6 THE PRE-ISLAMIC ARABIAN ELEMENT 1. 1. x.

X When the Empire was at the noontide of its glory and the Syrian wars of Thutmose III (1479-1447 B.C.) had broken down such barriers as remained, "all the world traded in the Delta markets," and an inscription from the tomb of Harmhab (1350-13 15) is particularly interesting as proving that Arab settlement in Egypt had been taking place for some time: it records how fugitives from Palestine begged the Pharaoh to give them an asylum in Egypt "after the manner of your fathers' fathers since the beginning." By now, too, the Shasu or Khabiri, the desert Semites, including Arabs, Hebrews and Aramaeans, were inundating Syria and Palestine, until, in the reign of Ikhnaton (1375-1358) they became paramount on the eastern borders of Egypt.

Their power received a check at the hands of Seti I (c. I3I3-I292), and they were also no doubt affected by the repulses inflicted by Rameses II (1292-1225) on the Hittites.

By the time of Rameses 's death there were numbers of Arabians captured in war and enrolled as serfs in Egypt, or employed as mercenaries*.

XI The power of Egypt then began to decline, and during the nineteenth, twentieth and twenty-first dynasties the Libyans so overran Egypt that by 950 B.C. they had gained the supreme power. The presumption is that some of the eastern nomads, who were divided by no great racial gulf from the Libyans, took the opportunity at the same time to settle with them in the Delta and intermarry with them as they had probably already intermarried with the native Egyptians.

XII In the Nubian period which followed, Assyria rose to the height of her power and subdued Egypt. Psammetichus I (663-609) was practically a vassal of that power in the early years of his reign ; but later, as Babylon supplanted Assyria, he asserted his independence and entered into widely ramifying foreign relations with the powers to the north and east; and his successors imitated his example.

XIII Sixty years after the death of Psammetichus I Cyrus founded the Medo-Persian empire, and in 525 B.C. Cambyses, King of Persia, occupied Egypt.

XIV The Arabs may have strengthened their footing in Egypt during the Assyrian and Babylonian periods. Herodotus indeed speaks of Sennacherib as "King of the Arabians and Assyrians" Breasted, Hist. pp. 244, 253. Breasted, A. R. in, 10, 11.

' Breasted, Hist. pp. 263, 284, 285. * Ibid. pp. 254, 317, 318.

* Ibid. pp. 298, 327, 328, 333 ff.; and cp. A. R. iii, 570; iv, 35, 83, 84.

« Bk. II, 141.