id="Page_34" class="x-ebookmaker-pageno" title="[Pg 34]"/> shall give them up to Ramessu Miamun, the great prince of Egypt, [that they may receive their punishment.

'If servants of Ramessu Miamun, the great prince of Egypt, leave his country], and betake themselves to the land of Kheta, to make themselves servants of another, they shall not remain in the land of Kheta; [they shall be given up] to Ramessu Miamun, the great prince of Egypt.

'If, on the other hand, there should flee away [servants of the great king of Kheta, in order to betake themselves to] Ramessu Miamun, the great prince of Egypt, [in order to stay in Egypt], then those who have come from the land of Kheta in order to betake themselves to Ramessu Miamun, the great prince of Egypt, shall not be [received by] Ramessu Miamun, the great prince of Egypt, [but] the great prince of Egypt, Ramessu Miamun, [shall deliver them up to the great king of Kheta].

'[And if there shall leave the land of Kheta persons] of skilful mind, so that they come to the land of Egypt to make themselves servants of another, then Ramessu Miamun will not allow them to settle, he will deliver them up to the great king of Kheta.

'When this [treaty] shall be known [by the inhabitants of the land of Egypt and of the land of Kheta, then shall they not offend against it, for all that stands written on] the silver tablet, these are words which will have been approved by the company of the gods among the male gods and among the female gods, among those namely of the land of Egypt. They are witnesses for me [to the validity] of these words, [which they have allowed.

'This is the catalogue of the gods of the land of Kheta:—

(1) 'Sutekh of the city] of Tunep[2],
(2) 'Sutekh of the land of Kheta,
(3) 'Sutekh of the city of Arnema,
(4) 'Sutekh of the city of Zaranda,
(5) 'Sutekh of the city of Pilqa,
(6) 'Sutekh of the city of Khisasap,
(7) 'Sutekh of the city of Sarsu,
(8) 'Sutekh of the city of Khilip (Aleppo),
(9) 'Sutekh of the city of ...,
(10) 'Sutekh of the city of Sarpina,
(11) 'Astarta[3] of the land of Kheta,
(12) 'The god of the land of Zaiath-khirri,
(13) 'The god of the land of Ka ...,
(14) 'The god of the land of Kher ...,
(15) 'The goddess of the city of Akh ...,
(16) '[The goddess of the city of ...] and of the land of A...ua,
(17) 'The goddess of the land of Zaina,
(18) 'The god of the land of ...nath...er.

'[I have invoked these male and these] female [gods of the land of Kheta, these are the gods] of the land, [as witnesses to] my oath. [With them have been associated the male and the female gods] of the mountains and of the rivers of the land of Kheta, the gods of the land of Qazauadana, Amon, Ra, Sutekh, and the male and female gods of the land of Egypt, of the earth, of the sea, of the winds, and of the storms.

'With regard to the commandment which the silver tablet contains for the people of Kheta and for the people of Egypt, he who shall not observe it shall be given over [to the vengeance] of the company of the gods of Kheta, and shall be given over [to the vengeance] of the gods of Egypt, [he] and his house and his servants.

'But he who shall observe these commandments which the silver tablet contains, whether he be of the people of Kheta or [of the people of Egypt], because he has not neglected them, the company of the gods of the land of Kheta and the company of the gods of the land of Egypt shall secure his reward and preserve life [for him] and his servants and those who are with him and who are with his servants.

'If there flee away of the inhabitants [one from the land of Egypt], or two or three, and they betake themselves to the great king of Kheta [the great king of Kheta shall not] allow them [to remain, but he shall] deliver them up, and send them back to Ramessu Miamun, the great prince of Egypt.

'Now with respect to the [inhabitant of the land of Egypt], who is delivered up to Ramessu Miamun, the great prince of Egypt, his fault shall not be avenged upon him, his [house] shall not be taken away, nor his [wife] nor his [children]. There shall not be [put to death his mother, neither shall he be punished in his eyes, nor on his mouth, nor on the soles of his feet], so that thus no crime shall be brought forward against him.

'In the same way shall it be done if inhabitants of the land of Kheta take to flight, be it one alone, or two, or three, to betake themselves to Ramessu Miamun, the great prince of Egypt. Ramessu Miamun, the great prince of Egypt, shall cause them to be seized, and they shall be delivered up to the great king of Kheta.

'[With regard to] him who [is delivered up, his crime shall not be brought forward against him]. His [house] shall not be taken away, nor his wives, nor his children, nor his people; his mother shall not be put to death; he shall not be punished in his eyes, nor on his mouth, nor on the soles of his feet, nor shall any accusation be brought forward against him.

'That which is in the middle of this silver tablet and on its front side is a likeness of the god Sutekh ..., surrounded by an inscription to this effect: "This is the [picture] of the god Sutekh, the king of heaven and [earth]." At the time (?) of the treaty which Kheta-sira, the great king of the Kheta, made....'

This compact of offensive and defensive alliance proves more forcibly than any description the position to which the Hittite empire had attained. It ranked side by side with the Egypt of Ramses, the last great Pharaoh who ever ruled over the land of the Nile. With Egypt it had contested the sovereignty of Western Asia, and had compelled the Egyptian monarch to consent to peace. Egypt and the Hittites were now the two leading powers of the world.

The treaty was ratified by the visit of the Hittite prince Kheta-sira to Egypt in his national costume, and the marriage of his daughter to Ramses in the thirty-fourth year of the Pharaoh's reign (B. C. 1354). She took the Egyptian name of Ur-maa Noferu-Ra, and her beauty was celebrated by the scribes of the court. Syria was handed over to the Hittites as their legitimate possession; Egypt never again attempted to wrest it from them, and if the Hittite yoke was to be shaken off it must be through the efforts of the Syrians themselves. For a while, however, 'the great king of the Hittites' preserved his power intact; his supremacy was acknowledged from the Euphrates in the east to the Ægean Sea in the west, from Kappadokia in the north to the tribes of Canaan in the south. Even Naharina, once the antagonist of the Egyptian Pharaohs, acknowledged his sovereignty, and Pethor, the home of Balaam, at the junction of the Euphrates and the Sajur, became a Hittite town. The cities of Philistia, indeed, still sent tribute to the Egyptian ruler, but northwards the Hittite sway seems to have been omnipotent. The Amorites of the mountains allied themselves with 'the children of Heth,' and the Canaanites in the lowlands looked to them for protection. The Israelites had not as yet thrust themselves between the two great powers of the Oriental world: it was still possible for a Hittite sovereign to visit Egypt, and for an Egyptian traveller to explore the cities of Canaan.

After sixty-six years of vainglorious splendour the long reign of Ramses II. came to an end (B.