How to read the dates
The Metropolitan Museum publishes both period essays and Heilbrunn chronology charts. They do not always use the same end date for a period. The Old Kingdom essay uses about 2649 to 2130 B.C. The chart for 8000 to 2000 B.C. uses about 2649 to 2150 B.C. This page names the chart or essay behind each sentence instead of forcing one timeline.
This is not a list of thirty dynasties. It is a map of the long stretches museum labels use when they date an object.
Early state and the Old Kingdom
The Heilbrunn chart places the Predynastic Period at about 4500 to 3100 B.C. and the Early Dynastic Period at about 3100 to 2649 B.C. The Old Kingdom essay says knowledge of that later age is largely funerary. Dynasty 3 begins there with Netjerikhet, later called Djoser. His Saqqara complex is described as the earliest stone structure in Egypt, with the Step Pyramid at its center.
The same essay treats the end of the Old Kingdom as more than a palace quarrel. Decentralization, provincial policy, pressure from Nubia, and climate change all sit among the contributing factors. Several short reigns follow Pepi II.
Middle Kingdom between two intermediate periods
On the 8000 to 2000 B.C. chart, the First Intermediate Period is about 2150 to 2030 B.C., with competing dynasties at Heracleopolis and Thebes. The Middle Kingdom essay dates its era about 2030 to 1650 B.C., Dynasties 11 through 13, and says Nebhepetre Mentuhotep II reunited Upper and Lower Egypt. Under Amenemhat I and Senwosret I a new capital was established at Itjtawi, and pyramid complexes were built again.
The 2000 to 1000 B.C. chart places the Second Intermediate Period at about 1640 to 1550 B.C. The New Kingdom essay says Theban rulers of Dynasty 17 drove Hyksos kings from the Delta, and that Ahmose I finished that reunification.
New Kingdom
The New Kingdom essay dates the period about 1550 to 1070 B.C. Dynasty 18 campaigns extended Egyptian influence in the Near East and established control of Nubia to the fourth cataract. Much of the resulting wealth was spent on the gods, especially Amun-Re of Thebes, whose temple at Karnak grew under later rulers.
Dynasty 19 set an administrative capital in the Delta. Thebes remained a cultural and religious center. Pharaohs built mortuary temples there and were buried in rock-cut tombs painted with afterlife texts. Deir el-Medina housed the artisans who made those tombs. The essay calls the New Kingdom nearly 500 years of political stability and prosperity, and also a period of nonroyal art.
Later periods
The Third Intermediate Period essay and the 1000 B.C. to 1 A.D. chart place that age at about 1070 to 712 B.C. The chart describes competing power bases, many with origins in Libyan groups settled in the Delta, and notes that metal temple statuary and coffin decoration still flourished.
The same chart dates the Late Period about 712 to 332 B.C., Dynasties 25 through 30. It records Assyrian campaigns between about 671 and 663 B.C. and Achaemenid rule from 525 to 404 B.C. and again from 343 to 332 B.C. Macedonian and Ptolemaic rule is dated about 332 to 30 B.C. Hellenistic taste was strong at court, while the Ptolemies presented themselves as pharaohs and built temples in pharaonic style. This page stops at that chart. It does not narrate the Roman centuries.
Practice on this site
Use this overview to place a deity or a museum object, then go back to the cited page for that god or to the Open Access collection. King lists and year-by-year reigns are not collected here.
Sources & References
- The Met – Egypt in the Old Kingdom (ca. 2649–2130 B.C.)
- The Met – Egypt in the Middle Kingdom (ca. 2030–1650 B.C.)
- The Met – Egypt in the New Kingdom (ca. 1550–1070 B.C.)
- The Met – Egypt in the Third Intermediate Period (1070–712 B.C.)
- The Met Heilbrunn Timeline – Egypt, 8000–2000 B.C.
- The Met Heilbrunn Timeline – Egypt, 2000–1000 B.C.
- The Met Heilbrunn Timeline – Egypt, 1000 B.C.–1 A.D.