FROM The Instruction of Ptah-Hotep

In contrast to ancient Mesopotamian laws, no ancient Egyptian law code has survived, although various texts suggest that laws did indeed exist. This document, however, pro-vides an excellent description of proper behavior in personal relations and, implicitly, a sense of Egyptian social values, at least among the elite. Dating perhaps as early as the late Old Kingdom, this tat is presented as the instructions of the vizier (the most important royal official under the king himself), Ptah-hotep, to his son.

From Ancient Egyptian Literature, vol. 1, The Old and Middle Kingdoms, by Miriam Lichtheim (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973), pp. 205-9.

REVIEW QUESTIONS-

1. According to Ptah-hotep, what are the most important virtues in proper human relations?

2. Are those virtues to be applied differently to people of different rank and social class?

3. How much importance is ascribed to the ability to fight physically?