Iconographic representations of grasshopper in ancient Egyptian wilderness

Abstract EN

Both the grasshopper and the locust belong to the same insect family and called by the ancient Egyptian sAnHm or snHm, both shared the same physical features, but different in their habits.

While grasshopper lives in solitary as seen in ancient Egyptian scenes, the locust lives in groups in dens numbers causing danger and destruction, where the Egyptian compared it with their enemies and multitudes as described in their textual sources especially the military texts.

This paper deals with grasshopper as a theme preferred by the ancient Egyptian artisan as a solitary insect portrayed in most Egyptian scenes especially in the fowling and fishing scene, sitting calmly on plant branches, bushes or papyrus flower, or flying between birds in the ceiling of some tombs as a decorative motif.

It also found in the religious texts, where the dead king flight to the sky or ascended to it over the back of a grasshopper.

Moreover, the deceased can find a place to rest in the field of grasshopper as recorded in the pyramid texts and the book of the dead respectively.