Nubia

Origins and formation

The Kingdom of Kush, also called the Kushite Empire, was an ancient kingdom in Nubia, centered on the Nile Valley in what is now northern Sudan and southern Egypt. Kerma was the dominant power between about 2450 and 1450 BC, controlling the valley between the first and fourth cataracts, an area as large as Egypt. Egyptians identified Kerma as Kush. The two civilizations traded and fought. Much of Nubia came under Egyptian rule in the New Kingdom, about 1550 to 1070 BC. A first-century queen is one reign inside that longer Nile history. She is not Kerma.¹

Defining periods

Amanitore, also spelled Amanitere or Amanitare, was a queen regnant of Kush, ruling from Meroe in the middle of the first century AD. She ruled together with her son, Natakamani. Their co-reign is well attested and appears prosperous. They may have been contemporaries of Nero. Older scholars assumed she was his wife. A graffito at the Temple of Dakka is now read as evidence that she was his mother. During the co-reign, only Natakamani was explicitly titled ruler, qore, while Amanitore was titled kandake. The opening sentence and that title sit together in the same lead. This essay does not collapse them into one English word. The published Civilization VII Egypt essay is the neighboring kingdom. It is not this state, so it is not linked as the same civilization.^{1 2}

Leaders

The English hub and the Chinese hub both list a Nubia Civilization and Scenario Pack. That sentence names the civilization and the pack. It does not name Amanitore. The Chinese update notes head a balance block with the ordinary name for Nubia and mention a ranged-unit bonus and a pyramid. They do not print her name. The Chinese form in this essay is the standard reading. Her pack is the scenario pack, because the hub assigns the civilization there and the retrieved pages do not add a second Nubian leader.^{3 4 5}

Legacy and interpretation

Kush’s legacy in the lead is a Nile kingdom that Egyptians named and sometimes ruled. Amanitore’s legacy is a first-century co-reign at Meroe, with a title the lead does not reduce to one office. Reading her as Kerma, or as the New Kingdom pharaohs, joins centuries the sources keep apart. Egypt’s published essay remains the other side of that river history.^{1 2}

A closer look

The update’s Nubia lines change production toward ranged units and the yields of a pyramid. They are balance numbers. This essay does not copy them. A changed pyramid is not Meroe and not the graffito at the temple of Dakka in the biography lead.⁵

In Civilization VI

The civilization is the scenario pack named on the hub. Amanitore’s Chinese name is a standard reading. Keep Kerma’s centuries, the New Kingdom, and the first-century co-reign apart.^{1 2 3}