Egypt Exploration Society

Pygmies and Dwarfs in Ancient Egypt

Author(s): Warren R. Dawson
Source: The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 24, No. 2 (Dec., 1938), pp. 185-189
Published by: Egypt Exploration Society
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3854789
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(185)

PYGMIES AND DWARFS IN ANCIENT EGYPT

BY WARREN R. DAWSON
THEPharaohs of Egypt and their nobles, from the earliest times, delighted to have in their
households dwarfs and other mis-shapen human beings. This peculiar taste has had a very
wide distribution both in space and time, and it has survived in many places until recent
years. To this fancy we owe the existence of a number of pictures, statues, and drawings
in the monumental records of Egypt. Many of these representations supply pathological
features of great interest, all of which have a bearing upon the history of medicine.
It is curious that in the works of many modern writers pygmies and dwarfs should be
spoken of almost as if they were synonymous terms. The ancient Egyptians themselves
distinguished between pygmies, i.e. the normally small races of men from the interior of
Africa, and dwarfs, which were pathological cases drawn from their own population.
Pygmies
tomb
of
Khewefhar
In the
('Harkhuf') at Aswan there is an interesting inscription which
made four journeys to Southern Nubia, whence he travelled
Khewefhar
refers to pygmies.
westward. Three of these journeys were made in the reign of Mernerecand the fourth in
that of Pepy II, both kings of the Sixth Dynasty. Whilst on his last journey he wrote to
the king reporting that he had secured a pygmy, and the king's reply to that letter is copied
on the walls of his tomb. The original letter seems to have spoken of the pygmy as a wild
and fierce creature continually seeking to escape, for the king's reply gives explicit directions
to his official from this point of view. Reference may also have been made to a pygmy
brought to Egypt by one Werdjededba' in the reign of the Pharaoh Isesi. These references
can be inferredfrom the king's letter, which opens with an acknowledgement of his minister's
communication, and proceeds as follows:1
'Come northwardto the Residence immediately. Leave (everything ?) and bring this pygmy
with thee, which thou hast brought living, prosperous,and healthy from the land of the Akhtiu,2
for the dances of the god, to rejoiceand gladdenthe heart of the king of Upper and LowerEgypt
Neferker5e,may he live for ever. When he (the pygmy) goes down with thee to the vessel, appoint
trusty people,who shallbe abouthim on each side of the vessel; take carelest he fall into the water.
When he sleeps at night, appointagain trusty people who shall sleep about him in his tent: inspect
ten times a night. My majesty desiresto see this pygmy more than the produceof Sinai and of
Pwenet. If thou arrivestat the Residence,this pygmybeingwith thee alive,prosperous,and healthy,
My Majestywill do for thee a greaterthing than that which was done for the Treasurerof the God
Werdjededba'in the time of Isesi, in accordancewith the heart's desire of My Majestyto see this
pygmy.'
The late Professor Breasted, in his translation, Anc. Rec., I, ? 353, used throughout the
which means 'pygmy', the word for
?z f ,3
word 'dwarf'. The Egyptian word is dng,
'dwarf' being nmi,4 ^Pj as we shall presently see. In commenting upon the foregoing
1 Urk.,I, 129-31.
2 An unknown
southernpeople. Theold translation'spirits'is impossible.
3

In Pyr. it is written drng.

