The Middle Kingdom had been a time of unity and prosperity which dissolved during the 13th Dynasty so that by c. 1782 BCE a new power had been able to rise in the north of Egypt, that of the Hyksos. The Hyksos were Semitic peoples who established a seat of power at Avaris in Lower Egypt while, at the same time, the Kingdom of Kush rose in the south in Upper Egypt. These two powers were enabled to establish themselves so firmly because of the neglect of the latter part of the 13th Dynasty. The rule of the Hyksos and, to a lesser extent, the rise of Kush, characterize the era which 19th and 20th century CE scholars named the Second Intermediate Period.
Although Egyptian writers of the New Kingdom, and later, would characterize the time of the Hyksos as a time of chaos and destruction, the archaeological record – as well as evidence from the time – show this is a literary exaggeration intended to contrast the greatness of a strong, unified country (such as prevailed in the New Kingdom) with the disunity that came before it. All evidence points to a cordial, if not warm, relationship between the foreign kings at Avaris and the Egyptian rulers at Thebes until the wars broke out which finally resulted in the expulsion of the Hyksos from Egypt. Further, the Hyksos introduced a number of cultural innovations, especially in warfare, which the Egyptians made use of in building their empire. Scholars Brier and Hobbs write:
However pleased the Egyptians may have been to evict the Hyksos, they owed a great debt to their former occupiers. Egypt learned about chariots and horses from the Hyksos along with the secret of producing bronze, a metal harder than their copper. Battles against the Hyksos also led Egypt to look beyond its northern borders for the first time and, with a better-equipped arm, eventually to dominate the Middle East (27).
Map of the New Kingdom of Egypt, 1450 BCE
The war with the Hyksos began when the Egyptian king Seqenenra Taa (also known as Ta’O) interpreted a message from the Hyksos king Apepi as a challenge and went to war with him. Ta’O was killed, most likely in battle, and the cause was taken up by Kamose of Thebes (probably Ta’O’s son) who claimed victory over the Hyksos after destroying the city of Avaris. Later inscriptions from the time, and the archaeological record, show that Avaris was still a Hyksos stronghold in the time of the next king, Ahmose I, who fought three battles to take it and drove the Hyksos first to Palestine and then to Syria. With the defeat of the foreign kings and their expulsion from Egypt, Ahmose I re-established his borders, pushed the Kushites further to the south, unified the country under his rule from the city of Thebes, and thus initiated the period of the New Kingdom.
The 18th Dynasty
Ahmose I understood that the Hyksos had been able to establish themselves so firmly because they had been allowed to by earlier Egyptian monarchs. He therefore decided to create buffer zones around Egypt to secure the borders and fortified neglected settlements at key spots to guard the country. Ahmose I’s struggle against the Hyksos brought him and his army into contact with the regions of Palestine and Syria where he continued his campaigns as well as leading military expeditions south against the Kingdom of Kush in Nubia. When he died he had consolidated his rule and secured the country leaving a stable political and economic situation for his successor Amenhotep I (c. 1541-1520 BCE).
Amenhotep I maintained his father’s policies and emulated him as a warrior king in inscriptions but probably only led campaigns in Nubia. There are no records of him leading expeditions into Palestine or Syria but he may have since those regions remained secure during his reign and that of his successor. Amenhotep I is best known for his contributions to the arts and religious developments. The Book of Coming Forth by Day (better known as The Egyptian Book of the Dead) attained its final form under his reign and he was the patron of the artist’s colony of Deir el-Medina, the village responsible for work done on the tombs in the Valley of the Kings where the great pharaohs were buried
