A procession of the early dynastic Pharaoh Narmer is illustrated on this facsimile of the famous Narmer Palette, found at Hierakonpolis. Keith Schengili-Roberts Hatshepsut is not only the most successful female ruler in Egypt's history but among the most remarkable leaders of the ancient world. She broke with the tradition of a patriarchal monarchy with no evidence of rebellion on the part of her subjects or the court and established a reign which enriched Egypt financially and culturally without engaging in any extensive military campaigns. Amenemhet let build a new capital south of Memphis called Ity-tawy. A name meaning “Seizer of the Two Lands” or “Ruler of the Two Lands”. He is believed to have put effort into only keeping the ones loyal and trustworthy close to him, as to not meet the same faith as his predecessor. After a protracted civil war and several abortive attempts to reunite ancient Egypt, the empire remained divided ruled by a loose association between the rival regional governments. Military Factors Then, in the 8th century B.C., the Nubians or Kushites peacefully claimed the Egyptian throne during a time of political turmoil. A succession of Kushite pharaohs ruled Egypt for nearly a century as the 25th Dynasty before being pushed out by Assyrian invaders.

Modern loose interpretation at the The Pharaonic Village in Cairo of a Battle scene from the Great Kadesh reliefs of Ramses II on the Walls of the Ramesseum. When Ramesses XI took the throne in 1,099 BCE, he was only ruler by name. 2,000 years after Narmer (/Menes) had united the kingdoms, Lower and Upper Egypt had started to fight once more. Harihur, a priest in Thebe, had power in Upper Egypt and Nubia while an aristocrat called Smendes ruled Lower Egypt. After the New Kingdom, Egypt was ruled by a succession of foreign powers, further evidence of its decline as an independent empire. The prehistory of Egypt spans from early human settlements to the beginning of the Early Dynastic Period of Egypt (c. 3100 BCE), which started with the first Pharoah Narmer (also known as Menes). It is equivalent to the Neolithic period, and is divided into cultural periods, named after locations where Egyptian settlements were found. The Late Paleolithic After a long civil war and several attempts to reunite Egypt, the empire remained split with a loose association between the governments of the two regions.The Egyptian literary work The Report of Wenamun is set during this period and describes the difficulties of an official who is sent on a mission to the Levant to buy wood for the restoration of the Barque of Amun. At the height of the empire, this task would have posed no problems but, the author makes clear, once Egypt had lost its balance and fallen in status with other powers, even the simplest undertaking could become an ordeal. Wenamun is robbed, insulted, ignored, and even resorts to robbery himself. Greek was the official language of the kingdom and Greek culture — including religion — became established there. As the years went by the Egyptian’s grew more and more tired of their foreign leaders. By the year 206 BCE, during the reign of Ptolemy IV, a revolt in Upper Egypt resulted in a somewhat autonomous region ruled by a ruler called Harwennefer. It existed for some two decades before king Ptolemy V Epiphanes re-established his absolute authority there. Egypt experienced its last gasp of greatness under the Ptolemaic Dynasty (305 to 30 B.C.), a succession of Macedonian Greek pharaohs who ruled Egypt after the death of Alexander the Great. Cleopatra VII is the best-known of the Ptolemaic pharaohs, who constructed a magnificent Hellenistic capital in Alexandria.

The fifth dynasty started after Shepseskaf, it is unclear what happened, but we do know that Userkaf took power and founded the dynasty. Because of this most king stopped want to build these gigantic monuments, focusing more on smaller ones. Another thing built around Abusir was sun temples — a phenomenon special to this dynasty.We have no indication at the end of the 6th Dynasty that there was a bid for power by the local governors. It is only after the initial breakdown that power was wielded by the kings of a province in Middle Egypt, later called Herakleopolis. The capital was approximately 15 km west of Beni Suef on the right bank of Bahr Yusuf. According to Manetho, Herakleopolis became the capital of Egypt during the 9th and 10th Dynasties and the town played a major role after the end of the Old Kingdom. Evidence for this account comes from inscriptions in the tombs of a vassal prince at Asyut. These reveal that war broke out between the kings of Herakleopolis and Theban kings. The war lasted for several years and ended when the Theban king Mentuhotep II Nebhepetre (2061 - 2010 BC) defeated Herakleopolis before re-unifying the country. Christianity began to spread through Egypt and with it the Greek alphabet – both transforming key features of the ancient culture that we know and recognize today. Adopting a new religion, where the old religion had been a major cultural force in the Egyptian empire, led to the end of practices such as mummification, that the ancient Egyptians were well known for. The ninth dynasty was probably founded by Kheti around the year 2160 BCE, who created a power centrum in Herakleopolis. During the 10th dynasty, a political struggle started between Herakleopolis and Thebe. This once against divided the kingdom. Albeit, it ended with that Mentuhotep II established power over the whole kingdom around 2055 BCE, and chose Thebe as the new center of power. It is unclear if this happened through violence or diplomacy.

Ramses III subsequently defeated the Sea Peoples and ejected them from Egypt, however, the cost was ruinous both in lives and in resources. Clear evidence emerges after this victory, that the drain on Egyptian manpower badly affected Egypt’s agricultural output and its grain production in particular. While the outcome of the protracted Roman civil war finally ended the independent ancient Egyptian Empire These seismic cultural and political shifts signalled the ultimate fall of ancient Egypt. Reflecting On The PastA letter from a general during the reign of Ramesses XI exemplifies how fragmented Egyptian society had become by this time when he asks, “As for pharaoh, whose superior is he after all?” (van de Mieroop, 257). This kind of question would have been unthinkable at the height of the Egyptian Empire but, as the priests of Amun became more powerful and the king became weaker, the monarch came to matter less and less to the people. Over a span of approximately one hundred years, unseasonably cold and dry weather affected Egypt. Colder weather stressed typically warm weather crops and low rainfall caused water levels in the Nile to fall. Both factors together caused widespread hunger and hundreds of thousands of Egyptians died from dehydration and starvation. Ramesses III defeated the Sea Peoples just as his predecessors had but the cost in lives and resources was tremendous. In keeping with the Egyptian practice of elevating the numbers of enemies slain in battle while minimizing their own losses, official records only record the glorious victories of the defense of Egypt. Evidence of problems arising afterwards, however, indicates that a loss of labor resulted in less grain production and a struggling economy. The cost of the war had also depleted the treasury and trade relations with other powers were suffering because Egypt did not have the kinds of resources as before and, also, these other powers were dealing with their own difficulties resulting from raids by the Sea Peoples and others. Not only were the weapons of the army new and improved but so was the structure of the military itself. Between the time of Amenemhat I and Ahmose I the military had remained more or less the same. Weaponry and military training had improved but not dramatically. Under the reign of Amenhotep I, though, this would change as Egyptologist Margaret Bunson explains: