Ancient Egypt Agriculture

Egyptian Agriculture

Agriculture in Ancient Egypt is very interesting and unique. Egyptians adapted to their environment in several ways. Some of the fascinating aspects of Ancient Egyptian agriculture is the Nile River, which is a vital part of Ancient Egyptian agriculture. It is very amazing how Egyptians had very organized seasons: Akhet(the flooding season), Peret(the growing season), and Shemu(the harvesting season). Egyptian Agriculture is an amazing and big topic.

The first season of the cycle is the Peret, the growing season. The crops that the Ancient Egyptians planted were grains(which were most common), wheat, vegetables, fruits, flax, and papyrus seed. Since planting was after the “proyet”-the receding of the flood from the Nile

During the akhet, there is none to little agricultural jobs, as farmers would have their fields soaking wet. So the farmers find other jobs available like building pyramids. The akhet immensely helps the Ancient Egyptian farmers, like providing moisture for crops and making large amounts of fertile silt. The fertile silt is very tiny particles of soil that water propelled. After the akhet did the fertile soil was so rich that it’s appearance was black and called ‘Black Land’. Due to the Nile River, irrigating water to the crops was very easy to

Harvest usually occurred in May, June, or April. Since harvest had to be done during nearly everyone participated. The poor hoped to get some left over grains after working. Some of the interesting crops with special ways of harvesting are the grains. Grains were cut with sickles, in 30 B.C.E, when the Romans took over Egypt, iron sickles were more common. After the grains were cut, the grains had to be bundled-which is to prevent a mess. The grains were taken to a place that was dry to do a process named ‘parching’, which is drying the grain so it didn’t rot. Then, the threshing process would occur. Workers straighten the grains in a contained place where the ground was very hard, and cleaned. Donkeys or cows then walked on the grains. After that, another process, name winnowing was worked on; workers used big forks to scoop the grains up, which meant most grains were left behind. The straws were going to be used to generate mud bricks. After, the grain was able to be stored in granaries for food, and the agricultural cycle was going to start