Sesostris

According to Greek legend, an Egyptian monarch who invaded Libya, Arabia, Thrace, and Scythia, subdued Ethiopia, placed a fleet on the Red Sea, and extended his dominion to India. He was possibly Sesostris I (c.1980–1935 BC), II (c.1906–1887 BC), and III (c.1887–1849 BC) compounded into one heroic figure.

Sesostris was the name of a legendary king of ancient Egypt.

According to Herodotus, Diodorus Siculus (who calls him Sesoosis), and Strabo, he conquered the whole world, even Scythia and Ethiopia, divided Egypt into administrative districts or nomes, was a great law-giver, and introduced a caste system into Egypt and the worship of Serapis.

In Manetho, however, he occupied the second Senusret (formerly read Usertesen) of the Twelfth Dynasty, and his name is now usually viewed as a corruption of Senwosri. So far as is known, no Egyptian king penetrated a days journey beyond the Euphrates or into Asia Minor, or touched the continent of Europe. The kings of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth dynasties were the greatest conquerors that Egypt ever produced, and their records are clear on this point.

Khyan, the powerful but poorly-documented Hyksos king of the Fifteenth dynasty of Egypt, whose prenomen was Seuserenre, is perhaps a possible prototype, for objects inscribed with his name have been found from Baghdad to Knossos.

In the case of Taharqa, the miscellaneous levies which he employed himself and those which composed the Egyptian and Assyrian armies opposed to him, and the lands that Egypt and Nubia traded with, must all have been counted, partly through misunderstanding and partly through wilful perversion, to his empire.

Herodotus claims Sesostris was the father of the blinded king Pheron, who was less warlike than his father.

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.