The high position occupied in ancient Egypt by the mother of the family, the "mistress of the house," is absolutely irreconcilable with the existence either of polygamy as a general practice, or of such an institution as the harîm. The plurality of wives does not appear to have been contrary to law, but it certainly was unusual. A few of the Egyptian kings had a large number of wives, but they appear in this respect to have followed foreign rather than native custom. The use of the word harem in the translation of hieroglyphic texts tends to produce an entirely erroneous conception of ancient Egyptian society. The word itself is harmless; but (to say the least) it confounds Egyptian with utterly foreign ideas, Arabian or Turkish; and when it is used to signify an establishment of concubines, I believe the translator has entirely misunderstood the Egyptian text.[1]
- ↑ Many excellent scholars have used "harem" as the translation of the Egyptian word χent. The most important passage which would justify this rendering is on the tablet of Pa-shere-en-Ptah. It is thus translated in Brugsch's Hieroglyphic Lexicon, p. 1093: "Es waren mir schöne Weiber, doch war ich bereits 43 Jahr alt ohne dass mir ein männliches Kind geboren war." I believe the passage is better understood if taken in connection with the corresponding passage on the tablet of the wife of Pa-shere-en-Ptah (Sharpe, "Egyptian Inscriptions," Vol. I. pl. 4). This lady says of her husband: "I had not borne to him a male child, but daughters only." He therefore means to say: "I had handsome girls, but I was already forty-three years old before a boy was born to me." The German "Frauenzimmer," if put into hieroglyphic orthography, would admit of the very determinative sign which leads to the notion of "shutting up."
