Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 09:08, 14 April 2006

Part of a series on the
History of Egypt
Prehistoric Egypt Paleolithic 300,000–17,000 BC Mesolithic 17,000–9000 BC Predynastic Period 6000–3000 BC
Ancient Egypt Early Dynastic Period 3150–2686 BC Old Kingdom 2686–2181 BC 1st Intermediate Period 2181–2055 BC Middle Kingdom 2055–1650 BC 2nd Intermediate Period 1650–1550 BC New Kingdom 1550–1069 BC 3rd Intermediate Period 1069–664 BC Late Period 664–332 BC
Greco-Roman Egypt Argead dynasty 332–310 BC Ptolemaic dynasties 310–30 BC Roman and Byzantine Egypt 30 BC–641 AD Sasanian Egypt 619–629
Medieval Egypt Rashidun caliphate 641–661 Umayyad caliphate 661–750 Abbasid dynasty 750–935 Tulunid dynasty 868–905 Ikhshidid dynasty 935–969 Fatimid dynasty 969–1171 Ayyubid dynasty 1171–1250 Mamluk dynasty 1250–1517
Early modern Egypt Ottoman Egypt 1517–1867 French occupation 1798–1801 Muhammad Ali dynasty 1805–1953 Khedivate of Egypt 1867–1914
Late Modern Egypt British occupation 1882–1922 Sultanate of Egypt 1914–1922 Kingdom of Egypt 1922–1953 Republic 1953–present
Egypt portal
v t e

The history of Egypt is the longest continuous history, as a unified state, of any country in the world. The Nile valley forms a natural geographic and economic unit, bounded to the east and west by deserts, to the north by the sea and to the south by the Cataracts of the Nile. The need to have a single authority to manage the waters of the Nile led to the creation of the world's first state in Egypt in about 3000 BC. Egypt's peculiar geography made it a difficult country to attack, which is why Pharaonic Egypt was for so long an independent and self-contained state.

Once Egypt did succumb to foreign rule, however, it proved unable to escape from it, and for 2,300 years Egypt was governed by foreigners: Assyrians, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Turks, French, and British. When Gamal Abdel Nasser (President of Egypt 1954–1970) remarked that he was the first native Egyptian to exercise sovereign power in the country since Pharaoh Nectanebo II, deposed by the Persians in 343 BC, he was only exaggerating slightly.

In this encyclopedia, Egyptian history has been divided into seven periods:

• History of ancient Egypt: 3000 BC to 525 BC
• History of Egypt under Achaemenid Persian Domination: 525 BC to 332 BC
• History of Greek and Roman Egypt: 332 BC to AD 639
• History of early Arab Egypt: 639 to 1517
• History of Ottoman Egypt: 1517 to 1805
• Egypt under Muhammad Ali and his successors: 1805 to 1882
• History of Modern Egypt: since 1882

See also

• Aegyptus
• Ancient Egypt
• Egyptian mythology
• History of Africa
• History of the Middle East
• Pharaoh

External links

• Modern Egypt Chronology World History Database
• Egypt.. the past and the present
• WWW-VL: History: Ancient Egypt

• Ancient Egypt
• History of Egypt
• History of the Middle East