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Nile
*** Shopping-Tip: Nile
''For alternative meanings of "Nile," see
Nile (disambiguation)''
{{Infobox_river | river_name = Nile
| image_name = Egypt_Nil.jpg
| caption = The Nile River in Egypt
| origin =
Africa
| mouth =
Mediterranean Sea
| basin_countries =
Uganda,
Sudan,
Egypt
| length = 6,695 km (4,160 mi)
| elevation = 1,134 m (3,721 ft)
| discharge = 2,830 m³/s (99,956 ft³/s)
| watershed = 3,400,000 km² (1,312,740 mi²)
}}
The '''Nile''' (
Arabic language Arabic: النيل ''an-nīl''), in
Africa, is one of the two longest
rivers on
Earth.
Terminology of the Nile
The word "Nile" ('nIl) comes from the word ''Neilos'' (Î?ειλος), a Greek name meaning river valley. Another Greek name for the Nile was ''Aigyptos'' (Αιγυπτος), which itself is the source of the name "Egypt."
The length of the Nile
* The most recent measurement of the legth of the Nile was measured along the
White Nile.
The wateshed of the Nile
* The
watershed [http://earthtrends.wri.org/maps_spatial/maps_detail_static.php?map_select=299&theme=2] of the Nile extends southwards into extreme parts of Africa.
Branches
Image:River Nile route.jpg thumb|left|East Africa, showing the course of the River Nile, with the Blue and White Nile marked in those colours
There are two great branches of the Nile: the White Nile, from equatorial East Africa, and the
Blue Nile, from
Ethiopia. Both branches formed on the western flanks of the East African Rift, which is the southern African part of the
Great Rift Valley.
White Nile
Lake Victoria, which lies between
Uganda,
Kenya and
Tanzania, is considered to be the source of the Nile, although the lake itself has feeder rivers of considerable size from the other
Great Lakes (Africa) Great Lakes of Africa. In particular, the farthest headstream of the Nile is the
Ruvyironza River in Burundi, which is an upper branch of the
Kagera River. The Kagera flows for 690 km (429 miles) before reaching Lake Victoria. Recently an expedition team (The Ascend the Nile team), claims to be the first to have travelled the river's length to its "source" in Rwanda's Nyungwe Forest. The team travelled the vast distance in three 4m (13ft) boats, overcoming obstacles such as "massive rapids, crocodile charges, serious tropical diseases and horrendous logistics".
Mr McGrigor and his New Zealand team mates, Cam McLeay and Garth MacIntyre, claim to have found the true length of the Nile - at least 107 km longer than previously thought. They explored the Nile and utilised a
Geographical positioning system to record every step of the way on a
Geographical information system.
Leaving Lake Victoria, the river is known as the
Victoria Nile. It flows further for approximately 500 km (300 miles), through
Lake Kyoga, until it reaches
Lake Albert. After leaving Lake Albert, the river is known as the
Albert Nile. It then flows into
Sudan, where it becomes known as the
Bahr al Jebel. At the confluence of the Bahr al Jebel with the
Bahr el Ghazal, itself 720 km (445 miles) long, the river becomes known as the Bahr al Abyad, or the
White Nile, from the clay suspended in its waters. From there, the river flows to
Khartoum.
Blue Nile
Meanwhile, the
Blue Nile (or Bahr al Azraq to Sudanese; Abbay to Ethiopians) springs from
Lake Tana in the Ethiopian Highlands. The Blue Nile flows about 1,400 km (850 miles) to
Khartoum, where the Blue Nile and White Nile join to form "the Nile." Most of the water carried by the Nile (about 80-85%) originates from
Ethiopia, but this runoff happens only in summer, when the great rains fall on the Ethiopian Plateau; the rest of the year, the great rivers draining Ethiopia to the Nile (Sobat, Blue Nile, and Atbara) flow weakly or are dry.