'In M.K. written -

-,

nmw.
0

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WARREN R. DAWSON

186

inscription,1 Breasted evidently confused pygmies and dwarfs, for he says that Khewefhar
'returned bringing a rich pack train and a dwarf from one of the pygmy tribes of inner
Africa. These uncouth, bandy-legged creatures were highly prized by the noble class in
Egypt: they were not unlike the merry genius Bes in appearance, and they executed dances
in which the Egyptians took the greatest delight.' He refers to two illustrations (his Figs.
41, 75), both of which represent not pygmies, but achondroplastic dwarfs. The late Sir
Gaston Maspero, in an illuminating commentary on the inscription of Khewefhar,2 calls
attention to the reference in the Pyr. Texts (? 1189) to the d;ng 'who dances the dance of the
god', but both here and elsewhere in his writings he appears to harbour the same confusion
between pygmies and dwarfs. I know of no Egyptian representations of dancing pygmies,
but there is in the CairoMuseum a bronze statuette of a pygmy. This figurine has been made
deliberately grotesque, but there can be no doubt that an African pygmy is intended. The
artist has exaggerated the protrusion of the belly and the enlargement of the navel; these
throw into contrast the lean ribs and prominent clavicles. His grotesque fancy has led him
to fashion the nose crooked and the mouth awry, but the negroid characters are strongly
marked.3 In the great temple of Bubastis a bas-relief represents three figures which I
believe to be pygmies.4 They are clearly not achondroplastic dwarfs, and although of short
stature-the tops of their heads just reach the level of the shoulders of the Egyptians
represented in the same scene-they have well-proportioned bodies without pathological
deformity, and a slight tendency to steatopygia is indicated. In his remarks on this scene
the late Professor Naville confuses pygmies and dwarfs as other writers have done.5
Dwarfs
The Egyptian dwarfs are all, without exception, cases of the pathological condition
known as achondroplasia,and we have evidence of these achondroplastic dwarfs in Egypt in
predynastic times and throughout the historic period from the First to the Thirtieth
Dynasties. Skeletons of two such dwarfs, and the humerus of a third,6 were found in the
royal tombs at Abydos.7 In the same place were also found two stelae, on each of which
the crude but convincing outline of a dwarf is carved.8 At Abydos also, the skeleton of a
dwarf dating from the Fifth Dynasty was found, and this is now in the Museum of the Royal
College of Surgeons in London. Another skeleton of protodynastic age was found on the site
of the ancient Hieraconpolis,9and yet another, dating from the Sixth Dynasty, was found by
Garstang at Beni Hasan.10 Many years ago, Mariette discovered at Sakkarah the tomb of
the dwarf Khnemhotpe, and in it was found the statue, now in the Cairo Museum, which is
one of the most famous pieces of Old-Kingdom sculpture, and photographs of which have
been reproduced in countless books, both Egyptological1 and other. From another part of
the same necropolis, Quibell obtained in 1910 the granite sarcophagus of a dwarf, Djeho
the son of Petekhons, of the Thirtieth Dynasty, on the lid of which is sculptured a fulllength profile of his nude figure.12 Early in 1927, the tomb of another dwarf, Seneb, of the
2
Hist., 139-40.
Etudes de Myth.,I, 429.
G.
Ann.
Serv.
124
and
4,
Daressy,
3
P1.
4 E. Naville, Festival Hall, P1. xx, 5.
6 Petrie, Royal Tombs,I, 13.
5 Op. cit., 31.
7
8
Op. cit., n, 24.
Op. cit., I, P1. 35.
9 Quibelland Green,
26.
10
in,
Hierakonpolis,
Garstang,Burial Customs(1907), 41.
1 E.g. Borchardt,Statuenu. Statuetten. . . (CCG),I, P1. 32, No. 144.
12 See
Quibell and Hayter, Archaic M.astabas(Excavationsat Saqqara,vi), P1. xxxv. For the texts and
full description of the sarcophagus see Maspero, Sarcophagesdes epoquespersane et ptolemaique(CCG),
73 ff., with Pls. vi-viii.
1

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PYGMIES AND DWARFS IN ANCIENT EGYPT

