High Priests of Amun
Control of local affairs tended to come more and more into the hands of the High Priests of Amun, so that during the Third Intermediate Period, the High Priest of Amun exerted absolute power over the South, a counterbalance to the 21st and 22nd Dynasty kings who ruled from the Delta. Intermarriage and adoption strengthened the ties between them, daughters of the Tanite kings being installed as God’s Wife of Amun at Thebes, where they wielded greater power. Theban political influence receded only in the Late Period.