Anna-Latifa Mourad - Böcker

Egypt and the Levant witnessed complex transformations across the Bronze Age. Beyond the rise and collapse of powerful cities and states were the long-distance connectivities that enabled the movements of people and animals, and the interlinked exchanges of commodities and ideas. By the Late Bronze Age, these connectivities exhibited markers of globalisation. This Element considers how such markers emerged and developed in the preceding centuries. Focusing on the third to mid-second millennium BCE, it brings together recent research on socio-political developments and cross-cultural interactions to give an overview of the transforming networks linking Old to early New Kingdom Egypt and EB III to LB I Levantine communities. In doing so, the Element incorporates approaches that move away from imperialist structures of exchange to consider how dynamic networks were negotiated and maintained across periods of socio-political change.

Egypt and the Levant witnessed complex transformations across the Bronze Age. Beyond the rise and collapse of powerful cities and states were the long-distance connectivities that enabled the movements of people and animals, and the interlinked exchanges of commodities and ideas. By the Late Bronze Age, these connectivities exhibited markers of globalisation. This Element considers how such markers emerged and developed in the preceding centuries. Focusing on the third to mid-second millennium BCE, it brings together recent research on socio-political developments and cross-cultural interactions to give an overview of the transforming networks linking Old to early New Kingdom Egypt and EB III to LB I Levantine communities. In doing so, the Element incorporates approaches that move away from imperialist structures of exchange to consider how dynamic networks were negotiated and maintained across periods of socio-political change.

Manetho’s obscure reference to a race of invaders has been a constant source of debate and controversy. But who are these invaders? They are named the ‘Hyksos’ – a Greek modification of the Egyptian expression HqA xAs.wt ‘ruler of foreign lands’. The Hyksos are correlated with the Fifteenth Dynasty of the Second Intermediate Period, a time characterised by the destabilisation and regionalisation of the Egyptian state. Several scholars have pondered over their victory and rule in Egypt, from the manner in which they entered Egypt and the means with which they claimed the throne to their final expulsion from the land. This book assesses their rise to power, exploring the preliminary stages that enabled the Hyksos to gain control over a portion of Egyptian territory and thus to merit a small mention in Manetho’s history.