d

b

years. If the number of kings were seventy-seven,* add to these fifteen Cynic heroes, eight demi-gods, twelve gods, and Sol the son of Vulcan, and we have, perhaps, Manetho's one hundred and thirteen geneations. In like manner I might attempt to fix the numbers of years which he assigned to the several generations. If the reigns of his kings amounted to between 17 and 1800 years, then the reigns of his gods, demi-gods, and heroes, filled up the space of almost 35000; for all together made 36525 years. The numbers of years of the reigns of the kings, as calculated in the supplement to the old Chronographeon, are 1710. The dynasties ended with Nectanebus, A. M. 3654 ; count back from hence 1710 years, and we begin the reign of the first king, A. M. 1944. Menes, or the Miz

reign, not of one, but of three kings: and that these supplements and corrections are just, the reader may be satisfied from the accounts given of these dynasties by Africanus and Eusebius, Syncell. p. 76, 77, and from the true history of Egypt from Nectanebus' advancement to the throne, to the flight of Nectanebus. See Prideaux Connect. Parti. b. 7.

If the reader counts up the numbers of years assigned to the reigns of the kings in the several dynasties annexed to the Chronographeon, supposing six years to be the reign of the king omitted xxviii dynasty, (see this dynast. in Africa. & Euseb. Syncell. p. 76, 77.) and supposing the years of the xxx dynasty to be 25 not 18, (consult Prideaux' Connect. for the reigns of the kings which belonged to that dynasty,) he will find the sum of years to be 1710. Chronograph. Syncell. p. 51.:

a Vid. quæ sup. c Ibid. d'Ibid.

Vid. quæ sup. f Syncell. p. 256.

raim of Moses,& went into Egypt about A. M. 1772, xemoved from the land of Zoan there into a further part of the country about A. M. 1881, and died about A.M. 1943; so that Manetho's accounts began the kings about the time of Menes. Of this sort, I believe, was the work of Manetho: and it is obyious, that it did not appear to carry the accounts of the Egyptian kings so far backward, as the Greeks must suppose they ought to be carried, from what had been before published of them in the Greek tongue. Herodotus wrote about a century and a half earlier than Manetho ; and according to what he collected, the Egyptians had had from Menes to Cambyses above three hundred and fifty kings. When Herodotus was in Egypt, he was carried into a temple, where he counted the number of the statues of the priests, that were set up there, and he reckoned three hundred and forty-five; and the Egyptians informed him, that they had so many priests, and as many kings, from Menes, their first king to Sethos." We cannot suppose that Herodotus

I cannot think the numbers are printed so accurately, or that we may be able, perhaps, to correct them with so much certainty and exactness, as to determine absolutely that this was the real number fixed by Manetho; from this pumber we may form a general notion of his computations, and that is all we can pretend to endeavour at.

Compute the time of Herodotus from Prideaux Connect.

part i. b. 6. ad an. 444.

m Id, ibid. c. 141,

Herodot. Hist. lib. 2.

■ Ibid.

should herein publish an absolute falsehood; and if Herodotus did indeed see such a collection of statues, how is it possible, that there should have been no more kings of Egypt, than what Manetho seems to have suggested? But this matter may be easily cleared. The Egyptians had collected into this temple the statues of priests from a multitude of cities, and might, in shewing them to strangers ostentatiously set off the number of their priests and kings, not telling how they had collected them, and they might hereby easily send into the world enlarged accounts of the Egyptian antiquities. But Manetho knew the affairs of his country too well to be led into this error. He sup posed one continued empire to have subsisted and been maintained in Egypt from Menes to Nectanebus ; that the seat of it had in different ages been at different cities; sometimes at This, sometimes at Memphis, sometimes at Diospolis, and sometimes at Tanis. Accordingly he deduces and connects a series of those kings, whom he imagined to have had in their times the supreme command; omitting all others their contemporaries, whom he supposed to have governed but as deputies to these, in their respective provinces or cities. However, Manetho's account does not seem to have given an entire satisfaction; for in a little time after he had composed it, in the reign of Ptolemy Euergetes, the immediate successor of Philadelphus, who had employed Manetho, Eratosthenes was ordered to make a further collection of the Egyptian kings.

III. Eratosthenes was a Cyrenian, had studied at Athens, was of great eminence for his parts and learn

ing, had an invitation into Egypt from Ptolemy Euergetes, who made him one of the keepers of the royal library at Alexandria,° and commanded him to give him a catalogue of the Egyptian kings. Eratosthenes hereupon made a list of the kings, who had `reigned at Thebes or Diospolis, and to every king's name added the number of years in his reign. His catalogue is preserved in Syncellus, and the names of the kings, and number of years of the respective reigns set down in it, are as follows. 7. Menes reigned years 62. . Athothes 59. II. Another Athothes IV. Diabies 19. V. Pemphos 18. VI. Tægar Amachus Momcheiri 79. VII. Stæchus 6. sormies 30. IX. Mares 26. x. Anoyphes 20. Sirius 18. XII. Chnoubus Gneurus 22. XI. Ramosis 13. XIV. Biyris 10. XV. Saophis Comastes 29. XVI. Sen-Saophis 27. XVII. Moscheris Heliodotus 31. XVIII. Musthis 33. XIX. Pammus Archondes 35. XX. Achescus Ocaras 1.

32.

Apappus maximus 100.

XXII.

Nicotris 6.

XXI.

vini. Go

XI.

XXIII. Myrtæus Ammonodotus 22. XXIV. Thuosi Mares. 12. XXV. Thinillus 8. XXVI. Semphruceates 18. XXVII. Chouther Taurus 7. xxvIII. Meures Philoscorus 12. XXIX. Chomæptha Mundus Philephastus 11. xxx. Anchunius Ochy-Tyrannus 60. XXXI. Penteathyris 16. XXXII. Stamenemes 23. XXXIII. Sistosichermes 55. Mæris 43. XXXV.

XXXIV.

Siphoas, or Mercury, 5. XXXVI. The name of the king is wanting, the years of his reign are 14. xxxvII.

⚫ Voss. de Histor. Græc. 1. i. c. 17. Prideaux Connect. Syncell. p. 91-147.

part. 2, b. 2.

Pheuron, or Nilus, 5 years.

XXXVIII.

Amuthantæus

63. This is the remain we have of Eratosthenes, taken by Syncellus from the annals of Apollodorus." It begins from Menes, who was the Mizraim of Moses,' 62 years before the death of Menes, 124 years, says Syncellus, after the confusion of tongues,' that is, when Menes removed from the land of Tanis into Thebais, A. M. 1881. The sum of all the reigns contained in the catalogue amount, according to Syncellus, to 1076 years," and consequently the catalogue 257 may be computed to end A. M. 2957. But before I leave this work of Eratosthenes, I would offer a few remarks upon it. 1. The nature and manner of it points out, what were the reputed defects of Manetho's performance, at the time of composing it. Had Manetho's been esteemed a complete work, Eratosthenes would certainly not have been employed so soon after him. But the number of Egyptian kings suggested by Herodotus, upon the appearance of a strict enquiry, and a very good information, could not but put the learned Greeks at Alexandria, as well as others,

Syncell. p. 91.
Syncell. p. 147.

Gen. x. 13. Vol. i. b. 4. t Vol. i. b. 4.

If the reader sums up the reigns above recounted, he will find them amount to but 1050: but I must observe, that in the margin of Syncellus' Chronographia, at the name of Pentea thyris the xxxi. king, it is remarked, that the years of his reign should be read 6 note 42, not 16; make this correction, and the sum of years of the catalogue will be 1076, as Syncellus writes it.