e performance of costly religious ceremonies, such
as the enthronement or burial of an Apis. The pomp and luxury usually
displayed on such occasions grew less and less under the successors of
Takeloti II., Sheshonq III., Pimi, and Sheshonq IV.***

* The story of these events is told in several greatly
mutilated inscriptions to be found at Karnak on the outer
surface of the south wall of the Hall of Columns.

** It is evident that this was so, from a romance discovered
by Krall.

*** One need only go to the Louvre and compare the Apis
stelae erected during this period with those engraved in the
time of the XXVIth dynasty, in order to realise the low ebb
to which the later kings of the XXIInd dynasty had fallen:
the fact that the chapel and monuments were built under
their direction shows that they were still masters of
Memphis. We have no authentic date for Sheshonq II., and the
twenty-ninth year is the latest known in the case of
Takeloti II., but we know that Sheshonq III. reigned fifty-
two years, and, after two years of Pimi, we find a reference
to the thirty-seventh year of Sheshonq IV. If we allow a
round century for these last kings we are not likely to be
far out: this would place the close of the Bubastite dynasty
somewhere about 780 B.C.

When the last of these passed away after an inglorious reign of at least
thirty-seven years, the prestige of his race had so completely declined
that the country would have no more of it; the sceptre passed into the
hands of another dynasty, this time of Tanite origin.* It was probably
a younger branch of the Bubastite family allied to the Ramessides
and Theban Pallacides. Petu-bastis, the first of the line, secured
recognition in Thebes,** and throughout the rest of Egypt as well, but
his influence was little greater than that of his predecessors; as in
the past, the real power was in the hands of the high priests.

* The following list gives the names of the Pharaohs of the
XXIIth dynasty in so far as they have been ascertained up
to the present:--

[Illustration: 252.jpg TABLE OF PHARAOHS OF THE XXIITH DYNASTY]

** This fact has recently been placed beyond doubt by
inscriptions found on the quay at Karnak near the water-
marks of the Nile.

One of them, Auiti by name, even went so far, in the fourteenth or
fifteenth year, as to declare hims