Twentieth and Twenty-first Dynasties—The Ramessidæ and the Priest-Kings.
(_Circa_ 1200-970 B.C.)
It may be doubtful whether Rameses III., son of the Setnekht who
pacified Egypt and restored order, was connected by blood with the
preceding dynasties. He bore the name of an illustrious predecessor,
however, and throughout his reign he appears to have made it his aim
to emulate the great Rameses. His first task was to reorganise the
public service, which had fallen into great disorder; to appoint and
to regulate the station and office of the prince-governors, of the
soldiers of the army and their foreign auxiliaries, of the inferior
servants and the bondsmen. The earliest years of his reign were
disturbed by invasion both from east and west. The Shashu and the
Libyans, ever hanging on the confines, were always ready to cross the
border of the Delta when opportunity served, and during the tumults,
amidst which the nineteenth dynasty closed, such an opportunity
certainly presented itself. After assailing the invaders and driving
them back, Rameses transplanted his prisoners into large fortified
places, where they were kept under guard, and a certain quantity of
woven stuff and corn was yearly exacted from them, for the service
of the temples. But a more dangerous foe remained to be assailed. A
certain tribe, known as the Mashausha, had penetrated the land south
of Memphis, had entered the oasis of the Fayoum, and had not only
gradually crept south, but had advanced eastwards from the Fayoum
to the Nile itself. Of certain towns these foreigners had even held
possession for years. In the fifth year of his reign, Rameses III.
attacked the Mashausha, and, after a fearful slaughter, drove them out
of the land. The prisoners appear to have been employed as mercenaries
in the army and navy, whilst their wives and children were removed to
fortified places, and their flocks and herds confiscated to the service
of the temple of Amen-Ra.
At the head of the Red Sea the king constructed a well, carefully
guarded by fortifications, and re-opened trade with Punt by way of
Koptos and the sea. He also renewed the working of the _mafek_[73] and
copper mines. Then he tells us he planted trees and shrubs throughout
the land, that the people might sit under the shade, and he says
further, that the country was so safe that the weakest woman might
travel alone without fear of molestation. ‘The soldiers of the horse
and foot,’ continues his account, ‘live at ease; the Sardinian and
Libyan auxiliaries stretch themselves full length upon their backs.
They are not on the watch, for the enemy have ceased to invade. Their
bows and arrows lie useless. They eat and drink with their wives and
children, and make themselves merry. I am among them as a protector
ready to defend.’
But soon another dark cloud, gathering in the distance, rapidly
approached, and broke in a torrent of invasion upon the northern shore.
The foe came this time from the distant regions of Asia Minor.
The old claims of Egypt to supremacy in Asia had long been suffered to
lapse, and the course of time brought many changes.
In the earliest ages, strong and civilised kingdoms (perhaps coeval
with the pyramids) had existed at Ur, Larsa, and other cities of
Chaldea. But they had fallen and passed away when Thothmes III. entered
Mesopotamia. The country was then divided into petty principalities,
which were subdued with little difficulty. By the time Rameses II. was
on the throne (the fourteenth century B.C.), Nineveh and Babylon had
become the capitals of strong and important states, and were constantly
engaged in mortal conflict for supremacy. They were absorbed in this
mutual strife and in warding off the hostile assaults of the Elamites
and other neighbouring nations; neither state was as yet thinking of
far-extended conquest and dominion. The Israelites entered Canaan and
carried on a war of extermination against its inhabitants, but they
only succeeded in establishing themselves in parts of the country,
generally in the more hilly districts, as the Canaanites, possessing
chariots and horses, were able to maintain possession of the plains.
The Egyptians probably viewed this fierce conflict with indifference,
careful only that the great military road should not be interfered
with, and the Israelites, maintaining their hold of the ‘promised land’
with much difficulty, were by no means prepared for any such attempt.
