Both their name and origin were doubtless well known to the Egyptians,

but the latter nevertheless disdained to apply to them any term but that

of “she-maû,” * strangers, and in referring to them used the same

vague appellations which they applied to the Bedouin of the Sinaitic

peninsula,--Monâtiû, the shepherds, or Sâtiû, the archers. They

succeeded in hiding the original name of their conquerors so thoroughly,

that in the end they themselves forgot it, and kept the secret of it

from posterity.

The remembrance of the cruelties with which the invaders sullied their

conquest lived long after them; it still stirred the anger of Manetho

after a lapse of twenty centuries.** The victors were known as the

“Plagues” or “Pests,” and every possible crime and impiety was attributed

to them.

* The term _shamamil,_ variant of _sliemaû,_ is applied to

them by Queen Hâtshopsîtu: the same term is employed shortly

afterward by Thutmosis III., to indicate the enemies whom he

had defeated at Megiddo.

** He speaks of them in contemptuous terms as _men of

ignoble race_. The epithet _Aîti, Iaîti, Iadîti_, was applied

to the Nubians by the writer of the inscription of Ahmosi-

si-Abîna, and to the Shepherds of the Delta by the author of

the _Sallier Papyrus_. Brugsch explained it as “the rebels,”

or “disturbers,” and Goodwin translated it “invaders”;

Chabas rendered it by “plague-stricken,” an interpretation

which was in closer conformity with its etymological

meaning, and Groff pointed out that the malady called Ait,

or Adit in Egyptian, is the malignant fever still frequently

to be met with at the present day in the marshy cantons of

the Delta, and furnished the proper rendering, which is “The

Fever-stricken.”

[Illustration: 080.jpg A HYKSÔS PRISONER GUIDING THE PLOUGH, AT EL-KAB]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Insinger.

But the brutalities attending the invasion once past, the invaders

soon lost their barbarity and became rapidly civilized. Those of them

stationed in the encampment at Avaris retained the military qualities

and characteristic energy of their race; the remainder became

assimilated to their new compatriots, and were soon recognisable merely

by their long hair, thick beard, and marked features. Their sovereigns

seemed to have realised from the first that it was more to their

interest to exploit the country than to pillage it; as, however, none of

them was competent to understand the intricacies of the treasury, they

were forced to retain the services of the majority of the scribes, who

had managed the public accounts under the native kings.* Once schooled

to the new state of affairs, they readily adopted the refinements of

civilized life.

* The same thing took place on every occasion when Egypt was

conquered by an alien race: the Persian Achæmenians and

Greeks made use of the native employés, as did the Romans

after them; and lastly, the Mussulmans, Arabs, and Turks.

The court of the Pharaohs, with its pomp and its usual assemblage of

officials, both great and small, was revived around the person of

the new sovereign;* the titles of the Amenemhâîts and the Usirtasens,

adapted to these “princes of foreign lands,” ** legitimatised them as

descendants of Horus and sons of the Sun.*** They respected the

local religions, and went so far as to favour those of the gods whose

attributes appeared to connect them with some of their own barbarous

divinities. The chief deity of their worship was Baal, the lord of

all,**** a cruel and savage warrior; his resemblance to Sit, the brother

and enemy of Osiris, was so marked, that he was identified with the

Egyptian deity, with the emphatic additional title of Sutkhû, the Great

Sit.^

* The narrative of the _Sallier Papyrus,_ No. 1, shows us

the civil and military chiefs collected round the Shepherd-

king Apôpi, and escorting him in the solemn processions in

honour of the gods. They are followed by the scribes and

magicians, who give him advice on important occasions.

** Hiqu Situ: this is the title of Abîsha at Beni-Hassan,

which is also assumed by Khiani on several small monuments;

Steindorff has attempted to connect it with the name of the

Hyksôs.

*** The preamble of the two or three Shepherd-kings of whom

we know anything, contains the two cartouches, the special

titles, and the names of Horus, which formed part of the

title of the kings of pure Egyptian race; thus Apôphis IL is

proclaimed to be the living Horus, who joins the two earths

in peace, the good god, Aqnunrî, son of the Sun, Apôpi, who

lives for ever, on the statues of Mîrmâshâu, which he had

appropriated, and on the pink granite table of offerings in

the Gizeh Museum.

**** The name of Baal, transcribed Baâlu, is found on that

of a certain Petebaâlû, “the Gift of Baal,” who must have

flourished in the time of the last shepherd-kings, or rather

under the Theban kings of the XVIIth dynasty, who were their

contemporaries, whose conclusions have been adopted by

Brugsch.

^ Sutikhû, Sutkhû, are lengthened forms of Sûtû, or Sîtû;

and Chabas, who had at first denied the existence of the

final _Jehû_, afterwards himself supplied the philological

arguments which proved the correctness of the reading: he

rightly refused, however, to recognise in Sutikhû or Sutkhû

--the name of the conquerors’ god--a transliteration of the

Phoenician Sydyk, and would only see in it that of the

nearest Egyptian deity. This view is now accepted as the

right one, and Sutkhû is regarded as the indigenous

equivalent of the great Asiatic god, elsewhere called Baal,

or supreme lord. [Professor Pétrie found a scarab bearing

the cartouche of “Sutekh” Apepi I. at Koptos.--Te.]

He was usually represented as a fully armed warrior, wearing a helmet

of circular form, ornamented with two plumes; but he also borrowed

the emblematic animal of Sît, the fennec, and the winged griffin which

haunted the deserts of the Thebaid. His temples were erected in the

cities of the Delta, side by side with the sanctuaries of the feudal

gods, both at Bubastis and at Tanis. Tanis, now made the capital,

reopened its palaces, and acquired a fresh impetus from the royal

presence within its walls. Apôphis Aq-nûnrî, one of its kings, dedicated

several tables of offerings in that city, and engraved his cartouches

upon the sphinxes and standing colossi of the Pharaohs of the XIIth and

XIIIth dynasties.

[Illustration: 082.jpg TABLE OF OFFERINGS BEARING THE NAME OF APÔTI

ÂQNÛNRÎ]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by E. Brugsch.

[Illustration: 083.jpg Page Image]

He was, however, honest enough to leave the inscriptions of his

predecessors intact, and not to appropriate to himself the credit of

works belonging to the Amenemhâîts or to Mirmâshâû. Khianî, who is

possibly the Iannas of Manetho, was not, however, so easily satisfied.*

The statue bearing his inscription, of which the lower part was

discovered by Naville at Bubastis, appears to have been really carved

for himself or for one of his contemporaries. It is a work possessing no

originality, though of very commendable execution, such as would render

it acceptable to any museum; the artist who conceived it took ‘his

inspiration with considerable cleverness from the best examples

turned out by the schools of the Delta under the Sovkhotpfts and the

Nofirhotpûs. But a small grey granite lion, also of the reign of Khianî,

which by a strange fate had found its way to Bagdad, does not raise our

estimation of the modelling of animals in the Hyksôs period.

* Naville, who reads the name Râyan or Yanrâ, thinks that

this prince must be the Annas or Iannas mentioned by Manetho

as being one of the six shepherd-kings of the XVth dynasty.

Mr. Pétrie proposed to read Khian, Khianî, and the fragment

discovered at Gebeleîn confirms this reading, as well as a

certain number of cylinders and scarabs. Mr. Pétrie prefers

to place this Pharaoh in the VIIIth dynasty, and makes him

one of the leaders in the foreign occupation to which he

supposes Egypt to have submitted at that time; but it is

almost certain that he ought to be placed among the Hyksôs

of the XVIth dynasty. The name Khianî, more correctly

Khiyanî or Kheyanî, is connected by Tomkins, and Hilprecht

with that of a certain Khayanû or Khayan, son of Gabbar, who

reigned in Amanos in the time of Salmanasar II., King of

Assyria.

[Illustration: 084.jpg BROKEN STATUE OF KHIANI]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Naville.

It is heavy in form, and the muzzle in no way recalls the fine profile

of the lions executed by the sculptors of earlier times. The pursuit

of science and the culture of learning appear to have been more

successfully perpetuated than the fine arts; a treatise on mathematics,

of which a copy has come down to us, would seem to have been recopied,

if not remodelled, in the twenty-second year of Apôphis IL Aûsirrî. If

we only possessed more monuments or documents treating of this period,

we should doubtless perceive that their sojourn on the banks of the

Nile was instrumental in causing a speedy change in the appearance and

character of the Hyksôs. The strangers retained to a certain extent

their coarse countenances and rude manners: they showed no aptitude for

tilling the soil or sowing grain, but delighted in the marshy expanses

of the Delta, where they gave themselves up to a semi-savage life

of hunting and of tending cattle. The nobles among them, clothed and

schooled after the Egyptian fashion, and holding fiefs, or positions at

court, differed but little from the native feudal chiefs. We see here a

case of what generally happens when a horde of barbarians settles down

in a highly organised country which by a stroke of fortune they may have

conquered; as soon as the Hyksôs had taken complete possession of Egypt,

Egypt in her turn took possession of them, and those who survived the

enervating effect of her civilization were all but transformed into

Egyptians.

If, in the time of the native Pharaohs, Asiatic tribes had been drawn

towards Egypt, where they were treated as subjects or almost as slaves,

the attraction which she possessed for them must have increased in

intensity under the shepherds. They would now find the country in the

hands of men of the same races as themselves--Egyptianised, it is true,

but not to such an extent as to have completely lost their own language

and the knowledge of their own extraction. Such immigrants were the more

readily welcomed, since there lurked a feeling among the Hyksôs that it

was necessary to strengthen themselves against the slumbering hostility

of the indigenous population. The royal palace must have more than once

opened its gates to Asiatic counsellors and favourites. Canaanites and

Bedouin must often have been enlisted for the camp at Avaris. Invasions,

famines, civil wars, all seem to have conspired to drive into Egypt not

only isolated individuals, but whole families and tribes. That of the

Beni-Israel, or Israelites, who entered the country about this time, has

since acquired a unique position in the world’s history. They belonged

to that family of Semitic extraction which we know by the monuments

and tradition to have been scattered in ancient times along the western

shores of the Persian Gulf and on the banks of the Euphrates. Those

situated nearest to Chaldæa and to the sea probably led a settled

existence; they cultivated the soil, they employed themselves in

commerce and industries, their vessels--from Dilmun, from Mâgan, and

from Milukhkha--coasted from one place to another, and made their way to

the cities of Sumer and Accad. They had been civilized from very early

times, and some of their towns were situated on islands, so as to

be protected from sudden incursions. Other tribes of the same family

occupied the interior of the continent; they lived in tents, and

delighted in the unsettled life of nomads. There appeared to be in this

distant corner of Arabia an inexhaustible reserve of population, which

periodically overflowed its borders and spread over the world. It was

from this very region that we see the Kashdim, the true Chaldæans,

issuing ready armed for combat,--a people whose name was subsequently

used to denote several tribes settled between the lower waters of the

Tigris and the Euphrates. It was there, among the marshes on either side

of these rivers, that the Aramoans established their first settlements

after quitting the desert. There also the oldest legends of the race

placed the cradle of the Phoenicians; it was even believed, about the

time of Alexander, that the earliest ruins attributable to this people

had been discovered on the Bahrein Islands, the largest of which, Tylos

and Arados, bore names resembling the two great ports of Tyre and Arvad.

We are indebted to tradition for the cause of their emigration and the

route by which they reached the Mediterranean. The occurrence of violent

earthquakes forced them to leave their home; they travelled as far as

the Lake of Syria, where they halted for some time; then resuming their

march, did not rest till they had reached the sea, where they founded

Sidon. The question arises as to the position of the Lake of Syria on

whose shores they rested, some believing it to be the Bahr-î-Nedjif

and the environs of Babylon; others, the Lake of Bambykês near the

Euphrates, the emigrants doubtless having followed up the course of that

river, and having approached the country of their destination on its

north-eastern frontier. Another theory would seek to identify the lake

with the waters of Merom, the Lake of Galilee, or the Dead Sea; in this

case the horde must have crossed the neck of the Arabian peninsula,

from the Euphrates to the Jordan, through one of those long valleys,

sprinkled with oases, which afforded an occasional route for caravans.*

Several writers assure us that the Phoenician tradition of this exodus

was misunderstood by Herodotus, and that the sea which they remembered

on reaching Tyre was not the Persian Gulf, but the Dead Sea. If this had

been the case, they need not have hesitated to assign their departure to

causes mentioned in other documents. The Bible tells us that, soon after

the invasion of Kudur-lagamar, the anger of God being kindled by the

wickedness of Sodom and Gomorrah, He resolved to destroy the five cities

situated in the valley of Siddim. A cloud of burning brimstone broke

over them and consumed them; when the fumes and smoke, as “of a

furnace,” had passed away, the very site of the towns had disappeared.**

Previous to their destruction, the lake into which the Jordan empties

itself had had but a restricted area: the subsidence of the southern

plain, which had been occupied by the impious cities, doubled the size

of the lake, and enlarged it to its present dimensions. The earthquake

which caused the Phoenicians to leave their ancestral home may have been

the result of this cataclysm, and the sea on whose shores they sojourned

would thus be our Dead Sea.

