It is clear that this list exhibits in their oldest orthography the greater number of these towns, which are afterwards mentioned so frequently in the records of wars in Assyrian history, in the cuneiform inscriptions which have been deciphered. They are the old allied cities of those Khita, of unknown origin, who, long before the rise of Nineveh and Babylon, played the same part which at a later period the Assyrians undertook with success. Though we are not yet in a position to solve the obscure problem here suggested, yet future discoveries will doubtless afford convincing proofs, that the rule of the Khita in the highest antiquity was of ant

importance which we can now only guess at. This list of towns will therefore remain a monument of the greatest value, as a memorial of times and peoples long since vanished, whose lost remembrance is awakened to new life by the dead letters of these numerous names. With such a perception of their value, the reader may cast his eye over the long catalogue of those very ancient names which we have transcribed, even if his own science should not avail him better than ours for subjecting them to a comparative investigation. For in these names, so far as they are not demonstrably of Semitic origin, lies the key to their language. The right understanding of them offers, therefore, the surest means of fixing the place of the Khita in the life of the ancient nations.

I. MEN-PEHUTI-RA RAMESSU I. (RAMSES I.) 1400 B.C.

Although we possess no information from the monuments about the family ties which united the king, who was the head and founder of the Nineteenth Dynasty, with his predecessor Horemhib, there must have been nevertheless a close connection between them. Whether Ramses was the son, son-in-law, or brother of Horemhib, is as yet undecided. If I say the brother, I am led to this as a possible supposition by the testimony of the memorial stone of a contemporary family, which mentions the brothers Horemhib and Ramses among the sons of a certain Ha-Aai, an ' overseer of the cutters of hieroglyphs' of his unnamed lord of the land' (Ai? see Vol. I. c. xiii. near end).

The reign of Ramses I. seems to have been neither of long duration, nor to have been filled with remarkable deeds. His fame consists chiefly in the place he occupies in the historical series, as the father of a very celebrated son, and the grandfather of one who was covered with glory and sung of as a hero to the latest ages. His recognition as the legitimate king by the priests of Amon is authenticated by the representation of his solemn coronation on the entrance gate of the temple of Karnak.1

He had a war with the Khita, although we only learn this fact incidentally from the contents of the treaty of peace concluded by Ramses II. with the Khita.2 His royal opponent Saplel had, after the end of the war, made an offensive and defensive alliance with Ramses I., and so the Khita and the Egyptians continued to exercise their sovereignty within their own boundaries, without molesting one another any further.

A memorial stone of the second year of his reign, found at the second cataract at Wady-Halfa (the place was then called Behani, and is the Boôn of Ptolemy), informs us, that king Ramses I. founded there a storehouse for the temple of his divine father Hor-khem, and filled it with captive men-servants and maid-servants from the conquered countries. Of

1 For the better understanding of the frequent allusions in the following pages to the parts of the temple of Karnak, the reader may consult the description in Murray's Handbook for Egypt, p. 496. The plan of the temple is given on page 11.—ED.

2 This treaty is translated in full under the reign of Ramses II. (See pp. 71, f.)-ED.

whatever consequence the fact thus recorded may have been to the ancient inhabitants of the temple at Behani, the history of his times gains little by it.

After his death, Ramses I. was laid in his own tomb-chamber in the valley of the kings' sepulchres, and he was succeeded in the kingdom by his son, to whom the monuments give the name of

II. MA-MEN-RA MINEPTAH I. SETI I. (SETHOS). 1366 B.C. After a long interval, there rises again a brilliant star on the horizon of Egyptian history. The voice of the monuments begins anew to speak of the victories of Pharaoh, and to sing the glory of the empire. It is chiefly the great national temple at Thebes which records the honours of Seti by inscriptions and by pictures; for the king executed works to the glorious god Amon, the finished splendour of which is only surpassed by their extraordinary size. We refer to the building of that wonderful 'Great Hall' in the temple at Karnak, where 134 columns of astonishing height and circumference still attract the admiration of our fastidious age. As the description of this building does not come within the limits of our historical work, we are obliged to refer our readers to the excellent accounts of Egyptian travellers. The outer wall, however, on the north side of this hall, must have our full attention, since its representations stand in the closest connection with the wars of Seti, beginning with the first year of his reign.

These wars arose from the constant advances of the neighbouring peoples, to the east of Egypt, upon