July
31
/ 2018
In the 17th century BC, a group of Semitic origin took advantage of political divisions to seize power in Egypt. These Levantine lords were called the “Hyksos” and were longtime residents of ancient Egypt, had spawned several dynasties, and ruled the northern Delta. They also ticked off some native Egyptian rulers, who established their own mini-fiefdoms in the south. But it took a Hyksos ruler complaining about noisy hippos to both start a war in ancient Egypt and then unify it once again. Rebelling Against the Hyksos In opposition to the Hyksos (a Greek transliteration of the Egyptian “Heqa-khasut” or “rulers of foreign lands”) in the north, native Egyptians kicked off the so-called Seventeenth Dynasty in Thebes, headed by a
