Draft sections of the 'Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended' and of a treatise on Daniel: section f

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Chap. VIII.
The Monarchy of Egypt at Memphys.

Herodotus & Diodorus tell us from the Egyptian Priests that Orus the son of Osiris & Isis was the last of the Gods who reigned in Egypt & that after the Gods & Typhon Egypt was governed by men the first of which was Menes. So Iosephus saith that all the kings of Egypt from Minæus who built Memphys were called Pharaoh. So also Eratosthenes, Manetho, Africanus Eusebius & Syncellus unanimously make Menes the first king of Egypt, that is after the Gods. He taught the people the adoration of the Gods & the manner of divine worship & therefore lived after the Gods of Egypt. He taught the people how to adorn their beds & tables with rich cloaths & coverings & was the first that brought in a delicate & sumptuous way of living and therefore reigned over a rich & flourishing kingdom such as was scarce to be met with in Egypt before the expulsion of the Shepherds. He made a bridge over the Nile at Memphys & twelve miles above Memphys by making a great bank of earth turned the river into a new channel through the middle of the mountains & the old channel being dried up he there built Memphys on the western side of the river & therein he built the most magnificent & memorable Temple of Vulcan, works to great for any age before the reign of Sesostris. By the counsel of all antiquity he reigned after Osiris Isis & Orus & by consequence after Sesak & the son of Sesak. He was the first that instituted written laws feigning that he received them from Mercury, & therefore he reigned after Mercury had invented the Theban letters & was deified.

Manethos^[1] tells us of two Mercuries, the first called Thoth, the second the son of Agathodæmon & father of Tat who translated into books what the first wrote in the sacred dialect & hieroglyphical letters on pillars in the Syringes or vaults neare Thebes, & placed the books in the Adyta of the Temples of Egypt. The first was the Secretary of Osiris & Isis, the second I take to be Athothis <2r> whom Manetho & Eratosthenes make the successor of Menes & of whom Manetho saith that he built the royal Palace in Memphys & wrote books of Anatomy being a Physitian. The invention of the Egyptian letters is by Sanchoniatho & others ascribed to the first Mercury Till his days & for a good while after they used the Hieroglyphic writing as appears by the Obelisks made by Sesostris & some of his successors. But when the letters invented by this Mercury began to be in use, the Secretary of State wrote down the laws of Egypt in these letters & translated the sacred inscriptions into books for the use of the Temples, & this was done in the reign of Menes whose Secretary was therefore called the second Mercury. Anticlides wrote that one Menon or Menas invented letters in Egypt 15 years before Phoroneus a most ancient king of Greece & endeavored to prove it by ancient records & monuments. If Menas be Menes, the invention of letters is ascribed to him because he first brought them into use in Egypt. But if they were invented 15 years before the reign of Phoroneus, Menon or Menas may be Ammon the father of Sesostris, & thus letters might be invented in Egypt before Cadmus brought them into Greece.

Menes reigning next after the Gods & semi-gods & being the successor of Orus, lived in the times of the Argonautic expedition & Trojan war & so was contemporary to Memnon. For they are but several names of the same king. Ffrom Amenophis or Amenoph by omitting the first letter were formed Menphis, Memphis, Moph, Noph, the names of his royal city & also Menoph Menes, Memnon his own names.. The name Menes is by Eratosthenes interpreted Διόνιος Iovius & therefore came from the word Ammon or Amenoph (the Egyptian name of Iupiter) by omitting the first letter. This is the great Iupiter of the Atlantides whose father Saturn by his ill manners & covetousness lost the love of his people & was thereupon expelled his kingdom by his son. This king is also called Amenephthes by Eusebius, Imandes, Ismandes & Isimandes by Strabo, Osimandes by Heccatæus, Osimanduas æ Mendes by Diodorus.

Iosephus tells us out of Manetho that this Amenophis was a contemplator of the Gods as was Orus a former king, & was perswaded by one of the Priests to purge Egypt from leaprous and impure men, & for that end gathered then out of all Egypt to the number of 80000 & granted them Abaris or Pelusium the city of Typhon to inhabit whereupon they conceiving this a fit place to make a rebellion made Osarsiphus Priest of Heliopolis their captain & abolished the worship of the Theban Gods & fortified their cities & prepared for war against Amenophis & called in the Iews from Ierusalem who came to Pelusium with an army of 200000 to their assistance. That this was the second invasion of Egypt by the Shepherds, & that Amenophis came against them with an army of 300000 leaving his young son Ramesses (a child of five years old ) in the care of a friend, but before he fought Osarsiphus he returned back <3r> to Memphys & went thence into Ethiopia with all his ships & multitude where he reigned 13 years while Osarsiphus & the Iews reigned at Peleusium. That Osarsiphus was Moses & made laws for the people at Abaris & wasted the cities of Egypt: but after 13 years Amenophis came out of Ethiopia with a great army & his son Ramesses joyned him with another army & they fought the shepherds & polluted people & drave them out of Egypt pursuing them as far as the borders of Syria. And the same story is told by Cheræmon with some variation of circumstances. For Cheræmon saith that when Amenophis retired into Ethiopia he left his wife big with child of Messenes, for so he calls Ramesses. Let the story be purged from the mistake that Osarsiphus was Moses & from the calumny that the Egyptians who called in the Iews were leaprous æ let it be compared with what the Atlantides relate of Iupiter's expelling his wicked father & it will run thus, that when the army of Zerah was beaten at Maresch by the Iews, the Egyptians to guard Egypt against the Iews placed great forces in Pelusium. that the people of Egypt & Ethiopia revolting from Zerah set up Amenophis over them & the Egyptians at Pelusium revolted from the Ethiopians & made Osarsiphus their captain & called in the victorious Iews to their assistance; that Amenophis led his army against Osarsiphus, & being afraid returned back to Memphys without venturing a second battel against the Iews & from thence went up into Thebais & Ethiopia leaving his wife at Memphys either big with child or the child about six or eight years old. That India or some part thereof being in subjection to Egypt he sent for a body of Ethiopians from thence by sea to strengthen himself & gave them seats above Egypt; for Eusebius^[2] tells us: Sub Amenophe Æthiopes ab Iudo flumine consurgentes juxta Ægyptum consederunt. That after 13 years he returned with what force he & his young son Ramesses could make & conquered Osarsiphus & drave out the Iews. And to this action Ramesses seemed to relate when he inscribed on his Obelisk (as Hermapion^[3] interpreted it) that he had saved Egypt by expelling forreigners

Manetho saith that the shepherds obteined Egypt 511 years.

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the Roman Empire erected. This inscription seems to have been upon one of those Obelisks neare the monument of Memnon in Thebes mentioned by Strabo an eye witness. Above the Memnomium saith he are the sepulchers of forty kings of Egypt in caves cut in stone & by them in certain Obelisks inscriptions the riches & power of those Kings & the dominion propagated to Scythia & Bactriana & India & Ionia with the greatness of their tribute & their army of a thousand thousand men.

Next reigned Amenophes called Amenephthes by Eusebius Imandes, Ismandes & Isimandes by Strabo, Osymandes by Hecatæus æ Osimanduas & Mendes by Diodorus & generally Memnon by the Greeks. His ^a[4] mother was a Queen & therefore we may reccon him of the royal race of Sesostris. By the riches of his predecessor & his own acquisitions he did such works as made him more known to the Greeks then any of the Kings He visited the conquests of Sesostris, marched through Ionia & Phrygia, subdued the rebelling Bactrians, staid long in Susiana & left there a Palace & other works which the Greeks called Memnonia. In Egypt at Abydus he built another stately Palace & at Thebes on the west side of the Nile two Colossuses on of which was that famous statue which every morning at sun rise sounded with a musical voice. He built also at Thebes for his sepulchre a very magnificent structure like a Temple ten furlongs in circuit with several stately Porticos & Galleries. At the entrance of one of the porticos were three ) statues his own his mothers & his daughters each of one stone. His own was the biggest statue in all Egypt the measure of the foot thereof exceeding seven cubits. On this statue was this inscription

On the walls of one of the Galleries were Sculptures representing the war he made against the rebelling Bactrians with 400000 foot & 20000 horse commanded in four bodies by his four sons & also his beseiging a fortified place encompassed by a river (videlicet Susa) & his carrying away captives & triumphing for the victories. Perhaps this was the Memnonium in Thebais which Philostratus calls the Temple of Memnon others the temple of Serapis where was the speaking statue. [He built also^[5] the Labyrinth a work as magnificent as the Pyramids & at the end of which was a square Pyramid each of whose sides were almost four thacres & the height as much which is half the measure of the greatest Pyramid assigned by Herodotus]

Among the stupendious works of these Kings is to be recconed the vast Lake of Mæris with two Pyramids in the midst of fifty paces height above the water & as much below & upon each a Colossus in a throne representing him and his wife. This Lake was one of the greatest miracles of <5r> Egypt being made with Sluces to receive the water of the Nile in time of overflow & let it out afterwards to water the land. It was 3600 stadiums or 450 miles in compass & 50 paces deep where deepest. The channel by which the water flowed in & out was 80 stadiums long & 300 feet broad & cut in some places through rocks under ground. To open & shut the sluces cost 50 talents every time. He built also the stately northern Portico of the Temple of Vulcan & found out the elements of Geometry, & by all these characters was one of the successors of Sesostris. For Sesostris gave the first occasion to Geometry by dividing Egypt equally among all the Egyptians & built that sumptuous Temple of Vulcan to which Rhampsis Mæris & added Porticos & the work of the Lake was too vast for any age before his reign. He built also the Labyrinth neare the Lake & at with end of it a square Pyramid each of whose sides were almost four acres æ the height as much which is half the measure of the greatest Pyramid. And here the founder is supposed to lye intombed..

< insertion from f 4v >

The innermost room where the Kings body was supposed to lye was very magnificent with twenty rich beds to eat upon & the Statues of Iupiter Iuno & the King & apartments round about the room wherein were painted all the beasts which are accounted sacred in Egypt. Thence were ascents to the top of the whole Monument of the Sepulchre which being mounted appeared a border of gold round the tomb of three hundred sixty five cubits in compass & a cubit thick & the days of the year were distinguisht & inscribed on the several cubits a day on each cubit with the rising & setting of the stars & their signification according to the doctrine of the Egyptian Astrologers. This border was carried away by Cambyses when he conquered Egypt.

So sumptuous a monument as this border was would scarcely have been made by this king & placed next about his tomb, had it not been in memory of something done by himself. For all the rooms relate to him conteining representations of his person actions Iustice riches bounty piety, learning & way of life. His Library denotes him studious as well as warlike & the golden border shews that he applied himself to the study of the stars & made a new regulation of the year: // The first men would be apt to reccon time by lunar months & by summers & winters & thence come the Luni-solar year. These months consisting usually of 29 & 30 days alternately & there being something more then twelve of these months in a year they afterwards enlarged the months allotting 30 days to every month that 12 months might equal the year & this seems to be the oldest solar year & the occasion of dividing a circle into 360 degrees. This year being still found too short the Egyptians added five days to the end of it & so made the year of 365 days. / Who added these days has been disputed but this monument shews it was done by this King. // Arts & sciences are most apt to flourish in great kingdoms these & a Kalender to be reformed upon setting a new dominion, & Memnon was he that restored the Dominion & peace of Egypt. // And even the year itself points at him for its author. For by the year which the Israelites brought out of Egypt it a it began at the vernal equinox in his reign & therefore was either constituted by him or else was much older then the Egyptian Monarchy. If you re – – – – period 3821 (& for three years after) on the third day of April, which was then the first day after the vernal Equinox according to the Suns mean motion, & that year was about 55 years after the overthrow of the Ethiopians by Asa which I reccon within the compas of his reign. For Memnons actions after that victory make him long lived, & its probable that he minded not Astronomy till after he had finished his wars, which in Egypt & Asia together might take him up the first thirty or 35 years of that time. Damis saith that he died in Ethiopia after he had reigned 5 generations.

After this year was instituted the Egyptians observing more accurately the length of the year by the Heliacal rising of the stars

He did not therefore know that this year was too short by a 1/4t^ter of a day so as in every 4 years to make the stars change the day of their heliacal rising & setting For had he know this (as he would have done had this year been older then his reign) he would not have noted their rising & setting on certain days of this year in a Monument which he designed to be lasting. Astronomy was therefore then in its infancy & may reccon him its founder.

