BOOK ONE.

ON THE HIERO-

GLYPHICS OF THE EGYPTIANS.

Where the first humans were.

Those who have compiled the history of the most ancient Egyptian affairs—or rather, their fabulous deeds—have handed down nothing certain regarding the origin of the first letters or sciences. Likewise, they provide no certainty concerning the first kings in the world (who were believed to be gods) or the birth of the first men. Instead, whatever they have written about these matters is very much like the mere fictions of idle men, the delusions of the melancholic, or the fantasies of dreamers. Some assert that the first humans were produced in Egypt, based on the conjecture that around the Thebaid A region in Upper Egypt centered around the city of Thebes, often associated in antiquity with the origins of civilization., when the flooding of the Nile The seasonal flooding of the Nile was essential for Egyptian agriculture, depositing nutrient-rich silt. ceased and the sun warmed the mud left behind by the water, a multitude of mice arose from the cracks in the earth in many places. They suggest that, just as in the very beginning of the world, all living creatures and even humans themselves were born in a similar fashion. But Diodorus Siculus A Greek historian from the 1st century BCE; his "Library of History" is a primary source for ancient myths and geography., who traveled through the greater part of Asia and Europe, as well as Egypt (as he himself admits),
The first Kings.
Book 1, chapter 1.

says: "Regarding who the first kings in the world were, we have found no certainty at all, since no historians provide evidence to the contrary. Indeed, it is impossible for writing to have existed as early as the first kings. If, however, anyone should contend that letters existed even then, certainly those who wrote of such things
The first letters and writers.

lived much later." Not only do the Greeks and other writers doubt what that more ancient age produced, but even those who call themselves the Indigetes A term for the "original" or "earth-born" inhabitants of a land; in Roman mythology, these were local deities or ancestors. and the first to [witness] events...