Egypt’s Pre-dynastic

At http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/print/2010/1003/heritage.htm there is a report of a plan by Zahi Hawass to introduce museums that specialise – including one housing artifacts of the Pre-dynastic period which he intends to establish at Qena. The Pre-dynastic phase represent the period preceding unification. Neolithic people appeared around 5000BC, the general date, replacing earlier hunter-gatherer socieities on the Nile river terraces. Seasonal settlement on the Fayoum depression is known from as early as 8000BC when a large lake existed there. By 5000BC emmer wheat, barley and flax were being grown around the lakes – but this may also have been seasonal. The Maudi Museum’s Pre-dynastic collection will form the basis of the new museum at Qena. Maudi was excavated in 1918 – but investigations continued intermittently through the 1920s and 1930s. Maudi is a location within reach of both Lower and Upper Egypt and was an important trading centre with contacts to Syria-Palestine.