Manetho Study in Egyptian Chronology How Ancient Scribes Garbled an Accurate Chronology of Dynastic Egypt Marco Polo Monographs by Gary Greenberg

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MPM8: MANETHO: A Study in Egyptian Chronology How Ancient Scribes Garbled an Accurate Chronology of Dynastic Egypt
by Gary Greenberg
Contents __________________________________________ 1.....Acknowledgements 13....Introduction / Preface 15....1:The Problem of Manetho�s chronology 36....2:An Overview of Egyptian Chronology 54....3:The Middle Kingdom: Dynasties XI-XII 89....4:The Eighteenth & Nineteenth Dynasties 165...5:The Second Intermediate Period 242...6:The Sixth Dynasty & First Intermediate Period 283...7:The Fifth Dynasty 308...8:The Fourth Dynasty 344...9:Error Patterns 361...Conclusions 364...Notes Book Reviews �An intriguing approach to a long-debated issue.� - Dr. Aidan Dodson, Visiting Fellow in Archaeology, University of Bristol UK	ORDER NOW When was the sphinx carved? What was the date of exodus? This book explores how we understand the passage of time! ISBN 0-9714683-6-2 Cloth Bound Price $39.50 US ISBN 0-9714683-7-0 Paperback Price $31.00 US Single Orders Volume Orders Excerpt Below
�An excellent and well-written analysis that makes a valuable contribution to the study of Egyptian chronology and king-lists. Greenberg shows that Manetho originally had a highly accurate record of Egyptian chronology but that it was severely altered in the course of transmission. Of particular interest is his reconstruction of Manetho's original Twelfth Dynasty and Second Intermediate Period chronologies and his demonstration that Manetho's chronology paralleled that of the Turin Canon far more often than previously recognized.� - Dr. Frank J. Yurco, Egyptologist, Chicago IL �Informatively written by ancient history, mythology, and Biblical studies expert Gary Greenberg, Manetho: A Study In Egyptian Chronology explores how ancient scribes may have misinterpreted the chronology Egyptian history, and offers a carefully researched survey of the landmark events of Egyptian history. Straightforward writing adds life to the trek through years and centuries, in this fascinating study of dynasties, war, achievements, and lasting cultural legacy. Also available in a hardcover edition (09714-68362, $39.50), Manetho is a thoughtful and iconoclastic contribution to the field of Egyptology and is very highly recommended reading for academia as well as the non-specialist general reader with an interest in ancient Egyptian history.� - James A. Cox, Editor-in-Chief, Midwest Book Review The Author Gary Greenberg is a leading expert in Near Eastern history and author of several well received studies: The Moses Mystery: The African Origins of the Jewish People, reprinted as The Bible Myth: The African Origins of the Jewish People, 101 Myths of the Bible: How Ancient Scribes Invented Biblical History, The Sins of King David: A New History. He now turns his private-eye-like investigation on the mysterious father of ancient Egyptian chronology and comes up with some amazing conclusions, with far reaching effect.

EXCERPTS

This work concerns itself with mainstream Egyptian chronology. It assumes the validity of Sothic dating and proceeds from there. Consequently, there is no discussion herein regarding what is generally referred to as the New Chronology, works that argue for a massive shortening and restructuring of Egyptian chronology, as proposed by Peter James, David Rohl, or Immanuel Velikovsky and/or their followers.

Although this is not a doctoral thesis that attempts to cite every single article and argument in the field, I have attempted to provide a reasonably up to date account of the various chronological issues that divide Egyptologists and provide some background information about what the disagreements are about. In the interest of readability, however, I have omitted the heavily technical discussions that underlie some of the more complex issues, such as interpretations of the lunar data in the Illahun papyri, and have instead noted the different viewpoints and referred the reader to the more technical articles for their own further study.

The material appearing here derives, in part, from my book, The Moses Mystery (reprinted as The Bible Myth), articles that have appeared in some Egyptological journals, and from papers presented at a number of Egyptological conferences. In some cases, I have revised and/or expanded upon these earlier materials. The arguments and evidence presented here supercede my earlier work and in case of any apparent conflict the views presented here represent my current thinking.

Gary Greenberg, August 2002.

 
1. THE PROBLEM OF MANETHO�S CHRONOLOGY

In the third century B.C., an important and influential Egyptian priest named Manetho wrote an account of his country�s history. It contained a wealth of information about ancient Egypt and included a chronological record of all Egyptian kings from the beginning of the first dynasty (c. 3100 B.C.) down to the conquest of Egypt by Alexander the Great in 332 B.C. Unfortunately, no extant copy of Manetho�s original manuscript has yet been found.
We do have three ancient texts � one from the first century Jewish historian Josephus, another from the third century Christian chronographer Africanus, and another from the fourth century Christian historian Eusebius � that claim to be based on Manetho�s history, but they are frequently and substantially inconsistent with each other in many respects and all three are often at great odds with the known chronological record for ancient Egypt.
Among the problems found in these accounts are that many of the king names are unrecognizable, a number of kings have reigns that are too long, several dynasties have more kings than actually ruled, in some cases kings appear to be listed out of order, several dynasties have no kings listed at all, many dynasties have durations far in excess of that allowed by the chronological record, and some dynasties seem to be spurious.  Nevertheless, studies of the Manetho derived texts reveal that Manetho�s original chronology must have been based, at least in part, on accurate chronological accounts from Egyptian records. 
Manetho, himself, served as a priest at the city of Heliopolis, and legend holds that the temple at Heliopolis had a picture of a tree with the names of every Egyptian king inscribed on a separate leaf. Until the advent of modern Egyptology the Manetho texts heavily influenced our development of a chronological history for the rulers of ancient Egypt.

Manetho�s history also had a strong influence on biblical studies. His long chronological history provided a potential anchor point around which dates for biblical events could be established, particularly with regard to the chronology of the Exodus from Egypt under Moses and the chronology of civilization after the flood in Noah�s time. In fact, Josephus�s identification of the Exodus with Manetho�s account of the expulsion of the Hyksos kings at the start of what would have been the Eighteenth Dynasty, deeply influenced centuries of biblical scholarship.

We should also note that because much of our development of chronology in the nations outside of Egypt, particularly in Canaan and Mesopotamia, depended upon chronological links to events inside of Egypt, Manetho was an early influence on our development of chronology in those other nations as well and continues to provide a major temporal framework.
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Chapter 4

