A-Group (3500 - 2800 BC)

The dawn of the civilisation
       At the end of the 4 th millennium in the vicinity of the First and Second Cataracts a new culture, today called A-Group (or A-Horizon), appeared. A major role in its development must have been played by significant cultural influences from Upper Egypt, where the beginnings of the ancient civilization of the pharaohs were being established at the same time. Apart from animal husbandry, trade became the source of the group's wealth: in exchange for skins of wild animals, gold, ivory, ostrich eggs and feathers as well as precious ebony wood, the inhabitants of what was to become Egypt offered copper tools, foodstuffs (oil, honey and beer) and above all pottery of highest quality.

Elephantine - "Elephant Town"
       The development of trade enriched the local tribal chieftains and helped the penetration of Egyptian culture and religion into Nubia. To carry out trade with the south, an Egyptian factory was established on the island of Elephantine (ancient Abu , "Elephant Town", modern Aswan). Soon however, Egyptians started to wage war against the inhabitants of Lower Nubia - one of such conflicts seems to be memorialized in a graffito at Jebel Sheikh Suliman near Wadi Halfa, where the name of pharaoh Djer is accompanied by an image of a bound Nubian chieftain. Possibly, due to the changes in the Egyptian policy towards the south during the 1 st Dynasty (ca 3000 - 2890) most A-Group settlements were abandoned.