Ancient Egypt
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Image:Padlock-silver-medium.svg![Khafre's Pyramid and the Great Sphinx of Giza, built about 2550 BC during the Fourth Dynasty of the Old Kingdom,[1] are enduring symbols of the civilization of ancient Egypt](http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/thumb/b/b5/300px-Egypt.Giza.Sphinx.01.jpg)
Ancient Egypt was a civilization in Northeastern Africa concentrated along the middle to lower reaches of the Nile River, reaching its greatest extent in the second millennium BC, during the New Kingdom. It stretched from the Nile Delta in the north as far south as Jebel Barkal at the Fourth Cataract of the Nile, in modern-day Sudan. Extensions to the geographic range of ancient Egyptian civilization included, at different times, areas of the southern Levant, the Eastern Desert and the Red Sea coastline, the Sinai Peninsula, and the oases of the Western desert.[2]
The civilization of ancient Egypt developed over more than three and a half millennia. It began with the political unification of the major Nile Valley cultures under one ruler, the first pharaoh, around 3150 BC,[3] and led to a series of golden ages known as Kingdoms separated by periods of relative instability known as Intermediate Periods. After the end of the last golden age, the New Kingdom, the civilization of ancient Egypt entered a period of slow, steady decline, when Egypt was conquered by a succession of foreign adversaries. The power of the pharaohs officially ended in 31 BC, when the early Roman Empire conquered Egypt and made it a province of the Empire.[1]
The civilization of ancient Egypt was based on balanced control of natural and human resources under the leadership of the pharaoh, religious leaders, and court administrators, characterised by controlled irrigation of the fertile Nile Valley; the mineral exploitation of the valley and surrounding desert regions; the early development of an independent writing system and literature; the organization of collective construction and agricultural projects; trade with surrounding regions in east and central Africa and the eastern Mediterranean; and finally, military ventures that defeated foreign enemies and asserted Egyptian domination throughout the region. Motivating and organising these activities was a bureaucracy of elite scribes, religious leaders, and administrators under the control of the quasi-divine pharaoh (becoming divine upon death), who ensured the cooperation and unity of the Egyptian people by means of an elaborate system of religious beliefs.[2][4]
History
| Dynasties of Pharaohs in Ancient Egypt |
| Predynastic Egypt |
| Protodynastic Period |
| Early Dynastic Period |
| 1st 2nd |
| Old Kingdom |
| 3rd 4th 5th 6th |
| First Intermediate Period |
| 7th 8th 9th 10th |
| 11th (Thebes only) |
| Middle Kingdom |
| 11th (All Egypt) |
| 12th 13th 14th |
| Second Intermediate Period |
| 15th 16th 17th |
| New Kingdom |
| 18th 19th 20th |
| Third Intermediate Period |
| 21st 22nd
23rd 24th 25th 26th |
| First Persian Period |
| Late Period |
| 28th 29th 30th |
| Second Persian Period |
| Graeco-Roman Period |
| Alexander the Great |
| Ptolemaic Dynasty |
| Roman Egypt |
| Arab Conquest |
The Nile has been the lifeline of Egypt since nomadic hunter-gatherers began living in the region during the Pleistocene, some 1.8 million years ago.[2] The lifestyles of early humans were highly dependent on climate, and by the late Paleolithic the arid climate of northern Africa had become increasingly hot and dry, forcing the population to concentrate along the Nile valley.[2] The fertile floodplain of the Nile gave humans the opportunity to develop a settled agricultural economy and a more developed, centralized society that became a cornerstone in the history of human civilization.[2]
Predynastic period
By about 5500 BC, small tribes living in the Nile valley had developed into a series of unique cultures demonstrating firm control of agriculture and animal husbandry. These cultures are identifiable by their unique pottery and personal items, such as combs, bracelets, and beads. The largest of these early cultures in upper Egypt, the Badari culture, is known for its high quality ceramics, stone tools, and its use of copper.[5] Badari burials are simple pit graves and show signs of social stratification; evidence that the culture was coming under the control of more powerful leaders.[2]
In upper Egypt, a culture with Badari features began to expand along the Nile by about 4000 BC, and is known as the Naqada culture. Over a period of about 1000 years, the Naqada culture developed from a few small farming communities into a powerful civilization whose leaders were in complete control of the people and resources of the Nile valley.[6] Establishing a power center at Hierakonpolis, and later at Abydos, Naqada leaders expanded their control of Egypt northwards along the Nile and engaged in trade with Nubia, the oases of the western desert, and the cultures of the eastern Mediterranean.[2]
The Naqada culture manufactured a diverse array of material goods including painted pottery, high quality derocative stone vases, cosmetic palettes, and jewelrey made of gold, lapis, and ivory, reflecting the increased power and wealth of the elite. They also developed a ceramic glaze known as faience, which was used to decorate cups, amulets, and figurines well into the Roman Period.[7] During the last phase of the predynastic, the Naqada culture began using written symbols which would eventually evolve into a full system of hieroglyphs for writing the ancient Egyptian language.[8]
Early dynastic period
Although the transition to a fully unified Egyptian state under the rule of the pharaoh happened gradually, ancient Egyptians writing many centuries later chose to begin their official history with a king named "Meni" (or Menes in Greek), who they believed had united the two kingdoms of Upper and Lower Egypt.[2]
The long line of pharaohs to follow would be grouped into 30 dynasties by an Egyptian priest named Manetho, writing in the third century BC. This system is still used today. Scholars have suggested the mythical Menes is the pharaoh Narmer based on an interpretation of the Narmer Palette, a ceremonial cosmetic palette depicting this ruler wearing pharaonic regalia.[1]
During the early dynastic period, beginning about 3150 BC, the first pharaohs solidified their control over lower Egypt by establishing a capital at Memphis. From this new city, they could control trade routes to the levant and the labor and agricultural produce of the fertile delta region.
