Egyptian stone vessels have been found in Byblos, Palestine, Crete, Mycenae and Asine in Greece. The Badarian Period and Naqada I (c5000BC – 3400BC) periods represent a continuous period of growth and in ideas. The break comes between Naqada I and Naqada II, with the introduction (possibly) of the Dynastic Race.

The Egyptian potteryThe forms of ancient Egyptian potterywere numerous. Vases were made principally for practical use and not for ornament although the decoration in some of them is remarkable.

The amphora, in Egypt as in all ancient countries was the most common and most useful vase, was made in all sizes, from the three-inch oil or perfume container to the immense jar of three or four feet in height, for holding water, wine, oil, or grain.Pottery provides a secure support for dating of all archaeological finds. The studies of their dating shed light on the proper period produced as well as the cultural affiliations and economic aspects around them. People start creating pottery vessels very early in time In order to have something were to keep wheat products and grains in them so it wouldn’t get wet and go moldy. Pottery was used for utilitarian tasks such as cooking, storage, and shipping. In Egypt artisan produced interesting shapes ceramic figures, vessels, and even sarcophagi which were very much a part of ancient Egyptian funerary practices.The earliest Egyptian pottery already had geometric designs on it. The Egyptians made two kinds of pottery:– The ordinary made soft pottery.– The coarse, gritty compound, lacking cohesion, sandy, easily crumbled, very white, but always covered with a strong glaze or enamel.The purpose of the ancient ceramic in Egypt as well as the one of their contemporaries cover; domestic use, funerary, festival, and ritual contexts.

Egypt produced several varieties of unglazed pottery. The most common pottery was the ordinary red, cream-colored, and the yellow ones. The art of covering pottery with enamel was invented by the Egyptians at a very early date. They applied it to stone as well as to pottery. Enameled pottery was also used for inlaying purposes in ornamental work.Ceramic material allow be interpreted in its wider socio-economic context. The studies about this pottery derived from analyzing many sites in Egypt from the Delta in the north to Elephantine in the south, and covering a chronological range from the Old Kingdom to the Coptic period.The pottery with funerary purpose made in Egypt show a large numbers of smaller enameled potteries which were deposited with the dead; they are very well preserved and provide very important information. The most common founded were those now called Osirian figures, usually representing mummies.

They are found both unglazed and enameled, in red pottery and in with a hard, gritty pottery.The pottery that corresponds with the pre dynastic Egypt was often of a surprisingly fine quality. The so called “Badarian” period pottery was made without the use of a potter’s wheel, and it was usually the woman who elaborated the pottery. These beautiful pieces were burnished to a lustrous finish. They were probably fired in either open bonfires or very primitive kilns, but remain some of the most astonishing pottery ever produced in Egypt.From the Naqada period (4,000 – 3,000 BC) until the dynastic period, paintings without guides, repetitive templates or fixed concepts were added to the pottery freely. Animal’s figures, patterns, boats and human figures were depicted.The potter’s wheel in Egypt was invented in the Old Kingdom.

At first this device was a simple turntable, but later evolved into a true potter’s wheel, requiring better preparation of the clay and more control during firing. These potter’s wheels were still hand turned. With the potter’s wheel more refined kilns were constructed, this new technique allowed pottery to be made in more abundance, but did not entirely replace all other forms of pottery making. For example, bread moulds continued to be handmade around a core known as a “Patrix”.After the pottery was formed, either by a potter’s wheel or more primitive means, it would have been left to thoroughly dry. If the surface was to be burnished, after drying the pottery would have been polished with pebbles and then painted or perhaps engraved and finally fired, probably in a not confined place during pre dynastic times, until the development of kilns.

Egyptian pottery can be divided into two broad categories dependent on the type of clay that was used.– The pottery made with Nile clay, and known as Nile silt ware. This potter after being fired, it has a red-brown color, been used for common, utilitarian purposes, though at times it might have been decorated or painted. Blue painted pottery was somewhat common during the New Kingdom (1,550-1,069 BC).– The pottery made from ‘marl clay’. Medabots metabee version all medals.

This type of pottery was usually thought superior to the common Nile mud pottery, often used for decorations and other functions. Was often burnished, leaving a shiny glaze like surface although it was not a truly glace process.

.The prehistory of Egypt spans the period from the earliest human settlement to the beginning of the around 3100 BC, starting with the first, for some Egyptologists, for others, with the name also possibly used for one of these kings. This Predynastic era is traditionally equivalent to the final part of the period beginning c. 6000 BC and ending in the period c.

