History of Egypt, Chaldæa, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) eBook

Gaston Maspero
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 344 pages of information about History of Egypt, Chaldæa, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12).

History of Egypt, Chaldæa, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) eBook

Gaston Maspero
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 344 pages of information about History of Egypt, Chaldæa, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12).
* The site of the Tikhisa country is imperfectly defined.  Nisrana was seemingly applied to the marshy lake into which the Koweik flows, and it is perhaps to be found in the name Kin-nesrin.  In this case Tikhisa would be the country near the lake; the district of the Grseco-Roruan Chalkis is situated on the right of the military road.

The return of the expedition was a sort of triumphal procession.  At every halting-place the troops found quarters and provisions prepared for them, bread and cakes, perfumes, oil, wine, and honey being provided in such quantities that they were obliged on their departure to leave the greater part behind them.  The scribes took advantage of this peaceful state of affairs to draw up minute accounts of the products of Lotanu—­corn, barley, millet, fruits, and various kinds of oil—­prompted doubtless by the desire to arrive at a fairly just apportionment of the tribute.  Indeed, the results of the expedition were considered so satisfactory that they were recorded on a special monument dedicated in the palace at Thebes.  The names of the towns and peoples might change with every war, but the spoils suffered no diminution.  In the year XXXIII., the kingdoms situated to the west of the Euphrates were so far pacified that Thutmosis was able without risk to carry his arms to Mesopotamia.  He entered the country by the fords of Carchemish, near to the spot where his grandfather, Thutmosis I., had erected his stele half a century previously.  He placed another beside this, and a third to the eastward to mark the point to which he had extended the frontier of his empire..  The Mitanni, who exercised a sort of hegemony over the whole of Naharaim, were this time the objects of his attack.  Thirty-two of their towns fell one after another, their kings were taken captive and the walls of their cities were razed, without any serious resistance.  The battalions of the enemy were dispersed at the first shock, and Pharaoh “pursued them for the space of a mile, without one of them daring to look behind him, for they thought only of escape, and fled before him like a flock of goats.”  Thutmosis pushed forward as far certainly as the Balikh, and perhaps on to the Khabur or even to the Hermus; and as he approached the frontier, the king of Singar, a vassal of Assyria, sent him presents of lapis-lazuli.

When this prince had retired, another chief, the lord of the Great Kkati, whose territory had not even been threatened by the invaders, deemed it prudent to follow the example of the petty princes of the plain of the Euphrates, and despatched envoys to the Pharaoh bearing presents of no great value, but testifying to his desire to live on good terms with Egypt.  Still further on, the inhabitants of Nii begged the king’s acceptance of a troop of slaves and two hundred and sixty mares; he remained among them long enough to erect a stele commemorating his triumph, and to indulge in one of those extensive hunts which were the delight

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History of Egypt, Chaldæa, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.