What did the Ancient Egyptians look like?

[Karakars]

So around that time random people were just showing up like "alright I'm king of Egypt now"?

That's kinda the way to describe all the Intermediate periods of Egypt, yes. In these periods the Egyptian realm had, in general, weak leaders and a very fragile stability making it a prey to larger kingdoms who had previously been attacked by Egypt. Basically nothing much happened during these periods other than Egypt being conquered by almost every civilization around them.

You are right: Nubian is #25.
But the hypotheses still stand: #24 and #25 could have been lumped together (for brevity), historians had a Delta-based bias and therefore overlooked #23 (which was concurrent with #22) or #26 (the Assyrians) forbade mentioning the Nubians (#25).

[The New California Republic]

They looked like humans.

Nice humans, they tended sheep

They adored cats tho, so that puts the Egyptians down several levels at least.

[Karakars]

They looked like humans.

Nice humans, they tended sheep

They adored cats tho, so that puts the Egyptians down several levels at least.

Bastet didn't become a thing until the crazy cat codger (son of Rameses II) made it a thing.

That's right, all you crazy cat ladies out there: your prototype was a MAN!

[An Alan Smithee Nation]

Wilson, Keppel, and Betty.

[Borderlands of Rojava]

They looked like humans.

Nice humans, they tended sheep

They adored cats tho, so that puts the Egyptians down several levels at least.

The Egyptians were a society of crazy cat ladies lmfao.

[Ifreann]

If the defence of a Hollywood casting choice is genetic analysis of ancient mummified remains then we're essentially agreeing with the people who insist that casting choices should always be racially accurate. All the people who freak out because a person of colour is cast in a role they think has to go to a white person, we're taking the position that they're right if our argument is "Gal Gadot is the right race, actually".

Race is a social construct with no basis in biology. We can no more determine the race of the Ancient Egyptians than we can determine which football team they supported. We might be able to get some idea of what their skin might have looked like, but our skin tone is not strictly a function of our genetics. Do we think people getting a tan is in vivo genetic engineering? Of course not. Also it would be deeply foolish to assume that any ancient civilisation was homogeneous. Egypt two thousand years ago did not exist in some alternate dimension, cut off from the rest of Earth. If someone from Kamchatka had felt like going on a very long walk they could have wound up in Egypt during the lifetime of Cleopatra VII Philopator.

So who should be cast as Cleopatra? I don't know, whoever. It would be good for minority actors to get more leading roles, and it would be fun to see racists freaking out at a black Cleopatra, but it's hardly the end of the world if Gal Gadot plays her. What's the movie even about? Is it portraying the historical figure Cleopatra or the Shakespeare character Cleopatra? Does anyone even care, or is this thread just ten pages of people acting like race is a real thing with sensible rules that we can discover and not made up bullshit?

---

They're just ridiculous though. They ignore all the civilizations of africa whose members were the actual ancestors of many African Americans and instead go "nah Egypt is ours for the taking."

Because they're not as impressive. Sub-Saharan Africa was a largely undereveloped area. If it didn't have access to the Saharan trade routes or the Red Sea, it was largely backwards. Even then the more impressive parts of black Africa weren't as impressive as what other cultures had. Sub-Saharan Africa was always behind the rest of the world, culminating in the inevitable Scramble for Africa. Afrocentrists know that Sub-Saharan Africa was shit compared to Europe, Asia, and North Africa. So they try to leech off nearby civs to try and make up for the simple embarrassing fact that Sub-Saharan Africa has always been a primitive backwater. It's pure envy is all.

They should stop trying to claim a fictional, glorious past and work on a better, glorious future.

"underdeveloped"
"backwards"
"primitive backwater"

Because as we all know, there is a hierarchy of civilisations, a linear progression of development from the emergence of society to the modern day, and we know that African civilisations were progressing slowly and failing to develop because they weren't the same as European civilisations. If they were developing properly there would have been a sub-Saharan Rome just like the European one, but no, they were primitives and didn't follow the correct course of history: the European one.

---

Because of ethnic history, not actual surface details.

Most white people look the same, but if you told a French guy and a Russian guy that they looked basically the same you'd never hear the end of it.

That ringing you hear in the background is the residual sound of an Irish man screaming forever after being told "you're a really handsome guy. Are you British?"

Only an American could say this.

[Trollzyn the Infinite]

Because they're not as impressive. Sub-Saharan Africa was a largely undereveloped area. If it didn't have access to the Saharan trade routes or the Red Sea, it was largely backwards. Even then the more impressive parts of black Africa weren't as impressive as what other cultures had. Sub-Saharan Africa was always behind the rest of the world, culminating in the inevitable Scramble for Africa. Afrocentrists know that Sub-Saharan Africa was shit compared to Europe, Asia, and North Africa. So they try to leech off nearby civs to try and make up for the simple embarrassing fact that Sub-Saharan Africa has always been a primitive backwater. It's pure envy is all.

