The 1995 Nile Valley North map features:
• Modern cities, highways, railways, and airports
• Historical sites with a chronology inset indicating period best represented by each site
• Insets of Giza and the Pyramids, Memphis, and Cairo
• Archaeological details of notable sites including the Giza Necropolis and the Sphinx, as well as lesser known temples and ruins
• Facts about archaeological discoveries such as the Rosetta Stone
• Interesting facts about how the Nile Delta geography shaped early Egyptian civilization
• Illustrations of Hatshepsut and the Sphinx
* Lesson plan idea - have your students research for updated information on the archeology of the Nile River Valley • maps
“Let your hands build, O people!” urges an inscription carved nearly 3,500 years ago on the rock-cut tomb of a high official at Thebes.
Build they did, the ancient Egyptians – beginning about 3000 B.C. and continuing with only periodic disruptions for more than three millennia. So prodigious were they, and so substantial their creations, that the valley of the Nile endures today as an open-air museum filled with pyramids and tombs, temples and chapels, obelisks and colossi.
To put up structures on the scale of of the pyramids, the Egyptians had to mobilize, feed, and administer a huge labor force. Recent excavation of the graves of pyramid workers reveals that some were missing limbs or had damaged spines – the human cost of a national compulsion to glorify gods and deify the souls of kings.
THE DELTA - For millions of years rich black silt built a triangular delta at the Nile's mouth. Cultivation of emmer wheat, barley, and flax began to replace nomadic herding about 5000 B.C. Ringed by fields, villages clung to sandy ridges between branches of the river. As more land was reclaimed for crops and contacts with western Asia intensified, the delta breadbasket became Egypt's power center.
ROSETTA STONE - In 1799 a member of Napoleon Bonaparte's military expedition (1798-1801) found a black basalt slab inscribed with hieroglyphs but also carrying demotic script (later Egyptian curisive writing) and Greek. In 1822 French scholar Jean-Francois Champollion solved the mystery of Egyptian writing by relating the Greek and hieroglyphic texts.
GIZA - Superlative emblems of the quest for immortality, the pyramid tombs of Giza went up at the command of the Dynasty IV kings, who worshiped the sun god, Re. Pyramids may have represented eternal shafts of sunlight or symbolized the mythical mound of creation. Some scholars now believe that the pyramid form had evolved much earlier, not in royal circles but as part of the religion of the common people.
The Great Pyramid of Khufu (Cheops) was built 755 feet square and 481 feet tall – the world's largest stone edifice. Khufu's funerary complex includes a mortuary temple, four small subsidiary pyramids, five pits for this royal boats, and a valley temple, identified in 1990. Only Khafre's (Chephren's) pyramid retains part of the original casing of of gleaming white limestone.
GIZA NECROPOLIS - Some 4,000 members of the elite were buried at this cemetery on the Giza plateau from 2600 to 2100 B.C. A few of the tombs recently opened by the Egyptian Antiquities Organization contain colorful paintings and reliefs depicting contemporary life.
PYRAMIDS - Most of the dozens of Old Kingdom pyramids rise on the west bank near ancient Memphis. About 2630 B.C. Imhotep, architect to King Kjoser (Dynasty III), masterminded the Step Pyramid at Saqqara. Possibly the world's oldest freestanding stone structure, this pyramid consists of six tiers atop a mastaba, or low, oblong tomb, faced with cut stone. King Snefru probably built the Maidum pyramid; about 2600 B.C. he put up the Bent and Northern Stone pyramids at Dahshur, other forerunners of the true pyramids at Giza. The tombs of Unis, Pepi I, and other Old Kingdom rulers contain the Pyramid Texts – hieroglpyhic incantations to ensure the king's immortality.
CHOICE OF STONE - Egyptians used a variety of stone, hard and soft. White limestone – facing for the pyramids – came from Tura near Cairo. Quarries at Aswan furnished red and black granite, and the desert of northwestern Nubia, gneiss, a striped, crystalline rock. Basalt cme from quarries in El Faiyum, travertine – Egyptian alabaster – from near Tell el'Amarna.
MEMPHIS - An 80-ton alabaster sphinx recalls the heyday of Memphis (29º50'40"N 31º15'3"E), and to have been founded by Aha, first pharaoh of Dynasty I, about 3000 B.C. Originally called White Wall because of its dazzling fortifications, Egypt's capital during the Old Kingdom remained powerful until the rise of Cairo in the first millennium A.D. This sphinx sits at the site of the Great Temple of Ptah, patron god of Memphis.
CAIRO - Africa's most populous city blends East and West, ancient and modern. Romans occupied the site 2,000 years ago. In A.D. 641 Arabs founded El Fustat nearby, and in 969 a new walled city, El Qahira (the Victorious), became capital of the Fatimid empire. By the early 1300s Cairo outshone every city in Europe and the Middle East. Many of its architectural gems date from the Mamluk era (1257-1517).
WRAPPED FOR ETERNITY - The ancient Egyptians are known for mummifying their kings – a process that took 70 days – but during the Late and Ptolemaic periods the ritual preservation of animals also became common. Mummified bulls, cats, baboons, ibis, dogs, and other species have been unearthed from the necropolis at Saqqara.
CHRONOLOGY -
A.D. 395 | GRECO-ROMAN PERIOD - Ptolemies rule after the death of Alexander the Great. Dramatic growth of population and agricultural output. Roman emperors build many temples, depicting themselves in the Egyptian style.
LATE PERIOD - Dynasties XXV-XXX - Nubians from Kush conquer Egypt; Egypt reunited under Saite dynasty. Persia rules in fifth century B.C. Egypt independent from 404 to 343 B.C.
715 B.C.
THIRD INTERMEDIATE PERIOD - Dynasties XXI-XXIV - Egypt is divided. The high priests of Amun control Thebes; ethnic Libyans rule elsewhere.
NEW KINGDOM Dynasties XVIII-XX - Thebans expel the Hyksos and reunite Egypt. In this “age of emprie.” warrior kings conquer parts of Syria, Palestine, and Lower Nubia.
1550 B.C.
SECOND INTERMEDIATE PERIOD Dynasties XV-XVII - Asiatic Hyksos settlers rule the north, introducing the horse and chariot; Thebans rule the south.
MIDDLE KINGDOM Dynasties XI-XIV - Reunification by Theban kings. Dynasty XII kings win control of Lower Nubia; royal burials shift north to near Memphis. Major irrigation projects. Classical literary period.
2040 B.C.
FIRST INTERMEDIATE PERIOD - Dynasties IX-XI - Political chaos as Egypt splits into two regions with separate dynasties.
OLD KINGDOM - Dynasties III-VIII - Age of pyramids reaches zenith at Giza; cult of the sun god, Re, centered at Heliopolis. Cultrual flowering; trade with Mediterranean region and brief occupation of Lower Nubia.
2600 B.C.
EARLY DYNASTIC - Dynasties I-II - Consolidation of the state and founding of Memphis. Calendar and hieroglyphic writing. royal necropolis at Abydos; vast cemeteries at Saqqara and other sites.
3,000 B.C.