187

Sixth Dynasty, was brought to light in the necropolis of Gizah.1 In addition to these actual
bones and definite historic records of dwarfs, there exists a large number of representations
of achondroplastic dwarfs in the wall-paintings of tombs in various sites, as well as drawings
of them on papyrus, and a series of figurines and statues.2
Dwarfs in Egypt fulfilled various offices and duties, sometimes of an important kind,
but I know of no evidence whatever that they were engaged in performing sacred dances
as the dng, or pygmies, were. They are frequentlyrepresented in charge of jewellery (Exx. 1,
6, 18),3 or of pet animals (3, 4, 21), or in personal attendance about their masters (5, 7, 8, 9,
10). These dwarfs are generally of the male sex, females being much rarer, although in
modern times achondroplasia occurs more frequently among women than among men.
The dwarf in Ex. 2 stands on the prow of a boat and brandishes a sling; the female figure
in Ex. 13 carries an object that seems to be a coffer, and walks behind a procession of
musicians; the dwarf in Ex. 5 holds a mirror, whilst that in the figurine, Ex. 22, carries on
his shoulders, St. Christopher-like, the god Bes.4 In Petrie's Medum, P1. 24, there is a picture of a child who has been spoken of as a dwarf,5because he is in charge of tame monkeys,
a function frequently performed by dwarfs (cf. 3): his proportions are, however, those of a
normal child, although the artist has deliberately emphasized his small stature in order to
strike a contrast with the relatively large size of the monkeys. The dwarfs Khnemhotpe,
Seneb, and Djeho, referred to above, must have been persons of considerable importance?
to have been able to afford, the two former costly tombs, and the latter a massive granite
sarcophagus. Khnemhotpe bore the title of Keeper of the Royal Wardrobe, and Djeho bears
a number of high titles. The important positions occupied by dwarfs in ancient Egypt is
further indicated by the fact that the skeletons referred to above were found in the royal
necropolis.
Generally speaking, these achondroplastic dwarfs are depicted by the Egyptians with
considerable fidelity to nature. The body is muscular and thickset, the limbs short, the
genitalia infantile, and the head large.7 In some cases there is a more or less marked degree
of lordosis (1, 18, 27), but generally the spine approximates to the form of that of a normal
man. In most of the drawings the heads of the dwarfs reach to the waist-level of the normal
men in the same scenes. In some instances, however, the artist has resorted to a playful
trick of wilful exaggeration, evidently designed to produce a striking effect. Thus in
Exx. 3, 4, 21 the dwarfs are drawn on a smaller scale in relation to the animals they are
1 Junker, Vorldufiger
Berichtin Anzeiger d. Akad. d. Wiss. in Wien, philos.-hist. Klasse, Jahrg. 1927,
100 ff.
2
1, Deshasheh,P1. 13; 2, Op. cit., P1. 5; 3, SheiklhSaid, P1. 4; 4, Op. cit., P1. 6; 5, Deir el Gebrawi,i,
P1. 17; 6, Op. cit., P1. 13; 7, RockTombsof El Amarna,n, P1.5; 8, Op. cit., P1. 8; 9, Beni Hasan, :, P1. 32;
10, Op. cit., P1. 16; 11, Royal Tombs,I, P1. 35; 12, Petrie, Amulets,P1. 32; 13, Petrie, Athribis,P1. 1; 14,
RoyalTombs,II, P1.28; 15, Abydos,I, P1.4, fig. 11; 16, Quibell,Hierakonpolis,I, P1. 18, fig. 19; 17, Balabish,
P1. 20; 18, Tombof Ptahhetep(Paget and Pirie), P1. 25; 19, Leps., Dkm., n, 36c; 20, Garstang,Burial Customs, Fig. 230, p. 325; 21, Bissing, Gemnikai,I, P1. 23; 22, MacgregorSale Catalogue(Sotheby's, 1922),
P1. 25, lot 1310; 23, Op. cit., P1. 24; 24, Murray,Hist. Studies(1911),p. 40; 25, Papyrusof Ani, P1. 11; 26,
Papyrus of QueenHenttowe(Cairo):Mariette, Pap. de Boulaq,m, No. 23; 27, Lepsius, Todtenbuch,vig. to
? 164 = Gunn, Rec. trav. 39, 102. (The foregoing memoirs, when no author's name is quoted, are EES
Excavation Memoirsand Arch. Survey.)
3 These numbers refer to the referencesin footnote 2 above.
4 Cf. JEA 15, 1; 16, 143.
5 E.g. by Maspero,Dawn of Civilization,299.
6 Seneb was a Prophet of Cheopsand Buto, and bore a numberof other titles, some of which referto him
as director of classes of dwarfs; see Junker, op. cit., 106 ff.
7 Cf. F. J. Poynton, Systemof Medicine,ed. Allbutt and Rolleston, 1907, iii, 117 ff.

