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EXECRATION TEXTS*
Certain Egyptian Middle Kingdom texts containing curses (execrations) directed against the pharaoh’s enemies. Such texts have been found on 20th- to 19th-century BC bowls from Thebes, and on 19th- to 18th-century figurines from Saqqara. The bowls or figurines, inscribed with names of rulers, cities, or persons and accompanied by a curse, were ceremonially smashed and given a ritual burial, symbolizing the curse intended for damage would be done to those named in the inscription.
This form of magic was aimed at both nations and individuals who constituted a threat to the kingdom. Egypt’s neighbor Libya is mentioned infrequently in the texts, but there were evidently more powerful enemies in the Sudan. Eight Egyptian individuals who were presumably part of a harem conspiracy were execrated. But the greatest threat loomed in the area of Palestine and Syria; over 60 towns or regions were singled out for execration. The list of place-names includes such well-known towns as Byblos, Ashkelon, Tyre, Jerusalem, and Beth-shan, and it provides an important source for the study of the historical geography of ancient Palestine.