Religion and Ethics Forum
General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: Anchorman on April 03, 2017, 11:56:47 AM
-
The latest stuff coming from Egypt, and probably the fifth or sixth major find this year, is just breaking - the remains of a third dynasty pyramid (dating to about thirty years before the 'great pyramid' of Khufu at Giza - have been found. http://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.co.uk/2017/04/egyptian-team-discover-remains-of-5000.html?m=1#!/2017/04/egyptian-team-discover-remains-of-5000.html
-
The latest stuff coming from Egypt, and probably the fifth or sixth major find this year, is just breaking - the remains of a third dynasty pyramid (dating to about thirty years before the 'great pyramid' of Khufu at Giza - have been found. http://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.co.uk/2017/04/egyptian-team-discover-remains-of-5000.html?m=1#!/2017/04/egyptian-team-discover-remains-of-5000.html
Anchorman, is this as it seerseerns to me to be an exceptional amount of finds? If so, is there any particular reason for it.
-
It seems to be just a bit above average, NS. The media, however, seem to concentrate on 'Tut stuff' and anything Zahi Hawass, self publicist extraordinary, comes up with, to the detriment of everything else. Last season, for instance, there were over thirty excavations in the field in Egypt (and four very brave ones in the Sudan), and a pretty good haul of discoveries ensued. Ironically, the reduced tourist traffic, especially in the Luxor area, means that the excavations can procede in relative peace (relative if you include the armed guards).
-
It seems to be just a bit above average, NS. The media, however, seem to concentrate on 'Tut stuff' and anything Zahi Hawass, self publicist extraordinary, comes up with, to the detriment of everything else. Last season, for instance, there were over thirty excavations in the field in Egypt (and four very brave ones in the Sudan), and a pretty good haul of discoveries ensued. Ironically, the reduced tourist traffic, especially in the Luxor area, means that the excavations can procede in relative peace (relative if you include the armed guards).
Thanks, I did wonder if the reduction in the tourist trade might have a spin off benefit. One of things I found fascinating when I first went to Rome was the extent to which archeological discoveries were almost an annoyance to many people. It underlines that there much be many fascinating sites still list around the Med and beyond.
-
The original post referred to a third dynasty pyramid - it appears that Luxor News erred and the actual remains are those of a THIRTEENTH dynasty pyramid. Actually, this might be even more significant than the earlier possibility - since we have all the main royal pyramids and tombs of the third dynasty, but the thirteenth is still relatively little known, with a confusion of kings who reigned for a short time, and some simultaneously. If this tomb has a burial in any semi-intact state, it will add a whole lot to the study of the period. Here's a link to some of the very latest pics. http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/262156.aspx
-
......and there's more. OK, pyramidiots of the world unite and get your measuring tapes out. A friend of mine, French Egyptologist Jean Pierre Houdin, has posted the latest info on voids found within the great pyramid of Khufu at Giza. https://mobile.twitter.com/MehdiTayoubi/status/848962894821814272/photo/1?utm_source=fb&utm_medium=fb&utm_campaign=MehdiTayoubi&utm_content=848962894821814272
-
The very latest stuff from the 'new' pyramid at Dahshur. The ID seems to be one of the many kings of this complex period - and one of whom we know very little. This seems interesting. http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/262348.aspx
-
......and they keep on comiing......... http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContentP/9/265161/Heritage/Egyptian-archaeologists-unearth-tomb-of-th-Dynasty.aspx
-
The latest spectacular pictures from the Luxor cache tomb, the official details of which have just been announced. http://www.egyptindependent.com/news/photos-pharaonic-cemetery-dozens-coffins-gold-colored-masks-discovered-luxor
-
The very latest pics from the dig at Dashur, where the remains of a royal burial from the somewhat obscure thirteenth dynasty are being excavated. http://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/the-burial-chamber-of-13th-dynasty.html#!/2017/05/the-burial-chamber-of-13th-dynasty.html
-
And yet more...... This time, mainly Greco-Roman period - but a cache tomb of at least nineteen mummies plus artefacts...... http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/5063/Ministry-announces-18-mummies-discovered-in-central-Egypt
-
......and the latest. intriguing, find.... https://www.livescience.com/59534-ancient-nubia-tomb-of-gold-worker-found.html
-
.....And so it continues. The latest scans of KV 62 are, apparently, "quite encouraging". This makes four separate scans of the tomb of Tutankhamun since Nick Reeves revealed his theory that there is at least one as yet undiscovered chamber in the modest, roughly made tomb. It's taking longer to scan it than it did to build it...... Here's the latest National Geographic report. WARNING: THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS ZAHI HAWASS..... http://www.nationalgeographic.it/popoli-culture/2017/07/07/news/sulle_tracce_di_nefertiti-3594952/?refresh_ce
-
With the caveat that this article contains Zahi Hawass, and therefore either speculation, plagiarism or both, a lot of Egyptologists are getting their knickers in a twist at the possibility that a new tomb in the Valley of the Kings might be that of Tutankhamun's wife, Ankhesenamun - possibly because it is located next to Ay, Tutankhamun's successor (and probably grandfather) who may have 'married' Ankhesenamun (his granddaughter?) to legitimise his claim to power. Personally,. I think the mummy labelled KV 21 a in the Cairo Museum is her, but we await developments. https://www.livescience.com/59840-king-tut-wife-tomb-possibly-found.html
-
Get your speculation hats ready - 'cos the tech may be coming up trumps. The experts have discovered an as yet unknown void within the great pyramid of Khufu. http://www.newsweek.com/ancient-egypt-secret-room-discovered-great-pyramid-archaeologists-armed-lasers-647372
-
The new dig season's barly begun, and yet another discovery is announcedd - a whopping great necropolis at Luxor!
