King Zoser
Family
Seals discovered in Khasekhemwy’s tomb and at Beit Khallaf connect Djoser to Khasekhemwy, the final ruler of Egypt’s Second Dynasty, through his wife Queen Nimaethap (Nimaat-hap). Nimaat-hap is identified as the “mother of the king’s children, Nimaat-hap” on the Abydos seal.
The same individual is referred to as the “mother of the dual ruler” on a mastaba in Beit Khallaf.
Other seals discovered at the Beit Khallaf site have been dated to the reign of Djoser.
This data points to either Khasekhemwy as Djoser’s biological father or Nimaat-hap as his mother through a prior husband.
The discovery of Djoser’s sealings at Khasekhemwy’s tomb by German Egyptologist Gunter Dreyer provides additional evidence that Djoser was Khasekhemwy’s immediate successor and that he completed the tomb’s construction.
In the last years of Sneferu’s rule, her cult appears to have continued to exist.
In the Egyptian Museum of Turin, Hetephernebti is recognised as one of Djoser’s queens “on a sequence of boundary stela from the Step Pyramid enclosure (now in several museums) and a fragment of relief from a building in Hermopolis.” Their only named daughter was Inetkawes. During Djoser’s reign, a third royal female was also documented, although her name has been lost. It is unknown how Djoser and his successor Sekhemkhet were related, and it is also unclear when he passed away.
King Zoser Reign
Third Dynasty
In the last years of Sneferu’s rule, her cult appears to have continued to exist.
Sometime around 2686 BC, the territories of Upper and Lower Egypt were merged into a single state. Following the unification of the thrones, Egypt experienced a prosperous period that saw the beginning of the Third Dynasty and the Old Kingdom. Due to the incompleteness of the historical sources, it is uncertain who the dynasty’s founder was exactly. One of the leading contenders to lead the Third Dynasty is Djoser. Nebka and Sanakht are more contenders. The likelihood that Nebka and Sanakht are referring to the same person further complicates matters.
Achievements of King Zoser
A number of military expeditions were sent by Djoser to the Sinai Peninsula, where the native populace was subdued. Additionally, he dispatched missions there to mine for precious minerals like turquoise and copper. This is known through inscriptions discovered in the area’s desert, some of which occasionally show the Set banner next to the symbols of Horus. As had been more typical under Khasekhemwy. The Sinai served as a strategic barrier between the Nile basin and Asia.
King Zoser monument’s
His step pyramid, which involved stacking numerous mastaba tombs on top of one another, is his most well-known building. In the later Old Kingdom, these formations would eventually evolve to the typical pyramid tomb. Many centuries later, Manetho alludes to the advancements in architecture during this era by stating that “Tosorthros.”
In addition to being remembered as the physician Aesculapius and for bringing about some modifications in the writing system, also learned how to build with hewn stone. Modern academics believe that Manetho initially attributed (or intended to attribute) these exploits to Imuthes, who corresponds to Imhotep, the well-known minister of Djoser who oversaw the construction of the Step Pyramid and was later deified by the Greeks and Romans as Aesculapius.
Djoser is mentioned in certain fragmentary reliefs discovered at Heliopolis and Gebelein, which suggests he ordered building projects in those cities. Additionally, he might have set the First Cataract as his kingdom’s southern border. When Djoser erected the temple of Khnum on the island of Elephantine at the First Cataract, a seven-year famine in Egypt was put an end.
According to an inscription known as the Famine Stela, which claims to belong to the reign of Djoser but was likely written during the Ptolemaic Dynasty. Some people believe that this old writing was a fable when it was written. It does, however, demonstrate that Egyptians remembered Djoser more than two millennia after the end of his dynasty.
Unfinished tomb of King Zoser
Djoser was ultimately interred in his well-known pyramid at Saqqara in Lower Egypt. Despite the fact that he appears to have started an incomplete tomb at Abydos (Upper Egypt). Since the 2nd dynasty’s Khasekhemwy was the last pharaoh to be interred at Abydos. Some Egyptologists surmise that Djoser’s reign marks the completion of the move to a more northern capital.
