Dedi

This article is about the ctional magician. For the month of the schemu-season[9] and travels to Djedrobotic probe studying the pyramids, see Djedi Project. Sneferu. He nds Dedi and invites the old man to the
For the Orthodox Jewish singer, see Dedi Graucher.
kings palace with the words: Your condition is equal
to someone who lives from aging and to someone who
sleeps until dawn, free of illness and wheezing. For ag[3]
[4]
Dedi (also Djedi or Djedi of Djed-Sneferu ) is the
name of a ctional ancient Egyptian magician appear- ing is the time of dying, the time of the preparing the
burial and the time of being buried. This is the quesing in the fourth chapter of a story told in the legendary
Westcar Papyrus. He is said to have worked wonders dur- tioning about the condition of a noble man. I have come
to summon you in order of my father, justied, that you
ing the reign of king (pharaoh) Khufu (4th Dynasty).
may eat from the delicacies my father gives, the food of
his followers. And then he may guide you to the ancestors
which are in the necropolis now.[3] Dedi replies: Wel1 Literary person
come, welcome, Djedefhor, son of the king, beloved of
his father! May you be praised by your father, Khufu the
Dedi appears only in the fourth story of the Westcar Pa- justied. May he let your place be at the front of all timepyrus - there is no archeological or historical evidence that honored ones. May thine Ka successfully champion all
he existed. Nevertheless he is an object of great interest things against any enemy. May thine Ba know the ways
[3]
for historians and Egyptologists, since his magic tricks that lead to the gateway of the mummied deceased.
are connected to later cultural perceptions of the person- Djedefhor brings Dedi to the harbor and makes a boat
ality of king Khufu. Dedi is described as a commoner prepared for traveling. The old man promises to follow
of extraordinary age, endowed with magical powers and Djedefhor, on the condition that he may bring his books
and scholars with him. Djedefhor accepts, and both men
talented in making prophecies.[3][5][6]
travel to Khufus royal palace.

Djedefhor enters the palace and goes immediately to his

father, king Khufu. The prince says: May thy majesty
live, be blessed and being prosperous! I have brought
Dedi to you![3] Khufu replies: Go and bring him to
me![3] Then Khufu takes place in the royal audiencehall. The Pharaoh receives Dedi with the words: What
is it, Dedi, this denying to have seen you ever before?[3]
Dedi answers: Oh sovereign, my lord! Only the one who
is summoned is one who will come. I was summoned,
and now see, oh sovereign, my lord, I have come.[3]
The pharaoh continues: Is it true, this talk-about that
you could mend a severed head?[3] Dedi says: Yes, oh
sovereign, my lord. May you live, be blessed and prosperous. I know how to do that.[3] Khufu replies: May
a prisoner, who is jailed, be brought to me, so that his
execution may be enforced..[3] Dedi refuses with the
words: Not to make a human suer, oh sovereign, my
lord! May you live, be blessed and prosperous. You see,
it was never allowed to do something like that on the noble ock.[10] Dedi chooses three animals instead - rst
a goose. He decapitates the goose and places her head
at the eastern side of the audience hall, the body at the
western side. Then Dedi utters a secret spell and the head
of the goose stands up, starting to waddle. Then the body
of the goose stands up and waddles, too. Both body-parts
move into equal directions, then melt together. The resurrected goose now leaves the hall cackling. The same

The wonder of Dedi

According to the Westcar Papyrus, prince Djedefhor

brings up the story of Dedi. He stands before his father,
king Khufu, and says: There is only speaking of miracles
which happened a long time ago, something known by
past generations only. Truth and falsehood cannot be distinguished here. But there is someone under thy majestys
own lifetime who is not known, someone who is able to
make a ignoramus become wise.[3] Khufu asks: Whats
the meaning of this, Djedefhor, my son?[3] Djedefhor
answers: Theres a commoner named Dedi, living in
Djed-Sneferu. Hes a simple citizen, but 110 years old,
eats 500 loaves of bread, a shoulder of beef and drinks
100 jars of beer every day. He is capable of resurrecting decapitated beings. He is also said to be able to make
wild lions so obedient that the animal would follow him
with a cord dragging on the ground. Furthermore, this
Dedi has knowledge of the number of Iput [7] in the wenetsanctuary of Thoth.[3] The pharaoh spent a good deal
of time to seek for these chambers, for he planned to
build something similar to his horizon.[8] And Khufu orders: You thyself, Djedefhor, my son, may bring him to
me![3]
And so Djedefhor arranges his journey during the rst
1

