Ramses III. was the last of the great Pharaohs in whose veins ran native
Egyptian blood. His successors all bore the same name as himself, but they
possessed neither his energy nor his power to rule. He had saved Egypt
from further attack from without, and it was well he had done so, for the
feeble monarchs of the twentieth dynasty would have been unable to resist
the foe. They ceased even to build or to erect the monuments which
testified to the prosperity of the country and the progress of its art.
The high-priests of Amon gradually usurped their authority, and a time
came at length when the last of the Ramses fled into exile in Ethiopia,
and a new dynasty governed in his stead. But the rule of the new monarchs
was hardly acknowledged beyond the Delta; Thebes was practically
independent under its priest-kings, and though they acknowledged the
authority of the Tanite Pharaohs in name, they acted, in real fact, as if
they were independent sovereigns. One of them, Ra-men-kheper, built
fortresses not only at Gebelên in the south, but also at El-Hîbeh in the
north, and thus blocked the river against the subjects of the Tanite
princes, as well as against invaders from the south. At times, indeed, the
Tanite Pharaohs of the twenty-first dynasty exercised an actual
sovereignty over Upper Egypt, and Smendes, the first of them, quarried
stone at Dababîyeh, opposite Gebelên, with which to repair the canal of
Luxor; but, as a general rule, so far as the south was concerned, they
were Pharaohs only in name. The rival dynasty of Theban high-priests was
at once more powerful and more king-like. They it was who, in some moment
of danger, concealed the mummies of the great monarchs of the eighteenth
and nineteenth dynasties in the pit at Dêr el-Bahâri, and whose own
mummies were entombed by the side of those of a Thothmes and a Ramses.
The Egyptian wife of Solomon was the daughter of one of the last Pharaohs
of the twenty-first dynasty. She brought with her as a dowry the
Canaanitish city of Gezer. Gezer had been one of the leading cities of
Palestine in the days of the Tel el-Amarna correspondence, and through all
the years of Israelitish conquest it had remained in Canaanitish hands. It
was a Pharaoh of Tanis, and not an Israelite, into whose possession it was
destined finally to fall.
The waning power of Solomon in Israel coincided with the waning power of
the twenty-first dynasty. Long before the death of the Hebrew monarch, a
new dynasty was reigning over Egypt. Shishak, its founder, was of Libyan
origin. His immediate forefathers had commanded the Libyan mercenaries in
the service of the Pharaoh, and inscriptions lately discovered in the
Oasis of El-Khargeh write the name Shashaka. The Egyptians slightly
changed its pronunciation and made it Shashanq, but in the Old Testament
the true form is preserved.
Shishak brought new vigour into the decaying monarchy of the Nile. The
priest-kings of Thebes went down before him, along with the effete
Pharaohs of Tanis. It may be that Solomon attempted to assist his
father-in-law; if he did so, the only result was to bring trouble upon
himself. His rebel subject Jeroboam fled to Egypt, and found shelter and
protection in Shishak’s court.
Shishak must have looked on with satisfaction while the neighbouring
empire of Israel fell to pieces, until eventually the central power itself
was shattered in twain. The rebel he had so carefully nurtured at his own
court was the instrument which relieved him of all further fear of danger
on the side of Asia. So far from being a menace to Egypt, Jerusalem now
lay at the mercy of the Egyptian armies, and in the fifth year of
Rehoboam, Shishak led his forces against it. The strong walls Solomon had
built were of no avail; its temple and palace were plundered, and the
golden shields in its armoury were carried away. A record of the campaign
was engraved by the conqueror on the southern wall of the temple of Amon
at Karnak. There we read how he had overthrown the Amu or Asiatics, and
the Fenkhu or people of Palestine, and underneath are the cartouches, each
with the head of a captive above it, which contain the names of the
conquered places. At the outset come the names of towns in the northern
kingdom of Israel. But, as Professor Maspero remarks, this does not prove
that they were actually among the conquests of Shishak. If Jeroboam had
begged his aid against Judah, and thereby acknowledged himself the vassal
of the Pharaoh, it would have been a sufficient pretext for inserting the
names of his cities among the subject states of Egypt. But it may be that
the campaign was directed quite as much against Israel as against Judah,
and that Judah suffered most, simply because it had to bear the brunt of
the attack.