Afterwards the Egyptians by continuing to observe the rising & setting of the stars found that this year was too short by a quarter of a day, that is by a year in 1460 years & thence formed their Annus magnus of 1460 Egyptian years in which time the beginning of their year ran round the Zodiack. But the difference between the solar & the sidereal year they had not yet observed. This great year they called canicular because they determined its length by the rising of the Dog star. In the next room was delineated a court of Iustice with people about with Iudge & in the next Next was a room was delineated the magnificent furnishing of the Table his riches & his offerings to the Gods, In the next was represented his Library with this inscription, the cure of the mind. And next the Library was a stately room

< text from f 5r resumes >

He is called Maris, Myris, Marrus & corruptly Ayres, Biyres, Soris, Lachares, Labares & Thuoris by changing the letter M into Α, VI, Σ, ΛΑ & such like mistakes. His successor in the Canons^[6] is called Saophis Suphis & Saphaosos

Saophis (called also Suphis, Siphaosos, Syphuris, Phiops, Cheops, Chembis & Chemmis [Apappus maximus,                 was a merchant & contemplator of the Gods & & wrote a sacred book which, saith Manetho, I procured in Egypt. Hence they called him Mercury & therefore this was he who wrote the books which went under the name of Mercury & was called Trismegistus . Herodotus writes that he interdicted the sacrifices & shut up the Temples during his reign to imploy the people in his works. But this looks like a story made by those who were angry at the Pyramids. For among the successors of Sesostris Herodotus & Diodorus reccon the founders of the three great Pyramids neare Memphys & ascribe the biggest of them to this King, another of them to his brother & successor Cephren (called also Suphis Saophis Sen Saophis Mente-Suphis, Methu-Suphis & Achesca Ocharas) & the third either by the daughter of Cheops whom Manetho calls Nitocris or by Mycerinus the son of Suphis & successor of Cephren, who in the chronical canons is called also Cerinus & Moscherus & Mencheres.

Asychis the successor of Mycerinus made the very large

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& thereupon made a fable that Rhea being with child by Saturn the Sun playd she might not be delivered in any month nor in the year: & that Mercury won from Luna at dice so much time as made five days & added them to the 360 days. In giving this account how the Sun got 5 days to his year & the moon lose as many from hers, they make the year before this alteration to consist of 360 days. And on that account they called the 5 days επαγομενοι additional to the year.

So Moses describes the duration of the flood by months of 30 days each & & to a year of 12 such months Iohn alluded in the Apocalyps in making three times (or years) & an half equal to 42 months & those equal to 1260 days. And solon in discoursing with Cræsus reccons seventy years of 360 days each & then tells us of intercalary months every other year. For the Athenians every other year added months of 10 & 11 days alternately having been taught the length of the solar year by the Egyptians.

The first men would be apt to take notice of the revolutions of the sun & moon & the returns of summer & winter & thence came the recconings of time by days months & years, & the forming of Lunisolar years. Then finding that these months consisted of 29 & 30 days alternately & that there were something more then 12 such months in a summer & winter they took the round numbers of 30 days to a month & 12 months to a year & accordingly divided the Zodiac into 12 signs & every sign into 30 degrees & this seems to be the oldest solar year & the grownd of dividing a circle into 360 degrees. So Moses describes the duration of the flood by months of 30 days each & Solon in discoursing with Cræsus reccons 70 years of 360 days each & to such years Iohn alludes in the Apocalyps in making 3 times (or years) & an half equal to 42 months & those to 1260 days. At length finding this year too short the Egyptians added 5 days to the end of it, & as they had before dedicated the 12 months to the 12 Gods so now & called those days ἐπαγόμενας additional days & dedicated them to {nativiti}es of their Gods Osyris Isis Orus Typhon Nephthe. & in memory of the addition formed this fable that Rhea being with child by Saturn the sun prayd she might not be delivered in any month nor in the year & that Mercury won from Luna at Dice the two & seventieth part of every day which of the whole yeare made up 5 days & added those 5 days to the 360. This is the reason they give why men made the Solar year longer & the Lunar shorter then the old year of 360 days. //Tis agreed that this alteration of the ancient Solar year was made by the Egyptians, & this Monument by dividing the circle into 365 degrees shews that it was made in the reign of Amenophis. He restored the dominion of Egypt & Calendars are seldome reformed but upon setting up new dominions. Nor perhaps was any king big enough to do it before him & Sesostris.

And even the year it self of 365 days points at him for the author. The first ages in recconing by summers & winters would be apt (like Thucydides in his {hist}) to begin their year in spring or autumn. So did the Iews in the year which they brought out of Egypt. And if the Egyptians did the same, & accordingly began this year at one of the Equinoxes at its first institution. it was either instituted by him or very much older then he – Now if this year was made to begin at the autumnal equinox twas an hundred years older then Moses, if at the rising of the Dog star (as some think) twas 300 years older then Sesak (& on this ground Syncellus seems to ascribe it to the Shepherds), but if at the vernal equinox it began in the reign of this king. For this egyptian year was the same with the year of Nabonassar & in the year of the Iulian Period 3821 (& for 3 years after) began on the 3^d of April which was then the first day after the vernal equinox according to the Suns mean motion, & that Iulian year was 55 years after the overthrow of the Ethiopians by Asa which I reccon within the compass of the reign of Amenophis. For his exile & actions after that victory of Asa

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the Roman Empire exacted. This inscription seems to have been upon one of those Obelisks neare the Monument of Memnon in Thebes mentioned by Strabo an eye witness. Above the Memnonium saith he are the Sepulchres of forty kings of Egypt in caves cut in stone & by them in certain Obelisks inscriptions declaring the riches & power of those kings & their dominion propagated to Scythia & Bactriana & India & Ionia with the greatness of their tribute & their army of a thousand thousand men.

Next reigned Amenophis called Amenephthes by Eusebius, Imandes Ismandes & Isimandes by Strabo, Osimandes by Hecatæus, Osimanduas & Mendes by Diodorus. His ^a[7] mother was a Queen & he was the ^b[8] son of Rhampses. In his reign & in the 14 or 15^th year of Asa King of Iuda ^c[9], Zerah the Ethiopian with an army of a thousand thousand Ethiopians ^d[10] & Libyans invaded Iudea. Their way was through Egypt & they seem to have made a considerable stay there. For Asa had peace ten years before they invaded him & long prepard to meet either them or the Egyptians. For while the land was yet before him he sought the lord & destroyed Idolatry & fortified the cities of Iudea with walls & towers & gates & barrs & prepared an army of five hundred & eighty thousand men. This he did without any checque from the Egyptians they having work enough at home. At length when the Ethiopians advanced from Egypt, he met them with this army & routed them totaly at Mareshah a town of Iudea towards Egypt & pursued them to Gerar & smote the cities about Gerar & as he returned with much spoile Azariah the prophet went out to meet him & said Hear me Asa & Iudah & Benjamin. The Lord is with you while ye be with him & if ye seek him he will be found of you but if ye forsake him he will forsake you. Now for a long season Israel hath been without a true God & without a teaching Priest & without Law. And in those times [videlicet under the dominion of Egypt] there was no peace to him that went out nor to him that came in but great vexations were upon all the inhabitants of the countries & nation was destroyed of nation & city of city: For God did vex them with all adversity. But when Israel in their trouble [videlicet out of fear of the Ethiopians] did turn unto the Lord & sought him he was found of them. The Ethiopians therefore invaded Egypt before he began to seek the Lord & by consequence stayed in Egypt some years before they invaded Iudea.

By this victory the Iews shook of the dominion of Egypt For whereas Sesak had taken away all the treasures of the Temple Asa now brought into the Temple the silver & gold & vessels which he & his father had dedicated in the room of what Sesak had taken away. And henceforward he and his son Iehosaphat flourished in power & wealth for many years. So then by this <7r> invasion the dominion of Egypt was shaken so that Herodotus was not much out when he wrote that Sesostris was the only King that enjoyed the Empire.

Iosephus tells us out of Manetho & Chæremon that in the reign of Amenophis (that Amenophis who was the son of Rampsus & grandson of Sethos & father of Ramesses) a great body of Egyptians revolted at Pelusium & had a polity & laws given them by Osarsiphus Priest of Heliopolis & called in a body of Iews from Ierusalem to their assistance & that Amenophis leaving his wife with child of Ramesses or the child but 5 years old fled to Ethiopia where the King of Ethiopia was voluntarily subject to him & after thirteen years exile or above his young son Ramesses drave out the rebells & the Iews to the borders of Syria & called back his father. This story Manetho & Chæremon have distorted applying it to the times of Moses as if Moses were Osarsiphus & the Israelites whom Moses led out of Egypt were the Iews now expelled by Amenophis. Let the story be purged from what belongs to that fiction & it will amount to this that after the Ethiopians were routed at Maresah the Ethiopians called in the victorious Iews to their assistance & then by a new war drove out the Ethiopians & Libyans from the lower Egypt & made them retire into Thebais & the adjacent parts of Ethiopia carrying along with them with Amenophis & other captives, & that Amenophis staid in exile till his son Ramesses grew up, had the government put into his hands by the Egyptians, conquered the Ethiopians abovementioned & brought back his father & obliged the Iews to withdraw out of Egypt into Syria. And to this action Ramesses seems to relate when he inscribed on his obelisk (as Hermapion^[11] interpreted it) that he had saved Egypt by expelling forreigners. And Eusebius^[12] Sub Amenophe Æthiopes ab Inde flumine consurgentes, juxta Ægyptum consederunt.

Amenophis having recovered Egypt & being now inured to war led his army out of Egypt to visit the conquests of Sesostris, marched through Ionia & Phrygia, subdued the rebbelling Bactrians, took Susa staid long there & left there a Palace & other works which the Greeks call Memnonia. In Egypt at Abydus he built another stately Palace & at Thebes on the west side of the Nile two Colossus's one of which was that famous statue which every morning at sun rise sounded with a musical voice.^✝ < insertion from f 6v > & for the most part Memnon by the Greeks ✝ Pausanias^[13] speaking of this statue, saith, that he most admired the Colossus of the Egyptians in Thebais beyond the Nile at the place called the Syringes. For there is still saith he the statue of a man sitting & many called it Memnon. For they say that he penetrated out of Ethiopia into Egypt & as far as Susa. But the Thebans say it was not Mennon but Phamenophes a native of Thebais. Some say it was the Statue of Sesostris. Cambyses broke off the upper part to the middle & the lower part remaines sitting & every morning at sun rise emits a sound like that of a string of a harp or lute when it happens to break. < text from f 7r resumes > He Amenophis built also at Thebes his own sepulchre^[14] a very magnificent structure like a Temple ten furlongs in circuit with several stately Portico's & Galleries. ‡ < insertion from f 6v > ‡ This seems to be the Memnonium in Thebais which Philostratus calls the Temple of Memnon, others the Temple of Serapis where was the speaking statue. At the entrance – < text from f 7r resumes > At the entrance of one of the Porticos were three statues his own his mothers & his daughters, each of one stone. His own was the biggest statue in all Egypt the measure of the foot thereof exceeding seven cubits. It had this inscription.

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As Babylon & Rome were adorned in the height of their empire so was Thebes & all Egypt in the reign of Sesostris & his successors, the Captives spoiles & tribute of the nations being employed in building Palaces, Temples, Obelisks, Pyramids & other works. For Sesostris returning home ^a[15] with a great multitude of captives & large spoiles & ^b[16] imposing yearly tributes on the conquered nations ^c[17] built & adorned new Temples in all the cities of Egypt ^b honouring the Gods & chiefly Vulcan with gifts & ^d[18] cut ditches from the river Nile into all parts of Egypt for supplying the cities with water & carrying corn & other commodities between them by water: & with the earth dug out he raised the cities higher to defend them from the inundation of the river, & ^n[19] fortified them. & in these works employed only the captives he brought home with him. He erected also in Heliopolis two Obelisks of 120 cubits, inscribing on them the greatness of his dominion & tribute with the number of the conquered nations. ^g[20] one of which Augustus Cæsar conveyed to Rome And ^f[21] before the Temple of Vulcan he erected his own & his wifes statues of 30 cubites & four others of 20 cubits to his four sons. & attempted to cut a ditch from Nile to the red sea.

