Egyptology News

New head of Supreme Council of Culture has much to address

2012-02-12T12:26:00.002Z

Saeed Tawfiq, a professor of aesthetics at Cairo University, was appointed the new secretary general of the Supreme Council of Culture on Thursday, after the resignation of Camellia Sobhy.

Sobhy, the first woman to head the council, resigned after two months for unknown reasons. Tawfiq was one of the candidates competing against Sobhy during the elections for the position.

As Tawfiq takes up his new role this week, he is faced with a number of issues at the council.

The Supreme Council of Culture Youth recently issued a statement condemning what they described as the “totalitarian management” of the council, and asking for real reforms. They have threatened to go on strike and hold a sit-in starting Tuesday 14 February.

Among their demands are more competitive salaries for employees and official contracts for staff who have worked on temporary contracts for years. These demands have been raised repeatedly since April 2011.

Emergency Red List of Egyptian Cultural Objects at Risk

2012-02-12T12:22:00.002Z

ICOM

The International Council of Museums (ICOM) announces the publication, at the National Museum of Egyptian Civilisation in Cairo (NMEC), on 6 February 2012 at 10 a.m., of a new Emergency Red List: the Emergency Red List of Egyptian Cultural Objects at Risk. ICOM Director General, Julien Anfruns, officially presented the Emergency Red List, on this occasion, in the presence of the Director of the NMEC, Dr Mohammed Abdel Fatah. Julien Anfruns had an official meeting after the presentation with the Minister of State for Antiquities, Pr Mohammed Ibrahim Ali.

Catastrophe in Cairo's historic Al-Muizz Street contained

2012-02-12T12:19:00.001Z

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

With two photographs.

Following six hours of being submerged in drainage water, Al-Muizz Street is back to normal and the distinguished Islamic monuments that line its edges are safe.

Yesterday, after the noon prayer, drainage water leaked into the street and almost inundated a large section where the 11th century Qalawun complex is located. The Qalawun complex consists of a mosque, a quranic school, a sabil (water fountain) and a mausoleum.

Mohsen Sayed, head of the Islamic Antiquities Department, told Ahram Online that the street was inundated in water as the main sewage tunnel of the street was blocked.

“This is not the antiquities' fault,” Sayed said, adding that according to the street’s development project, the Antiquities Department is paying an annual fee to operate a pumping machine that has been installed to prevent the leakage of water into the street and to pump it out if neccessary.

Missing Ancient Egyptian objects returned to Berlin

2012-02-12T12:15:00.002Z

Auction Central News

Dozens of mostly Egyptian objects from the 4th to 7th centuries AD which had been missing since the end of World War II have been unearthed and returned to a Berlin museum, officials said Monday.

The 44 pieces were identified as being part of the Bode Museum's collection of Byzantine art after being stored for decades in two boxes at Leipzig University's Egyptian Museum in eastern Germany.

They had been transported to the Soviet Union after World War II and were brought back to Germany in 1958 but got mixed up with objects from Leipzig and ended up there instead.

New archive space takes shape at EES

2012-02-12T12:09:00.002Z

Egypt Exploration Society

With some great photos.

For the last few months the new archive space in no. 4 Doughty Mews has slowly been taking shape. The room in question was formerly the kitchen of Professor Caminos who lived at no. 4 until his death in 1992, and was refurbished in readiness for the storage of archival material in the summer of 2011 (see ‘Refurbishment Commences’). Immediately prior to this the room had been used for the temporary storage of archival material for which no space could be found elsewhere on the premises, most problematically two series of historic photographs which had both been returned to the Society in 2007.

The first series, taken during the Society’s work at Tell El-Amarna in the 1920s and 30s had previously been kept in Cambridge where the current Amarna Project was based, but were transferred back to Doughty Mews when the project moved its base to Cairo. The photographs in the second group were taken at the temple of Sety I at Abydos in the 1920s, 30s and 70s (see ‘Amice Calverley, the EES, and the temple of Sety I at Abydos’) and had until recently been kept at the University of Oxford where the decoration in the temple is the subject of ongoing research.

Egypt security stop robbery at Cairo mosque

2012-02-12T11:55:00.002Z

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

Police patrolling Cairo's Citadel area discovered thieves trying to escape from the Al-Refaai mosque with boxes containing four large Islamic lamps.

Antiquities Minister Mohamed Ibrahim announced that officers from the Tourism and Antiquities police had caught the thieves red handed as they attempted to leave the mosque through the backyard.

The Al-Refaai mosque is located in the square adjacent to the Salaheddin citadel.

The mosque was constructed in two phases between 1869 and 1912. It was originally commissioned by Lady Khushiar Hanim, mother of the 19th century Khedive Ismail, to extend and replace the pre-existing mediaeval zawiya (small mosque) of Ahmed Al-Refaai. She founded the mosque in 1869, but construction was stopped in 1880. Construction resumed in 1905 and the mosque was finished in 1911.

Bikya Masr

Egypt security forces said it stopped an antique lamps robbery at the al-Refai mosque in the historic area of the Citadel on Thursday morning.

Minister of Antiquities Mohamed Ibrahim said security personal noticed three men carrying heavy bags and trying to flee the area and they stopped them.

They found several antique lamps from inside the mosque that the thieves unscrewed in their attempt to steal them and sell them for large amounts of money.

Security chased the thieves, forcing them to leave the lamps behind.

Work at Sharm el Sheik Museum progresses

2012-02-12T11:45:00.001Z

Luxor Times

With photos

Dr. Mohamed Ibrahim (Minister State of Antiquities) visited the site of undergoing establishing Sharm El Sheikh Museum to check the workflow.

Sharm El Sheikh Museum which is designed to occupy 52 acres on which buildings will be only on 14% of the total area and the rest will be green areas and open display area. The museum is planned to host 7000 objects covering the history of Egypt from Pharaonic ages to modern ages (Mohamed Ali family).

Interview with Archaeologists Syndicate head Fayza Haikal

2012-02-12T11:23:00.000Z

Egypt Independent

After years of rejection by the Mubarak regime on the grounds that Egyptian antiquities are an issue of “national sovereignty,” the first Egyptian Archaeologists Syndicate was launched last week; and Fayza Haikal, Egyptology professor at The American University in Cairo, was chosen as its head.

On this occasion, Al-Masry Al-Youm talks to Haikal about the challenges the nascent syndicate is facing, from charges of corruption and antiquity theft against government officials - both before and after the protests erupted - to improving the work conditions of archaeologists and objections to the way Haikal was appointed.

Texts in Translation #1: The Heart Scarab of Na-her-hu

2012-02-12T11:22:00.003Z

Egypt at the Manchester Museum (Campbell Price)

Campbell Price continues to do an excellent job of making Egyptian objects more accessible to the general public on the Manchester Museum blog.

With a photograph of the inscription on the scarab.

Visitors sometimes comment that they would like to have access to translations of the hieroglyphic texts that appear on some of our Egyptian and Sudanese objects. We aim to provide these as a digital resource to complement the new Ancient Worlds galleries, and I will post them here as time – and work – allows. On a recent visit to the Museum, a group called Forever Young expressed a particular liking for this text, so it seemed a good place to start.

This spell is of a type usually carved on the underside of amulets known as Heart Scarabs. This example dates to the later New Kingdom (c. 1320-1069 BC), and belonged to a scribe named Na-her-hu. This is a shortened version of Spell (or ‘Chapter’) 30B of the Book of the Dead: slightly different versions are sometimes included in papyrus copies of the Book.

Dig Diary: Malqata

2012-02-12T11:15:00.002Z

iMalqata

The Malqata excavation is now underway at Luxor, and a dig diary with plenty of photographs can be found at the above address.

Other tabs show information about the site, including its history. Here's a short expert:

While the tombs of the pharaohs from the pyramids of the Old Kingdom to the Valley of the Kings are familiar the world over, the settings in which the kings of ancient Egypt lived and ruled are comparatively little known. One of the two royal cities from Ancient Egyptian times is at Malqata in western Thebes. It was built by the 18th Dynasty pharaoh Amenhotep III, who reigned for thirty-eight or thirty-nine years from about 1390-1352 B.C. Located on the sandy edge of the cultivation at the southern end of the Theban necropolis, the site today is marked only by low mud brick ruins and the great mounds that border the huge harbor known as the Birket Habu, also built by Amenhotep III.

One of the most significant urban sites surviving from ancient Egypt, Malqata was established by Amenhotep III in the 30th year of his reign (about 1360 B.C.) when he celebrated his first heb-sed, a royal jubilee intended in part to rejuvinate the king. The great palace city was constructed to the south of the large funerary temple the king was building for himself. In all, Amenhotep celebrated three sed-festivals: in year 30, year 34, and year 37 of his reign. After his death , the palace city was largely abandonned.

Catalan archaeological mission returns to Egypt

2012-02-12T11:14:00.001Z

ANSAMed

One year after the uprising in Egypt, the mission of archaeologists and Egyptologists of the University of Barcelona, working in collaboration with the Catalan Egyptology Society, returns to Cairo to resume its excavation work in Oxirrinco. The news is reported by mission director and Egyptology professor Josep Padro, quoted by La Vanguardia.

The goal of the Spanish mission, entering its 20th year, is to ''continue excavating the remains of a large Greek-Roman temple which, because of its position and texts found on papyrus scrolls, could be the Serapeum, dedicated to the god Serapis'', Pardo explains.

Dig Diary: Proyecto Qubbet el-hawa

2012-02-12T11:05:00.001Z

Universidad de Jaen

If you speak Spanish there is a lot of great information on this site about Qubbet el-hawa in Aswan, including the dig diary at the above page.

The English/American icon goes to a page where they promise an English language summary in the near future.

Qalawun complex is re-opened for visitors

2012-02-12T10:52:00.002Z

Luxor Times

With photo.

After completion of the cleaning and disinfecting work required because of a sewage pipe in the site, Sultan Qalawun complex is re-opened. The complex located in Gamalia district of Islamic Cairo and consents of a mosque, school and hospital (dated to 1294 A.D).

According to Mohsen Said (Head of the Islamic and Coptic department) the buildings were not affected by the sewage problem.

New Book: Belzoni: The Giant Archaeologists Love to Hate

2012-02-12T10:39:00.003Z

Charlotte Observer (Alan Rauch)

Resting in apparent tranquility at uptown's Discovery Place are more than 40 mummies from around the world. Charlotte is one of only a few American destinations for this major exhibit, and the opportunity to see so diverse an array of mummies - human and animal, Egyptian and South American - is remarkable.

The fascination that we feel for mummies, relics of the past that seem eerily in the moment, is not hard to understand, and it's certainly not a new phenomenon. Now a timely coincidence brings a new book tracing our compulsion for Egyptian relics. Ivor Noël Hume's "Belzoni: The Giant Archaeologists Love to Hate" examines the emergence of the Egyptian craze in the early 19th century by looking at one of the main figures in that movement.

Hume, an archeologist himself, introduces us to Giovanni Belzoni, an Italian-born English citizen whose name became synonymous with Egyptian treasures.

New Book: Making Archaeology Happen

2012-02-12T10:37:00.003Z

Left Coast Press

This being Martin Carver (he of Sutton Hoo) it is probably a UK-centric book (I haven't read it yet) but it's an interesting, widely relevant topic.

