Easton's Bible Dictionary (1897)
, “the black stream” (Isa. 23:3; Jer. 2:18) or simply “the river” (Gen. 41:1; Ex. 1:22, etc.) and the “flood of Egypt” (Amos 8:8). It consists of two rivers, the White Nile, which takes its rise in the Victoria Nyanza, and the Blue Nile, which rises in the Abyssinian Mountains. These unite at the town of Khartoum, whence it pursues its course for 1,800 miles, and falls into the Mediterranean through its two branches, into which it is divided a few miles north of Cairo, the Rosetta and the Damietta branch.
Smith's Bible Dictionary (1863)
(blue, dark), the great river of Egypt. ” (Genesis 15:18) We cannot as yet determine the length of the Nile, although recent discoveries have narrowed the question. There is scarcely a doubt that its largest confluent is fed by the great lakes on and south of the equator. It has been traced upward for about 2700 miles, measured by its course, not in a direct line, and its extent is probably over 1000 miles more. (The course of the river has been traced for 3300 miles.
For the first 1800 miles (McClintock and Strong say 2300) from its mouth it receives no tributary; but at Kartoom, the capital of Nubia, is the junction of the two great branches, the White Nile and the Blue Nile, so called from the color of the clay which tinges their waters. The Blue Nile rises in the mountains of Abyssinia and is the chief source of the deposit which the Nile brings to Egypt. The White Nile is the larger branch. Late travellers have found its source in Lake Victoria Nyanza, three degrees south of the equator.
From this lake to the mouth of the Nile the distance is 2300 miles in a straight line—one eleventh the circumference of the globe. From the First Cataract, at Syene, the river flows smoothly at the rate of two or three miles an hour with a width of half a mile. to Cairo. A little north of Cairo it divides into two branches, one flowing to Rosetta and the other to Damietta, from which place the mouths are named. See Bartlett’s “Egypt and Palestine,” 1879. The great peculiarity of the river is its annual overflow, caused by the periodical tropical rains.
“With wonderful clock-like regularity the river begins to swell about the end of June, rises 24 feet at Cairo between the 20th and 30th of September and falls as much by the middle of May. ”—Bartlett . So that the Nile increases one hundred days and decreases one hundred days, and the culmination scarcely varies three days from September 25 the autumnal equinox.
” As to the cause of the years of plenty and of famine in the time of Joseph, Mr. Osburn, in his “Monumental History of Egypt,” thinks that the cause of the seven years of plenty was the bursting of the barriers (and gradually wearing them away) of “the great lake of Ethiopia,” which once existed on the upper Nile, thus bringing more water and more sediment to lower Egypt for those years. And he shows how this same destruction of this immense sea would cause the absorption of the waters of the Nile over its dry bed for several years after thus causing the famine.
) The great difference between the Nile of Egypt in the present day and in ancient times is caused by the failure of some of its branches and the ceasing of some of its chief vegetable products; and the chief change in the aspect of the cultivable land, as dependent on the Nile, is the result of the ruin of the fish-pools and their conduits and the consequent decline of the fisheries. The river was famous for its seven branches, and under the Roman dominion eleven were counted, of which, however, there were but seven principal ones.
The monuments and the narratives of ancient writers show us in the Nile of Egypt in old times a stream bordered By flags and reeds, the covert of abundant wild fowl, and bearing on its waters the fragrant flowers of the various-colored lotus. Now in Egypt scarcely any reeds or waterplants—the famous papyrus being nearly, if not quite extinct, and the lotus almost unknown—are to he seen, excepting in the marshes near the Mediterranean. Of old the great river must have shown a more fair and busy scene than now.
Boats of many kinds were ever passing along it, by the painted walls of temples and the gardens that extended around the light summer pavilions, from the pleasure valley, with one great square sail in pattern and many oars, to the little papyrus skiff dancing on the water and carrying the seekers of pleasure where they could shoot with arrows or knock down with the throw-stick the wild fowl that abounded among the reeds, or engage in the dangerous chase of the hippopotamus or the crocodile. The Nile is constantly before us in the history of Israel in Egypt.
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible (1898) & Schaff's Bible Dictionary
NILE (blue, dark), the great river of Egypt and of Africa, and probably the second longest river in the world, its entire length being estimated at 4000 miles. The word "Nile" does not occur in Scripture, but the river is frequently referred to as Sihor or Shihor, which means "black" or "turbid" stream. Josh 13:3; Isa 23:3; Jer 2:18; 1 Chr 13:5. " Am 8:8; Neh 9:5. In the plural form this word year, rendered "river," frequently refers to the branches and canals of the Nile. This famous river is connected with the earliest history of the Egyptian and the Israelitish nations.