* They would thus have arrived at the shores of Lake Merom,

or at the shores either of the Dead Sea or of the Lake of

Gennesareth; the Arab traditions speak of an itinerary which

would have led the emigrants across the desert, but they

possess no historic value is so far as these early epochs

are concerned.

** _Gen._ xix. 24-29; the whole of this episode belongs to

the Jehovistic narrative.

One fact, however, appears to be certain in the midst of many

hypotheses, and that is that the Phoenicians had their origin in the

regions bordering on the Persian Gulf. It is useless to attempt, with

the inadequate materials as yet in our possession, to determine by what

route they reached the Syrian coast, though we may perhaps conjecture

the period of their arrival. Herodotus asserts that the Tyrians placed

the date of the foundation of their principal temple two thousand

three hundred years before the time of his visit, and the erection of a

sanctuary for their national deity would probably take place very soon

after their settlement at Tyre: this would bring their arrival there to

about the XXVIIIth century before our era. The Elamite and Babylonian

conquests would therefore have found the Phoenicians already established

in the country, and would have had appreciable effect upon them.

The question now arises whether the Beni-Israel belonged to the group of

tribes which included the Phoenicians, or whether they were of Chaldæan

race. Their national traditions leave no doubt upon that point. They are

regarded as belonging to an important race, which we find dispersed over

the country of Padan-Aram, in Northern Mesopotamia, near the base of

Mount Masios, and extending on both sides of the Euphrates.*

* The country of Padan-Aram is situated between the

Euphrates and the upper reaches of the Khabur, on both sides

of the Balikh, and is usually explained as the “plain” or

“table-land” of Aram, though the etymology is not certain;

the word seems to be preserved in that of Tell-Faddân, near

Harrân.

Their earliest chiefs bore the names of towns or of peoples,--N

akhor, Peleg, and Serug:* all were descendants of Arphaxad,** and it

was related that Terakh, the direct ancestor of the Israelites, had

dwelt in Ur-Kashdîm, the Ur or Uru of the Chaldæans.*** He is said to

have had three sons--Abraham, Nakhôr, and Harân. Harân begat Lot, but

died before his father in Ur-Kashdîm, his own country; Abraham and

Nakhor both took wives, but Abraham’s wife remained a long time barren.

Then Terakh, with his son Abraham, his grandson Lot, the son of Harân,

and his daughter-in-law Sarah,**** went forth from Ur-Kashdîm (Ur of the

Chaldees) to go into the land of Canaan.

* Nakhôr has been associated with the ancient village of

Khaura, or with the ancient village of Hâditha-en-Naura, to

the south of Anah; Peleg probably corresponds with Phalga or

Phaliga, which was situated at the mouth of the Khabur;

Serug with the present Sarudj in the neighbourhood of

Edessa, and the other names in the genealogy were probably

borrowed from as many different localities.

** The site of Arphaxad is doubtful, as is also its meaning:

its second element is undoubtedly the name of the Chaldæans,

but the first is interpreted in several ways--“frontier of

the Chaldæans,” “domain of the Chaldæans.” The similarity of

sound was the cause of its being for a long time associated

with the Arrapakhitis of classical times; the tendency is

now to recognise in it the country nearest to the ancient

domain of the Chaldæans, i.e. Babylonia proper.

*** Ur-Kashdîm has long been sought for in the north, either

at Orfa, in accordance with the tradition of the Syrian

Churches still existing in the East, or in a certain Ur of

Mesopotamia, placed by Ammianus Marcellinus between Nisibis

and the Tigris; at the present day Halévy still looks for it

on the Syrian bank of the Euphrates, to the south-east of

Thapsacus. Rawlin-son’s proposal to identify it with the

town of Uru has been successively accepted by nearly all

Assyriologists. Sayce remarks that the worship of Sin, which

was common to both towns, established a natural link between

them, and that an inhabitant of Uru would have felt more at

home in Harrân than in any other town.

**** The names of Sarah and Abraham, or rather the earlier

form, Abram, have been found, the latter under the form

Abirâmu, in the contracts of the first Chaldæan empire.

And they came unto Kharân, and dwelt there, and Terakh died in Kharân.*

It is a question whether Kharân is to be identified with Harrân in

Mesopotamia, the city of the god Sin; or, which is more probable, with

the Syrian town of Haurân, in the neighbourhood of Damascus. The tribes

who crossed the Euphrates became subsequently a somewhat important

people. They called themselves, or were known by others, as the ‘Ibrîm,

or Hebrews, the people from beyond the river;** and this appellation,

which we are accustomed to apply to the children of Israel only,

embraced also, at the time when the term was most extended, the

Ammonites, Moabites, Edomites, Ishmaelites, Midianites, and many other

tribes settled on the borders of the desert to the east and south of the

Dead Sea.

* Gen. xi. 27-32. In the opinion of most critics, verses 27,

31 32 form part of the document which was the basis of the

various narratives still traceable in the Bible; it is

thought that the remaining verses bear the marks of a later

redaction, or that they may be additions of a later date.

The most important part of the text, that relating the

migration from Ur-Kashdîm to Kharân, belongs, therefore, to

the very oldest part of the national tradition, and may be

regarded as expressing the knowledge which the Hebrews of

the times of the Kings possessed concerning the origin of

their race.

** The most ancient interpretation identified this nameless

river with the Euphrates; an identification still admitted

by most critics; others prefer to recognise it as being the

Jordan. Halévy prefers to identify it with one of the rivers

of Damascus, probably the Abana.

These peoples all traced their descent from Abraham, the son of Terakh,

but the children of Israel claimed the privilege of being the only

legitimate issue of his marriage with Sarah, giving naïve or derogatory

accounts of the relations which connected the others with their common

ancestor; Ammon and Moab were, for instance, the issue of the incestuous

union of Lot and his daughters. Midian and his sons were descended from

Keturah, who was merely a concubine, Ishmael was the son of an Egyptian

slave, while the “hairy” Esau had sold his birthright and the primacy of

the Edomites to his brother Jacob, and consequently to the Israelites,

for a dish of lentils. Abraham left Kharân at the command of Jahveh, his

God, receiving from Him a promise that his posterity should be blessed

above all others. Abraham pursued his way into the heart of Canaan

till he reached Shechem, and there, under the oaks of Moreh, Jahveh,

appearing to him a second time, announced to him that He would give the

whole land to his posterity as an inheritance. Abraham virtually took

possession of it, and wandered over it with his flocks, building altars

at Shechem, Bethel, and Mamre, the places where God had revealed Himself

to him, treating as his equals the native chiefs, Abîmelech of Gerar and

Melchizedek of Jerusalem,* and granting the valley of the Jordan as

a place of pasturage to his nephew Lot, whose flocks had increased

immensely.** His nomadic instinct having led him into Egypt, he was here

robbed of his wife by Pharaoh.***

* Cf. the meeting with Melchizedek after the victory over

the Elamites (_Gen_. xiv. 18-20) and the agreement with

Abîmelech about the well (Gen. xxi. 22-34). The mention of

the covenant of Abraham with Abîmelech belongs to the oldest

part of the national tradition, and is given to us in the

Jehovistic narrative. Many critics have questioned the

historical existence of Melchizedek, and believed that the

passage in which he is mentioned is merely a kind of parable

intended to show the head of the race paying tithe of the

spoil to the priest of the supreme God residing at

Jerusalem; the information, however, furnished by the Tel-

el-Amarna tablets about the ancient city of Jerusalem and

the character of its early kings have determined Sayce to

pronounce Melchizedek to be an historical personage.

** _Gen._ xiii. 1-13. Lot has been sometimes connected of

late with the people called on the Egyptian monuments

Rotanu, or Lotanu, whom we shall have occasion to mention

frequently further on: he is supposed to have been their

eponymous hero. Lôtan, which is the name of an Edomite clan,

(_Gen_. xxxvi. 20, 29), is a racial adjective, derived from

Lot.

*** _Gen._ xii. 9-20, xiii. 1. Abraham’s visit to Egypt

reproduces the principal events of that of Jacob.

[Illustration: 093.jpg THE TRADITIONAL OAK OF ABRAHAM AT HEBRON]

Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph brought home by Lortet.

On his return he purchased the field of Ephron, near Kirjath-Arba, and

the cave of Machpelah, of which he made a burying-place for his family*

Kirjath-Arba, the Hebron of subsequent times, became from henceforward

his favourite dwelling-place, and he was residing there when the

Elamites invaded the valley of Siddîm, and carried off Lot among their

prisoners.

* _Gen_. xiii. 18, xxiii. (Elohistic narrative). The tombs

of the patriarchs are believed by the Mohammedans to exist

to the present day in the cave which is situated within the

enclosure of the mosque at Hebron, and the tradition on

which this belief is based goes back to early Christian

times.

Abraham set out in pursuit of them, and succeeded in delivering his

nephew.* God (Jahveh) not only favoured him on every occasion, but

expressed His will to extend over Abraham’s descendants His sheltering

protection. He made a covenant with him, enjoining the use on the

occasion of the mysterious rites employed among the nations when

effecting a treaty of peace. Abraham offered up as victims a heifer, a

goat, and a three-year-old ram, together with a turtle-dove and a young

pigeon; he cut the animals into pieces, and piling them in two heaps,

waited till the evening. “And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep

fell upon Abraham; and lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him,”

and a voice from on high said to him: “Know of a surety that thy seed

shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them;

and they shall afflict them four hundred years; and also that nation,

whom they shall serve, will I judge: and afterward shall they come out

with great substance.... And it came to pass, that when the sun went

down, and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that

passed between those pieces.” Jahveh sealed the covenant by consuming the

offering.

* _Gen._ xiv. 12-24. 2 Gen. xv., Jehovistic narrative.

Two less important figures fill the interval between the Divine

prediction of servitude and its accomplishment. The birth of one of

them, Isaac, was ascribed to the Divine intervention at a period when

Sarah had given up all hope of becoming a mother. Abraham was sitting

at his tent door in the heat of the day, when three men presented

themselves before him, whom he invited to repose under the oak while he

prepared to offer them hospitality. After their meal, he who seemed to

be the chief of the three promised to return within a year, when Sarah

should be blessed with the possession of a son. The announcement came

from Jahveh, but Sarah was ignorant of the fact, and laughed to herself

within the tent on hearing this amazing prediction; for she said, “After

I am waxed old shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?” The child

was born, however, and was called Isaac, “the laugher,” in remembrance

of Sarah’s mocking laugh.* There is a remarkable resemblance between his

life and that of his father.** Like Abraham he dwelt near Hebron,***

and departing thence wandered with his household round the wells of

Beersheba. Like him he was threatened with the loss of his wife.

* _Gen_. xviii. 1-16, according to the Jehovistic narrative.

_Gen_. xvii. 15-22 gives another account, in which the

Elohistic writer predicts the birth of Isaac in a différent

way. The name of Isaac, “the laugher,” possibly abridged

from Isaak-el, “he on whom God smiles,” is explained in

three different ways: first, by the laugh of Abraham (ch.

xvii. 17); secondly, by that of Sarah (xviii. 12) when her

son’s birth was foretold to her; and lastly, by the laughter

of those who made sport of the delayed maternity of Sarah

(xxi. 6).

** Many critics see in the life of Isaac a colourless copy

of that of Abraham, while others, on the contrary, consider

that the primitive episodes belonged to the former, and that

the parallel portions of the two lives were borrowed from

the biography of the son to augment that of his father.

*** _Gen_. xxxv. 27, Elohistic narrative.

Like him, also, he renewed relations with Abîmelech of Gerar.* He married

his relative Rebecca, the granddaughter of Nâkhor and the sister of

Laban.** After twenty years of barrenness, his wife gave birth to twins,

Esau and Jacob, who contended with each other from their mother’s womb,

and whose descendants kept up a perpetual feud. We know how Esau, under

the influence of his appetite, deprived himself of the privileges of

his birthright, and subsequently went forth to become the founder of

the Edomites. Jacob spent a portion of his youth in Padan-Aram; here he

served Laban for the hands of his cousins Rachel and Leah; then, owing

to the bad faith of his uncle, he left him secretly, after twenty

years’ service, taking with him his wives and innumerable flocks. At

first he wandered aimlessly along the eastern bank of the Jordan,

where Jahveh revealed Himself to him in his troubles. Laban pursued and

overtook him, and, acknowledging his own injustice, pardoned him for

having taken flight. Jacob raised a heap of stones on the site of

their encounter, known at Mizpah to after-ages as the “Stone of Witness

“--G-al-Ed (Galeed).*** This having been accomplished, his difficulties

began with his brother Esau, who bore him no good will.

* _Gen._ xxvi. 1--31, Jehovistic narrative. In _Gen._ xxv.

11 an Elohistic interpolation makes Isaac also dwell in the

south, near to the “Well of the Living One Who seeth me.”

** _Gen._ xxiv., where two narratives appear to have been

amalgamated; in the second of these, Abraham seems to have

played no part, and Eliezer apparently conducted Rebecca

direct to her husband Isaac (vers. 61-67).

