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| *Travel Tips>>>Egypt Travel Tips |
I would like to know more about Nubian Culture and Egyptian men!? |
Travel Info I think I am in love with an egytian man but I live in America and I have never been to Egypt. I want to know more about the Egyptian and Nubian culture. What should I expect of Egyptian man? I know all people are different I was just looking for similar characteristics/likes/dislikes... Travel Tips The Nubian people are extremely friendly and flash the best and most charming smiles possible. The Nubian men I know are all great family men but incredible flirts when not at home. It doesn't matter what age they are,even the Grandad's haven't lost their touch!They mean no harm, it is just their way. If you are invited to a Nubian home for dinner,then you had better be prepared to eat! You find an amazing array of yummy dishes just keeps coming from the kitchen, till you are almost rolling on the floor saying, I surrender! A Nubian woman is the best cook. The Nubian culture is very like that of all the rural people around the Luxor and Aswan region. Very family based and a great love of life,tradition and God.Most of the young people still agree with the concept of a family organised marriage. This tradition goes back thousands of years and is all about forming alliances and consolidation of assets. They have amazing homes with very practical domed roofs that act as a natural form of cooling (heat rises).Even when they live in a traditional flat roofed Egyptian home you can always pick which house belongs to the Nubian family. As it is the one painted in beautiful blues,pinks and yellow. My knowledge is mostly regarding the Nubian history and life during Dynastic Egypt. But I am sure you are looking for and would prefer a more up to date view. I did a quick Yahoo search ,putting in as the keywords, Nubian culture and found a long list of sites were you will be able to get the information you want from. Best wishes with your love affair,Egyptian men are very caring, protective and special aren't they? I hope it blossoms and that you will get to visit Egypt and experience the warmth and friendship of the Nubian people first hand.Then you will very likely become like me. I ,just can't leave! Source(s): Australian, final yr.Egyptology student. Part time tour leader/guide, specialising in preDynastic and Dynastic Egypt. Other Travel Tips Nubian in Egypt had suffered a great deal of insecurity from periodical inundation of their land since 1903(the construction of the first Aswan Dam) and through 1912,1930 (raising of the Aswan Dam) till 1960 -the construction of the Aswan High Dam. They used to seek shelter in the chain of Nubian Mountains along the Nile whenever their villages were inundated. Every time they used to build new settlements which got inundated again and again till they were relocated in Kom Ombo. Thus they had shown a great deal of tolerance and persistence similar to their Sudanese Nubian brothers.The Egyptian Nubian are the Kunuz (Matokia)-an arabized Nubian,the Fadeja ( a continuation of the Nubian in the the northern parts of Sudanese Nubia ), the Nubanised Arabs of Koresko(Eliagat). The Nubian proper there (these who talk old Nubian) are very proud of their culture and heritage . Since they are a very small community in a highly populated Arabized country , their contribution to the welfare of Egypt is hard to separate from other Egyptians. The Nubian Christian Kingdoms: 600-1500 AD 1. The Christianization of Nubia In the fourth century AD, the Ethiopian kingdom of Axum declared itself Christian, and soon the Christian Byzantine court at Constantinople concluded a military and trade alliance with it. In AD 524, the Byzantines pledged to supply Axum with mercenary troops drawn from the Nubian tribes of the Blemmyes and Nobadae to assist it in its invasion of Yemen. At this point it seemed desirable to the Byzantine emperor, as a matter of border security, to convert the Blemmyes and Nobadae to Christianity. This occurred about 540, and the temple of Isis at Philae was finally closed by the emperor Justinian without apparent incident. The Christianization of Lower Nubia, however, was probably not entirely peaceful. In 1986, the Egypt Exploration Society under the direction of Boyce Driscell discovered the ruins of the last Post-Meroitic (i.e. "pagan") temple at Qasr Ibrim, which had been desecrated and destroyed in a single violent episode in the sixth century AD. Here were smashed Egyptian statues, overthrown altars, fragments of magnificent textiles from the sanctuary, all viciously torn to shreds, and painted wooden panels, reminiscent of Christian icons but portraying Egyptian deities or symbolic animals, which had been scattered wildly about. It seemed to be the decisive and vivid end of Egyptian and Meroitic antiquity and the ancient religion. In the sixth century AD two competing Christian doctrines upset the Eastern church, and supporters of each doctrine attempted to secure a foothold in Nubia, which became an arena for the religious, ideological and political struggle occurring elsewhere in the Eastern world. One, called the Monophysite ("One Body") doctrine, held that Jesus had but one nature that was both human and divine. This doctrine was supported by the native clergies of Egypt, Armenia, and Syria. The other, called the Dyophysite ("Two-Body") doctrine, held that Jesus had separate human and divine natures. This concept was held sacred by the clergy of Byzantium. In AD 451, the Monophysite doctrine was offically declared a heresy by Byzantium, but in Egypt it remained strong primarily because it gave the Egyptian church a means of asserting its ideological and political independence from the Byzantine church and government. 