Mid-way down the Nile from Cairo, hot and sultry Asyut is perhaps best known as one of ancient Egypt’s most powerful provincial capitals. From around 3,000 BC it formed one of the country’s commercial centres, where camels laden with spices, silks and slaves from North Africa and the East would converge to do business with settlers along the banks of the river.
Today few remnants of Asyut’s glorious trading past remain, with tombs, temples and a necropolis dominating the ancient city. Most of the modern cityscape showcases Egypt’s own answer to the ancient commercial wealth of the town, with high-rises, buzzing market bazaars and busy, tight-knit streets. It all makes for an enthralling and heady atmosphere, with its fusion of Coptic Christian traditions and Muslim faith, dusty adobe frontispieces and shiny modern blocks.
Be sure to ask your Asyut tourist guide to arrange a visit to the city’s Barrage Dam, or the Convent of the Holy Virgin in the shadow of the Asyut Mountains, famous as the place where the apparition of the Virgin Mary appeared in the year 2000.