Of Menephta, i.e. beloved of Ptah (1322–1302 B.C.), the son and successor of Ramses II., Josephus, following Manetho, gives us the following account:—"Like Horus, who had been king before him, Menephta desired to see the gods. This wish he confided to a wise prophet, the son of Papius. The prophet told him that he would see the gods if he cleared the whole land of leprous and unclean persons. Then the king collected out of Egypt all who were diseased in their bodies, to the number of 80,000, and threw them into the stone quarries east of the Nile, that they might labour there along with the other Egyptians condemned to similar toil. But as among the diseased persons were certain men of learning and priests who had been attacked by leprosy, the son of Papius feared the anger of the gods would descend upon himself and the king if holy men were forced into slavish tasks, and he foresaw that others would come to the aid of these impure persons, and rule over Egypt for thirteen years. He did not venture to tell this to the king, but wrote it down, and then put an end to his own life. Filled with anxiety, when the lepers had suffered long enough in the stone quarries, the king gave them Avaris, the city abandoned by the shepherds, as a refuge and protection. But according to the old mythology this city belonged to Typho. When the unclean persons came to Avaris, and were in possession of a centre to support any disaffection, they chose Osarsiph, one of the priests at Heliopolis, as their leader, and swore to obey him in everything. The first law he gave them was to offer prayer to no god, and to abstain from no animal held sacred in Egypt, but to sacrifice them all and eat them, and to hold communion with none but those who had taken the oath. After giving these and many other laws, diametrically opposed to the Egyptian customs, Osarsiph bade them fortify the city, and arm themselves against Menephta, while he took counsel with certain priests and infected persons, and sent an embassy to Jerusalem, to the shepherds driven out by Tuthmosis. He told them what an outrage had been done to him and his associates, and called on them to march against Egypt with the same intentions as himself. Avaris, the city of their forefathers, would first open its gates to them and give freely whatever they needed, and whenever necessary he would fight at their head and easily subdue the land for them. Delighted at the message, the shepherds all set out with eagerness, about 200,000 strong, and were soon in Avaris. When Menephta heard of their approach, he was seized with alarm, for he bethought him of the prophecy of the son of Papius. It is true he gathered together about 300,000 of the flower of the Egyptian army, but when the enemy met him, he would not join battle, fearing to fight against the gods. After taking counsel with his officers, he gave orders for the sacred animals, which were held in especial honour, to be brought to him, and bade the priests secure the images of the gods with the greatest care; and when he had placed his son Sethos, now five years old, in security with a friend, he turned back to Memphis. Then he took Apis and the other sacred animals, which the priests had brought to Memphis, with him, and retired with his army and the bulk of the Egyptians to Ethiopia. The king of Ethiopia, who was under a debt of gratitude to Menephta, received him and the multitude with him, provided for the Egyptians, and allotted them cities and villages sufficient to support them for the thirteen years, and caused the Ethiopian army to keep watch on the borders of Egypt. But the men of Jerusalem and the unclean invaded Egypt, and displayed such impious rage against the Egyptians, that to those who witnessed their wickedness their dominion seemed the worst of all. They were not content with burning cities and villages, with plundering the sanctuaries, and destroying the images of the gods, they even compelled the priests and prophets to sacrifice and strangle the sacred animals, and then they thrust them naked out of the temples, and ate the animals if at all good for food. But in time Menephta returned with a great host from Ethiopia, and his son Ramses also with an army. Both attacked the unclean and the shepherds, and overcame them. Many they slew, and the rest they pursued as far as the borders of Syria. It is said that the priest who gave them their constitution and laws, a native of Heliopolis, and called Osarsiph, from Osiris, the god worshipped there, changed his name from Osarsiph to Moses."[227]
