Ancient Egypt, from the first kings to Cleopatra

The Naqada culture: Egypt before the kings (c. 4000 to 3100 BC)

Archaeologists name the cultures of Upper Egypt before the kings after the site of Naqada, where Flinders Petrie dug thousands of graves in the 1890s. Over about a thousand years, small farming communities became towns ruled by chiefs, with centres at Naqada, Hierakonpolis and Abydos. Their pottery, slate palettes and goods spread north until one material culture covered the whole valley, the base on which the first kings built a single state.

• Petrie worked out the order of these graves with "sequence dating", ranking pottery styles by how they changed: one of the first scientific dating methods in archaeology.
• The British Museum's Gebelein man, nicknamed "Ginger", was buried around 3400 BC in a shallow pit. The hot dry sand preserved his body naturally, centuries before Egyptians mummified on purpose.
• Hierakonpolis, the town of the falcon god Horus, was one of the largest towns in Egypt at the time and had an early brewery and a cemetery with elephants, baboons and other wild animals buried in it.

Sources: Wikipedia: Naqada culture; Wikipedia: Gebelein predynastic mummies; Wikipedia: Hierakonpolis; World History Encyclopedia: Predynastic Period in Egypt

The first Egyptian writing: tomb U-j at Abydos (c. 3250 BC)

In 1988 German archaeologists led by Günter Dreyer excavated tomb U-j in the royal cemetery of Abydos. Among the jars and goods were more than 150 small labels of bone and ivory, carved with a few signs each, which had been tied to goods. Radiocarbon dating puts them around 3250 BC. Many scholars read the signs as early hieroglyphs that record places and quantities, which would make Egyptian writing about as old as the earliest writing in Mesopotamia.

• The tomb's owner is unknown; Egyptologists often call him "Scorpion I" after a sign found in the tomb.
• Some signs seem to be used for their sound, not just as pictures: the key step from symbols to real writing.
• Whether Egypt invented writing on its own or took the idea from Mesopotamia is still debated.

Sources: Wikipedia: Umm el-Qa'ab, the royal cemetery at Abydos; Wikipedia: Egyptian hieroglyphs; World History Encyclopedia: Egyptian Hieroglyphs

Narmer (c. 3100 BC)

Horus Narmer ("raging catfish"); possibly the Menes of later tradition, Dynasty 1

Narmer is the first king most Egyptologists place at the head of the First Dynasty. His name is written with a catfish and a chisel inside a serekh, the palace-façade frame of royal names. He is best known from the Narmer Palette, found at Hierakonpolis, which shows him striking an enemy in the white crown of Upper Egypt and parading in the red crown of Lower Egypt. Whether the palette records a real conquest that unified Egypt or celebrates a unity already won is debated.

How they came to power: Narmer probably inherited a kingdom already centred on Upper Egypt from earlier rulers buried at Abydos, and ruled the whole country from the Delta to the First Cataract.

How it ended: He was buried at Abydos in tomb B17/18. How he died is unknown.

• The Narmer Palette was found at Hierakonpolis in 1897 to 1898 by James Quibell and Frederick Green; it is now in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.
• Pottery marked with Narmer's serekh has been found in the southern Levant, evidence of trade or Egyptian presence there.
• Later Egyptians remembered the first king as Menes. Herodotus (2.99) says Min founded Memphis after damming the Nile; whether Menes was Narmer, his successor Aha, or a memory of both is unknown.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.99 (Min founds Memphis) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 1, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Narmer; Wikipedia: Narmer Palette; World History Encyclopedia: Narmer

Hor-Aha (c. 3085 to 3050 BC)

Horus Aha ("the fighter"), Dynasty 1

Aha followed Narmer, probably his son. A label from his reign records a visit to the shrine of Neith, and his tombs at Abydos are among the earliest large royal burials. Around his tomb lie more than thirty subsidiary graves of young people, apparently sacrificed at his funeral, a practice that lasted only through the First Dynasty. Many scholars think Aha, not Narmer, may be the founder later called Menes.

How they came to power: He succeeded Narmer, probably as his son; his mother may have been Neithhotep, whose large tomb at Naqada held objects naming both kings.

How it ended: Unknown. Manetho, as quoted by Africanus, says the first king Menes was carried off by a hippopotamus after reigning 62 years: a legend, not a record.

• His burial at Abydos included young lions, buried in a pit next to the tomb.
• An ebony label from Naqada with his name carries the sign "mn" beside it; some read this as the name Menes, others disagree.
• Diodorus (1.45) says the first king, Menas, taught the Egyptians to worship the gods and to live in luxury.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 1, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 1.45 (LacusCurtius); Wikipedia: Hor-Aha; Wikipedia: Menes; Wikipedia: Neithhotep

Djer (c. 3050 to 3010 BC)

Horus Djer, Dynasty 1

Djer ruled for roughly forty years, one of the longest reigns of the First Dynasty. His tomb at Abydos is surrounded by more than 300 subsidiary burials, the largest number of any king. A thousand years later, in the Middle Kingdom, Egyptians identified the tomb as the burial place of Osiris, god of the dead, and it became a goal of pilgrimage.

How they came to power: He was probably the son of Aha.

How it ended: He was buried at Abydos; the cause of death is unknown.

• Flinders Petrie found a mummified arm wearing four bracelets of gold, turquoise and amethyst hidden in a hole in the tomb wall in 1900; the bracelets survive in Cairo, though the arm was thrown away.
• A carved stone bed showing Osiris lying on a lion bier was placed in the tomb in the Thirteenth Dynasty, when it was revered as Osiris's grave.
• Records on the Palermo Stone probably cover part of his reign, year by year.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 1, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Djer; Wikipedia: Palermo Stone

Djet (c. 3010 to 3000 BC)

Horus Djet ("cobra"), also called Wadj, Dynasty 1

Djet's reign seems to have been short. His tomb at Abydos, with about 174 subsidiary burials, and large tombs of officials at Saqqara date from his time. His funerary stela, carved with a falcon perched over a serpent inside a palace façade, is one of the finest works of early Egyptian art.

How they came to power: He followed Djer, probably as his son.

How it ended: Unknown; his queen Merneith appears to have ruled for their young son Den after him.

• The Djet stela was found by Émile Amélineau at Abydos and is now in the Louvre.
• His name is written with a single cobra hieroglyph.
• A large tomb at Giza, much older than the pyramids, dates to his reign.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 1, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Djet

Merneith (c. 3000 BC)

Merneith ("beloved of Neith"), Dynasty 1

Merneith was probably Djet's wife and the mother of Den. She was buried at Abydos in a tomb as large as the kings' tombs, with subsidiary graves around it, which no other woman of the period received. A seal from Den's tomb lists her among the kings as "king's mother", so she probably ruled as regent while Den was a child.

How they came to power: When Djet died, their son Den was probably too young to rule, and Merneith governed for him.

How it ended: She was buried at Abydos (tomb Y). The date and cause of death are unknown.

• Petrie at first took Merneith for a king, because her tomb was so large and royal.
• Her name is not written in a serekh, the frame used only for kings' names, which is why most scholars call her a regent rather than a pharaoh.

Sources: Wikipedia: Merneith

Den (c. 2990 to 2940 BC)

Horus Den; personal name Khasty, Dynasty 1

Den had one of the longest and best-documented reigns of the First Dynasty. Labels from his reign record festivals, a census and campaigns to the east, and he is the first king known to have used the title "king of Upper and Lower Egypt" (nesu-bity) and to be shown in the double crown. His tomb at Abydos had a long stairway and the first granite floor in Egypt.

How they came to power: He came to the throne as a child, with his mother Merneith probably ruling for him at first.

How it ended: He was buried at Abydos in a tomb surrounded by about 130 subsidiary burials.

• An ivory label in the British Museum (the "MacGregor label") shows Den striking an eastern enemy, with the words "first time of smiting the east".
• He celebrated the sed festival, the jubilee of royal renewal, which implies a long reign of about 30 years or more.
• Officials of his time built huge mud-brick tombs at Saqqara, overlooking Memphis.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 1, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Den; Wikipedia: Sed festival; British Museum: label of King Den (EA 55586)

Qa'a (c. 2916 to 2890 BC)

Horus Qa'a, Dynasty 1

Qa'a ruled late in the First Dynasty after Anedjib and Semerkhet. His tomb at Abydos was rebuilt several times and still had subsidiary burials, though far fewer than earlier kings: the custom of human sacrifice at royal funerals ended soon after. His death was followed by a change of dynasty, perhaps after a dispute over the succession.

How they came to power: He succeeded Semerkhet, whose own reign Manetho (in Africanus) says saw "a very great calamity".

How it ended: He was buried at Abydos. The next king, Hotepsekhemwy, founded the Second Dynasty and sealed Qa'a's tomb, so the change of dynasty may have been peaceful.

• Seal impressions naming Hotepsekhemwy were found at the entrance of Qa'a's tomb, showing that the new king carried out his burial.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 1, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Qa'a; Wikipedia: Semerkhet

Nynetjer (c. 2810 to 2767 BC)

Horus Nynetjer ("godlike"); probably the Binothris of Manetho, Dynasty 2

Nynetjer was the third king of the Second Dynasty and ruled for about forty years. The Palermo Stone lists events of his reign, including festivals and the "hacking up" of northern towns. He was buried at Saqqara in a huge underground gallery tomb, not at Abydos, a sign that the court now looked to Memphis.

How they came to power: He followed Hotepsekhemwy and Nebra, early Second Dynasty kings buried at Saqqara.

How it ended: Unknown. After him the record becomes confused, and Egypt may have been divided for a time.

• Manetho, as quoted by Africanus, says that under Binothris "it was decided that women might hold the kingly office": an echo of queens like Merneith, written down 2,500 years later.
• His galleried tomb lies at Saqqara near the later pyramid of Unas; the tomb of his predecessors lies under its causeway.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 2, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Nynetjer; Wikipedia: Palermo Stone

Peribsen (c. 2740 BC)

Seth Peribsen, Dynasty 2

Peribsen broke with every king before him by placing the animal of the god Seth, instead of the falcon of Horus, above his serekh. Many scholars think this reflects a political or religious split in the late Second Dynasty, perhaps a divided Egypt with rival kings. He was buried at Abydos, the first king to return to the old royal cemetery for generations.

How they came to power: How he came to power is unknown; he may have ruled only part of Egypt.

How it ended: He was buried at Abydos (tomb P). His cult continued into the Fourth Dynasty, so he was not regarded as a usurper.

• His seals carry what is often called the earliest complete written sentence in Egypt: the god of Ombos (Seth) has united the Two Lands for his son, the king of Lower and Upper Egypt, Peribsen.

Sources: Wikipedia: Peribsen; Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 2, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.)

Khasekhemwy (c. 2714 to 2686 BC)

Horus-and-Seth Khasekhemwy ("the two powers have appeared"), Dynasty 2

The last king of the Second Dynasty probably first ruled as Khasekhem and changed his name to Khasekhemwy after ending a period of division, placing both the falcon of Horus and the animal of Seth above it as a sign of reconciliation. His enormous mud-brick enclosure at Abydos, the Shunet el-Zebib, still stands about 11 metres high, and his tomb is the largest of the early royal tombs.

How they came to power: He seems to have won a civil war: statues of Khasekhem from Hierakonpolis show slain northern enemies on their bases, with numbers in the tens of thousands.

How it ended: He was buried at Abydos. His wife Nimaathap was honoured as the mother of the next king, Djoser, so the Third Dynasty began with his family.

• His seated statues from Hierakonpolis, now in Cairo and the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, are among the oldest surviving statues of an Egyptian king.
• The Shunet el-Zebib at Abydos is one of the oldest mud-brick buildings in the world still standing.
• His tomb at Abydos contained a burial chamber of dressed limestone, one of the earliest stone-built rooms in Egypt.

