Psamtik II

        There is no conflict between the few documented activities of Psamtik II and the 5th century Persian context assigned to him in the revised history.  Herodotus has almost nothing to say about this king, crediting his reign with but a single activity.

Psammis reigned over Egypt for six years only; he invaded Ethiopia, and immediately thereafter died, and Apries his son reigned in his stead. (Her. II 161)

        The Petition of Petesi mentions as well that in the 4th year of Psamtik II priests from nomes throughout Egypt were summoned to a meeting in Khor (Palestine) for some unspecified reason.

And in the 4th year of Per'o Psammetk Nefrebre messages were sent to the great temples of Upper and Lower Egypt, saying, 'Per'o goeth to the land of Khor: let the priests come with the bouquets (?) of the gods of Kemi to take them to the land of Khor with Per'o.'  And a message was sent to Teuzoi, saying, 'Let a priest come with the bouquet of Amun to go to the land of Khor with Per'o.'  And the priests assembled and agreed in saying to Peteesi son of Essemteu, 'Thou art he that art meet to go to the land of Khor with Per'o: there is no man [here] in this city who can go to the land of Khor except thee.  Behold, thou art a scribe of the House of Life: there is not a thing that they shall ask thee to which there is not a suitable answer (?)  For thou art the prophet of Amun, and the prophets of the great gods of Kemi are they who are going to the land of Khor with Per'o.' Petititon 14:16-22

        So much for the reign of Psamtik II who died in 468 B.C..

The Rebellion

        Xerxes died in 465 B.C., assassinated in his bedchamber by a group of conspirators. A struggle for power ensued in the Persian capital.   Darius, the eldest son of Xerxes and legitimate heir, ruled briefly but was slain by his 18 year old brother Artaxerxes who proceeded to solidify his hold on power and ultimately ruled Persia for a remarkable 40 years (464-424 B.C.)   For the duration of his lengthy reign Artaxerxes held a firm grip on the Empire he inherited.  The only noteworthy exception was Egypt.   The succession struggles which followed Xerxes death  provided the context for a renewed attempt at independence in the remote Egyptian province.  Rebellion broke out once again.   This time the leader was a charismatic Egyptian of Libyan stock named Inaros.   His exploits are legendary.

Little else would be known about Egypt in the fifth century but for the Greek historians, and in them only on account of her relations with the Athenians.  Following the disturbances which arose after the murder of Xerxes and the accession of Artaxerxes I (465 B.C.) serious trouble sprang up in the north-western Delta.  Here a certain Inaros, the son of Psammetichus - both names are Egyptian, but Thucydides (i.104) calls him a king of the Libyans - revolted and established his headquarters at the fortress of Marea not far from the later Alexandrea.  The first clash with the Persians took place at Papremis, an uncertainly identified place somewhere in the west; the force under the satrap Achaemenes, the brother of Xerxes, was defeated and he was killed; the remnant of his army retreated to Memphis and entrenched themselves there.  Inaros was now in complete posssession of the Delta, but apparently made no claim to the kingship.  The inevitable relief from Persia was long in coming, but in expectation of it Inaros called for help upon the Athenians, at that time successfully warring against the Persians in Cyprus.  With their aid two-thirds of Memphis or the 'White Wall', as Thucydides correctly termed it, was taken , but the rest held out until the Persian general Megabyzus drove off the besiegers, who in their turn found themselves confined within the marshes called Prosopitis.  It was not until 454 B.C. that Megabyzus gained the upper hand; few of the Athenians escaped and a number of ships arriving too late to be of assistance were annihilated: Inaros himself was betrayed into Persian hands and was crucified.  This, however, was not quite the end of the revolt.  A chieftain named Amyrtaeus - again the name is pure Egyptian - remained undefeated in the extreme western  part of the Delta.  He once more summoned the Athenians to his support and a number of their ships actually started, but the death in Cyprus of the Greek commander Cimon caused them to turn back.  Shortly afterwards peace was declared between Athens and Persia and the intereference of the former in Egyptian affairs came to an end (449-448 B.C.) [33]Gardiner pp. 370-71

Apries

        Herodotus preserves few details of Apries' involvement in the revolt led by Inaros.   Most of his narrative concerns Apries' desperate attempt in 449 B.C., to regain control of the western Delta with the assistance of an Athenian force.   That matter is left for discussion in the next chapter when our attention is focussed on the life of Amasis.  Here we examine the revolt in its earlier stages.

