History of the world from the earliest historical time to the year 1898

Front matter

Class

J d- I

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT

Contents

Sction I. VNCIENT HISTORY,

•I THE BEGINNING OF HISTORICAL INFORMATION I<> THE . 01 fHE WESTERN ROMAN EMPIRE AD .

•-3

Section II. MEDIEVAL HISTORY

FROM END OF WESTERN EMPIRE TO THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA (A.D. 476—1492).

FROM PARTITION OF WESTERN ROMAN EMPIRE TO TREATY OF VERDUN (A.D. 476—843).

I. Italy ; the Papacy ; the (Greek) Byzantine Empire ; Spain ; Frank Kingdoms ; Feudalism ; Britain and England . 179-203

Contents

VII

111 K \ki mr GrI \i ; iiik

MPIRE

Booh II.

TR1 .'■' VERDUN TO CRUSADE PER:

(A.D

I! 1 III! I' A !IK

mi Byzanti Empire; ihk I wt Italian Republics

BOOft III.

THE CRUSADE PERIOD (A.D

III. G Italy

BOOft IV.

D v iii Contents

CHAP. PAGES

III. Southern Europe: Italy— the Papacy, Naples and

Sicily, Venice, Genoa ; the Moors in Spain ; the Turks; Downfall of Greek (Eastern or Byzantine) Empire 337-362

IV. Medleval Civilisation: Rise of Towns; the Hansa

League ; Decay of Feudalism ; Art ; Invention ; the Renaissance or Revival of Learning . . . 362-376

Section III. MODERN HISTORY

Bool? I.

THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA TO THE PEACE OF WESTPHALIA (1492— 1648).

I. Discovery of America ; Conquest of Mexico ; Conquest of Peru ; the Cape Route to India . . 377-389 II. Europe before the Reformation ..... 389-396

III. The Reformation ; Wars of Charles V. . . . 397-408

IV. The Reformation (continued) ; the Catholic Reaction 408-432 V. Spain and the Netherlands ; the Armada . . . 432-450

VI. The Thirty Years' War; the First Stuarts . . 450-461 VII. France; Southern and Eastern Europe . . . 461-474

Book II. PEACE OF WESTPHALIA TO FRENCH REVOLUTION

(1648— 1789).

I. The British Isles 474-482

II. The Wars of Louis XIV 482-498

Contents i\

III. Ci M R \l , N< tRl III RN, AND E \-i :

Russia ; nu Si \ i n Yi vrs' War ,

Russia and Turkey; mi Par n "i Poi \m> . .:

I\'. The Trans-Atlantic Problem: Greai Britain,

I'k Spain 314523

\". France; Southern Europe; mi Pre-revolutionary

VI. liu- American Revolutionary War .... 533

Booh III.

.!/ THE OUTBREAK OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION TO THE VGRESS OF VIENNA

I Thi French Revolution u*d Napoi eai

II. I in N u War (ift .... 55 3

I

Section I. ANCIENT HISTORY

••I Till KM. in. HISTORICAL INFORMATION I<> llll

IWNPALL <»l Mil WESTERN ROMAN EMPIRE,

IN I RODUCT< >RY.

A HISTORY of th< lay well be prefaced bj some account

by whon irld ia peopled. The

human types or families; of mankind arc the 1 ■ . 1 11 M mgolian, and the Ethiopian. I I

mainly r I rope and America; the Mongolians

ilasia ; the 1 Ethiopians in Al members <>f the human round th re between them.

>n and classification i families i I in the I rhich

. the M 11 the ' the M

ition is based upon ■ omp iri : which tl bin, the hair, the the tern;

and '

ami mainly oval prisii provided with creeds founded on revelations, and having a priesthood of a mediatorial character, or else by the form of religion called Brahmanism.