performance is done with an undened water bird[11] and

a bull. Both animals are brought successfully back to life,
too. Now the king says: It is said that you know the number of Iput inside the wenet-sanctuary of Thoth. Now?[3]
Dedi replies: May you be praised, oh sovereign, my lord!
I don't know their number. But I know where they can
be found.[3] Khufu asks: Where is it? Dedi answers:
There is a box of scrolls, made of int, which is stored
in a room called archive at Heliopolis.[3] The king orders: Take that box![3] Dedi replies: May your highness be prosperous and blessed, I'm not the one who can
bring it to you.[3] Khufu asks: Who may be the one
who could bring it to me?[3] Dedi answers: The eldest of the three children in the womb of Rededjet, he
will bring it to you.[3] The king says: I really wish all
these things you say. Who is it, this Rededjet?[3] Dedi
replies: Its the wife of a wab-priest of the god Ra, lord
of Sachebu. The god has adumbrated, that the eldest of
the three shall worship as a high priest of Heliopolis over
the whole realm.[3] The kings mood becomes grim after
this. Dedi asks: What is that heart of thine, oh sovereign,
my lord, becoming so sad! Is it because of the children I
have adumbrated? First your son, then his son and then
one of them.[3] Khufu replies: When will this Rededjet give birth?[3] Dedi says: It will happen during the
rst month of the peret-season,[12] on the fteenth day.[3]
Khufu becomes indignant: But its when the canal-oftwo-Mugilidae[13] is cut o!? I would even work with my
very own hands to enter them! And then I will visit that
temple of Ra, lord of Sachebu.[3] And Dedi says: Then I
will make the waters at the fordable spots of the canal-oftwo-Mugilidae become four cubits in height for you.[3]
Khufu stands up and orders: Have Dedi assigned to a
place within the palace of my son Djedefhor where he
shall live from now on. His daily gainings be 1000 loaves
of bread, 100 jars of beer, one neat and 100 bundles of
eld garlic.[3] And all things are done as ordered.[3][5][14]

Modern analysis

Historians and Egyptologists such as Adolf Erman and

Kurt Heinrich Sethe once thought the tales of Westcar
Papyrus were mere folklore. Magical tricks that show
animals being decapitated and their heads being replaced
were performed as recently as a few decades ago, though
today they are rarely shown because of aesthetical and
ethical misgivings.[14][15]
Modern Egyptologists like Verena Lepper and Miriam
Lichtheim deny this view and they argue that Sethe and
Erman may have just failed to see the profundity of such
novels. They point to multiple similar but somewhat later
ancient Egyptian writings in which magicians perform
very similar magic tricks and make prophecies to a king.
According to Lepper and Lichtheim, their stories are obviously inspired by the tale of Dedi. Descriptive examples are the papyri pAthen and The prophecy of Neferti.

REFERENCES

These novels show how popular the theme of prophesying already was during the Old Kingdom - just like in
the story of the Westcar Papyrus. And they both talk
about subalterns with magical powers similar to those of
Dedis. The Papyrus pBerlin 3023 contains the novel The
Eloquent Peasant, in which the following phrase appears:
See, these are artists who create the existing anew, who
even replace a severed head, which can be interpreted
as an allusion to the Westcar Papyrus. pBerlin 3023 contains another reference which strengthens the idea that
many ancient Egyptian novels were inuenced by Westcar
Papyrus: column 232 contains the phrase sleeping until
dawn, which appears nearly word-by-word in the Westcar
Papyrus. Since pAthen, pBerlin 3023 and The prophecy
of Neferti show the same manner of speaking and equal
picking up quaint phrases, Lepper and Lichtheim hold
that Dedi (and the other wise men from same papyrus)
must have been known to Egyptian authors for a long
time.[3][5]

