Egyptian Dreams

[dreamregent]

Could someone possibly point me in the direction of information describing the origin of this crown? I can find thousands of sources indicating a vague association with Lower Egypt and describing its meaning but nothing that points to its actual invention. I am only looking for attestations of this crown pre-dating the Narmer Palette, if any exist.
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Thanks,

Joe

[kylejustin]

the palette is the earliest image of the king wearing the crown from what i have read. they don't know much about the origins of the crowns at all really.
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heaven won't take me.......hell's afraid i'll take over.....

[Lutz]

[dreamregent]

[dreamregent]

wait a sec...forgot about the scorpion mace head. However, I guess the dating isn't too clear during this period.
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Thanks,

Joe

[neseret]

[Lutz]

[dashotep]

I am not convinced that a white crown is represented on the Qustul incense burner. There is not space for a seated figure below it unless the crown is vastly out of scale. I The tip and base of the 'white crown' skittle shape are missing. it could be a bird's body. That is my opinion on the thing. Said shape is found next to another representation of a bird, amid marshes.

Below is the side of the burner that is supposed to feature the white crown. It is nowhere to be seen, and it shows how much imagination went into the reconstruction!







There is not a red crown on the King Scorpion mace, and the idea that one may have featured on a missing part is speculation.

[Lutz]

[dashotep]

Dreamregent mentioned the scorpion mace. (Which I saw in Oxford the other day, incidentally). I have seen speculative reconstructions showing a fugure in the red crown, but it is not based on any part of the mace that survives.

The shape on the Qutsul burner is surely not a white crown. Who would draw a crown larger than the figure wearing it? That's what the speculative reconstruction would have us believe was depicted. That's just crazy! The entirety of the seated figure in the 'reconstruction' is based on no evidence whatsoever.

The surviving shape, comprised of two grooves, is not like the hedjet white crown, either, because the straighter line is on top and the curvier one is below, whereas with the white crown the reverse was the case. It looks more like a goose's body than a white crown, and the marshy setting and the fact that another bird is adjacent makes that more likely.

A close examoination of the fragment in question also reveals a square edge that would not be present on the brow of a white crown. This is the goose's backside!

[Lutz]

[dashotep]

A bird would make no sense in the context of a marsh scene next to another bird? I fail to see how you arrive at that conclusion.

There is no context for the seated king figure. There is a whole load of nothingess below the two lines (that could quite easily be a goose's body), as can be seen from the coloured photo. There isn't space for a figure to scale with the supposed crown, as noted, were any crown actually in sight. There isn't room for a seated king, there is barely room for a disembodied head at the proper scale.

[dashotep]

It seems some of the older representations of the red crown appear on the 1st Dynasty label of King Den, and the crown is somewhat over-sized in this case...



Not as over-sized as the 'white crown' on the Qustul burner would need to be in order for it to be correctly identified as such, however. So I'm still a bit on the fence...

[Lutz]

[Lutz]