In any case, the list of vanquished towns begins first with Gaza, the
possession of which was necessary before the Egyptian army could force its
way into Palestine; then come Rabbith of Issachar, Taanach, near Megiddo,
Hapharaim and Beth-Horon, while Mahanaim, on the eastern side of the
Jordan, is also included among them. But after this the list deals
exclusively with the towns and villages of Judah, and of the Bedouin
tribes in the desert to the south of it. Thus we have Ajalon and Makkedah,
Socho and Keilah, Migdol and Beth-anoth. Then we read the names of Azem
and Arad, farther to the south, as well as of the Hagaraim or “Enclosures”
of Arad, and Rabbith ’Aradai, “Arad the capital.” Next to Arad comes the
name of Yurahma, the Jerahme-el of the Old Testament, the brother of Caleb
the Kenizzite (1 Chron. ii. 42) whose land was ravaged by David (1 Sam.
xxx. 29). But the larger portion of the list is made up of the names of
small villages and even Bedouin encampments, or of such general terms as
Hagra, “enclosure,” Negebu, “the south,” ’Emeq, “the valley,” Shebbaleth,
“a torrent,” Abilim, “fields,” Ganat, “garden,” Haideba, “a quarry,” and
the Egyptian Shodinau, “canals.”(8) Among them we look in vain even for
names like those of Gezer and Beer-sheba. Jerusalem, too, is conspicuous
by its absence, unless we agree with Professor Maspero in seeing it in the
last name of the list (No. 133), of which only the first syllable is
preserved. Were it not for the record in the First Book of Kings, we
should never have known that the campaign of Shishak had inflicted such
signal injury on the kingdom of Judah.
Champollion, indeed, the first discoverer of the list and of its
importance, believed that he had found in it the name of the Jewish
capital. The twenty-ninth cartouche reads Yaud-hamelek, which he explained
as signifying “the kingdom of Judah,” while Rosellini made it “the king of
Judah.” But both interpretations are impossible. _Melek_, it is true,
means “king” in Hebrew, but “king of Judah” would have to be
_melek-Yaudah_; “kingdom of Judah,” _malkûth-Yaudah_. In the Semitic
languages the genitive must follow the noun that governs it.
Yaud-hamelek is the Hebrew Ye(h)ud ham-melech “Jehud of the king.” Jehud
was a town of Dan (Josh. xix. 45), which Blau has identified with the
modern El-Yehudîyeh, near Jaffa, and the title attached to it in the
Egyptian list implies that it was an appanage of the crown. The faces of
the prisoners who surmount the cartouches are worthy of attention. The
Egyptian artists were skilled delineators of the human features, and an
examination of their sculptures and paintings has shown that they
represented the characteristics of their models with wonderful truth and
accuracy. For ethnological purposes their portraits of foreign races are
of considerable importance. Now the prisoners of Shishak have the
features, not of the Jew, but of the Amorite. The prisoners who served as
models to the Egyptian sculptors at Karnak must therefore have been of
Amorite descent. It is a proof that the Amorite population in southern
Palestine was still strong in the days of Rehoboam and Shishak. The Jews
would have been predominant only in Jerusalem and the larger cities and
fortresses of the kingdom. Elsewhere the older race survived with all its
characteristic features; the Israelitish conquest had never rooted it out.
Hence it is that it still lives and flourishes in its ancient home. The
traveller in the country districts of Judah looks in vain for traces of
the Jewish race, but he may still see there the Amorite just as he is
depicted on the monuments of Egypt. The Jews, in fact, were but the
conquering and dominant caste, and with the extinction of their
nationality came also in Judah the extinction of their racial type. The
few who remained were one by one absorbed into the older population of the
country.
Shishak died soon after his Jewish campaigns. None of his successors seem
to have possessed his military capacity and energy. One of them, however,
Osorkon II., appears to have made an expedition against Palestine. Among
the monuments disinterred at Bubastis by Dr. Naville for the Egyptian
Exploration Fund are the inscribed blocks of stone which formed the walls
of the second hall of the temple. This hall was restored by Osorkon, who
called it the “Festival Hall” of Amon, which was dedicated on the day of
Khoiak, in the twenty-second year of the king’s reign. On one of the
blocks the Pharaoh declares that “all countries, the Upper and Lower
Retennu, are hidden under his feet.” The Upper Retennu denoted Palestine,
the Lower Retennu Northern Syria, and though the boast was doubtless a
vainglorious one, it must have had some foundation in truth.
