Kush, Egypt and King Piye
1The Nile flows north from the heart of Africa to the Mediterranean Sea. Ancient Egypt lay along its lower course. Upstream, to the south, past rocky rapids called cataracts, lay the kingdom of Kush, in what is now Sudan. In both lands most people lived close to the river. Farmers grew grain in the soil the river watered, and in Kush many families also herded cattle. Kush was rich in gold, ebony and ivory, which it traded north.
2By about 750 BCE, Egypt was no longer united. Rival rulers held different cities and parts of the Nile Delta, and they often fought one another. In Kush, kings ruled from Napata, near a flat-topped mountain called Gebel Barkal. Kushites had worshiped the Egyptian god Amun for centuries at a great temple at the foot of the mountain, first built by Egyptian kings and later enlarged by Kushite kings. Kushite kings believed that Amun gave them the right to rule.
3About 728 BCE, the Kushite king Piye led his army north. He took the Egyptian cities along the river one after another, and the rulers of the north knelt before him. Then he sailed home to Napata and left Egypt's local rulers in place under his authority. Later Kushite kings ruled Egypt directly as pharaohs for decades.
4Piye was buried at el-Kurru, near Napata, in a tomb topped by a pyramid, as Egyptian kings had been buried many centuries before. Near the tombs of Piye and later Kushite kings, archaeologists found the graves of horses, decorated with beads and metal ornaments.