Sources: Wikipedia: Khasekhemwy; Wikipedia: Shunet El Zebib

Djoser (c. 2667 to 2648 BC)

Horus Netjerikhet; remembered later as Djoser, Dynasty 3

Djoser, known in his own time by his Horus name Netjerikhet, ruled from Memphis at the start of the Old Kingdom. His Step Pyramid at Saqqara, about 62 metres high, began as a flat mastaba tomb and was enlarged into six stepped layers inside a vast walled complex of stone buildings that copy, in limestone, the reed and wood architecture of the time. It is the oldest large stone building in the world.

How they came to power: He was probably the son of Khasekhemwy and Queen Nimaathap, which links the Third Dynasty directly to the end of the Second.

How it ended: He was buried beneath the Step Pyramid; only fragments of a mummy, of disputed date, were found there.

• A statue base found at Saqqara carries the name and titles of Imhotep next to Djoser's, contemporary proof of the architect later worshipped as a god of medicine.
• Manetho (in Africanus) says of this king, Tosorthros, that he "built the house of hewn stone" and was called Asclepius for his medical skill, probably a memory of Imhotep merged with the king.
• His life-size seated statue was found in 1925 in a sealed room (serdab) beside the pyramid, looking out through two eye-holes; the original is in Cairo and a copy sits in its place.
• The Famine Stela on Sehel Island, carved about 2,400 years later under the Ptolemies, tells of a seven-year famine in Djoser's reign: a late legend, not a record.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 3, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Djoser; Wikipedia: Pyramid of Djoser; Wikipedia: Imhotep; Wikipedia: Famine Stela; World History Encyclopedia: Djoser

Imhotep, the architect who became a god (c. 2660 BC)

Imhotep was Djoser's chief official and, by tradition, the architect of the Step Pyramid. His name and titles, among them "chancellor of the king of Lower Egypt" and "high priest of Heliopolis", are carved on a statue base of Djoser found at Saqqara, so he was a real person of the highest rank. Over the following centuries scribes honoured him as a sage, and by the Late Period he was worshipped as a god of healing, whom the Greeks identified with Asclepius.

• His tomb has never been found; it is thought to lie somewhere at Saqqara.
• Manetho's description of Djoser as a healer who "built the house of hewn stone" probably borrows from the legend of Imhotep.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 3, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Imhotep; Wikipedia: Pyramid of Djoser

Sekhemkhet (c. 2648 to 2640 BC)

Horus Sekhemkhet, Dynasty 3

Djoser's successor began a step pyramid at Saqqara meant to be even larger than Djoser's, but it reached only a few metres before his early death. The buried pyramid was discovered in 1951 by the Egyptian archaeologist Zakaria Goneim.

How they came to power: He succeeded Djoser, perhaps as his son.

How it ended: He died after a short reign of about six or seven years.

• In 1954 Goneim opened a sealed alabaster sarcophagus inside the pyramid in front of the press; it was empty, and why is still unexplained.
• His name was found on jar sealings in the pyramid, which identified its owner.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 3, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Sekhemkhet; Wikipedia: Buried Pyramid

Sneferu (c. 2613 to 2589 BC)

Horus Nebmaat Sneferu, Dynasty 4

The founder of the Fourth Dynasty built at least three large pyramids and moved more stone than any other king, including his son Khufu. At Meidum he finished a step pyramid that was later converted to a true pyramid; at Dahshur the Bent Pyramid changes angle halfway up, apparently because its builders feared it would collapse; and the Red Pyramid beside it, about 105 metres high, is the first successful smooth-sided pyramid. Later Egyptians remembered him as a kind and generous king.

How they came to power: He succeeded Huni, the last king of the Third Dynasty, perhaps as his son by a minor queen.

How it ended: He was probably buried in the Red Pyramid, where human remains possibly his were found.

• The Westcar Papyrus, written down centuries later, tells how Sneferu, bored, was rowed on a lake by twenty young women dressed in nets, and a magician parted the water to find a lost pendant.
• The Palermo Stone records a campaign to Nubia under Sneferu that brought back 7,000 captives and 200,000 cattle, and the arrival of 40 ships loaded with cedar from Lebanon.
• The Bent Pyramid still keeps much of its original smooth limestone casing.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 4, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Sneferu; Wikipedia: Red Pyramid; Wikipedia: Bent Pyramid; Wikipedia: Westcar Papyrus

Khufu (c. 2589 to 2566 BC)

Horus Medjedu Khufu; Cheops to the Greeks, Dynasty 4

Khufu, son of Sneferu, built the Great Pyramid at Giza, originally about 146.6 metres high and made of some 2.3 million blocks. It was the tallest human-made structure in the world until the spire of Lincoln Cathedral in the 14th century AD. Greek writers made him a cruel tyrant, but that picture comes from stories told 2,000 years later; papyri from his own reign show a well-organised state paying and feeding its workers.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Sneferu; his mother was Queen Hetepheres I, whose hidden tomb with its gold furniture was found near the Great Pyramid in 1925.

How it ended: He reigned about 23 years. His body has never been found; the granite sarcophagus in the King's Chamber was empty when explorers reached it.

• The Diary of Merer, papyri found in 2013 at Wadi al-Jarf on the Red Sea, records an official ferrying limestone from the Tura quarries to Giza for the pyramid in Khufu's reign: the oldest inscribed papyri ever found.
• Herodotus (2.124) says Khufu shut the temples and made 100,000 men work in three-month shifts, 20 years on the pyramid; archaeology of the workers' town suggests a much smaller, fed and organised workforce.
• His ship, a 43-metre cedar boat buried in pieces beside the pyramid, was found in 1954 and rebuilt; it is now in the Grand Egyptian Museum.
• The only statue certainly of him is a 7.5 cm ivory figure found by Flinders Petrie at Abydos in 1903.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.124-126 (Cheops) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Herodotus, Histories Book 2 (free at Open Scriptorium); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 4, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Khufu; Wikipedia: Great Pyramid of Giza; Wikipedia: Diary of Merer; Wikipedia: Khufu ship

Djedefre (c. 2566 to 2558 BC)

Djedefre (also Radjedef), Dynasty 4

Djedefre, a son of Khufu, built his pyramid at Abu Rawash, north of Giza, on a high ridge; it was later quarried almost to nothing. He is the first king known to use the title "son of Ra" as part of his name, a sign of the sun god's growing importance.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Khufu, apparently ahead of his brother Khafre.

How it ended: He reigned about eight to eleven years; his pyramid was left unfinished or later stripped.

• Older books claimed he murdered his brother and that his statues were smashed in revenge; excavations at Abu Rawash found the statues were broken much later, by Roman and Christian stone robbers.
• A quartzite head of Djedefre from Abu Rawash in the Louvre is one of the finest royal portraits of the period.

Sources: Wikipedia: Djedefre; Wikipedia: Pyramid of Djedefre

Khafre (c. 2558 to 2532 BC)

Khafre; Chephren to the Greeks, Dynasty 4

Khafre, another son of Khufu, built the second pyramid at Giza. It is slightly smaller than his father's, but stands on higher ground and still has some of its original casing at the top, so it often looks taller. The Great Sphinx beside his causeway, carved from the living rock, is usually attributed to him, and his valley temple of red granite is one of the best preserved buildings of the Old Kingdom.

How they came to power: He succeeded his brother Djedefre.

How it ended: He reigned about 26 years. The sarcophagus in his pyramid was found empty by Giovanni Belzoni in 1818.

• A seated statue of Khafre with the falcon god Horus wrapping its wings around his head, carved from dark anorthosite gneiss, was found in his valley temple by Auguste Mariette in 1860.
• Herodotus (2.127) says Chephren reigned 56 years and that Egyptians so hated Cheops and Chephren that they would not say their names.
• Belzoni painted his own name and the date inside the burial chamber, where it can still be read.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.127-128 (Chephren) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Wikipedia: Khafre; Wikipedia: Pyramid of Khafre; Wikipedia: Great Sphinx of Giza

Menkaure (c. 2532 to 2503 BC)

Menkaure; Mycerinus to the Greeks, Dynasty 4

Menkaure, son of Khafre, built the third and smallest pyramid at Giza, cased at the bottom in red granite from Aswan. His valley temple yielded some of the greatest sculpture of the Old Kingdom, including the slate pair statue of the king and his queen in Boston and a set of triads showing him with goddesses, found by George Reisner in 1908.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Khafre.

How it ended: He died before his complex was finished; his son Shepseskaf completed it in mud brick.

• Herodotus (2.129-133) tells that Mycerinus reopened the temples his father and uncle had closed, and when an oracle gave him only six years to live he lit lamps and feasted every night, to double his time.
• His basalt sarcophagus, removed in 1838 by Howard Vyse, was lost at sea when the ship carrying it to England sank off Spain.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.129-134 (Mycerinus) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 4, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Menkaure; Wikipedia: Pyramid of Menkaure

Userkaf (c. 2494 to 2487 BC)

Userkaf, Dynasty 5

Userkaf began a new dynasty devoted to the sun god Ra. He built a small pyramid at Saqqara and the first sun temple at Abusir, an open court around a great obelisk-like pillar. His successors built sun temples and pyramids at Abusir, which became the new royal cemetery.

How they came to power: His origins are unclear; he may have been a grandson of Djedefre who married into the royal family.

How it ended: He reigned about seven years and was buried at Saqqara.

• The Westcar Papyrus later told that the first three kings of the dynasty were triplets born to Ruddjedet, wife of a priest of Ra, a legend that dresses the change of dynasty as the sun god's will.
• A colossal head of Userkaf in red granite was found at his pyramid temple; another, smaller head from his sun temple is in Cairo.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 5, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Userkaf; Wikipedia: Westcar Papyrus; Wikipedia: Sun temples

Sahure (c. 2487 to 2475 BC)

Sahure, Dynasty 5

Sahure built the first pyramid at Abusir, whose temple was decorated with some 10,000 square metres of fine reliefs, a model for later kings. The reliefs show sea-going ships, foreign captives and a royal hunt. The Palermo Stone records an expedition in his reign to Punt, the incense land on the Red Sea coast of Africa.

How they came to power: He succeeded Userkaf, probably his father.

How it ended: He reigned about twelve years and was buried in his pyramid at Abusir.

• The Palermo Stone lists the goods brought from Punt in his reign, among them 80,000 measures of myrrh and 6,000 of electrum.
• Reliefs from his causeway, found in 2002, show the pyramid's capstone being delivered and celebrated.

Sources: Wikipedia: Sahure; Wikipedia: Land of Punt; Wikipedia: Palermo Stone; World History Encyclopedia: Punt

Nyuserre Ini (c. 2445 to 2421 BC)

Nyuserre Ini, Dynasty 5

Nyuserre had one of the longest reigns of the Fifth Dynasty. He completed his family's monuments at Abusir and built the best preserved sun temple, at Abu Gurab, centred on a squat obelisk on a high base. Its reliefs of the seasons, with birds migrating, fish spawning and farmers at work, are among the earliest nature scenes in art.

How they came to power: He succeeded his brother Neferefre after the latter's short reign.

How it ended: He reigned perhaps 24 to 35 years and was buried at Abusir.

• He was still worshipped as a god in the Middle Kingdom, centuries after his death.

Sources: Wikipedia: Nyuserre Ini; Wikipedia: Abu Gorab sun temple

Unas (c. 2375 to 2345 BC)

Unas (Wenis), Dynasty 5

Unas, last king of the Fifth Dynasty, built a small pyramid at Saqqara, but inside it is one of the most important rooms in Egypt. Its walls carry the Pyramid Texts, the oldest religious writings in the world, a collection of spells to protect the king and lift him to the sky to join Ra and Osiris. His long causeway was carved with scenes including starving people, often read as a record of famine.

How they came to power: He succeeded Djedkare Isesi; how they were related is unknown.

How it ended: He reigned about 30 years. He seems to have had no male heir, and the throne passed to Teti, who founded the Sixth Dynasty.

• One section of his Pyramid Texts, the "Cannibal Hymn", has the king hunting and eating the gods to absorb their power.
• The pyramid was opened in 1881 by Gaston Maspero; fragments of a mummy were found in the burial chamber.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 5, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Unas; Wikipedia: Pyramid Texts; Wikipedia: Cannibal Hymn

Teti (c. 2345 to 2323 BC)

Teti, Dynasty 6

Teti came to the throne after Unas, perhaps by marrying a royal princess, and built his pyramid at Saqqara. His officials built some of the largest private tombs of the Old Kingdom around it, including the 33-room mastaba of his vizier Mereruka.

