How the Kushites Took Over Egypt | Flooded Tombs of the Nile

[tense music] Nuri is one of the most intensive concentrations of pyramids anywhere in the world, across any culture and civilization.

[upbeat music] In Sudan, in fact, there are more pyramids than in Egypt. And this is something that people don't think of very often.

NARRATOR: Kush and Egypt have a long interwoven history, one that is just beginning to be more fully understood.

FEMALE: Most of what we know in the history books about the kingdom of Kush comes from the perspective of the Egyptians, because the Egyptians had writing. And the Egyptians wrote everything down, everything. They pushed a phenomenal amount of paper, we would say in today's world. And we are fortunate to have a lot of those records, but those records frame everyone outside of Egypt as somehow not equal to or lesser than. History is written by the victors, the 1%. And archaeology tells the story of the underdogs, of the other 99%. The best way to really verify or disqualify a historical account is to look for the facts on the ground. Sometimes it jives with the history books and sometimes it doesn't.

[tense music] NARRATOR: Archaeologist Geoff Emberling has excavated many important Kush monuments, uncovering its past brick by brick.

GEOFF EMBERLING: We know that from the very first moment that Kush appears in history, around 2000 BC, it was powerful. It was so powerful that the Egyptians, at that time, built a series of fortresses along the Nile to protect themselves against the military power of Kush.

NARRATOR: From its prime position on the Nile, the Kush Empire controlled trade routes from the south up to Egypt, transporting ivory, leopard skins, precious stones, and gold.

GEOFF EMBERLING: They had the connections with inner Africa that could bring these exotic products all the way to Egypt and to the wider Mediterranean world.

FEMALE: They were the go-betweens and they became very, very rich and powerful off being in that position.

NARRATOR: Egypt relied on Kushite gold for their elaborate burials and fierce Kushite warriors to supplement Egyptian armies. Eventually, the Kushites gained so much power that the Egyptians saw them as a threat and invaded their neighbors to the south. For the next 400 years, Kush was controlled by Egypt. In the beginning, the Egyptians imposed their gods and temples on Kush.

FEMALE: They were taking the elites of Kushite society and giving them Egyptian educations.

NARRATOR: But the Kushites eventually became even more devout spiritual followers than their conquerors. Even as the Egyptian empire began to lose strength and withdraw in 1100 BC, the Kushites continued building their tombs in the shapes of pyramids. The jewelry found inside the burials makes clear their devotion to Egyptian gods. We know that by at least, at the bare minimum, by the 8th century BC, Kush is on the rise. They have thrown off the shackles of their Egyptian colonizers, but they do retain some Egyptian elements.

NARRATOR: For the center of their kingdom, the Kushites took over a place full of spiritual significance to the Egyptians, a stunning sandstone butte rising high above the desert landscape, Jebal Barkal, or sacred mountain. From here, the Kush kings were able to control an increasingly extensive territory.

GEOFF EMBERLING: Ultimately, that rise of power led to the Kushites being able to conquer all of Egypt, and that's historically just remarkable.

[upbeat music] NARRATOR: For nearly a hundred years, a succession of five Kushite kings ruled all of Egypt. From Napata, their capital, they controlled more area than any other Egyptian pharaohs, stretching from modern-day Khartoum to the Mediterranean. One of these Kushite kings, a renowned warrior named Taharqa, established Nuri as a royal cemetery.

GEOFF EMBERLING: In many ways, Taharqa was the most notable 25th dynasty king. The cemetery that he established at Nuri became the royal burial ground for Kush for over 300 years, so he became the ancestor that the succeeding kings of Kush wanted to connect themselves to.

[tense music] NARRATOR: Kings like Nastasen, who Pierce Paul is hoping may still lie inside his tomb.

I would like to find evidence of Nastasen himself. I'm not saying I want to come up face-to-face with him in the middle of the third chamber in the dark, but it'd be an experience.