I can remember someone saying to me, two decades ago, that Egypt was 'all dyg out'.
Since then, there have been around twenty major finds a year - every year.
http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/19746/Discovery-of-a-New-Archaeological-Necropolis-in-Luxor
-
That is a most interesting link. thank you for posting.
-
That is a most interesting link. thank you for posting.
Cheers, Susan.
-
Another day, another announcement.
This one might be important, though - for anyone interested in the lead up to Akhenaten's time.
Chambers that appear to have housed the burials of royal children and a few foriegn wives have been located in the West Valley - an adjunct of the Valley of the Kings, not far from the tomb of Amenhotep III, Tutankhamun's grandfather, and some of the burials seem to have been his offspring.
http://luxorpost.com/en/2017/08/a-royal-childrens-tomb-discovered-in-the-west-banks-valley-of-the-kings-in-luxor/
-
Something's brewing on the news feeds tonight.
Sometimes Egyptian press stuff can be OTT; however today's announcement has set Egyptologists' alarm bells ringing.
Dra abu el Naga was a burial ground for two main times - the second Intermediate royal tombs - and the third intermediate period eara.
Either discovery would be very significant - but the latter more so.
There are a few 'missing' priests and priest kings, as well as a couple of kings themselves, and we have long suspected a third 'mummy cache' tomb.
Two such cache tombs, labelled DB 320 and KV35, were found in the late nineteenth century, containing the stripped and re-wrapped mummies of many of the greatest Kings of Egypt, put there after there tombs were cleared by the state around 1050 BC.
Could this be number three?
Watch this space!
http://luxorpost.com/en/2017/09/egypt-announces-details-discovery-
mass-grave-pharaohs-luxor/
-
This seems to be more than a run-of-the-mill find, and points toward a sifnicant cache tomb.
The Department of Antiquities will be giving a live stream announcement tomorrow morning.
Meanwhile, here's a blog with pics and a few more details of this Dra abu el 'naga find.
http://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.co.uk/2017/09/exclusive-egyptian-archaeologists.html?m=1#!/2017/09/exclusive-egyptian-archaeologists.html
-
Confusion is Egypt's main export.
The Dra abu el Naga Tomb seems to be a typical recycling job - The Egyptians were experts at using earlier tombs to put later bodies in.
The original owner seems to have been a goldsmith named Amenemhet, and he lived in the fifteenth century BC - Egypt's golden age.
This in itself is unusual - elite craftsmen were usually buried in private tombs at Deir-el-medina; possibly Amenemhet was an elite craftsman, given high honours by the court - we have to research this.
Anyway, his tomb seems to have been opened four centuries later - not to rob, but to add a few more mummies!
There are plenty of shabti figures, statuettes, boxes, pots, maybe even Amenemhet's tool chest, in the tomb, and a superb insight into artisan life in the fifteenth century BC.
The added bonus is that there are a further four tombs located very close by - probably either members of Amenemhet's family, or fellow elite craftsmen.
-
And there's more.
Even whopping great Temples that we've known about for centuries can surprise us.