The Mongolians have a skin rough in texture and yellowish in hue ; hair dull black in colour, coarse and lank ; large cheek-bones, narrow, almond-shaped, rather oblique eyes, small nose, and features broad and flat ; and a sluggish, passive temperament, marked by much endurance, and mind fairly proficient in art and letters, but poor in science. Their religion is either polytheistic, or one involving spirit-worship (animism), and with a belief in visions and dreams, or else is Buddhistic.

The Ethiopic races are blackish or quite black in colour, with a cool, velvety skin, having a distinct odour; they have jet-black, short, woolly or frizzly hair ; high cheek-bones, broad, flat nose, and thick lips. Their temperament is sensuous, cheerful, unintellectual, and fitful in its changes from gaiety to ferocity. They have no science, art, or literature worthy of the name. Their religion is non-theistic, but consists of nature-worship, with witchcraft and fetichism strongly marked.

The Ethiopic races are found, firstly, in Africa, southwards from the Sahara ; the northern or Soudanese branch, down to about 5° north latitude, being negroes in the full sense, while the southern or Bantu family is composed of more or less mixed negro and negroid peoples. The Soudanese show, to a large extent, physical unity and linguistic diversity ; the Bantus are remarkable for linguistic unity and physical diversity. To the Soudanese group belong the Mandingans, Haussas, Yorubas, Fantis, Bagirmis, Masais, and many more ; the Bantus include the Zulu-Kaffirs, the Swahilis of the eastern coast, the Basutos, the Bechuanas, Barotses, Mashonas, and many more tribes of the Congo basin, the western coast, and South Africa. Secondly, an Oceanic division of the Ethiopics includes four branches : the Tasmanians, now extinct ; the Australian aborigines, least like the other negro or negroid peoples, and now nearly extinct; the Papuans of New Guinea and the Eastern Archipelago ; and the closely allied Melanesians of the New Hebrides, the Solomon Isles, Fiji, and New Caledonia. Both regions of the Ethiopic race contain dwarfish groups, Negritos or Negrillos (little negroes), such as the Akkas, Batwas, and Bushmen, in Africa, and the Simangs of Malacca and the Mincopies of the Andaman Isles.

The Mongolians include, firstly, the Mongolo-Tartars of Central and Northern Asia, parts of Russia, the Balkan Peninsula, and Asia

I he ( Race

Min ■ ndly, the people of China proper, Japan, Indo-China,

and Tibet ; thirdly, the hulk of the inhabitants of Finland, Lapland

ce of Russia), the Ural Mountains, the middle course of the Vi N thern Siberia, and Hungary; fourthly, the M Jynesians of the '■ ninsula, the Sunda groups,

the Philippines, Formosa, Mad a Zealand, Samoa, Tahiti,

Hawaii, and i I groups of islands in Eastern Polynesia;

fifthly, the American Indians and the Eskim i

The ' ins arc the inhabitants, in the main, of Southern and

tern Asia, l rope, and North Africa, and of the whole rid and Australasia. This great, by far the greatest, historical of mankind, .is comprising the most highly civilised peoples, 1 achievements are the subjects of history in the . has three main branches. These are the Aryan or n ; the Semitic; and the Hamitic The Ar prise Hindus, Persians, Afghans, Beluchis, Armenian , I ;cnt and modern), Latin races (ancient), Teutons or Germans, thuanians, a rtians. The 3 - are

represented historically by the Hebrews, Phoenicians, Assyrians, 1 .1 occupy in the modern

ia, Syria, Arabia, much of North Africa, and The Hamites or Hamitic branch of t I ide many dwellers in North and East Africa, as the Berbers of te Tuaregs of the W - hara, th I

1 peoples of < lalla land and Somali land.

resented, ire shall see, by th< the only gr< it Hai ti< nation.

