from the Eamessides.  Although hereditary claims to the throne and the pontificate had died out or lost their force in the male line, they were still persistently urged by the women:  consecrated from their birth to the service of Amon, and originally reserved to sing his praises or share his nuptial couch, those of them who married transmitted to their children, and more especially to their daughters, the divine germ which qualified them for the throne.  They and their followers never ceased to look for the day when the national deity should shake off his apathy, and, becoming the champion of their cause against the Bubastite or Tanite usurpers, restore their city to the rank and splendour from which it had fallen.  Namroti married one of these Theban princesses, and thus contrived to ward off the danger of revolt during his lifetime; but on his death or disappearance an insurrection broke out.  Sheshonq II. had succeeded Osorkon II., and he, in his turn, was followed by Takeloti II.  Takeloti chose Kala-mait, daughter of Namroti, as his lawful wife, formally recognised her as queen, and set up numerous statues and votive monuments in her honour.  But all in vain:  this concession failed to conciliate the rebellious, and the whole Thebaid rose against him to a man.  In the twelfth year of his reign he entrusted the task of putting down the revolt to his son Osorkon, at the same time conferring upon him the office of high priest.  It took several years to repress the rising; defeated in the eleventh year, the rebels still held the field in the fifteenth year of the king, and it was not till some time after, between the fifteenth and twenty-second year of Takeloti II., that they finally laid down their arms.* At the end of this struggle the king’s power was quite exhausted, while that of the feudal magnates had proportionately increased.  Before long, Egypt was split up into a number of petty states, some of them containing but a few towns, while others, following the example of Thebes, boldly annexed several adjacent nomes.  A last remnant of respect for the traditional monarchy kept them from entirely repudiating the authority of Pharaoh.  They still kept up an outward show of submission to his rule; they paid him military service when called upon, and appealed to him as umpire in their disputes, without, however, always accepting his rulings, and when they actually came to blows among themselves, were content to exercise their right of private warfare under his direction.** The royal domain gradually became narrowed down to the Memphite nome and the private appanages of the reigning house, and soon it no longer yielded the sums necessary for the due 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.