*** _Gen._ xxxi. 45-54, where the writer evidently traces

the origin of the word Gilead to Gal-Ed. We gather from the

context that the narrative was connected with the cairn at

Mizpah which separated the Hebrew from the Aramæan speaking

peoples.

One night, at the ford of the Jabbok, when he had fallen behind his

companions, “there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the

day,” without prevailing against him. The stranger endeavoured to escape

before daybreak, but only succeeded in doing so at the cost of giving

Jacob his blessing. “What is thy name? And he said, Jacob. And he

said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for thou hast

striven with God and with men, and hast prevailed.” Jacob called the

place Penîel, “for,” said he, “I have seen God face to face, and my life

is preserved.” The hollow of his thigh was “strained as he wrestled with

him,” and he became permanently lame.* Immediately after the struggle

he met Esau, and endeavoured to appease him by his humility, building a

house for him, and providing booths for his cattle, so as to secure for

his descendants the possession of the land. From this circumstance the

place received the name of Succôth--the “Booths “--by which appellation

it was henceforth known. Another locality where Jahveh had met Jacob

while he was pitching his tents, derived from this fact the designation

of the “Two Hosts”--Mahanaîm.** On the other side of the river, at

Shechem,*** at Bethel,**** and at Hebron, near to the burial-place of

his family, traces of him are everywhere to be found blent with those of

Abraham.

* _Gen._ xxxii. 22-32. This is the account of the Jehovistic

writer. The Elohist gives a different version of the

circumstances which led to the change of name from Jacob to

Israel; he places the scene at Bethel, and suggests no

precise etymology for the name Israel (_Gen._ xxxv. 9-15).

** _Gen._ xxxii. 2, 3, where the theophany is indicated

rather than directly stated.

*** _Gen._ xxxiii. 18-20. Here should be placed the episode

of Dinah seduced by an Amorite prince, and the consequent

massacre of the inhabitants by Simeon and Levi (_Gen._

xxxiv.). The almost complete dispersion of the two tribes of

Simeon and Levi is attributed to this massacre: cf. _Gen._

xlix. 5-7.

**** _Gen._ xxxv. 1-15, where is found the Elohistic version

(9-15) of the circumstances which led to the change of name

from Jacob to Israel.

By his two wives and their maids he had twelve sons. Leah was the mother

of Keuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zabulon; Gad. and Asher

were the children of his slave Zilpah; while Joseph and Benjamin were

the only sons of Rachel--Dan and Naphtali being the offspring of her

servant Bilhah. The preference which his father showed to him caused

Joseph to be hated by his brothers; they sold him to a caravan of

Midianites on their way to Egypt, and persuaded Jacob that a wild beast

had devoured him. Jahveh was, however, with Joseph, and “made all that

he did to prosper in his hand.” He was bought by Potiphar, a great

Egyptian lord and captain of Pharaoh’s guard, who made him his overseer;

his master’s wife, however, “cast her eyes upon Joseph,” but finding

that he rejected her shameless advances, she accused him of having

offered violence to her person. Being cast into prison, he astonished

his companions in misfortune by his skill in reading dreams, and was

summoned to Court to interpret to the king his dream of the seven lean

kine who had devoured the seven fat kine, which he did by representing

the latter as seven years of abundance, of which the crops should be

swallowed up by seven years of famine. Joseph was thereupon raised by

Pharaoh to the rank of prime minister. He stored up the surplus of the

abundant harvests, and as soon as the famine broke out, distributed

the corn to the hunger-stricken people in exchange for their silver and

gold, and for their flocks and fields. Hence it was,that the whole

of the Nile valley, with the exception of the lands belonging to the

priests, gradually passed into the possession of the royal treasury.

Meanwhile his brethren, who also suffered from the famine, came down

into Egypt to buy corn. Joseph revealed himself to them, pardoned the

wrong they had done him, and presented them to the Pharaoh. “And Pharaoh

said unto Joseph, Say unto thy brethren, This do ye; lade your beasts,

and go, get you unto the land of Canaan: and take your father and your

household, and come unto me: and I will give you the good of the land of

Egypt, and ye shall eat the fat of the land.” Jacob thereupon raised his

camp and came to Beersheba, where he offered sacrifices to the God

of his father Isaac; and Jahveh commanded him to go down into Egypt,

saying, “I will there make of thee a great nation: I will go down with

thee into Egypt: and I will also surely bring thee up again: and Joseph

shall put his hand upon thine eyes.” The whole family were installed by

Pharaoh in the province of Goshen, as far as possible from the centres

of the native population, “for every shepherd is an abomination unto the

Egyptians.”

In the midst of these stern yet touching narratives in which the Hebrews

of the times of the Kings delighted to trace the history of their remote

ancestors, one important fact arrests our attention: the Beni-Israel

quitted Southern Syria and settled on the banks of the Nile. They

had remained for a considerable time in what was known later as the

mountains of Judah. Hebron had served as their rallying-point; the broad

but scantily watered wadys separating the cultivated lands from the

desert, were to them a patrimony, which they shared with the inhabitants

of the neighbouring towns. Every year, in the spring, they led their

flocks to browse on the thin herbage growing in the bottoms of the

valleys, removing them to another district only when the supply of

fodder was exhausted. The women span, wove, fashioned garments, baked

bread, cooked the viands, and devoted themselves to the care of the

younger children, whom they suckled beyond the usual period. The men

lived like the Bedouin--periods of activity alternating regularly with

times of idleness, and the daily routine, with its simple duties and

casual work, often gave place to quarrels for the possession of some

rich pasturage or some never-failing well.

A comparatively ancient tradition relates that the Hebrews arrived in

Egypt during the reign of Aphôbis, a Hyksôs king, doubtless one of the

Apôpi, and possibly the monarch who restored the monuments of the Theban

Pharaohs, and engraved his name on the sphinxes of Amenemhâît III. and

on the colossi of Mîrmâshâû.* The land which the Hebrews obtained is

that which, down to the present day, is most frequently visited by

nomads, who find there an uncertain hospitality.

* The year XVII. of Apôphis has been pointed out as the date

of their arrival, and this combination, probably proposed by

some learned Jew of Alexandria, was adopted by Christian

chroniclers. It is unsupported by any fact of Egyptian

history, but it rests on a series of calculations founded on

the information contained in the Bible. Starting from the

assumption that the Exodus must have taken place under

Ahmosîs, and that the children of Israel had been four

hundred and thirty years on the banks of the Nile, it was

found that the beginning of their sojourn fell under the

reign of the Apôphis mentioned by Josephus, and, to be still

more correct, in the XVIIth year of that prince.

The tribes of the isthmus of Suez are now, in fact, constantly shifting

from one continent to another, and their encampments in any place are

merely temporary. The lord of the soil must, if he desire to keep them

within his borders, treat them with the greatest prudence and tact.

Should the government displease them in any way, or appear to curtail

their liberty, they pack up their tents and take flight into the desert.

The district occupied by them one day is on the next vacated and left to

desolation. Probably the same state of things existed in ancient times,

and the border nomes on the east of the Delta were in turn inhabited or

deserted by the Bedouin of the period. The towns were few in number,

but a series of forts protected the frontier. These were mere

village-strongholds perched on the summit of some eminence, and

surrounded by a strip of cornland. Beyond the frontier extended a region

of bare rock, or a wide plain saturated with the ill-regulated surplus

water of the inundation. The land of Goshen was bounded by the cities of

Heliopolis on the south, Bubastis on the west, and Tanis and Mendes on

the north: the garrison at Avaris could easily keep watch over it and

maintain order within it, while they could at the same time defend it

from the incursions of the Monatiû and the Hîrû-Shâîtû.*

* Goshen comprised the provinces situated on the borders of

the cultivable cornland, and watered by the infiltration of

the Nile, which caused the growth of a vegetation sufficient

to support the flocks during a few weeks; and it may also

have included the imperfectly irrigated provinces which were

covered with pools and reedy swamps after each inundation.

The Beni-Israel throve in these surroundings so well adapted to their

traditional tastes. Even if their subsequent importance as a nation

has been over-estimated, they did not at least share the fate of many

foreign tribes, who, when transplanted into Egypt, waned and died out,

or, at the end of two or three generations, became merged in the native

population.* In pursuing their calling as shepherds, almost within sight

of the rich cities of the Nile valley, they never forsook the God of

their fathers to bow down before the Enneads or Triads of Egypt; whether

He was already known to them as Jahveh, or was worshipped under the

collective name of Elohîm, they served Him with almost unbroken fidelity

even in the presence of Râ and Osiris, of Phtah and Sûtkhû.

* We are told that when the Hebrews left Ramses, they were

“about six hundred thousand on foot that were men, beside

children. And a mixed multitude went up also with them; and

flocks and herds, even very much cattle” (_Exod._ xii. 37,

38).

The Hyksôs conquest had not in any way modified the feudal system of the

country. The Shepherd-kings must have inherited the royal domain just as

they found it at the close of the XIVth dynasty, but doubtless the whole

Delta, from Avaris to Sais, and from Memphis to Buto, was their personal

appanage. Their direct authority probably extended no further south than

the pyramids, and their supremacy over the fiefs of the Said was at best

precarious. The turbulent lords who shared among them the possession of

the valley had never lost their proud or rebellious spirit, and under

the foreign as under the native Pharaohs regulated their obedience

to their ruler by the energy he displayed, or by their regard for

the resources at his disposal. Thebes had never completely lost the

ascendency which it obtained over them at the fall of the Memphite

dynasty. The accession of the Xoite dynasty, and the arrival of the

Shepherd-kings, in relegating Thebes unceremoniously to a second rank,

had not discouraged it, or lowered its royal prestige in its own eyes or

in those of others: the lords of the south instinctively rallied around

it, as around their natural citadel, and their resources, combined with

its own, rendered it as formidable a power as that of the masters of the

Delta. If we had fuller information as to the history of this period, we

should doubtless see that the various Theban princes took occasion, as

in the Heracleopolitan epoch, to pick a quarrel with their sovereign

lord, and did not allow themselves to be discouraged by any check.*

* The length of time during which Egypt was subject to

Asiatic rule is not fully known. Historians are agreed in

recognizing the three epochs referred to in the narrative of

Manetho as corresponding with (1) the conquest and the six

first Hyksôs kings, including the XVth Theban dynasty; (2)

the complete submission of Egypt to the XVIth foreign

dynasty; (3) the war of independence during the XVIIth

dynasty, which consisted of two parallel series of kings,

the one Shepherds (Pharaohs), the other Thebans. There has

been considerable discussion as to the duration of the

oppression. The best solution is still that given by Erman,

according to whom the XVth dynasty lasted 284, the XVIth

234, and the XVIIth 143 years, or, in all, 661 years. The

invasion must, therefore, have taken place about 2346 B.C.,

or about the time when the Elamite power was at its highest.

The advent of the XVIth dynasty would fall about 2062 B.C.,

and the commencement of the war of independence between 1730

and 1720 B.C.

The period of hegemony attributed by the chronicles to the Hyksôs of the

XVIth dynasty was not probably, as far as they were concerned, years of

perfect tranquillity, or of undisputed authority. In inscribing their

sole names on the lists, the compilers denoted merely the shorter

or longer period during which their Theban vassals failed in their

rebellious efforts, and did not dare to assume openly the title or

ensigns of royalty. A certain Apôphis, probably the same who took the

prsenomen of Aqnûnrî, was reigning at Tanis when the decisive revolt

broke out, and Saqnûnrî Tiûâa I., who was the leader on the occasion,

had no other title of authority over the provinces of the south than

that of _hiqu,_ or regent. We are unacquainted with the cause of the

outbreak or with its sequel, and the Egyptians themselves seem to have

been not much better informed on the subject than ourselves. They gave

free flight to their fancy, and accommodated the details to their taste,

not shrinking from the introduction of daring fictions into the account.

A romance, which was very popular with the literati four or five hundred

years later, asserted that the real cause of the war was a kind of

religious quarrel. “It happened that the land of Egypt belonged to

the Fever-stricken, and, as there was no supreme king at that time, it

happened then that King Saqnûnrî was regent of the city of the south,

and that the Fever-stricken of the city of Râ were under the rule of

Râ-Apôpi in Avaris. The Whole Land tribute to the latter in manufactured

products, and the north did the same in all the good things of the

Delta. Now, the King Râ-Apôpi took to himself Sûtkhû for lord, and he

did not serve any other god in the Whole Land except Sûtkhû, and he

built a temple of excellent and everlasting work at the gate of the King

Râ-Apôpi, and he arose every morning to sacrifice the daily victims,

and the chief vassals were there with garlands of flowers, as it was

accustomed to be done for the temple of Phrâ-Harmâkhis.” Having finished

the temple, he thought of imposing upon the Thebans the cult of his god,

but as he shrank from employing force in such a delicate matter, he had

recourse to stratagem. He took counsel with his princes and generals,

but they were unable to propose any plan. The college of diviners and

scribes was more complaisant: “Let a messenger go to the regent of the

city of the South to tell him: The King Râ-Apôpi commands thee: ‘That

the hippopotami which are in the pool of the town are to be exterminated

in the pool, in order that slumber may come to me by day and by night.’

He will not be able to reply good or bad, and thou shalt send him

another messenger: The King Râ-Apôpi commands thee: ‘If the chief of the

South does not reply to my message, let him serve no longer any god but

Sûtkhû. But if he replies to it, and will do that which I tell him

to do, then I will impose nothing further upon him, and I will not in

future bow before any other god of the Whole Land than Amonrâ, king of

the gods!’” Another Pharaoh of popular romance, Nectanebo, possessed,

at a much later date, mares which conceived at the neighing of the

stallions of Babylon, and his friend Lycerus had a cat which went forth

every night to wring the necks of the cocks of Memphis:* the hippopotami

of the Theban lake, which troubled the rest of the King of Tanis, were

evidently of close kin to these extraordinary animals.

* Found in a popular story, which came in later times to be

associated with the traditions connected with Æsop.

The sequel is unfortunately lost. We may assume, however, without much

risk of error, that Saqnûnrî came forth safe and sound from the ordeal;

that Apôpi was taken in his own trap, and saw himself driven to the dire

extremity of giving up Sûtkhû for Amonrâ or of declaring war. He was

likely to adopt the latter alternative, and the end of the manuscript

would probably have related his defeat.

[Illustration: 106.jpg PALLATE OF Tiûâa]

Drawn from the original by Faucher-Gudin.

Hostilities continued for a century and a half from the time when

Saqnûnrî Tiûâa declared himself son of the Sun and king of the

two Egypts. From the moment in which he surrounded his name with a

cartouche, the princes of the Said threw in their lot with him, and the

XVIIth dynasty had its beginning on the day of his proclamation. The

strife at first was undecisive and without marked advantage to either

side: at length the Pharaoh whom the Greek copyists of Manetho call

Alisphragmouthosis, defeated the barbarians, drove them away from

Memphis and from the western plains of the Delta, and shut them up in

their entrenched camp at Avaris, between the Sebennytic branch of the

Nile and the Wady Tumilât. The monuments bearing on this period of

strife and misery are few in number, and it is a fortunate circumstance

if some insignificant object tarns up which would elsewhere be passed

over as unworthy of notice. One of the officials of Tiûâa I. has left us

his writing palette, on which the cartouches of his master are incised

with a rudeness baffling description.

We have also information of a prince of the blood, a king’s son, Tûaû,

who accompanied this same Pharaoh in his expeditions; and the Gîzeh

Museum is proud of having in its possession the i wooden sabre which

this individual placed on the mummy of a certain Aqhorû, to enable him

to defend himself against the monsters of the lower world. A second

Saqnûnrî Tiûâa succeeded the first, and like him was buried in a little

brick pyramid on the border of the Theban necropolis. At his death the

series of rulers was broken, and we meet with several names which

are difficult to classify--Sakhontinibrî, Sanakhtû-niri, Hotpûrî,

Manhotpûrî, Eâhotpû.*

* Hotpûrî and Manhotpûrî are both mentioned in the fragments

of a fantastic story (copied during the XXth dynasty), bits

of which are found in most European museums. In one of these

fragments, preserved in the Louvre, mention is made of

Hotpûrî’s tomb, certainly situated at Thebes; we possess

scarabs of this king, and Pétrie discovered at Coptos a

fragment of a stele bearing his name and titles, and

describing the works which he executed in the temples of the

town. The XIVth year of Manhotpûrî is mentioned in a passage

of the story as being the date of the death of a personage

born under Hotpûrî. These two kings belong, as far as we are

able to judge, to the middle of the XVIIth dynasty; I am

inclined to place beside them the Pharaoh Nûbhotpûrî, of

whom we possess a few rather coarse scarabs.

As we proceed, however, information becomes more plentiful, and the list

of reigns almost complete. The part which the princesses of older

times played in the transmission of power had, from the XIIth dynasty

downward, considerably increased in importance, and threatened to

overshadow that of the princes. The question presents itself whether,

during these centuries of perpetual warfare, there had not been a moment

when, all the males of the family having perished, the women alone

were left to perpetuate the solar race on the earth and to keep the

succession unbroken. As soon as the veil over this period of history

begins to be lifted, we distinguish among the personages emerging from

the obscurity as many queens as kings presiding over the destinies of

Egypt. The sons took precedence of the daughters when both were the

offspring of a brother and sister born of the same parents, and when,

consequently, they were of equal rank; but, on the other hand, the sons

forfeited this equality when there was any inferiority in origin on the

maternal side, and their prospect of succession to the throne diminished

in proportion to their mother’s remoteness from the line of Râ. In the

latter case all their sisters, born of marriages which to us appear

incestuous, took precedence of them, and the eldest daughter became the

legitimate Pharaoh, who sat in the seat of Horus on the death of her

father, or even occasionally during his lifetime. The prince whom she

married governed for her, and discharged those royal duties which could

be legally performed by a man only,--such as offering worship to the

supreme gods, commanding the army, and administering justice; but his

wife never ceased to be sovereign, and however small the intelligence

or firmness of which she might be possessed, her husband was obliged

to leave to her, at all events on certain occasions, the direction of

affairs.

[Illustration: 109.jpg NOFRÎTARI, FROM TUE WOODEN STATUETTE IN THE TURIN

MUSEUM]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Plinders

Pétrie.

At her death her children inherited the crown: their father had formally

to invest the eldest of them with royal, authority in the room of the

deceased, and with him he shared the externals, if not the reality, of

power.* It is doubtful whether the third Saq-nûnrî Tiûâa known to us--he

who added an epithet to his name, and was commonly known as Tiûâqni,

“Tiûâa the brave” ** --united in his person all the requisites of a

Pharaoh qualified to reign in his own right. However this may have been,

at all events his wife, Queen Ahhotpû, possessed them.

* Thus we find Thûtmosis I. formally enthroning his daughter

Hât-shopsîtû, towards the close of his reign.

** It would seem that the epithet Qeni ( = the brave, the

robust) did not form an indispensable part of his name, any

more than Ahmosi did of the names of members of the family

of Ahmosis, the conqueror of the Shepherds. It is to him

that the Tiûâa cartouche refers, which is to be found on the

statue mentioned by Daninos-Pasha, published by Bouriant,

and on which we find Ahmosis, a princess of the same name,

together with Queen Ahhotpû I.

His eldest son Ahmosû died prematurely; the two younger brothers, Kamosû

and a second Ahmosû, the Amosis of the Greeks, assumed the crown after

him. It is possible, as frequently happened, that their young sister

Ahmasi-Nofrîtari entered the harem of both brothers consecutively.

[Illustration: 110.jpg THE HEAD OF SAQNURI]

Drawn by Bouclier, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-Bey.

We cannot be sure that she was united to Kamosû, but at all events she

became the wife of Ahmosis, and the rights which she possessed, together

with those which her husband had inherited from their mother Ahhotpû,

gave him a legal claim such as was seldom enjoyed by the Pharaohs of

that period, so many of them being sovereigns merely _de facto,_ while

he was doubly king by right.

Tiûâqni, Kamosû,* and Ahmosis** quickly succeeded each other. Tiûâqni

very probably waged war against the Shepherds, and it is not known

whether he fell upon the field of battle or was the victim of some plot;

the appearance of his mummy proves that he died a violent death when

about forty years of age. Two or three men, whether assassins or

soldiers, must have surrounded and despatched him before help was

available. A blow from an axe must have severed part of his left cheek,

exposed the teeth, fractured the jaw, and sent him senseless to the

ground; another blow must have seriously injured the skull, and a dagger

or javelin has cut open the forehead on the right side, a little above

the eye. His body must have remained lying where it fell for some

time: when found, decomposition had set in, and the embalming had to

be hastily performed as best it might. The hair is thick, rough, and

matted; the face had been shaved on the morning of his death, but by

touching the cheek we can ascertain how harsh and abundant the hair must

have been. The mummy is that of a fine, vigorous man, who might have

lived to a hundred years, and he must have defended himself resolutely

against his assailants; his features bear even now an expression of

fury. A flattened patch of exuded brain appears above one eye, the

forehead is wrinkled, and the lips, which are drawn back in a circle

about the gums, reveal the teeth still biting into the tongue. Kamosû

did not reign long; we know nothing of the events of his life, but we

owe to him one of the prettiest examples of the Egyptian goldsmith’s

art--the gold boat mounted on a carriage of wood and bronze, which

was to convey his double on its journeys through Hades. This boat was

afterwards appropriated by his mother Ahhotpû.

* With regard to Kamosû, we possess, in addition to the

miniature bark which was discovered on the sarcophagus of

Queen Ahhotpû, and which is now in the museum at Gîzeh, a

few scattered references to his worship existing on the

monuments, on a stele at Gîzeh, on a table of offerings in

the Marseilles Museum, and in the list of princes worshipped

by the “servants of the Necropolis.” His pyramid was at Drah-

Abu’l-Neggah, beside those of Ilûâa and Amenôthês I.

** The name Amosû or Ahmosi is usually translated “Child of

the Moon-god” the real meaning is, “the Moon-god has brought

forth,” “him” or “her” (referring to the person who bears

the name) being understood.

Ahmosisa must have been about twenty-five years of age when he ascended

the throne; he was of medium height, as his body when mummied measured

only 5 feet 6 inches in length, but the development of the neck and

chest indicates extraordinary strength. The head is small in proportion

to the bust, the forehead low and narrow, the cheek-bones project, and

the hair is thick and wavy. The face exactly resembles that of Tiûâcrai,

and the likeness alone would proclaim the affinity, even if we were

ignorant of the close relationship which united these two Pharaohs.*

Ahmosis seems to have been a strong, active, warlike man; he was

successful in all the wars in which we know him to have been engaged,

and he ousted the Shepherds from the last towns occupied by them. It is

possible that modern writers have exaggerated the credit due to Ahmosis

for expelling the Hyksôs. He found the task already half accomplished,

and the warfare of his forefathers for at least a century must have

prepared the way for his success; if he appears to have played the most

important _rôle_ in the history of the deliverance, it is owing to our

ignorance of the work of others, and he thus benefits by the oblivion

into which their deeds have passed. Taking this into consideration, we

must still admit that the Shepherds, even when driven into Avaris, were

not adversaries to be despised. Forced by the continual pressure of the

Egyptian armies into this corner of the Delta, they were as a compact

body the more able to make a protracted resistance against very superior

forces.

* Here again my description is taken from the present

appearance of the mummy, which is now in the Gîzeh Museum.

It is evident, from the inspection which I have made, that

Ahmosis was about fifty years old at the time of his death,

and, allowing him to have reigned twenty-five years, he must

have been twenty-five or twenty-six when he came to the

throne.

[Illustration: 113.jpg THE SMALL GOLD VOTIVE BARQUE OF PHARAOH KAMOSÛ,

IN THE GÎZEH MUSEUM.]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Émil Brugsch-Bey.

The impenetrable marshes of Menzaleh on the north, and the desert of the

Red Sea on the south, completely covered both their wings; the shifting

network of the branches of the Nile, together with the artificial

canals, protected them as by a series of moats in front, while Syria in

their rear offered them inexhaustible resources for revictualling their

troops, or levying recruits among tribes of kindred race. As long as

they could hold their ground there, a re-invasion was always possible;

one victory would bring them to Memphis, and the whole valley would

again fall under then-suzerainty. Ahmosis, by driving them from their

last stronghold, averted this danger. It is, therefore, not without

reason that the official chroniclers of later times separated him from

his ancestors and made him the head of a new dynasty.

[Illustration: 114.jpg Page Image]

His predecessors had in reality been merely Pharaohs on sufferance,

ruling in the south within the confines of their Theban principality,

gaining in power, it is true, with every generation, but never able to

attain to the suzerainty of the whole country. They were reckoned in

the XVIIth dynasty together with the Hyksôs sovereigns of uncontested

legitimacy, while their successors were chosen to constitute

the XVIIIth, comprising Pharaohs with full powers, tolerating no

competitors, and uniting under their firm rule the two regions of

which Egypt was composed--the possessions of Sit and the possessions of

Horus.*

* Manetho, or his abridgers, call the king who drove out the

Shepherds Amôsis or Tethmôsis. Lepsius thought he saw

grounds for preferring the second reading, and identified

this Tethmôsis with Thûtmosi Manakhpirri, the ïhûtmosis III.

of our lists; Ahmosis could only have driven out the greater

part of the nation. This theory, to which Naville still

adheres, as also does Stindorff, was disputed nearly fifty

years ago by E. de Rougé; nowadays we are obliged to admit

that, subsequent to the Vth year of Ahmosis, there were no

longer Shepherd-kings in Egypt, even though a part of the

conquering race may have remained in the country in a state

of slavery, as we shall soon have occasion to observe.

The war of deliverance broke out on the accession of Ahmosis, and

continued during the first five years of his reign.* One of his

lieutenants, the king’s namesake--Âhmosi-si-Abîna--who belonged to the

family of the lords of Nekhabît, has left us an account, in one of the

inscriptions in his tomb, of the numerous exploits in which he took part

side by side with his royal master, and thus, thanks to this fortunate

record of his vanity, we are not left in complete ignorance of the

events which took place during this crucial struggle between the Asiatic

settlers and their former subjects. Nekhabît had enjoyed considerable

prosperity in the earlier ages of Egyptian history, marking as it

did the extreme southern limit of the kingdom, and forming an outpost

against the barbarous tribes of Nubia. As soon as the progress of

conquest had pushed the frontier as far south as the first cataract,

it declined in importance, and the remembrance of its former greatness

found an echo only in proverbial expressions or in titles used at the

Pharaonic court.* The nomes situated to the south of Thebes, unlike

those of Middle Egypt, did not comprise any extensive fertile or

well-watered territory calculated to enrich its possessors or to afford

sufficient support for a large population: they consisted of long strips

of alluvial soil, shut in between the river and the mountain range,

but above the level of the inundation, and consequently difficult to

irrigate.

* This is evident from passage in the biography of Ahmosi-

si-Abîna, where it is stated that, after the taking of

Avaris, the king passed into Asia in the year VI. The first

few lines of the _Great Inscription of El-Kab_ seem to refer

to four successive campaigns, i.e. four years of warfare up

to the taking of Avaris, and to a fifth year spent in

pursuing the Shepherds into Syria.

** The vulture of Nekhabît is used to indicate the south,

while the urseus of Buto denotes the extreme north; the

title Râ-Nekhnît, “Chief of Nekhnît,” which is,

hypothetically, supposed to refer to a judicial function, is

none the less associated with the expression, “Nekhabît-

Tekhnît,” as an indication of the south, and, therefore,

can be traced to the prehistoric epoch when Nekhabît was the

primary designation of the south.

[Illustration: 116.jpg THE WALLS OF EL-KAB SEEN FROM THE TOMB OF PIHIRI]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-Bey.

[Illustration: 116a.jpg COLLECTION OF VASES] MODELLED AND PAINTED IN THE

GRAND TEMPLE. PHILAE ISLAND.

These nomes were cultivated, moreover, by a poor and sparse population.

It needed a fortuitous combination of circumstances to relieve them from

their poverty-stricken condition--either a war, which would bring into

prominence their strategic positions; or the establishment of

markets, such as those of Syênê and Elephantine, where the commerce

of neighbouring regions would naturally centre; or the erection, as at

Ombos or Adfû, of a temple which would periodically attract a crowd

of pilgrims. The principality of the Two Feathers comprised, besides

Nekhabît, ât least two such towns--Anît, on its northern boundary, and

Nekhnît almost facing Nekhabît on the left bank of the river.* These

three towns sometimes formed separate estates for as many independent

lords:** even when united they constituted a fiefdom of but restricted

area and of slender revenues, its chiefs ranking below those of the

great feudal princes of Middle Egypt. The rulers of this fiefdom led an

obscure existence during the whole period of the Memphite empire, and

when at length Thebes gained the ascendency, they rallied to the latter

and acknowledged her suzerainty. One of them, Sovkûnakhîti, gained the

favour of Sovkhotpû III. Sakhemûaztaûirî, who granted him lands which

made the fortune of his house; another of them, Aï, married Khonsu,

one of the daughters of Sovkûmsaûf I. and his Queen Nûbkhâs, and it is

possible that the misshapen pyramid of Qûlah, the most southern in Egypt

proper, was built for one of these royally connected personages.

* Nekhnît is the Hieracônpolis of Greek and Roman times,

Hâît-Baûkû, the modern name of which is Kom-el-Ahmar.

** Pihiri was, therefore, prince of Nekhabît and of Anît at

one and the same time, whereas the town of Nekhnît had its

own special rulers, several of whom are known to us from the

tombs at Kom-el-Ahmar.

The descendants of Aï attached themselves faithfully to the Pharaohs

of the XVIIth dynasty, and helped them to the utmost in their struggle

against the invaders. Their capital, Nekhabît, was situated between the

Nile and the Arabian chain, at the entrance to a valley which penetrates

some distance into the desert, and leads to the gold-mines on the Red

Sea. The town profited considerably from the precious metals brought

into it by the caravans, and also from the extraction of natron, which

from prehistoric times was largely employed in embalming. It had been

a fortified place from the outset, and its walls, carefully repaired

by successive ages, were still intact at the beginning of this century.

They described at this time a rough quadrilateral, the two longer sides

of which measured some 1900 feet in length, the two shorter being about

one-fourth less. The southern face was constructed in a fashion common

in brick buildings in Egypt, being divided into alternate panels of

horizontally laid courses, and those in which the courses were concave;

on the north and west façades the bricks were so laid as to present

an undulating arrangement running uninterruptedly from one end to the

other. The walls are 33 feet thick, and their average height 27 feet;

broad and easy steps lead to the foot-walk on the top. The gates are

unsymmetrically placed, there being one on the north, east, and west

sides respectively; while the southern side is left without an opening.

These walls afforded protection to a dense but unequally distributed

population, the bulk of which was housed towards the north and west

sides, where the remains of an immense number of dwellings may still

be seen. The temples were crowded together in a small square enclosure,

concentric with the walls of the enceinte, and the principal sanctuary

was dedicated to Nekhabît, the vulture goddess, who gave her name to the

city.* This enclosure formed a kind of citadel, where the garrison could

hold out when the outer part had fallen into the enemy’s hands. The

times were troublous; the open country was repeatedly wasted by war, and

the peasantry had more than once to seek shelter behind the protecting

ramparts of the town, leaving their lands to lie fallow.

* A part of the latter temple, that which had been rebuilt

in the Saîte epoch, was still standing at the beginning of

the XIXth century, with columns bearing the cartouches of

Hakori; it was destroyed about the year 1825, and

Champollion found only the foundations of the walls.

[Illustration: 119.jpg THE RUINS OF THE PYRAMID OF QÛLAH, NEAR

MOHAMMERIEH]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-

Bey.

Famine constantly resulted from these disturbances, and it taxed all the

powers of the ruling prince to provide at such times for his people. A

chief of the Commissariat, Bebî by name, who lived about this period,

gives us a lengthy account of the number of loaves, oxen, goats, and

pigs, which he allowed to all the inhabitants both great and little,

down even to the quantity of oil and incense, which he had taken care to

store up for them: his prudence was always justified by the issue, for

“during the many years in which the famine recurred, he distributed

grain in the city to all those who hungered.”

Babaî, the first of the lords of El-Kab whose name has come down to

us, was a captain in the service of Saqnûnrî Tiûâqni.* His son Ahmosi,

having approached the end of his career, cut a tomb for himself in the

hill which overlooks the northern side of the town. He relates on

the walls of his sepulchre, for the benefit of posterity, the most

praiseworthy actions of his long life. He had scarcely emerged from

childhood when he was called upon to act for his father, and before his

marriage he was appointed to the command of the barque _The Calf._ From

thence he was promoted to the ship _The North_, and on account of his

activity he was chosen to escort his namesake the king on foot, whenever

he drove in his chariot. He repaired to his post at the moment when the

decisive war against the Hyksôs broke out.

* There are still some doubts as to the descent of this

Ahmosi. Some authorities hold that Babai was the name of his

father and Abîna that of his grandfather; others think that

Babai was his father and Abîna his mother; others, again,

make out Babai and Abîna to be variants of the same name,

probably a Semitic one, borne by the father of Ahmosi; the

majority of modern Egyptologists (including myself) regard

this last hypothesis as being the most probable one.

The tradition current in the time of the Ptolemies reckoned the number

of men under the command of King Ahmosis when he encamped before

Avaris at 480,000. This immense multitude failed to bring matters to a

successful issue, and the siege dragged on indefinitely. The king afc

length preferred to treat with the Shepherds, and gave them permission

to retreat into Syria safe and sound, together with their wives, their

children, and all their goods. This account, however, in no way agrees

with the all too brief narration of events furnished by the inscription

in the tomb. The army to which Egypt really owed its deliverance was

not the undisciplined rabble of later tradition, but, on the contrary,

consisted of troops similar to those which subsequently invaded Syria,

some 15,000 to 20,000 in number, fully equipped and ably officered,

supported, moreover, by a fleet ready to transfer them across the canals

and arms of the river in a vigorous condition and ready for the battle.*

* It may be pointed out that Ahmosi, son of Abîna, was a

sailor and a leader of sailors; that he passed from one

vessel to another, until he was at length appointed to the

command of one of the most important ships in the royal

fleet. Transport by water always played considerable part in

the wars which were carried on in Egyptian territory; I have

elsewhere drawn attention to campaigns conducted in this

manner under the Horacleopolitan dynasties, and we shall see

that the Ethiopian conquerors adopted the same mode of

transit in the course of their invasion of Egypt.

As soon as this fleet arrived at the scene of hostilities, the

engagement began. Ahmosi-si-Abîna conducted the manouvres under the

king’s eye, and soon gave such evidence of his capacity, that he was

transferred by royal favour to the _Rising in Memphis_--a vessel with

a high freeboard. He was shortly afterwards appointed to a post in a

division told off for duty on the river Zadiku, which ran under the

walls of the enemy’s fortress.* Two successive and vigorous attacks

made in this quarter were barren of important results. Ahmosi-si-Abîna

succeeded in each of the attacks in killing an enemy, bringing back as

trophies a hand of each of his victims, and his prowess, made known to

the king by one of the heralds, twice procured for him, “the gold of

valour,” probably in the form of collars, chains, or bracelets.**

* The name of this canal was first recognised by Brugsch,

then misunderstood and translated “the water bearing the

name of the water of Avaris.” It is now road “Zadikû,” and,

with the Egyptian article, Pa-zadikû, or Pzadikû. The name

is of Semitic origin, and is derived from the root meaning

“to be just;” we do not know to which of the watercourses

traversing the east of the Delta it ought to be applied.

** The fact that the attacks from this side were not

successful is proved by the sequel. If they had succeeded,

as is usually supposed, the Egyptians would not have fallen

back on another point further south in order to renew the

struggle.

[Illustration: 122.jpg THE TOMBS OF THE PRINCES OF NEKHABÎT, IN THE

HILLSIDE ABOVE EL-KAB]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-Bey.

The assault having been repulsed in this quarter, the Egyptians made

their way towards the south, and came into conflict with the enemy at

the village of Taqimît.* Here, again, the battle remained undecided,

but Ahmosi-si-Abîna had an adventure. He had taken a prisoner, and in

bringing him back lost himself, fell into a muddy ditch, and, when he

had freed himself from the dirt as well as he could, pursued his way

by mistake for some time in the direction of Avaris. He found out his

error, however, before it was too late, came back to the camp safe

and sound, and received once more some gold as a reward of his brave

conduct. A second attack upon the town was crowned with complete

success; it was taken by storm, given over to pillage, and

Ahmosi-si-Abîna succeeded in capturing one man and three women, who were

afterwards, at the distribution of the spoil, given to him as slaves.**

The enemy evacuated in haste the last strongholds which they held in

the east of the Delta, and took refuge in the Syrian provinces on the

Egyptian frontier. Whether it was that they assumed here a menacing

attitude, or whether Ahmosis hoped to deal them a crushing blow before

they could find time to breathe, or to rally around them sufficient

forces to renew the offensive, he made up his mind to cross the

frontier, which he did in the 5th year of his reign.

* The site of Taqimît is unknown.

** The prisoner who was given to Ahmosis after the victory,

is probably Paâmû, the Asiatic, mentioned in the list of his

slaves which he had engraved on one of the walls of his

tomb.

It was the first time for centuries that a Pharaoh had trusted himself

in Asia, and the same dread of the unknown which had restrained his

ancestors of the XIIth dynasty, doubtless arrested Ahmosis also on the

threshold of the continent. He did not penetrate further than the border

provinces of Zahi, situated on the edge of the desert, and contented

himself with pillaging the little town of Sharûhana.* Ahmosi-si-Abîna

was again his companion, together with his cousin, Ahmosi-Pannekhabit,

then at the beginning of his career, who brought away on this occasion

two young girls for his household.**

* Sharûhana, which is mentioned again under Thûtmosis III.

is not the plain of Sharon, as Birch imagined, but the

Sharuhen of the Biblical texts, in the tribe of Simeon

(_Josh._ xix. 6), as Brugsch recognised it to be. It is

probably identical with the modern Tell-esh-Sheriâh, which

lies north-west of Beersheba.

** Ahmosi Pannekhabit lay in tomb No. 2, at El-Kab. His

history is briefly told on one of the walls, and on two

sides of the pedestal of his statues. We have one of these,

or rather two plates from the pedestal of one of them, in

the Louvre; the other is in a good state of preservation,

and belongs to Mr. Finlay. The inscription is found in a

mutilated condition on the wall of the tomb, but the three

monuments which have come down to us are sufficiently

complementary to one another to enable us to restore nearly

the whole of the original text.

The expedition having accomplished its purpose, the Egyptians returned

home with their spoil, and did not revisit Asia for a long period. If

the Hyksôs generals had fostered in their minds the idea that they could

recover their lost ground, and easily re-enter upon the possession of

their African domain, this reverse must have cruelly disillusioned them.

