The first known zoo appeared in Egypt before the pharaohs.

3500 BC

Around 3500 BC Hierakonpolis kept hippos, elephants, baboons, crocodiles and a leopard, whose burials were found in 2009.

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The event

• The menagerie of Hierakonpolisc. 3500 BC · Nekhen, Egypt. At Nekhen, one of Egypt's earliest capitals, archaeologists in 2009 found the burials of animals kept around 3500 BC: a leopard, crocodiles, hippos, elephants, baboons and cats. It is the oldest known menagerie, centuries before the first pharaohs.

35th century BC

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