CHAPTER IV. THE RESTORATION

[XVIIITH DYNASTY: _ca._ 1635-1365 B.C.]

Walled towns, stored arsenals and armories, goodly races of horse, chariots of war, elephants, ordnance, artillery, and the like--all this is but a sheep in a lion’s skin, except the breed and disposition of the people be stout and warlike.--BACON.

It has just been shown that the leading dynasties of the Theban kingdom, before the invasion of the Hyksos, had essentially a pacific character. Their epoch was a period of social, literary and artistic activity, such as usually comes to a nation only at the apex of its career, or as it is passing into its decline. It was so here. Egypt as a nation was soon overthrown; an outside people invaded the sacred precincts, so jealously guarded hitherto from even peaceful intrusion, usurped the power, and for some centuries dominated the original inhabitants. These invaders, as we have seen, were of a more primitive type of civilisation than the Egyptians. Their reign was a time of apparently retrograde evolution, marked to after generations by no lasting monuments such as made earlier generations famous.

Yet it may be questioned whether, on the whole, the influence of these semi-barbarians upon the cultured but somewhat degenerate stock of the ancient civilisation, may not have been in the highest degree beneficial.

Everywhere in history we shall see that the virile stock is the stock which is not weakened by too many generations of that luxury which seems to be the necessary associate of higher culture. We shall see also that a mixed race is always at a premium. A nation which shuts itself off from contact with other nations is in the condition of a finely inbred race of domesticated animals. The racial peculiarities may be greatly developed, certain finer traits of mind and body may be highly intensified. But in the full rounding out of aggregate powers of mind and body, there is a deviation that amounts to degeneration. And when this weakened stock comes into competition with some cruder but sturdier race, the issue is not in doubt; the fate awaits it that befel the Egyptians at the hands of the “barbaric” Hyksos invaders.

But a degenerate or perverted stock often shows marvellous powers of recuperation under influence of changed conditions, and an infusion of fresh blood grafted on such a stock can work wonders. It is said that the highly developed greyhound was useless as a hunting dog till crossed with a strain of bulldog--an infusion of blood which, while not marring the distinctive physical peculiarities of the hound, yet quite sufficed to supply the lacking stamina and courage. It may be questioned whether precisely such a vitalising influence as this may not have come to the Egyptians through the Hyksos invasion. It is hardly to be supposed that the invaders remained for centuries in Egypt in sufficient numbers to maintain absolute political control without having some ethnic influence; and if this be admitted, it is hardly in doubt, physiologically speaking, that such influence, in this closely inbred race, would be beneficial. It might graft the bulldog spirit of the Hyksos upon the greyhound-spirited Egyptian nation. But whether or not this be the explanation of the change that now came over the national spirit, it was surely a bulldog nation that now emerged from the Hyksos thraldom and started out upon a world-conquest. In tracing the course of events in this new epoch we see Egypt approaching the apex of its power.

THE HYKSOS EXPULSION: AAHMES AND HIS SUCCESSORS

[Sidenote: [_ca._ 1635-1610 B.C.]]

Aahmes must have been between twenty-five and thirty years of age when, as survivor of his elder brothers, he came to the throne. He had married Nefert-ari, his sister or half-sister, as the case may be, who may previously have been an inmate of his brothers’ harems as well; and her own royal rights, joined to his own, established a legal claim for Aahmes to the kingdom such as few Pharaohs have possessed.

His mummy shows him to have been of medium height, with well-developed neck and chest. The head is small, the forehead low and narrow, the cheek bones project, and the hair is thick and wavy. He was undoubtedly a strong, active, warlike man, which qualities won him success in his wars.

From what we know now of the condition of the struggle against the Hyksos, at the time of the accession of Aahmes,--that their rule had been limited to the district around Avaris,--no doubt the credit due to this king for finally expelling them has been greatly exaggerated. Yet, concentrated and strongly intrenched as they were in the fortress of Ha-Uar, they were by no means insignificant adversaries. From their position, made the more inaccessible by the marsh-lands and rivers of the Delta, and by the neighbouring desert, there was always danger of an attempt upon Memphis, and Aahmes is the one who removed this last menace to the re-established kingdom, and made his dominion over the whole country secure. Therefore the official chroniclers had every reason to begin a new dynasty with the accession of this great king.

For the actual expulsion of the Hyksos we have two accounts: that of Manetho transcribed by Josephus and quoted in the preceding chapter, and that of the doughty namesake of the king, Aahmes-si-Abana (son of Abana), as recorded on his tomb at El-Kab.

The Manetho version runs that Aahmes (Alisphragmuthosis) shut the Shepherds up in Avaris, whence they were finally ejected and driven into Syria by his grandson, Tehutimes I. This, however, is a mistake, and the Egyptian historian has undoubtedly confused the taking of Avaris with the Syrian wars of Tehutimes. Aahmes-si-Abana makes no mention of Tehutimes taking Avaris.[a]

His account, therefore, is the more accurate and complete. This is the tale on his tomb:

“The dead Admiral Aahmes, son of Abana. He speaks thus: ‘I say to you, all men; and I make known to you the rewards and honours that have fallen to my lot. I was presented with golden gifts eight times before the whole land, and with many slaves, male and female; likewise I was given much land. The title of “the Brave” which I gained shall never perish in this land.’

