Egypt, commonly known as ?The Motherland of the World?, ?Land of Civilizations? and ?The Greatest Power in Human History?, is reputed worldwide for its distinct 7,000-year-old record of civilization and immense wealth of knowledge.This has made Egypt a master and pioneer of science, arts, culture, architecture as well as almost all fields of human knowledge.

Amongst all civilizations and nations, Egypt has always maintained a unique position. Historically, Egypt is universally acknowledged as the world's most ancient state with a unified societal entity within its current geographical borders.

Through this area there runs the River Nile starting from the Great Lakes in the heart of Africa, through northern Sudan where the Ethiopian tributaries collecting rain water flows into its main course.

Running past the cataract area south of Aswan, it calms down, flowing smoothly down to its mouth on the Mediterranean Sea.

Egypt has been referred to as the "Gift of the Nile" due to the river that has nourished the desert land and sustained one of the most ancient, continuous civilizations in the world.

The country has long captured the world's imagination as the magical land of the Pharaohs and their awe-inspiring Pyramids of Giza, the only one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World to survive.

Islam arrived with the Arab conquests in the 7th century and the country subsequently went on to become a major cultural and spiritual heart of the Muslim world. Its most famous landmark, the Al-Azhar Mosque in Cairo, founded in the 10th century, has long been a source of great pride for Muslims. In keeping with a country that is no stranger to longevity, Al-Azhar's prestigious teaching institution, which attracts scholars from around the world, is considered to be the oldest university in existence

Today, the overwhelming majority of the country's approximately 65 million inhabitants are Muslims. City horizons are dotted with the minarets of mosques and, every day, their speakers crackle with the evocative, almost ethereal, calls of the "muezzins" summoning the faithful to prayer. On Fridays, the special day of prayer, mosques are filled to bursting point and sidewalks and prayer mats spill out onto the sidewalks and streets. Yet the population is not uniformly Muslim. Christianity continues to thrive in Egypt, and a significant minority of the country belongs to the distinctive Egyptian church whose members are known as Copts.

The country is also home to a million or so Christians of other denominations, such as the Roman Catholic Church, and the Greek and Armenian Orthodox Churches. For many centuries Egypt was also home to a flourishing community of Jews, though most left the country after the creation of the state of Israel in 1948. Today, only a handful remains in Cairo.

Egypt is 50 feet below sea level. Some important cities, towns, and places in Egypt are Cairo (the capital), Giza, Memphis, Thebes, Alexandria, Suez Canal, Abu Simbel, Sinai Peninsula, and Rosetta.

The highest point is Catharine Mountain that is 8,668 feet high. The lowest point is Qattara Depression and is 436 feet below sea level.

The Nile Delta is the only delta in Egypt and is 100 miles long and 155 miles wide. It is in the shape of a triangle. There are 5 important oases in Egypt and they are all located in the Libyan Desert. They are the Farafrah, Bahriah, Dakhla, Kharijah, and the Siwah oases.The area of Egypt is 386, 662 square miles. The distances from east to west are 770 miles and from north to south it is 675 miles.

There are no forests in but there are date palms and citrus groves. Papyrus plants grow only near the Nile.