LmmiTCiti.— Robinson, BRP U. 49 ; Porter, Giant Citiei of Bathan, 808 ; PBF St (1895), 166 ; BUm, A Hound qf ilany CUitt (IBM), Ui. A. HkNDEBSOM.
EGYPT.-
L Name.
li. Physical ohirTtw, UL Fauna. It. Flora.
▼. Ethnology, t1 Lan^a^. TiL Chronology, tUL History.
Ix. Relations with Asia.
s. Religion.
L Name. — The name by which the Egyptians at all times designated their country was Ktinc< (Copt. KHMC. xutfi ), a word of which the prob.ible etymology — root km 'black' — would confirm the statements of Herodotus and Plutarcli, who con- nect it with the dark colour of tlie soil. The contrasting redness of the neighbouring desert sand gave to that the name of ' tlie Red Land.' It is phonetically impossible to connect Ktme< with tne name Ham (ori). To the Semites the country was known as Alizraira (onp, seldom iW?, MfOTpaf/i, fiUaapaifi), the termination here being no doubt locative and not a dual. The older cunei- form texts vocalize Mujr, the later Mi?r ; tlio Amama letters have generally Mijrl, pi.' For this word a favourite though undeiiionstrable derivation is that from ^'ls? ' fort.' The (ireek name Afyi'irTof (Arab. fCibt, Eth. Gchf, and European Copt) is of equally obscure origin. It cannot be satisfactorily derived from any Egyptian or Semitic word or combination of words. In the earliest Greek writers (Odyssey generally) it is the name of the river, for which NeiXot (cf. 7nj, -irij ?) is first found in Hesiod. In the later epoclis and in poetical texts we meet with many other names for Egypt. Of such V mri is among the most frequent, ann seems connected specially with Lower r'gj'pt and the inundation. ' The Land of the Sycamore,' 'of the Olive,' 'of the Sacred Eye,' are names whicli require for their explanation a greater knowledge of the geogra[)hical myths than we possess.
ii. Physical Character. — The geological con-
• Aooordinft to W. Max Muller (Z. Au. v\\l. 200), Mn?ru, whence Shalmaiioscr ii. received prcRonts. was Ej^ypt. nol a N. Syrian or Annrnian diatrii t (Winckler, Iloiiinicl, etc.). Winckler has suj^j^estcd {Alt. For. 24 (T.) that another Klufri, which he locates in J-^Iom or Sinai, may have been the real ori^n of the Kxodtis tradition, renilniscences of wandcringv in that district havitits' ffot confused with the name of ICL'-j'^it. In 8. Arabian Inscriptions this Miisri and K^>-pt are di<ttit)gutshed ■a pxD and "ViD (dommel In FutKhriftf. Eben, 27).
__'pt U
are three — the bed of rock (limestone for the most part, with sandstone and granite in the S.), which stretches across the N.E. corner of Africa j then the sand which lies upon this, and extends from the Arabian desert bills on the E. to the Libyan range on the W. ; lastly, the black Nile mud, resting upon the sand in the centre of the valley, and foriiung the highroad for the great stream on which the prosperity of the country de{ieiid8. The number and dimensions of the buildings erected at aU periods gave a high import- ance to the geological elements of the countrj-. The limestone obtained near Memphis (Turrali) furnished the material for the principal works of the early periods. The great temples hi"her up the valley, especially those of Thebes, are built of sandstone, conveniently obtainable at Silsileh. Red granite for statues, sarcophagi, etc., was worked at the first Cataract (Aswftn) ; black granite and diorite for similar purposes came from the eastern desert (Ilamni.'iniat). Alabaster, a favourite material, usually for smaller objects, was quarried opposite Dahshflr, or (a better quality) at Htnb, near Beni-Uasan, whence it was extracted under the earliest Dynasties. In metals the Nile valley itself is poor; those most valued come from abroad, — gold in plenty from Nubia or the eastern desert ; silver, which was rarer, probably from Cilicia ; copper from Sinai, later also from Cyprus ; malachite and lapis lazuli from Sin.ai and Mesopotamia. Bronze, familiar during all later epochs, was made with tin, the provenance of which is uncertain, but which was already used under the Gth Dynasty. Nor can we tell whence iron, well known at any rate from about 800 B.C., was obtained, though a limited amount could be got from the western desert.
The course of the Nile through Nubia is hindered by a succession of rocky barriers, the last or northernmost of which— the first Cataract — has often been the political as it is the natural frontier of Egypt. Between the Cataracts and the Delta the country is of a very uniform character. The valley is extensive or narrow as the two hill-ranges recede from or approach the stream. Its breadth varies from about nine to four miles. As the river progresses northward, the hills gradually fall back and the valley expands into the plain of the Delta, across which the river makes its way by various channels to the Mediterranean. Although the surface-denudation recognizable at certain points of the river's course and the petrified forests still extant testify to very diU'erent climatic condi- tions at a remote geological period, it is unlikely that during the five or six thousand )'ear8 of historic Egypt there has been much change in the aspect of the country. By the opening of that period the valley had been dried, the river-bed raised, and the stream's course fixed practically to its actual extent, though the number of its inoutlis was greater than it is to-d;vy.