“He speaks further: ‘I saw the light in the city of Nekheb [El-Kab]. My father was a captain of King Seqenen-Ra; Baba son of Roant was his name. Then I took his place on the ship called _The Calf_, in the days of King Neb-pehthet-Ra [Aahmes]. I was young and had no wife and I wore the _semt_ cloth and the _shennu_ [garments of youth]. But as soon as I had taken a house, I was placed on the ship _The North_ because of my valour, and I had to attend the sovereign--life, health, strength be his--on foot when he rode forth in his chariot.

“‘The town of Ha-Uar [Avaris] was besieged, and I showed my worth in the presence of his Majesty. I was promoted to the ship _Kha-em-men-nefer_ [Accession in Memphis]. They fought in the Pazekthu canal, near Avaris. I fought hand to hand, and I carried off a hand. The king’s herald saw this, and the golden collar of bravery was given me. They fought a second time at this place and again I captured a hand; a second golden gift was given me.

“‘They fought at Ta-kemt, south of the city. There I took a living prisoner. I plunged into the water--I led him through the water so as to keep away from the road to the town. This was made known to the herald of the king; I received the golden gift once more.

“‘They took Ha-Uar; I carried away from thence one man and three women; his Majesty gave them to me as slaves.’”[b]

In the time of the Ptolemies, tradition had it that King Aahmes appeared before Avaris with an army of four hundred and eighty thousand men, that there was a long siege, which was finally ended by the king treating with the besieged and permitting them to depart peacefully, with their wives, children, and possessions, into Syria. But the truth is, that Aahmes had a well organised and equipped army of fifteen to twenty thousand men, and that the town was taken on the second attack. The enemy left their last strongholds in haste and retreated into the bordering provinces of Syria. For some reason--they may have threatened him from some new vantage point, or he may have wished to deal a final crushing blow--Aahmes determined to cross the frontier, which he did in the fifth year of his reign. It was the first time in centuries that the king of Egypt had set foot in Asia, and even now he barely crossed the threshold.[a]

Admiral Aahmes continues his narrative:

“They besieged the town of Sharhana [Sherohan], in the year V, and his Majesty took it. I carried off from thence two women and one hand, and the golden collar of valour was given me. And my captives were given me for slaves.”

After the capture of Sherohan, Aahmes went on to the border provinces of Zahi (Phœnicia) and then turned back. The fall of the Palestine town crushed the Hyksos’ last hope of recovering their Egyptian domain. The majority of their race had not fled with the army, but had remained with other tribes that had followed them into Egypt--the Israelites among them--to accept whatever lot was meted out by the new conquerors. The yoke was not imposed equally throughout the land. Those living in the Delta regions were reduced to slavery, and all that part of the country was well fortified to resist the Bedouin.

Aahmes returned to Africa only to find his presence needed in the South. The land of Nubia, tributary to the lords of Thebes, had been somewhat neglected during the long struggle which the Pharaoh had just successfully terminated. The southern races had failed to assimilate the gift of culture and civilisation thrust upon them by the rulers of the XIIth and XIIIth Dynasties, and kept to their own customs while the temples erected by Usertsen and Amenemhat crumbled and vanished. From out this disordered state developed a serious invasion from the Sudan. Hostile tribes--which ones, we know not--descended the Nile, outraging the people and desecrating the sanctuaries. Aahmes hastened to meet them.

“His Majesty went south,” runs the record of Aahmes the admiral, “to Khent-en-nefer to destroy the Anu Khenti, and his Majesty made great havoc among them. I captured two live men and three hands; once more I was given the gold of valour, and my two captives were given to me for slaves. Then his Majesty came down the river; his heart swelled with his brave and victorious deeds; he had conquered the people of the South and of the North.”

The triumph of the return was dimmed by disquieting news from the North. The remains of the Hyksos race had taken advantage of Aahmes’ absence in the South to break out in rebellion. There seem to have been two outbursts. One by the Aata, probably a branch of the Hyksos, which marched southward and was destroyed by Aahmes at Tentoa, the other by a powerful faction under a certain Teta-an. Aahmes-si-Abana tells of his fate:

“Then came that enemy named Teta-an; he had brought wicked rebels together. But his Majesty slaughtered him and his slaves even to extinction.”[b]

Thus was stamped out the last spark of Asiatic resistance. There are no more records of expeditions undertaken in this Pharaoh’s reign--at least none in which he took part.

From the crushing of Teta-an, about the sixth year, to the twenty-second, the monuments are silent; and when again they speak we find a peaceful and not a warlike monarch. It is a law of human progress that an age of military success is followed by a revival of art and building activity. At the end of Aahmes’ reign--he ruled about twenty-five years--this condition prevailed throughout the kingdom. The principal temples of the land were restored or rebuilt. The reward of the gods for their divine aid in the deliverance of Egypt was thus bestowed. A tenth of all the booty of victory was devoted to the needs of the religious cult. Sculptors and painters, for whom there had been centuries of little or no employment, recovered their skill in the revived demand for their services, and, indeed, a new school, with new ideas and methods, came into existence under the great impetus to culture. In the twenty-second year the quarries of Turah were reopened that building stone might be obtained for the temples of Ptah at Memphis and Amen at Thebes, although nothing was done to the latter until a later reign.

