Again Ezekiel continues his prophecies concerning Egypt.

Peoples of Egypt
http://www.website1.com/odyssey/week3/FYI02A.html
People of Egypt

COPTS
ARABS
BEDOUINS
FALLAHIN
CITY PEOPLE
NUBIANS

Copts

The Copts are the modern descendants of the ancient Egyptians. The word
Copt comes from the later Greek and Arab pronunciation of the word "Egypt".
The consonants of both words are nearly identical in sound: compare CPT and
GPT. Copt is an unusual word. It describes a group of people or an ethnic
group, the language they spoke (Coptic) and their religion. The Copts are
the living descendants of the pharaohs. Many of these people converted to
Christianity during the Roman period in Egypt. The number of Copts living
in Egypt has steadily declined under Muslim rule in Egypt. The Copts make
up less than 10% of the total Egyptian population, but these numbers are
debated. There are a number of villages in Upper Egypt that remain almost
entirely Coptic. While many Copts are well educated professionals others
suffer in horrible poverty. Many of the educated Copts have left Egypt and
live in English-speaking countries around the world. There are growing
populations in the United States, Canada and Australia. There are an
estimated 15 million Copts in the world today.

Arabs

The history of Egypt is in part the story of her conquest and rule by
foreign people. In 641 A.D. Egypt was conquered by invading forces from
Arabia. The Arabian peninsula had recently been converted to Islam (the
Moslem religion), a religion established by Mohammed around 610 A. D. The
crusading armies quickly conquered the lands of the middle east and swept
across north Africa and pushed into Spain as well. Many who lived in these
lands were forcibly converted to Islam and the Arab people settled in these
areas. Arab is a name used to describe people from the Arabian peninsula
who migrated as a result of the Arab conquests and the spread of Islam
throughout the middle east and north Africa. Not all Arabs are Moslems.
There are large numbers of Arab Christians in the middle east as well. The
Arabic language is in the Semitic language family, making it very similar
to other Semitic languages like Hebrew, Syriac and Ethiopic.

The Bedouin (Arab ethnic group)

The Bedouin are nomadic Arab people who migrate through the Egyptian
deserts in search of grazing for their livestock and water for their
families. Their are a number of Bedouin tribes that have occupied various
regions of Egypt since ancient times. These tribes are divided into clans
or extended family units. The Bedouins move from location to location in
small, compact groups led by an elder male. They live in temporary straw
and twig installations or tents made of animal skin panels that can be
secured to keep the sand out or opened to let the cooling breezes through
the tent. The men dress for the harsh extremes of the desert, wearing
layered flowing robes that protect them from the sun's intense rays and yet
that allow the air to circulate through their garments keeping the body
temperature cooler. Their heads and neck are covered to shield them from
the sun and wind-blown sand and to reduce the loss of moisture. The women
wear black dresses and embroidered headdresses or bright and festive
colors. Often their faces are veiled with veils decorated with embroidered
designs, shells and coins. The Bedouin are hearty and resourceful people
who live in one of the most demanding regions of the world. They know and
respect the desert. Bedouins do not die of starvation. They live to
survive. Their lives are not wasteful or greedy and they are always open to
hospitality. As they entertain strangers, they learn of recent news and the
availability of pasturelands and water in other areas.

It is common for Bedouin men and boys to be gone for many days, tending
their flocks, hunting or trading in a nearby village. The women are left
behind to tend the tent and some of the livestock. It is also not unusual
for the women to pick-up camp and move during their husbands' absence,
because of some need. The husbands will spend a number of days tracking
down their families. In the event of a divorce, the tent belongs to the
woman and the livestock are taken by the man. The women produce beautiful
embroidery that are sold in markets in the oases. A number of pressures are
forcing these people to leave their ancient way of life. They settle on the
outskirts of desert villages and are eventually absorbed into rural
communities often as desert farmers.

The Fallahin (Mixed ethnic groups)

The Fallahin are the people who inhabit the rural villages that line the
Nile. These people work their small plots of land harvesting three separate
crops each year. They also often keep some low maintenance livestock like
chickens and goats. The beast of burden is a water buffalo. The Fallahin
work hard to feed themselves and the huge population of Egypt. Everyone in
the family works together in the field. Women thresh the grain and carry
huge loads of alfalfa or hay on their heads and the boys drive donkey carts
filled with fresh fruit and vegetables to market. Women and small children
tend booths and sell their crops. The Fallahin live in mudbrick homes,
sometimes covered with white plaster, bordered in light blue. The houses
are simple, often with dirt floors and no electricity or plumbing. The
house is designed to provide insulation from the cold winter nights and at
the same time circulation to cool the simple homes during the blistering
summer days. Moslem Fallahin who have made their journey to Mecca, may
decorate the outside of their house with paintings illustrating the story
of their pilgrimage. The local mosque and these so-called Hajj houses,
named after the Arabic word for the mandatory pilgrimage to Mecca, have
pride-of-place in a Fallahin village.

The villages bustle with excitement on religious festivals or weddings,
giving people an excuse to leave their back-breaking labor and to enjoy the
company of family and friends. The streets of a Fallahin village are
congested at these times with singing, dancing and festivities. Women
typically wear a black cover over brightly colored house clothes. Their
head is also covered with a black vale. On market day the women come to
town in bright and festive colors to buy, to sell and to meet with friends.
The women also wear silver and gold jewelry, necklaces, and bracelets on
their wrists and ankles. This is their dowry, or the price that their
husband had to pay for the right to marry the woman. Women can be divorced
quickly by Islamic law. The women keep their dowry close at hand for future
security in case of a swift divorce. The women also often have their faces
tattooed, especially around the lips, with traditional clan designs. The
village is closely-knit social unit of extended families. Many of these
families have lived in the same villages since the times of the pharaohs.

City Dwellers (Mixed ethnic groups)

The city dwellers live packed on top of each other in Cairo and Alexandria.
The cities are active all night. People live in flats or apartments in high
rises. The wealthy live in exclusive areas of town often populated by
foreigners or they live in high rises overlooking the Nile or the
Mediterranean Sea. The traffic and the pollution is always bad. Cairo has
the worst pollution in the entire world. The air pollution that a person is
exposed to in a day in Cairo is said to be equivalent to smoking six packs
of cigarettes a day! Cairo is an active city caught between the east and
the west. Donkey carts and Mercedes compete for lanes in traffic. There is
a huge gap in Egypt between the wealthy and the poor. Nowhere is this more
apparent, than in large cities.

Nubians

The Nubians are the people who originally lived in the southern parts of
Egypt in the area that is now known as the Sudan. The word Nubian comes
from the ancient Egyptian word for gold because this is the place where
gold from the interior of Africa made its way through these people' hands
into the courts of the pharaoh. The ancient Egyptians has interaction with
the Nubians from the earliest historical period. There is a long history of
tensions in the ancient world between Nubia and Egypt. Nubians were
assimilated into Egyptian culture and many of them inner-married. There
were later Egyptians dynasties of Nubian pharaohs who introduced their own
exotic brands of hybrid deities which were more reflective of the animal
and spiritual life of interior Africa. The Nubians are village people,
joyous in spirit and hard-working. They had their own ancient language and
their own unique cultural traits. The Nubians are darker in complexion than
the Arab or Copt and they have heavier facial features and coarser hair.
The Aswan High Dam Project displaced tens of thousands of Nubians from
their land but their culture is still alive and Nubians can be seen from
Alexandria to Cairo to Aswan and the villages that surround it.