Контрольный тест по истории — «Древний Египет» 5 класс

Контрольный тест по теме: «Древний Египет»

Вариант I

1. Древняя столица Древнего Египта:

А) Мемфис;

Б) Фивы;

В) Мегиддо;

Г) Нил.

2. Служители богов и хранители знаний в Древнем Египте:

А) священники; В) жрецы;

Б) фараоны; Г) писцы.

3. Драгоценный металл, ценившийся в Египте дороже золота:

А) железо; В) бронза;

Б) серебро; Г) олово.

4. Предмет, защищавший, по мнению египтян, человека от злых духов:

А) амулет; В) сфинкс;

Б) рельеф; Г) саркофаг.

5. О ком в Египте говорили: «сын бога», «великий бог», «Он солнце, видящий лучами своими»:

А) о жреце;

Б) о фараоне;

В) о Ниле;

Г) о труженике.

6. Колесничим в Древнем Египте мог стать только:

А) наёмный воин В) знатный человек

Б) слуга знатного человека Г) раб-пленник

7. Верно ли следующее суждение:

Древний Египет — это страна, которая располагалась на берегах Нила от первого порога до Средиземного моря.

А) верно Б) неверно

8. Бог – покровитель фараонов:

А) Осирис;

Б) Амон-Ра;

В) Гор;

Г) Тутмос.

9. Соотнесите термины и определения.

1) сфинкс; 2) храм; 3) Осирис

А) фараон и судья в царстве мёртвых; Б) существо с телом льва и головой человека; В) жилище богов

10. Соотнесите имена египетских богов с названиями священных животных, которые их символизировали.

1) Анубис; 2) Гор; 3) Нут; 4) Тот; 5) Бастет.

а) Корова; б) ибис; в) кошка; г) шакал; д) сокол.

Контрольный тест по теме: «Древний Египет»

Вариант II

1. Река, дающая жизнь Египту:

А) Тигр;

Б) Евфрат;

В) Нил;

Г) Тибр.

2. Жилище богов:

А) жрец; В) мавзолей;

Б) храм; Г) церковь.

3. Наука о планетах и звездах, особо почитаемая в Древнем Египте:

А) археология; В) астрономия;

Б) антропология; Г) космонавтика

4. Боевые колесницы

А) стоили дорого, принадлежали лишь знатным египтянам

Б) обычно применялись в самом начале сражения

В) были единственным родом войск в Египте

Г) имелись у всех египтян ( и бедных, и богатых)

5. Служащие в Древнем Египте, собиравшие налоги:

А) жрецы В) вельможи

Б) писцы Г) фараоны

6. «Священные письмена» — это

А) изображение суда Осириса

Б) иероглифы-знаки древнеегипетского письма

В) изображение древнеегипетских богов

Г) мифы о древнеегипетских богах

7. Верно ли следующее суждение:

Египетское государство возникло примерно за 3 тысячи лет до н.э в результате объединения Южного и Северного Египта

А) верно Б) неверно

8. Самая высокая пирамида была построена по приказу фараона

А) Тутанхамона В) Эхнатона

Б) Тутмоса Г) Хеопса

9. Соотнесите термины и определения.

1) Фараон; 2) жрец; 3) пирамида; 4) миф.

А) Служитель бога; Б) повелитель Египта; В) сказание о богах; Г) гробница египетских фараонов.

10. Соотнесите имена богов и их функции.

1) Амон; 2) Маат; 3) Бастет; 4) Нут; 5) Исида

А) богиня правды ; Б) богиня неба ; В) бог Солнца ; Г) богиня-защитница жён и матерей ; Д) покровительница женщин и их красоты

Тест по истории Древний Египет 5 класс

Итоговая контрольная работа к главе «Древний Египет»

5 класс

Учитель: Суворова Анастасия Ивановна

1 вариант

1. В Древнем Египте сыном бога Амона называли:

а) начальника работ по строительству пирамид

б) фараона

в) путешественника, отправившегося в Нубию

г) сборщика налогов

2. Кто в Древнем Египте мог построить себе гробницу?

а) гончар

б) земледелец

в) «носитель царских сандалий»

г) раб знатного человека

3. Столицей Древнего Египта при фараоне Тутмосе был город

а) Кадеш

б) Мемфис

в) Фивы

г) Мегиддо

4. Какое из перечисленных событий произошло раньше остальных?

а) поход фараона Тутмоса на Мегиддо

б) объединение Египта

в) строительство пирамиды фараона Хеопса

г) правление фараона Эхнатона

5. Кто из перечисленных не входил в состав населения Древнего Египта?

а) вожди племен д) земледельцы

б) ремесленники е) воины

в) писцы ж) рабы-пленники

г) фараон з) вельможи

6. Установите соответствие между понятиями и их определениями. Получившуюся последовательность цифр запишите в таблицу.

А) бог 1) гроб, украшенный рисунками и надписями

Б) колонна 2) повелитель людей и природы

В) саркофаг 3) гробница фараона

Г) пирамида 4) высокий столб-опора в здании

7. Какой древнеегипетский миф объясняет смену дня и ночи?

а) об Осирисе и Исиде

б) о «стране мёртвых»

в) об Амоне и Апопе

г) о Гебе и Нут

8. «Священные письмена»- это

а) изображение суда Осириса

б) иероглифы- знаки древнеегипетского письма

в) изображение древнеегипетских богов

г) мифы о древнеегипетских письменах

Итоговая контрольная работа к главе «Древний Египет»

5 класс

Учитель: Суворова Анастасия Ивановна

2 вариант

1. Когда мог появиться титул «Царь Южного и Северного Египта»?

