Now, I understand that many believe that any non-black Egyptian cannot be native to Egypt, but this theory is false. We know very well that ancient Egyptians were diverse.
For those who say the first picture is of Greek and Roman settlers, anthropologists proved that these mummies belongs to native Egyptians.
The mummy portraits of the Roman and early Byzantine period from Fayum are our best guide to the facial characteristics of the people ….. recent analysis of the skulls of the mummies reveals the same physical anthropology as that of the ‘native’ Egyptians of the Pharaonic period.[1]
Islamophobes and more recently racial supremacists often claim that modern Egyptians aren’t natives because the original inhabitants were allegedly exterminated by Arabs during the 7th century conquest. However, there are no historical record or archaeological evidence of any large scale displacement of Egyptians.
To the Islamophobes, it took 600 years for Egypt to become Muslim majority. It wouldn’t have taken that long if force was indeed used. As to the racial supremacists, northern Egyptians were always closely connected to the Near East. Is it really surprising that Egyptians are generally lighter than Sub Saharan Africans considering Egypt’s geographical position?
Besides, the most sophisticated genetic study of ancient Egyptians ever conducted in 2017 proved the continuity between both populations.
Fayum mummy portraits
Their skin colour varies
We observe highly similar haplogroup profiles between the three ancient groups (Fig. 3a), supported by low FST values (<0.05) and P values >0.1 for the continuity test. Modern Egyptians share this profile but in addition show a marked increase of African mtDNA lineages L0–L4 up to 20% (consistent with nuclear estimates of 80% non-African ancestry reported in Pagani et al.17). Genetic continuity between ancient and modern Egyptians cannot be ruled out by our formal test despite this sub-Saharan African influx, while continuity with modern Ethiopians17, who carry >60% African L lineages, is not supported.[2]
Analysis of mitochondrial genes belonging to 90 ancient Egyptian mummies and compared to samples from modern Egypt and Ethiopia
As you can see, the bars that illustrate the genetic composition of Egyptians throughout four historical periods are close to each other. Thus, the continuity between Egyptians of Pharaonic, Hellenic, Roman and Modern eras has been proven. If anything, modern northern Egyptians are more African than before.
But why do they identify as Arabs?
Because they speak Arabic..Being Arab is like being a Latin American or Slavic. Its more related to language and culture than genetics.
Lastly, Egyptians aren’t black and white, nobody identifies with their skin colour. I only used the term “black Egyptians” because I know how pervasive American mentality on this site.
In conclusion, black-skinned Egyptians never left Egypt which has always been a diverse country.
Most have varying degrees of Arab ancestry too, i.e., my cousin did an ancestry test and his results were largely Egyptian with substantial but slightly lesser Arabian heritage. I expect to have similar results.
Footnotes
[1] Egypt After the Pharaohs 332 BC-AD 642
[2] Ancient Egyptian mummy genomes suggest an increase of Sub-Saharan African ancestry in post-Roman periods – Nature Communications
