Words for Board: Nile, Pharaoh, Papyrus, Hieroglyphics, Theocratic Government, Ra, Amon-Ra, Osiris, Isis, Ikhnaton, Aton

The 2nd great civilization started at almost the same time as the Sumerians. People lumped up around the Nile river and started the Egyptian civilization. Like the Sumerians taming the Nile tamed the Egyptian people at the same time. The Nile is very long (4,000 miles as compared to the Mississippi of 2,500 miles). The Nile starts in the mountains of central Africa and flows north to the Mediterranean Sea. (Notice–it flows north. U.S. rivers flow south.) The Egyptians were up by the mouth of the Mediterranean Sea. Egyptians didn't know the origin of the river–just accepted it as an obvious gift of the gods. The Nile is predictable. It floods every year, same time, cuz the gods were on time. (It has nothing to do with the snow on the mountains in Africa melting–right?) The Egyptians built artificial lakes to trap the water when it flooded. The prevailing winds of Egypt were from the north and the current from the south so it was easy to travel in Egypt.

Egyptians were very optimistic as compared to Sumerians. It was obvious that the gods loved them best. And that could be easily believed. The location of Egypt was almost perfect, as far as defense goes. To the west is the Sahara Desert. To the south is Black Africa with its sparse barbaric population. The Nile also had tricky waterfalls in it to keep troops from traveling up north by boat. To the east was the Red Sea and the Arabian Desert. To the north is the Mediterranean Sea which is actually mild to travel but at the time, the boats weren't god enough to ferry troops with. The only place to get Egypt is the Sinai Peninsula and they just kept troops there so they had no worries. (The Sinai Peninsula is currently the place that the Jews and Arabs hassle over.)

Egyptian political history comes in 3 periods–Old, Middle, and New Egypt. Read the Syllabus to find out about it. The Egyptian government was a dictatorship. They had a king called the Pharaoh ("House of the Ruler"). Pharaoh is a god (actually the son of the sun god). He had a real name (Charlie, Fred, etc.) But you never pronounced his name so you called him Pharaoh. He never died (since he was a god). But he did change earthly forms with every new reign. He owned Egypt–all of it–lock, stock, and all the land. He would, however, for a small fee (1/3 of the crops) allow you to work his land for him. But he told you what, when and how to plant. (Much the same as American farming today.)

The social classes were: Upper = Priests and Nobles; Middle = Lawyers and Merchants; and the people we would have associated with–Lower = 85% of the population, i.e. Farmers and General Commoners. During the winter the farmers worked for the government as builders and laborers on the pyramids and other government projects cuz they could only plant in the summer. The women in Egypt had it better than almost all ancient civilizations. (Maybe the Egyptians had some sense after all.) There were almost no slaves (which are a by-product of war) cuz there wasn't much war (cuz of their great location.

Writing in Egypt was with pictures. They were better than the Sumerians cuz they had Papyrus, a reed from the Nile which they made paper out of so they could write with a brush and ink. They developed their own shorthand but it was still pictures. They almost got the alphabet, but they were too proud to import it. Their writing was called Hieroglyphics ("sacred carvings").

By religion, Egyptians were polytheists. Their religion was tied up with their government. They had a Theocratic Government. The leader of one was the leader of the other–uh, that is to say the head of the government was also the head of the church. There was a union of church and state.

Animals played a big part in religion early. They were used as symbols for the gods to give the gods a concrete appearance. As the civilization improved, animals lost their neatness cuz they could be killed. Man's self image improved too. But the Egyptians didn't want to lose the old ways. So their gods looked like ½ animal and ½ people. There were at least 80 different gods.

Egyptians believed in a static (unchanging) universe. It didn't and shouldn't change. The gods made the world the way it is and obviously it's the best way or the gods would have done it differently. Therefore, there was no progress. Animals don't change so maybe animals were closer to the ideals of the gods. Egyptians even had cemeteries for animals–some of them specialized (strictly horse, dog, etc.).

According to the creation story, gods made Egypt and the Pharaoh. The gods loved Egypt best cuz the river flooded just right, they had natural protection and very rich soil.

