Hedvig Győry: Mélanges offerts a Edith Varga „Le lotus qui sort de terre” (Bulletin du Musée Hongrois des Beaux-Arts Supplément 1. Budapest, 2001)

LEO DEPUYDT: What Is Certain about the Origin of the Egyptian Civil Calendar?

tion, may thus be derived from an anchor, which does not. A Sothic date discovered at Illahun then gains credibility and makes it possible to date Sesostris III to the nineteenth century B.C. In conclusion, Sothic dating remains the backbone of Egyptian chronology because it is more precise than the two anchors. But it is the two anchors that ultimately serve as guarantee that Egyptian history is roughly placed in time where it should be. However, even considering Sothic dating, the dates in the recent handbooks vary by up to fifty years for the second millennium B.C. and for up to two hundred years for the third millennium B.C. I refrain from entering into more detail. The length of Egyptian history is discussed here only to achieve a better understanding of the problem of the origin of the calendar. 2. What Is Certain about the Origin of the Egyptian Civil Calendar? It may be considered certain short of considering certain types of evidence a fraud - that Egyptian history began in the early third millennium B.C. It is difficult to know exactly when. It is also a fact that the earliest certain evidence for the Egyptian civil calendar dates to Dynasty Four. An inscription from Tehne mentioning Pharaoh Mycerinos lays out the calendar's structure.

13 An inscription in Djoser's step pyramid complex mentions the month III Smw (Month II).'

4 This is presumably a civil, not a lunar, month. The inscription is in ink and seems to be related to the building of the pyramid. I cannot judge from the edition of the inscription whether there is a possibility that the inscription was inscribed at a later date. These two facts make it possible to produce an argument that connects the origin of the civil calendar with the beginning of the inundation or with the rising of Sirius or with both. The purpose of what follows is not only to make the argument's logic fully explicit in order to calibrate its reasonableness but also to clarify that the argument cannot be proven positively. Still, even if nothing is certain, we might as well find out why this is so. The first two steps of the argument are two reasonable assumptions. First, the civil calendar was created shortly before the time in which it is first attested. Second, the 365-day year was never disrupted by calendar reforms. 13 K. Sethe, Urk I, p. 25. 14 J. Kahl - N. Kloth - U. Zimmermann, Die Inschriften der 3. Dynastie. Ägyptologische Abhandlungen 56, Wiesbaden 1995, pp. 70-71.