Periods Of Ancient Egyptian History2

http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/prehistory/egypt/history/timeline.html

Periods of Ancient Egyptian History Periods (All dates are "Before Common Era" or B.C.E.) Greek Dynasty- (332 - 30 B.C.E.) Persian Period II - (342 - 332 B.C.E.) Late Period II - (425 - 342 B.C.E.) Persian Period I - (517 - 425 B.C.E.) Late Period I - (1069 - 517 B.C.E.) New Kingdom -(1550 - 1069 B.C.E.) Intermediate Period II - (1650 - 1550 B.C.E.) Middle Kingdom - (2125 - 1650 B.C.E.) Intermediate Period I -(2181 - 2125 B.C.E.) Old Kingdom - (3100 - 2181 B.C.E.) Archaic Period - (3414 - 3100 B.C.E.) Predynastic Period - (5464 - 3414 B.C.E.)

Dynasties

1st

2nd 4th 6th 8th 10th 12th 14th 16th 18th 20th 22nd 24th 26th 28th 30th 32nd

5th 9th 13th 17th 21st 25th 29th

Period

(B.C.E.)

Dynasty

3rd 7th 11th 15th 19th 23rd 27th 31st

Significant People

Greek Dynasty (332-30)

XXXII

Cleopatra VII Ptolemy I Arsinoe II Pompey Alexander Augustus Caesar

Persian Period II (342-332)

XXXI

Darius III Artaxerxes III

XXX

Nectanebo I

Late Period II (425-342)

Persian Period I (517-425)

Late Period I (1069-517)

XXIX XXVIII

Amyrteos

XXVII

Artaxeres Xerxes Darius I Cambyses

XXVI

Necho II Herodotus

XXV

Shabaka

XXIV

Tefnakht

XXIII XXII

Osoraken I Shoshenk I

XXI

Psusennes I

XX

Ramses III

XIX

Ramses II

XVIII

Nefertiti Princess Ankhesenaton Tutankhamun Hatshepsut Tuthmosis I II III IV Ahmose I Rekhmire

New Kingdom (1550-1069)

XVII Intermediate Period II (1650-1550)

Kamose

XVI XV

Khyan

XIV XIII

Middle Kingdom (2125-1650)

Intermediate Period I (2181-2125)

XII

Senusret I II III Amenemhet I II III

XI

Mentuhotep I

X IX

Achthoes

VIII VII

Old Kingdom (3100-2181)

Archaic Period (3414-3100) Predynastic Period (ca5464-3414)

Timeline of Events and Kingdoms in Ancient Egypt

VI

Pepi II Pepi I Weni

V

Sahure

IV

Chepheren Khufu Sneferu

III

Huni Imhotep Dzoser

II I

Menes

Late Middle Early Dates (Before Common Era)

Significant Events

Archaic

3411 - 3100

Unification of all Egypt

Old Kingdom

3100 - 2181

Construction of the pyramids begins

First Intermediate

2181 - 2125

Political chaos

Middle Kingdom

2125 - 1650

Recovery and political stability

Second Intermediate 1650 - 1550 New Kingdom

1550 - 1069

Hyksos "invasion" Creation of the Egyptian Empire, and Akanaten's religious strategy begins.

Early Pre-Dynastic (4,500 - 4,000 B.C.E.)

Prior to 4000 B.C.E., Egypt was populated by nomadic tribes complete with different cultures and traditions. Sometime around this date, however, the tribes began to band together. The Early Predynastic is marked by the development of the Faiyum Culture in the north and the Badarian Culture in the South. Differences between the two cultures are primarily in the areas of stone-working, pottery manufacture and the production of flint tools and weapons. Another difference between the two lies in the relative importance of their hunting and fishing activities. The people of the Faiyum tended to aquire their food by non-agrarian methods. The Badarian Culture was based on farming, hunting, and mining. They traded for various products, including wool and turquoise, and made carved objects and pottery. They had a great deal of knowledge about copper ores and how to extract the metals. This era also witnessed advances in furniture and agricultural equipment. There was an obvious development in funeral ritualistic practices, in which the deceased would be buried under the simple protection of a animal skin, but the tomb began to take on a more solid architectural appearance. The production of black-topped pottery, at this time, reached a sophisticated level. Bone and ivory objects such as combs, cosmetic spoons, and female figurines became particularly common. Decorative clay objects were common, in particular those called the “dancer”, or small women with their arms upraised. Artifacts from 3300 B.C.E. indicate further development in both culture and technology. There is evidence among the Naqada of advanced burial and irrigation systems. Small models of houses (similar to those from the Old Kingdom) were found in some of the burial sites. They had larger settlements, and traded with outsiders for materials like lapis lazuli, and are first noted around 4000 B.C.E.. They made decorated pottery, as well as clay and ivory figurines. The pottery had geometric shapes or animals painted or carved on it instead of the previous method of simple banding. Items became more varied in shape, not only for practical reasons, but also for purely aesthetic ones.

