(, , "Esparto Valley") is a city in the Northern state of Sudan on the shores of Lake Nubia near the border with Egypt. It is the terminus of a rail line from Khartoum and the point where goods are transferred from rail to ferries going down the lake. As of 2007, the city had a population of 15,725. The city is located amidst numerous ancient Nubian antiquities and was the focus of much archaeological work by teams seeking to save artifacts from the flooding caused by the completion of the Aswan Dam. History Archaeological evidence indicates that settlement has been in the area since ancient times, and during the Middle Kingdom period, the Egyptian colony of Buhen across the river existed until the Roman period. The modern town of Wadi Halfa was founded in the 19th century, when it became a port on the Nile for steamers from Aswan, such as the Nubia. During the Turko-Egyptian conquest of 1820, Wadi Halfa was used as a stopping point for troops headed south. Communications developed in the latter half of the 19th century, with a telegraph line to Egypt connected in 1866 and ill-fated attempts to build a railway to Kerma in 1873 and 1877. The eventual establishment of the Sudanese rail head at Wadi Halfaconnected via steamer to the Egyptian network via a port just south of Asyutcaused the site to eclipse the former caravan site at Korosko. In 1885, Wadi Halfa entered a period of turmoil after falling under the Mahdist War regime. Conflicts frequently broke out on the border, and in 1889, Abd al-Rahman al-Mahdi's army entered the town on the way to the Battle of Tushki. Wadi Halfa was briefly the headquarters of the British-led Egyptian and British forces under Kitchener seeking to defeat the forces of Muhammad Ahmad, the Mahdi proclaimed by his disciples, from 1881 to 1885. The rail line up the Nile was originally begun in 1897 to support this military buildup; it extends, via Atbara, to El Obeid and beyond into southern and western Sudan. A river monitoring station functioned in Wadi Halfa between 1911 and 1931, to monitor changes associated with the Aswan reservoir, but from 1931 to 1962 it was moved to Kajnarty, 47 kilometres to the north of the town. A railroad hotel was built in the town during the 20th century, and during World War II, Wadi Halfa was