Chronological Considerations

The Egyptological concept of Intermediate Periods, which was developed in the conceptual context of Imperial Germany, is a terminological misnomer which blurs the different periods of Egyptian history and often paints a false picture (Schneider 1998; 2003b). Instead of a ‘‘Second Intermediate Period’’ it would be better to speak of the Hyksos period and the Era of the Second Theban Petty State, which led into the New Kingdom with the victory of the national Egyptian Thebans.

The New Kingdom (c.1539-1071/70 bc) falls in the Late Bronze Age. Egyptian chronology (Hornung, Krauss, Warburton 2006) provides the framework of dates for the chronology of the entire Ancient Near East. Unfortunately, the Egyptian method of counting years can seldom be translated into absolute modern dates. Known conformities with the dating systems of other peoples (synchronisms) only help very slightly, as the calculation from them into modern dates depends on Egyptian dates.

The identification of Egyptian dates in relation to known natural events is only possible in a few instances for the period of the New Kingdom. Eclipses or sightings of comets are not recorded. The eruption of the volcano of Thera/Santorini in the Aegean, which is sometimes connected to the Storm Stela of Ahmose, cannot be accurately dated. According to the most recent research the tephra layers in Greenland’s ice, which indicate a volcanic eruption around 1645 B. C. (+ 4 years) and were originally attributed to the Thera eruption, are actually from the eruption of Mount Anjakshak in Alaska (Pearce et al. 2007). Pumice from the Thera Eruption is detectable in Avaris, but in Thutmosid layers over a century later. The Sothis date on the back of the Ebers Papyrus, which notes the early rise of Sirius, provides a dating of the reign of Ahmose, but, even here, due to a number of unknown factors no exact conversion of the dates is possible. Only the dates of new moons which are known from Egypt can be safely exploited for chronological purposes.  to them, it is possible to date the accession to the throne of Thutmose III to the year 1479.

Due to the king lists of the New Kingdom (Redford 1986b) it is possible to establish a sequence of the sovereigns of this period, Manetho’s information concerning this era being fragmentary. The Ramesside king lists of Saqqara and Abydos served a cult function in which the reigning sovereigns placed themselves within a long series of legitimate ancestors. Given this function, they neither pass on the exact duration of reigns nor do they include rulers who were considered as illegitimate in the period of the Ramessides. The deliberate ignoring of the Amarna period later on has also resulted in another chronological uncertainty, namely the length of the reign of Horemheb, which was counted as including the entire Amarna period. Until the exact length of the Amarna period is determined, the real length of the reign of Horemheb cannot be calculated. The discussion of this point, which was recently rekindled by van Dijk, forms the basis of the ‘‘long’’ or ‘‘short’’ chronologies of the New Kingdom (Astrom 1989; van Dijk 2008).

The Turin Canon of Kings (Ryholt 2004) from the early Ramesside Period served other purposes than the monumental Ramesside lists and for this reason is a useful complement to them. Possibly made for archival purposes, the papyrus lists regnal years beside the names of kings and also names the rulers of the Hyksos period, so that the Egyptians could use it in legal disputes (one might call to mind the Stele of Mes, Gardiner 1964). On the other hand, the grouping of ruling houses and the inclusion of the sums of ruling periods may, in fact, have been motivated by historiographic consideration. Only the high degree of damage to the papyrus, which causes large uncertainties about the order of individual rulers and the lengths of‘‘dynasties,’’ reduces the usefulness of the papyrus as a basis for establishing a chronology. However, in spite of these hotly disputed issues, the overall chronology rests on a relatively stable base, with uncertainties of only a few decades.