Making Archaeology Happen: Design versus Dogma
Martin Carver (Author)
184 pp. / 6.00 x 9.00 / Sep, 2011

‘Archaeology is for people’ is the theme of this book. Split between the academic and commercial sectors, archaeological investigation is also deeply embedded in the needs of local communities, making it simultaneously an art, science and social science. Such a multi-disciplinary discipline needs special methods and creative freedom, not repetitive responses. Carver argues that commercial procedures and academic theory are both suffocating creativity in fieldwork. He’d like to see us bring much more diversity and technical ingenuity to every opportunity, and maintains this is more a matter of getting ourselves free of dogma than needing more time and money. This has many implications for the way archaeology is designed and procured – moving archaeologists up the professional ladder from builder to architect, with contracts based on quality of design, not the price.

Exhibition: To Live Forever

2012-02-12T10:03:00.001Z

omaha.com (Carol )

Over the next three months, visitors to Joslyn Art Museum can get a taste of its allure during the "To Live Forever: Egyptian Treasures From the Brooklyn Museum" exhibition, which opens Saturday.

Put together by Dr. Edward Bleiberg, curator of Egyptian, classical and ancient near Eastern art for the Brooklyn Museum, the exhibit spans thousands of years, from prehistoric times to the Roman era.

Bleiberg thinks it's Egypt's history that speaks to us. "This is one of the oldest documented places on earth," he said in a phone interview. "We can see the origins as far back as 7,000 years. It speaks to our fascination of where it all began."

Another draw is the civilization's mystery, said Toby Jurovics, Joslyn's chief curator and Holland curator of American Western Art. "It's still mysterious to us, which is something you don't have with Greece or Rome."

Exhibition: Picturing the Past at the OI

2012-02-12T10:01:00.002Z

Oriental Institute

February 7 - September 2, 2012, Oriental Institute, Chicago.

Download the Show Catalog in Adode Portable Document Format (pdf)

Picturing the Past presents paintings, architectural reconstructions, facsimiles, casts, models, photographs, and computer-aided reconstructions that show how the architecture, sites, and artifacts of the ancient Middle East have been documented. The show also examines how the publication of those images have shaped our perception of the ancient world, and how some of the more "imaginary" reconstructions have obscured our real understanding of the past. The exhibit also shows how features of the ancient Middle East have been presented in different ways for different audiences, in some cases transforming a highly academic image into a widely recognized icon of the past.

Among the topics covered are the Oriental Institute's contributions to the documentation of Egyptian monuments through the development of an epigraphic method. James Henry Breasted's notebooks of careful hand copies of hieroglyphic inscriptions and his own camera are shown alongside archival photos of the 1905 expedition to Nubia during which the epigraphic process was invented. The work of the current Epigraphic Survey is shown by a sequence of photos and collation sheets that illustrate the many steps that culminate in the final publication.

Exhibition: Pharaoh: King of Egypt at Leeds, UK

2012-02-12T10:00:00.001Z

AboutMyArea

Visitors to Leeds City Museum will be transported back to ancient Egypt from this weekend as a major new exhibition featuring over 130 stunning historic artefacts goes on display.

The touring exhibition entitled ‘Pharaoh: King of Egypt' which showcases objects from the British Museum collection opens on Saturday and runs until Sunday 17 June 2012 at the museum off Millennium Square with admission being free.

Developed by the British Museum in partnership with the Great North Museum, the exhibition explores the lives of the pharaohs and their role as head of state, chief priest and army commanders through objects and artefacts spanning over 3,000 years of history including stunning palace decorations, sculpture, jewellery and papyri.

Themes examined include the realities of ruling a complex society and dealing with issues such as international diplomacy, tomb-robbing, civil war and foreigners on the throne. Among the eye-catching objects on display is a wonderfully-preserved standing wooden tomb guardian representing the figure of Pharaoh Ramses I, who was hugely influential despite a short-lived rule from 1295-1294 BC.

Exhibition: Fascinating Mummies, Edinburgh UK

2012-02-12T09:52:00.003Z

STV (Catie Guitart)

The Fascinating Mummies exhibition runs from February 11 to May 27 at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh.

There's a nice slideshow of the exhibition aswell.

An exhibition guiding visitors through the complex rituals surrounding death and the afterlife in Ancient Egypt opens at the National Museum of Scotland.

Fascinating Mummies features hundreds of treasures from two of the world’s top Ancient Egypt collections, some dating back as far as 4000BC.

The exhibition, which opens on Saturday, boasts material from the Rijkesmuseum van Oudheden in Leiden, the Netherlands, as well as a selection from National Museum Scotland’s own collection.

Dr Gordon Rintoul, director of National Museums Scotland, said: “This is the first major Egyptian exhibition that has been in Edinburgh, indeed Scotland, in three decades. It is the only opportunity to see this wonderful material from the Rijkesmuseum, together with our own material that has previously been unseen.

“Both collections sprang from the same source in the early and mid 19th century of people who were intellectually enquiring and outward looking, and collected things from Egypt and took them back to their homeland.

Travel: Pyramids of northern Sudan

2012-02-12T09:50:00.002Z

Vancouver Sun (Jules Knox)

Aside from the odd camel driver lounging in the shade, nobody else is around at the pyramids and I am free to explore the world-class, UNESCO-listed heritage site on my own. The Meroë site was built as a royal cemetery for leaders of the Kushite Kingdom between about 300 BC to 300 AD. While experts believe that they can pronounce the Meroitic script correctly because of cross-references with Egyptian names, they still have not been able to translate and understand the language. This ancient culture has been able to successfully guard its mysteries for thousands of years.

I set up my tent on the outskirts of the pyramids and flop in the soft sand to marvel at the spectacular colours that only a desert sunset can provide. The setting among the dunes is sub-lime. As dusk slowly turns to night, the full moon and soft celestial light illuminate the silhouette of the pyramids in unbelievable artistic perfection. It hasn't been easy getting to Sudan, but there is no doubt left in my mind that it has been completely worth it.

Travel to Sudan definitely presents its challenges.

Pyramids spotted from ISS

2012-02-12T09:48:00.002Z

Nicole Stott Twitpic

NASA astronaut Nicle Stott has posted a photograph of the Giza pyramids as seen from space. You will probably need to click on the image to expand it on order to see them.

Photo for Today - The Ramesseum

2012-02-12T09:46:00.002Z

Oldest case of prostate cancer

2012-02-04T10:33:00.004Z

This story was reported by The Portugal News back in November 2011, but seems to have been picked up only recently by other media.

Bikya Masr

An international research team in Lisbon has diagnosed the oldest case of prostate cancer in ancient Egypt and the second oldest case in the world.

Using high-resolution computerized tomography (CT) scanners, the researchers identified the cancer in a mummy subject known as M1.

“Cancer is such a hot topic these days; experts are constantly trying to probe in hopes of answering the one question- when and how did the ailment really evolve?” said Salima Ikram; member of the research team and professor of Egyptology at The American University in Cairo (AUC).

“Findings such as these bring us one step closer to finding the cause of cancer, and, ultimately, the cure to a disease that has besieged mankind for so long.”

MSNBC

A professor from American University in Cairo says discovery of prostate cancer in a 2,200-year-old mummy indicates the disease was caused by genetics, not environment.

The genetics-environment question is key to understanding cancer.

AUC professor Salima Ikram, a member of the team that studied the mummy in Portugal for two years, said Sunday the mummy was of a man who died in his forties.

She said this was the second oldest known case of prostate cancer.

"Living conditions in ancient times were very different; there were no pollutants or modified foods, which leads us to believe that the disease is not necessarily only linked to industrial factors," she said.

The Medical Daily (Christine Hsu)

The mummy was that of an adult male with a height of five feet and five inches who lived between 285BC to 230 BC and died when he was between the ages of 51 to 60-years-old, according to researchers.

Images also showed that the mummified man suffered from lumbosacral osteoarthritis and that there were several post-mortem fractures that were probably produced when the mummy was shipped to Europe.

Digital X-ray scans revealed that the mummy had been buried with crossed arms, a common pose in Ptolemaic mummies, which in the New Kingdom was often associated with royals.

M1 was buried with a cartonnage mask and bib, and had a decoratively painted veil.

Prostate cancer develops in the prostate, a walnut-sized gland in the male reproductive system, and may spread to other pelvic regions like the lumbar spine, upper arm and leg bones, the ribs, and can ultimately spread to most of the skeleton. Problems with urinating, sexual intercourse or erectile dysfunction are all likely symptoms of the disease.

More from Amara West excavations

2012-02-04T10:09:00.002Z

If you are not already signed up to the Amara West blog I do sincerely recommend it - they still have a couple of weeks of the season left and update the blog regularly. Here are a sample of recent posts, all with lovely photographs.

British Museum -nice objects among archaeological puzzles

With, amongst others, a photograph of a gorgeous faience scarab base showing a beautifully etched image of the Pharaoh Menkheperra as a sphinx.

Every house in the town has so far contained a central room for domestic activity and often a separate room for making bread and grinding cereals.

Less common are fine faience artefacts, an example of which turned up this week – we recovered a small but very finely carved scarab which depicts a representation of the king as a sphinx, a classic symbol of pharaonic power, with the name Menkheperra before it. This was one of the names of Thutmose III (1479-1425 BC), popular on amulets and scarabs long after his death.

British Museum - The Town Site - half way through the season

With some really good photos

With three weeks digging left, it’s a good time to reflect on the key discoveries of the season so far in the town of Amara West. Though these have included objects, from the spectacular to the mundane, the combination of stratigraphy and architecture unearthed has allowed us to interpret the purpose of buildings – and one of our key challenges has been to work out which walls belong to which structures, and in what order they were built.

British Museum - Excavating the cemeteries

I’m currently excavating a grave (317) in Cemetery D. It extends east-west and is around 2.5 metres in length, with a rather small shaft (only about 90cm long) leading to a small burial chamber around 1.2m wide. There are no remnants of a superstructure, and the roof of the chamber has been removed by surface erosion, where a scatter of schist stones suggests the grave was looted in ancient times.

We unearthed skeletal remains and some faience and shell beads scattered in windblown sand in the burial chamber, but below this we found another skeleton, undisturbed and intact. Among the most interesting things about this burial are the plant remains found associated with it, which when studied will tell us more about how the bodies were treated for burial.

British Museum - More on the hieroglyph inscription

With photos

All this work is providing us with a better understanding of the settlement of Amara West, and helps us date and interpret the buildings, features and objects we encounter.

For example, Elisabeth’s drawings have helped confirm the reading of the royal name at the end of the eroded inscription on a sandstone doorjamb (F990) found exposed on the surface east of the town wall. The signs written in the cartouche were not readable until seen in a variety of different lights, but also with a torch during the dark hours of the early morning. We are now confident it bears the name of Ramesses II.

Saqqara Dig Diary

2012-02-04T09:56:00.003Z

Saqqara.nl

Week 31 January - 2 February 2012

There we are again in Cairo, after an absence of two years due to the revolution in Egypt which made work in 2011 impossible. Field director Maarten Raven and his deputy Christian Greco arrived on the 31st, and the next day visited the offices of the Ministry of Antiquities in order to sign the contract for a continuation of our work at Saqqara. We were helped very efficiently by the new head of the department of foreign missions, and spent the rest of the day in talks with Kim Duistermaat, the director of the Dutch-Flemish Institute in Cairo (always our base while we are staying in Cairo), and with the architect Nicholas Warner, who has been responsible for the overall consolidation of our site over the past ten years. Bit by bit we received the news of everything that has happened here during (and after) the revolution, a process that is still going on and will take many more years to come to a new balance. Not all news is pleasant, and Egypt has clearly become a different country.

