We’ve all been there, right? Sipping your latte, minding your business, when-bam! Space-time rips open like cheap spandex, and your friendly neighborhood mad scientist hands you the keys to his Delorean-turned-time-machine.
Next thing you know, you’re catapulted into Ancient Egypt- where pyramids tower, pharaohs rule, and you’re about to become ancient history yourself. Forget sightseeing. This is a one-way ticket to “hope-you-survive-hour-one” territory.
Good luck, you’ll need it! And here’s why… Childhood Even though you’ve hurtled back millennia- long before you were a glint in the pizza delivery guy’s eye- let’s just assume you’ve landed as an adult. Why?
Because being a kid in Ancient Egypt wouldn’t help your life expectancy. Today, we have access to the medical technology required for any complications that may occur during pregnancy. Back in Ancient Egypt, a newborn’s best chance at life was praying the gods were feeling generous and not treating your arrival like a cosmic dice roll.
Infant mortality rates were high. Anywhere between 20% to half of all pregnancies would end in the child dying due to complications or diseases. Things wouldn’t look that much more optimistic for a baby that made it out of the womb either.
Many were left frail and malnourished, thanks to environmental factors like diseases and hunger from scarcity of food. What, you think travelling back to Ancient Egypt would land you right in the pharaoh’s palace? No chance, you’re starting at the bottom, at the lowest rungs of Egyptian civilization.
And for kids, this didn’t mean spending your days playing or even going to school – it meant work. Among peasant families, the role of a child was to assist their family, taking on chores or assisting with caring for siblings. And in some cases, for those who owned or lived on farm land, learning to help the family business.
It was a way of life, without it the family wouldn’t be able to survive. Still, at least you’d have a hot meal to look forward to at the end of the day, right? Oh, what’s that?
Kids in Ancient Egypt had never even heard of a hot meal. Food For children in Ancient Egypt, dinner was dependent on their family’s circumstances. Meals would consist of coarse bread, milk, and whatever fruits or vegetables the family could scavenge or grow.
Bread was the cornerstone of their diet, but it was dense, gritty, and often contained small stone fragments from the grinding process. Eating bread wasn’t just nourishment- it was a challenge. Worn-down teeth from grit were a common issue even in early life.
The main course could be something as simple as half an onion or a small handful of lentils. Luxuries like dates or figs were occasional treats but far from everyday staples for a peasant child. If a child was lucky, their father might bring home fish from the river, which could be roasted or dried for preservation.
Meat was nearly unheard of for children in peasant families. Livestock was too valuable, providing milk or helping with farming. Slaughtering an animal for food was reserved for exceptional circumstances.
Even eggs, while more sustainable, were a rare commodity. For children, this sparse diet had consequences. Malnutrition and stunted growth were common, and food insecurity shaped their entire lives.
Every meal, no matter how modest, was a small victory in the daily fight for survival… one gritty bite at a time. And this is largely why we’re going with the assumption that you weren’t reborn as a child in Ancient Egypt, and have instead travelled back there as a grown adult. Language & Social Norms Before we go any further, let’s consider a few important facts.
You’ve been plucked from the comfort of the modern day and dropped into an ancient era. An era where you have zero chance of speaking the language. Even if you’re fluent in modern Egyptian Arabic, don’t get your hopes up.
Ancient languages have shifted so much over the centuries, their dialects would be completely unrecognizable to a modern ear. Think Shakespearean English versus internet slang- but way, way worse. And don’t be fooled by all those Hollywood epics where everyone conveniently speaks English with a British accent.
That’s not happening here. But language barriers are only the beginningAncient Egypt is an alien world compared to the one you know. The customs, manners, and social rules of the time would be so drastically different from today’s norms- they’d make trying to blend in an impossible challenge.
Thousands of years of cultural evolution mean you wouldn’t just stick out- you’d practically scream time traveler. Even something as basic as a greeting or gesture could land you in trouble if it’s misunderstood- or worse, considered offensive. And while you might think you could wing it”and rely on observation, consider this… How well do you think someone from 4,000 years ago would adapt today if dropped in the middle of Times Square?
