Dynasty Four has left a great mass of monu ments. The first King. Suefrn, was the first great warrior. the made expeditions into Nubia and Syria, and opened a new eopperonine at Wadi Magharah. his two sueeessors, the Cheops (q.v.) and Chephren (q.v.) of llerodotus. built the two largest pyramids—works which were never equaled at any later period. Later tradition ascribes the famous Sphinx near the pyramids to Chephren. but this is doubtful. Menkaurt. or llyeeritins built the third in size of the great pyramids; all subsequent royal pyramids are considerably smaller. Under this and the follow ing dynasty Egyptian sculpture reached its acme of perfection (e. 2S00 ti.c.). The most remark able monument of Dynasty Five (twelve kings) is the sun-temple near Riga. of which a building in the form of an obelisk has remained. The last king, called (Milos by Manetho, inaugurated the etistom of covering the chamber of the pyramid with inseriptii ins. This example, followed regu la•ly in Dynasty Six. has furnished to us the ex tensive texts of the pyramids opened in ISSO (those of Teti or Atoll, l'epi or Aland I„ Me Pepi II., and Neferkari•). These are all magical texts, of no historic but of great lin guistic interest, being copies of books so ancient that they were partially unintelligible even to the scribes of that age. Pepi 1, (or perhaps Apopi —the vowels are not expressed) left numerous traces of his building activity; be also waged a great war in Palestine, for which he used many negro troops from the tributary regions of Nubia. Most of the kings of this period built their resi dences—every King building a new city—around Memphis; the city of Memphis itself derived its name ( I/ea/infer. 'Good abode') from that of the pyramid of Pepi 1.. which stood in the vicinity. Pepi II. is reported to have reigned more than 90 years. Under his successor we bear of an ex pedition into the negro countries on the White Nile, to procure a pigmy for the King (c.2500), Dynasties Seven to Nine form a very obscure period which has left hardly any monuments. The princes of the names (counties) had become so independent that the power of the King de creased. Dynasties Seven and Eight were of .Memphiti•, Nine and Ten of lleraeleopolitan origin. The latter had to fight continually against rebellious nomarchs (counts), especially against those of Thebes, who began to claim the royal title, and finally succeeded in conquering the whole county. ruling as Dynasty Eleven. The last six kings of this family (nearly all called Antef or Mentuhotep) governed a reunited kingdom. Under them Thebes, formerly an in siplitleant town. first became the capital of Egypt. The last King of this dynasty. Sanklt has left the first report of an expedition to Punt. (See belo•.) The Twelfth (Theban?) Dynasty seems, from recent discoveries, to Imo bums about n.c. 2000. This period of about 200 years (seven kings. Amenemhat I., Usertesen Amenemhat II., Vsertesen II., Usertesen I I I., Amenemhat Ill., Antenemhat IV.. and a (gueen. was considered IT the later Egyp. Hans as the Golden Age, especially of literatm.e., the poetical style of which formed the model for all succeeding periods. Of the numerous build ings of Dynasty Twelve and its renowned art. comparatively little has survived. Antenenthat Ill, (q.v.) was the King Moeris of llerodotus, who gained the Province of the Fa (i)yam for a,rictlture, by diking off large parts from the lake, formed IT a branch of the Nile flowing into that oasis. Of the so-called Labyrinth, the larg est of all Egyptian temples, built at this time near the pyramid of Amenemhat III. in the neigh borhood of 11:1\0.r:ill. only a few stones It does not seem that the Twelfth Dynasty pos sessed more of Asia than the copper-mines near 1NI omit Final. hut Nubia was gradually eOlupered as fat' as the Second Cataract. where Usertesen I I. established his frontier. by building two strong fortresses.. on both sides of the Nile. The gold mines of that country were explored by the Pharaohs. After Dynasty Twelve Egypt fell back into the fernier anarehy and strife of nomarchs, and it is likely that more than 130 princes, fight ing with their neighbors for the crown, did not fill noire than about a century (Dynasties Thir teen and Fourteen).
Somewhat before 1700, Egypt was suddenly conquered by a foreign nation, whose rulers Manetho calls 11 yksos, i.e. shepherd (or foreign!) kings. We know nothing about the origin of these foreigners (they are usually taken for (yanaanites or Turanian., though both theories lack proof) except that they had first conquered Syria. In Egypt they soon became Egyptianized. They kept only the Delta under the it direct administration, leaving Upper Egypt to tributary native princes. The viceroys of 'Filches Dynasty Seventeen) finally threw oil the yoke of the foreign sover eign Apoph After a long struggle. during which the Thebans Ill. and his suc cessor died, Amasis 1. ( Aahmes or Atomise) put an end to the rule of the Ilyksos by conquering their capital and ehief fortress Avaris ior Hat-floret ) on the northeastern frontier ( e. 1(100). Pursuing, them into Palestine. Amasis. the first ruler of Dynasty Eighteen, inaugurated the period of conquests in Asia. Ilis unlimited power (the dominion of the many monarchs had been wiped out during the long Ilyksos war) and his army. disciplined and trained in the war of
independence, enabled him to conquer Palestine and Phoenicia. His son Amenophis (Amenhotep) i.. dying after a brief reign. became the patron saint of the Theban necropolis. Thutmosis (Thothines or Dhutmose) I. penetrated into Nubia beyond the third cataract. and into Syria as far as the Euphrates. His son. Thutmosis had to share his power with his energetic sister and wife hatshepsut (Hatasn). who also kept his minor successor Thutmosis L(her nephew?) under her control for twenty-two years. In one of the finest buildings of Egypt, her temple at Deir eldiahri. is as the most remarkable event of her reign the equipment of a whole fleet to -ail to the Abyssinian and Somali coast, called Punt (Phut in the Bible), in order to bring back gold. rare animals, and, above all. incense, to gether with some living incense-trees to be planted at Thebes. Formerly only single ships had been sent to Punt.