They should stop trying to claim a fictional, glorious past and work on a better, glorious future.

"underdeveloped"
"backwards"
"primitive backwater"

Because as we all know, there is a hierarchy of civilisations, a linear progression of development from the emergence of society to the modern day, and we know that African civilisations were progressing slowly and failing to develop because they weren't the same as European civilisations. If they were developing properly there would have been a sub-Saharan Rome just like the European one, but no, they were primitives and didn't follow the correct course of history: the European one.

Nice try.

1. Never compared Sub-Saharan Africa to Europe specifically.
2. Never said Africans did civilization "wrong" (what that's supposed to mean) and that they were failures.
3. Never said anything about hierarchy or linear progression.

You're seeing racist dogwhistling where none exists, friend. Africa had some great and interesting civs. I said this in the thread. But these sprang up in spite of the fact that Africa--as in, the land itself--is a shit place to build a civilization. Even in the modern age exploiting Africa's natural resources is still difficult. It's just a shitty continent, really. That's not the fault of the people and I never said it was. Africans got the rough stick. They made the best of what they had, but for the most part the continent fell behind the rest of the world. This isn't unique to Africa. It happened everywhere - even in parts of Europe. It still happens today. It's hard to keep up with the rest of the world when you're only connection to it are trade routes through a massive barrier of desert or rough, unsafe sea lanes. Lack of interaction with other civs didn't help their already shitty situation.

[Heloin]

"underdeveloped"
"backwards"
"primitive backwater"

Because as we all know, there is a hierarchy of civilisations, a linear progression of development from the emergence of society to the modern day, and we know that African civilisations were progressing slowly and failing to develop because they weren't the same as European civilisations. If they were developing properly there would have been a sub-Saharan Rome just like the European one, but no, they were primitives and didn't follow the correct course of history: the European one.

Nice try.

1. Never compared Sub-Saharan Africa to Europe specifically.
2. Never said Africans did civilization "wrong" (what that's supposed to mean) and that they were failures.
3. Never said anything about hierarchy or linear progression.

You're seeing racist dogwhistling where none exists, friend. Africa had some great and interesting civs. I said this in the thread. But these sprang up in spite of the fact that Africa--as in, the land itself--is a shit place to build a civilization. Even in the modern age exploiting Africa's natural resources is still difficult. It's just a shitty continent, really. That's not the fault of the people and I never said it was. Africans got the rough stick. They made the best of what they had, but for the most part the continent fell behind the rest of the world. This isn't unique to Africa. It happened everywhere - even in parts of Europe. It still happens today. It's hard to keep up with the rest of the world when you're only connection to it are trade routes through a massive barrier of desert or rough, unsafe sea lanes. Lack of interaction with other civs didn't help their already shitty situation.

Jared Diamond's work and others like him who help spread this myth has done so much harm in the teaching of history. From Mali, to Ashanti, to Benin, to Aksum, to the Swahili, to Zimbabwe, Empires the same and sometimes greater then others of their time have risen and fallen. It's a complete fabrication that the monolithic "Africa" is more geographically challenged then other regions of the Earth. Africa has it's issues today as a result of colonialism and it's still present aftermath, not for being a somehow worse landmass.

[The Two Jerseys]

So we can have a white guy play Shaka Zulu because it reflects the racial makeup of modern South Africa, right?

[Greed and Death]

If the defence of a Hollywood casting choice is genetic analysis of ancient mummified remains then we're essentially agreeing with the people who insist that casting choices should always be racially accurate. All the people who freak out because a person of colour is cast in a role they think has to go to a white person, we're taking the position that they're right if our argument is "Gal Gadot is the right race, actually".

Race is a social construct with no basis in biology. We can no more determine the race of the Ancient Egyptians than we can determine which football team they supported. We might be able to get some idea of what their skin might have looked like, but our skin tone is not strictly a function of our genetics. Do we think people getting a tan is in vivo genetic engineering? Of course not. Also it would be deeply foolish to assume that any ancient civilisation was homogeneous. Egypt two thousand years ago did not exist in some alternate dimension, cut off from the rest of Earth. If someone from Kamchatka had felt like going on a very long walk they could have wound up in Egypt during the lifetime of Cleopatra VII Philopator.

This is Important. Egypt was not a Homogenous society. The border between Upper Egypt and Lower Nubia was in influx it shifted as politics and military allowed. This meant a good portion of upper Egypt would have populations of what we clearly call black today.

Most theories of Egypt's founding do suggest that in pre history farmers from the Tigris and Euphrates (by way of settling the Levant having kids and them migrating westward) settled the area and out competed the local hunter gathers due to advanced farming techniques. This is generally how farming spread in prehistory.

