The Nile: A Journey Downriver Through Egypt's Past and Present
A descriptive descent of the Nile, from Aswan to Cairo, Wilkinson’s travelogue fascinatingly blends the historical and the contemporary to underscore the eternal truth about Egypt, its absolute dependence on the Nile’s waters. An able writer (The Rise and Fall of Ancient Egypt, 2011), Wilkinson enriches his observations with those of Western visitors since Herodotus, biographically digressing into their awestruck interests in Egyptian antiquities. Regularly contrasting their sketches and his own observations, Wilkinson unveils continuities in the depth of the Nile’s historical time. Start with what he regards as the Nile Valley’s most significant monument—no, not Karnak or the pyramids but rock-cut steps near Aswan. They are the Nilometer, “the key to Egypt’s fabled wealth”; they measured the Nile’s annual flood. Water’s vital importance to Egypt for millennia surfaces repeatedly in Wilkinson’s pleasingly paced presentation, materially as the means of transportation and agriculture and also spiritually in ancient Egyptian religion, Wilkinson’s commentary about whose pantheon underscores motivations of divine propitiation behind the construction of pharaonic monuments. From its archaeological past to its populous present, Egypt has a marvelously acute expositor in Wilkinson. --Gilbert Taylor