Egypt
The gift of the Nile and the land of the pharaohs, the most populous Arab nation, shaped by everyday piety, the ancient Coptic church, boundless hospitality, and deep family bonds, where one of the world's oldest civilisations lives on in daily life. The complete guide.
Egypt is a country in the northeast corner of Africa, joined to Asia by the Sinai peninsula, home to about one hundred and ten million people, nearly all of them crowded along the thin green ribbon of the Nile valley and its delta amid a vast surrounding desert. To understand it, begin with the Nile, the river that has given Egypt life and shape since the dawn of history; with the immense inheritance of ancient Egypt, the pharaohs and the pyramids, that still marks the land and the national pride; with Islam, the faith of the great majority, lived as an everyday piety that orders the day and the year; with the ancient Coptic Christian church, one of the oldest in the world, that has endured beside Islam for centuries; with the boundless hospitality and generosity for which Egyptians are famous; and with the deep bonds of family and the respect for elders that anchor society. From these flow the customs that follow: the warm greeting, the shared meal, the great festivals. This guide walks through each in turn.
Overview
Egypt is a large country in the northeast corner of Africa, joined across the Sinai peninsula to Asia and bordering the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Red Sea to the east, so that it stands at the meeting of Africa, Asia, and the Arab world. Almost the whole of the country is desert, and the great majority of its people, about one hundred and ten million, the most of any Arab nation, are packed into the narrow green valley and broad delta of the Nile, the river that crosses the desert from south to north and makes Egyptian life possible. The capital, Cairo, on the Nile near the delta, is the largest city in the Arab world and one of the great cities of Africa and the Middle East.
Egypt is a republic, governed from Cairo by a president and parliament, a nation that has known monarchy, revolution, and military-backed rule in its modern history and that remains a leading power in the Arab world. The official language is Arabic, spoken in a distinctive Egyptian dialect known and loved across the Arab world through Egypt's films and music. The great majority of Egyptians are Sunni Muslims, with a significant minority of Coptic Christians, one of the oldest Christian communities on earth, and the country is heir to one of the longest and greatest civilisations in human history.
A few deep forces shape life in Egypt. There is the Nile, the river that gives the land life and form. There is the immense inheritance of ancient Egypt, the pharaohs and the pyramids. There is Islam, lived as an everyday piety. There is the ancient Coptic church beside it. There is the boundless hospitality and generosity of the people. And there are the deep bonds of family and respect for elders. The sections that follow trace these forces and then walk through the customs of daily life.
The gift of the Nile
To understand Egypt, one must begin with the Nile, for as the ancient historian said, Egypt is the gift of the Nile, and the truth of that phrase has held for more than five thousand years. The country is almost entirely desert, harsh and lifeless, save for the thin green thread of the river valley and the fan of the delta where the Nile meets the sea, and it is there, on the narrow strip of land the river waters, that nearly all Egyptians have always lived. The Nile is the lifeblood of the nation, the source of its water, its food, its settlement, and its very existence, and Egyptian life has been shaped by the river since the dawn of civilisation.
For thousands of years the rhythm of Egyptian life followed the rhythm of the river, above all its yearly flood, which once spread its rich black silt across the fields and made the valley one of the most fertile and productive lands on earth, the granary of the ancient world. This dependable abundance, won from the desert by the river, gave rise to one of humanity's first and greatest civilisations and sustained the dense farming population, the fellahin, whose age-old life on the land has continued, in its essentials, for millennia. The great dam built in the south in modern times has tamed the flood and changed the old rhythm, but the river remains the indispensable heart of the nation.
The Nile is not only a practical necessity but a deep presence in the Egyptian soul, the axis around which the whole country is arranged, dividing the land into the cultivated and the desert, ordering the cities and villages strung along its banks, and carrying the traffic of life upon its waters. To this day the overwhelming majority of Egyptians live within a short distance of the river, and the desert that fills most of the map is nearly empty. The pressure of a fast-growing population upon the limited fertile land of the valley is one of the great challenges of modern Egypt. To understand Egypt is to begin with the Nile, the river that has given the land its life, its shape, and its civilisation since the beginning.
