Why was the looped sash worn at the king’s waist almost always painted red?  What significance

does this color hold and what message does it convey as a prominent regalia element?  In the first

post on the red looped sash,  we discussed the use of sashes in general, outlined previous

scholarship on the regalia element, and pointed out the occurrences of the looped sash in

Ramesside royal tombs.  That post noted that flowing sashes were connected to divine insignia and

appear to have been related to the ankh,  an important symbol of revivification.  In this second

installment of our examination of the looped sash, the focus is a general examination of the color red

in ancient Egypt.  Although it may seem a digression, it is important to this four-part discussion of

the range of meanings inherent in the physical appearance of the looped sash that an investigation

of its color be carried out. 

Colors had great meaning and carried magical significance (see G. Pinch in   Colour and Painting in

Ancient Egypt ).  Red was an especially potent color–it was connected to the wild desert, primeval

powers of creation, blood and violence, and certain aspects of the solar cycle.  When depicted in

color, the looped sash is almost invariably red, although I have found a few blue examples.

Ramses III in QV44 wearing a blue looped sash:

 

Red (desher) is a highly ambivalent color throughout Egyptian history. The color was associated with

the deserts, and deshret (the ‘red lands’) stood in balance against kemet, the black land (i.e. the

fertile Nile Valley).  Through its relationship with the uncontrolled hinterlands, red was connected to

virulent and chaotic powers, such as the raging of Seth  and the monstrous snake Apophis , but red is

also closely linked with the sun and represented the stalwart protection granted by the Eyes of

Re  who guarded the sun god on his journey.

Apophis (Apep) bound in KV9:

The goddesses who could personify the Eye, such as Sakhmet  and Hathor , are described in some

magical texts as being clad in brilliant red linen. These potentially ‘angry’ goddesses are depicted in

red clothing as well, such as Hathor in the tomb of Thutmosis IV .

Sakhmet at Medinet Habu:

 

Red was considered the morning and evening color of Re , representing that moment when he

crosses the dangerous liminal zone of the horizon.  When the looped sash appears in the costume

of the living Amenhotep III, it, along with the apron embellished with disc-topped uraei,  shebiu collar,

armbands, and feather patterned aprons, was intended to identify the king with the sun. Many of

these costume elements had been seen previously on pharaoh (from the time of Amenhotep II), but

only in a particular context: where the king was portrayed in private tombs wearing these attributes,

enshrined, and referred to as the sun god Re (W.R. Johnson, in   Amenhotep III , p. 86)

Red and blood were intimately connected with the daily rebirth of the sun god.  There are two major

reasons for this association indicated textually.  One of these is connected with Nut’s  birth blood,

which emerges with the disc and is called the “red flood” (in Coffin Text  407, for example).

Ceiling in the burial chamber of KV9, showing the solar disc on it’s cyclical journey through Nut:

It is perhaps telling that in CT 714, the word ‘hahw,’ or ‘flood,’ is determined not only with a water

sign but also a sky symbol. The text from the cenotaph of Seti I at Abydos indicates that, after his

birth, the rejuvenated god “swims in his redness” (J.Allen,   Genesis in Ancient Egypt , p.3).

Detail in KV9 of Re, shown as a red child, emerging from the netherworld at dawn:

 

The other, more aggressive, connection is made apparent in Pyramid Text  273-4, the “Cannibal”

spell, which describes how the deceased king swallows his enemies in order to absorb their power

(K.Goebs,   Crowns in Egyptian Funerary Literature , p.207). The process is considered

simultaneously destructive and creative, much like cooking ‘destroys’ the original ingredients, but the

whole comes together to form something new. Herishef, the ‘ba who is in his redness,’ was

associated with sunrise and presided over the Lake of Blood. This deity, who represented the united

Re and Osiris  and was associated with kingship and its transfer, commenced terrestrial kingship “as

a result of Sakhmet’s bloodbath” (Goebs, 254) He was considered to be the actual embodiment of

the aggressive dawn-form of the sun god. The ‘flood of blood’ apparent on the pre-dawn horizon

“appears to represent the (chaotic pre-sunrise) basis from which the new creation emerges in the

morning” (Goebs, 254).

