This could have been but a provisional arrangement: if Thebes had not altogether renounced the hope of repossessing some day the lost conquests of Thutmosis III., the Khati, drawn by the same instinct which had urged them to cross their frontiers towards the south, were not likely to be content with less than the expulsion of the Egyptians from Syria, and the absorption of the whole country into the Hittite dominion. Peace was maintained during Harmhabi's lifetime. We know nothing of Egyptian affairs during the last years of his reign. His rule may have come to an end owing to some court intrigue, or he may have had no male heir to follow him.* Ramses, who succeeded him, did not belong to the royal line, or was only remotely connected with it.** * It would appear, from an Ostracon in the British Museum, that the year XXI. follows after the year VII. of Harmhabi's reign; it is possible that the year XXI. may belong to one of Harmhabi's successors, Seti I. or Ramses II., for example. ** The efforts to connect Ramses I. with a family of Semitic origin, possibly the Shepherd-kings themselves, have not been successful. Everything goes to prove that the Ramses family was, and considered itself to be, of Egyptian origin. Brugsch and Ed. Meyer were inclined to see in Ramses I. a younger brother of Harmhabi. This hypothesis has nothing either for Or against it up to the present. He was already an old man when he ascended the throne, and we ought perhaps to identify him with one or other of the Ramses who flourished under the last Pharaohs of the XVIIIth dynasty, perhaps the one who governed Thebes under Khuniatonu, or another, who began but never finished his tomb in the hillside above Tel el-Amarna, in the burying-place of the worshippers of the Disk. [Illustration: 160.jpg RAMSES I.] Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a sketch in Rosellini. He had held important offices under Harmhabi,* and had obtained in marriage for his son Seti the hand of Tuia, who, of all the royal family, possessed the strongest rights to the crown.** * This Tel el-Amarna Ramses is, perhaps, identical with the Theban one: he may have followed his master to his new capital, and have had a tomb dug for himself there, which he subsequently abandoned, on the death of Khuniatonu, in order to return to Thebes with Tutankhamon and Ai.