2. The Nubian Christian Kingdoms Nubia in the sixth century AD was divided into three kingdoms: a northern, called Nobatia, which extended roughly from the First Cataract south to the Third; a central, called Makuria, which extended from the Third Cataract south to the Sixth; and a southern called Alwa, which extended from the Sixth Cataract southward up the Blue Nile to the no-man's land between it and the Abyssinian (Ethiopian) kingdom of Axum. Competing Monophysite and Dyophysite missionaries to Nobatia resulted in its conversion to Monophysitism in 543 and its becoming allied to the Egyptian Coptic church. Since the Nubian kingdoms were all mutually mistrustful of each other, Makuria embraced the Dyophysite doctrine and became allied with Byzantium in 570. Alwa, in 580, then became Monopysite in opposition to Makuria on its north and Axum in the south, both of which were Dyophysite. By the mid-seventh century, however, as Egypt fell first to the invading armies of the Persians (616-629) and then to the Arabs (639-641), Makuria absorbed Nobatia and became Monopysite - as an extension of the Egyptian Coptic Church, which retained independence under the early Egyptian Arab rulers because it opposed Byzantium. Although the Coptic Christian Church in Egypt was allowed to exist under Islam, it became marginalized. With the advent of secure Islamic control over the eastern Mediterranean and Red Sea, both Alwa and Axum soon also became Monophysite, now recognizing the authority of the Egyptian Coptic patriarch, because they, too, were cut off from the protection of Byzantium. Local political and religious rivalries were now subordinated to the greater threat, which was Islam. The Arab armies that subdued Egypt also attempted to conquer Nubia in 642 and again in 652. In the first confrontation, the Arabs were repulsed decisively by Nubian archers, which, after three millennia, were still devastatingly effective. In the second confrontation, the Arabs, who were now armed with coats of mail, were more successful, and this led both sides to make a treaty. This "pact" (known, in fact, as the "Baqt," from the Greek pakton) declared that the Arab authorities in Egypt would make no further attacks on Nubia if the Nubians provided an annual tribute of 360 slaves and allowed a mosque to be built in the center of their capital at Old Dongola. The contract was signed, and it remained in effect for six centuries. From the late seventh to the fifteenth century, Nubia had two Christian kingdoms, each with its own ruler. Old Dongola, the capital of Makuria, is now the largest Christian archaeological site in the Sudan (currently being excavated by a Polish team from the National Museum, Warsaw, under the direction of Dr, W, Godlewski). The capital of Alwa was Soba, a smaller site on the north bank of the Blue Nile, about 15 miles upstream from modern Khartoum. There were thirteen episcopal sees or provinces, each with its own bishop and each with its own cathedral, and every settlement had at least one church. The cathedrals were among the greatest architectural and artistic achievements of the age, as revealed by the well preserved cathedral found at Faras during the 1960's by Polish archaeologists. These cathedrals, built with assistance from Byzantine architects and artists, were, after the eighth century, entirely decorated on the interior with spectacular, brilliantly painted frescoes of scenes and figures from the Old and New Testaments. Although Faras cathedral was flooded by the Aswan Dam, its frescoes fortunately could be saved and now grace both the Sudan National Museum in Khartoum and the Warsaw Museum in Poland There were also monasteries for the training of monks. A particularly picturesque ruined medieval monastery can still be seen at Ghazali (脭Gazelle'), located in an isolated desert area about 12 miles from the Nile opposite ancient Napata (Gebel Barkal). The ruined church, outbuildings, and cemetery of monks' graves lie on the edge of a wadi ("dry streambed") near several lovely stands of palms. The adoption of Christianity by the Nubians allowed them to replace the secretive ancient Egyptian cults, to which they had so long been attached, with a new religion that was easy to grasp and which welcomed the common man. Unlike the old religion, which excluded the people from the temple sanctuaries and the presence of the gods, Christianity provided the people with holy places built within their settlements and into which they were invited and given direct personal access to the Divinity. The new faith also provided simple concepts for