а) 2 тыс. лет до н.э.

б) 3 тыс. лет до н.э.

в) 5 тыс. лет до н.э.

г) 6 тыс. лет до н.э.

2. Основа богатства и процветания Древнего Египта- это

а) земледелие

б) скотоводство

в) ремёсла

г) торговля

3. Что из перечисленного не является особенностью древнеегипетского письма?

а) одним и тем же иероглифом могло обозначаться целое слово или один согласный звук

б) один значок мог обозначать несколько согласных звуков

в) перед словом ставился значок-определитель, который подсказывал смысл слова

г) каждый гласный звук передавался отдельным иероглифом

4. Свои самые крупные завоевания фараон Тутмос совершил

а) около 1430 года до н.э.

б) около 1500 года до н.э.

в) около 1580 года до н.э.

г) около 1600 года до н.э.

5. Что явилось результатом победы царя Южного Египта над правителем Северного Египта в 3000 году до н.э.?

а) возникновение иероглифической письменности

б) строительство пирамиды Хеопса

в) объединение Египта

г) появление повести о приключениях Синухета

6. Установите соответствие между понятиями и их определениями. Получившуюся последовательность цифр запишите в таблицу.

А) храм 1) служитель богов

Б) обелиск 2) высокий остроконечный каменный столб

В) жрец 3) скульптура с телом льва и головой человека

Г) сфинкс 4) жилище богов

7. Самая высокая пирамида была выстроена по приказу фараона

а) Тутанхамона

б) Тутмоса

в) Эхнатона

г) Хеопса

8. «Священные письмена»- это

а) изображение суда Осириса

б) иероглифы- знаки древнеегипетского письма

в) изображение древнеегипетских богов

г) мифы о древнеегипетских письменах

90000 BBC — History — Ancient History in depth: Ancient Egypt and the Modern World 90001 90002 A popular subject 90003 90004 Five thousand years ago the chain of independent city-states lining the River Nile united to form one long, thin country ruled by one king, or pharaoh. Almost instantly a highly distinctive culture developed. For almost 30 centuries Egypt remained the foremost nation in the Mediterranean world. Then, in 332 BC, the arrival of Alexander the Great heralded the end of the Egyptian way of life.90005 90004 The unique culture was quickly buried beneath successive layers of Greek, Roman and Arabic tradition, and all knowledge of Egypt’s glorious past was lost. Only the decaying stone monuments, their hieroglyphic texts now unreadable, survived as silent witnesses to a long lost civilisation. 90005 90004 Some 2,000 years on, however, the ancient hieroglyphs have been decoded and Egyptology — the study of ancient Egypt — is booming. At a time when Latin and ancient Greek are rapidly vanishing from the school curriculum, more and more people are choosing to read hieroglyphs in their spare time.And the Egyptian galleries of our museums are packed with visitors, while the galleries dedicated to other ancient cultures remain empty. 90005 90004 To emphasise the point, University Egyptology courses are full to bursting, and night school classes are attracting increasing numbers of people happy to spend their leisure hours studying the far distant past. This obvious interest has become self-fulfilling. Publishers and television producers are happy to invest in ancient Egypt because they know that there will be an appreciative audience for their work, and every new book, each new programme, attracts more devotees to the subject.90005 90004 All ancient civilisations have contributed in some way to the development of modern society. All therefore are equally deserving of study. Why then do so many people choose to concentrate on Egypt? What does the culture of ancient Egypt offer the modern world that other cultures — those of Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley, or China — do not? 90005 90004 Those who have been bitten by the Egyptology bug cite a variety of reasons for their addiction — the beauty of the art, the skill of the craftsmen, the intricacies of the language, the certainties of the priests — or even a vague, indefinable feeling that the Egyptians came as close as is humanly possible to living a near-perfect life.Individually these would all be good reasons to study any ancient civilisation. Combined, and tinged with the glamour bestowed by some of the world’s most flamboyant archaeologists, they make an irresistible package. 90005 90002 Preservation 90003 90004 90019 The Nile, and the rich land on either side of it © Egypt’s rich material legacy is the result of her unique funerary beliefs, which, combined with her distinctive geography, encouraged the preservation of archaeological material.The River Nile flows northwards through the centre of Egypt, bringing much needed water to an otherwise arid part of north-east Africa. 90005 90004 Their total dependence on the River Nile as a source of water and a means of transport had a deep impact on the way that the Egyptians saw the world. Their sun god, the falcon-headed Re, did not cross the heavens in a flaming chariot, he sailed sedately in a solar boat. 90005 90004 Parallel to the Nile on both banks of the river runs the Black Land — the narrow strip of fertile soil that allowed the Egyptians to practice the most efficient agriculture in the ancient world.Beyond the Black Land lies the inhospitable Red Land, the desert that once served as a vast cemetery, and beyond the Red Land are the cliffs that protected Egypt from unwelcome visitors. 90005 90004 Believing that the soul could live beyond death, the Egyptians buried their dead in the Red Land, with all the goods they considered they would need in what they thought of as the ‘afterlife’. While their mud-brick houses have dissolved and their stone temples have decayed, their desert tombs have survived relatively intact, the dry conditions encouraging the preservation of such delicate materials as plaster, wood, papyrus, cloth, leather and skin.90005 90004 This wealth of objects, of course, creates a highly biased collection of artefacts. The lives and possessions of the poor are under-represented, and we can never be certain that the goods so carefully provided for the dead were representative of the goods used in daily life. Nevertheless, the contents of Egypt’s tombs, supplemented by the illustrations on the tomb walls, have allowed specialists to develop a greater understanding of Egyptian material technology than of any other ancient civilisation.90005 90002 Pyramids and mathematics 90003 90004 90032 The Great Pyramid, on the Giza plateau © Egypt’s magnificent stone buildings — her pyramids and