ABSTRACT
The southern boundary of Egypt until modern times was the natural frontier formed by the First Cataract of the Nile, a few miles upstream of Aswan. Beyond this point lay the territory of the Nubians, whose settlements were thinly strung out along the river banks, wherever cultivation was possible. Christian Nubia and Muslim Egypt thereupon settled down to several centuries of more or less peaceful coexistence. The Red Sea itself was a Muslim lake, and ports on the African coast were important entrepots for international trade. The attempt was indeed made: Ibn Sulaym al-Aswani, who went as a Fatimid envoy to Dongola in the later part of the fourth/tenth century, described the reach of the Nile above the Second Cataract as being a closed military district, where unauthorized intruders were liable to the death-penalty. A presage of coming danger to the Nubian kingdom accompanied the rise of Saladin to power in Egypt.