From the tradition of the Hebrews we learn that their ancestors, after pasturing their flocks for a long time, under Egyptian protection, on the Pelusiac arm of the Nile, in the land of Goshen, became weary of the task-work imposed upon them, and set forth out of Egypt, in order to feed their flocks in freedom in the peninsula of Sinai, to the east of the Dead Sea. The oppression of these shepherds by Egypt may, of course, be connected with the fortification of the border towards Syria, the construction of the canal, and the erection of the cities for trade, and the border fortresses on this canal. Accordingly there seems no reason to contest the tradition of the Egyptians that the exodus of the Hebrews took place under Menephta. That the Egyptian tradition regards these Hebrews as leprous and unclean Egyptians is of no importance. The cession of Avaris and invitation of the Hyksos is mere imagination, arising from the somewhat analogous event of former times. The most improbable fact is the voluntary departure of Menephta to the allied king of the Ethiopians, and the abandonment of Egypt without a struggle to her fiercest foe. Under Ramses II., as we have seen, Ethiopia, as far as Mount Barkal, became an Egyptian province. Far more credible is the tradition of the Hebrews that the army of the Pharaoh met with a heavy reverse in the attempt to check the exodus of the Hebrews, and their union with the hostile tribes of the desert. It is possible that, in consequence of this disaster, a king was set up in opposition to Menephta, and that Menephta retired before him to Ethiopia, from whence he afterwards recovered Egypt. In the excerpt of Eusebius we find, after the name Menephta, a king Amenemes, and on the monuments Amenemessu, whose shields, though chiselled out, can still be recognised.[228]
Of all these things the monuments of Menephta know nothing. On the contrary, a long inscription in the small court, on the southern wall of the temple at Karnak, tells us of a victory which Menephta had obtained over the Libyan tribes. These are the Lubu (Libyans), Maschawascha (who may be explained as the Maxyans, a tribe which, as Herodotus tells us, dwelt near Lake Triton, on the north coast of Africa), the Kesak, and from the "regions on the sea," the Tuirscha, Sakalascha, Schardaina, Akaiwascha, and Leku. They had crossed the western border and forced their way, not into the land only, but down to the river, and had pitched their camp in the territory of the city Paali. The king was obliged to protect the city of Tum and the sanctuary of Ptah Tatamen (perhaps Memphis). On the first of Epiphi—the year of the reign of Menephta was not given, or at any rate is not found now—a battle took place. Of the Lubu 6,359 were slain; of hands belonging to the Sakalascha 250 were counted, and 790 belonging to the Tuirscha. Fourteen pairs of horses were taken, belonging to the chief of the Leku and his sons, and 9,111 swords of the Maschawascha.[229]
Menephta was succeeded by Sethos II. and Menephta II. Then followed Ramses III. (1269–1244 B.C.). The warlike exploits which this king has commemorated on his temple at Medinet Habu appear from the inscriptions to have been hardly inferior to those of Sethos I. and Ramses II. In the reliefs of this temple is seen an Egyptian fleet and the engagement with the ships of the enemy. On a picture on a wall are collected all the campaigns of the king; the chiefs of the conquered tribes are represented by fourteen figures, and the accompanying hieroglyphics give us the names of their tribes. Two of these names are destroyed, and a third is illegible. The first figure is the chief of the "evil land of Cush." Two of the figures are negroes, and their tribes are mentioned. Then follow the lord "of the hostile Schasu," i.e. the shepherds of the Syrian border, the "evil chief of the Cheta," against whom the inscription observes that he was taken alive, the "evil chief of the Amari" (Amorites), the sovereign of the Lubu (Libyans), the sovereign of the Maschawascha, the coast-land Tuirscha, the coast-land Schardaina, and the "lord of the hostile Zakkarj."[230] The first Menephta, as we have seen, had been compelled to fight against the Lubu, Maschawascha, Tuirscha, and Schardaina. The remaining figures prove that Ramses III. carried on war on the Upper Nile against the Nubians and Negro tribes, and in the north-east he had to contend with the Schasu, i.e. the descendants of the Hyksos, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the old enemies against whom his forefathers took the field. To these the Pulista, i.e. the Philistines, who are here mentioned for the first time, are added in a list of the nations reduced by the king in the eighth and ninth years of his reign, inscribed on the right wing