Egypt lay sheltered from invasion behind Jerusalem. But with the death of Sennacherib there came a change. His son and successor, Esar-haddon, was a good general and a man of great ability. Manasseh of Judah became his vassal, and the way lay open to the Nile. With a large body of trained veterans he descended upon Egypt (b.c. 674). The sheikh of the Bedouin provided him with the camels which conveyed the water for the army across the desert. Three campaigns were needed before Egypt, under its Ethiopian ruler, could be subdued. But at last, in b.c. 670, Esar-haddon drove the Egyptian forces before him in fifteen days (from the 3rd to the [pg 117] 18th of Tammuz or June) all the way from the frontier to Memphis, thrice defeating them with heavy loss, and wounding Tirhakah himself. Three days later Memphis fell, and Tirhakah fled to Ethiopia, leaving Egypt to the conqueror. It was after this success that the Assyrian monarch erected the stêlê at Sinjerli, on which he is portrayed with Tirhakah of Egypt and Baal of Tyre kneeling before him, each with a ring through his lips, to which is attached a bridle held by the Assyrian king.
Egypt was reorganised under Assyrian rule, and measures taken to prevent the return of the Ethiopians. It was divided into twenty satrapies, the native princes being appointed to govern them for their Assyrian master. At their head was placed Necho, the vassal king of Sais. Esar-haddon now returned to Nineveh, and on the cliffs of the Nahr el-Kelb, near Beyrout, he engraved a record of his conquest of Egypt and Thebes by the side of the monument whereon, seven centuries previously, Ramses ii. had boasted of his victories over the nations of Asia.
At first the Egyptian princes were well pleased with their change of masters. But in Thebes there was a strong party which sympathised with Ethiopia rather than with Assyria. With their help, Tirhakah returned in b.c. 668, sailed down the Nile, and took [pg 118] Memphis by storm. Esar-haddon started at once to suppress the revolt. But on the way to Egypt he died on the 10th of Marchesvan or October, and his son, Assur-bani-pal, followed him on the throne.
The Ethiopian army was encountered near Kar-banit, in the Delta. A complete victory was gained over it, and Tirhakah was compelled to fly, first from Memphis, then from Thebes. The tributary kings whom he had displaced were restored, and Assur-bani-pal left Egypt in the full belief that it was tranquil. But hardly had he returned to Nineveh before a fresh revolt broke out there. Tirhakah began to plot with the native satraps, and even Necho of Sais was suspected of complicity. The commanders of the Assyrian garrisons, accordingly, sent him and two other princes (from Tanis and Goshen) loaded with chains to Assyria. But Assur-bani-pal, either really convinced of Necho's innocence or pretending to be so, not only pardoned him but bestowed upon him a robe of honour, as well as a sword of gold and a chariot and horses, and sent him back to Sais, giving at the same time the government of Athribis, whose mounds lie close to Benha, to his son, Psammetikhos. Meanwhile Tirhakah had again penetrated to Thebes and Memphis, where he celebrated the festival in honour of the appearance of a new Apis. But his power was no longer what [pg 119] it once had been, and even before the return of Necho he found it prudent to retire to Ethiopia. There he died a few months later.
The Thebaid, however, continued in a state of revolt against the Assyrian authority. Another Ethiopian king, whom the Assyrians call Urd-Aman, had succeeded Tirhakah, and was battling for the sovereignty of Egypt. Urd-Aman is usually identified with the Pharaoh Rud-Amon, whose name has been met with on two Egyptian monuments, but about whom nothing further is known. Some scholars, however, read the name Tand-Aman, and identify it with that of Tuatan-Amon or Tuant-Amon, whose royal cartouches are engraved by the side of those of Tirhakah in the temple of Ptah-Osiris at Karnak. An inscription found built into a wall at Luxor mentions his third year, and a large stêlê erected by him at Napata was discovered among the ruins of his capital in 1862, and is now in the Museum of Gizeh. On this he states that in the first year of his reign he was excited by a dream to invade the north. Thebes opened its gates to him, and after worshipping in the temple of Amon at Karnak, he marched to Memphis, which he captured after a slight resistance. Then he proceeded against the princes of the Delta, who, however, shut themselves up in their cities or else submitted to him.
One day Paqrur of Goshen appeared at Memphis to do him homage, much to the surprise and delight of the Ethiopian king. As Paqrur was the prince of Pi-Sopd or Goshen, who had been sent to Nineveh along with Necho, the date of Tuatan-Amon is pretty clear. How he came to quit Egypt, however, he does not vouchsafe to explain.
Whether Urd-Aman were Rud-Amon or Tuatan-Amon, he gave a good deal of trouble to the Assyrians. Thebes was securely in his hands, and from thence he marched upon Memphis. The Assyrian garrison and its allies were defeated in front of the city, which was then blockaded and taken after a long siege. Necho was captured and put to death, and Psammetikhos escaped the same fate only by flight into Syria. But Assyrian revenge did not tarry long. Assur-bani-pal determined to put an end to Egyptian revolt and Ethiopian invasion once for all. A large army was despatched to the Nile, which overthrew the forces of Rud-Amon in the Delta and pursued him as far as Thebes. Thence he fled to Kipkip in Ethiopia, and a terrible punishment was inflicted on the capital of southern Egypt. The whole of its inhabitants were led away into slavery. Its temples—at once the centres of disaffection and fortresses against attack—were half-demolished, its monuments and palaces were destroyed, and all its [pg 121] treasures, sacred and profane, were carried away. Among the spoil were two obelisks, more than seventy tons in weight, which were removed to Nineveh as trophies of victory. The injuries which Kambyses has been accused of inflicting on the ancient monuments of Thebes were really the work of the Assyrians.
How great was the impression made upon the oriental world by the sack of Thebes may be gathered from the reference to it by the prophet Nahum (iii. 8-10). Nineveh itself is threatened with the same overthrow. “Art thou better than No of Amon, that was situate among the rivers, that had the waters round about it, whose rampart was the sea, (the Nile), and her wall was from the sea? Ethiopia and Egypt were her strength, and it was infinite; Put and Lubim were thy helpers. Yet was she carried away, she went into captivity: her young children also were dashed in pieces at the top of all the streets: and they cast lots for her honourable men, and all her great men were bound in chains.” As the destruction of Thebes took place about b.c. 665, the date of Nahum's prophecy cannot have been much later.
In the Assyrian inscriptions Thebes is called Ni', corresponding with the No of the Old Testament. Both words represent the Egyptian Nu, “city,” [pg 122] Thebes being pre-eminently “the city” of Upper Egypt. Its patron-deity was Amon, to whom its great temple was dedicated, and hence it is that Nahum calls it “No of Amon.” Divided as it was into two halves by the Nile, and encircled on either side by canals, one of which—“the southern water”—still runs past the southern front of the temple of Luxor, it could truly be said that its “rampart was the sea.” To this day the Nile is called “the sea” by the natives of Egypt.
The Ethiopians penetrated into Egypt no more. The twenty satrapies were re-established; and Psammetikhos received his father's principality, though the precedence among the vassal-kings was given to Paqrur of Goshen. For a time the country was at peace.