4. THE EIGHTEENTH AND NINETEENTH DYNASTIES
For the Eighteenth Dynasty we have three key astronomically determined dates that define the debate about the correct chronology for this dynasty, but there is some argument over what these three dates should be. One is the Sothic date for the ninth year of Amenhotep I. The other two involve lunar dates for the first years of Thutmose III and the Nineteenth Dynasty pharaoh Ramesses II. Despite the differences of opinion, the high and low chronologies differ by no more than about twenty-five years.
In addition, we have several inscriptions that give us high year marks for many of the pharaohs and in several cases final year markers for the last year of reign. We also have a few gaps in the record that have to be filled in by guesswork, the decisions being controlled primarily by what choices one makes with regard to the astronomically determined dates.
Table 4-1 shows several alternative chronologies for the Eighteenth Dynasty.  I have arranged them so that they are grouped according to whether they follow the high or low chronologies. In addition, I have included a column showing the highest known year dates for each of the pharaohs. I have also included a line giving the total dynastic duration for each proposal, but we must remember that the summation line might be slightly higher or lower than the actual total due to rounding off errors for partial years.
Table 4-2 is based on the same data as Table 4-1, but instead of giving dates it gives the proposed durations for each king. In those cases where the proponent advocates a coregency between two pharaohs I have put the length of the proposed coregency in parentheses alongside the first of the two pharaohs to rule. I have also placed shaded bands across the two sets of reigns about which we have the most chronological disagreement, Thutmose I/Thutmoses II and Amenhotep II/Thutmose IV. Table 4-2 should make it much easier to follow the discussions of the various chronological differences that exist.
The proposed starting dates range from Gardiner�s 1575 to Kitchen and Aldred�s 1540, and the durations of the dynasty range from Wente�s and Van Siclen�s 277 years to Aldred�s 241 years. Aldred�s shorter duration is due to his belief that there was a 12-year coregency between Amenhotep III and Akhenaten, a view that few Egyptologists endorse, although some might support a brief coregency of about two years as in the Wente and Van Siclen chronology. If we remove the 10-12 years of Aldred�s coregency, his duration increases to about 251-253 years.
This leaves Kitchen�s chronology with the shortest duration at 245 years, but his chronology ignores the Sothic date (see below) and gives Thutmose II only a 3-year reign. He acknowledges, however, the possibility that Thutmose II had a 13-year reign, which would increase his dynastic duration to about 255 years. 
Again, we must remember that the year numbers in Table 4-2 are rounded off because the first and last years of a pharaoh�s reign would usually be partial years. This could have a small but insignificant effect on the actual figures set forth.
The Sothic Debate Dispute
It had been widely accepted that Papyrus Ebers noted a Sothic rising in the ninth year of Amenhotep I, with Egyptologists arguing over whether the sighting occurred in Memphis or Thebes (and Krauss arguing for Elephantine, a minority viewpoint among Egyptologists.) The practical effect of these differences has to do with determining the year of the sighting; the further south one goes the later the year of the rising.
If the sighting took place in Memphis, the ninth year of Amenhotep I would have to have fallen between 1544-1537, with high chronologists grouped in the 1544-1542 range.  If the sighting occurred in Thebes the ninth year fell between 1525-1517, with low chronologists congregating around the low end of the range. 
Recently, Kitchen, citing Beckerath, has written �most opinion now disallows this document [i.e., Papyrus Ebers] as real evidence of a specific rising of Sothis.�  The consequences of this view, however, are relatively minor. Beckerath�s chronology allows for Amenhotep�s ninth year to fall at the low end of the Theban sighting range, 1517. Kitchen�s chronology moves Amenhotep�s ninth year after the allowable Sothic range, but this is due to his allocation of only 3 years for Thutmose II, where Beckerath has 14 years. As noted above, Kitchen acknowledges the possibility that Thutmose II ruled at least 13 years, and if that amount is restored to Kitchen�s chronology, his ninth year for Amenhotep I falls into the accepted range.
The Lunar Dates for Thutmose III and Ramesses II
Egyptologists agree that based on lunar data, Thutmose III came to the throne in either 1504, 1490, or 1479 and Ramesses II came to the throne in either 1304, 1290, or 1279.
Although Gardiner favored 1490 as the starting date for Thutmoses III, later proponents of the high chronology have generally accepted 1504 as the correct choice. The low chronologists have generally accepted 1479. Gardiner�s dating of Thutmose III to 1490 requires that he increase the total time allotted for Thutmose I and Thutmose II, giving each of them reigns longer than most Egyptologists would presently accept.
Ramesses II was the third king of the Nineteenth Dynasty. His two dynastic predecessors were Ramesses I and Sethos I. Establishing a starting date for Ramesses II, enables one to count backwards to establish the end date of the Eighteenth Dynasty. Low chronologists opt for a 1279 date for Ramesses II and high chronologists for 1304.
Wente and Van Siclen, although supporting the high date for Thutmose III, endorse the low date for Ramesses II. This required that they allow longer reigns for Amenhotep II and Thutmose IV than most Egyptologists presently endorse, but they may have since abandoned that view. 
Counting back to the end of the Eighteenth Dynasty, however, presents a small difficulty. While we know Ramesses I only served about 2 years, part as coregent with Horemheb, the last pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty, we don�t know for certain how long Sethos I reigned. For him we have a high-year mark of 11 years, but we don�t know if that was his final year. Some Egyptologists would assign him just 11 years, others as much as 14 to 18 years.
One issue that affects the choices made has to do with the possible start of a Sothic Cycle at the beginning of Sethos I�s reign. The evidence is ambiguous at best. An Alexandrian mathematician named Theon (fourth century AD) indicated that a Sothic Cycle began in the �era of Menophres.� 
On the assumption that this was a credible reference to the start of a Sothic Cycle a number of Egyptologists attempted to identify who or what Menophres was. Several of them considered the name, a Greek rendition of the original Egyptian, to be a corruption of Mry-n-Pth, �beloved of Ptah�, which appeared at the beginning of Sethos I�s second cartouche.  Others have considered the name a corruption of Mn-nfr, meaning �Memphis�, which some have taken as a reference to a renewal in Memphis and associated it with a renewal under the reign of Horemheb. 
If Menophres referred to the start of Sethos I�s reign, then the chronology would have to be adjusted to reflect that coincidence. Not too long ago, it was thought that the Sothic Cycle began in 1318. If Ramesses II came to the throne in 1304, then Sethos I would have to have ruled as early as 1318, giving him a duration of about 14-15 years, a bit longer than the highest attested year for his reign. Subsequent study showed that the Sothic Cycle started at 1314. This fits quite well with Sethos I starting in 1314 and Ramesses II starting in 1304, requiring no adjustment to the Year 11 marker.
On the other hand, a starting date of either 1318 or 1314 for Sethos I is too early for Ramesses II to have begun his reign in either 1290 or 1279, the latter being favored by the low chronologists. Associating Menophres with an undetermined year in the reign of Horemheb, as some have suggested, is, however, consistent with both the high and low chronologies. Unfortunately, we can not be sure what Menophres refers to, and we can�t use that reference to resolve the conflict between the high and low chronologies.
A Chronological Overview of the Eighteenth Dynasty
There are a few other problems with Eighteenth Dynasty chronology that we should look at before we began our analysis of Manetho�s account. In the following section I will briefly review chronological issues for each of the Eighteenth Dynasty kings. I proceed through the list in the order of succession.
1. Ahmose, the founder of the dynasty, has a high-year mark of 22, but Egyptologists generally assign him the 25 years given to him by Manetho.  As Table 4-1 shows, both the high and low chronologies follow this approach.
2. Amenhotep I has a high year mark of 21 and he is usually credited with that number of years in both the high and low chronologies.  Wente and Van Siclen, however, have suggested a 26-year reign and assign these additional years to a coregency with Ahmose  and Murnane seems to endorse that interpretation.  Such a coregency does not appear to have wide support.
3. Thutmose I has a clear indication of a Year 4 and a questionable indication of a Year 9. Neither of these markers necessarily defines his last year on the throne. As you can see from Table 4-2, there is a good deal of disagreement as to how many years to assign this king. To a large extent, the resolution depends upon what date one selects for the start of Thutmose III and one fills in the gap with whatever number of years are necessary to complete the proposed chronology.
4. Thutmose II is also problematic. The highest known year mark is 1. But Georges Daressy copied an inscription from a monument, the copy of which has since been lost, and he read a Year 18 belonging to Thutmose II.  This has been challenged by many Egyptologists. Some have argued that the Year 18 reading may have been a misreading of Year 14, the mistake caused by some damage to the entry.  Others have suggested that the Year 18 entry actually belonged to Queen Hatshepsut.  The loss of the inscription makes it difficult to resolve the question.
While most Egyptologists opt for a Year 14 or lower reading, Gardiner has proposed that Thutmose II may have reached a Year 20.  As with Thutmose I, what choices one makes with regard to the length of reign for this pharaoh usually depends upon what date has been chosen for the start of Thutmose III. The combined reigns of Thutmose I and Thutmose II would have to fill the entire period between the End of Amenhotep I and the beginning of Thutmose III.
5. Hatshepsut served as coregent with Thutmose III until Year 22 of the latter. Although she started out as coregent for the young Thutmose III, sometime between Year 2 and Year 7 she declared herself the sole ruler.  In Year 22 of Thutmose III, the male monarch declared himself the sole ruler. 
This queen also celebrated a Sed Festival in Year 16 of her reign,  which usually (but not always) signifies the beginning of a thirtieth year of reign. As she did not reach a thirtieth year, it has been suggested that the thirty years were counted either from the start of the reign of Thutmose I (her father, whom she highly honored) or Thutmose II (her husband, whom she greatly disliked.)  Some inscriptions suggest that she tried to portray herself as direct successor to Thutmose I, making her appear to be co-ruler with Thutmose II, although there doesn�t appear to be any significant evidence that she did in fact so serve. 
In establishing her length of reign, we have a couple of options. As coregent with Thutmose III from the beginning, she can be considered to have lasted until her 22nd year. If we count only from when she declared herself sole ruler, she had a reign of 16-20 years. For our analysis, we will use Year 22 as her last year.
If Thutmose I ruled no more than the 9 or so years known from the record, and Thutmose II ruled no more than a couple of years (ignoring the Daressy inscription) then it is possible that the Jubilee for Hatshepsut commemorated the start of Thutmose I�s reign. On the other hand, if Thutmose II ruled for about 14 years, in accord with one view of the Daressy inscription, then the Jubilee would have marked the beginning of Thutmose II�s reign, subsuming all of his years under her own reign, making her appear to be coregent with her husband. Of course it is also possible that Thutmose II ruled more than 14 years and/or Hatshepsut celebrated an early Sed Festival. The analysis of her Sed Festival date depends upon what choices one makes with regard to the reigns of Thutmose I and Thutmose II.
6. Thutmose III died on the throne during his 54th year. He ruled for 53 years, 10 months and 26 days.  As discussed above, the chief chronological issue with regard to his reign is whether he took the throne in 1504, 1490, or 1479. He may have also had a short coregency with his successor, Amenhotep II, of no more than about 2 years and 4 months, but there is no agreement among Egyptologists as to the existence of this coregency.
7. Amenhotep II had an inscription indicating that he might have celebrated a Sed Festival, indicating he reached a Year 30. But there is some question as to whether Sed Festivals almost always occurred in Year 30. Not all did. At one time, Year 23 was thought to be the highest certain year mark, but the discovery of a wine jar from his Year 26 resulted in the wide acceptance of Year 26 as the minimum length of his reign. Wente and Van Siclen cite some indirect evidence suggesting a Year 34.  Kitchen amends the argument, acknowledging only that inscriptions provide for a 34-year interval between the death of Thutmose III and some point during the reign of Thutmose IV.  As noted above, there is some evidence of a coregency with Thutmose III and Aldred has also argued for a coregency with Amenhotep II�s successor, Thutmose IV.
