Intro to the chronology of Ancient Egypt
Manetho’s Egyptian History (Aegyptiaca) gives us the basic structure of the Egyptian chronology that we still use today.
Who is Manetho?
He is a priestly advisor who lived during the reign of Ptolemy I.
He was concerned with introducing the cult of Serapis.
He was a priest in the temple of Heliopolis and had access to the temple records.
Intro to the chronology of Ancient Egypt
Manetho divided the Egyptian history into Dynasties (Ruling Houses) and we recognize 30 of them from the unification of Egypt down to the death of the last native Egyptian king Nectanebo II.
What is a Dynasty?
Are a series of rulers sharing a common origin, who are usually, though not necessarily, of the same family.
Manetho’s sections for each Dynasty starts with the number of kings and the capital city. Then he lists the names of individual rulers and number of years and at the end, he sums up the total number of years.
Palermo Stone
Palermo Stone
Is the earliest evidence of Ancient Egyptian history.
It is part of a 5th Dynasty basalt stelae inscribed on both sides with the royal annals stretching back to the prehistoric rulers.
The main fragment has been known since 1866 and is currently in the collection of the Palermo Archeological Museum in Sicily.
There are five fragments of the Royal Annals in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, four of which were acquired between 1895 and 1914. The fifth was purchased on the antiquities market in 1963. One small fragment is in the Petrie Museum of University College in London, forming part of the collection of the archeologist Sir Flinders Petrie (and purchased by him in 1914).
Palermo Stone
The slab was about 21 m long and 0.6 m wide, but most of it is missing now.
The text on the stone records the regnal years of the rulers till the 5th Dynasty.
The text is divided into a series of horizontal registers divided by vertical lines that are curved at the top imitating the sign rnpt.
Royal list of Karnak
It was located in the southwest corner of the Festival Hall of Tutmosis III, in the middle of the temple of Amun Ra, in the Karnak Temple Complex, in modern Luxor, Egypt.
Is now preserved in the Louvre Museum.
Composed during the reign of Thutmose III , it listed 61 kings beginning with Snefru from the Old Kingdom. Only the names of 39 kings are still readable.
It also includes the names of the rulers of the 1st and 2nd Intermediate Periods.
Royal list of Karnak
Royal List of Abydos
Also known as the Abydos Table.
Is still in situ in the temple of King Seti I at Abydos. It is located on the walls of the corridor in the hall of ancestors.
It consists of three rows of 38 cartouches (borders enclosing the name of a king) in each row. The upper two rows contain names of the kings, while the third row merely repeats Seti I's throne name.
The names of the kings of the 2nd Intermediate Period are not recorded in the list. The list omits the names of many earlier kings, who were apparently considered illegitimate — such as Ekhnaton, Hatshepsut, Tutankhamun, and Ay.
It is the sole source to date of the names of many of the kings of the Seventh and Eighth Dynasties, so the list is valued greatly for that reason.
Abydos Table
It represents King Seti I with his younger son the later king Ramses II on the way to making an offering to Ptah-Sokar-Osiris, on behalf of their ancestors - the contents of the king list. Ramses is depicted holding centers.
The list contains cartouches of 76 kings, running in two rows from the 1st king of Egypt to King Seti I.
Saqqara Tablet
Royal List of Saqqara
Also known as the Saqqara Tablet.
Was discovered in 1861 in Saqqara in the tomb of “&i-n-ry” an official (chief lector priest, and Overseer of Works on all royal monuments) under King Ramses II from the 19th Dynasty.
Is now exhibited in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.
It contains the names of 47 king (originally 58) running from the 1st king of the 1st Dynasty to Ramses II in reverse chronological order again omitting those of the 2nd Intermediate Period.
Turin Canon
Turin Canon List
Also known as the Turin Royal Canon, is an Egyptian hieratic papyrus thought to date from the reign of King Ramses II, now in the Museo Egizio (Egyptian Museum) in Turin, Italy.
The papyrus is the most extensive list and the finest record of the Egyptian chronology but unfortunately the most damaged and now incomplete.
It is considered the basis for most chronology before the reign of Ramses II.
Turin Canon List
The papyrus was found by the Italian traveler Bernardino Drovetti in 1820 at Luxor (Thebes), Egypt and was preserved in 1824 in the Egyptian Museum in Turin.
When the box in which it had been transported to Italy was unpacked, the list had disintegrated into small fragments.
Jean-Francoise Champollion, examined it and was able to recognize only some of the larger fragments containing royal names, and produced a drawing of what he could translate. A reconstruction of the list was created to better understand it and to aid in research.
Turin Canon List
The papyrus lists the names of about 300 rulers, the lengths of reigns in years, with months and days for some kings.
The list also is believed to contain kings from the 15th Dynasty, the Hyksos, who ruled Lower Egypt.
