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Egyptian New Chronology

Or Could the Biblical history be True?

Page 8

8) A New Chronology for the Twelfth Dynasty of Egypt

In the previous section, I developed two powerful tools for the creation of a new chronology for the 12th dynasty: a little guide on the use of Manetho's data, and a new firm anchor point for this important dynasty (if you're not a believer and need arguments in favour of the veracity of Biblical history, read Mike Sanders pages: www.biblemysteries.com) In this new page, we'll use this point and Manetho's data to compute new chronology dates for the Ammenemes and the Sesostris, some of the most powerful Pharaohs Egypt ever had.

But we still need some further tools, more specific to this dynasty: the way it built it's calendar, and the problem of co-regencies.

During the 12th dynasty (as with other dynasties before and after), the calender worked without any "year zero". Whatever his actual crowning date was, the new king was considered to have ruled since the previous New Year day, that is, since the 1st day of the 1st month of Akhet. This is the official beggining of year one of the reign of the new king. Of course, on that day, the Egyptian didn't know their (then) king would die before the end of the year, so they, at first, would date that new year by the old king, say year 46 in the case of Sesostris I. The net result is that this year 46 is the very same one as the "new" year 1. Now, if that king died on the 2nd day of the 4th month of Akhet, the Egyptian Annals, like the Turin Papyrus, would say he had ruled the land for 45 years, 3 months and 2 days. Of course, in order to get the actual reign lenght, you'd also need the date of his predecessors death, as his first "year" wasn't complete. But, when it comes to count the total for the dynasty, in order not to count these "x months, y days" twice, you simply add the year figures for all kings, but the last, which you put completely (and need only the accession date of the very first king of the dynasty to get the exact total).

This dynasty appearently knew many co-regencies, as we know many double dates from monuments. But there interpretation has recently been challenged. While the arguments that the 10 years co-regency between Sesostris and his father never took place, too long and complex to fit on this page, are compelling and accepted here, I do not feel that all other such documents should be discarded. Indeed, we know that Sesostris I himself feared to se his throne usurped, and therefore I think it would have been logical for him to instore a co-regency. Moreover, simple age calculation show that these kings all have died very old, so co-regencies are indeed very plausible.

A final note before we list the kings. For convinience, we will consider that the Egyptian year began the same day as our Julian years. This, of course, is false (see page 2), but the difference is never bigger than a year and is therefore quite negligeable compared to our margin of 14+X years for the anchor point.

So, here is what the king lists other than Manetho record in term of 12th dynasty kings:
pTurin, line V.19 is the incomplete dynasty header: "[kings] of the residence Itj-Taouy...", Itj-Taouy being the new capital founded by the dynasty's first king. Then, we have:

Abydos list	Saqqara list	Turin Papyrus	King's name	Reign lenght (pTurin)

#59	#44	#V.20	Seheteptibre	[2]9 y
#60	#43	#V.21	Kheperkare	45 y
#61	#42	#V.22	Nebkaoure	10+ y*
#62	#41	#V.23	Khakheperre	19 y
#63	#40	#V.24	Khakaoure	30+ y*
#64	#39	#V.25	Nimaatre	40+ y*
#65	#38	#VI.1	Maatkheroure	9 y, 3 m, 27 d
--	#37 (Sobekkare)	#VI.2 (Sobekneferoure)	(name different on both lists)	3 y, 10 m, 24 d

Of course, all pTurin entries originally had months and days for all kings, but these are now lost (not an obstacle to our present analysis though, see point #1 above), of those with * only the number of decades now remains (and only the units for Sehetepibre). Then remains pTurin line #VI.3, the dynasty's total: "Total of the kings of the residence [Itj-Taouy], 8 [kings] for 213 years, 1 months and 17 days". Thus, the first king was crowned on the 7th day (24-17) of the 10th month (11-1), using the methodology developped above.

