Egypt in the first millennium BC (1) ‘Libyans and Nubians’

Tony Leahy

Foreign contacts • Libyan invasions/migrations began c. 1300 BC –

eventually became kings by c. 1070 BC

• Nubian invasions and loose overlordship, c. 730-660 BC

• Assyrian invasions, 670s-660s

• Greek soldiers + traders in Egypt c. 650 BC onwards

• Persian Conquest, 525 BC

• Macedonian ‘liberation’ by Alexander the Great, 332 BC then 300 years of rule by descendants of a general, Ptolemy

• Roman conquest 30 BC

• Resilience and vibrancy of pharaonic culture despite all

Libyan, Nubian, Persian and Greek

Third Intermediate Period (c. 1070-664 BC)

• Dynasties 21-24 – Libyan Period

(rise to power of descendants of immigrants from a semi-nomadic society, period characterised by fragmentation of country)

• Dynasty 25 – Nubian (Kushite) Period (invasion from south, imposition of tribute, no major change to political structure, clashes with Assyria)

The end of the New Kingdom c. 1070 BC

• invasions of Libyans and ‘Sea Peoples’

• high-priests of Amun/military commanders based at Thebes, ruling most of the Valley,

• kings of the Twenty-first Dynasty ruling the Delta

• shift of northern capital from Piramesse to nearby new city of Tanis

• new type of royal burial at Tanis

• social crisis, reflected in tomb-robberies?

Egyptians victorious? Medinet Habu, mortuary temple of Ramses III

“Egypt’s last great hero”?

Prisoners to kings

Ramses III’s prisoners Medinet Habu, c. 1170 BC - among the ruling elite in the person of Herihor within a century

Sheshonq I: pharaoh and foreigner

‘Great chief of the Meshwesh’ to ‘King’

Amun’s warrior: Sheshonq I

What’s in a name?

• Six kings called Sheshonq

• Five called Osorkon

• Three called Takeloth

• Significance of retention of Libyan names for centuries?

• How far are names a clue to ethnic identity?

Traces of a Libyan Period temple at Balamun

Tanis: royal tombs of Dynasties 21-22 (‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’)

Major changes in nature and location of royal burials

New and old at Tanis: funerary mask and reused sarcophagus from Valley of kings

Multiple usurpation: a sphinx from Tanis

Craftsmanship in metal and stone under Osorkon II

Greater prominence of women

Women alone in divine presence God’s Wife of Amun

Laments of a general for his dead king and of a child for her

premature death

• ‘Though I am but a child, harm is what

befell me, • When I was but a child (one without fault

reports it). • I lie in the valley, a young girl, I thirst with

water beside me! • I was driven from childhood too early, • turned away from my house as a

youngster, before I had my fill of it. • The dark, a child’s terror, engulfed me, • while the breast was in my mouth. • The demons of the hall bar everyone from

me. • I am too young to be alone. • My heart enjoyed seeing many people, • I was one who loved gaiety. • O king of the gods, lord of eternity, to

whom all people come, • Give me bread, milk, incense, water that

come from your altar, • I am a young girl without fault.’

An oracular amuletic decree

Mont-Re-Harakhty, lord of Thebes… said:

' I shall keep safe Paditwerisheru called Djedmontefankh, whose mother is Nespernub, son of Djedkhons (the) son of Hori, my servant.

I shall keep him healthy (in) his flesh and his bone(s). I shall keep healthy his head, I shall keep healthy his right eye and his left eye. I shall keep healthy his ears. I shall keep healthy his nose. I shall keep healthy [his] mouth. I shall keep healthy his tongue. I shall keep healthy his teeth…

I shall enable him to grow up. I shall enable him to develop, I shall enable him to become excellent and I shall enable him to become clever. I shall enable him to see himself with his hand bent towards Amun, Mut, Khons, and Mont, lord of Hermonthis.'

Personal protection

the Horus child on the crocodiles

Genealogies in stone in temples:

statues and footprints

The divisions of Egypt, c 730 BC (invasion of Pi(ankh)y)

As many as five ‘kings of Upper and Lower Egypt’

Numerous ‘great chiefs of the Meshwesh’, just as powerful?

The tribal chiefs flourish down to the seventh century BC

The Nubians arrive c. 730 BC: invasion of Pi(ankh)y

Nubian adoption of Egyptian burial customs

The Kushite kings (25th Dynasty): a distinctive iconography

Summary of key points

• Period of fragmentation in which local power seems to be accepted as political ‘norm’ – different from earlier ‘intermediate’ periods.

• Major social and religious developments

• Ethnic dimension – impact of Libyans on political structure of country and its culture