3000 BC.The dates of the Predynastic period were first defined before widespread archaeological excavation of Egypt took place, and recent finds indicating very gradual Predynastic development have led to controversy over when exactly the Predynastic period ended. Thus, various terms such as ', 'Zero Dynasty' or 'Dynasty 0' are used to name the part of the period which might be characterized as Predynastic by some and Early Dynastic by others.The Predynastic period is generally divided into cultural eras, each named after the place where a certain type of Egyptian settlement was first discovered. However, the same gradual development that characterizes the Protodynastic period is present throughout the entire Predynastic period, and individual 'cultures' must not be interpreted as separate entities but as largely subjective divisions used to facilitate study of the entire period.The vast majority of Predynastic archaeological finds have been in, because the silt of the was more heavily deposited at the, completely burying most Delta sites long before modern times. It is unclear whether radiocarbon dates in this section are or not. Please help by clarifying whether the given dates are calibrated ( BC/BCE or cal BP) or uncalibrated ( uncal BP or bp). Excavation of the Nile has exposed early stone tools from the last million or so years. The earliest of these lithic industries were located within a 30-metre (100 ft), and were primitive( c.

600,000 years ago), and an Egyptian form of the ( c. 400,000 years ago). Within the 15-metre (50 ft) terrace was developed Acheulean. Originally reported as early ( c. 160,000 years ago) but since changed to, other implements were located in the 10-metre (30 ft) terrace.

The 4.5- and 3-metre (15–10 ft) terraces saw a more developed version of the Levalloisean, also initially reported as an Egyptian version of Mousterian. An Egyptian version of the technology was also located. Wadi Halfa. Aterian point from Zaccar, Djelfa region, Algeria.Some of the oldest known structures were discovered in Egypt by archaeologist along the southern border near, in Arkin 8 site.

Chmielewski dated the structures to 100,000 BC. The remains of the structures are oval depressions about 30 cm deep and 2 × 1 meters across. Many are lined with flat sandstone slabs. They are called tent rings, because the rocks supported a dome-like shelter of skins or brush.

This type of dwelling provided a permanent place to live, but if necessary, could be taken down easily and moved. They were mobile structures—easily disassembled, moved, and reassembled—providing hunter-gatherers with semi-permanent habitation. Aterian Industry. Main article:tool-making reached Egypt c. Khormusan Industry The industry in Egypt began between 42,000 and 32,000 BP.

Developed tools not only from but also from animal. They also developed small resembling those of, but no have been found.

The end of the Khormusan industry came around 16,000 B.C. With the appearance of other cultures in the region, including the Gemaian. Late Paleolithic The Late in Egypt started around 30,000 BC. The skeleton was found in 1980 and dated in 1982 from nine samples ranging between 35,100 and 30,360 years. This specimen is the only complete modern human skeleton from the earliest Late Stone Age in Africa. Mesolithic. Main article:The Halfan and Kubbaniyan, two closely related industries, flourished along the Upper.

Halfan sites are found in the far north of Sudan, whereas Kubbaniyan sites are found in Upper Egypt. For the Halfan, only four radiocarbon dates have been produced.

Schild and Wendorf (2014) discard the earliest and latest as erratic and conclude that the Halfan existed c. 22.5-22.0 ka cal BP. People survived on a diet of large herd animals and the Khormusan tradition of fishing. Greater concentrations of artifacts indicate that they were not bound to seasonal wandering, but settled for longer periods.

The Halfan culture was derived in turn from the Khormusanwhich depended on specialized hunting, fishing, and collecting techniques for survival. The primary material remains of this culture are stone tools, flakes, and a multitude of rock paintings.Sebilian culture. Main article:The Qadan culture (13,000–9,000 BC) was a that, evidence suggests, originated in (present-day south ) approximately 15,000 years ago.

The Qadan subsistence mode is estimated to have persisted for approximately 4,000 years. It was characterized by, as well as a unique approach to food gathering that incorporated the preparation and consumption of wild grasses. Systematic efforts were made by the Qadan people to water, care for, and harvest local plant life, but grains were not planted in ordered rows.Around twenty archaeological sites in give evidence for the existence of the Qadan culture's - culture. Its makers also practiced wild grain harvesting along the during the beginning of the Sahaba Daru Nile phase, when desiccation in the caused residents of the Libyan oases to retreat into the Nile valley.