Here's the very latest from the iconic Temple of Horus at Edfu - one of the best preserved Ptolemaic period temples - and one we thought we knew everything about - until today, that is.
http://www.egypttoday.com
/Article/4/24753/Edfo-Temple-expansion-discovered
-
Probably one of the best Egyptologists in his field, Barry Kemp, has announced a new find.
Kemp's speciality is Akhetaten - the city built by the so-called 'heretic' king Akhenaten; which he has excavetad for more than a decade.
This article gives a rather poor image of this latest find, but it's still worth a look.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/278025.aspx
-
Probably one of the best Egyptologists in his field, Barry Kemp, has announced a new find.
Kemp's speciality is Akhetaten - the city built by the so-called 'heretic' king Akhenaten; which he has excavetad for more than a decade.
This article gives a rather poor image of this latest find, but it's still worth a look.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/278025.aspx
A DECADE? Should have used a JCB!
-
Funny you should say that....
In his book "The city of Akhenaten and Nefertiti", Kemp shows how, with the help of a mini JCB, he found the cemetery of the workers who built the city -and there's a great pic of this in the book to boot!
-
........And there's more.
Remains of a temple complex discovered - dating to Ramesses II's time, from Abusir, near Memphis (Just south of Cairo)
http://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.co.uk/2017/10/czech-archaeologists-discover-ramses-ii.html?m=1#!/2017/10/czech-archaeologists-discover-ramses-ii.html
-
This looks interesting - but how the heck they're going to access it beats me.
http://www.nature.com/news/cosmic-ray-particles-reveal-secret-chamber-in-egypt-s-great-pyramid-1.22939
And here's a youtube link to images of the scanning project.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZB-MOGw0RMo&feature=youtu.be
-
Yes, this latest piece of news about the large space above the King's chamber is most interesting, isn't it? On the GH forum in the 'Mysteries' section there is quite a lively discussion.
-
Yes, this latest piece of news about the large space above the King's chamber is most interesting, isn't it? On the GH forum in the 'Mysteries' section there is quite a lively discussion.
Hi, Susan;
You can bet the Egyptology sites are in overdrive at the moment - and some of the more - er - speculative ones as well!
If you want my opinion, for what it's worth, I think this will be another 'relieving chamber' designed to take the stress from the building blocks above it. I very much doubt if there is any material there - though I hope I'm wrong.
In my wildest dreams, I suppose I could hope for images or a statue of Khufu - of all the Old Kingdom monarchs, he is the one with the fewest statues to his name. We only have one - a three inch high ivory statuette, which in all probability was carved much later than his time.
If you're interested, there's a few intelligent articles by French Egyptologist Jean-Pierre Houdin on the following site - which is also well respected for in-depth articles on mainly Old Kingdom stuff.
http://emhotep.net/
-
anchorman
Thank you for reply. I will look up Houdinlater. Even if it is another relieving chamber, it will still be a new discovery, I suppose!
-
And another....
This time atemple in the Delta - rare enough; this one could be significant signalling a major settlement....
http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/32821/A-temple-for-Isis-dating-back-to-Ancient-Egypt-era
-
What's this 'relieving chamber' full of ?? Water?? ;)
-
What's this 'relieving chamber' full of ?? Water?? ;)
Well, as one o the gangs which built the thing called themselves"Khufu's drunkards" (as scrawled in a graffito in another such cahmber), who knows...: :)
-
it
Well, as one o the gangs which built the thing called themselves"Khufu's drunkards" (as scrawled in a graffito in another such cahmber), who knows...: :)
hi Anchorman
I'd be grateful if you would watch this video and give me your thoughts on it
https://youtu.be/puXsFyainQU
thanks
-
hi Anchorman
I'd be grateful if you would watch this video and give me your thoughts on it
https://youtu.be/puXsFyainQU
thanks
I've had a quick look, Walter.
The Old Kingdom isn't my speciality - more the Amarna Period and Third Intermediate Period/late period.
However, I do know that there is absolutely no doubt that the Giza pyramids were constructed for the kings who were interred in them - and that the construction technology is fairly well known, as are the burials of those who constructed them, which show the strains, wear and tear expected in their construction.
We even have the docks where the stones were landed from Tura - and evidence from Tura - namely half quarried stones with scrawled inscriptions left because they were surplus to requirements.
Besides, the pyramids did not appear from nowhere; they evolved from the 'mastaba' tombs of the Second dynasty, through the Step Pyramid of Njeterkhet Djoser in the third (and partially completed step pyramids of his three successors) To Sneferu's attempts to cover his step pyramid and turn it into a 'true' pyramid - which failed, so he built two more until the third - the first 'true' pyramid, met with his approval.
