84 THE WISDOM OF OLD EGYPT 



of Nile mud, and we can estimate that it does not go 

 back beyond the New Stone Age. At that time the 

 peoples of the Mediterranean region were developing 

 agriculture, and this fertile and sheltered valley would 

 prove one of the most valuable and desirable sites in 

 the whole region. 



We have evidence that men of the Old Stone Age 

 lived on the rocky fringes of the desert overlooking 

 Egypt. We find their Palaeolithic implements. Then, 

 in the lowest deposits reached by our excavators, we 

 have evidence of a large Neolithic population covering 

 the valley itself, from the Delta to the First Cataract, 

 after the Ice Age and the Old Stone Age were over. This 

 Neolithic population passes quite gradually, as in the 

 case of Crete, into the state which we call civilization. 



There has been a good deal of controversy as to the 

 origin of these early Egyptians. Some think they 

 came from the African lands to the west. Others 

 trace them to Arabia, or even Mesopotamia ; and 

 others again bring them from the south. Now that 

 this early period is better known to us, there is a 

 very general agreement that, in the main, they were 

 a southern extension of the Mediterranean race. 

 There are writers who think that the Cretans came 

 from Egypt, because the common dress of the men in 

 both cases was a simple loin-cloth. On the contrary, 

 this is only one of many indications that they were 

 the northern and southern wings of the large popu- 

 lation which the Ice Age drove to the relatively 

 pleasant region lying to the south-east of Europe. 



But there are ample traces of a great mingling of 

 populations in early Egypt, and this gives us the 

 essential condition of progress — clash of peoples and 

 cultures. All Egyptologists are agreed that the fertile 



