Abstract
Part I of this essay argues that an intricate system of succession strategies existed in ancient Egypt with the so-called "positional succession" at its centre. The text explains how these succession strategies (mix of bio-genealogically and culturally defined kinship relations) were valid simultaneously, resulting in paradoxes axial to the ancient Egyptian symbolic system.
The text describes the impossibility of individuals, attempting to navigate these cultural dynamics with the intent of manipulating them to their advantage, of escaping such symbolic polyvalence. This essay therefore aims-among other things-to be a contribution to the discussion on the modalities of the individual-society interaction.
The argument also illustrates that even though these succession strategies concern the pinnacle of ancient Egyptian society (office of the king), the underlying symbolic dynamics, conceptualised by the ka, are constitutive for ancient Egyptian society as a whole and can thus be readily applied to other areas as well (funerary concepts, kinship system, cosmology, etc.). The analysis is based primarily on New Kingdom material.
Part II then tentatively extrapolates these principles to the Old Kingdom context with the intent of identifying possible similarities. If the supporting arguments of this article's thesis are found satisfactory, then the suggested workings of the "positional succession" strategy within the ancient Egyptian symbolic system would have major impact on our understanding of ancient Egyptian royal ideology, kinship system and cultural dynamics in general.