A Nilometer that was probably constructed in the third century B.C., during the reign of Ptolemies, was uncovered by workmen who are building a water pumping station in the ancient Egyptian city of Thmuis.
Nilometer was a device used by the ancient Egyptian to calculate the water level of the Nile River during its annual flood, and therefore predict the success of the harvest and compute the tax rate for the year. Rising water from the river may have flowed through a channel or from the rising water table, into the nilometer's circular well, which was accessed by a staircase. One of the large limestone blocks in the nilometer debars a list of Greek names followed by numbers which suggests that these people may have contributed funds to build it. Archaeologists suspect that it was originally located within a temple complex. They would have thought of the Nile River as a god and the nilometer was this point of interface between the spiritual and the pragmatic.
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