The increasing power and wealth of the pharaohs during the early dynastic period is reflected in their elaborate mastaba tombs and mortuary cult structures at Abydos which were used to celebrate the deified pharaoh after his death.[2] The strong institution of kingship these pharaohs developed served to legitimize the state control over the land, labor, and resources which allowed the civilization of ancient Egypt to flourish.[9]
Old Kingdom
The pharaohs of the Old Kingdom made stunning advances in architecture, art, and technology, fueled by the increased agricultural productivity made possible by a well developed central administration.[2] Under the direction of the vizier, state officials coordinated irrigation projects to improve crop yield, collected taxes, drafted peasants to work on construction projects, and established a justice system to maintain peace and order.[2] With the surplus resources made available by a productive and stable economy, the state was able to sponsor the building of colossal monuments and royal workshops producing exceptional works of art. The pyramids built by Djoser, Khufu, and their descendants stand as eternal symbols of the power of the pharaohs.
With the increasing importance of the central administration, a new class of educated scribes and officials arose who were granted estates by the pharaoh in payment for their services. Pharaohs also made land grants to their mortuary cults and local temples to ensure these institutions would have the necessary resources to worship the pharaoh after his death. By the end of the Old Kingdom, five centuries of these practices had slowly eroded the economic power of the pharaoh, who could no longer afford to support a large centralized administration.[2] As the power of the pharaoh diminished, regional governers called nomarchs began to challenge the supremacy of the pharaoh which ultimately undermined the unity of the country. Coupled with severe droughts between 2200 and 2150 BC,[10] the country entered a 140 year period of famine and strife known as the First Intermediate Period.[11]
First Intermediate Period
After the fall of the Old Kingdom came a roughly 200-year stretch of time known as the First Intermediate Period, which is generally thought to include a relatively obscure set of pharaohs running from the end of the Sixth to the Tenth, and most of the Eleventh Dynasty. Most of these were likely local monarchs who did not hold much power outside of their own limited domain, and none held power over the whole of Egypt.
By 2160 BC a new line of pharaohs (the Ninth and Tenth Dynasties) consolidated Lower Egypt from their capital in Herakleopolis Magna. A rival line (the Eleventh Dynasty) based at Thebes reunited Upper Egypt and a clash between the two rival dynasties was inevitable. Around 2055 BC the Theban forces defeated the Heracleopolitan Pharaohs, reunited the Two Lands. The reign of its first pharaoh, Mentuhotep II marks the beginning of the Middle Kingdom.
Middle Kingdom
The Middle Kingdom is the period in the history of ancient Egypt stretching from the establishment of the Eleventh Dynasty to the end of the Fourteenth Dynasty, roughly between 2030 BC and 1640 BC.
The period comprises two phases, the 11th Dynasty, which ruled from Thebes and the 12th Dynasty onwards which was centered around el-Lisht. These two dynasties were originally considered to be the full extent of this unified kingdom, but historians now[12] consider the 13th Dynasty to at least partially belong to the Middle Kingdom.
The earliest pharaohs of the Middle Kingdom traced their origin to a nomarch of Thebes, "Intef the Great, son of Iku", who is mentioned in a number of contemporary inscriptions. However, his immediate successor Mentuhotep I is considered the first pharaoh of this dynasty.
An inscription carved during the reign of Wahankh Intef II shows that he was the first of this dynasty to claim to rule over the whole of Egypt, a claim which brought the Thebeans into conflict with the rulers of Herakleopolis Magna, the Tenth Dynasty. Intef undertook several campaigns northwards, and captured the important nome of Abydos.
