In this lecture at the Yale Nile Initiative lecture series held at Yale University, Neal Spencer, Keeper in the Department of Egypt and Nubian antiquities, explores the intentions of the New Kingdom Egyptian state in creating riparian towns along the Nubian Nile, the realities of their distinctive trajectories, and the evidence for local agency, the role of the changing Nile within that time frame, and how inhabitants coped, or sought to cope, with these climatic changes.