Kingdom of Kerma

The first kingdom of Kush

Kerma, on the Nile in northern Sudan, was the capital of what archaeologists call the first kingdom of Kush. According to the Swiss archaeological mission that excavated the city from 1977 to 2002, Kerma was founded around 2500 BCE, and at its height the kingdom's territory stretched along the Nile from the First Cataract to the Fifth. Archaeologists divide its history into phases, from Old Kerma through Middle Kerma to Classic Kerma. The Met dates the Middle and Classic phases to about 2050–1500 BCE and the Classic phase, the kingdom's peak, to about 1750–1550 BCE.

The city

At the center of Kerma stands the Western Deffufa, a massive mud-brick temple that is still nearly 20 meters high. It grew from an early sanctuary and was rebuilt many times over almost a thousand years as the city's religious heart. A palace with a large circular audience hall stood nearby. Walls, bastions and ditches protected the town, which by the Classic period covered more than 20 hectares. The excavators think the walled city was largely reserved for the royal family and ruling class.

Burials and crafts

Kerma's kings were buried in vaulted chambers beneath huge earthen mounds, with beds inlaid with ivory, bronze weapons, stone and ceramic vessels, and gold jewelry. Animal remains, including decorated cattle skulls, were part of burial practice. Kerma potters produced thin-walled, highly burnished red vessels with black tops, which the Met calls some of the finest ceramics of any ancient culture.

Rival of Egypt

Kerma traded with Egypt and competed with it for control of Nubia. During Egypt's 12th Dynasty, the pharaohs built fortresses on both banks of the Nile at the Second Cataract, chiefly as a defense against Kerma. When Egyptian power weakened in the Second Intermediate Period, around 1650–1550 BCE, Kerma's rulers took over these forts, extended their control across Lower Nubia and formed an alliance with the Hyksos kings who ruled the Nile Delta. Texts of the Theban king Kamose point to cooperation between Kush and the Hyksos against Thebes.

Conquest

Early in the New Kingdom, the kings of Egypt's 18th Dynasty pushed south. Accounts differ on the details. World History Encyclopedia says Thutmose I took the frontier past the Third Cataract and that Kerma itself was seized under Thutmose II. The Swiss mission dates the kingdom's end to around 1450 BCE, naming Thutmose III among the conquering kings and noting that the capital was destroyed. By about 1450 BCE, the Met notes, Egypt controlled Nubia as far as the Fourth Cataract and governed it through a viceroy, the "King's Son of Kush."

Legacy

A new settlement grew up just north of the old capital at Dukki Gel, and Kushite culture continued under Egyptian rule. Under Egyptian rule, Napata near Jebel Barkal became the main center of Nubia, the place from which a later Kushite kingdom would rise.