Psamatik may have cherished, and of which Neco attempted the
realization. The defeat of Carchemish shattered the unsubstantial fabric
into atoms, and gave a death-blow to hopes which no Pharaoh ever
entertained afterwards.
FOOTNOTES:
[29] Jeremiah xlvi. 3-12.
XXIII.
THE LATER SAÏTE KINGS.--PSAMATIK II., APRIES, AND AMASIS.
The Saïtic revival in art and architecture, in commercial and general
prosperity, which Psamatik the First inaugurated, continued under his
successors. To the short reign of Psamatik II. belong a considerable
number of inscriptions, some good bas-reliefs at Abydos and Philæ, and a
large number of statues. One of these, in the collection of the Vatican,
is remarkable for its beauty. Apries erected numerous _stelæ_, and at
least one pair of obelisks, wherewith he adorned the Temple of Neith at
Saïs. Amasis afforded great encouragement to art and architecture. He
added a court of entrance to the above temple, with propylæa of unusual
dimensions, adorned the dromos conducting to it with numerous
andro-sphinxes, erected colossal statues within the temple precincts,
and conveyed thither from Elephantine a monolithic shrine or chamber of
extraordinary dimensions. Traces of his architectural activity are also
found at Memphis, Thebes, Abydos, Bubastis, and Thmuïs or Leontopolis.
Statuary flourished during his reign. Even portrait-painting was
attempted; and Amasis sent a likeness of himself, painted on panel, as
a present to the people of Cyrene. It was maintained by the Egyptians of
a century later that the reign of Amasis was the most prosperous time
which Egypt had ever seen, the land being more productive, the cities
more numerous, and the entire people more happy than either previously
or subsequently. Amasis certainly gave a fresh impulse to commerce,
since he held frequent communication with the Greek states of Asia
Minor, as well as with the settlers at Cyrene, and gave increased
privileges to the trading community of Naucratis.
Even in a military point of view, there was to some extent a recovery
from the disaster of Carchemish. The Babylonian empire was not
sufficiently established or consolidated at the accession of
Nebuchadnezzar for that monarch to form at once extensive schemes of
conquest. There was much to be done in Elam, in Asia Minor, in Phœnicia,
and in Palestine, before his hands could be free to occupy themselves in
the subjugation of more distant regions. Within three years after the
battle of Carchemish Judæa threw off the yoke of Babylon, and a few
years later Phœnicia rebelled under the hegemony of Tyre. Nebuchadnezzar
had not much difficulty in crushing the Jewish outbreak; but Tyre
resisted his arms with extreme obstinacy, and it was not till thirteen
years after the revolt took place that Phœnicia was re-conquered. Even
then the position of Judæa was insecure: she was known to be thoroughly
disaffected, and only waiting an opportunity to rebel a second time.
Thus Nebuchadnezzar was fully occupied with troubles within his own
dominions, and left Egypt undisturbed to repair her losses, and recover
her military prestige, as she best might.
Neco outlived his defeat about eight or nine years, during which he
nursed his strength, and abstained from all warlike enterprises. His
son, Psamatik II., who succeeded him B.C. 596, made an attack on the
Ethiopians, and seems to have penetrated deep into Nubia, where a
monument was set up by two of his generals, Apollonius, a Greek, and
Amasis, an Egyptian, which may still be seen on the rocks of Abu-Simbel,
and is the earliest known Greek inscription. The following is a
facsimile, only reduced in size:--
[Illustration: Greek inscription]
Apries, the son of Neco, brought this war to an end in the first year of
his reign (B.C. 590) by the arms of one of his generals; and, finding
that Nebuchadnezzar was still unable to reduce Phœnicia to subjection,
he ventured, in B.C. 588, to conclude a treaty with Zedekiah, king of
Judah, and to promise him assistance, if he would join him against the
Babylonians. This Zedekiah consented to do, and the war followed which
terminated in the capture and destruction of Jerusalem, and the transfer
of the Jewish people to Babylonia.
