Lower Egypt from Giza - February 2022

The first question is: How is Upper Egypt distinguished from Lower Egypt? Geographically, Lower Egypt is in the north, where the Nile River drains into the Mediterranean Sea. Upper Egypt includes the southern portion of the Nile River and borders the Libyan desert. 

Modern day Cairo and Giza are in Lower Egypt and Upper Egypt includes cities such as Luxor, Qena and Aswan. Both Upper and Lower Ancient Egypt were separate kingdoms, until unification in 3000 BC. 

Before this period, the kings of the two regions had unique crowns. Rulers of the unified kingdom wore a double crown. This "double" crown represented the the sovereignty of a unified kingdom and reflected a combination of the two kingdom crowns. A unified Ancient Egypt was also represented by a knotted papyrus (Lower Egypt) and lotus plant (Upper Egypt).

 

Lower Egypt

From our Giza hotel, our day trips included the Egyptian Museum, Mosque of Mohammad (or Alabaster Mosque), Memphis, Sakkara Necropolis and The Great Pyramids of Giza.

Egyptian Museum of Antiquities

This Museum was built in 1901 and housed the main collection of Ancient Egypt artifacts (150,000 in number). As we toured the exhibits, empty cases indicated that several items had already moved to the Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza. The new museum is scheduled to open in November 2022 and will have 870,000 square feet of floor space. This museum will be the largest museum in the world. 

With exhibits spread over two floors, the ground floor of the current Egyptian Museum contained larger sculptures and antiquities. We were particularly fascinated by the first floor exhibits. This floor included more items from everyday life plus artifacts from the tomb of Tutankhamen. Many of the Tutankhamun collection were made of solid or inlaid gold. Gold was mined in Ancient Egypt and was a more common material than silver.   

Great Mosque of Muhammad 

This mosque was built between 1830 and 1848. It is the most visible mosque in Cairo. Note the alabaster from the upper walls is missing. In the 1850s, these panels were removed for use in a palace of Abbas I of Egypt. 

This clocktower was presented to Muhammad Ali by King Philippe of France.
An obelisk from Luxor was given as a reciprocal gift and 
is now standing in Place de la Concorde in Paris.

Memphis 

Memphis is located on the west bank of the Nile River, about 12 miles from Giza. It was the capital of Egypt's Old Kingdom (2700-2200BC). Memphis was also the first capital of the unified Ancient Egypt. We visited the open air museum and viewed limestone and granite artifacts from Memphis. 

Ramses II Colossal Statue (36 feet tall)

Statue of Ramses II

Alabaster Sphinx

Sakkara Necropolis

Sakkara, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, served as the ancient Egyptian Royalty burial grounds for Memphis. The Step Pyramid of Djoser is a visual highlight of this area. It was built in 2600BC within the Old Kingdom period. Along side the pyramid are smaller pyramids and private non-royal funeral monuments. 

Prior to this trip, I always envisioned pyramids were placed deep into the desert. We learned from our Egyptologist that the pyramids locations were placed near the Nile for stone transport and within moderate to short travel distances from where royalty and officials resided. Thus, pyramid locations were near the floodplains of the Nile River and placed in bedrock areas.

Step Pyramid

Great Pyramid Complex in Giza

This complex represents another UNESCO World Heritage site from the Old Kingdom (2600-2500BC). The Great Pyramid (Pyramid of Khufu) is the larger structure within the complex and is about 480 feet high and built of an estimated 2.3 million blocks, weighing 6 million tons.

The Great Pyramid is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. It was the tallest man-made structure in the world for over 3,800 years. The smooth limestone casing is no longer present.

We had an opportunity to take a hunched walk into the interior Grand Gallery of the Great Pyramid. With a warning of the low ceiling and claustrophobic narrow passage way, we opted to view the Great Pyramid from the exterior.

From within this complex, we were able to view the Great Sphinx of Giza, with head of a man and body of a lion. The head of the Sphinx has been said to represent Pharaoh Khafre. We noted that the Pyramid of Khafre is also in the Great Pyramid complex (second tallest) and is distinguished by a red granite peak. This is more durable stone and is clearly noticeable.