For the most part, during Egypt’s predynastic phase, there are myriads of settlements that develop into small tribal kingdoms. These eventually evolved into two larger groups, one in the delta and one in the Nile Valley up to the delta that once united, began the Dynastic period in Egypt. Amanda Minich Fall 2000

Middle Predynastic (4,000 - 3,500 B.C.E.)

The Middle Predynastic Period in Egypt dates to 4000 B.C.E. This time period is also referred to as the Gerzean Period or the Naqada Period. It is most recognized by the growing influence of the peoples of the north over those of the South, a prelude to what is to come in the late pre-dynastic period. The two main groups were the Amratian and the Gerzean. The greatest difference that can be seen among these people is in their ceramic industry. The Amratian pottery had some decoration, but its main purpose was functional. Gerzean pottery was decorated with geometric shapes and realistic animals. Decoration of ceramic vessels went through a dual evolution that began to include geometric motifs inspired by plant forms and painted or incised depictions of animals and shapes, with the appearance of thereomephic vessels. The art of clay-working had already reached its peak, particularly in the painted terracotta female "dancers" with raised arms. Animals such as ostriches and ibexes were found on their pottery, this lead some to speculate that the Gerzean were hunting in the sub-desert, because these animals are not found in the Nile Valley. In this period we also find the first representations of gods. Most of this was through their art on pottery. The gods were depicted as riding in boats. Some believe that this could be only records of visits from chieftains and records of battles. However these items were placed with the dead, which suggests that they were sacred. Changes in funerary practices among the Gerzean were found in this period. People were found buried in the fetal position and accompanied by sacred items and food. Children were now buried in cemeteries outside the villages instead of under the floor of their dwelling. We also begin to see tomb building in this era. The changes of burial customs have lead us to believe that this was a time of belief in the concept of life after death. The Amratian culture was not as elaborate with their burial practices; their dead were usually buried in a small pit with a skin cover over it. The appearance of historical architectural forms, "models" that the deceased took with him into the afterlife, have revealed the existence of houses and mud-brick enclosure walls. This suggests that the concept of the Egyptian town and urban planning can be traced back as far as the Amatian (Naqada I) Phase.

REFERENCES: Adams, Barbara. Pre-Dynastic Egypt. Lubrecht and Cramer, Ltd. New York. 1988 Bains, John. Atlas of Ancient Egypt. Facts on File inc. 1980Greenblatt, Miriam. Hatshepsut and Ancient Egypt. Marshall Cavendish Inc.

Late Predynastic (3,500 - 3,300 B.C.E.)

The Late Predynastic Period, (also called Gerzean period or Naqada II) is known as the most important predynastic culture in Egypt. Although the center of the development was the same as that of Amratian (or Naqada I), Gerzean culture slowly spread throughout Egypt. The Late Predynastic Period is best characterized by the discovery of the el-Gerza Culture providing a third predynastic phase and a second stage of the Naqada period. Kawm al-Ahmar, Naqada, and Abydos are the large sites developed during Naqada II period. They had large settlement areas with increasing division of wealth and status. Social stratification is evident from the burials of this time. The rich were buried in tombs lined with mud brick, while the poor were buried in oblong tombs with one-sided ledges to hold funerary offerings. Tombs of people in the upper class were bigger and richer than those of the middle class. Regional political leaders can be easily identified by their "chieftains's tombs'' at different sites. Compared with the pharonic civilization, the Gerzean culture reached a stage of development that was already well advanced, especially in its funeral and religious rituals. Gerzean tombs had become virtual replicas of earthly dwellings; sometimes they comprised several profusely furnished rooms. There were amulets, figurines and ceremonial objects decorated with thematic scenes of animals (lions, bulls, cattle, hippopotami and falcons) which are known to have represented various gods from a very early period in Egyptian history. By Naqada II (also called Nakada II or Naqadah II) Period, bigger and more practical river ships were made, and the trade along the Nile River was flourishing. Egyptian boats changed from crafts made of reed bundles to ships made of wood planks. There is evidence of intense trade with the Near East. Ma'adi was a center of trade with the Near East and there were a wide range of settlement that presumably played a role of intermediary to transport goods to the south. Imports of lapis lazuli tell us that their trading went as far as Badakhshan in Afghanistan. Lapis lazulis was traded across land and by ocean via the Persian Gulf to Sumer. Evidence of a brief period of either direct or indirect contact with cultures in Mesopotamia during the late Gerzean time was found. Some of the influence from Southwestern Asia can be seen from pottery paralleled in Mesopotamia and Palestine, seal stones with Mesopotamian motifs-interlacing ophidians, master of animals, griffin