        We can assume that the intense desire to liberate the country from Persian domination which had resulted in the earlier short-lived Egyptian rebellion led by Necao Wahemibre had only intensified in the harsh environment created by Xerxes.   Early in Apries reign, either immediately after he succeeded his father Psamtik II in 468 B.C. or soon after Xerxes death in 465 B.C. he set about fortifying the Memphite capital.   It is possible that the construction was sanctioned by the Persians, who sensed the growing unrest within the country and ordered the fortification of existing strongholds as a precaution.   Alternatively, Apries may have begun strengthening his defensive fortifications in the years immediately preceding the outbreak of hostilities in anticipation of the need for a sanctuary.  Regardless, when Petrie excavated the large mound at the north end of Memphis in 1909 he discovered it to be the site of what he called "the royal palace of Apries".   But a palace it was not.

        According to Petrie the building "occupied the north-west corner of the great fortified camp of about thirty acres, at the north end of the ruins of Memphis."

The walls are all of black mud brick, with stone linings around the lower part of the halls, stone floors to the halls, and stone doorways and stairways.  The walls are from 10 to 22 feet in thickness, generally being about 14 feet.  They vary in age, some being patched on the top with later brickwork, some being built up from the floor of Apries, while many extend down far into the mound, covered with plaster, and evidently have served for previous palaces. [35]

In the reconstruction of Apries a new approach to the palace was laid out, through a mass of building rather more to the east.  A gateway in the wall, seen at the foot of Plate I, is exactly opposite the end of the "new broadway".  Between them, isolating the palace, is a fosse about twenty feet deep, though the bottom of it is far above the level of the fields.  This was doubtless crossed by a draw-bridge.  Each side of the fosse has been partly built up as a berm, so that the space of 33 feet wide is narrowed to 9 feet between these berms. [36]

The things found in the palace were not numerous, but they were mostly of unusually fine quality, as we might expect, and they throw light on the length of use of the building after the time of Apries.   Among the small pieces of late coloured sculpture, there was one with a fragment of a blank cartouche, on which had been painted the beginning of the name of Cambyses.  The next dated object is the sling bullet of Khabbash who held Memphis 486-484 B.C.  There was rough reconstruction after the XXVIth dynasty, as the slab of Tha-ast-en-amu, who appears to been also called Aahmes-si-neit-rannu, was brought probably from his tomb.  Of the time of Artaxerxes II, 402 B.C., there is a copy of a date on a document in Aramaic.  Probably of Persian age is the large quantity of scale armour.  Herodotos mentions the Persians wearing "sleeved breastplates with iron scales like those of a fish"; and, much later Ammianus describes that "they had plates of iron closely fitting over every limb", they "were covered from head to foot with thin plates of iron like the feathers of a bird", "this armour of theirs being singularly adapted to all the inflections of the body" and "all the troops were clothed in steel, in such a way that their bodies were covered with strong plates, so that the hard joints of the armour fitted every limb of their bodies". [37]

        We can assume, both from the presence of a "sling bullet of Khabbash" and the profusion of Persian armour in the palace fortress, that the facility had been built before Inaros' clash with the Persians at Papremis,  the arrival of the Athenian naval force, and the retreat of the remnant of the Persian army to Memphis, whence they held out for about three years.   Apries fortress had become a Persian sanctuary.   The battle of Papremis is typically dated around 460 B.C.  The arrival of the Athenian naval force to assist Inaros probably dates to 459 B.C.   The Persian relief forces, led by Megabyzus did not arrive till around 456 B.C.   Khababash must have been part of the combined Egyptian/Athenian force beseiging the Persians in the palace of Apries during the years 459-456 B.C.

