Ramesses XI

Accession date

Ramesses XI is usually assigned an accession date of III shemu 20 (third month of the Summer season, day 20) However, a later Twentieth Dynasty papyrus fragment from Deir el-Medina published in 2023 by the Egyptologist Robert J. Demarée refers to a partial date of Year 4, III month of Akhet together with a change to Year 1, IV month of Akhet. Although both kings are unnamed, the papyrus is strongly suggested by Demarée to refer to the reigns of Ramesses X and his successor Ramesses XI. If confirmed, this would mean that Ramesses XI actually had his accession date between the III and IV month of Akhet rather than III Shemu 20 as has been assumed.

Demarée stresses in his 2023 study that the sources which support an accession date of III Shemu day 20 for Ramesses XI are hardly conclusive:

The two key documents quoted are P. Turin Cat. 1888 + Cat. 2095 and P. Ashmolean Museum 1945.96, the Adoption Papyrus. The first is a journal text from the reign of Ramesses XI containing a series of dates spread over several months, with only one full date: Year 18 IV Šmw Day 14 or 24. Considering this as certain indication of a recent year change is speculation and beyond proof. The second document is the famous Adoption Papyrus, P. Ashmolean Museum 1945.96. In the words of its first editor, Alan Gardiner, the opening lines of this document record, on III Šmw Day 20, a visit by Ramesses XI to the Temple of Karnak to announce his accession to the god Amun, followed by an offering to this deity. The text clearly only speaks of informing the god Amun of the accession of the king – sr.t xa n nTr pn Sps n Imn. Contrary to the opinion of the scholars who first posited III Šmw Day 20 as the coronation date, the accession of the king did not take place on that day at Karnak. This ceremony certainly had already taken place earlier either in the [Royal] Delta residence or at Memphis, and as usual the king later had to pay visits to other state gods to inform them of his accession.

The wḥm-mswt ("Renaissance") era

Ramesses XI's reign is notable for a large number of important papyri that have been discovered, including the Adoption Papyrus, which mentions regnal years 1 and 18 of his reign; Pap. B.M. 10052, Pap. Mayer A, Pap. B.M. 10403 and Pap. B.M. 10383 (the last four containing the accounts of tomb-robbery trials conducted during the first two years of the wḥm-mswt); Pap. Ambras (containing a list of documents which were repurchased in year 6 of the wḥm-mswt, after having been stolen from some temple archive, most probably during the chaotic period of the suppression of the High Priest of Amun Amenhotep); the Turin Taxation Papyrus, of an unspecified year 12; Pap. B.M. 10068, which includes on its verso two lists, called the House-list (from an unspecified year 12) and the Srmt-list (undated, but slightly later than the Houselist); Pap. B.M. 9997, of an unspecified year 14 and 15; and an entire series of Late Ramesside Letters written by -among others- the scribes of the Necropolis Dhutmose, Butehamun, and the High Priest Piankh. Late Ramesside Letter no. 9 establishes that the wḥm-mswt period lasted into a 10th year (which more or less equates year 28 proper of Ramesses XI).

Pinehesy was subsequently designated as an enemy in several papyri from year 1 and 2 of the wḥm-mswt (equaling year 19 and 20 proper of Ramesses XI) where his name was consistently associated "by the nḏs [or] ('bad') bird as its determinative" in these papyri.

How exactly the anarchic period of the Suppression was ended and who ultimately forced Pinehesy out of Thebes is unknown, due to a lack of explicit sources. However, it seems that Pinehesy retreated to Nubia and succeeded in maintaining some sort of powerbase there for over a decade. In year 10 of the wḥm-mswt the then general and High Priest Piankh goes on an expedition to Nubia to "meet Pinehesy". Although it is often postulated that it was the aim of this campaign to fight the former Viceroy, this is by no means certain. The sources are actually ambiguous on this point and the political climate may well have changed over the years. There is some evidence that at this time Piankh may no longer have been a loyal servant of Ramesses XI, which allows for the possibility that he was secretly negotiating with Pinehesy, possibly even plotting against the reigning king. Edward Wente wrote: "One has the impression that the viceroy and his Nubian troops were loyalists, for the remarks made by his opponent Piankh in letter No. 301 are quite disparaging of the pharaoh, Ramesses XI." In this letter, better known as LRL no. 21, Piankh remarks:

As for Pharaoh, l.p.h., how shall he reach this land? And of whom is Pharaoh, l.p.h., superior still?

In the same letter and two others (LRL no. 34 and no. 35) Piankh gives the order to the Scribe of the Necropolis Tjaroy (=Dhutmose), the lady Nodjmet and a certain Payshuuben to secretly arrest and question two Medjay policemen about certain things they had apparently said:

If they find out that (it is) true, you shall place them (in) two baskets and (they) shall be thrown (into) this water by night. But do not let anybody in the land find out.