8. Thutmose IV has no high year mark greater than Year 8, and many Egyptologists pad this with a couple of extra years to fill out a specific chronological scheme. Wente and Van Siclen have argued that this king had a long reign and assigned him 34 years. Beckerath has assigned him a 2-year coregency with his successor.
9. Amenhotep III has a high year mark of 37 and that figure is closely followed in the various chronologies. There are also questions about whether or not this king shared a coregency with his successor Amenhotep IV (i.e., Akhenaten.) Aldred is the leading proponent for a 12-year joint rule while Wente and Van Siclen accept the possibility of perhaps as much as 2 years. Few Egyptologists would go much beyond a 2-year coregency and many doubt the existence of any coregency.
As to the issue of absolute dating, however, an attempt has been made to establish some correlations with Babylonian dates based on correspondence between a Babylonian king named Burna-Burias II and the reigns of Amenhotep III, Akhenaten, and Tutankhamen, each of whom were on the throne during some portion of the reign of that foreign ruler.
According to a chronological scheme by John A. Brinkman, Burna-Burias II�s predecessor died either between 1365 and 1355 or between 1355 and 1345.  According to the author of that chronology, there is no proof one way or the other that favors either alternative.  If the earlier date range is correct, Amenhotep III�s last year can be no earlier than about 1365-1355, indicating that he came to the throne no earlier than 1401-1391.
This would be inconsistent with the high chronology if we assume no long coregency between Amenhotep III and Akhenaten. Wente and Van Siclen accepted the Babylonian synchronizations implied by Brinkman�s chronology and, as a result, they had to adopt the low chronology date for Ramesses II.
On the other hand, Near Eastern chronology in the second millennium is the subject of significant debate, with at least three different chronological schemes competing for acceptance, high, middle, and low. Opinions about which is correct frequently shift. The Cambridge Ancient History, for example, places the start of Burna-Burias II�s reign at 1375  or perhaps 1377,  which allows for a starting date of Amenhotep III as early as 1411 or 1413, which can accommodate the high chronology.
10. Akhenaten (Amenhotep IV) ruled for 17 years. He was succeeded by Smenkhkare, with whom he may have shared a brief coregency. Although he came to the throne with the name Amenhotep IV, in Year 5 of his reign he changed his name to Akhenaten.
This pharaoh established a new religion that many consider to be monotheistic. He worshipped the Aten, the solar disk, as a visible manifestation of the one true deity. He imposed his religious reforms upon all of Egypt and aggressively sought to downplay the god Amen, then the chief deity of Egypt.
His reforms were not well received and not long after his death a counter-revolution set in, with pharaoh Horemheb working to eliminate all public references to this pharaoh and his religious viewpoint. Akhenaten�s religious reforms are often referred to as the Amarna heresy. Amarna is the modern name for the ancient city of Akhetaten, which Akhenaten built as his capitol.
11. Smenkhkare ruled for 3 years, some portion of which may have been a coregency with Akhenaten. He shared Akhenaten�s religious views.
12. Tutankhamen ruled for 9 years. He originally bore the name Tutankhaten, having been born during the Amarna period. After he came to the throne he changed his name to Tutankhamen, reflecting the change in the power structure between Aten worshippers and Amen worshippers.
As noted above, some portion of the reign of the Babylonian king Burna-Burias II overlapped the reign of Tutankhamen. In the CAH chronology, Burna-Burias ruled until 1347,  which is consistent with a starting date of 1355 for Tutankhamen in the high chronology.
For Tutankhamen we have another Near Eastern synchronization. A Hittite text refers to a �portent� involving the sun in the tenth year of the Hittite king Murshilish II.  This has been interpreted as a reference to an eclipse and the context suggested that the eclipse should have occurred in 1335, placing the start of that king�s reign in 1344. This king was preceded briefly by his brother, and before him was a king named Suppiluliumash.  Towards the end of Suppiliumash�s reign a Hittite record indicates that Tutankhamen had recently died.  This suggests that Tutankhamen couldn�t have died any later than about 1344-1346.
By itself, this would indicate possible starting dates for Tutankhamen of no later than about 1352 and as early as perhaps 1360. But taken in conjunction with the high Burna-Burias II dates (given in CAH), proponents of the high chronology should probably accept 1355 as the likely starting date for Tutankhamen.
If it is correct that this Hittite text refers to the eclipse of 1344, then assuming a full coregency between Akhenaten and Smenkhkare and no significant coregency between Akhenaten and Amenhotep III, Amenhotep III came to the throne at about 1410-1411. This is consistent with the high chronology, inconsistent with the low chronology, and inconsistent with the Brinkman chronology for Burna-Burias II.
This led to a further examination of the astronomical record and scholars discovered that another eclipse occurred in 1312.  Some scholars have argued that this is the �portent� referred to in the Hittite text and it has the effect of pushing the end date for Tutankhamen forward by about 23 years. This would be consistent with the low chronology and inconsistent with the high chronology. Once again, we are at an impasse and can�t resolve the dispute between the two camps.
13. Ay served as a chief military officer during Akhenaten�s reign and probably functioned as the power behind the throne of Tutankhamen, who was but a child when he came to rule. Ay ruled about four years and was the last of the pharaohs directly associated with the Amarna heresy of Akhenaten.
14. Horemheb is conventionally considered the last of the Eighteenth Dynasty pharaohs and towards the end of his reign he appointed Ramesses I as his coregent. He played a major role in obliterating public evidence of Akhenaten�s religious revolution.
The highest official year-mark for Horemheb is 13, but a graffito attests to a Year 27. Another important inscription in connection with Horemheb�s reign comes from the time of Ramesses II, which attributes to Horemheb a reign of 59 years. 
This extremely long length of reign is widely understood to incorporate within Horemheb�s administration all of the reigns of the kings associated within the Amarna heresy. As such, it signifies the continuing efforts in the time of Ramesses II to block out public recognition for Akhenaten�s religious reforms.
The correlation works out quite well. Counting 17 years for Akhenaten, 3 years for Smenkhkare, 9 years for Tutankhamen, and 4 years for Ay, gives a total of 33 years. Combined with Horemheb�s 27 years, we get a total of 60 years. Recognizing that the lengths of reigns are all rounded off to whole years and that there may have been a coregency between Akhenaten and Smenkhkare leaves a nearly perfect correlation with the 59 years attributed to Horemheb by Ramesses II. For that reason, many Egyptologists take 59 years as the length of reign from the start of Akhenaten to the end of Horemheb, fiddling slightly with the length of Horemheb�s reign and the length of the coregency between Akhenaten and Smenkhkare in order to round the total off to 59 years.
An Overview of the Early Nineteenth Dynasty
Although we will not do a full detailed study of the Nineteenth Dynasty in this work, for our examination of Manetho�s Eighteenth Dynasty we do need to be familiar with the Nineteenth Dynasty sequence of reigns and durations. That dynasty had eight kings counting Ramesses I. Although Egyptologists generally identify Ramesses I as the first king of the dynasty, despite his coregency with Horemheb, the Manetho sources, as we shall see, appear to have started the dynasty with his successor, Sethos I. The modern arrangement reflects the fact that Sethos I was the son of Ramesses I.
Ramesses I had a brief reign of about two years, partly as a coregent with Horemheb and the remainder either as sole ruler and/or as coregent with Sethos I. Sethos I, whom we have already discussed, has a length of reign between 11 and 18 years. Following him came Ramesses II, whose first year on the throne was 1304 in the high chronology and 1279 in the low chronology. He ruled for 66 years and 10 months.  His death occurred in the first or second month of the Egyptian civil calendar.  Next came Merneptah, whose highest attested duration is Year 10.  After him, matters become a bit murky.
The next two kings were Amenmesse and Sethos II, but the order of their reigns is the subject of debate and there is some question as to how long Amenesse ruled. Sethos II ruled no more than about 5 years and eleven months.  Amenemhe may have ruled as long as 3 years and 8 months.  Wente and Van Siclen place Amenesse�s reign after that of Sethos II.  Gardiner, however, says that this pharaoh�s reign was very brief, coming either before or during the reign of Sethos II.  Kitchen places Amenesse before Sethos II but gives him a 3-year sole reign. 
For the last two rulers, Siptah and Twosre,  there were probably about eight years combined, possibly with some overlap between them.  Gardiner, however, credited them with consecutive reigns totaling about 14 years.  The difference concerns the allocation of a Year 8 for Twosre. Advocates of the shorter duration argue that the 8 years attributed to Twosre were the result of that pharaoh�s (falsely?) incorporating all the years of Siptah within the pharaoh�s own reign.  Egyptologists generally accept that there was a brief kingless period between the end of Twosre and the start of the Twentieth Dynasty. 
The chronological problems following the Nineteenth Dynasty reigns after Ramesses II do not affect the quality of our analysis for Manetho�s Eighteenth Dynasty as set forth below but do show some of the confusion that may have been evident among the redactors of Manetho�s history.
A Neutral Chronological Model for Eighteenth Dynasty 
We have seen that for the Eighteenth Dynasty there are three chronological anchor dates, with the high and low chronologies differing as to which set of dates to use. We have also seen that despite a significant number of high-year markers there are a couple of chronological gaps that result in varying interpretations of the evidence. The chief issues concern the lengths of reign for Thutmose I, Thutmose II, Amenhotep II, and Thutmose III. Because the year-markers for these four pharaohs are so low (despite the Year-26 for Amenhotep II) we don�t have enough information to fill in the spaces between the anchor dates. As a result, various theories are set forth about these four reigns along with a variety of suggestions concerning coregencies, with no generally agreed upon set of solutions.
In an attempt to deal with this problem, and to provide a chronological template for comparison with the Manetho figures, I developed what I consider a chronologically neutral model of the Eighteenth Dynasty. The model is neutral in that it doesn�t distinguish between the high and low chronologies. Either set of advocates can use it. Its primary feature is that it uses all the generally agreed upon high-year dates but eliminates all the proposed coregencies except Hatshepsut, whose entire reign was concurrent with Thutmose III, and that of Horemheb and Ramesses I, which lasted less than 2 years. This establishes a set of parameters for the four uncertain reigns.
What is important to understand about this model is that it does not necessarily provide the precise chronology for the Eighteenth Dynasty. Individual lengths of reign can be adjusted upward to accommodate new discoveries or alternative theories but as a consequence, some other reign or reigns might have to be either shortened or turned into coregencies. In fact, later on I will suggest that there was a coregency between Thutmose III and Amenhotep II and the model will have to be modified to make that adjustment.
Table 4-3 sets forth this neutral chronological model and from here on in I will refer to it as the Chronological Model. Below I have set forth the assumptions underlying the model�s structure. It has a duration of 260 years, but because the first and last year may be partial years the actual duration of the model chronology should fall between a little over 258 years and a little under 262 years. Most of the chronologies proposed by Egyptologists generally fall a few years shorter than the one in this model (although some have slightly longer durations, see Tables 4-1 and 4-2) but that is due to the presence of coregencies in the proposed solutions. However, since no coregencies (except for Hatshepsut and Ramesses I) have been conclusively demonstrated, I have eliminated them from the model.
It will be argued further below that the original Manetho chronology for the Eighteenth Dynasty closely tracks this model.
Assumptions for Table 4-3

