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 750 ETHIOPIA ETHIOPIA (LANGUAGES AND LITERATURE) He entered Egypt with a large array, and claimed the sovereignty. He was gladly re- ceived at Thebes, but the chiefs of the Delta uni- ted against him, and a bloody battle was fought before he entered Memphis. Amen-meri-Nut does not seem to have cared greatly for the crown of Egypt, for after receiving an immense tribute from the princes of the Delta, he with- drew to his country. The Ethiopian kings continued in possession of the Thebaid during the time of the dodecarchy in Lower Egypt. Amen-iritis, the queen whom Piankhi II., the successor of Amen-meri-Nut, had married to legitimate his occupancy of the Ethiopian throne, seems to have been a woman of supe- rior merit, and, being charged with the regen- cy of Egypt under three successive Ethiopian kings, rendered herself very popular in the Thebaid. Her daughter Shap-en-ap became the wife of Psammetik I. (Psammetichus, 664- 610), who in alliance with the Greeks had de- throned the 11 kings his colleagues, and ruled over Lower Egypt. The favors which this king bestowed on foreigners offended the mili- tary class, and they emigrated in a body of 200,000 men to Ethiopia, where they formed a separate colony. The Ethiopians soon after had to resist an invasion by Psammetik II. (Psammis, 594-588), the successor of Necho II., who had married his own aunt, Net-aker, daughter of Shap-en-ap, in order to create a right to the Ethiopian sovereignty. After the conquest of Egypt by Cambyses in 525, the Ethiopians were also threatened with being absorbed in the great Persian empire. A nu- merous force, led by Cambyses, marched to- ward their frontier, but had to return ; for leaving the banks of the Nile, and attempting to cross the Nubian desert, the army nearly perished with famine. The Ethiopians were left unmolested by Darius (521-486), who was satisfied with receiving from them a very small tribute. They sent to Persia every third year 4 pints of gold dust, 200 logs of ebony, 5 negro slaves, and 20 tusks of ivory. When .Egypt was ruled by the Ptolemies, the arts and enterprise of the Greeks also entered Ethi- opia, and led to the overthrow of the tyranny of the priests, and to the founding of Hellenic trading posts on the coast of the Red sea. Ptolemy Euergetes (247-222) conquered the southern country, and set up a throne of white marble with an inscription of his conquests. The Ethiopians soon regained their indepen- dence. During the reign of Augustus they advanced under their queen Oandace as far as the Roman garrisons at Philre, where Petro- nius, the legate of the prefect of Egypt, ^Elius Gallus, repulsed them and pursued them to the neighborhood of Napata. But it appears that the Romans did not enter into possession of any part of Ethiopia, and that Augustus re- mitted the tribute. The influx of Arabs must have been very great, for at this period the population of Ethiopia is frequently spoken of as Arabian. For the history of the country during our era, see ABYSSINIA. The monu- ments of Ethiopia are in part of a decidedly Egyptian character. Many temples have been found wholly or partly hewn in the rocks of the mountains. Tombs are not frequent. Near Mount Barkal are the remains of several pyra- mids, which differ from the Egyptian in being much higher proportionally to the base. Higher up the river the monuments are wholly Ethio- pian in style, and indicate the great wealth and culture of the ancient nation. Lepsius gives a detailed description of them. He found in all 30 names of kings and queens, and it ap- pears that the kings were at the same time high priests of Ammon. The eldest son seems to have inherited the throne, unless the wife of the king should survive, in which case the succession fell to her. The crown prince du- ring the lifetime of his father was a second high priest of Ammon. The worship of Ammon and Osiris was carried, according to Herodotus, from Meroe to Egypt, and the temple of Kar- nak and several Nubian monuments seem to commemorate this migration. The constant intercourse of the Ethiopians with the Egyp- tians renders it probable that the two nations had many points of agreement in manners and customs. (See EGYPT.) ETHIOPIA, Languages and Literature of. The inscriptions on the pyramids in Ethiopia con- sist in part of hieroglyphs strongly resembling the Egyptian ; but the language of the two countries was not the same. The Ethiopians used the hieroglyphs as a sort of sacred char- acter, but without a complete knowledge of their use, and evidently rather as an ornament than as a means of conveying information. There is at least no doubt that at the time of the erection of the oldest pyramids a demotic graphic system was commonly in use among them. The prominent position which this style of writing occupies on the monuments, while the hieroglyphs seem to furnish at best only marginal notes, shows clearly that it must have been the current language of the country. It resembles the Egyptian demotic, but the constant repetition of the same signs leads to the supposition that it had a more limited al- phabet, perhaps not exceeding 30 signs. The analogy of the history of the development of the Ethiopic and the Egyptian graphic systems extends still further. At a later period an Ethiopic-Greek style of writing came into use, which may be compared to the Coptic, and from which it borrowed several letters. (See EGYPT, LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE OF.) The Ethiopic-Greek is found in the inscriptions of Soba and in many others, especially on the walls of the temple in Wady es-Safra. These and the Ethiopic demotic inscriptions contain undoubtedly the true language of ancient Ethio- pia ; but its vocabulary and grammar have not yet been determined. The language now des- ignated as Ethiopic was spoken in the subse- quent Abyssinian empire. It was originally one of the many dialects of the Arabic- African