After Thutmosis III. had conic to power by Hatshepusut's death ( e. 13001. lie showed himself the greatest conqueror among the Pharaohs. In at least sixteen campaigns, he conquered Pales. tine, Plicenicia, and Syria as far as the Lower ()routes. and penetrated victoriously as far as northern Mesopotamia (Mitanni). storming Karkemish on the Euphrates. and hunting ele phants in that region. With his rich booty he embellished the temples of Egypt in a manner unequaled by any of his predecessors. though they had all been great builders. The gigantic Temple of Ammon at Karnak is chiefly his work. Ilis son Amenophis (Amenhotep) ii. ( c. 140) main tained the Egyptian possessions in Asia, and so lid Thutmosis IV., but Amenophis 11. gradually lost the northern regions. Ile lived on good terms with Mitanni, and married the sister of its King Dushrtita. For an account of the cuneiform dis patches received from Asia during the reign of this King and that of his son. which were found near Tell el-Amarna. see AmmtNA LETTEns.
son. by the beautiful and influential Queen Teye. Amenophis IV. (about 1110), eaused a great revolution by trying to replace the old re ligion with a solar cult. approaching monotheism. Ile persecuted the worship of the supreme god Am MOTI With special vehemence. carrying his ani mosity so far as to obliterate the name of the god from earlier monuments. and to change his own name, which contained that of Ammon, to "The Splendor of the Sun" (Akhunaten). i le removed his residence from Amnion's city, Thebes, and built a new capital at Tell el.Amarna in Middle Egypt. After his death (about 1395i, the new religion. which had previously met with great opposition. was destroyed together with its temples under the following ephemeral kings: Sinenkli-ka-rt;. Tutankhamon. and Ay. King Haremheb (about 1380) completed the restora lion of the old creed.
With the short-lived Rameses I.. Dynasty Nine teen (about 1350) begins. Sethos (Sety. Seti. or Setoy) 1.. his successor, a great warrior. whose tomb in Bibrin el-Moluk is the finest of all the royal tombs there, attempted to will back the parts of Middle Syria which had been lost. and was there entangled in a war with the Kheta or Hittites, whose kingdom seems to have had its original centre in Cappadocia. Ilis SOB Ra II., or Sesostris (c. 1330 B.C. ) , continued this war for twenty years with varying success. Finally at the peace eoneluded with the Hittites, and sealed by a marriage between Rameses and the daughter of their King, Syria was divided, and Egypt re tained Palestine and the southern half of nicia. The numerous representations of a few modest victories (chiefly that near Kadesh on the Orontes. later Laodicea and Libanum) made the Greeks believe that Rameses II. had been the conqueror of half the world. However, his activity as a builder during his reign of sixty-seven years was beyond comparison, though he usurped many monuments, replacing earlier names by his own. Perhaps two-thirds of all the monuments bear his cartouche. As he colonized Goshen (the modern Wadi Tumilat) and built there the cities of Pithom and Rameses, he has been pointed out as the Pharaoh who oppressed the Israelites. and his son has been deemed the Pharaoh of the Exodus. But an inscription, found in IStni, shows that, in the fifth year of his son Mernephtah, Israel was already settled in Palestine, and that an earlier date must be sought for the Exodus. On the other hand. it is clear from the Amarna Letters (q.v.). written about n.e. 1400. that at that time Israel had not vet entered the Promised Land. The date of the Exodus must, therefore. be placed in the interval between these two extreme limits. or, in round numbers, between n.c. 1400 and 1250. The theory is sometimes advanced that the ancestors of Israel settled in Egypt under the llyksos kings, but there is no evidence in support of this view. In fact. with the single exception of Mernephtah's inscription. theme is no mention of Israel in the Egyptian records, and nothing is known in re gard to the date of the chosen people's settlement in Egypt or the length of their sojourn there. All theories upon this subject are based upon little more than pure conjecture. Under neplitah, the Libyans devastated the Western Delta, and pirates from Asia Minor and Europe ravaged its shores—the Akaywash (Adm.:ins ?), . , .