The other import thing to note is the Egyptians used makeup as a sunblock which suggest they are lighter than would have naturally developed in that latitude.

[Pythmos]

Nice try.

1. Never compared Sub-Saharan Africa to Europe specifically.
2. Never said Africans did civilization "wrong" (what that's supposed to mean) and that they were failures.
3. Never said anything about hierarchy or linear progression.

You're seeing racist dogwhistling where none exists, friend. Africa had some great and interesting civs. I said this in the thread. But these sprang up in spite of the fact that Africa--as in, the land itself--is a shit place to build a civilization. Even in the modern age exploiting Africa's natural resources is still difficult. It's just a shitty continent, really. That's not the fault of the people and I never said it was. Africans got the rough stick. They made the best of what they had, but for the most part the continent fell behind the rest of the world. This isn't unique to Africa. It happened everywhere - even in parts of Europe. It still happens today. It's hard to keep up with the rest of the world when you're only connection to it are trade routes through a massive barrier of desert or rough, unsafe sea lanes. Lack of interaction with other civs didn't help their already shitty situation.

Jared Diamond's work and others like him who help spread this myth has done so much harm in the teaching of history. From Mali, to Ashanti, to Benin, to Aksum, to the Swahili, to Zimbabwe, Empires the same and sometimes greater then others of their time have risen and fallen. It's a complete fabrication that the monolithic "Africa" is more geographically challenged then other regions of the Earth. Africa has it's issues today as a result of colonialism and it's still present aftermath, not for being a somehow worse landmass.

Africa has issues as a result of Africans continuing colonial borders that don't make sense except to a small priviledged group.

Why do the Tuareg not have their own nation? There are millions of them.
Why is the east of the Congo still being exploited? - Maybe because they shouldn't be in one state with those coastal people who are effectively still colonising them?
Why was South-Sudan ever a part of Sudan?
Why is there a giant border right through the middle of Hausa-speaking territory?

I could go on, but you get the point.

Meantime, back to the subject in hand.

The Nile Delta has always had a more open-border history with the Levant than the upstream part of Egypt.
Greeks had settled Cyrenaeca by the 7th century BCE.
There was Naukratis: a Greek city IN the actual Delta.
Macedonians had ruled Egypt since the late 4th century BCE.
If the Ptolemies married outside their own family, they did so with Levantine-Greek dynasties, like the Seleucids.
Egypt had Cyprus for a colony for most of the time between Alexander and Cleopatra.
Alexandria was a city named after the first Macedonian pharaoh - with a significant Greek and Jewish population. It was also the capital where Cleopatra was born.

So...

Cleopatra was white.
As were most of the ruling class and merchant class around her.
And Elizabeth Taylor did a great job playing her.
And I'm confident that this Israeli actress I have never heard of will do so too.

And those who reject that actress out of hand because of her race are ... racists.

[The Archregimancy]

Your occasional recurring reminder that coming up with a simple answer to address any question relating to a civilisation that lasted more than 3000 years is always going to be problematic; and that trying to classify people in the distant past on the basis of modern racial classification is always going to be tricky.


Anyway, what does the NSG mob want me to do here? Would you like your friendly neighbourhood archaeologist (who was indeed working in Cairo until August) to try and address the questions raised by the OP as quickly and succinctly as possible? Because while it's basically well-intentioned, there's a lot of assumptions to unpack there.

[Ifreann]

"underdeveloped"
"backwards"
"primitive backwater"

Because as we all know, there is a hierarchy of civilisations, a linear progression of development from the emergence of society to the modern day, and we know that African civilisations were progressing slowly and failing to develop because they weren't the same as European civilisations. If they were developing properly there would have been a sub-Saharan Rome just like the European one, but no, they were primitives and didn't follow the correct course of history: the European one.

Nice try.

1. Never compared Sub-Saharan Africa to Europe specifically.
2. Never said Africans did civilization "wrong" (what that's supposed to mean) and that they were failures.
3. Never said anything about hierarchy or linear progression.

I know you didn't say those things. But when one says that something is underdeveloped, that necessarily implies that there is a correct amount of development which has not been attained. When one says that something is backwards, that necessarily implies that there was some right direction that they should have gone in. These terms require some point of reference. What is your point of reference? I would venture that you did not actually have one consciously in mind.

You're seeing racist dogwhistling where none exists, friend.

I would call it Eurocentrism, not racist dogwhistling. I don't think you're trying to convey a secret racist message, I think you're just wrong in how you think of civilisations and societies.

