Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt are known as the cradle of human civilisation. These are the places where several civilisations developed independently. Some of the earliest developments in writing, agriculture, urbanisation, organised religion and government took place in Egypt. 

Cairo is the capital of Egypt. The city is the largest city not only of Egypt, but of the Arab world. 

Cairo has an ancient history. The city was named “Al-Qahira” by Al-Mu’izz li Din Allah, the fourth Fatimid Caliph in the year 973. The name meant “the victorious”. The Al-Azhar University, the third oldest university in the world, was founded during this time. 

Even today, Cairo remains the cultural capital of the Arab world. The city’s premier collection of over 1,00,000 artefacts from nearly every period of Egyptian history is well preserved in the Egyptian Museum at Maydan Tahrir.  

The chief source of Cairo’s local economy is tourism. It also depends on manufacturing textiles, food and tobacco products, chemicals, plastics, metals, and automobiles. 

The Tahrir Square, Cairo Tower, the old Cairo and Khan el-Khalili are some of the landmarks that attract tourists. 

Cairo is situated in the northeast part of Egypt. The great Blue Nile snakes through Cairo from the north to the south splitting her into two parts-east and west. It is home to one of the most famous gigantic Seven Wonders of the World “The Pyramids of Giza”. The Great Pyramids and the Sphinx of course are the main attractions here.  They are located in the Giza plateau just outside the city. 

There are other important Egyptian ruins within the Cairo area as well including Memphis which has the giant statue of Ramses II. Some of the important ancient Egyptian attractions are housed within the Egyptian Museum, another must-see attraction. The treasures of King Tutankhamun including the famous gold mask are at the Egyptian Museum.   

The treasures are extremely impressive as each object was made with such fine detail and remember that they were made thousands of years ago. It is interesting to note that although Tutankhamun’s treasures are impressive, the boy king was not one of the major pharaohs. So, one can just imagine what the treasures of the other pharaohs would have been like. It’s too bad that the grave robbers got to them first. The other antiquities at the museum are also quite impressive so one can easily spend a good portion of the day here.