Warfare continued intermittently between the Thebean and Heracleapolitan dynasts until the 14th regnal year of Nebhetepra Mentuhotep II, when the Herakleopolitans were defeated, and the Theban dynasty began to consolidate their rule. Mentuhotep II is known to have commanded military campaigns south into Nubia, which had gained its independence during the First Intermediate Period. There is also evidence for military actions against Palestine. The king reorganized the country and placed a vizier at the head of civil administration for the country.
Mentuhotep IV was the final pharaoh of this dynasty, and despite being absent from various lists of pharaohs, his reign is attested from a few inscriptions in Wadi Hammamat that record expeditions to the Red Sea coast and to quarry stone for the royal monuments. The leader of this expedition was his vizier Amenemhat, who is widely assumed to be the future pharaoh Amenemhet I, the first king of the 12th Dynasty. Amenemhet is widely assumed by some Egyptologists to have either usurped the throne or assumed power after Mentuhotep IV died childless.
Amenemhat I built a new capital for Egypt, known as Itjtawy, thought to be located near the present-day el-Lisht, although the chronicler Manetho claims the capital remained at Thebes. Amenemhat forcibly pacified internal unrest, curtailed the rights of the nomarchs, and is known to have at launched at least one campaign into Nubia. His son Senusret I continued the policy of his father to recapture Nubia and other territories lost during the First Intermediate Period. The Libyans were subdued under his forty-five year reign and Egypt's prosperity and security were secured.
Senusret III (1878 BC–1839 BC) was a warrior-king, leading his troops deep into Nubia,
and built a series of massive forts throughout the country to establish Egypt's formal boundaries with the unconquered areas of
its territory.
Egypt's population began to exceed food production levels during the reign of Amenemhat III, who then ordered the exploitation of the Fayyum and increased mining operations in the Sinaï desert. He also invited Asiatic settlers to Egypt to labor on Egypt's monuments. Late in his reign the annual floods along the Nile began to fail, further straining the resources of the government. The Thirteenth Dynasty and Fourteenth Dynasty witnessed the slow decline of Egypt into the Second Intermediate Period in which some of the Asiatic settlers of Amenemhat III would grasp power over Egypt as the Hyksos.
Second Intermediate Period and the Hyksos
The Second Intermediate Period marks a period when Ancient Egypt once again fell into disarray between the end of the Middle Kingdom, and the start of the New Kingdom. This period is best known as the time the Hyksos made their appearance in Egypt, the reigns of its kings comprising the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Dynasties.
The Thirteenth Dynasty proved unable to hold onto the long land of Egypt, and a provincial ruling family located in the marshes of the western Delta at Xois broke away from the central authority to form the Fourteenth Dynasty. The splintering of the land accelerated after the reign of the Thirteenth Dynasty king Neferhotep I.
The Hyksos first appear during the reign the Thirteenth Dynasty pharaoh Sobekhotep IV, and by 1720 BC took control of the town of Avaris. The outlines of the traditional account of the "invasion" of the land by the Hyksos is preserved in the Aegyptiaca of Manetho, who records that during this time the Hyksos overran Egypt, led by Salitis, the founder of the Fifteenth Dynasty. In the last decades, however, the idea of a simple migration, with little or no violence involved, has gained some support.[13] Under this theory, the Egyptian rulers of 13th Dynasty were unable to stop these new migrants from travelling to Egypt from Asia because they were weak kings who were struggling to cope with various domestic problems including possibly famine.
The Hyksos princes and chieftains ruled in the eastern Delta with their local Egyptian vassals. The Hyksos Fifteenth Dynasty rulers established their capital and seat of government at Memphis and their summer residence at Avaris.
The Hyksos kingdom was centered in the eastern Nile Delta and Middle Egypt and was limited in size, never extending south into Upper Egypt, which was under control by Theban-based rulers. Hyksos relations with the south seem to have been mainly of a commercial nature, although Theban princes appear to have recognized the Hyksos rulers and may possibly have provided them with tribute for a period.
Around the time Memphis fell to the Hyksos, the native Egyptian ruling house in Thebes declared its independence from the vassal dynasty in Itj-tawy and set itself up as the Seventeenth Dynasty. This dynasty was to prove the salvation of Egypt and would eventually lead the war of liberation that drove the Hyksos back into Asia. The two last kings of this dynasty were Tao II the Brave and Kamose. Ahmose I completed the conquest and expulsion of the Hyksos from the delta region, restored Theban rule over the whole of Egypt and successfully reasserted Egyptian power in its formerly subject territories of Nubia and Canaan.[14] His reign marks this beginning of the Eighteenth Dynasty and the New Kingdom period.
