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The History of Egypt Under the Ptolemies

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The History of Egypt Under the Ptolemies UC-NRLF $C lb EbE THE HISTORY OF EGYPT THE PTOLEMIES. BY SAMUEL SHARPE. LONDON: EDWARD MOXON, DOVER STREET. 1838. 65 Printed by Arthur Taylor, Coleman Street. TO THE READER. The Author has given neither the arguments nor the whole of the authorities on which the sketch of the earlier history in the Introduction rests, as it would have had too much of the dryness of an antiquarian enquiry, and as he has already published them in his Early History of Egypt. In the rest of the book he has in every case pointed out in the margin the sources from which he has drawn his information. » Canonbury, 12th November, 1838. Works published by the same Author. The EARLY HISTORY of EGYPT, from the Old Testament, Herodotus, Manetho, and the Hieroglyphieal Inscriptions. EGYPTIAN INSCRIPTIONS, from the British Museum and other sources. Sixty Plates in folio. Rudiments of a VOCABULARY of EGYPTIAN HIEROGLYPHICS. M451 42 ERRATA. Page 103, line 23, for Syria read Macedonia. Page 104, line 4, for Syrians read Macedonians. CONTENTS. Introduction. Abraham : shepherd kings : Joseph : kings of Thebes : era ofMenophres, exodus of the Jews, Rameses the Great, buildings, conquests, popu- lation, mines: Shishank, B.C. 970: Solomon: kings of Tanis : Bocchoris of Sais : kings of Ethiopia, B. c. 730 .- kings ofSais : Africa is sailed round, Greek mercenaries and settlers, Solon and Pythagoras : Persian conquest, B.C. 525 .- Inarus rebels : Herodotus and Hellanicus : Amyrtaus, Nectanebo : Eudoxus, Chrysippus, and Plato : Alexander the Great : oasis of Ammon, native judges, Cleomenes. Ptolemy Soter, b.c 322. Funeral of Alexander: Perdiccas overcome: Phenicia and Ccelo-Syria conquered : the bull Apis : buildings of Alexandria ; Serapis : the Museum : papyrus : Cyrene conquered : Cyprus conquered : Egyp- soldiers : Demetrius beaten : Petra it : Hecatceus : tian city of '; stops Antigonus the Jews : Demetrius conquers at sea : Antigonus beaten ; Rhodes : coins : Apel- les, Euclid, Diodorus Cronus, and Antiphilus : Thais and her children : Eury- dice and her children : Berenice and her children : Ptolemy lays aside the crown. Ptolemy Philadelphia, b.c 284. His tutor Philetas: his coronation: Cyrene revolts : his two brothers killed : embassy to Rome : the Carthaginians ask a loan : the light-house : port ofBerenice : canal : elephants caught .• Deme- trius Phalerius, Zenodotus, Euclid, Ctesibius, Theocritus, Callimachus, Hegesias, Philostephanus, Aristippus, Arete, Metrodidactus, Theodorus, Strato : Timo- charis, Aristillus, and Aristarchus, the astronomers: Aratus and his translators : Sosibius, Zoilus, Timon, Manetho, Petosiris, Timosthenes the admiral : Menander sent for : Colotes : public readers : Pamphilus, Neacles, and Helena : the Jews : the Bible translated : Arsinoe and her children : Arsinoe, his sister : coins : Er- gamenes : statue of Diana : Cleombrotus, Erasistratus, and Herophilus : pro- vinces, forces, revenue, treasure. IV CONTENTS. Ptolemy Euergetes, b.c. 246. Conquests in Syria: hair of Berenice: Conon: buildings: conquests in Ethiopia: Monumentum Adulitanum and Cosmas Indicopleustes : Onias ; revenues ofJudcea : Cleomenes : Aristophanes : Eratos- thenes : Apollonius Rhodius : Lycophron : Jesus the son ofSirach : Apollonius of Perga : coins : judges. Ptolemy Philopator, B.C. 221. His mother and brother put to death: battle ofRaphia : the Jewish temple : huge ships : the queen put to death : Aga- thocles, Sosibius, Tlepolemus : Sphcerus, Eratosthenes, Ptolemy the son ofAge- sarchus, Timeeus : buildings : coins. Ptolemy Epiph anes, b. c. 204. Death ofAgathocles and hisfamily : revolt of Scopas : guardianship ofRome : thephalanx beaten: coronation: Rosetta Stone : Cleopatra's dower : rebellion at Lycopolis : coins: loss ofprovinces: Polybins. B.C. 180. with Ptolemy Philometor, War Antiochus ; coronation : Egypt invaded: Ptolemy Euergetes II. declared king: Cyprus rebels: second invasion: Euergetes made king of Cyrene: Jewish temple at Leontopolis : buildings : collections for the dead : Aristarchus the critic : Moschus of Syra- cuse : Nicander : Hipparchus: Hero, the power ofsteam : coins: Cleopatra and her children. Ptolemy Euergetes II. B.C. 145. He kills his nephew: the journey of Scipio Africanus : the Maccabees : the kingflies to Cyprus, kills his son, returns : trade to India : Eudoxus Cyzicenus : Aristobulus the Jew, Sositheus, the younger Homer : Pergamus, its library, parchment : Cleopatra Cocce and her children. Cleopatra Cocce and Ptolemy Soter II. b.c. 116. Alexander reigns in Cyprus : marriages and quarrels of the Syrian kings : the Jews and Samari- tans: Soter flies to Cyprus. Cleopatra Cocce and Ptolemy Alexander, b.c. 106. Wars in Syria and Judcea : Cleopatra put to death : coins : Ptolemy Apion : Cyrene seized by the Romans. Ptolemy Soter 'II. B.C. 87. The rebellion and ruin of Thebes: Lucullus : Dio: coins. CONTENTS. V Cleopatra Berenice, b.c. 80. She is ordered to marry Alexander, and to reign jointly with him : his