In the Second Book of Chronicles (xiv. 9-15) we are told that when Asa was
on the Jewish throne, “there came out against them Zerah the Ethiopian
with an host of a thousand thousand and three hundred chariots.” The
similarity between the names Zerah and Osorkon has long been noticed, and
the reign of Osorkon II. would coincide with that of Asa. Dr. Naville,
therefore, is probably right in believing that some connection exists
between the campaign of Zerah and the boast of Osorkon. It is true that
the Chronicler calls Zerah an Ethiopian, and describes his army as an
Ethiopian host; but this seems due to the fact that the next kings of
Egypt who interfered in the affairs of Palestine, So and Tirhakah, were of
Ethiopian descent. In the time of Asa, at any rate, when the twenty-second
dynasty was ruling over Egypt, no Ethiopian army could have entered Judah
without the permission of the Egyptian monarch. However, Dr. Naville draws
attention to the fact that Osorkon seems to have had some special tie with
Ethiopia. His great festival at Bubastis was attended by natives of
Ethiopia, the Anti came with their gifts from “the land of the negroes,”
and are depicted like the priests on the walls of the hall.
But troublous times were in store for Egypt. The twenty-second dynasty
came to an end, and a period followed of confusion, civil war, and foreign
invasion. The kings of Ethiopia sailed down the Nile and swept the country
from Assuan to the sea. Petty princes reigned as independent sovereigns in
the various cities of Egypt, and waged war one against the other. Pi-ankhi
the Ethiopian was content with their momentary submission; he then retired
to his ancestral capital at Napata, midway between Dongola and Khartûm,
carrying with him the spoils of the Nile. Another Ethiopian, Shabaka or
Sabako, the son of Kashet, made a more permanent settlement in Egypt. He
put to death the nominal Pharaoh, Bak-n-ran-f or Bokkhoris, and founded
the twenty-fifth dynasty. Order was again restored, the petty princes
suppressed, and Egypt as well as Ethiopia obeyed a single head. The roads
were cleared of brigands, the temples and walls of the cities were
rebuilt, and trade could again pass freely up and down the Nile.
An Egyptian civilisation and an Egyptian religion had been established in
Ethiopia since the days of the eighteenth dynasty. For some centuries,
even after they had become independent of Egypt, the ruling classes
boasted of the purity of their Egyptian descent. But before the age of
Sabako the Egyptian element had been absorbed by the native population. We
have learned from a monument of the Assyrian king, Esar-haddon, lately
found at Sinjerli, in northern Syria, that Sabako and his successors had
all the physical characteristics of the negro. But no sign of this is
allowed to appear on the Egyptian monuments. With the contempt for the
black race which still distinguishes them, the Egyptians refused to
acknowledge that their Pharaohs could be of negro blood. In the sculptures
and paintings of the Nile, accordingly, the kings of the Ethiopian dynasty
are represented with all the features of the Egyptian race.
In spite, however, of all attempts to conceal the fact, we now know that
they were negroes in reality. But they brought with them a vigour and a
strength of will that had long been wanting among the rulers of Egypt. And
it was not long before their Asiatic neighbours found that a new and
energetic power had arisen on the banks of the Nile. Assyria was now
extending its empire throughout Western Asia, and claiming to control the
politics of Syria and Palestine. The Syrian princes looked to Egypt for
help. In B.C. 720, Assyria and Egypt met face to face for the first time.
Sib’e, the Tartan, or commander-in-chief, of the Egyptian armies, with
Hanno of Gaza and other Syrian allies, blocked the way of the Assyrian
invaders at Raphia, on the border of Palestine. The victory was won by the
Assyrian Sargon. Hanno was captured, and Sib’e fled to the Delta. But
Sargon turned northward again, and did not follow up his success. He was
content with receiving the tribute of Pharaoh (Pir’u) “king of Egypt,” of
Samsi, the queen of Arabia, and of Ithamar the Sabæan.
In Sib’e we must see the So or Seve of the Old Testament (2 Kings xvii.
4). He is there called “king of Egypt,” but he was rather one of the
subordinate princes of the Delta, who acted as the commander-in-chief of
“Pharaoh.” Pharaoh, it would seem, was still Bak-n-ran-f.
A few years later Sabako was established on the throne. He reigned at
least twelve years, and was succeeded by his brother-in-law, Tirhakah, the
Tarqû of the Assyrian texts. Under him, Egypt once more played a part in
Jewish history.
