H. Breasted and other twentieth century Egyptologists, and the reader of modern histories of Egypt will find that Menes is still a favorite subject for creative hypothesis and scholarly debate. He is still regarded by some scholars as the legendary military conqueror who unified Egypt through war, but others now hypothesize that Lower Egypt had already been conquered at least a generation before Menes, and that Menes was actually a savvy politician who consolidated the legal claim to the throne of the southern "Hawk-kings" by assuming the gods and rituals of the north, and by marrying into their most prominent royal family.
The Unification of Upper and Lower Egypt
Manetho's treatment of the generations before Menes as "prehistoric" or "predynastic" has fostered the misconception that Menes was the first king in Egypt. Today it is known that Egypt contained a number of advanced and organized societies as early as the sixth millennium B.C.
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