Living a Religious Life: The Display of Religious

Experience in Egyptian Autobiographies

Maria Michela Luiselli
Independent Scholar

Numerous and extensive studies on Egyptian so-called autobiographies focus on many different aspects of this
textual genre,1 including their relations to more strictly literary genres, language issues, social backgrounds, func-
tions, and more. However, the religious dimension of autobiographies has received far less attention, with only
a few studies carried out so far.2
“Religious systems are seen as structures perpetuated by the black box of an abstract society, while the sub-
jective experience of the individuals that make up society is often ignored,” as J. L. Dornan observed.3 Her
statement is set within cultural phenomenological studies and reflects the way religions of ancient societies are
traditionally approached and investigated. It is an appropriate summary of the methodology of some studies of
personal religion in Egypt,4 as the methodology of some scholars still focuses on how the state imposes its reli-
gious system on individuals and how those individuals participated in a prestructured and predefined system.5
While there is no doubt that the impact of state religion on society and its members is a significant issue, its
implications for the religious experience of the individual has not been a matter of investigation. Hence, the aim
of the present article is to address this specific topic as reflected in autobiographical texts from various historical
periods. The implicit springboard of the research outlined in this article is the individual religious dimension
in ancient Egyptian religion, which may be determined by borrowing analytical methods provided by cultural
(neuro-)phenomenology6 and the anthropology of religion.7 A selection of meaningful statements referring to
personal religious experience, provided by the so-called autobiographies, which constitute the research dataset,
will be analyzed in the present article in order to explore the subjective religious experience reflected in these

1.  Autobiographies were initially recorded on tomb walls accessible to the living. They were later inscribed on mobile supports
like stelae or statues, which were set up mainly in temples rather than tombs. Studies of Egyptian autobiographies include (in
chronological order): Jansen-Winkeln 1985; Griffiths 1988; Lichtheim 1988, 1992; Guksch (Heye) 1994; Perdu 1995; Gnirs 1996;
Coulon 1997; Kloth 2002; Frood 2007; Kubisch 2008 2010; von Lieven 2010; Stauder-Porchet 2017.
2.  For instance, Griffiths 1988; Lichtheim 1992; Gnirs 1996; Frood 2007; Jansen-Winkeln 1985. The same can also be said of
studies of personal religion in Egypt, some of which deal with religious statements made in autobiographical inscriptions (Blumen-
thal 1998; Luiselli 2011, esp. 220–27 and 245–69; Adderley 2015, 12–50).
3.  Dornan 2004, 25.
4.  E.g., Assmann 1984; Bickel 2003; Stevens 2006; Luiselli 2011; Weiss 2015.
5.  See esp. Kemp 1995; Kessler 1998; Kessler 1999; Adrom 2005; Morgan 2004, 333–52; Bussmann 2017.
6.  See e.g., Dornan 2004, whose theoretical frame is discussed and adopted in the present article.
7.  See Boyer 2001; Bowie 2008; Lambeck 2008.

307
308 LUISELLI

texts, its meaning in social, cultural, and cognitive terms, as well as its relation to the shared belief system. In
religious-anthropological terms, the meaning of “belief ” is entirely subordinated to the culture in which it is
embedded. While in modern Western contexts, religious belief is regarded as an alternative worldview, other
societies and cultures do not share this perspective.8 This same issue is crucial when addressing ancient Egyptian
religious belief since the texts express it as a form of loyalty and trust.

Accounts of Personal Religious Experience in Egyptian Autobiographies

The complex concept of experience has been recently introduced into Egyptological research by J. Baines9 who
focuses on examples relating to the understanding of experience or experiences as “significant events in one’s
life, in which one may be actively or passively involved, that can take many forms and that may be worth
commemorating.”10 Furthermore, Baines stresses that the specific event, subjectively deemed significant, is dis-
tinguished from the backdrop of the “flux of human existence” and cannot be represented either visually or
verbally.11 It is this precise event that leads to an exceptional individual experience, which autobiographical texts
commemorate in more or less detailed descriptions. The present article will focus on this understanding of expe-
rience and its link to religion. Such focus, however, must be differentiated from one on everyday religious experi-
ence, that is, the individual’s participation in daily religious activities, for instance, in the domestic environment,
which can be traced through material culture and general archaeological remains.12 When autobiographical texts
address religious experiences, they usually do not describe the everyday routine but rather the exceptionality of
single events—linked to the function of autobiographies and to their significance in terms of social display in
Egypt. Members of the elite singled out religious experiences to demarcate their privileged position in society and
mark outstanding achievements in life. By contrast, priests’ autobiographical texts, especially those of the Late
period, made extensive use of sacerdotal topics—like the correct performance of rituals, the caring for temple
buildings, and the like—as a means of expressing everyday conduct. Such sacerdotal material does not represent
a particular focus on exceptional moments but rather an expression of daily encounters with religion in order to
convey the image of an ideally conducted life. In the first case, religious experience is differentiated and made
exceptional, while in the second case it merely reflects the fulfillment of culturally embedded duties. Neverthe-
less, in this latter case, the regular performance of ritual actions as well as participation in religious festivals were
equally regarded as a way to experience the divine through performance, and hence are worthy of mention.
Records of events expressing belief in God, the experience of something interpreted as God’s will, or his in-
tervention in one’s life, permeate many modern autobiographies.13 Such events demonstrate the infinite divine
power characteristic of modern, Christian, Western, post-Enlightenment conceptions (and perceptions) of God,

8.  Bowie 2008, 9.

9.  Baines 2013, who bases his study on the theory of Turner and Bruner 1986.
10.  Baines 2013, 235.
11.  Baines 2013, 235.
12.  See, for instance, Stevens 2006 with respect to domestic religious practices at Tell el-Amarna and Weiss 2015 in relation to
Deir el-Medina. See also Baines 1987.
13.  See for instance King and Ritz 1996, 28: “I visualized the death of my mother and grandmother, imagining that I was going
through the same thing. I prayed to God to take me. Wanted to stop suffering … suddenly I thought maybe it’s not my time. Maybe
I shouldn’t be telling God to take me. I don’t know God’s plan… who does?” Or Clapton 2007, 257: “Within a few days I realised
that something had happened for me. An atheist would probably say it was just a change of attitude … but there was much more to
it than that.… From that day until this, I never failed to pray in the morning, on my knees, asking for help, and at night, to express
gratitude for my life…. I have no problem with religion … but my searching took me away from church and community worship.”
 LIVING A RELIGIOUS LIFE 309

faith, piety, and religion. Here, the subjectivity of the author when stressing his own personal religious experience
or belief is central and is granted more weight than shared religious belief systems and knowledge.
However, things look different when we approach ancient Egyptian autobiographies. Following Baines’s argu-
ment, a possible reason for the relatively scarce mention of religious events might be due to decorum,14 which
restricted the impact such events could have had on one’s self-presentation, on the audience of autobiographies
and, hence, on the very purpose of these texts. As a general rule, it appears that in Egyptian autobiographies the
recalling of single religious events that affected one’s life is not common and does not involve an individual’s
childhood.15 Nonetheless, a few statements emphasize the close relationship the “biographical subject”16 had with
a god since birth. For instance, sources dating to the Second Intermediate period include the phrases “one who is
known by his god since his childhood”17 and “one whom his god loved since he was nursed”.18 The backdrop of
this display of closeness to the divine is the protagonists’ having served as priests in the temple of the particular
god,19 thus suggesting that one’s profession was the first way to establish a relationship to a god, as later sources
similarly indicate.20 For example, in the Twentieth Dynasty stela BM EA 278 the “servant in the Place of Truth”
Qenhekhepeshef states that he was born (ms.w) in the wbȝ-courtyard of the temple of Hathor in Deir el-Bahri.21
In addition, the autobiography of Roma-Roy on his block statue Cairo JE 37874 presents the protagonist as
having grown up in the temple (domain) of Amun-Re in Karnak.22 These examples present their protagonists’
lives as being under the protection of a god since childhood despite the lack of any precocious religious experi-
ence. While these statements clearly aim at setting the author’s life under the protection of a god, no particular
religious experience of the author that could justify this precocious contact with the divine is mentioned. In fact,

