Menelaus the Historian was a Greek author of the 1st century BCE. No biographical details survive; he is known only through citations by later writers. His sole attested work is a lost history of Egypt, which survives in fragments.

These fragments are preserved primarily in Josephus’s Against Apion and in the writings of Eusebius. Josephus cites Menelaus’s account of the Hyksos period to argue for the antiquity of the Jewish people.

Menelaus is significant as a source used by later historians. His citation by Josephus indicates he was considered a credible authority on Egyptian history. His surviving fragments contribute to understanding the transmission of Egyptian traditions by Greek historians in the Hellenistic period.