This article is taken from the Figaro Hors-Série: Ramsès II, the event exhibition at the Grande Halle de la Villette. We believed in the slow decline of a world, when it was that of a dynasty. Neglecting to maintain the Asian possessions of the kingdom, Akhenaten had weakened the empire. His solar cult, imposed to the exclusion of the traditional gods, had revolted the high priests of Thebes. Tutankhamun, his successor, had reigned without glory. He left at his death an Egypt threatened from the outside by the ambitions of Hatti, the kingdom of the Hittites in central Anatolia, and from the inside by the prevarications of royal officials and the tenacious hostility of the powerful clergy of Amun. The golden age of the Eighteenth Dynasty, under Amenhotep III, seemed a long way off. No doubt we were talking about decadence. The times demanded an energetic soul, a strong man, more concerned with politics than with mysticism, capable at last of reforming the empire. This was Horemheb, general-in-chief of the armies of Tutankhamun; a cunning, ambitious man, who knew how to put order in the administration, but he had no descendants. When he died in 1295 BC, a little five-year-old redhead was there attending the funeral. He bears the name of his grandfather, vizier promoted heir to the kingdom by Horemheb. This grandfather is called Ramessou, first of the name. As for this grandson, he will later be called Ramses the Great. A destiny has just been born at the same time as a dynasty.
Where are these Ramses from? Are they of noble stock to claim the double crown? Not at all. We know that the first of the Ramessids was the son of a certain Seti, a native of the eastern marches of the empire, chief of the king’s archers. A soldier, therefore, father, grandfather, great-grandfather of soldiers, because Ramses I, Seti I and Ramses II, who will successively lead Egypt, will all be warrior kings. Valor alone distinguished this simple commander of the troops, Pa-Ramessou, future Ramses I, whose article Pa, which he later blew up, showed modest origins. Thus the childhood of the second of the Ramesses bathed in the story of conquests and campaigns. He is told of the seventeen expeditions of Thutmose in Asia, a heroic and not so distant period when the empire had ventured beyond the Orontes. He already knows that Amurru, Phenicia, Galilee, always disputed, give the keys of the power in Asia. The family is established in Memphis, at the junction of Upper and Lower Egypt. This royal capital is also a garrison town. Pharaoh’s grandson is surrounded by soldiers. He assimilates the discipline and acquires a taste for glory. He sees his father, Prince Seti, leave to subdue the rebellious people of the Fenkhou and return triumphant. He is not ten years old and is burning to show his worth. The time is to reconquer. We want to reconnect with the most glorious past of Egypt. Because it is not the rupture that the new dynasty promotes, but continuity. The titulature of the first of the Ramses bears witness to this. Among the five canonical names that Ramses I chose for himself on ascending the throne, two evoke King Ahmose, who had inaugurated the New Kingdom by driving out the Hyksos – these Semitic sovereigns whom imperial propaganda presented as usurpers. The ambition is clear: to restore order and justice to the land of Re.
The future Ramses II grew up in a climate of enthusiasm and confidence, in the midst of the Renaissance (ouhem mésout). The word here is not an anachronism. He returns several times in history to underline the desire to restore the balance of the country after a period of political or religious instability. Moreover, an exceptional phenomenon had taken place at the beginning of the reign of Horemheb, which justified all the hopes: the civil calendar had aligned itself with the solar calendar. An administrative year had three hundred and sixty-five days, while the solar year had three hundred and sixty-five and a quarter. The calendar was therefore delayed by six hours, and “lost” a day every four years. It took 1,460 years for the two cycles to coincide. This moment of balance where human time was in tune with the cosmos was welcomed as a renewal. No doubt the opening of a new cycle was seen as an omen: the Nineteenth Dynasty had the favor of the gods. Seti I, father of the young Ramses, knew how to play on this momentum. It was the “beginning of eternity”. With the Ramessides, a new era began.
Ramses II, the event exhibition at the Grande Halle de la Villette, 164 pages, €13.90, available on newsstands and on Le Figaro Store.
