PERIOD GUIDE · Egypt
Sasanian rule in Egypt: dates without finds
According to the Met's timeline, the Sasanians ruled Egypt in 616-628. The sources checked name no find, building or layer dated to these years, and this page documents that gap.
616-628 CEMove through the periods
Its place in the Egypt scheme
The whole scheme with this period marked; the periods before and after are its neighbours in the row. Boundaries follow the sources and are not to scale.
- The Neolithic in Egypt7,000-4,500 BCE
- The Predynastic period in Egypt4,500-3,100 BCE
- The Early Dynastic period in Egypt3,100-2,649 BCE
- The Old Kingdom of Egypt2,649-2,150 BCE
- The First Intermediate Period in Egypt2,150-2,030 BCE
- The Middle Kingdom of Egypt2,030-1,640 BCE
- The Second Intermediate Period in Egypt1,640-1,550 BCE
- The New Kingdom of Egypt1,550-1,070 BCE
- The Third Intermediate Period in Egypt1,070-712 BCE
- The Late Period in Egypt712-332 BCE
- Macedonian and Ptolemaic Egypt332-30 BCE
- Roman rule in Egypt30 BCE - 330 CE
- Byzantine rule in Egypt330-641 CE
- Early Islamic Egypt641-969 CE
- Fatimid Egypt969-1,171 CE
- Ayyubid Egypt1,171-1,252 CE
- Mamluk Egypt1,250-1,517 CE
The frame
The bar on the Met's timeline page for Egypt, 500-1000 CE, marks "Sasanian rule, 616-628". The events of the period state that the Persian-Sasanian king Khosrow II seized control of Egypt from the Byzantine emperor Heraclius, and that Sasanian rule in Egypt was short-lived. On this site it is a sub-period within "Byzantine rule in Egypt", so that the episode is not left out of the sequence; it is not presented as a period of its own with its own finds. Source 1.
Boundaries and overlaps
According to the same page, the Byzantine state recaptured the territory in 629, and the bar marks "Byzantine rule" again from 629 to 641. The Sasanian span therefore lies entirely within the range of the Byzantine page, between its two spans. The source does not detail the course of the conquest or its end beyond these years, and this page does not move the boundaries earlier or later. Source 1.
On this site
No item on the site is placed in this period yet. Two sources were checked: the Met's timeline page for Egypt, 500-1000 CE, which gives only the span of rule, and the UNESCO World Heritage Centre page "Historic Cairo", which does not mention Sasanian rule or the years 616-629. What is missing, precisely: a find, building or layer that an institutional source dates explicitly to Sasanian rule in Egypt. Until such a source is found, this page shows the dates only and does not take in items from the years before or after. Sources 1, 2.
Source
Sources and further reading
The research and references behind this page. Rights to external content remain with their owners.
- 1
Egypt, 500-1000 A.D. (Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, chronology)
The Metropolitan Museum of Art · Checked
- 2
Historic Cairo
UNESCO World Heritage Centre · Checked