The papyrus was originally a tax roll, but on its back is written a list of the kings – including mythical kings such as gods, as well as human kings. That the back of an older papyrus was used may indicate that the list was not of great formal importance to the writer, although the primary function of the list is thought to have been as an administrative aid.
Manetho’s Aegyptiaca
The Aegyptiaca, the "History of Egypt", may have been Manetho's largest work, and certainly the most important. It was organized chronologically and divided into three volumes, and his division of rulers into dynasties was an innovation.
Badarian Culture
The Badarian culture provides the earliest direct evidence of agriculture in Upper Egypt during the Predynastic Era. It was first identified in El-Badari, Asyout.
About forty settlements and six hundred graves have been located.
The Badarian economy was based mostly on Agriculture, fishing and animal husbandry. Remains of cattle, dogs, and sheep were found in the cemeteries. Wheat, barley, and lentils were consumed.
The culture is known largely from cemeteries in the low desert. The deceased were placed on mats and buried in pits with their heads usually laid to the south, looking west. The pottery that was buried with them is the most characteristic element of the Badarian culture. It had been given a distinctive, decorative rippled surface.
The Badarian Culture used to produce the kind of pottery called Blacktop-ware.
LOCATION OF BADARI
Badarian Products
Pottery with rippled edges:
NAQADA CULTURE
Is the second major phase of the Predynastic Period.
It derives its name from the site Naqada in Upper Egypt in Qena Governorate. It is located on the west bank of the Nile river, 25 km north of Luxor and 31 km south of Qena city.
It was known in Ancient Egypt as Nbwt. Its name derives from nbw, meaning gold, on account of the proximity of gold mines in the Eastern Desert.
The first discovery of the site was under Flinders Petrie in 1892, when he uncovered a vast cemetery of more than 3000 graves.
Naqada burials consisted of the body of the deceased in a fetal position, wrapped in an animal skin, sometimes covered by a mat and most often deposited in a simple pit hollowed out of the sand.
The offerings accompanying the deceased were: pottery vessels, palettes, combs and spoons of bone or ivory, and flint knives.
NAQADA CULTURE
NAQADA I
NAQADA I
Characteristics:
Also called Amratian Culture named after the site of El-Amra, about 120 km (75 mi) south of Badari, Upper Egypt.
El-Amra was the first site where this culture group was found, however, this period is better attested at the Naqada site, thus it also is referred to as the Naqada I culture.
Black-topped ware continued to be produced, but white cross-line ware, a type of pottery which has been decorated with close parallel white lines being crossed by another set of close parallel white lines, begins to be produced during this time.
Naqada I Pottery
NAQADA I
Trade between Upper and Lower Egypt is attested at this time through newly excavated objects. A stone vase from the north has been found at el-Amra, and copper, which is not present in Egypt, apparently was imported from the Sinai or perhaps from Nubia. Obsidian and an extremely small amount of gold were both definitively imported from Nubia during this time. Trade with the oases also took place.
New innovations such as mud-brick buildings for which the Gerzean period is well known also begin to appear during this time.
Additionally, oval and cosmetic palettes appear to be used in this period.
NAQADA II culture
NAQADA II
Characteristics of Naqada II culture:
Also called Gerzean culture, named after the town Gerzeh, which is a predynastic cemetery located along the west bank of the Nile and today named after Al-Girza the present day town in Egypt. It is situated only several miles east of the lake of Fayoum.
The primary distinguishing feature between the earlier Amratian (Naqada I) culture and the Gerzean culture is the extra decorative effort exhibited in the pottery of the period. The artwork on Gerzean pottery features stylized animals and environment at a greater degree than the earlier Amratian artwork. Further, images of ostriches in the pottery artwork were represented along with other birds and animals.
Gerzian Products:
NAQADA II
Burial sites in Gerzeh have uncovered artifacts such as cosmetic palettes, a bone Harpoon, an ivory pot, stone vessels, iron beads and fine ripple-flaked knives of exceptional workmanship. The iron beads discovered in two Gerzean graves by Egyptologists Wainwright in 1911 are in fact the earliest artifacts of iron known.
Gerzian tombs included furnished rooms, amulets, and figurines.
The end of the Gerzian period is generally regarded as coinciding with the Unification of Egypt.
NAQADA III
Naqada III is the last phase of the Naqada culture of ancient Egyptian prehistory. It is the period during which the process of state formation began.
Naqada III is often referred to as Dynasty 0 or Protodynastic Period.
NAQADA III
Naqada III extended all over Egypt and was characterized by some notable characteristics :
Egyptian language was first recorded in hieroglyphs.
The appearance of first graphical narratives on Palettes.
The first regular use of Serekh.
The first truly royal cemeteries.
Possibly the first example of irrigation.
Narmer Palette
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