Exactly. In short, Ancient Egypt isn’t just another country or even another era- it’s another world. Now, let’s see where you’d fit into the structure of Ancient Egyptian society.
Social Status In Ancient Egypt, reigning supreme at the top of the social… triangle- no, no… pyramid- is the pharaoh. Part king, part god, and 100% the CEO of divine vibes. No, really.
The Pharoah isn’t just royalty- they’re basically the cosmic middle manager between us mere mortals and the all-powerful Egyptian Ennead. The pharaoh is divinely appointed, and surrounded by their most trusted advisors, scribes, courtiers and other high ranking officials, all highly skilled and educated. In other words, not you!
You’re somewhere all the way down here at the base, lower than the nobility, and even below the middle class of Ancient Egyptian society. That’s likely to be a pretty tough break for you. You’re not rubbing elbows with the nobility or even the middle class of Ancient Egyptian society.
No, you’re more likely to be mistaken for the lowest strata- a slave or forced laborer. So, chances are you’re looking at capture and being sold into slavery, likely headed for a labour job. Now, you might initially think you could tough this out.
But you forgot that a lot of labourers were physically abused by their owners, deemed to be property of their masters and had virtually no rights or protections. Ancient Egyptians even had a specific word for this, ‘Hem’, which was used to refer to enslaved persons as someone with diminished rights and were forcibly made to carry out a specific task. But you wouldn’t know this, remember?
You don’t speak the language. So it’s time to work up a sweat… but, do you really know the first thing about manual labour? Work Maybe you hold a manual job in the present day, but things were drastically different back in ancient times.
Even if you think you could handle the crack of a slaver driver’s whip—and let’s be honest, tough guy, that’s a big if- your troubles wouldn’t stop there. Unless you could rapidly figure out the specific techniques and methods required for the work, your fumbling and confusion wouldn’t go unnoticed. Add to that the fact that you likely wouldn’t be able to keep physically fit enough to continue working for very long.
Sure, you might last a while, but the sudden and dramatic change in your diet is going to have an impact. You’ve gone from having your pick of whatever you like in the modern day, to scraps of whatever meagre food you can get in your new time period. This is going to wreak havoc with your body.
It’s hard to get a consistent or healthy intake of calories when you’re right at the bottom. Of course, manual work doesn’t just mean moving heavy rocks to build grand monuments and palaces for the pharaoh. You might find yourself working on a farm!
Sounds great, right? The quiet life, out on the ranch… one question: do you know anything about farming? And do you know how to use the methods of farming that were commonplace thousands of years ago?
We’d guess not. There are no tractors, heavy machinery or any other modern innovations that exist to streamline the work of farm hands. It’s estimated that around ninety percent of Ancient Egyptian peasants worked on farms, which certainly made it a competitive market.
But competition’s great for… something, right? But as if potential rivalry with other local farmers wasn’t enough to contend with, there’s also the problem of your new worst enemy… the Nile river. For centuries, this iconic river provided a source of irrigation, transforming the areas around it into land suitable for agriculture.
However, while that might be a help for your farming endeavours, we wouldn’t recommend grabbing a cup and taking a big old swig of that Nile water. Worms. Yes, you heard that right.
WORMS! The Nile has long been infested with parasitic flat worms called Schistosoma worms, and that’s as much true today as it was back during the heyday of Ancient Egypt. Schistosoma worms infect and then grow inside river snails, but if you think that means you’ve got nothing to worry about – think again.
After these Schistosoma worms are done with their snail host, they emerge into the water, where they can live for around 48 hours while seeking a new home. If you were to wade into the Nile river, let’s say to gather water for your crops, and encountered one of these parasites, it would be able to burrow its way through your skin using enzymes. Once inside, a Schistosoma worm can then travel through your blood vessels, heading towards your intestines and urinary tract.
Once there, it becomes what’s called a ‘blood fluke’. You might think that latter word means getting lucky, but think again. If you’ve picked up one of these parasitic hitchhikers, you most certainly aren’t going to be having a good time.
A blood fluke will head towards your bladder, where it will lay eggs, causing acute inflammation of the bladder wall. The end result is Haematuria, better known as blood in your urine. Oh, and as if that wasn’t bad enough, other symptoms also include a high fever and some real nasty diarrhoea.