AERA Giza Plateau blog

2012-02-04T09:46:00.005Z

Aeraweb

The AERA (Ancient Egypt Research Associates) blog for the 2012 Field Season has been running for some weeks at the Giza Plateau, with four posts to date. Here's the most recent of the posts:

With two photos.

Posted by Rabee Eissa, SCA archaeologist

One of the most interesting things that I noticed in my excavation, in what seems to be a storage building that dates to the Old Kingdom in Giza, is a concentration of ash. This ash surrounded circular mud brick silos that had been constructed beside each other forming an L. The ash itself was very dark, dense and soft. Thinking about the silos and the ash, I remembered my mother and her storage methods for the butter. She put the butter in a big aluminum jar and surrounded the jar with a layer of soft ash to prevent the ants from reaching the butter. My colleague Hussein Rekaby, an excavation supervisor, told me that the people in his village near Aswan still use the same idea in their construction of storage silos. They start by spreading ash horizontally, then they put clay to make the base of the silo before building the silo itself. Hanan Mahmoud, hearing Hussein’s story, told me that she exposed a layer of ash deposit under a sequence of round mud brick silos when she excavated House E to the East of Queen Khentkawes tomb at Giza. We follow some of our ancestors’ daily life behaviors and customs.

Diario Djehuty

2012-02-04T09:42:00.003Z

Diario Djehuty

The Djehuty dig diary is in full swing for those of you speak Spanish, or are prepared to use a translation engine. Daily posts in January and February are accompanied by lovely photos.

There's also a summary, in English, of the 2011 season:
www.excavacionegipto.com/campana/nota_prensa11_ing.jsp.htm

Suez Museum relates the city’s history through ages

2012-02-04T09:40:00.001Z

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

Following almost six years of construction the long-awaited Suez National Museum had its official inauguration while the city was marking one year of Egypt’s Revolution.

While some of Suez inhabitants were protesting before the Suez governorate building, there were others at the city’s national museum celebrating its official opening.

Stretching over 6,800 square metres on the bank of the Suez Canal stands the two-story pyramid shaped building of the Suez National museum, relating the story of the city throughout the ages.

In a gala opening on Sunday evening, Minister of State for Antiquities Mohamed Ibrahim officially inaugurated the museum. On display are 1500 artefacts from the prehistoric era to modern times.

Crocodile museum to open

2012-02-04T09:39:00.003Z

Ahram Online (Nevine El-aref)

Overlooking the Aswan Nile shore, neighbouring the ancient Egyptian temple of Kom Ombo, the first ever crocodile museum in Egypt is scheduled to be opened on Tuesday.

The museum, which is dedicated to the ancient Egyptian god Sobek, displays forty mummified crocodiles, ranging from two to five metres long, as well as crocodile foetuses and eggs. Also on show is a collection of wooden and granite crocodile statues and replicas of crocodile holes in rocks.

A visitor’s centre adorned with posters will screen a documentary before entrance to the museum, as an introduction to Sobek and crocodiles in Egypt.

Object Biography #2: A label of King Djer (Acc. no. 6763a)

2012-02-04T09:03:00.002Z

Manchester Museum (Campbell Price)

A really good piece, putting the label into its Abydos context. With photos and illustrations.

This small (1.8 x 1.9 cm) piece of incised bone doesn’t look like much, but it comes from one of Pharaonic Egypt’s most hallowed places. The Umm el-Qaab (Arabic for ‘Mother of Pots’) area of Abydos was the burial place of the first kings of Egypt. Abydos was sacred to later Egyptians as the cult centre of the Osiris, the god of the dead and of rebirth. Many hoped to make a pilgrimage to the site and those that did left offerings, evidenced by millions of pottery vessels – giving the area its modern Arabic name.

From as early as the Middle Kingdom (c. 2055-1650 BC), one of the early royal tombs was believed to be the actual burial place of Osiris.

New Book: Tutankhamen’s Curse

2012-02-04T08:53:00.002Z

The Bolton News ()

ANCIENT Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamen holds as much fascination for us as Madonna or Angelina Jolie, according to egyptologist Joyce Tyldesley.

The Bolton-based academic, who is regarded as a leading authority in the field, has just published her latest book on the famous pharaoh, Tutankhamen’s Curse, and is now starting work on a text about Nefertiti.

She said: “I’m interested in what makes people celebrities and why we are interested in them — people like Tutankhamen and Nefertiti were the celebrities of the ancient world.”

Dozens of conspiracy theories surround the death of the pharaoh, but Dr Tyldesley says she doubted that Tutankhamen was assassinated, as some believe. “It would have been an odd thing to do,” she said. “He had been on the throne for nearly 10 years when he died, and seemed to be doing a good job.

Exhibition / Interview: “From Nubia to Sudan”

2012-02-04T08:37:00.003Z

Greek Reporter (by Zdravka Mihaylova)

Interview with Alexandros Tsakos and Henriette Hafsaas-Tsakos. With photos.

Last October the Benaki Museum of Islamic Art inaugurated the photo exhibition ‘From Nubia to Sudan through the Eyes of the Greek-Norwegian Archaeological Mission’ (6 October 2011-19 February 2012). The photographs have been taken by Alexandros Tsakos and Henriette Hafsaas-Tsakos during the periods they were working as an archaeological team, traveling and living in Sudan. Their subjects concern the history of Sudan and its people, their religious cults, from the ancient and medieval civilizations of Nubia to modern Islamic Sudan.

Between 2003 and 2008, Alexandros has worked for the Merowe Dam Archaeological Salvage Project, at Jebel Barkal, and at Akad. He has organized the Greek Community of Khartoum Cultural Center “Ergamenis”. He has led the renovation of the Museum at Jebel Barkal, and was the contractor of UNESCO for the rehabilitation of the Permanent Exhibition of Medieval Antiquities in the Sudan National Museum. During 2007-2008 he worked extensively on the Medieval collection stored in the Sudan National Museum. He has published several articles on Medieval inscriptions from Nubia, the latest of which concerns the Christian inscriptions from the island of Sai.

Exhibition: Papyri, Mummies, Gold in Warsaw

2012-02-04T08:36:00.002Z

The Warsaw Voice

A bowl retrieved from a tomb in Thebes, scarabs and other treasures of ancient Egypt unearthed during archeological digs are on show at an exhibition at the Archeological Museum in Warsaw until the end of May.

The exhibition is entitled Papyri, Mummies, Gold… Michał Tyszkiewicz and the 150th Anniversary of Polish and Lithuanian Excavations in Egypt. Count Michał Tyszkiewicz was the first Polish explorer who focused on ancient Egypt. A century and a half ago, he found gold, papyri and mummies by the River Nile. A part of his collection was lost, while 125 of the most interesting artifacts that have survived can be now seen in Warsaw.

Tyszkiewicz’s excavations took place in Karnak, Western Thebes, the Esna area, Wadi es-Sebua (Nubia) and in Saqqara. Tyszkiewicz had astonishing success. His collection of around 800 items was added to the collection of the Louvre Museum and laid the foundations for Egyptian collections at several museums in Lithuania.

Recent photos of Luxor's Avenue of Sphinxes

2012-02-04T08:35:00.004Z

Luxor Times

Photos on the above page.

After our report of the state of the Sphinx Avenue and how it was used as a rubbish dump (Read Here) and the follow up in the last printed issue of Luxor Times (Here) and the latest announcements concerning the Avenue and the partial opening in March 2012 (More details Here), There was a slow work has been going on lately in one section of the avenue which the Minister State of Antiquities, Dr. Mohammed Ibrahim said it will be excavated and not included in the opening ceremony in March.

Ottoman Cairo's ghosts hold delightful secrets

2012-02-04T07:39:00.001Z

Al Ahram Weekly (Gamal Nkrumah)

Agnieszka Dobrowolska, a conservation architect, travels, often alone or in the company of her co-worker and architectural partner, her husband Jaroslaw Dobrowolski -- author of The Living Stones of Cairo -- to bring back intriguing tales of magnificent buildings that she often restores to a semblance of their original sublimity and resplendence. Together, they authored numerous works including Heliopolis: Rebirth of the City of the Sun.

The couple is off to Dongola, Sudan, later in February. Convivial and not averse to a witticism, with a light touch and a clear ear, she had spent at least 15 years in chronicling, conserving and restoring the architectural treasures of Egypt. As an architect, she never planned for a career in conservation. Ever since her Egyptian sojourn, her work and the rich architectural heritage of Egypt have moved in tandem with her life.

Moreover, she has a fine ear for conversation and a taste for the historical, and in particular constructions constituting or chronicling history.

Photo for Today - the Ramesseum

2012-02-04T07:26:00.001Z

The Ramesseum

Long lost temple from the Meroe period found

2012-01-29T19:55:00.001Z

Prague Monitor

Czech archaeologists have found a long lost temple from the Meroe period near the town of Vad Bon Naga in Sudan, Pavel Onderka, from Prague's Naprstek Museum of Asian, African and American Cultures, told journalists yesterday.

The large temple compound is situated 130 km northwards of Khartoum. European travellers saw the remains of the temple in the early 19th century but then the temple disappeared in the desert, said Onderka who leads the Czech archaeology expedition.

He said the Czech expedition revealed a signet ring with a picture of Nubian Lion god Apede-mak, a statuette of the originally Egyptian god Osiris, a stone with a Meroe hieroglyphs and parts of sandstone blocks.

Czech archaeologists have been working in the Vad Bon Naga locality for three seasons.

Red List Announced Covering At-Risk Egyptian Cultural Objects

2012-01-29T19:40:00.002Z

Cultural Heritage Lawyer (Rick St Hilaire)

The International Council of Museums (ICOM) today announced that it would soon release a Red List for Egypt. Red Lists describe various types of cultural objects that are considered to be at-risk. Such lists have been created for cultural objects from Afghanistan, Cambodia, Africa, and seven other places.

Regarding Egypt, ICOM's December-January e-newsletter states:

"Following several months of preparation, ICOM is delighted to announce the official launch of a new Red List in the coming weeks. The Emergency Red List of Egyptian Cultural Objects at Risk, the 11thpublication in ICOM’s Red List series and its third Emergency Red List, is one of the tangible outcomes of ICOM’s involvement in the protection of Egyptian cultural heritage, following the events that shook the country in the past year. The List was drafted in close collaboration with members of ICOM’s International Committee for Egyptology (CIPEG), national and international experts in Egyptian art and antiquities, and the Ministry of Antiquities of Egypt."

Search for Cleopatra to be resumed, although artefacts stolen during disturbances

2012-01-29T19:29:00.003Z

Dominican Today

Egypt’s new military authorities have reissued the license to Dominican archaeologist Kathleen Martinez to resume the excavations in the historic search for the tomb of Cleopatra, an investigation that has piqued the interest and obtained the support of the leaders of the United Arab Emirates.

Martinez made the announcement Friday, but also revealed the theft of many of the artifacts she had already unearthed and the “disappearance” of the excavation equipment during the year-long turmoil in Egypt.