The shadow of the pharaohs
No nation carries a more ancient or more glorious past than Egypt, for here arose one of the very first and greatest of human civilisations, the civilisation of the pharaohs, which flourished along the Nile for some three thousand years and left behind wonders that still astonish the world. The pyramids of Giza, the last surviving wonder of the ancient world, the Great Sphinx, the vast temples of Luxor and Karnak, the tombs of the Valley of the Kings, the treasures of the boy-king Tutankhamun, the hieroglyphs and the mummies and the gods, all speak of a civilisation of extraordinary achievement in building, art, writing, science, and religion, that endured longer than any since.
This immense inheritance is a source of deep pride for modern Egyptians, who see themselves as the heirs of the pharaohs and the guardians of one of humanity's greatest legacies. The pyramids and the Sphinx are the supreme symbols of the nation, the image of Egypt to the world, and the ancient monuments draw visitors from across the globe, making tourism a great pillar of the economy. The opening of grand new museums and the steady unearthing of new treasures keep the ancient glory before the eyes of the world and the nation.
The ancient civilisation, though its religion and language passed away long ago, beneath the later layers of Christianity, Islam, and the Arabic tongue, left traces that linger in Egyptian life: in certain customs and superstitions, in the spring festival of Sham el-Nessim that reaches back to pharaonic times, in folk practices and beliefs, and above all in the deep sense of a continuous Egyptian identity reaching back across the millennia. Modern Egyptians are Arabs and Muslims or Christians, but they are also, in their own deep sense of themselves, the children of a civilisation older than almost any other. To understand Egypt is to understand the long shadow of the pharaohs, the ancient glory that still shapes the nation's pride and identity.
Everyday piety
Egypt is a deeply Muslim country, and Islam is woven into the very texture of daily life, lived not as a thing apart but as an everyday piety that orders the hours, the week, and the year. The great majority of Egyptians are Sunni Muslims, and the faith shapes the rhythm of ordinary life: the call to prayer sounds five times a day from the minarets of countless mosques across every city and village; the faithful pause to pray; the Friday midday prayer gathers the community and marks the holy day of the week; and the language of everyday speech is filled with the names of God, the constant insha'Allah, God willing, and al-hamdulillah, praise be to God.
Egypt holds a special place in the Islamic world as a centre of learning and faith. Cairo is home to al-Azhar, one of the oldest and most respected centres of Islamic scholarship in the world, whose authority reaches across the Sunni Muslim community, and Egypt has long been a heartland of Islamic thought, law, and culture. The country is dotted with magnificent old mosques, the architecture of centuries of Islamic civilisation, and the faith has shaped its art, its law, its calendar, and its values of charity, modesty, family, and submission to God.
Egyptian Islam is, for most, a faith of deep but warm and tolerant piety, woven with a love of the saints and their shrines, the popular festivals called mulids that celebrate holy figures, and a folk religion rich in custom alongside the formal faith, though stricter and more reformist currents also run through Egyptian religious life. Religion is a powerful and visible force in Egyptian society, deeply felt and openly expressed, and it shapes the conduct, the values, and the worldview of the people. For a visitor, respect for the faith, its customs, and its sensibilities is essential and deeply appreciated. To understand Egypt is to understand the everyday piety of its Islam, woven into the rhythm of ordinary life.
The Coptic church
Beside the Muslim majority lives one of the oldest Christian communities in the world, the Coptic Christians of Egypt, whose church reaches back to the very first century of Christianity and who have kept their faith through nearly two thousand years. The Copts, who make up a significant minority of Egyptians, perhaps a tenth of the population, belong mainly to the Coptic Orthodox Church, an ancient eastern Christian church with its own pope, its own traditions, its own calendar, and its own deep roots in Egyptian soil. By tradition the church was founded by Saint Mark the Evangelist, and Egypt was a great centre of early Christianity and the birthplace of Christian monasticism.