[Sidenote: [_ca._ 1610-1590 B.C.]]

Aahmes died when he was between fifty and sixty. They buried the great Pharaoh in a modest place he had prepared for himself in the necropolis of Drah-abu’l-Neggah. His worship continued for nearly a thousand years, and of him--and still more of Queen Nefert-ari--there exist more instances of adoration than of any other ruler.

Aahmes left a numerous progeny, and six or seven of his children had Nefert-ari for mother. The eldest seems to have been named Sapair, but he died when young, and it is probable that a Se-Amen was the second son and that he too never reached maturity. But whether Amenhotep I was the second or third of Aahmes’ male issue, the kingship devolved upon him. As he was still in his minority, the queen mother assumed the reins of government. Nefert-ari had been no idle inmate of her husband’s harem, and she now asserted her many titles to authority, some of which had precedence over those of her husband and son. There is nothing known of her joint rule with Amenhotep, but it was undoubtedly a prosperous one. She was worshipped after death as a divinity, on a plane, indeed, with the great Theban triad, Amen, Khonsu, and Mut, for all the rights of the royal line descended through her. Her sons, Sapair and Amenhotep, her daughters, Set-amen, Set-kames, and Merit-amen, also shared in the worship.

Amenhotep does not seem to have been ambitious for foreign conquest. His campaigns were confined to Africa. The chief chronicle of his reign is again that tomb at El-Kab whereon Aahmes, son of Abana, recorded his exploits. The brave admiral was now nearly fifty years of age.

“It fell to me,” he relates, “to carry King Zeser-ka-Ra [Amenhotep I] on his voyage to Cush, where he went to extend the frontiers of Egypt. His majesty smote these Anu Khenti [Nubians] from the midst of his troops.

“Behold, I led our soldiers and I fought with all my strength. The king saw my bravery, as I captured two hands and brought them to his Majesty. In two days I bore his Majesty back to Egypt from the upper land. And I was given the golden gift and two female slaves, and I was raised to the dignity of ‘Warrior of the King.’”

The Nubian campaign was a short and unimportant one. A more important one was directed against the Amukehaka, who apparently were a portion of the Libyan race of the Tuhennu. These people had for centuries been restless and given trouble to the Pharaohs, but the strength of the New Kingdom was now entirely able to cope with them. Notwithstanding these few campaigns, the reign of Amenhotep I is to be characterised as one of peace and internal prosperity. He merely attained in the South and West that security his father had brought about in the North. Commerce, agriculture, and town life flourished, and indeed he well deserved the veneration which for centuries was accorded him in the Theban capital and where he is represented as Osiris. The coffin and mummy of this king were among Professor Maspero’s wonderful find at Deir-el-Bahari. He thus tells of it: “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 uncrumpled through the long centuries.”

[Sidenote: [_ca._ 1590-1565 B.C.]]

Amenhotep married his own sister, Aah-hotep II, and among their children was a princess, Aahmes. The Pharaoh had also, by a concubine, Sensenb, a son, Tehutimes, who was married to his half-sister Aahmes. Tehutimes was probably a little younger than his wife. Aahmes, from her pure royal descent, had far more claim to the throne than her husband and brother, but for some reason she yielded her rights, and Tehutimes was crowned at Thebes the 21st of Phamenoth, the third month. If he had been co-regent with his father, it must have been for a short time only. The new king was a tall, broad-shouldered, well-knit man, possessed of great powers of endurance. His full round face is marked with a long nose and square chin, and his thick lips wear a smiling but firm expression.

The beginnings of a new spirit, which was destined to break up the isolation of the kingdoms of antiquity, were stirring in this monarch’s soul. With his own country in practical subjection, there came that inevitable desire to intrude into other lands. We have seen how the Pharaohs had always shown a certain timidity about passing the Isthmus of Suez, and how Aahmes, well equipped for foreign conquest as he was, had hastened home after he had once driven the fleeing Hyksos across the border. His was no spirit of world conquest; but with Tehutimes the case was different, although certain domestic troubles kept him for the time at home. The neighbouring land of Syria, with its large and wealthy towns, growing richer every day through a well-organised commerce on land and sea, had previously been invaded by the Chaldeans and was now under their undisputed sway; and when this same spirit was once aroused in the fresh and vigorous kingdom of the restoration, what was more natural than that its cupidity should turn in this same direction? But some difficulties at home for the time being prevented, Tehutimes I had to repress outbreaks in the vicinity of the Second and Third Cataracts.

The story of Aahmes, now nearly seventy years of age, relates:

“It fell to me to carry the king Aa-kheper-ka-Ra [Tehutimes I] on his voyage to Khent-en-nefer for the purpose of punishing the rebels among the tribes and of quelling the marauders from the hills. On his ships I showed valour, and I was raised to be an admiral of the marines. Their people were carried off alive and captives. His Majesty returned down the river; all the lands were now under his rule. That vile king of the Anu of Khenti was held head down when the king landed at Thebes.”

