Itbāy ( ar, اطبيه) or ʿAtbāy is a region of southeastern Egypt and northeastern

Sudan Sudan ( or ; ar, السودان, as-Sūdān, officially the Republic of the Sudan ( ar, جمهورية السودان, link=no, Jumhūriyyat as-Sūdān), is a country in Northeast Africa. It shares borders with the Central African Republic t ...

. It is characterized by a chain of mountains, the Red Sea Hills, running north–south and parallel with the Red Sea. The hills separate the narrow coastal plain from the Eastern Desert.

Geology

The Red Sea Hills are composed of the exposed Neoproterozoic volcano-sedimentary rock of the

Arabian-Nubian Shield The Arabian-Nubian Shield (ANS) is an exposure of Precambrian crystalline rocks on the flanks of the Red Sea. The crystalline rocks are mostly Neoproterozoic in age. Geographically - and from north to south - the ANS includes parts of Israel, Jo ...

. Although the rock itself is 550–900 million years old, the mountains were created by

uplift Uplift may refer to: Science * Geologic uplift, a geological process ** Tectonic uplift, a geological process * Stellar uplift, the theoretical prospect of moving a stellar mass * Uplift mountains * Llano Uplift * Nemaha Uplift Business * Uplif ...

when the Red Sea itself was formed in the

Oligocene The Oligocene ( ) is a geologic epoch of the Paleogene Period and extends from about 33.9 million to 23 million years before the present ( to ). As with other older geologic periods, the rock beds that define the epoch are well identified but the ...

, only some 23–34 million years ago. The Red Sea Hills are thus part of the same formation as the

Sarawat Mountains The Sarawat Mountains ( ar, جِبَالُ ٱلسَّرَوَاتِ, Jibāl as-Sarawāt), also known as the Sarat, is a part of the Hijaz mountains in the western part of the Arabian Peninsula. In a broad sense, it runs parallel to the eastern c ...

of Saudi Arabia and the mountains of the Sinai Peninsula. The Red Sea Hills rise almost to today, but in the past were much higher. The Oligocene uplift caused the rejuvenation of their streams and the increased erosion removed most of the limestone and sandstone to expose the

basement A basement or cellar is one or more floors of a building that are completely or partly below the ground floor. It generally is used as a utility space for a building, where such items as the furnace, water heater, breaker panel or fuse box, ...

layer. The Itbāy is arid, receiving less than of rainfall each year with high variability.Leif Manger, ''Managing pastoral adaptations in the Red Sea Hills of the Sudan: Challenges and Dilemmas'' (IIED, 1994), p. 2. The Barka River, the most significant of the few seasonal streams that flow into the Red Sea, rises in the Red Sea Hills of Sudan and empties into the sea at the Tokar Delta. In prehistoric times it was probably a permanent river.

History

In prehistoric times, the Red Sea Hills were likely the area where the Proto- Cushitic language was spoken. The Red Sea Hills are a source of porphyry, which was being mined as early as the fourth millennium BC.David N. Edwards, ''The Nubian Past: An Archaeology of the Sudan'' (Routledge, 2004), pp. 64, 209, 251–52. The Red Sea Hills are inhabited by the Beja people who speak a Cushitic language and practice pastoralism. They mainly live near the dry riverbeds, ''wādī''s, that flow seasonally into the sea and the Nile, where there is limited vegetation. In antiquity, the Beja were known as the

Blemmyes The Blemmyes ( grc, Βλέμμυες, Latin: ''Blemmyae'') were an Eastern Desert people who appeared in written sources from the 7th century BC until the 8th century AD.. By the late 4th century, they had occupied Lower Nubia and established a k ...

and their presence in the hills is detected archaeologically by the presence of

Eastern Desert Ware Eastern may refer to: Transportation *China Eastern Airlines, a current Chinese airline based in Shanghai * Eastern Air, former name of Zambia Skyways * Eastern Air Lines, a defunct American airline that operated from 1926 to 1991 *Eastern Air ...

from the fourth century AD. The

material culture Material culture is the aspect of social reality grounded in the objects and architecture that surround people. It includes the usage, consumption, creation, and trade of objects as well as the behaviors, norms, and rituals that the objects creat ...

of the hills places it firmly within ancient Egypt's sphere of influence. Extensive mining settlements have been found in the Wadi Allaqi and the

Wadi Gabgaba Wadi ( ar, وَادِي, wādī), alternatively ''wād'' ( ar, وَاد), North African Arabic Oued, is the Arabic term traditionally referring to a valley. In some instances, it may refer to a wet (ephemeral) riverbed that contains water onl ...

. The early Blemmyes built platform tumuli (flat-topped burial mounds), and the appearance of

cairn A cairn is a man-made pile (or stack) of stones raised for a purpose, usually as a marker or as a burial mound. The word ''cairn'' comes from the gd, càrn (plural ). Cairns have been and are used for a broad variety of purposes. In prehis ...

s to mark burials in the late Middle Ages may be linked to Islamization.

References

{{coord, 25.6611, N, 33.9533, E, source:kolossus-ruwiki, display=title Geography of Egypt Geography of Sudan Blemmyes Regions of Africa