        Immediately before, or perhaps during the assault on the Memphite garrison,  the rebellion spread to the south of Egypt.   The inscription on a statue of Nesuhor, governor of the southlands under Apries,  records a military encounter between troops under Nesuhor's command and the mercenary troops occupying Elephantine.   Needless to say the inscription has been variously interpreted.    It begins with a statement of Nesuhor's credentials:

.... as his lord - his equal; whom his majesty appointed to a very great office, the office of his eldest son, governor of the Door of the Southern Countries, to repel the countries that rebel against him.  When he hath spread the fear of him in the southern countries, they flee into their valleys for fear of him.  Who did not relax [vigilance in] seeking benefits for his lord; honored of the King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Apries (H''-ib-R'), favored by the son of Re, Wahibre (W'h-yb-R'), Nesuhor, whose beautiful name if Ib-Psamtik-menekh ("The-Heart-of-Psamtik-is-Excellent"), son of Ifrer (Ywfrr), born of the mistress, Tesenethor (T'-sn.t-Hr), triumphant. BAR IV 990

For ye rescued me from an evil plight, from the mercenaries [Libyans], Greeks, Asiatics, and foreigners, who had it in their hearts to --, and who had it in their hearts to go to Shas-heret (S'ys-hr.t).  His majesty feared because of the evil which they did (or "might  do")  I re-established their heart in reason by advice, not permitting them to go to Nubia (Tk'-pd.t), (but) bringing them to the place where his majesty was; and his majesty executed their [punishment].(italicized insert mine) BAR IV 994

This was apparently in his (Apries') Nubian war, which is undated, but is described on the statue of his general, Nes'hor, who records that he overcame the Amu, Hanebu, and Sati, who probably belonged to the Egyptian mercenaries of the southern frontier... [38]

        Only one other historical reference alludes to Apries' involvement in the early stages of the rebellion.  Herodotus preserves the memory:

He  was more fortunate than any former king (save only his great-grandfather Psammetichus) during his rule of twenty-five years, in which he sent an army against Sidon and did battle by sea with the king of Tyre. (Her. II 161)

Meanwhile Inaros, son of Psammetichus, a Libyan king of the Libyans on the Egyptian border, having his headqueaters at Marea, the town above Pharos, caused a revolt of almost the whole of Egypt from King Artaxerxes, and placing himself at its head, invited the Athenians to his assistance.   Abandoning a Cyprian expedition upon which they happened to be engaged, with two hundred ships of their own and their allies, they arrived in Egypt and sailed from the sea into the Nile, and making themselves masters of the river and two-thirds of Memphis, addressed themselves to the attack of the remaining third, which is called White Castle.  Within it were Persians and Medes who had taken refuge there, and Egyptians who had not joined the rebellion. [Thuc. 105]

        If that interpretation fails then we must assume that ground troops and ships were sent later (perhaps during the lengthy seige of Memphis) to destroy the Persian naval base of operations at Tyre and Sidon.  Regardless of the timing, there is no difficulty imagining either the motivation or the possibility of the military actions described by Herodotus.

        Not so in the traditional history.    Nebuchadrezzar began his assault on Tyre in the immediate aftermath of the fall of Jerusalem in 586 B.C.   The assault lasted thirteen years, ending around 573 B.C.    We wonder why Apries would immediately engage in war a country already devastated and all but abandoned.  But that is precisely what is argued by Egyptologists.  Petrie reasons that "some time between 574 B.C. and 569 B.C., after Tyre had been crushed by Babylon, Egypt again tried for a footing [in Syria], defeated the remains of the Phoenician fleet and its Cypriote allies, and captured Sidon." [39]   Let the reader judge the merits of this proposal.