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188

WARREN R. DAWSON

tending than can possibly have existed in nature; for in one case the standing dwarf is
very little taller than the squatting monkey,' in the second the top of the dwarf's head
does not reach to the greyhound's chin, and in the third the dwarf is scarcely taller than the
greyhound and monkey he holds in leash. As already mentioned, most of the Egyptian
dwarfs are males, but considerable development of the breasts is usually indicated. A pair
of dwarfs, one male, the other female, habitually accompany one of the princesses in the
scenes portrayed in the tombs at El-'Amarnah. They have mock-grandiloquent names and
titles: the male is Parec ('the Sun') and the female Erenheh ('forever'), and they are called
'the vizier' and 'the queen' respectively. In addition to the usual signs of achondroplasia,
they have deformities of the feet, and in the case of the male, of the head also.2
The shape of the head varies considerably. It is well known that achondroplastic
infants are liable to malformation of the head during parturition, owing to its relatively
large size. In some cases, the skull appears quite normal in contour, but in others it is
dolichocephalic, or otherwise deformed, sometimes to a very marked degree (3, 8, 14, 25,
26). In such cases.the occipital region is sometimes rounded in form (7, 25), and sometimes
square and angular (8, 26). Deformity of the skull is probably deliberately exaggerated,
but it is not wise to place much reliance on this feature, for Exx. 7, 8, both of which represent the same individual, reveal two different cranial contours. The head of Djeho is in
contrast with all the others, for the brow is high, the top of the head elevated and domed,
and its form suggests that which sometimes results from malposition during parturition, i.e.
through occipitoposterior presentation.
The legs are often bandy, and this is a common feature of achondroplasia (9, 10, 14).
The form of the dwarf at Beni Hasan (9) suggests rickets, but the square muscular build
and short arms make it more probable that ordinary achondroplasia is intended, and that
the bowing of the legs is exaggerated, an inference which is confirmed by the word nmw
(-) 'dwarf', written above the figure.
Achondroplastic dwarfs must have had magical significance, and for this reason figurines
and amulets were formed in their shape from the earliest times (12, 16, 20, 22, 23). In a
magical papyrus at Leiden there is a spell to facilitate birth, called 'The Spell of the Dwarf'.
At the end of the incantation is the rubric: 'Say the words four times over a dwarf of clay
placed upon the vertex of the woman who is giving birth.'3 In another magical papyrus
there is a spell in which a dwarf is invoked: '0 thou dwarf of heaven! 0 thou dwarf of
heaven! Thou dwarf whose face is big, whose back is long and whose legs are short.'4 The
picture accompanying the 164th spell of the Book of the Dead represents the body of an
achondroplastic dwarf with a Janus-head-the face looking forwards is that of a falcon,
and that looking backwards is human. The arm is raised in the attitude of the god Min. In
the remarkable series of pictures of divinities seated in shrines which accompanies the 147th
spell of the Book of the Dead, one is the seated figure of an achondroplastic dwarf (e.g.
P. Ani, P1. xi), and a similar figure sometimes occurs in funerary papyri of the Twenty-first
Dynasty (26). The last three examples, although mythological subjects, are clearly based
upon human models, with the exaggeration needed to produce a terrifying appearance, for
they are all denizens of the underworld.
1 It is a Cercopithecus
monkey, which in the attitude depicted could scarcely have exceeded a height
of 18 inches.
2 These dwarfs occur
many times in the tomb-scenes: of Panehasy (Rock Tombsof El Amara, in,
Pls. 5, 8); of May (op. cit., v, P1. 3); of Ay (op. cit., vI, Pls. 17, 26, 28).
3 P. Leiden.I. 348, 12, 2-6.
4 P.
Mag. Harris, 8. 9-10; Gunn, Rec. trav. 39, 102.

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PYGMIES AND DWARFS IN ANCIENT EGYPT

189

Another indication of the respect in which dwarfs were held in Egypt is provided by a
sentence of the Teaching of Amenemope, in which the sage says:' Laugh not at a blind man,
nor tease a dwarf.'1 Finally, it may be mentioned that the personal namePI-nmi,'the Dwarf',
occurs frequently in an Eighteenth-Dynasty account-papyrus in the British Museum.2
I am indebted to Professor Gunn for a revised translation of the text in the tomb of
Khewefhar and for some valuable references.
ADDITIONAL

NOTE

In stating above that I knew of no records of dwarfs performing sacred dances, I had
overlooked the passages quoted by Gardiner, Notes on ... Sinuhe, 70 (to Sinuhe B, 194-5).
In the first of these (Mariette, Mon. Div., 61) reference is definitely made to dancing (hbb)
at the door of a tomb, performed by dwarfs (nmiw). The second instance (Ptolemaic) is
similarly worded, but 'dwarf' is here not spelt out, being written simply with the wordsign P which might as well stand for dng as for nmi. It is well known that amongst the
funerary ceremonies a dance was performed by men wearing a peculiar head-dress, the
mww as they were called, and it seems probable that in the first-mentioned text (N.-K.)
the scribe confused the writing of ~
nmw, the usual M.-K. writing,
11 mww with which he transcribed into the current spelling -|i
.
Concerning this possible confusion
of words, see Gardiner's note, loc. cit., and as to the mww-dancers, see Davies-Gardiner,
Tomb of Amenemhet,51, n. 3.
It is hardly likely that the 'dance of the god', in which the king took so keen an interest,
should refer to one of the routine funerary ceremonies which were performed for private
individuals. The true pygmy-dance is much more likely to have been a temple-ritual.
There are many painted or sculptured scenes representing the mww-dancers in tombs of
all periods, but there is not a single instance, so far as I am aware, of a picture of the'dance
of the god', which must have been a very rare occurrence-only performed, in fact, upon
the infrequent occasions when a pygmy could be procured to do it.
1
2

P. BM. 10474, 24. 9 (cf. JEA 12, 221).

P. BM. 10056, recto 5, 3 and often (Glanville, ZAS 68, 34).

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