Imhotep (/ɪmˈhoʊtɛp/; Ancient Egyptian: ỉỉ-m-ḥtp "(the one who) comes in peace"; fl. late 27th century BC) was an Egyptian chancellor to the King Djoser, possible architect of Djoser's step pyramid, and high priest of the sun god Ra at Heliopolis.
Born date unknownLast edited Oct 15, 2026, 2:38 PM
Imhotep (/ɪmˈhoʊtɛp/;1Ancient Egyptian: ỉỉ-m-ḥtp "(the one who) comes in peace";2 fl. late 27th century BC) was an Egyptian chancellor to the King Djoser, possible architect of Djoser's step pyramid, and high priest of the sun god Ra at Heliopolis. Very little is known of Imhotep as a historical figure, but in the 3,000 years following his death, he was gradually glorified and deified.
Traditions from long after Imhotep's death treated him as a great author of wisdom texts3 and especially as a physician.45678 No extant text from his lifetime mentions these capacities, and none mention his name in the first 1,200 years following his death.910 The Westcar Papyrus of the Hyksos period, written in classical Middle Egyptian (likely around the 13th Dynasty), contains , possibly Imhotep. However, this section is badly damaged and no mention of this character's name survived.
This page is based on “Imhotep” from English Wikipedia, (r1377151404) CC BY-SA 4.0 used under the license. The original authors are listed in its page history.
Apart from the two short contemporary inscriptions that establish him as chancellor to the Pharaoh, the first surviving text to name Imhotep dates to the time of Amenhotep III (c. 1391–1353 BC). It is addressed to the owner of a tomb and reads:
The wab-priest may give offerings to your ka. The wab-priests may stretch to you their arms with libations on the soil, as it is done for Imhotep with the remains of the water bowl.
It appears that this libation to Imhotep was done regularly, as they are attested on papyri associated with statues of Imhotep until the Late Period (c. 664–332 BC). Wildung (1977)3 explains the origin of this cult as a slow evolution of intellectuals' memory of Imhotep, from his death onward. Gardiner finds the cult of Imhotep during the New Kingdom (c. 1550–1077 BC) sufficiently distinct from the usual offerings made to other commoners that the epithet "demigod" is likely justified to describe his veneration.13
The first references to the healing abilities of Imhotep occur from the Thirtieth Dynasty (c. 380–343 BC) onward, some 2,200 years after his death.103
Imhotep is among fewer than a dozen non-royal Egyptians who were deified after their deaths.1415 The center of his cult was in Memphis. The location of his tomb remains unknown, despite efforts to find it.16
Historicity
Imhotep's historicity is confirmed by two contemporary inscriptions made during his lifetime on the base or pedestal of one of Djoser's statues (Cairo JE 49889) and also by a graffito on the enclosure wall surrounding Sekhemkhet's unfinished step pyramid.1718 The latter inscription suggests that Imhotep outlived Djoser by a few years and went on to serve in the construction of King Sekhemkhet's pyramid, which was abandoned due to this ruler's brief reign.17
Imhotep held the ambiguous title bity sensen or bity senwy, unique in ancient Egyptian history. This literally translates as "the King of Lower Egypt, the two brothers", and could be interpreted to mean that Imhotep might have been twin brother of Pharaoh, which would explain his high position; with no known individuals with similar titles, however, interpretation remains highly speculative.19 If not a blood relative, he might have been the King's confidant or childhood friend.20
Architecture and engineering
Imhotep was one of the chief officials of the PharaohDjoser. Concurring with much later legends, Egyptologists credit him with the design and construction of the Pyramid of Djoser, a step pyramid at Saqqara built during the 3rd Dynasty.21 He may also have been responsible for the first known use of stone columns to support a building.22 Despite these later attestations, the pharaonic Egyptians themselves never credited Imhotep as the designer of the stepped pyramid, nor with the invention of stone architecture.23
Deification
God of medicine
Two thousand years after his death, Imhotep's status had risen to that of a god of medicine and healing. Eventually, Imhotep was equated with Thoth, the god of architecture, mathematics, and medicine, and patron of scribes: Imhotep's cult was merged with that of his own former tutelary god.
He was revered in the region of Thebes as the "brother" of Amenhotep, son of Hapu – another deified architect – in the temples dedicated to Thoth.2425 Because of his association with health, the Greeks equated Imhotep with Asklepios, their own god of health who also was a deified mortal.26
According to myth, Imhotep's mother was a mortal named Khereduankh, she too being eventually revered as a demi-goddess as the daughter of Banebdjedet.27 Alternatively, since Imhotep was known as the "Son of Ptah",25 his mother was sometimes claimed to be Sekhmet, the patron of Upper Egypt whose consort was Ptah.