Khababash

        We admit that the "sling bullet of Khabbash" found by Petrie in Apries' "palace" cannot, in and of itself,  support the conclusion we have drawn from it, namely, that Khababash participated in the three year assault on the confined Persian/Egyptian troops in Memphis.   But the matter does not end with that single piece of evidence.   Petrie referred to "Khabbash"  as the leader of the Egyptian rebellion of 486-484 B.C.   He must have some basis in fact for his belief that Khababash lived in 5th century B.C.   Who is Khababash and why did scholars, early in the twentieth century, believe that he ruled during the first Persian occupation?  Today it is considered axiomatic that he is a late 4th century king.

        Almost nothing is known of this ephemeral king.   Two documents must suffice to date his reign.  One we have already examined.   The inscribed sarcophogus in the Serapeum vault which bears his name tells us only that an Apis bull died during his second year.   We have already briefly discussed this sarcophogus.   The fact that it is contained in the "greater vaults" tells us that Khababash postdates the time of Psamtik I, and , if our earlier reasoning was correct, he must have lived between the 6th year of Cambyses and 23rd year of Amasis in the revised chronology.   Khababash was therefore a 5th century king.   We need only look at the known dates for the Apis deaths in the 5th century and subtract a year to find the possible dates for the beginning of his reign.

        An Apis bull died in the 12 year of Apries, 457 B.C..   If this is the bull honored by Khababash, then his reign began in 458 B.C.   The seige of Memphis lasted from 459-456 B.C.   The correspondence in dates is perfect.   And we have not chosen the 12th year of Apries merely to suit the argument of this revision.  It is the date demanded by the only other document which makes historical reference to this king, the so-called Satrap stela.   We follow Gardiner's description:

Another knotty problem is raised by a certain Khababash who assumed the title of a Pharaoh.  An Apis sarcophagus of his second year is known, and the marriage contract of a petty Theban priest is dated in his first year.  More interesting, however, is the information about him disclosed by a stela of 311 B.C., when the later Ptolemy I Soter was as yet only the satrap of Egypt.  In form this inscription is a eulogy of Ptolemy's great achievements, but its evident purpose was to record his restititution to the priests of Buto of a tract of country which, after having belonged to them from time immemorial, had been taken from them by Xerxes, who is described as an enemy and malefactor.  Khababash, having listened to the priests' plea and having been reminded that the god Horus had expelled Xerxes and his son from Egypt by way of punishment, granted the petition, as was likewise done later by Ptolemy.  There are here two clues to the historical position of Khababash: first he was clearly posterior to Xerxes, and secondly he is said to have made his decision after having explored the Delta mouths through which the 'Asiatics', i.e. the Persians, might be expected to attack Egypt.[40]

        On the basis of these "clues" Egyptologists ought to have reasoned that Khababash belonged in the time of Inaros, and only shortly after the battle of Papremis.  But the Greek historians say nothing about Khababash and even Inaros is never called a king in the existing histories.   Nineteenth century scholars therefore dated Khababash earlier in the 5th century, ignoring the fact that he postdated Xerxes,  and identified him as the leader of the 487-484 B.C. rebellion.    Twentieth century scholars have placed him in the 30th dynasty immediately preceding the arrival of Alexander the Great.    These later scholars follow yet a third clue mentioned by Gardiner, who continues his earlier discussion by adding:

There is a third clue in the fact that the above mentioned marriage contract was signed by the same notary as signed another document of 324 B.C.[41]

        We return to the Satrap stela for one final comment.   An important detail emerges from the portion of the text which discusses the expulsion of Xerxes and his son from Egypt.   We  quote one of the earliest translations, that of Mahaffy in his  History of Egypt Under the Ptolemaic Dynasty:

"They spake before his Holiness (i.e. Khababasha): The king our Lord Horus, son of Isis, son of Osiris, the ruler or rulers, the king of the kings of Upper Egypt, the king of the kings of Lower Egypt, the avenger of his father, the lord of Pe, being the beginning of the gods hereafter, not a king after him, cast out the miscreant Xerxes with his eldest son, making himself known in the town of Neith, Sais, on this day beside the holy mother. [43]

