Kingship and ancient Egyptian civilization are virtually synonymous. Rule by a single king over the land of Egypt began in around 3300 BCE and was intrinsic to the country thereafter: pharaoh was Egypt. When central control came undone, as it did at the end of the Old Kingdom, the state was reunited and re-formed by a king claiming divine birth and authority, returning to the basic tenets of kingship developed early on in the first few dynasties and cemented in place by the beginning of the Old Kingdom. As seen in late Predynastic Hierakonpolis, the power of the king was symbolized quite physically not only in the strength of wild animals but in the ability to defeat them. The king’s control of chaos, in the form of hunting animals and defeating foreigners, was depicted in art for the rest of pharaonic history.