Volcanic Suppression Of Nile Summer Flooding Triggers Revolt And Constrains Interstate Conflict In Ancient Egypt

Abstract

Volcanic eruptions provide tests of human and natural system sensitivity to abrupt shocks because their repeated occurrence allows the identification of systematic relationships in the presence of random variability. Here we show a suppression of Nile summer flooding via the radiative and dynamical impacts of explosive volcanism on the African monsoon, using climate model output, ice-core-based volcanic forcing data, Nilometer measurements, and ancient Egyptian writings. We then examine the response of Ptolemaic Egypt (305–30 BCE), one of the best-documented ancient superpowers, to volcanically induced Nile suppression. Eruptions are associated with revolt onset against elite rule, and the cessation of Ptolemaic state warfare with their great rival, the Seleukid Empire. Eruptions are also followed by socioeconomic stress with increased hereditary land sales, and the issuance of priestly decrees to reinforce elite authority. Ptolemaic vulnerability to volcanic eruptions offers a caution for all monsoon-dependent agricultural regions, presently including 70% of world population.

Introduction

The need to adapt to and mitigate the impacts of anthropogenic climate change has revived interest in longstanding but unsettled questions concerning how past climatic changes have influenced human societies1. Egypt provides a unique historical laboratory in which to study social vulnerability and response to abrupt hydroclimatic shocks. As one of the Ancient World’s great “hydraulic civilizations”2, its prosperity was overwhelmingly tied to the annual cycle of Nile summer flooding, with diminished flooding (Nile failure) often associated with major human impacts through its many millennia of recorded history3. Of all Ancient Egyptian history, that of Ptolemaic Egypt (305–30 BCE; Fig. 1a) is most richly furnished with contemporary documentation. As the longest-lived successor to Alexander the Great’s empire, the Ptolemaic state was a major force in the transformative Hellenistic era, a period marked by large-scale conflict but also material and cultural achievement. Ptolemaic Egypt featured one of the largest cities of the Ancient Mediterranean (Alexandria), including the Great Library and Lighthouse, and was a hub for invention, boasting minds such as Euclid and Archimedes. Technological advances such as the saqiya4, a rotary-wheel water-lifting machine documented by the mid-third century BCE, maslin (mixed wheat-barley) cropping, as well as grain storage, acted to mitigate the impacts of the mercurial Nile flood. Families also distributed land in geographically dispersed individual shares to further hedge against the risk of Nile failure, and tailored agricultural decisions to annual flood conditions6. External territories (e.g., Anatolia, Syria) capable of rainfed agriculture also helped buffer the state against Nile failure. The existence of these mitigation and adaptation strategies highlights the importance of managing Nile variability in Ptolemaic Egypt, yet discussion of the impact of hydroclimatic shocks is effectively absent from modern histories of the period.

At ~6825 km, the Nile is among the Earth’s great rivers, fed by rainfall in Africa’s equatorial plateau (mainly via the White Nile) and the Ethiopian Highlands (mainly via the Blue Nile and Atbara rivers)8. Before twentieth century damming, the summer flood, driven primarily by monsoon rainfall in the Ethiopian highlands, began with rising waters observed at Aswan as early as June, peaking from August to September, and largely receding by the end of October, when crop sowing began2. Nile flood suppression from historical eruptions has been little studied, despite Nile failures with severe social impacts coinciding with eruptions su