The assumptions used for establishing Table 4-3 are:
1. No coregencies except for that between Hatshepsut and Thutmose III and that between Horemheb and Ramesses I;
2. For Ahmose I, a high starting date of 1575 and a low starting date of 1550;
3. The use of Manetho�s 25 years and 4 months as the length of reign for Ahmose, a figure accepted in both the high and low chronologies;
4. For Thutmose III, a high starting date of 1504 and a low starting date of 1479;
5. For Ramesses II, a high starting date of 1304 or a low starting date of 1279;
6. Use of the high year marks of 11 years for Sethos II, 2 years for Ramesses I, 27 years for Horemheb, 4 years for Ay, 9 years for Tutankhamen, 3 years for Smenkhkare, 17 years for Akhenaten, 37 years for Amenhotep III, and 21 years for Amenhotep I as the lengths of reign for each of those pharaohs;
7. No more than about 1 year for the independent reign of Ramesses I;
8. A 59 year duration for the reigns of Amenhotep IV through Horemheb; and
9. At least a 34-year period between the end of Thutmose III and some point in the reign of Thutmose IV.
This model makes basic straightforward assumptions, although not all Egyptologists agree with all the choices. To the extent that anyone disagrees with any of the assumptions made here, one can make the appropriate adjustments to the model where the archaeological data allows for such adjustments. For example, one can�t increase a length of reign beyond the known duration (e.g., Thutmose III�s 53 years, 10 months and 26 days) but one can extend a reign where we have only a high-year mark. However, if you propose a 14 year reign for Sethos I instead of the 11 years provided by the high year mark, you have to make the appropriate adjustment of dates back to your chosen date for the end of Thutmose III and make sure the data is consistent with all the other archaeological parameters.  Changes to the assumptions underlying my model will primarily affect the maximum allowable time for the four reigns where there is a substantial amount of uncertainty as to the duration.
Should definitive evidence of coregencies come forth, adjustments to the model will have to be made.

