Nile

Nezar AlSayyad is an architect, planner and urban historian. He is Professor Emeritus of Architecture and Planning at the University of California, Berkeley, where he was Faculty Director of the Centre for Arab Societies and Environment Studies for two decades. He has published numerous books including, most recently, Cairo: Histories of a City (Harvard University Press, 2011) and Traditions: The Real, the Hyper and the Virtual (Routledge, 2014).

A fascinating historical and geographic tour of the Nile, this book comes on the heels of Cairo: Histories of the City to reconfirm AlSayyad’s outstanding storytelling and open-eyed love of his native Egypt. The narrative flows in time along the meandering river from the first settlements on its banks to the capitals of the contemporary states that bicker over its water, stitching together a tale of human ingenuity, discovery, exploitation, and planning.

• DedicationPrefaceRoadmapPrologue: The Urban Life of a RiverChapter 1. Finding the Source of the Nile: Centuries of DiscoveryChapter 2. Birth of the Nile: Water Carves a Path through Rugged LandChapter 3. The Nile of Lower Egypt: Memphis, the First Capital CityChapter 4. Thebes of the Pharaohs: The Nile of Upper EgyptChapter 5. Avaris and Akhetaten: Temporary Capitals on the NileChapter 6. Nubia on the Nile: The Kingdom of the Black Pharaohs in Napata and MeroeChapter 7. Alexandria: Greeks and Romans on the Western Edge of the Nile DeltaChapter 8. A Nile Oasis in the Sahara: Fayoum of the PtolemiesChapter 9. Cairo: The Thousand Years Capital on the NileChapter 10. Crusaders on the Nile: Damietta and MansouraChapter 11. Cities of the Blue Nile: Lake Tana and the Ethiopian EmpiresChapter 12. Rosetta and the Discovery of Ancient Egypt: Where the Nile Meets the SeaChapter 13. Khartoum and Omdurman: An Islamic State on the Nile in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan Chapter 14. A Pyramid for the Living: The Nile at AswanEpilogue: On the Possible Death of the Nile and the Life of Its Cities