Egypt Inventions – Interesting Inventions of Ancient Egypt
When most people think of Ancient Egypt, the first things that come to mind are pyramids, pharohs, mummies, and curses.
Given that the Egyptians gave to us the wonderous pyramids, it should come as no surprise that they also had a number of inventions that were no small feats. The Egyptian civilization spanned thousands of years, and during that time they made numerous advances in the fields of agriculture, academia, and astrology.
As simple as it may seem, the advent of black ink was very important. Ink and papyrus were more convienent than having to carve something into stone, and as evidenced from the numerous scrolls recovered, the Egyptians ink was extremely durable, lasting thousands of years.
Any society that thrives for an extended period of time must have at least a somewhat advanced system of agriculture. Egypt was no different, inventing the first ox-drawn plow. These were seen as early as 2500 BC. This relates to two other areas that most people don’t consider the Egyptians experts in – blacksmithing (for making the plows) and husbandry.
As other ancient civilizations did, the Egyptians also had their own calendar system. What differentiated theirs was that it happened to be 365 days long, and included leap years. 238 BC was the year that the Egyptions derived that every fourth year would have 1 extra day.
Relating again to ink, Egyption papyrus was the first paper of its kind. It was made by taking fibers from the papyrus plant, and was the precursor to what we call paper.
Although the construction of the pyramids will likely remain a mystery, there is one obvious fact that cannot be overlooked – it took a lot of people working together to build them. As such, the Egyptians can be said to be the first people to employ a large scale, organized labor force. Taking into account that constructing even a single pyramid can take several decades, it was truly impressive how they were able to manage so many people for such an extended period of time.
The Egyptians were one of the premier civiliations of ancient times – it should come as no surprise that they had numerous inventions that we still see today.
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