His son & successor whom Pliny calls Nuncoreus & Herodotus Pheron ^a[22] erected two Obelisks of 100 cubits but did nothi{ng} in war. Rhampses (whom Herodotus calls Rhampsinitus, Diodorus Rhemphis & Africanus Rhapsaces is by Manetho made the eldest son & successor of Sesostris. Whether he was the same with Nuncoreus or his successor is uncertain. He ^b[23] spent his whole age in heaping up wealth & was the richest of all the kings, but did nothing glorious. He gathered in gold & silver 400000 talents an Egyptian talent being two Attic ones that is 120 Attick pounds He ^c[24] built the western portico of the Temple of Vulcan placing his own statues before it. ^d[25] Tacit{us} tells us that Germanicus Cæsar visiting Egypt to know its antiquities viewed the great ruins of old Thebes where some structures remained with Egyptian letters expressing its ancient wealth, & the oldest of the Priests being commanded to interpret them related that there once dwelt in it seven hundred thousand of military age & that king Rhampses the that army reigned over Libya, Ethiopia, the Medes, Persians, Bactrians & Scythians & the territories of the Syrians, Armenians, Cappadocians & Bithynia & Lycia from Sea to Sea The tributes & gifts of every nation (in gold, silver, armour, horses, ivory & odours for the temples & corn & all utensils) were also read being scarce less magnificent then what the Parthians or the Roman Empire exacted. This inscription seems to have been upon one of those Obelisks neare the Munment of Memnon in Thebes mentioned by ^a[26] Strabo an eye witness. Above the Memnonium saith he are the sepulchers of 40 kings of Egypt in caves cut in stone & by them in certain Obelisks inscriptions declaring the riches & power of those kings & the dominion propagated to Scythia & Bactriana & India & Ionia with the greatness of their tribute & their army of a thousand thousand men.

Next reigned Amenophes called Amenephthes by Eusebius, Imandes Ismandes & Isimandes by Strabo Osymandes by Hecatæus & Memnon by the greeks: & he by the riches of his predecessor & by his own acquisitions did such works as made him more then any of the kings. He visited the conquests of Sesostris marched through Ionia & Phrygia, subdued the rebelling Bactrians, ^a[27] staid long in Susiana & left there a palace & other works which the Greeks called Memnonia. In Egypt ^b[28] at Abydus he built another stately Palace & ^c[29] at Thebes two Colossuses one of which was that famous statue which <8v> {every} morning at sun rise sounded with a musical voice. He built also another ^d[30] magnificent structure like a Temple with three statues, his own his mothers & his daughters with this inscription on his own.

And on the walls were sculptures representing the war he made against the rebelling Bactrians with 400000 foot & 20000 horse commanded in four bodies by his four sons, & also his taking of Susa & carrying away captives & triumphing for the victory. Perhaps this was the Memnonium in Thebais which Philostratus calls the temple of Memnon others the temple of Serapis where was the speaking statue.. He built also ^e[31] the Labyrinth a work as magnificent as the Pyramids, & ^f[32] at the end of which was the sepulcher of Imandes the founder being a square Pyramid each of whose sides were almost four acres & the height as much. which is half the measure of the greatest Pyramid assigned by Herodotus.

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Among the stupendious works of these kings are to be recconned the vast Lake of Maris with two Pyramids in the midst of 50 paces height above the water & as much below & upon each a Colossus in a throne representing him & his wife. This Lake was one of the greatest miracles of Egypt being made with sluces to receive the water of the Nile in time of overflow & let it out afterwards to water the land. It was 3600 stadiums or 450 miles in compass & 50 paces deep where deepest. The channel by which the water flowed in & out was 80 stadiums long & 300 feet broad & cut in some places through rocks under ground. To open or shut the sluces cost 50 talents every time. He built also the stately northern portico of the Temple of Vulcan & found out the Elements of Geometry. And by all these characters was one of the successors of Sesostris. For Sesostris gave the first occasion to Geom by dividing Egypt equally among all Egyptians [gave the first occasion to Geometry] he <9v> {& built} that Temple of Vulcan to which Rhampses, Mæris & Asychis added Porticos & the work of the Lake was too vast for any age before this reign. Some attribute the Labyrinth to Maris confounding him with his predecessor Imandes, whence its probable that he finished it. He is sometimes called Mæris, Myris, Marrus & corruptly Ayres, Biyris, Soris, Lachares, Labares, & Thuorus by changing the letter Μ into Α, VI, Σ, ΔΑ & such like mistakes. And Thuor

     

Among the successors of Sesostris Herodotus & Diodorus reccon the founders of the three great Pyramids neare Memphys. The first & greatest was built by Cheops called also Chembis, Chemmis Suphis Siphoas Saophis & Syphuris Phiops, Apappus maximus, the middlemost by his daughter, the third by his brother & successor Chephren called also Suphis, Saophis, & Sen Soaphis Mente Suphis. Diodorus attributes the second to Chephren & the third to Mycerinus the son of Suphis & successor of Chepren. Manetho attributes the third to Nitocris the successor & sister of Mente Suphis. In the chronical canons he is called Moscheres & Mencheres. Saophis or Suphis was a merchant & contemplator of the Gods & wrote a sacred book which saith Manetho I procured in Egypt: whence they called him Mercury. This was he therefore who wrote those books which & who assumed the title of Trismegistus. Herodotus writes that he interdicted the sacrifices & shut up the Temples during his reign to imploy the people in his works. But this looks like a story made by those who were angry at the Pyramids. [He seems to be the same with Nichepsus. For Syncellus makes Nichepsus the successor of Thuoris & the name has affinity with Cheops & the Character of the person with Mercury. For Niceps is was a great Astronomer the first that invented & wrote of Astrological predictions & nativities & of the 36 Decani into which the heaven is divided with their powers, teaching all things that belonged to the art. & being therein followed by the Chaldeans & Magi. Whence Paulinus in Ausonius

And Philastrius Brixiensis affirms that Hermes defined that the generration of men was according to the seven planets.

Diodorus makes Boccharis to be the 4^th king from Mycerinus but names not the three middlemost. The first of them Herodotus calls Asychis & saith that he made the very large & beautiful eastern Portico of the Temple of Vulcane & a brick Pyramid with an inscription signifying that it excelled the other Pyramids as much as Iupiter did the other Gods because made of clay fetcht from the bottom of a lake with a long staff. And besides these Pyramids there were about 18 others neare the Mummies one of which is recconed by Greves to be equal to the greatest of the 3 neare Memphis but the most of them were much smaller. For the ancient kings of Thebes till the reign of Memnon seem to have been buried together in tombs cut in a rock neare Thebes as was mentioned above but after Imandes & Mæris brought pyramids into fashion, the following kings seem to have spent their time & revenues on these monuments for themselves their wives & children.

<10r>

If the Iews, whom Manetho takes to be the Shepherds, entered Egypt a year or two after the battel at Mareseh, & Amenophis after three or four years more went up into Thebais & Ethiopia & reigned there 13 years before he returned back against Osarsiphus this last expulsion of the shepherds will be about the 33^th year of Asa. Count backwards 511 years & the first reign of the shepherds in Egypt will begin about ten years after the conquest & division of the land of Canaan by Ioshuah. Which agrees well with what we said above of those shepherds being Canaanites driven out by Ioshuah.

Amenophis having recovered the dominion of Egypt & Libya & being now potent & inured to war, led his army out of Egypt to visit the conquests of Sesostris, marched through Ionia & Phrygia, subdued the rebelling Bactrians, took Susa, reigned long there & left there a Palace & other works which the Greeks call Memnonia. In Egypt he built Memphys as above & at Abydus he built another stately Palace & at Thebes on the west side of the Nile two Colossus's one of which was that famous statue which every morning at sun rise sounded with a musical voice. Pausanias^[33] speaking of this statue saith that he most admired the Colossus of the Egyptians in Thebais beyond the Nile at the place called the Syringes. For there is still, saith he, the statue of a man sitting & many called it Memnon. For they say that he penetrated out of Ethiopia into Egypt as far as Susa. But the Thebans say it was not Memnon but Phamenophis a native of Tebais. Some say it was the statue of Sesostris. Cambyses brake off the upper part to the middle & the lower part remains sitting & every morning at sun-rise emits a sound like that of a string of a harp or lute when it happens to break. Thus far Pausanius. Amenophis built also at Thebes his own sepulchre^[34] a very magnificent structure like a Temple ten furlongs in circuit with several stately Porticos & Galleries. This seems to be the Memnonium in Thebais which Philostratus calls the Temple of Memnon, others the Temple of Serapis where was the speaking statue. At the entrance of one of the Porticos were three statues, his own his mothers & his daughters each of one stone. His own was the biggest statue in all Egypt the measure of the foot thereof exceeding seven cubits. It had this inscription.

There was also another statue of his mother with three crowns on her head to denote that she was the daughter wife & mother of a king, videlicet Rhea the daughter of Ammon. On the walls of one of the Galleries were sculptures representing the war he made against the rebelling Bactrians with 400000 foot & 20000 horse commanded in four bodies by his four sons, & also his beseiging a bulwark incompassed with a river (videlicet Susa) & his carrying away captives & triumphing for these victories. In the next room was delineated a Court of Iustice with people about the Iudge & in the next was represented the Kings Table sumptuously furnished & his riches & offerings to the Gods. In the next room was his Library with this inscription, The cure of the mind: & adjoyning to it were the Images of the Gods & the King making offerings peculiarly belonging to each of them. Next the Library was a stately room wherein were twenty beds to eat upon richly adorned & the images of Iupiter & Iuno & the King. And here it's supposed that the kings body lyes interred. Round the room were many apartments wherein were painted all the beasts that are accounted sacred in Egypt. Thence were ascents to the top of the whole Monument which being mounted appeared a border of gold round the Tomb of three hundred sixty five cubits in compass & a cubit thick & the days of the year were distinguished & inscribed on the several cubits a day on each cubit with the rising & setting of the stars & their signification according to the doctrine of the Egyptian Astrologers. This border was carried away by Cambyses when he conquered Egypt.

So sumptuous a monument as this golden border would scarce have been made by this king or his successor & placed in the principal room next about his Tomb had it not been in memory of something done by himself. For all the rooms of this Temple relate to him, conteining representations of his person, actions, justice, riches, table, bounty piety & learning. In one room he is represented making war, in another doing justice, in a third honouring the Gods, in a fourth his Library denotes him <12r> studious, in the last room the golden border shews that after he had restored the Egyptian Monarchy he applied himself to the study of the stars & by their risings & settings made a new regulation of the year.

You have heard how Ammon was much addicted to Astronomy & from him the study descended to his children & grandchildren Hyperion, Atlas, Typhon Mercury, Memnon, Prometheus. How the court of Egypt came to be so much addicted to this study I do not find in history, but if room may be allowed for conjecture I suspect that the Merchants trading upon the red Sea were the first that found out letters numbers & Arithmetick & observed the stars, these things being useful in their trafique & that when the court of Edom fled from David into Egypt they carried these things with them to the court of Pharaoh, & on that accompt were enterteined there with so much favour as is mentioned in scripture. Ammon divided the days into hours but the year which he used was lunisolar as you heard above, & this year being of an uncertain length & therefore unfit for Astronomical uses a new year was to be invented for keeping an exact amount of time before Astronomy could be brought to any competent degree of perfection And the first attempt that I meet with of that kind was in the reign of Osiris.

For ^a[35] in the holy Isle of Nile neare Phylas was a sepulchre built to Osiris religiously reverenced by all the Priests of Egypt wherein were laid up 360 Bowles which certain Priests appointed for that purpose filled every day with milk (that is every day one Bowle) & called upon the Gods by name with mourning & lamentation^a[36]. These Bowles answer in number to the 360 days of which the year was anciently supposed to consist, & the designe of filling them seems to be for counting the days in order to measure time by such a yeare.

