Egyptian religious poetry

INTRODUCTION yi

great achievement made him extremely popular among his own people, and many poems were written extolling his divinity and his prowess. On his death rival claimants to the throne ravaged the country by civil war during many years. In the end the power was seized by Setekh-nekht, who transmitted it to his son, Rameses III, the first King of the xxth dynasty. Though Rameses III was the master-mind that inflicted a crushing defeat on the great coalition of sea-peoples, who were attempting to invade Egypt, either he did not strike the imagination of the contemporary Egyptian poets or there were then no writers with the gift of poetry. The hymns in his honour call him God, but there is little or no devotion in them, the similes are often bombastic, and the style turgid. Rameses III was the last of the great Pharaohs, and his temple at Medinet Habu was the last of that series of temples which are among the architectural wonders of the ancient world. His successors were pious weaklings, and the power fell more and more into the hands of the ambitious High-Priest of Amon, Heri-hor, who on the death of the last of the rois fainéants seized the throne and founded the xxist dynasty. Egypt had now shrunk to its smallest dimensions ; under the rule of Heri-hor and the successive high-priests the temples and priesthoods flourished, but the people were sunk in ignorance and superstition.

Egypt remained poor and insignificant until Shishak I, Prince of Bubastis, made himself Pharaoh, and was the first king of the xxiind dynasty. He led his people to battle and enriched Egypt with the spoil of the temple of Jehovah at Jerusalem. The xxxiiird dynasty was the beginning of the subjection of Egypt to foreign conquerors. The Ethiopian conquerors had, however, great respect for the arts, as is shown by the fine work of their sculpture and by the literature, of which unfortunately very little survives. The Ethiopians were driven out by the