1 properl)

r tin- mountain-region whence the nan <lerr. oe of the finest I the

human r. '

whi« h n< n be

■ior to all historic al monum

the i

I i ■ region of Central Asia, east of the Caspian Sea, and north of the Hindu Kush and of the ridge connecting that range with the Elburz Mountains. This race, before its members were parted by migration, had made a marked advance from the purely barbarous or savage state. They led a peaceful life, devoted mainly to pastoral and agricultural work. The family life, basis of all society and law, was firmly settled, with due reverence for its ties and duties, and with a recognition, by special names, of the degrees of relationship created by marriage. From the solitary family life in detached dwellings they had proceeded to the gathering of hom;steads into villages and towns. The family had grown into the tribe, and the father, the family-head, had been developed into a primitive king. Progress in the arts of life was shown by the grinding of grain into meal, and the making of meal into bread ; by the weaving of cloth and its sewing into garments ; by the use of the metals gold and silver, and of a third metal which was probably iron ; by wielding tools of hewn and polished stone ; by building boats for use on rivers and lakes, the sea or ocean being yet to them unknown ; and not least, by the naming of numbers as far as a hundred. Tall of stature, powerful in frame, white-skinned, fair-haired, and probably blue-eyed, this primitive race had minds open to all impressions, observant of nature's phenomena, and souls whose religion consisted in the worship of the beneficent Powers of Nature — the sky, light, fire, the sun, the earth, the waters, and the winds — and in an abhorrence, without any attempt at propitiation, of the harmful Powers, such as Darkness and Drought. Praise, thanksgiving, and prayers for help were the ritual of these simple and manly beings, along with sacrificial offerings to which their bright deities were bidden as guests and of which they partook as friends share in a feast at the house of a friend. The word Arya, in Sanskrit, a language derived from the original Aryan tongue, means " noble," "exalted," "venerable," and as the Caucasian presents us with the highest type among the three families of man, so the Aryan branch displays the noblest pattern of that highest type. This king of races claims of right the foremost place on history's page, as that which is most worthy of renown for energy, enterprise, and skill, and has reached the highest point of intellectual development, as manifested in science, literature, and art, and in the priceless possession of political freedom. A grand event came in the history of mankind when this Aryan race, obeying a law of movement found acting in all ages of the world, began to move from their

1 ■■. isions <<f Ancient Hisl 5

ancestral tarted <>n their mission t>) fill, to

and [•> civilise the Western world. I rms they

and in their new region beca

of tl 1 the Italians, the Greeks, the Teutoi . and

at a later tun inant <>f the primitive

• ie I [imalayas and the 1 Imdu

. Mount 1 the Punjab, to become the dominant

in t ; lley, while others became settlers in Persia, on

the plateau whose modern name h Iran <>r Elan, a word akin

Turn the earliest history based on records wi

or painted on stone <>r brick, uc find

cnt history, ethnogi , in two divisions. The first

stern peoples known I lamitic) ;

all Semitii II ndus perhaps the Phrygians, and

and Persians, all Aryan : and the Parthians,

. and Jap ' sian. In this order,

taking the PI with the I the Hin

rate later treatment, we deal with

empires. The second division, that <>f the

the Cell Italians),

ire have seen, of Aryan ra<

BOOK I.

THE GREAT EMPIRES: EASTERN NATIONS.

Chapter I. — The Egyptians

In the north-east of Africa, at a time so uncertain that the date for the first king, assigned by learned men, varies between 5700 and 2440 B.C., arose a wonderful Hamitic people, who became great in arts and arms, and left behind them architectural and sculptural monuments which have been objects of amazement and admiration to all beholders. A true conception of Ancient Egypt requires us to disregard the modern map, and to view the territory as comprising nothing but the narrow valley of the Nile, extending for about 700 miles from the First Cataract to a point below (north of) Cairo, and the outspreading Delta, fanshaped, lying between that point and the sandy shores of the Mediterranean. The original seven mouths of the mighty river have now been reduced, by silting-up, to two, the Rosetta and Damietta outlets. The valley, a ravine cut out, in the course of ages, in the sandy and rocky soil, nowhere exceeds ten miles in breadth, and is sometimes narrowed to one, the basin being bounded to east and west by hills generally but 300 feet above sea-level. The whole area of this famous country was less than that of Belgium, and was, in its most flourishing days, at least as densely peopled, with a multitude of towns and villages, large and small, forming one great hive of human beings. The valley is known as Upper Egypt or the Said, the Delta as Lower Egypt. The country was, in a peculiar sense, the region of the Nile. That great, and till very recent days, mysterious river, was at once the creator of Lower Egypt by its deposit of mud, and the supporter of all life in Upper and Lower Egypt alike by its annual overflow. In the words of the Greek historian, Egypt was " the gift of the Nile," and so dependent were the inhabitants for sub-

