Certos and the Theban Power-Brokers: A Revised Chronology of the Third Intermediate Period Integrating Sothic Lists, Quay Stratigraphy, and Parallel Regnal Counts

The conventional chronology of Egypt’s Third Intermediate Period places the 22nd and 23rd Dynasties in the 10th–8th centuries BCE. This paper presents an alternative framework (IMC) in which kings typically operate on 70-year spans with multiple parallel regnal counts articulated at Sed-festival points (Years 31 and 62). Drawing on the physical stratigraphy of the Karnak Nile quay inscriptions (8 years per level), the Chronicle of Prince Osorkon, Manetho, and entries in the Book of Sothis, the model relocates key figures to the 12th–11th centuries BCE. Osorkon B (High Priest of Amun and later king) is identified with “Certos” of the Sothic lists. The resulting timeline clarifies the prolonged Theban civil war and explains the apparent distortions in conventional dating, particularly the mis-identification of Shishak.