Nicaea, Council of Tutankhamun died after 10 years, probably of natural causes Paradoxically, this obscure teenager is the best known of Egypt’s kings due to the discovery of his intact tomb in 1922 The reigns of the nonroyal Ay and Horemheb brought the Eighteenth Dynasty to an end Ramses I, a close adviser and military officer, succeeded Horemheb He was the founder of the Nineteenth Dynasty (1295–1186 b.c.e.) This dynasty is defined by the 67-year reign of his grandson Ramses II (1279–12 b.c.e.) Ramses (born of Ra) was a larger-than-life figure who filled Egypt with his statues, recorded his military campaigns on temple walls, and built on a scale of unparalleled magnificence His huge mortuary temple, the Ramesseum, stands on the West Bank at Thebes His greatest monument is his temple carved into the mountainous cliffs at Abu Simbel above the Second Cataract It was saved from the rising waters of Lake Nasser during the 1960s by an international effort and, with Giza and Karnak, remains a prime archaeological site Two enormous statues of Ramses flank the entrance Ramses built a residence at Piramesse in the Delta where his family came from The events of the biblical Exodus are traditionally associated with him, without much evidence His first and beloved “great royal wife” was Nefertari, whose magnificent tomb in the Valley of the Queens has been carefully restored Father of more than 100 sons and daughters, several of his sons by his chief wives held high positions He died around the age of 92 and was buried in the Valley of the Kings Ramses’s mummy remains in good condition in the Cairo Museum He outlived 12 of his sons and was succeeded by the 13th, Merneptah, already in his 60s In his 10-year reign Merneptah subdued the Libyans and sent military expeditions to Nubia and Palestine After Merneptah a disputed succession ushered in the last four short reigns of the Nineteenth Dynasty ending with Queen Twosret The origins of the Twentieth Dynasty (1186–1069 b.c.e.) remain confused: From its second pharaoh, Ramses III, all its rulers were named Ramses Ramses III reigned for 31 years and was the last powerful pharaoh He successfully prevented the Sea Peoples from entering Egypt but ruled an Egypt whose influence abroad had diminished At home the centuries-old policy of lavishing endowments on the major temples, particularly that of Amun-Ra at Karnak, led to a priesthood whose political and economic power rivaled that of the pharaoh During the 28-year reign of the last pharaoh, Ramses XI, the high priest of Amun at Karnak, Herihor, adopted some royal titles and was virtual ruler of Upper Egypt Royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings were pillaged and the royal envoy to the ruler of Byblos, Wenamun, was re- 309 ceived with scant courtesy The power of Amun-Ra had finally eclipsed that of the pharaohs, and Egypt’s imperial age slid into decline and civil discord See also Hittites Further reading: Allen, James P Middle Egyptian: An Introduction to the Language and Culture of Hieroglyphs Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000; Clayton, Peter A Chronicles of the Pharaohs London: Thames and Hudson, 1998; Gardiner, Alan Egypt of the Pharaohs New York: Oxford University Press, 1964; Grimal, Nicolas A History of Ancient Egypt New York: Blackwell, 1995; Kemp, Barry J Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization New York: Routledge, 1995; Lichtheim, Miriam Ancient Egyptian Literature, Vol 2, The New Kingdom Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976; Manley, Bill The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Egypt New York: Penguin Books, 1996; O’Connor, David, and Eric H Cline, eds Amenhotep III: Perspectives on His Reign Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2001 John Barclay Burns Nicaea, Council of Christianity in the early fourth century c.e was a complex spectrum of beliefs, whose adherents were faced with the additional problem that their religion was illegal in the Roman Empire Constantine the Great recognized Christianity as a legal religion in 313 c.e in the Western Roman Empire With Constantine’s unification of the Eastern and Western Roman Empires in 324, an approach to the growing Christian population and the implications of its theological diversity and disputes became a matter of national interest At the heart of this Christian diversity was a theological dispute concerning the divinity of the Son of God that had developed in Alexandria Bishop Alexander of Alexandria formulated traditional theology in somewhat novel formulas He emphasized that the Word is eternally generated from the Father and that, if it is correct to call God Father, God always must be the father of a son Alexander expressed these thoughts in slogans such as “Always God, always the Son.” To some this view endangered monotheism by suggesting, in effect, the existence of a second co-eternal and equal god alongside the one God Arius, a well-respected senior presbyter and preacher in Alexandria, became the leader of the opposition called Arianism and attacked Alexander’s theology by presenting a radicalized