An outline, era by era

Unification under Narmer (~3100 BCE); hieroglyphs

Bronze Age · ~3300 – ~1200 BCE

Around 3100 BCE, the long valley of the Nile and its wide delta were brought under a single ruler for the first time. Later Egyptians credited this to a founder-king called Menes. Modern scholars debate whether Menes was the same person as Narmer, whose name appears on a famous carved palette from Hierakonpolis, or as his successor Aha. Either way, the First Dynasty that followed ruled from a capital at Memphis, near the point where the valley opens into the delta.

Egypt's unification was probably gradual rather than a single conquest, and it grew out of earlier regional centres such as Naqada, Hierakonpolis and Abydos. At about the same time Egyptians developed hieroglyphs, a script that mixes pictures, sound signs and signs that mark meaning. The earliest examples are short labels on tombs, seals and tags from Abydos, dated to about 3250 BCE or a little later. Hieroglyphs were used for royal and religious texts for more than 3,000 years, and they helped hold a large, long-lived state together.

Things happened, and the rest is history

  1. Predynastic Naqada and Hierakonpolis: rise of the southern chiefdoms

    Event

    What happened

    Through the Naqada culture, from about 4000 to 3100 BCE, villages in Upper Egypt grow into larger centres with rich cemeteries, specialised craft production and long-distance trade. At Hierakonpolis, Naqada and Abydos, elite tombs of the Naqada II and III periods hold fine pottery, stone vessels, gold and imported goods. Around 3300 BCE the tomb of a ruler at Abydos, Tomb U-j, shows a wealthy local elite. By the Naqada III period, Naqada culture goods and styles spread north into the Delta and south into Lower Nubia.

    The rest is history

    This long process created the wealth, ranked society and shared symbols of rule from which the First Dynasty emerged. Scholars agree that unification was probably gradual and rooted in the south, though they debate how far it was won by conquest, by alliance or by the spread of culture. Images such as the falcon and the white crown, seen at Hierakonpolis, later became symbols of the Egyptian king. By about 3100 BCE a single ruler, with a royal cemetery at Abydos, controlled the Nile Valley and Delta. The earliest Egyptian writing comes from this same elite setting.

    Sources

    1. BookWengrow, David. The Archaeology of Early Egypt: Social Transformations in North-East Africa, 10,000 to 2650 BC. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.Survey of the Naqada culture and the growth of the early state.
    2. BookWilkinson, Toby A. H. Early Dynastic Egypt. London: Routledge, 1999.Evidence from predynastic centres to the first two dynasties.
    3. BookHendrickx, Stan, and Pierre Vermeersch. Prehistory: From the Palaeolithic to the Badarian Culture. In The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.

  2. The First Dynasty royal tombs at Abydos

    Event

    What happened

    In the First Dynasty, from about 3100 BCE, the kings of Egypt are buried in large mudbrick tombs at Umm el-Qaab, the cemetery at Abydos. The tombs of Aha, Djer, Djet, Den and their successors are marked by stelae carved with the king's name, and are surrounded by the small graves of attendants. Near the Nile floodplain the same kings build great mudbrick enclosures, such as the one at Abydos for Khasekhemwy later on, and tombs and cemeteries at Saqqara, north of Memphis, serve the high officials of the new state. Inscribed labels, seal impressions and stone vessels from these tombs name the kings and their officials.

    The rest is history

    These burials show a single royal house, using a shared set of royal names and titles, ruling both the valley and the delta. The inscribed labels and seals give the earliest continuous written record of Egyptian kings and their administration. Whether Narmer or Aha is the Menes of later tradition is debated. The Abydos cemetery was still honoured in later times, and the tomb of Djer was later venerated as the tomb of Osiris. The First Dynasty is conventionally dated from about 3100 to 2900 BCE, and the state it set up lasted into the Second Dynasty and the Old Kingdom.

    Sources

    1. BookWilkinson, Toby A. H. Early Dynastic Egypt. London: Routledge, 1999.Standard survey of the royal tombs and administration of the first two dynasties.
    2. BookPetrie, W. M. Flinders. The Royal Tombs of the Earliest Dynasties, Part II. London: Egypt Exploration Fund, 1901.Early excavation report on the Abydos royal tombs.

  3. Menes, the first king of all Egypt

    Origin story

    The legend

    Menes, a king from the south, marches north and joins Upper and Lower Egypt into one kingdom. He founds the city of Memphis by turning aside the course of the Nile and building a dam. He rules for many years, and a hippopotamus is said to have killed him in the end.

    The rest is history

    The story is told by Herodotus in the 5th century BCE and by Manetho, an Egyptian priest writing in Greek in the 3rd century BCE. Egyptian king lists from the New Kingdom, such as the Abydos King List of Seti I, also begin with Meni. No contemporary document names a king Menes. Scholars usually think the name refers to Narmer or Aha, and some think it was a title or a later memory of a founder. Excavations at Abydos found the early royal tombs, which show a unified state under the First Dynasty. The story of the dam at Memphis is only reported by Herodotus.

    Sources

    1. PrimaryHerodotus. Histories, Book 2.99. Greek prose, 5th century BCE.
    2. PrimaryManetho. Aegyptiaca. Greek history of Egypt, 3rd century BCE, preserved in excerpts. Loeb Classical Library, translated by W. G. Waddell, 1940.
    3. BookWilkinson, Toby A. H. Early Dynastic Egypt. London: Routledge, 1999.Standard survey of the evidence for the first two dynasties.

  4. Narmer smites his enemy

    Heroic tale

    The legend

    King Narmer wears the white crown of the south and grips an enemy by the hair, raising his mace to strike him down. On the other side of the same stone he wears the red crown of the north and walks in procession past rows of beheaded foes. The gods watch over him, and a falcon holds a captive on a rope.

    The rest is history

    The Narmer Palette was found in 1898 at Hierakonpolis by James Quibell and Frederick Green. It is a ceremonial slate about 64 cm high, now in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Its image of a king smiting a foe became the standard pose of Egyptian kingship for 3,000 years. Many scholars once read it as a record of the conquest of the north. Others now see it as a ritual or symbolic scene and do not think it shows one particular battle. Narmer's name, written with a catfish and a chisel sign, is among the earliest readable royal names.

    Sources

    1. BookQuibell, James E., and Frederick W. Green. Hierakonpolis, Part II. London: Bernard Quaritch, 1902.First publication of the palette from its discovery.
    2. BookWengrow, David. The Archaeology of Early Egypt: Social Transformations in North-East Africa, 10,000 to 2650 BC. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
    3. BookWilkinson, Toby A. H. The Rise and Fall of Ancient Egypt. London: Bloomsbury, 2010.

  5. Thoth gives writing to humankind

    Myth

    The legend

    The god Thoth, the ibis-headed lord of wisdom, invents writing and gives it to humans. In Plato's telling, he offers it to the king of Egypt as a cure for forgetfulness. The king refuses it, saying that people who rely on it will stop using their memory.

    The rest is history

    Egyptians called hieroglyphs the words of the god, medu netjer, and Thoth was the patron of scribes. The version in which the king refuses the gift is told by Plato in the Phaedrus, written in the 4th century BCE, and is a Greek tale rather than an Egyptian text. The archaeology gives a human timeline instead. Tomb U-j at Abydos, dated to about 3250 BCE, held more than 100 small bone and ivory labels with early signs, and it is one of the oldest known examples of Egyptian writing. Whether Egyptian writing was inspired by Mesopotamian writing is debated, but its signs and style are distinct.

    Sources

    1. PrimaryPlato. Phaedrus, 274c-275b. Greek dialogue, 4th century BCE.
    2. BookDreyer, Günter. Umm el-Qaab I: Das prädynastische Königsgrab U-j und seine frühen Schriftzeugnisse. Mainz: Philipp von Zabern, 1998.Excavation report on tomb U-j and its labels (in German).
    3. BookAllen, James P. Middle Egyptian: An Introduction to the Language and Culture of Hieroglyphs. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014.

  6. The riddle of the hieroglyphs

    Popular belief

    The legend

    For centuries it is believed that hieroglyphs are a secret code of mystical symbols, each picture standing for a deep idea. Their meaning is lost until a young French scholar, Champollion, suddenly cracks the code from the Rosetta Stone in 1822.

    The rest is history

    The mystical view goes back to late antiquity, and Horapollo's Hieroglyphica, a Greek text of perhaps the 5th century CE, explained the signs as symbols. Hieroglyphs in fact record the Egyptian language, with sound signs and signs that give meaning. The Rosetta Stone, found in 1799, carries one decree in hieroglyphs, Demotic and Greek, which allowed comparison. Thomas Young made early progress, and Jean-François Champollion announced his decipherment in 1822 in his Lettre à M. Dacier. It was a work of years, built on his knowledge of Coptic, which descends from the Egyptian language.

    Sources

    1. PrimaryHorapollo. Hieroglyphica. Greek text on the meaning of hieroglyphs, probably 5th century CE.
    2. BookParkinson, Richard. Cracking Codes: The Rosetta Stone and Decipherment. London: British Museum Press, 1999.
    3. BookAdkins, Lesley, and Roy Adkins. The Keys of Egypt: The Race to Crack the Hieroglyph Code. London: HarperCollins, 2000.

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