The Uncertain Lengths of Reign
The chronological model set forth in Table 4-3 shows that the maximum combined length of reign for Thutmose I and Thutmose II is approximately 25-26 years. For Thutmose I, the minimum length of reign based on the high year mark is either 4 or 9. For Thutmose II, the minimum length is either 1 year, based on the highest known year in an inscription, or 14 or 18 years based on the lost Daressy inscription and how one would interpret it. This would give possible minimum combined lengths for Thutmose I and Thutmose II of either 5-10 years  or 18-23 years  or 22-26 years.  Given the 25-26 year maximum in the model, to allow for anything over 26 years would require either a coregency between at least one of these two pharaohs and some other pharaoh, or an acceptable adjustment to some of the model�s other dates of reign.
As to the other two uncertain reigns, Amenhotep II and Thutmose IV, the model shows a maximum combined length of about 41 years, with no coregencies allowed for. The minimum length of reign for the two combined durations, based on high year marks, would be 34 years, 26 for Amenhotep II and 8 for Thutmose IV, with an understanding that there is at least a 34 year period from the end of Thutmose III to some point during the reign of Thutmose IV. (In our subsequent analysis, I will suggest that there was a short coregency between Thutmose III and Amenhotep II.)

Some Proposed Summation Lines

As we look at the Manetho chronology, there will be questions raised about the existence of certain summation lines. In preparation for that discussion, I want to draw your attention to some combinations in the proposed model.
From Ahmose I to start of Thutmose III	 71 years;
From Ahmose I to end of Thutmose III	125 years;
From Thutmose III to end of Horemheb	135 years;
From Amenhotep IV to end of Horemheb	 59 years.
The Manetho Sources
Table 4-4 sets forth the rosters of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Dynasties as they appear in each of the three Manetho sources, Josephus, Africanus, and Eusebius. Where Africanus and Eusebius omitted kings appearing in the Josephus list, I have skipped a space in order to preserve the alignments. No spaces are skipped in the original text. Although Africanus and Eusebius each show a distinct break between the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Dynasties, Josephus does not. He runs the two together.
All three lists, as we shall see, place at least one Eighteenth Dynasty king, Amenophis (number 17 in Josephus) after Ramesses (number 15 in the Josephus list.) In addition, both Africanus and Eusebius begin the Nineteenth Dynasty with Sethos rather than Ramesses. This suggests that either Manetho or his later redactors saw Ramesses I as the last pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty and Sethos I as the first king of the Nineteenth Dynasty. Although the identification of Ramesses I as the end of the Eighteenth Dynasty runs counter to modern convention, it is reasonably consistent with the archaeological record as much of Ramesses I�s reign took place as coregent to Horemheb.

Josephus
The Josephus list appears in the middle of a narrative account about the Hyksos kings and other matters that we shall consider in more detail further below. Unlike Africanus and Eusebius, his king-list does not appear in tabular form. His version, beginning with a king named Tethmosis, provides the lengths of reign for each of the kings and includes, in most cases, the number of months served in the final year.
He sets forth the information one king after another and continues down to Sethos (number 18 on his list) but at this point in the narrative he doesn�t give Sethos�s length of reign. Later in the text he gives the lengths of reign for both a Sethos and a Rampses, but does so in the midst of a very confusing chronological narrative about time frames involving the expulsion of the Hyksos, the conflict between the mythic figures of Danaus and Aegyptus, and the expulsion of an Egyptian priest named Osarseph and his connection to the Exodus of Israel from Egypt.
This particular later portion of Josephus, as we will learn further below, turns out to have some very important information buried within it that confirms the accuracy of the original Manetho list before it reached its garbled state as exhibited in Josephus and the other sources. The evidence will show that Manetho originally had an Eighteenth Dynasty with a duration of 259 years. We will examine that portion of Josephus more closely after we fully examine the information set forth in Table 4-4 and reconstruct the Manetho list in the context of the archaeological record.
One particularly vexing problem with the Josephus chronology involves the presence of a pharaoh named Harmesses Miamun, who served 66 years and 2 months. No Eighteenth Dynasty pharaoh had such a long reign and it seems clearly out of place in his list of kings. It is often suggested that this Harmesses Miamun is a replication of Ramesses II, who did serve into his 67th year and who appears to be represented in the Josephus list by Rampses, whom he credits with 66 years. By this interpretation, Ramesses II appears twice in the Josephus list. An alternative explanation for the presence of two kings serving 66 or more years will be presented below.
If we eliminate the intrusive Harmesses Miamun from the Josephus list, and sum the total duration down through Amenophis (number 17), we get 266 years and 10 months, a figure not too far from the 260 years in our Chronological Model.

Africanus
The Africanus list closely follows the Josephus list but has a few important differences. Africanus omits the length of reign for the dynasty�s first king. (In the next chapter we will learn that the years belonging to this king were accidentally added to the reign of one of the Second Intermediate Period kings.) His lengths of reign are also rounded off to whole numbers but there is no clear pattern as to when he rounded up or down. In a few instances his lengths of reign vary from Josephus even after the rounding off is accounted for. (Compare Josephus�s numbers 3, 10, 11, 18b, and 19 with the corresponding Africanus kings.)
Most importantly, Africanus has omitted Josephus�s Harmesses Miamun from the Eighteenth Dynasty. However, if you look at his Nineteenth Dynasty listing, you will note that he has two kings, Rapsaces and Ramesses in the 60-year range. This suggests that one of those two kings corresponds to Josephus�s Harmesses Miamun and that Africanus has a different sequence than Josephus.
Eusebius, too, has an omission at that point, but seems to have switched names, dropping Harmesses Miamun but assigning his long length of reign to Ramesses and dropping the short length of reign that belongs to Ramesses in the other two lists. At the same time, he also has a Ramesses in the Nineteenth Dynasty also with a 66-year reign. This, too, suggests that one of the Ramesses in the Eusebius chronology corresponds to Harmesses Miamun.
All three lists seem to provide for two kings ruling in excess of 60 years, one of whom should probably correspond to Ramesses II and the other having no counterpart in the archaeological record.
In addition, Africanus indicates the existence of a summation line of 69 years from the beginning of the dynasty down to his Misphragmuthosis. This total, however, omits the length of reign for the first king. As Table 4-4 shows, the Africanus sources preserve two different figures, 24 or 21, for the length of reign of Amenophthis, his third king. If 24 years is correct, the Africanus total would be 72 years, differing from the recorded total, but if 21 years is correct, the sum of 69 years is correctly recorded. This suggests that 21 may have been the original Africanus figure. What this sum represents will be discussed later.
Africanus also records the dynastic duration as 263 years, but if you add up his lengths of reign, the total is 262 years if you use 24 years for his third king or 259 years if you use 21 years. Based on the previous mentioned summation line, 21 years appears to be the original figure, increasing the gap between the recorded total and the actual total. Although both totals closely approximate that in our proposed Chronological Model, the Africanus total excludes Ahmose, the first king of the dynasty, whose length of reign is not given but who served at least 22 years. This deficit is mostly eliminated up by his erroneous attribution of an extra 20 years to Acencheres (compared to Josephus�s number 10) and an extra 3 years to his first Amenophis (compared to Josephus�s number 3.)
Eusebius
The Eusebius list set forth here is the Armenian version, which for this dynasty is more complete than the Syncellus version. But there are some differences between the two Eusebius accounts. In the Syncellus version, the first king is named Amosis rather than Amoses. Also in Syncellus, the fifth king, Mispharmuthosis in the Armenian list, is given as Misphragmuthosis, which is the same name used in the Africanus roster.
There are also a couple of differences as to lengths of reign. Where the lengths of reign in the Syncellus version vary from those in the Armenian version, I have placed the Syncellus number in parenthesis alongside the Armenian figure.
Syncellus gives Orus a reign of 36 years in one version of his text and 38 years in another, while the Armenian version gives him 28 years. Thus the Syncellus version closely follows the other two sources as to the length of reign for this king.
Another important difference is that the Syncellus list includes Josephus�s Rathotis (and Africanus�s Rathos), who is missing from the Armenian version, but the Syncellus list identifies this king as Athotis, and gives him a reign of either 9 or 39 years. Finally, in the Syncellus version, the third king of the Nineteenth Dynasty has a reign of 40 years where the Armenian version has 8.
When we compare the Eusebius list to Josephus and Africanus, we see that, like Africanus, he has rounded off the lengths of reign, and in a few instances the lengths of reign vary from the Josephus list. (See Josephus numbers 10, 12, 13, 16, 17, and 18b.)
Both versions of the Eusebius list give the dynastic duration as 348 years, and this extremely high number excludes the reign of Josephus�s Amessis (21 years and 9 months) from the total. However, his total includes an extra 20-21 years for the Amenophis at the end of his Eighteenth Dynasty, and the extra 66-67 years for Ramesses.  If we subtract these extra 86-88 years from the Eusebius duration, the duration reduces to 260-262 years. Though this total is flawed due to the deletion of one king and an increase in the length of another king by the same number of years, it does indicate that the Manetho sources congregate around a total dynastic duration of close to 260 years. We will fine tune all these variations later on.
As in Africanus, the Syncellus version of Eusebius also indicates that there was a summation line containing the total number of years from the start of the dynasty down to the reign of Misphragmuthosis. That total, 71 years, closely matches the 69 or 72 years in Africanus, but it contains a different combination of reigns. Eusebius included Africanus�s missing first reign but omitted the fourth ruler, Amessis, who appears in the Josephus and Africanus lists. The Armenian version of Eusebius omits the summation line altogether.
Interestingly, while Africanus and Eusebius occasionally vary from Josephus, they do not do so in the same manner, and in most instances, where one of them differs from Josephus the other agrees with Josephus. Compare, for example, Josephus�s number 9 (where the Syncellus version of Eusebius also agrees with Josephus), 11 (where the Syncellus version of Eusebius has either 9 or 39 years), 12, 13, and 17. In addition, Eusebius omits Josephus�s Amessis but Africanus includes that king under the name Amensis, and has the same length of reign as Josephus.
All things considered, Josephus appears to have the chronology most consistent with the original tradition, but it is not without its problems, as we shall now see.
Comparing Manetho to the Archaeological Record
Reconstructing Manetho�s Eighteenth Dynasty requires that we cross a few difficult barriers. To begin with, Manetho used Greek variations for the Egyptian names and for the most part they do not easily correspond to known Egyptian names for the Eighteenth Dynasty kings. His naming conventions may have been further complicated by the existence of four kings named Thutmose and four kings named Amenhotep (including Akhenaten who changed his name from Amenhotep) and the difficult problem of the coregency between Hatshepsut and Thutmose III, as well as possible attempts by Hatshepsut to falsely incorporate the reign of Thutmose II into her total length of reign by describing herself as a functional coregent of her husband Thutmose II.
Second, Manetho seems to have more kings listed for the Eighteenth Dynasty than actually served. Even if we omit his Harmesses Miamun, who seems clearly out of place, and incorporate both Hatshepsut and Ramesses I (number 15 on his list) as part of the Eighteenth Dynasty due to coregencies, he lists 16 kings. But the correct number of kings, again counting Ramesses I and Hatshepsut, should only be 15.
Third, none of the Manetho kings has a length of reign close in size to that of Thutmose III, who ruled into his 54th year, except Harmesses Miamun, whose reigns is far too long to correspond to that of Thutmose III.
Fourth, to the extent that there are obvious correlations between the Manetho list and a corresponding king of the Eighteenth Dynasty, the sequence of reigns is in great disarray. Josephus�s Amessis, for instance, is described as a female ruling 21 years and 9 months. This would appear to be Queen Hatshepsut, who served as either coregent or sole ruler into a 22nd year. Yet, Josephus lists her in the fourth position and chronologically she should be in fifth place.
Similarly, the correct second king on the list should be Amenhotep I. In Greek, Amenhotep is rendered as Amenophis, and there are three kings named Amenophis on the Joseph list. But the first Amenophis to appear in the Josephus list does so in the number three position. Even if we assume for the sake of argument (and I don�t make such assumption in this reconstruction) that the second king on the Josephus list, Chebron, corresponds to the missing fourth Amenophis under a different name, that would result in Amenophis I and Amenophis II appearing in sequential order when they are several kings apart in the correct chronological sequence.
Our task, then, is to impose some order over this apparent chaos. The simplest approach would be to see if any obvious correspondences can be made and after doing so see what remains. Table 4-5 shows my complete solution for the correspondences between members of the Josephus list and the actual rulers of the Eighteenth Dynasty. (Harmesses Miamun is omitted from the list because he does not belong to the Eighteenth Dynasty.) How I arrived at this conclusion is set forth below.
I do, however, first want to draw your attention to a few observations about the proposed reconstruction.
In two instances I have combined together more than one Josephus king and aligned the concatenated reigns with the single reign of a particular Eighteenth Dynasty king. One of those kings is Thutmose III, whose reconstructed length in the Josephus list is 60 years and 4 months. This is approximately 6 years and 5 months longer than his actual reign and this increased length will have to be accounted for.
The other king whose reign includes more than one Manetho king is Horemheb, who I have combined with Josephus�s Acencheres I (number 12) and Acencheres II (number 13) and with Ramesses, his coregent. The combined length of reign is 26 years. For Horemheb we have an unofficial high-year mark of 27 years. It doesn�t indicate how far into the 27th year he went but in our Josephus construction, Horemheb completed a 26th year. The rounding off of partial months in the three Josephus reigns I associate with Horemheb could have actually shortened the Josephus total by up to a couple of months, which would have deprived him of some portion of his 27th year.
Additionally, if you add up the lengths of reign for all the Josephus kings in the Eighteenth Dynasty reconstruction, excluding Harmesses Miamun but including Ramesses I (as coregent with Horemheb), the total duration is 266 years and 10 months, which exceeds the duration of our Chronological Model by almost the same number of years that the erroneous length of reign for Thutmose III in our Josephus reconstruction exceeds the true length of reign. (Our Chronological Model has a total duration of between 258-262 years.)

