The New Kingdom of Egypt

• 16 / 5 / 2023

The Egyptian New Kingdom, or the modern state, also referred to as the Egyptian empire, is known as the "era of war glory", the period in the history of ancient Egypt between the sixteenth century BC and the eleventh century BC, covering the eighteenth, nineteenth, and Twentieth dynasties of Egypt. Radiocarbon dating places the exact beginning of the modern kingdom between 1570 BC and 1544 BC.

The Eighteenth Dynasty included some of the most famous kings of Egypt, among whom were Ahmose I, Hatshepsut, Thutmose III, Amenhotep III, Akhenaten, and Tutankhamun

Ahmose I is seen as the founder of the Eighteenth Dynasty. He continued the campaigns of his father, Saqnun-Ra, and Camus against the Hyksos until he reunited the country again. 

The campaigns of Ahmose to expel the Hyksos from the Nile Delta and regain the former Egyptian territories to the South began around the year of his tenth reign. Having destroyed the stronghold of the Hyksos at Avaris in the east of the Delta, he finally led them beyond the eastern borders and then laid siege to Sharuhin (tell Al-Fara'a) in southern Palestine; the full extent of his conquests may have been much greater. His breakthrough to the Middle East came at a time when there was no established major power in the region. This political gap facilitated the creation of an Egyptian Empire. 

Ahmose followed Amenhotep I, who pushed the Egyptian border south to the third cataract, near the capital of El-Karmah, while collecting tribute from his Asian possessions and possibly campaigning in Syria. The nascent Mitanni Kingdom in northern Syria, first mentioned on a painting by one of Amenhotep's soldiers and also known as Nahrin, may have threatened the Egyptian conquests in the North. 
Amenhotep II was followed by Thutmose I, who in his second year led an expedition across the river deep into Nubia, beyond the borders of his predecessor. As evidenced by the inscriptions carved along the way, he passed the fourth waterfall and erected a new border in Karges near the fifth waterfall. The project is evidenced by the biographies of two Upper Egyptians who were among the forces that carried out the campaign. 

Another motive was the fact that the anti-Egyptian kingdom of Kush, stationed near the third cataract, was seriously threatening Egypt during the seventeenth Egyptian dynasty and allied with the Hyksos. After the Nubian war, Thutmose penetrated the Euphrates River in the vicinity of Carchemish in Syria, where he continued to hunt the Hyksos. Inside Egypt, Thutmose renovated the Karnak in Thebes. He erected a closed wall and two towers at the West End, with a small colonnade Hall between them.

The heyday of the modern kingdom The Nineteenth Dynasty was founded by the vizier Ramses I, who was chosen by King Horemheb, the last ruler of the Eighteenth Dynasty to succeed him, and he comes from a non-Royal Military Family from the eastern Nile Delta, and with the Nineteenth Dynasty there was a political shift to the Delta. His short reign served as a transitional period between the reign of Horemheb and the powerful kings of this dynasty. in particular, in 1292, Ramses I ascended the throne and shortly thereafter made Seti I his accomplice to help him take on some of the most stringent royal duties. While his son planned campaigns against Syria in an attempt to regain Egypt's lost possessions there, Ramses completed the decoration of the second edifice and its vestibule in the great Karnak Temple of the national god, Amun, in Thebes, which was built and partially decorated. His predecessor. He also took part in the construction of the large pillared hall of the Karnak Temple and began its decoration shortly before his death in 1290. Inscriptions reveal that Ramses reigned about a year and four months. He was buried in a small, hastily prepared tomb in the valley of the Kings in Thebes. Later, during the period of political unrest, The Mummy was removed and taken to a secret resting place. In the late nineteenth century, that tomb was rediscovered, but the remains of the King were removed by robbers. 

Seti I restored countless monuments that were defaced in the Amarna Period , he fortified the borders, opened mines and quarries, dug wells, rebuilt temples and shrines that had collapsed or been damaged; he continued the work started by his father in the construction of the Great Hall of columns with a cornice, which is one of the most magnificent monuments of Egyptian architecture, and the refined decoration of his monuments, especially his temple in Abydos, shows a classical tendency. He also commissioned original bas-reliefs showing the stages of his campaigns, which are remarkably preserved on the northern wall of the Great Hall of columns in Karnak. Such a variety of artistic approaches is characteristic of the Ramesside Period, which was culturally and ethnically pluralistic. Although his son Ramses II is the most famous, many scholars believe that SETI was the greatest king of the XIX dynasty.

For the first time in more than a thousand years, the princes were prominently represented in monuments. The second son of Ramses, khaemwas, became famous as the high priest of Ptah in Memphis. He restored many monuments in the Memphis area, including the pyramids and pyramidal temples of the ancient Egyptian kingdom, and constructed buildings near the Serapeum in Saqqara. He was celebrated in Roman times as a wise and charming man and became the hero of a series of stories. 