The Coptic community has lived alongside the Muslim majority for many centuries, and the two have shared the land, the language, the customs, and much of the culture of Egypt, so that Copts and Muslims are alike Egyptians, bound by a common nationality, history, and way of life. The Copts keep their own religious calendar and festivals, their Christmas on the seventh of January, their Easter, their fasts and feasts, their churches and monasteries, and they preserve in their liturgy traces of the ancient Egyptian language, the last living echo of the tongue of the pharaohs. The relations between the communities have generally been peaceful, though times of tension and trouble have occurred, as in any land of mixed faith.
The presence of this ancient Christian church gives Egyptian culture a depth and a continuity reaching back beyond Islam to the early Christian centuries and beyond. Some Egyptian customs and festivals, above all the spring festival of Sham el-Nessim, are shared across the religious divide and reach back to pre-Christian times, marking the deep common Egyptian heritage beneath the difference of faith. For a visitor, the Coptic monasteries, churches, and traditions are a window into one of the oldest living Christian cultures on earth. To understand Egypt is to understand the ancient Coptic church and the long coexistence of Christian and Muslim in the land of the Nile.
The open hand
If any one quality defines the Egyptian people, it is their hospitality, a warmth and generosity toward guests and strangers that is famous across the world and lies at the very heart of the culture. Egyptians love to host, to welcome, to feed, and to make a guest feel at home, and the offering of food, tea, and sweets to a visitor is something close to a sacred duty, an expression of generosity, honour, and warmth that runs deep in the national character. To welcome a guest, even a stranger, as if they were family, sparing no effort to make them comfortable, is the Egyptian way.
This hospitality is offered with a remarkable warmth and humour, for Egyptians are known across the Arab world for their friendliness, their good cheer, their quickness to laugh and joke, and their genuine kindness to strangers. A visitor is likely to be greeted with smiles, drawn into conversation, offered tea or a meal, and treated with a generosity that can be overwhelming, often by people of modest means, for the poorer the host, frequently the more open the welcome. To refuse an offer of hospitality outright can give offence; the gracious way is to accept warmly, or to decline gently with thanks and polite insistence on both sides.
The hospitality flows from deep cultural and religious roots, from the value placed on generosity in Islam and in Egyptian tradition, from the warmth of a communal society, and from a genuine delight in the company of others. Food is at the centre of it, for to feed a guest abundantly is the deepest expression of welcome, and a guest will be pressed to eat and eat again. For a visitor, the keys are to receive Egyptian hospitality graciously, to return warmth with warmth, and to understand that the generosity is genuine and heartfelt. To understand Egypt is to understand the boundless hospitality and generosity of its people, perhaps the warmest welcome in the world.
The honoured place of elders
The family lies at the very heart of Egyptian life, the deepest and most important of all bonds, and Egyptian families are close, warm, and extended, reaching well beyond parents and children to embrace grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins in a tight and supportive web. The extended family is the foundation of society, the first source of love, support, identity, and security, and its bonds carry deep obligations of mutual help, so that family members support one another through life as a matter of course, and the family, far more than the state, is the safety net on which people rely.
Within the family, age and seniority command deep respect, and the honouring of elders is a cornerstone value of Egyptian life. The young defer to the old, show them respect and obedience, do not challenge or contradict them, do not raise their voices to them, and use special respectful terms of address for parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and elders generally. The care of aging parents by their children is taken for granted, multigenerational households are common, and the old are honoured and cherished rather than set aside. Respect flows up the generations, and authority and wisdom are accorded to age.
The individual in Egypt is understood always within this web of family, not as a solitary self but as a member of a kin group to which one owes loyalty and from which one draws identity and support, and the honour and good name of the family matter greatly to all its members. Decisions, from marriage to work, are made with the family in mind, and the bonds of kinship shape the whole of life. Modern city life, smaller homes, and economic pressure have brought some change, yet the family remains the bedrock of Egyptian society and the deepest source of belonging. To understand Egypt is to understand the central place of the close extended family and the deep respect for elders in the life of every Egyptian.
