Page "History of Sudan" Paragraph 13

By the 11th century BC, the authority of the New Kingdom dynasties had diminished, allowing divided rule in Egypt, and ending Egyptian control of Kush.

With the withdrawal of the Egyptians, there ceased to be any written record or information from Kush about the region's activities over the next three hundred years.

In the early 8th century BC, however, Kush emerged as an independent kingdom ruled from Napata by an aggressive line of monarchs who slowly extended their influence into Egypt.

Around 750 BC, a Kushite king called Kashta conquered Upper Egypt and became ruler of Thebes until approximately 740 BC.

His successor, Piankhy, subdued the delta, and conquered Egypt, thus initiating the Twenty-fifth Dynasty, and founded a line of kings who ruled Kush and Thebes for about a hundred years.

The dynasty's interference with the Assyrian sphere of influence in the Near East caused a confrontation between Egypt and the powerful Assyrian Empire, which controlled a vast empire comprising much of the Middle East, Asia Minor, Caucasus and East Mediterannean from their Mesopotamian homeland.

Taharqa ( 688-663 BC ), the last Kushite pharaoh, was defeated and driven out of the Near East by the Assyrian Emperor Sennacherib.

Sennacherib's successor Esarhaddon went further, launching a full scale invasion of Egypt in 674 BC, defeating Taharqa and quickly conquering the land.

Taharqa fled back to Nubia, and native Egyptian princes were installrd by the Assyrians as vassals of Esarhaddon.

However, Taharqa was able to return some years later and wrest back control of a part of Egypt as far as Thebes from the Egyptian vassal princes of Assyria.

Esarhaddon died in his capital Nineveh while preparing to return to Egypt and once more eject the Kushites.