The Hippopotamus in Ancient Egypt

As many of you may know, my secondary interest beyond animals is ancient civilizations, my personal favorite of which is ancient Egypt. As such, it seemed appropriate to write a short but comprehensive article on an animal in Egyptian life. I decided to go with the hippopotamus (Hippopotamus amphibius), as an animal that is not only endlessly interesting in life but also has a rich and contradictory role in the culture of the ancient Egyptians.

Lu the hippopotamus at Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park, what an impressive animal. Their power made them both feared and revered in ancient Egypt. Image by Donovan Snell.

To start, it may seem strange that hippos were prominent in Egypt as the animal no longer occurs in the Nile or anywhere else in Egypt. The last confirmed report of the animal in the country comes from 1818, though sightings up to 1850 have been reported. During antiquity, however, the hippo was a native and familiar member of the Nile’s diverse array of wildlife. As many readers may already know, the hippo is a dangerous animal even to this day, and the same was true during ancient times. The hippo was feared not only for their danger to people but perhaps even more so, their danger to croplands. Their enormous appetites made them a pest to farmers.

The Greek historian Diodorus Siculus wrote that, if the hippo were more plentiful, they would utterly destroy all crops in Egypt. Consequently, he writes, the animal was extensively hunted by the Egyptians to prevent this. This wasn’t just noted by foreigners, either, but is also written about in many Egyptian texts. One papyrus scroll even reads, of a devastated crop, that, “...the insect took half and the hippopotamus ate the rest.” Hippo attacks were probably not uncommon but apparently not always fatal, as there is at least one known Egyptian medical document that describes a cure for wounds caused by the hippo, implying people did on occasion survive such attacks. As one may imagine, the excessive overhunting of the hippo took its toll on their populations. The Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus mentions that, by the late 4th century C.E., the hippo was heavily depleted from the Nile Delta and quite difficult to encounter. During the Greco-Roman period, the hippo, alongside the crocodile, was considered the stereotypical “Egyptian animal,” despite the fact that, by that point, the animal was quite rare in Egypt and very few Greek or Roman people would have seen one. The hippo was even rare in Roman entertainment and only ventured into the Colosseum a handful of recorded times.

The hippo was a common element of so-called “Nilotic murals,” scenes of the Nile created by the Romans as part of their heavy interest in Egyptian life and culture. This particular one is from a 3rd century mosaic in modern Tunisia. Image by Ad Meskens on Wikimedia Commons.

The hippo was hunted and eaten even during predynastic times, as attested by sites such as Merimda Beni Salama. This practice continued throughout Egypt’s history, and the animal’s flesh, skin, and oil all became valued substances. Most sought after of all, however, was the ivory from their impressive tusks, which were in all kinds of carvings.

A magic device made from the tusk of a hippo, believed to be from around the late Middle Kingdom. Image by the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Wikimedia Commons.

Most depictions of hippo hunts show roughly the same thing; the hippo was harpooned several times from a boat. Attached to the harpoons via rope were floatation devices, allowing the hunters to track the hippo even after they submerged underwater. It is a pretty common artistic motif, especially during the Old Kingdom, in reliefs in tombs and temples to show a team of hunters accompanying the pharaoh or another upper class person on a hippopotamus hunt. This seems to have had a symbolic meaning, as a way of showing the pharaoh having power over evil and chaotic forces. The hunting of a hippo, in real life, may have been something of a religious or noble ritual. This has some evidence behind it; the scene of a hippo hunt at the Karnak temple, dedicated to king Tuthmosis III, shows the king spearing the hippo alongside two priests, implying the hunt is religious in nature. In reality, upper-class people almost certainly were not actively involved in the hunting of the hippo, instead watching from the sidelines as their servants did the difficult and highly dangerous work.

A classic hippo-hunting scene from the Tomb of Ty at Saqqara. Note the open mouth of the hippo being attacked. Image by OsirisNet.

Many hunting scenes show the hippos with their mouths wide open, teeth exposed. This is almost certainly based on direct observation, as hippos will widely yawn and show off their tusks when threatened.

The classic hippo threat display, something the Egyptians were apparently familiar with. Image by Bernard Gagnon on Wikimedia Commons.

As is true of many other animals in Egyptian culture, the sex of the animal played a role in how the animal was perceived. The male hippo was thought of far more negatively, their aggressive nature and habit of swimming in murky depths being associated with the Set, the god of chaos and evil. Despite the long history of hunting hippos, the connection between hippos and Set was only firmly established during the New Kingdom. From then on, scenes of Horus, the god most associated with the pharaoh, harpooning a hippo also became quite common.

A little hard to see, this scene from the Temple of Edfu depicts the god Horus roping in a hippopotamus. Image by the University of Birmingham.

This connection is also apparent in writings about Set, such as the “Contendings of Horus and Set” scroll. In the story, Set turns both himself and Horus into hippos as part of a contest to see who can hold their breath the longest. There is also some connection with the hippo to the underworld. The chimeric creature Ammit, “the devourer of the dead,” has the hindquarters of a hippo with other parts from crocodile and big cat. According to ancient Egyptian belief, Ammit will eat those who are unworthy to continue on their journey through the afterlife.

