End of The Old Kingdom
End of The Old Kingdom
End of The Old Kingdom
UCLA
Peer Reviewed
Title:
End of the Old Kingdom
Author:
Mueller-Wollermann, Renate, University of Tuebingen
Publication Date:
08-20-2014
Series:
UCLA Encyclopedia of Egyptology
Permalink:
http://escholarship.org/uc/item/2ns3652b
Keywords:
climate, economy, politics
Local Identifier:
nelc_uee_8761
Abstract:
Egypt’s Old Kingdom ended, according to widespread scholarly opinion, with the last king of the
8th Dynasty—that is, around the middle of the twenty-second century BCE, or a few decades
later. The reasons for the fall are to be seen in internal and/or climatic factors that arose much
earlier, or possibly in an invasion from the northeast—explanations that do not preclude each
other. As a result of these factors, the territorial entity of the Egyptian state was dissolved and
a period of economic and cultural decline followed. The end of the Old Kingdom is one of the
most controversial topics in Egyptian historiography. Moreover, the end recorded by the ancient
Egyptians does not necessarily coincide with what modern scholars have considered the end.Until
now the exact causes for the decline remain uncertain.
Copyright Information:
All rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. Contact the author or original publisher for any
necessary permissions. eScholarship is not the copyright owner for deposited works. Learn more
at http://www.escholarship.org/help_copyright.html#reuse
JACCO DIELEMAN
Editor
University of California, Los Angeles
ELIZABETH FROOD
Editor
University of Oxford
WOLFRAM GRAJETZKI
Area Editor Time and History
University College London
JOHN BAINES
Senior Editorial Consultant
University of Oxford
Short Citation:
Müller-Wollermann, 2014, End of the Old Kingdom. UEE.
Full Citation:
Müller-Wollermann, Renate, 2014, End of the Old Kingdom. In Wolfram Grajetzki and Willeke
Wendrich (eds.), UCLA Encyclopedia of Egyptology, Los Angeles.
http://digital2.library.ucla.edu/viewItem.do?ark=21198/zz002hzfs1
Egypt’s Old Kingdom ended, according to widespread scholarly opinion, with the last king of the
8th Dynasty—that is, around the middle of the twenty-second century BCE, or a few decades later.
The reasons for the fall are to be seen in internal and/or climatic factors that arose much earlier, or
possibly in an invasion from the northeast—explanations that do not preclude each other. As a
result of these factors, the territorial entity of the Egyptian state was dissolved and a period of
economic and cultural decline followed. The end of the Old Kingdom is one of the most controversial
topics in Egyptian historiography. Moreover, the end recorded by the ancient Egyptians does not
necessarily coincide with what modern scholars have considered the end. Until now the exact causes
for the decline remain uncertain.
وذلك في منتصف القرن الثاني،انتهت الدولة القديمة بنهاية آخر ملوك االسرة الثامنة
وتتمحور.والعشرين قبل الميالد أو ربما بعد ذلك بعدة عقود وفقا للرأي الشائع بين الباحثين
او عوامل مناخية والتي ظهرت قبل هذه المرحلة/أسباب االنهيار حول عوامل داخلية و
وهي أسباب، او ربما يكون االنهيار نتيجةً لغزو من الجهة الشمالية الشرقية لمصر،بكثير
تم تفكيك الوحدة االقليمية للدولة المصرية نتيجة هذه العوامل.متعددة ال تتعارض مع بعضها
وتعد نهاية الدولة القديمة من أكثر.وتالها فترة من التدهور االقتصادي والثقافي
باإلضافة إلى أن النهاية التي،الموضوعات المثيرة للجدل بمجال دراسة تاريخ مصر القديمة
وثقها قدماء المصريون ال تتوافق بالضرورة مع ما يعتبره العلماء الحاليين نهاية الدولة
. وال تزال حتى األن أسباب هذا التدهور غير معروفة.القديمة
he term “Old Kingdom” (in Kingdom at the end of the 6th Dynasty, or
T German: Altes Reich; in French:
ancien empire) was minted in the
after the reign of Pepy II (Baud 2010: 63). Most
Egyptologists now designate the first two
mid-nineteenth century and at that time meant dynasties as the Early Dynastic Period, the Old
the period of the 1st through the 16th Kingdom beginning with the 3rd Dynasty.
dynasties; later the term referred to the period
Dynasties 6 and 8 are combined in the
of the 1st through the 10th dynasties, and today
Canon of Turin (Málek 1982); the 7th Dynasty
it refers to the 1st through the 8th dynasties
is fictive. Thus, anciently the Old Kingdom was
(Müller-Wollermann 1986: 4-7). Some
considered to have ended after the 8th
scholars, however, put the end of the Old
Bibliographic Notes
The most important texts of the Old Kingdom were translated by Strudwick (2005). Administrative
changes were studied by Kanawati (1980) and the provincial administration by Martin-Pardey (1976).
Arguments for the decline of the Old Kingdom can be found in Müller-Wollermann (1986), Bárta
(2009), and Jansen-Winkeln (2010).
References
Bárta, Miroslav
2009 Der Zusammenbruch des Alten Reiches. Sokar 18, pp. 44-53.
2013 Radiocarbon dates for the Old Kingdom and their correspondences. In Radiocarbon and the
chronologies of ancient Egypt, ed. Andrew Shortland and C. Bronk Ramsey, pp. 218-223. Oxford:
Oxbow Books.
Bárta, Miroslav, and Aleš Bezdĕk
2008 Beetles and the decline of the Old Kingdom: Climate change in ancient Egypt. In Chronology and
archaeology in ancient Egypt (the Third Millennium B.C.), ed. Hana Vymazalová, Miroslav Bárta, pp. 214-
222. Prague: Czech Institute of Egyptology, Faculty of Arts, Charles University of Prague.
Baud, Michel
2006 Dynasties 6 and 8. In Ancient Egyptian chronology, ed. Erik Hornung, Rolf Krauss, and David
Warburton, pp. 144-158. Leiden and Boston: Brill.
2010 The Old Kingdom. In A companion to ancient Egypt I, ed. Alan Lloyd, pp. 63-80. Malden, MA: Wiley-
Blackwell.
Bell, Barbara
1971 The Dark Ages in ancient history I: The first Dark Age in Egypt. American Journal of Archaeology 75,
pp. 1-26.
Breasted, James Henry
1906 Ancient records of Egypt I. New York: Russell & Russell.
Brovarski, Edward
2013 Overseers of Upper Egypt in the Old to Middle Kingdoms: Part 1. Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache und
Altertumskunde 140, pp. 91-111.
Cagle, Anthony
2003 The spatial structure of Kom el-Hisn: An Old Kingdom town in the western Nile Delta, Egypt. Oxford:
Archaeopress.
Figure 2. Statue of Metjetji, late 5th Dynasty-early 6th Dynasty. Courtesy of the Brooklyn Museum, Charles
Edwin Wilbour Fund, 53.222.