14.  Baines 2013, 238–39.

15.  This might be due to the Egyptian understanding and perception of childhood. Eyre (2011, 187) claims that Egypt did not
have a concept of childhood comparable to our modern one. See also Kubisch 2003. The discovery and investigation of child buri-
als, however, has shown that children of all ages were given meaningful burials in several places in Egypt, suggesting the existence of
funerary beliefs in connection with children and thus challenging the supposed non-existence of a concept of childhood in ancient
Egypt. See, for instance, Meskell 1994; 2002, 81; Zillhardt 2009, 12–15. The fact that the relationship between children and re-
ligion has not been investigated for ancient Egypt the way it has been for modern societies (compare, e.g., Barrett 2012; Ridgely
2012) is an additional challenge to the understanding of childhood religious experiences in Egypt. See also Feucht 1995, 361–66;
Harrington 2005; and Luiselli 2018.
16.  The discussion of the authorship of Egyptian autobiographies is one of the most relevant questions within the study of this
textual genre. Since the use of the first person singular in these texts is a fiction and they were probably commissioned by owners
of tombs or statues or their heirs but not composed by them, the use of the terms “author” and “autobiography” is potentially
misleading; see Perdu 1995, 2243; Frood 2007, 3. However, the main purpose of these texts was the presentation of (aspects of )
one’s life to a targeted audience (see von Lieven 2010) in the first person singular. For the term “biographical subject,” I refer to
Gerald Moers’s paper “Who Speaks? Some General Remarks on ‘Voice’ in Egyptian Life-Writing” given at the conference “Ancient
Egyptian Autobiographies: Forms, Contexts, Functions,” University of Basel, 14–17 May 2014. The use of these terms in the pres-
ent article is to be understood on that basis.
17.  Stela Louvre AF 9916, lines 5–6: Kubisch 2008, 40, no. 51.
18.  Edfu 20 (Cairo JE 46200): Kubisch 2008, 40, no. 50.
19.  Kubisch 2008, 40–41.
20.  Among these, the inscriptions of Bakenkhons on his two block statues are particularly relevant. See statues München
Glyptothek WAF 38 and Cairo CG 42.155 (Luiselli 2011, 265–69 with references) where Bakenkhons highlights the fact that the
god Amun, for whom he built the Eastern temple in Karnak, recognized him because of his character (statue Cairo CG 42.155,
back pillar, line 2: sjȝ=f wj ḥr bjȝ.t=j) and that he was in the temple of Karnak following Amun since childhood (wḏḥ) (München
Glyptothek WAF 38, bases).
21.  Luiselli 2011, 400–402.
22.  Frood 2007, 48.
310 LUISELLI

Egyptian sources tend to show that religious experiences as referred to in Egyptian autobiographies concerned
mainly adult male lives.23

Tracing Changes in the Religious Dimension in

Egyptian Autobiographies through Time

Looking for the religious dimension in Egyptian autobiographies from a chronological point of view may help
to reveal patterns and highlight differences. It is from the First Intermediate period onwards that autobiographi-
cal inscriptions, pertaining mostly to nomarchs, reflect the view of single individuals’ belief that a divine entity
that had chosen them for duties requiring competence, moral excellence, and courage, actually led their life.24
The religious experiences recorded in these older sources describe the nomarchs as being at the receiving end of a
divine choice that would determine their conduct and political acts. Moreover, the concept of the personal god
(nṯr=f) appears in these texts for the first time within monumental discourse, becoming a crucial part of elite self-
presentation. During the First Intermediate period and Middle Kingdom, the personal relationship with the god
became one of the significant elements defining and distinguishing the tomb owner. The gods—usually the local
ones—are said to know the protagonist’s (i.e., the tomb owner’s) character and to direct his life and exceptional
events according to a divine plan that he realized.25 The protagonists of these autobiographies were members of
the highest elite of the country, held priestly titles and acted in temples, performing ritual actions.26
Accounts of personal religious experience linked to ritual actions, and the close relationship with a god that
resulted from this, also play a role in autobiographical texts dating to the Second Intermediate period. Statements
from priests’ autobiographies of this period show that sometimes the ritual actions related to their priestly titles
were specified by emphasizing the physical closeness they had to the divine statue. On stela Cairo CG 20318, line
7, from El-Kab, for instance, the protagonist states that he was “one who enters to god (i.e., stands in the pres-
ence of a god) when he is alone”;27 stela Bologna MCABo EG 1911 shows a wʿb ʿḳ-Priest.28 S. Kubisch’s analysis
of these statements also shows that, in particular, lower orders of priests, like wʿb-priests and lector priests, would
emphasize this access to the divine. This probably was meant to accentuate their active involvement in the per-
formance of some ritual acts that were normally restricted to higher-ranking priests.29 While it is not surprising
that priests’ autobiographies focus on highlighting all the actions involved in general cult performance,30 their

23.  A few autobiographical texts of women are attested in the first millennium BCE. See Perdu 1995, 2243; Vittmann 1995;
Adderley 2015, 13; also Baines and Klotz, this volume.
24.  Blumenthal 1998, 213–31; Luiselli 2011, 220–27 and 245–47 (esp. the tomb inscription of Ankhtyfy and Jtj-Jbj) with
further references.
25.  See, for instance, the statement in the First Intermediate period autobiography of Jtj-jbj from Assiut (Luiselli 2011, 246
with further references).
26.  Presently, this is to be considered against the backdrop of the differentiation between strictly funerary texts like the Coffin
Texts and autobiographies related to the life of the deceased. Reference is here made to S. Bickel’s paper “Biography and Coffin
Texts: Two Strands of One Plot?” given at the conference “Ancient Egyptian Autobiographies: Forms, Contexts, Functions,” Uni-
versity of Basel, 14–17 May 2014, in which she argued that pronouncements of status in the Coffin Texts and autobiographies were
part of the construction of social self in Egypt, one directed to the gods, the other to the living.
27.  Kubisch 2008, 70–73. A visualization of the latter is provided by, for instance, stela Bologna MCABo EG 1911 (Luiselli
2011, pl. 1).
28.  Luiselli 2013, 18 and 30, fig. 1.
29.  Kubisch 2008, 70–73.
30.  Such as the access to the temple in a purified state, the presentation of offerings, the appeasement of the god, and the recita-
tion of hymns; see Kubisch 2008, 70–80.
 LIVING A RELIGIOUS LIFE 311