4 References
[1] Westcar-Papyrus, column 7, rst row
[2] Verena M. Lepper: Untersuchungen zu pWestcar.
Eine philologische und literaturwissenschaftliche (Neu)Analyse. In: gyptologische Abhandlungen, Band 70.
Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2008, ISBN 3-447-05651-7,
page 103.
[3] Verena M. Lepper: Untersuchungen zu pWestcar.
Eine philologische und literaturwissenschaftliche (Neu)Analyse. In: gyptologische Abhandlungen, Band 70.
Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2008, ISBN 3-447-05651-7,
page 41 47, 103 & 308 310..
[4] Djed-Sneferu was the curatorial name of Dahshur during the Old Kingdom. See: Jean Claude Goyon, Christine
Cardin: Proceedings of the ninth International Congress of
Egyptologists, volume 1. page 1128.
[5] Miriam Lichtheim: Ancient Egyptian literature: a book of
readings. The Old and Middle Kingdoms, Band 1. University of California Press 2000, ISBN 0-520-02899-6, page
215 220.
[6] Alan B. Lloyd: Herodotus, book II: introduction, Band 1.
BRILL, Leiden 1975, ISBN 90-04-04179-6, page 104
106.
[7] A word of unsure meaning which may be translated as
sealed chamber or sanctuary"; Egyptologists dispute
the real meaning. See: Jenny Berggren: The Ipwt in Papyrus Westcar. Masters Thesis, Uppsala 2006 (PDF; 2,57
MB)
[8] In this case horizon is a quaint alteration for a royal
cemetery. See: Verena M. Lepper: Untersuchungen zu pWestcar. Eine philologische und literaturwissenschaftliche (Neu-)Analyse. In: gyptologische Abhandlungen, Band 70. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2008, ISBN
3-447-05651-7, page 42 & 114.

[9] Egyptian word for spring. See Rolf Krauss: Sothis- und
Monddaten: Studien zur astronomischen und technischen
Chronologie Altgyptens, Gerstenberg, Hildesheim 1985,
ISBN 3-8067-8086-X
[10] Its assumed by Egyptologists, that the alteration noble ock was a bad pun to the human race in general. See: Verena M. Lepper: Untersuchungen zu pWestcar. Eine philologische und literaturwissenschaftliche
(Neu-)Analyse. In: gyptologische Abhandlungen, Band
70. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 2008, ISBN 3-447-056517, page 42 & 114.
[11] The bird in question is called khet-aa-bird which means
the bird with long, wooden legs. It is highly uncertain
which race of bird was meant in the papyrus. Verena Lepper thinks about a Eurasian bittern, which is mentioned in
oering lists of the Old Kingdom. See: Verena M. Lepper: Untersuchungen zu pWestcar. Eine philologische und
literaturwissenschaftliche (Neu-)Analyse. In: gyptologische Abhandlungen, Band 70. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden
2008, ISBN 3-447-05651-7, page 115.
[12] Ancient Egyptian name of the winter season. See: Verena M. Lepper: Untersuchungen zu pWestcar. Eine philologische und literaturwissenschaftliche (Neu-)Analyse. In:
gyptologische Abhandlungen, Band 70. Harrassowitz,
Wiesbaden 2008, ISBN 3-447-05651-7, page 116.
[13] Ancient Egyptian name of the Nile. See: Verena M. Lepper: Untersuchungen zu pWestcar. Eine philologische und
literaturwissenschaftliche (Neu-)Analyse. In: gyptologische Abhandlungen, Band 70. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden
2008, ISBN 3-447-05651-7, page 116.
[14] Adolf Erman: Die Mrchen des Papyrus Westcar I. Einleitung und Commentar. In: Mitteilungen aus den Orientalischen Sammlungen. Heft V, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin,
Berlin 1890. page 10 12.
[15] Udo Bartsch: Unterhaltungskunst A-Z (Taschenbuch der
Knste). Henschel, Leipzig 1977 (2. Ausgabe), page 85.

External links
Transcription and translating of Papyrus Westcar
(Berlin Papyrus 3033) into English by the transcription of A. M. Blackman (1988) (PDF-File)
Dedi in Papyrus Westcar at resham.org

6 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

6.1

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Dedi Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dedi?oldid=743692766 Contributors: Charles Matthews, Greenrd, Phil Boswell, Premeditated
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6.2

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6.3

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