EGYPT

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EGYPT

• Land of the Pharaohs

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The Nile The Source of Life

• Nomadic peoples settled near the banks of the
  Nile River in Africa.
• Like the Tigris and Euphrates, the Nile flooded
  and left the flooded farm lands covered with rich
  silt.

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• The people of the Nile River valley developed a
  system of writing by 3000 B.C.E. HIEROGLYPHICS
• The Egyptians learned how to make a form of paper
  from the papyrus plant.

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• The ability to read the hieroglyphics of the
  Egyptians was lost after the fall of Rome in the
  early centuries C.E.
• It was not until the 1820s when French linguist
  Jean Francois CHAMPOLLION used the ROSETTA STONE
  to decipher Egyptian hieroglyphics.

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• Rosetta Stone

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• Early Egyptian city states developed along the
  Nile.
• The region was divided into
• Upper Egypt
• Lower Egypt near the Nile DELTA

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• These city-states were unified by the king
  PHARAOH Menes ca. 3200 B.C.E.
• Upper and Lower Egypt became one kingdom.

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ca. 2650 B.C.E 2180 B.C.E.

• Ancient Egyptian history is divided into
• Old Kingdom the land was ruled by the pharaohs
  who were thought to be gods on earth. Royal
  families DYNASTY ruled from generation to
  generation.

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ca. 2040 B.C.E. 1760 B.C.E.

• The Middle Kingdom
• This period saw the dramatic growth of Egyptian
  culture, art and architecture.
• Literature also flourished
• The Middle Kingdom ended when nobles, priests,
  and invaders fought for power.

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Ancient Egyptian Society and Culture

• The Nile was the source of all life in Egypt.
• Water from the Nile was diverted into irrigation
  ditches for farming
• Wheat
• Barley
• Flax

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• Surplus grain was sold throughout the
  Mediterranean Sea and into Africa and Asia
• Egypt grew well known, rich and powerful

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The Pyramids Tombs for the Dead
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Imhotep the Great Pyramid Builder
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The Sphinx
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• Egypt prospered in large part because of its
• advanced education
• Bureaucracy
• Literacy

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Egyptian Religion - Ra

• Man with hawk head and headdress with a sun disk
• Ra was the sun god. He was the most important
  god of the ancient Egyptians. The ancient
  Egyptians believed that Ra was swallowed every
  night by the sky goddess Nut, and was reborn
  every morning.

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Osiris

• A mummified man wearing a white cone-like
  headdress with feathers
• Osiris was the god of the dead, and ruler of the
  underworld. Osiris was the brother/husband of
  Isis, and the brother of Nepthys and Seth. He was
  also the father of Horus.
• As well as being a god of the dead, Osiris was a
  god of resurrection and fertility. In fact, the
  ancient Egyptians believed that Osiris gave them
  the gift of barley, one of their most important
  crops.

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Seth

• Man with the head of a 'Seth animal'
  (unidentifiable)
• Seth was the god of chaos. Seth represented
  everything that threatened harmony in Egypt.
• He was the brother of Osiris and Isis, as well as
  the brother/husband of Nepthys. He murdered his
  brother Osiris, then battled with his nephew
  Horus to be the ruler of the living.
• At certain times in the history of ancient Egypt,
  Seth was associated with royalty.

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Isis

• Woman with headdress in the shape of a throne
• A pair of cow horns with a sun disk
• Isis was a protective goddess. She used powerful
  magic spells to help people in need. Isis was the
  wife of Osiris and the mother of Horus.
• Since each pharaoh was considered the 'living
  Horus', Isis was very important.

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Anubis

• Man with a jackal head
• A jackal
• Anubis was the god of embalming and the dead.
  Since jackals were often seen in cemeteries, the
  ancient Egyptians believed that Anubis watched
  over the dead.
• Anubis was the god who helped to embalm Osiris
  after he was killed by Seth. Thus, Anubis was the
  god who watched over the process of mummifying
  people when they died.
• Priests often wore a mask of Anubis during
  mummification ceremonies.

