The Greek historian Herodotus in the Fifth Century B.C. wrote that “Egypt was the gift of the Nile.” Silt deposits from the Nile made the surrounding land fertile because the River overflowed its banks annually. The Ancient Egyptians cultivated and traded wheat, flax, papyrus, and other crops around the Nile. Farmers raised beans, tobacco, lentils, peas, and watermelons.
They were expert traders who acquired exotic items from central Africa. Ivory, ebony wood, incense, precious oils, leopard skins, monkeys, giraffes and ostrich feathers were available from the merchants. A tune “Hymn to the Nile” was created and sung by the ancient Egyptians.
Water buffalo were brought in from Asia and the Assyrians introduced camels in the Seventh Century B.C.. The waters of the Nile were vital to both humans and livestock. Hapi was the god of the annual floods and both he and the pharaoh were thought to control the flooding. The name means “running one.” Each new year they had five days of rituals and celebrations.
The Nile was thought to be a causeway from life to death. The east was the place of birth and growth and the west was considered the place of death. The god Ra, the Sun, underwent birth, death, and resurrection, every day as he crossed the sky. All tombs were west of the Nile because the Egyptians believed that in order to enter the afterlife, they had to be buried on the side that symbolized death.
Salama suggested that 66 Million years ago, a series of closed continental basins each occupied part of the Rift Systems. The connection of the different Niles occurred during the cyclic wet periods about 100,000 to 120,000 years ago. It is estimated that 160 Million individuals now depend on the waters of the Nile for survival.
The Nile is the longest river in the world and extends 4,000 miles north. It gives rise to great civilizations as this miraculous river brings life to the face of Africa. Europeans in the 14th Century wanted to learn the source of the Nile. The Pope sent monks as emissaries to Mongolia and described being told of the source of the Nile in Abyssinia which was the ancient name for Ethiopia.
The Nile has been a conveyor belt for goods. Winter winds blow south, up River, so ships could sail up River. The 1970 completion of the Aswan High Dam ended the Summer floods and their renewal of the fertile soil, thus fundamentally changing farming practices.
John Hanning Speke was a Victorian explorer who first reached Lake Victoria in 1858 and returned to establish it as the source of the Nile by 1862. Henry Morton Stanley circumnavigated the Lake and confirmed Speke’s observations in 1875.
European involvement in Egypt began in the time of Napoleon. Laird Shipyard of Liverpool sent an iron steamer to the Nile in the 1830s. With the completion of the Suez Canal and the British takeover of Egypt in the 1870s, more British river steamers followed.
The Nile is a natural navigation channel and gives access to Khartoum and Sudan by steamer. During the First World War, river steamers provided both security and sightseeing to the Pyramids and Thebes. A map of the Nile from 1911 shows a route when its entire primary course ran through British occupations, colonies, and protectorates. The sun, indeed, did not set on the British empire.
Above Khartoum, the Nile is known as the White Nile. At Khartoum the River is joined by the Blue Nile. The White Nile begins in equatorial East Africa and the Blue Nile begins in Ethiopia. Preservation of the Nile is critical because it has enriched human life for thousands of years.