The Hello and welcome back to the Egyptian history podcast episode episode 51, everywhere and nowhere. In this episode we meet

the first kings of the elusive 13th dynasty, a period in which Egypt's royal

household was wealthy, powerful and stable, and yet more ephemeral than it had been for 300 years.

This episode is brought to you by Paul and James, and thank you for their generous support of the podcast.

I hope you and all my listeners enjoy the show. The year is now 1786 B.C.E and the 12th dynasty is gone.

Its last king, the female Nefaru Sobek, had died without air,

and a new family has taken power. As a result, the 200-year

lineage of Amenham Hart the first was gone, permanently removed from power.

Although they will be forever immortalized as one of these strongest dynasties

ever to control the throne, their political relevance has come to its end.

The power of rule now belongs to a new family, descended from the king Ma'a-Hirurei

Amenemhat the fourth. But apart from a shift in bloodlines, it is mostly business as usual. Things will change in the coming decades, but at the

start things are progressing as normal. This is still the Middle Kingdom, and that particular

error will not come to its end for 75 years.

So why the fuss?

The problem with the 13th dynasty compared to its predecessor is that it is so much more vague and so much more convoluted in terms of political history.

This makes it an absolute mess to decrypt and half of the kings don't even have secured dates.

We know that they existed, but in some cases,

kings could be up to 50 or 70 years out of their proper place.

It is horrendous. Case in point, we just have to look at the number of

kings in this period compared to the number of kings in Dynasty 12. Over the

span of 200 years, the 12elfth Dynasty was ruled by 8 kings.

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