Manetho

**Manetho** was an ancient Egyptian historian and priest from Sebennytos. He lived during the Ptolemaic era, in about 300 BC.

Manetho wrote the _Aegyptiaca_ (_History of Egypt_). His book is used by Egyptologists to work out the dates for events in ancient Egypt. The earliest reference to Manetho's _Aegyptiaca_ is in Jewish historian Josephus's book, "Against Apion".

## Name

We do not know what Manetho's name means, some suggestions are "Gift of Thoth", "Beloved of Thoth", "Truth of Thoth", "Beloved of Neith", or "Lover of Neith", _Myinyu-heter_ ("Horseherd" or "Groom") and _Ma'ani-Djehuti_ ("I have seen Thoth").

## Life and work

We do not know when he was born or died. His book may have been written during the rule of Ptolemy I Soter (323–283 BC) and Ptolemy II Philadelphus (285–246 BC). The _Hibeh Papyri_, dated to 241/40 BC, suggests he may been writing during the rule of Ptolemy III Euergetes (246–222 BC). He wrote in the Greek language. Other works he wrote include _Against Herodotus_, _The Sacred Book_, _On Antiquity and Religion_, _On Festivals_, _On the Preparation of Kyphi_, and the _Digest of Physics_. The _Book of Sothis_ on astrology, may also be written by him.

He was probably a priest of the sun god Ra at Heliopolis. He knew a lot about the cult of Sarapis based on Osiris and Apis. Sarapis was a Greco-Macedonian version of the Egyptian cult dating back to Alexander the Great. Tacitus and Plutarch wrote that Ptolemy (probably Ptolemy Soter) imported a statue of the god.

## _Aegyptiaca_

The _Aegyptiaca_, the "History of Egypt", may have been Manetho's largest work. It was in date order and divided into three volumes. In _Aegyptiaca_, he invented the word _dynasty_ to mean a group of kings with a common origin. It came from the Greek word _dynasteia_, meaning "governmental power". He was the first person to group the rulers into dynasties. He did not use the word to mean families. He began a new dynasty when there was a break or change in the power of government. For example, there was a break between the Fourth Dynasty in Memphis, and the Fifth Dynasty at Elephantine. He included details of many of the kings.

_Aegyptiaca_ may have been written as an Egyptian history, to be more accurate than Herodotus' _Histories_. Hiis other book, _Against Herodotus_, may be just have been a short version of _Aegyptiaca_. There are no original copies of either book.

### Copies of the book

_Aegyptiaca_ has not survived as a complete book. It is very possible that what has been kept was rewritten by other writers to support their Egyptian, Jewish, or Greek histories. This makes it difficult for modern historians to know how reliable it is as a history.

The earliest mention of Manetho is in Josephus' _Contra Apionem_ ("Against Apion"). This was written nearly 400 years after _Aegyptiaca_. It is clear that Josephus did not have the original of Manethos' book. At about the same time, a short version, the Epitome, of the book was being used. This kept Manetho's brief list of dynasties and a some parts that were seen as important. For example, it said that the first ruler of the first Dynasty, Menes, "was snatched and killed by a hippopotamus". It is not known if any of the short version is Manetho's original writing. Copies were written by Sextus Julius Africanus and Eusebius of Caesarea. Eusebius's copy was used by Jerome in his Latin translation, an Armenian translation, and by George Syncellus. Syncellus saw that the copies by Eusebius and Africanus were almost the same, so he placed them side by side in his work, _Ecloga Chronographica_.

These last four copies are the only copies of the epitome of Manetho. Other sections are in Malalas's _Chronographia_ and _Excerpta Latina Barbari_ ("Excerpts in Bad Latin").

### Sources and methods

Manetho used lists of kings to provide a structure for his history. Josephus wrote that Manetho also used stories, myths and legends for his book. This was common among historians of that time. He must have known the Greek work of Herodotus. He tried to link Egyptian history with Greek history. For example, he links King Memnon with Amenophis, and Armesis with Danaos. It is possible that these links may have been the work of later writers. We do know he could write in the Greek language.

#### King lists

The king-list that Manetho used is unknown. The Turin King List is the one that is the most similar. The oldest source to compare with Manetho are the _Old Kingdom Annals_ (c. 2500-2200 BC). There are also the Karnak king list, two at Abydos and the Saqqara list.

The _Old Kingdom Annals_ only survive on the Palermo Stone. There are many differences between the stone and Manetho. The stone stops at the fifth dynasty. It includes the early kings of Lower Egypt and kings of Upper Egypt. Manetho lists several Greek and Egyptian gods beginning with Hephaistos and Helios. The _Annals_ also give annual reports of the activities of the kings.

The New Kingdom lists left out some rulers. The list prepared for Seti I, has 76 kings from the First Dynasties to the Fourteenth, but leave out the Hyksos rulers and those linked to Akhenaten. The Saqqara list also does not include them in its list of 58 names. These names were left out for religious, rather than political reasons. If Manetho used these lists at all, he would have been unable to get all of his information from them.

