Excursions in Egypt

Egypt, a country located in the northeast corner of Africa. In the heart of Egypt, in the Nile River Valley and Delta, was home to one of the major civilizations of the ancient Near East and, like Mesopotamia further east, one of the world's first cities and literate societies developed here. Pharaonic Egypt flourished for about 3,000 years during a series of local dynasties interspersed with brief periods of foreign rule. After 323 Ave. Cr. Alexander the Great conquered the region, and urban Egypt became an integral part of the Hellenistic world. Under the rule of the Greek Ptolemaic dynasty, the city of Alexandria flourished with an advanced literate society, but modern Egypt was destroyed in the 30s. BC was conquered by the Romans. It remained part of the Roman Republic and Empire, and later part of the Byzantine Empire, the successor state of Rome, until it was conquered by Arab Muslim armies in 639–642.