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But the rebellion of Nectanebo forced Tachos to relinquish his projects, and the dominion over the Phoenician cities seems to have reverted to Persia without any effort on her part.
Never since the last Nectanebo was conquered by the Persians, eight hundred years earlier, did the Egyptians seem so near to throwing off the foreign yoke and rising again as an independent nation. But the Greeks, who had taught them so much, had not taught them the arts of war; and the nation remained enslaved to those who could wield the sword.
These columns probably belonged to the twelfth dynasty. In what Naville called the "Ptolemaic Hall" occurs the name Nephthorheb or Nectanebo I. of the thirtieth dynasty. The relics of this remarkable temple thus cover a period from the sixth to the thirtieth dynasties, some 3,200 years.
These consisted of mixed troops, partly Greek and partly Egyptian; between whom jealousies and suspicions were easily sown by the Persian leaders, who by these means rapidly reduced the secondary cities of Lower Egypt, and were advancing upon Memphis, when Nectanebo in despair quitted the country and fled southwards to Ethiopia.
On the death of Arsinoë, Philadelphus built a tomb for her in Alexandria, called the Arsinoëum, and set up in it an obelisk eighty cubits high, which had been made by King Nectanebo, but had been left plain, without carving. Satyrus, the architect, had the charge of moving it. He dug a canal to it as it lay upon the ground, and moved two heavily laden barges under it.
Idrieus succeeded in reducing Cyprus; but the two satraps suffered a single defeat at the hands of Tennes, the Sidonian king, who was aided by 40,000 Greek mercenaries, sent him by Nectanebo, and commanded by Mentor the Rhodian. The Persian forces were driven out of Phoenicia; and Sidon had ample time to strengthen its defences and make preparations for a desperate resistance.
Levying a vast army, he marched into Egypt, and engaged Noctanebo, the king, in a contest for existence. Nectanebo, however, having obtained the services of two Greek generals, Diophantus, an Athenian, and Lamius, a citizen of Sparta, boldly met his enemy in the field, defeated him, and completely repulsed his expedition. Hereupon the contagion of revolt spread.
Nectanebo was only able to oppose to this vast array an army less than one third of the size.
This, however, is very far from having been the case. We first see the kings of Lower Egypt guarding their thrones at Saïs by Greek soldiers; and then, that every struggle of Inarus, of Nectanebo, and of Tachos, against the Persians, was only made by the courage and arms of Greeks hired in the Delta by Egyptian gold.
Alliance was at once formed with the Egyptian king, Nekht-nebf, or Nectanebo II., who sent a body of 4,000 Greek mercenaries, under Mentor the Rhodian, to the aid of Tennes. Hostilities commenced by the Phoenicians expelling or massacring the Persian garrisons, devastating the royal park or paradise, and burning the stores of forage collected for the use of the Persian cavalry.
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