Vassalage or Patronage? Revisiting the Hyksos socio-political practices

FLAMMINI, ROXANA

Cincinnati

Congreso; 64th American Research Center in Egypt Annual Meeting; 2013

American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE)

The term vassal was generally employed by scholars to characterize the Hyksos (c. 1640-1530 BC) attempts of subduing other rulers. In fact, the impressive amount of scarabs bearing Egyptian titles and epithets as well as the title “heqa khasut”; the discourse of the Hyksos Apophis preserved in the Second Stela of Kamose and other evidence in this regard led to such characterization of the socio-political practices of those rulers. Unfortunately the concept was applied without a critical discussion to prove if it could explain the particular asymmetrical relationships the evidence shows. In this paper I propose to review the evidence in the light of the more accurate concept of patronage, following the proposal made by the late Robert Westbrook (2005). Thus, I shall present a review of the bibliography on the subject as well as a new reading of selected passages of the Second Stela of Kamose and other textual, epigraphic and material evidence.