Mr Mubarak is reported to be in a poor state of health
Mr Mubarak, 83, faces the death penalty if found guilty of ordering the killing of protesters in this year's uprising.
He is also accused of corruption. The former leader - who was
wheeled on a hospital bed into the courtroom earlier this month -
denies all the charges.
Mr Mubarak is being tried with his sons Alaa and Gama, who are accused of corruption and also deny the charges.
Mr Mubarak was forced from office by mass demonstrations in February.
Tantawi demand
Hundreds of riot police were on guard outside the courtroom on Monday.
A number of Mubarak supporters had gathered, some chanting: "He is Egyptian until death" and "Hosni Mubarak is not Saddam".
Monday's session is likely to be dominated by legal arguments.
Lawyers for the families of the
demonstrators who were killed in the uprising have already asked for
greater access to Mr Mubarak's communication records, the BBC's Yolande
Knell in Cairo reports.
The families want to know what orders he gave to his
officials as police tried to stop the protests using brutal means, our
correspondent says.
Defence lawyers have demanded that Field Marshal Mohamed
Hussein Tantawi, who leads the military council that took over from Mr
Mubarak but who was his defence minister for two decades, must testify.
They say his evidence on Mr Mubarak could prove pivotal.
The judge has still to rule on who will testify.
Meanwhile Mr Mubarak's lawyer, Farid al-Deeb, has asked the
judge to call 1,600 witnesses, including a number of top military
officials. Observers say the judge will probably reduce the list he has
demanded.
Mr Mubarak is reported to be in a poor state of health, and
doctors have been constantly monitoring his medical condition at a
military hospital near the capital.
Amazement and drama
During the previous court session on 3 August, some 3,000 soldiers and police were drafted in to maintain order.
Despite that, the court session was at times unruly, with lawyers jostling and clamouring to be heard by the judge.
The charges against the Mubaraks were read out, and Hosni Mubarak and his sons each denied them.
Everybody was in shock as the trial began, says the BBC's Jon
Leyne in Cairo, because this was the moment that no-one in Egypt -
maybe all of the Middle East - expected to see.
On Sunday, Egypt's former Interior Minister Habib al-Adly
reappeared in the Cairo court on charges of killing nearly 850
demonstrators during the uprising. His trial was adjourned to 5
September.
Adly has already been sentenced to 12 years in prison for money-laundering.
In a separate development, leading Egyptian blogger Asmaa
Mahfouz was on Sunday questioned for allegedly defaming the military on
Facebook, the official Mena news agency reported.
Ms Mahfouz, one of the leader of the Egyptian revolution, is
suspected of calling for assassination attacks against the military and
judicial bodies.
She was briefly detained by military prosecutors and later
released on a bail of $3,356 (£2,062), Mena says. Her lawyer denied all
the accusations.
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