Dream interpretation plays an important role in the Bible, with figures like Joseph and Daniel. What do we know about dream interpretation and divination in the ancient Middle East, especially the Levant and Egypt?

by Dinocrocodile
Bentresh

Dreams in the ancient Near East were viewed as messages from the gods, and most people communicated with the gods only through dreams. Some prophetic dreams were unprompted, but those seeking the answer to a thorny issue could solicit a prophetic dream by sleeping in a location sacred to the gods (e.g. temple roofs in Egypt), which we call "dream incubation."

The Assyriologist A. Leo Oppenheim categorized prophetic dreams into two types: message dreams and symbolic dreams.

  • Message dreams, as the name suggests, are verbal messages and are almost always exclusive to kings in the ancient Near East. Typically texts recorded the name of the person who had the dream, where s/he had the dream, and the contents of the dream.

  • Symbolic dreams communicate a message through allegorical means rather than a verbal message.

Message dreams are best attested in the Hittite archives of the 15th-13th centuries BCE, as the Hittite kings and queens recorded their dreams in meticulous detail. In the Apology of Ḫattušili III, essentially a sort of autobiography of Ḫattušili, he recounts how the goddess Ištar sent a dream to his father instructing him to dedicate the sickly young prince to her service.

Ištar, My Lady, sent Muwatalli, my brother, to Muršili, my father, through a dream saying: "For Ḫattušili the years are short; he is not to live long. Hand him over to me, and let him be my priest, so he shall live."

Most Hittite dreams are not very interesting and consist primarily of a god or goddess requesting a votive offering.

Through a dream, Ištar of Dupa requested of His Majesty

1 golden solar disc of 16 shekels, 2 oxen, and 7 sheep.

Thus said (the priestess) Hepapiya: "They shall give them to the great god."

As another example of a message dream, the god Ningirsu visited Gudea, the king of Larsa, in a dream in the 22nd century BCE and requested the construction of a temple.

On that day, in a nocturnal vision Gudea saw his master, lord Ningirsu. Ningirsu spoke to him of his house, of its building. He showed him an E-ninnu with full grandeur.

Gudea seems to have been puzzled by this dream and sought out the goddess Nanše for more detailed instructions, who duly told him how to construct and dedicate the temple.

Although Gudea sought out a goddess to interpret his dreams, dreams of Babylonian kings were most often interpreted by female relatives. For example, the royal archives of the city of Mari (in what is now Syria) include many letters from a woman named Addu-dūri, who seems to have been the mother of Zimri-lim, the most prominent king in the Mari archives. In some cases, Addu-dūri wrote to the king to pass on prophetic dreams of the priests of Mari.

Speak to my lord: Thus Addu-duri: Iddin-ili, the priest of Itur-Mer, has had a dream. He says: "In my dream Belet-biri stood by me. She spoke to me as follows: 'The kingdom is his brick mould and the dynasty is his wall! Why does he incessantly climb the watchtower? Let him protect himself!'"

Now, my lord should not fail to protect himself!

In other cases, Addu-dūri wrote to her son about dreams of her own.

In my dream I entered the temple of Belet-ekallim, but Belet-ekallim was not present nor were there images in front of her. When I saw this, I began to weep. This dream of mine took place during the evening watch. When I returned, Dadâ, the priest of Ištar of Bišra, was standing at the gate of Belet-ekallim, and an eerie voice kept calling out: "Come back, O Dagan! Come back, O Dagan!" This is what it kept calling out over and over.

Another matter: a prophetess arose in the temple of Annunitum and spoke: "Zimri-Lim, do not go on campaign! Stay in Mari, and I shall continue to answer."

Message dreams are relatively rare in Egyptian historical texts prior to the Late Period, but they appear fairly often in literary texts. For example, the assassinated Middle Kingdom king Amenemhat I visits his son Senusret I in a dream in the Instructions of Amenemhat in order to provide him advice about how to rule.

The beginning of the teaching made by the majesty of Sehetepibre, the son of Re, Amenemhat, true of voice, as he spoke in a message of truth to his son, the lord of all.

The "dream stela" of Thutmose IV provides one of the few examples of a message dream recorded in historical inscriptions. The stela recounts a dream in which the prince encountered the god Harmakhis-Khepri-Re-Atum, who manifested as the sphinx, while sleeping in the shade beneath the sphinx.

One of these days it happened that the king’s son Thutmose came on an excursion at noon time. Then he rested in the shadow of this great god. Sleep took hold of him, slumbering at the time when the sun was at (its) peak. He found the majesty of this august god speaking with his own mouth, as a father speaks to his son, saying: "See me, look at me, my son, Thutmose! I am thy father, Harmakhis-Khepri-Re-Atum. I shall give thee my kingdom upon earth at the head of the living.

Although message dreams are relatively rare in the historical record in Egypt, symbolic dreams are well attested. Much of our knowledge about New Kingdom dream interpretation comes from a handbook from Deir el-Medina, the village of the artisans who created the royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings and Valley of the Queens. Deir el-Medina had an unusually high level of literacy, and about 20,000 texts have been found in the village so far, many of which still need to be translated and studied.

The dream interpretation manual lists symbolic dreams and categorizes each as good (nfr, 𓄤) or bad (Dw, 𓈋). Bad dreams are marked in red, the color associated with evil things in Egyptian texts. To quote a few examples of good dreams:

If a man sees himself in a dream…

  • Sitting in a garden in the sun – it means pleasure
  • Demolishing a wall – it means purification from evil
  • Eating excrement – consuming his property in his house
  • Mating with a cow – spending a happy day in his house
  • Eating crocodile meat – becoming an official among his people
  • Offering water – it means prosperity

And a few examples of bad dreams:

If a man sees himself in a dream…

  • Seizing one of his lower legs – a report about him by those who are yonder (= the dead)
  • Seeing himself in a mirror – it means another wife
  • God has dispelled his weeping for him – it means fighting
  • While he sees himself suffering in his side – extracting his property from him
  • Eating hot meat – it means not being found innocent
  • Shod with white sandals – it means roaming the earth

Many (if indeed not most) of these interpretations of dreams are based on wordplay, of which the Egyptians were exceedingly fond. Scott Noegel wrote an excellent monograph on the topic, Nocturnal Ciphers: The Allusive Language of Dreams in the Ancient Near East.

The dream handbook was created and owned by a man named Qenherkhopeshef, a scribe in the village, which suggests that dream interpretation in Egypt was not the exclusive domain of priests but rather was open to literate individuals in general.

Sources and further reading: