Some questions we can now answer from our trip and from a textbook about Egypt:
Page by Emma
Question: Answer:
-How did geography impact ancient Egyptians?
Well, while me and Elaine were in Egypt, we asked around about how the spot for building Egypt was chosen. I (Emma) challenged myself to write a paragraph about Egyptian Geography. Click the button below to access my paragraph!
-How did the development of ancient Egypt help agriculture develop?
The Nile River Painting
- Why was the Nile River important to the ancient Egyptians?
Me and Elaine found out this: Egyptians migrated and moved to a place where it was divine for farming, but that was kind of hard to farm in a desert, so they settled by the Nile River. There they found ways to grow crops alone the Nile with the river’s way of giving silt by flooding over onto the land. After the floods died down, there was a mineral called silt that was left to make exceptional farming soil. Once the Egyptians harnessed ways to control the silt for their agricultural needs, they made lots of farming fields for crops. The found ways to plant seeds and ways to make fertile soil.
The Egyptians needed a water source like the Nile for growing crops and catching fish, as well as for freshwater to drink and bathe in. Without the Nile River, Egyptians wouldn’t have a way to grow crops and have water for drinking and bathing. There would be dirty, thirsty people without much food. The Nile was a very respected thing in Egyptian culture and it was praised as it was the “creator of all good”. The Egyptians even wrote a hymn (a song or poem) to the Nile for all that it did in their lives.
The Nile River when flooded
-How were the Egyptians protected by their physical environment?
-How did the flooding of the Nile affect the ancient Egyptians?
"HYMN TO THE NILE"
ADORATION to the NILE!
Hail to thee, O NILE!
who manifesteth thyself over this land,
and comest to give life to EGYPT!
Mysterious is thy issuing forth from the darkness,
on this day whereon it is celebrated!
Watering the orchards created by RA
to cause all the cattle to live,
thou givest the earth to drink, inexhaustible one!
Path that descendest from the sky,
loving the bread of SEB and the firstfruits of NEPERA,
thou causest the workshops of PTAH to prosper!
Well, in the maps above/below, you can see that there was a list of things that helped protect Egypt from the geography. Those things are the Red Sea, the Mediterranean Sea, the Sinai, the Eastern Desert, the Western Desert, and the marsh lands around the Nile. All of them helped protect Egypt by making it hard for invaders to get through, making it a long trip if invaders where to sail through one of the seas, etc. Egypt picked a great spot to make their civilization because it was mostly isolated.
The flooding of the Nile was beneficial to the Egyptians and tough to work with at the same time. The Nile flooded and took out current crops and sometimes even floated away or abducted houses and farm animals, which wasn’t good. On the other hand, When the river went down, it left a mineral called silt that made the soil it landed on rich and amazing for growing crops in. It also gave drinking water, fish, and a place to bathe. Overall, the river was an exceptional part of Egyptian life, even when there were some downsides for living close to it.
Click the notebook to read the WHOLE "Hymn To The Nile"
Map of Ancient Egypt Map of Recources in Egypt
