The story of Egypt is the story of history itself--the endless rise and
fall, the life and death and life again of the eternal human effort to
endure, enjoy, and understand the mystery of our universe. Emerging from
the ancient mists of time, Egypt met the challenge of the mystery in a
glorious evolution of religious, intellectual, and political
institutions and for two millenniums flourished with all the vigor that
the human heart can invest in a social and cultural order. Then Egypt
began to crumble into the desert sands and the waters of the Nile, and
her remarkable achievements in civilization became her lingering
epitaph. John A. Wilson has written a rich and interpretive biography of
one of the greatest cultural periods in human experience. He answers--as
best the modern Egyptologist can--the questions inevitably asked
concerning the dissolution of Egypt's glory. Here is scholarship in its
finest form, concerned with the humanity that has preceded us, and
finding in man's past grandeur and failure much meaning for men of
today.