A sensible approach to the Pyramid Era

by Damien F. Mackey In Dr. John Osgood’s scenario, the Fifth, Sixth and Twelfth dynasties, though approximately contemporaneous, remain nevertheless as separate dynasties. For him, this is the time of Joseph and the Famine. Dr John Osgood has made this insightful observation in his new book, They Speak With One Voice. A Correlation of the Bible Record with Archaeology, 2020 (p. 263): Let us look at the testimony of the pyramids – a purely sequential arrangement of the dynasties makes no sense with the pyramids. For it demands that after the demise of the 6th Dynasty, over 200 years passed and the almost identical technology was resurrected in the building of the 12th Dynasty pyramids. This is analogous to our society suddenly returning to the 18th century, and although they placed more on tradition than do we, it still makes no sense. Conventionally, the Sixth Dynasty closes at c. 2150 BC, whilst the Twelfth Dynasty commences at c. 1940 BC, slightly more than two centuries apart. Dr. Osgood is working here at trying to tie up, as the biblical Famine at the time of Joseph, a supposed famine during the reign of Sesostris, in the Twelfth Dynasty, and a supposed famine in the reign of Unas, of the Fifth Dynasty. This is a futile task, I believe, because Joseph is better situated to the Third Dynasty, to the reign of Horus Netjerikhet, when there apparently was a famine lasting for seven years. But what Dr. Osgood has managed to do is to argue for a dynastic re-arrangement that is virtually the very one that I have been working on in recent times, according to which the Fifth, Sixth and Twelfth Egyptian dynasties were contemporaneous. Dr. Donovan Courville had already made the suggestion in his classic set, The Exodus Problem and its Ramifications (CA, 1971), that the Sixth and Twelfth dynasties were contemporaneous. I have gone so far as, not only to make contemporaneous the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Twelfth dynasties, but to identify them all as the one dynasty, and at the time of Moses. For more on my early dynastic reconstructions at the time of Moses, see e.g. my article: First two Egyptian kings during career of Moses (3) First two Egyptian kings during career of Moses | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu In Dr. John Osgood’s scenario, the Fifth, Sixth and Twelfth dynasties, though approximately contemporaneous, remain nevertheless as separate dynasties. For him, this is the time of Joseph and the Famine. From Dr John Osgood’s account of The 6th Dynasty, beginning on p. 260 of his book, we learn that, for this dynasty: The Turin Canon then suggests a possible 13 kings (and Queen) Manetho and the Abydos List give 6. Sakkara gives only 4. That is not entirely encouraging. Sakkara’s 4 comes closest to my estimation of only 3 rulers, two kings and a Queen – the latter having come to rule on the throne as the very last of this great dynasty. Dr. Osgood continues (op. cit., pp. 260-261): Newberry has suggested that T [Turin] 4:10 is a king named Nefersahor (1943, p. 52). Karkare Ibi’s pyramid has been discovered among the Pepi II group at Sakkara. Newberry also made the case (not accepted by all) that Neith, whose pyramid is among the group of Pepi II’s wives at Sakkara is in fact the Nitocris of Manetho, and was: Eldest daughter of Pepi I. The sister and wife of Merenre. The sister and wife later of Pepi II, during his minority. Avenged the murder of her brother Merenre and died (allegedly suicide) after a 12 year reign with Pepi II during his early years. How complicated! As I showed in my article above, on Moses, and, regarding the Queen who came to the throne: Female Ruler of Egypt late during sojourn of Moses in the land of Midian (5) Female Ruler of Egypt late during sojourn of Moses in the land of Midian | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu the Sixth Dynasty was composed of only 3 main royal persons: Teti [= Merenre I-II]; Pepi [I-II]; and Nitocris All three of these monarchs can be found, under various alter egos, amongst several Old Kingdom dynasties, and the Middle Kingdom’s Twelfth Dynasty. Thus, for instance, the assassinated Merenre was the same ruler as the assassinated Teti, Sixth Dynasty, who, in turn, connects with the assassinated Amenemes (so-called I) of the Twelfth Dynasty. Teti, Amenemes, as well, shared the throne name, Sehetibre, and the Horus name, Sehetep-tawy. Newberry may well be right that Nefersahor belongs amongst the group, given the second ruler of the dynasty’s many Nefer names (“First Two Kings” article above): “Neferikare has a heap of Kha- element and Neferkare type names (Nephercheres, Neferkeris, Kaikai, Kaka, Nefer-it-ka-re, Neferirkara)”. But I may be able to be even more specific than that. Pepi’s prenomen was Nefersahor, according to: https://ancientegyptonline.co.uk/pepii/ Prenomen nfr sA Hr (Nefersahor) – Horus Is Perfect In Protection (Abydos kings list) Nor is it so very surprising, in my revised context, that various Sixth Dynasty pyramids would be found amongst Twelfth Dynasty ones. Dr. Osgood continues (op. cit., p. 261): In the Abydos list the next 2 kings may well be repetitions of some of the 6th Dynasty kings (and Queen). No. 40 Netjerkare – may well reflect Pepi II’s Horus name Neterkhau. No. 41 Menkare – the alternate name for Nitocris. In my “First Two Kings” article, Menkare, Menkaure, however, is yet another alter ego for Teti (= Cheops and Amenemes so-called III). Thus I wrote: …. [Cheops’] pyramid transforms him into the very symbol of absolute rule, and