temples — have inspired innumerable artists, writers, poets and architects from the Roman period to the present day. The pyramid form, in particular, still pays an important role in modern architecture, and can be seen rising above cemeteries and innumerable shopping centres, and at the new entrance to the Louvre Museum, Paris.90005 90004 The original pyramids serve as a testament to the mathematical skill of the Egyptians, a skill that stimulated Greek mathematicians, including Pythagoras, to perfect their work. The Great Pyramid, built by Khufu (Cheops) in 2550 BC, for example, stands an impressive 46m (150ft) high, with a slope of 51degrees. Its sides, with an average length of 230m (754ft), vary by less than 5cm (2in). Higher than St Paul’s Cathedral, the pyramid was aligned with amazing accuracy almost exactly to true north.90005 90004 But the pyramids are more than mathematical puzzles. They hold the key to understanding the structure of Egyptian society. The pyramids were built, not by the gangs of slaves often portrayed by Hollywood film moguls, but by a workforce of up to 5,000 permanent employees, supplemented by as many as 20,000 temporary workers, who would work for three or four months on the pyramid site , before returning home. 90005 90004 The bureaucracy that we know lay behind this operation is staggering.Not only did the workforce have to be summoned, housed and fed, but administrators also had to coordinate the supplies of stone, rope, fuel and wood that were needed to support the building work. Pyramid studies confirm that a pre-mechanical society can, given adequate resources and the will to succeed, achieve great things. Pyramid building would have been impossible without strong government backed up by an efficient civil service. No wonder many archaeologists believe that, while the Egyptians undeniably built the pyramids, the pyramids also built Egypt.90005 .90000 Grade 5 — Term 3: An ancient African society: Egypt 90001 90002 90003 The Nile river and its influence on settlement 90004 90005 90002 90003 The tomb of Tutankhamen 90004 90005 90002 90003 Way of life in ancient Egypt 90004 90005 90002 90003 The spread of Egypt’s knowledge 90004 90005 90002 Together we will learn about the way of life in ancient Egyptian society. The development of the Egyptian civilization is traced from the beginning of the settlement at the Nile river through to the uniting of Upper and Lower Egypt under one Pharaoh.90005 90002 We learn about their beliefs and religion and the important structures that still stand in Egypt today. We also outline the contribution that ancient Egyptians have made to the development of writing, mathematics and medicine. The mysteries of the tomb of Tutankhamen is also discussed in this topic. 90005 90002 90003 The Nile river and its influence on settlement 90004 ↵ 90005 90026 ‘Not only is the Egyptian climate peculiar to that country, and the Nile different in the way it behaves from rivers elsewhere, but the manners and customs of the Egyptians themselves seem to be the opposite of the typical practices of mankind’.- Herodotus. 90027 90028 90029 90030 90031 90032 90033 90034 90035 90030 90031 90003 An introduction to ancient Egypt. Source 90004 90034 90035 90042 90043 90002 When Herodotus, the ancient Greek historian, wrote these words, Egyptian civilization had been going successfully for thousands of years without foreign interference. These unusual people, thanks to the uniquely protective Nile River Valley, had the opportunity to develop differently from Europe and the East.Long periods of isolated growth without foreign invasion occurred because Egypt had natural borders that were impossible, or very difficult to cross. 90005 90002 So immense is the significance of the Nile River to the development of Egyptian civilization, that we can not separate the history of Egypt from its geography and other natural aspects. The Nile was very important as a communication and trade route across a vast and harsh land. Also, its annual flooding renewed farmlands that would otherwise be arid desert.90005 90002 90005 90003 An Illustration of the Nile River Image source 90004 90002 Outside of the Egyptian border the Nile divides into two main rivers, known as the White Nile and the Blue Nile. The White Nile is the longer of the two, and is responsible for 16% of the water flow in the Nile River, which makes the Blue Nile the main source of water and also fertile soil to Egypt. The White Nile travels from Tanzania, through Uganda into Southern Sudan. The Blue Nile flows through Ethiopia and mergers with the White Nile near the Sudanese capital of Khartoum, becoming what is known as the Nile proper.90005 90002 90003 Map of the Nile River Image source 90004 90005 90002 Since before written history, people have built their homes in towns and cities made along the banks of the Nile, but it was not always this way. The earliest inhabitants of this region were Stone-Age hunter-gatherers who roamed an immense area rich in wildlife, which is now a desert. With radical changes in climate, these people gradually replaced their nomadic culture with the settled life of agriculturalists. 90005 90026 ‘We are content with our Black land «| the heartland is with us’.90027 90002 — A Pharaoh’s inscription on a wall in the Temple of Karnak in Thebes, referring to Egyptian appreciation of the fertile soil. 90005 90002 The Sahara desert, the Nile River and the abundance of rock greatly influenced where and how the ancient Egyptians settled and built their civilization. These factors combined: landforms, climate and water, are looked at in detail. 90005 90002 Alluvial soil is rich earth deposited by floods, usually over riverbanks. The Nile flooded annually in summer this way, renewing the fertility of the soil and the Egyptians ‘ability to grow crops and feed themselves over and over again.Their gratitude for this is reflected in their religion. 