Egyptian+Trade

Egyptian Trade **Simply because of their geographic advantages, Ancient Egypt was able to diversify from an agricultural society to one of the wealthiest trading countries in the world**. Throughout this year we have based our studies on the idea of //__Guns, Germs, and Steel__// by Jared Diamond. It wasn’t until near the end of this case study that I agree with him. aAINT THAT THE TRUTH!!!!!



[|http://web.bryant.edu/~langlois/ecology/nile1.JPG] The Nile river, fertilizing the dry soil of the desert.

Living right next to the Nile is just lucky- geographically lucky. If I start off with food production, the Nile was able to assure that to the Egyptians. 4100 miles of water gushing over its banks, fertilizes the soil next to it, making the deserted land fruitful. The Nile had satisfied the thirst of their plants; therefore the Egyptians were able to produce enough food to prevent them from starvation. **(Argument One: the availability of plentiful resources enabled them to produce enough crops to fulfill their needs and later trade the surplus for the things they needed)**

http://www.tommyschultz.com/images/bkk-st-food/dried-fish.jpg http://www.ancient-egypt-online.com/images/dates.jpg http://www.essentialoil.in/images/wheat.jpg The three main crops of Ancient Egypt: fish, date, and wheat.

Wheat was one of their main crops, and the reason is simple. Unlike bananas, Wheat was easy to plant- just scatter the seeds around the field. In a wheat field there is thousands and thousands of grain seeds, and there is few difficulties collecting the cereal crop. An additional convenience to growing wheat is it stores for a long time. In a deserted country like Egypt it is essential that you have stored food, so when natural disasters occur you are able to prevent your family from starvation. Comparing wheat with bananas was just an example from Papa New Guinea, a country Jared diamond had mentioned numerous times in his book. Unlike the New Guineans who did not produce such convenient crops, they were unable to make time for other things; this is why an easy farmed cereal crop was so important at that time.

As the Egyptians were able to think about more than food for survival, they began exchanging basic necessities. Between the townspeople, they developed a system of trade called the Barter System. Take a fisher and a cobbler for example; this fisher wanted new shoes, but because there was no set currency, he had to find a cobbler who had shoes and wanted fish. Once he found the cobbler, he would be able to exchange his fish for the shoes, this is a simple way of explaining how bartering went by in Ancient Egypt. This system wasn’t quickly forgotten. As trading slowly expanded beyond neighbors in town, and their desires grew past basic necessities, trade began to spread. Based on the idea of bartering, the Egyptians began to exchange goods with nearby civilizations, for instance the Lebanese.

http://www.berlinkauf.com/images/2250_sOWZRR0Rju.JPG The Lebanese and South Africans trades wood with the Egyptians, in return for resources they lacked.

In Lebanon, they had wood, something Egypt did not produce enough of, but needed desperately. The navy development required a fair bit of wood, and the Egyptians looked to their fellow neighbors for it //(source one)//. In return for wood, the Lebanese received wheat; as so for other Africans countires, who also traded a great deal of timber //(source two)//. Once again, if it wasn’t for their production of wheat reaching beyond the amount required for the townspeople, there would have never been enough to trade with other countries; yet again, on the account of the Nile’s presence.

http://yalibnan.com/site/archives/2007/09/23/lebanon%20map.gif http://www.theodora.com/wfb/south_africa/south_africa_maps.html These two countries both established trading connections, using the Barter System as a base for their trading activities.

Not only did trading with their neighbors fulfill some of their requirements for certain products, but also enabled them to be heard of from even further countries. **(Argument Two: with such nearby civilizations, they were able to exchange resources, enriching their own storage of fundamental supplies)** Neighbors of the Lebanese and the South Africans were able to hear from them how convenient and profitable trade was between the Egyptians and themselves. This encourages the other countries to seek trade connections with Ancient Egypt. Those longer distance connections eventually came to the result of trading routes. On land, they took shortcuts, where at junctions they could perform trade, exchange goods all across the continent. Yet to mention the Nile again, for the Egyptians the Nile acted as a highway, transportation like boats were able to travel with the current to civilizations established lower down the continent.

[|http://www.macs.hw.ac.uk/~ai38/Sudan/pic's/maps/suda_tribes.gif] With the Nile passing through Nubia, transportation was somewhat more convenient.

