Graeber and Wengrow take a closer look at "the division of ancient Egyptian history into Old, Middle, and New Kingdoms"
"Each is separated by an 'intermediate' period, often described as epochs of 'chaos and cultural degeneration.' In fact, these were simply periods when there was no single ruler of Egypt. Authority devolved to local factions or [...] changed its nature altogether. Taken together, these intermediate periods span about a third of Egypt's ancient history"
in Thebes, between 754 and 525 BC, "a series of five unmarried, childless princesses [...] were elevated to the position of 'god's wife of Amun,' a title and role which acquired not just supreme religious, but also great economic and political weight at this time [...] To have a situation in which women not only command power on such a scale, but in which this power is linked to an office reserved explicitly for single women, is historically unusual. Yet this political innovation is little discussed, partly because it is already framed within an 'intermediate' or 'late' period"
"the tripartite division only began to be proposed by modern Egyptologists in the late nineteenth century [...] German, particularly Prussian, scholars played a leading role here. Their tendency to perceive ancient Egypt's past as a series of cyclical alternations between unity and disintegration clearly echoes the political concerns of Bismarck's Germany"