Narmer

Narmer is the earliest king of unified Egypt who can be securely attested from contemporary objects, conventionally dated to around 3100 BCE at the opening of the Early Dynastic Period. His great ceremonial palette, found at Hierakonpolis, shows a single king wearing both the White Crown of Upper Egypt and the Red Crown of Lower Egypt, and is traditionally read as a record of the union of the two lands. Whether Narmer is the same king as the 'Menes' whom much later tradition (Manetho and the king-lists) names as the founder of Egypt is genuinely unsettled; he may be Menes, or Menes may be Hor-Aha, or a composite founding figure. For that reason the unification is best understood as part documented history and part founding legend. Narmer is known from the Narmer Palette, the Narmer Macehead, and inscribed artefacts bearing his name; the deeper details of his reign cannot be recovered.