The first ages being destitute of Arithmetic & Astronomy counted months by the visible returns of the Moon & years by the visible returns of Sun or of the four seasones of the year Summer & winter spring & autumn according to the saying of Moses that the sun & Moon were for signes & for Seasons & for days & for years that is, the Moon for signes of the Months & for seasons recconed from three months to three months, & the sun for days & for years.. And this practise occasioned their celebrating the new moons & new years days with feasting. And as often <13r> as they perceived twelve lunar months too short for the returning seasons of the year or for the rising or setting of some star, they added a thirteenth. By this means the Hebrews always began their sacred year in spring & their civil year in Autumn in the seventh month of their sacred year so that the same months always fell upon the same seasons of the year. For in the month Abib they always offered the first fruits of the corn in the ear & forty days after they offered the first fruits of the harvest & after they had gathered the fruit of the land they kept the Feast of Tabernacles in the month Tisri. This year was brought out of Egypt by the Hebrews & therefore was the old Egyptian year. For Diodorus tells us that Hyperion an ancient king of Egypt used the Lunisolar year, and Moses, while he was yet in Egypt changed the beginning of the year from one month to another without altering the form of it. Exod 12. And so the year which the Samaritans brought with them out of Assyria, and the ancient Chaldæan year which the Iews brought back with them from the Babylonian captivity was Lunisolar. Vpon the 16^th day of the month Lous the Babylonians annually celebrated the feast Sacæa as Athenaus (Lib. 12) relates out of Berosus, that is, upon the 16^th day of the Babylonian month which fell in with the month Lous of the Macedonians & which was therefore Lunar & kept to the season of the year the month Lous being a summer month answering to the month Ab of the year which the Iews brought from Babylon. This month Ab had its name from אב which signifies corn & other vegetables of the earth in that state when they are most green & flourishing & the next month אלול Elul signifies the time when the earth is new reaped & emptied of corn. Which being the names of the Chaldæan months shews that their months were fixed to the seasons. Chaldea was peopled by Arabians & the Arabian months are Lunar to this day, & anciently their years were Lunisolar, as were also the years of the Syrians & people of Asia minor & Athenians & Romans. For Simplicius^[37] in his Commentary on the 5^t of Aristotles Physical Acroasis, tells us ἁς δὲ ὑμεῖς ποιούμεθα ἀρχὰς &c Quæ facimus initia anni quidem vel ad æstivum solstitium ut Attici, vel ad autumnale æquinoctium ut terræ quæ nunc Asia dicitur incolæ, vel ad brumam ut <14r> Romani, vel circa æquinoctium vernum ut Arabes & Damasceni: mensis verò [initium] ut quidam volunt [ab] plenilunium aut novilunium. And Galen: Quod tempus Romæ est September, Pergami apud nos mensis Hyperberetæus, Athenis verò mysteria: ea namque erant Boedromione.

<15ar>

And Censorinus tells us that – natural year And Cicero that the Sicilians – or two days. So also Aratus & his Commentator Theon – seasons (Lib. 1, 2.) And Hesiod makes Lenæon a winter Month - Pleiades. And Scaliger & others inform us also that the ancient years of Persia India China & the adjacent Isles were Lunisolar

Now The Lunar Month usually ending upon the 30^th day, the ancient nations in their recconings used 30 days for a month: but Solon finding this month too long called the 30^th day ἠνην καὶ νεαν the old & the new & taught the Athenians to count the months by 30 & 29 days alternately. These were the Kalender months of the Ancients which they used without correction in recconing times past or to come, where they could not be assisted by the course of the Moon So Moses in describing the flood puts 15 months for 150 days & the author of the Book of Esther puts 180 days for six months, & Herodotus in recconing the age of man constantly takes 30 days for a month. But in recconing times present they always corrected their months by the course of the Moon as you heard above, adding or omitting a day or two in the month as often as they found it necessary to make their months agree with the revolutions of the Moon.

And as for the year or Annus vertens they recconed it to consist of twelve months, but finding this year too short they added a month to the end of it as often as they found it requisite to make the year agre with the Sun & seasons. And hence arose several longer periods of time as the Dieteris which consisted of two years & a month, the Tetraeteris which consisted of 4 years & one or two months, the Octaeteris which consisted of 8 years & three months, & the Enneadeaeteris which consisted of 19 years & seven months. But the Egyptians instead of these intercalary months added five days to the end of the year.

The ancient Kalender-year therefore consisted of 12 months each of which had 30 days & hence came the division of the Zodiaque into 12 signs & of every signe into 30 parts or degrees a signe answering to a month & a degree to a day. But this year being too short for the return of the seasons they added a month to it every other year excepting once in eight years <15av> and thence formed the Dieteris consisting three times of 25 months & once of 24, the Tetraeteris consisting alternately of 49 & 50 months & the Octaeteris consisting of 99 months. For Herodotus & Censorinus Plutarch tell us that the ancient Greeks added a month to the end of every other year to make this year agree with the seasons & course of the Sun, & thereby saith Censorinus they formed the Dieteris, Tetraeteris & Octaeteris. And the year to which this month was added Herodotus describes to consist of twelve months & every month of 30 days , For he speaks of the Kalendar months without considering the course of the Moon by which they were to be corrected.

Now these periods of time seem to be as ancient in Greece as the first memory of things. & were probably brought into Greece by the Phenicians & Egyptians who first sailed thither. For the Octaeteris was the annus magnus of Cadmus & Minos & was used in many religions of Greece & in celebrating the Olympic games first instituted by Pelops & Hercules one of the Idæi Dactyli, & the Dieteris was used in celebrating the mysteries of Bacchus. And Herodotus tells us that the Greeks had their festivals from Egypt & Festus Avienus seems to attribute a regulation of the year to Cecrops the Egyptian, where speaking of the Enneaeteris of Harpalus turned into the Enneadecaeteris by Meton he saith

The emendation of the year by intercalary months being troublesome & unfit for Astronomical uses the Egyptians neglected the course of the Moon & counting all the 360 days in the Kalendar year they found them too short for the course of the Sun by five days & therefore added five days to the end of the 360

For After the Greeks had for some time used their first Octaeteris they mended it several ways, as by altering the order of the intercalary Months, by countig the 12 months of 29 & 30 days alternately & <15br> making the 13^th month always of 30 days & by adding 3 days in every 16 years, & at length they found out the Enneadecaeteris whereby they became able to publish Almanacks or Kalendars of time for nineteen years to come & a while after by the cycle of Calippus for 76 years to come.

But in doing these things – Chaldeans.

The Egyptians were therefore the firs –

<15r>

as they perceived twelve lunar months too short for the returning seasons of the year or for the rising or setting of some star, they added a thirteenth. By this means the Hebrews always began their sacred year in spring & their civil year in Autumn in the seventh month of their sacred year so that the same months always fell upon the same seasons of theyear. For in the month Abib they always offered the first fruits of the corn in the ear & forty days after they offered the first fruits of the harvest & after they had gathered the fruit of the land they kept the Feast of Tabernacles in the month Tisri. This year was brought out of Egypt by the Hebrews & therefore was the old Egyptian year For Moses while he was yet in Egypt changed the beginning of from one month to another without altering the form of it. Exod 12. And Diodorus tells us that Hyperion an ancient king of Egypt used the Lunisolar year.. 2 And by the like practise the months of the old year of the Greeks were lunar & always kept to the same seasons of the year so that the Olympic games were always celebrated at Midsummer & other festivals at other set seasons of the year. And Hesiod^[38] makes Lenæon a winter month & begins the year after the rising of the Pleiades. 1 And so the Chaldean Lunisolar year which the Iews brought back with them from the Babylonian captivity kept to the seasons of the year. And upon the sixteenth day of the month Lous the Babylonians annually celebrated the Feast Sacæa as Athenæus (Lib. 12) relates out of Berosus; that is, upon the sixteenth day of the Babylonian month which fell in with the month Lous of the Macedonians, & which was therefore Lunar & kept to the course of the Moon & to the same season of the year, the month Lous being a summer month answering to the month Ab of the year which the Iews brought from Babylon.

At first the nations were without Astronomical rules, but at length observing that there were three intercalary months in eight years or thereabouts, they formed an Octaeteris by which they knew when to add the intercalary months without minding the seasons of summer & winter or the risings & settings of the stars above once in eight years. And this Octaeteris was used in Greece before the reign of Sesak it being the ^a[39] Annus magnus of Cadmus & ^b[40] Minos & being ^c[41] used in many religions of Greece & ^c[42] in celebrating the Ludi Pythica at Delphos. And therefore it may be accounted as old as those religions & festivals & by consequence brought into Greece by the first Phenicians & Egyptians who sailed thither such as were Cadmus & Cecrops. For Herodotus tells us that the Greeks had their Festivals & Oracles from Egypt & Festus Avienus seems to attribute a regulation of the year to Cecrops where speaking of the Enneateris of Harpalus turned into the Enneadecaeteris by Meton he saith

The Octaeteris of the Greeks seems to have been formed at first by adding a month to every other year excepting once in eight years. For it appears our of Herodotus, Censorinus & Geminus that the old Greek years were alternately of twelve <16r> and thirteen months. Two of these years therefore made the Dieteris of the ancients consisting three times of 25 Lunar Months & once of 24, & four of them made the Tetraeteris consisting of 49 & 50 lunar months alternately & the omission of the intercalary month every eighth year made the Octaeeris consisting of 99 lunar months. For the months of these periods were certainly lunar & the years were solar. For ^a[43] Solon commanded the Athenians to count the days by the Moon & called the day of conjunction ἐνὴν καὶ νέαν the old & the new &, referring to the old month that part of the day which preceded the conjunction & the rest of the day to the new month. And ^b[44] Geminus tells us that all the ancient Greeks by their laws & the dictates of their Oracles made their years agree with the Sun & their months & days of the month with the course of the Moon so that the same sacrifices might always fall upon the same seasons of the year & upon the same days of the Lunar Month, & that they accounted this acceptable & gratefull to the Gods, & according to the institutions of their country. And ^c[45] Cicero saith that the Sicilians & other Greeks to make their days & months agree with the courses of the Sun & Moon sometimes took away a day or two from the month & sometimes made the month longer by one or two days. And ^d[46] Censorinus that the several ancient nations of Italy had several years but all of them by months variously intercalated corrected their civil years by that one true natural year.

When the ancients were to reccon times past or to come or were to summ up the days or months in any number of years in doing of which they could have no assistance from the Sun & Moon they were necessitated to take a certain number of days for a Lunar Month & a certain number of months for a Solar year. And so taking the next round numbers of 30 days to a month & 12 months to a year they formed a notional & chronological year convenient for computations & exact enough for such purposes as they applied it to And according to this way of recconing they supposed the Luni-Solar year to consist of 360 days, not yet knowing the true length of it, & divided the Zodiac into twelve signes & every signe into 30 parts or degrees so that a degree might answer to the Sun's motion in a day. And this seems to have been the original of dividing a circle into 360 degrees. But it is not to be supposed that any nation used such years or months for keeping a recconing of time in civil affairs. For the beginning of such a year would in seventy years have run round the four seasons of the solar year & thereby have discovered the difference between this year & the solar year much sooner then it was known: And months of 30 days would in a year or two have notoriously disagreed from the course of the Moon. When therefore Moses Herodotus & others reccon by Months of 30 days or <17r> Geminus tells us that the months of the ancients consisted of thirty days they are to be understood of the chronological months. And if the ancient at any time applied these months to civil uses it is to be conceived that they corrected them perpetually by the Moon making them shorter or longer by a day or two & adding a month to the year as often as the course of the Moon & seasons required, so that their months & years might constantly agree with the heavens. This is plain from Herodotus who in recconing the age of man uses the Chronological year of 12 months & 360 days & then adds that every other year was made longer by a month that the seasons might answer. The 12 months corrected by the Moon made but 354 days & to complete the year a 13^th was added as often as the seasons required. And this seems to have been the state of the year in the first ages before the invention of Astronomical rules. But after they found out the rules of intercaling three months in eight years & recconing by months of 29 & 30 days alternately for two years together, they became able to keep a recconing of time without correcting the recconing by the heavens above once in two four or eight years & the Greeks (Cleostratus, Democritus, Philolaus, Harpalus, Eudoxus, Meton Calippus & others) by further experiience mended the rules they found out the Enneadecaeteris, whereby they became able to publish Almanachs or Calenders of time for nineteen years to come, & a while after by the cycle of Calippus for 76 years to come.

But in doing these things the Greeks received light from the Egyptians. For Strabo^[47] tells us that Eudoxus staying with Plato thirteen years in Egypt learnt there of the Priests how much the year was longer then 365 days: for till then, saith Strabo, the year was unknown to the Greeks as were also many other things untill the later Astronomers received them from the Priests of Egypt, as they still continue to receive from them and the Chaldeans.

