Ancient Egypt and Modern Egypt

[Fire_Unionist]

This is going to be an annoyingly simplistic question, but how do modern Egyptians view ancient Egypt?

To be less annoyingly simplistic I’m interested in how it’s taught in schools, whether ancient Egypt is seen as a direct predecessor to the modern nation or rather and entirely different thing (I.e. does the Arab identity play such an important role in modern Egyptian historical memory that the beginning of Egyptian history is more popularly conceived as starting with the Arab invasion rather than anything prior to that).

How does that viewpoint change based on ideology (conservative Islamist, liberal, etc) and religion (Sunni, Coptic, etc).

 

[Antediluvian Monster]

I can hardly offer well informed opinion on this, but nevertheless what immediately comes to my mind is Nasser. On one hand hailed as first native Egyptian to rule the country after millenia of dynasties of foreign origin, on the other hand an Arab pan-nationalist.

 

[Fire_Unionist]

I can hardly offer well informed opinion on this, but nevertheless what immediately comes to my mind is Nasser. On one hand hailed as first native Egyptian to rule the country after millenia of dynasties of foreign origin, on the other hand an Arab pan-nationalist.

Did he say anything interesting about ancient Egypt?

 

[IsadorBG]

This is going to be an annoyingly simplistic question, but how do modern Egyptians view ancient Egypt?

To be less annoyingly simplistic I’m interested in how it’s taught in schools, whether ancient Egypt is seen as a direct predecessor to the modern nation or rather and entirely different thing (I.e. does the Arab identity play such an important role in modern Egyptian historical memory that the beginning of Egyptian history is more popularly conceived as starting with the Arab invasion rather than anything prior to that).

How does that viewpoint change based on ideology (conservative Islamist, liberal, etc) and religion (Sunni, Coptic, etc).

The few things I know from what I gathered by disussing with some Egyptians: They believe (rightly) that they are the direct descendent of the ancient egyptians and as far as they are concerned that part of history is theirs and they are quite proud of it.

The Arabic idendity is a more complex topic and can vary from people to people. Some are deeply attached to this aspect of their culture others think it's consequence of the conquest and do not believe that Egyptians are Arabs.
The latter of course is influenced by the religious/ideological belief of each individual. Also there is an ethnic component to the subject as there is Egyptians descended from caucasians and turkish people, mostly descendent of the Mamlukes.

Frankly the history of Egypt can be quite confusing for who want to build a romantisised nationalistic/religious past let's not forget that even discouting Old Egypt, there's also periods where Egypt was a hellenic state, the jewel of Rome, the heart of a (the only)Shi'a caliphate and of course a state ruled literally by slaves for centuries.

So mmh yeah... .