The People of Egypt

Because of its central location on routes of trade, conquest, and migration,
through the centuries of its recorded history, Egypt has become home to
many temporary residents and permanent immigrants. With the passage
of time, each wave of new immigrants has assimilated into the local mix
of peoples, making modern Egypt a combination of Libyans, Nubians,
Syrians, Persians, Macedonians, Romans, Arabs, Turks, Circassians,
Greeks, Italians, and Armenians, along with the descendants of the
people of ancient Egypt. Upper Egyptians in antiquity were largely small
and fi ne boned, with narrow skulls and dark wavy hair. Those of the
Nile Delta, who had more contact with southwest Asian peoples, were
heavier and taller and their skulls were broader. Although the artistic
conventions of ancient Egypt were highly stylized, paintings and statues
show men with reddish-brown skin, while women are shown with much
fairer skin, perhaps because they spent more time indoors. Their facial
features resemble those of sub-Saharan Africans. Assumptions about
appearance must, however, be cautious.

Language and Religion
The ancient Egyptian language is considered by linguists to belong to
the Afro-Asiatic language group, which includes many other languages
spoken by ancient peoples. It survives in Coptic, which was a spoken
language from ancient times until about 1500, but now is used by
Egyptian Christians only in religious services.
Modern Egyptians speak Arabic, with a few words and phrases that
may be derived from the language of ancient Egypt. Written Arabic
is the same from Morocco to Kuwait, and is also the language of religious
law and ritual for the world’s 1.5 billion Muslims. The spoken
language of Egypt is not quite the same as written Arabic, which has
elaborate rules about grammar and syntax. Many Egyptians believe
that having Arabic as their native tongue makes them Arabs; in popular
usage, though, settled Egyptians call the Bedouins “Arabs,” but not
themselves. The vernacular dialects of Cairo and of Upper Egypt differ
from the colloquial Arabic of the Bedouins and from that of other Arab
countries, but Egyptians (like other Arabs) tend to view their spoken
dialects as “slang” and written Arabic as their “true” language, even
though it must be learned in school.
Egypt’s pharaonic religious beliefs gave way to Coptic Christianity,
but many ancient practices survived, especially among farmers. For
example, the months of modern Egypt’s agricultural calendar are the
same as those of ancient and Coptic Egypt. From the seventh-century
Arab conquest until modern times, Christianity has slowly given way to
Islam, but conversion to Islam was gradual and rarely forced. Although
Christians and Muslims celebrate holidays limited to their own religions,
in Egypt they share a spring holiday, Shamm al-Nasim (smelling
the breeze), observed on Easter Monday of the Coptic calendar, when
families go out from their houses to enjoy a picnic. In addition, as long
as the Nile fl ooded its banks each year, all Egyptians, whether Jewish,
Christian, or Muslim, joined in seasonal festivities marking the onset,
the progress, and the climax of the inundation that gave life and prosperity
to their country (Lane 1836, chapter 26).