Among the Qadan culture sites is the cemetery, which has been dated to the Mesolithic.Qadan peoples were the first to develop and they also developed independently to aid in the collecting and processing of these plant foods prior to consumption. However, there are no indications of the use of these tools after around 10,000 BC, when hunter-gatherers replaced them. Harifian culture.

Location of the Fayum oasisContinued expansion of the desert forced the early ancestors of the to settle around the more permanently and adopt a more sedentary lifestyle during the.The period from 9000 to 6000 BC has left very little in the way of archaeological evidence. Around 6000 BC, Neolithic settlements appear all over Egypt. Studies based on, and data have attributed these settlements to migrants from the in the returning during the, bringing to the region. Jared Diamond, in a non-scholar work, proposes other regions in Africa independently developed agriculture at about the same time: the, the,. Arrowheads from Al Fayum.Some morphological and post-cranial data has linked the earliest farming populations at Fayum, Merimde, and El-Badari, to Near Eastern populations. However, the archaeological data also suggests that Near Eastern domesticates were incorporated into a pre-existing foraging strategy and only slowly developed into a full-blown lifestyle, contrary to what would be expected from settler colonists from the Near East.

Finally, the names for the Near Eastern domesticates imported into Egypt were not Sumerian or loan words, which further diminishes the likelihood of a mass immigrant colonization of lower Egypt during the transition to agriculture.is evidenced for the first time during the Faiyum A Period. People of this period, unlike later Egyptians, buried their dead very close to, and sometimes inside, their settlements.Although archaeological sites reveal very little about this time, an examination of the many Egyptian words for 'city' provide a hypothetical list of reasons why the Egyptians settled. In Upper Egypt, terminology indicates trade, protection of livestock, high ground for flood refuge, and sacred sites for deities.

Merimde culture. Main article:From about 5000 to 4200 BC the Merimde culture, so far only known from a big settlement site at the edge of the Western Delta, flourished in Lower Egypt. The culture has strong connections to the Faiyum A culture as well as the Levant. People lived in small huts, produced a simple undecorated pottery and had stone tools. Cattle, sheep, goats and pigs were held. Wheat, sorghum and barley were planted. The Merimde people buried their dead within the settlement and produced clay figurines.

The first Egyptian lifesize head made of clay comes from Merimde. El Omari culture The El Omari culture is known from a small settlement near modern Cairo. People seem to have lived in huts, but only postholes and pits survive. The pottery is undecorated.

Stone tools include small flakes, axes and sickles. Metal was not yet known.

Their sites were occupied from 4000 BC to the Archaic Period. Maadi culture The Maadi culture (also called Buto Maadi culture) is the most important Lower Egyptian prehistoric culture contemporary with I and II phases in Upper Egypt. The culture is best known from the site near Cairo, but is also attested in many other places in the Delta to the Faiyum region. This culture was marked by development in architecture and technology. It also followed its predecessor cultures when it comes to undecorated ceramics.Copper was known, and some copper have been found.

The pottery is simple and undecorated and shows, in some forms, strong connections to the southern Levant. People lived in small huts, partly dug into the ground. The dead were buried in cemeteries, but with few burial goods. The Maadi culture was replaced by the Naqada III culture; whether this happened by conquest or infiltration is still an open question. Upper Egypt Tasian culture. Main article:The Tasian culture was the next in.

This culture group is named for the burials found at, on the east bank of the Nile between. The Tasian culture group is notable for producing the earliest blacktop-ware, a type of red and brown pottery that is painted black on the top and interior. This pottery is vital to the dating of Predynastic Egypt. Because all dates for the Predynastic period are tenuous at best, developed a system called by which the relative date, if not the absolute date, of any given Predynastic site can be ascertained by examining its pottery.As the Predynastic period progressed, the handles on pottery evolved from functional to ornamental.

The degree to which any given archaeological site has functional or ornamental pottery can also be used to determine the relative date of the site. Since there is little difference between Tasian ceramics and Badarian pottery, the Tasian Culture overlaps the Badarian range significantly. From the Tasian period onward, it appears that Upper Egypt was influenced strongly by the culture of. Badarian culture. Ancient Badarian mortuary figurine of a woman, held at theThe Badarian culture, from about 4400 to 4000 BC, is named for the site near Der Tasa. It followed the Tasian culture, but was so similar that many consider them one continuous period. The Badarian Culture continued to produce the kind of pottery called blacktop-ware (albeit much improved in quality) and was assigned Sequence Dating numbers 21–29.