90005 90002 90003 Farming in Ancient Egypt Image source 90004 90005 90002 Ancient Greeks said that Egypt was the gift of the Nile. The Ancient Egyptians settled themselves on the narrow strip of alluvial soil along both banks of the Nile. This came about for two reasons: excellent agricultural soil in the thin fertile zone next to the river. Beyond this was barren land and rugged cliffs, followed by arid desert. The Nile is the biggest river in Africa and is the result of the joining of three rivers from Sudan, Uganda and Ethiopia.It starts in south (Upper) Egypt and ends at the country’s northern border with the Mediterranean Sea (Lower Egypt). This separation of the country into two regions stems from ancient times. It also reflects the distinctly different higher ground and narrower river valleys in the south, from the flat flood plains of the delta in the north by the sea.The Nile River is considered to be the longest river in the world at 6,853 km. 90005 90002 Since before written history, people have built their homes in towns and cities developed along the banks of the Nile, but it was not always this way.The earliest inhabitants of this region were Stone-Age hunter-gatherers who roamed an immense area rich in wildlife, which is now a desert. With radical changes in climate, rain became less abundant and these people gradually replaced their nomadic culture with the settled life of agriculturalists. They settled along the banks of the Nile River and grew crops such as wheat and barley. They also farmed with animals. The Egyptians used the Nile for drinking water, irrigation, fishing, mud and reeds and they sailed around the Nileto transport goods.90005 90002 ‘We are content with our Black land … the heartland is with us’. — A Pharaoh’s inscription on a wall in the Temple of Karnak in Thebes, referring to Egyptian appreciation of the fertile soil. Ancient Greeks said that Egypt was the gift of the Nile. The Ancient Egyptians settled themselves on the narrow strip of alluvial soil along both banks of the Nile. This came about for two reasons: excellent agricultural soil in the thin fertile zone next to the river. Beyond this was barren land and rugged cliffs, followed by arid desert.The Sahara desert, the Nile River and the abundance of rock greatly influenced where and how the ancient Egyptians settled and built their civilization. 90005 90002 In its lower (northern) part, the Nile River splits itself many times and spills into the Mediterranean Sea across a huge delta plain. To the east another natural boundary, The Red Sea, extends roughly parallel to the Nile. Because of these two seas, the Egyptians were the only people of the ancient world to be able to control both western and eastern foreign trade.90005 90002 It is due to the Nile River that the ancient Egyptians were able to develop their civilization. The Nile River brought water and rich fertile soil that the Egyptians used to grow crops in. The Egyptians knew which time of year the Nile River would flood, bringing its gift of rich soil. The Egyptians depended on the Nile River to flood otherwise they could not grow their crops and there would be a famine. Egyptian daily life revolved around the Nile River for planting and harvesting crops.The Nile flooded the area for about three months and then it had time to empty out into the Mediterranean Sea and return back to its normal size and flow. 90005 90002 90003 A Shaduf used in ancient Egypt Image source 90004 90005 90002 90003 An illustration of an Archimedean screw Image source 90004 90005 90090 90002 Since the Nile flooded its banks every year, the Egyptians built their houses close together on high land and farmers were forced to move further inland. Farmers built canals and created an irrigation system to water their crops.They used ‘shadufs’, a hand-operated device for lifting water from the Nile River into buckets, which they then poured into the irrigation ditches. Farmers also made use of an ‘Archimedean screw’ which was used to lift water from a low lying body of water into irrigation trenches. Once the bottom of the screw-thread was lowered into the water the farmer turned the handle and as the bottom end of the tube turned, it scooped up a volume of water that travelled up the spiral screw within an enclosed tube; until it finally poured out from the top to feed the irrigation systems.90005 90002 Pharaohs would have beautiful leisure boats built for them to travel up and down the Nile for pleasure and relaxation. The Nile River was also important for transportation and trade. 90005 90002 90003 An Egyptian boat Image source 90004 90005 90002 The Nile River also played an important role in the economic, political and spiritual life of Egyptians. The river provided Egypt with trade routes in both the east and the west. Small boats were first built from the papyrus plant which grew on the banks of the Nile River, and was used for fishing and short trips.As the Egyptians skills developed, they began building bigger boats from wood which were able to transport cattle, stone, wood and people along the Nile. In its lower (northern) part, the Nile River splits itself many times and spills into the Mediterranean Sea across a huge delta plain. To the east another natural boundary, the Red Sea, extends roughly parallel to the Nile. Because of these two seas, the Egyptians were the only people of the ancient world to be able to control both western and eastern foreign trade.Due to this trading system, water buffaloes and camels were transported to Egypt from Asia and Persia during the 17th century. Camels were used for ploughing and carrying water from the river Nile, a process which was very important both for the people and their livestock. 90005 90002 The Nile River also played in a role in the spiritual life of the Egyptian. It was believed to be the gateway from life to death and the afterlife. The rise and fall of the Nile waters led the ancient Egyptians to view cycles of birth, death and re-birth.The east coast of the Nile was thought to be a representation of birth or life, and the west coast of the Nile was thought to symbolise death. This originates from the movement of the sun, which rises (is born) in the east and sets (dies) in the west. That is why all the tombs and pyramids are seen on the west bank of the River Nile. The god of the Nile is Hapi, who was known as the bringer of water and fertility. Osiris, god of the afterlife is also associated with the Nile as he was killed on its river bank.The Nile influenced many religious acts in ancient Egypt, which stemmed from its depiction of the afterlife, such as the preservation of mummies and the construction of the Great Pyramids that were built with its waters. 