The long-awaited opening of the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) on 1 November was a moment of pride for many Egyptians and a celebration of their ancient heritage broadcast on giant screens across Cairo’s squares.
Social media flooded with patriotic fervour as tens of thousands shared AI-generated selfies depicting themselves as Pharaohs. Yet, alongside the jubilation, a fierce controversy has flared up over the question of Egypt’s “true” identity. Debates have erupted about who can claim Egypt’s past and define its present.
For instance, when a Netflix docudrama portrayed the ancient Egyptian Queen Cleopatra VII as a black African, Egyptian experts and officials decried it as a distortion of Egypt’s history and “Egyptian identity.” Prominent archaeologist Zahi Hawass publicly blasted such ahistorical portrayals, emphatically asserting that Cleopatra “was not dark-skinned” and calling Afrocentric claims misguided falsehoods.
Egyptian lawyers even went so far as to demand $2 billion in compensation for the “distortion” of Egypt’s civilisational image.
This clash highlights how emotive and contested Egyptian identity remains in the public sphere. Some voices outside Egypt argue that modern Egyptians are not the sole heirs of the Pharaohs, positing alternative narratives of ancient Egypt’s heritage. Inside Egypt, however, many bristle at outsiders’ attempts to redefine their story, especially at a time when the nation is proudly showcasing a 7,000-year-old civilisation to the world.
The inauguration of the GEM has thus become a catalyst for soul-searching: is Egyptian identity defined by its Pharaonic glory, its Arab-Islamic culture, its African roots, or all of the above? Egyptians have grappled with such questions before. During the political tumult of the early 2010s, intellectuals like Tarek Osman observed that a “heated – and at times violent – debate about Egypt’s identity” lay at the heart of the crisis.
Then and now, the crux of the controversy is the same: who has the right to define what it means to be Egyptian?
Answering that question requires recognising that Egyptian identity is not a monolith to be defined by any single era or group. Egypt’s identity is famously multi-layered, built up over millennia of continuous civilisation and cultural blending. Scholars often describe the Egyptian personality as a synthesis of many layers: ancient Pharaonic, Graeco-Roman, Coptic (early Christian), Islamic, Arabic, Mediterranean, and African.
Few nations can claim such a rich palimpsest of identities. From the time of the Pharaohs through Greek and Roman rule, from the Christian Coptic era to the Arab-Islamic conquest and beyond, each chapter of history has added another layer to the Egyptian tapestry without erasing the previous ones. Modern Egypt is thus a unique fusion that is proudly rooted in both Africa and the Middle East and is the heir to both ancient Mediterranean civilisation and that of the Arab world.
Crucially, Egypt has a remarkable ability to assimilate influences and make them its own. History shows that conquerors and newcomers have often been absorbed into the fabric of Egypt. As one historian notes, Egyptian society has persisted by “turning the conquerors and the conquered into ‘Egyptians’,” thus creating a sense of continuity and cultural homogeneity despite successive periods of foreign rule.
The Greek-speaking Ptolemies, Roman governors, Arab settlers, and Ottoman Turks all became part of the Egyptian story – contributing to it but also adapting to long-standing local traditions. This longevity and absorption have imbued Egyptians with a strong sense of a continuous national character.
It is no surprise that officials at the GEM opening repeatedly invoked Egypt’s 7,000-year-old statehood. Prime Minister Mustafa Madbouli also hailed the new museum as a “gift from Egypt to the whole world from a country whose history goes back more than 7,000 years.” The implication is clear – modern Egyptians see themselves as the direct inheritors of an ancient nation, even as they acknowledge the many threads woven into that inheritance.
This mosaic-like identity has endowed Egyptians with enduring values and outlooks. One hallmark is openness and cosmopolitanism. Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, Egypt thrived by embracing diverse cultural influences, blending Islamic, Christian, Jewish, Arab, African, Mediterranean and European elements “into the basic cloth of the Nile.”
The result, as Osman notes, was a society that became notably progressive, tolerant and open. The Cairo and Alexandria of the 1930s to the 1950s were famed as cosmopolitan hubs where many ethnic and religious communities coexisted and contributed to a vibrant cultural life. This tradition of openness has made Egyptians generally receptive to engaging with the wider world, confident in their identity even as they absorb new ideas.