The primary difference that prevents scholars from merging the two periods is that Badarian sites use copper in addition to stone and are thus settlements, while the Tasian sites are still considered.Badarian flint tools continued to develop into sharper and more shapely blades, and the first was developed. Distinctly Badarian sites have been located from to a little north of Abydos. It appears that the Fayum A culture and the Badarian and Tasian Periods overlapped significantly; however, the Fayum A culture was considerably less agricultural and was still Neolithic in nature. Naqada culture. Ovoid Naqada I (Amratian) black-topped terracotta vase, (c. 3800-3500 BC).The Amratian culture lasted from about 4000 to 3500 BC. It is named after the site of, about 120 km south of.

El-Amra is the first site where this culture group was found unmingled with the later Gerzean culture group, but this period is better attested at the Naqada site, so it also is referred to as the Naqada I culture. Black-topped ware continues to appear, but white cross-line ware, a type of pottery which has been decorated with close parallel white lines being crossed by another set of close parallel white lines, is also found at this time. The Amratian period falls between S.D. 30 and 39 in Petrie's system.Newly excavated objects attest to increased trade between Upper and Lower Egypt at this time. A stone vase from the north was found at el-Amra, and copper, which is not mined in Egypt, was imported from the Sinai, or possibly Nubia. And a small amount of were both definitely imported from Nubia. Trade with the oases also was likely.New innovations appeared in Amratian settlements as precursors to later cultural periods.

For example, the mud-brick buildings for which the Gerzean period is known were first seen in Amratian times, but only in small numbers. Additionally, oval and theriomorphic appear in this period, but the workmanship is very rudimentary and the relief artwork for which they were later known is not yet present. Gerzean culture (Naqada II). A typical Naqada II pot with ship themeThe Gerzean culture, from about 3500 to 3200 BC, is named after the site of.

It was the next stage in Egyptian cultural development, and it was during this time that the foundation of Dynastic Egypt was laid. Gerzean culture is largely an unbroken development out of Amratian Culture, starting in the delta and moving south through upper Egypt, but failing to dislodge Amratian culture in Nubia. Gerzean pottery is assigned values from S.D. 40 through 62, and is distinctly different from Amratian white cross-lined wares or black-topped ware. Gerzean pottery was painted mostly in dark red with pictures of animals, people, and ships, as well as geometric symbols that appear derived from animals. Also, 'wavy' handles, rare before this period (though occasionally found as early as S.D.

35) became more common and more elaborate until they were almost completely ornamental.Gerzean culture coincided with a, and farming along the Nile now produced the vast majority of food, though contemporary paintings indicate that hunting was not entirely forgone. With increased food supplies, adopted a much more sedentary lifestyle and cities grew as large as 5,000.It was in this time that Egyptian city dwellers stopped building with and began mass-producing mud bricks, first found in the Amratian Period, to build their cities.Egyptian stone tools, while still in use, moved from construction to ripple-flaked construction. Copper was used for all kinds of tools, and the first copper weaponry appears here. Silver, gold, lapis, and were used ornamentally, and the grinding palettes used for eye-paint since the Badarian period began to be adorned with relief carvings. King as on the. This work of art both shows the influence of Mesopotamia on at an early date, during a period of, and the state of Mesopotamian royal iconography during the Uruk period.The first tombs in classic Egyptian style were also built, modeled after ordinary houses and sometimes composed of multiple rooms. Although further excavations in the Delta are needed, this style is generally believed to originate there and not in Upper Egypt.Although the Gerzean Culture is now clearly identified as being the continuation of the period, significant amounts of influences worked their way into Egypt during the which were interpreted in previous years as evidence of a Mesopotamian ruling class, the so-called, coming to power over.