His son was Khufu, builder of the Great pyramid at Giza.
The failed step pyramids, and Sneferu's 'bent' second pyramid, give insights into the evolving construction.
As for drilling? Take a look at these statues of Khufu's son, Khafre - carved using copper chisels from hard granite - and you'll see that the limestone and sandstone from which the pyramids were constructed were 'easier' to shape by comparison.
http://www.bridgemanimages.com/fr/asset/68328/egyptian-4th-dynasty-c-2613-2498-bc/statue-of-khafre-2520-2494-bc-enthroned-from-the-valley-temple-of-the-pyramid-of-khafre-at-giza-old-kingdom-c-2540-2505-bc-diorite-see-also-68319
Hope that helps.
-
er, not really I'm more interested in the ''lost technology' as demonstrated in the vid . rather than who they were built for ,which to me, is far more important . but you don't know?
sorry i've just remembered , you are hard of sight please excuse me .
-
er, not really I'm more interested in the ''lost technology' as demonstrated in the vid . rather than who they were built for ,which to me, is far more important . but you don't know?
sorry i've just remembered , you are hard of sight please excuse me .
Nah.
I can magnify my (extra large) screen up to x120, so I can watch a youtube video.
Thing is, though, there are no 'lost technologies' as far as the Old Kingdom pyramids are concerned.
The self-same 'drill holes' can be seen in the earliest door lintels dating back 150 years before Khufu's time.
There are umpteen spurious claims on dbious sites - from Graham Hancock to Erik von Danekin (not forgetting David Icke) trying to find a myster where there is no mystery to find.
The sheer, incredible truth is that these monuments were plannded using sticks and cords, plumb lines and set squares, built using copper chisels, sand, grindsones and muscle power, by ordinary men with extraordinary minds.
-
Nah.
I can magnify my (extra large) screen up to x120, so I can watch a youtube video.
Thing is, though, there are no 'lost technologies' as far as the Old Kingdom pyramids are concerned.
The self-same 'drill holes' can be seen in the earliest door lintels dating back 150 years before Khufu's time.
There are umpteen spurious claims on dbious sites - from Graham Hancock to Erik von Danekin (not forgetting David Icke) trying to find a myster where there is no mystery to find.
The sheer, incredible truth is that these monuments were plannded using sticks and cords, plumb lines and set squares, built using copper chisels, sand, grindsones and muscle power, by ordinary men with extraordinary minds.
so are you saying the video is fake and the stone cutting is modern?
-
No, what I'm saying is that we can easily trace the evolution of building in stone back to the second dynasty mastabas.
The holes have been noted, as I pointed out, in door lintels which predate the pyramids, the same holes being noted down through the millenia in door lintels and footings in temple construction throughout Egypt - right into the Roman period.
There is np 'lost technology' as far as reputable experts on the Old Kingdom such as Romer, Kitchen, Houdin, etc, are concerned.
Nor are there any mysteries involving the carving, transporting and moving the blocks - especially since the discovery of the world's oldest papyrus which was written by a 'fang leader' on the construction of Khufu's pyramid.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/ancient-egypt-shipping-mining-farming-economy-pyramids-180956619/
-
No, what I'm saying is that we can easily trace the evolution of building in stone back to the second dynasty mastabas.
The holes have been noted, as I pointed out, in door lintels which predate the pyramids, the same holes being noted down through the millenia in door lintels and footings in temple construction throughout Egypt - right into the Roman period.
There is np 'lost technology' as far as reputable experts on the Old Kingdom such as Romer, Kitchen, Houdin, etc, are concerned.
Nor are there any mysteries involving the carving, transporting and moving the blocks - especially since the discovery of the world's oldest papyrus which was written by a 'fang leader' on the construction of Khufu's pyramid.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/ancient-egypt-shipping-mining-farming-economy-pyramids-180956619/
no, that's not helping me.
I'm interested in how the stone was drilled and cut so precisely . If you don't know I would rather you say so , with all due respect
I have no interest what so ever in who ordered , or what dynasty or who they were constructed for . I'm only interested in their technology and tools because that is far more important to human endeavour than the fancy rulers and their families
or perhaps this aspect doesnt interest you ?
cheers
Walter
-
There are various possible techniques for drilling holes and the like using copper tools with the addition of sand to do the work. I think it is true to say that we don't know exactly what techniques were used but that there is no reason to think that there was some hi tech method now lost as the results seen can be produced using technology available to the pyramid builders.
