The Complete Ramses II

by Damien F. Mackey Part One: Ramses II greatly over-stretched As with King Solomon (though, in his case, to a lesser extent), who must now be sought for in three supposedly separate historical eras: Archaeology for King Solomon ‘all in pieces, all coherence gone’ https://www.academia.edu/45185158/Archaeology_for_King_Solomon_all_in_pieces_all_coherence_gone historians (Egyptologists) have so fragmented the historical Ramses II as to render him, in his fullness, well-nigh irrecoverable. Consequently, revisionist historians have laboured unsuccessfully so far to pinpoint a proper time-location for Ramses II in the context of Dr. Immanuel Velikovsky’s important lowering of Egypt’s New Kingdom by half a millennium or more (his Ages in Chaos series). Dr. Velikovsky had had the right idea. In order for the long-reigning Ramses II (67 years) to be able to fit into this new scheme of things, the mighty pharaoh must be identified with a supposedly later pharaonic alter ego. Velikovsky chose to identify the Nineteenth Dynasty’s Ramses with the Twenty-Sixth Dynasty’s pharaoh Necho. Biblically, Dr. Donovan Courville (The Exodus Problem and its Ramifications, vols 1 and 2, 1971) thought to identify Ramses II, at the very end of his extensive reign, with the enigmatic “So King of Egypt” of 2 Kings 17:4 - at the time of kings Hoshea of Israel and Hezekiah of Judah. As we shall find, these respective ID’s opted for by Drs. Velikovsky and Courville – whilst being on the right track – bring with them some rather awkward problems. The purpose of this present series will be for me to attempt to recover fully the historical Ramses II ‘the Great’. My extraordinary contention will be that this most famous of pharaohs has been so tortuously stretched, racked and hacked upon the Procrustean bed of Sothic theory: Fall of the Sothic Theory: Egyptian Chronology Revisited https://answersingenesis.org/archaeology/ancient-egypt/fall-of-the-sothic-theory-egyptian-chronology-revisited/ that the poor king’s fragmentary parts now stretch, in all of their bits and pieces, from conventional c. 1300 BC to c. 350 BC, a whopping – and quite inexcusable – 950 years! That span will more than accommodate Dr. Velikovsky’s half millennium, or so, of downward time shift. Revisionist historians have thought that (i) Ramses II looms with (ii) “The Assuruballit Problem” [TAP], and (iii) The Third Intermediate Period [TIP], as presenting the greatest of all challenges to the revision of ancient Egypt. As regards (ii) TAP, my solution (with which I am content) has been to move Shalmaneser III right out of the El Amarna era. Emmet Sweeney has done the same, whilst, however, locating Shalmaneser III to an era somewhat earlier than the one I have suggested for him: SHALMANESER III AND SETI I: CONTEMPORARIES AND ALLIES https://www.academia.edu/44864569/SHALMANESER_III_AND_SETI_I_CONTEMPORARIES_AND_ALLIES Now, in this series, I hope finally to settle (i) the problem of Ramses II, in broad outline at least, but definitely not in precise detail. My solution will be found also to make a significant dent, at least, in (iii) TIP, with Ramses II being a golden thread running right through the dark and murky TIP labyrinth, thereby greatly illuminating it. So, let us hop on board the TIP-TAP Time Machine in order to gather together all of the separate parts of Ramses II (and hopefully identify “So king of Egypt” in the process), knitting these all together again and wrapping them up in suitably cohesive pharaonic binding cloths. Part Two: Ramses III folds seamlessly into Ramses II We first pick up Ramses II in his artificial era of c. 1280-1213 BC. In that early time location, the mighty pharaoh is favoured as being the Pharaoh of the Exodus. This is a double mistake. For one, the era of the biblical Exodus is approximately 150-200 years earlier than this; and, secondly, Ramses II (as we shall find) belongs more than half a millennium later than where the textbooks have dated him. Our first alter ego extension of Ramses II is his namesake, assigned to the Twentieth Dynasty, Ramses III (c. 1186-1154 BC). Ramses III and his sons follow a pattern so incredibly similar to Ramses II (as historians have indeed noticed) - and that despite Ramses III being accredited with less than half the length of reign of Ramses II - that it is a wonder revisionists have not been making the comparison (I know of none who have, at least): that RAMSES II = RAMSES III. I have made that comparison in articles such as e.g.: Ramses II, Ramses III. Part One: Some ‘ramifying’ similarities https://www.academia.edu/37461306/Ramses_II_Ramses_III_Part_One_Some_ramifying_similarities and: New Revision for Ramses II. Part Two: Ramses III was not emulating Ramses II https://www.academia.edu/38165672/New_Revision_for_Ramses_II_Part_Two_Ramses_III_was_not_emulating_Ramses_II Let us read about some of it from the first article listed above: “[Rameses III’s] … children turned out to resemble Rameses II’s not only in their names but also in their early deaths”. N. Grimal Should revisionists perhaps have realised, in their efforts to streamline the later Egyptian history, that the troublesome Ramses II ought to be merged with the similarly troublesome Ramses III? From N. Grimal (A History of Ancient Egypt, Blackwell, 1994) we can pick up certain amazing similarities between pharaoh Ramses (or Rameses, Ramesses) II, conventionally - but quite wrongly - dated to c. 1200 BC, and Ramses III, conventionally dated to c. 1150 BC. P. 271: From the very outset Ramesses III’s role-model was Ramesses II. His successors also modelled themselves on the earlier Ramesses, but it was Ramesses III who went to the greatest lengths, from the choice of his titulature to the construction of a mortuary temple copying the plan of the Ramesseum. …. Like Ramesses II, he had to deal with a very delicate state of affairs in his foreign policy. The Libyans … in the western Delta …. Ramesses managed to defeat this new [sic] onslaught, and was even able to incorporate a number of the Libyan captives into the Egyptian army. Pp. 274-275 …. The [Medinet Habu] texts and military representations were a monument … to the fact that Ramesses III’s exploits could transform him into an archetypal figure removed from his own specific place in time. My comment: This is precisely what conventional history has done to Ramses III, ‘removed him from his own specific place in time’]. … the king was represented as eternally victorious not only over the Libyan confederations, but also over the enemies conquered by Ramesses II. …. The wars of Ramesses III were also depicted on the inner walls of the temple in the first and second courts. They stood alongside …. political representations, such as the list of Ramesses III’s sons on the west portico in the second court, in imitation of the list of the sons of Ramesses II in the Ramesseum. … his children turned out to resemble Rameses II’s not only in their names but also in their early deaths. P. 276 The reign of Ramesses III was followed by a rapid succession of eight kings …. All of them bore the name Ramesses and all claimed varying degrees of blood-link with Ramesses II. Was it a case of same era; same dynasty; same titulature; same sons (pre-deceased); same Libyans; same Sea Peoples; and SAME PERSON? [End of quotes] Many more comparisons could be added to these. For example: The “Sea Peoples” for which the reign of Ramses III is so famous, is the same era as that of the “Sea Peoples” at the time of Ramses II (https://www.ancient.eu/Sea_Peoples/): The Sea Peoples & Ramesses II Ramesses the Great was one of the most effective rulers in the history of ancient Egypt and among his many accomplishments was securing the borders against invasion by nomadic tribes and securing the trade routes vital to the country's economy. Early in his reign, the Hittites seized the important trade center of Kadesh (in modern-day Syria) and in 1274 BCE Ramesses led his army to drive them out. Ramesses claimed a great victory and had the story inscribed in detail and read to the people. His claim of total victory is disputed by the Hittite account claiming their own but the inscription is important for many other reasons than Ramesses would have had in mind and, among them, what it says about the Sea Peoples. In his account, the Sea Peoples are mentioned as allies of the Hittites but also as serving in his own army as mercenaries. No mention is made of where they came from or who they were which suggests to scholars that the audience would have already had this information; the Sea Peoples needed no introduction. Ramesses also relates how, in the second year of his reign, he defeated these people in a naval battle off the coast of Egypt. Ramesses allowed the Sea Peoples' war ships and their supply and cargo vessels to approach the mouth of the Nile where he had a small Egyptian fleet positioned in a defensive formation. He then waited in the wings for the Sea Peoples to attack what seemed to be an insignificant force before launching his full attack upon them from their flanks and sinking their ships. This battle seems to have involved only the Sherdan Sea Peoples or, at least, they are the only ones mentioned because, after the battle, many were pressed into Ramesses' army and some served as his elite body guard. [End of quote] Pharaoh Ramses II thus far has been lowered to the mid-C12th BC. He still has a long way to be dragged down. Part Three: Psibkhenno continues the thread Our time machine, having to this point glided along effortlessly from Ramses II to Ramses III (from c. 1300 BC to c. 1150 BC), will now encounter some heavy turbulence as it plunges headlong into that dark realm of TIP, into the mid-C11th BC (conventional dating). My claim at the beginning of this series was that “Ramses II [would be] a golden thread running right through the dark and murky TIP labyrinth, thereby greatly illuminating it”. To demonstrate this, however, is not quite so easy. My focus now shifts to pharaoh Psibkhenno (or Psusennes), whom N. Grimal will connect to the Ramessides as follows: “… Psusennes himself was the chief priest of Amun at Tanis, but he also traced his succession back to Ramesses XI by renaming himself ‘Ramesses-Psusennes’” (A History of Ancient Egypt, p. 315). “He clearly emphasized his Theban heritage: his Horus name was ‘Powerful bull crowned at Thebes’ and his Two Ladies name was ‘great builder in Karnak’.” TIP encompasses Egyptian dynasties Twenty-One to Twenty-Five (conventional dating 1069-702 BC. See N. Grimal, ibid., p. 393). But the whole thing is confusion confounded. The TIP in general is most complex and difficult in the extreme, and no one I am sure would argue with N. Grimal’s view, which he gives interestingly with reference to revisionist Peter James’ Centuries of Darkness, that the TIP is “one of the most confused periods in Egyptian history, a period which historians have still not been able to disentangle satisfactorily from the fragments of evidence (James 1991)”. The Twenty-First and the Twenty-Second dynasties, that have been placed in Indian file sequence, need to be made approximately contemporaneous, as past scholars have thought. M. Bierbrier has written about the dearth of 21st dynasty material (The Late New Kingdom in Egypt (c. 1300-664 B.C.). A Genealogical and Chronological Investigation, Aris and Phillips Ltd, Warminster, 1975, p. 45): With the advent of Dynasty XXI the copious sources of information which were available in the previous two dynasties vanish. Administrative papyri and ostraca prove practically non-existent. Votive statuary would seem to disappear almost totally. Graffiti and inscriptions decline to a few badly preserved examples. Most important of all, tombs which have provided the basic material for the study of the families of Dynasty XIX and Dynasty XX are for the most part no longer built but are replaced by small intrusive burials in older tombs or by large caches of coffins secreted in obscure tombs in the rock cliffs of Thebes. … Because of this dearth of material, it is not possible as in Dynasty XIX and Dynasty XX to present a coherent outline of the descent of various families and their interrelations. Bierbrier thought that: “This paucity of information is partly due to the shift of political power to the northern cities which have been less well preserved and excavated than those of the south and partly due to the less prosperous and more unsettled times”. James refers to the lack of stone statues at the time as described by Bierbrier as “a bizarre absence not encountered in other periods of Egyptian history”. And he adds here: “Yet with the advent of the 22nd Dynasty, ‘a wealth of data on the priests and officials of Thebes’ is known ...”