9) Bridging the FIP gap: A new chronology for dynasties
8 to 11
Now that we have developped a complete chronology for the 12th dynasty, the next step is to see it it can be compatible with the dates I had developed for dynasties 1 to 7 (and Africanus' 8th) with my last summer paper, as summarized at the bottom of page 6. For this, we'll need too place the Memphite 8th, the Heracleopolitan 9/10th and the Theban 11th. In the previous pages, I had suggested an aprroximate date of early 6th dynasty for the begginning of the Heracleopolitan line. This remains the best we can do now. Likewise, the beginning of the 8th was set, logically, at the end of the 7th (of Eusebius), that is, 1732 ± (22+X). No clue could give us any hint on the begginning of the 11th, yet the best knowned dynasty of the FIP... This is why we needed dates for the following kings first.
As seen on page 6, the 11th dynasty was of 6 kings for 143 years, a
figure which I had taken from pTurin #V.18
{6 kings making [...] years, [...] 7 [erased], total 143}. Before
that, the papyrus is badly damaged, but here is what is what we still can
read today:
#V.11: The kings... (i.e. the dynasty's header)
#V.12 and #V.13: lost
#V.14: ...49 [years]...
#V.15: ...8[years??]...
#V.16: ...Nebhepetre... 51 years...
#V.17: ...Seankhka... 12 [years]...
On line 14, the number can only be in years, and so is probably the
12 on line 17 (it can't be in months and the placement of the number suggests
a year), but, for line 15, the 8 could be years, months or days...
Under all probability, the 11th dynasty worked with a calendar similar
to the 12th, so the method developped in the previous section also works
here. Line 18 suggests us that, for 7 years, a further king of this
dynasty had ruled the land, but had been erased afterwards. So, deducing
from the total of 143 years the known lenghts, we have 24 years left for
the kings on lines 12, 13, and 15: an average of 8 years each.
The monumental lists of Abydos (on position #57 and #58) and Saqqara (on position #46 and #45) both only list 2 kings for this dynasty: Nebhepetre and Seankhkare, the last two names on pTurin.
One more question needs to be discussed before we go reign by reign: the co-regency question. It was once beleived that it had been introduced in the 12th dynasty, and never before. Yet it is now more and more agreed that co-regencies date at least to the 6th dynasty. So it is not impossible that 11th dynasty kings have made use of this political mean, the 3rd and 5th kings, ruling respectively 49 and 51 years, would be, in my opinion, prime candidates to have instored co-regencies with their respective heir before their death. Unfortunately, we don't have any double dates to confirm this theory... Now, on to the kings!
The last king of this dynasty, according to Egyptologists, and also the one who got "erased", was Nebtaouyre Mentouhotep IV. According to pTurin, he would have ruled 7 years (and, presumably, a lost number of months and days; the highest date known is year 2.)... During which the future Amenemhat I was Vizier. This man took the throne, under unknown circumpstances, with the consequence that Mentouhotep IV was forgotten to official history. We also have discovered in the previous section that 13 years had "disappeared" from Manetho's account of Amenemhat I as well as from pTurin's dynastic total. My conclusion: Amenemhat I took the throne and "annexed" the 13 previous years as his own (this could explain the lack of documents from the early years... he was not king yet!) In our new chronology, the 14th year of Amenemhat I, 1702 BC, is thus Mentouhotep IV's 8th and last. This gives him figures of 1709-1702. Similarly, applying the 143 years figure to an ending date of 1702, we get a beggining in 1845 BC. (slightly later if there were any co-regencies), some decades after the end of the second dynasty in Upper Egypt. Thus, the re-union under Pepy I, proposed in my last summer paper, soon collapsed, probably because of the Heracleopolitan dynasty, rival of the sixth: the Theban nomarchs (e.i. governers) took the king title de facto. Indeed, the first king of the line, Mentouhotep I apparently only received the title posthumously, as his Horus name, Tepy-a, means 'the ancestor'. Documents from his reign mentioned that this ancestor recognized the authority of the Memphite king, a fact rather hard to believe if referring to the lesser kings of the 7th-8th dynasty, which is what most Egyptologists would have us to believe.
The dynasties last king according to all lists was SeankhkareMentouhotep III, who apearently ruled 12 years (pTurin). The highest dates knowned for him is the 8th year. Accepting the pTurin figure, this gives Mentouhotep III the years 1721-1709. From the above calcutions, Amenemhat's "first year" was in 1715, Mentouhotep III's seventh. What happened in that year that the next but one king would start his "official" reign from it? While Mentouhotep IV was erased, his predessessor Seankhkare did not suffer this horrible fate. Why? Because he was the son of the great Mentouhotep II who rebuilt Egypt after the troubles of the 1st intermediate period? Their could be many reasons for such a situation (e-mail me your suggestions!) but my favorite is that, for his first 6 years, he was the co-regent of his aged father, ultimately the only reason he was remembered.
Let's now talk about his father, Mentouhotep II the Great. During his long career of 51 years, (1766 to 1715, if our propositions are correct), he completely changed his throne names 2 times (3 titulatures including the original), which is why you'll sometimes see in older Egyptological books as many as 5 of 6 different Mentouhoteps in this dynasty: it took sometimes before the fact that we were dealing with one and the same king became clear. His political agenda can be retraced in his 3 Horus names: for at the least his first 14 years he was knowned as the Horus Seankhibtaouy, 'He who makes to live the heart of the Two Lands', a pompous name he chose, presumably in defiance to the old senile Pepy II and his hordes of incapable (or powerless) co-regents. This would indeed work well with the dates developed in our last summer paper. Then, and probably only for a short time, he became known as the Horus Netjerhedjet ('Lord of the White Crown'), the king Nebhepetre. Documents from that era show signs of a victory for the king... we may thus assumes that the change in titulature took place at the time he defeated the Heracleopolitans and put an end to their rule, yet he is only the lord of the White Crown of Upper Egypt, a clear sign, in my opininon, that Lower Egypt still had its own kings (the 7th dynasty of Eusebius). Then, for his jubily, presumably his 4th, when the name is attested for the first time (year 39->1728), he became the Horus Semataouy, "He who units the Two Lands". Notice that, by that year, the 8th dynasty had begun (according to my dates)... Yet, the Abydos list, after the five kings of the seventh dynasty, only gives one name for this dynasty (#56, right before Mentouhotep II): Neferirkare. In other words, Nebhepetre became the true king of all Egypt, relagating Neferirkare and his Memphite successors as symbolic kings of the Double Country (they probably also fulfiled religious tasks, but most of the power was to remain in Mentouhotep II hands.) Before trying to identify these 8th dynasty's kings, lets summarise the (very tentative) new chronology for the 11th dynasty (uncertainties are of 12+X years for M.IV, as a minimum, and grow larger as we get further back in time):
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