content is valuable for the interpretative framework proposed here, considering that these accounts come from
autobiographies of low-ranking wʿb-priests.31 Through the mediation of the ritual, or through participation in a
ritual possibly celebrated by a ḥm-nṯr-priest, the protagonist recorded his own religious experience. The ritual in
these cases was a mediator between the shared belief system and the lived religious experience of the single indi-
vidual.32 The exceptionality of their experience is used here as a means of departing from normal expectations,
thus augmenting their own self-presentation.
The account of a religious experience of the individual as achieved through active involvement in ritual per-
formance, though not overwhelmingly recorded during the Middle Kingdom, became more and more apparent
in later sources. Autobiographical texts especially of the Ramesside period present several significant changes
when compared to previous texts, in terms of content, setting, purposes, and media used.33 In temples, statues
set up by private individuals became the preferred medium for autobiographical inscriptions, whereas in tombs
they tended to be inscribed on stelae34 or tomb walls. Texts may stress that the protagonist has performed ritual
actions for the god(s),35 trusted their plans and followed their will, as well as considerably improved the temples
by restoring old parts or adding new buildings.36 The gods in turn recognize the protagonist and favor him
because of his distinctive character and skills, and they advance his career. In this respect, these texts follow the
earlier tradition.37 With regard to the display of religious experience, they not only continue the features briefly
described above in relation to the Second Intermediate period texts, but they additionally emphasize personal
religious beliefs by evoking memories that represent the protagonists’ closeness to the gods. Some Egyptological
studies have suggested that this religious dimension, and especially the display of closeness to the gods, was the
most important topic for autobiographical self-presentation in the Ramesside period.38
Most autobiographies of the New Kingdom speak for the lives of priests, and they mostly come from Karnak
and Abydos.39 Particularly significant is the autobiography of the high priest of Amun Nebwanenef in his tomb,
in which Ramesses II’s words about the consultation of the oracle of Amun in favor of Nebwanenef are reported:

As Re lives for me and loves me [i.e., Pharaoh], and as my father Amun favours me, I presented to him
the whole entourage … but he was not content with a single one among them, except when I spoke
your name to him. Perform beneficent acts to him inasmuch as he desired you! … He will give the West
to you, because, as for my father Amun, he is a great god, without equal.… No god will have power over
what he has done, for his plans cannot be thwarted; one relies on his speech.40

31.  Kubisch 2008, 76.

32.  Dornan 2004, 26–27. On this topic see also Bergmann 2008 and Rüpke 2011 as well as the discussion under “Highlighting
One’s Religious Experience” below.
33.  Gnirs 1996, 234; Frood 2007, 12–29; Baines and Frood 2011, 11–14; Luiselli 2011, 107.
34.  Adderley 2015, 12.
35.  Such as Urk. IV, 1952, 5, mentioned in Frood 2007, 254 and discussed in more detail by Klotz, this volume. See also the
autobiography of the High Priest of Nekhbet, Setau, dating to the reign of Ramesses III and inscribed in his tomb at El-Kab (tomb
no. 4), which states that he had “taken/brought” (ṯȝj) the barque of the goddess “to the Sed-Festival” (r pȝ ḥb-sd; KRI V, 430).
36.  This became a frequent topic especially in Ptolemaic autobiographies. See part 3 of the present article.
37.  Compare, for instance, the autobiography of the high priest of Amun Nebwanenef in Theban Tomb 157 discussed below
(translation in Frood 2007, esp. 35–36 and list of sources, 257, no. 1), and the autobiography of the high-priest of Amun Roma-
Roy from Karnak, inscribed on his limestone block statue Cairo CG 42185 (Schulz 1992, vol. 1, cat. no. 153; vol. 2, pl. 67a–b.
Translation by Frood 2007, 51–54 and list of sources, 257, no. 3c).
38.  See esp. Gnirs 1996, 204–5, and Frood 2007, 24–26.
39.  Frood 2007, nos. 1–18.
40.  Translated by Frood 2007, 36–37.
312 LUISELLI

Another example is the autobiography of the high priest of Amun Roma-Roy from Karnak, inscribed on his
limestone block statue (Cairo CG 42185).41 It follows his offering formula to Amun-Re, Amunet, Mut, and
Khonsu, which requests that his statue be established in Karnak. It states that:

I have come before you, lord of the gods, Amun, ruler of the Ennead, so that I may praise your perfec-
tion every day, so that I may satisfy your desires.… May you favor your defender upon earth, that I may
follow you in a truthful way and grow old in your domain, in possession of your favors, my eyes seeing
your uraeus…. I was strong, vigilant, one effective for his lord, who made monuments in his domain
with a loving heart, my heart assessing every work, seeking out what is beneficial for my august god. He
[Amun] favoured me for what I did, inasmuch as I am beneficial to him. He caused me to be supreme
chief spokesman over his domain. I reached an old age in his following, possessing his favor…. I was
high priest as the gift of Amun; it was him who chose me himself, in front of his temple [probably an
oracular appointment]. He gave me a venerable position shouldering his image, all my limbs being
strong, my eyes far-seeing, sustenance and provisions in my mouth.42

In keeping with a tradition started in the First Intermediate period by some nomarchs, priests and high officials
now attributed their career directly to divine intervention.
However, as E. Frood’s collection shows, autobiographical texts were also composed for members of the mili-
tary staff, artists, and civil officials. They were now not only inscribed on tomb walls, but far more often on tem-
ple walls and on statues or stelae set up in temple environments. Within this very vast corpus some texts deserve
particular attention. Specifically, reference will be made to two well-known Ramesside texts: the autobiographies
of the Overseer of the Fieldworkers of the Domain of Amun Djehutyemheb43 and of the Assessor of Cattle of the
Domain of Amun Samut, called Kyky.44 These two autobiographical texts are stylized differently than other texts
in the same category. However, they fit with the innovative character of Ramesside autobiographical inscriptions
in general and can therefore be classified as autobiographies.45 Both were written on tomb walls, in keeping with
earlier tradition. However, they constitute a breakthrough with respect to the religious dimension. Although
both protagonists were part of the temple staff at Karnak, they mention neither the celebration of a ritual nor
any building activity that they were possibly involved in. Instead, they single out specific experiences that can be
linked to a shared belief of Ramesside Egypt, at least in the Theban area, namely, the belief in the actual interven-
tion of gods in human life and in the total dependence of people on the divine. No previous autobiographical
text shows anything comparable. Djehutyemheb recounted the appearance of the goddess Hathor, in her form of
Mistress of the West, in his dreams, alongside the words she spoke to him (a very unusual element in nonliterary
texts46), words of protection for the afterlife:

41.  Schulz 1992, vol. 1, cat. no. 153; vol. 2, pl. 67a–b.
42.  Translated by Frood 2007, 50–54.
43. KRI VII, 153, 5–155, 4; Assmann 1978; Frood 2007, 91–94; Luiselli 2011, 263–65 (with further references).
44. KRI III, 336, 1–341, 12; Vernus 1978; Frood 2007, 84–91; Luiselli 2011, 259–62 (with further references).
45.  This in accordance with Frood 2007, 85 who states that Samut-Kyky’s text “explicitly departs from the traditional structures
of biographical inscriptions.” Samut’s inscription is wrapped around his figure, shown with his arms raised in adoration gesture, and
that of an enthroned Mut (see the detailed description provided by Frood 2007, 84–85) thus emphasizing the religious dimension
of the text. In the case of Djehutyemheb, the autobiographical dimension is inserted into a hymn to the goddess Hathor; this is
followed by her response, which explicitly ensures his posthumous life. See Frood 2007, 91–92.
46.  Luiselli 2005.
 LIVING A RELIGIOUS LIFE 313

I will announce you to the great god [i.e., Osiris] that he may say to you “welcome!” … I will hand
you over to the lord of Heliopolis that he may cause your offerings to endure.47

Hathor is here assuring Djehutyemheb that she will care for his funerary cult. In this text, Djehutyemheb is not
simply recalling a dream in our sense. According to the Egyptian perception of dreams and nightmares, he is
stating having seen a goddess who had appeared to him while he was sleeping,48 thus stressing his personal experi-
ence of the divine, highlighting the exclusive contact a goddess established with him and, consequently, his own
distinguished life. In other words, Djehutyemheb’s autobiography suggests to the modern scholar that the belief
gained meaning and authenticity through personal religious experience. This is also what happened with Samut-
Kyky’s declaration of his submission to Mut. In his autobiography, Samut begins by recalling his god, who would
instruct him and give him a place in life:

Now his god instructed him, he taught him according to his teaching. He placed him upon the path
of life, in order to protect his body.49

Although Samut declares having had a personal god taking care of him since childhood,50 Samut “sought within
himself, in order to find a protector for himself ” and “he found Mut at the head of the gods.”51 In his text, Samut
provides a reason why he abandoned his original personal god and chose Mut, to whose temple administration
he bequeathed all his property:

She removed anguish for me; she left me in a painful moment, (but) she came, the north wind before
her, after I called upon her name.52

After a short description of himself, Samut invokes Mut, begging her to hear his prayers, to keep him safe from
every evil until his death and to protect him during life after death.53 In so doing, Samut purposely chose a new
personal god because of an event that had affected his life, the understanding of which is, however, challenging
due to a problematic text passage.54 What becomes clear from what immediately follows, however, is that Samut
reacted to a critical event in his life. Here, it was not the participation in a ritual or its celebration that created
the relationship to a divine entity, but rather an experience that was interpreted as being the result of divine will
and intervention in one’s life. These two texts are regarded as paradigmatic in the present article. They describe
single life experiences linked to the shared belief of Ramesside Egypt, at least in the Theban area, in which the
actual intervention of gods in human life and the dependence of people upon the divine was a crucial aspect. No
earlier autobiographical text shows anything comparable, and the link to features of Ramesside personal piety, as
known from extensive evidence, is obvious.

47.  Translation by Frood 2007, 94.

48.  Szpakowska 2001, 31–33; 2003, 141–42.
49.  Translation Frood 2007, 85.
50.  “The god knew him as a youth, decreeing for him rich provisions” (translated by Frood 2007, 86).
51.  Translation Frood 2007, 86.
52.  Translation by Frood 2007, 86.
53.  Translation Frood 2007, 86–87.
54. KRI III, 336, 8–9: jrj=s n=j wš m ḥr-n-ḥr nhj<=s> <wj> m ȝ.t ḏw.t st jj.t ṯʿw-mḥw r-ḥȝ.t=s ḏr jʿš=j ḥr rn=s. See Vernus
1978, esp. 121–22; Assmann 1999, no. 173; Frood 2007, 86; and Gnirs 2003, 175–99, esp. 180. Recently discussed in Luiselli
2017.
314 LUISELLI

The fact that a prayer is incorporated into the autobiographical text is not surprising; it is a distinctive feature
of New Kingdom autobiographical texts, which often include hymns and divine invocations.55 The emphasis on
the personal experience interpreted as a religious one and the intertwining of prayers and biographical statements
are also the reason why some scholars interpreted some texts on votive or so-called personal piety stelae as auto-
biographical texts.56 The main reason for this categorization is based on longer texts of this type, which provide
a “confession of sins,” that is to say, the ritually performed public admission of misbehavior and wrongdoing
in connection with a deity.57 One of the most striking examples is certainly represented by the two stelae of the
workman Neferabu58 that dramatically express the donor’s personal experience of divine power. While it is un-
deniable that in these texts aspects of the autobiographical genre permeated hymns and prayers, to consider and
label these texts as autobiographies is not entirely convincing. These texts bear the Egyptian’s own explicit text
categorization as dwȝ and /or rdj.t-jȝw-texts, thus directly indicating that the praise of one or more deities was
their primary purpose. This type of monument has been recovered in sacred areas of shrines and temples, tombs,
and in domestic environments.59 The iconography covers a broad range of topics,60 while showcasing the connec-
tion between one or more individuals, sometimes family members,61 and one or more gods. Hence, these monu-
ments certainly aimed at providing a frame for self-presentation within the local community and the recalling
of personal religious experience. They were significant for both purposes, as they both reified the idea of divine
intervention in human life current at that time and demarcated the exceptionality of single individuals. However,
to directly compare this with the standard autobiographical strategy of self-presentation would be misleading. As
a matter of fact, some texts admit failure by referring to an experience of divine power that resulted from personal
wrongdoing62—a fact that does not comply with the fundamental characteristics of autobiographies and could
potentially jeopardize the establishment of the funerary cult by highlighting instances of the deceased’s poor
conduct.63 Traditionally, autobiographies stress the exceptional character and life of the author, rather than his
misdeeds and troubles, although the display of divine mercy might arguably have been a marker of exceptionality
too. However, it seems that the few autobiographical statements alluded to on these monuments were meant to
demonstrate special access to the divine and to display one’s direct connection with it. These stelae were probably
erected during the lifetimes of their donors. Following the death of their donors, the stelae were possibly inserted

55.  Gnirs 1996, 202.

56.  Gnirs 1996, 204; Frood 2007, 219–32; Baines and Frood 2011, 9–10.
57.  Gnirs 2003, 176–99.
58.  Stela BM EA 589: James 1970, pls. 31–31a; KRI III, 771, 7–772, 8. See Frood 2007, 223–25 for an English translation,
and Luiselli 2011, 361–63 for general discussion and further references. Stela Turin 50058: Tosi and Roccati 1972, 78 and 279;
KRI III, 772, 9–773, 9. English translation in Frood 2007, 226–27, and discussion and further references in Luiselli 2011, 358–61.
59.  For instance, the less formalized and so-called ostracon-stelae (see Dorn 2011, 185) as well as Weiss 2015, 43, although
in this specific case Weiss refers to an ancestor stela rather than to one dedicated to a deity. In general terms, stelae from secure
domestic find contexts tend to lack extensive hymns (Weiss 2015, 156–57, with n. 1273).
60.  For the broad iconographical range of votive stelae from Deir el-Medina, see Exell 2009. The stelae from the so-called
Salakhana trove in Assiut, which differ some from the Deir el-Medina corpus, have been extensively studied by DuQuesne et al.
(esp. 2009) and by Wells (2014).
61.  See for instance stela Turin 50045 (Tosi and Roccati 1972, 273) or 50046 (Tosi and Roccati 1972, 80). On the concept
and understanding of “family” in Deir el-Medina, see Weiss 2015, 13.
62.  Apart from the stelae of Neferabu mentioned above, see for instance Stela Bankes 6 (Gunn 1916, 81; Luiselli 2011, 134
und 369–71) where the lady of the house, Jjt-Neferti, blames the gossip of some women from the community for her divine punish-
ment (seeing darkness by day, see Luiselli 2011, 162–68) and poor situation. Furthermore, on stela Turin 50044 (Tosi and Roccati
1972, 78; Luiselli 2011, 366–68, pl. 9) the donor Huj admits having sworn falsely in the name of Jah.
63.  See Adderley 2015, 13.
 LIVING A RELIGIOUS LIFE 315

into the sphere of general ritual action performed in the local sanctuary64 and did not primarily aim at preserving
the donor’s memory in perpetuity. Nonetheless, it is a fact that these monuments make use of autobiographical
statements and strategies to connect an individual with a god65 and they can certainly be interpreted as demon-
strating some emphasis on personal religious experience and the emotions connected with it.