-
Exactly.
That's why I pointed out the evolution of building techniques over the centuries, Maeght.
We don't know exactly which method was used, but we do know the three or four alternative methods. Time and the action of sand had erased traces of the copper which was left by the chisels, I suppose.
Claims of ancient technology, alien technology, lost technology, secret meanings of the measurements of the Giza pyramids, not to mention Hancock's dating the Sphinx to before 10,000 BC, can be lumped into a term coined by the 'father of Egyptology', W.M. Flinders Petrie, when he was approached by one such 'theorist'.
He called them 'pyramidiots' - and the term stuck.
They were, and are, incredible constructions - dubbed 'resurrection machines' by modern Egyptologists.
Don't bother sticking a tomato under a pyramid to see if it will germinate - the 'resurrection' was supposed to unite the king with the solar deities.
-
Exactly.
That's why I pointed out the evolution of building techniques over the centuries, Maeght.
We don't know exactly which method was used, but we do know the three or four alternative methods. Time and the action of sand had erased traces of the copper which was left by the chisels, I suppose.
Claims of ancient technology, alien technology, lost technology, secret meanings of the measurements of the Giza pyramids, not to mention Hancock's dating the Sphinx to before 10,000 BC, can be lumped into a term coined by the 'father of Egyptology', W.M. Flinders Petrie, when he was approached by one such 'theorist'.
He called them 'pyramidiots' - and the term stuck.
They were, and are, incredible constructions - dubbed 'resurrection machines' by modern Egyptologists.
Don't bother sticking a tomato under a pyramid to see if it will germinate - the 'resurrection' was supposed to unite the king with the solar deities.
There is it seems to me a modern belief that things can only get done using hi tech. I was talking to a lad about Victorian mining and canal building once and he said 'But how did they do it without technology,?' Manpower,time and basic tools can achieve a lot.
-
There is it seems to me a modern belief that things can only get done using hi tech. I was talking to a lad about Victorian mining and canal building once and he said 'But how did they do it without technology,?' Manpower,time and basic tools can achieve a lot.
It's been argued, convincingly, that, just as the Industrial revolurion kick started what has become modern society, so the 'pyramid age ' - the fourth dynasty - stabilised Egypt and firmly estaqblished the concept of a nation-state.
Whereas before the king had exercised authority frm Memphis bu force, since he needed vast amounts of agriculture, livestock, not to mention a standing force of at least seven thousand workers ro quarry, refine, transport and erect the stones, never mind bakers, brewers, tanners, etc, the state was reorganised, a civil service established to enforce taxation,etc...eseentially, the system survived a further three millenia, despite interuption due to internal or external forces.
And since Egypt became the model for nation building in the Levant, and eventually, southern Europe, the pyramid age may well have started the rise of modern state development.
-
Exactly.
That's why I pointed out the evolution of building techniques over the centuries, Maeght.
We don't know exactly which method was used, but we do know the three or four alternative methods. Time and the action of sand had erased traces of the copper which was left by the chisels, I suppose.
Claims of ancient technology, alien technology, lost technology, secret meanings of the measurements of the Giza pyramids, not to mention Hancock's dating the Sphinx to before 10,000 BC, can be lumped into a term coined by the 'father of Egyptology', W.M. Flinders Petrie, when he was approached by one such 'theorist'.
He called them 'pyramidiots' - and the term stuck.
They were, and are, incredible constructions - dubbed 'resurrection machines' by modern Egyptologists.
Don't bother sticking a tomato under a pyramid to see if it will germinate - the 'resurrection' was supposed to unite the king with the solar deities.
well , thanks for your replies , however it is obvious we are interested in totally different aspects of this subject .
I'm only concerned by the engineering , tooling, mathematicians and cutting methods used which is obviously far more important than the other stuff
cheers
Walter
-
Earlier in this thread,
walter,
i posted a link to the Em Hotep site, which includes extensive articles by Jean-Pierre Houdin, himself a highly qualified at
rchetect and draughtsman who turned to Egyptology, and has since used his expertise to research the construction techniques of the Giza pyramids. Both he and Lehrer , as well as Romer, are experts in the field of dyn IV monumental constuctions, having excavated in the area as well as at Sakkara, Abusir and Dahshur, on earlier and indeed later pyramids.
