Glasgow Chronology
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The Glasgow Chronology or New Chronology is a proposed revision of the Egyptian chronology of ancient Egypt. It was first formulated between the years 1978 and 1982 by a working group following the Glasgow Conference of Society for Interdisciplinary Studies (SIS, a non-profit organization advocating serious academic analysis of the writings of Immanuel Velikovsky and other catastrophists).
This chronology placed the Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt some five hundred years later than the conventional chronology of Egypt.
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[edit] Chronology formation
Peter James, David Rohl, and their co-workers abandoned the Egyptian chronology in 1982, and went on to form their own chronologies. Rohl's chronology, which embraces the name "New Chronology," makes Ramesses II into the Shishaq of the Bible, while James equates Ramesses III with Shishaq. The Glasgow Chronology accepted all the character identifications proposed by Velikovsky in Ages in Chaos (1952). Thus Hatshepsut, who visited the Divine Land, was equated with the Queen of Sheba, who visited Solomon in Jerusalem, whilst Thutmose III, who followed Hatshepsut, was equated with Shishaq, who plundered the Jerusalem temple after the death of Solomon. Velikovsky therefore reduced the age of the Eighteenth Dynasty by five centuries. However, in his subsequently published Ramses II and his Time (1978), he brought the Nineteenth dynasty down by roughly seven centuries, thus opening a two-century gap between the Eighteenth and Nineteenth dynasties. Despite the Glasgow Chronology intent of reducing the age of the Nineteenth dynasty by five centuries and allowing it to naturally follow from the Eighteenth dynasty, it was historically insupportable.
[edit] Theories
The Glasgow Chronology was a prime concern of ISIS. Building upon the the Glasgow Chronology presented at the Society for Interdisciplinary Studies' 1978 conference, the New Chronology puts the dates on the Traditional Chronologies Based upon Egypt out by up to 300 years at points prior to the universally accepted fixed date of 664 BC for the sacking of Thebes by Ashurbanipal.
Rohl's published works, A Test of Time and Legend, set forth his theories for dating Egyptian kings of the 19th through 25th Dynasties, which would require a major revision of the conventional chronology of ancient Egypt, and less radical revisions of the chronologies of Israel and Mesopotamia. Rohl asserts that these allow him to identify many of the main characters in the Old Testament with people whose names appear in archeological finds.
One of Rohl's methods includes the use of archaeo-astronomy, which he uses to fix the date of a solar eclipse which happened during the reign of Amenhotep IV and was observed in the town of Ugarit. According to Rohl,[citation needed] the only possible time where such eclipse could be visible in Ugarit during the whole second millennium BC was 9 May 1012 BC.[1] According to conventional chronology, Ugarit was already destroyed in the 12th century BC, and Amenothep IV (Akhenaton) ruled c. 1353–1334 BC. NASA reports a solar eclipse with totality for northern Egypt and near-totality in the Levant for 14 May 1337 BC.[2]
[edit] Claims
Rohl's redating is based on criticism of three of the four arguments which he considers are the foundations of the conventional Egyptian chronology:
- Rohl claims that the identification of "Shishaq, King of Egypt" (1 Kings 14:25f; 2 Chronicles 12:2–9), first proposed by Jean-François Champollion, is based on incorrect conclusions. Rohl argues instead that Shishaq should be identified with Ramesses II, which would move the date of Ramesses' reign forward some 300 years. (See the articles on Shoshenq I and Shishaq.)
- He claims that the record in the Ebers papyrus of the rising of Sirius in the ninth regnal year of Amenhotep I, which supposedly fixes the year to either 1542 BC or 1517 BC, is misread, and instead should be understood as evidence for a reform in the Egyptian Calendar.
- Papyrus Leiden I.350, which dates to the 52nd year of Ramesses II, records lunar observations that place that year of Ramesses' reign in one of 1278, 1253, 1228 or 1203 BC. Having questioned the value of the Ebers Papyrus, Rohl argues that since these lunar observations are accurate every twenty-five years, they could also indicate dates 300 years later.
[edit] Interpretations
Rohl bases his revised chronology (the New Chronology) on his interpretation of numerous archeological finds and genealogical records of several individuals. For example:
- Rohl notes a gap in the stelae associated with the Apis vaults at Saqqara for the 21st and 22nd dynasties of Egypt, which combined with the placement of coffins at the Royal Cache (TT 320) of coffins, shows these two dynasties were contemporary. He also offers an interpretation of the relationship of the tombs of Osorkon I and Psusennes I at Tanis that supports his theory.
- Rohl offers inscriptions that list three non-royal genealogies, which when considering one generation was an average of 20 years suggests Ramesses II flourished at the later time.
[edit] Opposition
Mainstream Egyptology rejects Rohl's theories. Rohl's most vocal critic has been Professor Kenneth Kitchen, formerly of Liverpool University. One of Kitchen's major objections to Rohl's arguments concerns his alleged omission of evidence that conflicts with Rohl's theories. Kitchen has pointed out that the genealogies Rohl references to date Ramesses II omit one or more names known from other inscriptions.
Similarly, Egyptologists[who?] have pointed out that no other known king of Egypt fits the identification as well as Shoshenq I. The redating of Ramesses II three centuries later would not only reposition the date of the Battle of Qadesh and complicate the chronology of Hittite history, it would require a less severe revision of the chronology of Assyrian history prior to 664 BC.
As well as opposition from mainstream Egyptologists, Rohl has also been criticized by revisionist historians. Professor Gunnar Heinsohn, for example, of Bremen University, has proposed an even more radical downdating than that of Velikovsky, whilst more recently Emmet Sweeney of Northern Ireland has produced what might be described as a synthesis of Heinsohn and the Glasgow Chronology. In Sweeney's system, as outlined in his Empire of Thebes, there is no separation of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Dynasties, but the Eighteenth Dynasty is brought down to the seventh century BC, where it joins up with the Nineteenth, which commences around 600 BC. Sweeney therefore retains much of what Velikovsky wrote in Ramses II and his Time and all of what he said in Peoples of the Sea, and in addition retains many of the synchronisms with biblical history proposed in the original Glasgow Chronology.
[edit] References
- A Test Of Time: Volume One: The Bible- From Myth To History by David M. Rohl (Author) BCA 1995
- Legend, The Genesis of Civilisation, Test of Time, Volume 2 (Hardcover) by David M. Rohl (Author) Publisher: Century Publishing Co.; Reissue edition (1998) ISBN-10: 071267747X ISBN-13: 978-0712677479
