Like a giant snake, the Nile River slithers through some of the driest desert land on earth to create a narrow green valley. The ancient Greeks called this land Egypt. For more than five thousand years, famous and often mysterious civilizations thrived along the banks of the Nile. About 450BCE, a Greek historian named Herodotus called Egypt the “Gift of the Nile” because the Egyptian civilization depended on the resources of the great river.