The Egyptians were therefore the first who found out the true length of the year. For long before these Rules of the Greeks were found out, while the nations used to count only the age of the Moon & upon the appearance of every new Moon to begin a new recconing, the Egyptians contrived by the solemnity of the milk bowles to count all the 360 days of which the year was reputed to consist & by repeating the recconing found this year too short. This ceremony being performed with morning & lamentation in the sepulchre of Osiris was doubtless a funeral rite in honour to his memory. For ^a[48] Sayches or Sesak, who is Osiris taught Astronomy & ^b[49] Hyperion who is also Osiris is said to have found out the motions of the Sun & Moon & other stars & the seasons & distinctions of time measured by them, & afterwards to have imparted his knowledge to others And therefore he was called the father of those Planets as being the first that taught the knowledge & nature of them.^b[50] <18r> And Mercury who instituted the funeral rites of Osiris was also an Astronomer, & therefore a fit person to celebrate Osiris for his skill in that science. Before this institution Astronomy was in its infancy. For Ammon whom the Atlantides call Vranus measured the year by the course of the Sun & the months by the course of the Moon & while men recconed only by Lunar Months & by summers & winters & knew not the just number of days in the solar year but supposed them to be 360, the motions of the Planets could not be computed for want of knowing the just number of days between the Observations. And therefore its very probable that the Astronomers of Egypt intended by the solemnity of the milk bowles to found a new Æra for keeping an exact reconning of time by years of 360 days & in honour to the great Osiris dated this Æra from his Apotheosis & appointed Priests to keep the recconing in one of his Temples.

But the Egyptians soon finding this year too short added five days to the end of it & in memory of the addition formed the fable that Rhea being with child by Saturn, the Sun prayed that she might not be delivered in any month nor in the year. Then Mercury won from Luna at Dice the two & sixtieth part of every day which in the whole year made up five days & added those five days to the 360 & these five days the Egyptians celebrate as the birth days of Osiris, Isis, Orus senior, Typhon & Nephthe the wife of Typhō. This reason they give why Mercury made the Lunary year shorter & the Solary year longer then the former year of 360 days For they ascribe all their inventions to Mercury. And while they tell us that this addition was made when Rhea was with child by Saturn that her children (Osiris, Isis, &c) might be born on those days they discover the time of the addition,

Tis agreed that this alteration was first made by the Egyptians. So Herodotus^[51]: The Egyptians first of all men invented the year & distinguished it into 12 months & found out this by the stars. In this also they seem to act more prudently then the Greeks. They intercale every other year to make the seasons return, but the Egyptians to the 12 months of 30 days each add yearly 5 days. Syncellus^[52] ascribes this alteration to Assis the six king of the Shepherds. He, saith Syncellus, added the five additional days to the year & under him, as they say, the Egyptian year acquired 365 days which before was measured only by 360. But that the rude & ignorant Shepherds should make this alteration or that this victorious kings of Thebais should receive the year of their enemies not likely. The people of Thebais challenged this year as their own invention. They. saith Diodorus, affirm that Philosophy & the exacter knowledge of the stars was found out by them, the situation of their land helping them to observe the risings & settings of the stars & that they ordered the months & years after a particular manner by the course of the sun without regard to the course of the Moon, counting 30 days to a month & 12 <19r> months & five days to a year. By the fable of the Egypians that when Rhea was with child by Saturn, or according to Diodorus, when Iuno was with child by Iupiter these five days were added that their children might be born in no part of the old year & then Iuno brought forth Osiris, Isis, Orus senior, Typhon & Nephthe on these five days, & here by this emendation of the year is ascribed to Ammon the father of Osiris & Isis, which brings us neare the truth. The monuments of the milk bowles & golden border (which I had rather trust) ascribe it to the younger Ammon or Amenophis whom the Greeks call Memnon: If the five additional days were at their first institution consecrated to the Gods Osiris, Isis, Orus senior, Typhon & Nephthe, the institution must be after those Gods were born & most probably after they were dead & deified & become the Dij pœnates of Memnon. And even the year it self by its epocha points at Memnon for the author.

The first ages counting their years by returns of summer & winter seed time & harvest & minding the products of the earth would be apt to end their year with the ingathering of the ripe fruits of the earth & begin the next year with gardening & tillage pruning setting & sowing in order to a new crop & ingathering, referring to one & the same year the whole growth of all the fruits of that year. Hence the oldest years of the Greeks began in winter & the year which the Hebrews used in Egypt began in Autumn & so did the year of the people of Asia minor, the old year of the Romans. the Æra Seleucidarum Alexandræa, Antiochena & Arabica. But upon new occasions the Epochas have been changed from winter to summer & from Autumn to Spring. So Moses changed the beginning of the Iewish year. And so the Egyptians might change the beginning of theirs. And if the Egyptians began their new year of 365 days at either of the Equinoxes at its first institution, it was either instituted by Memnon or was older then Moses. If at first it began at the autumnal Equinox it was an hundred years older then Moses: if at the rising of the Dog-star (as some think) it was 300 years older then Sesak, & on this ground Syncellus seems to ascribe it to the Shepherds: but if at first it began at the Vernal Equinox (for almost all nations began their years at one of the cardinal points) then it is just as old as the latter end of the reign of Memnon For this Egyptian year was the same with the year of Nabonassar & began always on the same day & therefore in the year of the Iulian Period 3821 (& for three years after) it began on the third of April which was then the first day after the Vernal Equinox according to the Sun's mean motion, & that year of the Iulian Period was 55 years after the overthrow of the Ethiopians by Asa, which I reccon within the compass of the reign of Amenophis. For his reign in Ethiopia & wars in Asia & stay at Susa & ensuing works in Egypt make him long lived after <20r> that victory. Damis ^a[53] saith that he died in Ethiopia (so he calles Thebais) after he had reigned five generations, & its probable that he minded not Astronomy till after his wars & return from Susa. In the Canons Menes (who is this king) is said to have reigned 62 years. Censorinus ^b[54] tells us, novissime Arminon ad tridecim menses & dies quinque annum Ægypium produxisse. Here thirteen months should be 12 (as Scaliger & Salmasius note) & Arminon should be Ammonem or Amenophen.

Whilst Amenophes noted the rising & setting of the stars on the days of the year markt out on the golden border it shews that Astronomers had already given names to the stars by the help of Constellations, & that they determined the length of the year by their heliacal risings & settings It shews also that they did not yet know that this year was too short by a quarter of a day so as in every four years to make the stars change the days of their heliacal rising & setting. For had they known this, as they would have done if this year had been older then the reign of Amenophis, they would not have noted the rising & setting of the stars on certain days of this year in a monument which was designed to be lasting. Astronomy was therefore then in its infancy & may reccon Ammon Sesak & Amenophis its founders.

Afterwards the Egyptians by continuing to observe the rising & setting of the stars found that this year was too short by a quarter of a day, that is by a year in 1460 natural years & thence formed the Annus magnus of 1461 Egyptian years in which time the beginning of their year ran round the Zodiac. This great year was called Annus Sothiacus, the Canicular year because they determined its length by the rising of the stars & principally by the rising of the Dog star called Sothis in their language. And therefore they had not yet found out the difference between the solar & siderial year nor the Precession of the Equinox.

This year of 365 days the Babylonians received from the Egyptians, & the Persians from the Babylonians. Whence it came to the Armenians & Syrians. It was received also by the Greeks in the Æra Philippæa dated from the death of Alexander. And Iulius Cæsar corrected it by adding a day in every four years & made it the year of the Romans, which year is too long by a week in nine hundred years, & may be corrected without disturbing the Dominical Letter or perplexing Chronology, by omitting a week at the end of every nine hundred years.

By the unanimous tradition of the Greeks Memnon was contemporary to the sons of Priam. They tell us that he was the son of Aurora & Tithonus the brother of Priam & Homer Pindar Pausanias Diodorus & others say that he came to the war at Troy & was there slain by Achilles. If about the <21r> time of that war or immediately after he came into Phrygia not to assist the Trojans but in carrying on his conquests, this might give occasion to the Greeks to report him slain by their Hero: but if he had not lived in that age there could have been no pretence for the story. Pausanias relates that in a publick building at Delphos he saw several pictures made by Polygnotus (a famous old Painter contemporary to Artaxerxes Longimanus) & that in one of them were painted Hector Memnon & Sarpedon all of them with beards & Paris a beardless young man & by Memnon was painted a naked Ethiopian boy. And, saith Pausanias, Memnon came to the war of Troy not from Ethiopia but from Susa a city of Persia conquering all the intermediate nations as far as the river Choaspis. And the Phrygians still shew by what way he led his army, the way being distinguished by mansions. In memory of this expedition the Nicomedians kept in the Temple of Æesculapius a copper sword which they said was Memnon's. It was an old monument because made of copper the metal of which the Greeks & Trojans then made their weapons. Since Memnon is feigned to be the son of Tithonus if we may suppose him born when Tithonus went captive into Thebais, he might be about 26 years old when he retired from Memphys into Ethiopia, 40 when he drave the Iews out of Egypt 50 or 55 when he came from Susa into Asia minor conquering all the nations before him & 74 when he constituted the new year of 365 days.

Between Osimandes & Miris (i. e. Memnon & Mæris) Diodorus^[55] places one Vchoreus & says that he built Memphys & fortified it to admiration with a mighty rampart of earth & a broad & deep trench which was filled with the water of the Nile, & built Palaces in it, & that this place was so commodiously pitche upon by the builder that most of the kings who reigned after him preferred it before Thebes & removed the court thence to this place so that the magnificence of Thebes from that time began to decrease & Memphys to increase till Alexander king of Macedon built Alexandria. By these works I take Vchoreus to be either Memnon himself or one of his Princes. For the Deputy Governours of Egypt are sometimes recconed amongst the Kings.

For amongst the kings of Egypt Herodotus reccons Proteus & places him next after Pheron the successor of Sesostris, but Proteus seems rather to have been a Viceroy set over the lower Egypt then a sovereign king. For^[56] he was a Memphyte of ignoble extraction & reigned at Memphys. Conon^[57] calls him an Egyptian Prophet, that is a Priest. And the name Proteus being a Greek word which signifies a chief man or Prince seems to be not the proper name of a man but a title of honour. For had it been a proper name the Greeks <22r> would have retained the Egyptian word without translating it whereas Herodotus tells us that it is the kings name in Greek, that is a Greek word of the same signification with his name or title in the Egyptian language, & Diodorus tells us that this man's name was Cetes. There were several Princes of Egypt called Proteus, one of which fled from Busiris king of Egypt & came with Cadmus into Europe. And it's probable that the frequent changing of the person might give occasion to the Greeks to feign that Proteus put on all shapes. Some make him a Phenician reigning neare Pharus where Alexandria was afterward built, as Tzetzes^[58]

And this agrees best with his being a God of the Sea. But the Proteus of Herodotus reigned in Memphys & left a sumptuous Temple there to the south of the Temple of Vulcan. In this Temple was the house of Venus Hospita by which name Herodotus conjectured that Helena the daughter of Tyndarus was meant, having heard that she stayed in Egypt with Proteus & was called Venus Hospita & being told so by the Priests of Egypt. For when Alexander stole her from her husband Menelaus & fled with her from Greece he was driven with her upon the coast of Egypt, & Thonis the governour of the Port suspecting him sent him to Proteus at Memphys & Proteus examining the matter deteined Helena (as Herodotus relates) & sent home Alexander. Then the Greeks demanding her of the Trojans made war upon Troy thinking that Alexander had carried her thither, but after the destruction of Troy Menelaus went for her into Egypt. And to this history, saith Herodotus, Homer alludes in mentioning the errors of Paris with Helena by sea upon the coast of Sidon before the war & the voyage of Menelaus into Egypt after it. According to this story the Proteus of Herodotus reigned in the time of the Trojan war & therefore governed the lower Egypt under Amenophis or Memnon. However since the Temples of Vulcan & Venus Hospita stood together & were built at the same time, I take her to be Vulcans wife. Cinyras had furnished Memnon with armour for his wars & for this benefaction Memnon honoured him after death with a very sumptuous Temple in Memphys & Proteus built another by it to the Cyprian Queen.