At least six temples were erected in Nubia, among which the two carved from a cliff at Abu Simbel, with their four huge statues of the King, are the most magnificent and famous. The larger work between the two began under Seti I but was largely completed by Ramesses, while the other was entirely due to Ramesses. He also founded the new capital in the Delta in his reign was called ber-Ramses. It previously served as a summer palace during the reign of Seti I. 
 

Seti II son of Merneptah (reigned from 1204 to 1198 BC) had to face a usurper named Amenmesse, rebelled in Nubia and was accepted into Upper Egypt. His successor, sebtah, was enthroned by the Syrian royal butler, Bay, who became an adviser to Egypt. Sebtah was succeeded by the widow of Seti II tosert, who reigned as Queen from 1191 to 1189 BC, after her years of reign since the death of Seti II, whose name she restored to sebtah. 

The last years of power. Main article: The twentieth Egyptian family Order was restored by a man of mysterious origin, set nakhti, the founder of the twentieth Egyptian dynasty, who seized the Tomb of tosert in the valley of the Kings. The inscription of list nakhti tells about his struggle for the pacification of the land, which ended in the second of his three years of Reign.

round the 28th year of the King's reign, the vizier of Lower Egypt was overthrown due to corruption. A year later, workers working at the royal tombs of Thebes went on strike because of delays in the delivery of their monthly rations. Only the intervention of the minister of Upper Egypt, who took charge of the whole country, ended the work stoppage. The build quality foreshadows the decline. Towards the end of his reign, administrative incompetence and the deteriorating economic situation led to the failure of the government to deliver grain rations on time to cemetery workers, whose discontent was expressed in demonstrations and in the first recorded strikes in history. These demonstrations continued sporadically throughout the family.

Upon assuming the Regency, Ramesses IV compiled a lengthy document (the Harris papyrus) recording his father Ramesses III's gifts to the Gods, blessings for his son, and a survey of his reign. Shortly thereafter, the new king conducted a large-scale construction program. In his first year, quarries (coarse sandstone) in the Wadi Hammat east of Copts (modern Qeifi) in Upper Egypt were surveyed and reopened for the extraction of building stones.

. The greatest activity occurred in the third year of his reign, when three expeditions mined stones in the Hammat Valley, including one consisting of 8,368 men, of whom 5,000 were soldiers, led by the high priest of Amun, Ramessesnakht. The king established two temples at Deir el-Bahri in western Thebes, one of which was a huge funerary temple that, had it been completed, would have been the largest of all. He also completed the decoration of the temple and the surrounding rooms in the temple of Khons in Karnak. He left inscriptions in many places throughout Egypt.

The period of the archeparchy saw a trend towards the formation of major priestly families, which the Kings sometimes tried to counteract by appointing external men to the higher priesthood. One of these families originated in Ramsesnakht, the son of a royal servant, as a high priest in Thebes. Ramseysnakht was involved in administrative and clerical Affairs. He led an expedition to Wadi Hammamat (currently Wadi Rawd Sa'id) in the eastern desert and Thebes, supervised the distribution of rations to workers decorating the royal tomb. During the reign of Ramesses V, the son of Ramessesnakht was not only the procurator of Amun, but also served as the administrator of the Royal lands and the head of taxation. Thus, this family gained extensive power over the wealth of Amun and the finances of the state, but to what extent this threatened royal power is uncertain. Part of the problem of evaluating the evidence is that the history of Ramesses is viewed through the Theban bias, because Thebes is the main source of information. Evidence from Lower Egypt, where the king usually resides, is scanty because the conditions there were unfavorable for the preservation of antiquities or papyri.

Ramesses VIII was succeeded by Ramesses IX, and under his reign, Amenhotep, the high priest of Amun, exercised many religious and governmental functions in Thebes, while Ramesses IX remained almost continuously in his capital in the Nile Delta. Libyan robbers from two tribes began to disturb the Theban region in the eighth year of his reign, and five years later they caused a work stoppage in western Thebes; later they penetrated eastern Thebes. The failure of the government to pay rations for several months to cemetery employees in western Thebes led to the looting of cemeteries by poorer workers, and the price of grain remained high, although slightly below the peak levels of the reign of Ramses IX's predecessor. Through all these difficulties, Ramesses IX remained in control of Nubia, although he kept his residence mainly in the Delta. Although a 19-year sentence has been proposed for him, no incidents have been recorded over the past two years.

the reign of Ramses X. After Ramses IX, only one year of his reign is proved, using diaries from his third year, found in western Thebes. He reveals that the Tomb cutters were unemployed for long periods, both because the Libyans were roaming the area and because the rations due to the workers were overdue. According to one of the entries, the workers flatly refused to obey even an order issued by the minister himself. Perhaps the high priest of Amun, who is often mentioned in the diaries, was Amenhotep, who survived until the next reign.