. - Apis Bulls Peter James again, in his discussion of Apis bull burials at Saqqara - which burials he considers to be “potentially one of the most important sources of chronological information for the TIP” - gives this yet further example of the lack of 21st dynasty evidence (op. cit., pp. 236, 238, emphasis added): The most striking gap in this sequence [of Apis burials] is for the 21st and early 22nd Dynasties, so far totally unattested. On the conventional dating this period was some 210 years, during which time there should have been about 12 Apis burials, based on the average life expectancy of eighteen years, as calculated by Jean Vercoutter. An ‘embalming table’ with the name of Shoshenq 1 suggests that there may have been one 22nd Dynasty burial which has not been recovered, but the complete lack of records for the 21st Dynasty is still extraordinary. In the case of Psibkhenno, my Ramses thread, he has probably been split into two (I and II), due to the separation of the Twenty-First and Twenty-Second dynasties. Thus there is a Psibkhenno I (1039-993) overlapping with Smendes (1069-1043), and again a Psibkhneno II (959-945) near to Shoshenq I (945-924). But, as Beatrice L. Goff has noted (Symbols of Ancient Egypt in the Late Period: The Twenty-first Dynasty, . p. 49): “On the Dakhleh Stela of the Twenty-second Dynasty reference is made to the 19th year of ‘Pharaoh Psusennes’. …. As Gardiner observes, one cannot determine from this statement whether Psusennes I or II is intended”. That may enable us to bring Psibkhenno I and II together as one. He is my Ramses thread at the beginning of TIP. We have a potential of 46 years of reign for Psibkhenno, making of him, appropriately, a very long-reigning ‘Ramesses’. As well as Psibkhenno I and II, Smendes I (and probably II) and Shoshenq I are the same, as I have suggested in e.g. my multi-part series: Smendes and Shoshenq I https://www.academia.edu/39023282/Smendes_and_Shoshenq_I https://www.academia.edu/39049684/Smendes_and_Shoshenq_I_Part_One_ii_Shoshenq_I_considered_a_new_Smendes_ https://www.academia.edu/39024683/Smendes_and_Shoshenq_I_Part_Two_Smendes_so_poorly_attested But Psibkhenno needs an alter ego, because much of his building work is thought no longer to exist. This is typical of the Twenty-First Dynasty, which is quite archaeologically deficient, as argued above. N. Grimal has written, re “The historical interpretation of Tanis”, for instance (p. 317): “Nothing remains of the actual buildings of Psusennes I …”. And again (p. 315): “At Tanis, Psusennes I built a new enclosure around the temple dedicated to the triad of Amun, Mut and Khonsu. If the few traces of reuse of earlier monuments are to be believed, he made many other contributions to the temple, but because of the current conditions of the site little is known concerning this work”. Psibkhenno was apparently the father-in-law of Shoshenq I (Grimal, p. 319). Smendes II, who I suspect must be Smendes=Shoshenq I, “sent a pair of bracelets to Psusennes …”. (p. 318). Psibkhenno may now, at last (see (b) next) enable us to anchor Ramses II ‘the Great’ in a real historico-biblical phase. So far in this series Egypt has been considered in complete isolation from the other nations, from Mesopotamia, for instance, and from the biblical history. This is very much due to the effect of the Sothic chronology, whose effect is to disconnect much of Egyptian history (especially its earlier phases) from its real, contemporaneous scene; but it is also because the pharaohs were more inclined to boast about themselves to the exclusion of the other nations. In this they were unlike the Assyrians, who, whilst likewise boastful, kept detailed and useful historical records, which included many handy foreign names and places. With the name, PSIBKHENNO, we may perhaps be able to pick up a useful clue, enabling at last for a potential connection for Egypt with Mesopotamia. Thanks to David Rohl, a revisionist, we get this compelling observation of real phonetic value: “… we might find the true identity of Si’be in the 21st Dynasty king Psibkhenno, more commonly known by the classical name of Psusennes” (“Comments by David Rohl”, SIS Workshop, vol. 5, no.1, 1982, p. 19). I like this connection as made by Rohl, and I accept it – Psibkhenno, a long-reigning ‘Ramesses’, and indeed my Ramses ‘the Great’, a contemporary of the mighty neo-Assyrian king Sargon II. In conventional terms, the Sargonic era is c. 700 BC, approximately 600 years from Ramses’ presumed beginnings in c. 1300 BC. And what may strongly re-inforce Ramses II’s place in the neo-Assyrian era is the fact that an inscription of his at the mouth of the Nahr al-Kalb, stands opposite one of Sennacherib’s successor, Esarhaddon (c. 680-668 BC, conventional dating). What to make of this? - Convention, of course, would have Esarhaddon arriving at the scene about half a millennium after Ramses II, and defacing the latter’s image. Thus, for instance: https://www.livius.org/sources/content/anet/289-esarhaddons-nahr-al-kalb-inscription/ “To make sure that the Phoenician cities better understood that Esarhaddon was and would always be victorious, the king left an inscription at the mouth of the Nahr al-Kalb, opposite one of the reliefs that the Egyptian king Ramesses II had once made to commemorate his Syrian campaigns. Everyone traveling along the coast from Byblos to Beirut would see Esarhaddon's relief and understand that Esarhaddon was a greater conqueror than the heroes of the past”. - Dr. Velikovsky, with his radical revision, actually located Ramses II even later than Esarhaddon; - My revision in this series will have Ramses II as an older contemporary of Esarhaddon. Now, biblically, we may be able further to extend our