Hello Thanos5150; you wrote: ”I may be wrong, but I do not find it a "big" stretch and ultimately a question worth asking. The 17th year cattle count is not required to be located at G1 and is noted mostly to highlight the folly of using two years for the cattle count instead of one which is just as well demonstrated at Dahshur.”

Giza and Dahshur may both be incorrect; Meidum may be the true nexus of Petrie’s confusion.

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”With Cheops we are faced with no real discrepancy: the Turin Papyrus gives 23 years whereas the records reach up to the 12th (An example of a 17th count was argued by Petrie; however, it is probable that he was confused on this matter)²⁰. In this case one may argue for a biennial system. After all, this is a new reign and the practices of Snefru need not have been followed. It is unfortunate that Cairo Fragment No. 2 of the Annals does not preserve any dates and that none of the nine listed cases present a “year after the Xth occurrence” or any connection with cattle.

²⁰ A History of Egypt¹⁰, Lauer is adverse to this reference: in: BIFAO 73, 1973, 134, n. 1; cf. Stadelmann, in: MDAIK 43, 1986, 239. I suspect that Petrie confused his data and mixed the evidence from Snefru at Meidum (where there are cases of zp 17: nos. 13-15 in our list under that king) with that of Cheops at Giza”

From the ”Addendum: Meidum Dates”:

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”The following are the graffiti listed by Posener-Kriéger that should be added to our analysis. Those without dates are ignored. All relate to Snefru.

(5) Year of the 17 occurrence: Graffiti A 12-21 with A 23-26 to be added possibly A 22 is to be set in the same group.”

Source: “Dated Texts of the Old Kingdom”, Anthony Spalinger, Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur © 1994, Pages 285, 318 and 319.


Note to the serious student: The whole of the article contains scholarly merit. In particular, the Addendum contains cogent discourse ”concerning the intricate question of regnal year dating in the Old Kingdom”, amplifying a transitional intercalation from the ‘cattle count’, while recognizing the import of the maturing organizational bureaucracy.



Dr. Troglodyte