It would be valuable and interesting to know what impression the strange land of Syria, with its wide, irregular plains, its high, snow-topped mountains, its walled towns perched in difficult positions in inaccessible places, its people different in customs and with a civilisation not below their own, made upon the Theban legions when at last they found themselves in Palestine. But of what they thought and felt, they have left no word. The lines with which Aahmes of El-Kab closes the record of this long life--he must have been over ninety when he died--goes no more into detail than the rest of his account.

“After this, his Majesty--life, health, and strength be his--went to Ruthen to take satisfaction upon the countries. His Majesty arrived at Naharain [Upper Mesopotamia]; he found the enemy that conspired against him. His Majesty made great destruction among them; an immense number of live captives was carried off from the victories.

“Behold, I was at the head of our soldiers. His Majesty saw my bravery as I captured a chariot, its horses and those who were in it. I took them to his Majesty and was once more given the collar of gold for valour. I have grown up and reached old age; my honours are many. I shall rest in my tomb which I myself have made.”

Tehutimes in his first campaign went far beyond his grandfather, and his route--Gaza to Megiddo, to Kadesh, to Carchemish--became in later times that followed by the Egyptians whenever they descended upon the Euphrates. Of the fortunes of his progress we have not the slightest information, except as Aahmes tells us, he met the enemy in Naharain. The opposing army was under the command of the king of Mitanni, or perhaps one of the captains of the Kossæan king of Babylon, and all the petty princes of the northern provinces served in it with their troops to repel the new invader. But the victory was Tehutimes’. No doubt his army was superior to that of his opponents. Its organisation and training had steadily improved since the days of Aahmes, for it was constantly called into service against the tribes of Ethiopia and Libya. The Syrians were wanting neither in efficiency nor bravery, but their country was much disorganised and their number of fighting men by no means so great as their enemy’s. Therefore they could not command such a force as the Egyptians mustered against them.

Tehutimes erected a stele on the Euphrates to mark the limits of his dominion, and then turned back, richly laden, to Thebes. The later Pharaohs, whenever they invaded Asia, pursued similar methods--a sudden advance diagonally to the northeast, routing and dispersing any opposing force, spreading destruction on every hand, then a quick return to the fatherland, before the approaching winter would put an end to all action.

But Tehutimes’ success in his first expedition was so decisive, so overwhelming, that he never found it necessary again to cross the Isthmus. Southern Syria made no murmur against the burden laid upon it, although the North, it is true, soon slipped from the Pharaoh’s grasp, if indeed he ever had his grip upon it. A strong garrison was left at Gaza, and the king returned to his still rebellious subjects in Ethiopia and Nubia. Two or three rebellions were easily silenced. On these expeditions Tehutimes passed through the old canal built by Usertsen III, and on the rocks that border it have been found many interesting inscriptions relating to the trip. One at Assuan reads, “Year III, Pakhons 20, his Majesty passed this canal in force and power in his campaign to crush Ethiopia, the vile”; on another there is cut, “His Majesty came to Cush to crush the vile”; and on a third, “His Majesty commanded to clear this canal, after he found it filled with stones so that no boat could pass up it. He passed up it, his heart filled with joy.” The king now placed the affairs of his southern lands in the hands of a viceroy, who is called “Royal Son of Cush,” and must, therefore, have had the blood of Ra in his veins. Likewise the king made extensive provisions for fortifications. He restored the fortresses of Semneh and Kummeh to the efficiency they possessed in the great days of the XIIth Dynasty, and he built a brickwork citadel to command the Nile on the island of Tombos, near the Third Cataract. All these precautions enabled Tehutimes I to live out the remainder of a reign of about twenty-five years in complete peace. The strange circumstance of his later years and the problems of his successor are well recounted in Maspero’s monumental work on “The Struggle of the Nations” and his history of the ancient oriental peoples.[a]

The position of Tehutimes I was, indeed, a curious one; although _de facto_ absolute in power, his children by Queen Aahmes took precedence of him, for by her mother’s descent she had a better right to the crown than her husband, and legally the king should have retired in favour of his sons as soon as they were old enough to reign. [According to Petrie, these two were children of Amenhotep I by Queen Aah-hotep and consequently brothers of Queen Aahmes.] The eldest of them, Uazmes, died early. The second, Amenmes, lived at least to attain adolescence: he was allowed to share the crown with his father from the fourth year of the latter’s reign, and he also held a military command in the Delta, but before long he also died, and Tehutimes I was left with only one son--a Tehutimes like himself--to succeed him. The mother of this prince was a certain Mut-nefert, half-sister to the king on his father’s side, who enjoyed such a high rank in the royal family that her husband allowed her to be portrayed in royal dress; her pedigree on the mother’s side, however, was not so distinguished, and precluded her son from being recognised as heir-apparent; hence the occupation of the “seat of Horus” reverted once more to a woman, Hatshepsitu, the eldest daughter of Aahmes.

