Читать книгу The Herodotus Encyclopedia - Группа авторов - Страница 461

R. DREW GRIFFITH

Queen’s University at Kingston, Ontario

1) A blind Egyptian pharaoh, according to Herodotus (2.137, 140) the successor of ASYCHIS. Herodotus writes that it was during Anysis’ reign that the Ethiopian Shabako (SABACOS) completed the invasion of EGYPT begun by his brother, Piye (Piankhy), initiating the 25th (Ethiopian) Dynasty, an actual event dated to c. 715 BCE. When faced with the invasion, Anysis retreated to the marsh‐lands of the DELTA, where he waited out the fifty years of Ethiopian occupation before returning to the throne when they withdrew. During his internal EXILE, Anysis lived on an ISLAND in the marshes named ELBO, which he augmented with ash that his former citizens brought him as a gift.

The story embodies three folkloric elements. The island growing out of the water may echo the benben, the first, PYRAMID‐shaped land that according to Egyptian creation‐lore emerged from the primordial waters. The once‐and‐future king theme is familiar in folk tales such as that of King Arthur. Finally, blindness is a recurrent motif in Herodotus’ stories (cf. 2.111; 4.2; 6.177; the ARIMASPIANS have only one eye, 3.116). As a result of this highly folkloric content, Lloyd (1988, 90) reasonably suspects that Anysis stands for the whole of the 23rd Dynasty.

2) An Egyptian city, probably Tell Belim, 19 kilometers northwest of El‐Qanṭara, in the NILE Delta. According to Herodotus (2.137) it was the hometown of Anysis (1).

SEE ALSO: Amyrtaeus; Anytis; Disabilities; Ethiopians; Monarchy