Ill] AND HISTOEIC TIMES 231 



desiring more and more to eradicate the stock of Egypt. Their 

 race was collectively termed Hyksos ('T«;crc69), which signifies 

 Shepherd Kings, for hyk in the sacred dialect denotes a king, 

 and SOS means a ' shepherd ' and ' shepherds ' in the vernacular, 

 and so the compound Hyksos is formed. Some say that they 

 were Arabs. In another copy it is stated that by the term 

 Hyksos is indicated not ' Shepherd Kings,' but ' shepherd cap- 

 tives,' for the words yk and Ak m. Egyptian, when aspirated, 

 literally mean captives (al^/xaXcoroi,), and this seems to me 

 {i.e. Josephus himself) more plausible and more in keeping with 

 the ancient history. Manetho states that these aforementioned 

 kings — the so-called Shepherd Kings — and their descendants 

 were masters of Egypt for five hundred and eleven years. But 

 after this, says Manetho, both the kings of the Thebais and of 

 the rest of Egypt revolted against the Shepherds and a great 

 and protracted war broke out. But in the reign of a king 

 named Misphragmouthosis, Manetho says that the Shepherds 

 were defeated and were expelled from all the rest of Egypt, 

 and they were shut up in a certain place which had a circum- 

 ference of 10,000 ploughgates (dpovpal). Now this place was 

 named Avaris, and Manetho says that the Shepherds had 

 surrounded it with a high and strong wall for the security of 

 their property and their plunder. But Thoumosis (Thothmes) 

 attempted to besiege it and take it by storm, and beleaguered 

 the walls with an army of 480,000 men. But just as he 

 had despaired of reducing them by siege, they capitulated on 

 condition that they would be permitted to depart unharmed 

 whithersoever they pleased. In accordance with these terms 

 they departed with all their families and possessions, in number 

 not less than 240,000, and made their way across the desert 

 into Syria. But through fear of the power of the Assyrians, 

 who were at that time the masters of Asia, they built in what 

 is now Judaea a city of sufficient size to contain this multitude 

 of people and named it Hierosolyma (Jerusalem). But in another 

 book of his Egyptian History Manetho says that this nation — the 

 so-called Shepherds — are described ('ye'ypd<p0ac, i.e. depicted) as 

 captives in some of the sacred (i.e. written in hieroglyphs) books, 

 and he is right in so saying. For as a matter of fact the 