Image:Nile composite NASA.jpg Composite_image right|thumb|160px|[[Composite image|Composite satellite image of the Nile (see also the
:Image:Nile River and delta from orbit.jpg Nile delta).html" title="Meaning of Composite.html" title="Meaning of right|thumb|160px|[[Composite image|Composite">right|thumb|160px|[[Composite image|Composite satellite image of the Nile (see also the
:Image:Nile River and delta from orbit.jpg Nile delta)">Composite.html" title="Meaning of right|thumb|160px|[[Composite image|Composite">right|thumb|160px|[[Composite image|Composite satellite image of the Nile (see also the
:Image:Nile River and delta from orbit.jpg Nile delta)
The Nile River
After the Blue and White Niles merge, the only remaining major tributary is the
Atbara River, which originates in Ethiopia north of Lake Tana, and is approximately 800 km (500 miles) long. It joins the Nile approximately 300 km (200 miles) past Khartoum. The Nile is also unusual in that its last tributary (the Atbara) joins it approximately halfway to the sea. From that point north, the Nile diminishes because of evaporation.
The Nile in Sudan is distinctive for two reasons: 1) it flows over
Cataracts of the Nile 6 groups of cataracts, from the first at Aswan to the sixth at Sabaloka (just north of Khartoum); and 2) it reverses course for much of its course, flowing back to the SW before returning to flow north again to the sea. This is the "Great Bend of the Nile."
Image:ISS006-E-43181.jpg International Space Station.html" title="Meaning of left left|thumb|The Great Bend of the Nile in Sudan, looking north across the Sahara Desert towards Lake Nasser and Egypt. Photograph ISS006-E-43181 taken from the [[International Space Station, courtesy of NASA..html" title="Meaning of thumb|The Great Bend of the Nile in Sudan, looking north across the Sahara Desert towards Lake Nasser and Egypt. Photograph ISS006-E-43181 taken from the [[International Space Station">left|thumb|The Great Bend of the Nile in Sudan, looking north across the Sahara Desert towards Lake Nasser and Egypt. Photograph ISS006-E-43181 taken from the [[International Space Station, courtesy of NASA.">thumb|The Great Bend of the Nile in Sudan, looking north across the Sahara Desert towards Lake Nasser and Egypt. Photograph ISS006-E-43181 taken from the [[International Space Station">left|thumb|The Great Bend of the Nile in Sudan, looking north across the Sahara Desert towards Lake Nasser and Egypt. Photograph ISS006-E-43181 taken from the [[International Space Station, courtesy of NASA.
The Nile then reaches the man-made
Lake Nasser, impounded behind the
Aswan High Dam 270 km (170 miles) into
Egypt from the Sudanese border. Since 1998, some of Lake Nasser's waters have spilt westward to form the
Toshka Lakes. From Lake Nasser, the main channel flows north through Egypt and into the
Mediterranean Sea; a side channel, the
Bahr Yussef, splits from the main channel downriver from the city of
Asyut, and empties into the
Fayum. Where the Nile meets the Mediterranean, the
Nile Delta, is the
eponym of all river deltas worldwide. Enrichment from Nile sediments carried eastward by currents nurture the fishing industries of the Eastern Mediterranean, or used to before the Aswan High Dam was built.
History of the Nile
The Nile (''iteru'' in
Egyptian language Ancient Egyptian) was the lifeline of the
Ancient Egypt ancient Egyptian civilization, with most of the population and all of the cities of
Egypt resting along those parts of the Nile valley lying north of
Aswan. The Nile has been the lifeline for
Egypt Egyptian culture since the
Stone Age. Climate change - or perhaps
desertification overgrazing - about
8000 BC desiccation desiccated the
pastoralism pastoral lands of Egypt to form the
Sahara, and the tribes naturally migrated to the river, where they developed a settled
agriculture agricultural economics economy and a more-centralized
society.