How they came to power: He may have married Iput, probably a daughter of Unas, to secure the throne.

How it ended: Manetho, as quoted by Africanus, says King Othoes "was murdered by his bodyguard". There is no contemporary proof, but a short-lived king, Userkare, came between him and his son Pepi I.

• Mereruka's tomb next to Teti's pyramid has more than 30 decorated rooms, the largest private tomb of the Old Kingdom.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 6, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Teti; Wikipedia: Mereruka

Pepi I (c. 2321 to 2287 BC)

Pepi I Meryre, Dynasty 6

Pepi I ruled for decades and built widely across Egypt. His pyramid at Saqqara was named Men-nefer-Pepi, "the perfection of Pepi endures", and the name Men-nefer passed to the nearby city, which the Greeks called Memphis. The autobiography of his official Weni records a secret trial of a queen for a conspiracy in the harem and five campaigns against "the sand-dwellers" in the Levant.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Teti, after the brief reign of Userkare.

How it ended: He reigned perhaps 40 to 50 years and was buried at Saqqara.

• Two copper statues of Pepi I and a smaller figure found at Hierakonpolis in 1898 are the oldest large metal statues known from Egypt.
• He married two sisters, both named Ankhesenpepi, who became the mothers of the next two kings.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 6, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Pepi I; Wikipedia: Weni; Wikipedia: Memphis

Pepi II (c. 2278 to 2184 BC)

Pepi II Neferkare, Dynasty 6

Pepi II came to the throne as a child. Manetho says he began to reign at six and lived to 100, which would make his 94-year reign the longest of any monarch, though some scholars think a reign of about 64 years is more likely. As his reign went on, power drained to provincial governors, and soon after his death the Old Kingdom collapsed.

How they came to power: He succeeded his half-brother Merenre while still a child; his mother Ankhesenpepi II ruled as regent.

How it ended: He died very old. Within a few years the Sixth Dynasty ended and Egypt entered the First Intermediate Period.

• The official Harkhuf carved on his tomb at Aswan a letter from the boy king, eager to see a dancing pygmy Harkhuf was bringing from the south: the king says he wants to see it more than the gifts of Sinai and Punt.
• Manetho, as quoted by Africanus, says Phiops "began to reign at the age of six and continued until his hundredth year".

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 6, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Pepi II; Wikipedia: Harkhuf

The legend of Queen Nitocris (end of the Sixth Dynasty (legend))

Herodotus heard from Egyptian priests that a queen named Nitocris took the throne after her brother, the king, was murdered. She built an underground hall, invited those she held guilty to a feast there, and let in the river through a hidden channel to drown them, then killed herself to escape revenge. Manetho also lists a Queen Nitocris at the end of the Sixth Dynasty. No monument of her has ever been found, and many scholars now think the name in the Turin King List is a misreading of a male king, Netjerkare Siptah.

• Herodotus (2.100) gives the story; Manetho calls her "the noblest and loveliest of the women of her time".
• The Turin King List, a papyrus of the 13th century BC, is the only Egyptian source that might name her, and its fragment is damaged at exactly that point.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.100 (Nitocris) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 6, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Nitocris; Wikipedia: Turin King List

The First Intermediate Period: famine and rival kings (c. 2160 to 2055 BC)

After Pepi II the monarchy weakened fast. Manetho lists a Seventh Dynasty of "seventy kings in seventy days", a sign of how confused the record is. Real power passed to provincial governors, and two rival royal houses emerged: one at Herakleopolis in the north and one at Thebes in the south. Low Nile floods, perhaps linked to a drier climate across the region about 2200 BC, made things worse.

• The governor Ankhtifi wrote in his tomb at Mo'alla that all of Upper Egypt was dying of hunger, to the point that people were eating their children, while he alone kept his province fed.
• Manetho, as quoted by Africanus, gives the Seventh Dynasty "seventy kings of Memphis, who reigned for seventy days".
• The Teaching for King Merikare, written as a Herakleopolitan king's advice to his son, admits to a sacking of the holy city of Thinis and calls it a sin.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 7, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: First Intermediate Period; Wikipedia: Ankhtifi; Wikipedia: 4.2-kiloyear event; Wikipedia: Teaching for Merikare

Mentuhotep II (c. 2055 to 2004 BC)

Nebhepetre Mentuhotep II, Dynasty 11

Mentuhotep II inherited the Theban kingdom in the south and, in about his 39th year, defeated the Herakleopolitan kings and reunited Egypt, beginning the Middle Kingdom. He built a terraced mortuary temple at Deir el-Bahri in western Thebes, a model for Hatshepsut's temple next to it 500 years later. Later king lists honour him beside Menes and Ahmose as one of the three founders of Egypt.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Intef III as king of Thebes, ruling only the south at first.

How it ended: He reigned about 51 years and was buried at Deir el-Bahri.

• A tomb near his temple held about 60 soldiers killed in battle, wrapped in linen, many with arrow wounds and head injuries: probably men who died in his wars of reunification.
• In 1898 Howard Carter's horse stumbled into a hole at Deir el-Bahri; when he dug there in 1900 it led to a hidden chamber with a seated statue of the king with black skin, a colour of rebirth and Osiris.

Sources: Wikipedia: Mentuhotep II; Wikipedia: Deir el-Bahari

Amenemhat I (c. 1985 to 1956 BC)

Sehetepibre Amenemhat I, Dynasty 12

Amenemhat I founded the Twelfth Dynasty. He is very probably the vizier Amenemhat who led a quarrying expedition for the last Eleventh Dynasty king. He built a new capital, Itjtawy, near the Faiyum, and began the custom of making his son co-ruler before his death to secure the succession.

How they came to power: He seems to have taken the throne from Mentuhotep IV, whose vizier he had been; how is unknown.

How it ended: He was assassinated in a palace plot around his 30th year. The Instruction of Amenemhat, written in his voice, describes the attack at night by his own guards, and the Story of Sinuhe opens with the news of his death.

• The Instruction of Amenemhat warns his son: "Trust not a brother, know not a friend".
• The quarry inscription of his vizier namesake in Wadi Hammamat records a pregnant gazelle giving birth on the block chosen for the king's sarcophagus, taken as an omen.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 12, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Amenemhat I; Wikipedia: Instruction of Amenemhat; Wikipedia: Story of Sinuhe

Senusret I (c. 1956 to 1911 BC)

Kheperkare Senusret I (Sesostris I), Dynasty 12

Senusret I was campaigning in Libya when his father was murdered; he hurried back and took control. He extended Egyptian rule south into Nubia, built at temples across the country, and his reign is the setting of the Story of Sinuhe, the most admired work of Egyptian literature.

How they came to power: He had been made co-ruler by his father about ten years before the assassination.

How it ended: He reigned about 45 years, made his son Amenemhat II co-regent, and was buried in his pyramid at Lisht.

• His red granite obelisk at Heliopolis, about 21 metres tall, still stands where it was raised: the oldest obelisk still standing in its original place.
• His White Chapel, a small limestone shrine, was taken apart and used as fill inside a later Karnak gateway; Egyptologists rebuilt it in the 20th century, almost complete.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 12, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Senusret I; Wikipedia: White Chapel; Wikipedia: Story of Sinuhe

The classics of Egyptian literature (c. 1950 to 1750 BC)

The Middle Kingdom produced the stories and teachings that scribes copied for a thousand years afterwards. The Story of Sinuhe tells of an official who flees Egypt after Amenemhat I's murder, grows rich among the tribes of the Levant, and in old age begs to come home to be buried in Egypt. The Eloquent Peasant pleads nine times for justice, and the Shipwrecked Sailor meets a giant talking serpent on an enchanted island.

• Sinuhe survives in many copies, including school exercises on limestone flakes, the way modern students copy famous texts.
• The language of these works, Middle Egyptian, became the classical form of the language that later scribes studied, much as Latin was studied in medieval Europe.

Sources: Wikipedia: Story of Sinuhe; Wikipedia: The Eloquent Peasant; Wikipedia: Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor; Wikipedia: Middle Egyptian

Senusret III (c. 1870 to 1831 BC)

Khakaure Senusret III (Sesostris III), Dynasty 12

Senusret III conquered Lower Nubia up to the Second Cataract and secured it with a chain of massive mud-brick fortresses. He reorganised the government and seems to have reduced the power of provincial governors. His statues break with idealised royal portraits, showing heavy eyelids and lined faces. He was worshipped in Nubia for centuries, and Greek tales of the conqueror Sesostris may partly preserve his memory.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Senusret II.

How it ended: He reigned about 39 years; he built a pyramid at Dahshur and a vast tomb at Abydos, and where he was actually buried is debated.

• His boundary stela at Semna tells future kings that a son who keeps the border is his true son, and one who abandons it "is not my son, he was not born to me".
• He had a canal cut through the rocks of the First Cataract so warships could sail into Nubia.
• Herodotus (2.102-110) tells of a king Sesostris who conquered Asia and Europe; the story mixes Senusret with later kings like Ramesses II.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.102-110 (Sesostris) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 12, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Senusret III; Wikipedia: Semna; World History Encyclopedia: Senusret III

Amenemhat III (c. 1831 to 1786 BC)

Nimaatre Amenemhat III, Dynasty 12

Amenemhat III presided over the peak of the Middle Kingdom. He developed the Faiyum oasis with irrigation works and built two pyramids: one at Dahshur, the "Black Pyramid", which began to crack and subside, and a second at Hawara where he was buried. The huge temple beside the Hawara pyramid amazed Greek visitors, who called it the Labyrinth.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Senusret III, after a period of co-rule.

How it ended: He reigned about 45 years and was buried at Hawara; his pyramid had a maze of blind passages and a quartzite burial chamber cut from a single block.

• Herodotus (2.148) says the Labyrinth had 3,000 rooms, half above ground and half below, and that it surpassed even the pyramids.
• Strabo, who saw it around 25 BC, also describes it (17.1.37).
• Mining expeditions to the turquoise mines of Serabit el-Khadim in Sinai reached a peak under him.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.148-149 (the Labyrinth and Lake Moeris) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Strabo, Geography 17.1.37 (LacusCurtius); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 12, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Amenemhat III; Wikipedia: Hawara; Wikipedia: Black Pyramid

Sobekneferu (c. 1777 to 1773 BC)

Sobekkare Sobekneferu, Dynasty 12

Sobekneferu, probably a daughter of Amenemhat III, took the throne at the end of the Twelfth Dynasty when no male heir survived. She used the full titulary of a king, and her surviving statues combine a woman's dress with the royal nemes headcloth and kilt. The Turin King List gives her a reign of almost four years.

How they came to power: She followed Amenemhat IV, probably her brother or half-brother, apparently because the male line had died out.

How it ended: The end of her reign closed the Twelfth Dynasty. Her tomb has not been certainly identified.

• The Turin King List gives her reign as 3 years, 10 months and 24 days.
• Manetho, as quoted by Africanus, calls her Skemiophris, sister of the previous king.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 12, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Sobekneferu; Wikipedia: Turin King List

The Hyksos rule northern Egypt (c. 1650 to 1550 BC)

As the Thirteenth Dynasty weakened, people of Levantine (Canaanite) origin who had settled in the eastern Delta took power and ruled from Avaris as the Fifteenth Dynasty. Egyptians called their rulers heqau khasut, "rulers of foreign lands", which the Greeks turned into Hyksos. Manetho, quoted by Josephus, described a sudden invasion, but excavations at Avaris (Tell el-Dab'a) show a long, gradual build-up of a Levantine population. The Hyksos period brought the horse and chariot, and new bronze weapons, into general use in Egypt.

• Josephus (Against Apion 1.75-82) quotes Manetho's account of invaders "of obscure race" who "seized it by main force without striking a blow".
• A stone lid with the name of the Hyksos king Khyan was found at Knossos on Crete, a sign of the dynasty's reach across the Mediterranean.
• Excavations at Tell el-Dab'a found Minoan-style wall paintings with bull-leapers at Avaris, from the years just after the Hyksos were driven out.

