Interested in Knowing More about Prisons in Ancient Egypt?

By: Ali Abu Dashish

CAIRO, Dec. 18 (SEE)- Prisons, in the ancient times, were the places people who broke the law were put, whether these people were civilians, war captives, political dissents, heretics, renegades, etc. In the ancient times, prisons appeared in Egypt, Iraq, Greece, and Rome.

Egyptian archaeologist Hussein Abdel Basir said, "Prisons were referred to in many ancient Egyptian texts. Prophet Joseph's story is the most famous evidence that Egypt had prisons. Joseph stayed few years in jail, and when he was proved innocent, he was honorably released. Here we can see the role of justice to implement rightness and confront injustice."

Jails in ancient Egypt worked on rehabilitation to convert criminals to ethical persons that benefit and can adapt with the Egyptian society, this society that sanctified "Almaat" justice.

Before speaking about the prisons' concept in ancient Egypt, we have to give a brief note about justice that was very important in ancient Egypt. Justice was a non separable element from the society's culture. In the life of an ancient Egyptian, law was essential, bearing in mind that Egypt created law and judicial system. An ancient Egyptian believed that the court's decisions influenced society, people who broke the law should be punished, and that the impacted ones should be supported. So in order to apply justice and law, best men across Egypt were nominated as judges.

Kings in ancient Egypt were responsible of all legal matters, and many times they issued judicial decrees. Minister's category was directly below the Pharaoh's one. Also the minister was responsible of Egypt's administration and its judicial system. The Pharaoh and the minister authorized the local officials to lead the judicial and administrative affairs of the country.

Since the old kingdom of Egypt (2686-2181B.C.) the country was run by a group of educated scribes who passed the tough task of learning to read and write. The writers' class had an important role in favor of Egypt's prosperity. Egypt's law advanced so slowly, till the extent that laws could still be effective for long time.

Because of this wide description of Egypt's administrative structure, we cannot conclude the way with which, in reality, law was practiced. Although there are numerous resources available, no example for codified Egyptian law, before the year 700B.C. has been found yet.

As a result we have to resort to other available documents, such as contracts, court records, and royal decrees. On one hand we do not have these documents in large quantity. On the other side, there are some exceptions encountered at the worker's community at the city's monastery in the modern kingdom. Throughout all centuries, the monastery's residents made many documents that were archived. In these documents there are texts that inform about the workers' daily life. Also these documents helped us to know the judicial system in ancient Egypt.

According to the texts, including the court records, it is difficult to differentiate between the criminal law and other law branches. Criminal law was not clearly identified within the Egyptian judicial system. Nevertheless, there is a way to clearly identify criminal cases in the city's monastery's legal texts. This could be done through evaluating punishments applied in different cases, as punishments differed according to the case.

It seems that, somehow, there were thefts at the city's monastery, as the records include the accusations, investigations, and punishments applied. However, punishments were only financial, as thieves had to give back the articles they had stolen. They had to pay a compensation that reached four times the value of the stolen articles. In case the stolen articles belonged to the state, punishment would be tougher. On the other side, if the stolen articles belonged to the Pharaoh, thieves had to pay from 80 thousand to 100 thousand times the stolen stuff's value, in addition to the physical punishment, including beating, and in rare cases punishment reached death penalty.

When it comes to the Egyptian law in regard to adultery and raping, the city's monastery's judicial texts was not decisive. But surely, both were not acceptable. Many times these behaviors were dealt with through courts. Concerning other behaviors, such as homeopathy and prostitution, it seemed that they were not considered as crimes. Of course, ancient Egyptian society punished sexual assaults. In some cases, it was found that criminals received physical punishment in this regard.

Ancient Egyptians were guided by goddess of justice Maat. Living according to Maat's principals was a collective responsibility. No wonder, the judiciary's integrity enjoyed an exceptional importance. Judges were governmental officials, who represented the Pharaoh in legal and administrative affairs. This is why any unaccepted behavior directly impacted the Pharaoh. Thus, all precautions were used to guarantee the court's integrity, as shown in the monastery's texts.

At the end of Ramses' era, one of the queens and some of the palace's men planned to assistant the king. Many of the royal women, ten of the harem's officials and their wives were involved. The plot was discovered. Such a deep case cannot be resolved by an ordinary legal court, so a special committee, that included fourteen senior officials, was assigned to investigate the crime and punish the criminals.

Cemeteries, especially the ones that belonged to the high class, were the target for thieves. The punishment against royal cemeteries' thefts led to death penalty. Major courts, presided over by the minister, were the entity that judged the cases of royal cemeteries' thefts.

Although our information about jails in ancient Egypt is little, according to what we discovered, in ancient Egypt the following aspects were effective: justice principals, the citizens' right to feel secure, and punishments for criminals. As previously mentioned, there had to be a place for criminals, for the society's sake, until they would convert to an ethical person. In other words, a criminal's liberty was restricted, for them to be educated.

So ancient Egypt had prisons and they were important to the society. The word "prison" was known in Hieroglyphic as "Eith" and "Khnrt". "Khnry" meant prisoner. The big prison in Thebes was called "Khnrt Wr", coming from the verb "Knr" that means imprison.

In the famous story about Cheops and the magicians, Cheops asked a magician, called Gdy, if he could combine a dead human being's head that had been separated from his body, by his magic. Gdy said "Yes I can." Cheops then brought one of the prisoners. However, Gdy said, "Not upon a man." A goose was brought and after Gdy's talisman, all were surprised when the goose's head was separated from its body. The head was flying to ceiling. Afterwards the head returned to the body as if nothing happened. From this story we can conclude that prisons were present on ancient Egypt since the old kingdom.

Also in Mry Ka Raa's doctrine, he mentioned "do not kill, this is not going to benefit you, and you are going to be punished by beating or be put in prison."

In addition, Al Lahoun prison is one of the most famous prisons in ancient Egypt. There, a list with some prisoners' names was encountered.

During the Ramses III's era, some women were accused of theft and they were imprisoned in Thebes. At a late era, it was mentioned that people resorted to the pine justice at the big temple only, that was named The Justice's Gate, and was described in texts as "The place where the whispers of oppressed people were being heard, where weak and strong persons were being treated equally, where justice was applied, and injustice did not have place."

In a papyrus, this sentence was found "The prisoners are at the city in the temple," it is translated also as "The prisoners are at the city and the temple." Although there is nothing clear about the prisons' presence at Memphis' temples, their presence was logic bearing on mind the priests' role at these temples. Priests were considered judges of justice. Some signs referred that major temples included attached prisons.

To sum up, ancient Egypt created the great human value of educating criminals through keeping them in jail, to apply justice's principal and benefit society.

Translator: Maydaa Abo El-Nadar