North of Syria the power of the Kheta had greatly diminished, and was
still further weakened by the assault of a mighty host of confederated
tribes, which, emerging at this juncture from the hills and coast lands
of Asia Minor, poured in a resistless stream towards the south. With
them may have been allied, in hope of plunder, Etruscans, pirates from
of old, and not unlikely roving Greeks from the isles and shores of the
Mediterranean, probably little better than pirates themselves. For this
formidable onslaught was made by sea and land simultaneously. The land
forces defeated the Kheta, occupied Kadi (Galilee), and pitched their
camp for a while in the land of the Amorites, ravaging and plundering
as they went. The sequel may be described in the graphic narrative
of Rameses III.: ‘They came leaping from their coasts and islands,
and spread themselves at once over all lands; no people stood before
their arms. Their nostrils snuffed the air of the southern lands;
their desire was to breathe a balmy atmosphere. On they came against
the Egyptian land. But there was in readiness a fiery furnace before
their faces on the side of Egypt. Their hearts were full of confidence,
their minds of plans. But an ambush was prepared for them, and they
were taken in the snare like birds. They who reached the boundaries
of my land never reaped harvest more. Their soul and spirit passed
away for ever. A mighty firebrand was lighted before those who were
assembled on the great sea in front of the mouths of the river. A wall
of iron shut them in on the lake. They were caught like birds in a
net, and were made prisoners; their ships and all they possessed lay
strewn on the mirror of the water. Those who came by the way of the
land, Amen-Ra pursued and annihilated them. Thus have I taken from
the nations the desire to direct their thoughts against Egypt.’ This
account of the great battle of Migdol, which secured a long period of
repose from hostile attack, is inscribed upon the walls of the great
temple which Rameses III. erected not far from the colossi of Amenhotep
III. in Western Thebes. Here are also pictorial representations of the
scene where naval warfare is for the first time depicted. No doubt the
services of the mercenaries, so largely employed in the fleet, stood
the Egyptians in good stead at this crisis, the naval service never
being popular with the native population.
The great temple of Rameses III. at Medinet Habou (to which, for the
first time, so far as we know, a palace was annexed) was enriched with
vast donations by the king; he also conferred immense gifts on other
temples, which are detailed in almost endless lists. For Rameses III.,
at some period, undertook wars of retribution, and won victories, and
acquired rich spoil, both on the mainland and in the Mediterranean
isles, more especially in Cilicia and in Cyprus. Fabulous stories were
current in after times concerning King Rampsinitus (as the Greeks
called this monarch) and his wonderful treasure-house. Herodotus heard
some of these sensational narratives, and recorded them at full length
in his writings.
In the construction of this temple, Rameses III. did not scruple to
employ materials taken from those of his predecessors. Bricks with
the names of Seti I. and Rameses II. were freely used to build up its
walls. Nor was this all he borrowed, for, as if he had not acquired
sufficient renown on his own account, he adopted an inscription in
honour of Rameses the Great as his own. It is a long panegyric in the
most grandiloquent language, and not only abounds in general phrases of
much high-flown glorification of the king, but especially commemorates
his building up of the city of Zoan and his first meeting with the
Princess of Kheta. Rameses III. had the whole panegyric copied, with a
few slight necessary changes. He, however, let it appear as if he had
been the builder of Zoan, only stopping short of claiming the Khetan
princess as his bride. It is curious that, after all, these attempts of
the third Rameses to associate and almost to identify himself with the
second Rameses may be said to have so far succeeded that they were in
fact often confused with each other by foreign historians, and it is
doubtful to this day which of the two was meant by the Sesostris of the
Greeks—the probability being that he was a personage created out the
confused traditions of both the Egyptian conquerors.
In spite of riches and renown, the throne of the third Rameses was not
too securely based. It may have been that he was not of the ancient
race, so long venerated and deified by the people, or it may have been
that there was a general decay in Egyptian loyalty, but the fact is
certain that a conspiracy of the most alarming extent was discovered,
originating in the royal household itself. The conspirators were
detected in time, and the record of their trial has been preserved.
Many officers of high rank and many ladies in the palace were
implicated. The first page of the papyrus is unfortunately defaced, so
that the precise object and nature of the plot must remain uncertain.
The royal commission to the judges is in the following terms:—‘Those
who are accused by the country I give them into your charge. As to
the talk of men I know nothing about it. Go ye and judge. Let what
they have done be upon their own heads.’ Sentence of death[74] was
pronounced on most of the criminals, others were condemned to have
their noses and ears cut off, the women appear to have been sentenced
to a sort of penal servitude.
