According to Countryaah website, Egypt has about 100 million people. It should be mentioned that in 1981 there were only around 42 million.
Age structure
less than 5% are older than 65 years
around 65% are between 15 and 64 years old
around 30% are younger than 15 years
Ethnic groups
The population of Egypt consists mainly of Arabized Hamites and Arab Bedouins, as well as Berbers, Turks, Nubians and Sudanese as well as minorities of Syrians, Palestinians, Greeks, Italians, Cypriots and Maltese.
Religions
Slightly less than 90% of the residents of Egypt are Muslims, and Islam is also the state religion of the country. Another 8% -10% are Copts, there are also Greek Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant and Jewish minorities.
There are around 95,000 mosques and around 2,000 churches in the country.
Languages
Egyptian Arabic is the country’s official language. Nubian and Berber languages such as Siwi are also spoken. English and French are used as commercial languages. Coptic developed from the language of ancient Egypt and is now only used as a sacred language.
Capital, other cities
The capital of Egypt is Cairo (Medinat al-Qahira), with a population of around 22 million. Interestingly, the name “Cairo” comes from the old Arabic name “Medinat al Qahira” (the victorious city) for the planet Mars. The name was given in 969 after the laying of the foundation stone by the general Gohar al-Sicili, who was born in Sicily and converted to Islam, because Mars was crossing the meridian (longitude) of the city that was just founded at that time. According to Abbreviation Finder, EGY stands for Egypt in English. Click to see other meanings of this 3-letter acronym.
Other cities are:
Alexandria (Al-Iskandariyah) with around 3.4 million residents
Giza (Al-Jizah) with around 2.4 million residents
Shubra al-Khaymah with around 900,000 residents
Port Said (Bur Sa’id) with around 500,000 residents
Suez (As-Suways) with around 420,000 residents.
Another very important city in Egypt is Luxor, which extends both near the Valley of the Kings and near the temple complex of Karnak.
Egypt: geography, map
Egypt covers an area of 1,002,000 km². Check topmbadirectory for politics, flags, famous people, animals and plants of Egypt.
Thereof:
Fields and fieldsAround 2.5% of the land is used as arable land or fields, especially for growing cotton, as well as rice, vegetables, millet and broad beans.
DesertAbout 96.5% of the country consists of the Sahara desert.
Limits
Egypt shares a border with a total of four states.
to the Gaza Strip with a length of 11 km
to Israel with a length of 266 km
to Libya with a length of 1,115 km
to Sudan with a length of 1,273 km.
Coastal
Egypt has a coast to the Mediterranean Sea with a length of around 2,450 km. It also borders the Gulf of Suez and Aqaba and in the southeast – or in the south of the Sinai – the Red Sea.
Tidal range
The tidal range in the Mediterranean is around a decimeter (= 0.1 m) – and in the Red Sea between 0.6 and 0.9 m.
Longitude and latitude
Egypt – including the Sinai Peninsula – extends over the following geographical latitude (abbreviation Δφ) and geographical longitude (abbreviation Δλ):
Δφ = from rounded 22 ° to 32 ° north latitude Δλ = from rounded 025 ° to 035 ° east longitude
You can find detailed information on this subject under Longitude and Latitude, General.
Time
For Egypt, the following value applies to Central European Time (CET), i.e. the time (without summer time). A minus sign means that it is earlier there, a plus sign that it is later than CET:
Δt (CET) = + 1 h
Further and detailed explanations of the time can be found under Time zones, time.
The highest point of the sun in Cairo
Cairo lies at a northern latitude of around φ = 30 °.
As long as the sun is at the tropic, i.e. at δ = 23.5 °, summer starts in Cairo, this is June 21. Then, for the highest position of the sun at noon, according to Eq. 1 (see position of the sun):
30 ° = (90 ° – h) + 23.5 °
so:
H = 83.5 °
At 83.5 °, the sun in Cairo has the highest level of the entire year above the horizon (more precisely: above the horizon).
mountains
MountCatherine
The highest mountain in the country is Mount Catherine with a height of 2,637 m. Other high mountains: Mount Sinai (Gebel Mûsa) with a height of 2,285 m
Shâyib el Banât with a height of 2,187 m.
the nil
The longest and at the same time only river in the country is the Nile (Arabic: an-Nīl) with a length of 6,671 kilometers. It is and was Egypt’s economic lifeline. The giant stream is either the longest or the second longest river in the world (depending on how the Amazon is defined).