It is uncertain what exact part Apries took in this war. We know that he
called out the full force of the empire, and marched into Palestine,
with the object of relieving Zedekiah. as soon as he knew that that
monarch's safety was threatened. We know that he marched towards
Jerusalem, and took up such a threatening attitude that Nebuchadnezzar
at one time actually raised the siege (Jer. xxxvii. 5). We do not know
what followed. Whether Apries, on finding that the whole Chaldæan force
had broken up from before Jerusalem and was marching against himself,
took fright at the danger which he had affronted, and made a sudden
inglorious retreat; or whether he boldly met the Babylonian host and
contended with them in a pitched battle, wherein he was worsted, and
from which he was forced to fly into his own land, is uncertain.
Josephus positively declares that he took the braver and more honourable
course: the silence of Scripture as to any battle is thought to imply
that he showed the white feather. In either case, the result was the
same. Egypt recoiled before Babylon; Palestine was evacuated; and
Zedekiah was left to himself. In B.C. 586 Jerusalem fell; Zedekiah was
made a prisoner and cruelly deprived of sight; the Temple and city were
burnt, and the bulk of the people carried into captivity. Babylon
rounded off her dominion in this quarter by the absorption of the last
state upon her south-western border that had maintained the shadow of
independence: and the two great powers of these parts, hitherto
prevented from coming into contact by the intervention of a sort of
political "buffer," became conterminous, and were thus brought into a
position in which it was not possible that a collision should for any
considerable time be avoided.
Recognizing the certainty of the impending collision, Apries sought to
strengthen his power for resistance by attaching to his own empire the
Phœnician towns of the Syrian coast, whose adhesion to his side would
secure him, at any rate, the maritime superiority. He made an expedition
against Tyre and Sidon both by land and sea, defeated the combined fleet
of Phœnicia and Cyprus in a great engagement, besieged Sidon, and after
a time compelled it to surrender. He then endeavoured further to
strengthen himself on the land side by bringing under subjection the
Greek city of Cyrene, which had now become a flourishing community; but
here his good fortune forsook him; the Cyrenæan forces defeated the army
which he sent against them, with great slaughter; and the event brought
Apries into disfavour with his subjects, who imagined that he had, of
malice prepense, sent his troops into the jaws of destruction. According
to Herodotus, the immediate result was a revolt, which cost Apries his
throne, and, within a short time, his life; but the entire narrative of
Herodotus is in the highest degree improbable, and some recent
discoveries suggest a wholly different termination to the reign of this
remarkable king.
It is certain that in B.C. 568 Nebuchadnezzar made an expedition into
Egypt According to all accounts this date fell into the lifetime of
Apries. Amasis, however, the successor of Apries, appears to have been
Nebuchadnezzar's direct antagonist, and to have resisted him in the
field, while Apries remained in the palace at Saïs. The two were joint
kings from B.C. 571 to B.C. 565. Nebuchadnezzar, at first, neglected
Saïs, and proceeded, by way of Heliopolis and Bubastis (Ezek. xxx. 17),
against the old capitals, Memphis and Thebes. Having taken these, and
"destroyed the idols and made the images to cease," he advanced up the
Nile valley to Elephantine, which he took, and then endeavoured to
penetrate into Nubia. A check, however, was inflicted on his army by
Nes-Hor, the Governor of the South, whereupon he gave up his idea of
Nubian conquest. Returning down the valley, he completed that ravage of
Egypt which is described by Jeremiah and Ezekiel. It is probable that in
B.C. 565, three years after his first invasion, he took Saïs and put the
aged Apries to death.[30] Amasis he allowed still to reign, but only as
a tributary king, and thus Egypt became "a base kingdom" (Ezek. xxix.
14), "the basest of the kingdoms" (ibid. verse 15), if its former
exaltation were taken into account.
The "base kingdom" was, however, materially, as flourishing as ever. The
sense of security from foreign attack was a great encouragement to
private industry and commercial enterprise. The discontinuances of
lavish expenditure on military expeditions improved the state finances,
and enabled those at the head of the government to employ the money,
that would otherwise have been wasted, in reproductive undertakings. The
agricultural system of Egypt was never better organized or better
managed than under Amasis. Nature seemed to conspire with man to make
the time one of joy and delight, for the inundation was scarcely ever
before so regularly abundant, nor were the crops ever before so
plentiful. The "twenty thousand cities," which Herodotus assigns to the
time, may be a myth; but, beyond all doubt, the tradition which told of
them was based upon the fact of a period of unexampled prosperity.
