The Collaborative International Dictionary
Hyksos \Hyk"sos\, n. [Gr. ?, fr. Egypt. hikshasu chiefs of the Bedouins, shepherds.] A dynasty of Egyptian kings, often called the Shepherd kings, of foreign origin, who, according to the narrative of Manetho, ruled for about 500 years, forming the XVth and XVIth dynasties. It is now considered that the XVIth is merely a double of the XVth dynasty, and that the total period of the six Hyksos kings was little more than 100 years. It is supposed that they were Asiatic Semites.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
c.1600, 15th dynasty of Egyptian kings (1650-1558 B.C.E.), called "Shepherd Kings," from Greek Hyksos, from Egyptian, either hiq shasu "ruler of nomads," or heqa khoswe "chief of foreign lands."
Wikipedia
The Hyksos ( or ; Egyptian heqa khaseshet, "ruler(s) of the foreign countries"; Greek , ) were a people of mixed origins from Western Asia, who settled in the eastern Nile Delta, some time before 1650 BC. The arrival of the Hyksos led to the end of the Thirteenth Dynasty of Egypt and initiated the Second Intermediate Period. In the context of Ancient Egypt, the term " Asiatic" – which is often used of the Hyksos – may refer to any people native to areas east of Egypt.
Immigration by Canaanite populations preceded the Hyksos. Canaanites first appeared in Egypt towards the end of the 12th Dynasty c. 1800 BC, and either around that time or c. 1720 BC, established an independent realm in the eastern Nile Delta. The Canaanite rulers of the Delta, regrouped in the 14th Dynasty, coexisted with the Egyptian 13th Dynasty, based in Itjtawy. The power of the 13th and 14th Dynasties progressively waned, perhaps due to famine and plague,
In about 1650 BC, both dynasties were invaded by the Hyksos, who formed the 15th Dynasty. The collapse of the 13th Dynasty created a power vacuum in the south, which may have led to the rise of the 16th Dynasty, based in Thebes, and possibly of a local dynasty in Abydos. The Hyksos eventually conquered both, albeit for only a short time in the case of Thebes. From then on, the 17th Dynasty took control of Thebes and reigned for some time in peaceful coexistence with the Hyksos kings, perhaps as their vassals. Eventually, Seqenenre Tao, Kamose and Ahmose waged war against the Hyksos and expelled Khamudi, their last king, from Egypt c. 1550 BC.
The Hyksos practiced horse burials, and their chief deity, their native storm god, the West Semitic Baal, became associated with the Egyptian storm and desert god, Seth. The Hyksos were a people of mixed Asiatic origin with mainly Semitic components. Although some scholars have suggested that the Hyksos contained a Hurrian component, most other scholars have dismissed this possibility. The Hurrians spoke an isolated language, but were under Indo-European rule and influence, and Hurrian etymologies have been suggested for some Hyksos names while Indo-European etymologies have been suggested for a very few names. If a Hurrian component did indeed exist among the Hyksos, an Indo-European component becomes difficult to explain, as Indo-European peoples only exercised a significant influence upon Hurrians in Syria after the Hyksos were well established in Egypt.
The Hyksos brought several technical innovations to Egypt, as well as cultural infusions such as new musical instruments and foreign loanwords. The changes introduced include new techniques of bronze working and pottery, new breeds of animals, and new crops. In warfare, they introduced the horse and chariot, the composite bow, improved battle-axes, and advanced fortification techniques. Because of these cultural advances, Hyksos rule became decisive for Egypt’s later empire in the Middle East.
Usage examples of "hyksos".
Thirteenth Egyptian Dynasty, while the alabastron of Khyan links the later portion of the period with the Hyksos domination in Egypt.
One night we find ourselves in a Memphis tavern where a gang of sturdy but not very bright Hyksos adventurers are conspiring over beer.
Now since he is a native Egyptian, and not just another Hyksos who has come out of history from nowhere and will inevitably go back there again, these rootless shepherds turned adventurers naturally respect the tavern owner.
And although it seems witless today, that Hyksos gang with their dense shepherd heads believed him.
Crazed by thirst after their long dusty dig down from the summit, the Hyksos gang and the tavern owner threw themselves into the sluggish stream to drink their fill and then some.
The intercourse between Crete and Egypt, however, goes much farther back than either the domination of the Hyksos or the Middle Kingdom.
The modern German school, however, represented by Erman, Mahler, Meyer, and the American, Professor Breasted, arguing from the astronomical evidence of the Kahun Papyrus, cuts this allowance short by over 700 years, allowing only 208 years for the great gap, and proposing to pack the five Dynasties and the Hyksos domination into that time.
The disastrous period of the Hyksos domination in Egypt has left but one trace at Knossos, but that is of peculiar interest, for it is the lid of an alabastron bearing the name of the Hyksos King Khyan.
It cannot be said that we know any of the Hyksos Kings, but Khyan is the one whose relics are the most widely distributed and have the most interest.
So it has been suggested that the Knossos lid and the Baghdad lion are the scanty relics of a great Hyksos empire which once extended from the Euphrates to the First Cataract of the Nile, and possibly also held Crete in subjection.
It is much less likely still that a King of the Hyksos race, whose whole tradition is of the land and the desert, should have succeeded in establishing any suzerainty over a race whose whole tradition is of the sea, and which was then in the full pride of its strength.
In Egypt the Seventeenth Dynasty had at last, after long hesitation, picked up the gauntlet thrown down by the Hyksos conquerors, and the War of Independence had resulted in the expulsion of the Desert Princes and their race.
In the meantime the Bedouins established a dynasty which ruled a considerable time, and is known as that of the Hyksos or Shepherd Kings.
The Israelites belonged to the same race as the hated Hyksos or Shepherd Kings.
The Egyptians fell under the grip of the Hyksos invaders soon after 1700 B.