TEHUTIMES II; QUEEN HATSHEPSU

[Sidenote: [_ca._ 1565-1530 B.C.]]

Hatshepsitu herself was not, however, of purely divine descent. Her paternal ancestor, Sensenb, had not been a scion of the royal house, and this flaw in her pedigree threatened to mar, in her case, the sanctity of the solar blood. According to Egyptian belief, this defect of birth could be remedied only by a miracle, and the ancestral god, becoming incarnate in the earthly father at the moment of conception had to condescend to infuse fresh virtue into his race in this manner. The inscriptions with which Hatshepsitu decorated her chapel relate how, on that fateful night, Amen descended upon Aahmes in a flood of perfume and light. The queen received him favourably, and the divine spouse on leaving her announced to her the approaching birth of a daughter, in whom his valour and strength should be manifested once more here below.

The sequel of the story is displayed in a series of pictures. The protecting divinities who preside over the birth of children conduct the queen to her couch, and the sorrowful resignation depicted on her face, together with the languid grace of her whole figure, display in this portrait of her a finished work of art. The child enters the world amid shouts of joy, and the propitious genii who nourish both her and her double, constitute themselves her nurses. At the appointed time, her earthly father summons the great nobles to a solemn festival, and presents to them his daughter, who is to reign with him over Egypt and the world.

From henceforth Hatshepsitu adopts every possible device to conceal her sex. She changes the termination of her name, and calls herself Hatshepsu, the “Chief of the Nobles,” in lieu of Hatshepsitu, the “Chief of the Favourites.” She becomes the King Maat-ka-Ra, and on the occasion of all public ceremonies she appears in male costume.

We see her represented on Theban monuments with uncovered shoulders, devoid of breasts, wearing the short loin-cloth and the keffieh, while the diadem rests on her closely cut hair, and the false beard depends from her chin. She retained, however, the feminine pronoun in speaking of herself, and also an epithet, inserted in her cartouche, which declared her to be the betrothed of Amen--_Khnem Amen_. Her father united her while still young to her brother Tehutimes, who appears to have been her junior, and this fact doubtless explains the very subordinate part which he plays beside the queen. When Tehutimes I died, Egyptian etiquette demanded that a man should be at the head of affairs, and this youth succeeded his father in office: but Hatshepsu, while relinquishing the semblance of power and the externals of pomp to her husband, kept the direction of the state entirely in her own hands. The portraits of her which have been preserved represent her as having refined features, with a proud and energetic expression. The oval of the face is elongated, the cheeks a little hollow, and the eyes deep set under the arch of the brow, while the lips are thin and tightly closed. She governed with so firm a hand that neither Egypt nor its foreign vassals dared to make any serious attempt to withdraw themselves from her authority. One raid, in which several prisoners were taken, punished a rising of the Shasu in central Syria, while the usual expeditions maintained order among the peoples of Ethiopia, and quenched any attempt which they might make to revolt. When in the second year of his reign the news was brought to Tehutimes II that the inhabitants of the Upper Nile had ceased to observe the conditions which his father had imposed upon them, he “became furious as a panther,” and assembling his troops, set out for war without further delay. The presence of the king with the army filled the rebels with dismay, and a campaign of a few weeks put an end to their attempt at rebelling. Tehutimes II carried on the works begun by his father, but did not long survive him. The mask on his coffin represents him with a smiling and amiable countenance, and with the fine pathetic eyes which show his descent from the Pharaohs of the XIIth Dynasty. By his marriage with Hatshepsu, Tehutimes left daughters only, but he had one son, also a Tehutimes,[3] by a woman of low birth, perhaps merely a slave, whose name was Aset. Hatshepsu proclaimed this child her successor, for his youth and humble parentage could not excite her jealousy. She betrothed him to her one surviving daughter, Hatshepsitu II, and having thus settled the succession in the main line, she continued to rule alone in the name of her nephew who was still a minor, as she had done formerly in the case of her half-brother.

Her reign was a prosperous one, but whether the flourishing condition of things was owing to the ability of her political administration or to her fortunate choice of ministers, we are unable to tell. She pressed forward the work of building with great activity, under the direction of her architect Senmut, not only at Deir-el-Bahari, but at Karnak, and indeed everywhere in Thebes. The plans of the building had been arranged under Tehutimes I, and their execution had been carried out so quickly that in many cases the queen had merely to see to the sculptural ornamentation on the all-but-completed walls. This work, however, afforded her sufficient excuse, according to Egyptian custom, to attribute the whole structure to herself, and the opinion she had of her own powers is exhibited with great naïveté in her inscriptions. [A famous incident of her reign was the sending out of an expedition across the Red Sea in quest of incense.]

[Sidenote: [_ca._ 1530-1520 B.C.]]

