Ancient Times in the Nile Delta

Ramses Temple and the Nile Shoreline at Abu Simbel Photographic Print
Boyer, David
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The exhaustive archeological research that has brought to light so much of the history of ancient Egypt has been confined chiefly to the Nile valley. There the bordering limestone cliffs and the nearby supplies of granite, porphyry, and other hard rocks for ornament and sculpture provided the material for the monuments that have endured down to our own time. In the delta, on the other hand, if stone was to be used for construction it had to be brought down from the valley or from the scarcely less distant limestone cliffs west of Alexandria. Furthermore, the deep alluvium of the delta afforded no such solid foundation on which to build as did, for example, the rocky floor of the Theban area in the Qena Bend of the Nile, or the granite cliffs of Aswan, or the desert-edge site of the Great Pyramids. As a result, the few ancient stone structures that were built in the delta have been largely submerged as the rock foundation subsided under the increasing weight of alluvium.

Nevertheless, it is believed that civilization in Egypt first developed in the delta. There the Pharaohs of the First and Second Dynasties reigned in capitals at Sais and Tanis, and from there natives or invaders now and again challenged the authority of the Theban Pharaohs. Its great expanse of cultivable land, as compared with the narrow strip in the valley, made the delta both an attraction to foreign invaders and a base of resources which ambitious Egyptians could muster for the overthrow of the valley rulers. The extent of delta cultivation in Pharaonic times is not certain. The sites of ancient cities are known, however, at least within the present area generally under cultivation. Furthermore, even in the water-logged and largely abandoned land of the coastal belt, ruins of Ptolemaic and early Roman settlements and traces of canals and embankments indicate that much of the land was once under cultivation.

After the Arab conquest in the Seventh century A. D., the area of cultivated land in the delta continued to decrease, until, by the end of the eighteenth century, it covered no more than 60 per cent of the delta. The decline in production from the land still under cultivation was scarcely less serious. Although irrigation and drainage works in the delta were almost completely neglected throughout this period, the decline is to be attributed only in part to that. Most marked was the deterioration of the coastal belt and the eastern and western borders.

Subsidence of the delta foundation had finally brought a broad coastal belt close to, and in places below, sea level and so lowered the central part of the delta that Nile water could reach only the central two branches (the Rosetta and Damietta) of the seven that formerly carried its water to all parts of the delta.

The Barari Towns

Two towns, Damietta and Rosetta, near the sea on the Nile branches, may be expected to prosper greatly, if and when further large areas of the barari land are reclaimed for agriculture. They owe their present size, however, rather to their inheritance from the past, when as maritime -- riverine ports, they were the main Mediterranean gateways to the country than to any present importance as commercial or marketing centers. Although no longer of any consequence as ports, except for a little coastwise sailing-vessel trade, they still contain some survivals of the varied industries that developed in them when they were Egypt's chief entrepots of foreign trade.

Rosetta (Arabic Rasheed), on the west bank of the Rosetta Branch about ten miles from its mouth, occupies the site of an ancient town called Botbitine by the Greeks. Following the silting up of the other western branches of the Nile and of the canal by which the Ptolemies had connected Alexandria with the westernmost, or Canobic, Branch, Rosetta became important as a way station on the overland and water route between the Gulf of Suez and the Mediterranean. It maintained this position until 1820 when Mohammed Ali completed his Mamudiya Canal connecting Alexandria with the Nile. Rice mills along the river wharves and the salting of fish are Rosetta's present principal industrial activities.

Damietta (Arabic Dumyat), on the east bank of the Damietta Branch about eight miles from its mouth, is some four miles upstream from the original town, called Tamiatis in the ancient Coptic language of Egypt. Because of its proximity to the coastal trade routes of the Levant, Tamiatis was a thriving center of trade in silk, linen, dates, fish, and spices, exceeding Rosetta in the volume of its commerce and in its manufacturing industry. In the twelfth century its prosperity was further enhanced by the decline of the old silk-trade center of Tinnis farther east, owing to the latter's partial submergence in the rising water of Lake Manzala. Louis IX of France, the Saint Louis of the Crusades, captured Tamiatis in 1249 A. D. After the French had been driven out, the Mameluke bey governing this section of Egypt destroyed the town and about 1260 relocated it on its present site, less vulnerable from the sea.

