nt finds is a series of tablets
inscribed with the Babylonian legends concerning the creation of the
world and man, which present many new and striking parallels to the
beliefs on these subjects embodied in Hebrew literature. We have not
space to treat this subject at greater length in the present work, but
we may here note that discovery and research in its relation to the
later empires that ruled at Babylon have produced results of literary
rather than of historical importance. But we should exceed the space
at our disposal if we attempted even to skim this fascinating field of
study in which so much has recently been achieved. For it is time we
turned once more to Egypt and directed our inquiry towards ascertaining
what recent research has to tell us with regard to her inhabitants
during the later periods of her existence as a nation of the ancient
world.

CHAPTER IX--THE LAST DAYS OF ANCIENT EGYPT

Before we turned from Egypt to summarize the information, afforded by
recent discoveries, upon the history of Western Asia under the kings
of the Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian periods, we noted that the Asiatic
empire of Egypt was regained by the reactionary kings of the XIXth
Dynasty, after its temporary loss owing to the vagaries of Akhunaten.
Palestine remained Egyptian throughout the period of the judges until
the foundation of the kingdom of Judah. With the decline of military
spirit in Egypt and the increasing power of the priesthood, authority
over Asia became less and less a reality. Tribute was no longer paid,
and the tribes wrangled without a restraining hand, during the reigns of
the successors of Ramses III. By the time of the priest-kings of Thebes
(the XXIst Dynasty) the authority of the Pharaohs had ceased to be
exercised in Syria. Egypt was itself divided into two kingdoms, the one
ruled by Northern descendants of the Ramessids at Tanis, the other by
the priestly monarchs at Thebes, who reigned by right of inheritance as
a result of the marriage of the daughter of Ramses with the high
priest Amenhetep, father of Herhor, the first priest-king. The Thebans
fortified Gebelen in the South and el-Hebi in the North against attack,
and evidently their relations with the Tanites were not always friendly.

In Syria nothing of the imperial power remained. The prestige of the god
Amen of Thebes, however, was still very great. We see this clearly from
a very interesting papyrus of the reign of Herhor, publishe