July 28, 1882.] 



KNOWLEDGE • 



141 



|.^tl V AN ILLJiaSLIR^^TED V> i^ 



I V^ MAr.A7fNP nrQrTFMfF. "^ 



MAGAZINE OF SqENCE 



[^ PLAlNLV YfOKDED -£XACTI^J 



rj ILOXDOX: FRIDAY,YJULY 2S. 1882, 



ESCRIBED 



y 



Contents 



\Vas Barneses II. the Pharaoh of 

 the Oppression? Part V. By 

 Miss A.B.Edwards Ul 



Stimulants and Study. By the 

 Editor 142 



Future Sources of our Food Supplr. 

 Part II. Br PercT RnsseU . .:. U3 



Xiahts with a Three-inch Telescope. 

 By F.R.A.S. (lUtutrattd) IM 



A Ghost Stonr 1J5 



A Theory of Foresights 116 



Home Cures for Poisons 146 



Lower Life Forms 147 



Professor Owen on Virisi^ction 147 



Weather Charts for the AVeek 14.9 



■ Science and Art Gossip 143 



, Correspondence; — An Etfective 

 i Accumulator— Progenitor of Ver- 

 . tebrata— Double Star Castor— 



Vitreous Glaze for Stone, 4c 149 



Answers to Correspondents 152 



Our Mathematical Column 154 



j Our Chess Column 155 



I Our Whist Column 158 



L 



WAS KAMESES II. THE PHAEAOH 

 OF THE OPPRESSIONS^? 



By Amelia B. Edwards. 



v.— THE HTKSHOS KALENDAE AND THE EXODUS, 

 ACCORDING TO THE STXCHEOXOUS THEORY. 



IT has been suggested that Sut-aa-peh-peh Nubti in- 

 stituted his Kalendar when he ascended the throne. 

 This is pure assumption. We know nothing of Nubti 

 but his name; and we know nothing of liis Kalendar* 

 beyond the fact that it liad been founded 400 years before 

 tlie tablet of San was erected by command of Eameses II. 



But what we are fairly at liberty to conjecture is that 

 Xubti, at some undetermined point in the course of his 

 reign, sought to correct the fluctuations of the vague year 

 by the substitution of a fixed }'ear,t and that his improved 

 Kalendar, though apparently set a.'^ide liy the Pharaohs of 

 the Restoration (i.e., XVIIIth and XlXth dynasties), was 

 still in vulgar use 400 years later among the semi- 

 Semitic populations of the Delta. Let us say, then, 

 that Kubti instituted his Kalendar in the year B.c. 

 1800, just 338 years before the commencement of the 

 XlXth dynasty, and 97 years before the restoration 

 of the native monarchy in the person of Ahmes, first 

 Pharaoh of the XVIIIth Dynasty, b.c 1703. At this 

 time (b.c. 1800) the Hykshos dominion was about midway 

 of its third dynastic line, and at the height of its prosperity 

 and splendour. The tributary princes of Thebes had as 

 yet shown no disposition to revolt ; and the war of libera- 

 tion — which did not break out till the reign of Apapi, and 



* If the mounds of San were thoron<;liIy e.icavated, notliin^ is more 

 likely than tliat a tablet, or many t.iblets, might be found, engmved 

 with this kalendar in fall, like the sculptured kalcndars of the 

 temples of Denderah, Edfoo, and Mcdinet Haboo. 



t The Egyptian year consisted of twelve months of thirty days 

 each, to which were added five extra days (epaci) to bring np tiio 

 number to 305. Even so, the year fell short of the right time by a 

 (|Uarter of a day, which caused a loss of one whole day in every 

 four years, and thus, in course of time, changed the relative posi- 

 tions of the seasons. Many attempts were made at various periods 

 to substitute a fixed year; but none were successful until the 

 Alexandrian year (which began on August 20) was established 

 during the Roman period. 