Later Developments

The display of contact with the divine sphere in autobiographical texts considerably developed during the first
millennium BCE. During the Libyan period,66 temple statues became the medium par excellence to display
autobiographies, depriving the tomb of its long-lasting tradition.67 The setting of the large collection of auto-
biographical texts dating to the Libyan period within the temple context68 testifies to and emphasizes the role
that the religious dimension had gained in this text category. The gods—usually local ones69—are perceived and
described in these inscriptions as personal protectors during life and after death, as loving fathers and caretak-
ers, as those who listen to prayers, and as entities which actively intervene in human life; the practice developed
and outlined in New Kingdom autobiographies basically continued afterwards.70 Amun is the god most often
invoked in autobiographies from the Libyan period, since their protagonists were predominantly priests from the
Theban area.71 Already during the New Kingdom, hymns and prayers were included in autobiographies for the
purposes of self-presentation described above. However, in later texts they are clearly granted greater importance.
On the stelophorous statue Cairo CG 42208, for instance, which dates to the reign of Osorkon II and was origi-
nally set up in the temple of Amun-Re in Karnak, the donor Nakhtefmut reports aspects of his life and family
directly to Amun-Re, asking for intervention in a particular situation concerning his heirs:

Ich habe Preisungen und Gebete gesagt, damit du augenblicklich eilends zu mir kommst, wenn ich
(dich) anrufe wegen meiner Tochter – deiner Dienerin, meinem Liebling; sie ist gut zu mir, denn du
hast durch sie mein Herz in vollkommener Weise zufriedengestellt … um später für sie zu sorgen, da-
mit du ihr dauerhaft festsetzt die jmj.t-prw-Schenkung an allen Dingen, die ich ihr überlasse in deinen
Tempeln.… Kein anderer Sohn und (keine andere) Tochter sollen sagen ‘Gib mir das Gleiche!’ … Ich
vertraue auf dich, denn du bist ja der gute Beschützer des Vertrauenden, einer, der Antwort gibt auf die
Stimme dessen, der daniederliegt.72

This example shows that, by the Libyan period, the idea of the gods’ care for a person’s life was so strong that in
order to achieve self-presentation, autobiographies stressed genuine personal religious beliefs and used these to

64.  Luiselli 2011, 178–79 with further references.

65.  O. Perdu, in his paper “Parler de soi aux dieux : un genre particulier d’autobiographie” (delivered at the Basel Biographies
conference, May 2014), considers these texts to be autobiographies encapsulated in prayers and hymns and addressed to the gods
as their main audience.
66.  Adderley 2015, 12–13, notes that no statues with autobiographical inscriptions are known from the Twenty-first Dynasty
except for one text possibly preserved on stela London UC 16824.
67.  Adderley 2015, 12.
68.  Jansen-Winkeln 1985; Adderley 2015, 12–49.
69.  Adderley 2015, 15. This is a characteristic of autobiographical inscriptions and prayer texts in general. See Luiselli 2011,
esp. 235–36.
70.  See the detailed analysis provided by Adderley 2015, 14–27.
71.  Adderley 2015, 15.
72.  Translation by Jansen-Winkeln 1985, 48.
316 LUISELLI

trigger memories linked to the protagonist by recalling life events that had brought him close to the divine sphere
during his lifetime. In his autobiography, Nakhtefmut considers his daughter a gift of Amun, implicitly casting
Amun as personally caring for him. He also states that he has prayed to Amun to intervene in his personal family
issues. By confirming his correct conduct towards a god through loyalty and prayers, and by declaring his blind
trust in Amun’s intervention, Nakhtefmut proclaims the god’s caring nature and reflects beliefs current at the
time.73 The setting in a temple environment74 and the perpetuated declaration of loyalty and blind trust in the
god were the conditions for this experience and for a dialogue with the divine,75 characterized by the invocation
of protection for Nakhtefmut himself and also his relatives in both this life and the afterlife. The new settings
and media of autobiographies in the Libyan period went beyond the aim solely of self-presentation to a human
community. The gods were the “new” audience,76 whose support, care, and protection the protagonist sought for
his afterlife by demonstrating his loyalty, devotion, and pious attitude.
In later Egyptian autobiographies the religious dimension became crucial: the gods rather than the living
were the target audience of self-presentation, and participation in rituals and in major religious festivals as forms
of personal religious experience became increasingly central.77 Starting from the Harris stela (BM EA 886), D.
Klotz analyzes the accounts of personal experience of religious ceremonies in Egyptian autobiographies, focus-
ing particularly on Ptolemaic and Late period texts.78 However, Klotz’s study also shows that explicit mention of
participation in religious ceremonies through time is sparse compared with other, more prominently discussed
qualities of the protagonists. Nonetheless, some Ptolemaic texts testify to the right conduct of people during
religious festivals: attending processions (at least as observer), praising the gods, presenting offerings, and enter-
ing the accessible parts of temple buildings.79 The connection with the divine world becomes crucial in the latest
examples of Egyptian autobiographies and especially in the Ptolemaic period, when protagonists’ emphasis on
actions that please the gods becomes a display of loyalty and devotion.80 Euergetism was considered another kind
of action looked favorably upon by the gods—notable examples come from autobiographies of the Ptolemaic
period.81 As C. Zivie-Coche has pointed out,82 texts that portray the reconstruction and restoration of temples in

73.  Another example is statue Cairo CG 42211, quoted in Adderley 2015, 26, with n. 113. For the attitude displayed in this
example, see also Adderley 2015, 24 and 29.
74.  See, for instance, statue Cairo CG 42256 (Eaton-Krauss and Jansen-Winkeln 2001, 6, fig. 3, lines 6–7). Here a mother
tells her deceased son, having set up his statue in the temple of Karnak, to allow the statue to take part in the religious festivals and
celebrations in the temple, that is, to allow it to be close to the god.
75.  Reference is made here to O. Perdu’s paper, “Parler de soi aux dieux : un genre particulier d’autobiographie” (see above, n.
65), which highlights how the later examples of this kind of self-presentation cast the gods rather than the living as the audience.
The deceased’s memory and his funerary cult were now safe because guaranteed by the gods with whom the author himself held a
dialogue. The display of religion in autobiographical texts peaks in the Late period.
76.  Adderley 2015, 32, rightfully also considers the protagonists’ fellow priests as an important part of the audience to whom
the texts on temple statues were addressed. By demonstrating excellent conduct in compliance with a god’s teaching and expecta-
tions, the protagonist aimed to ensure his veneration as well as offerings in the aftermath of his death. For the gods as audience
of autobiographies, see again O. Perdu, “Parler de soi aux dieux : un genre particulier d’autobiographie” (see above, n. 65). Perdu
considers the New Kingdom text inscribed on the stela of Suti and Hor, BM EA 826 (Urk. IV, 1943–46) as an earlier example of
this subtype of autobiography. There, the autobiographical part follows a long and detailed hymn to the sun god.
77.  Klotz, this volume.
78.  Klotz, this volume.
79.  Stela Pushkin Museum, I.1.b.270, lines 6–8 (Hodjash and Berlev 1982, 190–91), quoted by Klotz, this volume.
80.  Perdu, “Parler de soi aux dieux : un genre particulier d’autobiographie” (above, n. 65), points out that this topic is particu-
larly present in autobiographies inscribed on temple statues, but is generally missing from texts in tombs, which prefer the more
traditional presentation of the righteous individual.
81.  See Zivie-Coche 2004.
82.  Zivie-Coche 2004.
 LIVING A RELIGIOUS LIFE 317

Tanis or the dressing of divine statues83 as acts of euergetism84 are particularly informative with regard to under-
standing the period’s concept of devotion and religious agency. Zivie-Coche shows how the titles displayed on
these texts can be used to reconstruct acts of devotion in the cults celebrated at that time in Tanis, acts that were
aimed at highlighting the exceptionality of the protagonists in front of both the human and the divine audiences
addressed. Indeed, by this time any form of action for and interaction with the divine had become a means of
demonstrating the protagonist’s superiority.

