The start date of the campaign is approximately 1178 BCE, in the eighth Regnal year of Pharaoh Usermaatre Meryamun, aka Ramesses III, aka "Bringer of Ra's Order, Truth and Justice, Beloved of Amun, Born of Ra and Ruler of Heliopolis".
In a far off land, the city of Troy has just fallen to the Trojan Horse. Aeneas is on his way to found Rome.
It has been three years since the military campaign that succeeded in repulsing an invasion from Libya. The seat of government is moving to the fortified temple/administrative complex of Medinet Habu at Thebes, still under construction, though the nominal capital is still at Pi-Ramesses (House of Ramesses, the capital constructed by Ramesses II) in the eastern Nile Delta.
Egypt extends from deep into Nubia up along the Levant into Mesopotamia and the border with the Hittite empire in the north and the Assyrians to the east.
Magic is everywhere. Every village has its own patron deity, most towns have several or share the gods of the Nome (district). Many streams, hills, palm groves, marshes and even large rock outcroppings have an associated spirit.
The land has mostly recovered from the heresy of Akhenaten. The PCs, along with major priests and officials, are aware that Akhenaten was under the thrall of a band of mind flayers led by Smenkhkare. This secret has been kept from the general public. The mind flayer dominion over Egypt was broken by Tutankhamun, but remnants of the group escaped and made occasional attempts to regain control. Ramesses III believes his father Setnakht put a final end to the mind flayer incursion in the civil war that overthrew Tausret.
For simplicity, we will pretend Egypt has a market economy with coinage as usual for 5e. However, the actual economy in ancient Egypt was more complicated. There was no coinage. Nonetheless, there were standard exchange rates for some goods, e.g. 2 debens (2x91g = 180g) of copper was equivalent to one khar (sack holding 2 bushels) of grain.
The ancient egyptian measures were roughly
deben ~ 91g
kite ~ 9.1g
khar ~ 2 bushels
1 silver ~ 100 copper
1 gold ~ 2 silver
To avoid having to change D&D price lists, we will adopt the D&D convention that 1 gold = 10 silver = 100 copper.
Nominally the entire land of Egypt belongs to pharaoh. In practice, past pharaohs have granted land and goods to temples for their exclusive use in perpetuity. This has increased the taxation rate for everyone else, causing some discontent. Compounding the political problem, temples often form part of the tax collection system, running Nilometers and in some cases collecting the pharoah's portion (taxes).
For game purposes, Nubians are deemed to be from one of the elven races. However, Nubians are still human, so they differ from elves in the following ways:
Nubians need the same amount of sleep as other humans (i.e. no 4hr trance to regain spells and no short nights for a long rest)
Nubians have a similar lifespan to other humans (i.e. there are no PCs who have been around for hundreds of years and if there are ancient NPCs, they have prolonged their lives somehow through magical means).
This is a list of the most common languages spoken in the campaign, mapped to standard dndbeyond languages because I don't see a way to add homebrew language options.
Common - Egyptian (aka common or Kemetic). Most people the characters will meet speak this language
Sylvan - Nubian (aka sylvan). Many people throughout Kemet (Egypt) speak Nubian in addition to Kemetic.
Elven - Meroitic - spoken by the people of Kush, south of Egyptian controlled Nubia
Dwarvish - Numidian - spoken by the Libyan tribes and many in the desert oases. The name Numidian is an anachronism, since the Numidian kingdom came much later in time. In the time of the campaign, "Numidian" is a trade tongue shared by many of the tribal groups in North Africa, each of which also has its own language.
Leonin - Siwi - spoken by natives of Siwa oasis, though most also speak Numidian
Naush - Nesite- spoken by the Hittites far to the north (but south of Troy)
Minotaur - Minoan - spoken by traders from Crete and Greece
Gnomish - Phoenician - spoken by the maritime traders from the Levantine coast (though the region is currently part of the Hittite empire).
Halfling - Akkadian- spoken by the people of Babylon and nearby city-states, currently tributary to Egypt. Also spoken in the Assyrian empire, which is not subject to Egyptian control.
Giant - Elamite - spoken by the city-state of Elam and some of the surrounding city-states not conquered by Egypt. We'll use Elamite as the language for all the lands toward what would later become Persia, though historically that would not have been true.
In addition to the languages above, there is Heka, the True Tongue, spoken by the creator god Ptah and the root of all magic. This language is personified in the god Heka and is used in almost all spellcasting. The PCs speak and/or write only the few words they need to cast their spells. All gods, even those from foreign lands, speak more of the language. Their mastery of Heka is the root of much of their power.
Gods, spirits, elementals, demons, dragons etc speak the local language, plus whatever words of Heka they need to manifest their powers. There are no species languages such as "giant" or "draconic". Similarly, there are no "infernal" or "celestial" alignment languages.
The language spoken in the Duat (the Egyptian underworld through which the chariot of Ra passes each night on its journey to the east and the homeland of most demons) is Kemetic.
For the sake of amusement, we will treat parts of Virgil's Aeneid as historical. As the campaign opens, Aeneas and his followers are trying to build the city of Pergamea on the island of Crete, where there will shortly be an outbreak of plague. Carthage was founded some 20 years previous and is currently ruled by queen Dido.
Troy fell to the Minoans two years ago. Odysseus is currently a prisoner of the Titan Calypso on the island of Ogdia. He's not fated to escape to resume his voyage home for another five years.
Opet Festival (II Akhet–III Akhet), up to 27 days long by the end of Ramesses III's reign
Khoiak Festival (IV Akhet–I Peret);
Festival of the Two Goddesses (I Peret);
Festival of Lifting-Up the Sky (II Peret–III Peret);
Festival of Entering the Sky (III Peret–IV Peret);
Valley Festival (II Shemu).