with wings, and the complex niched-facade mud brick architecture paralleled in Sumer where it was used for the decoration of the temples of the gods. The major difference between the Amatian and the Gerzean lay in their ceramic production. The decoration of Gerzean pottery was more developed with the use of stylized motifs including geometrical representations of flora and more naturalistic depictions of fauna and other aspects of their culture. Gerzean culture was introduced into Egypt by the "Eastern Desert Folk,'' who invaded and governed Egypt while the Amratian white-lined pottery was brought by "Libyan invasions.'' Gerzean culture is characterized by a buff-coloured pottery with pictorial decorations in dark red paint, use of an abrasive tubular drill for stonecutting, pearshaped mace-heads and ripple-flacked flint knives and an advanced metallurgy. During the Gerzean period, pottery was mass-produced and was of very good quality. Unusual animal motifs drawn on the Gerzean pottery, such as ostriches and ibexes tell us that Gerzean people went to hunt in the sub-desert since those animals could not be found near the Nile River. The donkey was the only locally domesticated animal that was portrayed as tame in the late Predynastic art. Gazelle herding and the domestication of sheep and dogs are found in the Gerzean along with cattle and pigs. The dwarf goat was found at the Gerzean site of Tukh and Esh-Shaheinab. The ancient indigenous way of hunting, fishing and utilizing wild plants supported the subsistence economy of Egypt until late Predynastic Period. However, population increase affected the distribution of plants and animals in the desert. In the late predynastic period, elephants, giraffes and ostriches seem to have vanished from the desert and floodplain. Writing was most likely not brought into Egypt, but may have began during this period with representations on the Naqada pottery. This pottery apparently charts gradual stylization of the plants, animals and religious dances depicted, eventually resulting in a set of divine symbols that are virtually hieroglyphic signs. These Naqada pictures reflect a fundamental principle throughout Egyptian history: the combination of pictograms and phonograms. In the later Gerzean period, there is evidence of increased political activity and the general opinion is that a struggle for predominance now developed between Upper and Lower Egypt. In both regions, the basic unit of government was the local community clustered around a town or group of villages and was under the greater control of a local variant of one of the universal gods, and looking for leadership to some powerful headman. REFERENCES: Silverman, David P.ed. Ancient Egypt. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. Trigger, B.G., et al. Ancient Egypt: A Social History. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983. (Untitled) ANCIENT EGYPT. The University of Texas: Anthropology Course.

http://www.dla.utexas.edu/depts/anthro/courses/97fall/denbow304/WEEK11.HTML October 4, 2000.Dynastic Race. NUNKI.NET: The Official David Rohl Wed. http://www.nunki.net/PerDud/TheWorks/Express/DynasticRace.html October 4, 2000."Egypt.'' Egypt World. (1998 -2000). http://egyptworld.8k.com/closeegypt.html October 4, 2000."Egypt History.'' newafrica.com: Africa's Information Provider. (2000). http://www.newafrica.com/history/egypt/ancient%20egypt.htm October 4, 2000."Egypt History - Predynastic Period.'' Official Internet Site of: The Ministry of Tourism, Egypt -The Egyptian Tourist Authority. (2000 -2004). http://touregypt.net/ebph5.htm October 4, 2000.``Encyclopdia Britannica (Egypt).'' (1999 - 2000). http://www.britannica.com/bcom/eb/article/printable/0/0,5722,115550,00.html October 4, 2000.``Gerzean Culture -Britannica.com.'' (1999 -2000). http://www.britannica.com/bcom/eb/article/4/0,5716,37324+1+36613,00.htmlquery=ger zean%20culture October 4, 2000.``Naqada II Other Objects.'' Museum of Ancient Cultures. (1997-1999). http://www.museum.mq.edu.au/eegypt2/naqada2a.html October 4, 2000. "pre/early dynastic egypt.'' The University of Texas: Archaeology. http://wwwhost.cc.utexas.edu/ftp/courses/archaeology/ARY_302/Egypt/02.early_dynast ic_egypt.htm October 4, 2000.Photographs of Gerzean Pottery "Gerzean Pot.'' http://userwww.sfsu.edu/~marianb/GerzeanPot.html "Objects from Naqada II Graves.'' http://www.museum.mq.edu.au/eegypt2/naqada2a.html "Painted clay vessel, Gerzean culture.'' http://www.britannica.com/bcom/eb/article/single_image/0,5716,11468+asmbly%5Fid,0 0.html "Clay vessel from the late Gerzian Period.'' http://www.secular.org/library/modern/gerald_larue/otll/chap6.html "Gerzean Vase.'' http://www.atlan.org/articles/temple2/zoom/fig3c.jpg Written By Kozue Takahashi.

