NATIVE KINGS.

17 to which the arts and sciences had been there carried as by the wonders of the Sphinx and pyramids; and he carried back to Greece the doctrine, before unheard of, of the immortality of the soul and a life after death. His description of the country, the people, and their religion is in the highest degree curious; but, as he seems to have learnt nothing from the priests of Memphis about the early kings, except those who were natives of the Delta, his history is only valuable for the kings of the Saïtic dynasty.

About the same time, though most likely a little earlier, Hellanicus visited Egypt. He wrote a description of the country, which was to be met with in the libraries of Alexandria for above six hundred years, but is since lost.

In the reign of Darius Nothus, the Persians were again driven out of Egypt; and Amyrtæus of Sais, who had for some little time been reigning in the marshes, made himself king, and the country was once more free. He reigned quietly for six years; he added to the buildings in Thebes, and in the great oasis; he set up an obelisk at Memphis; and the beautiful sarcophagus in which he was buried is now lying in the British Museum.

A. Gellius, lib. xv. 23. Athenæus, lib. xi. 6.

Manetho.

B. C. 414.

lib. iii. 15. B. C. 408. Manetho.

Pausiris, his son, succeeded him, but rather as a satrap of Persia Herodotus, than as a king; and we next find five kings of Mendes following one another on the throne of Egypt: Nepherites, Achoris, Psammuthes, Muthes, and Nepherites. They were in league with Cyprus, and were sometimes helped by the Athenians against the

Persians.

Nectanebo I., of Sebennytus, then reigned over Egypt, and Artaxerxes Mnemon sent against him an army of two hundred thousand men under his general Pharnabazus, with twenty thousand Greeks under Iphicrates of Athens. But the overflow of the Nile, and the jealousy between the generals, defeated this expedition.

Diod. Sic.

lib. xv.

B. C. 377.

Diogenes
Laertius;

In this reign Eudoxus the astronomer, Chrysippus the physician, and Strabo, and Plato, the still more famous philosopher, came to Egypt with

lib. xvii.

friendly letters from Agesilaus king of Sparta, to Nectanebo and the priests. Of the schools of Egypt at this time we unfortunately know nothing; but we can have no greater proof of the esteem in which they were held, than that these three men, each at the head of his own branch of science, should have come to Egypt to finish Diog. Laert. their studies. Here Eudoxus may have learnt from Ichonuphys of Heliopolis, under whom he studied, the true length of the year and of the month, upon which he formed his octaëterid, a period of eight years or ninety-nine months; Chrysippus may have learnt anatomy, which the prejudices of the Greeks forbad him to study at home; and Plato may have learnt the doctrine of the immortality of the soul.

viii. 90.

Diod. Sic. lib. xv. 92.

Aristoteles,

de Cura reif.

lib. ii.

We find the name of Nectanebo on the buildings of Thebes and of the island of Phila, which shows that the arts were not wholly dead in this reign.

Teos, or Tachus, then succeeded; but he had to defend his throne against the power of the Persians, who still looked upon Egypt as a province in a state of rebellion. He was helped by a large body of Spartan mercenaries, under the command of their own king Agesilaus, and his fleet was led by Chabrias the Athenian, who was fighting for the Egyptians against the command of his own state; for the Athenians and Spartans had lately changed sides, and the Athenians were now helping the Persians.

In this hard struggle for freedom, when the treasure of Tachus, and the sums raised willingly by the priests, were spent, Chabrias persuaded the king to put a duty on the sale of corn; before this time all taxes, except the crown-rent on land, were unknown in Egypt.

When Tachus led his Greek mercenaries into Syria against the Persians, the Egyptian troops set up Nectanebo II. as king; and Tachus fled to Persia, and even suffered himself to be named general of the invading army of Persians, against whom he was only a month before opposed. The Persian invasion was, however, stopt by the death of Artaxerxes; but, nevertheless, Tachus and his twenty thousand Greeks overthrew the Egyptian army of one hundred thousand men, and regained the kingdom; but his death, which followed immediately, left Nectanebo king.

Nectanebo II. was for several years successful in keeping his throne against the armies of Persia, mainly by helping the Phenicians, who stood between Egypt and the invader. But most of the Greek states ranged themselves on the side of Persia; and though Nectanebo had twenty thousand Greeks in his pay, he was at last conquered by Ochus, and he fled with his treasures to Ethiopia.

On this, Egypt again became a Persian province. Ochus carefully levelled the fortifications of the cities, and carried with him into Persia a large weight of silver and gold, together with the sacred records from the temples, which however were afterwards sent back for a sum of money that was raised by the priests to ransom them. The country then remained for seventeen years under a Persian satrap, till Alexander the Great, having conquered Darius in Asia Minor, instead of marching upon Persia, turned aside to the easier conquest of Egypt.

Diod. Sic.

lib. xv. 92.

B.C. 358.

B. c. 333.

lib. iv.

Alexander was stopt for some time before the little town of Gaza, Q. Curtius, where Batis, the brave governor, had the courage to close the gates against the Greek army. His impatience at being checked by so small a force was only equalled by his cruelty when he had overcome it; he tied Batis by the heels to his chariot, and dragged him

Arrian. lib. iii.

lib. iv.

round the walls of the city, as Achilles had dragged the body of Hector.

On the seventh day after leaving Gaza he reached Pelusium, the most easterly town in Egypt, after a march of one hundred and seventy miles along the coast of the Mediterranean, through a desert which forms the natural boundary of the country. The fleet kept close to the shore to carry the stores, as no fresh water is to Q. Curtius, be met with on the whole line of the march. The Egyptians did not even try to hide their joy at his approach: they were bending very unwillingly under the heavy and hated yoke of the Persians, who had long been looked upon as their natural enemies, and who in the pride of their success had added insults to the other evils of being governed by the satrap of a conqueror. They had not even gained the respect of the conquered by their warlike courage, for Egypt had in a great part been conquered and held by Greek mercenaries.

Arrian. lib. iii.

The Persian forces had been for the most part withdrawn from the country by Sabaces, the satrap of Egypt, to meet Alexander in Asia Minor, and had formed part of the army of Darius when he was beaten near the town of Issus on the coast of Cilicia. The garrisons were not strong enough to guard the towns left in their charge; the Greek fleet easily overpowered the Egyptian fleet in the harbour of Pelusium, and the town opened its gates to Alexander. Here he left a garrison, and ordering his fleet to meet him at Memphis, he marched the shortest way to Heliopolis, leaving the Nile on his right hand. All the towns on his march opened their gates to him. Mazakes, who had been left without an army as satrap of Egypt when Sabaces led the troops into Asia Minor, and who had heard of the shameful flight of Darius, of the death of Sabaces, and that Alexander was master of Phenicia, Syria, and the

north of Arabia, had no choice but to yield up the fortified cities without a struggle. The Macedonian army crossed the Nile near Heliopolis, and then entered Memphis.

Memphis had long been the capital of all Egypt. In earlier ages, when the warlike virtues of the Thebans had made Egypt the greatest kingdom in the world, Memphis and the lowland corn-fields of the Delta paid tribute to Thebes; but, with the improvements in navigation, the cities on the coast rose in wealth; the navigation of the Red Sea, though always dangerous, became less dreaded, and Thebes lost the toll on the carrying trade of the Nile. Wealth alone, however, would not have given the sovereignty to Lower Egypt, had not the Greek mercenaries been at hand to fight for those who would pay them. The kings of Sais had guarded their thrones with Greek shields; and it was on the rash but praiseworthy attempt of Amasis to lessen the power of these mercenaries that they joined Cambyses, and Egypt became a Persian province.

In the struggles of the Egyptians to throw off the Persian yoke, we have seen little more than the Athenians and Spartans carrying on their old quarrels on the plains of the Delta; hence, when Alexander by his successes in Greece had put a stop to the feuds at home, the mercenaries of both parties flocked to his conquering standard, and he found himself on the throne of Upper and Lower Egypt without any struggle being made against him by the Egyptians.

Alexander's success as a general is almost thrown into the shade by his wisdom as a statesman. On reaching Memphis, his first care was to prove to the Egyptians that he was come to re-establish their ancient monarchy. He went in state to the temple of Apis, and sacrificed to the sacred bull, as the native kings had done at their coronations; and gained the good will of the crowd by games and music which were performed by skilful Greeks for their amusement.

Denon, plate 134.