Sources: Josephus, Against Apion 1.73-105 (quoting Manetho on the Hyksos; free at Open Scriptorium); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 15, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Hyksos; Wikipedia: Avaris; World History Encyclopedia: Hyksos

Apepi (c. 1590 to 1550 BC)

Apepi (Apophis), Hyksos king, Dynasty 15

Apepi was the longest-reigning Hyksos king, ruling for about 40 years from Avaris. Late in his reign the Theban kings Seqenenre Tao and Kamose went to war against him, and a later Egyptian tale cast him as the villain of the conflict.

How they came to power: He succeeded Khyan, the best attested Hyksos king.

How it ended: He seems to have died around the time Kamose's campaigns reached the Delta; Avaris fell to Ahmose a few years later.

• The Rhind Mathematical Papyrus, now in the British Museum, says it was copied by the scribe Ahmes in year 33 of Apepi from an older text; it has problems on fractions, areas and pyramid slopes.
• In a later story, the Quarrel of Apophis and Seqenenre, Apepi complains that the hippopotamuses in Thebes, hundreds of kilometres away, are keeping him awake: an insulting pretext for war.

Sources: Josephus, Against Apion 1.73-105 (quoting Manetho on the Hyksos; free at Open Scriptorium); Wikipedia: Apepi; Wikipedia: Rhind Mathematical Papyrus; Wikipedia: The Quarrel of Apophis and Seqenenre

Seqenenre Tao (c. 1560 BC)

Seqenenre Tao ("the Brave"), Dynasty 17

Seqenenre Tao ruled the Theban kingdom in the south and began the war of liberation against the Hyksos. His mummy, found in the royal cache at Deir el-Bahri in 1881, has terrible head wounds: blows from an axe, a spear or dagger, and a club.

How they came to power: He succeeded Senakhtenre, probably his father, as king of Thebes.

How it ended: He was killed in his late 30s or early 40s, probably in battle or soon after it. A CT study published in 2021 suggested he had been captured, his hands perhaps bound, and executed with several weapons of Hyksos type.

• His mummy was hastily embalmed, which suggests he died away from the royal workshops, perhaps on the battlefield.
• His sons Kamose and Ahmose carried on the war and finished it.

Sources: Wikipedia: Seqenenre Tao; Wikipedia: Royal mummy cache (TT320)

Kamose (c. 1555 to 1550 BC)

Wadjkheperre Kamose, Dynasty 17

Kamose, last king of the Seventeenth Dynasty, carried the war to the gates of Avaris. Two large stelae he set up at Karnak describe the campaign in his own words, including his complaint that he sat between an Asiatic in the north and a Nubian in the south.

How they came to power: He succeeded Seqenenre Tao, probably his father.

How it ended: He died after a reign of only about three to five years, and his younger brother (or son) Ahmose completed the war.

• The Second Kamose Stela says his men captured a messenger carrying a letter from Apepi to the ruler of Kush, proposing an alliance against Thebes.

Sources: Wikipedia: Kamose; Wikipedia: Carnarvon Tablet (an ancient copy of the Kamose text)

Ahmose I (c. 1550 to 1525 BC)

Nebpehtyre Ahmose I, Dynasty 18

Ahmose came to the throne young, with his mother Ahhotep probably governing at first. In the second half of his reign he captured Avaris and pursued the Hyksos into southern Canaan, besieging Sharuhen. He then campaigned in Nubia and reunited Egypt under one king again, beginning the Eighteenth Dynasty and the New Kingdom.

How they came to power: He succeeded Kamose as king of Thebes.

How it ended: He reigned about 25 years and died in his mid 30s; his mummy was found in the Deir el-Bahri cache.

• A soldier from El Kab, Ahmose son of Ebana, carved his life story in his tomb: he fought at the siege of Avaris and says the Egyptians besieged Sharuhen for three years.
• His Tempest Stela at Karnak describes a great storm and flood, which some link to the Thera (Santorini) eruption; the link is debated.
• His mother Ahhotep was honoured with golden flies, an award for bravery, found in her burial.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Ahmose I; Wikipedia: Ahmose, son of Ebana; Wikipedia: Ahhotep I

Amenhotep I (c. 1525 to 1504 BC)

Djeserkare Amenhotep I, Dynasty 18

Amenhotep I, son of Ahmose I, consolidated the new kingdom his father had won, campaigning in Nubia and building at Karnak. He and his mother Ahmose-Nefertari were later deified, and the workmen's village of Deir el-Medina, which built the royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings, honoured them as patrons for centuries.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Ahmose I.

How it ended: He reigned about 21 years and seems to have died without a surviving son; Thutmose I followed him.

• His mummy, re-wrapped by priests about 400 years after his death and found in the Deir el-Bahri cache, still has its original garlands and face mask. In 2021 researchers published a CT "digital unwrapping" that showed he died at about 35.
• His oracle statue was carried in processions at Deir el-Medina, where villagers asked it to settle disputes.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Amenhotep I; Wikipedia: Deir el-Medina; Wikipedia: Ahmose-Nefertari

Thutmose I (c. 1504 to 1492 BC)

Aakheperkare Thutmose I, Dynasty 18

Thutmose I, not of royal birth as far as is known, came to the throne after Amenhotep I. He campaigned deep into Nubia, beyond the Fourth Cataract, and into Syria as far as the Euphrates, setting up boundary stelae at both ends of his empire. He was the father of Hatshepsut.

How they came to power: He succeeded Amenhotep I, who seems to have died without a surviving son; Thutmose may have been a general.

How it ended: He reigned about 12 years. He was probably the first king buried in the Valley of the Kings.

• His architect Ineni wrote that he dug the king's rock-cut tomb "alone, no one seeing, no one hearing", the start of the secret royal cemetery in the Valley of the Kings.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Thutmose I; Wikipedia: Ineni; Wikipedia: Valley of the Kings

Deir el-Medina, the village of the tomb builders (c. 1500 to 1070 BC)

The craftsmen who cut and painted the royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings lived with their families in a walled village at Deir el-Medina, across the river from Thebes. Because many of them could write, they left thousands of ostraca (notes on pottery and stone flakes): letters, shopping lists, court cases, love poems and work registers. It is the best documented community of the ancient world.

• A work register in the British Museum from the reign of Ramesses II records why men were absent: brewing beer, being bitten by a scorpion, embalming a brother, or a wife or daughter "bleeding".
• In the reign of Ramesses III the villagers staged the first recorded strike in history when their grain rations were late.

Sources: Wikipedia: Deir el-Medina; Wikipedia: Ostracon

Thutmose II (c. 1492 to 1479 BC)

Aakheperenre Thutmose II, Dynasty 18

Thutmose II, son of Thutmose I by a minor wife, married his half-sister Hatshepsut. His reign was short and is poorly documented, apart from campaigns to put down a revolt in Nubia. When he died his son Thutmose III was a small child, and Hatshepsut became regent.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Thutmose I, after older brothers had died.

How it ended: He died young after a reign of perhaps three to thirteen years; the length is debated.

• In February 2025 Egypt announced that an Egyptian-British team had identified his tomb in the Theban hills west of the Valley of the Kings, the first royal tomb of the dynasty found since Tutankhamun's in 1922; it had been flooded and emptied in antiquity.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Thutmose II

Thutmose III (c. 1479 to 1425 BC)

Menkheperre Thutmose III, Dynasty 18

Thutmose III came to the throne as a small child and shared it with Hatshepsut for some 20 years. After her death he led about 17 campaigns into the Levant, beginning with the Battle of Megiddo, and made Egypt the greatest power of the Near East, with vassals from Gaza to the Euphrates. He reigned 54 years in all.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Thutmose II as a young child; his stepmother Hatshepsut was regent, then co-king.

How it ended: He died in his 54th regnal year and was buried in the Valley of the Kings (KV34); his mummy was later moved to the Deir el-Bahri cache.

• At Megiddo he chose the narrow, dangerous Aruna pass over two safer roads, surprised the Canaanite coalition, and then besieged the city for about seven months. The account, carved at Karnak, is the first detailed record of a battle.
• His "botanical garden" relief at Karnak shows foreign plants and animals brought back from his Syrian campaigns.
• The American Egyptologist James Henry Breasted called him "the Napoleon of Egypt".

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Thutmose III; Wikipedia: Battle of Megiddo (15th century BC); World History Encyclopedia: Thutmose III

Hatshepsut (c. 1473 to 1458 BC)

Maatkare Hatshepsut, Dynasty 18

Hatshepsut, daughter of Thutmose I and widow of Thutmose II, first ruled as regent for her young stepson Thutmose III, then had herself crowned king. She is shown in the regalia of a male king, with kilt and false beard. Her reign was peaceful and prosperous: she built the terraced temple at Deir el-Bahri, raised obelisks at Karnak, and sent a famous trading expedition to Punt.

How they came to power: About seven years into her regency for Thutmose III she took the full titles of a king, ruling as senior co-king.

How it ended: She died around 1458 BC, in her 22nd regnal year (counted from Thutmose III's accession). Her mummy was identified in 2007 from a loose tooth that fitted a gap in its jaw.

• The Punt reliefs at Deir el-Bahri show ships loaded with incense trees, apes and ebony, and the queen of Punt, Ati, drawn as very large.
• One of her obelisks at Karnak, about 29.5 metres tall, still stands: the tallest surviving ancient obelisk in Egypt.
• About 20 years after her death, late in Thutmose III's reign, her images and names were chiselled off many monuments.
• Manetho, as quoted by Josephus, lists a queen Amessis or Amensis in this place in the dynasty.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Hatshepsut; Wikipedia: Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut; Wikipedia: Land of Punt; World History Encyclopedia: Hatshepsut

Amenhotep II (c. 1427 to 1400 BC)

Aakheperure Amenhotep II, Dynasty 18

Amenhotep II, son of Thutmose III, presented himself as a superhuman sportsman and warrior. He campaigned in Syria early in his reign, then made peace with Mitanni. His tomb in the Valley of the Kings (KV35) was used about 400 years later as a hiding place for other royal mummies.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Thutmose III after a short co-regency.

How it ended: He reigned about 26 years. When Victor Loret entered his tomb in 1898, his own mummy still lay in its sarcophagus.

• His Sphinx Stela at Giza says he shot arrows through copper targets a palm thick while driving his chariot, and rowed a ship farther than 200 sailors.

Sources: Wikipedia: Amenhotep II; Wikipedia: KV35

Thutmose IV (c. 1400 to 1390 BC)

Menkheperure Thutmose IV, Dynasty 18

Thutmose IV made peace with Mitanni, Egypt's old rival in Syria, and married a Mitannian princess, opening a period of diplomacy rather than war. He is best known for the Dream Stela he set up between the paws of the Great Sphinx at Giza.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Amenhotep II. His Dream Stela suggests he was not the expected heir and needed divine backing.

How it ended: He reigned about 10 years and died young; he was buried in the Valley of the Kings (KV43).

• The Dream Stela says that, resting in the shade of the Sphinx while hunting, prince Thutmose dreamt the god promised him kingship if he freed its body from the sand.

Sources: Wikipedia: Thutmose IV; Wikipedia: Dream Stele

Amenhotep III (c. 1390 to 1352 BC)

Nebmaatre Amenhotep III, Dynasty 18

Amenhotep III ruled at the height of Egypt's wealth and power, through diplomacy more than war. Letters on clay tablets from the kings of Babylon, Mitanni and others ask him for gold and princesses. He built on a colossal scale: Luxor Temple, a vast mortuary temple of which only the two Colossi of Memnon still stand, and a palace city at Malkata. His chief wife Tiye was unusually prominent.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Thutmose IV as a boy.

How it ended: He reigned about 38 years and, judging from his mummy, suffered badly from dental disease in old age.