Now, let's see what Manetho has for this 12th dynasty: The first king was listed after the 11th dynasty, in conclusion to the 1st book: "...Ammenemes ruled for 16 years.", in all 3 sources. These 3 sources also agree on the first for kings of "the 12th dynasty [that] consisted of 7 kings of Diospolis.", even thought the name of the 4th is written slightly differently in all 3:
Sesonchosis, 46 years
Ammanemes, 38 years
Sesostris, 48 years
Lamares (Lachares, Lamaris, Lampares), 8 years.
But, from here, the evidence diverges. Africanus gives the remaining 3 kings as:
Ameres, 8 years
Ammenemes, 8 years
Scemiophris, 4 years.
Total, 160 years.
These 3 "8 years" is a row look suspect, and form an ideal candidate for a copying mistake: certainly one of them is to be replaced by a 9 or 10 (of Maatkheroure of pTurin). Also, the 160 years, a simple addition of these figures, out of which at least one is certainly wrong, is useless. On the other side, after Lamares, Eusebius gives us: "His successors ruled for 42 years and the reigns of the whole dynasty amounted to 245 years." Here, the total obvioulsy isn't a simple addition (that would be 182 years), similarly, the 42 years isn't 8+8+4, so Eusebius used a different tradition. Like in the previous section, we'll do our best to harmonize these.

The dynasty's second king, Kheperkare Senousert I, dates were computed in the previous section (dropping the error margins): from 1686 to 1641 BC. Indeed, the highest date known from this king is from year 45, working rather well with pTurin's 45 "complete" years, and with Manetho's "46 years", understood as "45 complete years and the beginning of a 46th".

The first Sesostris' father was SehetepibreAmenemhat I, called Ammenemes in Manetho. The 12th dynasty founder (he was Vizier under the last 11th dynasty king) ruled the land into is 30th year, as confirmed by 2 documents: the story of Sinuhe, which gives the exact date on which the king was murdered, and a stela from a tomb also records that its owner worked "30 years for Amenemhat I and 10 for Senousert I". So, setting year 30 as 1686, Amenemhat I got on the throne in 1715 BC. But wait, did he really ruled all these years? Manetho only gives him 16 years, and all dated documents from his reign belongs to the last 8 years... I think we're onto something here...

The first Sesostris' son was an Ammenemes, like his grand-father: NebkaoureAmenemhat II. The highest date known for this king being 35, I think we can safely assume the Mrl of 38 years (37 complete) to be accurate. But this king had co-regencies with both his father and son. In the first case, we have a double date that gives year 44 S.I = year 2 A.II, which means that Amenemhat II was crowned in his father's 43rd year: 1644 BC, in our model. he would therefore have died in 1607.

The twelfth dynasty 4th king was Khakheperre Senousert II. The highest known date for him is not higher than 6, which is also the year he became sole king, as we have a double date that gives: year 35 A.II = year 3 S.II. In our model, he was crowned in 1612 BC. How long after that he remained on the throne is a matter of conjectures... Using pTurin reign lenght of 19 complete years, he died in 1593. But modern Egyptologist have showed that his rule couldn't have been much longer than 8 or 9 years... To keep with all the evidences, I therefore suggest that he took is son as co-regent early in his tenth year, 1603, the reason for this will soon become evident (unfortunately, we don not possess a double date here).

His son was Khakaoure Senousert III, Manetho's Sesostris. The highest date known for him with certainty is his 19th, but documents with years over 30 (and up to 39) have been given to this king by many Egyptologists, and this agrees well with what's left of pTurin. So, if he was crowned in 1603, he died in 1565, his 39th year. But, as there are not as many documents in those last 20 years, he most probably already had his son as co-regent and effective ruler shortly after year 19. I would say from this very year 19, 1585 BC. Back to Manetho now. Instead of two consecutive Sesostris, he only listed one, with an rl longer too long for either. Yet, this rl could very well represent the total time the land was ruled by a Sesostris, either one or both. Indeed, if we set 1612, S.II's first year as the first of this "composite Sesostris", his 48th year would be 1565, which is the last one of S.III above (hence the necessity of the co-regency beginning in year 10: 9+39 = 48). Note that, the number of kings being given correctly by Manetho in the dynasty header, adding one king here means we must substract another one to compensate.

