His men were placed under canvas, and working under the protection of immense shields, supported on posts, they made a ditch around the walls, strengthening it with a palisade. The king constructed also on the east side a fort which he called “Manakhpirrî-holds-the-Asiatics.” Famine soon told on the demoralised citizens, and their surrender brought about the submission of the entire country. Most of the countries situated between the Jordan and the sea—Shunem, Cana, Kinnereth, Hazor, Bedippa, Laish, Merom, and Acre—besides the cities of the Haurân—Hamath, Magato, Ashtarôth, Ono-repha, and even Damascus itself—recognised the suzerainty of Egypt, and their lords came in to the camp to do homage.*

The Syrian losses did not amount to more than 83 killed and 400 prisoners, showing how easily they had been routed; but they had abandoned considerable supplies, all of which had fallen into the hands of the victors. Some 724 chariots, 2041 mares, 200 suits of armour, 602 bows, the tent of the Prince of Qodshû with its poles of cypress inlaid with gold, besides oxen, cows, goats, and more than 20,000 sheep, were among the spoil. Before quitting the plain of Bsdraelon, the king caused an official survey of it to be made, and had the harvest reaped. It yielded 208,000 bushels of wheat, not taking into account what had been looted or damaged by the marauding soldiery. The return homewards of the Egyptians must have resembled the exodus of some emigrating tribe rather than the progress of a regular army

Thûtmosis caused a long list of the vanquished to be engraved on the walls of the temple which he was building at Karnak, thus affording the good people of Thebes an opportunity for the first time of reading on the monuments the titles of the king’s Syrian subjects written in hieroglyphics. One hundred and nineteen names follow each other in unbroken succession, some of them representing mere villages, while others denoted powerful nations; the catalogue, however, was not to end even here. Having once set out on a career of conquest, the Pharaoh had no inclination to lay aside his arms. From the XXIIth year of his reign to that of his death, we have a record of twelve military expeditions, all of which he led in person. Southern Syria was conquered at the outset—the whole of Kharû as far as the Lake of Grennesareth, and the Amorite power was broken at one blow.

The three succeeding campaigns consolidated the rule of Egypt in the country of the Negeb, which lay to the south-west of the Dead Sea, in Phoenicia, which prudently resigned itself to its fate, and in that part of Lotanii occupying the northern part of the basin of the Orontes.**

None of these expeditions appear to have been marked by any successes comparable to the victory at Megiddo, for the coalition of the Syrian chiefs did not survive the blow which they then sustained; but Qodshû long remained the centre of resistance, and the successive defeats which its inhabitants suffered never disarmed for more than a short interval the hatred which they felt for the Egyptian.

During these years of glorious activity considerable tribute poured in to both Memphis and Thebes; not only ingots of gold and silver, bars and blocks of copper and lead, blocks of lapis-lazuli and valuable vases, but horses, oxen, sheep, goats, and useful animals of every kind, in addition to all of which we find, as in Hâtshopsîtû’s reign, the mention of rare plants and shrubs brought back from countries traversed by the armies in their various expeditions. The Theban priests and savants exhibited much interest in such curiosities, and their royal pupil gave orders to his generals to collect for their benefit all that appeared either rare or novel. They endeavoured to acclimatise the species or the varieties likely to be useful, and in order to preserve a record of these experiments, they caused a representation of the strange plants or animals to be drawn on the walls of one of the chapels which they were then building to one of their gods. These pictures may still be seen there in interminable lines, portraying the specimens brought from the Upper Lotanû in the XXVth year of Thûtmosis, and we are able to distinguish, side by side with many plants peculiar to the regions of the Euphrates, others having their habitat in the mountains and valleys of tropical Africa.

This return to an aggressive policy on the part of the Egyptians, after the weakness they had exhibited during the later period of Hâtshopsîtû’s regency, seriously disconcerted the Asiatic sovereigns. They had vainly flattered themselves that the invasion of Thûtmosis I. was merely the caprice of an adventurous prince, and they hoped that when his love of enterprise had expended itself, Egypt would permanently withdraw within her traditional boundaries, and that the relations of Elam with Babylon, Carchemish with Qodshû, and the barbarians of the Persian Gulf with the inhabitants of the Iranian table-land would resume their former course. This vain delusion was dispelled by the advent of a new Thûtmosis, who showed clearly by his actions that he intended to establish and maintain the sovereignty of Egypt over the western dependencies, at least, of the ancient Chaldæan empire, that is to say, over the countries which bordered the middle course of the Euphrates and the coasts of the Mediterranean. The audacity of his marches, the valour of his men, the facility with which in a few hours he had crushed the assembled forces of half Syria, left no room to doubt that he was possessed of personal qualities and material resources sufficient to carry out projects of the most ambitious character. Babylon, enfeebled by the perpetual dissensions of its Cossæan princes, was no longer in a position to contest with him the little authority she still retained over the peoples of Naharaim or of Coele-Syria; protected by the distance which separated her from the Nile valley, she preserved a sullen neutrality, while Assyria hastened to form a peaceful alliance with the invading power. Again and again its kings sent to Thûtmosis presents in proportion to their resources, and the Pharaoh naturally treated their advances as undeniable proofs of their voluntary vassalage. Each time that he received from them a gift of metal or lapis-lazuli, he proudly recorded their tribute in the annals of his reign; and if, in exchange, he sent them some Egyptian product, it was in smaller quantities, as might be expected from a lord to his vassal.*

Sometimes there would accompany the convoy, surrounded by an escort of slaves and women, some princess, whom the king would place in his harem or graciously pass on to one of his children; but when, on the other hand, an even distant relative of the Pharaoh was asked in marriage for some king on the banks of the Tigris or Euphrates, the request was met with a disdainful negative: the daughters of the Sun were of too noble a race to stoop to such alliances, and they would count it a humiliation to be sent in marriage to a foreign court.

