early Egyptian History* 183[ 



proper name, the last of the second row, since knowti to be the 

 name of the king whose title is the last in the succession, and 

 who was the fourth in reign and generation before Sesostris. 

 The third row was recognised to consist of one proper name 

 and one title, each repeated ten times, and alternating with 

 each other : these are since known to be the name and title of 

 Sesostris, to whose reign the construction of the table is with 

 much probability ascribed. The titles in the same row \Vith 

 that of the ancestor of Sesostris and preceding it, have been 

 identified on other monuments, coupled with names which are 

 those of the predecessors of the same king in the list of Manetho. 



It would exceed our limits, and it is not our purpose, to 

 trace in detail the successive steps by which the existence of 

 each of the kings of Manetho's list, from the expulsion of the 

 Phoenician shepherds from Lower Egypt, and the consequent 

 union, of Upper and Lower Egypt in a single monarchy, to 

 the reign of Sesostris, has been attested by the monuments. 

 Suffice it to say, that the same number of individuals as 

 stated by Manetho, namely, eighteen, filling a space of four 

 centuries, are shown, by the monuments, to have reigned in 

 that interval, and to have borne the same relationship, as well 

 as succession, to each other, as is expressed by the historian : 

 that, of the eighteen names, eight in different parts of the list 

 are read on the monuments identically as in the historical 

 record ; and that in regard to the names that are not identical, 

 we have the testimony of Manetho that some amongst the 

 kings, Sesostris, for example, were known by two and even by 

 more names. The table of Abydus appears to have been 

 strictly a genealogical record ; a record of generations, in which 

 ■view it is strictly accordant with the historian. 



The period of the Egyptian annals on which this light has 

 b^en thrown, is precisely that which might have been selected 

 in the whole history of Egypt as the most desirable for such 

 purpose. Independently of its very high antiquity, it was the 

 period of the greatest splendour and power of the native Egyp- 

 tian monarchy, and of the highest (Egyptian) cultivation of 

 the arts. The greater part of the more ancient, and by far the 

 most admirable in execution, of the temples, palaces, and sta- 

 tues, which still attest by their ruins their former magnificence, 

 are the work of that age ; and the hieroglyphic inscriptions stiU 



