Pharaoh

Pharaoh (/ˈfeɪ.roʊ/, /fɛr.oʊ/ or /fær.oʊ/) is the common title of the Kings of Ancient Egypt until the Macedonian conquest.

Etymology

The word pharaoh ultimately was derived from a compound word represented as pr-3, written with the two biliteral hieroglyphs pr "house" and ꜥꜣ "column". It was used only in larger phrases such as smr pr-aa 'Courtier of the High House', with specific reference to the buildings of the court or palace. From the twelfth dynasty onward, the word appears in a wish formula 'Great House, may it live, prosper, and be in health', but again only with reference to the royal palace and not the person.

During the reign of Thutmose III (circa 1479–1425 BC) in the New Kingdom, after the foreign rule of the Hyksos during the Second Intermediate Period, pharaoh became the form of address for a person who was king.

The earliest instance where pr-aa is used specifically to address the ruler is in a letter to Amenhotep IV (Akhenaten), who reigned circa 1353–1336 BC, which is addressed to 'Pharaoh, all life, prosperity, and health!. During the eighteenth dynasty (16th to 14th centuries BC) the title pharaoh was employed as a reverential designation of the ruler. About the late twenty-first dynasty (10th century BC), however, instead of being used alone as before, it began to be added to the other titles before the ruler's name, and from the twenty-fifth dynasty (eighth to seventh centuries BC) it was, at least in ordinary usage, the only epithet prefixed to the royal appellative.

Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt was a civilization of ancient Northeastern Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in what is now the modern country of Egypt. It is one of six civilizations globally to arise independently. Egyptian civilization coalesced around 3150 BC (according to conventional Egyptian chronology) with the political unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh. The history of ancient Egypt occurred in a series of stable Kingdoms, separated by periods of relative instability known as Intermediate Periods: the Old Kingdom of the Early Bronze Age, the Middle Kingdom of the Middle Bronze Age and the New Kingdom of the Late Bronze Age.

Egypt reached the pinnacle of its power during the New Kingdom, in the Ramesside period where it rivalled the Hittite Empire, Assyrian Empire and Mitanni Empire, after which it entered a period of slow decline. Egypt was invaded or conquered by a succession of foreign powers, such as the Canaanites/Hyksos, Libyans, the Nubians, the Assyrians, Babylonians, the Achaemenid Persians, and the Macedonians in the Third Intermediate Period and the Late Period of Egypt. In the aftermath of Alexander the Great's death, one of his generals, Ptolemy Soter, established himself as the new ruler of Egypt. This Greek Ptolemaic Kingdom ruled Egypt until 30 BC, when, under Cleopatra, it fell to the Roman Empire and became a Roman province.

The Greatest Pharaohs

The Greatest Pharaohs is a 1997 American educational documentary film about Ancient Egypt distributed by A&E and narrated by Frank Langella with commentary by experts in the field. It is 200 minutes long and split into four parts, with each part explaining the lives of four Egyptian pharaohs.

In education

The film uses interviews of historians, re-creations through CGI, location footage, and archaeological and scientific evidence to tell the story of these Egyptian monarchs. It has been made available for instructional use by A&E, and is now being used in anthropology and archaeology courses at colleges and universities, such as the University of Vermont,San Francisco State University,Oriental Institute of Chicago,University of Pennsylvania, and University of California, Berkeley, as well as smaller colleges such as Blue Ridge Community College. It is available in public libraries across the United States, and in archives such as La Bibliographie nationale française.

The Greatest

The Greatest may refer to:

Film

Music

Egypt

Egypt (ⁱ/ˈiːdʒɪpt/; Arabic: مِصر‎ Miṣr, Egyptian Arabic: مَصر Maṣr, Coptic: Ⲭⲏⲙⲓ Khemi), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia, via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is the world's only contiguous Eurafrasian nation. Most of Egypt's territory of 1,010,408 square kilometres (390,000 sq mi) lies within the Nile Valley. Egypt is a Mediterranean country. It is bordered by the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Gulf of Aqaba to the east, the Red Sea to the east and south, Sudan to the south and Libya to the west.

Egypt has one of the longest histories of any modern country, arising in the tenth millennium BC as one of the world's first nation states. Considered a cradle of civilisation, Ancient Egypt experienced some of the earliest developments of writing, agriculture, urbanisation, organised religion and central government. Iconic monuments such as the Giza Necropolis and its Great Sphinx, as well the ruins of Memphis, Thebes, Karnak, and the Valley of the Kings, reflect this legacy and remain a significant focus of archaeological study and popular interest worldwide. Egypt's rich cultural heritage is an integral part of its national identity, having endured, and at times assimilated, various foreign influences, including Greek, Persian, Roman, Arab, Ottoman, and European. Although Christianised in the first century of the Common Era, it was subsequently Islamised due to the Islamic conquests of the seventh century.