Early Dynastic Egypt by Toby A. H. Wilkinson Page A

example, Malek 1986:29), the scorpion sign almost certainly records the name of the king, since it has been convincingly demonstrated that the rosette/palmette sign above the scorpion signified the ruler (H.S.Smith 1992:244). In view of the close stylistic similarities between the Scorpion macehead and the monuments of Narmer, the two kings were probably near contemporaries (Kaiser 1990:289, fig. 1). However, since no evidence of Scorpion has been found at Abydos— but note that the four-chambered tomb B50, devoid of any inscriptions, has been suggested as a possible burial place for Scorpion (Dreyer 1990:71)—he may not fit into the Thinite dynastic sequence at all. Instead, he may have belonged to the royal house of Hierakonpolis (Trigger et al. 1983:46), as suggested by the place he chose to dedicate his ceremonial macehead. In this case, he may have been at least partly contemporary with Narmer. The serekh of ‘Scorpion’ may occur on a wine jar from Minshat Abu Omar (Wildung 1981:37, fig. 33; van den Brink 1996: pl. 28), although this inscription has also been read as the name of Aha (Wildung 1981:35) Two serekh s written in ink on pottery vessels from Tarkhan (Petrie et al. 1913: pl. LX; Petrie 1914: pl. XL) have been read as ‘Scorpion’ (Kaplony 1963, II: 1090), although in the absence of any further comparable inscriptions a definitive reading remains impossible for the present.
A recent hypothesis assigns the Tarkhan inscriptions to another proposed king of ‘Dynasty 0’, the Horus ‘Crocodile‘ (Dreyer 1992a). This reading is based upon new infra-red photographs of the inscriptions and their comparison with a seal-impression from a third tomb at Tarkhan, dated to the reign of Narmer. The sealing, which may have belonged to a governor of the Tarkhan region, shows a series of crocodiles above coils which probably represent water. On the basis of the inscribed vessels themselves and the form of the serekh s, the Horus ‘Crocodile’ is identified as a usurper or alternatively a king reigning concurrently with the main Thinite royal family, early in the reign of ‘Ka’. Following this interpretation, the Minshat Abu Omar serekh mentioned above has now been attributed to ‘Horus (Crocodile) the Subduer’ (van den Brink 1996:147). The proposed new reading of the three inscriptions and the existence of a King ‘Crocodile’ is not universally accepted. By contrast, the Scorpion macehead remains a powerful piece of evidence for the existence of a late Predynastic king of this name.
‘Ka’
The horizontal stratigraphy of the royal burials at Abydos and the ceramic evidence—the types of pottery associated with the early royal names – make it fairly certain that Narmer was immediately preceded (as ruler of This, and perhaps as king of all Egypt) by the king whose Horus name shows a pair of arms, the hieroglyph later read as k3. King ‘Ka’, as he is generally known (but note Kaplony 1958), was buried in the double tomb B7/9, situated between the graves of his Predynastic forebears in Cemetery U and the tombs of his successors, the kings of the First Dynasty (Petrie 1901: pl. LIX). (The theory that the serekh s of ‘Ka’ from tomb B7/9 refer to the ka(-tomb) of Narmer [Baumgartel 1975:31; repeated by O’Brien 1996:132] would seem to be invalidated by the occurrences of the same serekh at sites other than Abydos.) Clay sealings from tomb B7/9 confirm its attribution (Petrie 1901: pls II.l and XIII.89). ‘Ka’ is the best attested king before Narmer, his name having been found at sites from Tell Ibrahim Awad in the north-eastern Delta (van den Brink 1992b: 53, n. 14) to Abydos in Upper Egypt. Two jars incised with the serekh of ‘Ka’ were found in graves at Helwan (Saad 1947:111 and 112, figs 11–12), apparently indicating that the city of Memphis—which the Helwan necropolis served— was already in existence before the reign of Narmer. This is despite later tradition that Menes founded Egypt’s