Unas reigned for 15 to 30 years in the mid-24th century BC, succeeding Djedkare Isesi, who might have been his father.
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Unas reigned for 15 to 30 years in the mid-24th century BC, succeeding Djedkare Isesi, who might have been his father.
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Little is known of Unas' activities during his reign, which was a time of economic decline.
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The growth and decentralization of the administration in conjunction with the lessening of the king's power continued under Unas, ultimately contributing to the collapse of the Old Kingdom some 200 years later.
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Unas built a pyramid in Saqqara, the smallest of the royal pyramids completed during the Old Kingdom.
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Unas had several daughters and possibly one or two sons who are believed to have predeceased him.
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Unas was succeeded by Teti, the first pharaoh of the Sixth Dynasty, possibly after a short crisis.
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In parallel to the official cult, Unas may have received popular veneration as a local god of Saqqara until as late as the Late Period, nearly 2000 years after his death.
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Unas is well attested by historical sources with three ancient Egyptian king lists dating to the New Kingdom period mentioning him.
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Unas' name is present on the Saqqara Tablet and on the Turin canon, both of which were written during the reign of Ramses II.
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Primary contemporaneous sources attesting to Unas' activities are the many reliefs from his pyramid complex.
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Unas assumed the throne at the death of his predecessor Djedkare Isesi.
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Unas had at least two queens, Nebet and Khenut, who were buried in a large double mastaba adjacent to their husband's pyramid.
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The filiation of Unas-Ankh is indirectly hinted at by his name and titles and by the presence of his tomb near those of Nebet and Unas but is not universally accepted.
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Unas had at least five daughters named Hemetre Hemi, Khentkaues, Neferut, Nefertkaues Iku, and Sesheshet Idut.
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Hence, Jurgen von Beckerath believes that Unas ruled Egypt for 20 years while Rolf Krauss, David Warburton and Erik Hornung shortened this number to 15 years in their 2012 study of Egyptian chronology.
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Unas' reign was a time of economic decline although, as the French Egyptologist Nicolas Grimal writes, it was "by no means a time of decadence".
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Until 1996, the domestic situation during Unas' reign was thought to have been disastrous, based on reliefs from the causeway of his pyramid complex showing emaciated people and thus suggesting times of famine.
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Whatever the basis for Manetho's choice to end the Fifth Dynasty with Unas, Egyptians living at the time probably perceived no particular change from one dynasty to the next.
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Reigns of Djedkare Isesi and of Unas were a time of changes in Ancient Egyptian religion and in the ideology of kingship, changes that are first demonstrable under Unas.
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Unas had a pyramid built for himself in North Saqqara, between the pyramid of Sekhemkhet and the southwestern corner of the pyramid complex of Djoser, in symmetry with the pyramid of Userkaf located at the northeastern corner.
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The pyramid of Unas is the smallest of the pyramids completed during the Old Kingdom, having a square base of 57.
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Pyramid of Unas is part of a larger mortuary complex built around it.
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Main innovation of the pyramid of Unas is the first appearance of the Pyramid Texts, one of the oldest religious texts in Egypt to have survived to this day.
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In doing so, Unas initiated a tradition that would be followed in the pyramid of the kings and queens of the Sixth to Eighth Dynasties, until the end of the Old Kingdom circa 200 years later.
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Hence, the Pyramid Texts of the pyramid of Unas incorporate instructions for ritual actions and words to be spoken, suggesting that they were precisely those performed and recited during the cult of the king in his mortuary temple.
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The priests of the cult of Unas adopted basilophorous names, incorporating that of the king, possibly upon taking office.
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