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Horus

• The ancient Egyptians had many different beliefs
  about the god Horus. One of the most common
  beliefs was that Horus was the son of Isis and
  Osiris.
• After Osiris was murdered by his brother Seth,
  Horus fought with Seth for the throne of Egypt.
• In this battle, Horus lost one of his eyes. The
  eye was restored to him and it became a symbol of
  protection for the ancient Egyptians. After this
  battle, Horus was chosen to be the ruler of the
  world of the living.

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The Eye of Horus
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Sun-Resurrection-Mummification
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The Invasion of the Hyksos

• A Semitic people known as the Hyksos moved into
  the Nile Delta ca. 1700 B.C.E.
• The Hyksos brought with them knowledge of bronze
  weapons and the horse drawn chariot.
• By 1650 B.C.E. the Hyksos had overthrown the
  Egyptian pharaoh and established themselves as
  pharaohs over Egypt.

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• The Hyksos never were able to rule all of Egypt
• The Middle Egypt was ruled by Egyptians who paid
  TRIBUTE to the Hyksos
• Upper Egypt was controlled by the people of Nubia
  who often fought the Hyksos
• Eventually, the Egyptians under the leadership of
  pharaoh AHMOSE rose up and expelled the Hyksos
  ca. 1570 B.C.E.

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The New Kingdom

• With the Hyksos gone the Egyptians rebuilt
  their kingdom and sought to expand their power
  beyond the Nile River Valley.
• The period of the New Kingdom saw pharonic Egypt
  at its zenith.

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Hatshepsut the Female Pharaoh

• When the pharaoh THUTMOSE II died his sister
  and wife HATSHEPSUT assumed power because the
  heir Thuthmose III was too young.
• Hatshepsut expanded the power and trade of Egypt.
• After her death, Thuthmose III tried to erase her
  name from history denying her an after-life.

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Akhenaton Religious Revolution and Upheaval

• Ca. 1380 B.C.E. the new pharaoh AMENHOTEP IV
  changed Egyptian religion.
• He stated that there was only one god the sun
  god ATON
• He even changed his name to AKHENATON pleasing
  to Aton

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• The rule of the pharaohs and the strength of
  Egyptian society and culture was the complex
  Egyptian religion.
• When Akhenaton overthrew the gods and their
  priests Egypt was in chaos.

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• Akhenatons successor the boy king Tutankhaten
  restored the old religion and the power of the
  priests.
• He renamed himself - TUTANKHAMEN

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• Over time, the New Kingdom came under attack
• The Hittites Indo-Europeans from Asia Minor
• The Hittites were masters of iron tools and
  weapons

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• Sea Peoples attacked the Nile Delta and ruined
  Egyptian sea trade.
• Libyans from the west also attacked weakening
  the power of the pharaohs.

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The Nubian Dynasty

• The people of Nubia the Kingdom of Kush began
  to take more and more control of southern Egypt.
• By 730 B.C.E the Nubian Dynasty took control of
  all of Egypt.
• By 671 B.C.E, however, even the Nubians were
  defeated by new invaders retreating to Kush.

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• Egypt was ruined by invaders and internal
  weakness.
• ca. 500 B.C.E. the Persians took control of the
  Nile River Valley
• ca. 323 B.C.E the young Greek king Alexander
  the Great conquered Egypt and made it part of
  his vast empire.

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Kush-Axum

•    The Aksumites were a people formed from the
  mix of Kushitic speaking people in Ethiopia and
  Semitic speaking people in southern Arabia who
  settled the territory across the Red Sea around
  500 BC. The Aksumites lived in the Ethiopian
  highlands near the Red Sea, and so enjoyed a
  strategic position in the trade routes between
  Yemen (in the south of the Arabian peninsula) and
  the cities of Nubia. They spoke a strongly
  Semitic language and wrote in Semitic characters
  Ethiopia, in fact, has one of the longest
  continuous literate traditions in Africa.   We
  know very little about the early Axumite kingdom.
  Roman and Greek sources indicate that an Axumite
  kingdom was thriving in the first century AD the
  city of Adulis is frequently mentioned because it
  had become one of the most important port cities
  in Africa. .

