ABSTRACT

T h e social, political, and religious crisis which had reduced the Egypt of the Heracleopolitan dynasties to an alarming degree of anarchy, weakness, and poverty (from 2360 to 2160 B.C.), was one of those maladies of adolescence from which a youthful body rises with augmented vigour. About 2160 B.C. authority was once more established in the central region of the South Kingdom in the hands of the princes of Thebes, Antef and Mentuhetep, who founded the X lth Dynasty (2160-2000 B.C.). Their successors, Amenemhat and Senusert of the XH th Dynasty (2000-1788 B.C.) inherited an Egypt that had regained unity, peace, and prosperity. This is the period of the Middle Kingdom, or Theban Empire (X lth to XH Ith Dynasties, roughly 2160 to 1660 B.C.), one of the most splendid epochs in Egyptian history. We shall relate in our book on the Nile and Egyptian Civilization how these kings rank among the most intelligent and the most sensible of their duties; they were able to heal the sores left by the social revolution. The old monarchy, sanctified by its halo of magic, its supernatural powers, and its childish superstitions, is transformed into an organism in which the practices of sorcery and theocratic theories are of less im­ portance than the conceptions of State socialism. Already the king, without renouncing his title as an autocratic god, fulfils his functions as the man par excellence; he aims at being an active shepherd of his people, just and inspired by goodwill. Under his leadership the Egyptian people awakes to political and social life, it becomes conscious of its per­ sonality. This fosters that blossoming of a most remarkable

philosophical and popular literature which gives us an insight into the meditations of sages on the revolutions in progress, and the imagination of the artists and the people excited by the new days. Confronting foreigners an Egyptian experiences the feeling of social, political, and intellectual superiority; pride in being a subject of Pharaoh makes way for the idea of the Egyptian fatherland.