Horemheb symposium on video

2012-01-29T18:57:00.001Z

You Tube
Symposium on Haremheb. General and King of Egypt.
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Introduced by Catherine H. Roehrig.

Many thanks to Dr Nick Reeves for this link. It shows a video version of a symposium about Horemheb. It's long! It lasts for over three hours, and is a great chance to see a series of lectures that you might not otherwise have had the opportunity to experience. I haven't had the chance to work my way through it yet but am very much looking forward to doing so.

First UK distance Diploma course to be offered by Manchester

2012-01-29T18:55:00.003Z

Great news from the grapevine. Apparently the proposal to run a distance learning Egyptology Diploma course out of Manchester University has passed with no objections at the Education Board and has received very positive feedback from the external assessor. Officially, the Diploma will have to be ratified by the university's Senate, but to all intents and purposes the Diploma will start recruiting soon, and will run from October 2012 so do keep an eye on the KNH website for registration information if you are interested in pursuing distance learning studies in Egyptology..

Book Review: The Pyramids of Ancient Egypt (in German)

2012-01-29T18:47:00.004Z

PalArch (Review by Christoffer Theis)

Dodson, A. 2003. The Pyramids of Ancient Egypt. – London, New Holland Publishers

Aidan Dodson verfolgt mit seinem Buch den Ansatz, eine Zusammenstellung aller Pyramiden in Ägypten zu bieten, ein „up-to-date listing of all known examples belonging to kings and queens “(S. 6, vgl. auch S. 7 & 13). Wie Dodson bereits auf S. 6 richtig feststellt, sind zwar einerseits sehr viele Bücher über Pyramiden erschienen, andererseits stellt es aber ein Desiderat dar, dass bisher kein Corpus alle Bauwerke in extenso behandelt.

Exhibition: The Oldest Modernist Paintings (Faiyum Portraits)

2012-01-29T18:45:00.002Z

Smithsonian Magazine

Between 1887 and 1889, the British archaeologist W.M. Flinders Petrie turned his attention to the Fayum, a sprawling oasis region 150 miles south of Alexandria. Excavating a vast cemetery from the first and second centuries A.D., when imperial Rome ruled Egypt, he found scores of exquisite portraits executed on wood panels by anonymous artists, each one associated with a mummified body. Petrie eventually uncovered 150.

The images seem to allow us to gaze directly into the ancient world. “The Fayum portraits have an almost disturbing lifelike quality and intensity,” says Euphrosyne Doxiadis, an artist who lives in Athens and Paris and is the author of The Mysterious Fayum Portraits. “The illusion, when standing in front of them, is that of coming face to face with someone one has to answer to—someone real.”

Recent articles and albums on Egyptological

2012-01-29T18:41:00.002Z

Edition 4 of the Magazine section of Egyptological is due out at the end of February. In our 'In Brief' and 'Photo Album' sections we publish pieces between editions. The following short articles and Photo Albums have been published on Egyptological over the last few weeks:

Articles

Lecture Review: Dr Elena Pischikova - Dancers, Donkeys, and Dirt: New Discoveries from the Time of the Black Pharaohs from South Asasif, Egypt. Review by Rebecca Kelly

Paneb - "The All Round Bad Guy"

Tomb KV64 in the Valley of the Kings - the Story as it Broke by Kate Phizackerley

Exhibition Spotlight: 'Before the Pyramids' at the Oriental Institute by Brian Alm

Photo Albums

Djanet (Tanis) by Francis Lankester

Tombs at Djanet (Tanis) by Francis Lankester

Serabit el-Khadim by Francis Lankester

The Tomb of Horemheb by Kate Gingell

Tomb of Maya at Saqqara by Kate Gingell (

Video: Scarabs in Ancient Egypt

2012-01-29T18:33:00.000Z

Egypt at the Manchester Museum blog (Campbell Price)

In preparation for the opening of our Ancient World Galleries, I spoke to our entomologist Dr. Dmitri Luganov about the habits of the scarab beetle and its significance in Ancient Egypt.

Just over 5 minutes in duration.

Photo for Today - Temple of Merenptah, Luxor

2012-01-29T16:26:00.002Z

Opening the coffin of KV64

2012-01-27T12:04:00.002Z

SF Video Portal

Video of the newly discovered tomb in the Valley of the Kings showing the opening of the 22nd Dynasty coffin. It is in German but there are some good shots even if you don't understand a word.

Thanks to Margaret Maitland's tweet on the subject for the link (@eloquentpeasant). And thanks to Barbara O'Neill for reminding me that Twitter does have a use!

Hieroglyph-inscribed lintel discovered at Amara West

2012-01-26T11:55:00.004Z

Amara West, British Museum blog (Mary Shepperson)

With photos.

House E13.6 at Amara West is a linear domestic house in the centre of the town. In its late phase, the house was entered from a narrow lane through two small rooms, leading to a large central room.

Excavation in the second of these small rooms revealed a cluster of large white sandstone blocks, lying under mudbrick rubble from a vaulted ceiling. They lay in a jumble in front of the doorway into the central room.

The largest stone slab lay on top of the smaller blocks and was cracked across its width near the centre. The profile of this slab showed that the underside was smooth with a raised edge down one long side; this was clearly a carefully worked stone face, suitable for carrying decoration or an inscription.

Les archives du chantier de la pyramide de Téti

2012-01-26T11:38:00.004Z

Pharaon Magazine

My thanks to Alice Gaylor for point out this link. It is an old link, but I didn't see it at the time and it is still very interesting.

Basically, a set of papyri from the Old Kingdom (probably the 6th Dynasty, during the reign of Teti). Badly damaged, the various pages have been studied over a 1o year period and some of the results have been revealed. The pages are from the office of royal architecture, responsible for the King's work and particularly his pyramid. There are several mentions of the transportation of stone blocks, limeston but above all granite. Several job titles are given. The funerary complex of Teti is cited several times which could mean that this is a log of everyday activity at the site. Finally, the papyri discuss several royal personages (queens and princes) hitherto unknown and whose graves could be located in the vicinity of the royal pyramid of Teti, yet to be discovered.

Ce jour à Paris, Philippe Collombert (qui dirige la mission française de Saqqarah Sud) a dévoilé les premiers résultats d'un travail mené depuis dix ans : un lot de papyrus tout chiffonné découvert par hasard dans une boite en carton dans une salle de l'institut français du Caire (IFAO).

Après de longs mois de travail pour dérouler les nombreux fragments, l'égyptologue a réussi, pour le moment, à constituer 17 plaques. Mais les papyrus sont très détruits mais M. Collombert peut tout de même fournir des éléments particulièrement intéressants.

La datation des papyrus et le lieu de la découverte
Ils datent sans doute du règne du roi Téti (6e dynastie) car le nom du roi est cité à de nombreuses reprises et pas seulement pour désigner son complexe funéraire (ce qui est important). Ils furent sans doute découvert par Lauer à la fin des années 1930 autour de la pyramide d'Ounas, zone sud.

Interview with Steven Cross re KV64 and research in the Valley of the Kings

2012-01-26T11:25:00.003Z

Em Hotep (Keith Payne)

Last week as news was breaking about the new tomb—KV64—Em Hotep received word from Stephen Cross, an Egyptologist and Geologist specializing in the Valley of the Kings, that he had photographed the tomb while conducting his own, unrelated research in the Valley. Naturally, Steve held onto this wonderful shot until after the University of Basel had made their announcement. Now that the whole world knows about KV64 and its lovely occupant, Steve has very kindly agreed to allow us to publish the photo, along with answer some questions about what is going on in the Valley of the Kings.

Inside: Current projects in the Valley of the Kings, Steve’s meeting with the new head of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, and a picture of KV64 you will not see anywhere else!

Who should save Egypt's archives?

2012-01-26T10:36:00.001Z

Al Jazeera (Hussein Omar)

It has sometimes been claimed that, like human rights and democracy, the protection of Egypt's cultural heritage cannot be left to the Egyptians. Corruption, poverty and ignorance, Egypt's critics maintain, pose a serious threat to the preservation of artefacts of "global importance".

Egypt's own Antiquities Council, of course, claims otherwise. Attempting to demonstrate its commitment to safeguarding "national heritage", erstwhile director Zahi Hawass waged a mildly successful international campaign to repatriate what "rightly belongs" to Egypt. In one case, a mummy returned from Atlanta, Georgia, was given a farcical state-funeral, serenaded by singing schoolchildren and marching military bagpipers.

Hawass, obsessed with ancient showpieces like the bust of Nefertiti and the Rosetta Stone, has long overlooked the theft of Egypt's non-ancient heritage. Ottoman deeds and Khedivial records that have mysteriously appeared in both private and public collections in the Gulf, for example, fell entirely outside the remit of his campaign.

Egyptians fed ibis birds for the afterlife

2012-01-26T10:20:00.004Z

New Scientist (Linda Geddes)

Ancient Egyptians paid special attention to the organs of their dead, embalming them so they would continue to function in the afterlife. Now it seems they did the same for sacrificed ibis birds, and even packed their stomachs with food so they wouldn't go hungry.

Ibis mummies are found in their millions at shrines in Egypt, where they were sacrificed to Thoth, the god of writing and wisdom. Andrew Wade at the University of Western Ontario in London, Canada, and his colleagues used a CT scanner to look inside two mummified adult ibises and one hatchling. This revealed that embalmers had removed their internal organs. The adult gizzards, complete with snail shells which may have come from the birds' last meals, were then replaced. The hatchling's body cavity had been stuffed with grain.

Vancouver Sun (Randy Boswell)

Analysis of a mummified, 2,500-year-old bird in the collection of a Canadian museum has led to a significant discovery about how ancient Egyptians viewed animals and their role in the afterlife.

Led by University of Western Ontario archeologist Andrew Wade, a team of experts from Canada, the U.S. and Egypt used computer imaging techniques to identify food stuffed into the beaks or bellies of sacred ibises — including a specimen from Montreal's Redpath Museum — before the creatures were sacrificed, mummified and placed as offerings to a god at prehistoric religious sites throughout the North African country.

The findings are the first to show mummified animals being treated with the same kind of reverence shown to humans, with ancient Egyptians apparently determined to ensure adequate food supplies for all living beings as they journeyed beyond death.

Paper discusses possibility of early Egyptian reference to Israel

2012-01-26T10:15:00.001Z

Bible History Daily

The Merneptah Stele has long been touted as the earliest extrabiblical reference to Israel.* The ancient Egyptian inscription dates to about 1205 B.C.E. and recounts the military conquests of the pharaoh Merneptah. Near the bottom of the hieroglyphic inscription, a people called “Israel” is said to have been wiped out by the conquering pharaoh. This has been used by some experts as evidence of the ethnogenesis of Israel around that time.

But a new publication by Egyptologists and Biblical scholars Manfred Görg, Peter van der Veen and Christoffer Theis suggests that there may be an even earlier reference to Israel in the Egyptian record. Manfred Görg discovered a broken statue pedestal containing hieroglyphic name-rings in the Egyptian Museum of Berlin and, after studying it with colleagues Peter van der Veen and Christoffer Theis, they suggest that one of the name-rings should be read as “Israel.”