THE ANCIENT

The Egyptians 7

sistence on the due rise of the river, varying from an average of 36 feet in Upper Egypt to 25 at Cairo, that a " bad Nile," or deficient overflow, meant scarcity of food, and a great lack of increase, happily rare, brought absolute famine. The almost utter absence of rain, storm, fog, frost, and snow is the peculiarity of the climate, which has really but two seasons — spring from October into May, with the fruit-trees blossoming in February and crops reaped before the end of April, and summer for the rest of the year. The great lake, studded with islands in the form of towns and villages, into which the Nile spread itself out in its yearly time of flood, left behind, on its retirement, an expanse of rich soil which made the country the most productive in the world, bearing a triple harvest in the ancient days, a crop of grain followed by two crops of grasses or of vegetables fit for the food of mankind. The wheat of Egypt, the most valuable product, supplied all neighbouring peoples in time of dearth, and the city of Rome, in all her later time, was almost wholly fed from the same bountiful source. Doora (a species of millet) and flax were also largely grown. The monuments show us the pressing of the grapes of Egypt, and the date-palm was ever at hand with its delicious fruit. The country possessed great advantages, beyond its wonderful fertility, for the progress of a nation to prosperity and power. The river supplied a highway for rapid communication from end to end, and the situation for commerce was most favourable in the ready access northwards to the Mediterranean, and eastwards, by the Red Sea, to the Indian Ocean or Eastern Sea. In timber the country was not rich, but serviceable woods were easily imported. The tall smooth reed called papyrus supplied long-lasting paper from its pith, and the lovely white waterlily, the lotus, was the favourite flower — an offering to the gods, an ornament worn by guests at the banquet, a model for architectural forms. Fish and water-fowl abounded, and the sport-loving Egyptians had "big game " in the hippopotamus and the crocodile. The early days of Egypt are shrouded in night. Whence came the Egyptian people of olden time ? We cannot say. The nation was, beyond all reasonable doubt, of Hamitic race, allied to the negro- peoples in physical and mental character, and in language, though it became, before the most flourishing period of its history, largely mingled with foreign elements from the Semitic peoples to the north-east, in Asia, from the Ethiopians to the south, and the Libyans to the west. Upon the whole, the Egyptians are remarkable for the independent, almost isolated, development of their civilisation.

The history of the country, in its long duration, its wars and conquests, its 30 dynasties, as arranged in the 3rd century B.C. by the priest Manetho, in a work of which only chronological epitomes remain, can only be dealt with briefly in a few salient points. M'na or Menes, a king variously placed at about 5000, 4500, and 3900 years B.C., is represented as the monarch who instituted laws and divine worship, and founded the city of Memphis on a site close to that of the modern Cairo. Two empires are usually recognised, the old empire, lasting from the time of Menes till 1670 B.C., and the new empire, from that date till the Persian conquest. Monumental history begins with a king named Seneferu, who conquered the Sinaitic peninsula, for the sake of its mines of copper and of turquoise. An incised tablet in that region records his person and exploit. Other monuments of his time show the first-known hieroglyphical writing, and there are pyramids belonging to the same early age. The monarchs named Khufu, Khafra, and Menkaura, respectively called Cheops, Cephrenes, and Mycerinus by Herodotus, were the builders of the three largest pyramids, those of Gizeh, near Cairo. The stupendous size of these works is well known. The largest, well styled by the great French archaeologist Lenormant, in respect of its mass, " the most prodigious of all human constructions," had originally a base of which each side was 764 feet in length, and a perpendicular height of 480 feet. Its area was above 13 acres, and its materials would have built a city of 22,000 solid stone houses, with walls afoot thick, 20 feet of frontage, and 30 feet of depth from front to back, the walls being 30 feet in height from the bottom of the foundation, and the party-walls having one-third the material of the main walls. Modern builders fully accept the statement of Herodotus that the construction of the " Great Pyramid" employed the continuous labour of 100,000 men for 20 years. The basement stones are in many cases 30 feet long, 5 feet high, and 4 or 5 feet wide, and weigh each from 46 to 57 tons, and the interior contains an elaborate system of chambers, galleries, and ventilation-shafts. The work displays marvellous mechanical skill in the fact of immense blocks of granite being brought from Syene, 500 miles away, polished like glass, and fitted together so accurately that it is very difficult to detect the joints.