90005 90002 The Nile River, due to its importance for Egyptian life, was present in their religion. Egyptians believed that the Nile River was the river way that was taken from life to death and then to enter the afterlife. The east was looked upon as the place of growth and birth (the sun rising) and the west was part of death (the sun setting).The Sun god Ra would travel in a boat from birth, through life, through death in the underworld and then to be reborn each day. Egyptians based their calendar on the three cycles of the Nile River. Each season lasted four months, each month thirty days. 90005 90002 90003 Journey of Re traveling through the Underworld in his solar barque Image source 90004 90005 90002 90003 The tomb of Tutankhamen 90004 ↵ 90005 90002 Of all the pharaohs of ancient Egypt, Tutankhamen is the most famous.This is due to the wealth of artefacts found in his tomb, which was «discovered» in тисячі дев’ятсот двадцять дві by British archaeologist Howard Carter, some 3000 years after Tutankhamen’s death. The quantity of objects shocked archaeologists who had until then not found a tomb still containing treasures. 90005 90002 King Tuts tomb is located in the Valley of Kings, situated at the west bank of the Nile. What makes the discovery of his tomb so significant is the fact that for thousands of years the tomb of King Tut remained safe from grave robbers.However, it is believed that thieves had broken into Tutankhamun’s tomb shortly after his burial, but the robbers were soon found and the tomb was resealed. The size of King Tuts tomb was small in comparison to other pharaohs, which has led some to believe that his death was unexpected and thus his burial was rushed by his successor AY. Following his death, King Tut’s rule had been ignored by the pharaohs who had succeeded him and his tomb held little importance. Workmen building tombs of future pharaohs built their huts over the young king’s place of burial.The building, along with flooding in the area meant that within a few generations the entrance to King Tut’s tomb had been clogged with stone debris and forgotten. 90005 90002 90003 Tutankhamen’s sarcophagus Image source 90004 90005 90002 Tutankhamun or «King Tut» is the most famous Egyptian pharaoh. Tutankhamun means ‘the living image of Amun «. He is well known because his burial tomb is one of the few that was discovered intact. It was very common for tomb raiders to steal the treasures that were buried with the pharaohs.Luckily, the tomb raiders did not locate King Tut’s tomb. We were then able to learn about the culture and people of ancient Egypt all from studying King Tut’s tomb and treasures. 90005 90002 90003 What king tut would have looked like? Image source 90004 90005 90002 Tut lived around тисячі триста сорок три to +1323 BC, he was only ten years old when he became a pharaoh and he earned his nickname of the ‘boy king’. King Tut’s father was the pharaoh Akhenaten. Akhenaten tried to change Egypt’s religion by removing all the old gods and replacing them with one god called Aten.This change was unpopular and when Akhenaten died the Egyptian people destroyed all traces of his reign. 90005 90002 King Tut relocated the city back to Thebes and rebuilt some of the temples for the gods. His hope was to restore popularity of the pharaoh and try to fix the damage that his father had done. 90005 90002 King Tut died at the young age of 19 and the cause of his death still remains a mystery today. Tutankhamun was buried in a tomb in the Valley of the Kings. In 1922 British archaeologist Howard Carter discovered the burial tomb of King Tut.Ancient Egyptians believed that when a person died they would enter the ‘afterlife’ where they would live in the same way that they did when they were alive. That is why Egyptians would bury everything they would need in the afterlife with them. The burial tomb of King Tut was piled with possessions: beds, chariots, games, art work, walking sticks, weapons and even food. Pharaohs had the most highly crafted items, many were made of gold, imported wood, inlaid gems and ivory. 90005 90002 The most fascinating item found was the stone sarcophagus containing three coffins, one inside the other, with a final coffin made of gold.When the lid of the third coffin was raised, King Tut’s royal mummy was revealed, preserved for more than 3,000 years. It took Carter 17 years to fully excavate King Tut’s tomb. 90005 90002 90003 A gilded coffin rests inside a sarcophagus of carved quartzite in the original burial chamber Image source 90004 90005 90090 90002 90003 Way of life in ancient Egypt 90004 ↵ 90005 90002 90003 Social structure in ancient Egypt 90004 90005 90002 Ancient Egyptians are the inventors of another feature of civilization still existing today — the complete dictator! Social and industrial conditions were determined, through priests and scribes, by the inflexible rule of omnipotent rulers.All of Egypt was subjugated under one ruler, the Pharaoh, who was God, king and high priest all rolled into one. The Pharaoh, screening much of his work and status in a kind of confusing mystery, centralized socio-economic power and control efficiently and ruthlessly, owns all the land. It is as if the triangular shape of pyramids themselves, show the hierarchy and control of one over many. 90005 90002 90003 Under the Pharaoh on the social pyramid sat the vizier (advisor). The vizier was the chief minister in charge of managing the taxes, building projects and government records that were kept by scribes.Next came the priests of the temples and the various nobles who held government jobs. Nobles were quite wealthy as they kept a part of the tax normally given to the pharaoh as well as some of the tributes that were given by the people to the gods. Army officials and scribes were on the next level down on the social pyramid. The soldiers fought in the armies during wartime, but in peacetime many supervised the peasants, enslaved people and farmers. They were also part of the building process of palaces, pyramids and other structures.Image source 90004 90005 90002 Under the Pharaoh on the social pyramid sat the vizier (advisor). The vizier was the chief minister in charge of managing the taxes, building projects and government records that were kept by scribes. Next came the priests of the temples and the various nobles who held government jobs. Nobles were quite wealthy as they kept a part of the tax normally given to the pharaoh as well as some of the tributes that were given by the people to the gods. Army officials and scribes were on the next level down on the social pyramid.The soldiers fought in the armies during wartime, but in peacetime many supervised the peasants, enslaved people and farmers. They were also part of the building process of palaces, pyramids and other structures. 