living and promised social equality after death. Although the rule of the Nubian Christian kings was considered to have divine sanction, the rulers themselves were no longer considered divine; they were mere servants of God, required to follow the same rules as all men. The only divine king was Jesus himself, and only he could be celebrated in art, architecture, and literature. The medieval Nubian kings, thus, are known only from texts. The royal tomb, as a symbol of authority, ceased to exist, and tombs of Christian Nubian kings are not known. Similarly, the graves of private citizens are small and plain, and no one - from king to commoner - was any longer buried with personal possessions and offerings. Only bishops seem to have received special burials; they were placed in vaulted chambers; they were dressed in their robes wearing their rings, and sometimes, as in most ancient times, were buried lying on their beds. The interior walls of the vaults were whitewashed on their interiors and inscribed with New Testament texts. The Christian era in Nubia marked a return to literacy, although literacy in the Middle Ages was primarily a possession of church personnel. Despite the allegiance of the Nubian church to the Egyptian church, the church language was primarily Greek as opposed to Coptic. By the later Middle Ages, the Nubians used their own language but wrote it in Greek letters. Eventually the authority of the Nubian kings declined. Increasing power was assumed by local chiefs, who began to put more effort into building castles than churches. Churches became increasingly smaller, while castles, as in Europe of the same period, became the most common monuments of the age - as well as symbols of Nubia's growing instability. By 1400, Nubia had become a "maze of warring principalities" and now lay vulnerable to immigrants bearing Islam. Nubia and Islam: 1400-the present 1. The Islamization of Nubia The Christian kingdoms of Makuria and Alwa gradually destabilized and fragmented into fiefdoms of independent warlords. Bands of bedouin Arabs, forced out of Egypt by its rulers, simultaneously pushed southward along the Red Sea hills and up the Nile and quickened the process of political decay. The influx of large numbers of Muslim nomads into Nubia undermined what little influence the Christian church still retained, and the divided Christian territories gradually fell into the hands of Muslim chiefs, either by violence or through their intermarriage with the ruling Nubian families. Traditionally in Nubian society a man left all his property not to his own sons but to his sister's eldest son. This explains why, in ancient times, the Nubian throne so often passed to a king's nephew. As the Arabs increasingly intermarried with the Nubian women, all property in time passed into the hands of the Arabs, who left all their property to their own sons. Because the Arabs became dominant both socially and politically, their children began to identify exclusively with their Arab ancestors while ignoring or suppressing knowledge of their pre-Islamic Nubian ancestors. The breakdown of centralized authority in the Nubian Nile Valley and surrounding deserts led to banditry and lawlessness, which resulted in a cessation of foreign trade and Nubia's increased isolation from the outside world. In the north, despite their conversion to Islam, Nubians were able to retain their language and some aspects of their former culture. In the south, the Nubians were Arabized to such an extent that they lost their native language to Arabic. Since native identity lacked prestige among the Arabs, the Islamized Nubians now assumed real or fraudulent genealogies that linked them to Arabia and the Prophet Mohammed. Eventually the Nubians came to be divided into numerous small Arab chiefdoms, encompassing one or several villages, and each was ruled by a mek ("king"). 2. The Kingdom of Sennar In the early sixteenth century a supreme Islamic kingship emerged at Sennar, about 180 miles south of modern Khartoum. This state, known as the Kingdom of the Funj, had a ruling dynasty actually of Nilotic or central African origin. The kings, in other words, had very black skin and were not Nubians. By some means, however, the Funj had come to embrace Islam and traced their descent from the Prophet Mohammed. Known as the "Black Sultans," they managed to extend their control over the northern Arab-Nubian tribes settled in Upper Nubia and eventually claimed tribute from all the meks along the Nile as far as the Third Cataract. North of there, the Ottoman Sultan in Turkey claimed the rest of Nubia as part of his own new territory, along with Egypt, which he conquered in 1517. He also seized control of the Red Sea ports of Suakin and Massawa. Although the early Funj rulers were not well versed Muslims, they did seek to become enlightened, and thus opened their kingdom up to foreign religious teachers. Thus many early Muslim missionaries came to the Sudan from Arabia and spread knowledge of the sufi sects of mystical Islam. Unlike the learned Islamic scholars trained in Cairo, Damascus or Baghdad, the sufis who came to the Sudan were bearers of a folk religion that believed in