Here is some more theory, and I am using 1626 BC and 1640 BC for the Thera and the Hyksos beginnings.
- Twenty years before Thera, rumblings caused Santorini people to abandon the island (established information). They mostly move to Crete, but lack of artistic/other jobs either causes a number to move to the Hyksos, or a bunch moved and WERE the Hyksos.
- The great eruption caused a tsunami which may have destroyed much of Minian port activity. Destroying ships in port, many support structures, and a large number of shipping related artisans and craftsmen. Only those ships at sea survived to reestablish shipping. This led to the decline of Minoan civilization which was there but not so strong around 1500 BC (established information), time of Tutmosis III.
- More artists and craftspeople head for Egypt and elsewhere as Myceneans/Sea People put pressure on Crete.
- Around 1350 Ahkenaten and Nefirtiti went off to build Amarna. They took with them a number of artists from the Minoan school who were tired of the stylized and perscribed methods of depiction used by the Egyptian hierarchy, religious and royal. An artistry of naturalism of plants, animals, and even royal personages flourished for a few short years. Here is a detailed and interesting link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akhenaten
Here's the relevant bit of the V chrono:
The Egyptian Middle Kingdom was made up of just two dynasties, the 12th and 13th, with part of the 11th dynasty emerging from the 1st Intermediate Period by reunifying the country. The 12th dyn syncs (as it turns out) with Shamshi-Adad I of Assyria and Hammurabi of the Babylonian 1st dynasty, along with Middle Minoan pottery (since the history of the Minoans remains pretty much unknown). The Exodus took place with the fall of the 13th dynasty. Two kings of the 14th dynasty are known from inscriptions, but since the dynastic structure is the result of the surviving versions of Manetho, probably all the pharaonic monuments should be dated using cosmic ray exposure or other appropriate methods.
The Hyksos arrived in the middle of the 15th c BC, from Arabia, ending the Middle Kingdom.
The 15th dynasty was that of the Hyksos, as was the 16th, and my somewhat wild guess is, Egypt was ruled by a number of different Arab tribes, each with their own territories, and not all of them adopting the ways of the conquered realm. Hyksos cartouches are known, but the need of the conventional pseudochronology is for the Hyksos period to be short, with few kings, and overlapping with native dynasties and pretenders. Quirke writes, "Apepi fought with the successors of the Thirteenth Dynasty, the Seventeenth Dynasty at Thebes, who emerged victorious. In the course of his long reign he changed his throne name twice." [note: Apepi is Apop/Agog]
The New Kingdom of Egypt began in synchrony (is that a word?) with the years of reign of King Saul and the later years of the prophet Samuel, who is described in the OT as murdering the last of the Hyksos pharaohs (OT Agog is the Hyksos Apop). The beginning of Mycenaean Greece also syncs with the Kings period of Israel. The female pharaoh Hatshepsut is better known as the Queen of Sheba. There was no "Sheba" in Yemen. Her time overlaps that of King Solomon.
Speos Artemidos (Grotto of Artemis)
Jimmy Dunn (?)
About 2 miles southwest of Beni Hassan is the Cave of Artemis, which was hewn out of rock. It is located in the Batn el-Baqara wadi and is dedicated to the lion-goddess Pakhet (she who scratches), otherwise known as Artemis. There are scenes of offerings to various gods, but the most interesting thing here is an inscription over the entrance which states that Hatshepsut (18th Dynasty) has rid Egypt of the Hyksos. Actually, she did not.
That could still be true, insofar as there could have been an area still controlled by the Hyksos, perhaps the western coast of the Red Sea, which was the route used for her journey to Punt (Israel).
Akhenaten lived in the 9th c BC, at the end of the 18th Dynasty, which was the founding dynasty of the New Kingdom. The 18th was followed by the 22nd, 23rd, and 24th (Libyan) dynasties, which was followed by the 25th or Nubian Dynasty, near the end of which saw the first Greek colony (invited) in Egypt.
Homer mentions Egyptian and Phrygian allies of Troy. The Kingdom of Phyrgia began during the reign of Assyrian King Sargon II (late 8th c BC), who is mentioned a good bit in the OT, and ended early in the 7th c BC. The royal burial mounds of the Phrygian capital number three (representing three generations). That's the window for the Trojan War.
During the 8th and 7th c BC the Scythians arrived, leading to the end of the Mycenaean period; the Scythians were influenced by the art and architecture of the Mycenaeans and the Minoan minority community.
The Assyrians invaded Egypt in the 7th c, around 80 years before an alliance of rivals and enemies ganged up and destroyed Nineveh and for all practical purposes ended the Assyrian Empire.
Egypt's 19th (Theban) dynasty, which is probably the best known (along with the 18th, and the Ptolemaic, which includes Cleopatra VII) followed the Assyrian occupation.
I liked that link, BTW, I've yet to read the whole thing, but I checked the usual sticking points in the nebulous quasi-histories of the House of Akhetaten, and whomever wrote it really distinguished themselves. Amazing that it's on wikiwackypedia.