Canal of the Pharaohs
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The ancient Canal of the pharaohs linked the Nile to the Red Sea. It dates to the early Egyptian kingdoms period, was improved significantly by Rameses the Great (Rameses II), was uninterred by Cyrus the Great of Persia when sands swallowed up a great part of it, and was maintained and improved during Roman times.
Eventually it was again swallowed by the desert sands during the Early Middle Ages, but it had been an important trading asset for nearly two thousand years, well into the early Islamic period. Thereafter, the land routes to tranship camel caravans' goods were from Alexandria to ports on the Red Sea or the northern Byzantine silk route through the Caucasian Mountains transhipping on the Caspian Sea and thence to India.
The earliest canal linked the Nile to the Suez lakes and dated to ca. 1500 BC.
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