Highlighting One’s Religious Experience

The material presented so far demonstrates that Egyptian autobiographies displayed religion in different ways,
depending on context and historical period. Generally, it can be observed that the importance of topics related to
religion and religious experience increased over time and gained particular relevance from the Ramesside period
onwards. Emphasis was given to beliefs in a variety of specific categories. Some were related to the nature of the
gods, some to an individual’s experience of the divine, others to the detailed and repetitive assertion of participa-
tion and/or access to rituals and cultic practices, or to the care of temples, and on. However, not all these aspects
were simultaneously present in the same text. Which aspect was highlighted strongly depended on the historical
period to which a text belongs, allowing the scholar to recognize patterns and developments.
In the present article, the focus has been on the display of personal religious experience in autobiographies.
Although this was not the most widespread form of religious display in these texts, it allows for an insight into
individual histories. The examples presented reflect exceptional single events in the subject’s life, current religious
beliefs tailored to an individual’s life situation, the scrupulous description of a person’s participation in rituals,
and care for sacred monuments. Both religious beliefs and access to rituals appear to have played a significant
role in this display.
The dialectic between religion and ritual is widely recognized and whether or not the emphasis is placed on
religious symbolism or ritual practice depends on the specific interest and orientation of a given scholar. Crucial
elements in the understanding of this dialectic, nowadays come from anthropology and religious studies.85 As
cultural phenomenologists and anthropologists argue, rituals are (and were!) not only symbolic performances86
of culturally salient religious meanings87 but the mediator par excellence between a shared belief system and the
individual’s subjective religious experiences. The phenomenological concept of the “cycle of meaning” looks at
the ways in which ritual, belief, and experience are linked.88 It is a dynamic process that maintains the interac-
tion between a belief system and individual experiences. According to this concept, a shared religious belief
system is symbolically and performatively expressed through ritual, thus evoking memories and experiences,
which in turn revitalize the belief system.89 Seen from this perspective, it appears erroneous to regard Egyptian

83.  For instance, on the statue of Teos, son of Wennefer (Cairo CG 700), who describes having dressed the statue of Amun of
Opet, see Zivie-Coche 2004.
84.  Such as with the statues of Panemerit (Cairo JE 67094; Louvre E 15683 + Cairo CG 27493; Louvre E 156), quoted by
Zivie-Coche 2004, dating to the reign of Ptolemy XII Auletes.
85.  See Fogelin 2007, 56.
86.  This refers to C. Geertz’s understanding of religion as a system of symbols that is culturally patterned (Geertz 1973, esp.
91–92). Critics of this approach are not lacking. See Asad 1983, 237–59.
87.  Dornan 2004, 26–27
88.  Dornan 2004, 28–29.
89.  Dornan 2004, 26–27: “ritual can channel experience based on belief and alter belief in accordance with experience.” Dor-
nan partly builds her theory upon the previous work of the anthropologists R. Firth and Ch. Laughlin. Both agree that “an indi-
318 LUISELLI

priests’ recurrent autobiographical assertions of correct ritual performance as simply commonplace,90 since both
the priests recording the active performance of rites and the ordinary people reaching out for contact with the
divine through their participation in public ceremonies personally experienced the divine in their lives. Rituals
reified the belief system, giving meaning to its symbols, and provided a way for the individual to directly expe-
rience religion through performance.91 With all due caution necessary for the analysis of ancient cultures, the
texts referred to here exemplify some aspects of this theoretical background. The statements of priests in Libyan
and Late period autobiographies, which stress how they had correctly performed the rituals, openly display the
lived experience of and closeness to the divine through the ritual.92 The rituals gave meaning to the belief system
and its symbols; attending ceremonies provided the chance to learn ideas about the divine through group-based
hymns and prayers.93 To illustrate this with É. Durkheim’s words: “these individual cults are not distinct and
autonomous religious systems but simply aspects of the religion common to the whole Church94 of which the
individuals are part.”95
What I have presented so far points to different perspectives over time on the lived religious experience of the
individual as displayed in autobiographical texts. Following the definition proposed by J. Rüpke “‘lived religion’
suggests a set of experiences, of practices addressed to, and conceptions of the divine, which are appropriated,
expressed, and shared by individuals in diverse social spaces.”96 The concept of “lived religion,” which originates
within phenomenological philosophy, is rooted in the idea of a “lived space” in which experiences of sounds,
rituals, music, gestures, and the like, set within the frames of defined spaces, can be explored. The underlying
idea is that religion, understood as religious practices, develops in defined spaces, meaning that interaction oc-
curs between the defined space and the religious agency conceived as taking place in it. Religious experiences and
practices are generated in defined spaces that in turn influence the conception of such experiences.97 In the con-
text of the present article, the religious experiences that the texts clearly set within a definite spatial context can
be understood as forms of “lived religion.” This spatial context need not be a physical one. Hence, for instance,
Nakhtefmut’s description of Amun’s loving intervention in his life is recognized in the form of the protagonist’s
daughter and is thus conceived within the frame of the family. More explicitly, when the high priest Setau de-
scribes his agency in the performance of a religious ceremony, such as by carrying the divine barque, more than
a simple statement of loyalty and devotion is displayed: religious ritual becomes the frame within which religion
is experienced. Reporting their experiences was clearly significant for the protagonists’ self-presentation and self-
evaluation in terms of lived moral values. Egyptian autobiographical statements of religious experience became

vidual’s faith in a state religion is based not only on their relationship to what is socially and/or institutionally sanctioned as sacred
or transcendent, but also on their own subjective experiences and memories within that religious system.” Moreover, “should either
one of these fail, should a religious belief no longer support or fit in with an individual’s experience, that belief will often undergo
alterations in order to resolve the dissonance.” (Dornan 2004, 30)
90.  I here refer to Klotz, this volume, whose view I support.
91.  Dornan 2004, 29.
92.  See also Adderley 2015, 32–33.
93.  Luiselli 2007, 87–96.
94.  Durkheim’s understanding of “Church” as “a society whose members are united because they imagine the sacred world
and its relations with the profane world in the same way” is based on the assumption that “religious beliefs are always shared by a
definite group that professes them and that practices the corresponding rites.” Moreover, according to Durkheim there is no religion
without Church at any time in history. See Durkheim 2008, 43.
95.  Durkheim 2008, 44.
96.  Rüpke 2011, 191.
97.  Bergmann 2008, esp. 197–200. This concept has recently been applied to the archaeological investigation of ancient reli-
gion by Rüpke 2011. For Egyptology see Stevens 2006, 2009, although not explicitly; see also Weiss 2015.
 LIVING A RELIGIOUS LIFE 319

increasingly prevalent, and they emphasized the agency of the individual in the religious system.98 In some cases,
divine intervention in one’s life is described and used as a means of differentiation and individualization. How-
ever, the developments illustrated so far went one step further. They displayed the perception of a religious system
that was increasingly tailored to individuals, their needs, and to specific situations in their lives. The gods were
believed to intervene in life, guide it, and influence it—not in a general way, but in very specific circumstances
that partly are recalled in the autobiographies.

