The Contribution of Trading Colonies Founded in Levant in Protodynastic and Early Dynastic Period (BC 3300-3000) to Egypt's Becoming a State

Abstract

This study is the fourth of an article series dedicated to colonization as a cause of cultural change. It discusses the effects of culture contact between lower (northern) and upper (southern) Egypt and the southern Levant during so- called Naqada expansion (widespread distribution of southern material culture at sites at the northern Egypt), and Egyptian colonization of the southern Levant assumed to be founded in the last quarter of the 4th millennium B.C. The ultimate objective of this study is to examine the relationship between long-distance trade, colonization and the state formation (state ideology, emergence of early elites, specialized craft production and political economy).