Crop failures in the reign of Senusert I

Despite Senusret I’s fame as a great pharaoh, there is evidence of disastrous crop failures during his reign: the second letter of Heqanakht, the tomb biographies of the nomarch Ameny and overseer of priests Mentuhotep; probably “The Story of Sinuhe”, B 154-155, and some “year of death” in pReisner I. According to S. Hodjash and O. Berlev, the seven year famine which started in Year 24 made the king shift his heb-sed festival by one year. These data show that even under the greatest kings, Egyptians were allowed to publicly mention acute food shortages. Hence the absence of such mentions in the Old Kingdom and during dynasty XII after Senusret I’s reign testifies to relative prosperity, in comparison with which the crop failures of the XXII-XX centuries B. C. seemed enormously frequent and disastrous. The sources do not mention any extraordinary measures aimed at supplying food to the hungry by Senusret I’s central government. At the same time, however, he launched a large scale building program in almost all important temples, which is considered to have given him a reason to tighten control over the country. But could an objective of this program also be to persuade the gods to save Egypt from crop failures? In two compositions about the seven year famine, in the “Famine Stela” and the introduction to the “Book of the Temple”, it is deficient Nile floods that are said to have forced kings to swiftly increase royal favors to temples. J. F. Quack considers dating the “Book of the Temple” to the Middle Kingdom. Could it be the reign of Senusret I, with its series of crop failures and large scale building program in temples? His inscription on Elephantine mentions a god’s revelation to the king in a dream, which is also the key episode in the “Book of the Temple” and “Famine Stela”.