The Turin King List was probably a government, rather than a religious document. It would not have needed to leave out kings for religious reasons. These sort of documents must have been available to Manetho. As a priest he would have had access to all written materials in the temple.

Manetho's list was probably from Lower Egypt. He included kings from the Third Intermediate Period, even such short-lived kings like Amenemnisu (5 years) and Osochor (6 years). But he left out the kings from Thebes, such as Osorkon III, Takelot III, Harsiese A and Pinedjem I and kings from Middle Egypt like Peftjaubast of Herakleopolis. Manetho's information must have come from a local city's temple library in the River Nile Delta. The Middle and Upper Egyptian Pharaohs did not control this part of the Delta; which is why they are left out of Manetho's king-list.

#### Names

By the Middle Kingdom, Egyptian kings each had five different names. These were the "Horus" name; the "Two Ladies" name; the "Gold Horus" name; the _praenomen_ or "throne name"; and a _nomen_, the personal name given at birth (also called a "Son of Ra" name as it was preceded by _Sa Re'_). Some Pharaohs also had more than one of these names. For example, Ramesses II used six Horus names at various times.  We do not know if Manetho knew about the different names of rulers long past. Not all the different names for each king have been discovered, and it maybe that the kings were known by other names as well as the official names. Because Manetho translated the names into Greek, we do not know the original Egyptian name.

### Content

**Volume 1** begins from the earliest times. It lists gods and demigods as kings of Egypt. Stories of Isis, Osiris, Set, or Horus might have been found here. The book then lists kings from the First Dynasty I to the Eleventh Dynasty. This would have included the Old Kingdom, the First Intermediate Period, and the early Middle Kingdom.

**Volume 2** covers Twelfth Dynasty to the Nineteenth. This includes the end of the Middle Kingdom and the Second Intermediate Period (XV–XVII—the Hyksos invasion), and the start of the New Kingdom. Josephus believed the Hyksos or "shepherd-kings" were the ancient Israelites who made their way out of Egypt (_Apion_ 1.82–92).

**Volume 3** starts with  the Twentieth Dynasty and ends with the Thirtieth.

### Effect of _Aegyptiaca_

Egyptologists still use Manetho's way of grouping the pharaohs into dynasties. The French explorer and Egyptologist, Jean-François Champollion, had a copy of Manetho's lists to help him read the hieroglyphs. Modern histories now use both the modern translation of names and Manetho's version.

## Further reading

- Helck, Hans Wolfgang. 1975. "Manethon (1)". In _Der kleine Pauly: Lexikon der Antike, auf der Grundlage von Pauly’s Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft_, edited by Konrat Ziegler, Walter Sontheimer, and Hans Gärtner. Vol. 3. München: Alfred Druckenmüller Verlag. 952–953. .
- Laqueur, Richard. 1928. "Manethon". In _Paulys Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft_, edited by August Friedrich von Pauly, Georg Wissowa, and Wilhelm Kroll. Vol. 14 of 24 vols. Stuttgart: Alfred Druckenmüller Verlag. 1060–1106. .
- M.A. Leahy. 1990. "Libya and Egypt c1300–750 BC." London: School of Oriental and African Studies, Centre of Near and Middle Eastern Studies, and The Society for Libyan Studies.
- Redford, Donald Bruce. 1986a. "The Name Manetho". In _Egyptological Studies in Honor of Richard A. Parker Presented on the Occasion of His 78th Birthday, December 10, 1983_, edited by Leonard H. Lesko. Hannover and London: University Press of New England. 118–121. .
- ———. 1986b. _Pharaonic King–Lists, Annals and Day–Books: A Contribution to the Study of the Egyptian Sense of History_. Society for the Study of Egyptian Antiquities Publications 4, ser. ed. Loretta M. James. Mississauga: Benben Publications. .
- ———. 2001. "Manetho". In _The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt_, edited by Donald Bruce Redford. Vol. 2 of 3 vols. Oxford, New York, and Cairo: Oxford University Press and The American University in Cairo Press. 336–337. .
- Thissen, Heinz-Josef. 1980. "Manetho". In _Lexikon der Ägyptologie_, edited by Hans Wolfgang Helck, and Wolfhart Westendorf. Vol. 3 of 7 vols. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. 1180–1181. .
- Verbrugghe, Gerald P., and John Moore Wickersham. 1996. _Berossos and Manetho, Introduced and Translated: Native Traditions in Ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt_. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. .
- Waddell, William Gillian, ed. 1940. _Manetho_. The Loeb Classical Library 350, ser. ed. George P. Goold. London and Cambridge: William Heinemann ltd. and Harvard University Press. .
- Cerqueiro, Daniel. 2012. "Aegyptos fragmentos de una aegyptiaca recóndita." Buenos Aires: Ed. Peq. Ven. .

## websites

- Chronologie de Manéthon  showing the names given by Manetho and the names used now
- Manetho: History of Egypt, Sacred Book, etc.
- Who's Who in Ancient Egypt: Manetho
- "The First Egyptian Narrative History: Manetho and Greek  Historiography", ZPE 127 (1999), pp.93-116 by J. Dillery