their native kings. In some instances, as, for example, in Anugas or
Nukhasse, the kings were little more than satraps of the Pharaoh, but in
other instances, like Alasiya, north of Hamath, they resembled the
rulers of the protected states in modern India. In fact, the king of
Alasiya calls the Pharaoh his "brother," and except for the obligation
of paying tribute was practically an independent sovereign.

The Egyptian dominion was acknowledged as far north as Mount Amanus.
Carchemish, soon to become a Hittite stronghold, was in Egyptian hands,
and the Hittites themselves had not yet emerged from the fortresses of
the Taurus. Their territory was still confined to Kataonia and Armenia
Minor between Melitênê and the Saros, and they courted the favour of the
Egyptian monarch by sending him gifts. Thothmes would have refused to
believe that before many years were over they would wrest Northern Syria
from his successors, and contend on equal terms with the Egyptian
Pharaoh.

The Egyptian possessions on the east bank of Euphrates lay along the
course of the Khabûr, towards the oasis of Singar or Shinar. North of
the Belikh came the powerful kingdom of Mitanni, Aram-Naharaim as it is
called in the Old Testament, which was never subdued by the Egyptian
arms, and whose royal family intermarried with the successors of
Thothmes. Mitanni, the capital, stood nearly opposite Carchemish, which
thus protected the Egyptian frontier on the east.

Southward of the Belikh the frontier was formed by the desert. Syria,
Bashan, Ammon, and Moab were all included in the Pharaoh's empire. But
there it came to an end. Mount Seir was never conquered by the
Egyptians. The "city" of Edom appears in one of the Tel el-Amarna
tablets as a foreign state whose inhabitants wage war against the