The Nile's role in the founding of Egyptian civilization
Sustenance played a crucial role in the founding of the Egyptian civilization. The Nile was an unending source of sustenance. The Nile made the land surrounding it extremely fertile when it flooded or inundated annually. The Egyptians were able to cultivate wheat and crops around the Nile providing food for the general population. Also the Nile’s water attracted game such as the
water buffalo and the occasional
camel. These animals could be killed for meat or could be captured, tamed and used for ploughing or in the camels case traveling. The water was consumed by both people and livestock. The Nile was also a convenient and efficient way of communication and transportation of people and goods.
Egypt’s stability was one of the best structured in history. In fact it could easily have surpassed many modern societies. This stability was an immediate result of the Nile’s fertility. The Nile served as a natural border against other power hungry civilizations. While other countries fell before the Babylonian and Hittite armies, Egypt remained sturdy and invulnerable. Another relevant point is that the Nile provided
flax for trade. The flax included largely of wheat, which was crucial in the Middle East where famine was very common. This trading system secured the diplomatic relationship Egypt had with other countries and therefore Egypt became economically stable. Also the Nile provided the resources, such as food or money, to quickly and efficiently raise an army, whether the army was to take on the defensive or the offensive if necessary. This is another reason why the Egyptian civilization was unable to be conquered for during the three millennia of its existence. The Nile played a major role in politics and social life. The Egyptian peoples very rarely revolted against the
Pharaoh and as a result it was very prosperous. The Egyptian system of government was not of hierarchical form, with the Pharaoh at the top of the feudal pyramid as we generally perceive it as. On the contrary it would work much like the following. The Pharaoh would supposedly flood the Nile and in return for the life giving water and crops the peasants would cultivate the fertile soil and send a portion of the resources they had reaped to the Pharaoh. He/ she would in turn use it for the wellbeing of Egyptian society. In this manner, a mutual reliance between the Pharaoh and his peasants evolved. They understood that without the other they could not survive. They understood that any revolution, however demanding the work may be, would put their stability at risk.
The Nile was a source of spiritual dimension. The Nile was so significant to the lifestyle of the Egyptians that they created a god dedicated to the welfare of the Nile’s annual inundation. The god’s name was Hapi and he and the Pharaoh controlled the flooding of the Nile River. Also the Nile was considered as a causeway from life to death/afterlife. This is a very popular theory based on the fact that all the Egyptian burial structures are located west of the Nile. As the god
Ra, the sun, undergoes birth death and resurrection each time he crosses the sky the east was though of as a place of birth and growth and the west was considered the place of death. All the tombs were located west of the Nile because the Egyptians believed that in order to enter the afterlife they must be buried on the side which symbolized death.
Herodotus, an acclaimed Greek historian wrote that ‘Egypt was the gift of the Nile’ and in a sense that is correct. Without the Nile River, the Egypt civilization would be short lived. The Nile provided the ingredients that make a powerful country and it is barely surprising to see that it lasted three thousand years. The Nile gave Egypt sustenance, stability and spiritual dimension.
Discoveries
The
Ishango Bone Ishango bone, the earliest known indication of
Ancient Egyptian multiplication, was discovered along the headwaters of the
Nile River (near
Lake Edward, northeastern
Democratic Republic of the Congo Congo), dating to
Upper Paleolithic 20,000 BC.
Despite the attempts of the
ancient Greece Greeks and
Rome Romans (who were unable to penetrate the
Sudd), the source of the Nile was unknown until the
19th century, when
John Hanning Speke was the first to identify it as
Lake Victoria. Various earlier expeditions since ancient times had failed to determine the river's source, thus yielding classical Hellenistic and Roman representations of the river as a male god with his face and head obscured in drapery.
Speke was part of a 1856-1858 expedition led by
Richard Francis Burton to search for the source of the Nile by entering Africa from Dar-Es-Salaam (modern Tanzania). Burton was convinced that
Lake Tanganyika was the source, but it was Speke who, leaving a sick Burton behind, found the large body of water now known as Lake Victoria and convinced himself that this was the Nile's true source. Speke returned with
James Augustus Grant in 1860-1863 for further explorations around Lake Victoria and traced the Nile northwards to Gondokoro, on the southern boundary of the
Sudd.
