would be one of the earliest public buildings erected there. This fact is recorded in a tablet which still exists in the quarry whence the stones were hewn. When this most important document is published, it will probably set at rest the question respecting the relative antiquities of Thebes and Memphis. We are again indebted to the curator of the Egyptian antiquities in the British Museum for this valuable confirmation of the view of the question which so necessarily follows upon the narrative of Holy Scripture.

The most celebrated act of the reign of Amosis was the expulsion of the shepherds from Memphis. The two races had, throughout the whole period of the usurpation, kept up a war along the confines of their kingdoms with various success. But Amosis recovered the possession of Memphis, and of the whole Delta, from Asseth, the second successor of Aphophis, compelling him and his army to take refuge in Aouaris, a fortified city or camp, which they had prepared on the eastern borders of Egypt.

It has just been noticed that, during the 260 years of their expulsion from Memphis, the Pharaohs of Upper Egypt had been engaged in continual wars; and this circumstance seems to have had a strong effect upon the national character of the Egyptians: they became a warlike race, able to expel these conquerors, before whom their ancestors had fled almost without striking a blow. Some cause must also have been at work to enervate the warlike spirit of the shepherd kings at Memphis, and the wealth which the administration of Joseph had poured into their coffers from the whole of the neighbouring countries, may with some probability be pointed out as that cause. The fame of this wealth would also violently stimulate the

ambition and avarice of the hereditary Pharaohs, and doubtless it fell into their possession with the territory they recovered. Some extraordinary circumstance like that with which the inspired history supplies us is certainly needed to account for the style of magnificence that distinguishes the monuments of the era which immediately followed the expulsion of the shepherds from those of all other periods.

An inscription on the tomb of one of the officers of Amosis, which has been found at Thebes, implies that his war against the shepherds was of long duration, and that he fought many battles with them both by land and sea, before he succeeded in expelling them from Egypt; an additional proof that they were not such barbarians as the Egyptian priests have described them to be. An inscription in the quarry of Mansarah also relates that Amosis hewed stones from thence for the construction of the temples of Ptha, Apis, and Amoun, at Memphis, in the twenty-second year of his reign.

CHAPTER X.

THE MONUMENTAL HISTORY OF EGYPT.

PART II.

THE Pharaohs of the eighteenth dynasty will now require our attention. According to the Greek authors, this was the most celebrated of all the generations of kings that ever sat upon the throne of Egypt. The monuments fully confirm this account. There is scarcely a temple or palace in Egypt which has not been founded by this illustrious race of monarchs.

As the tablet of Abydos is the link by which the written and the monumental histories of ancient Egypt are connected together, and as this invaluable document principally respects the eighteenth dynasty, we give a few of the coincidences between it and the lists of Manetho, which establish the certainty of the connexion. The fifth legible ring in the second line of the tablet from the right,* constantly occurs on other monuments in connexion with a second ring. The two are here subjoined; they read together,

"Sun, or Pharaoh, lord of the region of Moue," 002-uc Amosis, that is, "son of the moon." The interpretation of the remainder of the tablet shows that this is the hieroglyphic name of Amosis, the last monarch of the seventeenth dynasty, who

* See page 179.

expelled the shepherds. He is also called by Manetho, Misphragmouthosis.*

The complete name of the ring which follows immediately to the right reads,

לגס

อบ

"Lord of the universe, (governor devoted to the sun,) lord of the diadems of Egypt, (Amenotph;") that is, "the consecrated to Amoun." The first monarch of the eighteenth dynasty is named by Manetho Amenoph.

The ring which follows reads, when completed,

"Lord of the universe, (the great sun devoted to the world,) lord of the diadems of Egypt, (like the sun Thothmos,") which means “the son of Thoth." The second monarch of this dynasty was Thothmosis, according to Manetho.

The seventh name from thence, the sixth from the right of the middle line, offers a still more remarkable coincidence: it reads, when complete,

ww

"The king of an obedient people, (sun, lord of justice,) son of the sun, (Amenoph) governor of the region of purity and justice,” (Egypt.) The eighth monarch of the eighteenth dynasty, in Manetho's lists, is Amenoph,

who was called also by the Greeks Memnon.†

Pausanias informs us, in his description of Attica, of a celebrated colossus at Thebes which emitted melodious sounds at sunrise, and which the Greeks called

*Eratosthenes explains that all the kings of Egypt had three or four names; and it appears from the monuments that this is also the case with private individuals. † G. Sync. Chronographia, p. 72, etc.

Memnon, the son of Aurora, (the morning;) but he adds, "The Thebans say that it is not the statue of Memnon, but of Phamenoph, one of their countrymen." The remains of this colossus still exist on the plain of Thebes, covered with Greek and Latin inscriptions, recording the visits of persons of all ranks, and at all periods of the domination. of the Ptolemies and the emperors, to hear the mysterious sounds which issued from it. One of them reads thus: "I, Publius Balbinus, have heard Memnon or Phamenoph* uttering his divine sounds." On the base of this statue is inscribed in large hieroglyphic characters, of highly finished and perfect execution, the royal legend we are now considering. We cannot conceive of better evidence, either of the identity of this ancient monarch, or of the authenticity of the documents which establish it.†

The purport of the entire tablet having been to record the divine honours and gifts bestowed by Sesostris, by whose command it was engraven, upon the whole of his ancestry, the last line is entirely occupied with the repetitions of his name.

By the further aid of facts recorded on other monuments, a complete genealogical table of this illustrious line of warriors and statesmen has been made, which is here subjoined.

The 1st king was named Amenophis 1., the Years

18th Dynasty.

months

* Ph is the Egyptian definite article. The colossus was most probably named by

the Egyptians in common speech Phamenoph; that is, The Amenoph.

+ An interesting account of these inscriptions will be found in the Transactions of the Royal Society of Literature, vol. ii. part 1.