History

- About 3100 BC:
King Menes Unified upper & lower Egypt & established his capital at Memphies which is near present day Cairo.

- About 2600 BC:
The Old Kingdom was notable for the construction of pyramids. The Great Pyrimids & Sphinx where built around that time.

- About 1400 BC:
The Egyptian Empire reached its hieght during the reign of Thutmos III. Egypt Controlled the Middle East from Syria to Ethiopia.

- 332 BC:
Alexader The Great conquered Egypt & founded Alexandria.

- 31 BC:
A Roman fleet decisively defeated Egyptian forces under Antony & Cleopatra at the battle of Actium. Egypt became a Roman province next year.

- AD 642:
Arabs conquered Egypt and introduced Islam & the Arabic language into the country.

- 973:
Shiite Fatimid rulers moved the capital from Alexandria to the new city of Cairo. Cairo quickly became the center of the Islamic World.

- 1171:
Saladin overthrew the Fatimids & established the Ayyubid dynasty. Sunni Islam was restored at the state religion.

- 1250 :
Mamelukes bodyguards overthrew the Sultan & seized control of Egypt.

- 1517:
Ottoman Turks invaded & conquered Egypt. The Mamelukes retained local authority, & eventually challenged the Ottoman power in Egypt.

- 1798
Napoleon Bonaparte led a French invasion of Egypt. The invasion eventually failed, but many important archaeological treasures were found, including the famous Rosetta Stone, which was uncovered in 1799.

- 1805
Muhammad Ali secured control of Egypt and steered the country on an ambitious modernization program.

- 1882
British troops occupied Egypt. A nationalist movement soon sprang up.

- 1914
Great Britain declared Egypt a protectorate.

- 1922
Egypt became independent, but Great Britain retained many powers.

- 1942
The German advance in North Africa during World War II was halted by Allied forces at the Battle of Al 'Alamayn (Al 'Alamein).

- 1948
Egypt and other Arab countries invaded the newly created state of Israel, but were defeated.

- 1952
Gamal Abdel Nasser led a revolt that overthrew Egypt's monarchy. Two years later Nasser assumed complete executive authority.

- 1956
Egypt nationalized the Suez Canal to finance the Aswan High Dam project. French, British, and Israeli armies invaded and captured the Sinai Peninsula. The United Nations helped negotiate a settlement.

- 1958
Egypt and Syria formed the United Arab Republic. Syria withdrew in 1961, but Egypt continued to use the name until 1971.

- 1967
Egypt lost the Sinai Peninsula and most of its air force during the Six-Day War with Israel.

- 1970
Nasser died and was succeeded by Anwar al-Sadat.

- 1973
Egypt fought Israel and was defeated in the Yom Kippur War.

- 1979
Egypt and Israel signed a peace treaty arranging for the return of the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt.

- 1981
Sadat was assassinated by military officers. He was succeeded by Hosni Mubarak.

- 1991
Egyptian forces participated in the Persian Gulf War against Iraq.

- 1994
The Egyptian government moved to quell attacks by militant Muslim fundamentalists.

- 1995
Archaeologists discovered the tomb of King Ramses II's many sons, the largest tomb in Egypt's Valley of the Kings.

1996
In April, 18 Greek tourists were killed and 15 others wounded when Gamaat i-Islami gunmen attacked a Cairo hotel.

1997
In November, 62 people (58 of them tourists) were shot dead at Luxor in an attack by Islamic extremists.

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