Next after Amenophis reigned his son Ramesses, Rameses or Rhampses above mentioned. Herodotus calls him Rhampsinitus & saith he was the successor of Proteus. Diodorus ^a[59] calls him Rhemphis & saith he was the son &successor of Proteus. Pliny tells us ^b[60] that in his reign Troy was taken: for he reigned first <23r> under his father as you heard above & then alone. In Heliopolis he placed the biggest Obelisk in all Egypt which the Emperor Constantius removed to Rome. The ^c[61] inscription upon it as interpreted by Hermapion stiles him king of the world & represents him reigning over the whole world & over all the earth & that the Gods had given him a long life: which shews that he survived his father & inherited from him a very large & flourishing kingdom. He did nothing glorious but^[62] spent his whole age in heaping up wealth & was the richest of all the Kings & left more wealth behind him then any of them. For he gathered in gold & silver 400000 talents, an Egyptian talent being two Attic ones that is 120 Attic pounds. He built the western Portico of the Temple of Vulcan placing his own statue before it. Tacitus^[63] tells us that Germanicus Cæsar visiting Egypt to know its antiquities viewed the great ruins of old Thebes were some structures remained with Egyptian letters expressing its ancient wealth, & the oldest of the Priests being commanded to interpret them related that there once dwelt in it seven hundred thousand of military age & that king Rhamses with that army reigned over Libya Ethiopia, the Medes Persians Bactrians & Scythians & the territories of the Syrians Armenians Cappadocians & Bithynia & Lycia from sea to sea. The tributes & guifts of every nation (in gold silver armour horses ivory & odours for the Temples & corn & all Vtensiles) were also read being scarce less magnificent then what the Parthians or the Roman Empire exacted. The like inscriptions were upon some of those Obelisks neare the monument of Memnon in Thebes mentioned by Strabo^[64] an eye witness. Above the Memnonium, saith he, are the sepulchres of forty kings of Egypt cut in stone & by them in certain Obelisks inscriptions declaring the riches & power of those kings & their dominion propagated to Scythia & Bactriana & India & Ionia with the greatness of their tribute & their army of a thousand thousand. By these things you may learn the greatness of the Empire of Memnon, for Ramesses reigned only over his fathers dominions, & Memnon is that Iupiter of whom the Atlantides^[65] say that he went through the whole world doing good to all & after death was called Iupiter & unanimously by all placed in the highest heavens & called a God & supreme Lord of all the earth. Considering that he reigned long at Susa, he seems to be the great Iupiter Belus of the Assyrians & Babylonians whom they placed upon a soaring eagle with a thunderbolt in his hand to express the sublimity of his dominion <24r> & power in war. We shewed above that Ramesses was born about the 16^th or 18^th year of Asa, & seing he lived long, if we may suppose that he lived about 70 years his death will happen about 105 years after the death of Solomon about 100 years before the Olympiads & rise of the Assyrian monarchy & about 130 before the Æra of Nabonassar & invasion of Egypt by Sabacon the Ethiopian. And in this interval the Pyramids were built.

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^✝ Pliny^[66] tells us that the first Obelisk was made by Mitres (that is Miphres) who reigned in Heliopolis, & afterwards other kings in the same city made others, Sachis (that is Sesochis or Sesak) four each of 48 cubits in length, Ramises two, Smarres (that is Marrus or Mæris) one of 48, Eraphius (or Hophra) one of 48 & Nectabis (or Neochabis one of 80

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^✝ Among the stupendious works of these kings of Egypt is to be reconned that vast Lake of Mæris with two Pyramids in the midst of if fifty paces high above the water & as much below & upon each a Colossus in a throne representing him & his wife. This Lake was one of the greatest miracles in Egypt being made with sluices to receive the water of the Nile in time of overflowing & let it out afterwards to water the land. It was 3600 furlongs or 450 miles in compass & 50 paces deep where deepest. The channel by which the water flowed in & out was 80 furlongs long & 300 foot broad & cut in some places through rocks under ground. To open & shut the sluices cost 50 Talents every time. Neare the Lake he built the famous Labyrinth & at the end of it a square Pyramid each of whose sides was almost four acres & the height as much, which is half the measure of the greatest Pyramid. And here the founder is supposed to lye interred. He built also the stately northern Portico of the Temple of Vulcan, & found out the elements of Geometry & by all these characters was one of the successors of Sesostris. For Sesostris gave the first occasion to Geometry by dividing Egypt equally amongst the Egyptians at a certain rate by measure. And the Lake & Labyrinth & Pyramids were works too great for any age before the founding of the Monarchy. The works of Mæris being done at Memphys shew that he reigned in that city & therefore was later then either Memnon or his son & successor Rhampsis, especially since Memnon built that sumptuous Temple of Vulcan to which Rhampsis Mæris & Ayschis added Porticos. By the great riches which were left to Mæris by his Predecessor Rhampsis he was enabled to do these works. He is called also Maris, Myris, Marrus, & corruptly Ayres, Biyres, Soris, Vchoreus Lacharis, Labares & Thoris by changing the letter Μ into Α, VI, Σ, ΥΧΛ & <25r> such like mistakes.

In the Canons Suphis the founder of the greatest Pyramid is put the successor of Soris, Saophis of Ayres or Biyres & Siphoas or Siphaosis or Anoyphis of Maris. All which is as much as to say that Mæris was succeeded by Suphis the founder of the greatest Pyramid otherwise called Saophis, Siphoas, Siphaosis, Anoyphis. The builder of that Pyramid is by Herodotus called Cheops the word Saophis being changed into Cheophis or Cheops by the alteration of a letter. Whence Mæris is rightly placed between Rhampsinitus & Cheops. In the Canons he is also called Phiops & Apappus maximus. Diodorus calls the builder of the greatest Pyramid Chemnis or Chembis changing Cheoph into Chembis much after the manner that the Greeks change Moph into Memphis. Herodotus tells us that right & justice obteined in Egypt untill King Rhampsinitus, but his successor Cheops lapsed into all wickedness shutting up the Temples, interdicting the sacrifices & imploying not the captives but the Egyptians in his works. Among the righteous kings Mæris is included & should have been placed the last of them. In shutting up the Temples & abolishing the sacrifices the designe of Cheops seems to have been the abolishing the worship & memory of the former kings that his own might be had in the greater honour. For how desirous he was to be honoured after death appears by his building so great a Pyramid for that purpose a work in which he imployed 100000 men for 20 years together. He was a merchant & contemplator of the Gods & was called Mercury. But since he interdicted the worship of the Theban Gods he was not the second Mercury who translated the Hieroglyphic inscriptions of the first Mercury into books & placed them in the Temples. I had rather say that as the first Mercury was secretary of State to Osiris the founder of the Monarchy at Thebes so the second Mercury was secretary of State to Menes the founder of the monarchy at Memphys, & that this secretary was Athothes the Physitian who wrote of Anatomy & in the Canons is made the successor of Menes. In such a sense as the first Mercury reigned after Osiris the second reigned after Menes that is as a Viceroy or Proteus or chief secretary of state.

The three great Pyramids neare Memphys are all of them by Herodotus & Diodorus ascribed to kings who reigned after Sesostris, the biggest to this king, the next to his brother Cephren (called also Suphis, Saophis, Sen-Saophis, Mente-Suphis, Methu-Suphis, Echeseos & Achesca- <26r> Ocharas) & the third either to a forreign woman called Nitocris the or sister of Echeseos, or to Mycerinus the son of Suphis & successor of Cephren who in the Canons is called also Cerinus, Moscheres, Mencheres, & was addicted to drinking.

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He buried his daughter in the belly of a wooden Ox in the City Sais & this Ox was set up in a room & worshipped by the Egyptians with odors daily till the days of Herodotus. Diodorus saith that he began the third Pyramid but did not live to finish it, & by consequence it was finished by Nitocris. Her brother Methesuphis after one years reign was slain by the Egyptians & she revenged his death. The building of this Pyramid which the Egyptians attribute to their Queen Nitocris the vain-glorious Greeks attribute to Rhodope a famous weoman of their own nation. Iosephus^[67] calls that Queen Nicaule & saith that she reigned over both Egypt & Ethiopia: so that the Monarchy of Egypt restored by Memnon seems to have continued hitherto in a flourishing condition.

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Asychis the next king of Egypt made the very large & beautiful eastern Portico of the Temple of Vulcan & a brick Pyramid with an inscription signifying that it excelled the other Pyramids as much as Iupiter did the other Gods because made of clay fetched from the bottom of a Lake with a long staff.

And besides these Pyramids there were about 18 others neare the Mummies one of which is recconed by Greaves to be equal to the greatest of the three neare Memphis, but the most of them were much smaller. The small ones seem to be Pyramids which Enephes or Venephes (that is Amenophis) built in Cochone. The ancient kings of Thebes seem to have been buried together in Tombs cut out in a rock neare Thebes till Amenophis built a Temple for his sepulchre but after he & Mæris brought Pyramids into fashion the following kings built them still bigger & seem to have spent their time & revenues in these more lasting monuments for themselves their wives & children. The building of Pyramids depended on a particular humour of the Egyptians, then in fashion & therefore they were all built much about the same time & the gradual bigness of them shews in what order the kings reigned who built them, the smaller Pyramids being built before the greater came into fashion.

After these kings reigned Gnephachthus & his son Boccharis successively at Memphys, & Anysis in the lower Egypt most probably at Tanis or Zoan. Gnephachthus (called also Neochabis Nectabis & Technatis) leading an army into Arabia^[68] through desart places, his provision failed so that he was fain to take up with such mean food as he could then be supplied with which he relished so heartily that he forbad all excess & luxury & cursed Menes who first brought in a sumptuous & luxurious way of living & caused the curse to be cut on a pillar & placed on the Temple of Iupiter Hammon at Thebes, which made the fame & reputation of Menes to be clouded in future generations. After which ^b[69] this king & his son Boccharis used a moderate diet. Boccharis was a little man of an infirm body, but for prudence & justice he was famous. He was very piercing & quicksighted in judgement & is recconed amongst the lawmakers of Egypt, & was called Boccharis the wise. He ^c[70] let in a wild bull upon the Ox Mnevis, which the Ox slew & for that act the Egyptians hated him. From thence I gather that Heliopolis the city where <27r> this Ox was kept under his dominion.

Africanus mentions some kings reigning about this time at Tanis, videlicet 1 Petubastes in whose days according to Africanus the Olympiads began to be celebrated. 2 Osorchon whom the Egyptians call Hercules. 3 Psammis whose reign according to Eusebius began with the 36^th year of Azarias king of Iudah, that is with the Olympiads. 4 Zet........ Anysis was either the last of this race of kings or reigned in some other city in the lower Egypt. He was blind & in his reign & the reign of Boccharis, Sabadon the Ethiopian invaded & conquered Egypt, took Boccharis & burnt him alive & made Anysis fly into the fenny places of Egypt neare Abaris where he lay hid for some time in the Island Elbo. Sabacon punished none with death but condemned offenders to carry earth to the cities of Egypt for raising them higher by which means he raised them much higher then Sesostris had done before. Anysis & Sabacon are by Diodorus called Amosis & Actisanes. Amosis was cruel & put many to death for which reason his subjects upon the invasion of Actisanes revolted from him so that he was easily conquered. Actisanes was mercifull & obliging to his subjects & instead of putting robbers to death cut off their noses & banished them into a desart place between Egypt & Syria which from these robbers with cut noses was called Rhinocolura.

Isaias speaking of the times preceding the reign of Sabacon mentions these two kingdoms seated at Zoan or Tanis & Noph or Memphis.^[71] I will set, saith he, the Egyptians against the Egyptians & they shall fight every one against his brother & every one against his neighbour city against city & kingdom against kingdom & the spirit of Egypt shall fail. – And the Egyptians will I give over into the hand of a cruel Lord [videlicet Sabacon] & a fierce king shall rule over them. – Surely the Princes of Zoan are fools the counsell of the wise Counsellours of Pharaoh is become brutish. How say ye unto Pharaoh, I am the son of the wise the son of the ancient kings. – The Princes of Zoan are become fools, the Princes of Noph are deceived, they have also seduced Egypt they that were the stay of the Tribes thereof. – In that day there shall be a high way out of Egypt into Assyria & the Assyrian shall come into Egypt & the Egyptian into Assyria & the Egyptians shall serve the Assyrians.

Besides these two kingdoms there was a third at Sais where Stephanates Necepsos & Nechus reigned successively. Necepsos with one Petosiris is reputed the inventor of judicial <28r> Astrology & the first that wrote the art of predicting by the stars. Sabacon or one of his successors slew Nechus & made his son Psammiticus fly into Syria.

