![]() ![]() Modelling modern species’ ancient ranges can teach us a lot about how our ancestors’ ecosystems changed as a result of environmental change. Even a fanciful or imprecise ancient description can be highly informative. Our study shows how enlightening it can be when we combine ancient texts with modern technology. This implies that many more venomous snakes we only know from elsewhere might have been in Egypt at the time of the pharaohs. In the Nile valley and along the coast, for instance, farming and irrigation might have slowed the drying and allowed many species to persist into historical times. Drying of the climate and desertification had set in about 4,200 years ago, but perhaps not uniformly. Since the period we modelled, a lot has changed. Wildlife wonders of Britain and Ireland before the industrial revolution – my research reveals all the biodiversity we've lost Again, our models suggest that this species’ range would once have extended much further north. The puff adder ( Bitis arietans) would fit this description, but currently lives only south of Khartoum in Sudan and in northern Eritrea. Similarly, one entry of the Brooklyn Papyrus describes a snake “patterned like a quail” that “hisses like a goldsmith’s bellows”. For instance, boomslangs might have lived along the Red Sea coast in places that 4,000 years ago would have been part of Egypt. Others might have lived in the fertile, vegetated Nile valley or along the northern coast. Many could have occupied the southern and southeastern parts of the country as it then was – modern northern Sudan and the Red Sea coast. We found that nine of our ten species could probably once have lived in ancient Egypt. These include some of Africa’s most notorious venomous snakes such as the black mamba, puff adder and boomslang. We focused on ten species from the African tropics, the Maghreb region of north Africa and the Middle East that might match the papyrus’s descriptions. Our study shows the much more humid climates of early ancient Egypt would have supported many snakes that don’t live there today. It then produces a map showing all the places where that species might have been able to live in the past. Once the model has been taught to recognise places that are suitable today, we can add in maps of past climate conditions. Niche modelling reconstructs the conditions in which a species lives, and identifies parts of the planet that offer similar conditions. To find out, our masters student Elysha McBride used a statistical model called climate niche modelling to explore how the ranges of various African and Levantine (eastern Mediterranean) snakes have changed through time. Representation of Apep (Apophis) in Ancient Egyptian wall painting. This has led to much speculation among researchers as to which species are being described. Today, the area of ancient Egypt is home to far fewer species. The venomous snakes described in the Brooklyn Papyrus are diverse: 37 species are listed, of which the descriptions for 13 have been lost. ![]() Readers were also warned that this snake had not the usual two fangs but four, still a rare feature for a snake today. The bite of the “ great snake of Apophis” (a god who took the form of a snake), for example, was described as causing rapid death. For instance, the ancient Egyptian document called the Brooklyn Papyrus, dating back to around 660-330BC but likely a copy of a much older document, lists different kinds of snake known at the time, the effects of their bites, and their treatment.Īs well as the symptoms of the bite, the papyrus also describes the deity associated with the snake, or whose intervention might save the patient. They can provide some remarkable details, but identifying the species involved can still be hard. Like cave paintings, texts from early in recorded history often describe wild animals the writers knew. A much more diverse range of snakes than we’d imagined lived in the land of the pharaohs – which also explains why these Egyptian authors were so preoccupied with treating snakebites! ![]() How much can the written records of ancient civilisations tell us about the animals they lived alongside? Our latest research, based on the venomous snakes described in an ancient Egyptian papyrus, suggests more than you might think.
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