90005 90002 The royal household, priesthood and civil service administered the state under a system of nepotism — the children of the pharaohs and bureaucrats were exempt from manual work and succeeded to their parent’s position automatically. The civil service improved mathematics and writing (on clay and papyrus).These skills they kept to themselves and so maintained control. In this way planning and ideas became separate from doing and making. (Hellman: 1994) 90005 90002 Using the food surplus generated by a favourable climate and a large labourforce of enforced labour, the Pharaohs financed huge pyramids that eventually would contain their embalmed bodies and worldly riches for the after-life. These were built in summer during flood time by a very large staff of trained craftsmen and an army of peasant, slave and prisoners of war labourers.This religious obsession of the upper classes with the preservation of the body after death, led to the pyramid tomb standing as a symbol of the terrible majesty of the Pharaoh’s power. 90005 90002 The kings of ancient Egypt were known as ‘pharaoh’, a name given to them by the Hebrews while enslaved, and derived from the Egyptian word ‘per-aa’, meaning ‘great house’. (Fletcher: 1963). 90005 90002 90003 Beliefs and religion 90004 90005 90002 Ancient Egyptian religion remained mostly unchanged for many thousands of years, apart from a very short time of belief in one god during the Amarna period under King Akhenaten.Their culture changed little over this time. Although the Egyptians claimed to be monotheistic, in practise they were polytheistic. 90005 90002 90003 Ancient Egyptian gods Image source 90004 90005 90002 Religion was organized by a very powerful, well-educated priesthood with unlimited authority under the Pharaoh. The king was God on earth in the form of man, and no distinction was made between God and king. It was because of this that the ancient Egyptian belief system created and supported the political and social hierarchy.90005 90002 Egyptians strongly believed in an after-life, but only the wealthy could afford the expensive and labour-intensive preparations for this after- 90005.90000 ancient Egypt | Civilization, Geography, & History 90001 90002 Life in ancient Egypt 90003 90004 Ancient Egypt can be thought of as an oasis in the desert of northeastern Africa, dependent on the annual inundation of the Nile River to support its agricultural population. The country’s chief wealth came from the fertile floodplain of the Nile valley, where the river flows between bands of limestone hills, and the Nile delta, in which it fans into several branches north of present-day Cairo.Between the floodplain and the hills is a variable band of low desert that supported a certain amount of game. The Nile was Egypt’s sole transportation artery. 90005 90004 The First Cataract at Aswān, where the riverbed is turned into rapids by a belt of granite, was the country’s only well-defined boundary within a populated area. To the south lay the far less hospitable area of ​​Nubia, in which the river flowed through low sandstone hills that in most regions left only a very narrow strip of cultivable land.Nubia was significant for Egypt’s periodic southward expansion and for access to products from farther south. West of the Nile was the arid Sahara, broken by a chain of oases some 125 to 185 miles (200 to 300 km) from the river and lacking in all other resources except for a few minerals. The eastern desert, between the Nile and the Red Sea, was more important, for it supported a small nomadic population and desert game, contained numerous mineral deposits, including gold, and was the route to the Red Sea.90005 90004 To the northeast was the Isthmus of Suez. It offered the principal route for contact with Sinai, from which came turquoise and possibly copper, and with southwestern Asia, Egypt’s most important area of ​​cultural interaction, from which were received stimuli for technical development and cultivars for crops. Immigrants and ultimately invaders crossed the isthmus into Egypt, attracted by the country’s stability and prosperity. From the late 2nd millennium bce onward, numerous attacks were made by land and sea along the eastern Mediterranean coast.90005 Get exclusive access to content from our тисяча сімсот шістьдесят вісім First Edition with your subscription. Subscribe today 90004 At first, relatively little cultural contact came by way of the Mediterranean Sea, but from an early date Egypt maintained trading relations with the Lebanese port of Byblos (present-day Jbail). Egypt needed few imports to maintain basic standards of living, but good timber was essential and not available within the country, so it usually was obtained from Lebanon. Minerals such as obsidian and lapis lazuli were imported from as far afield as Anatolia and Afghanistan.90005 90004 Agriculture centred on the cultivation of cereal crops, chiefly emmer wheat (90013 Triticum dicoccum 90014) and barley (90013 Hordeum vulgare 90014). The fertility of the land and general predictability of the inundation ensured very high productivity from a single annual crop. This productivity made it possible to store large surpluses against crop failures and also formed the chief basis of Egyptian wealth, which was, until the creation of the large empires of the 1st millennium bce, the greatest of any state in the ancient Middle East.90005 90004 Basin irrigation was achieved by simple means, and multiple cropping was not feasible until much later times, except perhaps in the lakeside area of ​​Al-Fayyūm. As the river deposited alluvial silt, raising the level of the floodplain, and land was reclaimed from marsh, the area available for cultivation in the Nile valley and delta increased, while pastoralism declined slowly. In addition to grain crops, fruit and vegetables were important, the latter being irrigated year-round in small plots.Fish was also vital to the diet. Papyrus, which grew abundantly in marshes, was gathered wild and in later times was cultivated. It may have been used as a food crop, and it certainly was used to make rope, matting, and sandals. Above all, it provided the characteristic Egyptian writing material, which, with cereals, was the country’s chief export in Late period Egyptian and then Greco-Roman times. 90005 90004 Cattle may have been domesticated in northeastern Africa. The Egyptians kept many as draft animals and for their various products, showing some of the interest in breeds and individuals that is found to this day in the Sudan and eastern Africa.The donkey, which was the principal transport animal (the camel did not become common until Roman times), was probably domesticated in the region. The native Egyptian breed of sheep became extinct in the 2nd millennium bce and was replaced by an Asiatic breed. Sheep were primarily a source of meat; their wool was rarely used. Goats were more numerous than sheep. Pigs were also raised and eaten. Ducks and geese were kept for food, and many of the vast numbers of wild and migratory birds found in Egypt were hunted and trapped.Desert game, principally various species of antelope and ibex, were hunted by the elite; it was a royal privilege to hunt lions and wild cattle. Pets included dogs, which were also used for hunting, cats, and monkeys. In addition, the Egyptians had a great interest in, and knowledge of, most species of mammals, birds, reptiles, and fish in their environment. 90005 90004 Most Egyptians were probably descended from settlers who moved to the Nile valley in prehistoric times, with population increase coming through natural fertility.In various periods there were immigrants from Nubia, Libya, and especially the Middle East. They were historically significant and also may have contributed to population growth, but their numbers are unknown. Most people lived in villages and towns in the Nile valley and delta. Dwellings were normally built of mud brick and have long since disappeared beneath the rising water table or beneath modern town sites, thereby obliterating evidence for settlement patterns. In antiquity, as now, the most favoured location of settlements was on slightly raised ground near the riverbank, where transport and water were easily available and flooding was unlikely.Until the 1st millennium bce, Egypt was not urbanized to the same extent as Mesopotamia. Instead, a few centres, notably Memphis and Thebes, attracted population and particularly the elite, while the rest of the people were relatively evenly spread over the land. The size of the population has been estimated as having risen from 1 to 1.5 million in the 3rd millennium bce to perhaps twice that number in the late 2nd millennium and 1st millennium bce. (Much higher levels of population were reached in Greco-Roman times.) 90005 90004 Nearly all of the people were engaged in agriculture and were probably tied to the land. In theory all the land belonged to the king, although in practice those living on it could not easily be removed and some categories of land could be bought and sold. Land was assigned to high officials to provide them with an income, and most tracts required payment of substantial dues to the state, which had a strong interest in keeping the land in agricultural use. Abandoned land was taken back into state ownership and reassigned for cultivation.The people who lived on and worked the land were not free to leave and were obliged to work it, but they were not slaves; most paid a proportion of their produce to major officials. Free citizens who worked the land on their own behalf did emerge; terms applied to them tended originally to refer to poor people, but these agriculturalists were probably not poor. Slavery was never common, being restricted to captives and foreigners or to people who were forced by poverty or debt to sell themselves into service.Slaves sometimes even married members of their owners ‘families, so that in the long term those belonging to households tended to be assimilated into free society. In the New Kingdom (from about 1539 to 1075 bce), large numbers of captive slaves were acquired by major state institutions or incorporated into the army. Punitive treatment of foreign slaves or of native fugitives from their obligations included forced labour, exile (in, for example, the oases of the western desert), or compulsory enlistment in dangerous mining expeditions.Even nonpunitive employment such as quarrying in the desert was hazardous. The official record of one expedition shows a mortality rate of more than 10 percent. 90005 90004 Just as the Egyptians optimized agricultural production with simple means, their crafts and techniques, many of which originally came from Asia, were raised to extraordinary levels of perfection. The Egyptians ‘most striking technical achievement, massive stone building, also exploited the potential of a centralized state to mobilize a huge labour force, which was made available by efficient agricultural practices.Some of the technical and organizational skills involved were remarkable. The construction of the great pyramids of the 4th dynasty (90013 c. 90014 2575- 90013 c. 90014 2465 bce) has yet to be fully explained and would be a major challenge to this day. This expenditure of skill contrasts with sparse evidence of an essentially neolithic way of living for the rural population of the time, while the use of flint tools persisted even in urban environments at least until the late 2nd millennium bce.Metal was correspondingly scarce, much of it being used for prestige rather than everyday purposes. 90005 90004 In urban and elite contexts, the Egyptian ideal was the nuclear family, but, on the land and even within the central ruling group, there is evidence for extended families. Egyptians were monogamous, and the choice of partners in marriage, for which no formal ceremony or legal sanction is known, did not follow a set pattern. Consanguineous marriage was not practiced during the Dynastic period, except for the occasional marriage of a brother and sister within the royal family, and that practice may have been open only to kings or heirs to the throne.Divorce was in theory easy, but it was costly. Women had a legal status only marginally inferior to that of men. They could own and dispose of property in their own right, and they could initiate divorce and other legal proceedings. They hardly ever held administrative office but increasingly were involved in religious cults as priestesses or «chantresses.» Married women held the title «mistress of the house,» the precise significance of which is unknown. Lower down the social scale, they probably worked on the land as well as in the house.90005 90004 The uneven distribution of wealth, labour, and technology was related to the only partly urban character of society, especially in the 3rd millennium bce. The country’s resources were not fed into numerous provincial towns but instead were concentrated to great effect around the capital-itself a dispersed string of settlements rather than a city-and focused on the central figure in society, the king. In the 3rd and early 2nd millennia, the elite ideal, expressed in the decoration of private tombs, was manorial and rural.Not until much later did Egyptians develop a more pronouncedly urban character. 