Early dynastic period

Early Dynastic Period
According to Manetho, ancient Egyptian civilisation dawned with the unification of the country by Menes. Herodotus agrees with Manetho that Menes (or Min) was the first king ofEgypt, and Men is recorded as the first King of Upperand Lower Egypt in the Abydos Kings list, inscribed during the reign of Seti (New Kingdom). However, Egyptologists disagree on the identity of thePharaoh Men.
Herodotus claims that Men founded the ancient city of Memphis, an act is usually attributed to Hor-Aha. Some scholars have argued that Hor-aha and Menes are one and the same. They pointto the Naqada label, which bears Hor-aha´s birth name and (allegedly) his throne name - Men (established). However, the birth name faces away from the signs alleged to be the birth name (totallyagainst convention) and the signs above the name (the cobra and the vulture, also know as Nebty - "the two ladies") were not used with Royal names until the reign of Den . Finally, the Nebty and the signfor Men are surmounted by the sign for a shrine or funerary tent. It is therefore quite possible that Hor-aha was burying the previous Pharaoh, Men.
Other sources attribute the unification of Egyptto one of Hor-aha's predeccessors called Narmer. Excavations in Heliopolis (the site of the ancient city of Nekhen) unearthed many artefacts naming Narmer and seal impressions found in the tombsof Den and Qa´a imply that he unified Egypt. Furthermore, the Narmer palette shows the King wearing both the crown for Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt.

The Early Dynastic Period is a period of some 500 yearsor more at the beginning of what is conventionally considered as the history of Ancient Egypt. It was the culmination of the formative stage of the Ancient Egyptian culture that began centuries beforeduring the Prehistory.
It was during this period that the divine kingship became well established as Egypt's form of government, and with it, an entire culture that would remain virtually...