hor and the last of the Ramses, Smendes and the
accession to power of the XXIst dynasty: the division of Egypt into two
States--The priest-kings of Amon masters of Thebes under the suzerainty
of the Tanite Pharaohs--The close of the Theban empire._

[Illustration: 003.jpg Page Image]

CHAPTER I--THE CLOSE OF THE THEBAN EMPIRE--(continued)

_Ramses III.: Manners and Customs--Population--The predominance of Amon
and his high priests._

Opposite the Thebes of the living, Khafitnibus, the Thebes of the dead,
had gone on increasing in a remarkably rapid manner. It continued to
extend in the south-western direction from the heroic period of
the XVIIIth dynasty onwards, and all the eminence and valleys were
gradually appropriated one after the other for burying-places. At the
time of which I am speaking, this region formed an actual town, or
rather a chain of villages, each of which was grouped round some
building constructed by one or other of the Pharaohs as a funerary
chapel. Towards the north, opposite Karnak, they clustered at
Drah-abu'l-Neggah around pyramids of the first Theban monarchs, at
Qurneh around the mausolae of Ramses I. and Seti I., and at Sheikh
Abd el-Qurneh they lay near the Amenopheum and the Pamonkaniqimit,
or Ramesseum built by Ramses II. Towards the south they diminished
in number, tombs and monuments becoming fewer and appearing at wider
intervals; the Migdol of Ramses III. formed an isolated suburb, that of
Azamit, at Medinet-Habu; the chapel of Isis, constructed by Amenothes,
son of Hapu, formed a rallying-point for the huts of the hamlet of
Karka;* and in the far distance, in a wild gorge at the extreme limit
of human habitations, the queens of the Ramesside line slept their last
sleep.

* The village of Karka or Kaka was identified by Brugsch
with the hamlet of Deir el-Medineh: the founder of the
temple was none other than Amenothes, who was minister under
Amenothes III.

[Illustration: 004.jpg THE THEBAN CEMETERIES]

Each of these temples had around it its enclosing wall of dried brick,
and the collection of buildings within this boundary formed the Khiru,
or retreat of some one of the Theban Pharaohs, which, in the official
language of the time, was designated the "august Khiru of millions of
years."

[Illustration: 005.jpg THE NECROPOLIS OF SHEIKH AND EL-QURNEH]

Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Beato.

A sort of fortified structure, which wa