Actually Egypt did change but they did it so slowly (over a hundred years at a time) that they didn't notice. Like: in the Old Kingdom, only the Pharaoh and his family went to heaven. By the Middle Kingdom, everybody went to heaven. The change happened in a 500-600 year time span. In the Old Kingdom, no morality was associated with religion. The gods didn't care about your behavior as long as you perform the ceremonies. By the Middle Kingdom, the gods wanted good treatment of your fellow man. But the Egyptian priests started a new moneymaking gimmick. They sold copies of the Book of the Dead to be buried with every person. It was to be read when confronted by the god of the Underworld. It was like death insurance. It said things like: "I didn't steal, I didn't lie, etc." The gods were apparently so dumb or bored they believed it and would let you go to heaven. It wrecked the morals of the Middle Kingdom. As long as you had the Book of the Dead (a sure bestseller), you could do anything while alive cuz it protected you afterwards.

There was lots of symbolism in religion (still is). How do you know there are gods and what are they like? There's a world, isn't there? And somebody must have made it, right? They did a good job, too, right? So we can tell what the gods are like by examining the world and nature. For instance: the sun rises every day on time; therefore, the gods must be steady and majestic. The sun was symbolized by a boat being rowed across the sky with a man in the front standing, killing a snake. Why?, you ask. In general people are afraid of death, dark, and snakes. All are evil. The Egyptian nights were really dark (no glow of the electric city lights) and brought out all the old fears every night. The sun chased away the fears of the night and therefore all the evil.

Egyptians didn't care if their religious stories conflicted. (Polytheists are more tolerant.) Believe what you want. They told a story about why the sun goes down in the west and up in the east. You see, actually there is a large goddess bent over the earth in an arch. Every day she gives birth to the sun in the east and it travels over her stomach and is swallowed by her in the west to be born again the next day. (That's sure lots easier to explain to kids than the earth rotating and revolving and the sun actually not moving, etc.)

Religions tend to have 3 major deities cuz 3 was a sacred number in the ancient world. (Of course, today Christians believe in one god who just happens to come in 3 totally different but all the same parts . . . huh?) Egyptians had 3 major gods who were more important than the rest of the 80. There was Ra (also known as Amon-Ra cuz in the south he was Amon and in the north he was Ra, so to save hassle, he's Amon-Ra to them all). He was the sun god. He had a hawk's head. He really wasn't worshiped much cuz he always showed up. But he is still one of the biggies. Next there's Isis. She's the mother symbol, goddess of fertility. Then there's Osiris, god of the Nile. These were probably the main 3 cuz it requires all 3 working together to grow crops.

And now for Egyptian story time: You see Isis and Osiris are married. One day Osiris was out goofing off and was attacked by an evil god. He was cut up in pieces and scattered all over the earth (gods can't be killed). Isis eventually missed him and went out and found him (here and there) and put him back together. But he was never really the same. (Couldn't handle the crisis–kept going to pieces!–Sorry, Stockmyer did it first.) Part of the year he was with his wife in heaven and every was hunky-dorey and crops grew, etc. But since he had been similar to dead, he had the job of judging dead people and part of the year he had to go to the Underworld. Without him, things didn't work the same and Isis was sad and there was winter on earth. But he came back to life in the spring and things were back to normal. This story illustrates the dying/rising god theme that can be seen in almost every religion.

Egyptians did get one weirdie rebel in their centuries of culture. There was a New Kingdom pharaoh named Ikhnaton (a.k.a. Akhenaton a.k.a. Amenhotep IV). He didn't believe in the Egyptian religion. He said there was only 1 god symbolized by the sun named Aton. He even changed his name to Ikhnaton ("son of Aton") and built a new capital city. He was a Pacifist. People eventually rebelled (they were probably led by the out of work priests of the other 79 gods). The satellite countries under Egypt's control pulled away. Right in the middle of the turmoil, he died and everybody tried to forget him. They un-chiseled his name from pyramids, etc. and pretended he never existed. One of the reasons we hear about him is that he was the 1st monotheist (did you ever notice in grammar history books he'll get a big paragraph as compared to hardly any other pharaoh mentioned? That's cuz history books are written by Christians, i.e. monotheists).