salvation through spiritual ecstasy rather than through scriptures. Each sufi movement had its own prescribed route to salvation and enlightenment, usually through some rigid ritual abstentions and practices. While the people worshipped conventionally, certain male members of the society trained to study religion and joined one or another sufi order. These men then became disciples of a recognized sheikh or holy man. When the latter died, the disciples dispersed to found new schools and to disseminate further the teachings of the master. The Islamic period in the Sudan has not left many ancient remains. All the early mosques were built of perishable materials, like the houses themselves, and do not survive in any presentable state. Nor were these buildings decorated; there was no sculpture, no stone carving, no representational art. A few inscribed tombstones have been preserved from the early centuries of Islam, but not much else. Like the Christians, the Muslims were buried in simple graves, in which the dead were laid on their sides looking toward Mecca. The only people to merit burial in an impressive tomb were the saints and holy men who spread the faith across the countryside. Their tombs are the most impressive Islamic remains in the Sudan. They are great mud-brick, often whitewashed domes, called gubbas. Although many are in dilapidated condition, they survive because of the veneration in which their owners were and are still held. Doubtless the most magnificent objects created in the Sudan during this period were the costumes, armor, and weapons of the elite. Of this material, however, only very little still survives. It is a curious fact that with the introduction of Islam, the use of the bow and arrow - the weapon so identified with early Nubians - died out, probably because such weapons had not been used by the armies of the Prophet and for that reason were considered impure. 3. The Egyptian Conquest of Nubia and "the Sudan", 1821-1883 By the turn of the nineteenth century, the Funj kingdom was in collapse. Egypt's new ruler, an independent Turkish viceroy of Albanian descent named Muhammad Ali, turned his eyes to the south, seeking to seize control of the slave trade, which had become a major business in the Sudan during the Islamic era. Discovering that the Sudanese tribes had very few firearms, he invaded with a small, heavily armed force and quickly conquered the Sudan and annexed it to Egypt. He founded the city of Khartoum at the confluence of the Blue and White Niles as the seat of Egyptian governmental control in the Sudan. This period of Egyptian ("Turkish") rule in Sudan is known as the Turkiya. It was a period of intense slave raiding and exploitation of the Sudan's natural and animal resources; it was also a period in which European explorers and businessmen poured into the Sudan on an unprecedented scale. The headwaters of the Nile were discovered and explored, as were many of the remoter parts of the Sudan, but the Muslim peoples deeply resented the brutal treatment by the alien government, its oppressive taxes, and the presence of European Christian administrators, whom the Egyptians began using after 1870. 4. The Revolt of the Mahdi and the "Mahdiyya": 1883-1898 In 1881 an obscure Muslim holy man named Mohammed Ahmed declared himself the long-expected Messiah of Islam, the "Mahdi," and united the country under a message of expelling the hated Egyptians and uniting the people under the earliest and purest form of Islam. One hears again in this movement echoes of the "pious Aithiopians" of ancient times. The early victories of the Mahdi's followers against the Egyptian armies sent against him were considered miracles, and quickly all the Muslim Sudanese tribes rallied to his side. The Nubian tribes, which straddled Egypt and Sudan, were divided in their loyalties; some fought with the Mahdi; others rejected him as a false prophet. Since Egypt had just been taken over by British authorities, the Mahdi's revolt became a British problem, yet Britain was unable to prevent the Mahdi from conquering all of the country and its capital Khartoum, despite the dispatch of British troops. The determined defense of Khartoum against the Mahdi's forces by the British General Charles G. Gordon is one of the great tales of Colonialist Africa. The city ultimately fell after a ten month siege; Gordon was killed; the British were outraged but helpless to do anything; and the Sudan, for the next thirteen years, became an independent Islamic state. Until 1898, the Sudan successfully fought off the forces of colonialism; the period was called the Mahdiyya ("The Period of the Mahdi"). In 1896, however, Britain launched a slow invasion of the Sudan by building a railroad up the Nile and transporting troops, sophisticated weaponry and disassembled gunboats over the cataracts. On Sept. 2, 1898, just north of the Mahdist capital of Omdurman, the 50,000 man army of the Mahdi's successor, the Khalifa Abdullahi, carrying medieval weapons and primitive guns, attacked the British line. Over 11,000 men were mowed down by howitzers and machine guns. Resistance collapsed; the Khalifa fled and was later killed, and Britain took control of the Sudan. 