The warmth of talk
Egyptian greetings are warm, lengthy, and full of feeling, reflecting the friendliness and sociability of the people. People greet one another with genuine warmth and a string of polite inquiries after one's health, family, and affairs, for the greeting is not a quick formality but a real and valued exchange, and to rush past it is rude. Among men, a handshake, often warm and lingering, and among friends an embrace and a kiss on each cheek; among women similarly; though between men and women, especially the more religiously observant, it is wise to wait and follow the other's lead, for some will not shake hands across the sexes. The greetings come in Arabic, the common salaam alaikum, peace be upon you, and its warm reply chief among them.
Egyptian conversation is lively, warm, expressive, and full of humour, for Egyptians are famous across the Arab world for their wit, their love of jokes and banter, and their good cheer even in hard times. Talk is animated and often loud, people stand close and gesture freely, and conversation is a great pleasure and a social art. The language is rich in courtesy, in blessings and pious phrases, in elaborate politeness, and in the warmth that marks Egyptian social life. Egyptians are quick to laugh, to tease, and to make a stranger feel welcome through the warmth of their talk.
Courtesy and respect shape the manner of address, with respectful titles and forms used for elders, for those of higher status, and in formal settings, and a general politeness valued throughout social life. For a visitor, the way to get on is to meet the Egyptian warmth with warmth: to greet people properly and at leisure, to inquire after their well-being, to be friendly, patient, and good-humoured, and to enter into the sociable spirit. Even a few words of Arabic are warmly received, and an open, warm, respectful manner opens every door. To understand Egypt is to understand the warmth, length, and humour of its greetings and the deep sociability of its people.
Koshari, ful, and the Egyptian table
Egyptian food is hearty, flavourful, and rooted in the produce of the Nile valley, a cuisine of beans, grains, vegetables, and bread, shaped by the land and by the meeting of Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, and African ways. The great staple is bread, aysh, a word that also means life itself, the flat round loaves that accompany every meal, and beside it the beloved everyday dishes that feed the nation. Chief among them is ful medames, the slow-cooked fava beans dressed with oil, lemon, and cumin, the great national breakfast eaten across the land, and taamiya, the Egyptian falafel made from fava beans, fried golden and tucked into bread.
The most beloved of all Egyptian dishes is perhaps koshari, the hearty and humble national dish of rice, lentils, macaroni, and chickpeas topped with spiced tomato sauce and crisp fried onions, a filling and delicious meal eaten by rich and poor alike. To these are joined molokhia, the distinctive green soup-stew made from the leaves of the jute mallow, often cooked with chicken or rabbit; mahshi, vegetables stuffed with spiced rice; grilled meats and the popular pigeon, a prized delicacy; the array of dips and salads, the tahina and baba ghanoush; and a wealth of syrup-soaked sweets and pastries for the famous Egyptian sweet tooth. Mutton and chicken are the common meats, and as a Muslim country Egypt observes the rules of halal food, avoiding pork.
The meal is a shared and social occasion, often eaten from communal dishes, with the main meal of the day taken in the afternoon, and hospitality centres utterly on feeding the guest generously. Tea, strong and sweet, is the great everyday drink, offered constantly as a gesture of welcome, along with Turkish-style coffee and, in the cafes, the bubbling water pipe, the shisha, over which Egyptians sit and talk for hours. Food is traditionally eaten with the right hand, or with bread used to scoop, never with the left. For a visitor, to share an Egyptian meal, the ful and the koshari, the bread and the tea, is to taste the warmth of the culture. To understand Egypt is to understand its hearty, beloved table and the deep place of food in its hospitality.
The month of the fast
The holy month of Ramadan is the great event of the Egyptian year, a month that transforms the whole rhythm and feeling of the nation. Through Ramadan, Muslims fast from dawn to sunset, taking neither food nor drink through the daylight hours, and the days grow quiet and slow while the nights come alive. At sunset the fast is broken with the meal called iftar, often shared in great gatherings of family, friends, and community, and the streets fill with light, decoration, and festivity; the special lanterns called fanous glow everywhere, tables are laid to feed the poor, and a deep spirit of faith, charity, family, and community fills the month. Ramadan in Egypt is a time of devotion and of joyful, sociable nights.