Amasis's law, that each Egyptian should appear once each year before the
governor of his canton, and show the means by which he was getting an
honest living, may have done something towards making industry general;
but his example, his active habits, and his encouragement of art and
architecture, probably did more. His architectural works must have given
constant employment to large numbers of persons as quarrymen, boatmen,
bricklayers, plasterers, masons, carpenters, and master builders; his
patronage of art not only gave direct occupation to a multitude of
artists, but set a fashion to the more wealthy among his subjects by
which the demand for objects of art was multiplied a hundredfold.
Sculptors and painters had a happy time under a king who was always
building temples, erecting colossi, or sending statues or paintings of
himself as presents to foreign states or foreign shrines.
The external aspect of Egypt under the reign of Amasis is thus as bright
and flourishing as that which she ever wore at any former time; but, as
M. Lenormant observes, this apparent prosperity did but ill conceal the
decay of patriotism and the decline of all the institutions of the
nation. The kings of the Saïte dynasty had thought to re-vivify Egypt,
and infuse a little new blood into the old monarchy founded by Menes, by
allowing the great stream of liberal ideas, whereof Greece had already
made herself the propagator, to expand itself in her midst. Without
knowing it, they had by these means introduced on the banks of the Nile
a new element of decline. Constructed exclusively for continuance, for
preserving its own traditions in defiance of the flight of centuries,
the civilization of Egypt could only maintain itself by remaining
unmoved. From the day on which it found itself in contact with the
spirit of progress, personified in the Grecian civilization and in the
Greek race, it was under the absolute necessity of perishing. It could
neither launch itself upon a wholly new path, one which was the direct
negation of its own genius, nor continue on without change its own
existence. Thus, as soon as it began to be penetrated by Greek
influence, it fell at once into complete dissolution, and sank into a
state of decrepitude, that already resembled death. We shall see, in the
next section, how suddenly and completely the Egyptian power collapsed
when the moment of trial came, and how little support the surface
prosperity which marked the reign of Amasis was able to render to the
Empire in the hour of need and distress.
FOOTNOTES:
[30] Josephus, _Ant. Jud_. x. 9, 97.
XXIV.
THE PERSIAN CONQUEST.
The subjection of Egypt to Babylon, which commenced in B.C. 565, was of
that light and almost nominal character, which a nation that is not very
sensitive, or very jealous of its honour, does not care to shake off. A
small tribute was probably paid by the subject state to her suzerain,
but otherwise the yoke was unfelt There was no interference with the
internal government, or the religion of the Egyptians; no appointment of
Babylonian satraps, or tax-collectors; not even, so far as appears, any
demands for contingents of troops. Thus, although Nebuchadnezzar died
within seven years of his conquest of Egypt, and though a time of
disturbance and confusion followed his death, four kings occupying the
Babylonian throne within little more than six years, two of whom met
with a violent end, yet Amasis seems to have continued quiescent and
contented, in the enjoyment of a life somewhat more merry and amusing
than that of most monarchs, without making any effort to throw off the
Babylonian supremacy or reassert the independence of his country. It was
not till his self-indulgent apathy was intruded upon from without, and
he received an appeal from a foreign nation, to which he was compelled
to return an answer, that he looked the situation in the face, and came
to the conclusion that he might declare himself independent without much
risk. He had at this time patiently borne his subject position for the
space of above twenty years, though he might easily have reasserted
himself at the end of seven.
