The Nubian Pharaohs

Egypt had spent centuries trying to dominate Nubia to its south. Then Nubia conquered Egypt. The kings of Kush marched north, took the whole Nile valley, and ruled as Egypt's 25th Dynasty for nearly a century — presenting themselves not as foreign conquerors but as restorers of an Egyptian tradition they judged the Egyptians had let decay. They revived old religious practices and built pyramids at home in Sudan. Assyrian invasion eventually pushed them back south, where their kingdom continued for another thousand years.