This idea no longer attracts academic support.Distinctly foreign objects and art forms entered Egypt during this period, indicating contacts with several parts of Asia. Objects such as the handle, which has patently Mesopotamian relief carvings on it, have been found in Egypt, and the silver which appears in this period can only have been obtained from. Female figure, c. 3500–3400 B.C.E. Terracotta, painted, 11 1⁄ 2 in × 5 1⁄ 2 in × 2 1⁄ 4 in (29.2 cm × 14.0 cm × 5.7 cm).In addition, Egyptian objects are created which clearly mimic Mesopotamian forms, although not slavishly. Cylinder seals appear in Egypt, as well as recessed paneling architecture, the Egyptian reliefs on cosmetic palettes are clearly made in the same style as the contemporary Mesopotamian, and the ceremonial mace heads which turn up from the late Gerzean and early Semainean are crafted in the Mesopotamian 'pear-shaped' style, instead of the Egyptian native style.The route of this trade is difficult to determine, but contact with does not predate the early dynastic, so it is usually assumed to have been by water. During the time when the Dynastic Race Theory was still popular, it was theorized that Uruk sailors circumnavigated, but a route, probably by middlemen through, is more likely, as evidenced by the presence of objects in Egypt.The fact that so many Gerzean sites are at the mouths of which lead to the Red Sea may indicate some amount of trade via the Red Sea (though Byblian trade potentially could have crossed the Sinai and then taken to the Red Sea).

Also, it is considered unlikely that something as complicated as recessed panel architecture could have worked its way into Egypt by proxy, and at least a small contingent of migrants is often suspected.Despite this evidence of foreign influence, Egyptologists generally agree that the Gerzean Culture is still predominantly indigenous to Egypt.Protodynastic Period (Naqada III). Naqada III.The Naqada III period, from about 3200 to 3000 BC, is generally taken to be identical with the period, during which Egypt was unified.Naqada III is notable for being the first era with (though this is disputed by some), the first regular use of, the first irrigation, and the first appearance of royal cemeteries.The relatively affluent suburb of Cairo is built over the original Naqada stronghold. Timeline ( All dates are approximate). Late, from 40th millennium BC. tool-making.

Semi-permanent dwellings in. Tools made from animal bones, and other stones., from 11th millennium BC. c. 10,500 BC: Wild grain harvesting along the Nile, grain-grinding culture creates world's earliest stone blades roughly at end of. c.

8000 BC: Migration of peoples to the Nile, developing a more centralized society and settled agricultural economy. c. 7500 BC: Importing animals from Asia to Sahara. c. 7000 BC: Agriculture—animal and cereal—in East Sahara. c.

7000 BC: in deep year-round water wells dug, and large organized settlements designed in planned arrangements. c. 6000 BC: Rudimentary ships (rowed, single-sailed) depicted in Egyptian. c. 5500 BC: Stone-roofed subterranean chambers and other subterranean complexes in containing buried cattle.

c. 5000 BC: Alleged stone in.

c. 5000 BC:: furniture, tableware, models of rectangular houses, pots, dishes, cups, bowls, vases, figurines, combs.

c. 4400 BC: finely-woven fragment. From 4th millennium BC, has become prevalent. c. 4000 BC: early Naqadan trade (see ).

4th millennium BC: tomb-building, including underground rooms and burial of furniture and amulets. 4th millennium BC: imported from. c. 3900 BC: An in the Sahara leads to human migration to the Nile Valley.

c. 3500 BC: imported from and / or (see ).

c. 3500 BC:, world's oldest-(confirmed). c. 3500 BC:, world's earliest-known glazed ceramic beads. c. 3400 BC: , donkey domestication , (Meteoric) iron works,. c.

3300 BC: instruments and (see ). c. 3100 BC: Pharaoh, or, or possibly unified Upper and Lower EgyptRelative chronology. The Khormusan is defined as a Middle Palaeolithic industry while the Halfan is defined as an Epipalaeolithic industry.

According to scholarly opinion the Khormusan and the Halfan are viewed as separate and distinct cultures. ^ According to scholarly opinion the Harifian culture is derived from the Natufian culture in which the only characteristic that distinguishes it from the Natufian is the Harif point. It is viewed as an adaptation of Natufian hunter gatherers to the Negev and Sinai.

The Harifian are thought to have lasted only about three hundred years, then vanishing, followed by a thousand year hiatus during which the and regions were uninhabitable. Since the Harifian culture ended c. 12,000 BP there could be no possible connection with the PPNB which began c. 10,500 BP.

Settler colonists from the Near East would most likely have merged with the indigenous cultures resulting in a mixed economy with the agricultural aspect of the economy increasing in frequency through time, which is what the archaeological record more precisely indicates. Both pottery, lithics, and economy with Near Eastern characteristics, and lithics with African characteristics are present in the Fayum A culture.References.