Six of the Abydos kings have thus been identified with names in the
lists and in Manetho; that is to say, we now know the real names of six
of the earliest Egyptian monarchs, whose appellations are given us
under mutilated forms by the later list-makers. Prof. Petrie further
identifies (4) Tja Ati with Ateth, (3) Tjer with Teta, and (1) Aha with
Mena. Mena, Teta, Ateth, Ata, Hesepti, Merbap, Shemsu (?), and Qebh are
the names of the 1st Dynasty as given in the lists. The equivalent of
Ata Prof. Petrie finds in the name "Merneit," which is found at Umm
el-Ga'ab. But there is no proof whatever that Merneit was a king; he
was much more probably a prince or other great personage of the reign
of Den, who was buried with the kings. Prof. Petrie accepts the
identification of the personal name of Aha as "Men," and so makes him
the only equivalent of Mena. But this reading of the name is still
doubtful. Arguing that Aha must be Mena, and having all the rest of the
kings of the Ist Dynasty identified with the names in the lists, Prof.
Petrie is compelled to exclude Narmer from the dynasty, and to relegate
him to "Dynasty 0," before the time of Mena. It is quite possible,
however, that Narmer was the successor, not the predecessor, of Mena.
He was certainly either the one or the other, as the style of art in his
time was exactly the same as that in the time of Aha. The "Scorpion,"
too, whose name is found at Hierakonpolis, certainly dates to the same
time as Narmer and Aha, for the style of his work is the same. And it
may well be that he is not to be counted as a separate king, belonging
to "Dynasty 0 "(or "Dynasty -I") at all, but as identical with Narmer,
just as "Sma" may also be. We thus find that the two kings who left the
most developed remains at Hierakonpolis are the two whose monuments at
Abydos are the oldest of all on that site. That is to say, the kings
whose monuments record the conquest of the North belong to the period
of transition from the old Hierakonpolite dominion of Upper Egypt to the
new kingdom of all Egypt. They, in fact, represent the "Mena" or Menés