About 2400 b.c. the seat of government of the old empire seems to have been removed to Thebes, about 400 miles up the Nile from Memphis. The place had long been a provincial city of note, with a special style of manners, speech, religion, and mode of

I I . tiana f this pei

I

Is and i

l this line (Manet

I I from the 1 III,

• item branch <>f the ri

. into .1 natural d He th

• rid without th I

ham, with his

■ rule within the Delta, the valley of tl

f ti

in .ill I i ■

I I io A History of the World

and a period of conquest commenced under Thothmes I., grandson of Aahmes, and a monarch whose grandmother was of Ethiopian or Kushite race. He carried his arms far into Nubia on the south, extending the frontier to Tombos, beyond Dongola, and. through Syria as far as the Euphrates. Egypt thus entered on a new career, coming boldly to the front as a great nation aiming at wide dominion abroad. His daughter Hatasu reigned as queen along with her brother Thothmes II., and with sole power after his death, assuming male attire, with the style and title of " King," and playing a manly part in her regal office. Galleys for oars and sails were built on the western shore of the Red Sea, and commerce arose with southern Arabia for spices and incense. A glorious time for Egypt came in the reign of her brother and successor Thothmes III., a very able and ambitious man, who had been for many years under her control as his co-ruler. He marched into Syria, won a great victory over the Palestinian nations at Megiddo, and became master of the whole of Syria and part of Mesopotamia. For many years he was almost constantly engaged in expeditions into the East, making the monarchs of Babylon and Assyria tremble on their thrones. He also exacted from the Ethiopians to the south vast tributes of gold, ivory, ebony, and other valuables. He was both the greatest of Egyptian conquerors and one of the chief builders and patrons of art, erecting numerous temples and other monuments at the chief towns. One of his obelisks is now at Rome, another in Constantinople, a third in London, a fourth at New York. We may note that in this monarch's reign, in the part of the Delta called in Scripture " the land of Goshen," the children of Israel were rapidly growing in numbers and prosperity. His grandson, Amenhotep III. or Amenophis, is famous for the erection of the two seated colossi at Thebes, the greatest ever seen in the world, formed of a single solid block of sandstone, still more than 60 feet in height, after being subject for over 3,000 years to the corroding effect of weather. Nothing more striking can be conceived in art than these sublimely tranquil figures, sitting alone amid a verdant expanse, with islands of ruins in their rear. One of this Amenhotep's palace-temples was at Luxor, on the eastern bank of the Nile, a superb construction 800 feet long, and from 100 to 200 feet broad, with two obelisks, of which one is now in the centre of the Place de la Concorde at Paris.

Early in the 14th century B.C. we find Egyptian forces of Seti I. or Sethos in garrison at Tyre and Aradus in Canaan, and

The Egypti 1 1

•his time that new conflicts arose b rful people called Khit.i or 11 had capita

d Karkhemish on the l had fought with the I under Thothmes III., and

m pow< r. The n ms< ripti

prived the Hittites i .«>r Rami ■ ■ 11, styled " th<

the battles were fought ; but the

I II"' :

and the m.irr to a Hittite princess. From this

lime forward Egyptian influence and dominion in south-western

! of the pyramids became again simply i her former boundarii I. and R II exhibit the culminating point of

tian .irt, as regards the number, variety, and beauty of ai

I he pillared hall of > feet in

th and 1 70 in br< »j [64 m

. n circumference. I he

. and that, with the walls and pillars, was with

.:nted hieroglyphics and 1. parable 1 by m

whole buildii -I man's

the ino^t 111

I of all those wondrous works, which were really

■ :.d pillared halls, embellished with par

1 with the u:: I finish. 1

■ mi the • tern] I . that th'

I I in a reign

I withal '

and ' 1 irly in In

by ii

• il <.f the < ountrj

Memphis, and it was behind its walls that the Egyptian king, from lack of courage, remained secure, while his forces, after a desperate battle of six hours' duration, inflicted a severe defeat on the confederates, and compelled them to quit the land. The monarch, on the monuments, took to himself the whole credit of the victory. Menephthah, the " Pharaoh " of the Exodus, was soon afterwards involved in the quarrel with Moses which led to results so direful for his people in the plagues and in the destruction of the pursuing force of chariots and horsemen in the waters of the Red Sea.

Ramessu or Ramesses III. (i 269-1 244 B.C.), coming to the throne after a period of civil war and anarchy, had a reign made glorious by successes against the Bedouins on the north-east, the Libyans to the north-west, and a vast confederacy of foes from Italy and Greece who came against Egypt with naval and military forces by way of Syria and Palestine. Ramesses met them near the eastern mouths of the Nile, and defeated them utterly in several actions by land and water. He followed up this by an invasion of Syria, and then returned, after asserting his power, to build, to plant the country with trees, and to extend trade with Arabia and Ethiopia by way of the Red Sea. A long period of material, moral, and artistic decline followed under the Ramessids, ten sovereigns of the name of Ramesses.

In the year 1091 a new dynasty came to the throne in the person of Her-hor, high-priest of Amnion at Thebes. The seat of government was placed at Tanis, in the Delta, whence they are called the " Tanite kings." During part of this period David and Solomon were reigning in Palestine and Syria, and we find the wise king's subjects trading with Egypt for chariots and horses, and hjmself marrying an Egyptian princess. The plan of Solomon's Temple, with the two pillars "Jachin" and "Boaz" in place of obelisks, was inspired by Egyptian models.

In 961 an official of Semitic race gained royal power. This was Sheshonk, the " Shishak " of Scripture, who gave a friendly reception at his court to Jeroboam, afterwards king of Israel, and in his interest invaded Judah with a force of chariots, horse, and foot. His advance to Jerusalem was a mere triumphal march, and he retired after plundering the Temple and the palace, leaving Rehoboam on the throne as a prince tributary to Egyptian monarchs. In another campaign he captured for Jeroboam certain Levitical cities hostile to the king of Israel, and was virtually master as far as Galilee, and from the Mediterranean to the Syrian Desert. There was, in later days,

The Egyptians 13

further warfare between the Jews and Egypt. Asa, the grandson of Rehoboam, defeated an Egyptian army with great slaughter, and re-established the independence of Judah, putting an end for three centuries to Egyptian hopes of Asiatic dominion. Disintegration of the monarchy began, and Egypt was divided into a number ot principalities, with rival dynasties at Tanis, Memphis, Thebes, and other cities. Conquest by the Ethiopians followed in due course. In 730 B.C. Shabak or Sabaco subdued the country, and the Ethiopians, adopting the old religion of the land and repairing the temples, were in possession for about 60 years. During this time Egyptian and Assyrian armies met in Philistia, and the defeat of the African forces, in 720 and in 701, left Egypt exposed to Assyrian attacks. In 672 Esarhaddon, son of Sennacherib, the king of Assyria who had warred with Hezekiah, invaded Egypt with a great host, completely defeated the forces of Tehrak or Tirhaka, and ended the rule of the Ethiopian kings by overrunning the country from the Mediterranean to the First Cataract. The Assyrian conqueror divided the land into 20 districts, each with its governor and an Assyrian garrison in the capital town. Several attempts to re-establish Ethiopian power failed, and the end of olden Egypt seemed to have arrived.

