Introduction

My love for my country Egypt has been the main motive behind this work. This is besides my appreciation for Egypt's history and deep belief that the way towards realizing progress in the future lies in kindling the awareness of the grandeur of the past.

Egypt, as Egyptologists confirm, is the most ancient ever state in the contemporary world that is in the legal sense of the state with its three elements: the territory, the people and the government. For more than 5000 years, Egypt has been there with its definite geographical borders and its people living over there and a continued governmental system which has never been interrupted at any period of its history.

There might be peoples or tribes that had dwelled in other places all over the world such as the Asian civilizations in India and China whose history might date back to 20, 000 years, but their existence is doubtful, from a scientific perspective, given that no written script was left behind to confirm their history.

As regards the ancient Egyptian civilization, we know about it via written scripts meant to commemorate the name of the pharaoh, his dynasty, his relation to the gods, his achievements and the history of his life.

If the Egyptologists agree on the sources of the Egyptian history, we find that the most important of these resources are:

- Kings' lists in Abydos Temple.
- Kings' lists in Saqara Tombs.
- Another list in Karnak.

These lists have been the authenticated sources of Egypt's ancient history plus other sources as Palermo Stone, Turin Papyrus and the writings of the Greek thinker Herodotus in the 5th Century BC and the Egyptian priest Maniton in the 3rd Century AD.

The names of the rulers of the pharaohs written in the different scripts on the walls of the temples are regarded as the most important resources of the ancient Egyptian history. Still, historians have differed as regards the order of some pharaohs, the time of their rule plus the fact that the identity of some pharaohs remains unknown so far.

The Ptolemies, who succeeded the Pharaohs, have followed in the footsteps of the pharaohs as regards inscribing their names on the walls of their temples.

The enlisting of Egypt's rulers has taken place in the Roman and the Byzantine eras subsequently. When Muslims had entered Egypt, it turned into one of the Muslim states and the Wali "local governor" was named by the Caliph in the epoch of the Orthodox Caliphs and the Umayyad, Abbasid and Ottoman Caliphs as well.

Yet, Egypt's rulers used to enjoy some sort of a self-rule system as happened in the Tolon era, the Ikhshidi era, the Ayyubid era, the Fatimid era and the Mamluke era when Cairo hosted the Abbasid Caliphate in the wake of the fall of Baghdad.

Therefore, Egypt enjoys authenticated history over 50 centuries, a matter which should be attributed to its rulers. Every historian used to study the rulers and their history, yet we have no record of the rulers of Egypt in the different decades.

 That is why I have decided to collect the names of all Egypt's rulers in one volume to help researchers in the different domains plus being a source of a pride for all Egyptians. This is not an easy task owing to the deep-rooted Egyptian history and differences among the historians concerning the order of some pharaohs, the beginning and the end of their rules as well.

To overcome these obstacles, I had to check many references in different languages for every decade plus comparing Hegira calendar to Gregorian calendar.

I have also divided this encyclopedia into two parts: the first comprises 15 chapters where every decade of the Egyptian history has been tackled in a separate chapter as follows: a brief historical introduction for the decade, the names of the rulers and the date of the beginning and end of their rule.

The second part has been dedicated to the symbols of the rulers being of a special importance in the ancient eras and the modern time as well. The five chapters of this part deals with the way in which the names of the rulers were written in the official documents, the images of some Egyptian rulers, flags and slogans plus the musical note of the national anthem.

In conclusion, I have to mention that my role in the production of this encyclopedia has been confined just to collecting data and verifying resources plus quoting some of the works of the historians of the different Egyptian epochs.

Nasser el-Ansari