Inaros

        Establishing a link between Inaros and the Saite dynasty is more difficult than was the case for Khababasha.  The reason is simple.   Inaros is known only via the accounts of his rebellion preserved by the Greek historians Thucydides, Ktesias, Diodorus Siculus, and others.   His name is otherwise unknown.  Not a single Egyptian monument attests his existence.   The same can be said for a certain Amyrtaeus who is known to have assisted Inaros later in his rebellion, and who continued the revolt after Inaros' capture by the Persians.   We do wonder at this apparent lack of documentation.  It is a problem that needs to be addressed, but this is not the appropriate time.    An entire book in this series is devoted to the subject of the Inaros rebellion.  The present discussion is concerned only with establishing a connection between Inaros and the Saite dynasty.  The evidence is necessarily indirect.

        For well over a century the scholarly world has been aware of a cycle of stories concerned with the contemporaries and immediate successors of Inaros.   The documents are entirely written in Coptic on papyri and were probably composed in the Ptolemaic era.   This cycle of stories, bearing such exotic names as Inaros and the Griffon, Contest for the Benefice of Amun, Contest for the Breastplate (or Armour) of Inaros, and the Egyptians and Amazons are virtually inaccessible to the average reader.  None exists in English translation, some are unpublished, and the early publications of the two Contest stories, the Gernam translations of Spiegelberg and Krall, are difficult to find.   K.A. Kitchen provides a summary of these stories in an excursus in his popular Third Intermediate Period in Egypt. [46]    But Kitchen's discussion suffers from the mistaken supposition that much of the background is borrowed from the period of Assyrian occupation of Egypt, in spite of the presence of Inaros in the narrative.   Recently Kim Ryholt has published an English translation of a fragmentary papyrus containing a parallel to the earlier part of the Contest for the Armour of Inaros [47]

        There are certainly many mythological and legendary accretions present in this cycle of stories, but we argue that the underlying historical stratum is factual.  Inaros and the Griffon tells the story of Inaros fighting a griffon from the Red Sea.   The Contest for the Benefice of Amon describes how Ankhhor, son of a king Pedubast, usurped the inheritance of a high priest deceased during his father's reign and it goes on to document the consequences which ensued. The Contest for the Armour of Inaros describes the conflict between Pemu, son of Inaros, and Wertepamunniut of Mendes, following the death and burial of Inaros.  The action in the story takes place during the reign of king Pedubast, who has outlived Inaros, and whom Pemu saved when Egypt was invaded by foreigners led by an otherwise unknown 'slstny.  In the Egyptians and Amazons we see Pedikhons, another son of Inaros, leaving behind the comforts of Egypt, and the company of king Pedubast, to search for adventure in the East.

        All of these stories purport to originate from a single period in history, the time immediately following the death of Inaros.  There is no question that this is the famed leader of the 5th century rebellion.  Even Kitchen agrees.   But King Pedubast is the central figure, having had the good fortune to live through the foreign invasion and outlive Inaros.   In consequence the group of stories bears his name:  The Cycle of Pedubast.

        In the Contest for the Armour of Inaros King Pedubast remains in the background.   The fight is between Pamy the younger, son of Inaros, chief of the army, and Wertepamunniut, son of Ankhhor, apparently from a family antagonistic to Inaros.  We recall that many Egyptian mercenaries sided with the Persians when Inaros began his rebellion and they resisted the siege by Inaros and the Athenians for three years.   Perhaps the origins of the animosity between the two families can be traced to this source.  The details of the fight between Pamy and Wertepamunniut are otherwise of no interest to this revision.

        This Pedubast cycle privides a means whereby we can establish a possible connection between Inaros and the Saite dynasty.  The reasoning is necessarily circuitous.  If Inaros and Pedubast are contemporaries, then we can argue the case for Inaros by arguing the case for Pedubast.  In the concluding section of this chapter we attempt to show that a king Pedubast did in fact reign in the mid 5th century B.C..  He must therefore be the Pedubast, contemporary of Inaros, who figures so prominently in the Pedubast cycle.  And his reign, we argue, overlaps the early years of Amasis.