You might try the Em Hotep site for a fuller evaluation of the techniques and indeed technology used in the construction of the Giza pyramids.
http://emhotep.net/
-
Earlier in this thread,
walter,
i posted a link to the Em Hotep site, which includes extensive articles by Jean-Pierre Houdin, himself a highly qualified at
rchetect and draughtsman who turned to Egyptology, and has since used his expertise to research the construction techniques of the Giza pyramids. Both he and Lehrer , as well as Romer, are experts in the field of dyn IV monumental constuctions, having excavated in the area as well as at Sakkara, Abusir and Dahshur, on earlier and indeed later pyramids.
You might try the Em Hotep site for a fuller evaluation of the techniques and indeed technology used in the construction of the Giza pyramids.
http://emhotep.net/
yes I saw them and also just looked at the one you posted , they are not helpful.
unfortunately draughtsmen and architects are not generally engineers and tool makers
-
yes I saw them and also just looked at the one you posted , they are not helpful.
unfortunately draughtsmen and architects are not generally engineers and tool makers
What questions do you have Walter?
-
What questions do you have Walter?
have you seen the vid I linked to , not sure if its genuine, but my questions relate to what it refers to
drilling ,cutting ,shaping stone in such ways
-
have you seen the vid I linked to , not sure if its genuine, but my questions relate to what it refers to
drilling ,cutting ,shaping stone in such ways
Some of it. What specific questions though?
There are ?techniques for drilling and cutting stones using copper tools and sand. We don't know exactly which ones were used by the ancient Egyptians but there is no reason to think they couldn't achieve what they did using these techniques. Do you want to know the details of the techniques
-
Some of it. What specific questions though?
There are ?techniques for drilling and cutting stones using copper tools and sand. We don't know exactly which ones were used by the ancient Egyptians but there is no reason to think they couldn't achieve what they did using these techniques. Do you want to know the details of the techniques
what do you mean' there is no reason ' unless you can show me someone drill a perfect hole in stone with copper chisel , then I am not convinced
simply saying it , like you do, is not enough
-
what do you mean' there is no reason ' unless you can show me someone drill a perfect hole in stone with copper chisel , then I am not convinced
simply saying it , like you do, is not enough
I didn't say they used a copper chisel, I said copper tools (such as cylinders) and sand. Add water and plenty of time and you can cut through stone. There are lots of references to this on the internet. Google it. The fact that there are techniques which can achieve these results with the sort of technology the ancient Egyptians had is why I said 'there is no reason'.
-
Have you found this one Walter?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeS5lrmyD74
Just an example of the possible.
-
Have you found this one Walter?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeS5lrmyD74
Just an example of the possible.
that's what I'm after , thank you . I can imagine they came up with method of speeding that up though
-
that's what I'm after , thank you . I can imagine they came up with method of speeding that up though
Indeed.
-
that's what I'm after , thank you . I can imagine they came up with method of speeding that up though
Something was rattling through what's left of my mind last night as I slept through a presbytery meeting.
I'm almost certain the objects are on display at the brilliant Petrie museum, but I know Petrie brought some of the artefacts he found at Giza back to London.
Meantime, here's a reasonable article which might interest yo, Walter.
http://www.oocities.org/unforbidden_geology/ancient_egyptian_copper_coring_drills.html
s
-
Something was rattling through what's left of my mind last night as I slept through a presbytery meeting.
I'm almost certain the objects are on display at the brilliant Petrie museum, but I know Petrie brought some of the artefacts he found at Giza back to London.
Meantime, here's a reasonable article which might interest yo, Walter.
http://www.oocities.org/unforbidden_geology/ancient_egyptian_copper_coring_drills.html
s
thank you , that's more like it . I've had a quick read through , will give it more consideration later , very interesting .
-
thank you , that's more like it . I've had a quick read through , will give it more consideration later , very interesting .
Well, at least Presbytery's good for somethang.
By the way, for anyone who doesn't want to be dazzled by Egyptian New Kingdom bling, the Petrie Museum is a fantastic resource - crammed with stuff from Egypt's remote past right through the 'Pyramid age'.
-
And yet more...announced officially today. Two tombs, one known but not fully excaveted, the other unknown, found at dra Abu-el-Naga, near Luxor. These tombs date to the early eighteenth dynasty. http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/283041.aspx
-
Egypt: the gift that keeps on giving. Everyone's heard about Giza or Luxor - the 'glamerous' sites. But there's a site few tourists visit, but which has nonetheless proven a very rich seam for archaeology and a re-interpretation of history to boot - Gebel -el Sisila. (Other spellings are available) New finds are being made there on a regular basis, witrh the latest, somewhat poignant, finds, being recordes in the site blog, courtesy of the Egyptian Exploration Society. https://gebelelsilsilaepigraphicsurveyproject.blogspot.co.uk/
-
New Year, new finds.... This time from the Delta - where conditions usually conspire to ruin preservation, and remains are scant. Buto was a town sacred to the Wadjet cobra deity, and grew in importance from the eighth century BC. Several rulers came from the area, and finds there are always significant.http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/286388.aspx
-
Nah.
