Page:The Religion of Ancient Egypt.djvu/55

 is quite certain. The intention of the tablets was not historical or chronological, but simply devotional, and the selection and arrangement of names consequently vary, though the most considerable names are the same in all.

M. de Rougé has carefully studied all the monuments which belong to the first six dynasties. The earliest monuments that can be found belong to king Seneferu, the 20th on the list of Abydos; and from this king till the 38th on the list, the evidence is complete, and the order of succession thoroughly established by independent inscriptions contemporaneous with the sovereigns of whom they speak. There is, for instance, the tomb at Gizeh of a queen who graced the courts of king Seneferu and the two kings who followed him. Two officers have left inscriptions which say that they had served the kings Unas and Teta. The great inscription of Una begins by saying that this officer served Teta, and ends with his services under Merenrā. This king was succeeded by his brother Neferkarā (No. 38 of the list). The tomb of the mother of these royal brothers still exists. She was the wife of Pepi-Merirā (No. 36), several monuments of whom are known; one of them, in Wádi Maghārah in the peninsula of Mount Sinai, is dated in the eighteenth year of his reign.