The Seven Years' FamineKing Tcheser approaches the Nile gods for assistance as his people are in starvation after seven years of drought.
The high official Mater oversaw the entire South, the Island of Elephantine, and the area of Nubia in the eighteenth year of King Tcheser (the third monarch of the third dynasty). The King expressed his concern over the Nile's prolonged dry spell in a message delivered to Mater. This made the lands infertile and exceedingly challenging for crops of all kinds to grow. There was a shortage of grains and vegetables and no food for the populace.
King Tcheser remembered the god Imhotep, the South Wall's Ptah's son, who had once saved Egypt from a similar catastrophe. These begged his governor Mater to inform him where the Nile rose and which deity or goddess was its patron because his assistance was no longer available.
Mater immediately responded to this communication by heading to the King and giving him the information. He informed him that the first city in history was on the Island of Elephantine, where the Nile flow originated. Khnemu is the flood's protector and keeps the water contained.
After describing the temple of Khnemu at Elephantine to his royal master and noting that it also housed the temples of Sopdet, Anqet, Hapi, Shu, Geb, Nut, Osiris, Horus, Isis, and Nephthys, among other gods, Mater then listed the various goods that could be found in the parish and which offerings should be made to Khnemu. After hearing these words and offering sacrifices to the gods, the King entered his temple to seek Khnemus' assistance.
As Khnemu finally stood before him, he said: "I am the Creator Khnemu. My hands are on you to make your body healthy and to shield your person. I gave you your heart. He who made himself is me. I am the primordial watery abyss, and I am the Nile that rises at his command to nourish the labourers. I am Shu, the powerful possessor of the Earth, the Almighty, the father of the gods, and the director and guide of all men."
The god then detailed the good that would come to the land once he had stopped the hunger and promised that the Nile would rise yearly, as it had in earlier times. Khnemu stopped speaking, and King Tcheser recalled the god's complaint that no one had bothered to restore his shrine even though plenty of stone was nearby. A tax was to be imposed on all parish products and used to support the upkeep of the Khnemu priesthood, and some land on each side of the Nile near Elephantine was to be put aside for the endowment of the temple of Khnemu. He promptly issued this proclamation.
The King commanded that a copy of the decree be cut onto a stone tablet and placed in a visible location because it had been written on wood and would not last.
