Histories

Besides this story of the rearing of the children, I also heard other things at Mit Rahina [31.25,29.85] (inhabited place), Giza, Upper Egypt, Egypt, AfricaMemphis in conversation with the priests of Hephaestus;[*](Identified by the Greeks with the Egyptian Ptah.) and I visited Thebes [32.666,25.683] (deserted settlement), Qina, Upper Egypt, Egypt, AfricaThebes and Heliopolis [31.333,30.1] (deserted settlement), Cairo, Urban, Egypt, AfricaHeliopolis, too, for this very purpose, because I wished to know if the people of those places would tell me the same story as the priests at Mit Rahina [31.25,29.85] (inhabited place), Giza, Upper Egypt, Egypt, AfricaMemphis; for the people of Heliopolis [31.333,30.1] (deserted settlement), Cairo, Urban, Egypt, Africa Heliopolis are said to be the most learned of the Egyptians.

Now, such stories as I heard about the gods I am not ready to relate, except their names, for I believe that all men are equally knowledgeable about them; and I shall say about them what I am constrained to say by the course of my history.

But as to human affairs, this was the account in which they all agreed: the Egyptians, they said, were the first men who reckoned by years and made the year consist of twelve divisions of the seasons. They discovered this from the stars (so they said). And their reckoning is, to my mind, a juster one than that of the Greeks; for the Greeks add an intercalary month every other year, so that the seasons agree; but the Egyptians, reckoning thirty days to each of the twelve months, add five days in every year over and above the total, and thus the completed circle of seasons is made to agree with the calendar.

Furthermore, the Egyptians (they said) first used the names of twelve gods[*](There is much obscurity about the “Twelve Gods.” This only appears to be clear, that eight (or nine) gods form the first order of the Egyptian hierarchy, and that there are twelve of the second rank. See Hdt. 2.43, and Rawlinson's essay (ch. 3 in his Appendix to Book II.).) (which the Greeks afterwards borrowed from them); and it was they who first assigned to the several gods their altars and images and temples, and first carved figures on stone. Most of this they showed me in fact to be the case. The first human king of Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt, they said, was Min.

In his time all of Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt except the Thebaic [*](the southern part of Upper Egypt [32,26] (region), Egypt, Africa Upper Egypt.) district was a marsh: all the country that we now see was then covered by water, north of Birkat Qarun [30.666,29.466] (salt lake), Egypt, Africalake Moeris,[*](In the modern Al-Fayyum [30.8,29.316] (governorate), Upper Egypt, Egypt, AfricaFayyum, west of the Nahr an- Nil [31.1,30.166] (river), AfricaNile.) which is seven days' journey up the river from the sea.