Old Kingdom
Merenre Nemtyemsaf II
6th Dynasty · 2345-2181 BCE
Open full-size illustration →Source: Shaw, Oxford History of Ancient Egypt (2000)
Background
Merenre II, sometimes called Nemtyemsaf II, is a conventional late Dynasty 6 entry whose historical reality and position are difficult to establish from contemporary evidence. Later king lists and traditions place him after Pepi II, but the surviving archaeological record is thin and does not permit a secure biography. His apparent very short reign fits a period of dynastic instability, yet even that conclusion depends heavily on retrospective sources. He is best treated as a possible transitional ruler at the end of the Old Kingdom rather than as a figure for whom policies, monuments or family relations can be confidently reconstructed. Research: UCL Digital Egypt; Old Kingdom king lists.
Chronological source: Shaw, Oxford History of Ancient Egypt (2000)
Full profile
A fractured succession
Merenre II succeeded his elderly father, Pepi II, but his reign was incredibly short. By this point, the centralized authority of the pharaoh had completely broken down, and it is highly unlikely that he was officially recognized as the king over the entirety of a fractured Egypt.
A reign measured in months, not years
Manetho's later account, as preserved in later epitomes, credits Merenre II with a reign of only about a year, and some king lists reduce this further to a matter of months. The Turin Canon entry for this portion of the dynasty is badly damaged, which has forced Egyptologists to rely heavily on later, less reliable literary traditions to reconstruct even the barest outline of the reign, including its length and the circumstances of its end.
A possible link to Queen Nitiqret
Later Egyptian and Greek tradition closely associates the end of Merenre II's reign with the enigmatic queen Nitiqret, sometimes described as his wife or sister, whom ancient historians such as Manetho and Herodotus credited with taking the throne after his death. Modern Egyptologists have questioned much of this later legendary material, including whether Nitiqret ruled as an independent monarch in the way the stories describe, but the strong narrative link between Merenre II's brief reign and the accounts of her succession has kept the two figures closely tied together in modern discussions of how the Old Kingdom came to an end.
Sources for this profile
- Baker, D. D. (2008). The Encyclopedia of the Pharaohs: Volume 1. Stacey International.
- Shaw, I. (Ed.). (2000). The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt. Oxford University Press.
- Dodson, A., & Hilton, D. (2004). The Complete Royal Families of Ancient Egypt. Thames & Hudson.
- Leprohon, R. J. (2013). The Great Name: Ancient Egyptian Royal Titulary. Society of Biblical Literature.
- University College London. Digital Egypt for Universities.
The complete, APA-formatted reference list is on the Academic Sources & Bibliography page.