The pinnacle of ancient Egyptian power was achieved during the New Kingdom, which extended its rule to much of Nubia and a considerable portion of the Levant. After this period, Egypt entered an era of slow decline. Over the course of its history, it was invaded or conquered by a number of foreign civilizations, including the Hyksos, the Kushites, the Assyrians, the Persians, and the Greeks and then the Romans. The end of ancient Egypt is variously defined as occurring with the end of the Late Period during the Wars of Alexander the Great in 332 BC or with the end of the Greek-ruled Ptolemaic Kingdom during the Roman conquest of Egypt in 30 BC. In AD 642, the Arab conquest of Egypt brought an end to the region's millennium-long Greco-Roman period.
The success of ancient Egyptian civilization came partly from its ability to adapt to the Nile's conditions for agriculture. The predictable flooding of the Nile and controlled irrigation of its fertile valley produced surplus crops which supported a more dense population and thereby substantial social and cultural development. With resources to spare, the administration sponsored the mineral exploitation of the valley and its surrounding desert regions, the early development of an independent writing system, the organization of collective construction and agricultural projects, trade with other civilizations, and a military to assert Egyptian dominance throughout the Near East. Motivating and organizing these activities was a bureaucracy of elite scribes, religious leaders, and administrators under the control of the reigning pharaoh, who ensured the cooperation and unity of the Egyptian people in the context of an elaborate system of religious beliefs.[1]
Ploughing with a yoke of horned cattle in ancient Egypt. Painting from the burial chamber of Sennedjem, c. 1200 BC
The civilization of ancient Egypt was indebted to the Nile River and its dependable seasonal flooding. Thus, relying on the Nile River for its periodic flooding. The river's predictability and fertile soil allowed the indigenous Egyptians to build an empire on the basis of great agricultural wealth. Egyptians are credited as being one of the first groups of people to practice agriculture on a large scale. This was possible because of the ingenuity of the Egyptians as they developed basin irrigation. Their farming practices allowed them to grow staple food crops, especially grains such as wheat and barley, and industrial crops, such as flax and papyrus. (Full article...)
Tutankhamun or Tutankhamen (Ancient Egyptian: twt-ꜥnḫ-jmn; c.1342 BC– c.1323 BC), was the antepenultimatepharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty of ancient Egypt, who ruled c.1332 – 1323 BC. Born Tutankhaten, he instituted the restoration of the traditional polytheistic form of ancient Egyptian religion, undoing a previous shift to the religion known as Atenism. Tutankhamun's reign is considered one of the greatest restoration periods in ancient Egyptian history, and his tomb door proclaims his dedication to illustrative constructions of the ancient Egyptian gods.
His endowments and restorations of cults were recorded on the Restoration Stela. The cult of the god Amun at Thebes was restored to prominence, and the royal couple changed their names to "Tutankhamun" and "Ankhesenamun", replacing the -atensuffix. He also moved the royal court from Akhenaten's capital, Amarna, back to Memphis almost immediately on his accession to the kingship. He reestablished diplomatic relations with the Mitanni and carried out military campaigns in Nubia and the Near East. Tutankhamun was one of only a few kings known to be worshipped as a deity during their lifetime. He likely began construction of a royal tomb in the Valley of the Kings and an accompanying mortuary temple, but both were unfinished at the time of his death. (Full article...)
Image 5Naqada figure of a woman interpreted to represent the goddess Bat with her inward curving horns. Another hypothesis is that the raised arms symbolize wings and that the figure is an early version of the white vulture goddess Nekhbet, c. 3500–3400 B.C.E. terracotta, painted, 11+1⁄2in ×5+1⁄2in ×2+1⁄4in (29.2cm ×14.0cm ×5.7cm), Brooklyn Museum (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 6Megaliths from Nabta Playa displayed in Aswan, Upper Egypt (from History of ancient Egypt)
Image 14Aterian point from Zaccar, Djelfa region, Algeria. (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 15E1b1b is the most common paternal haplogroup across much of Africa, including Egypt, "Haplogroup E is defined by the M96 SNP (and others), for which a cautious reading of all of the evidence would indicate an eastern tropical African origin (Cruciani, 2007; Gomes et al., 2010; Trombetta et al., 2015)". (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 19A guardian statue which reflects the facial features of the reigning king, probably Amenemhat II or Senwosret II, and which functioned as a divine guardian for the imiut. Made of cedar wood and plaster c. 1919–1885 BC (from History of ancient Egypt)
Image 20Nabta Playa "calendar circle", reconstructed at Aswan Nubia museum. (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 24Carved catfish bones, and jar discovered in Maadi (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 25Possible prisoners and wounded men of the Buto-Maadi culture devoured by animals, while one is led by a man in long dress, probably an Egyptian official (fragment, top right corner). Battlefield Palette. (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 28Ancient Badarian mortuary figurine of a woman, held at the Louvre (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 29Evolution of Egyptian prehistoric pottery styles, from Naqada I to Naqada II and Naqada III (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 30Nazlet Khater skeleton, Upper Paleolithic, 35,000 before present; National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, Cairo (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 31Clapper discovered in Maadi, Louvre Museum (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 32Facial reconstruction and depiction created from the Nuwayrat Early Dynastic individual, carbon dated to 2855–2570 BCE, soon after the end of the Neolithic period. (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 33Merimde culture clay head, circa 5,000 BC. This is one of the earliest known representations of a human head in Egypt. (from Prehistoric Egypt)
Image 34Chronology of state formation in Ancient Egypt. (from Prehistoric Egypt)
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