• He announced events of his reign on large scarabs sent around Egypt, like press releases: one says he killed 102 lions in his first ten years.
• After an earthquake in 27 BC cracked one Colossus of Memnon, it made a sound at dawn; Greek and Roman tourists came to hear it and carved their names on its legs. Strabo heard a noise there but doubted it came from the stone (17.1.46).
• Many of the Amarna letters were written to him by foreign kings such as Tushratta of Mitanni.

Sources: Strabo, Geography 17.1.46 (LacusCurtius); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Amenhotep III; Wikipedia: Colossi of Memnon; Wikipedia: Commemorative scarabs of Amenhotep III; World History Encyclopedia: Amenhotep III

Akhenaten (c. 1352 to 1336 BC)

Neferkheperure Amenhotep IV, who renamed himself Akhenaten, Dynasty 18

Amenhotep IV raised the Aten, the disc of the sun, above all other gods and around his fifth year changed his name to Akhenaten, "effective for the Aten". He founded a new capital, Akhetaten (modern Amarna), closed or neglected the temples of Amun, and had the god's name hacked out across Egypt. Art changed too, showing the royal family in relaxed, intimate scenes and the king with an elongated face and body. After his death his city was abandoned and later kings erased him from the record, calling him "that criminal".

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Amenhotep III, perhaps after a short co-regency.

How it ended: He died in his 17th year. A mummy from tomb KV55 in the Valley of the Kings is, on DNA evidence, the father of Tutankhamun and is widely thought to be Akhenaten.

• The Great Hymn to the Aten, carved in the tomb of Ay at Amarna, praises the sun as the creator of all lands and peoples.
• In 1887 a local woman digging at Amarna found the Amarna letters, about 380 cuneiform tablets of diplomatic correspondence.
• His chief wife Nefertiti appears beside him in scenes of power, even smiting enemies, a role normally kept for kings.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Akhenaten; Wikipedia: Amarna letters; Wikipedia: Great Hymn to the Aten; Wikipedia: KV55; World History Encyclopedia: Akhenaten

Nefertiti, and the mystery king Neferneferuaten (c. 1352 to 1336 BC)

Neferneferuaten Nefertiti; possibly the later king Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten, Dynasty 18

Nefertiti was Akhenaten's chief wife and appears in Amarna art almost as his equal. She vanishes from view late in his reign, and around the same time a king named Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten appears, some of whose names are written with female endings. Many Egyptologists think this was Nefertiti ruling as co-king and then king, though others argue for Akhenaten's daughter Meritaten or another candidate. Her burial has never been found.

• Her painted limestone bust was found on 6 December 1912 in the workshop of the sculptor Thutmose at Amarna by Ludwig Borchardt's German team; it is in the Neues Museum in Berlin, and Egypt has asked for it back.
• A dated inscription found at Deir Abu Hinnis in 2012 shows she was still queen in Akhenaten's 16th year.

Sources: Wikipedia: Nefertiti; Wikipedia: Neferneferuaten; Wikipedia: Nefertiti Bust; World History Encyclopedia: Nefertiti

Tutankhamun (c. 1336 to 1327 BC)

Nebkheperure Tutankhamun (born Tutankhaten), Dynasty 18

Tutankhaten came to the throne aged about eight or nine and, guided by older officials such as Ay and General Horemheb, abandoned Amarna, restored the old gods and changed his name to Tutankhamun. He died at about 18 or 19. Later kings left him off the king lists, which helped his small tomb escape the great robberies. Its discovery by Howard Carter in 1922 made him the most famous pharaoh in the world.

How they came to power: He was the son of Akhenaten (on DNA evidence, the KV55 mummy) and a woman who was Akhenaten's full sister; he married his half-sister Ankhesenamun.

How it ended: He died in his late teens. DNA and CT studies published in 2010 found a bone disorder in his foot, a fracture of the left leg and the malaria parasite; the exact cause of death is still debated.

• Carter found the first step of the tomb (KV62) on 4 November 1922; asked by Lord Carnarvon if he could see anything, he later wrote that he replied, "Yes, wonderful things."
• His gold mask weighs about 10 kilograms.
• A widowed Egyptian queen, probably his widow Ankhesenamun, wrote to the Hittite king Suppiluliuma asking for a son to marry; the prince Zannanza was killed on the way.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Tutankhamun; Wikipedia: KV62; Wikipedia: Zannanza; World History Encyclopedia: Tutankhamun

Ay (c. 1327 to 1323 BC)

Kheperkheperure Ay, Dynasty 18

Ay was a senior official through the Amarna years, with the title "God's Father". His tomb at Amarna carries the fullest copy of the Great Hymn to the Aten. When Tutankhamun died without an heir, Ay, by then old, became king; a painting in Tutankhamun's tomb shows Ay, already wearing the crown, performing the funeral rite of Opening the Mouth for him.

How they came to power: He took the throne on Tutankhamun's death, perhaps ahead of General Horemheb, who had been named deputy.

How it ended: He reigned about four years and was buried in the western Valley of the Kings (WV23); Horemheb succeeded him and had his name hacked out.

• A ring with the names of Ay and Ankhesenamun has been taken as evidence that he married Tutankhamun's widow; it is debated.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Ay; Wikipedia: Great Hymn to the Aten

Horemheb (c. 1323 to 1295 BC)

Djeserkheperure Horemheb, Dynasty 18

Horemheb was commander of the army under Tutankhamun and became king after the brief reign of the elderly Ay. He issued a Great Edict against corrupt officials and soldiers, restored temples, and dismantled Akhenaten's monuments. Later king lists skip straight from Amenhotep III to Horemheb, as if the Amarna kings had never ruled.

How they came to power: He succeeded Ay, apparently without royal birth, on the strength of his military and administrative power.

How it ended: He reigned perhaps 14 to 27 years, leaving no son, and named his vizier Paramessu, an army officer, as heir: Ramesses I.

• The private tomb he built as a general at Saqqara was rediscovered in 1975; as king he was buried in the Valley of the Kings (KV57).
• His Great Edict, carved at Karnak, punishes officials who took bribes or stole from the poor with cutting off the nose and exile.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 18, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Horemheb; Wikipedia: Great Edict of Horemheb

Ramesses I (c. 1295 to 1294 BC)

Menpehtyre Ramesses I, Dynasty 19

Ramesses I, born Paramessu, was a military officer and vizier from the eastern Delta whom the childless Horemheb chose as heir. He was already old, and reigned for less than two years, but founded the dynasty of Seti I and Ramesses II.

How they came to power: He was appointed heir by Horemheb.

How it ended: He died after about 16 months and was buried in a small, hastily decorated tomb (KV16).

• A mummy bought in Egypt in the 19th century ended up in a museum at Niagara Falls; acquired by Emory University's Carlos Museum in 1999 and judged likely to be Ramesses I, it was returned to Egypt in 2003.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 19, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Ramesses I

Seti I (c. 1294 to 1279 BC)

Menmaatre Seti I, Dynasty 19

Seti I, son of Ramesses I, restored Egypt's power in the Levant after the Amarna years and built some of the most beautiful monuments of the New Kingdom: the temple at Abydos with its delicate reliefs, the great hypostyle hall at Karnak (begun by him), and his tomb KV17, decorated from end to end.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Ramesses I after a reign of under two years.

How it ended: He reigned about 11 to 15 years. His mummy, found in the Deir el-Bahri cache, is one of the best preserved royal mummies.

• The Abydos King List in his temple shows Seti and the young Ramesses honouring 76 earlier kings, but leaves out Hatshepsut and the Amarna kings.
• His tomb was discovered by Giovanni Belzoni in 1817; his alabaster sarcophagus is in Sir John Soane's Museum in London.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 19, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Seti I; Wikipedia: Abydos King List; Wikipedia: KV17

Ramesses II (c. 1279 to 1213 BC)

Usermaatre Setepenre Ramesses II ("the Great"); Ozymandias to the Greeks, Dynasty 19

Ramesses II reigned for 66 years and covered Egypt with monuments: Abu Simbel, the Ramesseum, a new capital Pi-Ramesses in the Delta, and his name carved over older kings' buildings. In his fifth year he fought the Hittite king Muwatalli II at Kadesh in Syria; the battle was a draw at best, but Ramesses publicised it on temple walls as a personal triumph. Sixteen years later Egypt and the Hittites signed a peace treaty.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Seti I, who had made him prince regent as a youth.

How it ended: He died in his early 90s, having outlived many of his heirs; his 13th son Merneptah succeeded him. His mummy was flown to Paris in 1976 for conservation.

• The treaty with Hattusili III (c. 1259 BC) survives in two versions: hieroglyphs at Karnak and a cuneiform clay tablet from the Hittite capital, now in Istanbul.
• Abu Simbel was cut into blocks and moved 65 metres higher between 1964 and 1968 to save it from the waters of Lake Nasser.
• Diodorus (1.47) quotes a statue inscription of "Osymandyas": "King of Kings am I; if anyone would know how great I am and where I lie, let him surpass one of my works." It inspired Shelley's sonnet Ozymandias (1818).
• He fathered roughly 100 children; their names are listed on temple walls.

Sources: Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 1.47-49 (LacusCurtius); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 19, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Ramesses II; Wikipedia: Battle of Kadesh; Wikipedia: Egyptian–Hittite peace treaty; Wikipedia: Abu Simbel; World History Encyclopedia: Ramesses II

The Battle of Kadesh (1274 BC)

In his fifth year Ramesses II marched on Kadesh, on the Orontes River in Syria, to win it back from the Hittite king Muwatalli II. Misled by two spies who said the Hittites were far away, he camped near the city with only part of his army, and the Hittite chariots smashed through one of his divisions. Ramesses rallied his troops until reinforcements arrived. Neither side took the other's territory, and Kadesh stayed Hittite.

• Ramesses had the battle carved on the walls of five temples, including Abu Simbel and the Ramesseum, in a long poem and an illustrated report. It is one of the earliest battles described in records from both sides.
• Hittite texts claim the victory too; sixteen years later the two powers signed a peace treaty.

Sources: Wikipedia: Battle of Kadesh; Wikipedia: Muwatalli II; World History Encyclopedia: Ramesses II

Merneptah (c. 1213 to 1203 BC)

Baenre Merneptah, Dynasty 19

Merneptah, the 13th son of Ramesses II, came to the throne already in his 60s. In his fifth year he defeated a Libyan invasion joined by groups of the "Sea Peoples". A stela recording his victories ends with a list of conquered places in Canaan, including the people "Israel".

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Ramesses II, whose older sons had died.

How it ended: He reigned about 10 years and was buried in KV8.

• The Merneptah Stela, found by Flinders Petrie at Thebes in 1896, says: "Israel is laid waste; his seed is not." It is the earliest known mention of Israel.

Sources: Wikipedia: Merneptah; Wikipedia: Merneptah Stele

Tausret (c. 1188 to 1186 BC)

Sitre-meritamun Tausret, Dynasty 19

Tausret was the chief wife of Seti II. After his death she acted as regent for the young king Siptah, and when he died she ruled alone as king for a short time, counting her years from his accession. Her reign ended in turmoil and the founding of a new dynasty by Setnakhte.

How they came to power: She took the full royal titles after the death of Siptah.

How it ended: The end of her reign is obscure; Setnakhte took her tomb in the Valley of the Kings (KV14) and enlarged it for himself.

• Manetho, as quoted by Africanus, mentions a king Thuoris in this place, who may be Tausret, and identifies him with Homer's Polybus, king of Egyptian Thebes.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 19, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Tausret

Ramesses III (c. 1184 to 1153 BC)

Usermaatre Meryamun Ramesses III, Dynasty 20

Ramesses III was the last great king of the New Kingdom. In his eighth year he defeated the Sea Peoples, migrating groups who had helped bring down the Hittites, on land and in a sea battle in the Nile mouths, recorded on the walls of his temple at Medinet Habu. Later in his reign the state struggled to pay its workers, and his reign ended in a palace conspiracy.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Setnakhte, founder of the Twentieth Dynasty.

How it ended: A minor wife, Tiye, plotted to put her son Pentawer on the throne. The Judicial Papyrus of Turin records the trial of the conspirators. A CT scan of his mummy published in 2012 showed a deep cut across his throat, so the plot almost certainly killed him.