5. The "Anglo-Egyptian Sudan" (1898-1956) and the Sudanese Republic (1956-present) After 1898 the Sudan remained officially a part of Egypt, but unofficially it was an independent British protectorate until 1956, when it was granted full independence. Although the Sudanese people aspired to democratic rule, and have periodically experienced it, the country almost from its beginning has been siezed by a succession of military dictatorships backed by rival Islamic political parties. Almost continuously from that time to the present, the country has been plagued by a series of devastating civil wars waged by the Islamic government against the non-Islamic southern Sudanese peoples, who have been fighting for their religious freedom and representation in the government. 6. The Birth of the Science of Nubiology. In 1958, Gamel Abdel Nasser, president of Egypt, decided to build a high dam at Aswan. The Egyptians wanted it to control the flooding of the Nile and to generate electrical power for themselves. Unfortunately the lake created by the dam would completely flood Lower Nubia and destroy all of the ancient Nubian sites in Egypt. The waters would also inundate about 70 mi (110 km) of the Sudan. Because of the building of the dam, a huge international emergency effort was organized to rescue Nubia's archaeological treasures and heritage before they were lost forever. Thus, between 1959 and 1967, over 40 international teams worked together to explore 300 miles of the Nile Valley. They discovered thousands of ancient sites and objects, which are now in museums the world over. Three complete Nubian temples were removed altogether and may now be seen in New York (Metropolitan Museum of Art), in Leiden, Holland (Museum van der Oudheden), and in Barcelona, Spain. Many others were taken down and restored on higher ground. This great effort made Lower Nubia, archaeologically, one of the best known regions of the world and created the discipline of "Nubiology." After the flooding of Lower Nubia and with the passage of time, many of the Nubiologists in the 1970's began to look south to continue their researches, and they began the exploration of the northern Sudan, which continues today (2001). Currently there are about sixteen foreign archaeological expeditions working in Sudan, as well as many Sudanese teams. People of northern Sudan and southern Egypt. With a history and traditions which can be traced to the dawn of civilization, the Nubian first settled along the banks of the Nile from Aswan south of Egypt to the 6th cataract just south of Khartoum (capital of Sudan). Along this great river they developed one of the oldest and greatest civilizations in Africa. Until they lost their last kingdom (Christian Nubia) only 5 centuries back the Nubians remained as the main rivals to the other great African civilization of Egypt. This great civilization is one of the main concerns of contemporary archaeologists, scholars, museums and universities around the world. Although Sudan had remained the main homeland of Nubians through their long history, many of their descendants today Egypt. But still the majority of Nubians of today are Sudanese. With only a population of slightly above 300,000 they are a minority in both countries. Nevertheless being of African descent they resemble other Sudanese people more than Egyptians. Nubians in both Sudan and Egypt have suffered a lot from intentional overlooking to their history and culture as well as displacement, relocation due to flooding and inundation of their homeland by dams constructed south of Egypt. During this century the Nubian homeland had been inundated three times, however the 1960 Nubian exodus is the most painful to all Nubians. Following the construction of Aswan High Dam in 1960 the land of Nubia between Aswan in Egypt and the 4th cataract in Sudan (main area of Nubians) was the subject of flooding and inundation. Nubians were displaced and relocated in other areas in both Sudan and Egypt. Great Nubian monuments and historical sites were drowned and lost for good. The influx of Arabs to Egypt and Sudan had contributed to the suppression of the Nubian identity following the collapse of the last Nubian kingdom in 1900. A major part of the Nubian population were totally arabized or claimed to be arabs (Jaa'leen-the majority of Northern Sudanese- and some Donglawes in Sudan, Kenuz and Koreskos in Egypt). However all Nubians were converted to Islam, and Arabic language became their main media of communication in addition to their indigenous old Nubian language. The unique characteristic of Nubian is shown in their culture (dress, dances, traditions and music) as well as their indigenous language which is the common feature of all Nubians. The distinguished and soft rhythms of the Nubian music and songs are borrowed by other ethnical groups in Sudan. In Egypt these rhythms are commonly used by some Egyptian-Nubian who sing in Arabic. With its very distinctive chantings and intonation the Nubian songs and music has a noticeable acclamation and acceptance among non-Nubian Sudanese and Egyptians. http://www.nubianet.org |
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