The Hippopotamus Pool

New Kingdom literary tradition states that Seqenenre Tao came into contact with his Hyksos contemporary in the north, Apepi or Apophis. The tradition took the form of a tale in which the Hyksos king Apopi sent a messenger to Seqenenre in Thebes to demand that the Theban hippopotamus pool be done away with, for the noise of these beasts was such, that he was unable sleep in far-away Avaris.

The Letter
It is to be remembered that the last Hyksos Pharaoh, Apophis (possibly enraged because, as a Hyksos Pharaoh, he never had access to the secret king-making rites of the legitimate pharaonic line) apparently wrote to Seqenenre Tao to demand that he suppress his hippopotamus pool for keeping him awake at night - in his Delta capital of Avaris, four hundred miles down river!

The story of this letter is contained in a papyrus from later in the New Kingdom, which breaks off in the middle, with Seqenenre wondering what on earth he should respond.

Let there be a withdrawal from the canal hippopotami which lie at the east of the City,

because they don't let sleep come to me either in the daytime or at night.