Item 1 of 2    Fayoum's history   Fayoum has an extremely interesting history linked with its function as a “miniature Nile Valley”, a garden in Egypt with an important agricultural function. Fayoum has seen human habitation since Neolithic times, and a large number of significant antiquities exist in this important Oasis. In Neolithic times(c.5500 to 4000 B.C.) two distinct groups existed around the lake shore: Early Neolithic Fayumian and Late Neolithic Moerian. During these periods the first known agricultural communities flourished in Fayoum.The history of Fayoum is closely connected to that of the earliest stages o f what now is Lake Qarun. In the Pleistocene the lake was much larger than at present. Large basketry grain silos have been found to the north of Lake Qarun, dating to a period in which the pharaohs did not even exist. During the Old Kingdom (c. 2686-2181 B.C.) Fayoum was known as Ta-she or She-resy (the Southern Lake) and was dedicated to the crocodile god Sobek. The firstreal pyramid of Egypt was built at the border of Fayoum in Medium and several Middle Kingdom kings built their pyramids in the shadow of this great example. The Middle Kingdom saw an enormous bloom of life in Fayoum. Efforts to control the swampy area resulted in some magnificent buildings and statuary. Today there are only traces of the pedestals of two giant statues that once stood in Biahmu. During the 12th Dynasty's King AmenemhetI's rule, the area's importance was elevated because of his ingenious scheme to regulate the Nile floods using Fayoum as a regulator reservoir. At that time there was a natural canal between the Nile and the lake of Qarun, Muslims believe that it was the biblical Joseph who widened the canal (Joseph's Canal or Bahr Youssef), and built the world's first dam at El Lahun to regulate the flowofwater.DuringthePharaohtime,FayoumbecameEgypt'smostfertileagricultural area and Amenemhet III loved the region to such an extent that he abandoned his pyramid at Dashur to build his colossi at Biahmu, Narmuthis, a temple dedicated to Sobek, and at Hawara, his new pyramid and the famous and then very popular Labyrinth. During Greek times (332-30 b.c) Fayoum was known as "the Marsh," before it was named the Arsinoite nome by Ptolemy Philadelphus in honor of his second wife (and sister). It was divided into a number of merides (districts), including Heracleides in the north. Themistos in the west, and Polemon in the south. New settlements grew throughout Fayoum including Karanis, Bacchias. Philadelphia and Dionysius. Under Greek rule there were 114 villages in Fayoum (only sixty existed in 1809). There was rivalry between villages and sometimes open hostility. They stole crops, good soil, and water rights from each other, just like Greek city states, medieval European towns, and modern nations everywhere. By the time of Ptolemy Euergetes II, Fayoum was in decline. The land was being reclaimed by the desert as canals clogged and the population diminished. The Greeks, under Ptolemy II, populated Fayoum with Greek veterans, Macedonians and other foreigners who began systematically improving the irrigation methods. They used Greek inventions such as the Archimedes’s screw and the sakiya to irrigate the farmlands. During the Roman Period (30 b.c.-a.d. 323), Egypt had to produce one third of the grain needed by Rome each year and Fayoum, with nearly ten percent of the cultivable total, earned the epithet "breadbasket of the Roman empire." Eventually Rome exacted too much from the farmers of Fayoum. Always rebellious, its population declined and the people, unpaid and overtaxed, were forced into serfdom. In 165, a plague descended on Egypt and the major villages in Fayoum suffered considerably. By the third and fourth centuries, communities like Philadelphia and Bacchias stood abandoned. By the middle of the third century (323-642) there was a large Christian community in Fayourn. Thirty-five monasteries existed during the middle Ages, many secluded in the surrounding deserts. The “Fayoum Portraits” are the first known art of Portraits discovered in Fayoum. These globally renowned paintings are life-like and once bandaged in place over the faces of mummies, dating usually between the 1st and 3rd centuries A.D. Most of these portraits have now been detached from their mummies. Yet, they provide a wealth of information about the clothing, adornment and physical characteristics of Egypt's wealthier inhabitants. Many ancient mosques and water constructions (i.e. bridges) were built in Fayoum during the Islamic era (642-1798). The hanging mosque and Qaitbay Mosque are good examples for the Islamic building style in Fayoum.

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