THE WEALTH OF THE NILE -- THE CULTURE AND ECONOMY OF ANCIENT EGYPT

A large part of the manufactured goods came from the families which produced the raw materials. While the men grew flax, their women spun and wove the linen. A sizable proportion of the grain was used for beer production. The fish caught by the men had to be cleaned and dried by the women to be of much use in the hot climate of Egypt.
In the towns small factories appeared, financed often by rich noblemen, bakeries, breweries, carpentry workshops and the like with a few dozen employees.

Bricks for building houses and palaces were made from the Nile mud, rocks for tombs and temples were found close to the Nile. Natron for embalming and salt were mined locally; flax and hemp grown for making clothes and ropes. Oil for lighting was pressed from the kikki seeds and later from olives. Papyrus grew abundantly in the Delta and was made into a kind of paper.

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From the Late Period on iron was mined in the eastern desert and worked in the Greek Delta town of Naukratis.

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