The circumstances under which the appeal was made were the following. A
new power had suddenly risen up in Asia. About B.C. 558, ten years after
Nebuchadnezzar's subjection of Egypt, Cyrus, son of Cambyses, the
tributary monarch of Persia under the Medes, assumed an independent
position and began a career of conquest. Having made himself master of a
large portion of the country of Elam, he assumed the title of "King of
Ansan," and engaged in a long war with Astyages (Istivegu), his former
suzerain, which terminated (in B.C. 549) in his taking the Median
monarch prisoner and succeeding to his dominions. It was at once
recognized through Asia that a new peril had arisen. The Medes, a
mountain people of great physical strength and remarkable bravery, had
for about a century been regarded as the most powerful people of Western
Asia. They had now been overthrown and conquered by a still more
powerful mountain race. That race had at its head an energetic and
enterprising prince, who was in the full vigour of youth, and fired
evidently with a high ambition. His position was naturally felt as a
direct menace by the neighbouring states of Babylon and Lydia, whose
royal families were interconnected. Crœsus of Lydia was the first to
take alarm and to devise measures for his own security. He formed the
conception of a grand league between the principal powers whom the rise
of Persia threatened, for mutual defence against the common enemy; and,
in furtherance of this design, sent, in B.C. 547, an embassy to Egypt,
and another to Babylon, proposing a close alliance between the three
countries. Amasis had to determine whether he would maintain his
subjection to Babylon and refuse the offer; or, by accepting it, declare
himself a wholly independent monarch. He learnt by the embassy, if he
did not know it before that Nabonadius, the Babylonian monarch, was in
difficulties, and could not resent his action. He might probably think
that, under the circumstances, Nabonadius would regard his joining the
league as a friendly, rather than an unfriendly, proceeding. At any
rate, the balance of advantage seemed to him on the side of complying
with the request of Crœsus. Crœsus was lord of Asia Minor, and it was
only by his permission that the Ionian and Carian mercenaries, on whom
the throne of the Pharaohs now mainly depended, could be recruited and
maintained at their proper strength. It would not do to offend so
important a personage; and accordingly Amasis came into the proposed
alliance, and pledged himself to send assistance to whichever of his two
confederates should be first attacked. Conversely, they no doubt pledged
themselves to him; but the remote position of Egypt rendered it
extremely improbable that they would be called upon to redeem their
pledges.
Nor was even Amasis called upon actually to redeem the pledges which he
had given. In B.C. 546, Crœsus, without summoning any contingents from
his allies, precipitated the war with Persia by crossing the river
Halys, and invading Cappadocia, which was included in the dominions of
Cyrus. Having suffered a severe defeat at Pteria, a Cappadocian city, he
returned to his capital and hastily sent messengers to Egypt and
elsewhere, begging for immediate assistance. What steps Amasis took upon
this, or intended to take, is uncertain; but it must have been before
any troops could have been dispatched, that news reached Egypt which
rendered it useless to send out an expedition. Crœsus had scarcely
reached his capital when he found himself attacked by Cyrus in his turn;
his army suffered a second defeat in the plain before Sardis; the city
was besieged, stormed, and taken within fourteen days. Crœsus fell,
alive, into the hands of his enemy, and was kindly treated; but his
kingdom had passed away. It was evidently too late for Amasis to attempt
to send him succour. The tripartite alliance had, by the force of
circumstances, come to an end, and Amasis was an independent monarch, no
longer bound by any engagements.
Shortly afterwards, in B.C. 538, the conquering monarchy of Persia
absorbed another victim. Nabonadius was attacked, Babylon taken, and the
Chaldæan monarchy, which had lasted nearly two thousand years, brought
to an end. The contest had been prolonged, and in the course of it some
disintegration of the empire had taken place. Phœnicia had asserted her
independence; and Cyprus, which was to a large extent Phœnician, had
followed the example of the mother-country. Under these circumstances,
Amasis thought he saw an opportunity of gaining some cheap laurels, and
accordingly made a naval expedition against the unfortunate islanders,
who were taken unawares and forced to become his tributaries. It was
unwise of the Egyptian monarch to remind Cyrus that he had still an open
enemy unchastised, one who had entered into a league against him ten
years previously, and was now anxious to prevent him from reaping the
full benefit of his conquests. We may be sure that the Persian monarch
noted and resented the interference with territories which he had some
right to consider his own; whether he took any steps to revenge himself
is doubtful. According to some, he required Amasis to send him one of
his daughters as a concubine, an insult which the Egyptian king escaped
by _finesse_ while he appeared to submit to it.
