Sorin Cosoveanu notified me that Egypt created three new governorates on 2014-08-17. Central Sinai is being formed from parts of South Sinai and North Sinai. Al-Alamein is splitting from Matruh. The third is Al-Wahhat Al-Bahariya, also known as Wahat or Oases; from the maps I've seen, it appears to be formed from parts of Al Jizah and Al Wadi al Jadid. (Note that there was a governorate called Bahariya Oases in 1947. It's the name of a landform, whether or not it's an administrative division.) At the same time, there are many territorial adjustments to the other governorates. The smaller governorates will acquire desert land from the large, sparsely populated ones. In theory, this will allow the small ones to move their surplus population outward and release arable land for cultivation. Confirmation is provided by source .
Looking further ahead, the government envisages the creation of governorates called 10 Ramadan and 26 January in the vicinity of Cairo. Recalling the brief career of Helwan and Sixth of October, I wonder whether these changes will remain in effect.
Egypt stopped observing daylight saving time from 2010 to 2013, but it is resuming it in 2014.
Update 6 to "Geopolitical Entities and Codes" was dated 2011-11-30. For Egypt, it rescinded the FIPS codes that had been assigned to Helwan and Sixth of October governorates. ISO 3166-2 deleted the same governorates on 2014-10-29.
Update 1 to the U.S. standard "Geopolitical Entities and Codes" is dated 2010-08-20. It assigns FIPS codes to the three newest governorates, Al Uqsur, Helwan, and Sixth of October. Newsletter II-2, an update to the ISO 3166-2 standard, is dated 2010-06-30. It assigns ISO codes to Helwan and Sixth of October governorates.
ISO 3166-2 has come out in a second edition, dated 2007-12-15. This contains the ISO code for Luxor, as shown below.
Egypt had been part of the Ottoman Empire before 1879. The British military occupied it in 1882, setting up a government subservient to British interests, although it remained technically a tributary state of the Ottoman Empire. On 1914-11-18, Great Britain declared Egypt to be its protectorate. After World War I, with Turkey defeated, Egypt was granted a large measure of independence, effective as of 1922-02-28. A constitutional monarchy was established. In 1952, the monarchy fell to a coup led by Gamal Abdel Nasser. Nasser's government formed a union with Syria, the United Arab Republic (U.A.R.), on 1958-02-01. Egypt and Syria became regions of the U.A.R. Syria withdrew from the union on 1961-09-29. Egypt continued to call itself the U.A.R. until 1971-09-01. On that date, a loose federation was formed, the Federation of Arab Republics, comprising Egypt, Syria, and Libya. Egypt's official name became the Arab Republic of Egypt. In the Six-Day War of 1967, Israel occupied the Sinai Peninsula up to the banks of the Suez Canal, later withdrawing to a cease-fire line a few kilometers to the east. The canal remained closed from 1967 to 1975. The Sinai was restored to Egypt in stages by the terms of the peace treaty negotiated at Camp David and signed on 1979-03-26.
Ancient Greek Aigyptios, from Egyptian hut-ka-ptah: castle of the soul of Ptah
Egypt is divided into 27 muhāfazāt (governorates).
|Ad Daqahlīyah||44||4,985,187||3,471||1,340||Al Mansūrah|
|Al Bahr al Ahmar||84||288,233||203,685||78,643||Al Ghurdaqah|
|Al Fayyūm||63||2,512,792||1,827||705||Al Fayyūm|
|Al Iskandarīyah||21,23||4,110,015||2,679||1,035||Al Iskandarīyah|
|Al Ismā`īlīyah||41||942,832||1,442||557||Al Ismā`īlīyah|
|Al Jīzah||12||6,272,571||85,105||32,859||Al Jīzah|
|Al Minūfīyah||32||3,270,404||1,532||592||Shibīn al Kawm|
|Al Minyā||61||4,179,309||2,262||873||Al Minyā|
|Al Qāhirah||11||7,786,640||214||83||Al Qāhirah|
|Al Uqsur||83||451,318||55||21||Al Uqsur|
|Al Wādī al Jadīd||72||187,256||376,505||145,369||Al Khārijah|
|Ash Sharqīyah||35||5,340,058||4,180||1,614||Az Zaqāzīq|
|As Suways||43||510,935||17,840||6,888||As Suways|
|Banī Suwayf||62||2,290,527||1,322||510||Banī Suwayf|
|Būr Sa`īd||42||570,768||72||28||Būr Sa`īd|
|Janūb Sīnā'||46||149,335||33,140||12,795||At Tur|
|Kafr ash Shaykh||33||2,618,111||3,437||1,327||Kafr ash Shaykh|
|Shamal Sīnā'||45||339,752||27,574||10,646||Al `Arish|
See the Markazes of Egypt page.
Egypt's subdivisions at the secondary level include markazes and kisms. The markazes are more rural than the kisms. Some small areas in port cities are under the separate jurisdiction of a police department. There are also territories, mostly desert, that are not in any of those subdivisions.
Egypt ceded two sparsely inhabited areas to Libya in 1919 and 1926. These cessions left the border in its modern position, following the meridian of 25° East quite closely.
The legal boundary between Egypt and Sudan follows the parallel of 22° North, except for a small jog where the Nile crosses it. At the Nile, Sudan owns territory north of that parallel, mostly inundated by Lake Nasser. However, near the Red Sea, the administrative boundary deviates from the legal boundary. There is a small region in Sudan, south of 22°, administered by Egypt, and a larger area in Egypt, north of the parallel, administered by Sudan.
Egypt owns some islands in the Red Sea. They belong to Al Bahr al Ahmar governorate. The largest of them include Jazīrat Shākir and Jazīrat Zabarjad.
There have been numerous border adjustments. Typically, one of the smaller governorates annexes adjacent territory from a frontier governorate.
According to source , the divisions of Egypt in 1913 were as follows. El-Arish is in what is now Shamal Sīnā' (North Sinai).
By the time of the 1947 census, the divisions were as follows (sources , , and others). Bahariya Oases seems to have come and gone over the span of a few years. When it was eliminated, it became part of Giza.
|Beni Suef||U||612,027||561,239||1096||Beni Suef|
EG30, and capital Helwan; Sixth of October had the respective codes
EG29, and its capital was Sixth of October City.
Place names are officially written in Arabic script. Some names may be translated, but most are transliterated or transcribed into the Roman alphabet. There are many possible methods of transliteration. Some of this variety is shown in the table of variant names.
The initial elements Ad, Al, As, Ash, At, and Az are articles. Sometimes, especially in older sources, they are spelled Ed, El, Es, and so on. Sometimes they are connected to the following word with hyphens. Some sources omit them entirely.
I have not attempted to reproduce the "dot below" diacritical mark that modifies some h's, s's, and t's. The ayn is shown as a back apostrophe (`), and the hamza as an apostrophe (').
|Al Bahr al Ahmar||9,914||15,929||N/A||38,000||56,191||90,491||155,695||288,233|
|Al Wādī al Jadīd||29,109||32,503||N/A||59,000||84,645||113,838||141,737||187,256|
|Kafr ash Shaykh||832,000||1,118,000||1,403,468||1,800,129||2,222,920||2,618,111|
The 1966 census is described as a "sample census".
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