Ancient Egypt in the Middle Kingdom

For more than a century after the collapse of the Old Kingdom, Egypt was a fractured land. Nomarchs ruled like kings, famine haunted the Nile, and rival dynasties fought for legitimacy. Out of this darkness rose Thebes—a provincial town that would transform itself into the crucible of Egypt's renewal. At its heart stood Mentuhotep II, the warrior-king who reunified the Two Lands and redefined what...