The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1876-05-18
THE AGE OF A PYRAMID.

Modern scholarship seems destined tC
win its most signal triumphs through the
application of a careful scientific method
to its researches into the past history o.
our race. 1t multiplies its aids, extends
the range of its evidences, and, by look.
ing far beyond'the field ofthe old chron.
icers, is at last able to correct their dis.
crepancies. Where the records of earth
are at variance, it consults the unerring
stars, and fixes the chronology of events
more wisely than the historian who
wrote only few generations after their
occurrence. The German astronomer,
Hansen, was one of the first to determine
the day and hour of an ancient battle by
calculating the eclipse of the sun which
occurred at the same time; and. now the
French Psychologists, profiting by the
remarkable astronomical knowledge of
the old Egyptians, are applying the same
methods of veri6cation with wonderful
success, to the hieroglyphic records,
At the meeting of the French Academy
of Inscriptions, on the 9TH of April, M.
de Sauley read paper in regard to dis
covery by the scholar Chabas, which for
the first time introduces positive date
into the Oldest Egyptian history. Hith-
erto the distinguished Psychologist, M.
de Rouge, has only succeeded in estab-
fishing three dates with absolute certain
ty-the years 1900 1910 and 962 B. G, the
last of these being that of the taking of
Jerusalem by Sheshonk l., the Shishak
ofthe Bible. But two or three months ago
M. Chabas was fortunate enough to sue
ceed in reading a doubtful cartouche Troy
al name inclosed in an oval fgure) in the
famous Ebers papyrus, fac-simile of
which was published last year. 1t pro-
we'd to be the name of the Pharaoh, Men
keres, the Mycerinus of the Greek his
torians, and the builder of the third or
smallest pyramid at Gizeh. Attached to
the Cartouche was an astronomical note,
stating that the heliacal rising of the star
Sothis occurred in the ninth year of the
reign of Menkeres.
The ancient Egyptians had the habit
OF signalizing important events by some
Cotemporaneous astronomical phenome-
non. Many OF the latter could scarcely
be identified or determined now; but,
since we know that their Sothis is our
star Sirius, we are easily able to fix the
rare periods of its heliacal rising. This
is the astronomical term used when a
star, after being in conjunction with the
sun and invisible, emerges from the light
sufficiently to be seen just before sunrise.
M. Chabas Immediately took his discov-
cry to the astronomer Blot, who made
The necessary calculations, whence it ap.
pears that the heliacal rising of Sothis,
in the ninth year of the reign of Menke-
res, must have taken place between the
years 3007 and 9010 BIC. M. de Sauley
stated that he had made the calculations
Independently, and with precisely the
same result, he was entirely convinced
,f the correctness of the date. AS the
1rst assured step toward establishing, if
'nly in its general outlines, the chronol-
,gy ofthe Ancient Egyptian Empire, this
discovery is of incalCulable importance.
t fixes the age of the third pyramid of
iizeh at about 4, $3.50 years, and antedates
~ fully l,77O years the earliest accurate
y ascertained point in ancient chronol-
gy.
These detached epochs are like so
nany solid piers in the flood of Time and
hough still too far apart to be bridged,
hey furnish secure resting places for the
historian. 1t is not too much to expect, :
hat when the aid of astronomy is called
D the investigation of the Assyrian as
'eIl as the Egyptian records, we may re- !
tore the chronological charts of both
mpires from the silent testimony of the :
eavens.-M Y. Tribune.