The Age of the Gods

VII. The Archaic Culture in Egypt and the Development of the Great State

103 vii The Archaic Culture in Egypt and the Development of the Great State i. the nile valley and its prehistoric cultures Vast as is the importance of Mesopotamia for the development of ancient civilisation, it does not stand alone. No less imposing and original is the creative genius of the egyptian culture, and even if the latter was, as we have suggested, indebted to the fertilising influence of asiatic civilisation, it nevertheless preserved its originality and its ancient indigenous culture-tradition. It is, in fact, in egypt that it is possible to trace back the continuous history of civilisation farther than anywhere else. owing to the dryness of the climate a far larger mass of archæological evidence has been preserved, and owing to the rapid achievement of political unity the beginnings of an historical tradition are exceptionally early and reliable. The land of egypt seems predestined by nature for the development of a unique civilisation. Nowhere else in the world are the natural conditions so simple and uniform, and the resources of the whole land so amenable to human control, and nowhere is there so abrupt a contrast between the intense fertility of the inhabited area and the utter desolation of the surrounding deserts. for egypt is the creation of a single river, which gives unity and life to the whole country, and human existence is absolutely dependent on the fertilising water of the annual inundation. from the point at which the Nile leaves the open plains of the sudan to traverse the high lands of North-eastern africa, its course lies in a narrow channel bounded on either side by the precipitous walls 104 The Age of the Gods of the desert plateau until it reaches the delta. as long as the river cuts its way through the sandstone and harder primary formations of Nubia , the valley is little more than a ravine, and the course of the stream is interrupted by frequent cataracts. south of assuan, however, it enters a softer limestone formation and the valley widens sufficiently to sustain a considerable population. finally, below Cairo the walls of the valley disappear and the river enters the wide alluvial plain of the delta. Thus the land falls into two distinct parts—the narrow rainless valley of Upper egypt, with its desert climate, and the broad fertile delta, which enjoys the winter rains and more temperate conditions of the Mediterranean countries. These are “The Two Lands” which nominally preserved their separate identity throughout the historical period . The centre of gravity of Lower egypt lies in the North-western delta, the region of sais and Buto, and later of alexandria, the capital of all egypt during the period of greek and Roman dominance. on the other hand, the centre of Upper egypt lies far to the south in the region of the Thebaid, and it is here that the capital was situated—at hierakonpolis or at This or at Thebes itself—in periods when the national Nilotic tradition was strongest. at other times, however, when neither Upper egypt nor the delta is predominant, the whole country finds its natural centre at the junction of the delta and the Upper Valley, the region of Memphis and Cairo. In spite of its great length, the habitable region is very restricted, indeed its total area is less than that of Belgium, and of this more than half lies in the delta. owing to natural conditions, practically the whole of the archæological evidence is derived from the upper valley between Cairo and the cataracts, which we are apt to regard as almost identical with ancient egypt; but it is important to remember that the richest, the most populous, and perhaps even the most civilised part of the country has always lain in the delta, though all material record of it is irretrievably lost. In prehistoric times, however, the face of the land was entirely different . The valley was a swampy jungle, the haunt of the hippopotamus and the crocodile, such as is now found only far south in the Bahr el ghazel, and the desert plateau was a grassy steppe, teeming with game, and capable of supporting a population of hunters whose palæolithic implements are still scattered plentifully over its surface. The first peo- Archaic Culture in Egypt 105 ple of the higher culture to enter the country seem to have come from the north, perhaps from asia...