New Kingdom
Egypt was reunited again, and as a result of the foreign rule of the Hyksos during the Second Intermediate Period, the New Kingdom saw Egypt create a buffer between the Levant and Egypt, and attain its greatest territorial extent. It expanded far south into Nubia and held wide territories in the Near East. Egyptian armies fought Hittite armies for control of modern-day Syria.
This became a time of great wealth and power for Egypt. Some of the most important and best-known Pharaohs ruled at this time.
Hatshepsut, unusual because she was a female pharaoh and thereby a rare occurrence in
Egyptian history—was an ambitious and competent leader—extending Egyptian trade south into present-day Somalia and north into the
Mediterranean. Her architecture achieved the highest development by Egypt and was unparalleled in the entire Mediterranean area
for a thousand years. She ruled for twenty years through a combination of deft political skill and the selection of
highly-skilled administrators. Her co-regent and eventual successor, Thutmose III ("the
Napoleon of Egypt"), expanded Egypt's army and wielded it with great success. Late
in his reign he ordered her name hacked out from many of her monuments and inserted his own.
One of the best-known eighteenth Dynasty pharaohs is Amenhotep IV, who changed his name to Akhenaten in honor of the Aten and whose exclusive worship of the Aten is often interpreted as history's first instance of monotheism. He moved the capital to a new city he built and called it, Akhetaten (modern Armana). Akhenaten's religious fervor is cited as the reason why this period was subsequently written out of Egyptian history. A political and religious revolutionary, Akhenaten introduced Atenism by the fourth year of his reign, raising the previously obscure god Aten (sometimes spelled Aton) to the position of supreme deity, suppressing the worship of other deities, and attacking the power of the entrenched Amen-Ra priestly establishment.
A new culture of art was introduced during this time that was more naturalistic and realistic. It was a departure from the stereotypical style that had predominated in Egyptian art for the previous 1700 years. Depictions of Akhenaten show exaggerated physical features. Styles of art that flourished during this short period are markedly different from other Egyptian art, bearing a variety of affectations, from elongated heads to protruding stomachs, exaggerated features, and as a contrast, the beauty of his queen Nefertiti.
The period following Akhenaten's death is confused and poorly attested, but worship of the old gods was revived and the reign of Tutankhamun marks the certain re-emergence of the old traditions. He was a young child when he ascended to the throne, and undoubtedly it was his advisers who made decisions for him. His given name was Tutankhaten, but with the resurgence of Amun, he was re-named Tutankhamun.
Tutankhamun died while he was still a teenager and was succeeded by Ay, who probably married Tutankhamun's widow to make his claim to the throne. When Ay died a few years later, Tutankhamun's former General Horemheb became ruler, and a new period of positive rule began. He set about securing internal stability and re-establishing the prestige that the country had before the reign of Akhenaten. When Horemheb died without an heir, he named his General Paramessu as his successor. Paramessu took the throne name Ramesses, and is considered the founder of the Nineteenth Dynasty.
Ramesses I only reigned for a couple of years and was succeeded by his son Seti I. Seti I carried on the work of Horemheb in restoring power, control, and respect to Egypt. He also was responsible for creating the the best known part of the temple complex at Abydos, his own mortuary temple.
Arguably, Ancient Egypt's power as a nation-state peaked during the reign of Ramesses II ("the Great") of the nineteenth dynasty. He reigned for 67 years from the age of 18. He carried on his immediate predecessor's work and created many more splendid temples, such as that of Abu Simbel on the Nubian border. He sought to recover territories in the Levant that had been held by eighteenth dynasty Egypt. His campaigns of reconquest culminated in the Battle of Kadesh, where he led Egyptian armies against those of the Hittite king Muwatalli II, but was caught in history's first recorded military ambush. Ramesses II was famed for the huge number of children he sired by his numerous wives and concubines. The tomb he built for his sons, many of whom he outlived, in the Valley of the Kings has proven to be the largest funerary complex in Egypt.