As in the case of the other coastal towns, Damietta suffered a decline after Mohammed Ali connected the Nile with Alexandria by his Mahmudiya Canal. But the creation of Port Sa'id, in connection with the construction of the Suez Canal, restored to Damietta a considerable measure of its former prosperity by providing a market and shipping point for its products. A motor road along the embankment that separates Lake Manzala from the sea and shipping on the lake link Damietta with Port Sa'id. Damietta has also profited by the development of the Ras el Barr summer resort at the mouth of the Damietta Branch. Damietta's principal industries today are those of long tradition there -- silk weaving, woodworking, leather working, and the making of confections. Many of their products are famous throughout the country. The importance of Damietta is indicated by its separation for administrative purposes from the province to which it would normally belong. It is one of five urban centers administered as governorates directly under the authority of the Minister of Interior.

The Barari Nile Delta

The truly barren "barari" land of the northern border of the delta is a broad belt occupying somewhat more than a fourth of the delta, twenty-five miles wide at its eastern end at Lake Manzala and decreasing in width westward to about ten miles at its western end. With an area of 21.10 square miles (5465 sq. km.), or 1.3 million feddans, it is about twice the size of the state of Rhode Island. The salinity and generally water-logged condition of its soil and the lack of natural drainage keeps most of this area of potential farm land beyond the present limits of cultivation. The salt content is everywhere high; in places near Lakes Burullus and Idku it is as much as 14 per cent. Only along the courses of the Damietta and Rosetta branches is the barari land high enough for good drainage. Here, on strips bordering both sides of these branches, the cultivated land of the delta continues to the sea.

Few roads of any kind cross this dreary, inhospitable region of grayish soil, marshes, lagoons, and dense reed growth; wide tracts are completely without human habitation. During the summer and autumn flood of the Nile it is everywhere difficult of access, and even the scanty winter rains turn it into a muddy morass. The transition from arable land is, however, gradual; patches of alkaline soil appear, the areas under cultivation grow progressively smaller and less productive, and signs of human habitation become more and more sparse. Rice is the principal crop of the transition zone, owing to its tolerance of soil salinity and its high water requirement.
Reclamation of the barari, to which Egyptians look hopefully for a major addition to their arable land, has been undertaken on any large scale only within the last thirty or forty years. Its ultimate success depends on complete control of the Nile flood. The task of reclamation is so costly and must be on such a large scale to be successful that it can be undertaken only by big landowners, land companies, or the government. Recruitment of the large labor force required is in itself a problem, because the region is so sparsely populated that most of the workers must be brought in from considerable distances. Under present conditions, reclamation is a highly speculative venture at best. Even when the land is brought to crop-producing condition, constant attention is necessary to keep it so.

Ten to fifteen years of continuous work are required to prepare the land for cultivation. The reclamation process involves elaborate drainage works in which recourse to pumping is commonly necessary. Natural growth must be cleared, salt washed out by repeated flooding, and drainage canals and ditches systematically maintained. Cultivation begins with one or more plantings of a highly salt-tolerant crop (usually berseem, the quick-growing Egyptian clover) before other crops are attempted.

In addition to the obvious benefit derived from the increase in cultivable land, large-scale reclamation projects in the barari belt have introduced a superior type of rural settlement, quite different from the usual hamlet of the Egyptian farmer -- with well-planned compounds with houses for the workers, offices for the management, stables, and workshops for implement repair. The workers' houses, built of baked brick, cementroofed, and with windows and sanitary facilities, have little in common with the primitive, mud-walled shelters of the great majority of rural Egyptians.