What is a serekh? The royal frame before the cartouche

The frame shows a god on a palace roof

Read as a picture, the serekh shows Horus living in the palace. In Egyptian belief the living king was the earthly form of Horus, the falcon god of the sky, and the frame shows the god standing on the royal residence. The name in the panel tells you which Horus is meant.

The bottom part copies real buildings. Early mud-brick walls of royal and elite monuments were built in and out in deep niches, a pattern Egyptologists call the palace façade. Scholars read the frame as plan and elevation drawn together: the front of the palace seen face on, the panel above it as the space inside the walls.

At Abydos, the outer wall of Khasekhemwy's mud-brick enclosure, the Shunet ez-Zebib, was niched to imitate a royal palace front.

A catfish and a chisel spell Narmer

Narmer's serekh holds two signs. The first is a catfish (K8), read nꜥr (nar). The second is a chisel (U23), read mr (mer). Put together as a rebus, pictures used for their sounds, they give nꜥr-mr, Narmer. What the name meant is uncertain: "fierce catfish" and "stinging catfish" are among the guesses. On some jars of his reign the catfish appears alone, as a short form.

The best-known copy is on the Narmer Palette, found at Hierakonpolis and now in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. The name stands in a serekh at the top of both faces, between two cow heads usually taken for the goddess Bat. These two serekhs carry no falcon. Early serekhs vary, and the frame alone was enough to mark a royal name.

See Narmer's name in its serekh

Djet's stela holds the clearest serekh

The clearest serekh to survive belongs to Djet, a later king of the 1st Dynasty. His stela, about 1.4 metres tall, stood at his tomb at Umm el-Qa'ab in Abydos and is now in the Louvre in Paris.

Falcon, panel and façade are cut in fine relief, and the panel holds a single snake. It is the cobra (I10), the sign later read ḏ (dj, as in jump), so the name is read ḏt, Djet. Books render it "Horus cobra" or "serpent of Horus". Readings of names this early are modern conventions, and older books call him Uadji.

Meet the other kings of the 1st Dynasty

Djoser wrote his name as Netjerikhet

In the 3rd Dynasty the serekh still held the king's main name. The king later remembered as Djoser called himself Netjerikhet. His name starts with the cloth on a pole (R8), nṯr, "god". The mouth (D21) follows for r, repeating the last sound of nṯr. The belly with its udder (F32) writes ẖt, "body". Read together, nṯrj-ẖt (netjeri-khet) means "divine of body", and with the falcon above, "Horus, divine of body". It is carved in serekhs on reliefs in his Step Pyramid complex at Saqqara and on a statue base that also names his official Imhotep.

Khufu, who built the Great Pyramid, had a Horus name too: Medjedu, mḏdw, usually translated "he who strikes (for Horus)". It is carved beside the knees of his ivory statuette from Abydos, about 7.5 cm tall, now in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

See where the Horus name sits among the five royal names

Two kings set Seth on the serekh

Peribsen, of the 2nd Dynasty, put the Seth animal (E20), the beast of Horus's rival, on his serekh. He is the only king known to have Seth alone there. Two stone stelae stood at his tomb at Abydos. One of them is now in the British Museum, and the Seth animal on it was hammered out at a later date. Why he chose Seth is still argued over. Older books saw a religious break, or a country split between followers of Horus and of Seth, and many scholars now doubt the split.

Khasekhemwy, the last king of the dynasty, set both the falcon and the Seth animal on his serekh. His name means "the two powers appear", and some Egyptologists read the pair of gods as a reconciliation of two rival camps. After him Horus stood alone again: Djoser's serekh has only the falcon.

Sneferu brought the cartouche into common use

The cartouche (V10) is a loop of rope tied at one end. The first examples are linked with kings at the end of the 3rd Dynasty, and from Sneferu, at the start of the 4th, it came into common use. Khufu's birth name, placenta, quail chick, horned viper, quail chick, ḫwfw, stands in a cartouche, and his Horus name stayed in the serekh.

The serekh never disappeared. Every later king kept a Horus name, and it stayed first of the five names of the full royal titulary, ahead of the Two Ladies, Golden Horus, throne and birth names. By the New Kingdom it was often written with no frame at all. For many of the earliest kings, though, a serekh holds the only name we have.

Read how the cartouche works

Cairo, Paris, London and Abydos hold famous serekhs

Look for the falcon first. The rectangle under it holds the Horus name. Read the panel and treat the façade below as part of the frame.

• Egyptian Museum, Cairo: the Narmer Palette and Khufu's ivory statuette
• Louvre, Paris: Djet's stela from Umm el-Qa'ab
• British Museum, London: a stone stela of Peribsen, when on show
• Abydos: the royal tombs of Umm el-Qa'ab and Khasekhemwy's niched enclosure
• Imhotep Museum, Saqqara: the statue base naming Netjerikhet and Imhotep, when on show

Plan a visit to Abydos

Questions

People in this article

• Narmer c. 3000 BC
• Djoser c. 2667–2648 BC
• Khufu c. 2589–2566 BC
• Imhotep Architect of Djoser, c. 2667–2648 BC
• Peribsen c. 2720–2710 BC
• Khasekhemwy c. 2705–2686 BC

Where to see it

• Abydos site
• Egyptian Museum, Cairo museum
• Louvre, Paris museum
• British Museum, London museum
• Saqqara site
• Step Pyramid of Djoser monument
• Imhotep Museum museum

More to read

• How many pharaohs were there? How many pharaohs were there? About 170 known by name, over 200 counting every king in the lists. Why the count is uncertain, and who came first and last.
• What does the Rosetta Stone say? The decree in plain words What does the Rosetta Stone say? A priests' decree of 196 BC thanking Ptolemy V for tax cuts and temple gifts, and ordering his statues and festivals.
• The negative confession: the 42 denials of the Book of the Dead The negative confession of Book of the Dead spell 125: the dead deny 42 wrongs before 42 judges. Real denials in translation, one read sign by sign.