• In his 29th year the tomb builders of Deir el-Medina, unpaid for weeks, stopped work and sat down behind the temples: the first recorded strike in history, described in the Turin Strike Papyrus.
• A mummy known as "Unknown Man E", buried without proper rites, shares DNA with Ramesses III and is thought to be Pentawer.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 20, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Ramesses III; Wikipedia: Harem conspiracy; Wikipedia: Sea Peoples; Wikipedia: Medinet Habu

The great tomb robberies (c. 1110 BC (reign of Ramesses IX))

As the economy weakened late in the Twentieth Dynasty, gangs plundered the tombs of western Thebes. Under Ramesses IX officials inspected the royal tombs and tried the robbers; the records survive on papyri. Within a few decades the priests of Amun gave up guarding the Valley of the Kings, stripped the royal mummies of their remaining valuables, and hid them in secret caches.

• In the Leopold II-Amherst Papyrus the stonemason Amenpanefer confesses that his gang broke into the pyramid of King Sobekemsaf, took the gold, and burned the coffins.
• The Abbott Papyrus records an inspection of ten royal tombs and a feud between the mayors of eastern and western Thebes over the robberies.

Sources: Wikipedia: Abbott Papyrus; Wikipedia: Leopold II-Amherst Papyrus; Wikipedia: Ramesses IX

The end of the New Kingdom (1069 BC)

By the reign of Ramesses XI, the last of the Ramessides, the high priests of Amun at Thebes, who were also army commanders, ran Upper Egypt almost independently. When Ramesses died, Smendes took the throne in the north and ruled from Tanis, while Theban high priests such as Pinedjem governed the south. The empire in Asia and Nubia was gone.

• The Report of Wenamun, a tale set at the end of the period, has an Egyptian envoy humiliated in Byblos while trying to buy cedar: a picture of how far Egypt's prestige had fallen.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 21, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Ramesses XI; Wikipedia: Report of Wenamun; Wikipedia: Third Intermediate Period

Smendes (c. 1069 to 1043 BC)

Hedjkheperre Setepenre Nesbanebdjed (Smendes), Dynasty 21

Smendes, probably a governor of Lower Egypt under Ramesses XI, became king when Ramesses died. He ruled the north from Tanis, while the high priests of Amun at Thebes, with whom his family married, ran the south. The arrangement kept Egypt formally united but in practice divided.

How they came to power: He took the throne on the death of Ramesses XI, perhaps by marrying a Ramesside princess.

How it ended: He reigned about 26 years.

• In the Report of Wenamun, the envoy Wenamun visits "Smendes and Tentamun" at Tanis before sailing to Byblos.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 21, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Smendes; Wikipedia: Report of Wenamun

Psusennes I (c. 1039 to 991 BC)

Akheperre Psusennes I, Dynasty 21

Psusennes I ruled the north from Tanis in the Delta, a city built largely from stone and statues carried from Pi-Ramesses. His tomb, inside the temple enclosure at Tanis, was found unplundered by the French archaeologist Pierre Montet in 1940, with a gold mask and a coffin of solid silver. Because the discovery came during the Second World War, it never became as famous as Tutankhamun's.

How they came to power: He succeeded Smendes (or Smendes' short-lived successor), founder of the Twenty-first Dynasty.

How it ended: He reigned about 46 years and was buried at Tanis.

• Silver was rarer than gold in Egypt, so his silver coffin was a greater display of wealth than a gold one would have been.
• The Tanis tombs were damp; his body survived only as a skeleton, unlike the dry Theban mummies.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 21, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Psusennes I; Wikipedia: Tanis

Priests hide the royal mummies (c. 1000 to 900 BC (found in 1881 and 1898))

During the Twenty-first Dynasty the priests of Amun moved the royal mummies out of their looted tombs, re-wrapped them, wrote dockets on the bandages recording who they were, and hid them in caches. The largest, tomb DB320 near Deir el-Bahri, was found by a local family in the 1870s, who sold objects from it for years before the authorities learned of it in 1881. A second cache was found in the tomb of Amenhotep II (KV35) in 1898.

• DB320 held the mummies of Seqenenre Tao, Ahmose I, Thutmose III, Seti I and Ramesses II, among dozens of others.
• When the mummies were carried by boat to Cairo in 1881, women along the Nile banks are said to have mourned the passing kings.
• In April 2021, 22 royal mummies were moved across Cairo to the new National Museum of Egyptian Civilization in a televised "Pharaohs' Golden Parade".

Sources: Wikipedia: Royal mummy cache (TT320); Wikipedia: KV35; Wikipedia: Pharaohs' Golden Parade

Shoshenq I (c. 945 to 924 BC)

Hedjkheperre Setepenre Shoshenq I; probably the biblical Shishak, Dynasty 22

Shoshenq I came from a family of Libyan (Meshwesh) chiefs settled at Bubastis and founded the Twenty-second Dynasty. He reunited Egypt and campaigned in Canaan; his triumphal relief at Karnak, the Bubastite Portal, lists over 150 places he claimed to have taken. Most scholars identify him with Shishak, who according to 1 Kings 14:25-26 attacked Jerusalem in the fifth year of Rehoboam and carried off the treasures of the temple.

How they came to power: He succeeded Psusennes II, the last king of the Twenty-first Dynasty, into whose family his son married.

How it ended: He reigned about 21 years.

• A fragment of a stela of Shoshenq I was found at Megiddo, in Israel.
• Jerusalem does not appear among the surviving names on the Bubastite Portal, part of which is damaged.

Sources: The Bible, 1 Kings 14:25-26 (NRSV, BibleGateway); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 22, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Shoshenq I; Wikipedia: Bubastite Portal

Piye (c. 747 to 716 BC)

Piye (Piankhy), king of Kush, Dynasty 25

Piye ruled the kingdom of Kush from Napata, below the Fourth Cataract in modern Sudan. Kush had absorbed Egyptian religion, and Piye saw himself as Amun's champion. Around 728 BC he marched north against a coalition of Delta princes led by Tefnakht of Sais, took Memphis, and received the submission of the local kings, beginning the Twenty-fifth Dynasty of Kushite pharaohs. Then he went home to Napata.

How they came to power: He inherited the throne of Kush from his father Kashta, who had already extended Kushite control into Upper Egypt.

How it ended: He died about 716 BC and was buried in a pyramid at el-Kurru, with his favourite horses buried nearby.

• His Victory Stela from Gebel Barkal tells how, after the surrender of Hermopolis, he inspected the stables of its king Nimlot and was furious that the horses had been left hungry.
• He refused to meet the defeated Delta princes in person because they were unclean, having eaten fish.

Sources: Wikipedia: Piye; Wikipedia: Kingdom of Kush

Shabaka (c. 716 to 702 BC)

Neferkare Shabaka, Dynasty 25

Shabaka, Piye's brother, ruled the whole of Egypt from Memphis, ending the independent Delta kingdom of Sais. He was a great builder and restorer of temples, and his reign looked back deliberately to the Old Kingdom for its style.

How they came to power: He succeeded his brother Piye.

How it ended: He reigned about 14 years and was buried at el-Kurru.

• The Shabaka Stone, in the British Museum, says the king had an old worm-eaten text copied onto stone; it preserves the "Memphite Theology", in which the god Ptah creates the world by thought and speech. The stone was later used as a millstone, which wore away its centre.
• Manetho, as quoted by Africanus, says Sabacon took Bocchoris of Sais captive and burned him alive.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 25, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Shabaka; Wikipedia: Shabaka Stone; British Museum: the Shabaka Stone (EA 498)

Taharqa (c. 690 to 664 BC)

Khunefertumre Taharqa; the biblical Tirhakah, Dynasty 25

Taharqa ruled Egypt and Kush at the height of the Twenty-fifth Dynasty and built across both, at Karnak and at Gebel Barkal. The Bible mentions "King Tirhakah of Cush" setting out against the Assyrian king Sennacherib (2 Kings 19:9). In 671 BC the Assyrian king Esarhaddon invaded, took Memphis and captured Taharqa's wife and son; Taharqa won it back, and lost it again to Ashurbanipal.

How they came to power: He succeeded his cousin (or brother) Shebitku.

How it ended: He retreated to Kush and died there in 664 BC; he was buried in the largest pyramid at Nuri.

• An inscription from his sixth year describes a huge Nile flood that brought good harvests, which he took as a sign of Amun's favour.

Sources: The Bible, 2 Kings 19:9 (NRSV, BibleGateway); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 25, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Taharqa; Wikipedia: Nuri

Psamtik I (664 to 610 BC)

Wahibre Psamtik I (Psammetichus), Dynasty 26

Psamtik began as a prince of Sais installed by the Assyrians, then threw off their control and reunited Egypt by about 656 BC, starting the Saite or Twenty-sixth Dynasty, a time of national revival. He relied on Greek and Carian mercenaries and settled them in camps in the Delta, beginning centuries of close contact between Egypt and the Greek world.

How they came to power: His father Necho I, a Delta ruler loyal to Assyria, was killed fighting the Kushite king Tantamani; the Assyrians installed Psamtik in his place.

How it ended: He reigned 54 years, one of the longest reigns of the Late Period.

• Herodotus (2.2) tells that Psammetichus had two babies raised by a shepherd who never spoke to them; the first word they said was "bekos", Phrygian for bread, so he concluded the Phrygians were the oldest people.
• An oracle, says Herodotus (2.152), foretold he would be helped by "bronze men from the sea": Ionian and Carian pirates in bronze armour who landed in Egypt.
• In his ninth year he had his daughter Nitocris adopted as the future "God's Wife of Amun" at Thebes, bringing the south under his control peacefully.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.2 (the language experiment) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Herodotus, Histories 2.151-157 (Psammetichus) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Herodotus, Histories Book 2 (free at Open Scriptorium); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 26, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Psamtik I

Tantamani (c. 664 to 656 BC)

Bakare Tantamani, Dynasty 25

Tantamani, nephew of Taharqa, was the last Kushite king to rule in Egypt. His Dream Stela says a vision of two serpents promised him both Upper and Lower Egypt. He marched north, retook Memphis (Necho I of Sais died fighting him), but the Assyrian army returned, drove him back to Nubia and sacked Thebes in 663 BC. Upper Egypt recognised him for a few more years, until Psamtik I took it over.

How they came to power: He succeeded his uncle Taharqa as king of Kush.

How it ended: He ruled on in Kush and was buried at el-Kurru, in a tomb with brightly painted walls.

• His Dream Stela was found at Gebel Barkal in Sudan.

Sources: Wikipedia: Tantamani; Wikipedia: Sack of Thebes

Assyria sacks Thebes (663 BC)

When Taharqa's successor Tantamani tried to retake Lower Egypt, the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal sent his army deep into Upper Egypt and sacked Thebes. Assyrian records boast of the treasure carried off, including two obelisks. The shock echoed abroad: the Hebrew prophet Nahum warned Nineveh that it would fall like "No-Amon", Thebes.

• Ashurbanipal's inscriptions say his army carried off two tall obelisks of shining metal from Thebes to Assyria.
• Nahum 3:8-10 asks Nineveh, "Are you better than Thebes that sat by the Nile?" and describes its children dashed to pieces.

Sources: The Bible, Nahum 3:8-10 (NRSV, BibleGateway); Wikipedia: Sack of Thebes; Wikipedia: Ashurbanipal; Wikipedia: Tantamani

Necho II (610 to 595 BC)

Wehemibre Necho II, Dynasty 26

Necho II tried to keep Babylon from taking over Assyria's empire. In 609 BC, marching north to help the last Assyrian king, he killed King Josiah of Judah at Megiddo. In 605 BC the Babylonian crown prince Nebuchadnezzar crushed his army at Carchemish, ending Egypt's hopes in Syria. At home he began a canal from the Nile to the Red Sea and built a navy of Greek-style warships.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Psamtik I.

How it ended: He reigned about 15 years.