They must have been forced to acknowledge that their power was at an

end, and to renounce all hope of returning to the country which had so

summarily ejected them. The majority of their own people did not follow

them into exile, but remained attached to the soil on which they

lived, and the tribes which had successively settled down beside

them--including the Beni-Israel themselves--no longer dreamed of

a return to their fatherland. The condition of these people varied

according to their locality. Those who had taken up a position in the

plain of the Delta were subjected to actual slavery. Ahmosis destroyed

the camp at Avails, quartered his officers in the towns, and constructed

forts at strategic points, or rebuilt the ancient citadels to resist the

incursions of the Bedouin. The vanquished people in the Delta, hemmed in

as they were by a network of fortresses, were thus reduced to a rabble

of serfs, to be taxed and subjected to the _corvée_ without mercy.

But further north, the fluctuating population which roamed between the

Sebennytic and Pelusiac branches of the Nile were not exposed to such

rough treatment. The marshes of the coast-line afforded them a safe

retreat, in which they could take refuge at the first threat of

exactions on the part of the royal emissaries. Secure within dense

thickets, upon islands approached by interminable causeways, often

covered with water, or by long tortuous canals concealed in the thick

growth of reeds, they were able to defy with impunity the efforts of the

most disciplined troops, and treason alone could put them at the mercy

of their foes. Most of the Pharaohs felt that the advantages to be

gained by conquering them would be outweighed by the difficulty of

the enterprise; all that could result from a campaign would be the

destruction of one or two villages, the acquisition of a few hundred

refractory captives, of some ill-favoured cattle, and a trophy of nets

and worm-eaten boats. The kings, therefore, preferred to keep a close

watch over these undisciplined hordes, and as long as their depredations

were kept within reasonable limits, they were left unmolested to their

wild and precarious life.

The Asiatic invasion had put a sudden stop to the advance of Egyptian

rule in the vast plains of the Upper Nile. The Theban princes, to whom

Nubia was directly subject, had been too completely engrossed in

the wars against their hereditary enemy, to devote much time to the

continuation of that work of colonization in the south which had been

carried on so vigorously by their forefathers of the XIIth and XIIIth

dynasties. The inhabitants of the Nile valley, as far as the second

cataract, rendered them obedience, but without any change in the

conditions and mode of their daily life, which appear to have remained

unaltered for centuries. The temples of Usirtasen and Amenemhaît

were allowed to fall into decay one after another, the towns waned in

prosperity, and were unable to keep their buildings and monuments in

repair; the inundation continued to bring with it periodically its

fleet of boats, which the sailors of Kûsh had laden with timber, gum,

elephants’ tusks, and gold dust: from time to time a band of Bedouin from

Uaûaît or Mazaiû would suddenly bear down upon some village and carry

off its spoils; the nearest garrison would be called to its aid, or, on

critical occasions, the king himself, at the head of his guards, would

fall on the marauders and drive them back into the mountains. Ahrnosis,

being greeted on his return from Syria by the news of such an outbreak,

thought it a favourable moment to impress upon the nomadic tribes of

Nubia the greatness of his conquest. On this occasion it was the people

of Khonthanûnofir, settled in the wadys east of the Nile, above Semneh,

which required a lesson. The army which had just expelled the Hyksôs was

rapidly conveyed to the opposite borders of the country by the fleet,

the two Ahmosi of Nekhabît occupying the highest posts. The Egyptians,

as was customary, landed at the nearest point to the enemy’s territory,

and succeeded in killing a few of the rebels. Ahmosi-si-Abîna brought

back two prisoners and three hands, for which he was rewarded by a gift

of two female Bedouin slaves, besides the “gold of valour.” This victory

in the south following on such decisive success in the north, filled the

heart of the Pharaoh with pride, and the view taken of it by those who

surrounded him is evident even in the brief sentences of the narrative.

He is described as descending the river on the royal galley, elated

in spirit and flushed by his triumph in Nubia, which had followed so

closely on the deliverance of the Delta. But scarcely had he reached

Thebes, when an unforeseen catastrophe turned his confidence into alarm,

and compelled him to retrace his steps. It would appear that at the

very moment when he was priding himself on the successful issue of his

Ethiopian expedition, one of the sudden outbreaks, which frequently

occurred in those regions, had culminated in a Sudanese invasion of

Egypt. We are not told the name of the rebel leader, nor those of the

tribes who took part in it. The Egyptian people, threatened in a moment

of such apparent security by this inroad of barbarians, regarded them

as a fresh incursion of the Hyksôs, and applied to these southerners

the opprobrious term of “Fever-stricken,” already used to denote their

Asiatic conquerors. The enemy descended the Nile, committing terrible

atrocities, and polluting every sanctuary of the Theban gods which came

within their reach. They had reached a spot called Tentoâ,* before they

fell in with the Egyptian troops. Ahmosi-si-Abîna again distinguished

himself in the engagement. The vessel which he commanded, probably the

_Rising in Memphis_, ran alongside the chief galliot of the Sudanese

fleet, and took possession of it after a struggle, in which Ahmosi

made two of the enemy’s sailors prisoners with his own hand. The king

generously rewarded those whose valour had thus turned the day in his

favour, for the danger had appeared to him critical; he allotted to

every man on board the victorious vessel five slaves, and five ancra of

land situated in his native province of each respectively. The invasion

was not without its natural consequences to Egypt itself.

* The name of this locality does not occur elsewhere; it

would seem to refer, not to a village, but rather to a

canal, or the branch of a river, or a harbour somewhere

along the Nile. I am unable to locate it definitely, but am

inclined to think we ought to look for it, if not in Egypt

itself, at any rate in that part of Nubia which is nearest

to Egypt. M. Revillout, taking up a theory which had been

abandoned by Chabas, recognising in this expedition an

offensive incursion of the Shepherds, suggests that Tantoâ

may be the modern Tantah in the Delta.

A certain Titiânu, who appears to have been at the head of a powerful

faction, rose in rebellion at some place not named in the narrative, but

in the rear of the army. The rapidity with which Ahmosis repulsed the

Nubians, and turned upon his new enemy, completely baffled the latter’s

plans, and he and his followers were cut to pieces, but the danger

had for the moment been serious.* It was, if not the last expedition

undertaken in this reign, at least the last commanded by the Pharaoh in

person. By his activity and courage Ahmosis had well earned the right to

pass the remainder of his days in peace.

* The wording of the text is so much condensed that it is

difficult to be sure of its moaning. Modern scholars agree

with Brugsch that Titiânu is the name of a man, but several

Egyptologists believe its bearer to have been chief of the

Ethiopian tribes, while others think him to have been a

rebellious Egyptian prince, or a king of the Shepherds, or

give up the task of identification in despair. The tortuous

wording of the text, and the expressions which occur in it,

seem to indicate that the rebel was a prince of the royal

blood, and even that the name he bears was not his real one.

Later on we shall find that, on a similar occasion, the

official documents refer to a prince who took part in a plot

against Ramses III. by the fictitious name of Pentauîrît;

Titiânu was probably a nickname of the same kind inserted in

place of the real name. It seems that, in cases of high

treason, the criminal not only lost his life, but his name

was proscribed both in this world and in the next.

A revival of military greatness always entailed a renaissance in art,

followed by an age of building activity. The claims of the gods upon the

spoils of war must be satisfied before those of men, because the victory

and the booty obtained through it were alike owing to the divine help

given in battle. A tenth, therefore, of the slaves, cattle, and precious

metals was set apart for the service of the gods, and even fields,

towns, and provinces were allotted to them, the produce of which was

applied to enhance the importance of their cult or to repair and enlarge

their temples. The main body of the building was strengthened, halls and

pylons were added to the original plan, and the impulse once given to

architectural work, the co-operation of other artificers soon

followed. Sculptors and painters whose art had been at a standstill for

generations during the centuries of Egypt’s humiliation, and whose

hands had lost their cunning for want of practice, were now once more in

demand. They had probably never completely lost the technical knowledge

of their calling, and the ancient buildings furnished them with various

types of models, which they had but to copy faithfully in order to

revive their old traditions. A few years after this revival a new school

sprang up, whose originality became daily more patent, and whose leaders

soon showed themselves to be in no way inferior to the masters of the

older schools. Ahmosis could not be accused of ingratitude to the gods;

as soon as his wars allowed him the necessary leisure, he began his work

of temple-building. The accession to power of the great Theban families

had been of little advantage to Thebes itself. Its Pharaohs, on assuming

the sovereignty of the whole valley, had not hesitated to abandon their

native city, and had made Heracleopolis, the Fayum or even Memphis,

their seat of government, only returning to Thebes in the time of the

XIIIth dynasty, when the decadence of their power had set in. The honour

of furnishing rulers for its country had often devolved on Thebes,

but the city had reaped but little benefit from the fact; this time,

however, the tide of fortune was to be turned. The other cities of Egypt

had come to regard Thebes as their metropolis from the time when they

had temples. The main body of the building was strengthened, halls and

pylons were added to the original plan, and the impulse once given to

architectural work, the co-operation of other artificers soon

followed. Sculptors and painters whose art had been at a standstill for

generations during the centuries of Egypt’s humiliation, and whose

hands had lost their cunning for want of practice, were now once more in

demand. They had probably never completely lost the technical knowledge

of their calling, and the ancient buildings furnished them with various

types of models, which they had but to copy faithfully in order to

revive their old traditions. A few years after this revival a new school

sprang up, whose originality became daily more patent, and whose leaders

soon showed themselves to be in no way inferior to the masters of the

older schools. Ahmosis could not be accused of ingratitude to the gods;

as soon as his wars allowed him the necessary leisure, he began his work

of temple-building. The accession to power of the great Theban families

had been of little advantage to Thebes itself. Its Pharaohs, on assuming

the sovereignty of the whole valley, had not hesitated to abandon their

native city, and had made Heracleopolis, the Fayum or even Memphis,

their seat of government, only returning to Thebes in the time of the

XIIIth dynasty, when the decadence of their power had set in. The honour

of furnishing rulers for its country had often devolved on Thebes,

but the city had reaped but little benefit from the fact; this time,

however, the tide of fortune was to be turned.

[Illustration: 130.jpg PAINTING IN TOMB OF THE KINGS THEBES]

The other cities of Egypt had come to regard Thebes as their metropolis

from the time when they had learned to rally round its princes to wage

war against the Hyksôs. It had been the last town to lay down arms at

the time of the invasion, and the first to take them up again in the

struggle for liberty. Thus the Egypt which vindicated her position among

the nations of the world was not the Egypt of the Memphite dynasties. It

was the great Egypt of the Amenemhâîts and the Usirtasens, still further

aggrandised by recent victories. Thebes was her natural capital, and

its kings could not have chosen a more suitable position from whence to

command effectually the whole empire. Situated at an equal distance from

both frontiers, the Pharaoh residing there, on the outbreak of a war

either in the north or south, had but half the length of the country to

traverse in order to reach the scene of action. Ahmosis spared no pains

to improve the city, but his resources did not allow of his embarking on

any very extensive schemes; he did not touch the temple of Amon, and

if he undertook any buildings in its neighbourhood, they must have been

minor edifices. He could, indeed, have had but little leisure to attempt

much else, for it was not till the XXIInd year of his reign that he was

able to set seriously to work.*

* In the inscription of the year XXII., Âhmosis expressly

states that he opened new chambers in the quarries of Tûrah

for the works in connection with the Theban Amon, as well as

for those of the temple of the Memphite Phtah.

An opportunity then occurred to revive a practice long fallen into

disuse under the foreign kings, and to set once more in motion an

essential part of the machinery of Egyptian administration. The quarries

of Turah, as is well known, enjoyed the privilege of furnishing the

finest materials to the royal architects; nowhere else could be found

limestone of such whiteness, so easy to cut, or so calculated to lend

itself to the carving of delicate inscriptions and bas-reliefs. The

commoner veins had never ceased to be worked by private enterprise,

gangs of quarrymen being always employed, as at the present day, in

cutting small stone for building purposes, or in ruthlessly chipping it

to pieces to burn for lime in the kilns of the neighbouring villages;

but the finest veins were always kept for State purposes. Contemporary

chroniclers might have formed a very just estimate of national

prosperity by the degree of activity shown in working these royal

preserves; when the amount of stone extracted was lessened, prosperity

was on the wane, and might be pronounced to be at its lowest ebb when

the noise of the quarryman’s hammer finally ceased to be heard.

[Illustration: 132.jpg A CONVOY OF TÛRAH QUARRYMEN DRAWING STONE]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch by Vyse-Perring.

Every dynasty whose resources were such as to justify their resumption

of the work proudly recorded the fact on stelae which lined

the approaches to the masons’ yards. Ahmosis reopened the Tûrah

quarry-chambers, and procured for himself “good stone and white” for the

temples of Anion at Thebes and of Phtah at Memphis. No monument has as

yet been discovered to throw any light on the fate of Memphis subsequent

to the time of the Amenemhâîts. It must have suffered quite as much

as any city of the Delta from the Shepherd invasion, and from the wars

which preceded their expulsion, since it was situated on the highway

of an invading army, and would offer an attraction for pillagers. By a

curious turn of fortune it was the “Fankhûi,” or Asiatic prisoners, who

were set to quarry the stone for the restoration of the monuments which

their own forefathers had reduced to ruins.* The bas-reliefs sculptured

on the stelæ of Ahmosis show them in full activity under the _corvée;_

we see here the stone block detached from the quarry being squared by

the chisel, or transported on a sledge drawn by oxen.

