It's all relative,
...the Romans were a player in the Mediterranean from about 200BC to about 400 AD; and part of that time they had to share the lake with the Carthaginians, Greeks, and the Macedonians. To the Egyptians, that was just a blip. The Egyptians were invaded by the Hyksos and occupied for about 800 years until they finally managed to kick them out. They then just picked up where they had left off, their culture relatively intact.