I can magny my (extra large) screen up to x120, so I can watch a youtube video.
Thing is, though, there are no 'lost technologies' as far as the Old Kingdom pyramids are concerned.
The self-same 'drill holes' can be seen in the earliest door lintels dating back 150 years before Khufu's time.
There are umpteen spurious claims on dbious sites - from Graham Hancock to Erik von Danekin (not forgetting David Icke) trying to find a myster where there is no mystery to find.
The sheer, incredible truth is that these monuments were plannded using sticks and cords, plumb lines and set squares, built using copper chisels, sand, grindsones and muscle power, by ordinary men with extraordinary minds.
A big round of applause here! On the Mysteries section of the GH message boards there are often long, long topics where the simple facts are disputed, not accepted, it must be mysterious ancient civilisations, lost skills etc etc :D
-
I zapped the t v about a week or so ago and I saw the last few minutes of a programme about the D N A links between Tut and his parents, it looks like they've nailed exactly who his parents were and not unusually in this era they were siblings plus Tut had an identifiable genetic disorder, a condition that was very likely to be the main contributory cause of his death.
Anyone know any more about that programme?
Egypt is certainly an amazing place for antiquities of all sorts and thanks for the various links, really really interesting.
Regards ippy
-
A big round of applause here! On the Mysteries section of the GH message boards there are often long, long topics where the simple facts are disputed, not accepted, it must be mysterious ancient civilisations, lost skills etc etc :D
In Greek times, it was 'lost wisdom.'.
By Arab times it was Ali Baba and alchemy.
The modern successors to Flinders Petrie's "pyramidiots" are alive and well, Susan.
In his time it was the theories of the 'pyramid inch' (which didn't exist) calculating the return of Christ, or the Great Pyramid as 'Joseph's granaries' which inspired the nut jobs.
A few decades later, the drivel surrounding the so-called "Curse of the Pharaohs" caught the imagination.
Now it's alien tech and extra-terrestrial influence.
Egypt seems to generate the tendency to fantasise.
-
I zapped the t v about a week or so ago and I saw the last few minutes of a programme about the D N A links between Tut and his parents, it looks like they've nailed exactly who his parents were and not unusually in this era they were siblings plus Tut had an identifiable genetic disorder, a condition that was very likely to be the main contributory cause of his death.
Anyone know any more about that programme?
Egypt is certainly an amazing place for antiquities of all sorts and thanks for the various links, really really interesting.
Regards ippy
Ippy: Those findings are about the most controversial in Egypt at the moment.
The identity of Tutankhamun's mum is a hot potato.
The mummy identified as "KV35 YL" is the prime candidate, but whether she was a full sister of Akhenaten or a cousin is still a bit iffy. The documentary plumps for a brother-sister bond, which wouldn't be impossible...other Egyptologists go for a cousin-cousin bond - the cousin being a member of a branch closely connected to the main Royal family for at least five generations.
Some claim to be able to put a name to that mummy - a name you've probably heard of - Nefertiti.
Not only that, given the position of her arms at the time of her embalming, they say that this confirms that she was yet another female king, ruling under the name "Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten".
If you're keeping up, you might be aware that probably 60% of the stuff in Tutankhamun's tomb - including at least two of the coffins and the golden mask - were actually made for this king.
So Tut might have been buried in his mum's coffin...
curioser and curioser....
-
Ippy: Those findings are about the most controversial in Egypt at the moment.
The identity of Tutankhamun's mum is a hot potato.
The mummy identified as "KV35 YL" is the prime candidate, but whether she was a full sister of Akhenaten or a cousin is still a bit iffy. The documentary plumps for a brother-sister bond, which wouldn't be impossible...other Egyptologists go for a cousin-cousin bond - the cousin being a member of a branch closely connected to the main Royal family for at least five generations.
Some claim to be able to put a name to that mummy - a name you've probably heard of - Nefertiti.
Not only that, given the position of her arms at the time of her embalming, they say that this confirms that she was yet another female king, ruling under the name "Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten".
