[56]. See Newberry, Life of Rekhmara, Pl. IV, and p. 23, where will be found a plan of the office.
[57]. It is probable that already at the time of the Eleventh Dynasty there was a Chief Keeper of the (Royal) Seal, for Mariette found at Karnak a monument of a certain Khetŷ, who is described as mer khetem em ta er zer-ef, “Keeper of the (Royal) Seal in the whole land.” Mariette, Karnak, pl. 8 j.) Of this Khetŷ there is a statuette in the Leyden Museum, and he is certainly the same individual as we see represented behind King Antef on one of the rocks of the Shût er Rigal. Under the New Empire we find mentioned once a
“Chief Keeper of the Seal of the Great Green Sea,” i.e., of the Mediterranean. (Capart, in Rec. de travaux, XXII, p. 106.)
[58]. This is seen from many inscriptions: Notably from the rock inscription of Mentu-hetep in the Shût er Rigal; the inscription of Nefer-hetep at Aswan (De Morgan, Cat., I, p. 17); the inscriptions of Rekhmara (Newberry, Rekhmara, Pl. III, l. 5, etc.); the scene on a slab from the tomb of a High Priest of Memphis, where the Chancellor is represented standing immediately behind the Vezîrs; and from the very powerful position of the Chancellor Baŷ under Ta-usert and Sa-ptah. The position of the Chancellors during the Hyksos period was also of very great importance.
[59]. He has been described as a kind of “Keeper of the Signet;” but his rank in the Egyptian State was much higher than that of the Scottish official. It is a position that appears to have been even greater than that of the Roman cura anulis, or “Keeper of the Imperial Seal” (Just., Hist., XLIII, 5).
[60]. Rekhmara, Pl. II and III.
[61]. Ibid., Pl. II, lines 5 and 6.
[62]. Stela of Sa-satet at Geneva. (Mélanges Arch., 1875, p. 218.)
[63]. Griffith and Tylor, The Tomb of Paheri, Pl. IX, l. 44. For earlier tours of these officials, see several graffiti on the rocks at Aswân, published in De Morgan’s Cat., I.