The second middle period
The second middle period
| The sovereigns of the XIII dynasty – about fifty – who reigned for
one-hundred and twenty years – were waker than their predecessors although they
kept control over Nubia and were able to keep a centralized administration. In the last years they had to compete with the rival sovereign of the XIV dynasty, who had acquired pover in the Delta region, and to drive back the invasions by the Hyksos, semitic people from western Asia. The Hyksos were settled already at the and of the XIII dynasty, in the area of the delta of the Nile where, taking advantage of the climate of anarchy that was getting created, they lived of raids. When in the Near Orient the pressure from the indoeuropean people increased (ittiti, cassiti and hurriti), the Hyksos invasion was more intense and as there wasn’t a great central power the invasors were able to get possesion of country; first they occupied the area of the delta and Avairis city; were they created an independent state; then in about fifty years they were able to expand their doman up to Menfi. The conquer was rather easy, also because the Hyksos used war carts with horres, which the Egyptian didn’t know. The Hyksos dynasty marked the beginning of the second middle period (about 214 years long) which was characterized by instability and the lack of a political union. The Hyksos of the XV dynasty governed from the capital Avari, in the eastern delta, keeping control over the central and northern regions of the country; they adopted the Egyptian titles and customs and they kept in the high levels of bureaucracy Egyptian functionaries. Meanwhile, in middle Egypt the XVI dynasty was founded, very probably subordinated by the Hyksos. In the south there was more independence by a third central power, place of the XVII teban dynasty, that reigned in the territory between Elefantina and Abido; already the teban king Kamose (1576-1570 BC) of the XVII dynasty, fought with success against the Hyksos, but it was his brother Amosi I who unified the country defeating them destroying their capital Avari and forcing them to Low Palestrine. The Hyksos, during their reign in Egypt, introduced some innovations, such as the vertical loom, the cultivation of olive trees, the working of bronze, and in the military ambit, the use of new arms and of the war cart. |
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