Civilization

Ancient Egypt

Also Known As Pharaonic Egypt

Ancient Egypt was the civilization that flourished along the Nile River in northeastern Africa from around 3100 BCE, when Upper and Lower Egypt were unified under its first pharaohs, until its absorption into the Persian and later Greco Roman world in the first millennium BCE. Its history is conventionally divided into the Old, Middle and New Kingdoms, separated by intermediate periods of fragmentation, and produced monumental architecture including the pyramids of Giza, a complex religious system centered on divine kingship and the afterlife, and one of the longest continuous written records of any ancient society, preserved in hieroglyphic and later hieratic and demotic scripts. Ancient Egypt's wealth rested on the predictable annual flooding of the Nile, which made it one of the most agriculturally productive and politically stable regions of the ancient world for long stretches of its history.

Facts

Region

Along the Nile River, northeastern Africa 1

End Year

30 BCE 1

Ancient Egypt as an independent state ends with the Roman annexation following the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BCE, a securely fixed date, though Egyptian culture and religion continued for centuries afterward under Roman rule.

Disputed

Start Year

3100 BCE 1

The unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under Narmer, or Menes in later tradition, is conventionally dated around 3100 BCE, but estimates in the scholarly literature range from roughly 3150 to 3000 BCE depending on the chronology used.

Connections

Associated With

Amarna Letters

Rosetta Stone

The Old Kingdom of Egypt

Era to a live counterpart from the era end

Treaty of Kadesh

In Era

The Ancient Near East and Bronze Age World

Source The Cambridge Ancient History

Related To

The Bronze Age Collapse

New Kingdom Egypt was directly struck by the Late Bronze Age Collapse, repelling Sea Peoples invasions under Merneptah and Ramesses III while losing its Near Eastern territories and much of its former power in the process.

Source The Cambridge Ancient History

The Hittites

Source Wikipedia: Hittites

Ruled By

Cleopatra VII

As the last active Ptolemaic ruler. The Ptolemaic Kingdom she ruled was a Greek dynasty over Egypt rather than a native Egyptian one, part of the broader civilization this entity represents.

Source The Cambridge Ancient History

Ramesses II

Source The Cambridge Ancient History

In the Other Atlases

Influenced

Egypt

Also in Geography Atlas: which this subject influenced.