The White Nile Expedition, led by South African national Hendri Coetzee, was to become the first to navigate the Nile in its entire length. The expedition took off from The Source of the Nile in Uganda on
January 17,
2004 and arrived safely at the Mediterranean in
Rosetta, Egypt, 4 months and 2 weeks later.
National Geographic Society National Geographic is releasing a feature film about the expedition towards the end of 2005, to be entitled ''The Longest River''.
On
April 28,
2004, geologist Pasquale Scaturro and his partner, kayaker and documentary filmmaker
Gordon Brown (cinematographer) Gordon Brown became the first people to navigate the Blue Nile, from
Lake Tana in
Ethiopia to the beaches of
Alexandria, Egypt Alexandria on the
Mediterranean. Though their expedition included a number of others, Brown and Scaturro were the only ones to remain on the expedition for the entire journey. They chronicled their adventure with an
IMAX camera and two handheld video cams, sharing their story in the IMAX film "''
Mystery of the Nile''," and in a book of the same title. Despite this attempt, the team was forced to use outboard motors for most of their journey, and it was not until
January 29,
2005, when
Canadian Les Jickling and
New Zealander Mark Tanner reached the Mediterranean Sea, that the river had been paddled for the first time under human power.
On the
30th of April 2005, a team led by South Africans Peter Meredith and Hendri Coetzee became the first to navigate the most remote headstream, the true source of the of the Nile, the Akagera river which starts as the Rukarara in Nyungwe forest in Rwanda.
On
March 31 2006, three explorers from Britain and New Zealand claimed to have been the first to travel the river from its mouth to a new "true source" deep in
Rwanda's Nyungwe rainforest.[http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060401/ts_nm/rwanda_expedition_dc_3]
The River Today
The Nile still supports much of the population of Africans living along its banks, as well as Egyptians, the latter living between otherwise inhospitable regions of the
Sahara Desert. The river flooded every summer, depositing fertile soil on the fields. The flow of the river is disturbed at several points by
Cataracts of the Nile cataracts, which are sections of faster-flowing water with many small islands, shallow water, and rocks, forming an obstacle to navigation by
boats. The sudd in the Sudan also forms a formidable obstacle for navigation and flow of water, to the extent that Egypt had once attempted to dig a canal (the Jongeli Canal) to improve the flow of this stagnant mass of water (also known as Lake No).
Image:Nile.jpg left|thumb|250px|View of the Nile from a cruiseboat, between Luxor and Aswan in Egypt The Nile was, and still is, used to transport goods to different places along its long path; especially since winter winds in this area blow up river, the ships could travel up with no work by using the sail, and down using the flow of the river. While most Egyptians still live in the Nile valley, the construction of the Aswan High Dam (finished in
1970) to provide hydroelectricity ended the summer floods and their renewal of the fertile soil.
Cities on the Nile include
Khartoum,
Aswan,
Luxor (
Thebes, Egypt Thebes), and the
Giza–
Cairo conurbation. The first cataract, the closest to the mouth of the river, is at
Aswan to the north of the
Aswan Dams. The Nile north of Aswan is a regular tourist route, with cruise ships and traditional wooden sailing boats known as
feluccas. In addition, many "floating hotel" cruise boats ply the route between
Luxor and
Aswan, stopping in at
Edfu and
Kom Ombo along the way. It used to be possible to sail on these boats all the way from
Cairo to
Aswan, but security concerns have shuts down the northernmost portion for many years.
Flooding of the Nile
The annual cycles of the Nile were very important to the lives of ancient Egyptians. The Nile 'mysteriously' but predictably rose each summer to flood and fertilize the land, without rain and in the hottest time of the year. A good flood and Egypt's wealth was assured; a poor flood or too great of a flood and Egypt would suffer.