His immediate successors continued the military campaigns, although an increasingly troubled court complicated matters. Ramesses II was succeeded by his son, Merneptah, and then by Merenptah's son, Seti II. Seti II's throne seems to have been disputed by his half-brother, Amenmesse, who temporarily may have ruled from Thebes. The power of dynasty slowly receeded and failed, leading to the reign of the last "great" pharaoh from the New Kingdom, Ramesses III, the son of Setnakhte who reigned three decades after the time of Ramesses II. In Year 8 of his reign, the Sea Peoples, invaded Egypt by land and sea. Ramesses III defeated them in two great land and sea battles. He claimed that he incorporated them as subject peoples and settled them in Southern Canaan, although there is evidence that they forced their way into Canaan. Their presence in Canaan may have contributed to the formation of new states in this region, such as Philistia, after the collapse of the Egyptian Empire. He was also compelled to fight invading Libyan tribesmen in two major campaigns in Egypt's Western Delta in his Year 6 and Year 11 respectively.[15]
The heavy cost of these battles slowly exhausted Egypt's treasury and contributed to the gradual decline of the Egyptian empire in Asia. The severity of these difficulties is stressed by the fact that the first known labor strike in recorded history occurred during Year 29 of Ramesses III's reign, when the food rations for the Egypt's favoured and elite royal tomb-builders and artisans in the village of Deir el Medina could not be provisioned.[16]
Following Ramesses III's death there was endless bickering among his heirs. Three of his sons would go on to assume power as Ramesses IV, Ramesses VI, and Ramesses VIII respectively. However, at this time Egypt also was increasingly beset by a series of droughts, below-normal flooding levels of the Nile, famine, civil unrest, and official corruption. The power of the last pharaoh of this dynasty, Ramesses XI, grew so weak that in the south the High Priests of Amun at Thebes became the effective defacto rulers of Upper Egypt, while Smendes controlled Lower Egypt even before Ramesses XI's death, this was a period of turmoil known as Whm Mswt. Smendes eventually would found the twenty-first dynasty at Tanis.
Third Intermediate Period
After the death of Ramesses XI, his successor Smendes ruled from the city of Tanis in the north, while the High Priests of Amun at Thebes had effective rule of the south of the country, whilst still nominally recognizing Smendes as king.[17] In fact, this division was less significant than it seems, since both priests and pharaohs came from the same family. Piankh, assumed control of Upper Egypt, ruling from Thebes, with the northern limit of his control ending at Al-Hibah. They were replaced without any apparent struggle by the Libyan kings of the twenty-second dynasty.
Shoshenq I, the first king of the new dynasty, briefly re-unified the country, putting control of the Amun clergy under that of his own son. The scant and patchy nature of the written records from this period suggests that it was an unsettled time, leading eventually to a separate group of pharaohs who established their control over Upper Egypt (comprising the twenty-third dynasty) which ran concurrently with the latter part of the twenty-second dynasty.
Under king Piye, the Nubian founder of twenty-fifth dynasty, the Nubians pushed north in an effort to crush his Libyan opponents ruling in the Delta. He managed to attain power as far as Memphis. His opponent Tefnakhte ultimately submitted to him, but he was allowed to remain in power in Lower Egypt and founded the short-lived twenty-fourth dynasty at Sais. Piye was succeeded first by his brother, Shabaka, and then by his two sons Shebitku and Taharqa.
The international prestige of Egypt declined considerably by this time. The country's international allies had fallen under the Assyrian sphere of influence and, from about 700 BC the question became when, not if, there would be war between the two states. Taharqa's reign and that of his successor, Tanutamun, were filled with constant conflict with the Assyrians against whom there were numerous victories. Ultimately Thebes was occupied and Memphis sacked.
Late Period
From 664 BC Egypt was ruled by client kings established by the Assyrians, establishing the Twenty-Sixth Dynasty. Psamtik I was the first to
be recognized as the king of the whole of Egypt, and he brought increased stability to the country during a 54-year reign from
the new capital of Sais. Four successive Saite kings continued guiding Egypt successfully
and peacefully from 610-526 BC. By the end of this period a new power was growing in the Near East:
Memphis and the Delta region became the target of many attacks from the Assyrians, until Psammetichus I managed to reunite Middle and Lower Egypt under his rule forming the Twenty-sixth dynasty.
The last pharaoh of the Twenty-Sixth
dynasty, Psammetichus III, was defeated by Cambyses II of Persia in the battle of Pelusium in the eastern
Nile delta in 525 BC, Egypt was then joined with
Cyprus and Phoenicia in the sixth satrapy of the
The Thirtieth Dynasty was established in 380 BC and lasted until 343 BC.
This was the last native house to rule Egypt. The brief restoration of Persian rule is sometimes known as the
Ptolemaic dynasty
In 332 BC Alexander III of Macedon conquered Egypt with little resistance from the Persians. He was welcomed by the Egyptians as a deliverer. He visited Memphis, and went on pilgrimage to the oracle of Amun at the Oasis of Siwa. The oracle declared him to be the son of Amun. He conciliated the Egyptians by the respect which he showed for their religion, but he appointed Greeks to virtually all the senior posts in the country, and founded a new Greek city, Alexandria, to be the new capital. The wealth of Egypt could now be harnessed for Alexander's conquest of the rest of the Persian Empire. Early in 331 BC he was ready to depart, and led his forces away to Phoenicia. He left Cleomenes as the ruling nomarch to control Egypt in his absence. Alexander never returned to Egypt.