Many farmers and fisher men, along with hunters and even those harvesting papyrus reeds ended up getting infected with what’s known today as urinary schistosomiasis. Some Egyptian men were even referred to by the pharaonic term ‘Aaa’, which we’re assuming was a reference to the screams of horror they’d make when they discovered blood coming from… well, you know. There have also been ancient references to “men who menstruated” thanks to this condition.
Schistosoma eggs would eventually be then passed out of the body through the urine, and those that would make it into fresh water would hatch and look for a river snail to infect. But for a human infected with these unwanted parasitic passengers, there was little to be done about it. But that’s not the only disease you need to worry about… Other Diseases So, with the risk of parasitic infections, maybe a different type of labour job – one far from the river – would be better.
Luckily for you, but not really, the pharaoh’s got plenty of projects that need labourers, those temples, statues and pyramids! Sure, days of heavy lifting under the brutal heat of the sun is hardly anyone’s idea of a good time. And it’s going to be an even worse time if you get sick.
Infectious diseases were rife back in Ancient Egypt, affecting large swathes of the population. Some of the most common being smallpox, tuberculosis and malaria. Given the severity of these infections, and that your immune system almost certainly isn’t equipped to protect you against them.
You’d better hope that your fellow labourers practise social distancing the moment that they start coughing. Otherwise, contracting any one of these could well be a death sentence. While you’re moving sandstone blocks around, trying to avoid catching anything, you might think that the key to survival is climbing your way up that Ancient Egyptian social pyramid.
Sure, let’s say that you managed to win the pharaoh’s favour by getting… really good at moving blocks. But let’s say the pharaoh is just so impressed with… how well you move rocks, that they decide to promote you. War Turns out, your new job comes with a spear and a front-row seat to the carnage of the battlefield.
Congratulations, you’ve been drafted as a soldier, Ancient Egypt-style. Forget perks like job security or career advancement- your only ‘benefit’ is a faint hope of seeing tomorrow. War in Ancient Egypt wasn’t glamorous, and being a foot soldier meant you were disposable.
Armed with little more than a spear, a shield, and maybe a bit of leather armor if you were lucky, you’d be sent straight into the chaos of battle. Whether facing neighboring enemies or suppressing rebellions within Egypt’s borders, the job was always the same. You’ll be marching into danger and hope you come out alive.
And the odds aren’t in your favor. Most soldiers met a grizzly end on the sharp tip of an enemy spear, or were struck down by volleys of arrows raining from above. Battlefields were chaotic, loud, and bloody, with no room for hesitation or error.
And let’s be real- you don’t exactly have military training, do you? No drills, no tactics, just a prayer to gods you don’t even know how to worship properly. Somehow you make it through and the pharaoh decides to make you one of their personal servants.
You might think that’s your ticket to an easier life in your new home of Ancient Egypt. Retainer Sacrifice Well, you’re forgetting what happened to a pharaoh’s servants when the monarch died. They became a retainer sacrifice.
This was the ritual killing of human beings, often domestic servants to the pharaohs, made as an offering to the gods, presented regularly and at special occasions. While the Ancient Egyptians would have viewed this as a privilege, given their beliefs about continuing life after death, we’re willing to bet you aren’t down on being sacrificially murdered, whether it’s to be an offering for the gods, or worse, to keep working for your boss even after you’re dead. There have been some contrasting reports of the Ancient Egyptian practise of ritualistically murdering the servants of pharaohs and burying them alongside the remains of the deceased ruler in order to continue serving them in the after life.
Some archaeologists believe this to have been mythologised, while others claim that the practise of killing and burying servants was phased out in the later periods of Ancient Egyptian history. So, stuck on the lower rungs of the Ancient Egyptian hierarchy, it seems like any plans you had of climbing upwards aren’t going to pay off. Better hurry up and choose between which infectious disease or occupational hazard you’d rather succumb to down at your level of the social… Think you could survive in Ancient Egypt?
Let us know your plan. Drp it in the comments below. Now go find out Why You Wouldn’t Survive In Medieval Times or click on this video instead.