A Condensed History of the Dakhleh Oasis – Part 1

2012-01-26T09:53:00.002Z

Mummy's Wrap

Often overlooked by the mainstream, the oases in the Western Desert of Egypt offer a unique view to the history of ancient Egypt. The history of the oases parallels the history of the Nile Valley, but there is a more rustic view. Of the oases, the Dakhleh Oasis, one of the furthest oases from the Nile Valley, shines as an archaeological star, presenting to the world an almost uninterrupted chronology of ancient Egypt stretching from the Predynastic period through modern times. This paper will touch upon each ancient Egyptian era until the Graeco-Roman period, bringing together a number of sources, but focusing mostly on the archaeological records supplied by the scientists working in Dakhleh.

Two teams of archaeologists currently work in Dakhleh. Monash University in Australia excavates at the sites of Deir Abu Metta, Muzawwaqa, Ismant el-Kharab or ancient Kellis, and Mut el-Kharab.[1] New York University (NYU) has recently taken over the American work in Dakhleh from Columbia University.[2] NYU is excavating the sites Amheida and Ain el-Gedida. The archaeological site records produced by both these institutions were invaluable to the following research.

Before it is possible to view a snapshot of ancient Egyptian history through the lens of the Dakhleh Oasis, the oases must be first examined from the perspective of the Nile Valley, albeit briefly.

New Book: Imaging the Cheops Pyramid Imaging the Cheops Pyramid

2012-01-26T09:29:00.003Z

Springer

Imaging the Cheops Pyramid
By H.D. Bui
Series: Solid Mechanics and Its Applications, Vol. 182
Springer

In this book Egyptian Archeology and Mathematics meet.
The author is an expert in theories and applications in Solid Mechanics and Inverse Problems, a former professor at Ecole Polytechnique and now works with Electricité de France on maintenance operations on nuclear power plants. In the Autumn of 1986, after the end of the operation on the King’s chamber conducted under the Technological and Scientific Sponsorship of EDF, to locate a cavity, he was called to solve a mathematical inverse problem, to find the unknown tomb of the King and the density structure of the whole pyramid based on measurements of microgravity made inside and outside of the pyramid.
This book recounts the various search operations on the pyramid of Cheops made at the request of the Egyptian and French authorities in 1986-1987. After the premature end of the Cheops operation in the Autumn of 1986, following the fiasco of unsuccessful drillings in the area suspected by both architects G. Dormion and J.P. Goidin and microgravity auscultation, EDF and CPGF (a geophysical company) teams continued their researches with measurements already made, trying this time an inversion of the Newton gravity equation for the entire pyramid and using another theoretical team led by the author.

Exhibition: Cleopatra in California

2012-01-26T08:59:00.004Z

Virtual Press Office

The west coast premiere of Cleopatra: The Search for the Last Queen of Egypt, featuring the largest collection of its kind ever assembled in the U.S., will open at the California Science Center May 23, 2012. More than 150 priceless Egyptian artifacts illuminating the life of Cleopatra VII, one of the most provocative and powerful women in history, will be on view including colossal statues, jewelry, coins and items from her sunken palace in Alexandria and other ancient sites that were significant during her life as queen.

Cleopatra: The Search for the Last Queen of Egypt immerses visitors in the experience of two present-day searches on land and sea for the elusive queen, which extend from the sands of Egypt to the depths of the Bay of Aboukir near Alexandria. The artifacts weigh in at about 30 tons in total, including two 16-foot granite statues of a Ptolemaic king and queen from the 4th – 3rd centuries B.C. .

Los Angeles Times

“Cleopatra” the movie is legendary in Los Angeles as the film starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton whose budget spun so far out of control that it nearly bankrupted 20th Century Fox in the early 1960s. Now comes Cleopatra the historical figure, starring in a touring museum exhibition that will arrive May 23 at the California Science Center in Exposition Park for a seven-month stay.

“Cleopatra: The Search for the Last Queen of Egypt,” will offer more than 150 artifacts, the biggest being 16-foot granite statues of two of the queen’s ancestors from the Ptolemaic dynasty that ruled from the 300s BC until the asp did its dirty work on Cleo in 30 BC, as Liz duly depicted on the big screen.

For those wanting to know how the real Cleopatra VII looked, the exhibition will offer gold coins with her profile (such as the one pictured). A New York Times reviewer deemed her features “less than sensuous” in critiquing the show’s 2010 premiere at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia.

Exhibition: Tutankhamun in Japan

2012-01-26T08:42:00.002Z

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

Tutankhamen reaches Japan for the first time in 46 years this week on the last leg of a ten stop tour that began in Switzerland in 2004 and passed through Germany, France, England and several US states.

Japan last fell under the spell of Tutankhamen in 1965 when parts of the priceless collection were exhibited in Tokyo. This time the exhibition will take place in the southern city of Osaka.

During the inauguration ceremony on Wednesday, Japan celebrated the arrival of the collection and the 150th anniversary of the first Samurai delegation to Egypt.

Minister of State for Antiquities Mohamed Ibrahim described the exhibition as an expression the amity between Egypt and Japan, and a message that Egypt is safe and open for business.

Egyptian frustration as tourists stay away

2012-01-26T08:34:00.001Z

The Guardian, UK (Jack Shenker)

At the main hall in Cairo's International Conference Centre, the organisers had pulled out all the stops. Suited waiters scurried about with canapés, pyramids of baked treats were stacked up on trestle tables, while dignitaries shook hands fervently in front of snapping cameras. For several hours the only thing missing was the guest of honour – though given the event's title, it was perhaps no surprise that Egypt's tourism minister felt little pressure to appear on time.

When Mounir Fakhry Abdel Nour did finally show up at this government-sponsored celebration of "last year's tourism achievements", his keynote speech offered little comfort to the industry figures who had gathered to discover just how bad the past 12 months had been – and what the fragile and protest-battered military government was planning to do about it. Since revolution erupted on 25 January 2011, Egypt's tourism sector – which had been generating more than £8bn a year and was believed to employ one in eight of the workforce – has been decimated.

The upshot, revealed Abdel Nour on Saturday, has been a £2.5bn decrease fall in tourism revenue alongside 32% fewer visitors, with the capital – which has played host to most of the street fighting in recent months – taking the brunt.

Lecture notes: Artefacts and Early Archaeologists in the Valley of Kings

2012-01-26T08:32:00.002Z

Luxor News blog (Jane Akshar)

Artefacts and Early Archaeologists in the Valley of Kings – Donald Ryan

Or what they left behind

There is a cycle in the Valley of Kings of burial (sometimes reburial) and robbery ancient and modern. There are mummy caches with dockets recording the movement from one safe place to another. There is one artefact that he feels sums up the whole valley which is of the remnants of the face piece where the wooden remains clearly show the marks of the adze that removed the gold.

The archaeologists of the past were interested in different things, gold and treasure mainly so often when they found a tomb they would describe it as having nothing of interest because it ‘only’ held mummies and pottery, consequently they left a lot behind in the tombs they excavated

Update on Hawass

2012-01-26T08:31:00.005Z

zahihawass.com

For anyone interested in the activities of Hawass, following his replacement, he has updated his website (see above link). The most interesting pieces of information that he imparts are that an artefact has been recently returned to the Egyptian Museum and that Hawass is currently writing a book about antiquities and the 2011 revolution, which is almost finished. He says that it will be published first in English and then in Arabic.

Photo for Today: Sarcophagus of Ankhnesneferibre

2012-01-26T08:28:00.003Z

Black schist sarcophagus of princess Ankhnesneferibre,
26th Dynasty Thebes
The sarcophagus was reused in the Roman period by
a Roman priest who changed some of the names in the cartouches.
British Museum. EA 32.

Scholars struggle to preserve Egypt's heritage

2012-01-20T15:58:00.002Z

The Chronicle (Ursula Lindsey)

When soldiers and protesters clashed in downtown Cairo in late December, the army's crackdown left at least 16 dead and hundreds injured. Another victim of the violence was the oldest scientific institute in Egypt, which was largely destroyed in a fire, along with much of its precious library.

The destruction of the historical archive of the Egyptian Scientific Institute caused an outcry. But while this is the most significant case of Egypt's historical heritage being damaged by the turbulence of the last year, it is hardly the only one. Since the uprising that ousted President Hosni Mubarak last February, antiquities and historical sites have faced a variety of new dangers.

"Threats to the heritage are diversifying," says Tamar Teneishvili, who oversees cultural programs in Egypt for the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization. "Who would have thought that the institute would burn that way? The situation is so unpredictable and volatile."

Egyptologists still digging up past, even with uncertain future

2012-01-20T15:47:00.001Z

Medill Reports Chicago (David B. Nelson)

The Egyptian Revolution that began a year ago continues to create instability in a country rich with antiquity. But most Egyptologists say it’s business as usual, even with the recent return of protestors to Tahrir Square in Cairo.

“The impact has been very minor,” said Emily Teeter, an Egyptologist and research associate at the Oriental Institute, a research center and archaeology museum at the University of Chicago. Teeter, also a representative to the Chicago chapter of the American Research Center in Egypt, was in Egypt as recently as last November. “The biggest disruption has been bureaucratic. Permissions were disrupted because committees weren’t meeting. Basically trying to do advanced planning was very hard,” she said.

Kathleen Scott, director of publications at the San Antonio chapter of the American Research Center, also reported only minor issues unrelated to safety.

“At first some expedition seasons were delayed or held off,” Scott said. “But for the most part our organization, which does a lot of the interface between expeditions and government, has found it to be going reasonably well.”

Heritage at what cost?

2012-01-20T15:45:00.002Z

Al Ahram Weekly (Nevine El Aref)

Almost two months since he took on Egypt's antiquities portfolio, Minister of State for Antiquities Mohamed Ibrahim tells Nevine El-Aref about his plans to develop and preserve Egypt's heritage -- including upping ticket prices for tourists

After months of decision, indecision and counter- decision, Egypt's antiquities and monuments have got their own ministry back. The Ministry of State for Antiquities has been resuscitated to join the National Rescue Government (NRG) led by Prime Minister Kamal El-Ganzouri.

Since the start of last year's January Revolution, several ancient monuments and artefacts exhibited in Egypt's museums, storehouses and archaeological sites have suffered from negligence or worse. The prevailing chaos led to a lack of security all over the country, and robberies were commonplace. Meanwhile, the official body, the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), then under the umbrella of the Ministry of Culture, swung between a Ministry of State for Antiquities (MSA) and an independent SCA body affiliated to the cabinet.

Finally, when the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) established the NRG two months ago, Egypt's antiquities regained its ministry as the MSA. Mohamed Ibrahim, chief of the Tourism Guiding English Department in the Faculty of Arts at Ain Shams University, was appointed to the post and became the second Minister of State for Antiquities, succeeding the better known archaeologist Zahi Hawass.

Ibrahim is no stranger to the SCA or the MSA's archaeological stratum.

Saving Egypt's fire-bombed books

2012-01-20T15:41:00.001Z

BBC News (Sarah Hashash)

Thousands of historical documents could be lost following a fire at the Institute of Egypt - which began during clashes in Tahrir Square last month - but an army of restoration workers is working day and night to save the country's written history.

The plain-clothes security guard in the dingy ground-floor office at Egypt's National Archives eyes my camera suspiciously.

On the desk in front of him lies a heavy black revolver. After a brief dispute with my guide and phone calls to his seniors, he reluctantly lets me in.

I am led into an adjoining room where, knee-deep in stacks of newspapers, men and women wearing face masks, rubber gloves and white lab coats are hard at work.