Following Alexander's death in Babylon in 323 BC, a succession crisis erupted among his generals. Initially, Perdiccas ruled the empire as regent for Alexander's half-brother Arrhidaeus, who became Philip III of Macedon, and then as regent for both Philip III and Alexander's infant son Alexander IV of Macedon, who had not been born at the time of his father's death. Perdiccas appointed Ptolemy, one of Alexander's closest companions, to be satrap of Egypt.
Ptolemy ruled Egypt from 323 BC, nominally in the name of the joint kings Philip III and Alexander IV. However, as Alexander the Great's empire disintegrated, Ptolemy soon established himself as ruler in his own right. Ptolemy successfully defended Egypt against an invasion by Perdiccas in 321 BC, and consolidated his position in Egypt and the surrounding areas during the Wars of the Diadochi (322 BC-301 BC). In 305 BC, Ptolemy took the title of King. As Ptolemy I Soter ("Saviour"), he founded the Ptolemaic dynasty that was to rule Egypt for nearly 300 years.
The later Ptolemies took on Egyptian traditions by marrying their siblings, had themselves portrayed on public monuments in Egyptian style and dress, and participated in Egyptian religious life.[18][19]
Hellenistic culture thrived in Egypt well after the Muslim conquest. The Ptolemies had to fight native rebellions and were involved in foreign and civil wars that led to the decline of the kingdom and its annexation by Rome.
Roman domination
After the defeat of Marc Antony and Ptolemaic Queen Cleopatra VII in the Battle of Actium in 30 BC by Octavian (the future Emperor Augustus), Egypt became a province of the Roman Empire, encompassing most of modern-day Egypt except for the Sinai Peninsula, bordered by the provinces of Cyrenaica to the west and Arabia, Egypt would come to serve as a major producer of grain for the empire. The reign of Constantine also saw the founding of Constantinople as a new capital for the Roman Empire, and in the course of the fourth century the Empire was divided in two, with Egypt finding itself in the Eastern Empire with its capital at Constantinople. This meant that within a few years Latin, never well established in Egypt, disappeared, and Greek reasserted itself as the language of government. During the fifth and sixth centuries the Eastern Roman Empire gradually became the Byzantine Empire, a Christian, Greek-speaking state that had little in common with the old empire of Rome, which disappeared in the face of the barbarian invasions in the fifth century. Another consequence of the triumph of Christianity was the final oppression and demise of the pagan culture: with the disappearance of the Egyptian priests and priestesses who officiated at the temples, no-one could read the hieroglyphics of Pharaonic Egypt, and its temples were converted to churches or abandoned to the desert.
The Eastern Empire became increasingly "oriental" in style as its links with the old Græco-Roman world faded. The Greek system of local government by citizens had now entirely disappeared. Offices, with new Byzantine names, were almost hereditary in the wealthy land-owning families. Alexandria, the second city of the empire, continued to be a centre of religious controversy and violence. Cyril, the patriarch of Alexandria, convinced the city's governor to expel the Jews from the city in 415 with the aid of the mob, in response to the Jews' nighttime massacre of many Christians. The murder of the philosopher Hypatia marked the final end of classical Hellenic culture in Egypt. Another schism in the Church produced a prolonged civil war and alienated Egypt from the Empire.
Muslim conquest
Egypt had been occupied just a decade before the conquest by the Persian Empire under Khosrau II (616 to 629 AD). An army of 4,000 Arabs led by Amr Ibn Al-Aas was sent by the Caliph Umar, successor to Muhammad, to spread Islamic rule to the west. These Arabs crossed into Egypt from Palestine in December 639, and advanced rapidly into the Nile Delta. The Imperial garrisons retreated into the walled towns, where they successfully held out for a year or more (although the Arabs were victorious at the Battle of Heliopolis in July 640.[20] But the Arabs sent for reinforcements, In April 641 they captured Alexandria. The Thebaid seems to have surrendered with scarcely any opposition. Most of the Egyptian Christians welcomed their new rulers: the accession of a new regime meant for them the end of the persecutions by the Byzantine state church. The Byzantines assembled a fleet with the aim of recapturing Egypt, and won back Alexandria in 645, but the Muslims retook the city in 646, completing the conquest
Government and economy
Administration and taxation
For administrative purposes, ancient Egypt was divided into districts, referred to by Egyptologists by the Greek term, nomes; they were called sepat in ancient Egyptian. The division into nomes can be traced back to the Predynastic Period (before 3100 BC), when the nomes originally existed as autonomous city-states. The nomes remained in place for more than three millennia, with the area of the individual nomes and their order of numbering remaining remarkably stable. Under the system that prevailed for most of pharaonic Egypt's history, the country was divided into forty-two nomes: twenty comprising Lower Egypt, whilst Upper Egypt was divided into twenty-two. Each nome was governed by a nomarch (Greek for "ruler of the nome",) a provincial governor who held regional authority. The position of the nomarch was at times hereditary, at times appointed by the pharaoh.