The sun god emerging in the burial chamber of KV9, surrounded by protective fire spewed from the uraei:

The protectively maternal and dangerously bloody aspects of red are explicitly linked in terms of

the deshret   crown  in the text of CT 44 (Goebs, 201).

Detail of the solar bark in KV9; note the red-clothed goddess wearing the deshret crown standing before the bark:

This dualistic nature is further suggested by the various interpretations of the red of dawn.   It has

been noted, for example, that the ‘red flood’ could not only refer to Nut’s birth blood, but also to the

ochre-colored beer that was poured out on the land to entice and appease the angry Eye (Goebs,

223).

According to the Seti I cenotaph text, it is seems clear that the sun was ‘born’ some time before

actual sunrise.  The duat   is described as being not at the visible horizon, but rather “somewhat

below the apparent intersection of sky and earth” (Allen, 6). The eleventh hour of the Amduat  was

called the ‘red-hour,’ and depictions of this portion of the solar cycle show four goddesses, wearing

desert determinatives  as crowns, who bear individual names like ‘Igniter.’ These aggressively

protective females functioned to destroy the enemies of the cosmic process who were attempting to

halt the solar bark and stop the sun god from rejuvenating creation at his rising.  Since fire is their

medium, these ‘reddening’ goddesses might be seen as manifestations of the Eye, the shining

uraeus who burns the bodies of Egypt’s enemies with her flame.

Guardians of the sun god in KV9; note the four females holding large red knives, like those inserted in the body of Apophis:

In CT 648, the sun god at dawn is described as three in one—the self-created Re, Sakhmet

overpowering his enemies, and the distant Horus who presides over the Ennead  (Goebs, 303). If the

rising sun can be simultaneously seen as Re and Sakhmet, the idea that the disc ‘drinks up’ the

redness of dawn to emerge anew may also be related to the myths of the Distant Eye.  The Eye is at

first distant and angry, but once appeased, she brings ‘completeness’ to her father, Re.  The

‘devouring flame’ that is the angry Eye “judges and gathers the gods” for the apparent slaughter of

the stars that occurs at dawn (Goebs, 335). The sky progresses from night, which is full of ‘millions’

of stars, to the deep redness that spreads before dawn.  This redness ‘eats up’ the stars, which lose

their brilliance and seem to vanish under the progressive tide.  Then the disc begins to emerge from

the horizon, apparently ‘sucking’ the red flood into itself, until it separates from the horizon as the

last trace of ‘blood’ disappears (Goebs 340).

The newly-reborn sun god emerging from the blood-red disc (detail in KV9 burial chamber):

The redness of dawn is also connected to Horus , the archetype of kingship.  PT 404, for instance,

includes a reference to the ‘Horus of (dawn)-redness,’ and the king himself is said to be “the redness

that came forth from Nut” in PT 1460a (Goebs, 168). Horus is explicitly connected to red cloth in

texts related to the ritual of the meret-chests at Edfu .   The god is said to “…unite with the seshed-

linen to overthrow your foe.  You hold the red linen in its moment” (A. Egberts,   In Quest of Meaning ,

180).

Seti I offering red linen to Amun-Re at his Abydos temple:

Actual royal examples of red sashes survive from the New Kingdom.  There were three different

types of sashes found in the tomb of Tutankhamun; undecorated simple, tapestry woven, and

‘Amarna-style’ (G. Vogelsang-Eastwood,   Tutankhamun’s Wardrobe , 59). One of the ‘Amarna’

sashes is largely intact (JE 62647) and preserves a linen tapestry woven central panel with pairs of

streamers extending from each side. Although they are woven with several colors, the decorated

sashes are predominantly red.