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•   Aksum lay dead in the path of the growing
  commercial trade routes between Africa, Arabia,
  and India. As a result, it became fabulously
  wealthy and its major cities, Adulis, Aksum, and
  Matara, became three of the most important
  cosmopolitan centers in the ancient world.
  Although they were off the beaten path as far as
  European history is concerned, they were just as
  cosmopolitan and culturally important in that
  they served as a crossroads to a variety of
  cultures Egyptian, Sudanic, Arabic, Middle
  Eastern, and Indian. Perhaps an indication of
  this cosmopolitan character can be found in the
  fact that the major Aksumite cities had Jewish,
  Nubian, Christian, and even Buddhist minorities.
     In the second century AD, Aksum acquired
  tribute states on the Arabian Peninsula across
  the Red Sea, conquered northern Ethiopia, and
  then finally conquered Kush. The downfall of the
  Nubian powers led to the meteoric rise of
  Aksumite imperial power. The Aksumites controlled
  one of the most important trade routes in the
  world and occupied one of the most fertile
  regions in the world.    The Aksumite religion
  was actually derived from Arabic religion. It was
  a polytheistic religion which believed that the
  gods controlled the natural forces of the
  universe. However, in the fourth century, Ezana,
  who was a folllower of Axumite religion,
  converted to Christianity under the tutelage of a
  Syrian bishop named Frumentius. Ezana declared
  Axum to be a Christian state , thus making it the
  first Christian state in the history of the
  world, and began actively converting the
  population to Christianity.

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•    Ethiopian Christianity was slightly
  different from its Greek origins. Under the
  influence of Egyptian Christians, the Axumites
  believed that Christ had a single rather than a
  double nature (man and god) this is called
  Monophysite (monosingle, physisnature)
  Christianity and was considered heretical in the
  European churches. In the fifth century AD, the
  Axumites replaced Greek in the liturgy and began
  using their own native language, Ge'ez. Finally,
  because of their Semitic origins, the Ethiopians
  believed that they were descendants of the
  Hebrews, who were also Semitic. They traced their
  origins all the way back to David. So the
  Ethiopians, unlike other Christians, really saw
  themselves as inheriting the covenants that
  Yahweh entered into with his chosen people (as a
  side note, the Ethiopic Church claims to have the
  Ark of the Covenant which is the chest in which
  the Decalogue was kept by the Hebrews).   

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•    Axum remained a strong empire and trading
  power until the rise of Islam in the seventh
  century AD. However, because the Axumites had
  sheltered Muhammed's first followers, the Muslims
  never attempted to overthrow Axum as they spread
  across the face of Africa. Even though Axum no
  longer served as a center or hub of international
  trade, it nonetheless enjoyed good relations with
  all of its Muslim neighbors. Two Christian states
  north of Axum, Maqurra and Alwa, survived until
  the thirteenth century when they were finally
  forced by Muslim migration to become Islamic.
  Axum, however, remained untouched by the Islamic
  movements across Africa. Because of this, the
  Ethiopic (or Abyssinian) Church has lasted until
  the present day. It is still a Monophysite church
  and its scriptures and liturgy are still in
  Ge'ez.

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African Christianity

• Copts term given to Egyptian Christians
  Coptic Church
• By the 3rd centuiry C.E. Coptic Christians made
  up a majority of Egyptians.
• The Church at Alexandria was the oldest in Africa
  and one of the churches of the PENTARCHY.

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Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church

• The church in Ethiopia has many similarities to
  Judaism food prohibitions, separation of the
  sexes in church, Saturday Sabbath, and removal of
  shoes in church similar to Muslims.