So then the Monarchy of Egypt in the reign of those kings who built the Pyramids became divided into several kingdoms at home & by consequence lost its dominion abroad, & these kingdoms warred with one another untill they were invaded & conquered by the nations which fell off from them videlicet first by the Ethiopians under Sabacon & afterwards by the Assyrians.

When Sabacon invaded Egypt a body of Egyptians fled into Babylonia. Hestiæus thus mentions this transmigration The Priests who escaped (that is who escaped from Sabacon) taking the sacra of Iupiter ἐνυάλιος came into Senaar a field of Babylonia. Iupiter Enyalius is the God of thunder Ammon or Belus Martius. Diodorus describes this transmigration more fully saying that Belus the son of Neptune & Libya led a colony into Babylon & placing his seat at Euphrates instituted Priests after the manner of the Egyptians exempt from Taxes & public duties, whom the Babylonians call Chaldeans & who observe the stars after the example of the Priests & Philosophers & Astrologers of Egypt. This colony carried with them into Babylonia the Astrology of Necepsos & the solar year of the Egyptians & founded the Æra of Nabonassar whose years have the very same Thoth with the years of Egypt. Whence we may reccon that Sabacon invaded Egypt about the time that the Æra of Nabonassar began.

The reign of the Ethiopians over Egypt according to Herodotus lasted 50 years & began & ended under Sabacon. But in the Dynasties of Africanus Sabacon reigned only eight years or according to Eusebius twelve & had two Ethiopian successors Seuechus his son who reigned 14 years & Tirhakah who reigned 18 or 20. Eusebius & Syncellus add a third successor Merres or Ammeres the Ethiopian who reigned 12 years. Seueches seems to be Suo or So king of Egypt with whom Hoshea king of Israel conspired against the Assyrians in the 4^th year of Hezekiah three years before the captivity of the ten Tribes (2 King. 17.4) And Tirhakah was that Pharaoh king of Egypt on whom Hezekiah trusted in the 14^th year of his reign when Sennacherib invaded Iudea, & that Tirhakah king of Ethiopia who in the same year came out against Sennacherib in behalf of Hezekiah (2 King. 18.21, 24 & 19.9). And therefore Tirhakah succeeded Sua between the 4^th & 14^th year of Hezekiah, that is between the 24 & 34^th year of Nabonassar. Count backward the 14 years reign of Sua & 12 years reign of Sabacon, & the recconing will place Sabacon's invasion of Egypt in or about the beginning of the Æra of Nabonassar

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Herodotus giving an account how Sennacherib lost his army saith that Sethon Priest of Vulcan was beseiged in Pelusium by Sennacherib & freed by mice eating the bowstrings & Quivers of the Assyrians & the strings for lying on their armour, & that he saw the statue of Sethon holding a mouse in his hand in memory of this deliverance. Sethon therefore was not king of Egypt but lived in the time of the Ethiopian kingdom. The Assyrians by this means being routed with a great slaughter, or as others say, dying of a sudden plague, Tirhakah or (as Strabo^[72] calls him) Tearco the Ethiopian carried on his victories as far as Europe as Sesak had done before him. He went westward as far as the Pillars & then led his army out of Spain into Thrace & Pontus. But against the successor of Tirhakah Assarhadon the son of Sennacherib sent Tartan with an army of Assyrians who fought against Ashdod or Azot a town of Palestine neare Egypt & took it & afterwards the Assyrians invaded & conquered Egypt & led the Ethiopians &Egyptians young & old into captivity naked & barefoot & with their buttocks uncovered Isa. 20. And about the same time they conquered also the Iews & carried Manasses captive to Babylon 2 Chron. 33.11, & Isa. 19.24, 25. Whence I gather that these conquests were made after Assarhadon became king of Babylon, that is after the year of Nabonassar 67. The Iews say that Manasseh was captivated in the 22^th year of his reign which was the year of Nabonassar 71: & Egypt lying beyond Iudea from Assyria may be presumed to be conquered afterwards; so that the Ethiopians reigned over Egypt about 70 or 75 years before they lost their dominion to the Assyrians.

After the Assyrians had conquered Egypt there was an interregnum of two years & then twelve Princes of Egypt by consent shared the kingdom amongst themselves & reigned 15 years, that is under the Assyrians. One of these Princes was Psammiticus above mentioned whom the people of the Sais called back from Syria. He reigned at Sais a city upon the mouth of the Canobic stream of the Nile the only Port in Egypt, & calling in forreigners from Arabia Caria & Ionia to his assistance he subdued the rest of the Princes & became king of all Egypt. Afterwards the nations of Phenicia Syria & Cilicia revolted also from the Assyrians. He beseiged Azot 29 years together & took it from the Assyrians. He was the first that let the Greeks into Egypt where he gave them seats. By reason of his army of forreigners a body of 200000 Egyptians fled from him & seated themselves in Ethiopia above Meroe. He built the southern Porch of the Temple of Vulcan in Memphis & over against it a Hall for keeping the Ox Apis. He reigned 54 years

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Ægypto Danaus advenit; ante ratibus navigabatur inventis in mari rubro inter insulas a rege Erythra. King Erythra is the king of Edom usually supposed to be Esau. For Esau, Edom, & Erythra are words of the same signification & signify red. Whence that sea was called mare Erythræum the red sea or Sea of Edom. From these Edomites the Phœnicians seem to have had their rise: for the Phenicians traded first upon the Red Sea & went from thence to the Mediterranean as they themselves & the Persians related to Herodotus.^[73] And so Pliny^[74] Tyrij orti ab Erythræo mari ferebantur & Solinus Tyrij a mari rubro profecti. Hence Dionysius Afer^[75] calls the Phenicians Erythreans & his old Interpreter thinks the name taken from the Red Sea. And Strabo^[76] tells us that some report that the Phœnicians & Sidonians were colonies of the inhabitants of the Ocean & that they were called Phenicians [Punici] because the sea is red.

How & when the Phœnicians came from the Red Sea may be gathered from the history of David. For when David smote Edom, Ioab stayed there with all Israel six months untill he had smitten every male in Edom 1 King. 11.15, 16. This made Hadad the young king of Edom fly into Egypt with certain Edomites his fathers servants & as many of the Edomites as could escape fled to the Philistims & to Sidon & other places where they could be protected. For Stephanus in Azot tells us ταύτην ἔκπσαν ἑῖς τῶν ἐπανελθόν των ἀπ' Ερυθρᾶς θαλάσσης φευγάδων. A fugitive or Exul from the Red Sea built Azot or Ashdod: that is a fugitive Prince of Edom fortified it against the Israelites. By this victory over the Edomites Ezion Gebar & Eloth (sea ports of the Edomites on the Red Sea) came into the hands of David, & his son Solomon built a Navy in Ezion Gebar & sent it on the Red Sea with a fleet of Hiram king of Tyre to Tarshish & Ophir for gold & silver & ivory & Peacocks [or Parrots] & Apes and pretious stones & Almug trees by which means the Queen of Sheba or Sabea in Arabia Felix heard of Solomon's glory and Hiram sent with Solomons servants in Solomon's Navy his own servants shipmen who had knowledge of the Sea. Solomons servants were therefore novices in Sea affairs and Hiram's servants were experienced marriners well acquainted with those seas by former voyages of the Phœnicians. For {Hiram} had also a navy on the Red Sea 1 King. 10.11, 22. <31r> Thus the trade of the Edomites on the Red Sea came into the hands of Solomon & Hiram.

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‡ In what year the Edomites were vanquished is uncertain. If Solomon may be supposed about 22 or 23 years old at the birth of Rehoboam his eldest son, since Rehoboam was 41 years old at the death of Solomon the birth of Solomon will be about the 17th year of Davids reign. And since Solomon was Davids second son by Bathsheba, the siege of Rabbah when David first lay with Bathsheba will begin at least two years before, & in the two years before that David had two great victories over the Ammonites & Syrians so that the war against them began in the 13th year of Davids reign, & the first 12 years of his reign were spent in wars with the house of Saul & with the Philistims & Amalakites & Edomites & Moabites. In the two first years of his reign he warred with the house of Saul, & his next wars were with the Philistims. Then he took Ierusalem & came & dwelt there in the eighth year of his reign, & the wars with Edom & Moab seem to be in the next four years: so that the error cannot be great if we place the flight of the Edomites upon the tenth year of Davids reign.

When the Edomites were driven from their seats it may be presumed that they sent out colonies upon the Mediterranean & of this there are footsteps. For Stephanus (in Ερυθραι) tells us that Erythra was the name of a city in Ionia, of another in Libya, of another in Locris, of another in Bœotia & of another in Cyprus. Erythræ in Ionia was a seaport town & most certainly a colony of forreigners. The inhabitants said that ^a[77] they came from Crete under the conduct of Erythrus the son of Rhadamanthus 1 : but their God was Phœnician; For they ^a[78] worshipped the statue of Hercules brought from Tyre, & in memory of its coming from thence they kept it standing upon the wood of the ship which brought it. By their God you may know that they were Phœnicians & by their name that they came fro the Erythræan Sea.

Herodotus tells us

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Herodotus^[79] tells us that the Phenicians were the authors of dissentions who coming from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean & seating themselves on the sea coasts of Syria, quickly undertook long voyages & in carrying of Egyptian & Assyrian wares passed over to other coasts & chiefly to Argos. For Argos was then the chief city of Greece. That the Phenicians coming hither exposed their merchandize & after 5 or 6 days when they had sold almost all, certain weomen came to the Sea amongst which was Io the daughter of Inachus & whilst they bought what they liked the Phenicians set upon them & seizing Io & some others carried them into their ship & sailed into Egypt, & this was the beginning of injuries. that in requital of this injury some Greeks of the Island Crete afterwards coming to Tyre carried away Europa, and a while after the Greeks committed also a sec{on}d injury in carrying away Medea from Colchos. And when the king of Colchos sent an Embassadour to demand his daughter back & that the raptors might be punished, the Greeks answered that as they (to wit the Egyptians of whom the kingdom of Colchos was a colony) had not punished the raptors of Io, so neither would the Greeks punish those of Medea. In the next age Paris stole Helena & these things occasioned the ruin of Troy. From these passages of Herodotus it appears that the navigation of the Phenician Merchants to Greece began upon their coming from the Red Sea & by consequence that the rapture of Io & Europa was not ancienter then the reign of Saul & David . The Sidonians might have ships before but it doth not appear that they traded with Greece before they fled from the Philistims & the Philistims fled from David & the Merchants of Edom were driven by David from their trade upon the Red Sea & deprived of their estates & country & thereby necessitated to seek out a new trade upon the Mediterranean for getting a livelyhood. In ☉ < insertion from f 30v > ☉ In such vessels as were used upon the Red Sea they sailed by the shoar of the Mediterranean till they came as far as Greece. These vessels were round & this sort of navigation continued in use till the Egyptians invented long ships in one of which with 50 aors Danaus came into Greece. In imitation of this ship the Greeks built the ship Argo. Then masts & sails invented by Dǽdalus came into use & navigation still improving the Phenicians soon after the Trojan war (as Strabo^[80] relates) sailed to the middle of the coast of Afric where they built cities, & went out beyond the Pillars of Hercules into the Atlantic Sea. These Phenicians seem to be chiefly Zidonians. for the Edomites fled to the enemies of Israel & in those days the Zidonians grew famous among the Greeks while Tyre was scarce known to them. Homer often names Zidon & Zidonians but makes no mention of Tyre. < text from f 31r resumes >