The Nile rises in Rwanda and flows from there through Burundi, Tanzania, Uganda, Sudan and of course Egypt. The Nile ends in a delta in the far north of Egypt and flows into the Mediterranean.
Lakes
The country includes several smaller and larger lakes. The largest (artificial) lake is the Nasser Reservoir with an area of around 5,500 km². Other larger lakes are Birket Qârûn and Buheirit Nâsir.
Mediterranean, Red Sea
Egypt borders the Mediterranean Sea in the north and the Red Sea in the southeast and south (Sinai Peninsula).
The Suez Canal serves as a man-made link between the Mediterranean, the Gulf of Suez and then the Red Sea.
Egypt’s desert
Sahara desert
Around 95% of Egypt consists of desert – it is the Egyptian Sahara and the deserts of Sinai.
According to scientists, the formation of the Sahara desert began around 70 million years ago, when the water level in the Mediterranean Sea sank and huge “beaches” – today’s desert – were left behind. It is estimated that at that time the edge of the sea up to the present-day Bahariyya oasis, which is about 300 km from the present-day Mediterranean coast.
The desert in Egypt is characterized by great diversity and is said to unite all types of desert in the world. So you can find dunes with steep edges, scree and rock formations or gorges, endless expanses that are only interrupted by conical limestone formations.
Also worth mentioning is the so-called White Desert, which is about 500 km southwest of Cairo. This desert area and its surroundings were declared a national park in 2002, with a total area of around 3,010 km².
One finds here, for example, white limestone monoliths, which are sedimented and calcified remains of plankton that date from around 80 million years ago. They got their current shape after the sea receded through wind and weather as well as the extreme temperature differences between day and night. Some of the monoliths are reminiscent of mushrooms, a sphinx or human heads.
Although the desert looks almost lifeless at first glance, numerous animals still live here, such as the desert fox, gerbils, lizards, beetles, scorpions and snakes as well as birds such as falcons.
Wild sheep (Weddan) live in the area around Uweinat and Gilf Kebir and in the eastern part of the desert there are even ibexes.
But humans have also left numerous traces in the desert, such as 5,000 year old rock paintings, markings of old caravan routes or ceramics from the Romans. And even prehistoric remains of sharks have been discovered in the desert sands.
It is also interesting that the desert sand is considered to be almost sterile and therefore the Bedouins rub desert sand into their wounds when they are injured.
Since time immemorial, the desert has also been considered a place of contemplation and reflection. Not least some of the monasteries that are still inhabited today are an example of this.
If you are a little enthusiastic about the mysticism of the desert, you should read the book “Wind, Sand und Sterne” by the French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900-1944) from 1939. De Saint-Exupéry in 1935 had to make an emergency landing about 200 km west of Cairo in the Sahara on the occasion of a flight from Paris to Saigon in which he had lost his orientation. He remained unharmed and was rescued by the Bedu when he was looking for a human habitation – shortly before he died of thirst.
Sinai
The approximately 61,000 km² Sinai Peninsula is bordered by the Gulf of Suez in the west, the Gulf of Aqaba and Israel in the east and the Red Sea in the south. The peninsula forms a transition between Asia and Africa.
The Katharinenberg (Jabal Katrina) – is with a height of 2,637 m the highest mountain of the peninsula and also of the whole of Egypt.
In the north of Sinai, annual rainfall of 20 mm to 50 mm is expected, while in the south it is between 150 mm and 200 mm. That is enough for nomads in South Sinai to be able to keep their animals in wadis and on mountain slopes.
The Suez Canal
The Suez Canal as a shipping channel connects the port cities of Port Said and Port Taufiq. This enables ships to pass from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea.
