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The beginning of Ancient Egypt

© Lucy Charlotte Acland Johnson

Ancient Egypt was a very advanced civilisation for its time. It had over a hundred gods and goddesses and the civilisation itself lasted for around 3000 years.

The question that seems obvious to me is: why?

Why should a desertland host such an amazing civilisation?

The answer is it was all due to the River Nile.

The Nile runs through Cairo, Luxor and Aswan, which are all important places.

At certain times of the year the Nile flooded because of the heavy seasonal rains. The river would burst it's banks and flood the land on either side of it (this is known as the "inundation"). When the waters went down again a fertile layer of soil called "silt" would be left on the land. This made the Nile valley a highly fertile place and attracted settlers who came from places such as nearby Palestine, Syria, from Libyan tribes in the West and finally from Nubia in the South. Later on (in about 3000 BC) traders from Iraq also came and settled.

At this time dead bodies were not made into mummies ("mummified") but were simply buried in the sand, often with their legs and arms touching. Not many things were buried with them.

Another difference is that at this time Egypt was not one country. It was made up of two parts: Upper (or Northern) Egypt and Lower (or Southern) Egypt. The Egypt ruled by fabulously rich Pharoahs (a "Pharoah" was an Egyptian king) was a long way off. The first step towards it was the joining of Upper and Lower Egypt which took place in around 3000 BC. After several battles Egypt was finally joined by Menes of Upper Egypt,who is also known as Meni.

This man became the first Pharoah of Egypt.

After managing to join the two lands Menes did not want to lose one again so to keep the two together he decided to build his capital city of Memphis at the old separating point where the two lands met.

Now that the two were one the rule of the Pharoahs could begin!

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