(e) It is a significant fact that the Chaldean tradition of the deluge as preserved by Berosus sets forth the special care taken by Noah to preserve and transmit tothe new-born nations after the flood the arts and sciences which had been developed before that catastrophe. They say he was admonished to put in writing an account of these arts and sciences and deposit it in a place of safety until the flood should be past. This tradition reveals the fact of a current belief that there was such knowledge to be preserved, and that means were used to preserve it.
2. Under the head of time required it remains to give a synopsis of the latest and most reliable results of Egyptologists in regard to the Egyptian date of Menes, their first king, and of the building of the three great pyramids—these being the most important epochs of the earliest Egyptian antiquity.
The standard historic authority (not, however, above suspicion) is Manetho, an Egyptian priest of Heliopolis, of the age of Ptolemy Philadelphus (reigned B. C. 284–246), who is supposed to have made up from the ancient records of his nation a list of thirty or thirty-one dynasties of Egyptian kings, beginning with Menes and ending with the conquests of Alexander the Great, giving the years of each king’s reign. Unfortunately it comes down in a somewhat fragmentary condition, as copied by Julius Africanus (died A. D. 232), who was himself in part copied by Eusebius (of the fourth century) and by Syncellus (flourished A. D. 780).
Until recently it has been the current opinion of the best authorities (still held by many) that these dynasties were at some points contemporary and not successive—some of them reigning in Upper Egypt, others in Middle or Lower Egypt, at the same time. This would raise the problems—How many and which were contemporary? How much is the entire period actually shortened by this contemporaneousness?——Moreover it has been supposed also that on the same throne there has been at some points a joint occupancy of two or more kings—father and son perhaps, or of some rival claimants;so that the entire duration of a given dynasty may be less than the sum of the reigns of its enumerated kings.[20]——The problem of whole duration being complicated by these elements of uncertainty, it has been the great aim of recent investigation to gather in all possible aid from the monuments and bring their testimony to bear upon the tables of Manetho. The results are variously estimated and the problem can not be regarded as yet fully settled.
I place together the opinions of some of the best authorities:
I. For the date of Menes, reputed the first king.
| B. C. | |
| Bunsen’s latest revised recension of Egyptian Chronology locates him[21] | 3059 |
| J. P. Thompson at least as far back as | 3000 |
| R. S. Poole (Smith’s Bible Dictionary, p. 682) | 2717 |
| Sir Gardner Wilkinson (see “Aids to Faith,” p. 294) | 2690 |
| Wm. Palmer (Smith’s Bible Dictionary, p. 687) | 2224 |
| The “Old Chronicle” (very valuable authority) | 2220 |
| Eratosthenes and Apollodorus, original authorities, in no respect inferior to Manetho | 2793 |
Other estimates from less reliable authorities carry him back yet further.
For convenience of comparison we place here our corrected Bible Chronology for the call of Abraham—viz. B. C. 2248; and for the flood, by the longest Septuagint text, B. C. 3425, and by the shortest, B. C. 3325. These dates afford ample time for Mizraim, grandson of Noah, to make a home and found a community in Egypt, in which Menes might presently reach the dignity of being the first king.
II. The date of the Pyramids.