When Tehutimes III approached manhood, his aunt, the queen, instead of abdicating in his favour, associated him with herself more frequently in the external acts of government. She was forced to yield him precedence in those religious ceremonies which could be performed by a man only, such as the dedication of one of the city gates of Ombos, and the foundation and marking out of a temple at Medinet Habu; but for the most part she obliged him to remain in the background and take a secondary place beside her. We are unable to determine the precise moment when this dual sovereignty came to an end. It was still existent in the XVIth year of the reign, but it had ceased before the XXIInd year. Death alone could take the sceptre from the hands that held it, and Tehutimes had to curb his impatience for many a long day before becoming the real master of Egypt. He was about twenty-five years of age[4] when this event took place, and he immediately revenged himself for the long repression he had undergone, by endeavouring to destroy the very remembrance of her whom he regarded as a usurper. Every portrait of her that he could deface without exposing himself to being accused of sacrilege, was cut away, and he substituted for her name either that of Tehutimes I or of Tehutimes II. A complete political change was effected both at home and abroad from the first day of his accession to power. Hatshepsu had been averse to war. During the whole of her reign there had not been a single campaign undertaken beyond the Isthmus of Suez, and by the end of her life she had lost nearly all that her father had gained in Syria; the people of Kharu [Phœnicia] had shaken off the yoke, probably at the instigation of the king of the Amorites, and nothing remained to Egypt of the Asiatic province but Gaza, Sharhana, and the neighbouring villages.[c]

One of the first acts of Tehutimes III as sole king, was to lead an expedition against Syria, where the constant revolts had weakened the power of Egypt. He arrived at Gaza on the 3rd (or 4th) of the month of Pakhons. There he celebrated the anniversary of his coronation, and the twenty-third year of his reign. He then proceeded by gentle marches to Ihem, twenty miles to the north of Gaza, where he learned from his envoys, that the king of Kadesh had intrenched himself at Megiddo, with a contingent of the rebels.

TRIUMPHS OF TEHUTIMES III; HIS SUCCESSORS

Fear of the danger of the mountain defiles near Aluna made some of the officers wish to turn back and go by the Ziftha road. But Tehutimes indignantly rejected their counsel, saying:

“By my life, by the love that Ra has for me, by the favour bestowed on me by my father Amen, my Majesty will take this road of Aluna, whether it please you to take any of the other routes suggested, or whether it please you to follow me. For would not these vile enemies, detested by Ra, say: ‘If Pharaoh is going by another route, he is going for fear of us’?”

Then the Pharaoh’s generals replied: “Thy father Amen protects thee; we will follow whithersoever thou leadest, as servants follow their lord.”

Three days’ rapid march brought the army, without any mishap, to the town of Aluna, close to a torrent called the Qina, a little to the south of Megiddo, and there it encamped for the night in the face of the enemy with the watchwords:

“Keep a good heart: courage! watch well! Be alert in the camp!”

Dawn found the Egyptian army ranged for battle; the right wing was directed towards the River Qina, while the left extended into the plain towards the northwest of Megiddo. After a sharp encounter, the Syrians were seized by a panic, and abandoning their horses and chariots on the battle-field, they fled back to Megiddo; but fear of the enemy kept the gates closed, and among those drawn up to the ramparts, by ropes let down by the townspeople, was the lord of Kadesh himself.

“If it had pleased God not to let the soldiers of his Majesty be employed in carrying off the spoils of his vile enemies, they could then have taken Megiddo,”--it says in the account of the campaign. The cupidity of the conquerors saved the lives of the vanquished, for, although they took possession on the field of battle of 2132 horses, 994 chariots, and all the booty left behind by the Asiatics, they took only 140 prisoners and killed only 83.

In the evening, when the victorious army marched by Tehutimes III with the spoils, the king exclaimed:

“Had you taken Megiddo, it would have been a very great favour granted me by my father this day; for as all the chiefs of the country are within the walls, it would be like taking a thousand cities to take Megiddo.”

However, the place, being soon besieged, capitulated in a few days. With its fall, the campaign ended; and the chiefs of Syria and Mesopotamia hastened to take the oath of allegiance and to pay tribute to Egypt.

Three successive campaigns, from the year XXIV to the year XXVIII of this reign, completed the subjugation of Syria and southern Phœnicia.

[Sidenote: [_ca._ 1520-1503 B.C.]]

In the year XXIX, Tehutimes proceeded to Naharain, the territory between the rivers Orontes and Euphrates, and the districts on the west of Khilibu were sacked to the glory of the god of Thebes, whose coffers were soon filled with the gold, silver, and treasures of the Hittite princes.

As the king was returning to Egypt with “a joyful heart,” he suddenly bethought him that the Zahi, rich in wine, oil and corn, and beyond the line of military routes, would be a wealthy and easy prey. So he turned to the east, and made a raid on the district of Aradus, which the Egyptians robbed of cattle and produce.

The following year the Thebans returned again, and the towns of Kadesh, Semyra, Aradus, and Arathu, on the shores of Lake Nisrana, fell one after the other. The sons of their chiefs were kept as hostages. The campaign lasted till XXXI; and the king celebrated his victory by putting up two steles near Carchemish, one on the east of the river, and the other near the stele erected by his father, or grandfather, Tehutimes I, nearly half a century before.

Then he conquered Ni[5] and received tribute from its prince. The sojourn of Tehutimes III in this town was signalised by the performance of the royal duty of killing wild beasts; and the king is reported to have hunted and killed more than one hundred and twenty elephants.