Psibkhenno-Si’be, thanks to a conclusion reached by Charles Boutflower (The Book of Isaiah Chapters [1-XXXIX] in the Light of Assyrian Monuments, Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, London/New York, 1930, p. 126) that ‘So’, Sibe and Shabaka were all the one person. He had written that: “The Hebrew characters read “So” should probably be read “Sĕvĕ”. And: “Sĕvĕ” … is to be identified with Shabaka [Shabako] the son of Kashta, who succeeded his father in 715” [sic]. The name ‘So’, it seems, can be variously rendered: e.g. Sĕvĕ; Sua; Soan (Josephus ); Soa, Soba, Segor (LXX). Most interestingly, in my new context, the Lucianic recension of the LXX has ‘So’ as an “Ethiopian, living in Egypt” (one Adrammelech). Psibkhenno-Sibe is the elusive “So king of Egypt” (2 Kings 17:4) at the time of Shalmaneser, king of Assyria. {Whether Psibkhenno is also the Shabako of the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty, as Boutflower thought, will be considered in the next part of this series}. This now extends the floruit of our Ramses ‘the Great’ all the way from Shalmaneser to Esarhaddon. This is also the very era of the Book of Tobit, whose chapter 1 encompasses “Shalmaneser”; “Sennacherib”; and “Esarhaddon”. Book of Tobit and the Neo-Assyrian Kings https://www.academia.edu/14097259/Book_of_Tobit_and_the_Neo_Assyrian_Kings Sargon is not mentioned here in Tobit. That is because Sargon is Sennacherib. See e.g. my article: Sargon II and Sennacherib: More than just an overlap https://www.academia.edu/8854988/Sargon_II_and_Sennacherib_More_than_just_an_overlap At last, Ramses II ‘the Great’ can be firmly fixed to the neo-Assyrian era, from Shalmaneser to Esarhaddon, thereby solving the long-existing problem for revisionists: Where to fit in Ramses II? It also solves the burning question of who was the biblical “So”. We need no longer entertain such ridiculous assertions that “So” pertains to pharaoh Tefnakht by a “process of metonymy” in relation to Tefnakht’s town of Saïs (cf. N. Grimal, p. 342). With the right key now in hand, we can identify Sargon II’s Egyptian contacts, namely: Si’be = Psibkhenno; Pharaoh of Egypt (Pirʾu of Musri) = Ramses II ‘the Great’; Shilkanni (thought to be Osorkon IV) is clearly Psibkhenno Shebitku of the Tang-i Var inscription (see next Part) Shilkanni’s gift to Sargon II of “twelve great horses from Egypt, which are unrivalled in the whole country” (Grimal, p. 343) is reminiscent of the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty with its love of fine chargers. Thus, as is thought (loc. cit.): “Piankhy … was buried at Napata along with two of the famous Egyptian chargers … the same horses which had aroused the admiration of Sargon II”. Dr. Donovan Courville had come the closest amongst the revisionists to identifying the biblical “So king of Egypt”, having rightly identified him with Ramses II - but Ramses II right at the end of his long reign, not near its beginning as with my reconstruction. Courville’s “So” would have been far too old and feeble, though, to have been able to come to the aid of king Hosea of Israel. Previously I had written on this: Now according to Courville’s system (which I first encountered in 1981, before I had actually read any of Velikovsky’s own writings), Ramses II, whose reign would have terminated in 726/725 BC, must have been the biblical “King So of Egypt” with whom Hoshea of Israel conspired against the king of Assyria (2 Kings 17:4). Courville had plausibly (in his context) suggested that the reason why ‘So’ was unable to help Hoshea of Israel was because the Egyptian king was, as Ramses II, now right at the end of his very long reign, and hence aged and feeble. Courville had looked to find the name ‘So’ amongst the many names of Ramses II, and had opted for the rather obscure ‘So’ element in that pharaoh’s Suten Bat name, Ra-user-Maat-Sotep-en-Ra. (See also pp. 286-287). Part Four: Incorporating the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty Conclusions so far: Ramses II = III must be moved well downwards on the timescale from c. 1300 BC. Absorbing Psibkhenno-Ramses as an alter ego of Ramses ‘the Great’, our composite pharaoh can now be firmly located to the neo-Assyrian era of Shalmaneser; (Sargon II =) Sennacherib; and Esarhaddon, he as their collective contemporary pharaonic ruler: ‘So’, Si’be, Shilkanni. Earlier, I had remarked along the lines that Ramses III and his sons are such a mirror-image likeness of Ramses II (despite the much shorter reign conventionally attributed to Ramses III) that it is a wonder that revisionists – so eager to compress New Kingdom Egyptian history – have not made the convenient identification: Ramses II (and sons) = Ramses III (and sons). And this comment can now be extended into the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty, to pharaoh Tirhakah. Whilst various revisionists, following Dr. I. Velikovsky, have looked to identify Ramses II with the relatively obscure Twenty-Sixth (Saïtic) Dynasty pharaoh, Necho (so-called II), none (as far as I am aware) seems to have suggested the ruler who so greatly sought to emulate Ramses II: namely, TIRHAKAH. Egyptologists, after their rocky encounter with the earlier TIP, tend to breathe a sigh of relief when it comes down to the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty. They shouldn’t. While it is assuredly better documented than are some earlier phases, and has known links with neo-Assyria, the whole thing actually turns out to be a complete mess. “Here at last”, wrote Sir Alan Gardiner, with an apparent sigh of relief upon his introduction of the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty, “we are heartened by some resemblance to authentic history …” (Egypt of the Pharaohs, The Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1961, p. 335). Perhaps though, from a conventional perspective, he could not have been more wrong. I had previously written on all of this: The Tang-i Var inscription dated to Sargon II’s Year 15 (c. 707 BC), according to which Shebitku - not Shabaka as was long thought - was the 25th dynasty pharaoh who had dispatched the rebel Iatna-Iamani in chains to Sargon