• Herodotus (4.42) says Necho sent Phoenician ships to sail round Africa, which took three years; they reported that, sailing west round the south of Africa, they had the sun on their right, a detail Herodotus disbelieved but which is true south of the equator.
• Herodotus (2.158) says 120,000 Egyptians died digging the canal before an oracle made Necho stop; it was finished later under the Persian king Darius I.
• 2 Kings 23:29 says Pharaoh Neco killed Josiah at Megiddo.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 4.42 (the voyage round Africa) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Herodotus, Histories 2.158-159 (the canal) (Perseus, Godley trans.); The Bible, 2 Kings 23:29-35 (NRSV, BibleGateway); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 26, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Necho II

Psamtik II (595 to 589 BC)

Neferibre Psamtik II, Dynasty 26

Psamtik II led a major campaign into Nubia in 592 BC against the Kushite kingdom, reaching beyond the Third Cataract. He also had the names of the earlier Kushite kings of Egypt hammered out of monuments.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Necho II.

How it ended: He reigned about six years.

• Greek mercenaries on his Nubian campaign scratched their names, and the name of their commander, on the colossi at Abu Simbel: among the earliest Greek inscriptions that can be dated.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.161 (Psammis) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Wikipedia: Psamtik II; Wikipedia: Abu Simbel

Apries (589 to 570 BC)

Haaibre Wahibre (Apries); the biblical Hophra, Dynasty 26

Apries supported Judah against Babylon, and the prophet Jeremiah names him as Pharaoh Hophra. In about 570 BC he sent an Egyptian army against the Greek colony of Cyrene in Libya; it was badly beaten, the soldiers blamed the king, and a revolt broke out. The general Amasis, sent to calm the rebels, was proclaimed king instead.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Psamtik II.

How it ended: Herodotus (2.169) says that after losing a battle to Amasis he was handed over to the Egyptians and strangled. An inscription of Amasis suggests he died fighting a later attempt to regain the throne, and that Amasis buried him with honour.

• Jeremiah 44:30 prophesies that God will hand "Pharaoh Hophra king of Egypt" over to his enemies.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.161-169 (Apries) (Perseus, Godley trans.); The Bible, Jeremiah 44:30 (NRSV, BibleGateway); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 26, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Apries

Amasis II (570 to 526 BC)

Khnemibre Ahmose II (Amasis), Dynasty 26

Amasis was a general of humble birth who replaced Apries and ruled for 44 prosperous years. He gave the Greek traders of Egypt their own city, Naukratis, allied with Greek states and the tyrant Polycrates of Samos, and built widely. Herodotus, who visited Egypt a century later, tells many stories about him, mostly flattering.

How they came to power: Sent by Apries to put down the mutiny after the Cyrene disaster, he was crowned by the rebels instead.

How it ended: He died in 526 BC, months before the Persians invaded. Herodotus (3.16) says the Persian king Cambyses later had his mummy dragged out, whipped and burned.

• Herodotus (2.172) says that when Egyptians scorned his low birth, Amasis had a golden footbath melted down and made into a god's statue, which the people then worshipped; so too, he said, he had become worthy of honour.
• Herodotus (2.173-174) says he worked hard in the morning and drank and joked with friends in the afternoon, and had been a thief as a young man.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.172-182 (Amasis) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Herodotus, Histories 3.16 (Cambyses and the mummy of Amasis) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 26, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Amasis II; Wikipedia: Naucratis

Psamtik III (526 to 525 BC)

Ankhkaenre Psamtik III, Dynasty 26

Psamtik III came to the throne just as the Persian king Cambyses II marched on Egypt. In 525 BC the Persians defeated the Egyptian army at Pelusium, on the eastern edge of the Delta, then took Memphis. Egypt became a province of the Persian Empire, ruled by Persian kings as the Twenty-seventh Dynasty.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Amasis in 526 BC.

How it ended: Herodotus (3.15) says he was at first treated well, but was caught plotting a revolt and forced to drink bull's blood, and died.

• Herodotus (3.14) says Cambyses tested him by parading his daughter dressed as a slave and his son on the way to execution; Psamtik did not weep, but wept when he saw an old friend reduced to begging, because, he said, his own sorrows were too great for tears.
• Herodotus (3.12) says that years later the battlefield was still covered with bones, and that Egyptian skulls were harder than Persian ones because Egyptians shaved their heads in the sun.
• The story that the Persians carried cats into battle comes from Polyaenus, writing 700 years later.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 3.10-15 (Pelusium and Psammenitus) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Herodotus, Histories Book 3 (free at Open Scriptorium); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 26, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Psamtik III; Wikipedia: Battle of Pelusium (525 BC)

Cambyses II (525 to 522 BC)

Cambyses II, king of Persia, pharaoh of Egypt, Dynasty 27 (Persian)

Cambyses II, son of Cyrus the Great, conquered Egypt in 525 BC and took the titles of a pharaoh. Herodotus, drawing on Egyptian priests hostile to him, describes him mocking Egyptian religion, stabbing the Apis bull, and sending an army into the desert that vanished. Egyptian documents from his reign show him behaving more like a conventional pharaoh.

How they came to power: He conquered Egypt by defeating Psamtik III at Pelusium.

How it ended: He died in 522 BC in Syria on his way home to deal with a usurper; Herodotus (3.64) says from a self-inflicted wound to the thigh while mounting his horse.

• Herodotus (3.26) says an army of 50,000 sent to attack the oasis of Siwa was buried by a sandstorm, the "lost army of Cambyses", which has never been found.
• An epitaph from the Serapeum at Saqqara records an Apis bull buried with full honours in his sixth year, which contradicts the story that he killed the Apis.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 3.1-38 (Cambyses in Egypt) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Herodotus, Histories Book 3 (free at Open Scriptorium); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 27, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Cambyses II; Wikipedia: Lost Army of Cambyses

Darius I (522 to 486 BC)

Darius I the Great, king of Persia, pharaoh of Egypt, Dynasty 27 (Persian)

Darius I ruled Egypt as a pharaoh from far-off Persia and was generally remembered well there. He completed the canal linking the Nile to the Red Sea, built the temple of Hibis in the Kharga Oasis, and is said to have had Egypt's laws collected. A revolt broke out in Egypt at the end of his reign, after his defeat at Marathon.

How they came to power: He seized the Persian throne in 522 BC after the death of Cambyses.

How it ended: He died in 486 BC in Persia.

• Granite stelae Darius set up along the canal say, in Old Persian and Egyptian, that he ordered it dug so ships could sail from the Nile to Persia.
• The Egyptian official Udjahorresnet, a former naval commander of Amasis, served the Persian kings and recorded his career on a statue now in the Vatican.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.158 (the canal) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 27, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Darius I; Wikipedia: Chalouf stele; Wikipedia: Udjahorresnet

Herodotus visits Egypt (c. 450 BC)

Herodotus of Halicarnassus travelled in Egypt during the first Persian period, probably around 450 BC, reaching as far south as Elephantine. Book 2 of his Histories describes the Nile, the customs of the Egyptians, the making of mummies, and the history of the kings as priests told it to him. It is the earliest full description of Egypt by an outsider; his accounts of his own time are often accurate, while his stories of the pyramid builders mix fact with later legend.

• Herodotus (2.5) calls the Delta land "given to the Egyptians by the river", the origin of the phrase "Egypt, the gift of the Nile".
• He says (2.35) that the Egyptians do everything the opposite way from other people: women go to market while men stay home and weave.
• His description of mummification (2.86-88), with three grades at three prices, is the most detailed from antiquity.

Sources: Herodotus, Histories 2.5 (the gift of the river) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Herodotus, Histories 2.35 (Egyptian customs) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Herodotus, Histories 2.86-88 (mummification) (Perseus, Godley trans.); Herodotus, Histories Book 2 (free at Open Scriptorium); Wikipedia: Herodotus

Nectanebo I (380 to 362 BC)

Kheperkare Nakhtnebef (Nectanebo I), Dynasty 30

Egypt broke free of Persia in 404 BC, and after several short dynasties the general Nectanebo I founded the Thirtieth Dynasty. In 373 BC a large Persian and Greek mercenary army invaded the Delta; delays and the rising Nile flood forced it to withdraw. Secure again, Nectanebo began a great programme of temple building that the Ptolemies would continue.

How they came to power: An army officer, he overthrew the last king of the Twenty-ninth Dynasty.

How it ended: He reigned 18 years and was succeeded by his son Teos.

• Diodorus (15.42-43) describes the failed Persian invasion of 373 BC and the quarrel between the Persian commander Pharnabazus and the Athenian general Iphicrates.
• The oldest surviving building on the island of Philae is a kiosk built by Nectanebo I.

Sources: Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 15.42-43 (the Persian invasion of 373 BC) (LacusCurtius); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 30, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Nectanebo I; Wikipedia: Philae

Nectanebo II (360 to 343 BC)

Snedjemibre Nakhthorhebyt (Nectanebo II), Dynasty 30

Nectanebo II seized power from his uncle Teos and was a lavish temple builder. In 343 BC the Persian king Artaxerxes III invaded with a large army, and after Greek mercenaries on both sides decided the war, Nectanebo fled south to Upper Egypt and then Nubia. Egypt became Persian again for eleven years, until Alexander the Great arrived.

How they came to power: He was proclaimed king by the army while his uncle Teos was campaigning in Syria.

How it ended: He fled to Nubia in 343 BC and his fate is unknown. A later Greek legend, the Alexander Romance, claims he went to Macedon and was the true father of Alexander the Great.

• His empty granite sarcophagus, in the British Museum, was found in a mosque in Alexandria, where it had been used as a washing basin; it was once believed to be Alexander's.
• Diodorus (16.51) says he gave up hope and fled to Ethiopia with most of his treasure.

Sources: Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 16.46-51 (the Persian reconquest) (LacusCurtius); Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 30, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Wikipedia: Nectanebo II; Wikipedia: Alexander Romance; British Museum: sarcophagus of Nectanebo II (EA 10)

Artaxerxes III (343 to 338 BC)

Artaxerxes III Ochus, king of Persia, pharaoh of Egypt, Dynasty 31 (Persian)

After several failed attempts, Artaxerxes III invaded Egypt in 343 BC with a huge army and Greek mercenaries, defeated Nectanebo II and made Egypt a Persian province again, the Thirty-first Dynasty. Greek writers say he plundered the temples and treated Egyptians harshly.

How they came to power: He conquered Egypt by defeating Nectanebo II.

How it ended: Diodorus (17.5) says his minister, the eunuch Bagoas, poisoned him in 338 BC.

• Diodorus (16.51) says he carried off the temple records, which Bagoas later sold back to the priests for large sums.

Sources: Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 16.51 (the reconquest) (LacusCurtius); Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 17.5 (his murder) (LacusCurtius); Wikipedia: Artaxerxes III

Alexander the Great (332 to 323 BC)

Alexander III of Macedon, pharaoh of Egypt, Macedonian

Alexander entered Egypt in late 332 BC after taking Tyre and Gaza; the Persian governor surrendered without a fight. He sacrificed to the Apis bull at Memphis, founded the city of Alexandria on the coast early in 331 BC, and made a hard journey across the desert to the oracle of Amun at Siwa, which greeted him as the god's son. He left Egypt a few months later and never returned alive.

How they came to power: He took Egypt from the Persian Empire during his war against Darius III.

How it ended: He died at Babylon in 323 BC. His general Ptolemy hijacked his funeral procession on its way to Macedon and brought the body to Egypt, where it was later entombed in Alexandria. The tomb's location is lost.

• Plutarch (Alexander 26) says Alexander chose the site of Alexandria after Homer appeared to him in a dream and recited the lines about the island of Pharos, and that the city's outline was marked with barley meal when chalk ran out.
• Plutarch (Alexander 27) says the priest at Siwa greeted him as "son of Zeus" (Zeus-Ammon), though Plutarch also reports a story that it was a slip of the priest's Greek.
• Strabo (17.1.8) says Ptolemy took the body and buried it at Alexandria.