It can only have been on account of the other wars which pressed upon
him and occupied him during his remaining years, that Cyrus did not
march in person against Amasis. First, the conquest of the nations
between the Caspian and the Indian Ocean detained him; and after this, a
danger showed itself on his north-eastern frontier which required all
his attention, and in meeting which he lost his life. The independent
tribes beyond the Oxus and the Jaxartes have through all history been an
annoyance and a peril to the power which rules over the Iranian plateau,
and it was in repelling an attack in this quarter that Cyrus fell.
Amasis, perhaps, congratulated himself on the defeat and death of the
great warrior king; but Egypt would, perhaps, have suffered less had the
invasion, which was sure to come, been conducted by the noble,
magnanimous, and merciful Cyrus, than she actually endured at the hands
of the impulsive tyrannical, and half-mad Cambyses.
The first step taken by Cambyses, who succeeded his father Cyrus in B.C.
529, was to reduce Phœnicia under his power. The support of a fleet was
of immense importance to an army about to attack Egypt, both for the
purpose of conveying water and stores, and of giving command over the
mouths of the Nile, so that the great cities, Pelusium, Tanis, Saïs,
Bubastis, Memphis, might be blockaded both by land and water. Persia, up
to the accession of Cambyses, had (so to speak) no fleet. Cambyses, by
threatening the Phœnician cities on the land side, succeeded in inducing
them to submit to him; he then, with their aid, detached Cyprus from her
Egyptian masters, and obtained the further assistance of a Cypriote
squadron. Some Greek ships also gave their services, and the result was
that he had the entire command of the sea, and was able to hold
possession of all the Nile mouths, and to bring his fleet up the river
to the very walls of Memphis.
Still, there were difficulties to overcome in respect of the passage of
an army. Egypt is separated from Palestine by a considerable tract of
waterless desert and it was necessary to convey by sea, or on the backs
of camels, all the water required for the troops, for the
camp-followers, and for the baggage animals. A numerous camel corps was
indispensable for the conveyance, and the Persians, though employing
camels on their expeditions, are not likely to have possessed any very
considerable number of these beasts. At any rate, it was extremely
convenient to find a fresh and abundant supply of camels on the spot,
together with abundant water-skins. This good fortune befell the Persian
monarch, who was able to make an alliance with the sheikh of the most
powerful Bedouin tribe of the region, who undertook the entire
responsibility of the water supply. He thus crossed the desert without
disaster or suffering, and brought his entire force intact to the
Pelusiac branch of the Nile, near the point where it poured its waters
into the Mediterranean Sea.
At this point he found a mixed Egyptian and Græco-Carian army prepared
to resist his further progress. Amasis had died about six months
previously, leaving his throne to his son, Psamatik the Third. This
young prince, notwithstanding his inexperience, had taken all the
measures that were possible to protect his kingdom from the invader. He
had gathered together his Greek and Carian mercenaries, and having also
levied a large native army, had posted the entire force not far from
Pelusium, in an advantageous position. On his Greeks and Carians he
could thoroughly depend, though they had lately seen but little service;
his native levies, on the contrary, were of scarcely any value; they
were jealous of the mercenaries, who had superseded them as the ordinary
land force, and they had had little practice in warfare for the last
forty years. At no time, probably, would an Egyptian army composed of
native troops have been a match for such soldiers as Cambyses brought
with him into Egypt--Persians, Medes, Hyrcanians, Mardians,
Greeks--trained in the school of Cyrus, inured to arms, and confident of
victory. But the native soldiery of the time of Psamatik III. fell far
below the average Egyptian type; it had little patriotism, it had no
experience, it was smarting under a sense of injury and ill-treatment at
the hands of the Saïte kings. The engagement between the two armies at
Pelusium was thus not so much a battle as a carnage. No doubt the
mercenaries made a stout resistance, but they were vastly outnumbered,
and were not much better troops than their adversaries. The Egyptians
must have been slaughtered like sheep. According to Ctesias, fifty
thousand of them fell, whereas the entire loss on the Persian side was
only six thousand. After a short struggle, the troops of Psamatik fled,
and in a little time the retreat became a complete rout. The fugitives
did not stop till they reached Memphis, where they shut themselves up
within the walls.