Wouldn't it make sense to merge the Upper and Lower Egyptian kingdoms into one de jure kingdom? Under the Persians, Ptolemies and Romans, Egypt would always be treated as one united administrative unit, and no ruler within the time period of your mod would claim only Upper or Lower Egypt as their domain, but always declared themselves kings or pharaohs of a united Egypt.
Also, I propose two small mechanics/changes. Firstly, to remove the pharaoh as the head of the Egyptian religion and incorporate a new mechanic for Egyptian priesthoods. Foreign pharaohs, of which there were plenty during the time period of your mod, often did not adhere primarily to the Egyptian pantheon, while they did derive legitimacy from their connections with the Egyptian priesthood and their position as pharaoh. However, Egypt had no single high priest either; instead, every cult had their own (high) priesthood. There were a few important cults and priesthoods in Egypt during this time period: the High Priesthood of Amun (popular until about 525 BCE), the Cult of Apis, the High Priesthood of Ptah (especially powerful under Saite dynasty and the Ptolemies), the cult of Isis (popular during the entire Late Period), and the oracle of Ammon in Siwa. I suggest that these three high priesthoods get represented in game, maybe by using a rework of the pentarch mechanic, so that they can compete for religious and political influence.
Secondly, any king-level ruler with at least one county in the de jure kingdom of Egypt, of any religion and culture, should be able to petition one of the leaders of these cults to receive the title of pharaoh. This would be represented as a trait with an opinion bonus with characters who adhere the Egyptian religion and gives prestige. Of course, priests should be able to ask for boons in return; maybe more financial gains in Egypt (represented by a lower tax rate, but a modifier for the priests which increases their own income), or just a straight out donation to their cult. Cults should also favor characters whose predecessors (so a parent or sibling) were appointed by the same cult, leading to this cult becoming more powerful by subsequent generations of pharaohs donating to the cult. Characters whose parent or sibling was pharaoh, but who now don't possess any counties in Egypt or who don't get approved by a priesthood should be able to still claim the title of pharaoh, and receive a version of the trait with much smaller bonuses (the Persians still claimed to rule Egypt during their Egyptian interregnum, for instance). Also, different cults should be able to support different claimants during civil wars, preferably those who were crowned by their own priesthood. The royal title of the de jure kingdom of Egypt should thus simply be king, seeing how pharaoh practically translates to that title anyway (especially during the Late Period). What do you think?
I like it so far, I've always had an issue with the kingdom between 2 different titles originally but I haven't revisited it for a long time. I am looking into the autocephaly mechanics at the moment to see if I can pull it off with the different high priests/cults, although I'm not sure about the role of "Pharaoh" being given out by the different pentarchs etc I may just tie it to the actual holder of the kingdom..which I think would be appropriate although there are several times that it seems an egyptian pharaoh (of sorts) existed while the persian held sway using a satrap so I'll need to see what other options I can come up with or if I could tie the title/trait together in some way.. - EDIT: so You can't use the pentarchy system for multiple religious_groups apparently? in my test it connected the other faiths pentarchs to the egyptian one somehow....so if I at least make it Autocephalous (without being pentarchy) then it makes the kingdom level (so the united Egypt) court priest the religious head of the lower bishops/priests....so I'd have to make the egyptian_faith title be called the high priest of Amun or another title I guess and the different Autocephalous priests might hold it at different points...
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