All the tribes of Syria had to submit to the powerful yoke of the Egyptians, and the chiefs of the Libanu, the Kheta [Hittites] and the king of Singara took the oath of allegiance.

Nevertheless there was a revolt under the king of Naharain in XXXVII, which was quelled by a great battle not far from Aluna. In XLI the seat of war was in Cœle-Syria; and the king of Kadesh refusing to do homage to Pharaoh, a deadly struggle took place under the ramparts of the city. The besieged tried the ruse of letting a mare loose among the chariots of Tehutimes; but Amenemheb, an officer of the guard, leaped to the ground, disembowelled the animal with a thrust of his sword, and cutting off its tail, presented it to the king; and the same brave officer, at the head of a picked body of men, succeeded in making a breach and forcing an entrance into the town.

Hardly a year passed without a skirmish with the Uauatu in Ethiopia. But the tribes, having trembled so long before the Pharaohs, fled at the first sign of attack. The Egyptians had only to take possession of the flocks and herds, or any booty left in the deserted villages, and the campaign of the commander was a series of easy victories, which were celebrated with triumph on their return home.

The success of Tehutimes III in his campaigns increased the size and wealth of the kingdom and gave ground for his being accorded the name of “the Great”; and it is not surprising to see that his deeds formed the subject of poetic panegyrics of the period, inscribed on the Temple of Karnak:

“I am come,” said the god Amen to him, “to permit thee to crush the princes of Zahi; I cast them at thy feet in their districts; I make them see thy Majesty as a lord of light, when thou shinest before them in my likeness.

“I am come to let thee crush the barbarians of Asia, to take captive the chiefs of Ruthen. I will make them see thy Majesty decked with warlike apparel, when thou wieldest thy arms upon the chariot.

“I am come to let thee crush the land of the East; Kefa (Phœnicia) and Asebi (Cyprus) are in fear of thee; I make them see thy Majesty like a young bull, firm of heart and irresistible with thy horns.

“I am come to let thee crush the people who reside in their ports. And the regions of Mathen tremble before thee. I make them see thy Majesty like the hippopotamus, lord of terror and unapproachable upon the waters.

“I am come to let thee crush the people who reside in their islands. Those who live on the bosom of the sea are within reach of thy roaring. I make them see thy Majesty as an avenger on the back of his victim.

“I am come to let thee crush the Tuhennu. The isles of the Uthent are at thy disposal. I make them see thy Majesty like that of a furious lion, that strews the valley with corpses.

“I am come to let thee crush the maritime countries, so that the girdle of the oceans is in thy hand. I make them see that thy Majesty, as the king of birds, sees everything with one glance.

“I am come to let thee crush the lords of the sands who live in the lagunes; to let thee lead the dwellers upon the sand into captivity. I make them see thy Majesty like a jackal of the South, a king of runners, a scourer of the two regions.

“I am come to let thee crush the barbarians of Nubia. As far as the land of Shat, all is in thy hand. I make them see thy Majesty like unto thy two brothers, Hor and Set, whose arms I have united to secure thy power.”

So much success appealed to the imagination of the people, and Tehutimes III was soon regarded as a hero of romance, as were Khufu and Usertsen I. Only one of the legends circulated for centuries after his death is still extant.

The prince of Joppa revolted and took the field against the Egyptians. The Pharaoh, unable at that time to leave his country, sent Thutii, one of his bravest generals, to quell the insurrection. The town was soon taken.

Tehutimes died on the last day of Phamenoth in the year LIV of his reign, and was buried at Thebes.

[Sidenote: [_ca._ 1503-1455 B.C.]]

Amenhotep II succeeded his father Tehutimes III.

The Syrians thought that the coming of a new king of Egypt meant a time for casting off the yoke of the Pharaohs. But they soon saw their mistake. Amenhotep laid waste the districts of the upper Jordan, and “like a terrible lion which puts a country to flight,” on Tybi 26th he crossed the Arseth to reconnoitre the passes of Anato. When “some Asiatics appeared on horseback to bar his approach, he seized their weapons of war, and his prowess equalled the mysterious power of Set, for the barbarians fled the glance.”

On the 10th Epiphi he took Ni without striking a blow. The inhabitants, men and women, were on the walls to do honour to his Majesty. Other places, like Akerith, underwent long siege, before surrendering. But the insurrection was entirely quelled by the year III, and in the course of the campaign the Pharaoh captured seven chiefs of the country of Thakhis. Six of them were solemnly sacrificed to Amen, their hands and heads being exposed on the walls of the temple of Karnak. The seventh was treated in the same way at Napata, as an example to the Ethiopian princes and to make them respect the authority of Pharaoh.

An insurrection of the tribes in the desert, and the oases on the east of Egypt, was quelled by Amenemheb, who had the same post under Amenhotep as he had under Tehutimes III.

Tehutimes IV, son of Amenhotep, was the next king of Egypt, and his successful campaigns confirmed his power in Syria and Ethiopia.

[Sidenote: [_ca._ 1455-1400 B.C.]]

