Expert: Francesco Marchesani - 6/23/2009

Question
What was the race of the Ancient Egyptians in the early dynasties? I've heard that they were originally White and then   they mixed with Black and Asian foreigners.

Answer
Hello,
actually applying modern notions of race (white, black, asian) to ancient Egypt is anachronistic, and about skin colour, the ancient Egyptians were neither black nor white: they had a fair/olive skin color as opposed to the typical black of sub-saharian africans, but they were not white as we defined it today (i.e. European/Caucasian).
Moreover, the "Asian" foreigners we talk about are not today's asian in the common understand of the term (i.e. people of Chinese, Japanese etc. origin), but they were Semitic populations from the Middle East with racial features similar to today's Israelis and Arabs.