A Study On The Legitimacy Of Sesostris Ⅰ

The king’s symbolic status was a continuation of an ideology that existed and evolved over thousands of years in ancient Egypt until the end of the first century BC.In the long-term development of kingship,pharaoh faced many challenges,but it was restored again and again and continued to develop.Its ideology may have changed in subtlety or emphasis,or its structure rearranged,but its essence remains essentially the same.This resilience,this amazing long-term success must depend in part on the political practice of reproducing and disseminating authority and legitimizing power to its holders.This paper takes Sesostris I as an example to study the legitimacy of kingship,which is divided into four parts.The first part narrates the mythological origin of the legitimacy of kingship and discusses its application and development before the Middle Kingdom of ancient Egypt in combination with the historical reality.The other three parts,based on the murder of the father of Sesostris I and his absence of legitimacy,respectively talk about the construction of genealogical,ability and divine legitimacy.After the murder,Sesostris I faced,first of all,a lack of genealogical legitimacy,The second part deals with the principle of coregency,building ties with Amenemhet I and his ancestors to strengthen his legitimacy.The third part is about the most ancient topic of ability legitimacy.In order to demonstrate his legitimacy,Sesostris I carried out large-scale buildings and wars,leaving extensive records in ancient Egyptian history.In addition,he also strengthened his role as the guardian of the cosmic order.As a remedy,Sesostris I also devote himself to divine legitimacy,the third part discusses the construction of divine legitimacy from three aspects: The Son of God,the choice of God and God.In particular,the choice of God leaves a lot of information,because this is the virtual construction of the coregency principle mentioned earlier.Through these three measures,Sesostris I succeeded in establishing his legitimacy,which is best illustrated by his long and stable reign.