will. Ptolemy Alexander II. b. c. 80. He marries Berenice, murders her, and is killed. Ptolemy Neus Dionysus, b.c. 80. Demetrius accused of sobriety: Cy- prus seized by Rome : the king flies from Egypt : Cato : Cleopatra Try- PHiENA and Berenice made queens : Julius Ccesar : Pompey : Gabinius : Seleucus Cybiosactes : Archelaus : Marc Antony : Rabirius : Diodorus Siculus : the pyramids, the temples, Apis, the cat, the mummies, funerals : revenue, trade, population, gold mines : Zopyrus, Apollonius of Cittium. Cleopatra and her Brothers, b.c. 51. She quarrels with Ptolemy: Pompey's death : Julius Caesar : battle in Alexandria : the library burnt : Pto- lemy drowned : Ccesarion born : Arsinoe led in triumph to Rome : the camelo- pard : the younger Ptolemy killed : Sosigenes, Bioscorides, Serapion, Didymus : costly dinners : the pearls : Arsinoe's death : scents : Antony's children, and gifts of kingdoms : coins : the new library : battle ofActium : Egypt conquered by Octavianus. Remarks. Index of Names. THE HISTORY OF EGYPT UNDER THE PTOLEMIES. INTRODUCTION. W HEN letters first rose in Greece and Rome, the writers found a rich harvest of fable and tradition, out of which they wove those beautiful tales that we now read as the beginning of Greek and Roman history. The Egyptians were not favoured with historians fix who could thus and hand down to us their traditions ; but, on the other hand, they had from far earlier times carved the names and deeds of their kings on the granite temples, and thus, instead of a rich poetic fable, they have left us a bald reality. In each case, the history of the country begins with scattered and dark hints, which some minds seize upon as treasures and others overlook as worthless, but which the historian can neither safely lean nor from him and this is the case with upon yet wholly fling ; the history of Egypt before the time when Abraham drove his herds into that country in search of food, which the drought had made scarce in Canaan. Egypt was then broken up into several little kingdoms. Upper Manetho. Egypt, the most powerful of these, had been ruled over by a race of kings who reigned in This, a city near the spot, or perhaps on the spot, where Abydos afterwards stood; and who had held Thebes, and '2 INTRODUCTION. Manetho. some of them Memphis, as part of their kingdom. We are told the of in This after that names seventeen who reigned ; which city fell, and rose to be of and it was Thebes capital Upper Egypt ; perhaps in the reign of the second or third Theban king that Abraham en- tered the Delta. The city of Elephantine, on an island in the Nile, just below the cataract at the southern boundary of Egypt, was also the capital of a little and know the and but the kingdom ; we names, nothing names., of nine kings who had reigned there. Elephantine no doubt fell when Thebes rose over the city of This. Memphis was the capital of the rich corn-fields of Lower Egypt, or the land of Mizraim as it is called in the Old Testament ; and perhaps the tenth of those Memphite kings whose names are known to us was reigning in the time of Abraham. We likewise have the name of one king who reigned at Heracleo- as that is close to it is most that he polis ; and, city Memphis, likely ruled over Memphis, and made Heracleopolis the capital of Lower Egypt during his reign. The people of both Upper and Lower Egypt seem to have been Copts, children of Cham or Ham, and from him they called their a after it has un- country Chemi ; and they spoke language which, dergone the changes of so many ages, Ave even now know as Coptic. Their religion was the same as what Herodotus and Diodorus after- their sacred animals wards found there : many cities had already ; and the bull Apis in Memphis, the bull Mnevis in Heliopolis, the of goat Mando in Mendes, were fed and waited upon at the cost or the those cities, and worshipped as images of Chem, Amun-Ra, Sun. afterwards Their buildings were much the same as those which rose in such massive grandeur. Venephres, king of This, had al- ABRAHAM. 3 built at a named Cochome the older of Wilkinson's ready pyramids city ; part Thebes. the great temple of Thebes, now called the temple of Karnak, was and most saw the obelisk of Osir- already begun ; Abraham likely tesen I., which even yet stands at Heliopolis. The carved writing, by means of figures of men and animals, which was afterwards, when easier ways of writing came into use, called sacred carving, or hieroglyphics, was even then not new. Egypt.Inscrip. plate 6. The inscriptions of the Osirtesens do not show us hieroglyphics in their earliest form in see words ; them we many spelt alphabeti- actions. cally mixt up with the symbols or pictures of objects and their time There had been, most likely, many ages before during which the hieroglyphics were wholly symbolic, before alphabetic spelling had been thought of. The journey of Abraham into Egypt was not that of a single fa- there was at the same time a of Manetho. mily ; great migration going on, Phenicians, moving out of their own country into Lower Egypt, and along the African coast of the Mediterranean.
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