The Importance Of The Nile River

Over the past few centuries, and still today, the Nile is a gift to the people of Egypt; it provides everything necessary for them to live their everyday lives economically, socially and religiously. The people in Egypt have relied on the Nile for as long as it has been there. They use the Nile for everything including protection, food, and the way to the afterlife.

In the social aspect, the Nile is most useful as protection. There are six cataracts in the Nile River. The cataracts in Egypt are sections along the Nile where the river tumbles over rocks. The cataracts vary in size ranging from white water rapids to medium sized waterfalls. The Nile flows South to North so these disturbances in the flow of the river make it near impossible to attack from the South. On the North end of the Nile River lies the Nile Delta. It is like tree roots that spread and branch out before flowing into the

They were able to use the river to move heavy goods that they otherwise would not have been able to move. This increased their ability to trade throughout cities. For centuries, Egypt was an important trading center for Africa, Asia and Europe. Port Said, located in Egypt, is a big trading center. Aside from trading, there were other jobs including ship builders, sailors, fishers and the most common job, farming. One third of the population, around 26,400,000 people, were farmers. The Nile River consistently flooded. Each time it would flood the land, the waters would deposit silt, fertilizing the land and making it so no crop rotation was needed. The farmers were able to grow two or three crops per year because of this. The Nile River was the farmers’ irrigation system and it never failed. With the river doing all the work, not as many machines were used as would have otherwise been needed. With all the success of farming, the Egyptian people were never short on food or fresh, clean drinking