Ancient Egypt IV – The Expulsion
Amenhotep and his driver were standing in his chariot only a couple of places away from his king.
Pharaoh Ahmose ( Moses in the language of the Hyksos ) had completed an agreement with the Hyksos that they should leave the country and go where they will.
Amenhotep thought back over the events of the past few years.
Seqenenra Tao II had been killed during a raid on the Hyksos and the war had been put on hold while a new king ascended the Theban Throne, the Pharaoh Kamose. Then Kamose went north to attack. He surprised and defeated the southernmost Hyksos garrison at Nefrusy, ( near modern Asyut ), and then led his army as far north as the neighborhood of the Hyksos capital of Avaris itself. Though that city was not taken, the fields around it were laid waste by the Thebans. The Hyksos king had outlived his first Egyptian contemporary, Seqenenra Tao II, and was still on the throne of a much reduced kingdom at the end of Kamose’s brief reign.
About the time of Kamose’s death, he had received a dispatch from Thebes addressed to “Overseer of the Royal Stables, Amenhotep,” It began, “Excellency, your father, the Noble Digshotep, has flown to the Sun.”
Amenhotep had reached the most prestigious and highly prized rank in Egypt’s army, Overseer of the Royal Stables, and he had delayed writing his father about it for too long.
After the death of Kamose and the enthronment of Ahmose, a few years had passed before Ahmose took to the field against the Hyksos. Ahmose was only ten years old when he became king of Egypt. Amentotep grinned at the memory of his father trying to say his sister had hung on the young prince’s arm as a ploy in trying to keep him from studying medicine.
Fifteen years had passed since then and after several battles and a long seige of the city of Avaris, the Hyksos were ready to call it quits and leave. Now Amenhotep was simply waiting to find out if the King were going to accompany the departing hord. It seems he might as he wants to make sure these shepherds do not turn around and return.
He was also awaiting word from the Admiral of the newly refurbished Egyptian Navy, which had been instrumental in winning several of the battles. If the king decided to escort the Hyksos out of the country, he wanted to know the Navy’s readiness to follow along the coast as floating supply depots for the land bound army.
Amenhotep’s personal feelings were that they should not go with the Hyksos since there was new pressure building from Nubia in the south that needed attention soon. Nubia could also be a source of wealth that the kingdom needed badly.
Another reason the king wanted to go, besides not wanting the Hyksos to turn back, is that part of the surrender terms included Egypt providing guides through the wilderness to Palestine. Egyptian traders knew the route as well as anybody, and so did the Hyksos. However, they did not want to depend on Hyksos guides as such guides could slip away and perhaps have Hyksos allies waiting in ambush along the route. The king stressed that Egyptians needed to be in control of the exodus.
They knew of the special winds that would blow the waters of the Reed Sea away from the shallow north end allowing people to pass before the wind failed and the waters returned. They knew of the ’secret’ traders springs which were sealed when not in use. A few blows from a spear or staff would break the seal and allow water to flow. Such sealed springs and wells were also common along the trade routes of the Eastern Desert to the mines and the Red Sea ports, Western Desert routes as well. These are natural cisterns formed of special layers of clay. The clays hinder water from local rainfall penetraing deep into the sandstone, therefore, creating underground water resources that could be easily tapped or that would have even formed natural outlets at topographically favorable places. And if one knew what to look for, symbols identifying these springs lined the trade routes across the desert.
Well, the word is in, we are going.
Ahmose drove the Hyksos as far as Sharuhen, where they resisted the expulsion. After a three year seige, they were defeated again and driven on.
I shall end this segment on Egyptian history with a quote from a later historian named Josephus Flavius.
“That the shepherds built a wall round all this place, which was a large and a strong wall, and this in order to keep all their possessions and their prey within a place of strength, but that Thummosis the son of Alisphragmuthosis made an attempt to take them by force and by siege, with four hundred and eighty thousand men to lie rotund about them, but that, upon his despair of taking the place by that siege, they came to a composition with them, that they should leave Egypt, and go, without any harm to be done to them, whithersoever they would; and that, after this composition was made, they went away with their whole families and effects, not fewer in number than two hundred and forty thousand, and took their journey from Egypt, through the wilderness, for Syria; but that as they were in fear of the Assyrians, who had then the dominion over Asia, they built a city in that country which is now called Judea, and that large enough to contain this great number of men, and called it Jerusalem.”
- Josephus Flavius, Against Apion, Book 1:14
Please note: – Ahmose is considered the founder of Egypt’s Great 18th dynasty. However, there was no ‘family’ change, only a ‘historic’ change. The 18th dynasty was a continuation of the same Royal Family that was the 17th dynasty.
A special note: – Whether this is, or is not, the basic event that was written of later by Israeli historians as “The Exodus” is not for me to say is, or is not, the case in this post.
My personal belief is that it is. It would be more politic for such historians to say “we escaped” than it would be to say “we were kicked out on our butts.” Your own belief will depend on your own research and the directions you take it.
Please remember that people such as David M. Rohl, who completely reinvented a chronology of Egyptian history to match Biblical timelines (mainstream archaeology does not accept it) and Ron Wyatt, who is not an archaeologist, but a anesthesia/surgical nurse from Tennessee, involved strongly with ‘fringe’ archaeology and promotes himself as an expert in the field, are “not” accepted as valid archaeological or historical researchers by mainstream archaeologists and historians. – - Though for reasons of your own, you may.
Till next time
Digs
For more information about life in Ancient Egypt: http://www.archaeolink.com/ancient_egyptian-civilization.htm