Placing Manetho�s Kings in Archaeological Context

Hatshepsut
As noted above, Josephus�s Queen Amessis clearly corresponds to Queen Hatshepsut.

Amenophis and Amenhotep
Josephus also has three kings named Amenophis, which suggests that they should correspond to three of the four Amenhoteps in the Eighteenth Dynasty. Let�s look at the reigns for the three kings named Amenophis.
Amenhotep I: Amenophis I (Josephus�s number 3) has a length of reign of 20 years and 7 months. Amenhotep I has a high year mark of 21, an excellent fit.
Amenhotep II: Amenophis II (Josephus�s number 8) has a reign of 30 years and 10 months, while Amenhotep II has a high year mark of at least 26 years and ruled no more than about 34 years (as the 34th year after the death of Thutmose III falls somewhere in the reign of Thutmose IV, Amenhotep II�s successor.) Since Amenhotep III had a high year mark of 37 and Amenhotep IV had a high year mark of only 17, it seems most likely that Josephus�s Amenophis II, ruling 30 years and 10 months, corresponds to Amenhotep II. The Josephus total is about 5 years longer than the highest known year-mark for Amenhotep II, but high-year marks are only a minimum length of reign, not a  maximum (unless they are death-years.) When we place this reign in the context of our Chronological Model, we will see that it fits in neatly.
Amenhotep IV (Akhenaten) and Smenkhkare: This leaves one more Amenophis in the Josephus list (number 17.) Josephus gives him a suggested length of reign of 19 years and 6 months. The closest correspondence would be Amenhotep IV, who ruled into his seventeenth year. However, Amenhotep IV�s successor, Smenkhkare, who may have shared some coregency with Amenhotep IV and who also promoted the Amarna heresy, ruled into his third year. So, if we combine these two kings together as if they were a single reign, the 19 years and 6 months makes an excellent fit with the chronological requirements and archaeological data.
The one apparent drawback, which we will resolve further below, is that by combining these two kings under one reign we increase the disparity between the number of actual kings who served in the Eighteenth Dynasty and the number of kings listed in the Josephus chronology.
Amenhotep III: Having disposed of three of the four Amenhoteps, we need to find one more, Amenhotep III, who had a high year mark of 37. The most likely candidate is Josephus�s Orus, to whom Josephus assigned a reign of 36 years and 5 months, a fit so tight with that of Amenhotep III that few Egyptologists dispute this identification.
Tutankhamen and Ay
We have high-year marks for Tutankhamen and Aye of 9 and 4 respectively. This would seem to closely fit with Josephus�s Rathotis (number 11) and Harmais (number 14), to whom he assigns respectively 9 years and 4 years and 1 month.

Ahmose
Most Egyptologists also accept that the first king in the Josephus list, Tethmosis, who is identified as Amos in Africanus and Amoses or Amosis in Eusebius, corresponds to Ahmose, the founder of the Eighteenth Dynasty. Although this king has a high year mark of only 22, Egyptologists commonly assign him 25 years on the basis of Manetho�s 25 years and 4 months in the Josephus list.