It was trust in “Pharaoh, king of Egypt,” that made Hezekiah revolt from
Assyria after Sargon’s death. The result was the invasion of his kingdom
by Sennacherib in B.C. 701. Tirhakah moved forward to help his ally. But
his march diverted the attention of the Assyrian monarch only for a while.
The armies of Sennacherib and Tirhakah met at Eltekeh, and Tirhakah the
Pharaoh of Egypt was forced to retire. Both claim a victory in their
inscriptions. Sennacherib tells us how “the kings of Egypt and the bowmen,
chariots, and horses of the king of northern Arabia, had collected their
innumerable forces and gone to the aid” of Hezekiah and his Philistine
allies, and how in sight of Eltekeh, “in reliance on Assur,” he had
“fought with them and utterly overthrown them.” “The charioteers and the
sons of the king of Egypt, together with the charioteers of the king of
northern Arabia,” he had “taken captive in the battle.” Tirhakah, on the
other hand, on a statue now in the Gizeh Museum, declares that he was the
conqueror of the Bedouin, the Hittites, the Arvadites, the Assyrians, and
the people of Aram-Naharaim. The battle, in fact, was a Kadmeian victory.
Tirhakah was so far defeated that he was forced to retreat to his own
dominions, while Sennacherib’s victory was not decisive enough to allow
him to pursue it. He contented himself with marching back into Judah,
burning and plundering its towns and villages, and carrying their
inhabitants into captivity. Then came the catastrophe which destroyed the
larger part of his army and obliged him to return ignominiously to his own
capital. The spoils and captives of Judah were the only fruits of his
campaign. His rebellious vassal went unpunished, and the strong fortress
of Jerusalem was saved from the Assyrian. Though Sennacherib made many
military expeditions during the remaining twenty years of his reign, he
never came again to the south of Palestine.
Egypt lay sheltered from invasion behind Jerusalem. But with the death of
Sennacherib there came a change. His son and successor, Esar-haddon, was a
good general and a man of great ability. Manasseh of Judah became his
vassal, and the way lay open to the Nile. With a large body of trained
veterans he descended upon Egypt (B.C. 674). The sheikh of the Bedouin
provided him with the camels which conveyed the water for the army across
the desert. Three campaigns were needed before Egypt, under its Ethiopian
ruler, could be subdued. But at last, in B.C. 670, Esar-haddon drove the
Egyptian forces before him in fifteen days (from the 3rd to the 18th of
Tammuz or June) all the way from the frontier to Memphis, thrice defeating
them with heavy loss, and wounding Tirhakah himself. Three days later
Memphis fell, and Tirhakah fled to Ethiopia, leaving Egypt to the
conqueror. It was after this success that the Assyrian monarch erected the
stêlê at Sinjerli, on which he is portrayed with Tirhakah of Egypt and
Baal of Tyre kneeling before him, each with a ring through his lips, to
which is attached a bridle held by the Assyrian king.
Egypt was reorganised under Assyrian rule, and measures taken to prevent
the return of the Ethiopians. It was divided into twenty satrapies, the
native princes being appointed to govern them for their Assyrian master.
At their head was placed Necho, the vassal king of Sais. Esar-haddon now
returned to Nineveh, and on the cliffs of the Nahr el-Kelb, near Beyrout,
he engraved a record of his conquest of Egypt and Thebes by the side of
the monument whereon, seven centuries previously, Ramses II. had boasted
of his victories over the nations of Asia.
At first the Egyptian princes were well pleased with their change of
masters. But in Thebes there was a strong party which sympathised with
Ethiopia rather than with Assyria. With their help, Tirhakah returned in
B.C. 668, sailed down the Nile, and took Memphis by storm. Esar-haddon
started at once to suppress the revolt. But on the way to Egypt he died on
the 10th of Marchesvan or October, and his son, Assur-bani-pal, followed
him on the throne.