which, as I have already observed, cannot have been an 

 enormously protracted war — was still far distant. It was 

 therefore about this time, when there was peace through- 

 out the land and peace along the frontiers, that Joseph 

 must have appeared upon the scene. We may assume that 

 he was born B.C. 183G, and that, having been sold as a 

 -slave to one Potiphar (Egyp". Petipa-Ra : i.e.. Devoted -to- 

 lla), a native Egyptian officer in the service of the Hykshos 

 sovereign, he was cast into prison upon an unjust charge 

 B.C. 1808, being then twenty-eight years of age. Two years 

 later (b.c 1806) he would have" been brought forth to 

 interpret the king's dream ; being, as it is expressly stated, 

 " thirty years old when he stood before Pliaraoh King of 

 Egypt" (Genesis, Chap. xlL, v. 4G). This would be just 

 six years before the institution of the Hykshos Kalendar, 

 in B.C. 1800 ; and as the Bible narrative, which is here 

 unusually precise, shows all this chain of important events 

 to have happened under a single Pharaoh, we must con- 

 clude that the king who dreamed of the seven high Niles 

 and the seven low Xiles, and who raised Joseph to power 

 because of the interpretation of his dream, could have been 

 none other than Sut-aa-peh-peh KubtL 



Prom this point (b.c 1806) we have now to reckon the 

 seven years of plenty, in the sixth of which the King 

 founded his Kalendar. The year B.C. 1800 marks, there- 

 fore, the new era of Xubti ; and the year B.C. 1799 marks 

 the last year of the good Niles. Next begin the seven 

 years of low Nile* and scant harvest, after two of which, 

 Joseph's brethren come from Canaan to buy com. This 

 brings us to B.C. 1797. Allowing a year for their double 

 journey, and for the journey of Isaac and his household, 

 we may next assign B.C. 1796 for the entry of the Hebrews 

 into Egypt. From this time to the death of Joseph (if we 

 credit him with the full traditional 110 years of life) we 

 have to count seventy years, so bringiug us to DC. 1726 ; 

 that is to say, to twenty -three years before the accession 

 of Ahmes, B.C. 1703. During these seventy years, 

 Nubti will have died and been succeeded by Apapi, 

 who erects a magnificent temple to Set,t and adorns 

 it with an avenue of human-headed sphinxes, carved 

 in the likeness of his own features. By this act, 

 and by the despotic fanaticism with which he sought, 

 apparently, to promulgate the cult of Set among the tribu- 

 tary rulers of Middle Egypt, Apapi roused the slumbering 

 hatred of the conquered race. A revolt broke out, headed 

 by Sekenen-Ea Ta-aa, prince of Thebes. Tlie revolt 

 speedily became a national war, which, as recorded in the 

 before-mentioned tomb at El Kab.J ended only with the 

 final expulsion of tlie Hykshos. If, therefore (accepting 

 ^lariette's dates for the commencement of the XVIIIth 

 Dynasty, rc. 1703, and for the expulsion of the Hykshos 

 in the sixth year of Ahmes, B.C. 1697), we allow thirty 

 years for the duration of the struggle, we must take ac. 

 1727 for the date at which it began. This would be one 

 year before the death of Joseph. 



• The dreams of Phnraoh are essentially local. The seven fat 

 kine, signifying prosperity, may bo interpreted to mean the seven 

 mystic cows, companions of Osiris-Apip, which wo see represented 

 in the vignettes to various copies of the Ritual ; and the seven lean 

 kine, ominous of famine, may well bo the seven cow-headed 

 goddesses known as "the Seven Ilathors"^ — minor divinities re- 

 sembling rapricious fairies, whoso functicin it was to distribute 

 good and ill luck. They "came up out of the river," which dis- 

 tinctly points to the annual inundation of the Nile ; while the soren 

 ears of poo<l corn followed by the seven cars of blasted com, as 

 distinctly refer to the good and bad crops consequent on seven good 

 Niles followed by seven bad Niles. 



t Set, or Sutekh, tho national God of the Hykshos and tlio 

 Uittitos. Throe of these sphinxes were found in si(u by Mariettc. 



t See KxowtEDCK, No. 35, p. 63. 



