Egypt fostered a mind-set of superiority to other cultures and
nations. Put simply, Egyptians looked down their noses at
other countries and their people, so few had any real incen-
tive to intermingle with them on their own territory. With
the exception of a small number of texts, only a few hints help
identify Egyptians outside Egypt. During the Nineteenth and
early Twentieth Dynasties (1307–1070 b.c.e.), Egyptian and
Egyptian-styled pottery is to be found in Canaan (Palestine)
and shows cross-cultural relations between Egypt and its
northwestern neighbors. At the same time, fortifi ed towns in
Nubia had a fairly uniform design, for example, Amara West
and Sesebi. It can be assumed that Egyptians were living in
such settlements.
Ancient Egypt was very much a crossroads. Positioned
as it was in the northeast sector of the African continent, it
became a central hub, engaging in trade relations with the
Near East, countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea,
and nations to the south. Egypt became a beehive of activity,
with builders, traders, farmers, diplomats, nomads, travel-
ers, and others passing across its borders and moving about
within the country. Archaeological evidence suggests that
late in the Predynastic Period (ca. 3000 b.c.e.) many of these
people came from such regions as Mesopotamia, bringing
their science, literature, art, mathematics, and other cultural
attributes with them. Many of these people from other lands
became the earliest Egyptians; later arrivals chose to remain
in Egypt, primarily because it was the most advanced civili-
zation of its time, providing opportunities for wealth, edu-
cation, and social relationships. In general, Egypt tended to
welcome people from other lands, thinking of them as Egyp-
tian as long as they made a point of acting like Egyptians.
Th e result was a swirl of population movement within Egypt,
though this population movement was, in general, not orga-
nized, nor did it occur among masses of people.
COLONIZATION
At all periods of Egyptian history transplantations of popula-
tion, or inner colonization, apparently occurred. Th e central
government divided the Egyptian countryside into organized
agricultural parts centered on larger settlements, the begin-
ning of the organized nomes, or provinces, of later periods.
Some of these settlements were in sparsely populated regions.
Th e land was cultivated by peasants recruited from more
populous regions. During the Fourth Dynasty (ca. 2575–2465
b.c.e.) a kind of colony program existed. King Snefru, the fi rst
king of the Fourth Dynasty, brought captives from diff erent
campaigns in Nubia and possibly Libya to Egypt and settled
them in newly founded manors in the eastern delta and in
Upper Egypt. In this period administration increased, and
the great pyramid-building projects required a large number
of new cultivated agricultural areas as economic support.
King Sesostris III (r. 1878–1841? b.c.e.), the fi ft h king of
the Twelft h^ Dynasty of the Middle Kingdom, constructed a
full-scale model town called Wah-sut in connection with a
cenotaph and the cult of the death god Osiris near Abydos
in northern Upper Egypt. Earlier model towns that suggest
internal colonization included the modern Tell el-Dab’a in
the eastern part of the Nile delta, known as Auaris at the be-
ginning of the Twelft h Dynasty, and Kahun in the vicinity
of modern El-Lahun from the reign of Sesostris II (r. 1897–
1878 b.c.e.).
Inner colonization a lso took t he form of resett lement proj-
e c t s du r i n g t he c re at ion of ne w c apit a l s l i k e A k he t at e n (pre s e nt-
day Tell el-‘Amârna) by Akhenaton (r. 1353–1335 b.c.e.) in the
Eighteenth Dynasty or Pi-Ramses by Ramses II (r. 1290–1224
b.c.e.) during the Nineteenth Dynasty. Oft en foreigners were
involved in this eff ort. A land register from the fourth regnal
year of Ramses V (r. 1156–1151 b.c.e.) lists Sherden men who
were cultivating farmland that they probably obtained underGranite statue of Sesotris III, from Deir el-Bahri, Th ebes, Egypt
(ca. 1850 b.c.e.); Sesostris constructed a town in northern Upper
Egypt for the purpose of internal colonization. (© Th e Trustees of the
British Museum)694 migration and population movements: Egypt