Amongst the means resorted to by the conspirators magic and sorcery
played a conspicuous part. One Penhi, superintendent of the herds, is
reported to have said:—‘If only I possessed a writing that would give
me power and strength!’ Having succeeded in procuring such a writing,
an ‘enchantment fell upon him so that he gained admittance to the
women’s house and to the deep and secret place. He made human figures
in wax for the purpose of alienating the mind of one of the maidens and
of bewitching another, inciting them to all kinds of wickedness and
villainy by his writings.’
There is good evidence that the practice of sorcery and magical arts
of all sorts was greatly on the increase. The very tales that have
been preserved belonging to this period are of wonder and enchantment;
superstition was rife on all hands. The god especially honoured under
the twentieth dynasty was the oracle-giving Khons;[75] the chapters of
the ritual assigned to this date are full of elaborate ceremonial, and
the use of certain portions as a spell or talisman is more and more
insisted on. Great virtue was also assigned to the mere repetition of
long and apparently meaningless names. Omens of all kinds were much
regarded, and so were lucky and unlucky days in the calendar.[76]
Nevertheless, alongside of these superstitious notions and practices
there existed a higher and a nobler life; no hymns preserved to us are
more lofty and beautiful in tone than some that are assigned to this
period. In one addressed to Amen-Ra, we read:—
‘O Ra, adored in Thebes! Thy love pervades the earth.
Thou makest grass for the cattle and fruit-bearing
trees for men. He causeth fish to live in the river,
and giveth food to the birds upon the wing, food to the
mice in their holes, and to the flying creatures on the
trees.
‘Hail to thee! say all creatures, from the height of
heaven to the breadth of the earth, and to the deep
places of the sea—Adoration unto thee who hast created
us!
‘The spirits thou hast made bow down before thee; the
gods adore thy majesty. We, the creatures of thy hand,
praise thee for our being, we give thanks to thee for
thy mercy towards us,—whose name is hidden from his
creatures—in his Name which is AMEN.’[77]
The hymn to the Nile, which is ascribed to the preceding dynasty, is
very remarkable from the twofold aspect it presents us. At first we
seem to behold only the river or some local deity impersonated in the
river:—
‘Hail to thee, O Nile!
Coming in peace, giving life to Khemi,
Watering the land unceasingly,
He maketh the fields ready for the plough;
Every creature receiveth food.’
After the song has proceeded for some time in this strain, all on a
sudden the Nile disappears from view, and the worshipper is in the
presence of the divine and unutterable, though with no apparent change
of person:—
‘He is not graven in marble,
No eye of man can behold him;
He hath no ministers nor offerings!
He is not adored in sanctuaries,
His dwelling is not known;
No shrine is found, nor pictured words,
No building may contain him!’
But then the loftier strain subsides again, and the hymn closes with
the words:—
‘Shine forth, shine forth, O Nile!
Giving life to men by his oxen,
Life to his oxen by his meadow land—
Shine forth, shine forth, O Nile!’
Rameses III. constructed for himself in the ‘valley of the kings,’ a
tomb which contained eight or ten chambers adorned with pictures of
scenes taken from both the present and the future life. Amongst them
occurs one evidently intended as an allegoric representation of the
hope of life after death—‘The horizon of heaven supported by a female
figure, and the sun just rising above it; this is so placed that a ray
of light can penetrate from the entrance of the tomb, 350 feet off,
and pass over the sarcophagus and illuminate this emblem of eternal
hope.’[78]
The thirteen succeeding sovereigns all bore the name of Rameses, but
hardly any record is left of their reigns. There are inscriptions
extant which belong to this period, lofty and bombastic in the extreme,
and exceeding in the pompous assumption of their style those of their
predecessors, if possible. They are mere empty phrases, which produce
only an impression of absurdity when applied to the Ramessidæ as they
pass across the stage in monotonous succession, and leave behind no
achievements or triumphs either of peace or of war. The fourth, sixth,
and seventh of these kings were sons of Rameses III.; the fifth of the
name was a usurper, so it is not likely that the reigns of all the four
together occupied any considerable period. One or two of the Ramessidæ
constructed tombs for themselves in the ‘valley of the kings;’ they
were given to carving their names and inscriptions on the monuments of
their predecessors, but all of them in succession did not quite achieve
the completion of the small oracle-temple of Khons, which was the
family sanctuary of their house. The chief event which is recorded of
these dull times is, however, significant, as showing how the profound
sense of veneration for the ‘eternal dwelling-places’ of the departed
must have been deadened, if not lost. In the reign of Rameses IX., it
was discovered that there was an organised scheme for breaking open
and plundering the tombs supposed most likely to contain treasure; the
resting-places of the sovereigns themselves were not respected. The
accused were brought to trial, and a careful investigation of the tombs
was instituted. It was found that in many cases the difficult task of
reaching the carefully concealed sarcophagus had been successfully
accomplished; the mummies had been dragged out, and the funeral gifts,
and aught else of value, carried off. Under the twentieth dynasty
the throne was no longer safe from conspiracy and domestic treason;
the very sanctity of the grave was violated, and the mummies of the
departed were not secure from outrage and plunder.