Unfortunately, trade was not always friendly- I need that and you need this so let’s swap. No, it didn’t always work that way. As throughout history, conflicts between leaders often lead to war; and Egypt too, had these conflicts. Through an unfriendly encounter with the leader of Nubia, Kamose (current Egyptian king at that time) ordered for his troops to take over lower Nubia. Eventually, after winning both lower and upper Nubia, Kamose managed to rid of Nubian King. Under Egyptian authority, they began to bring back tons and tons of gold from Kush, which later on made them the wealthiest nation in the world.

http://becomingrich.net/images/_private/Five_90_pound_gold_bricks.jpg Iron and copper were both metals used for tools, the method of production from European countries adopted by the Egyptians

Land trade wasn’t enough for Egypt, as they traveled up the Nile and to the delta; the beginning of oversea traded was just in front of their eyes. ** (Argument Three: the gift of the Nile not only helped them with food, but acted as a highway leading to more profitable trade overboard) ** Trade with the Romans was one of the most important. Egypt became the wheat industry for Rome, and in return they received metals such as gold and iron. You may think that Egypt was known for gold, and yes it was, but not //their// gold, for they had not produced it. Egyptian gold mining had never reached a ton, whereas they had imported nearly 1400 tons from Rome //(source four)//. However, this wasn’t the most influential; it was iron that had greatest impact on Egypt. Unlike the shiny yellow bricks, iron was hard and durable. With this metal, the Europeans made great tools and weapons; through trade, Ancient Egypt was soon able to adopt those techniques. Eventually, this was the result of advances arrow-heads, axes, spears, daggers, and so on.

http://www.anothersideofthecoin.com/byzantinelarge.jpg As coins were introduced to Egypt, trade became much more efficient.

Another big influence from foreign countries was currency. With the introduction of money, trade became much easier in Egypt. Before, they had traded with each other basing their product values on the other trading source, but of course this wasn’t always accurate. With a currency the whole of Egypt could follow, it made trade much easier, basing all the prices on the same few coins.

Again, I come back to the whole point I am trying to make; without the Nile, without the food, without their neighbors, the Egyptians would have never been as prosperous. It was their location that gave them the ability to thrive in trade. The Nile one of the most vital, providing them with food and transportation to and from the sea; and their neighbors, whom were able to begin trade starting with the basic necessities of Ancient Egypt. Thanks to geographic luck, Egypt went down in history as one of wealthiest nations on Earth, leaving their great architecture as an outcome of their glorious achievements.

Source one: "Ancient Egyptian Oversea Trade." __reshafim.org__. March 2004. http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/trade/ “The cedar wood imported was critical to the development of a navy capable of defending the country against the incursions of the Sea Peoples.”- information on how the need of wood was for naval development. //(to those of you who are having trouble finding the credibility of these websites, they are there, but just in another link on this webpage. For this website the bibliography contains a huge list of resources Andre Dollinger used in the making of this website:// http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/bibliography.htm ) Source two: "Ancient Egypt and interior Africa" __Rediscover Ancient Egypt__. 28 march 2003 http://www.egypt-tehuti.org/articles/interior-africa.html “The other African products that Egypt bought included: wood, gum, incense, carnelian (a stone prized both as jewelry and for arrowheads), haematite (red ochre), amazon stone, perfumes, oils, selected cattle, and dogs.” Source three: "Domestic Trade" __neferiti.iwebland.com__. January 2003 http://nefertiti.iwebland.com/trade/internal_trade.htm “Trade was done by barter, a reasonably efficient method when mostly basic necessities were exchanged” Source four: “Mining” __reshafim.org__. November 2002 http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/timelines/topics/mining.htm “The annual production of gold during pharaonic times is thought not to have exceeded one ton. In comparison, Spain, a major producing centre in Roman times shipped 1400 tons of gold to Rome.” Source five: Brown, Andrew "Ancient Egyptian Mining and Smelting" __reshafim.org__. 2004 http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/prehistory/egypt/dailylife/mining.htm “Provisioning remote locations in the eastern desert was especially difficult, as well, as caravans' risked attack by raiding desert-dwellers” Source six: Fox, Troy “The Equipment of Pharaoh military” __touregypt.net__ 2003 http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/weapons.htm “while Egypt produced at least part of the copper it needed for weapons, it had to import all the tin required to make bronze and was also wholly dependent on import for iron, which put it at a disadvantage to the rising empires of the east during the first millennium BC. “ Source seven: __ Achmed the Dead Terrorist __. Feat. Jeff Dunham. Krowbatellio. YouTube Movie. September 29th, 2007. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uwOL4rB-go “Location, location, location”- Jeff Dunham, a ventriloquist, said through his puppet “Achmed”
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