II, has brought new confusion. Here is the pertinent section of this document (Wikipedia’s “Shebitku”): … I (… Sargon) plundered the city of Ashdod, Iamani, its king, feared [my weapons] and …. he fled to the region of the land of Meluhha and lived (there) stealthfully (lit. like a thief) …. Shapataku’ (Shabatka) king of … Meluhha … put (Iamani) in manacles and handcuffs … he had him brought captive into my presence …. This means that Shebitku (and Tirhakah) must now be re-located upwards by at least a decade in relation to Sargon II. Perhaps nowhere does the conventional separation of Sargon II from Sennacherib show up as in this case. Yet even revisionist Rohl, as late as 2002, was ignoring the Tang-i Var evidence, dating Tirhakah’s first appearance, at the battle of Eltekeh, to 702 BC, an incredible “thirty-one years earlier” than his actual rule of 690-665 BC, which is, however, about two decades too late. Thus he wrote: For five years the new king of Napata (ruling from Kush) had reigned in co-operation with his cousin Shabataka [Shebitku], king of Egypt (son of Shabaka). Then Taharka [Tirhakah] became sole 25th Dynasty ruler of both Kush and Egypt in his sixth regnal year following the death of Shabataka in 684 BC. There were other Libyan pharaohs in Egypt (such as Shoshenk V of Tanis and Rudamun of Thebes) but they were all subservient to the Kushite king. The year 684 BC is far too late for the beginning of Tirhakah’s sole rule in relation to Shebitku and his known connection with Sargon II’s 15th year! And that is by no means the only problem with the current arrangement of the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty. In fact there appears to be a significant problem in the case of virtually each one of its major kings. Regarding its first (according to convention) major ruler, Piye, for instance, Gardiner has written: It is strange … that Manetho makes no mention of the great Sudanese or Cushite warrior Pi‘ankhy who about 730 B.C. suddenly altered the entire complexion of Egyptian affairs. He was the son of a … Kashta … and apparently a brother of the Shabako [Shabaka] whom Manetho presents under the name Sabacōn. And whilst, according to Herodotus, Shabaka (his Sabacos) reigned for some 50 years, he has been reduced by the Egyptologists to a mere 15-year reign. Furthermore: “The absence of the names of Shabako and Shebitku from the Assyrian and Hebrew records is no less remarkable than the scarcity of their monuments in the lands over which they extended their sway”. These anomalies, coupled with the surprise data from the Iranian Tang-i Var inscription (which is in fact an Assyrian reference to Shebitku), suggest that there are deep problems right the way through the current arrangement of the 25th dynasty. I hope that I am now beginning to propose plausible solutions to at least some of these. [End of quotes] The Twenty-Fifth Dynasty is usually presented with five main rulers, for example: https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/phar/hd_phar.htm Dynasty 25 (Nubian) ca. 712–664 B.C. Piye (establishes Nubian Dynasty in Egypt) ca. 743–712 B.C. Shabaqo (ca. 712–698 B.C). Shebitqo (ca. 698–690 B.C). Taharqo (loses control of Lower Egypt) (ca. 690–664 B.C). Tanutamani (loses control of Upper Egypt) (ca. 664–653 B.C). Unfortunately, though, almost all of these are poorly attested. (We got a hint of this above). Manetho does not mention either Piye (the supposed first king), or Tantumani (Tanutamun) (the supposed last king). Clearly these names are duplicates, alleged kings who are actually in need of alter egos – “absence of the names of Shabako and Shebitku from the Assyrian and Hebrew records”, “the scarcity of their monuments in the lands over which they extended their sway”. Hence we must radically re-shape the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty in relation to the neo-Assyrian evidence. Despite Manetho’s failure to mention Piankhy (Piye), we know something about this first listed strong ruler, his famous Year 21 campaign to reclaim full control of Egypt, to unify the country. But his beginning is conventionally dated to c. 747 BC, at the time of the great Assyrian king, Tiglath-pileser (so-called III), which would make Piankhy also the prime candidate for the biblical “So King of Egypt”. Piye’s Year 21 (his stele) can by no means, however, be brought into correspondence with the “So” incident at the beginning of the reign of Hezekiah, when Shalmaneser was king of Assyria. It is clearly of a later era, having its resonance to some degree in the records of Ashurbanipal. This is yet another example, it seems to me, of the chronological anomalies caused by the conventional structure of the TIP, including especially, in this case, the presumably well-known Piye. Here is how Phillip Clapham has explained it (“A Solution for the Third Intermediate period of Egypt”, SIS Workshop, vol. 4, no. 3, December, 1981, p. 7): The Piankhi Stele records the name and titles of the Egyptian kings and princes who had rallied behind Tefnakhte [Tefnakht] in rebellion against the Ethiopian pharaohs. These compare remarkably well with the names of Egyptian kings recorded by Assurbanipal [Ashurbanipal] in 667 BC [sic] and still others are known from the reign of Psammetich I (given in Kitchen’s index to names): (i) Osorkon of Bubastis (later seat of the 22nd Dynasty …); (ii) Namilt, Prince of Hermopolis (recorded the same by Assurbanipal …); (iii) Iuput of Leontopolis (a seat of the 23rd Dynasty according to Kitchen, Iuput son and co-regent of Pedubastis); (iv) Pef-tjau-awy-Bast (Pedubastis?) of Heracleopolis (Pudubisti of Assurbanipal?); (v) Akunosh of Sebennytos (an Akunosh of Sebennytos was the contemporary of Psammetich I, early reign, according to Kitchen); (vi) Bakennefi and Pediese of Athribis (Bakennefi of Assurbanipal); (vii) Patjenfy of Pi-Sopd (a Patjenfy, husband of a grandaughter of Takeloti I is given by Kitchen, possibly the same); (viii) Pamiu (Pimay of Assurbanipal and Pimay of Busiris from the early reign of Psammetich I); (ix) Tefnakhte (and Assurbanipal gives a Tefnakhte of Punubu); (x) Harseise [Harsiese] of Assurbanipal (a High Priest