The cyclic mystery created awe and stimulated worship, and the job of recording the history of Nile flooding, when the Nile was expected to flood, and the locations of farmers' plots after the floodwaters receded stimulated creation of the first scientific instrument (the
Nilometer), astronomy, and surveying. The concerns of ancient Egyptians for a good flood were justified. The failure of the Nile floods and the generally low level of the river is thought to have been responsible for the collapse of the Old Kingdom about 4200 years ago. These concerns are captured in the Bible, where Joseph correctly interpreted Pharaoh's dreams of 7 years of abundance and 7 years of poverty in Egypt to relate to good and then bad Nile floods.
Ledyard, in his ''Travels'', speaks contemptuously of this celebrated wonder:—"This is the mighty, the sovereign of rivers—the vast Nile that has been metamorphosed into one of the wonders of the world! Let me be careful how I read, and, above all, how I read ancient history. You have heard, and read too, much of its inundations. If the thousands of large and small canals from it, and the thousands of men and machines employed to transfer, by artificial means, the water of the Nile to the meadows on its banks—if this be the inundation that is meant, it is true; any other is false; it is not an inundating river."
More recently, drought during the 1980s led to widespread starvation in Ethiopia and Sudan but Egypt was protected from drought by water impounded in Lake Nasser.
The Eonile
The present Nile is at least the fifth river that has flowed north from the Ethiopian Highands.
Satellite imagery was used to identify dry watercourses in the desert to the west of the Nile. An Eonile canyon, now filled by surface drift, represents an ancestral Nile called the '''Eonile''' that flowed during the later
Miocene. The Eonile transported
Clastic clastic sediments to the Mediterranean, where several gas fields have been discovered within these sediments. South of Cairo, the sand-filled canyon can reach a depth of up to 1400 meters.
During the late-Miocene
Messinian Salinity Crisis, when the
Mediterranean Sea was a closed basin and sealevel in the sea dropped approximately 1500 m, the Nile cut its course down to the new base level until it was several hundred feet below world ocean level at
Aswan. This huge canyon is now full of later sediment.
Formerly,
Lake Tanganyika drained northwards into the Nile, until the
Virunga Mountains Virunga Volcanoes blocked its course in
Rwanda. That would have made the Nile much longer, with its longest headwaters in northern
Zambia.
External links
{{commons|Nile}}
-
Information and a map of the Nile's watershed
-
Geology and History of the Nile
-
Nile Delta from Space
-
Facts About The Nile River
-
Photo Gallery from a cruise between Luxor and Aswan
-
An excellent essay about the challenges of equitably allocating the waters of the Nile
-
Nile paleogeography
{{Ancient Egypt}}
Category:Geography of Africa
Category:Nile *
Category:Rivers of Egypt
Category:Rivers of Sudan
Category:Rivers of Uganda
{{Link FA|ru}}
ar:النيل
bg:Ð?ил
br:Nil
ca:Nil
cs:Nil
cy:Afon Nîl
da:Nilen
de:Nil
el:Î?είλος
eo:Nilo
es:Nilo
et:Niilus
fa:نیل
fi:Niili
fr:Nil
ga:An NÃl
he:× ×™×œ×•×¡
hu:NÃlus
id:Sungai Nil
is:NÃl
it:Nilo
ja:ナイル�
ko:나� 강
lb:Nil
lt:Nilas
mk:Ð?ил
nl:Nijl
nn:Nilen
no:Nilen
pl:Nil
pt:Rio Nilo
ru:Ð?ил (река)
scn:Nilu
simple:Nile
sk:NÃl
sl:Nil
sr:Ð?ил
sv:Nilen
sw:Nile
ta:நைல�
tr:Nil
uk:Ð?іл
vi:Sông Nil
zh:尼罗河
Category:Rivers of Africa
es:CategorÃa:Nilo
de:Kategorie: Nil
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