Sources: Plutarch, Life of Alexander 26-27 (free at Open Scriptorium); Strabo, Geography 17.1.8 (LacusCurtius); Wikipedia: Alexander the Great; Wikipedia: Siwa Oasis; Wikipedia: Tomb of Alexander the Great

Ptolemy I Soter (305 to 282 BC (governor from 323 BC))

Ptolemy I Soter ("Saviour"), Ptolemaic

Ptolemy, son of Lagus, was one of Alexander's Macedonian generals. When the empire was divided in 323 BC he took Egypt as governor, held it against rivals, and in 305 BC declared himself king. He made Alexandria his capital and, advised by the Athenian Demetrius of Phalerum, founded the Museum, a research institute, and the Library. He also promoted Serapis, a new god blending Greek and Egyptian features.

How they came to power: He took the governorship of Egypt in the division of Alexander's empire and fought off the regent Perdiccas, who invaded in 321 BC and was murdered by his own officers on the Nile.

How it ended: He died in 282 BC, aged about 84, after making his son Ptolemy II co-king.

• He wrote a history of Alexander's campaigns; it is lost, but Arrian used it as a main source.
• Manetho, an Egyptian priest, wrote his history of Egypt in Greek for the new dynasty, which is why Egyptian history is still divided into Manetho's 30 dynasties.

Sources: Strabo, Geography 17.1.8 (LacusCurtius); Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 18.28 (the funeral of Alexander) (LacusCurtius); Wikipedia: Ptolemy I Soter; Wikipedia: Library of Alexandria; Wikipedia: Serapis

The Library of Alexandria (c. 295 BC to 48 BC and after)

Founded under Ptolemy I or II as part of the Museum, a royal research institute, the Library aimed to own a copy of every Greek book, and many from other languages. Its scholars edited Homer, catalogued Greek literature and made discoveries in astronomy, geography and medicine. Fighting in Alexandria in 48 BC, when Julius Caesar was besieged there, burned many books; the institution then declined over centuries rather than vanishing in a single blaze.

• Its librarian Eratosthenes estimated the circumference of the Earth from the angle of the sun at Syene and at Alexandria, with remarkable accuracy.
• The poet Callimachus compiled the Pinakes, a catalogue of Greek authors in 120 books.
• Plutarch (Caesar 49) says the fire Caesar set to his enemies' ships spread and destroyed the great library; Seneca says 40,000 books burned.

Sources: Plutarch, Life of Caesar 48-49 (free at Open Scriptorium); Wikipedia: Library of Alexandria; Wikipedia: Eratosthenes; Wikipedia: Pinakes

Ptolemy II Philadelphus (284 to 246 BC)

Ptolemy II Philadelphus ("sibling-loving"), Ptolemaic

Ptolemy II made Alexandria the wealthiest and most brilliant city of the Greek world. The Pharos lighthouse, one of the Seven Wonders, was completed in his reign, the Library grew enormously, and poets and scientists such as Callimachus and Theocritus worked at his court. He married his full sister Arsinoe II, following Egyptian royal practice but shocking Greeks; both were worshipped as gods during their lives.

How they came to power: He was made co-king by his father in 284 BC and ruled alone from 282.

How it ended: He died in 246 BC.

• His Grand Procession in Alexandria, described by Athenaeus (book 5), included a golden phallus 180 feet long, elephants, and a float with a giant statue that stood up and sat down by itself.
• The Letter of Aristeas claims he had the Jewish law translated into Greek by 72 scholars, the origin of the name Septuagint; the story is legendary, but the translation began in Alexandria around this time.
• Manetho dedicated his history of Egypt to this king.

Sources: Strabo, Geography 17.1.6 (LacusCurtius); Wikipedia: Ptolemy II Philadelphus; Wikipedia: Lighthouse of Alexandria; Wikipedia: Arsinoe II; Wikipedia: Septuagint

Manetho writes the history of Egypt (c. 280 BC)

Manetho, a priest of Sebennytos in the Delta, wrote a history of Egypt in Greek, the Aegyptiaca, for the early Ptolemies, using temple records. He grouped the kings into dynasties, from the first king Menes to the Persian conquest. His work is lost, but long extracts were copied by the Jewish historian Josephus and by the Christian chronographers Africanus and Eusebius, and modern Egyptology still uses his dynasty numbers.

• The king lists survive in two versions, by Africanus and by Eusebius, which often disagree on reign lengths.
• Josephus quotes Manetho at length on the Hyksos, because he wanted to prove the antiquity of the Jews.

Sources: Manetho, History of Egypt, Dynasty 1 to 30, as quoted by Africanus and Eusebius (LacusCurtius, Waddell trans.); Josephus, Against Apion 1.73-105 (quoting Manetho on the Hyksos; free at Open Scriptorium); Wikipedia: Manetho

Ptolemy III Euergetes (246 to 222 BC)

Ptolemy III Euergetes ("Benefactor"), Ptolemaic

Ptolemy III, the most successful soldier of the dynasty, marched deep into the Seleucid empire in the Third Syrian War, which began over the murder of his sister Berenice in Antioch. Egypt reached its greatest extent in his reign. At home he built the great temple of Horus at Edfu and supported the Library.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Ptolemy II.

How it ended: He died in 222 BC.

• The Canopus Decree of 238 BC ordered an extra day every fourth year to keep the calendar in step with the seasons; it was not kept up.
• His queen, Berenice II, dedicated a lock of her hair for his safe return from war; when it vanished from the temple, the court astronomer said it had become a constellation, still called Coma Berenices.
• Galen later told how Ptolemy III borrowed the official Athenian copies of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides on a deposit of 15 talents, kept the originals and sent back copies.

Sources: Wikipedia: Ptolemy III Euergetes; Wikipedia: Canopus Decree; Wikipedia: Coma Berenices; Wikipedia: Temple of Edfu

The Battle of Raphia (217 BC)

At Raphia near Gaza, Ptolemy IV defeated the Seleucid king Antiochus III, who had invaded Syria and Palestine. Each side had over 60,000 infantry, and both used war elephants. For the first time the Ptolemies armed and trained some 20,000 native Egyptians as a Macedonian-style phalanx, and they helped win the battle; but newly confident Egyptian soldiers later joined revolts in the south.

• Polybius (5.84) says Ptolemy's smaller African elephants could not bear the smell and trumpeting of Antiochus's larger Indian elephants and fled.
• A great revolt broke out in Upper Egypt in 205 BC, and Thebes was ruled by native rival pharaohs for about 20 years.

Sources: Polybius, Histories 5.79-86 (the Battle of Raphia, LacusCurtius); Wikipedia: Battle of Raphia; Wikipedia: Ptolemy IV Philopator

Ptolemy V Epiphanes (204 to 180 BC)

Ptolemy V Epiphanes ("God Manifest"), Ptolemaic

Ptolemy V came to the throne aged about five, amid court murders, the loss of most of Syria to Antiochus III, and revolts in Egypt. In 196 BC an assembly of priests at Memphis issued a decree honouring him; copies were set up in temples, written in sacred hieroglyphs, everyday Demotic and Greek. One copy, reused in a fort wall at Rashid (Rosetta), became the key to reading Egyptian.

How they came to power: He succeeded his father Ptolemy IV as a child; the regents hid the king's death for a time.

How it ended: He died in 180 BC, aged about 30, possibly poisoned.

• French soldiers found the Rosetta Stone in July 1799; after the French surrender it was handed to Britain in 1801 and has been in the British Museum since 1802.
• Jean-François Champollion announced his decipherment of hieroglyphs in September 1822, using the Greek text and the royal names in cartouches.

Sources: Wikipedia: Ptolemy V Epiphanes; Wikipedia: Rosetta Stone; British Museum: the Rosetta Stone (EA 24); World History Encyclopedia: Rosetta Stone

Ptolemy XII Auletes (80 to 58 and 55 to 51 BC)

Ptolemy XII Neos Dionysos, nicknamed Auletes ("the Flute-player"), Ptolemaic

Ptolemy XII ruled a kingdom that survived only by Rome's favour. He spent huge sums bribing Roman politicians to recognise him as king, raising taxes in Egypt to pay for it. The Alexandrians threw him out in 58 BC; he went to Rome, borrowed more money, and was put back on the throne by a Roman army under Gabinius in 55 BC.

How they came to power: He was an illegitimate son of Ptolemy IX, brought to the throne by the Alexandrians in 80 BC when the legitimate line died out.

How it ended: He died in 51 BC, leaving his kingdom to his daughter Cleopatra VII and his son Ptolemy XIII as joint rulers, under the protection of the Roman people.

• Suetonius (Julius 54) says Caesar and Pompey received about 6,000 talents to have him recognised as king and ally of Rome.
• His nickname came from his love of playing the aulos, a reed pipe.

Sources: Suetonius, Life of Julius Caesar 54 (LacusCurtius); Wikipedia: Ptolemy XII Auletes

Cleopatra VII (51 to 30 BC)

Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator, Ptolemaic

Cleopatra VII came to the throne at about 18 with her younger brother Ptolemy XIII. Driven out by his advisers, she won Julius Caesar's support in Alexandria in 48 BC, had a son by him, Caesarion, and ruled with Roman backing. After Caesar's murder she allied with Mark Antony, with whom she had three children, and recovered much of the old Ptolemaic empire. Octavian declared war on her; after defeat at Actium in 31 BC, Antony and Cleopatra killed themselves at Alexandria.

How they came to power: She inherited the throne jointly with her brother in 51 BC and won sole power with Caesar's help in the Alexandrian War.

How it ended: She died at Alexandria in August 30 BC, aged 39. Plutarch (Antony 86) reports the story of an asp smuggled in a basket of figs, but adds that "the truth of the matter no one knows".

• Plutarch (Antony 27) says she spoke many languages and was the first of her line to learn Egyptian; her charm lay less in beauty than in her conversation and presence.
• Plutarch (Caesar 49) says she reached Caesar hidden in a bedding sack carried by her friend Apollodorus, not the rolled carpet of later legend.
• Plutarch (Antony 26) describes her sailing up the river Cydnus to meet Antony on a barge with a gilded stern, purple sails and silver oars, dressed as Aphrodite.

Sources: Plutarch, Life of Antony (LacusCurtius); Plutarch, Life of Antony (free at Open Scriptorium); Plutarch, Life of Caesar 48-49 (free at Open Scriptorium); Wikipedia: Cleopatra; World History Encyclopedia: Cleopatra VII

The Battle of Actium (2 September 31 BC)

Off Actium in western Greece, the fleet of Octavian, commanded by Marcus Agrippa, faced the fleet of Antony and Cleopatra, which had been blockaded for months and weakened by disease and desertion. During the battle Cleopatra's squadron of about 60 ships broke through and sailed away, and Antony left with a few ships to follow her. The rest of the fleet and the army surrendered. Within a year Octavian was in Alexandria.

• Plutarch (Antony 66) says that when Antony saw her ships flee he abandoned the men still fighting and dying for him and went after her.
• Octavian founded a "Victory City", Nicopolis, near the battlefield.

Sources: Plutarch, Life of Antony (LacusCurtius); Plutarch, Life of Antony (free at Open Scriptorium); Wikipedia: Battle of Actium

Rome takes Egypt (30 BC)

After Actium, Octavian (soon to be called Augustus) took Alexandria on 1 August 30 BC. Antony and then Cleopatra killed themselves. Caesarion, Cleopatra's son by Julius Caesar and briefly king as Ptolemy XV, was caught and killed. Egypt became a Roman province, but a special one: governed by a prefect answering to the emperor, closed to senators without permission, and shipping grain that fed Rome. Three thousand years of independent pharaohs were over, though Roman emperors were still shown on Egyptian temple walls in pharaoh's dress.

• Plutarch (Antony 81) says Octavian was persuaded to kill Caesarion by the philosopher Areius, who said "it is not a good thing to have too many Caesars".
• The temples of Dendera, Philae and Esna carry reliefs of Roman emperors as pharaohs, making offerings to the Egyptian gods.

Sources: Plutarch, Life of Antony (LacusCurtius); Plutarch, Life of Antony (free at Open Scriptorium); Wikipedia: Final war of the Roman Republic; Wikipedia: Caesarion; Wikipedia: Egypt (Roman province)