What Do You Call Someone From Egypt? (Answered!)

Someone from Egypt is called an Egyptian. Egyptians themselves, though, are one of multiple ethnic groups living in Egypt. While any citizen of the nation of Egypt may be called Egyptian, they may themselves prefer a different term depending on their ethnicity. There is also a sizeable Egyptian diaspora.

So, the short answer is that someone from Egypt is called an Egyptian.

Egypt is one of the most culturally and historically significant places in the world, and yet the modern nation-state is only a relatively recent invention.

For that reason, many groups living in Egypt today may not really consider themselves to be “Egyptian” except in a legal sense.

Let’s find out more.

In This Article

What are people from Egypt called?

The short answer is that someone from Egypt is called an Egyptian.

This is the term for a person of Egyptian nationality and citizenship, whatever else they may feel about their identity.

The real picture is a bit more complicated than this, but in the modern sense of a nation-state and citizenship, someone from Egypt is called an Egyptian.

Egypt is indeed largely dominated by a single ethnic group, who call themselves Egyptians.

They represent around 99% of the population.

This ethnic group have also gone by other names at different times, sometimes today called the Masryeen.

This is a modern Egyptian Arabic name meaning civilization, coming from the Semitic name for Egypt.

There are a couple of much smaller groups: the Bedouin people and the Berber people.

These represent less than 1% of the population, but nonetheless, they are still Egyptians in a legal sense, though perhaps not in an ethnic sense.

So, for your own purposes, it is most likely that the only word you’ll really need is Egyptian.

This is the way that most Egyptians identify today, and there is even a wider rejection of other identifiers such as the word “Arab”—although we’ll get to that later.

In any case, both ethnically and nationally speaking, most people in Egypt are simply called Egyptians.

Naturally, there are large migrant populations in Egpyt, too.

Lots of these in the modern day, unfortunately, are refugees—there are around 540,000 migrants in Egypt, the vast majority of which being from Palestine and Syria.

There is also a considerable population of Sudanese people.

While most of these feel themselves no doubt to be the nationality from which they originated, it is an interesting question when it comes to generational immigrants—do they become Egyptian, or stay the nationality of their parents?

Where does the name “Egypt” come from?

We get the name “Egypt” from Ancient Greek. Anglicized, the Greek name for Egypt was Aígyptos, deriving from the name Hikuptah.

This corresponded in turn with the Egyptian ha-ka-ptah, meaning “temple of the soul of Ptah”.

This was a particular deity associated with the city of Memphis, one of the most important cities in Ancient Egypt.

To the Egyptians, this name was strictly just one of the names used for the city of Memphis—the Greeks took it to mean the name of the whole country.

The Egyptians themselves called it something like Kemet in their own hieroglyphics, meaning “black land”, most probably in reference to the dark delta soil of the Nile valley.

Indeed, in Ancient Greek, Egypt and the river Nile were more or less synonymous.

The modern form of the word comes down to us through Old English and Middle French, where the Middle French Egypte derived in turn from the Latin form Aegyptus.

Are Egyptians Arabs or Africans?

Egyptian people largely live in Africa, and in that sense they are Africans.

However, they are also largely descended from Arab populations, and indeed the word Arab has been considered an accurate term to describe Egyptians in the past.

Some Egyptians today reject the label of Arab, though, and while that’s a complex internal debate, it’s worth being aware of.

In terms of genetics and ethnicity, the simple answer is that most ethnic Egyptians today are the descendants of an admixture between native African peoples and incoming Arab people.

Egypt has been ruled and dominated by both African and Arab peoples over the course of its long history.

It’s also worth considering how these two terms describe very different things—Arabs identify with one another on the basis of language, culture and history, but Africa is an incalculably larger ethnic melting pot. Being “African” could mean many more things than being “Arab”.

Where do Egyptians live?

As mentioned, another thing to keep in mind about Egyptians is that there is a huge Egyptian diaspora living outside of Egypt.

Of the roughly 120 million Egyptians living today, around 109 million live in Egypt.

The next largest population lives in Saudi Arabia, at just under 3 million.

There are between one and one and a half million Egyptians living in the United States, and a further million living in Libya.

All of this is to say that Egyptians may also feel themselves to be closer to the identity of a country to which they have migrated—while still being ethnically Egyptian.

So, Egypt is a fairly complex place with a lot going on in terms of local identity and ethnicity.

Again, the simple answer to the question is just that the word for a person from Egypt is Egyptian.

However, the real picture is not so clear-cut.

Many Egyptians might never use that word to describe themselves, while many may indeed feel more kin with it.

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Founder - @PollyWebster

Polly Webster is the founder of Foreign Lingo and a seasoned traveler with a decade of exploration under her belt.

Over the past 10 years, she has journeyed to numerous countries around the globe, immersing herself in diverse cultures, traditions, and languages.

Drawing from her rich experiences, Polly now writes insightful articles about travel, languages, traditions, and cultures, sharing her unique perspectives and invaluable tips with her readers.

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