The end of Ramadan brings the festival of Eid al-Fitr, the feast of the breaking of the fast, a joyful celebration of several days marked by special prayers, family gatherings, new clothes for the children, gifts and money for the young, visits to relatives, and feasting, with the beloved festive cookies called kahk, dusted with sugar, baked and shared in every home. It is a time of happiness, reunion, and generosity, one of the high points of the year.
The other great Islamic festival is Eid al-Adha, the feast of the sacrifice, which falls during the season of the pilgrimage to Mecca and commemorates the willingness of Abraham to sacrifice his son in obedience to God. It is marked by the sacrifice of an animal, a sheep or other, whose meat is shared with family, neighbours, and above all the poor, in a great act of charity, along with prayers, family gatherings, and feasting. These two Eids are the central religious festivals of the Egyptian year, deeply observed and joyfully celebrated. To understand Egypt is to understand the transforming month of Ramadan and the joyful feasts of the two Eids at the heart of the Muslim year.
Sham el-Nessim, the spring feast
Beyond the great Islamic feasts, Egypt keeps a remarkable festival that belongs to no single faith and reaches back to the very dawn of its history: Sham el-Nessim, the celebration of spring, an ancient Egyptian festival that has been kept for thousands of years and is celebrated to this day by all Egyptians, Muslim and Christian alike, as a national spring holiday. On this day, which falls the day after the Coptic Easter, families pour out into the gardens, parks, and green places along the Nile to spend the day outdoors, and they eat the traditional foods of the festival: the salted fish called fesikh, spring onions, lettuce, and coloured eggs, customs reaching back to pharaonic times. It is a beloved shared festival of the whole nation, a living thread to ancient Egypt.
The Coptic Christian community keeps its own rich festival calendar. Coptic Christmas falls on the seventh of January, marked by the midnight mass, family gatherings, and feasting after a long fast; Coptic Easter is the great feast of the Christian year, with its own customs and celebrations; and the Coptic calendar is marked by many fasts and feasts and by the festivals of the saints. These Christian festivals add their own colour to the Egyptian year and are part of the shared national life.
Egyptian popular religion brings the mulids, the festivals celebrating the birthdays of revered Muslim saints and holy figures, joyful and crowded celebrations of devotion, music, food, and festivity that gather great crowds at the shrines, a beloved feature of Egyptian folk religion. To these are joined the national holidays marking the events of modern Egyptian history, and the lively round of weddings, religious occasions, and family celebrations that fill the social calendar. Egyptians love a celebration, and the year is rich with them. To understand Egypt is to understand its festivals, above all the ancient national spring feast of Sham el-Nessim that all Egyptians share.
The code of modest dress
Dress in Egypt ranges widely, from the modern fashions of the cities to the traditional garments of the countryside and the requirements of religious modesty, and it varies greatly by region, class, faith, and generation. In the cities, especially among the better-off, dress is often modern and similar to that of Europe, though generally more modest, while in the countryside and among the traditional, older forms of dress endure, above all the galabeya, the long, loose, comfortable robe worn by men, practical in the heat and a familiar sight in the villages and the streets.
Modesty is the governing value in dress, especially for women, in this largely Muslim and conservative society. Many Egyptian women wear the headscarf, the hijab, covering the hair, along with modest clothing covering the arms and legs, and the wearing of the headscarf has grown common in recent decades, though the degree of covering varies widely, from the fully veiled to the uncovered, by personal choice, family, region, and conviction, and Christian women generally do not cover the hair. For both men and women, modest dress that covers the body is the respectable norm, and revealing clothing is frowned upon away from the tourist beaches and resorts.
For a visitor, the keys are to dress modestly and respectfully, especially away from the tourist areas, covering the shoulders and knees, and to dress with particular care when visiting mosques, churches, and religious sites, where modest dress is required and women may need to cover the hair. Modest, neat dress is appreciated and helps one fit in and show respect, while revealing or sloppy clothing draws unwelcome attention and gives offence in conservative settings. To understand Egypt is to understand the value of modesty in dress and the range of garments, from the city fashion to the village galabeya, that clothe its people.