The Story of the Rosetta Stone, "Finding a Lost Language"

The following is a chapter from "Ancient Peoples: A Hypertext View," draft by Richard A. Strachan and Kathleen A. Roetzel (1997)

Egyptian hieroglyphics had been used by the Egyptians for thousands of years. However, a particularly bleak period of Egyptian history is the conquest of Egypt by Persia. The Egyptians were dominated by Persian intruders. The events that changed the nature of Egypt were not the Persian conquest but rather the war between Persia (the rulers of Egypt) and the united Greek city-states. Greece had originally been united by Philip of Macedon and then ruled effectively by Alexander the Great. Alexander defeated the Persian forces and then took his army to Egypt. There he was welcomed as a conquering hero by the Egyptians because he brought an end to Persian rule. He was made a god by the Egyptians as well as a pharaoh. He, however, had other campaigns to wage and took his army off to the Middle East and the Indus River Valley leaving a regent in charge of Egypt. After the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC, his empire was divided among his three most trusted and powerful generals. The throne of Egypt fell to Ptolemy I, the son of Lagus. Ptolemy took Alexander’s preserved body in a jar filled with honey back to Alexandria. Ptolemy ran Egypt like a business, strictly for profit. . He was welcomed by the Egyptians as part of Alexander the Great’s family. Ptolemy then became the pharaoh, Ptolemy I. By so doing, he set the name standard for the 32nd Dynasty which turned out to be the last of Egypt’s great dynasties. All of his male successors were called Ptolemy and all of his female successors were called Cleopatra. As we move to the end of this Greek Dynasty, there was increasing involvement with the Roman Empire. The Roman civil war between Caesar and Pompeii indirectly involved Egypt. Pompeii lost this war and turned to Egypt for shelter and young Ptolemy (several generations below Ptolemy I) had him executed and delivered to Caesar. The young Ptolemy, thinking this would ingratiate him with Caesar was totally incorrect. His sister, Cleopatra, who was vying for the throne had other ways of ingratiating herself with Caesar - they had children together. Caesar was unfortunately assassinated while visiting Rome and his empire was divided up between General Marcus Antonious and his adopted son, Octavian. Marcus Antonious was better known as Marc Antony. Marc Antony took rulership of that part of the Empire that contained Egypt and that resulted in his inheriting Cleopatra. They, too, had children. His relationship with Octavian broke down and resulted in a war which Marc Antony lost. Antony was killed and Cleopatra committed suicide. Their male children were executed and their female children were probably married off to local princes. The Egyptian dynastic system was ended and a Roman Governorship was established. During the Ptolemic dynasty, Egyptian and Greek languages were used simultaneously. During the Roman Governorship only Latin was used and occasionally Greek. Within a hundred years the Egyptian hieroglyphics were no longer used or understood by anyone and even the Roman authors of the time suggested that hieroglyphics was not even a language. In the truest sense this is now a dead language. Ultimately the Roman Empire fell and the Middle Ages "came about". Nevertheless, there existed a constant contact between Europe and Egypt such that hieroglyphics were