Under Amenhotep III, who succeeded Tehutimes IV, the boundaries of Egyptian domination were fixed at the Euphrates on the north, and on the south by the land of the Gallas.

The Syrians were now completely under the Egyptian yoke, and willingly sent their daughters to the royal harem; the old-time wars had developed into occasional raids for the acquisition of slaves or workmen for the building operations in the valley of the Nile.

The last kings of the XVIIIth Dynasty were distinguished by the name of “heretic kings,” for as they resented the increasing sacerdotal power of the cult of Amen they established opposition cults. Tehutimes IV discarded the Great Sphinx and restored the old cult of Horemkhu (“The Sun in the Two Horizons”). Amenhotep III brought to Thebes the religion of Aten, the solar disk, and in the year X of his reign inaugurated a festival at Karnak in honour of the new religion. And Amenhotep IV, to free himself from the power of the high priest at Thebes, determined to have a new capital for his kingdom, in which Aten should be the supreme god. The religion of Aten was probably the most ancient form of the religions of Ra. The disk, before which protestations were made, was not only the shining and visible form of the divinity, it was the god himself.

[Sidenote: [_ca._ 1420-1365 B.C.]]

Amenhotep III married a wife of foreign origin and religion, Thi. He had by her a son who succeeded him under the name of Amenhotep IV. The figure of Amenhotep IV, as made known to us by the monuments, exhibits those peculiar and strange characteristics which mutilation impresses upon the face, chest, and abdomen of eunuchs. On the other hand, we know that at an early age he married Queen Nefert-Thi and had by her seven daughters. It is therefore probable that if he really did experience the misfortune of which his features seem to bear the evidence, it happened during the wars of Amenhotep III and among the black people of the South. The custom of mutilating prisoners and wounded is, among these people, as old as the world. Amenhotep IV doubtless imbibed religious ideas from his mother, for he manifested a great horror of the cult of Amen and gave his homage to the solar divinities, chiefly to the disk itself.

But the fear of arousing his subjects to revolt restrained him at first from too openly avowing his heresy. He contented himself with changing his name, which contained that of Amen, for that of Khun-aten, “Splendour of the Sun’s disk,” and continued to worship his father Amenhotep and the god Amen himself. Later, his religious fanaticism got the better of his prudence. The cult of Amen was forbidden and his name erased wherever it could be reached. The pure-blooded Egyptians came under suspicion on account of their religion and disappeared from the king’s entourage, giving place to Asiatic personages who resembled Pharaoh and were deprived like him of their virility.

Thebes, so full of monuments consecrated to the fallen god, lost its rank of capital.

Khun-aten built a new capital at a place in Middle Egypt which to-day bears the name of Tel-el-Amarna, and which he called Khut-aten, where there was nothing to recall the old religion.

The sun was the principal god of the old religion; all the ancient solar divinities, Ra-Horemkhu, Hor, were recognised and respected. Monuments show us the god in the form of a disk whose rays descend toward the earth, each ray terminating in a hand holding the ansated cross--the emblem of life. The disk is called Aten. Wherever the king goes, the solar disk accompanies him and sheds its benediction upon him.

But with all the attention he paid to religion, Khun-aten was, like his ancestors, a great builder and conqueror. Ethiopia, Thebes, and Memphis were fields of his activity, and he continued to exercise sovereign authority in Syria as well as in Africa.

At his death the crown passed to Prince Ai, his foster-brother, and husband of his eldest daughter Tai. The new king, without renouncing the religion of sun-worship, suspended the persecutions which had the cult of Amen for their object and restored the religion of the ancient national divinities. For successors he had his brothers-in-law Tut-ankh-Amen, and later Saa-nekht, whose reign, although short, seems to have been prosperous. Tut-ankh-Amen, at least, is represented as an all-powerful Pharaoh, to whom foreign peoples give trembling homage. [According to Brugsch and Wiedemann and Petrie the order of these kings is Saa-nekht, Tut-ankh-Amen, and Ai--the reverse of the order here given.]

But after them civil and religious wars desolated Egypt; the throne was occupied by ephemeral kings whose names even are unknown to us. [The kings formerly reputed to belong to the end of this dynasty are now, as Professor Petrie remarks, “not of historical substance, but only linguistic questions.” It has been well established that the names in question are either errors or “Ptolemaic bungles,” and they are now assigned to monarchs of this and other dynasties.]

King Hor-em-heb re-established peace, suppressed the solar religion, destroyed Khun-aten’s monuments, and everywhere restored the ancient cult. Outside the country he reconquered Ethiopia, which for the time being had been lost, and made the land of Punt tributary, but risked no expeditions into Syria. The conquests of the Tehutimes and the Amenhoteps, so dearly obtained in this direction, had been lost during the religious wars. The petty local princes had ceased to pay tribute: and to reduce them anew, a whole generation of conquerors was necessary.[a]

FOOTNOTES

[3] [Whether Tehutimes I or Tehutimes II was the father of Tehutimes III is still in doubt, but Maspero and Petrie incline to the belief that it was Tehutimes II.]

[4] [Petrie says he was about thirty-one years old.]

[5] [A town in the land of Naharain that sometimes has been confounded with Nineveh.]