The next king was NimaatreAmenemhat III, Manetho's Lamares. For this king, we have documents up to year 46, let's therefore postulate that he ruled into his 47th year... Completely different than Manetho's 8 years! Is this a switch in the data he gives? The 3 previous kings were given full reign lenght, including there last incomplete one... Here, we'd have only the lenght of Amenemhat I's reign without co-regency: if his effective rule had begun in 1585, and his sole rule in 1565, the 8th year of this new phase would fall in 1558 (his 28th year). The next year (a complete change in evidence for Manetho!), he'd take his son Maakheroure Amenemhat IV as co-regent. A trace of this could be found in Semna: there, Amenemhat I have the nile level recorded every year. Yet no mesures have been found for years 33, 34, and 35, it could be just a coincidence, but measures for the years 5,6, and 7 of Amenemhat IV have been found. In this model, these two sets of years are identical!

Manetho's Ameres, thus, is none other than Amenemhat IV. The 8 years given to him are a scribal mistake for 9 (complete) or 10 (incomplete) years. In this model, his dates then are: 1557 to 1548 BC. But that year in which he dies is only his father's 38th... So Manetho's last Ammenemes is Amenemhat III, once again in control of the whole land, for a further 8 years, leading us to 1541 (if 8 complete years, as the preceding 8 years), that is his 45th year, in this model!

The dynasty's last monarch was Amenemhat III's daughter, queen Sobekkare Neferousobek, Manetho's Scemiophris. She came to the throne in her father's prior to last year (with a short co-regency for which a document does exist, although no kings are named) and reigned into her 4th year, giving 1540 to 1537 BC. With her, this powerful family disappeared, allowing the 13th dynasty, the kings who knew not Joseph, to take there place. Getting back to Manetho: we here stuck to Africanus version... In Eusebius, we've got a period of 42 years after Lameres, but we've seen this include himself... assuming these 42 years include his years before he was sole king, but not the 8 years he was, we'd get a total of 49 years (minus 1 since year 21 of Amenemhat III = his first year as sole ruler). From his first year, 1585, this leads us to 1537 (assuming Eusebius reverted to the incomplete last year method), the last year of queen Neferousobek!

In summary, here is the new 12th dynasty chronology, based on an absolute date of 1665 ± (14+X) for year 22 of pharaoh Senousert I and the above considerations:

Sehetepibre Amenemhat I	29 years	1715-1686
Kheperkare Senousert I	45 years	1686-1641
Nebkaoure Amenemhat II	37 years	1644-1607
Khakheperre Senousert II	19 years	1612-1593
Khakaoure Senousert III	38 years	1603-1565
Nimaatre Amenemhat III	46 years	1585-1539
Maakheroure Amenemhat IV	9 years	1557-1548
Sobekare Neferousobek	3 years	1539-1537
8 kings	226 years	1715-1537 -> 179 years (incl.)

Observation one: To compare with Eusebius' total, we should first substract from the 179 years the 29 of Ammenemes: 150 years. This isn't 245 years, but rather close to 145 (an additional century, as for additional decades for kings...). The 5 years difference could be explained on failures to correctly understand the co-regencie's lenghts. So, while the error margin is of 14+X for Senousert I, it is around 19+X at the end of the dynasty.

Observation two: The total for all kings is of 226 years, 13 more than what the pTurin says... This looks strangely similar to the difference between the 29 complete years of Amenemhat I and the 16 given to him by Manetho. I feel this reveals us a crucial historical fact, to be reviewed in the next section, as we will bridge de gap back to our knowned dates for the 7th dynasties.

Observation three: In the conventional chronology, the 7th year of Senousert III falls in 1872 BC, here in 1597, that is 275 years later... I think this is the right time to introduce an astronomical proof of our new dates: a papyrus from the late 12th dynasty records many lunar observations. These, with a few reasonable modifications can yield a date of 1812 BC, compatible with the traditional chronology. BUT, taken at face value, making no assumptions what so ever, these observations match perfectly with year 1649 BC... Exactly were we'd place the late 12th dynasty!! I think this is a wonderful sign of the validity of our approach.

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