The Ethiopian army was encountered near Kar-banit, in the Delta. A
complete victory was gained over it, and Tirhakah was compelled to fly,
first from Memphis, then from Thebes. The tributary kings whom he had
displaced were restored, and Assur-bani-pal left Egypt in the full belief
that it was tranquil. But hardly had he returned to Nineveh before a fresh
revolt broke out there. Tirhakah began to plot with the native satraps,
and even Necho of Sais was suspected of complicity. The commanders of the
Assyrian garrisons, accordingly, sent him and two other princes (from
Tanis and Goshen) loaded with chains to Assyria. But Assur-bani-pal,
either really convinced of Necho’s innocence or pretending to be so, not
only pardoned him but bestowed upon him a robe of honour, as well as a
sword of gold and a chariot and horses, and sent him back to Sais, giving
at the same time the government of Athribis, whose mounds lie close to
Benha, to his son, Psammetikhos. Meanwhile Tirhakah had again penetrated
to Thebes and Memphis, where he celebrated the festival in honour of the
appearance of a new Apis. But his power was no longer what it once had
been, and even before the return of Necho he found it prudent to retire to
Ethiopia. There he died a few months later.
The Thebaid, however, continued in a state of revolt against the Assyrian
authority. Another Ethiopian king, whom the Assyrians call Urd-Aman, had
succeeded Tirhakah, and was battling for the sovereignty of Egypt.
Urd-Aman is usually identified with the Pharaoh Rud-Amon, whose name has
been met with on two Egyptian monuments, but about whom nothing further is
known. Some scholars, however, read the name Tand-Aman, and identify it
with that of Tuatan-Amon or Tuant-Amon, whose royal cartouches are
engraved by the side of those of Tirhakah in the temple of Ptah-Osiris at
Karnak. An inscription found built into a wall at Luxor mentions his third
year, and a large stêlê erected by him at Napata was discovered among the
ruins of his capital in 1862, and is now in the Museum of Gizeh. On this
he states that in the first year of his reign he was excited by a dream to
invade the north. Thebes opened its gates to him, and after worshipping in
the temple of Amon at Karnak, he marched to Memphis, which he captured
after a slight resistance. Then he proceeded against the princes of the
Delta, who, however, shut themselves up in their cities or else submitted
to him.
One day Paqrur of Goshen appeared at Memphis to do him homage, much to the
surprise and delight of the Ethiopian king. As Paqrur was the prince of
Pi-Sopd or Goshen, who had been sent to Nineveh along with Necho, the date
of Tuatan-Amon is pretty clear. How he came to quit Egypt, however, he
does not vouchsafe to explain.
Whether Urd-Aman were Rud-Amon or Tuatan-Amon, he gave a good deal of
trouble to the Assyrians. Thebes was securely in his hands, and from
thence he marched upon Memphis. The Assyrian garrison and its allies were
defeated in front of the city, which was then blockaded and taken after a
long siege. Necho was captured and put to death, and Psammetikhos escaped
the same fate only by flight into Syria. But Assyrian revenge did not
tarry long. Assur-bani-pal determined to put an end to Egyptian revolt and
Ethiopian invasion once for all. A large army was despatched to the Nile,
which overthrew the forces of Rud-Amon in the Delta and pursued him as far
as Thebes. Thence he fled to Kipkip in Ethiopia, and a terrible punishment
was inflicted on the capital of southern Egypt. The whole of its
inhabitants were led away into slavery. Its temples—at once the centres of
disaffection and fortresses against attack—were half-demolished, its
monuments and palaces were destroyed, and all its treasures, sacred and
profane, were carried away. Among the spoil were two obelisks, more than
seventy tons in weight, which were removed to Nineveh as trophies of
victory. The injuries which Kambyses has been accused of inflicting on the
ancient monuments of Thebes were really the work of the Assyrians.
How great was the impression made upon the oriental world by the sack of
Thebes may be gathered from the reference to it by the prophet Nahum (iii.
8-10). Nineveh itself is threatened with the same overthrow. “Art thou
better than No of Amon, that was situate among the rivers, that had the
waters round about it, whose rampart was the sea, (the Nile), and her wall
was from the sea? Ethiopia and Egypt were her strength, and it was
infinite; Put and Lubim were thy helpers. Yet was she carried away, she
went into captivity: her young children also were dashed in pieces at the
top of all the streets: and they cast lots for her honourable men, and all
her great men were bound in chains.” As the destruction of Thebes took
place about B.C. 665, the date of Nahum’s prophecy cannot have been much
later.
In the Assyrian inscriptions Thebes is called Ni’, corresponding with the
No of the Old Testament. Both words represent the Egyptian Nu, “city,”
Thebes being pre-eminently “the city” of Upper Egypt. Its patron-deity was
Amon, to whom its great temple was dedicated, and hence it is that Nahum
calls it “No of Amon.” Divided as it was into two halves by the Nile, and
encircled on either side by canals, one of which—“the southern
water”—still runs past the southern front of the temple of Luxor, it could
truly be said that its “rampart was the sea.” To this day the Nile is
called “the sea” by the natives of Egypt.