Bibliography

Adderley, Nicola J. 2015. Personal Religion in the Libyan Period in Egypt. Saarbrücken: Scholars’ Press.
Adrom, Faried. 2005. “‘Der Gipfel der Frömmigkeit’ (soziale und funktionale Überlegungen zu Kultstelen am
Beispiel der Stele Turin CG 50058 des Nfr-ʿbw).” Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur 33:1–28.
Asad, Talal. 1983. “Anthropological Conceptions of Religion: Reflections on Geertz.” Man, New Series 18:237–
59.
Assmann, Jan. 1978. “Eine Traumoffenbarung der Göttin Hathor: Zeugnisse ‘Persönlicher Frömmigkeit’ in
thebanischen Privatgräbern der Ramessidenzeit.” Revue d’Égyptologie 30:22–50.
———. 1984. Ägypten: Theologie und Frömmigkeit einer frühen Hochkultur. Urban-Taschenbücher 366.
Stuttgart: Kohlhammer.
———. 1999. Ägyptische Hymnen und Gebete: Übersetzt, kommentiert und eingeleitet. Orbis Biblicus et
Orientalis Sonderband. Fribourg: Universitätsverlag.
Baines, John. 1987. “Practical Religion and Piety.” Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 73:79–98.
———. 2013. High Culture and Experience in Ancient Egypt. Sheffield: Equinox.
Baines, John, and Elizabeth Frood. 2011. “Piety, Change and Display in the New Kingdom.” In Ramesside Stud-
ies in Honour of K. A. Kitchen, ed. Mark Collier and Steven R. Snape (Bolton, UK: Rutherford),
1–17.
Barrett, Justin L. 2012. Born Believers: The Science of Children’s Religious Belief. New York: Free Press.
Bergmann, Sigurd. 2008. “Lived Religion in Lived Space.” In Lived Religion: Conceptual, Empirical and Practical-
Theological Approaches; Essays in Honor of Hans-Günter Heimbrock, ed. Heinz Streib, Astrid Dinter,
and Kerstin Söderblom (Leiden: Brill), 197–209.
Bickel, Susanne. 2003. “‘Ich spreche ständig zu Aton…’: Zur Mensch-Gott-Beziehung in der Amarna Religion.”
Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions 3:23–45.
Blumenthal, Elke. 1998. “Sinuhes persönliche Frömmigkeit.” In Jerusalem Studies in Egyptology, ed. Irene Shi-
run-Grumach (Ägypten und Altes Testament 40. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz), 213–31.
Bowie, Fiona. 2008. “Anthropology of Religion.” in Religion Compass 2:862–74.
Boyer, Pascal. 2001. Et l’homme créa les dieux: comment expliquer la religion. Paris: Gallimard.
Bussmann, Richard. 2017. “Personal Piety: An Archaeological Response.” In Company of Images: Modelling the
Imaginary World of Middle Kingdom Egypt (2000-1500 BC). Proceedings of the International Confer-
ence of the EPOCHS Project Held 18th–20th September 2014 at UCL, London, ed. Gianluca Miniaci,
Marilina Betrò, and Stephen Quirke (Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 262. Leuven: Peeters), 71–91.
Clapton, Eric. 2007. The Autobiography. New York: Broadway Books.
Coulon, Laurent. 1997. “Véracité et rhétorique dans les autobiographies de la Première Période intermédiaire.”
Bulletin de l’Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale 97:109–138.

98.  Frood 2003, 74.

320 LUISELLI

Dorn, Andreas. 2011. Arbeiterhütten im Tal der Könige: Ein Beitrag zur altägyptischen Sozialgeschichte aufgrund
von neuem Quellenmaterial aus der Mitte der 20. Dynastie (ca. 1150 v. Chr.). Aegyptiaca Helvetica
23. Basel: Schwabe.
Dornan, Jennifer L. 2004. “Beyond Belief: Religious Experience, Ritual, and Cultural Neuro-phenomenology in
the Interpretation of Past Religious Systems.” Cambridge Archaeological Journal 14:25–36.
DuQuesne, Terence, Sabah Abdel Razek, Janet M. Johnstone, Edmund S. Meltzer, and Geoffrey J. Tassie. 2009.
The Salakhana Trove: Votive Stelae and Other Objects from Asyut. Oxfordshire Communications in
Egyptology 7. London: Darengo.
Durkheim, Émile. 2008. “The Elementary Form of Religious Life.” In A Reader in the Anthropology of Religion,
ed. Michael Lambeck (Oxford: Blackwell), 34–47.
Eaton-Krauss, Marianne, and Jansen-Winkeln Karl. 2001. “Der Würfelhocker des Hor aus der frühen 22. Dy-
nastie.” Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, Abteilung Kairo 57:1–13.
Exell, Karen. 2009. Soldiers, Sailors and Sandalmakers: A Social Reading of Ramesside Period Votive Stelae. Golden
House Publications Egyptology 10. London: Golden House Publications.
Eyre, Christopher. 2011. “Children and Literature in Pharaonic Egypt.” In Ramesside Studies in Honour of K. A.
Kitchen, ed. Mark Collier and Steven R. Snape (Bolton, UK: Rutherford), 177–87.
Feucht, Erika. 1995. Das Kind im Alten Ägypten: Die Stellung des Kindes in Familie und Gesellschaft nach altägyp-
tischen Texten und Darstellungen. Frankfurt: Campus-Verlag.
Fogelin, Lars. 2007. “The Archaeology of Religious Ritual.” Annual Review of Anthropology 36:55–71.
Frood, Elizabeth. 2003. “Ritual Function and Priestly Narrative: The Stelae of the High Priest of Osiris, Nebwa-
wy.” Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 89:59–81.
———. 2007. Biographical Texts from Ramessid Egypt. Writings from the Ancient World 26. Atlanta: Society of
Biblical Literature.
Geertz, Clifford. 1973. The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays. New York: Basic Books.
Gnirs, Andrea M. 1996. “Die ägyptische Autobiographie.” In Ancient Egyptian Literature: History and Forms, ed.
Antonio Loprieno (Probleme der Ägyptologie 10. Leiden: Brill), 191–242.
———. 2003. “Der Tod des Selbst: Die Wandlung der Jenseitsvorstellungen in der Ramessidenzeit.” In Grab
und Totenkult im Alten Ägypten, Festschrift J. Assmann, ed. Heike Guksch, Eva Hofmann, and Martin
Bommas (München: Beck), 175–99.
Griffiths, J. Gwyn. 1988. “Intimations in Egyptian Non-Royal Biography of a Belief in Divine Impact on Hu-
man Affairs.” In Pyramid Studies and Other Essays Presented to I. E. S. Edwards, ed. John Baines, T.
G. H. James, Anthony Leahy, and A. F. Shore (Egypt Exploration Society Occasional Publications 7.
London: Egypt Exploration Society), 92–102.
Guksch (Heye), Heike. 1994. Königsdienst: Zur Selbstdarstellung der Beamten in der 18. Dynastie. Studien zur
Archäologie und Geschichte Altägyptens 11. Heidelberg: Heidelberger Orientverlag.
Gunn, Battiscombe. 1916. “The Religion of the Poor in Ancient Egypt.” Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 3:81–94.
Harrington, Nicola. 2005. “Children and the Dead in New Kingdom Egypt.” In Current Research in Egyptol-
ogy 2005: Proceedings of the Sixth Annual Symposium, vol. 5, ed. Rachel Mairs and Alice Stevenson
(Oxford: Oxbow Books), 52–65.
Hodjash, Svetlana, and Oleg D. Berlev. 1982. The Egyptian Reliefs and Stelae in the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts,
Moscow. Leningrad: Aurora.
James, Thomas Garnet Henry. 1970. Hieroglyphic Texts from Egyptian Stelae, etc., part 9. London: British Mu-
seum Press.
Jansen-Winkeln, Karl. 1985. Ägyptische Biographien der 22. und 23. Dynastie. Ägypten und Altes Testament
8. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.
Kemp, Barry J. 1995. “How Religious Were the Ancient Egyptians?” Cambridge Archaeological Journal 5:25–54.
 LIVING A RELIGIOUS LIFE 321