Post-Alexander period
The Upper Egyptian Famine Stela, which dates from the Ptolemaic period (305–30 BC), bears an inscription containing a legend about a famine lasting seven years during the reign of Djoser. Imhotep is credited with having been instrumental in ending it. One of his priests explained the connection between the god Khnum and the rise of the Nile to the Pharaoh, who then had a dream in which the Nile god spoke to him, promising to end the drought.28
A demotic papyrus from the temple of Tebtunis, dating to the 2nd century AD, preserves a long story about Imhotep.29 The Pharaoh Djoser plays a prominent role in the story, which also mentions Imhotep's family; his father the god Ptah, his mother Khereduankh, and his younger sister Renpetneferet. At one point Djoser desires Renpetneferet, and Imhotep disguises himself and tries to rescue her. The text also refers to the royal tomb of Djoser. Part of the legend includes an anachronistic battle between the Old Kingdom and the Assyrian armies where Imhotep fights an Assyrian sorceress in a duel of magic.30
As an instigator of Egyptian culture, Imhotep's idealized image lasted well into the Roman period. In the Ptolemaic period, the Egyptian priest and historian Manetho credited him with inventing the method of a stone-dressed building during Djoser's reign, although he was not the first to actually build with stone. Stonewalling, flooring, lintels, and jambs had appeared sporadically during the Archaic Period, even though it is true that a building the size of the step pyramid made entirely out of stone had never before been constructed. Before Djoser, Kings were buried in mastaba tombs.
Medicine
EgyptologistJames Peter Allen states that "The Greeks equated him with their own god of medicine, Asklepios, although ironically, there is no evidence that Imhotep himself was a physician."31
In his Pulitzer-prize winning “biography” of cancer – The Emperor of All Maladies – Siddhartha Mukherjee cites the oldest identified written diagnosis of cancer to Imhotep.32 Unfortunately, the therapy Imhotep laconically prescribed for it would be equally recognizable for millennia: “There is none”.
Asante, Molefi Kete (2000). The Egyptian Philosophers: Ancient African voices from Imhotep to Akhenaten. Chicago, IL: African American Images. ISBN 978-0-913543-66-5.
Cormack, Maribelle (1965). Imhotep: Builder in stone. New York, NY: Franklin Watts.
Dawson, Warren R. (1929). Magician and Leech: A study in the beginnings of medicine with special reference to ancient Egypt. London, UK: Methuen.
Garry, T. Gerald (1931). Egypt: The home of the occult sciences, with special reference to Imhotep, the mysterious wise man and Egyptian god of medicine. London, UK: John Bale, Sons and Danielsson.
Hurry, Jamieson B. (1978) [1926]. Imhotep: The Egyptian god of medicine (2nd ed.). New York, NY: AMS Press. ISBN 978-0-404-13285-9.
Hurry, Jamieson B. (2014) [1926]. Imhotep: The Egyptian god of medicine (reprint ed.). Oxford, UK: Traffic Output. ISBN 978-0-404-13285-9.
Wildung, Dietrich (1977). Egyptian Saints: Deification in pharaonic Egypt. New York University Press. ISBN 978-0-8147-9169-1.
Wildung, Dietrich (1977). Imhotep und Amenhotep: Gottwerdung im alten Ägypten [Imhotep and Amenhotep: Deification in ancient Egypt] (in German). Deustcher Kunstverlag. ISBN 978-3-422-00829-8.
