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Seti I's name in hieroglyphs: his cartouche read sign by sign
13 October 2026
Seti I's cartouche is easy to spot: three signs, a sun disc, the seated goddess Maat and a game board. They spell his throne name, Menmaatre, "Eternal is the justice of Ra". His second cartouche holds his birth name, Seti Merenptah, "the one of Set, beloved of Ptah", with the strange animal of the god Set at its heart.
He ruled Egypt until 1279 BC, for nine to fifteen years by different estimates, as the second king of the 19th Dynasty. He was the son of Ramesses I and the father of Ramesses II, and his reliefs are among the finest ever carved.
The sun of Menmaatre is read last
The throne name is mn-mꜣꜥt-rꜥ, said "men-maat-ra". The sun disc (N5) for Ra sits at the top out of respect, though it is read last. Under it is the goddess Maat (C10), seated with her feather: truth, justice, the right order of things. Sometimes she holds an ankh on her knees (C10A).
The game board (Y5) seen from the side, with its pieces standing on top, writes mn, "to stay, to endure". Read in Egyptian order, the name says "Ra's justice endures". It stands after the sedge and the bee, the title "king of Upper and Lower Egypt".
Seti is named after the god Set
The birth name, transliterated sty mry-n-ptḥ, follows the title "son of Ra", written with a duck and a sun. Seti means "the one of Set". The animal of Set writes it: a seated beast with a curved snout and square-tipped ears that no zoologist has ever named.
Ptah's name moves to the front of the oval, as gods' names do. The stool (Q3) writes p, the loaf (X1) t and the twisted flax wick (V28) ḥ: ptḥ, Ptah, the creator god of Memphis. The canal (N36) and the water ripple (N35) write mry-n, "beloved of". Spellings vary from wall to wall.
Seti reached back to older kings
Seti's family were not royal by birth. They came from a military family of the Nile Delta, and his father, Ramesses I, rose to be vizier before the childless Horemheb chose him as heir. Seti took the Horus name of Thutmose III and added to it, and one of his titles called his reign wḥm mswt, "repeating of births": a new beginning after the Amarna years.
His birth name is bolder. He was named after his grandfather, a troop commander also called Seti, and through him after Set, a god of storms, deserts and foreign lands who also guarded the sun god's boat. Ptah, the god of Memphis, joins him in the epithet.
Abydos holds the finest of his names
His temple at Abydos is carved in delicate raised relief, and one corridor holds the Abydos King List: 76 cartouches from Menes, the first king, down to Seti himself, with a third row repeating his own two names. The list leaves out the Amarna kings and Hatshepsut. Behind the temple, the Osireion, built for him, carries more of his names.
At Karnak, his half of the Great Hypostyle Hall keeps the same crisp raised relief, and his wars fill the outer north wall. In the Valley of the Kings, his tomb (KV17), found by Giovanni Belzoni in 1817, is carved and painted on almost every wall, though it opens only at times. Abroad, the Flaminio obelisk in Rome's Piazza del Popolo, begun under him and finished by his son, carries his names.
His mummy is in Cairo and his sarcophagus in London
His mummy was found in 1881 in the royal cache at Deir el-Bahari, where priests had hidden many kings to save them from robbers. Since 2021 it has lain in the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization in Cairo.
His alabaster sarcophagus went the other way. Belzoni took it out of the tomb, and Sir John Soane bought it in 1824 for his house in London, now Sir John Soane's Museum, where it is covered in underworld texts and figures.
Three shapes write Menmaatre
Draw the oval and put the sun at the top. Maat sits under it, knees up, a single tall feather rising from her head. The game board lies across the bottom, a long rectangle with small pieces standing on it like teeth.
With those three shapes you can pick out his cartouche at Abydos. Ramesses II's throne name starts with the same sun and the same goddess.
Questions
How do you pronounce Seti?
Most people say "SET-ee". Some books write Sethos, from the Greek form, or Sety.
Is Seti I the pharaoh of the Exodus?
No ancient Egyptian source names the pharaoh of the Exodus. Films and books have pointed at Seti I, Ramesses II and others, but there is no evidence for any of them.
What is the Abydos King List?
A carved list of royal cartouches in Seti I's temple at Abydos. Beside it Seti and his son, the future Ramesses II, still a prince with the sidelock of youth, make offerings for the kings who came before them.
Can you visit the tomb of Seti I?
Sometimes. KV17 opens only at times, with its own ticket, so check before you go to the Valley of the Kings.
Glossary
- ankh
- The sign of life, ꜥnḫ, a cross with a loop on top. Gods hold it out to kings in temple scenes.
- birth name
- The name a king was given at birth, written in the second cartouche after the title "son of Ra". Egyptologists also call it the nomen.
- cartouche
- An oval ring drawn around a royal name, a loop of rope tied at one end. Kings wrote their two main names in cartouches.
- dynasty
- A line of kings counted together, usually one family. Egyptologists number Egypt's kings in about 30 dynasties, following the priest Manetho.
- epithet
- A title or phrase added to a name, such as "beloved of Amun" after a king's name or "true of voice" after the name of someone who has died.
- Horus name
- The oldest of a king's names, written in a serekh under the Horus falcon. It names the king as the god Horus on earth.
- Lower Egypt
- The north of Egypt, the flat Nile Delta from around Memphis to the sea. It is called lower because it is downstream.
- Maat
- Truth, justice and the right order of the world, shown as a goddess with an ostrich feather on her head. Kings claimed to uphold it.
- relief
- A carving on a flat surface. In raised relief the background is cut away. In sunk relief the figures are cut into the stone.
- throne name
- The name a king took when he came to the throne, written in the first cartouche after the title "King of Upper and Lower Egypt". Egyptologists also call it the prenomen.
- transliteration
- Writing Egyptian in Latin letters, one letter for each sound sign, such as ꜥnḫ for ankh. Egyptologists say the words with an e between consonants.
- vizier
- The king's chief minister, who ran the government, the courts and the treasury for him.
People in this article
Where to see it
- Abydos site
- Temple of Seti I at Abydos monument
- Osireion monument
- Karnak Temple site
- Valley of the Kings site
- Tomb of Seti I (KV17) monument
- Egyptian obelisks of Rome site
- Temple of Hatshepsut (Deir el-Bahari) site
- National Museum of Egyptian Civilization museum
Sources
More to read
- Sneferu in hieroglyphs: King Sneferu's name, cartouche and pyramids Sneferu's name in hieroglyphics: his cartouche read sign by sign, what the name means, one of the first cartouches, and where to see it at Dahshur.
- Neferure: Hatshepsut's daughter and her name in hieroglyphs Who was Neferure, the daughter of Hatshepsut? Her name Neferure, "Beauty of Ra", read sign by sign, her titles, her tutor Senenmut and where to see her.
- Teti: the pharaoh who founded the 6th Dynasty, in hieroglyphs Who was Teti, first king of Egypt's 6th Dynasty? His cartouche read sign by sign, his Horus name Seheteptawy, his pyramid at Saqqara and the murder story.