The ancient Egyptian government imposed a number of different taxes upon its people. As there was no known form of currency until the latter half of the first millennium BC, taxes were paid for "in kind" (with produce or work). The vizier (ancient Egyptian: tjaty) controlled the taxation system through the departments of state. The departments had to report daily on the amount of stock available and how much was expected in the future. Taxes were paid for depending on a person's craft or duty. Landowners paid their taxes in grain and other produce grown on their property. Artisans paid their taxes with goods they produced. Hunters and fishermen paid their taxes with produce from the river, marshes, and desert. One person from every household was required to pay a corvée or labor tax by doing public work for a few weeks every year, such as digging canals, mining, or serving in the temples. However, the rich could hire poorer people to fulfill their labor taxes.
Legal system
The head of the legal system in ancient Egypt was officially the pharaoh, who was responsible for proclaiming laws, delivering justice, and maintaining law and order, a concept the ancient Egyptians referred to as Ma'at.[4] Though no legal codes from ancient Egypt have survived, the many court documents which have survived show that Egyptian law was based on a common sense view of right and wrong that emphasized reaching agreements and resolution of conflict rather than strict adherence to a complicated set of statues.[21][22]
The ancient Egyptians viewed men and women, and people from all social classes except slaves, as essentially equal under the law, and even the lowliest peasant was entitled to petition the vizier and his court for redress.[21] In cases of tomb robbery or assassination plots, the state took on both the role of prosecutor and judge, and could torture the accused with beatings to obtain a confession and the names of any co-conspirators. Whether the charges were trivial or serious, court scribes documented the complaint, testimony, and verdict of the case for future reference.[22]
Punishment for minor crimes involved either imposition of fines, beatings, facial mutilation, or exile, depending on the severity of the offense. Serious crimes such as murder and tomb robbery were punished by death, which could be carried out by decapitation, drowning, or by impaling the criminal on a stake. Punishment could also be extended to the criminal's family.[4]
From at least the New Kingdom, some legal cases, disputes, and even military or agricultural decisions were resolved by consultation with a divine oracle.[23] The oracle, usually a statue in the image of the deity, could be asked a yes or no question to which the oracle could respond by a movement through the hidden actions of a priest.[23]
Agriculture
Egypt has a favorable combination of geographical features which contributed to the success of the ancient Egyptian culture, the most important of which was the rich fertile soil provided by annual inundations of the Nile river. This resulted in the ability of the ancient Egyptians to grow an abundance of food, which freed up the population to devote more time and resources for cultural, technological, and artistic pursuits. Land management was crucial in ancient Egypt, because taxes were assessed based on the amount of land a person owned.[4]
Farming in Egypt was dependent upon the cycle of the Nile River. The Egyptians distinguished between three seasons in their written records, which they called Akhet (flooding), Peret (planting), and Shemu (harvesting). The flooding season lasted from June to September, after which a layer of mineral-rich silt was deposited on the banks, being perfect for growing crops.
The growing season occurred between October and February, after the flood waters had receded. Farmers plowed and planted seeds in the fields, which were irrigated with dikes and canals. Egypt receives little rainfall, so farmers relied on the Nile to water their crops.
The harvesting season followed in March, April, and May. Farmers would harvest the crops by cutting them down with sickles. The crops would then be threshed by beating them with a flail, in order to separate the straw from the grain. Then the crops would be winnowed to remove the chaff. The grain was then ground on a stone to make flour, brewed to make beer, or stored for later use.
