proceedings, and the complaint seems to have led to some confidential
inquiries on the part of the home government, since we find a certain
Sibti-Hadad writing in answer to the Pharaoh's questions that Yankhamu
was a faithful servant of the king.

The country east of the Jordan also appears to have been within his
jurisdiction. At all events the following letter was addressed to him by
the governor Mut-Hadad, "the man of Hadad." "To Yankhamu my lord thus
speaks Mut-Hadad thy servant: at the feet of my lord I prostrate myself.
Since Mut-Hadad has declared in thy presence that Ayab has fled, and it
is certified (?) that the king of Bethel has fled from before the
officers of the king his lord, may the king my lord live, may the king
my lord live! I pray thee ask Ben-enima, ask ... tadua, ask Isuya, if
Ayâb has been in this city of Bethel for [the last] two months. Ever
since the arrival of [the image of] the god Merodach, the city of
Astarti (Ashtaroth-Karnaim) has been assisted, because all the
fortresses of the foreign land are hostile, namely, the cities of Udumu
(Edom), Aduri (Addar), Araru, Mestu (Mosheh), Magdalim (Migdol),
Khinianabi ('En han-nabi), Zarki-tsabtat, Khaini ('En), and Ibi-limma
(Abel). Again after thou hadst sent a letter to me I sent to him (i.e.
Ayâb), [to wait] until thy arrival from thy journey; and he reached the
city of Bethel and [there] they heard the news."

We learn from this letter that Edom was a "foreign country" unsubdued by
the Egyptian arms. The "city of Edom," from which the country took its
name, is again mentioned in the inscriptions of the Assyrian king
Esar-haddon, and it was there that the Assyrian tax-gatherers collected
the tribute of the Edomite nation. It would seem that the land of Edom
stretched further to the north in the age of Khu-n-Aten than it did at a
subsequent period of history, and that it encroached upon what was