The reclamation project of the Faiyum Depression was performed by the Ptolemies in which Lake Moeris was dried up from a previous level of 20 m above sea level to about 2 m above sea level during the reign of Ptolemy I (323-285 B. C.). Figure 3.9 shows trends in Lake Moeris starting from around 5000 B. C. The dried up level of the lake has been surmised by Caton-Thompson and Gardner (1934) from the inferred level of a saqiya well northeast of Birket Qarun. The drying up of the lake during early Ptolemaic times could not have been caused from low flows in the Nile because the flows were adequately high during this time period (Said, 1993). To lower the lake Ptolemy II (285-246 B. C.) constructed an embankment near Lahun in order to control the flow of water from the Nile into the Hawara channel that flows to the depression. This embankment (dike today measures some 5,000 m in length and up to 4 m height, Schnitter, 1994) closed the gap between two hills with the exception of a single opening with a dam and a weir at Luhan. The weir was used to keep the level of the lake at 2 m above sea level. The canal system used to channel
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Fig. 3.9 Trends in Lake Moeris levels from 5000 B. C. (Mehringer et al., 1978)
Water from the Nile River into the Faiyum Depression consisted of a radial network of relatively high gradient canals. This canal system was unique as compared to the canal systems used in the Nile valley and delta (Said, 1993). The reclamation project by the Ptolemaic engineers added approximately 325,000 acres of new and fertile arable land to Egypt (Said, 1993). This project along with the wide-spread use of the waterwheel significantly increased the wealth of Egypt and allowed the population to increase to an estimated 4.9 million people, the largest during the long history of Egypt prior to the nineteenth century.
World History