        Apart from the Pedubast cycle there is but one other probable link between Inaros and the Saite dynasty, this time a connection to Psamtik II.   It derives from the site of 'Ayn Manawir, located on the western outskirts of the Khargeh Oasis.   During the 1992 and 1993 excavations of the temple at this site, the excavation team discovered, in addition to  a considerable quantity of ceramic material, dozens of ostraca containing demotic inscriptions specifically dated to the later stages of the first Persian occupation and the early years of the 29th dynasty.   In particular the ostraca bear year dates from the reigns of Artaxerxes I,  Darius II,  Artaxerxes II, Amyrtaeus and Nepherites I., this at least in the opinion of the scholars at the site.[48]

        To be more specific the ostraca collection included 12 documents dated from years 22 through 40 of Artaxerxes I,  24 documents dated from years 2 through 18 of Darius II,  a single document each from years 1 and 3 of an unknown king ('rt)  which the excavators considered to be an abbreviation of the name of Artaxerxes II, a single document each from the 5th and 6th years of a king Psamtik, identified as Amyrtaeus, and a single document each from the years 5 and 7 of Nepherites I.  By assigning the documents to the named kings, it was determined that the temple compound was occupied continuously from 443 B.C. to 393 B.C.   The documents as assigned provide an almost continuous record of occupation of the temple.[49]   There are no individual photographs of the ostraca to allow us to check the identifications.

        The discovery of such a large number of dated documents from the reigns of Artaxerxes I and Darius II was welcomed by the excavators.   It was also somewhat of a surprise.   These two reigns are noted for their lack of dated documents.   Even more surprising were the two ostraca inscriptions dated to the 5th and 6th years of a king Psamtik.   To maintain the assumption of continuity of occupation it was concluded that these two ostraca must belong to the reign of Amyrtaeus, the sole occupant of Manetho's 28th dynasty,  who followed Darius II on the throne of Egypt.  It was argued further that they provide the first validation of the passage from Diodorus Siculus, quoted several times already in this revision, that the successor of Darius II was named "Psammetichus, king of the Egyptians, son of the famous Psammetichus (Diod 14.35.4)   These two inscriptions were therefore labelled as belonging to Psamtik V with the added qualification (= Amyrtaeus).

        As for the Artaxerxes II ostraca, only one of which is clearly legible,  the excavators can only suggest that "perhaps one can see there an abbreviated writing of Arta<xerxes>"

        Our first impulse is to accept "as is" the suggestions put forward in the preliminary report from this excavation site.  After all, it does support a contention we have made all along, that Amasis, whose last twenty years were coterminous with the reign of Darius II,  was succeeded by a king Psamtik.   We should be content with this verification of one important aspect of our revision.   But for other reasons we do not believe that the 'Ayn Manawir ostraca belong to Amyrtaeus.  We propose instead that they refer to the final years of Psamtik II.

        The 'Ayn Manawir scholars did not for a moment consider the possibility that the dates on the two ostraca refer to the final years of Psamtik II.  Psamtik's reign in the early 6th century was a hundred years too early for the Manawir temple.  But in the revised history that reign must be considered.   The 5th and 6th years of Psamtik II would correspond to 470 B.C. and 469 B.C.  There followed soon after the twenty years of the Inaros rebellion in its various stages, which overlaps for the most part the first twenty years of the reign of Artaxerxes I (665-645 B.C.).  The Manawir documentation resumes with the 22nd year of Artaxerxes I (443 B.C.), following the rebellion, and continues through the 18th year of Darius II (406 B.C.)   We therefore have a plausible alternative situation which explains the data and maintains the assumption that the site was occupied continuously, save for the years of the rebellion.  It is even possible that the problematic king  'rt  and the king identified as Nepherites I ruled in parts of Egypt during the rebellion.[50], filling the gap in the occupation record of the site.

