from the coasts of the Delta. This fleet joined the Libyan invaders, but was overthrown with heavy loss by the Egyptians, in whose ranks there actually served many Sherden and Kehaka, Sardinian and Libyan mercenaries. Egypt itself was thus clear of enemies; but the chariots and warriors of the Philistines and their associates were advancing through Syria, their families and goods following in ox-carts, and their ships accompanying them along the shore. Rameses led out his army and fleet against them and struck them so decisive a blow that the migrating swarm submitted to his rule and paid him tribute. In his eleventh year another Libyan invasion had to be met, and his suzerainty in Palestine forcibly asserted. His vigour was equal to all these emergencies and the later years of his reign were spent in peace. Rameses III., however, was not a great ruler. He was possessed by the spirit of decadence, imitative rather than originating. It is evident that Rameses II. was the model to which he endeavoured to conform, and he did not attempt to preserve himself from the weakening influences of priestcraft. To the temples he not only restored the property which had been given to them by former kings, but he also added greatly to their wealth; the Theban Ammon naturally received by far the greatest share, more than those of all the other gods together. The land held in the name of different deities is estimated at about 15% of the whole of Egypt; various temples of Ammon owned two-thirds of this, Re of Heliopolis and Ptah of Memphis being the next in wealth. His palace was at Medinet Habu on the west bank of Thebes in the south quarter; and here he built a great temple to Ammon, adorned with scenes from his victories and richly provided with divine offerings. Although Egypt probably was prosperous on the whole, there was undoubtedly great distress amongst certain portions of the population. We read in a papyrus of a strike of starving labourers in the Theban necropolis who would not work until corn was given to them, and apparently the government storehouse was empty at the time, perhaps in consequence of a bad Nile. Shortly before the death of the old king a plot in the harem to assassinate him, and apparently to place one of his sons on the throne, was discovered and its investigation ordered, leading after his death to the condemnation of many high-placed men and women. Nine kings of the name of Rameses now followed each other ingloriously in the space of about eighty years to the end of the XXth Dynasty, the power of the high priests of Ammon ever growing at their expense. At this time the Theban necropolis was being more systematically robbed than ever before. Under Rameses IX. an investigation took place which showed that one of the royal tombs before the western cliffs had been completely ransacked and the mummies burnt. Three years later the Valley of the Tombs of the Kings was attacked and the sepulchres of Seti I. and Rameses II. were robbed.
The authority of the last king of the XXth Dynasty, Rameses XII., was shadowy. Hrihor, the high priest in his reign, gradually gathered into his own hands all real power, and succeeded him at Thebes, c. 1100 B.C., The Deltaic Dynasties; Libyan period. while a prince at Tanis named Smendes (Esbentêti) founded a separate dynasty in the Delta (Dynasty XXI.). From this period dates a remarkable papyrus containing the report of an envoy named Unamûn, sent to Syria by Hrihor to obtain cedar timber from Byblus. He took with him an image of Ammon to bestow life and health on the prince of Byblus, but apparently no other provision for the journey or for the negotiations beyond a letter of recommendation to Smendes and a little gold and silver. Smendes had trading ships in the Phoenician ports, but even his influence was not greater than that of other commercial or pirate centres, while Hrihor was of no account except in so far as he might pay well for the cedar wood he required. Unamûn was robbed on the voyage, the prince of Byblus rebuffed him, and when at last the latter agreed to provide the timber it was only in exchange for substantial gifts hastily sent for from Egypt (including rolls of papyrus) and the promise of more to follow. The prince, however, seems to have acknowledged to some extent the divinity of Ammon and the debt owed by Phoenicia to Egyptian culture, and pitied the many misfortunes of Unamûn. The narrative shows the feebleness of Egypt abroad. The Tanite line of kings generally had the over-lordship of the high priests of Thebes; the descendants of Hrihor, however, sometimes by marriage with princesses of the other line, could assume cartouches and royal titles, and in some cases perhaps ruled the whole of Egypt. Ethiopia may have been ruled with the Thebais, but the records of the time are very scanty. Syria was wholly lost to Egypt. The mummies from the despoiled tombs of the kings were the object of much anxious care to the kings of this dynasty; after being removed from one tomb to another, they were finally deposited in a shaft near the temple of Deir el Bahri, where they remained for nearly three thousand years, until the demand for antiquities at last brought the plunderer once more to their hiding-place; eventually they were all secured for the Cairo museum, where they may now be seen.
Libyan soldiers had long been employed in the army, and their military chiefs settled in the large towns and acquired wealth and power, while the native rulers grew weaker and weaker. The Tanite dynasty may have risen from a Libyan stock, though there is nothing to prove it; the XXIInd Dynasty are clearly from their names of foreign extraction, and their genealogy indicates distinctly a Libyan military origin in a family of rulers of Heracleopolis Magna, in Middle Egypt. Sheshonk (Shishak) I., the founder of the dynasty, c. 950 B.C., seems to have fixed his residence at Bubastis in the Delta, and his son married the daughter of the last king of the Tanite dynasty. Heracleopolis seems henceforth for several centuries to have been capital of Middle Egypt, which was considered as a more or less distinct province. Sheshonk secured Thebes, making one of his sons high priest of Ammon, and whereas Solomon appears to have dealt with a king of Egypt on something like an equal footing, Sheshonk re-established Egyptian rule in Palestine and Nubia, and his expedition in the fifth year of Rehoboam subdued Israel as well as Judah, to judge by the list of city names which he inscribed on the wall of the temple of Karnak. Osorkon I. inherited a prosperous kingdom from his father, but no further progress was made. It required a strong hand to curb the Libyan chieftains, and divisions soon began to show themselves in the kingdom. The XXIInd Dynasty lasted through many generations; but there were rival kings, and M. Legrain thinks that he has proof that the XXIIIrd Dynasty was contemporaneous with the end of the XXIInd. The kings of the XXIIIrd Dynasty had little hold upon the subject princes, who spent the resources of the country in feuds amongst themselves. A native kingdom had meanwhile been established in Ethiopia. Our first knowledge of it is at this moment, when the Ethiopian king Pankhi already held the Thebais. The energetic prince of Sais, Tefnakht, followed by most of the princes of the Delta, subdued most of Middle Egypt, and by uniting these forces threatened the Ethiopian border. Heracleopolis Magna, however, with its petty king Pefteuaubasti, held out against Tefnakht, and Pankhi coming to its aid not only drove Tefnakht out of Middle Egypt, but also captured Memphis and received the submission of the princes and chiefs; in all these included four “kings” and fourteen other chiefs. According to Diodorus the Ethiopian state was theocratic, ruled through the king by the priests of Ammon. The account is probably exaggerated; but even in Pankhi’s record the piety of the king, especially towards Ammon, is very marked.
The XXIVth Dynasty consisted of a single Saite king named Bocchoris (Bekerrinf), son of Tefnachthus, apparently the above Tefnakht. Another Ethiopian invader, Shabako (Sabacon), is said to have burnt Bocchoris alive. The Ethiopian Dynasty. Ethiopian rule of the XXVth Dynasty was now firmly established, and the resources of the two countries together might have been employed in conquest in Syria and Phoenicia; but at this very time the Assyrian empire, risen to the highest pitch of military greatness, began to menace Egypt. The Ethiopian could do no more than encourage or support the Syrians in their fight for freedom against Sargon and Sennacherib. Shabako was followed by Shebitku and Shebitku by Tirhaka