* The _Fankhûi_ are, properly speaking, all white prisoners,

without distinction of race. Their name is derived from the

root _fôkhu, fankhu_ = to bind, press, carry off, steal,

destroy; if it is sometimes used in the sense of

Phoenicians, it is only in the Ptolemaic epoch. Here the

term “Fankhûi” refers to the Shepherds and Asiatics made

prisoners in the campaign of the year V. against Sharuhana.

Ahmosis had several children by his various wives; six at least owned

Nofrîtari for their mother and possessed near claims to the crown, but

she may have borne him others whose existence is unrecorded. The eldest

appears to have been a son, Sipiri; he received all the honours due to

an hereditary prince, but died without having reigned, and his second

brother, Amenhotpû--called by the Greeks Amenôthes*--took his place.

* The form Amenôphis, which is usually employed, is,

properly speaking, the equivalent of the name

_Amenemaupitu,_ or Amenaupîti, which belongs to a king of

the XXIst Tanite dynasty; the true Greek transcription of

the Ptolemaic epoch, corresponding to the pronunciation

_Amehotpe,_ or _Amenhopte,_ is Amenôthes. Under the XVIIIth

dynasty the cuneiform transcription of the tablets of Tel-el

Amarna, Amankhatbi, seems to indicate the pronunciation

Amanhautpi, Amanhatpi, side by side with the pronunciation

Aman-hautpu, Amenhotpu.

Ahmosis was laid to rest in the chapel which he had prepared for himself

in the cemetery of Drah-abu’l-Neggah, among the modest pyramids of the

XIth, XIIIth, and XVIIth dynasties.* He was venerated as a god, and

his cult was continued for six or eight centuries later, until the

increasing insecurity of the Theban necropolis at last necessitated

the removal of the kings from their funeral chambers.** The coffin of

Ahmosis was found to be still intact, though it was a poorly made one,

shaped to the contours of the body, and smeared over with yellow; it

represents the king with the false beard depending from his chin, and

his breast covered with a pectoral ornament, the features, hair,

and accessories being picked out in blue. His name has been hastily

inscribed in ink on the front of the winding-sheet, and when the lid was

removed, garlands of faded pink flowers were still found about the neck,

laid there as a last offering by the priests who placed the Pharaoh and

his compeers in their secret burying-place.

* The precise site is at present unknown: we see, however,

that it was in this place, when wo observe that Ahmosis was

worshipped by the Servants of the Necropolis, amongst the

kings and princes of his family who were buried at Drah-

abu’l-Neggah.

** His priests and the minor _employés_ of his cult are

mentioned on a stele in the museum at Turin, and on a brick

in the Berlin Museum. He is worshipped as a god, along with

Osiris, Horus, and Isis, on a stele in the Lyons Museum,

brought from Abydos: he had, probably, during one of his

journeys across Egypt, made a donation to the temple of that

city, on condition that he should be worshipped there for

ever; for a stele at Marseilles shows him offering homage to

Osiris in the bark of the god itself, and another stele in

the Louvre informs us that Pharaoh Thûtmosis IV. several

times sent one of his messengers to Abydos for the purpose

of presenting land to Osiris and to his own ancestor

Ahmosis.

[Illustration: 135.jpg COFFIN OF AHMOSIS IN THE GÎZEH MUSEUM]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-Bey.

Amenôthes I. had not attained his majority when his father “thus winged

his way to heaven,” leaving him as heir to the throne.* Nofrîtari

assumed the authority; after having shared the royal honours for nearly

twenty-five years with her husband, she resolutely refused to resign

them.** She was thus the first of those queens by divine right who,

scorning the inaction of the harem, took on themselves the right to

fulfil the active duties of a sovereign, and claimed the recognition of

the equality or superiority of their titles to those of their husbands

or sons.

* The last date known is that of the year XXII. at Tûrah;

Manetho’s lists give, in one place, twenty-five years and

four months after the expulsion; in another, twenty-six

years in round numbers, as the total duration of his reign,

which has every appearance of probability.

** There is no direct evidence to prove that Amenôthes I.

was a minor when he came to the throne; still the

presumptions in favour of this hypothesis, afforded by the

monuments, are so strong that many historians of ancient

Egypt have accepted it. Queen Nofrîtari is represented as

reigning, side by side with her reigning son, on some few

Theban tombs which can be attributed to their epoch.

[Illustration: 136.jpg NOFRITARI, HIE BLACK-SKINNED GODDESS]

Drawn by Bouclier, from the photograph by M. de Mertens

taken in the Berlin Museum.

The aged Ahhotpu, who, like Nofrîtari, was of pure royal descent, and

who might well have urged her superior rank, had been content to retire

in favour of her children; she lived to the tenth year of her grandson’s

reign, respected by all her family, but abstaining from all interference

in political affairs. When at length she passed away, full of days and

honour, she was embalmed with special care, and her body was placed in

a gilded mummy-case, the head of which presented a faithful copy of

her features. Beside her were piled the jewels she had received in her

lifetime from her husband and son. The majority of them a fan with a

handle plated with gold, a mirror of gilt bronze with ebony handle,

bracelets and ankle-rings, some of solid and some of hollow gold, edged

with fine chains of plaited gold wire, others formed of beads of gold,

lapis-lazuli, cornelian, and green felspar, many of them engraved with

the cartouche of Ahmosis. Belonging also to Ahmosis we have a beautiful

quiver, in which figures of the king and the gods stand out in high

relief on a gold plaque, delicately chased with a graving tool; the

background is formed of small pieces of lapis and blue glass, cunningly

cut to fit each other. One bracelet in particular, found on the

queen’s wrist, consisted of three parallel bands of solid gold set with

turquoises, and having, a vulture with extended wings on the front. The

queen’s hair was held in place by a gold circlet, scarcely as large as

a bracelet; a cartouche was affixed to the circlet, bearing the name of

Ahmosis in blue paste, and flanked by small sphinxes, one on each side,

as supporters. A thick flexible chain of gold was passed several times

round her neck, and attached to it as a pendant was a beautiful scarab,

partly of gold and partly of blue porcelain striped with gold. The

breast ornament was completed by a necklace of several rows of twisted

cords, from which depended antelopes pursued by tigers, sitting

jackals, hawks, vultures, and the winged urasus, all attached to the

winding-sheet by means of a small ring soldered on the back of each

animal. The fastening of this necklace was formed of the heads of two

gold hawks, the details of the heads being worked out in blue enamel.

Both weapons and amulets were found among the jewels, including three

gold flies suspended by a thin chain, nine gold and silver axes, a

lion’s head in gold of most minute workmanship, a sceptre of black wood

plated with gold, daggers to defend the deceased from the dangers of the

unseen world, boomerangs of hard wood, and the battle-axe of Ahmosis.

Besides these, there were two boats, one of gold and one of silver,

originally intended for the Pharaoh Kamosû--models of the skiff in which

his mummy crossed the Nile to reach its last resting-place, and to sail

in the wake of the gods on the western sea.

[Illustration: 136b.jpg THE JEWELS AND WEAPONS OF QUEEN ÂHHHOTPÛ I. IN

THE GÎZEH MUSEUM]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Bechard.

Nofrîtari thus reigned conjointly with Amenôthes, and even if we have no

record of any act in which she was specially concerned, we know at least

that her rule was a prosperous one, and that her memory was revered by

her subjects. While the majority of queens were relegated after death to

the crowd of shadowy ancestors to whom habitual sacrifice was offered,

the worshippers not knowing even to which sex these royal personages

belonged, the remembrance of Nofrîtari always remained distinct in their

minds, and her cult spread till it might be said to have become a kind

of popular religion. In this veneration Ahmosis was rarely associated

with the queen, but Amenôthes and several of her other children shared

in it--her son Sipiri, for instance, and her daughters Sîtamon,*

Sîtkamosi, and Marîtamon; Nofrîtari became, in fact, an actual goddess,

taking her place beside Amon, Khonsû, and Maut,** the members of

the Theban Triad, or standing alone as an object of worship for her

devotees.

* Sîtamon is mentioned, with her mother, on the Karnak stele

and on the coffin of Bûtehamon.

** She is worshipped with the Theban Triad by Brihor, at

Karnak, in the temple of Khonsû.

[Illustration: 141.jpg THE TWO COFFINS OF AHHOTP II. AND NOFRITARI

STANDING IN TUB VESTIBULE OF THE OLD BÛLAK MUSEUM.]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-

Bey.

She was identified with Isis, Hathor, and the mistresses of Hades, and

adopted their attributes, even to the black or blue coloured skin of

these funerary divinities.*

* Her statue in the Turin Museum represents her as having

black skin. She is also painted black standing before

Amenôthes (who is white) in the Deir el-Medineh tomb, now

preserved in the Berlin Museum, in that of Nibnûtîrû, and hi

that of Unnofir, at Sheikh Abd el-Qûrnah. Her face is

painted blue in the tomb of Kasa. The representations of

this queen with a black skin have caused her to be taken for

a negress, the daughter of an Ethiopian Pharaoh, or at any

rate the daughter of a chief of some Nubian tribe; it was

thought that Ahmosis must have married her to secure the

help of the negro tribes in his wars, and that it was owing

to this alliance that he succeeded in expelling the Hyksôs.

Later discoveries have not confirmed these hypotheses.

Nofrîtari was most probably an Egyptian of unmixed race, as

we have seen, and daughter of Ahhotpû I., and the black or

blue colour of her skin is merely owing to her

identification with the goddesses of the dead.

Considerable endowments were given for maintaining worship at her tomb,

and were administered by a special class of priests. Her mummy reposed

among those of the princes of her family, in the hiding-place at

Deîr-el-Baharî: it was enclosed in an enormous wooden sarcophagus

covered with linen and stucco, the lower part being shaped to the body,

while the upper part representing the head and arms could be lifted off

in one piece. The shoulders are covered with a network in relief, the

meshes of which are painted blue on a yellow background. The Queen’s

hands are crossed over her breast, and clasp the _crux ansata_, the

symbol of life. The whole mummy-case measures a little over nine feet

from the sole of the feet to the top of the head, which is furthermore

surmounted by a cap, and two long ostrich-feathers. The appearance is

not so much that of a coffin as of one of those enormous caryatides

which we sometimes find adorning the front of a temple.

We may perhaps attribute to the influence of Nofrîtari the lack of zest

evinced by Amenôthes for expeditions into Syria. Even the most energetic

kings had always shrunk from penetrating much beyond the isthmus. Those

who ventured so far as to work the mines of Sinai had nevertheless

felt a secret fear of invading Asia proper--a dread which they never

succeeded in overcoming. When the raids of the Bedouin obliged the

Egyptian sovereign to cross the frontier into their territory, he would

retire as soon as possible, without attempting any permanent conquest.

After the expulsion of the Hyksôs, Ahmosis seemed inclined to pursue a

less timorous course. He made an advance on Sharûhana and pillaged it,

and the booty he brought back ought to have encouraged him to attempt

more important expeditions; but he never returned to this region, and it

would seem that when his first enthusiasm had subsided, he was paralysed

by the same fear which had fallen on his ancestors. Nofrîtari may have

counselled her son not to break through the traditions which his father

had so strictly followed, for Amenôthes I. confined his campaigns to

Africa, and the traditional battle-fields there. He embarked for the

land of Kûsh on the vessel of Ahmosi-si-Abîna “for the purpose of

enlarging the frontiers of Egypt.” It was, we may believe, a thoroughly

conventional campaign, conducted according to the strictest precedents

of the XIIth dynasty. The Pharaoh, as might be expected, came into

personal contact with the enemy, and slew their chief with his own

hand; the barbarian warriors sold their lives dearly, but were unable

to protect their country from pillage, the victors carrying off whatever

they could seize--men, women, and cattle. The pursuit of the enemy had

led the army some distance into the desert, as far as a halting-place

called the “Upper cistern”--_Khnûmît hirît_; instead of retracing his

steps to the Nile squadron, and returning slowly by boat, Amenôthes

resolved to take a short cut homewards. Ahmosi conducted him back

overland in two days, and was rewarded for his speed by the gift of

a quantity of gold, and two female slaves. An incursion into Libya

followed quickly on the Ethiopian campaign.

[Illustration: 144.jpg STATUE OF AMENÔTHES I. IN THE TURIN MUSEUM]

Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph supplied by Flinders

Pétrie.

The tribe of the Kihaka, settled between Lake Mareotis and the Oasis of

Amon, had probably attacked in an audacious manner the western provinces

of the Delta; a raid was organized against them, and the issue was

commemorated by a small wooden stele, on which we see the victor

represented as brandishing his sword over a barbarian lying prostrate at

his feet. The exploits of Amenôthes appear to have ended with this raid,

for we possess no monument recording any further victory gained by him.