The oracle-temple of Khons was consulted on every important occasion,
and its fame seems to have spread far beyond the limits of Egypt
itself. A curious episode belonging to the reign of Rameses XII. has
been preserved, in a story written on the walls of this temple. It
relates that the king had married a princess of the land of Bakhten,
and that on a certain festival day there came a messenger from that
country bringing presents for the king, accompanied by a request from
the King of Bakhten. His daughter, the younger sister of the Queen
of Egypt, had become possessed by a strange malady, and his majesty
implored that a learned man acquainted with such things might be sent
from Egypt to see her. Rameses XII. accordingly sent a learned man
thither, who found the princess ‘in the state of one possessed with
spirits,’ but the spirit was hostile, nor could the learned man prevail
over him. A second message came from the troubled father, entreating
that an Egyptian god might be sent to Bakhten. Pharaoh was standing
before the shrine of the oracle-giving Khons, who was especially noted
for power over such maladies. On inquiring whether the god would be
willing to undertake the journey, the king received a favourable
answer. Accordingly the shrine of Khons was borne upon the shoulders
of twelve priests the whole way from Egypt to Bakhten, a journey of
one year and five months, attended by chariots and horsemen on the
right hand and on the left. The king and the princes came forth to
meet and to welcome the ark, and prostrated themselves on the ground
before it, and the god proceeded to the palace where the princess was,
and speedily effected a cure. The expelled spirit thereupon made a
humble submission to the god as his slave, and expressed his readiness
to return whence he came—only, he asked that, first of all, a great
sacrifice might be made in his honour. His request was granted, and,
says the story, ‘the spirit went in peace wherever he chose by order
of Khons, the giver of oracles. The prince of the land of Bakhten was
very much delighted, and so was every one in the land. He said: “I
will not let this god go back to Egypt; he shall stay in my country.”
Three years, four months, five weeks, and one day did the god remain
in Bakhten. Then it happened that the king saw in a dream the god come
out of his shrine in the likeness of a hawk of gold; he spread forth
his wings and flew on high towards the land of Khemi. When the king
awoke he was troubled in his mind, and he called the prophet of Khons
and said to him: “This god is hostile to us, let us send him back to
Egypt.” And he gave him many presents, besides troops and very many
horsemen. They reached Egypt in peace, and the presents were offered
to the god. So Khons re-entered his house in peace in the thirty-third
year of the king’s reign.’
The custom now so prevalent of consulting the oracle, and of acting
according to its dictates, is one amongst other significant signs of
the increasing power and influence of the priesthood and of the part
they were gradually assuming in the government of the country. Under
Rameses IX. the positions of king and priest seem already reversed. In
former days the kings recorded the story of the magnificent buildings
they erected in honour of the gods, and the munificent gifts with
which they endowed the temples, received by the priesthood with loyal
gratitude. But in the reign of Rameses IX. it is a chief priest of
Amen-Ra who carves upon the temple wall a full account of all _he_
has done in rebuilding and adorning the sacred edifice—the ‘holy house
of the chief priests of Amen.’ He, however, inscribes upon the work
the full name of Pharaoh, and thus dedicates it to the king, who duly
acknowledges his obligation, and orders rich rewards and honours to be
bestowed upon the chief priest in token of the royal gratitude.
