Tjeker

The Tjeker or Tjekker (Egyptian: ṯꜣkꜣr or ṯꜣkkꜣr) were one of the Sea Peoples during the end of the Late Bronze Age and early Iron Age.

Tjeker

Ṯ3k3r Tjeker Checker
The Tjeker and Peleset battling the troops of Ramesses III during the Battle of Djahy

Origin

As with other Sea Peoples, the origins of the Tjeker are uncertain. Their name is an Egyptian exonym, usually romanized as tkr, and expanded as Tjekru or Djekker. As such there is no consensus on the original form or etymology of the name, or the origin of the people. They have sometimes been identified with the Sicels of Sicily, who are also linked to Shekelesh: another exonym attributed to a different group amongst the Sea Peoples. Another theory, put forward by Flinders Petrie, links the ethnonym to Zakros, in eastern Crete. Some other scholars have accepted the association. A possible identity has been suggested with the Teucri, a tribe described by ancient sources as inhabiting northwest Anatolia to the south of Troy. However, this has been dismissed as "pure speculation" by Trevor Bryce.

History

Late Bronze Age

During the early 20th Dynasty of Egypt, Ramesses III (c. 1190 BCE) defeated the Sea Peoples including the Tjeker in Year 5, Year 8 and Year 12 as depicted at his Mortuary Temple at Medinet Habu. One scene shows the Tjeker and Peleset battling the troops of Ramesses III during the Battle of Djahy.

Iron Age

During the late 20th Dynasty of Egypt, under Ramesses XI (c. 1100 BCE), the Tjeker and its prince Beder are mentioned in the Story of Wenamun. They are thought to be the people who developed the port of Dor in Canaan during the 12th century BCE from a small Bronze Age town to a large city.

Settlement at Dor

The Tjeker may have conquered the city Dor, on the coast of Canaan near modern Haifa, and turned it into a large, well-fortified city (classified as "Dor XII", fl. c. 1150–1050), the center of a Tjeker kingdom that is confirmed archaeologically in the northern Sharon plain. The city was violently destroyed in the mid-11th century BCE, with the conflagration turning the mud bricks red and depositing a huge layer of ash and debris. Ephraim Stern connects the destruction with the contemporary expansion of the Phoenicians, which was checked by the Philistines further south and the Israelites.

The Tjeker are perhaps one of the few Sea Peoples for whom a ruler's name is recorded — in the 11th-century papyrus account of Wenamun, an Egyptian priest, the ruler of Dor is given as "Beder".

According to Edward Lipinski, the Sicals (Tjekker) of Dor were seamen or mercenaries, and b3-dỉ-r (Beder) was the title of the local governor, a deputy of the king of Tyre.

No mention of the Tjeker is made after the story of Wenamun.

References

• Lipiński, Edward (2006). On the Skirts of Canaan in the Iron Age: Historical and Topographical Researches. Peeters Publishers. pp. 96–. ISBN 978-90-429-1798-9. Retrieved 1 May 2013.
• Redford, Donald B. (1992). Egypt, Canaan, and Israel in Ancient Times. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-03606-3.
• Sandars, N.K. (1987). The Sea Peoples: Warriors of the ancient Mediterranean, Revised Edition. London: Thames and Hudson. ISBN 0-500-27387-1.
• Stern, Ephraim (August 1990). "New Evidence from Dor for the First Appearance of the Phoenicians along the Northern Coast of Israel" Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research No. 279, pp. 27–34.
• Woudhuizen, Frederik Christiaan (1992). The Language of the Sea Peoples. Amsterdam: Najade Press. ISBN 90-73835-02-X.
• Woudhuizen, Frederik Christiaan (April 2006). The Ethnicity of the Sea Peoples. Doctoral dissertation; Rotterdam: Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam, Faculteit der Wijsbegeerte.