Explosive eruptions can perturb climate by injecting sulfurous gases into the stratosphere; these gases react to form reflective sulfate aerosols that remain aloft in decreasing concentrations for approximately one to two years11. While most studies of the climatic effects of volcanism have focused on temperature changes, contemporary and historical societies were also vulnerable to hydrological changes12. Hydroclimate is harder to reconstruct and model, but studies are increasingly noting global and regional hydroclimatic impacts from explosive volcanism. Volcanic aerosols influence hydroclimate through multiple mechanisms. Aerosol scattering of solar radiation to space reduces tropospheric temperatures; if lower-tropospheric relative humidities remain unchanged, the mass of water converged by a given wind distribution decreases, and precipitation minus surface evaporation (P-E) is thus reduced21. This thermodynamic effect may represent the principal means by which equatorially symmetric aerosol distributions from tropical eruptions alter P–E15. In addition, extratropical eruptions increase sulfate aerosols on one side of the equator, cool that hemisphere, and may thus alter tropical P–E primarily by changing winds. In particular, a high-latitude energy sink in one hemisphere forces an anomalous Hadley circulation, shifting the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) away from that energy sink1. Aerosol cooling of northern high latitudes can thus force a southward shift of northern hemisphere (NH) summer monsoon precipitation, promoting drought in the northern parts of monsoon regions. These energy-budget arguments provide a more fundamental perspective on the controls on tropical rainfall than arguments based on land-ocean temperature contrast because large-scale tropical circulations are driven by horizontal gradients in the total (sensible plus latent) energy input to the atmosphere24. The hypothesis that a decrease in land-ocean temperature contrast will cause monsoon rainfall to weaken has been disproven by the observation that continental monsoon regions are cooler during years of enhanced monsoon precipitation25, and by the fact that monsoon winds weaken as land-ocean temperature contrast strengthens in projections of next-century warming.

Source

Egypt | The Pollution of the Nile River

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Source of Pollution

1. Factories

There are about 700 facilities manufacturing a variety different products located along the Nile river. Some of these facilities dump chemicals into the Nile, while others’ runoff finds its way to the water.

Some of the chemicals that find their way into the river would be phosphors, nitrogen, and pesticide residue. Once dumped, these chemicals can have negative affects on the microorganisms living in the water, by increasing the population of unhealthy bacteria by 50%-180%

2. Food Industry

Studies show that more then 350 different factories discharge their waste in to the Nile. The majority of these factories are involved in the food industry.
The Nile is suffering from the amount of agricultural waste that’s being dumped into the river. The waste is full of toxic chemicals like detergents, heavy metals, and pesticides. Discharge of oil and grease can come from untreated domestic waste water. Fortunately, those chemicals can be treated and removed from the water, but some like mutagens, and neurotoxins remain unaffected by water treatment.

3. Phosphate

On April 22 2015, an Egyptian military owned barge spilled 500 tons of phosphate in to the Nile.

Phosphate is a mineral that comes from rocks when they are eroding. In small amounts, phosphate is good for water bodies. For example, it can help the growth of plankton and aquatic plants.

But in large amounts, like what was dumped into the Nile, it is very harmful. The mineral can cause a nutrient imbalance in the water, which can damage the aquatic plants and kill them, and can also speed up the aging process of the river.

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Was the Arab Attempt to Destroy Joseph’s Tomb an Effort to Thwart Jewish Redemption?

“Seek the Lord and live, lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph, and it devour, with none to quench it for Bethel.” (Amos 5:6)

In response to a request by Arab states, UNESCO recently passed a resolution declaring holy Jewish places to be sites of Islamic heritage. The significant exception is the burial site of Joseph, which they have chosen to destroy rather than usurp.

The Arab’s treatment of the Jewish holy site should not be attributed to any hatred Islam has towards the Biblical character of Joseph, who is held in high esteem in the Koran. His story is told in great detail in the Muslim holy book. Why would Muslims choose to burn the burial site of one of the major characters in the Koran? The answer lies in the special significance of Joseph’s burial site to the Jewish redemptive process.

Rabbi Zechariah Wallerstein explained the special significance of Joseph’s burial site in a recent lecture, noting that it is the only holy site that the Arabs chose to burn. He explains the severity of their actions by saying that the worst type of person, someone God will not forgive, is a person who is ungrateful for something that was done for him.

The rabbi taught that this is learned from the story of Adam. When God confronts Adam for eating from the fruit of the tree of knowledge, Adam passes off the responsibility onto Eve. The Rabbi quoted Rashi, a medieval French rabbi renowned for his incredibly influential commentary on the Bible, who wrote that by blaming Eve, Adam rejected the good that was done for man when God by created woman. It is specifically for this ingratitude that man was ejected from the Garden of Eden.