Harseise was extant in the reign of Osorkon II (Kitchen), and resurfaces in the reigns of Shoshenq III and Pedubastis (conventional scheme)), which appears to indicate that the conventional 22nd/23rd chronology is in error. [End of quote] The northern kings against whom pharaoh Piankhy campaigned appear to reproduce a bunch of names again to be found at the time of Shoshenq I (c. 943-922, conventional dating) - wrongly thought to be the biblical “Shishak” (I Kings 14:25) - some two centuries previously. I refer to Osorkon, Iuput, Nimlot, sons of Shoshenq I. Compare these names with the list of the northern coalition at the time of Piankhy, “Libyans”, as noted by N. Grimal (pp. 338-339): Osorkon (so-called IV); Tefnakht; Pediese (Arthribis). He re-appointed Iuput (Leontopolis); Peftjauawybastet (Herakleopolis); Osorkon (Tanis) and Nimlot (Hermopolis). On p. 322 we read that Shoshenq I immediately appointed his son Iuput chief priest of Amun and commander-in-chief of armies, governor of Upper Egypt. He appointed another son, Nimlot, as military commander of Herakleopolis. This is potentially huge - the Twenty-Second Dynasty (Shoshenq; Osorkon; Iuput; Nimlot) needing to be merged with the Twenty-Fourth Dynasty (Tefknakht?; Osorkon; Iuput; Nimlot)? The mid-C10th BC, conventional, to be lowered into the mid-C8th BC, conventional? We are now going to find that the number of individual kings of the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty has conventionally been completely over-estimated. Let us cut to the chase. Piankhy, a powerful dynastic founder as we have suggested, is none other than Tirhakah, the supposed fourth king of the dynasty. As I have previously written on this: “Fortunately we do not need to guess who Piye was, because there is a scarab that tells us precisely that Snefer-Ra Piankhi was Tirhakah, much to the puzzlement of Petrie (A History of Egypt, Vol. 3, p. 290). It reads: “King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Tirhakah, Son of Ra, Piankhi”. The northern coalition against whom Piankhy marched in his Year 21 may well now be the coalition that had unsuccessfully faced Sennacherib at the battle of Eltekeh. Not long after that Sennacherib would withdraw from Judah because of Tirhakah. “When Sennacherib and his general (Rabshakeh) were besieging Lachish, Libnah, and Jerusalem, it was reported that Tirhakah was approaching with an army to assist the Palestinians against the Assyrian forces (II Kings xix. 9; Isa. xxxvii. 9)”: https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/14403-tirhakah The same thing would happen when Nebuchednezzar was besieging Jerusalem (Jeremiah 37:5): “Pharaoh’s army had marched out of Egypt, and when the Babylonians who were besieging Jerusalem heard the report about them, they withdrew from Jerusalem”. Not surprisingly now, Piankhy - who I consider to be Tirhakah - has likenesses to Ramses II. He restored work supposedly begun by Ramses II at Gebel Barkal (Grimal, p. 339): “Piankhy … temple of Gebel Barkal – the latest stage of Egyptian building has been … dated to the reign of Ramesses II”. Piankhy supposedly restored it (p. 340). Piankhy also took the coronation name that Ramses II had taken (loc. cit.): This did not prevent Piankhy using the monuments that he built and decorated to emphasize his role as unifier of Egypt. His titles included the Horus name of Sematawy: ‘He who has unified the Two Lands’; as well as … ‘He who was crowned in Thebes’. He identified himself with … Ramesses II, and adopted … coronation [name], Usermaatra …. Ramses II was, of course, named Usermaatre-setepenre (‘The Justice of Re is Powerful’). Instead of the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty beginning as early as 747 BC, as conventionally told, it would have begun closer to c. 730 BC, the time of So king of Egypt, of Hosea king of Israel and of Hezekiah king of Judah. - It was, therefore, a youthful Ramses II – not Dr. Courville’s aged one – to whom king Hosea of Israel called for help when under pressure from Shalmaneser of Assyria. - It was Ramses II whom Sargon II encountered as Si’be, and as Shilkanni (= Psibkhenno-Ramses); whose gift of horses reminds one of Piankhy’s fine steeds. (Grimal, p. 343): “Piankhy … was buried at Napata along with two of his famous Egyptian chargers … the same horses which had aroused the admiration of Sargon II”. - The Tang-I Var inscription tells of Sargon II and Shebitku, another variant name, I would suggest, of Psibkhenno (Ramses). But, in conventional history, this one great king has been split up into parts: as Piankhy; Shabako; Shebitku; and Tirhakah. Tirhakah, a legend, a Ramses type “…. the inscription was branded by the noted Egyptologist E. A. Wallis Budge as an “example of the worthlessness, historically, of such lists”. …. Petrie concludes that “Taharqa was as much ruler of Qedesh and Naharina as George II. was king of France, though officially so-called.” ….. The Sabbath and Jubilee Cycle Whilst various revisionists, following Dr. I. Velikovsky, have looked to identify Ramses II with the relatively obscure Twenty-Sixth (Saïtic) Dynasty pharaoh, Necho (so-called II), none (as far as I am aware) seems to have suggested the ruler who so greatly sought to emulate Ramses II: namely. TIRHAKAH. Tirhakah was a conqueror on a Ramesside scale Further to my conclusion in this series that the composite Piankhi/Tirhakah was also pharaoh Ramses II ‘the Great, I find that the pharaoh’s (as Tirhakah) list of captured cities seems to be identical, in part, to those of Ramses II. This is invariably interpreted by scholars as Tirhakah seeking to emulate an earlier Ramses II. We read in the article, The Sabbath and Jubilee Cycle, pp. 114-117: http://www.newbookinc.com/456-455BC%20AS%20SABATH%20YEAR-RETURN%20TO%20JUDEA.pdf … Egyptologists were amazed to find a long list of captured cities written on the base of a statue found at Karnak which belonged to a king named Tirhakah …. Each city represents the greater region under the control of this king. This record not only states that a king named Tirhakah controlled Ethiopia, Egypt, and northern Africa, but it claims that he had some sort of sovereignty