This, however, has not prevented his contemporaries from celebrating him

as a conquering and ‘victorious king. He is portrayed standing erect in

his chariot ready to charge, or as carrying off two barbarians whom he

holds half suffocated in his sinewy arms, or as gleefully smiting the

princes of foreign lands. He acquitted himself of the duties of the

chase as became a true Pharaoh, for we find him depicted in the act of

seizing a lion by the tail and raising him suddenly in mid-air previous

to despatching him. These are, indeed, but conventional pictures of

war, to which we must not attach an undue importance. Egypt had need of

repose in order to recover from the losses it had sustained during the

years of struggle with the invaders. If Amenôthes courted peace from

preference and not from political motives, his own generation profited

as much by his indolence as the preceding one had gained by the energy

of Ahrnosis. The towns in his reign resumed their ordinary life,

agriculture flourished, and commerce again followed its accustomed

routes. Egypt increased its resources, and was thus able to prepare

for future conquest. The taste for building had not as yet sufficiently

developed to become a drain upon the public treasury. We have, however,

records showing that Amenôthes excavated a cavern in the mountain

of Ibrîm in Nubia, dedicated to Satît, one of the goddesses of the

cataract.

[Illustration: 146.jpg Page Image]

It is also stated that he worked regularly the quarries of Silsileh,

but we do not know for what buildings the sandstone thus extracted was

destined.* Karnak was also adorned with chapels, and with at least one

colossus,** while several chambers built of the white limestone of Tûrah

were added to Ombos. Thebes had thus every reason to cherish the memory

of this pacific king.

* A bas-relief on the western bank of the river represents

him deified: Panaîti, the name of a superintendent of the

quarries who lived in his reign, has been preserved in

several graffiti, while another graffito gives us only the

protocol of the sovereign, and indicates that the quarries

were worked in his reign.

** The chambers of white limestone are marked I, K, on

Mariette’s plan; it is possible that they may have been

merely decorated under Thûtmosis III., whose cartouches

alternate with those of Amenôthes I. The colossus is now in

front of the third Pylon, and Wiedemann concluded from this

fact that Amenôthes had begun extensive works for enlarging

the temple of Amon; Mariette believed, with greater

probability, that the colossus formerly stood at the

entrance to the XIIth dynasty temple, but was removed to its

present position by Thûtmosis III.

As Nofrîtari had been metamorphosed into a form of Isis, Amenôthes was

similarly represented as Osiris, the protector of the Necropolis, and he

was depicted as such with the sombre colour of the funerary divinities;

his image, moreover, together with those of the other gods, was used

to decorate the interiors of coffins, and to protect the mummies of his

devotees.*

* Wiedemann has collected several examples, to which it

would be easy to add others. The names of the king are in

this case constantly accompanied by unusual epithets, which

are enclosed in one or other of his cartouches: Mons.

Kevillout, deceived by these unfamiliar forms, has made out

of one of these variants, on a painted cloth in the Louvre,

a new Amenôthes, whom he styles Amenôthes V.

[Illustration: 147.jpg THE COFFIN AND MUMMY OF AMENOTHES]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-

Bey.

One of his statues, now in the Turin Museum, represents him sitting on

his throne in the posture of a king giving audience to his subjects, or

in that of a god receiving the homage of his worshippers. The modelling

of the bust betrays a flexibility of handling which is astonishing in a

work of art so little removed from barbaric times; the head is a marvel

of delicacy and natural grace. We feel that the sculptor has taken a

delight in chiselling the features of his sovereign, and in reproducing

the benevolent and almost dreamy expression which characterised them.*

The cult of Amenôthes lasted for seven or eight centuries, until the

time when his coffin was removed and placed with those of the other

members of his family in the place where it remained concealed until our

own times.**

* Another statue of very fine workmanship, but mutilated, is

preserved in the Gizeh Museum; this statue is of the time of

Seti I., and, as is customary, represents Amenôthes in the

likeness of the king then reigning.

** We know, from the Abbott Papyrus, that the pyramid of

Amenôthes I. was situated at Dr-ah Abou’l-Neggah, among

those of the Pharaohs of the XIth, XIIth, and XVIIth

dynasties. The remains of it have not yet been discovered.

It is shaped to correspond with the form of the human body and painted

white; the face resembles that of his statue, and the eyes of enamel,

touched with kohl, give it a wonderful appearance of animation. The body

is swathed in orange-coloured linen, kept in place by bands of brownish

linen, and is further covered by a mask of wood and cartonnage, painted

to match the exterior of the coffin. Long garlands of faded flowers deck

the mummy from head to foot. A wasp, attracted by their scent, must have

settled upon them at the moment of burial, and become imprisoned by the

lid; the insect has been completely preserved from corruption by the

balsams of the embalmer, and its gauzy wings have passed un-crumpled

through the long centuries.

Amenôthes had married Ahhotpû II, his sister by the same father and

mother;* Ahmasi, the daughter born of this union, was given in marriage

to Thûtmosis, one of her brothers, the son of a mere concubine, by name

Sonisonbû.** Ahmasi, like her ancestor Nofrîtari, had therefore the

right to exercise all the royal functions, and she might have claimed

precedence of her husband. Whether from conjugal affection or from

weakness of character, she yielded, however, the priority to Thûtmosis,

and allowed him to assume the sole government.

* Ahhotpû II. may be seen beside her husband on several

monuments. The proof that she was full sister of Amenôthes

I. is furnished by the title of “hereditary princess” which

is given to her daughter Àhmasi; this princess would not

have taken precedence of her brother and husband Thûtmosis,

who was the son of an inferior wife, had she not been the

daughter of the only legitimate spouse of Amenôthes I. The

marriage had already taken place before the accession of

Thûtmosis I., as Ahmasi figures in a document dated the

first year of his reign.

** The absence of any cartouche shows that Sonisonbû did not

belong to the royal family, and the very form of the name

points her out to have been of the middle classes, and

merely a concubine. The accession of her son, however,

ennobled her, and he represents her as a queen on the walls

of the temple at Deîr el-Baharî; even then he merely styles

her “Royal Mother,” the only title she could really claim,

as her inferior position in the harem prevented her from

using that of “Royal Spouse.”

[Illustration: 150.jpg THÛTMOSIS I., FROM A STATUE IN THE GÎZEH MUSEUM]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the photograph taken by Émil

Brugsch-Bey.

He was crowned at Thebes on the 21st of the third month of Pirît; and

a circular, addressed to the representatives of the ancient seignorial

families and to the officers of the crown, announced the names assumed

by the new sovereign. “This is the royal rescript to announce to you

that my Majesty has arisen king of the two Egypts, on the seat of the

Horus of the living, without equal, for ever, and that my titles are

as follows: The vigorous bull Horus, beloved of Mâît, the Lord of

the Vulture and of the Uraeus who raises itself as a flame, most

valiant,--the golden Horns, whose years are good and who puts life

into all hearts, king of the two Egypts, Akhopirkerî, son of the Sun,

Thûtmosis, living for ever.* Cause, therefore, sacrifices to be offered

to the gods of the south and of Elephantine,** and hymns to be chanted

for the well-being of the King Akhopirkerî, living for ever, and then

cause the oath to be taken in the name of my Majesty, born of the royal

mother Sonisonbû, who is in good health.--This is sent to thee that thou

mayest know that the royal house is prosperous, and in good health and

condition, the 1st year, the 21st of the third month of Pirît, the day

of coronation.”

* This is really the protocol of the king, as we find it on

the monuments, with his two Horus names and his solar

titles.

** The copy of the letter which has come down to us is

addressed to the commander of Elephantine: hence the mention

of the gods of that town. The names of the divinities must

have been altered to suit each district, to which the order

to offer sacrifices for the prosperity of the new sovereign

was sent.

The new king was tall in stature, broad-shouldered, well knit, and

capable of enduring the fatigues of war without flagging. His statues

represent him as having a full, round face, long nose, square chin,

rather thick lips, and a smiling but firm expression. Thûtmosis brought

with him on ascending the throne the spirit of the younger generation,

who, born shortly after the deliverance from the Hyksôs, had grown up

in the peaceful days of Amenôthes, and, elated by the easy victories

obtained over the nations of the south, were inspired by ambitions

unknown to the Egyptians of earlier times. To this younger race Africa

no longer offered a sufficiently wide or attractive field; the whole

country was their own as far as the confluence of the two Niles, and the

Theban gods were worshipped at Napata no less devoutly than at Thebes

itself. What remained to be conquered in that direction was scarcely

worth the trouble of reducing to a province or of annexing as a colony;

it comprised a number of tribes hopelessly divided among themselves,

and consequently, in spite of their renowned bravery, without power of

resistance. Light columns of troops, drafted at intervals on either

side of the river, ensured order among the submissive, or despoiled the

refractory of their possessions in cattle, slaves, and precious stones.

Thûtmosis I. had to repress, however, very shortly after his accession,

a revolt of these borderers at the second and third cataracts, but they

were easily overcome in a campaign of a few days’ duration, in which the

two Âhmosis of Al-Kab took an honourable part. There was, as usual, an

encounter of the two fleets in the middle of the river: the young king

himself attacked the enemy’s chief, pierced him with his first arrow,

and made a considerable number of prisoners. Thûtmosis had the corpse of

the chief suspended as a trophy in front of the royal ship, and sailed

northwards towards Thebes, where, however, he was not destined to

remain long.* An ample field of action presented itself to him in the

north-east, affording scope for great exploits, as profitable as they

were glorious.**

* That this expedition must be placed at the beginning of

the king’s reign, in his first year, is shown by two facts:

(1) It precedes the Syrian campaign in the biography of the

two Âhmosis of El-Kab; (2) the Syrian campaign must have

ended in the second year of the reign, since Thûtmosis I.,

on the stele of Tombos which bears that date, gives

particulars of the course of the Euphrates, and records the

submission of the countries watered by that river. The date

of the invasion may be placed between 2300 and 2250 B.C.; if

we count 661 years for the three dynasties together, as

Erman proposes, we find that the accession of Ahmosis would

fall between 1640 and 1590. I should place it provisionally

in the year 1600, in order not to leave the position of the

succeeding reigns uncertain; I estimate the possible error

at about half a century.

** It is impossible at present to draw up a correct table of

the native or foreign sovereigns who reigned over Egypt

during the time of the Hyksôs. I have given the list of the

kings of the XIIIth and XIVth dynasties which are known to

us from the Turin Papyrus. I here append that of the

Pharaohs of the following dynasties, who are mentioned

either in the fragments of Manetho or on the monuments:

[Illustration: 153.jpg Table]

Syria offered to Egyptian cupidity a virgin prey in its large commercial

towns inhabited by an industrious population, who by maritime trade

and caravan traffic had amassed enormous wealth. The country had been

previously subdued by the Chaldæans, who still exercised an undisputed

influence over it, and it was but natural that the conquerors of the

Hyksôs should act in their turn as invaders. The incursion of Asiatics

into Egypt thus provoked a reaction which issued in an Egyptian invasion

of Asiatic soil. Thûtmosis and his contemporaries had inherited none of

the instinctive fear of penetrating into Syria which influenced Ahmosis

and his successor: the Theban legions were, perhaps, slow to advance,

but once they had trodden the roads of Palestine, they were not likely

to forego the delights of conquest. From that time forward there was

perpetual warfare and pillaging expeditions from the plains of the Blue

Nile to those of the Euphrates, so that scarcely a year passed without

bringing to the city of Amon its tribute of victories and riches gained

at the point of the sword. One day the news would be brought that the

Amorites or the Khâti had taken the field, to be immediately followed by

the announcement that their forces had been shattered against the valour

of the Egyptian battalions. Another day, Pharaoh would re-enter the city

with the flower of his generals and veterans; the chiefs whom he had

taken prisoners, sometimes with his own hand, would be conducted through

the streets, and then led to die at the foot of the altars, while

fantastic processions of richly clothed captives, beasts led by halters,

and slaves bending under the weight of the spoil would stretch in an

endless line behind him.

[Illustration: 154.jpg SIGNS, ARMS AND INSTRUMENTS]

Meanwhile the Timihû, roused by some unknown cause, would attack the

outposts stationed on the frontier, or news would come that the Peoples

of the Sea had landed on the western side of the Delta; the Pharaoh had

again to take the field, invariably with the same speedy and successful

issue. The Libyans seemed to fare no better than the Syrians, and before

long those who had survived the defeat would be paraded before the

Theban citizens, previous to being sent to join the Asiatic prisoners

in the mines or quarries; their blue eyes and fair hair showing from

beneath strangely shaped helmets, while their white skins, tall stature,

and tattooed bodies excited for a few hours the interest and mirth of

the idle crowd. At another time, one of the customary raids into the

land of Kûsh would take place, consisting of a rapid march across the

sands of the Ethiopian desert and a cruise along the coasts of Pûanîfc.

This would be followed by another triumphal procession, in which fresh

elements of interest would appear, heralded by flourish of trumpets and

roll of drums: Pharaoh would re-enter the city borne on the shoulders of

his officers, followed by negroes heavily chained, or coupled in such

a way that it was impossible for them to move without grotesque

contortions, while the acclamations of the multitude and the chanting of

the priests would resound from all sides as the _cortege_ passed through

the city gates on its way to the temple of Amon. Egypt, roused as it

were to warlike frenzy, hurled her armies across all her frontiers

simultaneously, and her sudden appearance in the heart of Syria gave a

new turn to human history. The isolation of the kingdoms of the ancient

world was at an end; the conflict of the nations was about to begin.