Editing Bronze Age (section)

==== Early Bronze dynasties ====
[[File:Egypt, New Kingdom, Dynasty 18 - Caryatid Mirror - 1983.196 - Cleveland Museum of Art.tif|thumb|upright|Bronze mirror with a female human figure at the base, [[Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt]] (1540–1296&nbsp;BCE)]]
[[File:Thutmose III sphinx E10897-Louvre 042005 06.jpg|thumb|upright|Sphinx-lion of [[Thutmose III]] (1479–1425&nbsp;BCE)]]

In [[Ancient Egypt]], the Bronze Age began in the [[Protodynastic Period]] {{circa|3150&nbsp;BC|lk=no}}E. The archaic ''Early Bronze Age of Egypt'', known as the [[Early Dynastic Period of Egypt]],<ref name="Karin Sowada and Peter Grave">Karin Sowada and Peter Grave. ''Egypt in the Eastern Mediterranean during the Old Kingdom''.</ref><ref>Lukas de Blois and R. J. van der Spek. ''An Introduction to the Ancient World''. p.&nbsp;14.</ref> immediately followed the unification of Lower and Upper Egypt, {{circa|3100&nbsp;BC|lk=no}}E. It is generally taken to include the [[First Dynasty of Egypt|First]] and [[Second Dynasty of Egypt|Second]] dynasties, lasting from the Protodynastic Period until {{circa|2686&nbsp;BC|lk=no}}E, or the beginning of the [[Old Kingdom]]. With the First Dynasty, the capital moved from [[Abydos, Egypt|Abydos]] to Memphis with a unified Egypt ruled by an Egyptian god-king. Abydos remained the major holy land in the south. The hallmarks of ancient Egyptian civilisation, such as art, architecture and religion, took shape in the Early Dynastic Period. [[Memphis, Egypt|Memphis]], in the Early Bronze Age, was the largest city of the time. The Old Kingdom of the regional Bronze Age<ref name="Karin Sowada and Peter Grave" /> is the name given to the period in the 3rd millennium&nbsp;BCE when Egyptian civilisation attained its first continuous peak of complexity and achievement—the first of three "Kingdom" periods which marked the high points of civilisation in the [[Geography of Egypt#Nile Valley and Delta|lower Nile Valley]] (the others being the [[Middle Kingdom of Egypt|Middle Kingdom]] and [[New Kingdom]]).

The [[First Intermediate Period of Egypt]],<ref>Hansen, M. (2000). ''A comparative study of thirty city-state cultures: An investigation conducted by the Copenhagen Polis Centre''. Copenhagen, Denmark: Det Kongelike Danske Videnskabernes Selskab. p. 68.</ref> often described as a "dark period" in ancient Egyptian history, spanned about 100 years after the end of the Old Kingdom from about 2181 to 2055&nbsp;BCE. Very little monumental evidence survives from this period, especially from the early part of it. The First Intermediate Period was a dynamic time when the rule of Egypt was roughly divided between two areas: [[Heracleopolis Magna|Heracleopolis]] in Lower Egypt and [[Thebes, Egypt|Thebes]] in Upper Egypt. These two kingdoms eventually came into conflict, and the Theban kings conquered the north, reunifying Egypt under a single ruler during the second part of the [[Eleventh Dynasty]].