over Tunip (Upper Syria, west of the Euphrates) … Qadesh (Lower Syria/ Palestine) … and the Shasu (region of Edom and the Trans-Jordan) … as far north as Arzawa (western Asia Minor) … Khatti (eastern Asia Minor) … and Naharin (western Mesopotamia) … and as far east as Assur (Assyria) …and Sinagar (Babylonia) …. In a footnote (p. 114, n.61), we read this comment: Mariette–Bey (KETA, pp. 66f), followed by Petrie (AHOE, 3, p. 297), and others, thought this list from Tirhakah was copied from an identical one found on a colossus which they believed belonged to Ramesses the Great (cf. KETA, Plate 385f). This colossus was identified with Ramesses II because his name was found inscribed upon it. The article continues: …. the inscription was branded by the noted Egyptologist E. A. Wallis Budge as an “example of the worthlessness, historically, of such lists”. …. Petrie concludes that “Taharqa was as much ruler of Qedesh and Naharina as George II. was king of France, though officially so-called.” ….. Despite the fact that these inscriptions are presently shunned, the ancient records actually confirm them. Severus (1.50), for example, notes that this “Tarraca, king of Ethiopia, invaded the kingdom of the Assyrians, Strabo speaks of a great king named “Tearko the Ethiopian” …. Tearko being the Greek form of the name Tirhakah. …. Tearko, he states, had led one of the great expeditions of the ancient world which were not “matters of off-hand knowledge to everybody”. …. Pharaoh Tirhakah’s conquests were akin to those of Ramses II ‘the Great’ because, so I believe, Tirhakah was Ramses II. Part Five: Foe of Esarhaddon-Ashurbanipal Introduction • Having re-set Ramses II (= III) from c. 1300 BC, to the C8th BC (conventional dating), as a youthful “So king of Egypt” at the time of king Shalmaneser of Assyria, and with Ramses continuing on into the • reign of Sargon II of Assyria, as Psibkhenno-Ramses (as Si’be, Shilkanni), and as • (Sargon II =) Sennacherib’s king of Ethiopia, Tirhakah, we can now take our history further, • closer to c. 700 BC (conventional dating) – i.e. some 600 years from where Ramses II is supposed to have begun – as Tirhakah, contemporary of Esarhaddon-Ashurbanipal of Assyria. I already previewed this, with mention of that Nahr al-Kalb inscription that sits Ramses II (defaced) alongside Esarhaddon, now as contemporaries. Yes, Ramses II must now be regarded, as Tirhakah, as an older contemporary of Esarhaddon, not preceding him by more than half a millennium (conventional view), nor coming later than Esarhaddon (Dr. Velikovsky’s estimation). The activities of Esarhaddon against Tirhakah, the Assyrian favouring pharaoh Necho instead, will be repeated in the annals of Ashurbanipal, who was Esarhaddon. See e.g. my article on this: Further linking Esarhaddon, Ashurbanipal https://www.academia.edu/40782929/Further_linking_Esarhaddon_Ashurbanipal?sm=b From M. Van de Mieroop (op. cit., pp. 238-239) we learn that: The idea of conquering Egypt must have been tempting to Esarhaddon and when the Assyrian king had sufficiently consolidated his hold over southern Palestine through a system of loyal vassals, he invaded. … he organized three campaigns, defeating the Nubian [sic] Taharqa [Tirhakah] and conquering the northern capital of Memphis. The Assyrian captured a Nubian prince and an enormous quantity of spoils, which were partly used to fund Babylon’s reconstruction. In order to maintain influence over the land, Esarhaddon made vassals of a number of rulers of the Nile Delta region. Ashurbanipal-as-Esarhaddon, did all this – all the same. The vassals that Assyria made are a major key to much of the TIP, conventionally staggered, but all being contemporaneous with the one Assyrian king. I previously wrote on this: This new situation later … during the reign of Ashurbanipal … is described also by Dirkzwager, in regard to the Annals of Ashurbanipal, complementing Clapham’s account of the Piye Stele: … I looked into the Annals of Assurbanipal [Ashurbanipal] … where Assurbanipal in the year after his accession to the throne (667) [sic] had to deal with an insurrection of Egyptian princes: 20 “roitelets” are named in the annals. We meet Necho (I), the father of Psammetichus I. But we find Puṭubišti reigning in Tsa’nu and Susinqu of Puširu too! Why cannot they be Petubastet of the 23rd and Sheshonq [Shoshenq] III …? The time fits well in our scheme. We learn that Manetho or the annalists made a mistake by putting Bubastis or Busiris where the other name would be right. It is curious to meet a king Pamai (Puaima) [Pimay] as well. He was reigning at Mendes. Perhaps Pamai of the 22nd [sic] dynasty was not the successor of Sheshonq III, but was given a little kingdom under the Assyrians (the 20 kings were vassals of the Assyrians) where he might have reigned contemporaneously with Sheshonq III. I think the list of Assurbanipal deserves a closer look, for I find there a Puqrur, a Bocchoris, a Wen-Amun, and a Tefnacht [Tefnakht]. “Are there chronological consequences?”, Dirkzwager proceeds to ask here. The ‘chronological consequences’ of Dirkzwager’s suggestions would perhaps be nothing less than the coalescing, in virtually one point of time, early in the reign of Ashurbanipal, kings … who are conventionally separated the one from the other by about a century. [End of quotes] Then the merry-go-round starts all over again, Van de Mieroop not realising that this had already occurred (p. 239): Assyria’s control was weak, however, and by the time Esarhaddon died [sic] … Taharqa had reasserted rule over the entire country of Egypt. An expedition sent out by Assurbanipal was successful, but its advance was interrupted by a rebellion of the Delta vassals. Assurbanipal defeats them, assisted by an army recruited from Syro-Phoenicia vassals, such as Judah, Edom and Moab, with ships obtained in Phoenicia and Cyprus that could sail up the Nile. The vassals were punished, but one, Necho, was reinstated and give special prominence. The merry-go-round has not stopped yet. Because we now find Tirhakah presumably succeeded by a relative Tantamani (or Tanutamun) (N. Grimal, op. cit., p. 351), a ruler who seems to begin by