and the Third Intermediate Period of Egypt.

His many popular German language publications include Handbuch der Ägyptischen Königsnamen, 2nd edition (Mainz, 1999) and Chronologie des Pharaonischen Ägypten or "Chronology of the Egyptian Pharaohs," MÄS 46 (Philip von Zabern, Mainz: 1997), which is regarded by academics as one of the best and most comprehensive books on the Chronology of Ancient Egypt and the reigns of its various Pharaohs. In 1953, he personally inspected and recorded the Nile Quay Texts at Karnak before they were permanently lost or damaged through erosion.

Throughout his academic career, Beckerath has maintained a high academic standard in his work and dispelled many previously held assumptions or beliefs by meticulously analyzing the evidence. For instance, in a GM 154 (1996) paper, he examined and published a privately owned and poorly known stela, which dated to Year 22 of Osorkon II's reign and has frequently been called a Jubilee stela by academics(GM 154, pp.19). Beckerath revealed, however, that this document did not mention any Sed festival or Jubilee celebrations for Osorkon II in this Year as one would have expected if he had indeed celebrated his massive Jubilee Feast at this time. Instead, Beckerath demonstrated that the stela's text simple read as: Regnal Year 22 under the Majesty of the King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Usermaatre Setepenamun(ie: Osorkon II), son of Re, the Appearance of the beloved Osorkon Meryamun in the presence of the deities Osiris, Horus and Isis.(GM 154, p.20). Osorkon II is shown being blessed by these Gods in the stela. In other words, the document is just a perfectly ordinary stela depicting the king before these trinity of Gods. Beckerath aptly notes that this new evidence casts serious doubt upon the idea that the damaged Sed Jubilee date in Osorkon II's Bubastis Festival Hall should be read as Year 22, rather than Year 30 of this Pharaoh's reign(the latter reading is possible with some restoration of the damaged numeral) as Edward Wente noted in his 1976 JNES review of Kitchen's TIPE book. Beckerath's analysis thus undermined the conventional view that this king celebrated his Sed Jubilee in his 22nd Year and suggests that Osorkon II likely celebrated his first Jubilee Feast in his 30th Year instead. Traditionally, in Egypt, Sed Jubilee Feasts were held on the 30th Year of a king's reign as is evidenced by the practices of other 22nd Dynasty kings such as Osorkon I, Shoshenq III and Shoshenq V.

Bibliography:

• Jürgen von Beckerath, 'Die Angebliche Jubiläums-Stele Osorkons II', GM 154(1996), pp.19-22.
• Edward Wente, Review of K.A. Kitchen's 'The Third Intermediate Period in Egypt c.1100-650 BC,' JNES 35(1976), pp.275-278

Categories: 1920 births | Egyptologists | German scholars

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