Notes
Footnotes
"Imhotep". Collins Dictionary. Retrieved 25 September 2014. ↩
Ranke, Hermann (1935). Die Ägyptischen Personennamen [Egyptian Personal Names] (PDF) (in German). Vol. 1: Verzeichnis der Namen. Glückstadt: J. J. Augustin. p. 9. Retrieved 24 July 2020. ↩
Wildung, D. (1977). Egyptian Saints: Deification in pharaonic Egypt. New York University Press. p. 34. ISBN 978-0-8147-9169-1. ↩↩2↩3↩4
Osler, William (2004). The Evolution of Modern Medicine. Kessinger. p. 12. ↩
Musso, C. G. (2005). Imhotep: The dean among the ancient Egyptian physicians. ↩
Willerson, J. T.; Teaff, R. (1995). "Egyptian Contributions to Cardiovascular Medicine". Texas Heart Institute Journal: 194. ↩
Adolf Erman: Die Märchen des Papyrus Westcar I. Einleitung und Commentar. In: Mitteilungen aus den Orientalischen Sammlungen. Heft V, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Berlin 1890. page 10 – 12. ↩
Hurry, Jamieson B. (2014) [1926]. Imhotep: The Egyptian god of medicine (reprint ed.). Oxford, UK: Traffic Output. pp. 47–48. ISBN 978-0-404-13285-9. ↩
Troche, Julia (2021). Death, Power and Apotheosis in Ancient Egypt: The Old and Middle Kingdoms. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. ↩
Malek, Jaromir (2002). "The Old Kingdom". In Shaw, Ian (ed.). The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt (paperback ed.). Oxford University Press. pp. 92–93. ↩↩2
Kahl, J. (2000). "Old Kingdom: Third Dynasty". In Redford, Donald (ed.). The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt. Vol. 2 (1st ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 592. ISBN 0195138228. ↩
Naunton, Chris (2018). Searching for the Lost Tombs of Egypt. Thames & Hudson. p. 44, e-book ed.. ISBN 978-0500051993. ↩
Naunton, Chris (2018). Searching for the Lost Tombs of Egypt. Thames & Hudson. p. 44, e-book ed. ISBN 978-0-500-77451-9. ↩
Kemp, B.J. (2005). Ancient Egypt. Routledge. p. 159. ↩
Romer, John (2013). A History of Ancient Egypt from the First Farmers to the Great Pyramid. Penguin Books. pp. 294–295. ISBN 9780141399713. ↩
Boylan, Patrick (1922). Thoth or the Hermes of Egypt: A study of some aspects of theological thought in ancient Egypt. Oxford University Press. pp. 166–168. ↩
Lichtheim, M. (1980). Ancient Egyptian Literature. The University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-04020-1. ↩↩2
Pinch, Geraldine (2002). Handbook of Egyptian Mythology. World Mythology. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-Clio. ISBN 9781576072424. OCLC52716451. ↩
Warner, Marina; Fernández-Armesto, Felipe (2003). World of Myths. University of Texas Press. p. 296. ISBN 0-292-70204-3. ↩
Ryholt, Kim (2009). Widmer, G.; Devauchelle, D. (eds.). The Life of Imhotep?. IXe Congrès International des Études Démotiques. Bibliothèque d'étude. Vol. 147. Le Caire, Egypt: Institut français d'archéologie orientale. pp. 305–315. ↩
Ryholt, Kim (2004). "The Assyrian invasion of Egypt in Egyptian literary tradition". Assyria and Beyond. Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. p. 501. ISBN 9062583113. ↩
Mukherjee, Siddhartha (29 September 2011). The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer. Fourth Estate Ltd; First Edition. ISBN 9780007250929. ↩
Reid, Danny (24 April 2014). "The Mummy (1932)". Pre-Code.com. Review, with Boris Karloff and David Manners. Retrieved 6 June 2016. ↩
Imhotep (/ɪmˈhoʊtɛp/;1Ancient Egyptian: ỉỉ-m-ḥtp "(the one who) comes in peace";2 fl. late 27th century BC) was an Egyptian chancellor to the King Djoser, possible architect of Djoser's step pyramid, and high priest of the sun god Ra at Heliopolis. Very little is known of Imhotep as a historical figure, but in the 3,000 years following his death, he was gradually glorified and deified.
Traditions from long after Imhotep's death treated him as a great author of wisdom texts3 and especially as a physician.45678 No extant text from his lifetime mentions these capacities, and none mention his name in the first 1,200 years following his death.910 The Westcar Papyrus of the Hyksos period, written in classical Middle Egyptian (likely around the ), contains , possibly Imhotep. However, this section is badly damaged and no mention of this character's name survived.
Apart from the two short contemporary inscriptions that establish him as chancellor to the Pharaoh, the first surviving text to name Imhotep dates to the time of Amenhotep III (c. 1391–1353 BC). It is addressed to the owner of a tomb and reads:
The wab-priest may give offerings to your ka. The wab-priests may stretch to you their arms with libations on the soil, as it is done for Imhotep with the remains of the water bowl.
