Little Egypt, Illinois

County: Clay

State: Illinois

Little Egypt or Egypt is a name historically associated with the southernmost part of Illinois. The area has no sharply defined boundaries, but it includes at least the eleven southernmost counties and as many as the twenty-eight southernmost counties. The exact origin of the name is unknown, but it may lie in the nickname for the Mississippi River, which was known as the "American Nile" from at least the late eighteenth century.

Edward Callary, Place Names of Illinois (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2009), 106; George W. Smith, When Lincoln Came to Egypt (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2016), 3-4.