Rabbi Wallerstein went on to explain that this is precisely the sin Arabs are guilty of when they try to eradicate the memory of Joseph. In the Bible, it is written that Joseph actually saved all of Egypt by foreseeing the future and storing food to last through the famine. In that sense, the entire Arab world owes the Jews a debt of gratitude.

“Burning down the gravesite of Joseph is an attempt to deny or cancel out that debt. It is the highest level of ingratitude, an unforgivable sin for which they should be thrown out of the land,” Wallerstein said.

Rabbi Wallerstein gives another reason for the Arab desire to wipe out the name of Joseph. He quotes the Zohar, an important Jewish work which states that before the Messiah comes, while he is in heaven, God dresses him in a robe on which every name of every Jew that was ever killed would be written. God tells the Messiah, ‘When you reveal yourself, this is the robe you will be wearing, and every name will be revenged’. The fire that will be used to burn those who killed Jews is Joseph’s fire, as expressed in Amos 5:6: “Seek the Lord and live, lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph, and it devour, with none to quench it for Bethel”, and again in Ovadiah 1:18: “Then the house of Jacob will be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame; But the house of Esau will be as stubble, And they will set them on fire and consume them”.

Rabbi Wallerstein explained the special significance of Joseph’s fire to Breaking Israel News.

“Joseph’s fire that burns them is Moshiach ben Yoseph (the Messiah from the House of Joseph), which is the battle that comes before Moshiach ben David (the Messiah from the House of David). This conflict over Joseph’s Tomb is just one more step before Moshiach. This never happened before,” he explained.

According to Rabbi Wallerstein, the Arabs, who are responsible for many of the names on that robe, are trying to extinguish the fire before it appears in its full glory to burn them. They are attacking fire with fire, which is why burning it once simply was not enough.

When asked what was at stake in this battle, Rabbi Wallerstein was very clear. “In kabbalah, Joseph is yesod, the foundation. He is the foundation of all creation, just like Adam. That is what’s at stake at Joseph’s Tomb.”

Source

— Ben Carson’s Theory That Egyptian Pyramids Were Built by Joseph Is 600 Years Old

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The Deadly Egyptian Cobra Controls and Deceives its Western & Eastern Dragons

 

 

 

“As for the terror of you, The arrogance of your heart has deceived you, O you who live in the clefts of the rock, Who occupy the height of the hill. Though you make your nest as high as an eagle’s, I will bring you down from there,” declares the LORD. [Jeremiah 49:16 ]

 

Mid January, I heard on South Korea’s global broadcast service, Arirang, the Egyptian ambassador to South Korea saying that Egypt is safe for tourists, and that many Koreans like to visit Christian sites in Egypt, such as the famous St. Catherine’s Monastery in the Sinai Peninsula.

 

Exactly a month later, there was a bomb attack on a tourist bus carrying 33 South Korean tourists in the Sinai. Three South Koreans and their bus driver were killed.

 

Egypt is in a desperate and dangerous state of affairs. The Egyptian nation has a poor soul which forces it to continuously apply some of the cheapest traits of human qualities when dealing with both its internal and foreign matters. Egypt has been deceiving itself and the masses of this world for years and centuries. Perhaps, the only two cunning nations that undeservedly capitalize or make a great deal out of their respective past civilizations are Egypt and Iran.

 

Egyptians pride themselves on making the storied eagle as their national symbol (their flag) Eagle is a symbol of pagan forms of deity. The Nazis too used the same eagle on their national flag which represents Satan’s empire. In such a figure a symbol may both reveal and conceal, while to the ignorant the figure remains inscrutable. For example, The Prophet Hosea said, “He shall come into their midst as the land, as an EAGLE (The ungodly Nebuchadnezzar is meant) against the house of the Lord, because they have transgressed my covenant, and have sinned against my law” (HOS 8:1)

 

Now, it seems Egyptians too copied the same propaganda style that Nazi Hitler adopted during the Second World War. The river Nile has always been a paramount issue for the rulers of Egypt. These rulers brainwashed their own people as well as the international communities by hiding their true intentions, omitting relevant historical facts and by constantly making deceiving statements everywhere. All their ministers, and overrated “experts’ are acting in a similar manner as Hitler’s prime deceiver, Joseph Goebbels, to intimidate the world community as if the construction of Ethiopian dams brings disaster, not only for Egypt, but for the wider world, by indicating that without the Nile there won’t be the Pyramids or the Sphinxes for the world to visit.