Free transit on the main road which ran diagonally through Kharû was ensured by fortresses constructed at strategic points,* and from this time forward Thûtmosis was able to bring the whole force of his army to bear upon both Coele-Syria and Naharaim.** He encamped, in the year XXVII., on the table-land separating the Afrîn and the Orontes from the Euphrates, and from that centre devastated the district of Ûânît,*** which lay to the west of Aleppo; then crossing “the water of Naharaim” in the neighbourhood of Carchemish, he penetrated into the heart of Mitanni.

The following year he reappeared in the same region. Tunipa, which had made an obstinate resistance, was taken, together with its king, and 329 of his nobles were forced to yield themselves prisoners. Thûtmosis “with a joyous heart” was carrying them away captive, when it occurred to him that the district of Zahi, which lay away for the most part from the great military highroads, was a tempting prey teeming with spoil. The barns were stored with wheat and barley, the cellars were filled with wine, the harvest was not yet gathered in, and the trees bent under the weight of their fruit. Having pillaged Senzaûrû on the Orontes,* he made his way to the westwards through the ravine formed by the Ishahr el-Kebîr, and descended suddenly on the territory of Arvad. The towns once more escaped pillage, but Thutmosis destroyed the harvests, plundered the orchards, carried off the cattle, and pitilessly wasted the whole of the maritime plain.

There was such abundance within the camp that the men were continually getting drunk, and spent their time in anointing themselves with oil, which they could do only in Egypt at the most solemn festivals. They returned to Syria in the year XXX., and their good fortune again favoured them. The stubborn Qodshû was harshly dealt with; Simyra and Arvad, which hitherto had held their own, now opened their gates to him; the lords of Upper Lotanû poured in their contributions without delay, and gave up their sons and brothers as hostages. In the year XXXI., the city of Anamut in Tikhisa, on the shores of Lake Msrana, yielded in its turn;* on the 3rd of Pakhons, the anniversary of his coronation, the Lotanû renewed their homage to him in person.

The return of the expedition was a sort of triumphal procession. At every halting-place the troops found quarters and provisions prepared for them, bread and cakes, perfumes, oil, wine, and honey being provided in such quantities that they were obliged on their departure to leave the greater part behind them. The scribes took advantage of this peaceful state of affairs to draw up minute accounts of the products of Lotanû—corn, barley, millet, fruits, and various kinds of oil—prompted doubtless by the desire to arrive at a fairly just apportionment of the tribute. Indeed, the results of the expedition were considered so satisfactory that they were recorded on a special monument dedicated in the palace at Thebes. The names of the towns and peoples might change with every war, but the spoils suffered no diminution. In the year XXXIII., the kingdoms situated to the west of the Euphrates were so far pacified that Thutmosis was able without risk to carry his arms to Mesopotamia. He entered the country by the fords of Carchemish, near to the spot where his grandfather, Thutmosis I., had erected his stele half a century previously. He placed another beside this, and a third to the eastward to mark the point to which he had extended the frontier of his empire.. The Mitanni, who exercised a sort of hegemony over the whole of Naharaim, were this time the objects of his attack. Thirty-two of their towns fell one after another, their kings were taken captive and the walls of their cities were razed, without any serious resistance. The battalions of the enemy were dispersed at the first shock, and Pharaoh “pursued them for the space of a mile, without one of them daring to look behind him, for they thought only of escape, and fled before him like a flock of goats.” Thutmosis pushed forward as far certainly as the Balikh, and perhaps on to the Khabur or even to the Hermus; and as he approached the frontier, the king of Singar, a vassal of Assyria, sent him presents of lapis-lazuli.

When this prince had retired, another chief, the lord of the Great Kkati, whose territory had not even been threatened by the invaders, deemed it prudent to follow the example of the petty princes of the plain of the Euphrates, and despatched envoys to the Pharaoh bearing presents of no great value, but testifying to his desire to live on good terms with Egypt. Still further on, the inhabitants of Nîi begged the king’s acceptance of a troop of slaves and two hundred and sixty mares; he remained among them long enough to erect a stele commemorating his triumph, and to indulge in one of those extensive hunts which were the delight of Oriental monarchs. The country abounded in elephants. The soldiers were employed as beaters, and the king and his court succeeded in killing one hundred and twenty head of big game, whose tusks were added to the spoils. These numbers indicate how the extinction of such animals in these parts was brought about. Beyond these regions, again, the sheikhs of the Lamnaniû came to meet the Pharaoh. They were a poor people, and had but little to offer, but among their gifts were some birds of a species unknown to the Egyptians, and two geese, with which, however, His Majesty deigned to be satisfied.*

END OF VOL. IV.