channelling Piankhy: In the same year, 665 BC [sic], Taharqa appointed his cousin Tantamani as heir, and in the following year he died at Napata. Tantamani was then crowned king of Napata and resolved to re-conquer Egypt. He described this conquest on a stele in the temple of Gebel Barkal, just as his grandfather [sic] Piankhy had done before him, and he obviously used Piankhy’s text as his model. …. [For this text, see Susan Wise Bauer’s The History of the Ancient World: From the Earliest Accounts to the Fall of Rome, p. 406]. Grimal continues: “… [Tantamani] then embarked on a crusade which clearly echoed that of Piankhy”. Recall what I wrote earlier, that “Manetho does not mention either Piye (the supposed first king), or Tantumani (Tanutamun) (the supposed last king)”. These need an alter ego (or more). And I have found that abundantly in Tirhakah = Ramses ‘the Great’. So, Tantamani, as we have found, started off like Piankhy and ended up like Tirhakah (all the same king), running from Ashurbanipal. P. 352: But Tantamani’s triumph was short-lived, for in 664/663 BC [sic] Ashurbanipal once more [read: same as before] unleashed his armies on Egypt. Memphis was captured and Tantamani could only withdraw to Thebes, closely followed by the Assyrians. When they invaded the very capital of Amun, Tantamani fled down to Napata. What then took place was an event that had already been totally inconceivable for over 1500 years [sic] – Thebes was sacked by invaders, burnt ravaged and all its temple treasures pillaged. …. Our composite Ramses II soon fades from the world scene after this catastrophe. Part Six: Nebuchednezzar; Cambyses; Artaxerxes III Nebuchednezzar With Esarhaddon-Ashurbanipal now identified as Nebuchednezzar (see e.g. my articles): Esarhaddon a tolerable fit for King Nebuchednezzar https://www.academia.edu/38017900/Esarhaddon_a_tolerable_fit_for_King_Nebuchednezzar and: Aligning Neo-Babylonia with Book of Daniel. Part Two: Merging late neo-Assyrians with Chaldeans https://www.academia.edu/38330399/Aligning_Neo_Babylonia_with_Book_of_Daniel_Part_Two_Merging_late_neo_Assyrians_with_Chaldeans then the invasion, and devastation, of Egypt, as foretold by the prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel - but almost totally missing from the Babylonian historical records - can be found abundantly covered in the Assyrian annals. The war was against Tirhakah (my Ramses II), un-mentioned (now presumed dead) in the text books such as N. Grimal’s (op. cit.). Necho II, thought to be an entity separate from Necho I the contemporary of Esarhaddon-Ashurbanipal, does get mentioned in the context of Nebuchednezzar (e.g. Grimal, pp 359f.). Dr. I. Velikovsky (Ramses II and His Time, 1978) was quite correct in placing of Ramses II at the time of Nebuchednezzar, but not in his identifying of Ramses II as Necho II. Tirhakah, I believe, works much better for Ramses II. Nor was Nebuchednezzar the same as the Hittite king, Hattusilis, as Velikovsky had thought, who made a treaty with Ramses II in the latter’s Year 21 (Grimal, p. 257). This was somewhat too early for Nebuchednezzar, a younger contemporary of Ramses II. Nebuchednezzar ran to ground the same Tirhakah as did Esarhaddon-Ashurbanipal, conqueror of Egypt. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A semi-fictitious, long-reigning pharaoh, Amasis (c. 570-526 BC, conventional dating), emerges at this time (Grimal, p. 364): “Amasis [Ramses?] has traditionally been remembered as a good-natured and exuberant ruler as well as a wise legislator, but unfortunately the Persian [sic] conquerors removed the records of his achievements for almost all the monuments that he built”. Seems like Amasis needs an alter ego. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Cambyses The whole thing (A) Esarhaddon-Ashurbanipal against Egypt, (B) Nebuchednezzar against Egypt, is repeated again with (C) Cambyses, also called “Nebuchednezzar”, who invaded and destroyed Egypt. See e.g. my multi-part series: Cambyses also named Nebuchadnezzar? beginning with: https://www.academia.edu/37313486/Cambyses_also_named_Nebuchadnezzar Cambyses’ foe is given as Psammetichus III (Grimal, p. 364). But the account of Cambyses is semi-fiction. Are we not told that: • Ashurbanipal invaded Egypt at the time of Psammetichus I (c. 664 BC); • Nebuchednezzar II invaded Egypt at the time of Psammetichus II (c. 595-589 BC); • Cambyses invaded Egypt at the time of Psammetichus III (c. 526-525 BC)? It is all one and the same thing. However, the Egyptian official who served as a guide for Cambyses in Egypt was real. See e.g.; my multi-part series: Cambyses mentored in Egypt by Udjahorresne beginning with: https://www.academia.edu/45543875/Cambyses_mentored_in_Egypt_by_Udjahorresne_Part_One_Too_many_invasions_of_Egypt Udjahorresne, as I propose in this series, was Tirhakah’s Crown Prince son, Usanahuru. He seems to emerge again in Esarhaddon’s records, as Nes-Anhuret. Artaxerxes III A final connection in this long saga of Ramses II, stretching him now all the way down from c. 1300 BC to c. 350 BC (conventional dating) to Artaxerxes (so-called) III. The “Artaxerxes king of Babylon” of Nehemiah (13:6) I have already identified with, again, Nebuchednezzar ‘the Great’: Nehemiah, and a cracker from A. van Hoonacker https://www.academia.edu/44858260/Nehemiah_and_a_cracker_from_A_van_Hoonacker Tirhakah (hence Ramses II), too, seems to re-emerge yet again in the person of “Tachos” (Teos), who rebelled against the Great King, “Artaxerxes” (Grimal, pp. 376-377). The conquest of Egypt, by Artaxerxes III followed a pattern suspiciously similar to that of Esarhaddon-Ashurbanipal/Nebuchednezzar-Cambyses. Grimal, in fact, likens it to that of Cambyses (p. 381): The new [sic] conqueror, Artaxerxes III, tore down the principal cities’ fortifications and pillaged the temples, forcing the priests to buy back the cult items at high prices. He probably did not commit all the atrocities that Greek tradition ascribes to him, for they seem to be modelled too much on the outrages supposedly perpetrated by Cambyses, such as the murder of Apis and Mnevis bulls and the slaughter of the Buchis bull of Mendes.