The Ethiopians penetrated into Egypt no more. The twenty satrapies were
re-established; and Psammetikhos received his father’s principality,
though the precedence among the vassal-kings was given to Paqrur of
Goshen. For a time the country was at peace.
Fifteen years later, however, an event occurred which shook the Assyrian
empire to its foundations. A revolt broke out which spread throughout the
whole of it. The revolt was headed by Assur-bani-pal’s brother, the
Viceroy of Babylonia, and for some time the result wavered in the balance.
But the good generalship and disciplined forces of Assyria eventually
prevailed, and she emerged from the struggle, exhausted indeed, but
triumphant. The empire, however, was shrunken. Gyges of Lydia had thrown
off his allegiance, and had assisted Psammetikhos of Sais to make Egypt
independent. While the Assyrian armies were battling for existence in
Asia, Psammetikhos, with the Ionian and Karian mercenaries from Lydia, was
driving out the Assyrian garrisons and overcoming his brother satraps. One
by one they disappeared before him, and at last he had the satisfaction of
seeing Egypt a united and independent monarchy, under a monarch who
claimed to be of native race.
The blood of the founder of the twenty-sixth dynasty was, however, mixed.
He seems to have been, partly at least, of Libyan descent, and it is even
doubtful whether his name is pure Egyptian. Like his father, he surrounded
himself with foreigners: the Greeks and Karians, with whose help he had
gained his throne, were high in favour, and constituted the royal
body-guard. The native Egyptian army, we are told, deserted the king in
disgust and made their way to Ethiopia. However that may be, Greek troops
were settled in “camps” in the Delta, Greek merchants were allowed to
trade and even to build in Egypt, and the Karians became dragomen, guides,
and interpreters between the natives and the European tourists who began
to visit the Nile.
It was during the reign of Psammetikhos I. (B.C. 664-610) that the great
invasion of nomad Scyths, referred to in the earlier chapters of Jeremiah,
swept over Western Asia. They sacked the towns of the Philistines and made
their way to the Egyptian frontier, but there they were bought off by
Psammetikhos. After their dispersion, the Egyptian Pharaoh turned his eyes
towards Palestine, with the intention of restoring the Asiatic empire of
Ramses II. The twenty-sixth dynasty was an age of antiquarian revival; not
content with restoring Egypt to peace and prosperity, its kings aimed also
at restoring the Egypt of the past. Egyptian art again puts on an antique
form, temples are repaired or erected in accordance with ancient models,
and literature reflects the general tendency. The revival only wanted
originality to make it successful; as it is, the art of the twenty-sixth
dynasty is careful and good, and under its rule Egypt enjoyed for the last
time a St. Luke’s summer of culture and renown.
The power of Assyria was passing away. The great rebellion, and the wars
in Elam which followed, had drained it of its resources. The Scythic
invasion destroyed what little strength was left. Before Psammetikhos died
Nineveh was already surrounded by its foes, and four years later it
perished utterly.
The provinces of the west became virtually independent. Josiah of Judah
still called himself a vassal of the Assyrian monarch, but he acted as if
the Assyrian monarchy did not exist. The Assyrian governor of Samaria was
deprived of his authority, and Jewish rule was obeyed throughout what had
been the territory of the Ten Tribes.
The weakness of Assyria was the opportunity of Egypt. The earlier years of
the reign of Psammetikhos were spent in reorganising his kingdom and army,
in suppressing all opposition to his government, and in rebuilding the
ruined cities and temples. Then he marched into Palestine and endeavoured
to secure once more for Egypt the cities of the Philistines. Ashdod was
taken after a prolonged siege, and an Egyptian garrison placed in it.
The successor of Psammetikhos was his son Necho, who carried out the
foreign policy of his father. The old canal which ran from the Red Sea at
Suez to the Nile near Zagazig, and which centuries of neglect had allowed
to be choked, was again partially cleared out, and “the tongue of the
Egyptian sea was cut off” (Isa. xi. 15). Ships were also sent from Suez
under Phœnician pilots to circumnavigate Africa. Three years did they
spend on the voyage, and after passing the Straits of Gibraltar, finally
arrived safely at the mouths of the Nile. There an incredulous people
heard that as they were sailing westward the sun was on their right hand.
