are also given by Syncellus, and a more perfect copy, in Armenian, found at Constantinople, and published in 1818. Some suppose that Eusebius copied from Africanus, but the differences between them make this improbable. It is more likely that both of them copied from epitomes of Manetho's work, and that these differences existed in those epitomes themselves. The charge of arbitrarily altering the numbers, etc., of his authorities, so often made against Eusebius, is not well sustained, at least to the extent alleged by Bunsen and some others.

The following is a summary of the dynasties, with the number of reigns in each, and their duration, as given by Manetho in the two versions above described.* Those marked * in the list of Eusebius are transcribed from Africanus:

Without noticing now the discrepancies between these lists, and assuming, as is generally done, that that given by Africanus is to be preferred, we have only to ascertain the date of their termination at the close of the XXXIst dynasty, and add to this the whole number of years covered by them to arrive at the age of Menes. The XXXIst dynasty ended. with the death of Nectanebus, fifteen years before the accession of Alexander of Macedon, B. C. 339.' The whole duration of the monarchy being 5404 years, we arrive at the conclusion that Menes began to reign 5743 years before the Christian era, which was at least sixty-two years before the creation, according to the Septuagint chronology. This date

* Smith's Dict. Gr. and Rom. Geog., art. Ægyptus.

is otherwise fixed, owing to different readings of the lists, by Rodier at B. C. 5853, by Boëckh at B. C. 5702, by Lenormant at B. C. 5004, by Brugsch at B. C. 4555, etc.

It now devolves upon us to inquire into the trustworthiness of this conclusion, and of the data from which it is derived.

1. We know nothing as to the truthfulness of the original sources from which Manetho professed to derive his account. His authority was the priests, and the sacred books under their care. But we know from Herodotus what incredible stories the priests were wont to relate to inquisitive travelers, tales of mingled fact and fable too gross even for those who were in quest of the marvelous and strange to believe. We know not whence the priests derived their information in the first place, how truthful they were in recording and transmitting it, or with what fidelity and accuracy Manetho himself transcribed it. The very first elements are wanting of a basis for an intelligent belief of the document.

2. Even if the account were originally true, it has evidently become so corrupt that it is now utterly impossible to determine what its genuine contents were. The copies we have, all come to us at second or third hand, and present the greatest

discrepancies with each other. Bunsen exhibits a tabular view of these in the three leading versions: first, of Africanus; second, of Eusebius, as quoted by Syncellus; and third, of Eusebius, as translated from the Armenian. These three contain about one hundred numbers, in less than twenty of which is there entire harmony in all the versions. Two of the three harmonize in some eight or ten more. The number of reigns varies from 366 — some say from 288 to 554; their aggregate duration from 4922 to 5404 years. Granting, then, that what Manetho actually wrote is to be received, the question still remains undecided, What did he write? In the present multiplicity of versions and of readings, nobody can tell. Sober criticism can not employ them to fix a single date.

3. The lists themselves bear internal evidence of their untrustworthiness. They relate the reigns of the gods, and demigods, and ghosts as positively, and with the same exact report of the years embraced in them, as in the case of the human monarchs who succeeded them. Many whole dynasties, covering, together, nearly 2000 years, show not the name of a single king. It gravely records that the Nile flowed with honey for eleven days, that one dynasty of seventy kings reigned just seventy days, and that, under one reign, a lamb

spoke -stories evidently no better than old wives' fables. It is, besides, self-contradictory. The sum of the years assigned to the several kings of a dynasty often differs from the alleged duration of the dynasty itself, and the aggregate duration of all the dynasties it expressly declares was only 3555 years, which is 1849 less than the footing: of the details.* A document exhibiting within itself such evidences of untruthfulness, is utterly unworthy of confidence. Only the most unbounded credulity can give to it any weight of authority.

4. The statements of Manetho are abundantly contradicted and refuted by other authority of far greater reliability than they.

- ἐξ

(a.) The first is that of the Old Chronicle, so called. Syncellus, who transmitted to us the lists of Manetho, as above related (p. 68), states as follows (pp. 51, 52): "There is extant among the Egyptians a certain Old Chronicle, the source, as I suppose, which led Manetho astray, ou xai tòv Μανεθῶ πεπλανῆσθαι νομίζω, — exhibiting thirty dynasties, and again one hundred and thirteen generations, with an infinite space of time, not the same, either, as that of Manetho, - viz., three myriads six thousand five hundred and twenty-five years, first of the Æritæ, secondly of the Mestræans, and thirdly of

* See page 70.