page_title: Pepi I Meryre
section_title: Military campaigns
hierarchical_section_title: Pepi I Meryre / Reign / Trade, mining and military activities / Military campaigns
caption_attribution_description: English: Le Musée égyptien: recueil de monuments et de notices sur les fouilles d'Egypte, vol. I, Le Caire, 1890-1900, pls. XXVII-XVIII
context_page_description: Pepi I Meryre was the third king of the Sixth Dynasty of Egypt, ruling for circa 50 years during the second half of the 24th century BC, toward the end of the Old Kingdom period. Pepi I was the son of his second predecessor Teti, ascending the throne only after the brief and enigmatic reign of the shadowy Userkare. Pepi's mother was queen Iput, who may have been a daughter of Unas, final ruler of the preceding Fifth Dynasty. Pepi, who had at least six queens, was succeeded by son Merenre Nemtyemsaf I with whom he may have share power in a coregency at the very end of his reign. In turn, Merenre was succeeded by Pepi II Neferkare, who might also have been a son of Pepi I. Pepi II was the last great pharaoh of the Old Kingdom period.
  Pepi faced several difficulties during his five decades on the throne, starting with the possible murder of his father and the ensuing reign of Userkare. Later, likely after his twentieth year of reign, Pepi faced a harem conspiracy hatched by one of his queens to place her son as heir to the throne, and possibly yet another conspiracy involving his vizier at the end of his reign.
context_section_description: Militarily, Pepi I's reign was marked by aggressive expansion into Nubia. This is reported on the walls of the tombs of the contemporary nomarchs of Elephantine, by alabaster vessels bearing Pepi's cartouche found in Kerma and by inscriptions in Tumas. This is also directly attested by the Sixth Dynasty royal annals, which recount at least one campaign into Nubia. Although the campaign narrative is now largely illegible, according to the Egyptologists Baud and Dobrev it comprised three phases: first, messengers were sent to Nubia for negotiation and surveillance purposes; then the military campaign took place and finally a booty of men and goods was brought back to Egypt to be presented to the pharaoh.
  To the north-east of Egypt, Pepi launched at least five military expeditions against the "sand dwellers" of Sinai and southern Canaan. These campaigns are recounted on the walls of the tomb of Weni, then officially a palace superintendent but given tasks befitting a general. Weni tells how he ordered nomarchs in Upper Egypt and the Nile Delta region to "call up the levies of their own subordinates, and these in turn
  summoned their subordinates down through every level of the local administration". Meanwhile, Nubian mercenaries were also recruited and endowed with the power to enrol men and seize goods, so that in total tens of thousands of men were at Weni's disposal.
  This is the only text relating the raising of an Egyptian army during the Old Kingdom period, and it also indirectly reveals the absence of a permanent, standing army at the time.
  The goal of this army was either to repulse and push-back rebelling Bedouins and Semitic people or to seize their properties and conquer their land in southern Canaan, an action possibly motivated by the intense commercial activities between Egypt and this region. 
  In any case the Egyptians did invade their opponents up to what was probably Mount Carmel or Ras Kouroun, landing troops directly on the coast thanks to Egyptian transport boats. Weni reports the destruction of walled towns, cutting down fig-trees and grape vines and setting fire to local shrines.
caption: Autobiography of Weni, now at the Egyptian Museum[note 20][150]
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