loincloths and protected by a long and cumbersome cow-hide shield – were now issued with protective jackets and a lighter, easier-to-handle tapered shield. Their most important introduction was, however, the harnessed horse and the two-wheeled horse-drawn chariot, a light and highly mobile vehicle which, manned by a driver and a soldier equipped with spear, shield and bow, quickly became one of the most valuable assets of the Egyptian army.
In the south the Theban 17th Dynasty ruled over Egypt from Elephantine to Cusae (el-Qusiya, Middle Egypt), successfully continuing many of the Middle Kingdom royal traditions but on a reduced scale and adapted to fit local conditions; the 17th Dynasty royal pyramids were
Fig. 1.1 The cartouche of King Sekenenre Tao II
relatively tiny mud-brick structures perched on top of rock-cut tombs. As the southern dynasty slowly established itself relationships between south and north gradually deteriorated, and open warfare erupted when King Sekenenre Tao II, ‘The Brave’, came to the Theban throne. A fantastic New Kingdom story which purports to explain the outbreak of hostilities starts by setting the scene:
It once happened that the land of Egypt was in misery, for there was no lord as [sole] king. A day came to pass when King Sekenenre was [still only] ruler of the Southern City. Misery was in the town of the Asiatics, for Prince Apophis was in Avaris, and the entire land paid tribute to him, delivering their taxes [and] even the north bringing every [sort of] good produce of the Delta. 9
We are told how the Hyksos King Apophis, now a fervent worshipper of the peculiar and so far unidentified animal-headed god Seth, decides to provoke a quarrel by making an intentionally ridiculous demand. A messenger is sent southwards, and he delivers the complaint to the bemused Sekenenre Tao:
Let there be a withdrawal from the canal of hippopotami which lie at the east of the City, because they don't let sleep come to me either in the daytime or at night.
Sekenenre is understandably rendered speechless by this unreasonable request: it is inconceivable that the Theban hippopotami could have been making so much noise that they were preventing Apophis from sleeping in Avaris, some 500 miles downstream. Unfortunately, the end of the story is lost, and we do not know how the king eventually replied, or indeed whether Apophis went on to make even more outrageous demands.
The more down-to-earth archaeological evidence confirms that Sekenenre Tao II fought against the Hyksos in Middle Egypt before dying of wounds sustained in battle: his mummified body was unwrapped by the French egyptologist Gaston Maspero in 1886, and examined by the distinguished anatomist G. Elliot Smith in 1906. The mummy was clearly a disturbing sight, with horrific head and neck injuries caused by repeated blows from a bronze Hyksos battle-axe:
All that now remains of Saqnounri Tiouaqen [Sekenenre Tao II] is a badly damaged, disarticulated skeleton enclosed in an imperfect sheet of soft, moist, flexible dark brown skin, which has a strongly aromatic, spicy odour… No attempt was made to put the body into the customary mummy-position; the head had not been straightened on the trunk, the legs were not fully extended, and the arms and hands were left in the agonized attitude into which they had been thrown in the death spasms following the murderous attack, the evidence of which is so clearly impressed on the battered face and skull. 10
The badly preserved body suggests that the king had been hastily mummified, not necessarily by the official royal undertakers. Sekenenre Tao II was succeeded by his son, Kamose, who ruled for little more than three years yet managed to strengthen the Theban hold on Middle Egypt. After brooding aloud on the unfortunate situation which had divided his land – ‘I should like to know what serves this strength of mine when a chieftain is in Avaris and another in Kush, and I sit united with an Asiatic
In the south the Theban 17th Dynasty ruled over Egypt from Elephantine to Cusae (el-Qusiya, Middle Egypt), successfully continuing many of the Middle Kingdom royal traditions but on a reduced scale and adapted to fit local conditions; the 17th Dynasty royal pyramids were
Fig. 1.1 The cartouche of King Sekenenre Tao II
relatively tiny mud-brick structures perched on top of rock-cut tombs. As the southern dynasty slowly established itself relationships between south and north gradually deteriorated, and open warfare erupted when King Sekenenre Tao II, ‘The Brave’, came to the Theban throne. A fantastic New Kingdom story which purports to explain the outbreak of hostilities starts by setting the scene:
It once happened that the land of Egypt was in misery, for there was no lord as [sole] king. A day came to pass when King Sekenenre was [still only] ruler of the Southern City. Misery was in the town of the Asiatics, for Prince Apophis was in Avaris, and the entire land paid tribute to him, delivering their taxes [and] even the north bringing every [sort of] good produce of the Delta. 9
We are told how the Hyksos King Apophis, now a fervent worshipper of the peculiar and so far unidentified animal-headed god Seth, decides to provoke a quarrel by making an intentionally ridiculous demand. A messenger is sent southwards, and he delivers the complaint to the bemused Sekenenre Tao:
Let there be a withdrawal from the canal of hippopotami which lie at the east of the City, because they don't let sleep come to me either in the daytime or at night.
Sekenenre is understandably rendered speechless by this unreasonable request: it is inconceivable that the Theban hippopotami could have been making so much noise that they were preventing Apophis from sleeping in Avaris, some 500 miles downstream. Unfortunately, the end of the story is lost, and we do not know how the king eventually replied, or indeed whether Apophis went on to make even more outrageous demands.
The more down-to-earth archaeological evidence confirms that Sekenenre Tao II fought against the Hyksos in Middle Egypt before dying of wounds sustained in battle: his mummified body was unwrapped by the French egyptologist Gaston Maspero in 1886, and examined by the distinguished anatomist G. Elliot Smith in 1906. The mummy was clearly a disturbing sight, with horrific head and neck injuries caused by repeated blows from a bronze Hyksos battle-axe:
All that now remains of Saqnounri Tiouaqen [Sekenenre Tao II] is a badly damaged, disarticulated skeleton enclosed in an imperfect sheet of soft, moist, flexible dark brown skin, which has a strongly aromatic, spicy odour… No attempt was made to put the body into the customary mummy-position; the head had not been straightened on the trunk, the legs were not fully extended, and the arms and hands were left in the agonized attitude into which they had been thrown in the death spasms following the murderous attack, the evidence of which is so clearly impressed on the battered face and skull. 10
The badly preserved body suggests that the king had been hastily mummified, not necessarily by the official royal undertakers. Sekenenre Tao II was succeeded by his son, Kamose, who ruled for little more than three years yet managed to strengthen the Theban hold on Middle Egypt. After brooding aloud on the unfortunate situation which had divided his land – ‘I should like to know what serves this strength of mine when a chieftain is in Avaris and another in Kush, and I sit united with an Asiatic
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