When Napata fi nally fell in the fourth century b.c.e., the
Kushites abandoned it and moved their capital farther south,
to Meroë. Th ey survived for the next several hundred years
as traders. Meanwhile, a new power in the region emerged,
the kingdom of Axum, which lay to the Kushites’ east. In the
second century c.e. Axum conquered Kush, and the Kushite
civilization for all intents and purposes disappeared.
Warfare also contributed to the decline and disappear-
ance of the Carthaginian culture along Africa’s northern
coast. Carthage had been founded in the ninth century b.c.e.,
and over time it developed into a major trading power, sup-
ported by a sophisticated agricultural system. Protecting its
large mercantile fl eet in the Mediterranean Sea was a massive
navy. However, Carthage was a threat to the Roman Empire,
and Rome concluded that Carthage had to be subdued. A se-
ries of three wars began in 264 b.c.e. Although the outcome of
the fi rst war was indecisive, the treaty the two powers signed
forced Carthage to pay huge indemnities to Rome, depleting
its treasury and beginning the process of collapse. At the end
of the third war, in 146 b.c.e., Rome decisively defeated the
Carthaginians; sacked the capital city, Carthage; and eff ec-
tively wiped out Carthaginian culture and society.EGYPT
BY MARIAM F. AYAD
Th e Egypt of the pharaohs lasted more than 3,000 years. Th e
wonderful monuments preserved at Luxor, Saqqara, and
other archaeological sites testify to the greatness this civili-
zation enjoyed. Except for those magnifi cent ruins, however,
little remains of this ancient culture.
Egypt’s long history is divided into Old, Middle, and
New Kingdoms, spanning the period from about 2575 to 1070
b.c.e. Th ese periods of prosperity, expansion, and massive
construction projects are interrupted or followed by times
of weakened royal authority and even chaos known as the
First, Second, and Th ird Intermediate Periods, respectively.
Th e Second (ca. 1640–ca. 1532 b.c.e.) and Th ird (ca. 1070–ca.
712 b.c.e.) Intermediate Periods witnessed foreign domina-
tion over parts of Egypt; the First Intermediate Period (ca.
2134–ca. 2040 b.c.e.) is unique in that internal rather than
external factors seem to have caused the collapse.
Th e First Intermediate Period survived in literary works
long aft er stability was restored to the land. More than any
other period of Egyptian history, it aff ected the Egyptian col-
lective psyche. For centuries aft er its end Egyptians viewed
it as a time of social collapse in which fundamental notions
of justice and social order were overturned. Several literary
works, including Th e Complaints of Khakheperre-sonb and
Th e Admonitions of Ipuwer, vividly describe the social condi-
tions prevalent during the First Intermediate Period.
In Th e Complaints of Khakheperre-sonb we read of a la nd
destroyed and broken up, where “order is cast out,” chaos
rules, and the temples are deprived of their regular rations.
Th is text describes a general state of mourning, distress,inequity, and crime. It paints a picture of reversed social
norms wherein the rulers become ruled. Th e Admonitions
of Ipuwer describes similar conditions. Th e author imparts
a sense of overarching futility and infertility: “Lo,... the
women are barren, none conceive.” Several passages explic-
itly refer to bloodshed: “Th ere’s blood everywhere.... Lo, the
river is blood.” Others mention that there was “no shortage
of dead,” that “many dead are buried in the river,” and that
“the stream [became] the grave, the tomb became stream.”
Th e Admonitions of Ipuwer has been cited as evidence of an
Egyptian civil war.
Another text, known as Instructions to Merikare, written
sometime in the Middle Kingdom, may also contain refer-
ences to a civil war, such as in a warning that “troops will
fi ght troops.” Traces of the name “Khety” preserved in Meri-
kare and written within the royal cartouche (the oval that
typically encircles the king’s name in ancient Egyptian writ-
ings) may indicate that the events referred to took place in
the First Intermediate Period, as “Khety” could conceivably
be another way to write Akhtoy, a name held by several rul-
ers during that diffi cult time. Yet another text, known as the
Prophecy of Neferti, suggests that Egypt’s rulers were “many”
during this period and that the land was in “turmoil” and
“uproar.” People “seize[d] weapons of warfare,” the son be-
coming as enemy, “the brother as foe,” and “a man slaying
his father.”
Scattered references in Th e Admonitions of Ipuwer and
in the Prophecy of Neferti as well as in other texts suggest an
extended severe drought. In the Prophecy of Neferti, “Dry is
the river of Egypt. One crosses the water on foot;... Th e land
is bowed down in distress.” Th is text also describes the land
as “ruined” and “shrunk,” “bare” and “deprived of produce”
and “lacking in crops.” Indeed, it has been suggested that to-
ward the end of the Sixth Dynasty (ca. 2323–ca. 2150 b.c.e.)
a series of low Niles and the ensuing economic decline may
have directly contributed to the collapse of centralized power
so characteristic of the First Intermediate Period.
Literary and autobiographical texts as well as archaeo-
logical evidence indicate that the Second Intermediate Pe-
riod witnessed a massive wave of Asiatic infi ltration into
the Nile delta. Whereas early scholars have assumed that
an outright invasion resulted in the Hyksos rule in Egypt
(Hyksos being a Greek version of the Egyptian heqa khasut,
“rulers of foreign lands”), it is now believed that the Hyksos
infi ltrated the delta gradually but massively at the end of the
Middle Kingdom. What exactly caused this mass immigra-
tion is not known, but possibly it resulted from a period of
drought in western Asia. Th e Second Intermediate Period
ended with the military expulsion of the Hyksos through
campaigns initiated by a series of Th eban rulers of the Sev-
enteenth Dynasty (ca. 1640–ca. 1550 b.c.e.), leading even-
tually to the establishment of the Eighteenth Dynasty (ca.
1550–ca. 1307 b.c.e.) and the New Kingdom.
Th e Th ird Intermediate Period shares some similarities
with the fi rst two. Like them, it was characterized by much1000 social collapse and abandonment: Egypt0895-1194_Soc&Culturev4(s-z).i1000 1000 10/10/07 2:30:43 PM