Africa had some great and interesting civs. I said this in the thread. But these sprang up in spite of the fact that Africa--as in, the land itself--is a shit place to build a civilization. Even in the modern age exploiting Africa's natural resources is still difficult. It's just a shitty continent, really. That's not the fault of the people and I never said it was. Africans got the rough stick. They made the best of what they had, but for the most part the continent fell behind the rest of the world. This isn't unique to Africa. It happened everywhere - even in parts of Europe. It still happens today. It's hard to keep up with the rest of the world when you're only connection to it are trade routes through a massive barrier of desert or rough, unsafe sea lanes. Lack of interaction with other civs didn't help their already shitty situation.

Africa is a shit place to build a civilisation if by "civilisation" you mean something like "akin to Ancient Rome", or maybe some other civilisation that historians have designated as great. The civilisations in Africa were clearly perfectly well developed for life in Africa. Of course they were, they wouldn't have existed otherwise. Maybe they weren't marching around massive armies in iron armour on stone roads, but so what? Why is that the standard by which they should be judged? Or since we're talking about Ancient Egypt, maybe it's pyramid building. If a civilisation didn't build huge structures like pyramids, does that make them underdeveloped? If so, why? The Pirahã people are best known for some features of their language. They can walk into the Amazon rainforest, bare-ass naked and empty-handed, and make anything they need on the fly, hand-craft any tools necessary to hunt and forage and survive. Are they underdeveloped because they haven't felled huge swathes of the forest to make room for farming and mining? If so, why?

[Sakkwato]

I don't think it has anything to do with racism anyway. Gal Gadot obviously has a lot more pulling power for ticket sales than anyone else they could get involved.

They'd cast Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as Cleopatra if they thought it would sell more tickets.

No lie, I really want to see that. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as Cleopatra sounds awesome.

Kevin Hart would be Marcus Antonius

[Greed and Death]

Your occasional recurring reminder that coming up with a simple answer to address any question relating to a civilisation that lasted more than 3000 years is always going to be problematic; and that trying to classify people in the distant past on the basis of modern racial classification is always going to be tricky.


Anyway, what does the NSG mob want me to do here? Would you like your friendly neighbourhood archaeologist (who was indeed working in Cairo until August) to try and address the questions raised by the OP as quickly and succinctly as possible? Because while it's basically well-intentioned, there's a lot of assumptions to unpack there.

I think it is better you start arguing with people over vast oversimplifications. No one likes a well thought out knowledgeable post with a lot to unpack.

[Pythmos]

No lie, I really want to see that. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as Cleopatra sounds awesome.

Kevin Hart would be Marcus Antonius

Do you mean Kevin Hart? Because I would love to see how that homophobe manages acting out a romance with a Cleopatra played by The Rock!

[Ifreann]

So we can have a white guy play Shaka Zulu because it reflects the racial makeup of modern South Africa, right?

Of course you can. You can do whatever you want with whoever might want to cooperate with you.

Oh, did you mean "can we do this and without anyone criticising us"?

[Radiatia]

It's only a matter of time before the professionally offended start complaining that Bambi wasn't voiced by a real deer.

[Greed and Death]

So we can have a white guy play Shaka Zulu because it reflects the racial makeup of modern South Africa, right?

Of course you can. You can do whatever you want with whoever might want to cooperate with you.

Oh, did you mean "can we do this and without anyone criticising us"?

Just no makeup to darken the actor's skin. We don't want black face.

[Purpelia]

Cleopatra was a descendant of the Greek nobility that took over Egypt after the death of Alexander the Great. How the hell could she be a person of any color other than what ever the Greeks are?

[Ifreann]

It's only a matter of time before the professionally offended start complaining that Bambi wasn't voiced by a real deer.

If we can learn to communicate with deer then I would be fully down with having real deer voice cartoon deer.

---

Cleopatra was a descendant of the Greek nobility that took over Egypt after the death of Alexander the Great. How the hell could she be a person of any color other than what ever the Greeks are?

I dunno man, how can I be one colour when I go to the beach and another colour a few hours later?

[Pythmos]

Cleopatra was a descendant of the Greek nobility that took over Egypt after the death of Alexander the Great. How the hell could she be a person of any color other than what ever the Greeks are?

I dunno man, how can I be one colour when I go to the beach and another colour a few hours later?

You have well-tanning skin. Be careful not to be accused of cultural and/ or genetic appropriation by the wokest of woke crowds.

[Purpelia]

I dunno man, how can I be one colour when I go to the beach and another colour a few hours later?

As I said, what ever color the Greeks are.

[Greed and Death]

I dunno man, how can I be one colour when I go to the beach and another colour a few hours later?

Because you are blackfishing people.
You have been doxed and sent to SJW HQ to be cancelled.

[Ifreann]

I dunno man, how can I be one colour when I go to the beach and another colour a few hours later?

You have well-tanning skin. Be careful not to be accused of cultural and/ or genetic appropriation by the wokest of woke crowds.

The latter colour is not brown.

---

I dunno man, how can I be one colour when I go to the beach and another colour a few hours later?

As I said, what ever color the Greeks are.

Variable?