But long before the return of his ships, Necho had placed himself at the
head of his army and entered on the invasion of Asia. The Syrians were
defeated at Migdol, and Gaza was occupied. The Egyptian army then
proceeded to march along the sea-coast by the ancient military road, which
struck inland at the Nahr el-Kelb. But the Jewish king, pleading his duty
to his Assyrian suzerain, attempted to block the way; the result was a
battle in the plain of Megiddo, where the Jewish forces were totally
routed, and Josiah himself carried from the field mortally wounded. Necho
now overran northern Syria as far as the Euphrates, and then returned
southward to punish the Jews. Jerusalem was captured by treachery, and
Jehoahaz, the new king, deposed after a reign of only three months. The
Pharaoh then made his brother Eliakim king in his stead, changing his name
to Jehoiakim. The city was fined a talent of gold and a hundred talents of
silver, and Necho sent his armour to the temple of Apollo near Miletus as
a thank-offering to the god of his Greek mercenaries.
The empire of Thothmes was restored, at all events in Asia. But it lasted
hardly more than three years. In B.C. 605 a decisive battle was fought at
Carchemish, on the Euphrates, now Jerablûs, between Necho and the
Babylonian prince Nebuchadrezzar, who commanded the army of his father
Nabopolassar. The Egyptians fled in confusion, and the Asiatic empire was
utterly lost. The Jewish king transferred his allegiance to the conqueror,
and for three years “became his servant.” Then he rebelled, probably in
consequence of a fresh attempt made by the Egyptians to recover their
power in Palestine. The attempt, however, failed, and a Babylonian army
was sent against Jerusalem. Jehoiakim was already dead, but his son
Jehoiachin, along with the leading citizens, the military class, and the
artisans—“ten thousand captives” in all—was carried into exile in
Babylonia (B.C. 599). His uncle Zedekiah was placed on the throne, and for
nearly nine years he remained faithful to his Babylonian master.
Then came temptation from the side of Egypt. Psammetikhos II., who had
succeeded his father Necho in B.C. 594, prepared to march into Palestine,
and contest the supremacy over Western Asia with the Babylonian monarch. A
Babylonian army was already besieging the revolted city of Jerusalem when
the forces of the Pharaoh appeared in sight. The Babylonians broke up
their camp and retired, and it seemed as if the rebellion of the Jewish
king had been successful (Jer. xxxvii. 5, 11; Ezek. xvii. 15).
But it was not for long. The Egyptians returned to “their own land,” and
the siege of Jerusalem was recommenced. At last, in B.C. 588, the city was
taken, its king and most of its inhabitants led into captivity, and its
temple and palace burned with fire. Judah was placed under a Babylonian
governor, and the authority of the Babylonians acknowledged as far as
Gaza.
Psammetikhos II. had died in the preceding year, and his son Uahabra, the
Apries of the Greeks, the Hophra of the Old Testament, occupied his place.
The army which had gone to the help of Zedekiah had doubtless been sent by
him. He had recaptured Gaza, and marched along the coast to Sidon, which
he captured, and Tyre, which was in rebellion against the Chaldæans, while
his fleet defeated the combined forces of the Cyprians and Phœnicians, and
held the sea. A hieroglyphic inscription, erected by a native of Gebal and
commemorative of the invasion, has recently been found near Sidon. But the
Egyptian conquests were again lost almost as quickly as they had been
made.
Palestine became a Babylonian province up to the frontiers of Egypt. Many
of the Jews who had been left in it fled to Egypt. Their numbers were
reinforced by a band of outlaws, of whom Johanan was the leader, who had
murdered the Babylonian governor and had dragged into Egypt with them the
prophet Jeremiah and his scribe Baruch. Jeremiah in vain protested against
their conduct, and predicted that Hophra should be slain by his enemies,
and that Nebuchadrezzar should set up his throne on that very pavement “at
the entry of Pharaoh’s house in Tahpanhes” where the prophet was then
standing. Tahpanhes is almost certainly Tel ed-Defneh, the Daphnæ of Greek
geography, which stands in the mid-desert about twelve miles to the west
of Kantara on the Suez Canal, and where Professor Flinders Petrie made
excavations for the Egypt Exploration Fund in 1886. There he found the
remains of a great fortress and camp, which had been built by Psammetikhos
I. for his Greek mercenaries. The walls of the camp were forty feet in
thickness, and the ruins of the fortress still go by the name of the
“Castle of the Jew’s Daughter.” In front of it is a brick pavement, just
like that described by Jeremiah.