consistently known by the European elite. The reason for this is that medical practices of the Middle Ages resulted in the prescription of bitumen, ground up mummies as a cure for various kinds of diseases. Thus, there was a trade in whole mummies which resulted in examples of hieroglyphics coming into Europe throughout the Dark Ages. As a result, there were some early attempts at translation of hieroglyphics. In 1633, a Jesuit priest named Anthanasius Kircher, whose specialities were the humanities, science, language and religion translated the word ‘autocrat’ or in Greek ‘autocratur’ into German and did so by substituting ideas for the images. His translation read "the originator of all moisture and all vegetation whose creative forces is brought into this kingdom by the holy mukta" (is this a ‘bureaucrat’?) The history of the deciphering of the Egyptian hieroglyphics during the 16th and 17th centuries took small steps toward final interpretation. Some scholars thought that the hieroglyphics were the origin of other languages. Some believed that hieroglyphics spelled nothing at all. Yet others believed that the hieroglyphics were an indication of social stratification or social significance. This speculation would have continued had not a political event interceded. The almost constant warfare between Britain and France resulted in a major change in the understanding of hieroglyphics. The French under Napoleon Bonaparte decided that they could defeat the British by attacking Egypt and subsequently controlling the rich food supply from along the Nile. In August of 1798, 13 French ships landed near Alexandria at Aboukir Bay in Egypt and marched inland to fight the British near Cairo. The night before the battle, Napoleon exhorted his troops on by saying something like "Soldiers, from the tops of these pyramids, forty centuries are looking down at you." The French ground forces won the conflict but the British navy, under the command of Lord Horratio Nelson, defeated the French navy. Napoleon believed that he would be in Egypt for only a few months, but he and his men were stranded there for three years with no way to return home. Napoleon had brought with him between nearly 1000 civilians including 167 of whom were scientists, technicians, mathematicians and artists who studied the art, architecture, and culture of Egypt during their "extended vacation." From 1809-1828, they published a 19-volume work called Description of Egypt. Their observations, drawings and illustrations were circulated throughout Europe and created a tremendous interest in antiquities of Egypt. The soldiers continued to "dig in" and they reconstructed forts as most soldiers had done during previous centuries by using building stones previously used by earlier peoples. In 1799, while extending a fortress near Rosetta, a small city near Alexandria, a young French officer named Pierre-Francois Bouchard found a block of black basalt stone. It measured three feet nine inches long, two feet four and half inches wide, and eleven inches thick and it contained three distinct bands of writing. The most incomplete was the top band containing hieroglyphics, the middle band was an Egyptian script called Demotic script (he did not know that), and the bottom was ancient Greek (he did recognize the bottom band). This stone was called the Rosetta Stone. He took the stone to the scholars and they realized that it was a royal decree that basically stated that it was to be written in the languages used in Egypt at the time. Scholars began to focus on the Demotic script, the middle band, because it was more complete and it looked more

like letters than the pictures in the upper band that were hieroglyphics. It was essentially a shorthand hieroglyphics that had evolved from an earlier shorthand version of Egyptian called Heiratic script. Material from Egypt was continuously coming into Europe. In order to display their status, the European gentry and nobility normally had some Egyptian relics in their possession, perhaps an art object on a table or if one were quite rich, they might have an obelisk in the front yard of the estate. Material containing hieroglyphics continued to enter Europe at a reasonably accelerated rate. The first to make any sense of the Demotic script on the Rosetta Stone was a French scholar named Silvestre deSacy. deSacy was an important and skilled French linguist. He identified the symbols which comprised the word ‘Ptolemy’ and ‘Alexander’ thus, establishing a relationship between the symbols and sounds. Johann Akerblad who history records as a Swedish diplomat, looked at the Rosetta Stone with an additional knowledge of Coptic. Coptic was the language used by the Coptic church of Egypt, an early Christian group who preserved the language which was used as early as the 4th century. Coptic was written with the Greek alphabet but utilizes seven additional symbols from the Demotic script. Akerblad’s knowledge of Coptic allowed him to identify the words for ‘love,’ ‘temple’ and ‘Greek’ thus, making it clear that the Demotic script was not only a phonetic script but it was also translatable. The earliest translation of the Greek text on the Rosetta Stone into English was done by Reverend Stephen Weston in London in April 1802 before the Society of Antiquaries . About this time, both deSacy and Thomas Young, attempted to decipher the hieroglyphics on the Rosetta Stone. Young was successful in determining that foreign names could not be represented by symbols because symbols are based upon the words used in a given language. Thus, foreign names had to be spelled phonetically. In hieroglyphics there are groups of symbols that are separated from other symbols. These encircled inscriptions are called cartouches. Thomas Young determined that the cartouches were proper names of people who were not Egyptian like the names of Ptolemy and Alexander which in Greek were Ptolemaios and Alexandrus. He successfully deciphered 5 cartouches. His publication on this matter was far reaching. At this point there is involvement by a young French historian and linguist named JeanFracois Champollion. Champollion had mastered many Eastern languages. In 1807, Champollion went to study for two years with noted French linguist Francois AntoineIsaac Silvestre deSacy. Later in his career, Champollion had compiled a Coptic dictionary and read Thomas Young in 1819. Looking at Young’s writing on the subject of hieroglyphics, he realized that what Young had actually proven was that all of hieroglyphics were phonetic, not just those hieroglyphics that were contained within the cartouches. Utilizing hieroglyphics from an estate at Kingston Lacey in Britain, Champollion correctly identified the names of Cleopatra and Alexandrus and verified Ptolemeus which had previously been identified by Young He published his results and continued his research. In 1822 new inscriptions from a temple at Abu Simbel on the Nile were introduced into Europe and Champollion had correctly identified the name of the pharaoh who had built the temple. That name was ‘Ramses.’ Utilizing his knowledge of Coptic he continued to successfully translate the hieroglyphics opening up an understanding of the Ancient Egyptians.