Herodotus’ version of events chose to emphasise his cruelty. Taken from: https://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/hh/hh2120.htm 124. ... Cheops became king over them and brought them to every kind of evil: for he shut up all the temples, and having first kept them from sacrificing there, he then bade all the Egyptians work for him. So some were appointed to draw stones from the stone-quarries in the Arabian mountains to the Nile, and others he ordered to receive the stones after they had been carried over the river in boats, and to draw them to those which are called the Libyan mountains; and they worked by a hundred thousand men at a time, for each three months continually. Of this oppression there passed ten years while the causeway was made by which they drew the stones, which causeway they built, and it is a work not much less, as it appears to me, than the pyramid; for the length of it is five furlongs and the breadth ten fathoms and the height, where it is highest, eight fathoms, and it is made of stone smoothed and with figures carved upon it. For this, they said, the ten years were spent, and for the underground chambers on the hill upon which the pyramids stand, which he caused to be made as sepulchral chambers for himself in an island, having conducted thither a channel from the Nile. For the making of the pyramid itself there passed a period of twenty years; and the pyramid is square, each side measuring eight hundred feet, and the height of it is the same. It is built of stone smoothed and fitted together in the most perfect manner, not one of the stones being less than thirty feet in length. Moreover: 126. Cheops moreover came, they said, to such a pitch of wickedness, that being in want of money he caused his own daughter to sit in the stews, and ordered her to obtain from those who came a certain amount of money (how much it was they did not tell me); but she not only obtained the sum appointed by her father, but also she formed a design for herself privately to leave behind her a memorial, and she requested each man who came in to her to give her one stone upon her building: and of these stones, they told me, the pyramid was built which stands in front of the great pyramid in the middle of the three, each side being one hundred and fifty feet in length. Menkaure, or Mycerinus, who will also figure in this series … may have been similarly disrespectful to his daughter: https://analog-antiquarian.net/2019/01/11/chapter-1-the-charlatan-and-the-gossip/ Legend had it that Menkaure had a daughter who was very special to him. One version of the tale said that she died of natural causes, whereupon in his grief he had a life-size wooden cow gilt with gold built as a repository for her remains. This, Herodotus claimed, could still be seen in his time in the city of Sais, “placed within the royal palace in a chamber which was greatly adorned; and they offer incense of all kinds before it every day, and each night a lamp burns beside it all through the night. Every year it is carried forth from the chamber, for they say that she asked of her father Mykerinos, when she was dying, that she might look upon the sun once in the year.” Another, darker version of the tale had it that Menkaure had been rather too enamored of his daughter. She sought refuge from his unwelcome advances with his concubines, but they betrayed her, and her father proceeded to “ravish” her. She hanged herself in the aftermath, whereupon a remorse-stricken Menkaure buried her in the gilt cow and her mother the queen cut off the hands of the concubines who had betrayed her. This explained why, in a chamber near that of the cow in Herodotus’s time, there stood many statues of women with the hands lopped off, “still lying at their feet even down to my time.” …. Ammenemes III “....This economic activity formed the basis for the numerous building works that make the reign of Ammenemes III one of the summits of state absolutism”. Recall: “[Cheops’] pyramid transforms him into the very symbol of absolute rule …”. [End of quotes] “But Unis’ pyramid is very similar to the 6th Dynasty pyramids and they are very similar to the 12th Dynasty pyramids. I. E. S. Edwards ‘The Pyramids of Egypt’ discusses the similarity, not only in style, but also the pyramid texts. Particularly the similar style of the 6th and the 12th”. Dr John Osgood Dr John Osgood, beginning on p. 263 (-264) of his book, will offer his revised version of the Placement of the 6th Dynasty: The conventional arrangement of the 6th Dynasty is sequential to the 5th, and considered the last dynasty before the ‘First Intermediate Period’. Here the 6th is seen as logically following the 5th, but reasons will be given to show that the 6th, in fact, is for the most part parallel to and subsidiary to the 12th. The concept of a First Intermediate Period is here rejected as historically untenable. 1) The Biblical chronology and narrative does not allow the long time required for the First Intermediate Period. 