Whereas Piankh would probably have had the authority to have people executed, it is noteworthy that his correspondents are explicitly urged to keep the matter secret. It has been argued that, given Piankh's supreme position at the time, the secrecy can only have concerned the king. If this is correct, it follows that the political situation of the time must have been very complex, with Piankh possibly acting on some hidden agenda. Unfortunately, due to the very limited nature of the sources, the exact relationships between the three main protagonists, Piankh, Pinehesy and Ramesses XI remain far from clear. Some scholars believe that the Nubian campaign was part of an ongoing power struggle between the High Priest of Amun and the Viceroy of Kush However, it is equally possible that Piankh came to the rescue of Pinehesy against some common enemy. The verb often translated as "to attack (Pinehesy)" only means "to meet/ to go to". In fact, neither the aim of the expedition nor its outcome are beyond doubt. The issue is further complicated by the ongoing debate about [1] the order of High Priests (either Herihor before Piankh or Piankh before Herihor) and [2] the correct ascription (either to the pre-Renaissance period or to the wḥm-mswt itself) of several documents from the reign of Ramesses XI.

At present, Ad Thijs' suggestion that Pinehesy was apparently rehabilitated by Ramesses XI in year 11 or 12 of the wḥm-mswt has only been explicitly accepted by the Egyptologist Aidan Dodson.

Length of reign

Neither the length of the Renaissance nor the ascription of certain documents from the reign of Ramesses XI are beyond dispute. At present, Thijs' proposal that Papyrus BM 10054 dates to the wḥm-mswt has been confirmed by other scholars such as Jürgen von Beckerath and Annie Gasse, who studied several newly discovered fragments belonging to this document. Consequently, it would appear that Ramesses XI's highest undisputed date is presently Year 11 of the wḥm-mswt (or Year 29 proper) of his reign, when Piankh's Nubian campaign terminated which means that the pharaoh had a minimum reign of 29 years when he died—-which can perhaps be extended to 30 years due to the "gap between the beginning of Dynasty 21 and the reign of Ramesses XI," with 33 years being hypothetical. Krauss and Warburton specifically write that due to the existence of this time gap,

Egyptologists generally concede that his reign could have ended 1 or 2 years later than year 10 of the wḥm-mswt era = regnal year 28.

Aidan Dodson, however, allows for a 'year 15' of the wḥm-mswt on the basis of P. BM 9997.

Either during the reign of Ramesses XI or shortly afterwards, the workmen village of Deir El Medina was abandoned, apparently because the Royal Necropolis was shifted northward to Tanis and there was no further need for their services at Thebes.

Late New Kingdom chronology of Ramesses XI

The conventional Egyptian chronology view is that Ramesses XI had an independent reign of between 29 and 30 or 33 full years between Ramesses X and Smendes. Thijs' separate proposal that the first 17 years of Ramesses XI's reign were entirely contemporary with the reigns of Ramesses IX (Years 5-19) and Ramesses X (Years 1-3) is not currently accepted by most Egyptologists except Aidan Dodson in his 2012 book Afterglow of Empire.

Tomb

Ramesses XI died under unknown circumstances. While he had a tomb prepared for himself in the Valley of the Kings (KV4), it was left unfinished and only partly decorated since Ramesses XI instead arranged to have himself buried away from Thebes, possibly near Memphis or in Pi-Ramesses. This pharaoh's tomb, however, includes some unusual features, including four rectangular, rather than square, pillars in its burial chamber and an extremely deep central burial shaft– at over 30 feet or 10 metres long– which was perhaps designed as an additional security device to prevent tomb robbery. During the 21st dynasty, under the reign of the High Priest of Thebes, Pinedjem I, Ramesses XI's tomb was used as a workshop for processing funerary materials from the burials of Hatshepsut, Thutmose III and perhaps Thutmose I. Ramesses XI's tomb has stood open since antiquity and was used as a dwelling by the Copts.

Succession

Most Egyptologists assume that Ramesses XI was succeeded on the throne by Smendes, as the first Lower Egyptian king of the Twenty-first Dynasty. However, the now widely accepted reversal of the previous order of the High Priests of Amun Herihor–Piankh by Karl Jansen-Winkeln has created the problem of a likely unidentified king reigning between Ramesses XI and Smendes, neither of whom can be unproblematically identified as the monarch in whose regnal Years 5 and 6 are attested activities of the High Priest Herihor. Ad Thijs attempted to address the problem by splitting the High Priest and subsequently King Pinedjem I into two persons and identifying King Pinedjem with the unnamed monarch, Rolf Krauss proposed that the reign intervening between those of Ramesses XI and Smendes belonged to Herihor himself, while Ian Mladjov proposed identifying the unnamed monarch with an unplaced king, Usermaatre-heqawast Rameses-mereramun, as Ramesses XII. The splitting up of the High Priest and later King Pinedjem into two distinct individuals is considered implausible, Krauss' solution, otherwise plausible, allows the paradox of Herihor using his own regnal years without claiming a royal title, while Mladjov's solution probably requires assuming a temporary interruption of work under the High Priest Herihor at the Temple of Khonsu, resuming only after he became king following the postulated Ramesses XII. Whatever the precise circumstances, Herihor and Smendes eventually assumed the kingship, founding the Twenty-first Dynasty, with its new royal capital at Tanis, while Middle and Upper Egypt, effectively passed into the hands of the High Priests of Amun at Thebes.