Mummy reunited with mask

2012-01-20T15:14:00.002Z

The Republic

The mummy Nefrina came face to face with her funeral mask Wednesday, as the likeness that had been buried with her — but was separated the past 82 years — was returned to her in the Reading Public Museum.

Museum Director John Graydon Smith thanked the University of Pennsylvania for lending the mask to the museum for the next year.

It was scheduled to go on display Thursday in the Nefrina Gallery.

"We are delighted," Smith said. "I really think it's going to show people, especially kids, what they were trying to accomplish in the mummification process.

"I don't know that we'll see a huge influx of visitors. From a responsibility perspective, this is the right thing to do."

The university bought the mummy, its coffin and the mask from an antiquities dealer in 1893. In 1930, it agreed to let the Reading museum borrow the mummy and coffin for display.

But it insisted on keeping the mask, even after the museum bought the mummy outright in 1949. The museum has been trying to borrow the mask since 1993.

Object Biography from Manchester Museum

2012-01-20T14:54:00.001Z

Manchester Museum Blog (Campbell Price)

Each month I hope to highlight an individual object that will feature in our new Ancient Worlds galleries. Many of the objects in the collection have incredible stories behind them but, due to an inevitable lack of space, these cannot be included fully in gallery labels or text panels. We aim to tell some of these stories – or “object biographies” – in digital content to accompany the new displays.

This small cup is only 6.75 cms in height but is made of eye-catching bright blue faience, or glazed composition ceramic. The hieroglyphs name Nesi-khonsu, wife of the Twenty-first Dynasty ruler Pinedjem II. She is given the title “first in charge of the musical troupe of Amun” (tA wrt-xnrt tp n imn) – a group of female musicians who entertained the deity in his temple at Karnak.

New Egyptian museum to cost LE5 billion

2012-01-20T14:42:00.001Z

Al Masry Al Youm

Egypt's Antiquities Minister Mohamed Ibrahim Ali has announced the start of the final phase of construction at the Grand Egyptian Museum, scheduled for inauguration in 2015. The new museum is being built on the Cairo-Alexandria Road, overlooking the Giza Pyramids

Speaking at a press conference on Tuesday, Ali said that representatives from Besix Group, the Belgian company that won the bid for the project, recently attended a ceremony for the start of the final phase, along with a number of foreign ambassadors.

Ali said that the overall cost of the project will be LE5 billion, adding that the Japanese government had provided a large part of the funding as a soft loan to be repaid within ten years of inauguration.

Egypt library czar calls for new archives law

2012-01-20T14:29:00.002Z

Ahram Online

In an interview this week with Egypt’s official Middle East News Agency, Zein Abdel-Hadi, recently appointed head of the Egyptian National Library and Archives, laid out an ambitious plan to revamp Egypt’s National Library, restructure the country’s library system, and push for a long-awaited archives law.

According to Abdel-Hadi, the challenges currently facing Egypt’s National Library are tremendous, the first of which has to do with the fact that library management reports to the Ministry of Culture at a time when the Bibliotheca Alexandrina is linked directly to the president’s office. In this context, Abdel-Hadi explained that the National Library’s total budget amounted to LE60 million while the Bibliotheca receives three times this amount.

While the National Library’s funds are hardly enough for wages and manuscript restoration projects, the Bibliotheca is able to conduct cultural activities beyond the scope of a normal library.

Rhind Mummy under the scanner

2012-01-20T13:55:00.001Z

Scotland on Sunday

SHE was spirited to Scotland by a forward-thinking Egyptologist who made an unusual decision not to unwrap the mummified remains of a young woman to find any “treasure” lying beneath.

Now, more than 150 years later, the secrets of what is under the black-tarred linen surrounding the “Rhind Mummy” has been revealed in a series of CT scans.

An Edinburgh University team of radiologists and forensic pathologists have identified the remains as those of a 2,000-year-old Egyptian woman, aged 25-29, with a plate of metal, probably solid gold, in the shape of a flying scarab, placed on her skull.

Another metal disc has also been found on her stomach, and she is clutching a rolled scroll in her right hand against her thigh. The scroll is likely to be a funerary text, combining directions for mummification with guidance for the afterlife, and it could give the mummy’s lineage or name.

New Book: Westcar on the Nile

2012-01-20T13:49:00.001Z

Reichert Verlag

On November 6, 1823, four Englishmen disembarked in the harbour of Alexandria. In the succeeding ten months, they traveled up the Nile as far as the Second Cataract and, in the course of their travels, witnessed the turmoils of a revolution against Mohamed Ali Pasha, the viceroy of Egypt. In this volume, Henry Westcar’s journal, which was written during this journey, is edited and annotated for the first time in its entirety. Additionally, the book offers a profound overview of the reign of Mohamed Ali Pasha and particularly the treatment of ancient monuments. The topic of the famous “Westcar Papyrus”, which owes its name to the author of the journal, is discussed in an excursus.

Demonology during the Late Pharaonic and Greco-Roman Periods

2012-01-20T13:46:00.003Z

Books and Journals

The Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions has an article focusing on Egypt, for those who are interested.

Volume 11, Issue 2, January 2011
ISSN: 1569-2116
E-ISSN: 1569-2124

Demonology during the Late Pharaonic and Greco-Roman Periods in Egypt
Rita Lucarelli
pp. 109–125 (17)

Travel: Cruising on a dahabiyya

2012-01-20T13:45:00.002Z

Daily Mail (Wendy Gomersall)

Fishermen in rowing boats just a few feet away from us slapped the river with big wooden bats to bring their prey to the surface. Farmers in long robes called galabeyas guided donkey carts loaded with sugar cane along the banks, and we counted the shiny black buffalo squatting in the shadows and pure white egrets standing in the shallows.

We waved back at passengers on the big cruise boats as they swept past, dwarfing our small but perfectly formed wooden vessel, and agreed that the Nile offers the best river cruise in the world.

Our boat with a difference was Amber, a dahabiyya. These wooden sailing boats were favoured 100 years ago – when Egypt-mania was new – by travellers who wanted to see the river, tombs and temples at a relaxed pace and in luxury, sharing the experience with a few like-minded passengers.

Hope for Libyan archaeology

2012-01-20T13:44:00.002Z

Past Horizons

With photos.

Libya boasts a rich cultural heritage; Palaeolithic rock paintings, Greek and Roman ruins and ancient desert oases. These historic treasures, including six UNESCO World Heritage sites, have suffered years of neglect and most recently the perils of conflict.

During the conflict in Libya there were allegations that pro-Qadhafi troops and missiles were being hidden in the ancient city of Leptis Magna and that Qadhafi was using it as an archaeological shield. With such explosive storage, the risk of damage was great, but the sites of Leptis Magna and Sabratha have survived the conflict unscathed. That is excellent news for the cultural heritage of Libya and the tourism industry that the nation hopes to resurrect.

Conflict is not the only threat to ancient artefacts. There is also the risk that a breakdown in law and order can give criminals the opportunity to steal items of great significance.

Why are so many edited volumes worthless?

2012-01-20T13:40:00.004Z

Publishing Archaeology (Michael E. Smith)

I think that "worthless" is harsh, but I have been wondering why, recently, so many edited volumes that really don't seem to live up to the potential of the individual contributors are now so popular.

Anyone who follows publishing in archaeology (and probably in academia in general) knows that there has been a great increase in the number of edited collections in the past decade or so. In my humble opinion, many—perhaps most—of these are close to worthless. I’ll spout off about this for a bit, and then provide some suggestions for graduate students and young professionals who are thinking of editing a collection of essays (since these tend to be the worst offenders in producing books of dubious value).

Why the profusion of edited volumes?

Photo for Today: The Papyrus of Nakht

2012-01-20T13:37:00.002Z

Papyrus of Nakht
Agriculture in the afterlife - The Field of Reeds
Late 18th Dynasty
British Museum
EA10471/13

University of Basel statement, in English

2012-01-18T09:45:00.003Z

University of Basel

Thanks to Val's comment on Egyptological for this link. Further to my previous post, the University of Basel have also posted an announcement in English, which repeats the details offered in the German version, but with a different photograph.

During the season of 2011, three edges of an unknown manmade feature appeared at 1.80m to the north of KV 40, on the 25th of January, the first day of the Egyptian revolution. Due to the situation, it was immediately covered with an iron door.

As this structure is so close to KV 40 and as it was impossible to know whether it was just a short unfinished shaft or a real tomb, we gave it the temporary number 40b. This number is now replaced by the final designation KV 64. The KV numbers should definitely be used exclusively for real tombs or deposits and not for possible cavities and yet unascertained structures.

This season, work was resumed on January 8th. With the permission of the Ministry of State of Antiquities we started to work on the unknown structure.

It soon turned out to be a rock-cut tomb of the 18th dynasty, 15th century BCE. In the shaft the upper edge of the door appeared at a depth of about 2.5m. The shaft measures approximately 1.10m by 1.60m. Its fill showed no evidence of being affected by flood water.

In the blocking of the entrance, two stages of use could be observed. Large stones in front and over the entrance belong to a secondary occupation. Of the primary phase dating to the 18th dynasty, some 0.50cm of the plaster seal of the entrance and a Nile silt flower pot with remnants of this plaster remain on the floor of the shaft.

See the above page for more.

University of Basel statement about KV64 discovery

2012-01-18T09:16:00.005Z

University of Basel

Many thanks to Daniel Arpagus for this link.

I don't speak any German so my interpretation of the following is based on Google Translate. The new pieces of information in here, as far as I can tell, are that the tomb has remained in tact since the 22nd Dynasty, preserving the original pattern of deposition, so items can be examined in situ. The mummy is intact, and the mummifed woman was around 1.55m tall. The remains of the grave goods from the original tomb owner (who still hasn't been identified), around 500 years before the 22nd Dynasty burial, remain below the surface of the debris at the moment, awaiting excavation. Google Translate couldn't translate "Einkammergrab" so if anyone could enlighten me I would be grateful!

There is a good photograph of the coffin, shown side on, with some of the hieroglyphs clearly visible. The coffin is accompanied by a small painted stela, but this is impossible to make out - it is easier to see in the photo that appeared on the Al Ahram page. The chamber in which the coffin lies appears to be very roughly hewn.

All terribly fascinating!

Forschende des Ägyptologischen Seminars der Universität Basel haben im ägyptischen Tal der Könige ein Grab gefunden, in dem im Abstand von etwa 500 Jahren zwei Begräbnisse stattfanden. Das rund 3500 Jahre alte Grab enthält einen Sarkophag mit der Mumie einer Frau und ist erst der zweite Fund im Tal der Könige seit der Entdeckung von Tutanchamuns Grabstätte 1922.

Bei der neu entdeckten Grabstätte mit der Bezeichnung KV 64 handelt es sich um ein über einen Schacht zugängliches Einkammergrab, in dem im Abstand von etwa 500 Jahren zwei Begräbnisse stattfanden. «Dieser Fund liefert wertvolle Informationen zu zwei unterschiedlichen Nutzungsphasen», so die Grabungsleiterin Elina Grothe-Paulin.

