Synchronisms and Significance: Reevaluating Interconnections Between Middle Kingdom Egypt and the Southern Levant

Abstract

The relationship and interconnections between Middle Bronze Age Palestine and Middle Kingdom Egypt have long been the subject of continued debate, influenced by chancing perspectives on the nature of the Middle Bronze Age and evidence regarding the chronological synchronisms and correlations between the two regions. Difficulties in understanding this relationship are augmented by the extreme paucity of existing data that may shed light on the problem. This article reexamines current available data that allow synchronisms to be made between Palestine and Egypt during the early second millennium BCE, and suggests possible conclusions concerning the nature of this relationship and the significance of the continuing scarcity of evidence for Egyptian interaction with the southern Levant.