Ramesses I
Although Ramesses I is conventionally identified as the first king of the Nineteenth Dynasty, he served much of his term as coregent with Horemheb. The three Manetho sources all place Ramesses I earlier than the last Amenophis (i.e., Amenhotep IV) in the list, and both Africanus and Eusebius begin the Nineteenth Dynasty with Sethos, the son of Ramesses I. This would suggest that for analysis of Manetho�s Eighteenth Dynasty chronology, we should incorporate Ramesses I as part of the roster. Josephus gives him a reign of 1 year and 4 months, which closely follows the archaeological evidence of a high-year mark of Year 2.
Thutmose III and the Extra Kings Problem
So far we have nine excellent correspondences between the Josephus king-list and the actual king-list for the Eighteenth Dynasty, and a tenth very good correlation between Amenhotep II and Josephus�s Amenophis (number 3), which indicates this king may have served a few years longer than indicated in the highest attested year in the record. There still remain five more kings to account for, the four Thutmoses and Horemheb. At the same time there are seven remaining kings in the Josephus list to account for, two more than we should expect.
Table 4-6 shows the Josephus kings not yet allotted and from which we need to choose our remaining correspondences. The list of kings appears in the same order as in the Joseph list and the number in parentheses indicates their actual position in the Josephus list.
The immediate problem that we face is that Thutmose III served for 53 years, 10 months and 26 days and none of the kings in Table 4-6 served anywhere close to that length of reign. If we incorporate Josephus�s Amessis (i.e., Hatshepsut) as part of Thutmose III�s reign, given that she was his coregent, we can include Amessis�s 21 years and 9 months in the Thutmose III total. However, even if we add the longest of the unassigned reigns to the Amessis total, Mephramuthosis�s 25 years and 10 months, we still fall about 6 years and 3 months too short.
This suggests that we have to select at least one more king in the Josephus list to bring us up to the required length of reign. If we include Mephramuthosis in the Thutmose III total, we have to include at least one other king in the Josephus list in order to reach the number of years actually served by Thutmose III. Alternatively, if we exclude Mephramuthosis from the total, we have to utilize at least three other kings from the Josephus list to obtain the necessary number of years. Unfortunately, examination of the list shows that whatever combination of kings we choose, the total will cause Thutmose III to have a length of reign several years longer than his actual length of reign.
Another important observation about the seven remaining Josephus kings is that five of them served lengths of reign that are separated by less than a year in duration, ranging from 12 years and 1 month to 13 years. In addition, the longest reign in the group of seven, 25 years and 10 months, is approximately equal to two combined reigns of 12 and a fraction years. That leaves only the 9 years and 8 months assigned to Thmosis outside the numerical pattern.
This array of reign lengths, therefore, makes it difficult to find a perfect solution to the assignment of correspondences between the Josephus and Eighteenth Dynasty king-lists. Egyptologists with pet theories can slightly manipulate the assignment of lengths of reign to accommodate their needs, but whichever distribution combination they choose, the assigned lengths of reign will not vary very much in overall duration and all such manipulations will fall within the basic parameters of our chronological model.
For that reason, with one exception that is not based on the length of reign, I am going to leave the lengths of reign in the order that Josephus has given. (Admittedly, this is not always the most reliable approach to take with Josephus, given his various misalignments, but, for reason stated above, the decision does not materially affect the outcome.)
The one exception that I make to the Josephus sequence is to identify his first Acencheres, number 10 in his list, with Thutmose II, placing this reign right after Chebron and before the earlier listed reigns of Mephres, Mephramuthosis, and Thmosis.
The reason for that switch is that Josephus describes this pharaoh as �his daughter�, presumably referring to the daughter of her predecessor. In the Josephus list that would make Acencheres the daughter of Orus (i.e., Amenhotep III) but that pharaoh had no daughter on the throne. The only pharaoh to whom such a description could apply would be Thutmose I, whose daughter was Hatshepsut, and we have already accounted for her reign with Amessis. But if we recall that Hatshepsut tried to create the appearance that she served as coregent to Thutmose II, whom she detested, then the identification of this Acencheres, the daughter of a pharaoh, with Thutmose II�s reign seems to make some logical sense. Therefore I assign the 12 years and 1 month given to this Acencheres to Thutmose II.
With that assignment in place, and otherwise following the Josephus order of kings, I suggest the following set of correspondences:
1. Chebron corresponds to Thutmose I, for a length of reign equal to 13 years.
2. Mephres plus Mephramuthosis together form part of the reign of Thutmose III. These reigns should be added on to the total for Amessis, giving a grand total of 60 years and 4 months, which is 6 years and 5 months too long. If that extra number of years is deleted from the Josephus dynastic total of 266 years and 10 months, we have a duration of just over 260 years, consistent with our Chronological Model.
3. Thmosis corresponds with Thutmose IV, giving him a reign of 9 years and 8 months.

Horemheb and Ramesses I
This leaves us with two unassigned kings, Acencheres I and Acencheres II (numbers 12 and 13) with respective reigns of 12 years and 5 months and 12 years and 3 months, a total of 24 years and 8 months. In my reconstruction I have aligned these two kings with Horemheb, but the total is a little short for a king who may have reached his 27th year. However, if we add in Ramesses (number 15), serving 1 year and 4 months, and add that to Horemheb, to account for the coregency between the two, the new total is 26 years completed, bringing us to the edge of a 27th year. The rounding off of partial months for these three included kings could account for his falling just shy of the 27th year.
The one major switch I would consider making in the above assignments would be to identify Mephramuthosis with Horemheb, giving him a reign of 25 years and 10 months. Adding to it the coregency with Ramesses I would give him a total duration of up to 27 years and 2 months, and a little shorter if not all of the reign of Ramesses I corresponds to a coregency. If such a switch were made, then Acencheres I and Acencheres II would replace Mephramuthosis in the alignment with Thutmose III. As the two Acencheres have a combined reign of 24 years and 8 months versus the 25 years and 10 months for Memphramuthosis, we would reduce Thutmose III�s reign by that difference, 1 year and 2 months, and thereby reduce the Thutmose III over-count to about 5 years and 3 months.
While I do not at this time propose making that switch, I don�t reject it as an acceptable alternative for the reconstruction of Manetho�s Eighteenth Dynasty.
How the Josephus Reconstruction Fits Our Chronological Model
With the Josephus reconstructions in place, our first concern should be to see how his reigns for Thutmose I, Thutmose II, Amenhotep II, and Thutmose IV fit into the Chronological Model. In the analysis above we set up the following correlations:

True King	Josephus King	Josephus Reign
Thutmose I	(2) Chebron	13 years;
Thutmose II	(10)Acencheres	12 years, 1 month;
Amenhotep II	(8) Amenophis	30 years, 10 months;
Thutmose IV	(7) Thmosis	9 years, 8 months.

In our Chronological Model, the combined length of reign for Thutmose I and Thutmose II was 25-26 years. In the above correlations, the reconstructed Josephus total is 25 years and 1 month, as tight a fit as you could want. For the combined reigns of Amenhotep II and Thutmose IV the target range was about 41 years. In the Josephus reconstruction, the total is 40 years and 6 months, again an extremely tight fit.
For Ahmose, Egyptologists already accept the Manetho figure as the likely length of reign. For Amenhotep I, Hatshepsut, Amenhotep III, Akhenaten and Smenkhkare combined, Tutankhamen, Ay, and Horemheb and Ramesses I combined, the Josephus reconstructions coincided exactly with the high year marks as preserved in the archaeological record.
Among our other assumptions with regard to the chronological model was that the length of time from Amenhotep IV to the start of Sethos was 59 years. In the Josephus construction that total works out to 58 years and 7 months, again, right on target.  Additionally, our assignment of reigns indicates that the 34th year after Thutmose III fell during the reign of Thutmose IV as required by the model.
This leaves only Thutmose III with a significant disparity, approximately 6 years and 5 months more than he served. If we subtract the Thutmose III over-count from the 266 years and 10 months for the Josephus total for the Eighteenth Dynasty, the revised Josephus dynastic duration would be 260 years and 5 months, right in line with our chronological model
To have only one inaccurate length of reign among fifteen kings shows that Manetho must have had an extremely accurate account of this dynasty in his original text. We will consider this Thutmose III error in more detail further below, where it will be argued that Manetho had the correct length of reign and that the extra years were the result of a mistake in transmission.
The 59-Year Reign of Sethos
There are three reigns so far unaccounted for in the Josephus list, Harmesses Miamun at 66 years and 2 months, Sethos at 59 years, and Rampses at 66 years. At first glance the reigns of Harmesses Miamun and Rampses appear to be duplicate but slightly inconsistent accounts of the reign of Ramesses II, who reigned for 66 years and 10 months. In addition, the reign of 59 years for Sethos is significantly out of bounds for the actual length of reign of about 11 to 18 years.
The 59 year length, however, recalls that Ramesses II assigned a 59-year reign to Horemheb, thereby incorporating all the reigns associated with the Amarna heresy under Horemheb�s sole rule. This suggests that in this portion of the list we are dealing with some confusion between summation lines and lengths of reign. For example, there might have been the existence of an earlier text that said something like �to Sethos, 59 years,� which was intended to indicate how many years passed from the start of Akhenaten�s reign to the beginning of Sethos�s reign. Such an entry may have easily been confused with a reference to the actual length of reign for Sethos. That is, some one may have read �to Sethos� to mean �give to Sethos� rather than �down to Sethos.�
In support of the idea that Sethos�s reign derives from an erroneous interpretation of a line of summation, we find some corroboration in the Africanus and Eusebius lists. If we count up the number of years in the Africanus list for the corresponding set of pharaohs, running from Amenhotep IV to the end of Ramesses I (Rathos to Amenophath in the Africanus list) we have a total of 55 years, and while Africanus gives Sethos only a 51 year reign, the Eusebius list gives him a 55 year reign. This suggests that the �51 years� of Africanus is a corrupt transmission of the �55 years� in Eusebius, which is itself a corrupt transmission of the 59 years in Manetho.
Eusebius seems to have incorporated another error into the same listing, giving his Amenophis a reign of 40 years, which would be the number of years from the end of Amenhotep IV to the beginning of Sethos I. This suggests a similar error in which the sum from Amenophis to Sethos was taken as beginning with the end of Amenophis�s reign instead of the beginning. Note that in all three Manetho lists, Sethos appears immediately after Amenophis, and in Josephus, no length of reign is given when Sethos is first listed. This suggests a good deal of confusion throughout the ranks of redactors concerning the chronology from Amenophis through Sethos. Further below we will note some additional problems with the 59-year reign associated with Sethos.

