Nag Hammadi

File:Raffinerie Say.JPG

Plaque of a local sugar refinery that mentions French town Ardres, 1901

Nag Hammadi (Template:IPAc-en Template:Respell; Template:Langx Template:Transliteration) is a city and markaz in Upper Egypt. It is located on the west bank of the Nile in the Qena Governorate, about Template:Convert north-west of Luxor. The city had a population of close to 61,737 Template:As of.

History

The town of Nag Hammadi was found on the site of older villages Ansan (Template:Langx) and al-Luaqi (Template:Langx)<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> in the 19th century and was named after its founder, Mahmoud Pasha Hammadi, a member of the Hammadi family in Sohag, Egypt. Mahmoud Pasha Hammadi was a major landholder in Sohag, and known for his strong opposition to the British rule in Egypt beginning in 1882.

In the city of Nag Hammadi, there is the palace of Prince Youssef Kamal, a member of the royal family (the family of Muhammad Ali Pasha), which overlooks the Nile River and is now an archaeological site.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Nag Hammadi is about Template:Convert west of ancient Chenoboskion (Template:Langx) The "Nag Hammadi library", an important collection of 2nd-century Gnostic texts, was found at Jabal al-Ṭārif near Nag Hammadi in 1945.<ref name="NHL">Template:Cite book. "The Nag Hammadi Library consists of twelve books, plus eight leaves removed from a thirteenth book in late antiquity and tucked inside the front cover of the sixth. These eight leaves comprise a complete text, an independent treatise taken out of a book of collected essays". (p. 10). Template:Cite web</ref>

The city was the site of the Nag Hammadi Massacre in January 2010, in which eight Coptic Christians were shot dead by three men.<ref name="catastrophe">"Egypt's anxious Copts 'await next catastropheTemplate:'" (25 January 2010) BBC News</ref> In total, nineteen Coptic Christians were attacked.<ref name="catastrophe"/><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Economy

Sugar and aluminium are produced in Nag Hammadi. The Nag Hammadi Sugar factory was built in 1895–1897 by French contractors Cail and Fives.<ref>Undated photo Wikimedia</ref> It is still in operation in 2018. Egyptalum is one of the largest aluminium producer in the Middle East. Wood particleboard is manufactured from sugar cane bagasse.

See also

• List of cities and towns in Egypt
• Nag Hammadi library