North of the dyke English engineers have found that the alluvial soil bears witness to interference with the natural course of the river of a far-reaching kind, and its long straight course resembles that of a canal rather than of the naturally winding stream of the Nile.
On the embankment thus won from the waters Menes built his capital, which bore the two names of Men-nefer or Memphis, "the Beautiful Place," and Ha-ka-Ptah or AEgyptos, "the Temple of the Double of Ptah." On the north side of it, in fact, stood the temple of Ptah, the local god, the scanty remains of which are still visited by the tourist.

In front of the shrine was the sacred lake across which, on days of festival, the image of the god was ferried, and which now serves as a village pond.
Menes was followed by six dynasties of kings, who reigned in all 1478 years.

The tombs of the two first dynasties have been found at Abydos.
Menes himself was buried on the edge of the desert near Negada, about twenty miles to the north of Thebes.

His sepulchre was built in rectangular form, of crude bricks, and filled with numerous chambers, in the innermost and largest of which the corpse of the king was laid.

Then wood was heaped about the walls and the whole set on fire, so that the royal body and the objects that were buried with it were half consumed by the heat.