The Josephus Summation Lines
At this point I wish to examine the issue alluded to earlier, about original numbers from Manetho that suggested a duration of 259 years for Manetho�s Eighteenth Dynasty. As noted earlier, these additional clues appeared in a very confusing chronological context at the end of Josephus�s account of the Eighteenth Dynasty. As also noted, the figures for the reigns of Sethos and Rampses, 59 and 66 years respectively, appeared in this other portion of the Josephus text rather than with his earlier listing of the length of reigns for the dynasty. Let me, therefore, provide a little textual context for the material and then set forth the chronological problems.
The Josephus Narrative
When Josephus quoted extensively from Manetho, he did so for a very narrow purpose. Manetho told a story about an Egyptian priest named Osarseph, who seized control of Egypt while a pharaoh named Amenophis was on the throne. This Amenophis fled to Ethiopia while Osarseph launched a reign of religious terror. Thirteen years later, Amenophis�s son, �Sethos also called Ramesses,� returned to Egypt and chased Osarseph out of the country. To make a long story short, Manetho identified this renegade Egyptian priest as Moses, and said that his followers were a large group of Egyptians suffering from leprosy. These followers left Egypt with Osarseph/Moses and established a home in Jerusalem.
Manetho�s claim about Moses and his leprous following greatly upset Josephus and the Jewish historian set out to refute the Egyptian�s charge, using Manetho�s text as his primary evidence. According to Josephus, the expulsion of the Hyksos at the beginning of the Eighteenth Dynasty was the true Exodus, and he mustered a variety of arguments to refute Manetho and quoted extensively from Manetho�s text to marshal his evidence. We need not explore the details of the argument and the Manetho narrative for our purposes. (For a more detailed analysis of the Osarseph materials, see my book The Moses Mystery, reprinted as The Bible Myth.) The important thing to know about the story is that Egyptologists generally recognize that the Osarseph story was based on events during the reign of Akhenaten after he changed his name from Amenhotep IV.
Reading the Josephus excerpts, which he seems to have obtained from two occasionally inconsistent copies of Manetho, it appears that his source material placed the Osarseph story at some point after the chronological accounts. Furthermore, Josephus did not see any connection between the Amenophis in the story and the Amenophis at the end of his Eighteenth Dynasty chronology, who corresponds to Akhenaten. He considered the Amenophis in the Osarseph account to be �a fictitious person,--for which reason he did not venture to define the length of his reign, although in the case of the other kings he adds their years precisely.�  Josephus appears to have ignored the fact that in both the Osarseph story and in the king-list, an Amenophis appears as the father of a pharaoh named �Sethos also called Ramesses.�
In addition to the Osarseph story, two other stories became entangled in Josephus�s citing of Manetho. The major one involved a dispute between a pharaoh named Sethos and his brother Harmais. The two fought against each other in a struggle for the throne. The other story involved the Greek myth of Danaus and Aegyptus, which involved an exodus of Greeks from Egypt and which story was an important part of the Greek heritage. (Manetho, remember, was writing in Greek for a Greek pharaoh and a Greek speaking audience.)
The Danaus and Aegyptus story was overlaid onto the Sethos and Harmais story, with Sethos identified as Aegyptus and Harmais as Danaus, the fleeing Greek. Because of some chronological claims in Josephus, it is not clear that he identified this Sethos and Harmais with the Sethos and Harmais in his dynastic chronology. (Eusebius, interestingly, places Danaus and Aegyptus in sequence just before Amenophis/Akhenaten.)

Chronological Claims
Josephus says that the expulsion of Osarseph took place 518 years after the expulsion of the Hyksos (at the beginning of the Eighteenth Dynasty.)  He also says that 393 years passed from the expulsion of the Hyksos down to the two brothers Sethos and Hermaeus (an alternative spelling of Harmais that he also uses, reflecting, perhaps, his reliance on inconsistent Manetho sources.)  He then tells us that Sethos drove out Hermaeus, and the former took the name Aegyptus and the latter Danaus, after which he says Sethos reigned for 59 years and Rampses, after him, for 66 years.
The chronological problems enter into the picture when you try to make sense of Josephus�s time frames.
If you add up all the reigns given in Josephus, from Tethmosis down to the start of Sethos, including Harmesses Miamun, the total is 333 years. Josephus places the start of Sethos�s 59-year reign at the end of 393 years, an apparent 60-year gap. Several interpreters, including Waddell, editor of the Loeb edition of Manetho, assume that the 393 year figure included the reign of Sethos.  If you add in his 59 years you get 392 years instead of 393 years, but let�s assume for the sake of argument that the one year difference is an acceptable error. This places the end of the 393-year period at the end of Sethos�s reign when the Josephus text places it at the beginning of Sethos�s reign.
Josephus also says that the Egyptians expelled Osarseph 518 years after the expulsion of the Hyksos, which is 125 years after the end of the 393-year period.  Contextually, Josephus seems to place the expulsion of Osarseph right after the reigns of Sethos and Rampses, to whom he gives respective durations of 59 and 66 years.
If you add up the 59 years for Sethos and 66 years for Rampses, you get 125 years. Therefore, to reach 518 years (or 517 years with the one year error) you have to double count the reign of Sethos, once to get from Tethmosis to 393 or 392 years and once again to get from 393 years to 518 years. All of these totals include the intrusive Harmesses Miamun, ruling for 66 years and 2 months.
Obviously, the Josephus chronology is quite confused and many are satisfied to simply dismiss it as an example of Manetho�s confusing chronological history. If you ignore Josephus�s explanations, however, and look at the simple numbers, another context suggests itself.

Making Sense of the Manetho Numbers
Josephus describes a period of 518 years from the beginning of the Eighteenth Dynasty to the end of the reign of Rampses. He gives Rampses a reign of 66 years and his predecessor, Sethos, a reign of 59 years. If we move Harmesses Miamun into the period between the end of the Eighteenth Dynasty and the start of Sethos, and we also replace Josephus�s erroneous figure for the reconstructed reign of Thutmosis III (i.e., 60 years and 4 months) with the correct length of reign (i.e., 53 years and 11 months), we get the following chronological arrangement:

1. Eighteenth Dynasty	260 years and 5 months; 
2. Harmesses Miamun	66 years and 2 months;
3. Unassigned time frame 66 years and 5 months; 
4. Sethos		59 years;
5. Rampses		66 years;
6. Subtotal 2-3		132 years and 7 months;
7. Subtotal 4-5		125 years;
8. Subtotal 2-5		257 years and 7 months;
9. Total 1-5		518 years.

In other words, the period of time defined by Josephus as following after the Eighteenth Dynasty appears to be less than 3 years shorter than the period of time allotted to the Eighteenth Dynasty. This suggests that, to some extent, the periods of time following after Josephus�s Eighteenth Dynasty may be summation lines. And, if we recognize that the 518 year total is equal to twice 259 years, the relationship becomes more apparent. ...
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