The shadowy forms of the Ramessid kings grow more and more indistinct;
of the three last, whose names are preserved as the fourteenth,
fifteenth, and sixteenth Rameses, it is quite uncertain whether they
were ever crowned in Thebes. The power of the chief priests during
the reign of so many feeble monarchs had, on the other hand, steadily
increased, until the government of the country was virtually in their
hands. Their ambition grew with what it fed on, and by repeated
intermarriages with princesses of the royal house, they might seem to
acquire a certain legitimate claim to the throne, of which they at last
took possession—Her-hor, ‘chief priest and first prophet of Amen,’
being proclaimed King of Upper and Lower Egypt probably about 1100 B.C.
[Illustration: Mummy and Mummy-case of the Priest Nebseni.]
The priests of Egypt formed, as we know, no distinct and isolated
caste. They were governors of cities, commanders on the battle-field,
physicians, architects, scribes; and thus were often seen in secular
employments, although they alone could enter within the sacred recesses
of the temple and officiate in its services. The kings themselves were
so far regarded as priests, that they were admitted to perform sacred
rites, and thus the regal and sacerdotal offices had long been in some
sense blended before Her-hor assumed the crown as the first sovereign
of the twenty-first dynasty—the dynasty of the priest-kings.
The sovereigns of this dynasty showed an especial solicitude in
preserving from injury and outrage the mortal remains of their
predecessors. They continued the custom, which had prevailed since the
spoliation of tombs came to light under Rameses IX., of a periodical
inspection, carried out officially, the results of which were recorded
on the spot by a scribe. Her-hor chose for his own family burial-place
a lonely spot not far from the terraced temple of Queen Hatasu. A mass
of broken rock almost hid the entrance, whence, by the descent of
a perpendicular shaft, 25 feet deep, by 7 feet wide, a subterranean
gallery of 200 feet in length was reached. Beyond was the vault, which
measured about 25 feet by 14. There were either six or seven sovereigns
of the twenty-first dynasty; and the last but one of them foreseeing,
it is not unlikely, that a time of trouble and danger was at hand,
gathered into the gloomy unadorned recesses of the gallery and vault
of his family tomb the coffins of many illustrious predecessors. He
then appears to have finally closed the tomb and suffered himself to
be buried elsewhere. It was here that the remains of so many Egyptian
sovereigns, both of the twenty-first and of earlier dynasties, were
found in the great discovery of 1881. The little we know concerning
even the names and succession of the priestly dynasty has been chiefly
derived from this their family burial-place. We find that four of them
married wives who were princesses in their own right. One of these
queens, wife of Pinotem II., fourth king of the dynasty, is buried
with her new-born babe by her side. The papyrus, containing portions
of the ritual, which according to custom was laid in the sarcophagus,
is in perfect preservation; it is beautifully written, and is full
of richly-coloured illustrations, of which the tints are as fresh as
if laid on yesterday. The last sovereign buried in this tomb was the
wife of the king who finally closed it. With her were found the usual
funereal papyrus, vases, and small statues; and besides these there was
the rich and beautifully adorned canopy under which her body had been
conveyed across the river to the city of the dead, and in a hamper
by her side was the funeral repast of meat and fruits, which, being
dedicated to her, show her to have been the last occupant of the family
vault. With the mummy of the deceased queen was interred a mummied
gazelle, that had probably been a pet with her in her lifetime. Both
vault and gallery were now full, and the king closed it; his own tomb
and that of his successor, the last monarch of the dynasty, are unknown.
[Illustration: Mummy of a Gazelle.]
FOOTNOTES:
[73] Sometimes supposed to have been the turquoise, but it is doubtful
whether correctly so.
[74] The wording of the judgment seems to imply a judicial suicide.
[75] Khons was the son of Amen and of Mut, the ‘divine mother,’ and
formed with them the sacred triad of Thebes: but his worship never
assumed a prominent place before this period. In many respects
resembling Thoth, and, like him, connected with the moon, he was the
especial god of the priesthood and giver of oracles.
[76] Tiele, _Hist. of Egyp. Relig._
[77] The Hidden or Unseen.
[78] Villiers Stuart, _Nile Gleanings_.