Resumo de The Egyptian - Mika Waltari

The Egyptian is a tremendous historical novel published by Mika Waltari in 1945. Mika Waltari is a well-known Finnish writer and this historical novel is his first, and the most successful one. It is set in a fascinating period of the ancient Egyptian history, the reign of pharaoh Akhenaten of the18th dynasty of Egypt, notable for single-handedly restructuring the Egyptian religion to monotheisticly worship the Aten.

Doctor Sinuhe, the hero of the novel is the royal physician, who tells the story in exile after Akhenaten's fall and death. The main character of the novel is named after that of an ancient Egyptian text commonly known as the Story of Sinuhe, dating from as early as the 12th dynasty, thus earlier than the Akhenaten?s times. Other important characters in the novel are Kaptah, who is a slave to Sinuhe, warlord Horemheb and women Sinuhe loves, Nefernefernefer, Minea and Merit. They and the facts and places are described with a remarkable precision, giving you the feeling that you are indeed among them. You are taken into the ancient Egypt during the time of instability in the society, with lots of remarkable changes, as religion based discrimination between people, while new pharaohs are replacing the old ones, and impoverished Egypt become a easy target for attacks from the neighboring countries. However, apart from those incidents from Egypt, the novel charts Sinuhe's travels in Babylon, in the Minoan Crete, among the Hittites, and among other surrounding cultures.
Sinuhe?s picture appears in the novel as a baby found in a basket floating along the Nile, by a poor couple, who will become his adoptive parents. During his childhood, Sinuhe learns healing skills from his foster father, who is a doctor. Growing up he goes to the pharaoh?s temple to study medicine, but will not stay there as teachings are prohibited to question, the reason for which he lives and gets additional teaching from elsewhere. He ends up traveling for years around Egypt?s neighboring countries, has to report the collected information about different nations and their war armament and styles to an Egyptian?s military commander, a friend of Sinuhe named Horemheb. Moreover, he never stops collecting also precious healing knowledge of different nations in exchange showing Egyptian healing methods to foreigners. Kaptah, the slave Sinuhe has, follows him obediently on all his journeys, but at the end, Sinuhe will give him the freedom.
Sinuhe holds a big secret about him and Egypt that, in fact he is Akhenaten?s older brother, thus he should have been a pharaoh himself. After Akhenaten?s fall, Tutankhamon will take the place, and thereafter Horemheb will become by vote a pharaoh. The novel will find its end at this moment, when from political reasons Sinuhe will be place-arrested by Horemheb, until the end of his life, on a small piece of land with possibility to view the Nile.

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