Thus did Muti comfort me and cheer me with her grumbling. I believe that it was thanks to her that I stretched forth my hand to life again and began to write. She goaded me to it although she could not read and secretly regarded my writing as nonsense. Yet she was glad for me to have some occupation, and she saw to it that I rested between times and enjoyed all the good dishes she prepared for me. She fulfilled her promise and set Pharaoh’s guards to work, making their lives a burden to them so that they cursed her with great feeling behind her back and called her a witch and a crocodile. But they dared not oppose her, for then she reviled them volubly, and her tongue was sharper than an ox goad.
I fancy that Muti’s influence was most wholesome. She kept the men in continual activity so that their time passed quickly. She rewarded them by baking good bread for them and brewing strong beer in great jars. They had fresh greenstuff from her herb garden, and she taught them how to vary their diet. Every year when the ships sailed to Punt, Kaptah sent us many donkey loads of goods from Thebes. He commissioned his scribes to write to us of all that went on in the city so that I did not live altogether in a sack. All this was of benefit to my guards. They learned new skill from Muti and grew rich from the presents I made them so that they did not long too sorely for Thebes.
Now I am weary with writing, and my eyes ache. Muti’s cats jump on my knee and rub their heads against my hand. My heart is weary of all I have written, and my limbs long for their eternal rest. Though I may not be happy, yet am I not unhappy in my loneliness.
I bless my paper and my pen, for thanks to them I could become a little boy again in the house of my father Senmut. I have walked the roads of Babylon with Minea, and Merit’s lovely arms have been about my neck. I have wept with those who mourned and shared out my grain among the poor. But I will not remember my evil deeds or the bitterness of my loss.
All this have I, Sinuhe the Egyptian, written, and for my own sake. Neither for gods nor for men, nor to immortalize my name, but only to bring peace to my own poor heart, whose measure is now full. I know that the guards will destroy all that I have written as soon as I am dead, and by the command of Horemheb they will pull down the walls of my house. Yet I do not know whether I greatly care.
Nevertheless, I am carefully preserving these books I have written, and Muti has plaited a strong cover of palm fiber for each of them. I keep these covered books in a silver box, and the silver box lies within a casket of hard wood, and that again within a copper one, just as the divine books of Thoth were once enclosed, to be sunk to the bed of the river. Whether my books will thus escape the guards, and whether Muti will hide them in my grave, I do not know, nor am I much concerned.
For I, Sinuhe, am a human being. I have lived in everyone who existed before me and shall live in all who come after me. I shall live in human tears and laughter, in human sorrow and fear, in human goodness and wickedness, in justice and injustice, in weakness and strength. As a human being I shall live eternally in mankind. I desire no offerings at my tomb and no immortality for my name. This was written by Sinuhe, the Egyptian, who lived alone all the days of his life.