        If we are correct in this hypothesis, then Psamtik V must go the way of Psamtik IV.

King Pedubast

        Three king Pedubasts are attested on Egyptian monuments, bearing the distinct prenomens Usimare Setepenamun, Sehetepibenre, and Seheribre.   In 1956 the Egyptologist  Jean Yoyotte expressed the opinion, with appropriate argument, that Seheribre Pedubast ruled in Egypt during the first Persian domination, a short time after the reign of Darius I.[51]  That opinion was shared by K.A. Kitchen, based on the same criteria,  as recently as 1986.[52]   We therefore rest our case, based on the opinion of these noted authorities, that a king Pedubast ruled Egypt around the time of Inaros in the mid 5th century.    But we are not here to prove the case for the underlying historicity of the Pedubast cycle of narratives.  We look for evidence that connects these kings with the Saite dynasty.

        That evidence is provided by Yoyotte himself, in a 1972 reevaluation of the subject.   By this time he has changed his mind on the date of Seheribre Pedubast, expressing a preference for a slightly different date (un peu differente), one closer to the reign of Amasis.   To understand his change of mind we need to briefly examine the primary inscriptional evidence on which his dating is based.

        Four separate instances of the name of king Seheribre Pedubast are known, but only one is of significant historical value.  It occurs on a seal impression on a group of three demotic papyri found by Petrie in the rubbish of the Meydum pyramid at the turn of the 20th century.  A seal which might have made this impression has also been found.  The sealed papyrus was in fine condition, written at the behest of the official named on the seal, whose name was Psamtik and who refers to himself as the  mr htm of a king Seheribre.  The substance of the letter, which concerned the assessment of land near Heracleopolis, is of minimal interest.   The letter is dated to the 6th day of the 4th month of the 1st year of a king who is not named in the body of the letter.   As mentioned, it is written in a demotic script.

        F. Ll. Griffith, an associate of Petrie and a demotic specialist, examined the papyrus and concluded that it belonged to the first Persian domination, probably to the time of Darius I.  It could not predate the time of Amasis since the demotic script, in the consensus view of scholars, was only introduced into Egypt during Amasis' reign.

        This left Petrie with an interpretive problem.  The sealed letter gave the impression that its dateline referred to the reign of the king Seheribre (Pedubast) named on the seal.   To date that king's reign coterminous with that of Amasis was out of the question.  And no such king was otherwise attested in the Persian period, .  The only kings Pedubast known to Egyptologists reigned either in the 23rd dynasty (8th century) or at the time of Ashurbanipal's dominion over Egypt (7th century).   Petrie solved his problem by considering that Psamtik was a necropolis official, charged with the task of attending to the tomb of  king Seheribre, and that the deceased king had reigned shortly before the 26th dynasty.  Yoyotte quotes Petrie's expressed opinion:

... a seal found upon a papyrus document in demotic, which Mr. Griffith would date to DArius and not before Amasis [...].  The official title mer sahu, keeper of the seal, is known in connexion with tombs in demotic period, so it does not imply that the king was living at the time the seal being used.   And this prayer [...] is like that offered to gods on other seals [...].  It seems therefore that this belonged to the keeper of the tomb of a king Seher-ab-ra.[53]

        When Yoyotte briefly addressed the issue of the dates of king Seheribre Pedubast in 1956, he immediately rejected Petrie's argument.[54]  He argued that the title mr htm means precisely what it says, "keeper of the seal" and that the dignitary who typically bore that title had no necessary connection with the necropolis.   The Medum papyrus must be understood as dating from the 1st year of a living king Seheribre, and since it originated from the Persian period it must belong to the earliest known time in that period when an Egyptian king was on the throne.  He therefore dated the king and the  document to the time of the first Egyptian rebellion, 487-484 B.C..   His reasoning was absolutely sound.