A depiction of the mythical Ammit from the Papyrus of Ani, shown with the back end of a hippo. Image by the British Museum on Wikimedia Commons.

While the male hippo was thought of negatively, the female hippopotamus had a more positive role in Egyptian belief systems. They were strongly associated with Taweret, “the great one,” a goddess of motherhood and fertility who is most often depicted as partially hippo herself.

A glazed faience amulet of the goddess Taweret, here depicted, as she usually is, as a bipedal hippo. Hippos were not always viewed so poorly. Image by the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Wikimedia Commons.

The association between the female hippo and motherhood probably comes from direct observation. Hippo mothers are fiercely protective of their calves, similar to Taweret, who is meant to be both powerful and protective as well as a caring and motherfly figure. It may also arise from how the hippo, like a human mother, has a long pregnancy resulting in only one baby.

The ferocity of a mother hippo seems to have been a source of awe and inspiration to the ancient Egyptians, connecting this animal to the goddess Taweret. Image by Jpatokal on Wikimedia Commons.

Taweret and Set are the only major Egyptian deities linked to the hippo but smaller, more local hippo deities are known, such as one named Reret. A few texts also make a large note out of the loud noises that hippos make, with one text exclaiming that an entire town was kept up all night by noisy hippos.

Artwork of hippos was common, as you may have already been able to tell, and much of it was probably based on real observation. The famous relief of a hippo attacking a crocodile from vizier Mereruka’s tomb at Saqqara is one of my personal favorite examples.

Seems as if the artist who carved the relief in vizier Mereruka’s tomb was inspired by a real observation, such as the one at right. Note how the carved hippo attacks the crocodile in the exact same way as the real deal. Left image by Flop Eared Mule on Wikimedia Commons and right image by Vaclav Silha.

In Egyptian cosmology, there is said to be a constellation in the form of a female hippo known as rrt. The most famous artistic rendition of the hippopotamus from ancient Egypt, however, comes in the form of the many Middle Kingdom green or blue faience figurines of hippos. They are often decorated in lotuses, a sign of rebirth, or in general Nile scenery of plants, insects, and frogs, probably meant to show the hippo’s natural habitat. Around 100 or so of these little faience hippos are known and stored in collections around the world.

The famous “William” hippopotamus figurine. Despite his fame, William here is only one of many other tiny hippo statutes. Image by Claire H. on Wikimedia Commons.

These figures come from tombs and are there to likely serve as guardians. They depict strong animals that protect the deceased from evil (somewhat contradictory to some ideas pointed at earlier, but it’s important to remember that cultural ideas can change rather quickly across periods of time). Similar to the lotuses often decorating them, hippos themselves were occasionally associated with rebirth and life as well. As creatures of the Nile, they were associated with life, as the Nile was considered the source of life and energy in the Egyptian world. Also, their habit of submerging under the murky, confusing depths only to reappear into the light when they come up to breathe can be seen as similar to the journey one must take through the underworld in order to be reborn. Hippos are also most active at the sunrise and sunset hours, which could be seen as the hippo acknowledging Ra’s voyage across the sky and into the underworld, waking to congratulate him on his return.

Interestingly, many of these faience hippos seem to have had their legs deliberately removed. Perhaps this was a way to protect the deceased against these powerful animals that could potentially turn.

One such faience hippo with legs that seem to have been weirdly removed. Perhaps, even in death, the strength and danger of the hippo was not underestimated. Image by one_click_beyond on Wikimedia Commons.

While most of these hippos are blue or green, some are intentionally red in color. This could be a reference to the substance produced by the hippo’s skin as a natural sunscreen. Set was sometimes referred to as “the red one” and red hippos are usually portrayed as male and aggressive, which cements the connection even further.

If you look closely at the belly and skin-folds of the hippo in front, you may notice a slight reddish hue. This is the result of an oily slime produced by the hippo’s skin that acts as a sunscreen and possibly a disinfectant. Image by Bernard Dupont on Wikimedia Commons.

A handful of New Kingdom texts and reliefs allude to some kind of “White Hippopotamus Festival,” in which the king apparently paid reverence to Tawaret or another hippo god. Little is known about this mysterious ritual or if it was even performed in reality at all. In artwork, lighter colored hippos are typically more positive and associated with Taweret.

Sources

Houlihan, Patrick F. The Animal World of the Pharaohs. Thames and Hudson, 1999.

Stünkel, Isabel. “Hippopotami in Ancient Egypt.” The Met Museum, 2017. https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/hipi/hd_hipi.htm

Hamed, Ahmed Ebied Ali. Sport, Leisure: Artistic Perspectives in Ancient Egyptian Temples (Part II). Recorde, 2015. https://revistas.ufrj.br/index.php/Recorde/article/viewFile/2315/1956

Lewis, Sian and Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones. The Culture of Animals in Antiquity. Routledge, 2018.