The milestones of a life
The great milestones of life in Egypt are marked with deep ceremony, the gathering of the family, and the customs of faith and tradition, and they are among the richest and most joyful expressions of the culture. Birth is welcomed with great rejoicing, and the arrival of a child, especially the first and especially a son, is a cause of celebration, marked among Muslims by the sebou, the festive ceremony on the seventh day after birth, with its old customs, music, and family gathering to welcome and bless the newborn.
The wedding is the supreme celebration, and Egyptian weddings are large, joyful, and lavish affairs that gather the wider family and community in festivity. The customs unfold over engagement, the writing of the marriage contract, and the great wedding celebration itself, with its music, dancing, feasting, and the festive procession called the zaffa that leads the bride and groom in with drums, music, and rejoicing. Weddings are occasions of immense importance, bringing together vast numbers of guests in celebration, for marriage is the foundation of the family, the central institution of Egyptian life, and a wedding is a major event for the whole community. The expense and effort lavished on weddings are great, reflecting their deep importance.
Death is marked according to faith, swiftly and with deep communal support. For Muslims, the body is washed, shrouded, and buried quickly, within a day if possible, in the Islamic way, and the family receives condolences in gatherings marked by the reading of the Quran, with further remembrance after forty days and after a year. The Coptic Christians keep their own funeral and mourning customs. In both, the community gathers around the bereaved in support, for mourning, like celebration, is shared. Through the milestones of life run the enduring threads of Egyptian culture: family, faith, community, and the love of both celebration and shared mourning. To understand Egypt is to understand these milestones, where family and faith mark the passage of every Egyptian life.
What gives offence
Egyptian life is governed by a warm but real sense of courtesy, and a visitor who understands a few key customs will be warmly received. The most important rules concern the hands and feet, as across the Muslim world: the left hand is considered unclean and is not used for eating, giving, or receiving, all of which are done with the right hand; and the feet are the lowest part of the body, so one does not point the soles of the feet or shoes at another person, which is a real insult, nor prop the feet up toward others. Shoes may be removed before entering homes and are always removed in mosques.
Respect for religion, for elders, and for the customs of modesty runs through Egyptian etiquette. Public displays of affection between couples are frowned upon, especially away from the most cosmopolitan circles, and modest behaviour and dress are expected. One should show respect around religious occasions and places, dress and behave appropriately at mosques and churches, and be sensitive during Ramadan, when eating, drinking, or smoking in public during the daylight fast is inconsiderate and best avoided. Taking photographs of people, especially women, without asking permission is rude and resented.
In manner, warmth, patience, and courtesy are the keys. Egyptians value good humour, friendliness, and respect, and dislike rudeness, arrogance, and the loss of temper. The warm and lengthy greeting, the polite inquiry, the gracious acceptance of hospitality, and a generally respectful and good-humoured manner open every door. Bargaining is expected and enjoyed in the markets, conducted with good cheer. Above all, the visitor should match the Egyptian warmth and show respect for the faith, the family, and the customs of the country. To understand Egypt is to understand its courtesy, the rules of hand and foot, the respect owed to faith and elders, and the warmth that underlies it all.
Cairo, the cities, and the countryside
Egyptian life is lived in two very different worlds: the great teeming cities, above all Cairo, and the timeless countryside of the Nile valley and delta, and the difference between them is one of the deep divisions of the nation. Cairo, the capital, is the largest city in the Arab world and one of the great megacities of the earth, a vast, dense, chaotic, and endlessly vibrant metropolis of some twenty million people, where the traffic roars, the markets teem, the ancient and the modern jostle together, and the energy never stops. It is the political, economic, cultural, and intellectual heart not only of Egypt but of much of the Arab world, a city of immense history, from the medieval Islamic old town to the modern sprawl.
