Ancient Egypt began in 3150 BC and ended in 31 BC along the Nile River in North Africa. The Pharaoh was the monarch and supreme military commander who divided Egypt into 42 administrative regions to govern the surplus crops produced by farming on the Nile. A notable artifact is the Rosetta Stone from 196 BC, discovered by the French in 1799, which was inscribed in two Egyptian languages and translated, helping scholars understand Egyptian hieroglyphics.