A revival, however, was to come. Psamatik or Psammitichus I., a man of Libyan race, ruler of one of the principalities, obtained from Gyges, king of Lydia, a strong force of Ionians and Carians, proclaimed himself king of all Egypt, crushed in battle the other petty princes, and met with no opposition from Assyria, then fully engaged with Asiatic foes. This energetic rebel thus became sole and absolute monarch of the country, from the mouths of the Nile to Elephantine, in 'B.C. 653, and held sway for over 40 years. His capital was fixed at Sais, in the Delta, and the new ruler strengthened his position by forming permanent camps of the foreign mercenaries, and by marrying a princess of one of the former dynasties. He then set to work to raise the country from its ruined condition, repairing canals and roads, encouraging tillage, reviving the arts, and throwing open Egypt, for the first time in her history, to the ability and enterprise of foreigners. Greeks came in and settled in the Delta, and commerce between Egypt and Greece arose.

The son of Psamatik, Neco or Neku, beginning his reign in 610, showed his nautical enterprise by an endeavour, foiled by excessive loss of life among the labourers, to reopen the canal, then silted-up by Nile mud and desert sand, which had been made by

Seti I. and Ramesses II. between the Nile and the Red Sea. His object was to afford communication between the two fleets of triremes which, by the aid of Greek workmen, he had built on the Red Sea and the Mediterranean. Under his auspices, Phoenician mariners sailed round Africa from the Red Sea, by the " Cape of Storms," as it was afterwards called, and the Straits of Gibraltar (" Pillars of Hercules ") to the Mediterranean coast of Egypt, which they reached in the third year, after the most remarkable and daring maritime exploit of ancient times. This energetic monarch next turned his attention to Syria and adjacent countries, and, defeating Josiah, king of Judah, at Megiddo, conquered Palestine, carrying off Josiah's second son, Jehoahaz, as a hostage, and leaving the eldest son, Jehoiakim, at Jerusalem as a tributary ruler. Three years later, in 605 B.C. the Egyptian army was utterly defeated at Karkhemish, on the Euphrates, by Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon; and thus for ever ended Egyptian hopes of empire in Asia.

His successors, Psamatik II. and Apries or Hophra, warred with the Ethiopians and with Nebuchadnezzar, and from 570 to 526 we find Aahmes or Amasis ruling Egypt as a tributary king under Babylon. Material prosperity was great in this time of political decline. Agriculture prospered through the regularity of the overflow of the bountiful river, and sculptors, painters, and builders of every class flourished under a ruler who was a lavish patron of Egyptian art in every form.

The country of conservatism and isolation now came under the powerful influence of the Greek progressive spirit, and Ancient Egypt's dissolution was hastened by the introduction of foreign elements. Amasis, at the close of his reign, rashly provoked the new great empire of Persia by an attack on Cyprus, and his son, Psamatik III., was totally defeated at Pelusium by the troops of Cambyses. This event, in 525 B.C., made Egypt nominally a Persian province, whose history was chequered by desperate revolts against Persian monarchs. It was about 450 B.C. that Herodotus visited Egypt to obtain the information embodied in the Second Book of his immortal work. As Persia declined in power, Egypt, whose tributary kings had armies of Greek mercenaries, was for long periods practically free from control, and in 375 B.C. Artaxerxes Mnemon of Persia, having hired a large force of Greeks under the Athenian general Iphicrates, wholly failed in an effort to re-establish Persian power. The successful Egyptian ruler, Nectanebo, was regarded by his subjects as a hero and a demigod, and his reign