Meroë

/mer"oh ee'/, n.

a ruined city in Sudan, on the Nile, NE of Khartoum: a capital of ancient Ethiopia that was destroyed A.D. c350.

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City, ancient Kush , northeastern Africa.

Situated on the eastern bank of the Nile River, north of modern Kabūshiyyah, Sudan, it was the southern administrative centre for the kingdom of Kush, beginning с 750 BC. After the sack of Napata (с 590), it became the capital of the kingdom. It included the region between the Nile and Atbara rivers, where the Meroitic language developed. It survived a Roman invasion but fell to Aksumite armies in the 4th century AD. The ruins of its temples and palaces still exist near Kabūshiyyah.

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▪ ancient city, The Sudan

      city of ancient Cush (Kush) the ruins of which are located on the east bank of the Nile about 4 miles (6.4 km) north of Kabūshīyah in the present-day Sudan; Meroe is also the name of the area surrounding the city.

      The 25th, or “Ethiopian,” dynasty of ancient Egypt is believed to have retired to Cush after 656 BC and established itself at Meroe, where it fostered an Egypto-Cushite culture that through the subsequent 1,000 years became increasingly cut off from its source. Meroe was the southern administrative centre for the kingdom of Cush, beginning about 750 BC, at a time when Napata was still its capital. After the sack of Napata in about 590 by the Egyptian pharaoh Psamtik II, Meroe became the capital of the kingdom and developed into a wide and prosperous area. It survived a Roman invasion—though its status was lowered thereby—but it later declined in the face of raiding tribes, to fall at the more determined invasions of the Aksumite armies, probably under Ella-Amida, whose reign ended between about AD 320 and 325.

      Excavations of Meroe, begun in 1902, have revealed the streets and buildings of a great and populous city. The chief features are a riverbank quay, with palaces nearby, and a great temple of Amon.

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