90005.90000 Scientists thought ancient Egyptian mummies did not have any DNA left. They were wrong | Science 90001 90002 Scientists successfully sequenced DNA from mummies from the site of Abusir el-Meleq, one of which was buried in this sarcophagus. 90003 bpk / Aegyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung, SMB / Sandra Steiss 90002 By Lizzie Wade 90005 May.30 2017, 11:00 AM 90006 90003 90002 Ancient Egyptian mummies preserve many details of the deceased: facial features, signs of illness, even tattoos. But not, it seemed, DNA. After trying repeatedly to extract it, many scientists were convinced that the hot desert climate and, perhaps, the chemicals used in mummification destroyed any genetic material long ago. Now, a team of ancient DNA specialists has successfully sequenced genomes from 90 ancient Egyptian mummies. The game-changing results give scientists their first insight into the genetics of ordinary ancient Egyptians-which changed surprisingly little through centuries of conquests.90003 90002 The sequencing success, reported this week in 90011 Nature Communications 90012, «finally proves to everyone that there’s DNA preserved in ancient Egyptian mummies,» says Albert Zink, a biological anthropologist at the Institute for Mummy Studies in Bolzano, Italy. He participated in a 2010 study that identified DNA sequences from 16 ancient Egyptian royal mummies, including Tutankhamun. But that study used polymerase chain reaction, a method that efficiently finds and extracts targeted DNA fragments but can not always reliably distinguish between ancient DNA and modern contamination.90003 90002 The new study, led by Johannes Krause, a geneticist at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Jena, Germany, used next-generation sequencing methods to read stretches of any DNA present in a sample and fish out those that resembled human DNA. The complete reads allowed the team to spot tell-tale damage patterns associated only with ancient DNA. That makes the new analysis much more reliable, says Hannes Schroeder, an ancient DNA researcher at the University of Copenhagen.»It succeeds where previous studies on Egyptian mummies have failed or fallen short.» 90003 90002 Krause, who has studied the DNA of Neandertals, Denisovans, and prehistoric migrants to Europe, recently gravitated toward ancient Egyptian mummies because of the empire’s tumultuous political history. At various points, it was conquered by Assyrians from the Near East, Nubians from farther south along the Nile, Persians, Greeks, and Romans, among others. «Our question was, did those foreign conquests have a genetic impact?» Krause says.90003 90002 Krause turned to a collection of 151 mummy heads from the ancient settlement of Abusir el-Meleq, about 100 kilometers south of Cairo along the Nile. The settlement was devoted to Osiris, the god of the dead, making it a popular burial spot for many centuries. The heads were excavated (and removed from their bodies) in the early 20th century and now reside in two collections in Germany, at the University of Tübingen and Berlin’s Museum of Prehistory and Early History. Radiocarbon dating shows that the mummies span 1300 years of ancient Egyptian history, during many of the foreign conquests and then Egypt’s incorporation into first the Greek and then the Roman empires.90003 90002 Whereas the mummies ‘soft tissue contained almost no DNA, the bones and teeth were chock full of genetic material. Ninety of the mummies yielded DNA once housed in mitochondria, the power plants of cells. Mitochondria carry only a few genes, but they are so plentiful that it’s often easier to find their DNA than the single full human genome in a cell’s nucleus. Still, because mitochondrial DNA is passed down from mother to child, it leaves out the story of the father’s DNA. The nuclear genome, which contains DNA from both parents, is far more informative.Unfortunately, Krause says, only a few of the mummies ‘nuclear genomes were well preserved, and even fewer passed his strict contamination tests. His team ended up with nuclear genome samples from only three mummies, each from a different time period. 90003 90002 Krause’s team compared the mummies ‘mitochondrial and nuclear DNA to ancient and modern populations in the Near East and Africa. They discovered that ancient Egyptians closely resembled ancient and modern Near Eastern populations, especially those in the Levant.What’s more, the genetics of the mummies remained remarkably consistent even as different powers conquered the empire. It’s possible that the mitochondrial genomes simply do not record the genetic contributions of foreign fathers, says Yehia Gad, a molecular geneticist at the National Research Centre in Cairo and a founder of the Egyptian Museum’s ancient DNA lab who worked with Zink on past mummy studies . But the three mummies with nuclear genome data also show striking genetic continuity, Krause points out.90003 90002 Later, however, something did alter the genomes of Egyptians. Although the mummies contain almost no DNA from sub-Saharan Africa, some 15% to 20% of modern Egyptians ‘mitochondrial DNA reflects sub-Saharan ancestry. «It’s really unexpected that we see this very late shift,» Krause says. He suspects increased trade along the Nile-including the slave trade-or the spread of Islam in the Middle Ages may have intensified contact between Northern and sub-Saharan Africa. 90003 90002 Geneticist Iosif Lazaridis of Harvard Medical School in Boston, who studies how and when ancient populations mixed, calls the new results «a big accomplishment.»But he wonders how representative Abusir el-Meleq is of ancient Egypt as a whole. «Egypt is a big place,» he says. Other regions may have experienced its conquests in different ways, some perhaps with more genetic mixing. But Lazaridis hopes for more revelations to come. «Now that it’s been proven that it’s possible to sample from mummies-well, there are literally thousands of mummies.» 90003 .