Describe the kingdom of Kush's trade relationship with Egypt, its period ruling Egypt as the 25th Dynasty, and its later achievements at Meroe.
South of Egypt along the Nile, in the region called Nubia (in today's Sudan), the kingdom of Kush grew into one of ancient Africa's great powers. Kush and Egypt were neighbors, trading partners, and sometimes rivals for more than two thousand years. Kushite merchants sent gold, ivory, ebony wood, incense, and exotic animals north to Egypt, and Kush absorbed a great deal of Egyptian culture in return, including its writing system, its style of pyramid, and worship of some of the same gods. At times Egypt controlled Kush; at other times, Kush grew strong enough to push back.
The clearest proof of Kush's power came around 747 BCE, when Kushite kings, including Piye, conquered Egypt itself and ruled it as Egypt's 25th Dynasty for about a century -- historians sometimes call these rulers the "Black Pharaohs." After Assyrian invasions pushed Kush's rulers back south, the kingdom's capital eventually moved to Meroe, where Kush developed large-scale ironworking (earning it a later nickname, the "Birmingham of Africa," after a British industrial city) and its own writing system, Meroitic, which historians can sound out but still cannot fully translate. Meroe also built far more pyramids than Egypt did -- smaller and steeper, but hundreds of them -- proof that Egypt was never the only pyramid-building civilization.
Mastery looks like: They can describe Kush's trade goods, explain the 25th Dynasty "Black Pharaohs," and name at least one achievement of Meroe.
Common stumbles: Assuming Kush only ever was ruled by Egypt, rather than understanding it also traded as an equal and once ruled Egypt itself.