The Middle Kingdom Era
One of the final achievements of the Old Kingdom of Egypt was the construction of Abdju, a city southwest of the capital. The existence of Pankemetism had recently become known to the conservative priests of Orthodox Kemetism, which asserted that only the Egyptian Gods were true. The priests put pressure on the kind but ineffective Pharaoh Dsjot-Men to get rid of the Pankemitists. Dsjot-Men felt that the best solution was to force the known Pankemetists to settle in the newly created city, thus taking their influence away from the capital. However, his plan backfired, as many Pankemetists practiced their rituals in secret. All Dsjot-Men had done was spread Pankemetism all over the kingdom.
The Old Kingdom staggered along for a few more decades, increasingly cracking down on Pankemetists until finally, they had enough. Despite the religion's persecution, it was popular with most lower and middle-class citizens, who were the ones actively trading with foreigners (who worshiped foreign Gods) and who saw Orthodox Kemetism as an elitist religion. On the day a law was announced that made any suspected Kemetist's whole family executed, violence against the status quo erupted. Eventually the ruling order was overthrown, and Mer-Het, a rare Pankemetist noble, was made Pharaoh.
The first major event to happen after the foundation of the Middle Kingdom of Egypt was first contact with the Pheonecian city-states. Word had already spread throughout the Middle East of the incredible story of the Pankemetic Revolution (as it came to be known to generations far in the future), and the Egyptians were all to happy to provide, as long as they were able to read the writing to ensure its accuracy. As it turned out, Egypt was looking for a way to distance itself from Orthodox Kemetism, and borrowing the writing from the Phoenecians was the perfect opportunity for them.
There were also many advances in arts of warfare during the early days of the Middle Kingdom. Bronze working and chariot warfare was introduced into the Egyptian psyche during this period.
Soon after the invention of chariot warfare, exciting news reached the Egyptians. In a land far to the east called Persia, word of Pankemetism and its resulting revolution reached the ears of the ruler of that land, Shah Failak, who decided to adopt the Cosmopolitan theology of the Egyptians in order to further unify his empire. While this did not mean much politically, it was a point of pride for the Egyptian commoners to know that they had produced such an enlightened religion.
Sadly, Pankemetism would not stop the Egyptians from viewing the Nubians (who were frequently enslaved), as inferiors. The constant abuse suffered at the hands of the Egyptians, as well as the recently established fact that the ruling order of a nation could be destroyed, encouraged the Nubians to rise up. Unlike most slave rebellions of the ancient world, this one was well-organized. The Nubian slaves were able to gather up horses in the area, and would attempt to use them for their own attempts at war. As horses were vital to the Egyptian military at the time, it was imperative that rebellion was quickly suppressed. Although the Egyptians were not able to suppress the rebellion immediately, they were able to scramble the leadership enough so that the Nubians were unable to use the captured horses to their full advantage. Soon after, the Egyptians were able to put down the rebellion.
The failed slave rebellion served as a wake-up-call to the upper echelons of Egyptian society, who understood how dangerously close Egypt had come to being destroyed. Although many plans on how to avoid such a catastrophe in the future were discussed, the one ultimately chosen came from the mind of Hon-t-to-kheb, an Egyptian noblewoman. Her idea was simple. The only way to prevent such a thing from happening again was to destroy all potential enemies of the kingdom within and without. While the idea may seem too simple and closed-minded to possibly work today, there were no previous examples of the ultimate fate of world conquerors back then. The War of Egyptian Aggression, or The Security War as it was called in Egypt, had begun with the surprise attack on the Persian city of Yerushalayim.
During the war, the Egyptians discovered the Babylonian empire, and although it was a possible threat, the Pharaoh at the time, Neb-Amen, wisely decided to avoid declaring war on them, and instead chose to teach them the ways of Pankemetism, so as to hopefully get on the Babylonians' good side. Although Pankemetism had not caught on in Babylon, the Babylonian functions of priests caught on in Egyptian society.
The Phoenician city-state of Sur was not as well-defended against attacks as the Babylonians were, and thus they were the second major city to fall victim to the Egyptians. The other Phoenician city-states would predictably not stand for seeing one of their own get captured due to blind foreign aggression, so they decided to form a coalition against the Middle Kingdom.
At this point Egypt was forced to fight on two fronts: That of the Levant, and Egypt proper. While Carthaginian Elephants were dispatched against Egypt proper. Realizing that their chariots could never compete with the Elephants alone, the Egyptians went to the one civilization that was willing to help them build weapons to fight against the Elephants: The Greeks, who were frankly flattered that they were the main reason that the current government existed.
Although the Egyptians won, it was a hard fought battle. The Egyptians themselves took more casualties than the Carthaginians, even though they had forced the many of the commoners into battle in order to gain a numerical advantage.
If technology saved the Egyptian front, then fine generalship saved the Levant. Egypt was clearly victorious in these battles, although in the chaos, the Babylonians grabbed some territory from Egypt. Egypt was already facing a war with the Persians and the Phoenicians, and Ra-mei, the Pharaoh at the time, had no desire to yet add the Babylonians to the mix. Only time would tell if the Egyptians would keep their victories going after the beginning of the war...
I looked it up, it's actually the place where the lighthouse was built.