2) Manetho’s history, in fact, does not require it either, as that dynastic historical arrangement is presented on the basis of sequelae on a geographic basis, ie. The Memphite Dynasties do not necessarily follow sequentially the end of the Thinite Dynasties, and the Heracleopolitan Dyasties (9/10), do not necessarily follow sequentially the Memphite group, nor the Theban group sequential to the Heracleopolitan group; parallelisms can fit well with this arrangement. In fact at least once Manetho admits to multiple parallel rules of native dynasties (at the Hyksos invasion he states that multiple kings were overcome). Let us look at the testimony of the pyramids – a purely sequential arrangement of the dynasties makes no sense with the pyramids. For it demands that after the demise of the 6th Dynasty, over 200 years passed and the almost identical technology was resurrected in the building of the 12th Dynasty pyramids. This is analogous to our society suddenly returning to the 18th century, and although they placed more on tradition than do we, it still makes no sense. Courville, in discussion of the famines, showed reason to place Unis [Unas] of the end of the 5th Dynasty parallel to the early 12th Dynasty. But Unis’ pyramid is very similar to the 6th Dynasty pyramids and they are very similar to the 12th Dynasty pyramids. I. E. S. Edwards ‘The Pyramids of Egypt’ discusses the similarity, not only in style, but also the pyramid texts. Particularly the similar style of the 6th and the 12th. …. [End of quote] What is happening here is that Dr. Osgood, like Dr. Courville whom he largely follows regarding the Fifth, Sixth and Twelfth dynastic arrangement, needs to identify a famine to associate with the biblical Joseph who they both believe to have belonged to the early Twelfth Dynasty. Such they cannot convincingly identify, I believe, because the biblical famine had occurred much earlier than this, during the Old Kingdom’s Third Dynasty. Despite the fact that both Drs. Courville and Osgood were attempting to situate Joseph where, in fact, Moses ought to be, they still managed to come up with a close connection between the Fifth, Sixth and Twelfth dynasties – {which is precisely what I have done; my reconstruction, though, being according to a Moses context} - because they, unlike I, have over-stretched these dynasties according to the excessively lengthy king lists. Thus Dr. Osgood is basically correct with many of the points that he makes above – but for the wrong reasons. To give some examples, to which I must add my own twist: The conventional arrangement of the 6th Dynasty is sequential to the 5th, and considered the last dynasty before the ‘First Intermediate Period’. With Drs. Courville and Osgood I reject that sequential arrangement. Here the 6th is seen as logically following the 5th, but reasons will be given to show that the 6th, in fact, is for the most part parallel to and subsidiary to the 12th. The concept of a First Intermediate Period is here rejected as historically untenable. My Moses articles un-complicate all of this, by identifying the Fifth, Sixth and Twelfth as the one and same dynasty. …. Manetho’s … dynastic historical arrangement is presented on the basis of sequelae on a geographic basis …. In fact at least once Manetho admits to multiple parallel rules of native dynasties (at the Hyksos invasion he states that multiple kings were overcome). Geography is not so terribly important here as any one ruler could be variously situated at different locations at different times. Nor is the Hyksos invasion of a later time at all relevant here. Let us look at the testimony of the pyramids – a purely sequential arrangement of the dynasties makes no sense with the pyramids. For it demands that after the demise of the 6th Dynasty, over 200 years passed and the almost identical technology was resurrected in the building of the 12th Dynasty pyramids. I fully agree with this one. Courville, in discussion of the famines, showed reason to place Unis [Unas] of the end of the 5th Dynasty parallel to the early 12th Dynasty. That was in order to parallel a supposed famine in the time of Unas with a supposed famine in the time of Sesostris. But Unis’ pyramid is very similar to the 6th Dynasty pyramids and … they are very similar to the 12th Dynasty pyramids. They are indeed, because the Fifth, Sixth and Twelfth - one and the same dynasty. Dr Osgood continues on p. 265: Examples: (p. 220) ‘Fundamentally, it (Pepi II’s pyramid) resembled closely the complex of Ammenemes I’. (p. 223) ‘… the arrangement of the enclosure walls in this complex was almost identical with the plan of the walls in the complex of Ammenemes I’. And why would that be? Well, in my scheme, Pepi (s0-called II) immediately follows the rule of Amenemes (so-called I). Dr. Osgood: And (p. 220) ‘… the greater part of the original plan of Sesostris I’s complex has been established and the extent to which its Mortuary Temple was copied form the Mortuary Temple’s [sic] of the VI th Dynasty, as illustrated by that of Pepi II, is clearly evident’. Of course, if the two dynasties were parallel, it may be that Pepi II copied that of Sesostris I. Or it may be, as according to my scheme, that Sesostris was Pepi. Dr. Osgood: The practice of co-regency is discussed by Gardiner (‘Egypt of the Pharaohs’), a practice which frequently occurred during the 12th Dynasty, but on p. 129 he mentions the possible practice during the 6th Dynasty: ‘… perhaps even at the start it was not quite an innovation, for we find evidence that Piopi [Pepi] I of Dyn VI may have adopted a similar course.’ If the dynasties were parallel that would not be surprising. Again, even less surprising if as according to my comments above. For more on matters such as these, see e.g. my articles: Egypt’s Old and Middle Kingdoms Far Closer in Time than Conventionally Thought (5) Egypt’s Old and Middle Kingdoms Far Closer in Time than Conventionally Thought | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu and: Was Great Sphinx of Egypt a Middle Kingdom project? (5) Was Great Sphinx of Egypt a Middle Kingdom project? | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu