EGYPT 



1970 



EGYPT 



these names) were the outstanding kings of 

 the famous Nineteenth Dynasty, the latter 

 reigning about 1330 u. c. Until recently it has 

 been believed that Rameses II was the king 

 who "knew not Joseph" and who oppressed 

 the Israelites, and that the Exodus occurred 

 under his son Mernephtah, but inscriptions 

 lately deciphered have proved that this is 

 impossible. With the Twentieth Dynasty came 

 a weakening of power, and gradually Egypt 

 passed under the sway of outside countries. 

 First Assyria (670 B.C.), then Persia (525 B.C.), 

 then Greece, had its will with the country, 

 Alexander the Great being received as a ver- 

 itable deliverer because the people had suf- 

 fered so severely under Persian rule. 



Egypt under the Greeks and Romans. Until 

 his death Alexander was lord of Egypt, and 

 then one of his generals, Ptolemy, was made 

 king. Alexander's new city, Alexandria, was 

 made the capital, and the new Greek state 

 acquired practical independence and a fore- 

 most place among the countries of the world. 

 Never before had Egypt been so prosperous, 

 for the first Ptolemy was a strong and wise 

 sovereign, and some of his descendants were 

 not unworthy of him. Commerce nourished, 

 the people had enough to eat, and Alexandria 

 became the center of the intellectual and lit- 

 erary life of the world. In the second century 

 B. c., a period of decline set in, and the later 

 rulers of the Ptolemaic dynasty were forced 

 to ask aid of Rome in their external and in- 

 ternal troubles. The last sovereign, Cleopatra 

 (which see), maintained her independence only 

 because her beauty brought her the favor of 

 the Roman rulers, and after her death the 

 country became a province of Rome. Under 

 the empire there were few disturbances in 

 Egypt, and the most interesting event was 

 the spread of Christianity among the people. 

 In the later divided condition of the Roman 

 Empire, Egypt was neglected, and in 641 was 

 conquered by the Saracens with little oppo- 

 sition. 



Under Mohammedan Rule. This African 

 province was a very important Mohammedan 

 possession, and Cairo was a center of Moslem 

 life. The Crusaders made Egypt one of their 

 points of attack but accomplished nothing 

 lasting, and from the thirteenth to the six- 

 teenth century the country was sinking con- 

 stantly lower into anarchy and wretchedness. 

 The Mameluke chieftains were conquered by 

 the Turks in 1517, but their real power was 

 not broken, and it was the Mamelukes whom 



Napoleon encountered on his invasion in 1798. 

 He gained control of the country, but in 1801 

 was driven out by the Turks, with the aid of 

 the British. 



Nineteenth Century Egypt. After the ex- 

 pulsion of the French, a Turkish soldier, Me- 

 hemet Ali, was made pasha, and as he was a 

 man of great ability his long rule was one of 

 progress. He succeeded in making the coun- 

 try practically independent, though he was 

 forced to acknowledge the nominal authority 

 of Turkey, and he extended Egyptian territory 

 materially and improved agriculture. His reign 

 was a hard one on the people, however, for he 

 laid upon them terrible burdens of taxation. 

 Under the rule of his successors, Abbas Pasha 

 and Said Pasha, the taxes were lessened and 

 the country was placed upon a firmer footing 

 financially. It was during the reign of Said 

 that the Suez Canal was begun. 



Ismail Pasha, a grandson of Mehemet Ali, 

 became the head of the government in 1863, 

 and four years later took the title of khedive, 

 which in Persian means prince. His adminis- 

 tration was vigorous but exceedingly extrava- 

 gant, and the finances of the country were 

 brought by him into the utmost disorder. 

 Forced by financial necessity to sell his stock 

 in the Suez Canal to Great Britain, thereby 

 giving the British a majority of the shares, 

 he thus gave that country its first hold on 

 Egypt, and in 1876 was compelled to allow 

 European commissioners to take control of 

 the revenue. In 1879 the French and British 

 governments obliged him to abdicate in favor 

 of his son Tewfik, and in the next year a joint 

 French and English control over the country 

 was established. The so-called national party 

 revolted in 1882, and forced the khedive to 

 flee, but a British fleet bombarded the city 

 on July 11, and restored him. Since the dual 

 control system seemed to lead to endless dif- 

 ficulties, the arrangement was modified so that 

 the country became practically a protectorate 

 of Great Britain, though the khedive remained 

 the nominal head. 



The next event of outstanding importance 

 was the rebellion in 1884 of the Mahdi, and 

 Gordon's expedition into the Sudan with its 

 tragic outcome. After that the Sudan remained 

 quiet for more than a decade, but in 1894 

 another insurrection occurred, which the new 

 Egyptian army under Kitchener put down in 

 a series of campaigns ending in 1898. Tewfik 

 died in 1892, after a long and wise rule, and 

 his son Abbas Hilmi succeeded. This able 