The expulsion of the Shepherds out of Egypt Polemo places in the time of Apis the son of Phoroneus as above but this Apis was a little later being supposed by the Greeks to be the Egyptian Osyris who was Sesostris as we shall shew hereafter. Iustin Martyr^[81] (in Cohortatione ad Græcos) tells us that Moses lived in the days of Ogyges & Inachus & that Apion the son of Possidonius in his Commentary against the Iews & in his fourth Book of Histories saith that when Inachus reigned at Argos the Iews under the conduct of Moses departed from Amasis king of Egypt, & that the same thing is reported by Ptolomy the Mendesian an Egyptian {Priest} who wrote the affairs of Egypt & by Hellanicus & Philocorus <32r> who wrote the Acts of the Athenians & by Castor & Thallus & Alexander Polyhistor. So also Tatian ^a[82] & Clemens ^b[83] out of ancient authors make Inachus contemporary to Moses & his son Phoroneus to Ogygus under whom happened the first flood The Shepherds were therefore expelled Egypt & the monarchy of Egypt erected in the days of Inachus the father of Phoroneus & Io, & therefore Inachus reigned in the days of Saul & a little before & after. For the Shepherds came out a little before & the rapture of Io was a little after. Phoroneus is reported the first who made laws & erected courts of justice at Argos & reduced the people from a rude & salvage way of life to a civil one & erected an altar to Iuno & these things the Greeks learnt of the Egyptians & Phenicians & therefore Phoroneus reigned about the time that the Phenicians began to sail into Greece or presently after & by consequence after the expulsion of the Shepherds & Edomites so that his reign fell in with part of Davids. He was contemporary ^a[84] to Ægialeus the first king of the Sicyonij being ^b[85] his brother & is accounted ^a[86] the first man & the father of mankind that is after the flood of Ogyges, and therefore since Greece ^c[87] knew nothing ancienter then Inachus Ægialeus & this flood : we may reccon that there is no memory of any thing done in Europe ancienter then the days of Samuel. Before the use of letters (brought in by Cadmus) nothing could be long remembered. ✝Cadmus being sent –

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^✝ Cadmus pretending to be sent in quest of his sister Europa & coming into Phocis ^a[89] followed an Ox which he had bought of the heardsmen of Pelagon & which was marked on both side with a white spot resembling the full Moon ^a[90]. This was in imitation of the Ox Apis & shews that he was of the religion of the Egyptians who worshipped that Ox. And thence its probable that as the Israelites in the time of Moses & Ieroboam in the time of Solomon by staying in Egypt learnt the worship of the Calf, so did the ancestors of Cadmus in the reign of the Shepherds. Some think that the letters also which Cadmus brought into Europe came originally out of Egypt. Strabo^[91] lets us know that the people which accompanied Cadmus into Europe were mixt of Phœnicians & Arabians which Arabians I take to be such as fled from the red sea to Sidon in the wars of David. Conon in his 32^th Narration saith that when Cadmus was sent to seek Europa he was accompanied with Proteus who came with Cadmus out of Egypt fearing the Tyranny of Busiris & married Chrysonome the daughter of Clytus king of a region in Thrace by the assistance of Clytus expelled the Bisaltes & became king of their country

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Cecrops is recconed the first Egyptian who led a colony into Greece. He ^a[92] first called Iupiter God & set up an Altar at Athens & erected a Statue to Minerva & after him came in the whole generation of Gods of Greece. Whence it may be collected that he was contemporary to Phoroneus & came into Greece in the reign of David or Saul when the shepherds were newly expelled Egypt. The marble places him 72 years before the coming of Danaus into Greece that is about the middle of Davids reign. For Danaus sailed into Greece about the 16^th year of Rehoboam as shall be shewed hereafter. Athens is reputed a colony of Egyptians coming from Sais where Minerva was worshipped. But Sir Iohn Marsham notes well that Cecrops their leader took shipping from Phœnicia & in his way to Greece arrived first at Cyprus. He seems to be one of the shepherds because a colony which he left in Cyprus sacrificed yearly a man to his daughter Agraulis, an impiety the genuine Egyptians were free from. By the like colonies the sacrificing of men came also into Greece. For Erectheus ^b[93] sacrificed his daughter & therefore was one of the shepherds. But circumcision ( the religion of the genuine Egyptians) was not any where introduced by them.

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 Diodorus ^a[94] tells us that Erechtheus in a time of famin brought a great quantity of corn from Egypt to Athens, for which benefaction they made him king of their city & that at this time Ceres came into Attica. She was entertained by Celeus king of Eleusis & nursed his son Triptolemus & taught him the sowing of corn & as the corn increased he dispersed it among the nations of Greece & in memory of these things the Eleusiana sacra were instituted with Egyptian ceremonies. Homer ^c[95] says that Ceres taught those mysteries to Triptolemus & Diocles & Eumolpus & Celeus the king, Herodotus^[96] that the daughters of Danaus brought them out of Egypt. Dadalus ^n[97] was the son of Merope the daughter of Erechtheus. # < insertion from f 31v > < text from f 31v resumes > Menestheus ^m[98] the son of Peteos the son of Omeeus the son of Erechtheus was at the Trojan war.. Calais & Zete ^d[99] the sons of Orithya the daughter of Erechtheus were in the Argonautic expedition, Procris another daughter of Erechtheus ^e was concubine to Minos the son of Europa, & the 50 daughters of Thespius ^f[100] the son of Erectheus lay with Hercules in his youth, & therefore Erechtheus was between two & three generations older then the Argonauts, & may be recconed about 10 or 15 years older then Solomon. Before he brought corn into Attica the Greeks lived of roots & acorns & other spontaneous fruits of the earth. He lived long & was slain in a war with Eumolpus. Celeus ^g[101] was the son of Rharus the son of Cranaus, & Cranaus was contemporary to Cecrops ā Rharus to Amphictyon the son of Deucalion. For ^k[102] Rharus married the daughter of Amphictyon ā the sister of Rharus married Amphictyon. In the reign of Celeus Triptolemus saved corn in a filed of Eleusine which from his grandfather was called Campus Rharius, & this seems to be about the time that Osiris or Bacchus & Danaus came into Europe, or a little before suppose in the end of the reign of Solomon, or beginning of Rehoboams. But Ceres came into Attica 20 or 30 years before because she nursed Triptolemus & lay with Iasion the brother of Harmonia the wife of Cadmus. Arcas the son of Callisto the daughter of Lycaon the son of Pelasgus received ^h[104] corn from Triptolemus & taught his people to sow & make bread of it & therefore Pelasgus was contemporary to Cranaus & Cecrops & all three flourished in the reign of Saul & David.

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Another instance of people coming out of Egypt & seating themselves in Phenicia seems to be in the family of Cepheus who was almost contemporary to Cadmus being an old man in the days of Perseus the grandfather of Euristheus who was contemporary to Hercules & the Argonauts. For Conon in his 40^th Narration saith that Cepheus the father of Andromeda reigned from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea & that his kingdom was called Ioppa from the city Ioppa <33r> upon the Mediterranean. And Stephanus in Ιόπη tells us that this City was built by Cepheus, which argues that a new dominion was erected there by his family. And Apollodorus makes this Cepheus & his brother Plineus to be the sons of Belus a king of Egypt the same Belus who was reputed the brother of Agenor the father of Cadmus & Europa. Be the genealogy true or fals it shews that the ancients derived the family of Cepheus from Egypt. He was accounted an Ethiopian, that is an Egyptian of Thebais.

Conon in his 37^th Narration tells us that when Cadmus was sent by the King of the Phenicians to seek Europa the Phenicians were very potent & having conquered a great part of Asia placed their royal seat at the Egyptian Thebes. Whence I learn that the kingdom of Egypt seated at Thebes was founded & grew potent about the times of Agenor & Cadmus, the Phenicians pretending to the 

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Ægyptus and Danaus are by the Greeks recconed among the sons of this Belus & therefore they flourished after the coming of Cadmus into Europe & were contemporary to Cepheus.. Manetho tells us that Ægyptus & Danaus were Sethosis & Armais, & that Sethosis having forces by sea & land left the government of Egypt to his brother Armais while he invaded & conquered Cyprus, Phenicia, Media Persia & other nations. Whence its plain that Sethosis was the same conquerer with Sesostris. The Greeks have transmitted to posterity many things concerning Sesostris, all which had been forgotten had those things been done before the use of Letters brought into Europe by Cadmus. And therefore Sesostris reigned after the rapture of Europa & by consequence after the days of David & Solomon. For Herodotus saw some of Sesostris his Pillars erected in Palestine in memory of his conquering that country, and such a conquest cannot agree to the warlike & victorious reigns of Saul & David nor to the peaceable & flourishing reign of Solomon, nor is there any mention of an invasion of Iudea by the Egyptians in the days of the Iudges or at any time before the fift year of Rehoboam. And on the other hand, all antiquity reccon Sesostris older then the Trojan war, & something older then the Argonautic expedition. For the Greeks built the ship Argo after the pattern of the long ship in which Danaus upon the return of Ægyptus or Sethosis into Egypt sailed with his 50 daughters to Greece. Sethosis therefore returned into Egypt about 10 or 20 or at most 30 years before the Argonautic expedition & by consequence invaded the nations in the reign of Rehoboam, & so can be no other king then Sesak.

The same thing is confirmed by Iosephus^[107] who affirms that Herodotus ascribes to Sesostris the actions of Sesak erring only in the name of the king. Which is all one as to say that Sesak was that conqueror whom Herodotus calls Sesostris. The old Scholiast of Apollonius Rhodius calls him Sesonchosis saying that Sesonchosis who was king of all Egypt & reigned after Orus, the son of Osiris & Isis, conquered all Asia & a great part of Europe & erected pillars of his conquests & made laws & found out horsmanship & left a colony at Æa with laws writ in Tables & with geographical Tables of his conquests by land & sea, & that Theopompus calls him Sesostris. <33v> Now Sesonchosis, or, as others call him, Sesonchis, is the same name with Sesak much after the manner that Memphis is the same name with Moph, or that the susanchites (Ezra 4) are the people of Susa or Shushan called Sheshach by Ieremiah ch 25 & 51.

And Solinus c.47 that they shewed the rock to which Andromeda was chained. From al{l} which it seems that Cepheus being of the royal family of the Kings of Egypt was by them placed at Ioppa & reigned over the Phenicians from the Mediterr{anean} to the red sea & built Ioppa for the seat of his kingdom, & reigned there in t{he} days of Perseus. & that in those days the Egyptians co{n}quered a great part of Asia & placed their royal seat at Thebes.

Among the sons of Belus the Egyptians also reccon Ægyptus & Danaus, & the{re}fore they flourished after the coming of Cadmus into Europe & were contempora{ry} to Cepheus. Belus in the language of the Egyptians is Ammon or Iupiter Am{mon} & therefore Ammon was the father of Ægyptus Danaus & Cepheus & brother of Agenor. In his days happened the story of Agenor & Cadmus & in the next reign the story of Ægyptus Danaus & Cepheus. Now Manetho tells us

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<34r>

including (as I reccon) the reign of the 12 kings. Then reigned^[108] Nechus or Nechoh 17 years, Psammis 6 years, Apries Vaphres or Hophra 25 years, Amasus 44 years & Psamminitus six months according to Herodotus. All these kings reigned in Sais & their reign including the preceding interregnum of two or three years took up 148 1/2 years & ended in the 5^t year of Cambyses or 223^th year of Nabonassar & therefore the interregnum & reign of the Assyrians over Egypt began in the year of Nabonassar 74 or 75, three or four years after the captivity of Manasses.

Nechus^[109] the successor of Psammiticus attempted to make a navigable ditch from the Bubastic stream of the Nile to the Red sea, prepared a navy both in the red sea & in the Mediterranean & went up against the Assyrians^[110] to Euphrates to beseige Carchemish (or Cercutium) & in the way at Megiddo (or Magdolus) vanquished & slew Iosiah king of Iudah who went out against him took Cadylus or Cades a city of Galilee & after three months fettered Iehoahaz the son & successor of Iosiah at Riblah or Antioch & made Iehojakim king in his room & put Iudea to tribute. But Nebuchadnezzar^[111] in the 3^d & 4^th year of Iehojakim invaded Syria routed Nechus at Carchemish & took all that belonged to him from the river of Egypt to the river of Euphrates, & about 38 years after^[112] (Ezek. 39.7) invaded & vanquished Egypt & Ethiopia & slew Pharaoh Hophra with a great part of his army & captivated the Egyptians wasting the land from Migdol to Syene & even to the border of Ethiopia & made either Partamis or Amasis their tributary king. Herodotus relates that the Egyptians revolted from Hophra & set up Amasis, Hellanicus that they revolted from Partamis & set up Amasis. Afterwards Cambyses in the fift year of his reign invaded Egypt again with a great slaughter & going up into Ethiopia founded the City Meroe & called it after the name of his mother. Amasis died in the winter before Cambyses entered Egypt & Psamminitus was conquered & slain by him in the summer following & Egypt has continued almost ever since in servitude.