Table I. page 79 shows the chronology of the first nineteen dynasties, according to recent authorities, before and after the discovery of the Kahun Sothic date.
The dates of the earlier dynasties in this table are always intended to be only approximate; for instance, Meyer in 1904 allowed an error of 100 years either of excess or deficiency in the dates he assigned to the dynasties from the Xth upwards.
The other dynasties are dated as in Table II. by different authorities.
See Ed. Meyer, Geschichte des Altertums, Bd. i. (Stuttgart, 1884), Geschichte des alten Ägyptens (1887), Ägyptische Chronologie (Abhandl. of Prussian Academy) (Berlin, 1904, with the supplement Nachträge zur ägypt. Chronologie, ib. 1907); K. Sethe, “Beiträge zur ältesten Geschichte Ägyptens” (in his Untersuchungen, Bd. iii.) (Leipzig, 1905); J. H. Breasted, Ancient Records of Egypt, “Historical Documents,” vol. i. (Chicago, 1906); W. M. F. Petrie, A History of Egypt, vol. i. (London, 1884), vol. iii. (1905), Researches in Sinai (London, 1906); G. Maspero, Histoire ancienne des peuples de l’orient (Paris, 1904); A. Wiedemann, Ägyptische Geschichte (Gotha, 1884); articles by Mahler and others in the Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache and Orientalistische Literaturzeitung (recent years).
(F. Ll. G.)
III. History
1. From the Earliest Times to the Moslem Conquest.
In the absence of a strict chronology, the epochs of Pharaonic history are conveniently reckoned in dynasties according to Manetho’s scheme, and these dynasties are grouped into longer periods:—the Old Kingdom (Dynasties I. to VIII.), including the Earliest Dynasties (I. to III.) and the Pyramid Period (Dynasties IV. to VI.); the Middle Kingdom (Dynasties IX. to XVII.), including the Heracleopolite Dynasties (IX. to X.) and the Hyksos Period (Dynasties XV. to XVII.); the New Empire (Dynasties XVIII. to XX.); the Deltaic Dynasties (Dynasties XXI. to XXXI.), including the Saite and Persian Periods (Dynasties XXVI. to XXXI.). The conquest by Alexander ushers in the Hellenistic age, comprising the periods of Ptolemaic and Roman rule.
The Prehistoric Age.—One of the most striking features of recent Egyptology is the way in which the earliest ages of the civilization, before the conventional Egyptian style was formed, have been illustrated by the results of excavation. Until 1895 there seemed little hope of reaching the records of those remote times, although it was plain that the civilization had developed in the Nile valley for many centuries before the IVth Dynasty, beyond which the earliest known monuments scarcely reached. Since that year, however, there has been a steady flow of discoveries in prehistoric and early historic cemeteries, and, partly in consequence of this, monuments already known, such as the annals of the Palermo stone, have been made articulate for the beginnings of history in Egypt.
It is probable that certain rudely chipped flints, so-called eoliths, in the alluvial gravels (formed generally at the mouth of wadis opening on to the Nile) at Thebes and elsewhere, are the work of primitive man; but it has been shown that such are produced also by natural forces in the rush of torrents. On the surface of the desert, at the borders of the valley, palaeolithic implements of well-defined form are not uncommon, and bear the marks of a remote antiquity. In some cases they appear to lie where they were chipped on the sites of flint factories. Geologists and anthropologists are not yet agreed on the question whether the climate and condition of the country have undergone large changes since these implements were deposited. As yet none have been found in such association with animal remains as would help in deciding their age, nor have any implements been discovered in rock-shelters or in caves.