Im oberen Bereich des Grabes, das am 12. Januar 2012 geöffnet wurde, entdeckten die Forschenden einen beschrifteten, gut erhaltenen hölzernen Sarkophag, der die Mumie einer Frau namens Nehemes-Bastet enthält. Diese stammt wohl aus einer der einflussreichen Familien der Amun-Priesterschaft und führte den in Elitekreisen häufigen Priesterinnentitel einer Sängerin des Amun. Die Basler Ägyptologen datieren diesen Fund auf die Zeit der 22. Dynastie (9. Jahrhundert v. Chr.).

More re Nehmes Bastet

2012-01-17T08:14:00.004Z

BBC News

Nothing much new here, apart from the confirmation that an intact mummy was found within the coffin as predicted. A useful round-up.

Archaeologists working in Egypt have discovered the tomb of a female singer in the Valley of the Kings.

The tomb was found by a team from the University of Basel in Switzerland who came across it by chance.

The woman, Nehmes Bastet, was a temple singer during Egypt's 22nd Dynasty (approximately 945 - 712BC), according to an inscription in the tomb.

The coffin found in the tomb contains an intact mummy from almost 3,000 years ago.

Professor Susanne Bickel of the University of Basel told the BBC that the coffin was opened on Monday and she was able to see the "nicely wrapped" mummy of the woman who was buried in the tomb.

The opening of the coffin was carried out by Prof Bickel and her Basel colleague, field director Elina Paulin-Grothe, together with the Chief Inspector of Antiquities of Upper Egypt, Dr Mohammed el-Bialy and inspector Ali Reda.

Prof Bickel said that the upper edge of the tomb was found on the first day of Egypt's revolution, on 25 January 2011. The opening was sealed with an iron cover and the discovery was kept quiet.

Mansour Boraik

2012-01-17T06:26:00.001Z

I had an email asking me for details about Mansour Boraik and his role in Luxor. Readers of Jane Akshar's Luxor blog will be very familiar with him, of course, but for those wondering about his background, he is currently Director General of Antiquities in Luxor and there's a useful summary of his career to date on the CFEETK website, for those interested in finding out more.

More re the new tomb: A summary of the known facts to date

2012-01-15T21:25:00.004Z

Egyptological (Kate Phizackerley)

Kate Phizackerley has posted a summary of the known facts to date, within the context of existing knowledge about excavations in the Valley of the Kings

The tomb was announced in Luxor by Mansour Boraik in Luxor and Mohamed Ibrahim, Minister of State for Antiquities in Cairo on 15th January 2012. A pre-annoucement a few days earlier had indicated that something had been discovered and would be revealed shortly.

KV64 is not in the central valley of the Kings. It is not on the hillside near KV8. It is not in the Western Valley. All of these have been mentioned as locations for KV64 – and indeed there is a probability of further finds in each of these areas. This is not then the story of the hunt for Tomb KV64, a story I will tell in full at a later date. Despite all the efforts which have gone into finding new tombs, like KV63 the new tomb was found by accident. The University of Basel has a concession to clean, document and record a number of the poorly studied undecorated tombs in the Valley of the Kings. During routine ground clearance they stumbled on two new features. One is a new feature near tomb KV40, reported as either a trial and abandoned shaft or possibly as foundation deposit for KV40. Dubbed KV40b, the details have not been fully reported and it was scheduled for investigation during winter 2011/12, although it may now take second place to KV64.

See the above page for the full story.
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More re new VOK discovery

2012-01-15T18:03:00.002Z

Yahoo News

I was somewhat dubious that the location had been correctly identified in earlier rumours, because the Valley of the Kings was reserved for royalty and their immediate family and dependents - but in this article Mansour Boraiq confirms that the site is indeed in the Valley of the Kings, and the burial was of a non-royal woman.

The singer's name, Nehmes Bastet, means she was believed to be protected by the feline deity Bastet.

The tomb was found by accident, according to Elena Pauline-Grothe, field director for excavation at the Valley of the Kings with Switzerland's University of Basel.

"We were not looking for new tombs. It was close to another tomb that was discovered 100 years ago," Pauline-Grothe said.

Pauline-Grothe said the tomb was not originally built for the female singer, but was reused for her 400 years after the original one, based on artifacts found inside. Archaeologists do not know whom the tomb was originally intended for.

The coffin of the singer belonged to the daughter of a high priest during the 22nd Dynasty.

Archaeologists concluded from artifacts that she sang in Karnak Temple, one of the most famous and largest open-air sites from the Pharaonic era, according to evidence at the site.

See the above page for more.

It's official - tomb of Ni Hms Bastet discovered in the Valley of the Kings

2012-01-15T15:52:00.004Z

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

There's not yet much information but what little there is can be found on the above page (copied below):

A deep burial well was found during a routine cleaning carried out by a Swiss archaeological mission on the path leading to King Tuthmosis III’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings. The well leads to a burial chamber filled with a treasured collection of ancient Egyptian artefacts.

Mohamed Ibrahim, Minister of State for Antiquities, said that further inside the chamber, excavators stumbled upon a wooden sarcophagus painted black and decorated with hieroglyphic texts, and a wooden stelae engraved with the names and different titles of the deceased.

See the above page for more.

New tomb discovered in Luxor?

2012-01-15T14:18:00.002Z

There have been rumours floating around that a new tomb has been found on the Luxor West Bank. I have seen nothing official, but Jane Akshar seems fairly confident that there is something in it. In a short post on her Luxor News Blog she says that more details will be available this evening, but that at 22nd Dynasty (Libyan rule) tomb has been found by the University of Basel tomb belonging to the a daughter of a priest of Amun Ra, Nekhmet Bastet .

Illegal digging at Beheira

2012-01-15T14:00:00.000Z

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

Today the Delta city of Beheira woke to the roar of bulldozers and trucks digging 35 feddans of Al-Qalaya archaeological site. The Antiquities and Tourism Police went to the site and surrounded it in order to stop those digging the site.

An archaeological committee led by Mohsen Sayed, head of the Islamic and Coptic Antiquities Department, headed towards the site in order to inspect the damaged done. Until now those conducting the illegal dig refused to move off the site.

Amarna: End-of-2011 report

2012-01-15T13:49:00.002Z

Another excellent report from Professor Barry Kemp from Amarna, providing an end of season report:

The fieldwork at Amarna for 2011 finally ended on December 28th. At the larger of the two exposures, the Lower Site, the 5-m wide trench that had begun to cross the floor of the wadi was further extended to the far side.

Across the full length the top layer of sand and gravel was removed, to the depth where the outline of grave pits became visible. Time did not allow for the excavation of the graves themselves in this new extension; they were protected with cloth and backfilled. The exposure of the tops of the graves - in effect the delineation of the plan of the cemetery in this part - revealed an unexpected anomaly. For part of the distance across the wadi floor (a stretch of 15 m) the graves stopped, only to reappear in the most distant squares that were past the mid-point. In part, this might be due to the burials having been washed away during the flood/s that created the channel, but this is unlikely to account entirely for their absence. It may be that these squares span some kind of thoroughfare or access route through the cemetery.

The surface of the Wadi Mouth Site is more broken by erosion channels, making excavation and the identification of graves less straightforward.

Excavation was limited to a block of four new 5-m squares. These confirmed that, despite the more difficult terrain, the conditions of preservation are actually the best so far encountered anywhere at the cemetery.

Parts of at least 40 skeletons were recovered this season, 26 from the Lower Site and 14 from the Wadi Mouth Site. They range in age from infants to adults. With one or two possible exceptions, there were no multiple burials this year: all were interred singularly. An additional 14 likely grave pits were identified, all but two at the Lower Site, which await excavation in a future season.

In the last week of excavation, a second decorated coffin was discovered at the Wadi Mouth Site. As there were no conservators on staff at this time, it was decided to leave the coffin in place, covered with textile and sand, until it can be properly consolidated and lifted in a future season. Only the very upper part of the two ends have been exposed, but the coffin seems to be a simple rectangular box measuring around 1 x 0.2 m, with painted surfaces (linear black decoration has been observed on the small parts exposed). In keeping with the good preservation of human remains at the Wadi Mouth Site, the wood also seems to be in much better condition than other coffins encountered so far at the cemetery, which now number 20, including this year's discoveries.

Other finds were very few. They include two pieces of folded gold sheet found mixed in with the disturbed bone of Individual 232, but probably found elsewhere and dropped into this grave by the robbers; a copper-alloy ring found on the second toe of the right foot of Individual 230; a copper-alloy ring found on the fourth finger (the 'ring finger') of the left hand of Individual 229, the bezel inscribed with a probable image of Re-Horakhty.

The tally of small finds from the cemetery has been modest from the outset of the work. This is not only a result of ancient robbery since undisturbed graves often also contain no grave goods. Even so, the rarity of finds this year has been particularly marked, in that no worked stone grave markers (stelae or pyramidions) were found at all. We have, from the beginning, noted that the extent of the cemetery along the sides of the wadi is revealed by a fairly close scatter of rough stones, often grey in colour, which are the remains of piles or cairns of stones that marked the positions of individual burials. On the floor of the wadi they scarcely appear, and few were found in the trench on the wadi floor. The likely explanation is that, after the cemetery had been abandoned (and after the phase of grave robbing), a torrential flood swept down the wadi and carried away the top surface including the stones. In January of this year, three days of heavy rain fell at Amarna, and short-lived streams formed in some of the wadis, including the large one that leads to the royal tombs. The South Tombs Cemetery wadi, however, absorbed the rainfall entirely, and no pools formed. It must have been a deluge of extraordinary magnitude to have created a flowing torrent with sufficient force to sweep the wadi floor clear of stones.

We know, from initial surveys, that human bones are scattered across the desert plain for some considerable distance in front of the wadi mouth. The contour map (see attached file) has picked up a slight swelling of the desert surface here, that probably marks the presence of a slight outwash fan or delta formed from debris washed out from the wadi and now covered by wind-blown sand. Somewhere in this formation there is likely to lie, shallowly buried, the stones, worked as well as unworked, together with small artefacts. This is another direction in which to pursue future investigations.

It is a relief to have reached the end of the year with the greater part of the intended work now accomplished. A period of writing-up will now follow, with fieldwork scheduled to begin at the end of March. This will see the start of a new project: the reclaiming of the Great Aten Temple, no less, a part of the Central City threatened by neglect and also by encroachment from the adjacent modern village cemetery.

The first step will be to clean and expose what remains of the mud-brick enclosure wall at the front, which, according to the Pendlebury plan of 1932, includes a wide entrance flanked by pylons, currently invisible beneath old spoil heaps. Once exposed and recorded afresh, it should be consolidated with new bricks so that it becomes a clearly visible boundary to the site. The two accompanying maps summarize this part of the plan.

It is a substantial piece of work that will considerably stretch our resources, the largest element in the budget being the employment of local workers and craftsmen and the purchase of local materials. Once more I appeal to the generosity of our supporters to help us, and offer my thanks in advance.

Barry Kemp 7 January 2012.

----------

The work at Amarna is supported directly by two institutions: in the UK by the Amarna Trust, and in the USA by the Amarna Research Foundation. In both cases, donations are tax deductible.