The ancient Egyptians cultivated wheat, emmer, barley, and several other cereal grains, which they used to make their two main food staples, bread and beer. Flax plants were grown, uprooted before they started flowering, and the fibres of their stems extracted. These fibres were split along their length, spun into thread which was used to weave sheets of linen to make into clothing. Papyrus growing on the banks of the Nile River was used to make paper. Vegetables and fruits were grown in garden plots close to their habitations on higher ground and had to be watered by hand.[24]
Natural resources
Egypt is a land rich in building and decorative stone, copper and lead ores, gold, and semiprecious stones, which the ancient Egyptians used to build monuments, sculpt statues, make tools, and fashion jewelry. They left no stone unturned in their search for gold, as no deposits of gold have since been found in Egypt that they overlooked.[25] Embalmers used salts from the Wadi Natrun for mummification, which also provided the gypsum needed to make plaster.[26]
The ore bearing rock formations in Egypt are found in distant, inhospitable Wadis in the eastern desert and the Sinai and required large state controlled expeditions to obtain the gold, copper ores, and decorative stones found there. The Wadi Hammamat was a notable source of granite, greywacke, and gold. Whenever possible, prisoners and slaves were forced into mining service, but Egyptian peasants might also be conscripted for this unpleasant labor.[27]
Flint was the first mineral collected and used to make tools, and flint handaxes are the earliest evidence of habitation in the Nile vally. Nodules of the material were carefully flaked to make blades and arrowheads of moderate hardness and durability even after copper was adopted for this purpose.[28] The Egyptians worked deposits of the lead ore galena at Gebel Rosas to make net sinkers, plumb bobs, and small figurines. Copper was the most important metal for toolmaking in ancient Egypt, and was smelted in furnaces from malachite ore mined in the Sinai.[29] Workers collected gold by washing the nuggets out of sediments in alluvial deposits, or by the more labor intensive process of grinding and washing gold-bearing quartzite. Iron deposits found in upper Egypt were utilized in the Late Period.[30]
High quality building stones are abundant in Egypt; the ancient Egyptians quarried limestone all along the Nile vally, granite from Aswan, and basalt and sandstone from the wadis of the eastern desert. Deposits of decorative stones such as porphyry, greywacke, alabaster, and carnelian dot the eastern desert and were collected even before the First Dynasty. In the Ptolemaic and Roman Periods, miners worked deposits of emeralds in Wadi Sikait and amethyst in Wadi el-Hudi.[30]
Language
Ancient Egyptian constitutes an independent part of the Afro-Asiatic language phylum. Its closest relatives are the Berber, Semitic, and Beja groups of languages. Written records of the Egyptian language have been dated from about 3200 BC, making it one of the oldest, and longest documented languages. Scholars group the Egyptian language into six major chronological divisions:[8]
- Archaic Egyptian (before 3000 BC)
Consists of inscriptions from the late Predynastic and Early Dynastic periods. The earliest known evidence of Egyptian hieroglyphic writing appears on Naqada II pottery vessels.
- Old Egyptian (3000–2000 BC)
The language of the Old Kingdom and First Intermediate Period. The Pyramid Texts are the largest body of literature written in this phase of the language. Tomb walls of elite Egyptians from this period also bear autobiographical writings representing Old Egyptian. One of its distinguishing characteristics is the tripling of ideograms, phonograms, and determinatives to indicate the plural. Overall, it does not differ significantly from the next stage.
- Middle Egyptian (2000–1300 BC)
Often dubbed Classical Egyptian, this stage is known from a variety of textual evidence in hieroglyphic and hieratic scripts dated from about the Middle Kingdom. It includes funerary texts inscribed on sarcophagi such as the Coffin Texts; wisdom texts instructing people on how to lead a life that exemplified the ancient Egyptian philosophical worldview (see the Ipuwer papyrus); tales detailing the adventures of a certain individual, for example the Story of Sinuhe; medical and scientific texts such as the Edwin Smith Papyrus and the Ebers papyrus; and poetic texts praising a deity or a pharaoh, such as the Hymn to the Nile. The Egyptian vernacular had already begun to change from the written language as evidenced by some Middle Kingdom hieratic texts, but classical Middle Egyptian continued to be written in formal contexts well into the Late Dynastic period (sometimes referred to as Late Middle Egyptian).
- Late Egyptian (1300–700 BC)
Records of this stage appear in the second part of the New Kingdom. It contains a rich body of religious and secular literature, comprising such famous examples as the Story of Wenamun and the Instructions of Ani. It was also the language of Ramesside administration. Late Egyptian is not totally distinct from Middle Egyptian, as many "classicisms" appear in historical and literary documents of this phase. However, the difference between Middle and Late Egyptian is greater than that between Middle and Old Egyptian. It is also a better representative than Middle Egyptian of the spoken language in the New Kingdom and beyond. Hieroglyphic orthography saw an enormous expansion of its graphemic inventory between the Late Dynastic and Ptolemaic periods.
- Demotic Egyptian (700 BC–300 AD)
- Coptic (300–1700 AD)
Writing
- See also: Egyptian hieroglyphs
![The Rosetta stone is a multilingual text written in hieroglyphs, demotic, and Greek, and enabled linguists to begin the process of hieroglyph decipherment.[8]](http://www.answers.com/main/Record2?a=NR&url=http%3A%2F%2Fcommons.wikimedia.org%2Fwiki%2FImage%3ARosetta%2520Stone%2520BW.jpeg)
For many years, the earliest known hieroglyphic inscription was the Narmer Palette, found during excavations at Hierakonpolis (modern Kawm al-Ahmar) in the 1890s, which has been dated to c.3150 BC. However, recent archaeological findings reveal that symbols on Gerzean pottery, c. 3250 BC, resemble the traditional hieroglyph forms. Also