Daluka

Daluka is the name of legendary queen of Egypt who ruled before the Great Flood according to medieval Coptic and Islamic folklore. She was part of the so-called "Soleyman dynasty", which also included Surid Ibn Salhouk, a king who was once believed to have built the Great Pyramid of Giza. She was sometimes called Zulaikha.

Background
According to a history of the Arab conquest of Egypt written by Ibn Abd al-Hakam (801–871), Daluka was said to be the builder of the Lighthouse of Alexandria, although the famous Cleopatra was sometimes considered to be the builder instead. Daluka's name was often used synonymously with that of Cleopatra in medieval Arabic texts. Both Daluka and Cleopatra were believed to have built a wall around Egypt to protect it from invasion. This wall was called "Hait-el-Agouz" and a channel was dug behind it. Dalukah was also said to have built a nilometer at Memphis and at least one pyramid in Egypt.

German Jesuit scholar Athanasius Kircher (1602–1680) mentioned the legend of Daluka and the fortress she built in Alexandria in his 1652 work Oedipus Aegyptiacus. According to Kircher, Daluka reigned after the Pharaoh drowned in the Red Sea while pursuing the Ishmaelites. This event saw the deaths of thousands of Egyptian men, and Daluka was chosen from among the many widows of these men to rule Egypt. She was the daughter of a man named Zabu, who was illustrious and knowledgeable of many things. According to Kircher, Daluka ruled for twenty years and was succeeded by a man named Darkun, who was one of the magnates, and reigned for thirty years.

When Daluka was named as part of a longer king list, she was usually listed as one of the monarchs who ruled Egypt before the Great Flood. At least one king list claimed she succeeded a king called "Nimrod" (not to be confused with the Biblical Nimrod), although some Coptic sources were unsure about her chronological placement. Some texts place her reign long after the Great Flood. According to The Prodigies of Egypt, written by 12th century Arab writer Murtada ibn al-'Afif, Daluka (named "Dalic" in this text) ascended to the throne after the death of her cousin, queen Charoba, who died unmarried. According to this narrative, Daluka ruled for seventy years. Egyptologist Ahmed Kamal compiled a list of names of ancient Egyptian kings from Arabic sources in 1903 and placed her after the period of the Great Flood, numbering her the 75th ruler of Egypt.

An Ethiopian regnal list written in 1922 included Daluka under the name "Eylouka" as part of the 'Tribe of Ori' who reigned before the Great Flood and claimed she ruled Aethiopia for 45 years from 3776 to 3731 BC. The 'Tribe of Ori' is clearly inspired by the Coptic tradition of the "Soleyman dynasty" that ruled Egypt prior to the Great Flood. Historian Manfred Kropp believed that the Ethiopian king list was written by foreign minister Heruy Wolde Selassie, who used European and Arab sources in an attempt to synchronize Ethiopian history with the wider Christian-Oriental histories. The inclusion of the "Soleyman dynasty" in the 1922 Ethiopian king list may have been due to Louis J. Morié's 1904 book Historie de l'Éthiopie, which showed a significant amount of influence in the narrative of the king list. Morié himself believed that the kings of the "Soleyman" dynasty were rulers of Aethiopia, although he used this word to refer to ancient Nubia rather than present-day Ethiopia.