It appears that this libation to Imhotep was done regularly, as they are attested on papyri associated with statues of Imhotep until the Late Period (c. 664–332 BC). Wildung (1977)3 explains the origin of this cult as a slow evolution of intellectuals' memory of Imhotep, from his death onward. Gardiner finds the cult of Imhotep during the New Kingdom (c. 1550–1077 BC) sufficiently distinct from the usual offerings made to other commoners that the epithet "demigod" is likely justified to describe his veneration.13
The first references to the healing abilities of Imhotep occur from the Thirtieth Dynasty (c. 380–343 BC) onward, some 2,200 years after his death.103
Imhotep is among fewer than a dozen non-royal Egyptians who were deified after their deaths.1415 The center of his cult was in Memphis. The location of his tomb remains unknown, despite efforts to find it.16
Historicity
Imhotep's historicity is confirmed by two contemporary inscriptions made during his lifetime on the base or pedestal of one of Djoser's statues (Cairo JE 49889) and also by a graffito on the enclosure wall surrounding Sekhemkhet's unfinished step pyramid.1718 The latter inscription suggests that Imhotep outlived Djoser by a few years and went on to serve in the construction of King Sekhemkhet's pyramid, which was abandoned due to this ruler's brief reign.17
Imhotep held the ambiguous title bity sensen or bity senwy, unique in ancient Egyptian history. This literally translates as "the King of Lower Egypt, the two brothers", and could be interpreted to mean that Imhotep might have been twin brother of Pharaoh, which would explain his high position; with no known individuals with similar titles, however, interpretation remains highly speculative.19 If not a blood relative, he might have been the King's confidant or childhood friend.20
Architecture and engineering
Imhotep was one of the chief officials of the PharaohDjoser. Concurring with much later legends, Egyptologists credit him with the design and construction of the Pyramid of Djoser, a step pyramid at Saqqara built during the 3rd Dynasty.21 He may also have been responsible for the first known use of stone columns to support a building.22 Despite these later attestations, the pharaonic Egyptians themselves never credited Imhotep as the designer of the stepped pyramid, nor with the invention of stone architecture.23
Deification
God of medicine
Two thousand years after his death, Imhotep's status had risen to that of a god of medicine and healing. Eventually, Imhotep was equated with Thoth, the god of architecture, mathematics, and medicine, and patron of scribes: Imhotep's cult was merged with that of his own former tutelary god.
He was revered in the region of Thebes as the "brother" of Amenhotep, son of Hapu – another deified architect – in the temples dedicated to Thoth.2425 Because of his association with health, the Greeks equated Imhotep with Asklepios, their own god of health who also was a deified mortal.26
According to myth, Imhotep's mother was a mortal named Khereduankh, she too being eventually revered as a demi-goddess as the daughter of Banebdjedet.27 Alternatively, since Imhotep was known as the "Son of Ptah",25 his mother was sometimes claimed to be Sekhmet, the patron of Upper Egypt whose consort was Ptah.
Post-Alexander period
The Upper Egyptian Famine Stela, which dates from the Ptolemaic period (305–30 BC), bears an inscription containing a legend about a famine lasting seven years during the reign of Djoser. Imhotep is credited with having been instrumental in ending it. One of his priests explained the connection between the god Khnum and the rise of the Nile to the Pharaoh, who then had a dream in which the Nile god spoke to him, promising to end the drought.28
A demotic papyrus from the temple of Tebtunis, dating to the 2nd century AD, preserves a long story about Imhotep.29 The Pharaoh Djoser plays a prominent role in the story, which also mentions Imhotep's family; his father the god Ptah, his mother Khereduankh, and his younger sister Renpetneferet. At one point Djoser desires Renpetneferet, and Imhotep disguises himself and tries to rescue her. The text also refers to the royal tomb of Djoser. Part of the legend includes an anachronistic battle between the Old Kingdom and the Assyrian armies where Imhotep fights an Assyrian sorceress in a duel of magic.30
As an instigator of Egyptian culture, Imhotep's idealized image lasted well into the Roman period. In the Ptolemaic period, the Egyptian priest and historian Manetho credited him with inventing the method of a stone-dressed building during Djoser's reign, although he was not the first to actually build with stone. Stonewalling, flooring, lintels, and jambs had appeared sporadically during the Archaic Period, even though it is true that a building the size of the step pyramid made entirely out of stone had never before been constructed. Before Djoser, Kings were buried in mastaba tombs.
Medicine
EgyptologistJames Peter Allen states that "The Greeks equated him with their own god of medicine, Asklepios, although ironically, there is no evidence that Imhotep himself was a physician."31
In his Pulitzer-prize winning “biography” of cancer – The Emperor of All Maladies – Siddhartha Mukherjee cites the oldest identified written diagnosis of cancer to Imhotep.32 Unfortunately, the therapy Imhotep laconically prescribed for it would be equally recognizable for millennia: “There is none”.
Asante, Molefi Kete (2000). The Egyptian Philosophers: Ancient African voices from Imhotep to Akhenaten. Chicago, IL: African American Images. ISBN 978-0-913543-66-5.
Cormack, Maribelle (1965). Imhotep: Builder in stone. New York, NY: Franklin Watts.
