CHAPTER XXI. EGYPT, 4235 B. C.
Egypt, the cradle of civilization, had its Democrats, who struck resistless blows for equality, freedom, and fraternity for the race. So accustomed have we become, in thinking of Egypt, to be struck so forcibly by those evidences, the pyramids, of slave labor and the oppressed condition of the large portion of the ancient population of Egypt, that the existence of democrats in Egypt seems totally inconsistent with our preconceived idea of the ancient civilization of that country. Yet, we find, during the fourth dynasty—4235 B. C., the pyramids were builded, and the great Sphinx at Gizeh. The wealth and splendor of Egypt were unapproached elsewhere; civilization, the arts and sciences, reached a height which, in some respects, the world has never known since that time. The civilization of to-day is unequal to the task of rearing such structures as the pyramids, over which more than fifty centuries have rolled without displacing a stone or crumbling a corner of the prodigious masses of granite, hewn from the distant quarries of Asswan, Mokattam and Tarah, and transported by means beyond the skill and comprehension of the science of the nineteenth century.
But with all its splendor, wealth, magnificence and culture, the kings and rulers of the Fourth Dynasty became corrupt, oppressive and tyrannical. The Common People, as they were called, revolted, and a revolution of fire and blood extinguished the dynasty, 3951 B. C.
Heedless of the immutable law that only in union is there strength, Egypt not only became corrupt and tyrannical, but divided into two kingdoms, who warred furiously against each other. Then it was that the nomadic hordes of Arabia and Syria saw their opportunity, and, swarming over the borders (2114 B. C.) and overflowing the valley of the Nile with a human flood a thousand-fold more destructive than the turbid inundation of that great river, they crushed the struggling legions like worms in the dust, and became the masters of the country.
They were the Hyksos, or Shepherd Kings, who stamped their rugged individuality on that wonderful land. They ruled for four centuries, forming the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth dynasties. Their last king was Apepi, who reigned sixty-one years, and is believed by many to have been the Pharaoh (“Pharaoh” was the general name for kings) in whose reign Joseph came into Egypt and was made governor over all the land.
The Shepherd Kings gradually succumbed to the civilization, culture, and manners of the Egyptians, and vanished from history by absorption among those people.