worse, something less than two hundred years. It was revived, indeed, by
the kings of the Dynasty succeeding, but had even less chance of
duration than of old. Rameses II, in dividing it to his own great
disadvantage with the Hatti king by a Treaty whose provisions are known
to us from surviving documents of both parties, confessed Egyptian
impotence to make good any contested claim; and by the end of the
thirteenth century the hand of Pharaoh was withdrawn from Asia, even
from that ancient appanage of Egypt, the peninsula of Sinai. Some
subsequent Egyptian kings would make raids into Syria, but none was
able, or very desirous, to establish there a permanent Empire.


SECTION 3. EMPIRE OF THE HATTI

[Plate 3: HATTI EMPIRE AT ITS GREATEST EXTENT. EARLY 13TH CENTURY B.C.]

The empire which pressed back the Egyptians is the last but one which we
have to consider before 1000 B.C. It has long been known that the
Hittites, variously called _Kheta_ by Egyptians and _Heth_ or _Hatti_ by
Semites and by themselves, developed into a power in westernmost Asia at
least as early as the fifteenth century; but it was not until their
cuneiform archives were discovered in 1907 at Boghazkeui in northern
Cappadocia that the imperial nature of their power, the centre from
which it was exerted, and the succession of the rulers who wielded it
became clear. It will be remembered that a great Hatti raid broke the
imperial sway of the First Babylonian Dynasty about 1800 B.C. Whence
those raiders came we have still to learn. But, since a Hatti people,
well enough organized to invade, conquer and impose its garrisons, and
(much more significant) its own peculiar civilization, on distant
territories, was seated at Boghazkeui (it is best to use this modern