Dawson, Warren R. (1929). Magician and Leech: A study in the beginnings of medicine with special reference to ancient Egypt. London, UK: Methuen.
Garry, T. Gerald (1931). Egypt: The home of the occult sciences, with special reference to Imhotep, the mysterious wise man and Egyptian god of medicine. London, UK: John Bale, Sons and Danielsson.
Hurry, Jamieson B. (1978) [1926]. Imhotep: The Egyptian god of medicine (2nd ed.). New York, NY: AMS Press. ISBN 978-0-404-13285-9.
Hurry, Jamieson B. (2014) [1926]. Imhotep: The Egyptian god of medicine (reprint ed.). Oxford, UK: Traffic Output. ISBN 978-0-404-13285-9.
Wildung, Dietrich (1977). Egyptian Saints: Deification in pharaonic Egypt. New York University Press. ISBN 978-0-8147-9169-1.
Wildung, Dietrich (1977). Imhotep und Amenhotep: Gottwerdung im alten Ägypten [Imhotep and Amenhotep: Deification in ancient Egypt] (in German). Deustcher Kunstverlag. ISBN 978-3-422-00829-8.
Notes
Footnotes
"Imhotep". Collins Dictionary. Retrieved 25 September 2014. ↩
Ranke, Hermann (1935). Die Ägyptischen Personennamen [Egyptian Personal Names] (PDF) (in German). Vol. 1: Verzeichnis der Namen. Glückstadt: J. J. Augustin. p. 9. Retrieved 24 July 2020. ↩
Wildung, D. (1977). Egyptian Saints: Deification in pharaonic Egypt. New York University Press. p. 34. ISBN 978-0-8147-9169-1. ↩↩2↩3↩4
Osler, William (2004). The Evolution of Modern Medicine. Kessinger. p. 12. ↩
Musso, C. G. (2005). Imhotep: The dean among the ancient Egyptian physicians. ↩
Willerson, J. T.; Teaff, R. (1995). "Egyptian Contributions to Cardiovascular Medicine". Texas Heart Institute Journal: 194. ↩
Adolf Erman: Die Märchen des Papyrus Westcar I. Einleitung und Commentar. In: Mitteilungen aus den Orientalischen Sammlungen. Heft V, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Berlin 1890. page 10 – 12. ↩
Hurry, Jamieson B. (2014) [1926]. Imhotep: The Egyptian god of medicine (reprint ed.). Oxford, UK: Traffic Output. pp. 47–48. ISBN 978-0-404-13285-9. ↩
Troche, Julia (2021). Death, Power and Apotheosis in Ancient Egypt: The Old and Middle Kingdoms. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. ↩
Malek, Jaromir (2002). "The Old Kingdom". In Shaw, Ian (ed.). The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt (paperback ed.). Oxford University Press. pp. 92–93. ↩↩2
Kahl, J. (2000). "Old Kingdom: Third Dynasty". In Redford, Donald (ed.). The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt. Vol. 2 (1st ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 592. ISBN 0195138228. ↩
Naunton, Chris (2018). Searching for the Lost Tombs of Egypt. Thames & Hudson. p. 44, e-book ed.. ISBN 978-0500051993. ↩
Naunton, Chris (2018). Searching for the Lost Tombs of Egypt. Thames & Hudson. p. 44, e-book ed. ISBN 978-0-500-77451-9. ↩
Kemp, B.J. (2005). Ancient Egypt. Routledge. p. 159. ↩
Romer, John (2013). A History of Ancient Egypt from the First Farmers to the Great Pyramid. Penguin Books. pp. 294–295. ISBN 9780141399713. ↩
Boylan, Patrick (1922). Thoth or the Hermes of Egypt: A study of some aspects of theological thought in ancient Egypt. Oxford University Press. pp. 166–168. ↩
Lichtheim, M. (1980). Ancient Egyptian Literature. The University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-04020-1. ↩↩2
Pinch, Geraldine (2002). Handbook of Egyptian Mythology. World Mythology. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-Clio. ISBN 9781576072424. OCLC52716451. ↩
Warner, Marina; Fernández-Armesto, Felipe (2003). World of Myths. University of Texas Press. p. 296. ISBN 0-292-70204-3. ↩
Ryholt, Kim (2009). Widmer, G.; Devauchelle, D. (eds.). The Life of Imhotep?. IXe Congrès International des Études Démotiques. Bibliothèque d'étude. Vol. 147. Le Caire, Egypt: Institut français d'archéologie orientale. pp. 305–315. ↩
Ryholt, Kim (2004). "The Assyrian invasion of Egypt in Egyptian literary tradition". Assyria and Beyond. Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. p. 501. ISBN 9062583113. ↩