* Graffiti of this sovereign have been found at the second cataract. Certain expressions have induced E. de Rougé to believe that he, as well as Siphtah, came originally from Khibît in the Aphroditopolite nome. This was an allusion, as Chabas had seen, to the myth of Horus, similar to that relating to Thûtmosis III., and which we more usually meet with in the cases of those kings who were not marked out from their birth onwards for the throne.
Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Émil Brugsch-Bey.
The second, who was named Siphtah-Mînephtah, ascended the throne of his father thanks to the devotion of his minister Baî,* but in a greater degree to his marriage with a certain princess called Tausirît. He maintained himself in this position for at least six years, during which he made an expedition into Ethiopia, and received in audience at Thebes messengers from all foreign nations. He kept up so zealously the appearance of universal dominion, that to judge from his inscriptions he must have been the equal of the most powerful of his predecessors at Thebes.
Egypt, nevertheless, was proceeding at a quick pace towards its downfall. No sooner had this monarch disappeared than it began to break up.** There were no doubt many claimants for the crown, but none of them succeeded in disposing of the claims of his rivals, and anarchy reigned supreme from one end of the Nile valley to the other. The land of Qîmît began to drift away, and the people within it had no longer a sovereign, and this, too, for many years, until other times came; for the land of Qîmît was in the hands of the princes ruling over the nomes, and they put each other to death, both great and small.
* Baî has left two inscriptions behind him, one at Silsilis and the other at Sehêl, and the titles he assumes on both monuments show the position he occupied at the Theban court during the reign of Siphtah-Mînephtah. Chabas thought that Baî had succeeded in maintaining his rights to the crown against the claims of Amenmesis.
** The little that we know about this period of anarchy has been obtained from the _Harris Papyrus_.
Other times came afterwards, during years of nothingness, in which Arisu, a Syrian,* was chief among them, and the whole country paid tribute before him; every one plotted with his neighbour to steal the goods of others, and it was the same with regard to the gods as with regard to men, offerings were no longer made in the temples.