. 5000 BC

Earliest evidence of settled human habitation in the Nile delta

3800 BC

The beginnings of Nile culture

3100-2650

Archaic Period

BC

3100 BC

Earliest evidence of hieroglyphic writingin Egypt

3100 BC

The legendary king, Menes, unites the two kingdoms of Egypt

3000 BC

Earliest evidence of sun-worship in Egypt

2700-1640

Pyramid-building period; largest pyramids built for Cheops, Chephren, and Mycerinus

BC

2550-2490 BC

2650-2134 BC

Building of the pyramid tombs for Khufu (Cheops) and Khephren (Chephren), the largest of the Egyptian pyramids Old Kingdom; beginning of the Third Dynasty

~2630 BC

Netcherike-Djoser, pharoah who built the the "Step" pyramid

2134-2040

Collapse of the Sixth Dynasty and the Old Kingdom; beginning of the First Intermediate Period

BC

2040-1640 BC

Middle Kingdom

1700 BC

Earliest evidence of diagnostic medicine in Egypt

1640-1550

Collapse of the Middle Kingdom (1640 BC; beginning of the Second Intermediate Period

BC

BC

New Kingdom; temple-building period in Egypt; the Temple of Karnak built and added to all through the New Kingdom period

~1500 BC

Earliest examples of the Book of the Dead

1380 BC

Building of the Temple of Luxor by Amenhotep III

1367-1350

Reign of Amenhotep IV (Akhenaton), who abandoned Egyptian polytheism for a monotheistic religion

1550-1070

BC

1347-1339 BC

Reign of Tutankhamon

1182-1151 BC

1070-712 BC

750 BC

Reign of Ramses III; supposed period of Hebrew migration out of Egypt to Palestine Collapse of New Kingdom (1070 BC; Third Intermediate Period Conquest of Egypt by Kush under Kashta and then Piankhy

712-332 BC Late period ~670 BC

Formation of a new Kushite kingdom at Meroë

332 BC

Invasion of Egypt by Alexander the Great

332 BC-395 Hellenistic-Roman Period AD

332-31 BC

Ptolemaic Egypt

285-246 BC

Reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphus, who commissioned the Greek translation of the Hebrew Torah, the Septuagint

~170 BC

Aristobolus, the first Jewish Greek philosopher, presents an explanation of Mosaic scripture to Ptolemy VI Philometor

51-30 BC

Reign of Cleopatra VII, last of the Ptolemaic monarchs of Egypt

31 BC

Battle of Actium; Cleopatra VII and Mark Antony defeated by Augustus Caesar

30 BC-395

Conquest of Egypt by Augustus Caesar; Roman period

AD

66 AD

Jewish riots against Rome in Egypt

395 AD

Roman Empire divided into two empires; Egypt controlled by Byzantium

395-641 AD

Byzantine period; Egyptian hieroglyphic writing falls out of use and soon becomes unintelligible

641 AD

Conquest of Egypt by the Muslim Arabs; Egypt becomes Islamic

1822 AD

Jean François Champollion deciphers the system of Egyptian hieroglyphic writing from the Rosetta Stone