Part 1 / Book 2 — CHAPTER XII. CONCLUDING SUMMARY OF EGYPTIAN HISTORY (continued 2)

MANETHO’S TABLE OF THE EGYPTIAN DYNASTIES

DynastyName of DynastyCapitalProvinceLength of YearsYears before HegiraYears before Christ

IThinisHarabat-el-MadfunehGirgeh25356265004

IIThinisHarabat-el-MadfunehGirgeh30253734751

IIIMemphisMitrahinehGizeh21450714449

IVMemphisMitrahinehGizeh28448574235

VMemphisMitrahinehGizeh24845733951

VIElephantineGezireh-AssuanEsneh20343253703

VIIMemphisMitrahinehGizeh70 days41223500

VIIIMemphisMitrahinehGizeh14241223500

IXHeracleopolisAhnas-el-MedinehBeni Suef10939803358

XHeracleopolisAhnas-el-MedinehBeni Suef18538713249

XIThebesMedinet HabuKeneh }21336863064

XIIThebesMedinet HabuKeneh }

XIIIThebesMedinet HabuKeneh45331732851

XIVXoïsSakhaMenufieh18430202398

XVHyksosSanSharkieh }51128362214

XVIHyksosSanSharkieh }

XVIIHyksosSanSharkieh }

XVIIIThebesMedinet HabuKeneh24123251703

XIXThebesMedinet HabuKeneh17420841462

XXThebesMedinet HabuKeneh17819101288

XXITanisSanSharkieh13017321110

XXIIBubastisTel-BastaSharkieh1701602980

XXIIITanisSanSharkieh891432810

XXIVSaïsSa-el-HagarGharbieh61343721

XXVEthiopianSa-el-HagarGharbieh501337715

XXVISaïsSa-el-HagarGharbieh1381287665

XXVIIPersianSa-el-HagarGharbieh1211149527

XXVIIISaïsSa-el-HagarGharbieh71028406

XXIXMendesAshmun-el-RumanDakalieh211021399

XXXSebennytesSamanudiGharbieh381000378

XXXIPersianSamanudiGharbieh8962340

End of list according to Manetho

XXXIIMacedonian27954332

XXXIIIGreek275927305

XXXIVRoman41165230

Edict of Theodosius241A.D. 381

No one can help being struck by the enormous total to which Manetho’s summing up of the dynasties brings us. By means of the Egyptian priest’s lists we are in truth carried back to the times that for all other peoples are purely mythical, but for Egypt are certainly historic.

Embarrassed by this fact and finding no other means of discrediting Manetho’s authenticity and veracity, some modern writers have supposed that Egypt has been at various periods of its history divided into several kingdoms, and that Manetho gives us as successive some royal families whose reigns were in fact simultaneous.

According to these authorities the Vth Dynasty, for example, would have reigned at Memphis at the same time that the VIth governed at Elephantine. It is not necessary to demonstrate the advantages of such an arrangement. By bringing certain dates closer together and by correcting others it is possible by an ingenious and clever arrangement of the dynasties to shorten almost at will the space of time covered by Manetho’s lists; thus while, in the table, we have the date 5626 A.H., that is, before the Hegira, [5004 B.C.] as that of the foundation of the Egyptian monarchy, other writers like Bunsen do not go farther back than 4245 A.H. or 3623 B.C.

On whose side does the truth lie? The more one studies the question, the more it is seen how difficult it is to reply. The greatest of all obstacles to the establishment of a definite Egyptian chronology is that the Egyptians never had a chronology proper. The employment of an era, properly so called, was unknown to them, and up to the present time it has never been proved that they reckoned otherwise than by the years of the reign. And moreover these years were far from having a fixed point of beginning, since sometimes they began at the commencement of the year in which the preceding king died, and sometimes with the coronation of the new king. Whatever may be the apparent precision of its calculations, modern science will always be baffled in its attempts to establish that which the Egyptians themselves did not possess.c

BRIEF REFERENCE-LIST OF AUTHORITIES BY CHAPTERS

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