ABSTRACT
in connexion with the Ptolemaïc Period a short account of the revival of the power of the Nubian kingdom must be given. We have already seen that the temple at Dakkeh, built by Ȧrq-Ȧmen (Ergamenes), was added to by Ptolemy IV., and it seems that either in his time or that of his predecessor much of the country between the First and Second Cataracts reverted to the Egyptian kingdom, from which it had been separated since the time of Ta-nut-Ȧmen, some 400 years before. Ptolemy II. must have asserted some claim to suzerainty over the Nubian kingdom, and this view is supported by the fact that he received the young Nubian prince Ȧrq-Ȧmen, the Ergamenes of Diodorus (iii. 6), at his court, for the purpose of being educated after the manner of the Greeks. Until this time the Nubian kingdom seems to have been isolated from Egypt, although the descendants of Ta-nut-Ȧmen continued to arrogate to themselves the titles of “king of the South and North,” and “son of the Sun,” thus claiming the legal right to rule over the whole of the Nile Valley from the Eastern Sûdân to the Mediterranean Sea. The Saïtes, however, took no notice of their claim, and in Nubia the Egyptian royal titles gradually came to be nothing but mere formulae, which its kings themselves scarcely understood. Their capital remained at Napata, https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9780203068786/975f8713-2987-4c60-833d-9420b1b61306/content/ch4_page142-01_B.tif" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"/> Nepita, about 450 miles from Wâdî Ḥaifa, for a long time, but they finally founded a new capital at Meroë, the ancient Egyptian Mạreạuat, https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9780203068786/975f8713-2987-4c60-833d-9420b1b61306/content/ch4_page142-02_B.tif" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"/>, the modern Baḳrawîyeh, which lies about forty miles south of the river Atbara.
