Nitrian Desert

The Nitrian Desert stretches west of Egypt's Nile Delta, a land of sand, stone and salt-bearing depressions. In late antiquity its solitude drew Christian hermits seeking lives of prayer. Monastic communities grew at Nitria, Kellia and Scetis, the last in Wadi El Natrun. Although Nitria and Kellia were eventually abandoned, Scetis remained inhabited through the Middle Ages, preserving a tradition that began with the desert fathers of the fourth century.