 

One of the latest deceiving tactics Egyptians have preferred to use is their aggressive propaganda campaign in the field of archeology and tourism. Since January 2014 there were more “discoveries” heralded in Egypt than during the whole of the 20^th century. It looks as though the Egyptian snake is attempting to fool the world into believing that if Ethiopia blocks the waters of the Nile there won’t be any tourist coming to Egypt or no new discoveries to be made. In other words, Ethiopia is aiming to destroy Egypt, the heritage of the world, so, stop Ethiopia now from using the Nile!

 

Egypt is using a publicity trick – a reverse psychology – when one of its ex-army general filed a court case asking for St. Catherine’s Monastery – the oldest functioning monastery in the world – to be demolished and its monks deported on the grounds that they pose a national security threat – “come to Egypt before we’ve destroyed everything worth seeing”-strategy.

 

Some of the newest “Discoveries”:

 

• Mystery Pharaoh Found in Egypt

Jan 16, 2014

 

The remains of a previously unknown pharaoh who reigned more than 3,600 years ago have emerged from Egypt’s desert sand.

 

• 4,600-Year-Old Step Pyramid Uncovered in Egypt

Feb 3, 2014

 

Archaeologists in southern Egypt have uncovered a step pyramid that dates back about 4,600 years.

 

• Drug References Found on Walls of Ancient Egyptian School

Feb 12, 2014

 

Archaeologists have discovered a school dating back about 1,700 years that contains ancient Greek writings on its walls, including a text about ancient drug use.

 

• 1,300-Year-Old Egyptian Mummy Had Biblical Tattoo

Mar 26, 2014

 

A mummy of an Egyptian woman dating back to 700 A.D. has been scanned and stripped to reveal a tattoo on her thigh that displays the name of the biblical archangel Michael.

 

• 3,300-Year-Old Tomb with Pyramid Entrance Discovered in Egypt

Mar 31, 2014

 

A tomb newly excavated at an ancient cemetery in Egypt would have boasted a pyramid 23 feet high at its entrance.

 

• Ancient Egyptian Mummy Found With Brain, No Heart

Apr 8, 2014

 

An ancient Egyptian mummy found with an intact brain, but no heart, has a plaque on her abdomen that may have been intended to ritually heal her.

 

• How the Ancient Egyptians Really Built the Pyramids

Apr 30, 2014

 

The ancient Egyptians who built the pyramids may have been able to move massive stone blocks across the desert by wetting the sand in front of a contraption built to pull the heavy objects, according to a new study.

 

‘One of The Earliest Images of Jesus’ Unearthed in Egyptian Tomb

April 30, 2014 

 

My note: The resemblance between the discovered image of young Jesus (left) and the older Ethiopian Jesus (right) is striking

A team of Catalan archaeologists believes it has unearthed one of the earliest images of Jesus Christ buried deep in an ancient Egyptian tomb. 

 

Experts at the University of Barcelona discovered an underground structure in the ancient Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchu which may have acted as a resting place for a number of priests.

 

More than 45 tonnes of rock had to be moved in order to access the hidden room. Another unidentified structure found nearby during this process is currently being investigated.

 

Once inside, the team found five or six coats of paint on the walls, the last of which was from the Coptic period of the first Christians.

 

The underground structure was also reportedly decorated with Coptic images and may contain one of the earliest-known representations of Jesus Christ, The Local has reported.

 

Dr Josep Padró, the Emeritus Professor at the University of Barcelona who led the expedition, described the find as “exceptional”.

 

He told the La Vanguardia newspaper that the figure is that of “a young man with curly hair, dressed in a short tunic and with his hand raised as if giving a blessing”.

 

“We could be dealing with a very early image of Jesus Christ,” he added.

 

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