Ex 2:3; Ex 7:20-21; Num 11:5; Ps 105:29; Jer 46:7-8; Zech 14:17-18. T. Physical Features. - The discovery of the true source of the Nile, and the reason for its annual overflow, are two scientific problems which have been discussed for upward of 2000 years. The course of the stream is now known for about 3300 miles, and with two interruptions - the cataract of Syene (Assouan) and the Upper Cataract - it is claimed by Baedeker's Handbook on Lower Egypt to be navigable throughout nearly the whole of that distance. But as there are many other cataracts, this statement cannot be correct.
The principal stream is now known to be the White Nile, while the Blue or Black Nile is of greater importance in contributing to the annual inundation of the lower river. The two streams unite at the town of Khartoom, the capital of Nubia, and from this point to the mouths of the stream at Damietta and Rosetta, upward of 1800 miles, it falls 1240 feet, and attains its greatest width a little below Khartoom and a little above Cairo, at each of which places it is about 1100 yards wide.
The source of the White Nile is doubtless Lake Victoria Nyanza, the largest part of which lies south of the equator, and from 3000 to 4000 feet above the level of the sea. The White Nile is so named from the color of the clay with which its waters are stained. The Blue Nile resembles a mountain-torrent, being liable to rise suddenly with the Abyssinian rains and sweep away whatever it encounters in its rapidly-descending course.
The source of the Blue Nile is high up in the Abyssinian mountains, from 6000 to 10,000 feet above the sea-level, and in springs which are regarded with superstitious veneration by the neighboring people. The river causes what would be otherwise a barren valley to be one of the most fertile regions in the world. " The waters of the Nile now empty into the sea through two streams, known as the Damietta and the Rosetta mouths; ancient writers, however, mention at least seven branches or mouths through which the Nile found its way to the sea.
There is the strongest proof that the Nile has filled up the sea for many miles to the north, and that its ancient mouths were several miles farther south. It has been ascertained that within the last half century the mouth of the Nile has advanced northward 4 miles, and the maps of Ptolemy, of the second and third centuries of the Christian era, show that the mouth was then about 40 miles farther south than at present. Hence, at this rate of deposit, the sea-coast, in the earlier history of ancient Egypt, must have been nearly as far south as its ancient capital, Memphis.
As rain seldom falls in Egypt proper, the fertility of "the country is entirely dependent upon the annual rise of the Nile. This usually begins in June and continues until near the end of September, the river remaining stationary for two or more weeks, and then attaining its highest level in October, when it begins to subside. , about 41 feet 2 inches, the cubit being 21 inches - while in the time of Herodotus 16 cubits sufficed; and the god of the Nile in the Vatican is therefore represented as surrounded by sixteen children.
) The successive years of famine in the days of Joseph were doubtless due to a deficient overflow of the Nile for those years. Formerly this annual inundation turned Egypt into a vast lake, but in later times the water has been distributed by a great network of canals, from which the huge basins of cultivated land into which the canals divide the country, are supplied with water of the depth required to leave a deposit of mud to fertilize the land.
The native uses his feet to regulate the flow of water into each of the squares or basins of land, and by a dexterous movement of his toes forms or removes a tiny embankment, as may be required to admit the proper flow of water. Another common mode is to use The Shadoof. the "shadoof," a bucket attached to a long pole hung on a pivot, balanced by a stone or a lump of clay at one end, and having the bucket on the other end. To this day the Nile is lined for hundreds of miles with these shadoofs, worked by men, women, and children, who lift the water out of the river to irrigate their fields.
" Deut 11:10-11. A number of festivals were celebrated in connection with the annual rise of the Nile, which appear from the monuments to have been common as early as the fourteenth The Nilometer. c. The height of the Nile was measured by the Nilometer, a square well having in its centre an octagonal column, on which were inscribed the ancient Arabic measures and Cufic inscriptions. d. 716, and was used to determine the height of the overflow, upon which was based the rate of taxation.
The government, however, cheated the poor people by false statements of the overflow, indicated by this measurement. The ancient Egyptians worshipped the river Nile as a god. Two of the ten plagues sent upon Pharaoh and Egypt before the departure of the Israelites were turning the water of the Nile into blood and bringing forth frogs from the river. Ex 7:15-25; Ex 8:3-7. The papyrus reeds - whence paper is designated - the flags, the lotus, and the various colored flowers formerly beautifying the banks of the river have nearly all disappeared, thus fulfilling prophecy. Isa 19:6-7.
This river, so intimately associated with the early history of the human race, is a favorite resort for tourists, who can go in steamers as far as the First Cataract, near Assouan (Syene), where were the great quarries which supplied stone for ancient Egyptian monuments, and from Phiae up to Aboo-Simbel and the Second Cataract. The Nile voyage, broken by donkey rides and visits to the pyramids, tombs, and ruins of temples and palaces of the Pharaohs, is one of the greatest enjoyments and best recreations of body and mind.