Daphnæ, in fact, was one of the chief fortresses of Egypt on the side of
Asia, and it was accordingly the chief station of the Greek mercenaries.
It commanded the entrance to the Delta, and was almost the first place in
Egypt that the traveller from Palestine who came by the modern caravan
road would approach. It was, therefore, the first settlement at which
Jewish fugitives who wished to avoid the Babylonian garrison at Gaza would
be likely to arrive. And it was also the first object of attack on the
part of an invader from the East. Its possession opened to him the way to
Memphis.
That Nebuchadrezzar actually invaded Egypt, as Jeremiah had predicted, we
now know from a fragment of his annals. In his thirty-seventh year (B.C.
567) he marched into Egypt, defeating the Pharaoh Amasis, and the soldiers
of “Phut of the Ionians,” “a distant land which is in the midst of the
sea.” The enemies, therefore, into whose hands Hophra was to fall were not
the Babylonians. They were, in fact, his own subjects.
He had pursued the Hellenising policy of his predecessors with greater
thoroughness than they had done, and had thus aroused the jealousy and
alarm of the native population. The Greek mercenaries alone had his
confidence, and the Egyptians accused him of betraying the native troops
whom he had sent to the help of the Libyans against the Greek colony of
Kyrênê. Amasis (or Ahmes), his brother-in-law, put himself at the head of
the rebels. A battle was fought near Sais between the Greek troops of
Hophra on the one side and the revolted Egyptians on the other, which
ended in the defeat of the Greeks and the capture of Hophra himself.
Amasis was proclaimed king (B.C. 570), and though the captive Pharaoh was
at first treated with respect, he was afterwards put to death.
The change of monarch made little difference to the Greeks in Egypt. They
were too valuable, both as soldiers and as traders, for the Pharaoh to
dispense with their services. The mercenaries were removed from Daphnæ to
Memphis, in the very heart of the kingdom, and fresh privileges were
granted to the merchants of Naukratis. The Pharaoh married a Greek wife,
and a demotic papyrus, now at Paris, even describes how he robbed the
temples of Memphis, On and Bubastis of their endowments and handed them
over to the Greek troops. “The Council” which sat under him ordered that
“the vessels, the fuel, the linen, and the dues” hitherto enjoyed by their
gods and their priests should be given instead to the foreigner. In this
act of sacrilege the Egyptians of a later day saw the cause of the
downfall of their country. The invasion of Nebuchadrezzar had passed over
it without producing much injury; indeed, it does not seem to have
extended beyond the eastern half of the Delta. But a new power, that of
Cyrus, was rising in the East. Amasis had foreseen the coming storm, and
had occupied Cyprus in advance. If Xenophon is to be believed, he had also
sent troops to the aid of Krœsus of Lydia. But all was of no avail. The
power of Cyrus steadily increased. The empires of Lydia and Babylonia went
down before it, and when his son Kambyses succeeded him in July, B.C. 529,
the new empire extended from the Mediterranean to India and from the
Caspian to the borders of Egypt. It was clear that the fertile banks of
the Nile would be the next object of attack.
Greek vanity asserted that the actual cause of the invasion was the Greek
mercenary Phanês. He had deserted to Kambyses, and explained to him how
Egypt could be entered. That Phanês was a name used by the Egyptian Greeks
we know from its occurrence on the fragment of a large vase discovered by
Professor Petrie at Naukratis. Here we read: “Phanês the son of Glaukos
dedicated me to Apollo of Naukratis.” But the invasion of Egypt by
Kambyses was the necessary consequence of the policy which had laid the
whole of the oriental world at his father’s feet.
Amasis died while the army of Kambyses was on its march (B.C. 526), and
his son Psammetikhos III. had to bear the brunt of the attack. A battle
was fought near Pelusium, and though the Greek and Karian auxiliaries did
their best, the invading forces gained the day. The Pharaoh fled to
Memphis, which was thereupon besieged by Kambyses. The siege was a short
one. The city of “the White Wall” was taken, Psammetikhos made a prisoner,
and his son, together with two thousand youths of the leading Egyptian
families, was put to death. For a while Psammetikhos himself was allowed
to live, but the fears of the conqueror soon caused him to be executed,
and with his death came the end of the twenty-sixth dynasty and the
independence of Egypt.