The Orient in Bible Times

neration ago, of a large number of letters written from Palestine in the period of Amenhotep HI and IV. With the first of those reigns began the participation of Egypt in the famous correspondence known to us from the Tell el-Amarna letters. The name given to the collection is taken from the ruined site in Egypt where they were found by peasants. They contain the diplomatic notes and state correspondence of governors and kings in Asia who wrote to the Egyptian pharaohs. They were written on clay tablets in the Babylonian language and the cuneiform character. They testify to the dominant position established by Thothmes in Asia. They give just as clear evidence of the cultural influence of the Babylonians in the age immediately preceding the Egyptian sway. The most intimate knowledge of ancient oriental politics is afforded by the documents. International and provincial complications, ambitions and motives are revealed with life-like faithfulness. Most of the letter-writers were local rulers of Syria and Palestine more or less submissive to the court of Egypt, but a small number is from foreign potentates. Burnaburiash, the Kassite king of Babylon, and Dushratta of Mitanni land are repre- sented. In the letters from the provinces one can mark the decline of Egyptian prestige from the reign of Amenhotep III to that of his son, the fourth of the name. The Amarna letters make archaeologists curious to know what became of the corresponding letters from Egypt to foreign...