Kessler, Dieter. 1998. “Dissidentenliteratur oder kultischer Hintergrund? Teil 1: Überlegungen zum Tura-Hym-
nus und zum Hymnus in TT 139.” Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur 25:161–88.
———. 1999. “Dissidentenliteratur oder kultischer Hintergrund (Teil 2)?” Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur
27:173–221.
King, B. B., and David Ritz. 1996. Blues All Around Me: The Autobiography of B. B. King. New York: Avon.
Kloth, Nicole. 2002. Die (auto-)biographischen Inschriften des ägyptischen Alten Reiches: Untersuchungen zu
Phraseologie und Entwicklung. Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur, Beihefte 8. Hamburg: Buske.
Kubisch, Sabine. 2003. “Kindheit und Erziehung in den Biographien der 13.–17. Dynastie.” In Menschenbil-
der—Bildermenschen: Kunst und Kultur im Alten Ägypten; Festschrift Erika Feucht, ed. Tobias Hof-
mann and Alexandra Sturm (Norderstedt, Germany: Books on Demand), 179–91.
———. 2008. Lebensbilder der 2. Zwischenzeit: Biographische Inschriften der 13.–17. Dynastie. Sonderschriften
des Deutsches Archäologischen Instituts, Abteilung Kairo 34. Berlin: de Gruyter.
———. 2010. “Biographies of the Thirteenth to Seventeenth Dynasties.” In The Second Intermediate Period
(Thirteenth–Seventeenth Dynasties): Current Research, Future Prospects, ed. Marcel Marée (Orientalia
Lovaniensia Analecta 192. Leuven: Peeters), 313–27.
Lambeck, Michael. 2008. A Reader in the Anthropology of Religion. Oxford: Blackwell.
Lichtheim, Miriam. 1988. Ancient Egyptian Autobiographies Chiefly of the Middle Kingdom: A Study and an An-
thology. Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 84. Fribourg: Universitätsverlag.
———. 1992. Maat in Egyptian Autobiographies and Related Studies. Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 120. Fribourg:
Universitätsverlag.
Luiselli, Maria Michela. 2005. “Fiktionale Dialoge? Zur Interaktion zwischen Gott und Mensch in der altägyp-
tischen Literatur.” Göttinger Miszellen 206:39–47.
———. 2007. “Das Bild des Betens: Versuch einer bildtheoretischen Analyse der altägyptischen Anbetungsges-
tik.” Imago Aegypti 2:87–96.
———. 2011. Die Suche nach Gottesnähe: Untersuchungen zur persönlichen Frömmigkeit in Ägypten von der Ersten
Zwischenzeit bis zum Ende des Neuen Reiches. Ägypten und Altes Testament 73. Wiesbaden: Harras-
sowitz.
———. 2013. “Images of Personal Religion in Ancient Egypt: An Outline.” In Kult und Bild: Die bildliche
Dimension des Kultes im Alten Orient, in der Antike und in der Neuzeit, ed. Maria Michela Luiselli,
Jürgen Mohn, and Stephanie Gripentrog (Diskurs Religion 1. Würzburg: Ergon), 13–39.
———. 2017. “Escaping Fear and Seeking Protection: On the Role of Mut in New Kingdom Personal Religion.”
In L’individu dans la religion égyptienne: actes de la journée d’études de l’équipe EPHE (EA 4519),
Paris, 27 juin 2014, ed. Christiane Zivie-Coche and Yannis Gourdon (Cahiers Égypte Nilotique et
Méditerranéenne 16. Montpellier: Université Paul Valéry Montpellier 3), 119–35.
———. 2018. “The Lived Religion of Children in Ramesside Egypt.” In The Ramesside Period in Egypt: Studies
into Cultural and Historical Processes of the 19th and 20th Dynasties; Proceedings of the International
Symposium Held in Heidelberg, 5th to 7th June 2015, ed. Sabine Kubisch and Ute Rummel (Sonder-
schriften des Deutsches Archäologischen Instituts, Abteilung Kairo 41. Berlin: de Gruyter), 205–16.
Morgan, Enka Elvira. 2004. Untersuchungen zu den Ohrenstelen aus Deir el-Medine. Ägypten und Altes Testa-
ment 61. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.
Meskell, Lynn. 1994. “Dying Young: The Experience of Death at Deir el-Medina.” Archaeological Review from
Cambridge 13.2:35–45.
———. 2002. Private Life in New Kingdom Egypt. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Perdu, Olivier. 1995. “Ancient Egyptian Autobiographies.” In Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, vol. 4, ed.
Jack Sasson (New York: Scribner), 2243–54.
Ridgely, Susan. 2012. “Children and Religion.” Religion Compass 6:236–48.
322 LUISELLI

Rüpke, Jörg. 2011. “Lived Ancient Religion: Questioning ‘Cults’ and ‘Polis Religion.’” Mythos. Rivista di Storia
delle Religioni 5:191–204.
Schulz, Regine. 1992. Die Entwicklung und Bedeutung des kuboiden Statuentypus: Eine Untersuchung zu den so-
genannten “Würfelhockern.” 2 vols. Hildesheimer ägyptologische Beiträge 33–34. Hildesheim: Gers-
tenberg.
Stauder-Porchet, Julie. 2017. Les autobiographies de l’Ancien Empire égyptien: étude sur la naissance d’un genre.
Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 255. Leuven: Peeters.
Stevens, Anna. 2006. Private Religion at Amarna: The Material Evidence. British Archaeological Reports Interna-
tional Series 1587. Oxford: Archaeopress.
———. 2009. “Domestic Religious Practices.” In UCLA Encyclopedia of Egyptology, ed. Willeke Wendrich and
Jacco Dieleman (Los Angeles: University of California Los Angeles).
Szpakowska, Kasia. 2001. “Through the Looking Glass: Dreams in Ancient Egypt.” In Dreams: A Reader on the
Religious, Cultural, and Psychological Dimensions of Dreaming, ed. Kelly Bulkeley (New York: Palgrave
Macmillan), 29–43.
Tosi, Mario, and Alessandro Roccati. 1972. Stela e altre epigrafi di Deir el Medina: n. 50001-n. 50262. Catalogo
del Museo Egizio di Torino 1. Turin: Edizioni d’arte Fratelli Pozzo.
Turner, Victor W., and Edward M. Bruner. 1986. The Anthropology of Experience. Urbana: University of Illinois
Press.
Vernus, Pascal. 1978. “Littérature et autobiographie: les inscriptions de sȝ-mwt surnommé kyky,” Revue
d’Égyptologie 30:115–46.
Vittmann, Günter. 1995. “Die Autobiographie der Tathotis (Stele Wien 5857).” Studien zur Altägyptischen Kul-
tur 22:283–323.
von Lieven, Alexandra. 2010. “Zur Funktion der ägyptischen Autobiographie.” Die Welt des Orients 40.1:54–69.
Weiss, Lara. 2015. Religious Practice at Deir el-Medina. Egyptologische Uitgaven 29. Leiden: Nederlands Insti-
tuut voor het Nabije Oosten.
Wells, Eric. 2014. Display and Devotion: A Social and Religious Analysis of New Kingdom Votive Stelae from Asyut.
PhD diss., University of California Los Angeles.
Zillhardt, Ruth. 2009. Kinderbestattungen und die soziale Stellung des Kindes im Alten Ägypten unter besonderer
Berücksichtigung des Ostfriedhofes von Deir el-Medine. Göttinger Miszellen, Beihefte 6. Göttingen:
Seminar für Ägyptologie und Koptologie.
Zivie-Coche, Christiane. 2004. Tanis: statues et autobiographies de dignitaires; Tanis à l’époque ptolémaïque. Tra-
vaux Récents sur le Tell de Sân el-Hagar 3. Paris: Éd. Noêsis.