Amarna Trust:
Donations can be made directly to the treasurer:
Dr Alison L. Gascoigne
Lecturer in Medieval Archaeology
University of Southampton
Avenue Campus
Highfield
Southampton
SO17 1BF
+44 (0)2380 599636

or to the Trust's bank account:
Bank: Nat West
Address: High Wycombe branch, 33 High Street, High Wycombe, Bucks,
HP11 2AJ
Account name: The Amarna Trust
Account number: 15626229
Branch sort code: 60-11-01
BIC: NWBK GB 2L
IBAN: GB66 NWBK 6011 0115 6262 29

or by electronic transfer through Paypal or Justgiving, available on the website www.amarnatrust.com (where a Gift Aid form is downloadable)

The Trust sends out a free newsletter twice a year, Horizon, to anyone who sends me a postal address. It is also available as a downloadable pdf file from our two web sites.

Amarna Research Foundation
The Amarna Research Foundation, Inc. is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization incorporated under the laws of the State of Colorado. It has been approved by the Internal Revenue Service as a charitable organization, and contributions to the Foundation are tax exempt.
The Foundation receives donations and runs a membership list. See www.museum-tours.com/amarna/ where a membership form can be downloaded.
The Foundation publishes a regular newsletter, The Akhetaten Sun, available to members.

Reading Public Museum's mummy reunited with mask

2012-01-15T13:26:00.002Z

bctv.org

After 82 years, the Reading Public Museum's resident 2,300 year-old mummy, Nefrina, will come face-to-face with her funerary mask when it is on public display in The Museum's Ancient Civilizations Gallery beginning January 19.

The cartonnage mask, made of a mixture of linen, plaster, papyrus, other pliable materials and covered in gold leaf, is on loan from the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archeology and Anthropology where it has been stored since 1893.

It will be on temporary display (through January 2013) as part of The Museum's Nefrina's World focus exhibition — also containing Nefrina's mummy, coffin, coffin lid, insights into the world in which she lived and a forensic facial reconstruction by artist Frank Bender (unveiled at the museum in 2010).

Tutankhamun in Japan on final leg of journey

2012-01-15T12:41:00.001Z

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

On the final leg of a 10-year-long world tour, “Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs” exhibition will officially open at the Tampozan Special Gallery in the Japanese city of Osaka.

Egyptian Minister of State for Antiquities Mohamed Ibrahim will travel to Osaka tomorrow to lead Egypt’s official delegation at the opening on Wednesday.

Restoring the pyramid of Djoser

2012-01-15T12:28:00.001Z

Wales Online

DEEP in the world’s oldest pyramid, real-life Indiana Jones Peter James faced the prospect of thousands of tons of rock crushing him at any time.

The former Royal Navy lieutenant-commander – dubbed Indiana James by his team – was at the bottom of a 29-metre shaft where he was fighting to save the 4,700-year-old structure.

It was not a job for people who don’t like being boxed in.

The 68-year-old said: “If you went there in the dark and did not know what you were doing you would just fall down the shaft and splat at the bottom.

“And there must be a thousand metres of tunnels underneath.”

In the eight metre square room he and his four man team sat with the stone sarcophagus of Pharaoh Tjoser – built to house the remains of the ancient ruler.

The only way to reach the sarcophagus is to descend a specially built scaffold tower.

All the way down the surrounding walls are dotted entrances to mysterious tunnels.

One leads from one side of the pyramid to the other.

Archaeologists will forego national day this year

2012-01-15T12:03:00.002Z

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

This year archaeologists will forego celebrating Archaeologists Day as it coincides with the anniversary of the January 2011 revolution.

Mohamed Ibrahim, minister of state for antiquities, decided to cancel the celebration ceremony this year for the sake of the feelings of the families of the revolution's martyrs. Ibrahim also called on archaeologists to work hard to protect Egypt’s heritage.

Online: The Advantage of Cultural Periphery

2012-01-15T11:55:00.000Z

tau.ac.il

The Advantage of Cultural Periphery: The Invention of the Alphabet in Sinai (Circa 1840 B.C.E ), pp. 255-321. In Rakefet Sela-Sheffy and Gideon Toury (eds). Cultural Contacts and the Making of the Cultures: Papers in homage to Itamar Even-Zohar (Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv University, 2011).

Almost all scholars who have studied the birth and development of the Canaanite alphabet – the ancestor of all modern alphabets – think that the Egyptian script played a major role in this great intellectual leap. However, they differ in their reconstructions as to where the invention originated (Canaan, Egypt, or Sinai), the Egyptian source used as the basis of the invention (hieroglyphs, cursive hieroglyphs, hieratic), and the exact role of the source in the actual process of invention.

Book Review: Ideologies in Archaeology

2012-01-15T11:51:00.002Z

About.com (Review by K. Kris Hirst)

Bernbeck R, and McGuire RH, editors. 2011. Ideologies in Archaeology. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. 311 p. in 14 chapters; 99 additional pages of bibliography, contributor biographies and an index. ISBN 978-0-8165-2673-4 (alkaline paper)

Ideologies in Archaeology is an incredibly important book, if you want to understand the inherent but understated inner struggle that is part and parcel of studying and writing about the past. The book is an edited collection of articles which describe aspects of a philosophy of archaeology that has been bubbling among some scholars for some time now: arguably since V.G. Childe's day of the 1920s and 30s, when Marxism, with its condemnation of how states control and manipulate the lives of ordinary people first became part of academic discourse.

Overall, Ideologies in Archaeology attacks the notion in two main branches.

Lecture Notes: The Life Cycle of a Theban tomb

2012-01-15T11:46:00.001Z

Luxor News Blog (Jane Akshar)

Thanks again to Jane for providing another write-up of the latest Mummification Museum lecture.

The Life Cycle of a Theban tomb – A view from the tomb of Panehsy and Tarenu TT16 by Suzanne Onstine

The team have done three seasons so far. Their approach is not to look at the tomb from a narrow 19th Dynasty viewpoint but a more holistic view of who was buried there throughout its history. The tomb is situated at Dra Abu Naga. The periods covered are New Kingdom, Third intermediate Period, Late Period and Hellestic.

The original builder has been identified as living in the Ramases II period not just on stylist grounds but also on because one of the people mentioned in it. However because he was a priest of the cult of Amenhotep I and Ahmose-Nefertari it is that pharaoh that is depicted. She was attracted to the tomb because Panehsy was a chanter, so was his wife which was a usual female role but a man to be doing it is more unusual, not only that his brother was also a chanter.

Why was Dra Abu Naga chosen by him as the location of his tomb?

Photo for Today: Shabti Box

2012-01-15T11:42:00.000Z

Shabti box showing the deceased and her ba
receiving food and drink from the goddess Nut
19th Dynasty
Provenance unknown
British Museum
EA 35648

Grand Museum now scheduled for 2015

2012-01-14T23:21:00.002Z

Al Ahram Weekly (Nevine El-Aref)

The roar of bulldozers, trucks and rock-crushers will soon be heard again on the Giza plateau as construction work is resumed following a year's hiatus.

On Tuesday, at a gala ceremony in the administration building of the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) on the Cairo-Alexandria road, an assembly of journalists, TV presenters, photographers, archaeologists, curators and governmental officials gathered to witness the signing of the contract for the GEM's third construction phase.

A joint venture between Egypt's Orascom Construction Industries (OCI) and the Belgium BESIX Group won the construction bid and was awarded the contract for the completion of the GEM's third phase, which entails the construction of the museum's main building and the surrounding landscaping.

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

At the premises of the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) overlooking Giza Plateau dozens of journalists and top antiquities officials will witness the signing of a contract between the Ministry of State for Antiquities (MSA) and Belgium construction companies in Egypt, who have been selected according to technical requirements agreed in a bid held early last month.

MSA Minister Mohamed Ibrahim Aly told Ahram Online that the third phase of the GEM rehabilitation scheme includes the construction of the museum’s main exhibition halls, which will display 120,000 ancient Egyptian artifacts. Featured in this wing of the museum will be the Ramses II colossus statue, transferred in 2005 from Ramses square Downtown Cairo, and his daughter’s colossus statue Merit-Amun, now on display in the Sohag open-air museum.

Crocodile Museum to open in Aswan

2012-01-14T22:28:00.002Z

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

After three years of construction, the Crocodiles Museum in Aswan will share the significance of crocodiles and the ancient Egyptian crocodile god Sobek with visitors by the end of January.

Overlooking the Nile and across from the historic temple of Kom Ombo in the upper Egyptian City, the museum aims to become the next big tourist attraction. Minister of State for Antiquities Mohamed Ibrahim told Ahram Online that the official inauguration of the museum will coincide with Aswan National Day in January.

The museum boasts a display of forty mummified crocodiles, ranging from two to five metres long, along a crocodile foetus and eggs. Also on show is a collection of wooden and granite crocodile statues and replicas of crocodile holes in rocks.

Egypt and U.S. Partner to Launch a Groundwater Lowering Project at Temple Edfu

2012-01-14T22:25:00.001Z

Luxor Times

The Ministry of State for Antiquities (MSA) along with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) kicked-off a new groundwater lowering project at Temple Edfu in a workshop held today in Cairo. The project will construct a drainage system to lower the groundwater level that threatens antiquities in the Edfu Temple and will be carried out over approximately 20 months.

Amara West blog up and running

2012-01-14T22:04:00.003Z

British Museum

If you enjoy following excavation blogs you won't be disappointed by this one. Here's one of the early posts, but they have been posting consistently since then, and their blog provides an excellent example of how good a blog can be at bridging between the researchers and the public. I've been enjoying it enormously.

With great photographs throughout.

After a few days preparing the house and all our equipment for the coming weeks of excavation, three of us took the boat journey to site on 2 January for the first time this season.

Michaela Binder walked the ground in cemetery D, where excavation will begin this week, but I spent most of my time supervising the erection of our site tents. One houses the policemen who guard the site, while the other is for our equipment. The tents also offer a welcome respite from the howling winds (like today) or biting flies, depending on the climate.

Once the tents were up, we started excavating in one of the houses (E13.8) under the supervision of Shadia Abdu Rabo. The upper deposit of mudbrick rubble has already yielded fragments with impressions of wooden poles, matting and foliage, indicating the space was once covered with a substantial roof.

Alongside pottery, fragments of ostrich eggshell, stone tools, carnelian and jasper jewellery have already come to light – perhaps this space will prove as intriguing as the other back rooms in this block of houses?

Antiquities Council to list endangered archeological sites in Lower Egypt

2012-01-14T21:32:00.001Z

Al Masry Al Youm

The Supreme Council of Antiquities is preparing a list of endangered archaeological sites in the Delta region and Lower Egypt, announced Mostaf Amin, the council’s newly appointed head, on Sunday. The list is to be published on the council’s website to flag archaeological sites threatened by urban expansion.

Object Biography #1: A vessel naming Nesi-khonsu

2012-01-14T21:12:00.003Z

Egypt at the Manchester Museum (Campbell Price)

So good to see Campbell Price making real use of this blog.

Each month I hope to highlight an individual object that will feature in our new Ancient Worlds galleries. Many of the objects in the collection have incredible stories behind them but, due to an inevitable lack of space, these cannot be included fully in gallery labels or text panels. We aim to tell some of these stories – or “object biographies” – in digital content to accompany the new displays.

This small cup is only 6.75 cms in height but is made of eye-catching bright blue faience, or glazed composition ceramic. The hieroglyphs name Nesi-khonsu, wife of the Twenty-first Dynasty ruler Pinedjem II. She is given the title “first in charge of the musical troupe of Amun” (tA wrt-xnrt tp n imn) – a group of female musicians who entertained the deity in his temple at Karnak.