Another core value is coexistence. Egypt’s population today is predominantly Muslim with a significant Coptic Christian minority, and the two communities have lived side by side for centuries. The ethos of religious coexistence became a pillar of national stability in modern times, often encouraged symbolically by leaders, for example by having the Sheikh of Al-Azhar and the Coptic Pope appear together during pivotal national moments.
As Osman writes, Egypt’s “frames of reference” have always been plural, and never in modern history has one sectarian identity completely marginalised the others. Indeed, diversity and tolerance are intrinsic to Egypt’s social fabric – “intrinsically Egypt has many shades,” as the Egyptian geographer Gamal Hemdan has famously said.
That pluralism, deeply ingrained over more than 150 years in the modern period, ensures that no single ideology or faction can legitimately claim to be the sole voice of Egyptian identity. The national character has been defined by a capacity to accommodate differences – a value that continues to help Egypt navigate internal religious and cultural dynamics.
Egypt’s layered identity has also fostered a notable resilience. A country that has endured foreign invasions, colonialism, wars, and upheavals has learned to bend without breaking. Egyptians often point out that their nation “persevered through acute challenges – military defeats, economic calamities, and even internal turmoil – by maintaining a significant part of its traditional rich fabric.” In practise, that meant clinging to a shared sense of “Egyptianness” even when times were hard and drawing pride and strength from an illustrious heritage.
Whether under the Pharaohs or presidents, Egypt’s people have repeatedly reinvented themselves while holding onto core civilisational memories in a testament to cultural endurance. That resilience is evident today in Egyptians’ pride amid adversity: even in an era of economic struggles, the spectacle of the GEM’s opening was embraced by many as proof that Egypt still holds an important place on the global stage. Pride in an ancient civilisation becomes a source of hope and fortitude in the present.
Finally, the civilisational richness of Egypt’s identity is itself a value and one that imbues citizens with a sense of grandeur, possibility, and responsibility. As the new museum demonstrates, Egyptians feel a duty to honour and preserve their heritage, asserting ownership over their narrative. Calls to repatriate iconic artefacts like the Nefertiti bust and the Rosetta Stone from Europe have grown louder with this renewed cultural pride.
The message is that Egyptian identity, forged by one of the world’s oldest continuous civilisations, is something to be cherished and safeguarded. It also carries a spirit of humanism: for centuries, Egypt’s legacy – from the Pyramids to Al-Azhar University – has been shared with the world, contributing to global knowledge and culture. In that sense, Egyptians see their identity as not just a parochial matter but as a gift to humanity, much in the way that Madbouli described the GEM.
So, who should define Egyptian identity? Amid the recent debates, the answer emerging from Egypt’s story is that no single person, era, or outside group can lay exclusive claim to it. Egyptian identity is a long conversation across time – a dialogue between Pharaonic kings and Coptic saints, between Muslim scholars and modern secularists, between African roots and the Arabic tongue.
It has been shaped by all these forces and thus cannot be reduced to any one of them. Any attempt to rigidly define it will be challenged by another facet of Egypt’s history. In modern Egypt, like over the past century, identity is a collective inheritance and a shared sentiment. It resides in widely held traditions and memories rather than in the decree of any narrow group.
Ultimately, the only people eligible to define Egyptian identity are the Egyptians themselves – and even they speak in many voices. The strength of Egypt’s identity lies in its plurality. As one Egyptian expression puts it, “Masr Umm Al-Dunya” – Egypt is the mother of the world.
A mother of such stature contains multitudes. The question of identity, then, is not a matter of choosing one historical layer over another, or one ideology over others. It is about embracing the full tapestry and allowing space for all the “many shades” of Egypt to coexist. In the wake of the GEM’s opening, the wisest course may be to celebrate that tapestry.
Rather than let any single narrative – whether local or foreign – monopolise the definition of who is truly Egyptian, the nation can assert that its identity is big enough to encompass Pharaonic grandeur, Arab heritage, African roots, and more. That legacy of openness, coexistence, resilience and rich culture is the birthright of all Egyptians, and it is they – in all their diversity – who will continue to define what Egypt is.
The author is a senior adviser to the Grand Mufti of Egypt.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 13 November, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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