The cities, Cairo and the great Mediterranean port of Alexandria above all, are worlds of modern life, of education and work and cosmopolitan ways, of cinema and cafes and commerce, more akin in their patterns to other world cities than to the Egyptian village, and the young, the educated, and the well-off live lives increasingly shaped by global modernity. The cities draw people in from the countryside in great numbers, swelling ever larger, and they carry the pressures of crowding, poverty, and the strain of growth alongside their energy and opportunity.
The countryside, by contrast, keeps a far older and slower way of life. In the villages of the Nile valley and the delta, the fellahin, the farmers, work the land much as their ancestors have for thousands of years, in a life of close community, deep tradition, strong religion, and enduring custom, shaped by the seasons and the river. Here the old ways, the traditional dress, the close family and village bonds, the folk customs and beliefs, run strongest. The gap between the modernising city and the traditional countryside, between rich and poor, is one of the great realities of modern Egypt. To understand Egypt is to understand both its worlds: the teeming, vibrant cities and the timeless life of the Nile-side countryside.
The voice of the Arab world
Egypt is the cultural powerhouse of the Arab world, the great producer of its films, its music, and its popular culture, and Egyptian arts are loved and known across the whole Arabic-speaking world and beyond. In music, Egypt has given the Arab world some of its greatest and most beloved figures, above all the legendary singer Umm Kulthum, whose voice held the Arab world spellbound and who remains an icon decades after her death, along with a host of other great singers and composers, so that Egyptian song has long set the standard for the region. The music ranges from the classical Arabic tradition to folk and the modern popular styles, and it fills Egyptian life.
Egyptian cinema is the Hollywood of the Arab world, the oldest and largest film industry in the region, which through its golden age and beyond produced the films and stars beloved across the Arabic-speaking world, spreading the Egyptian dialect and the images of Egyptian life far and wide, and making Cairo the centre of Arab popular culture. The Egyptian dialect of Arabic, carried by these films and songs, is the most widely understood in the Arab world. Television, especially the dramas of the Ramadan season, continues this cultural leadership.
Egypt has a rich literary tradition too, the land of the Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz, whose novels captured the life of Cairo and won him a place among the great writers of the world, and of a long line of poets, novelists, and thinkers, for Egypt has been a centre of Arabic letters and learning for centuries. To these are joined the folk arts and crafts, the music and dance of the regions, and the deep inheritance of Islamic and ancient art and architecture. This cultural richness, and Egypt's long role as the heart of Arab culture, is a source of deep national pride. To understand Egypt is to understand its place as the cultural heart of the Arab world, the home of its music, its cinema, and its letters.
The nation today
Egypt today is a republic of about one hundred and ten million people, the most populous nation in the Arab world and one of its leading powers, with its capital at Cairo, though a vast New Administrative Capital is being built in the desert to the east. It is governed by a president, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who has led the country since 2014, and a parliament, and it remains a pivotal nation in the politics of the Middle East and the Arab world, long a leader in the region's diplomacy and affairs. Arabic is the language, Islam the faith of the great majority, with the ancient Coptic Christian minority beside it.
Modern Egypt faces serious challenges. Its population is large and growing fast, pressing hard upon the limited fertile land of the Nile valley and the resources of the state; its economy has struggled with debt, inflation, and the rising cost of living, and a large share of the people live in poverty; and the country has known political turmoil, revolution, and authoritarian rule in recent years. Great national projects, the expansion of the Suez Canal, the new capital, the reclaiming of desert for farmland, aim to modernise the country and grow the economy, and tourism, drawn by the ancient wonders, remains a vital pillar. These are the concerns of a great and ancient nation working to meet the needs of its vast and youthful population.
Through all its modern trials, Egypt holds firmly to the identity that defines it. The Nile still gives the land its life; the inheritance of the pharaohs still fills the nation with pride; Islam is still lived as an everyday piety, with the ancient Coptic church beside it; the boundless hospitality and warmth of the people endure; and the deep bonds of family and the respect for elders still anchor society. To know Egypt is to meet one of the oldest and greatest of nations, the gift of the Nile and the land of the pharaohs, a place of deep faith, warm hospitality, and enduring family, where one of humanity's longest civilisations lives on in the daily life of its people.