        In 1972 Yoyotte returned to the subject for a more in depth analysis.  This time he focussed on the unique structure and wording of the inscription on the Medum seal, which reads:  "Protection of Seheribre, the keeper of the seal (mr htm) Psamtik".  The layout of the inscription is uniquely composed in four columns incorporating 1) the hieroglyph meaning "protection"; 2) the cartouche prenomen of the king surmounted by two plumes; 3) the title of the official; and 4) the name of the official.  One of the other previously mentioned items bearing the name of Seheribre, unfortunately lacking any historical context,  is also a seal with this identical structure.  Only the name of the official is different.  It reads:  "Protection of Seheribre, the mr htm Harouodj".

         Yoyotte goes on to document another eight seals with precisely this wording and artistic layout, though the names and titles of the officials all vary.  But without exception these other seals bear the kings's name Khnemibre , the prenomen of Ahmose-sa-Neit.   Based on the design of these eight seals, a design apparently unique to the time of Amasis, Yoyotte expressed the opinion that the king Sehibre mentioned on the other two seals must date very close to the time of Amasis.   The time of the Egyptian rebellion was forty years distant from Amasis' death.   That was too far removed.    A perusal of the known history of the early years of Darius I suggested the only possible alternative dating, that of the uprising against the satrap Aryandes in the autumn of 522 B.C. which supposedly lasted until 520 B.C.   Accordingly Yoyotte assumes that Seheribre Pedubast claimed sovereignty during this brief uprising, only four years removed from the death of  Amasis.

        But Yoyotte also has a problem.   The uprising in the early years of Darius reign was not a rebellion by the Egyptians against Persian rule.  If anything it pitted the Persian satrap Aryandes against Darius.   It is not worth our while to discuss the matter further.   There is absolutely no suggestion in the literature on the subject that any Egyptian king challenged Persian rule during this brief time period.  And besides,  if the king Seheribre reigned for only one or two years in some restricted area of the Delta we wonder how he managed to have two different officials, Psamtik and Harouodj, occupying the identical office (mr htm) at the same time.

        Let us set the matter straight.   Three facts emerge from the documents related to Seheribre Pedubast

        1)   The demotic period in Egypt did not begin with the reign of Amasis.  It began at the beginning of the first Persian domination.  With the dynasties displaced,  and the 26th dynasty wrongly positioned anterior to the 27th Persian period, scholars have confused the record.   The issue needs to be addressed in a separate analysis.

        2)  The letter written by Psamtik, the mr htm of Seheribre, dates from the middle of the first Persian domination, the time of Inaros, a fact memorialized in the many narratives of the Pedubast cycle.  There is no need to hypothesize the existence of another king by this name ruling earlier in the Persian period, whether in the forth year of Darius I or during the rebellion which ended Darius' reign.   Both Griffith and Yoyotte (in his earlier analysis) were close to the truth.

        3)  The reign of Seheribre Pedubast began roughly a decade before the reign of Amasis.  According to the Pedubast Cycle he outlived Inaros.   His death must therefore have preceded the beginning of Amasis' reign by at most a few years.  He may even have ruled through the early years of Amasis. [55]  Yoyotte's later analysis of the Seheribre and Knemibre seals is therefore also correct.

        4)  The possibility that Seheribre dates from within the Saite dynasty ought to have been seriously considered from the outset, were it not for the difficulty of explaining his historical position.   All of the Saite kings bore names with the identical format  x + ib + re and are all written with the god's name in honorific position:  re + x + ib.  The fact that the name Seher-ib-re has the identical structure as Wah-ib-re, Wahem-ib-re, Haa-ib-re,  Nefer-ib-re, and Khnem-ib-re has not been overlooked by scholars.  Its resemblance to Saite names was a factor in Yoyotte's argument.  Unfortunately Yoyotte's options were limited by his reliance on an errant chronology for the Saite dynasty. It is the displaced dynasties that continue to confound the scholars.

        The confusion continues into the reign of Amasis.