The XIth (Theban) dynasty contains but a small number of kings according to the official lists. The tables on the monuments recognize only two, Nibkhrôurî and Sônkhkarî, but the Turin Canon admits at least half a dozen. These differences probably arose from the fact that, the second Heracleopolitan dynasty having reigned at the same time as the earlier Theban princes, the tables on the monuments, while rejecting the Heracleopolitans, recognized as legitimate Pharaohs only those of the Theban kings who had ruled over the whole of Egypt, namely, the first and last of the series; the Canon, on the contrary, replaced the later Heracleopolitans by those among the contemporary Thebans who had assumed the royal titles. Whatever may have been the cause of these combinations, we find the lists again harmonizing with the accession of the XIIth (Theban) dynasty.
For the succeeding dynasties we possess merely the names enumerated on the fragments of the Turin Papyrus, several of which, however, are also found either in the royal chamber at Karnak, or on contemporary monuments. The order of the names is not always certain: it is, perhaps, best to transcribe the sequence as we are able to gather it from the fragments of the Royal Papyrus, without attempting to distinguish between those which belong to the XIIIth and those which must be. relegated to the following dynasties.
About fifty names still remain, but so mutilated and scattered over such small fragments of papyrus, that their order is most uncertain. We possess monuments of about one-fifth of these kings, and the lengths of their reigns, as far as we know them, all appear to have been short: we have no reason to doubt that they did really govern, and we can only hope that in time the progress of excavation will yield us records of them one after another. They bring us down to the period of the invasion of the Shepherds, and it is possible that some among them may be found to be contemporaries of the XVth and XVIth dynasties.