Tutankhamun’s ‘Amarna’ sash as displayed in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo:

Detail of Tutankhamun’s sash:

Also almost entirely red is the so-called ‘Rameses girdle.’  This incredibly well executed textile has

been interpreted as a scarf, a jacket, or a belt, but has been recently reinterpreted (by G.

Vogelsang-Eastwood) as an example of one of these long, looped sashes. It is delicately

embroidered with ankh signs and originally displayed a finely executed line of text (now completely

destroyed) that included the names and titles of Ramses III.

The looped red sash appears on the living king during the reign of Amenhotep III.   Also during this

period, a long red sash begins to be worn around the waist of royal women.  This same type of

crossed tie is well known from the iconography of goddesses in the New Kingdom, particularly Isis.  

It appears on Amenhotep III’s mother, Mutemwia, in TT 226 where he represents a form of the sun

god and she stands in the position of a goddess .  The sash was likely intended in this scene to tie

her with the sky mother who ensures the sun’s journey. By the beginning of the Nineteenth Dynasty,

the iconography of Isis “is indistinguishable from that of royal women” (L. Troy,   Patterns of

Queenship , 127).

Isis and Neith wearing the girdle tie in QV44:

As seen in the figure above, the shape of this tie worn by goddesses and queens is rendered quite

distinct from the looped sash that appears on the king. This type of tie (which sometimes also

appears on male deities) wraps twice around the body and is knotted at the waist in the front, with

the ends dangling down the front.  The king’s looped sash is wrapped an unknown number of times

around the waist (it is generally concealed by a belt, layered on top of the wrapped tie) and knotted

at the side, with one end loose and the other end tied into a loop.  Both kinds of ties represent ritual

knots that encircle the bodies of these beings, binding and protecting them while their bright

coloration loudly announces their apotropaic significance.  They may, in fact, be two different

versions of the same fundamental attribute—a strip of cloth that ritually enfolds, conceals, and

shields.

This red attribute, which encircles the body of goddesses and queens, may be directly related to

the tyet   amulet , the shape of which has been interpreted as a girdle tie. See the large blue and

red   tyet   amulet behind Nefertum in the tomb of Horemheb (KV 57) .  This probable connection

between the tyet amulet and the girdle tie would be consistent with the association of the protection

of a mother goddess. The tyet amulet is usually made of carnelian or other red material (although

they could also be blue) and is explicitly connected to the blood of Isis and the apotropaic role it

plays for the deceased in the Afterlife. In addition, the amulet has been linked to menstrual blood

and its place in reproduction. The element was specifically connected with the protective tie used by

Isis to shield the fetal Horus when Seth tried to cause her to miscarry.

There was an apparently deep connection between the tyet and the ankh. Some early ivory

fragments from Abydos show a tyet (rather than the ankh, as became usual) alternating

with was signs, and both ankh-djed and tyet-djed combinations are preserved from the early Old

Kingdom.

A frieze of djed and tyet signs at Dendera :

 

Even into the New Kingdom, the ankh and tyet remained strongly associated although clearly

differentiated.  They may even be viewed as two versions of the same thing, since the primary

difference between them is the orientation of the ‘arms’—stiffened and held horizontally for

the ankh as opposed to the softly rounded, flaccid arms of the tyet.

The above investigation suggested a range of possible meanings for the red looped sash.  The

associations of the red tie with the aggressive Eyes of Re and the morning and evening ordeals of

the solar god, when he passed through the dangerous liminal zone, indicate that this attribute was

related to a powerful form of apotropaic protection.  Its similarity to the girdle ties worn by goddesses

and queens, combined with the connection between both types of ties and the tyet and ankh,

suggests that this ritual knot was not only protective but also contained a significant creative

potential.  It is possible that the particular meaning inherent in the sash may vary considerably

depending upon the context and type of scene.

What do these aggressively apotropaic connotations reveal about the looped red sash?  How does

the connection between the guardians of the sun god and red ties fit in with the use of the looped

sash as an item of royal costume? In the next post  on the looped red sash, we will discuss the

appearances of this element of royal regalia at Medinet Habu.