Second Intermediate Period of Ancient Egypt

Second Intermediate Period of Egypt

The Second Intermediate Period marks a period when Ancient Egypt once again fell into disarray between the end of the Middle Kingdom, and the start of the New Kingdom. It is best known as when the Hyksos made their appearance in Egypt, whose reign comprised the 15th Dynasty and 16th Dynasty.

The brilliant Egyptian 12th Dynasty came to an end around 1800 BC, and was succeeded by the much weaker 13th Dynasty of Egypt. Both ruled from Itjtawy ("Seizer-of-the-Two-Lands") near Memphis and el-Lisht, just south of the apex of the Nile Delta. The 13th Dynasty is notable for the accession of the first formally recognised Semitic king: Khendjer. The 13th Dynasty proved unable to hold onto the entire territory of Egypt, and the provincial ruling family in Xois, located in the marshes of the western Delta, broke away from the central authority to form the 14th Dynasty. The splintering of the land accelerated after the reign of the 13th Dynasty king Sobekhotep IV. It was during Sobekhotep IV's reign that the Hyksos may have made their first appearance, and around 1720 BC took control of the town of Avaris (the modern Tell ed-Dab'a/Khata'na), a few miles from Qantir. The outlines of the traditional account of the "invasion" of the land by the Hyksos is preserved in the Aegyptiaca of Manetho, an Egyptian priest who wrote in the time of Ptolemy II Philadelphus. Manetho recorded that it was during the reign of one "Tutimaios" (who has been identified with Dudimose I of the 14th Dynasty) that the Hyksos overran Egypt, led by Salitis, the founder of the 15th Dynasty. This dynasty was succeeded by a group of Hyksos princes and chieftains, who ruled in the eastern Delta with their local Egyptian vassals, and are known primarily by scarabs inscribed with their names, called by modern Egyptologists the 16th Dynasty.

The later kings of the 13th Dynasty appear to be only ephemeral monarchs under the control of a powerful line of viziers, and indeed it has been suggested that the kingship in this period might have been elective if not actually appointive. One monarch late in the dynasty, Wahibre Ibiau, may have even been a former vizier. Beginning with the reign of Sobekhotep IV, the power of this dynasty, weak to begin with, deteriorated. The later king Merneferre Ay (ruled c.1700 BC) appears to have been a mere vassal of the Hyksos princes ruling there; his successors held onto their diminished office until c.1633 BC.

Around the time Memphis and Itj-tawy fell to the Hyksos, the native Egyptian ruling house in Thebes declared its independence from the vassal dynasty in Itj-tawy and set itself up as the 17th Dynasty. This dynasty was to prove the salvation of Egypt and would eventually lead the war of liberation that drove the Hyksos back into Asia. The two last kings of this dynasty were Tao II the Brave and Kamose, whom tradition credited with the final defeat of the Hyksos. With the 18th Dynasty, the New Kingdom begins.

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