definite æra of chronology, made it difficult to obtain a really correct order of succession, or a historical picture of the ancient period. The historical truth of the writings, which, in spite of these difficulties, were undertaken, as is shown by the monuments mentioned above, and the Turin papyrus (p. 25), was still more seriously impaired by the fact that the views of the priests were governed by the conception that the course of certain periods was allotted to the world by the gods, and in these periods the fortunes of Egypt had reached their fulfilment, and would continue to reach it. We have already become acquainted with this Sothis period (p. 29 ff). From the gods came life and the world. So the gods were said to have reigned in person over Egypt, before the kings, their divine successors, ruled over men. Hence the priests of Lower Egypt commenced the reign of the seven great gods with the beginning of a Sothis period. The seven great gods were followed by the twelve gods of the second rank, Thoth, Anubis, Chunsu, &c., in reigns of gradually diminishing length through a certain number of Sothis periods. According to the scheme still preserved, Ptah reigned 9,000 years, and the last of the gods only seventy years, so that on an average each occupies exactly half a Sothis period, or 730 of our years. These nineteen gods were followed by thirty demigods; to each of whom was allotted the twelfth part of a Sothis period for a reign, so that the whole period of the reign of the gods takes up twelve Sothis periods, or 17,520 years. After this, according to some authorities, began the period of human rulers; others allotted four Sothis periods, _i.e._ 5840 years, to another set of demigods. Then followed, beginning like the rest with the beginning of a Sothis period, the rule of human kings. This Sothis period commenced either in the year 5702 B.C., or, according to the arrangement of Lepsius, with the year 4242 B.C. This year, therefore, was the first of the history of Egypt. To Menes the priests attached the long list of names in one continuous series, without in the least regarding whether the dynasties were contemporaneous or successive, whether they ruled in Upper or Lower Egypt, over the whole land, or in certain districts only. If we calculate the rule of the human kings from the first of the dates given, the first Sothis period of men came to an end, according to the canon of Manetho, in 4242 B.C.; the second in 2782 B.C. The third ended in the time of Menephta I., in whose reign as a fact the Egyptian year did again coincide with the natural year.[291]