If you're keeping up, you might be aware that probably 60% of the stuff in Tutankhamun's tomb - including at least two of the coffins and the golden mask - were actually made for this king.
So Tut might have been buried in his mum's coffin...
curiouser and curiouser....
Yes I suppose like a lot of those convoluted happenings of those times you would, anyone would have quite some job unrevealing who's who, I'm my own uncle Etc.
My wife's cousin lectures Egyptology at the Uni in Adelaide, my she's such a very interesting person, she reads the hieroglyphics straight off of anything Egyptian, she's heavily into the Richard the third society as well down there, I'll have to drop her a line and catch up,
If you do find any more links like the D N A one I'd appreciate it if you were to bang it or them up on the screen.
Regards ippy and thanks, very interesting.
P S Haven't the Germans got a bust of Nefertiti, minus one eye? (My spell check has just tried to correct Nefertiti to infertile).
-
Yes I suppose like a lot of those convoluted happenings of those times you would, anyone would have quite some job unrevealing who's who, I'm my own uncle Etc. My wife's cousin lectures Egyptology at the Uni in Adelaide, my she's such a very interesting person, she reads the hieroglyphics straight off of anything Egyptian, she's heavily into the Richard the third society as well down there, I'll have to drop her a line and catch up, If you do find any more links like the D N A one I'd appreciate it if you were to bang it or them up on the screen. Regards ippy and thanks, very interesting. P S Haven't the Germans got a bust of Nefertiti, minus one eye? (My spell check has just tried to correct Nefertiti to infertile).
Last bit first; Yes, Borchart found the incredible bust of Nefertiti in the ruins of Akhenaten's capital - Akhrtatrn - now el-Amarna, at the site of a sculptor, Thutmose's studio.It is in Germany, though copies have been made and are in London and Cairo, exact in every detail. Second, if you're interested in the Amarna period - and I don't know an Egyptophile who isn't, there are literally thousands of books on the subject, from the scholarly to the plain nuts, but here are three of the best modern takes on the subject; "Akhenaten: Egypt's false prophet" by Nicolas Reeves, and two books by a friend of mine, Aiden Dodson, "Amarna Sunrise" and £Amarna Sunset". Finally, here's the link to the report on the DNA scans of the royal mummies; disputed by several experts, both on genetics and archaeology grounds, but, hey, that's Egypt for you; a detecive story where you try to find a crime when you can't identify the victims, but there's a good chance you have their guts in a jar..... https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/185393
-
Last bit first; Yes, Borchart found the incredible bust of Nefertiti in the ruins of Akhenaten's capital - Akhrtatrn - now el-Amarna, at the site of a sculptor, Thutmose's studio.It is in Germany, though copies have been made and are in London and Cairo, exact in every detail. Second, if you're interested in the Amarna period - and I don't know an Egyptophile who isn't, there are literally thousands of books on the subject, from the scholarly to the plain nuts, but here are three of the best modern takes on the subject; "Akhenaten: Egypt's false prophet" by Nicolas Reeves, and two books by a friend of mine, Aiden Dodson, "Amarna Sunrise" and £Amarna Sunset". Finally, here's the link to the report on the DNA scans of the royal mummies; disputed by several experts, both on genetics and archaeology grounds, but, hey, that's Egypt for you; a detecive story where you try to find a crime when you can't identify the victims, but there's a good chance you have their guts in a jar..... https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/185393
Thanks for the additional info Anch, I am really interested in Egyptology but I'm no expert on the subject, even so I shall be going through your links with interest.
I haven't got the time at the mo I'm adjusting my furniture to back up to the wall over the boxing I've put over the new central heating pipes etcetera prior to having new carpet laid, moved in here the day before the referendum and this is about the last of the many jobs that will make the place feel like our own, however there's a lot to catch up with including those links, thank you.
Kind regards ippy
-
Another week, another find.... This time from Sn-el Hagar....better known as Tanis, site, not of Indiana Jonses' Ark, but of the Northern Capital of the Third Intermediate Period - and, icidentally, the royal necropolis with finds that rivalled and surpassed those of Tutankhamun, in the late 1930's and mid '40's. This time a stela of Ramesses II - which came from his city of Piramesse (Biblical 'Ramses'). The entire stonework of the city, temples, statues, the lot, was moved to Tanis when the branch of the Nile on which Piramesse stood silted up - around 1000 BC. http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/40/288037/Heritage/Ancient-Egypt/Ramses-II-stelae-uncovered-at-San-AlHagar-site.aspx
-
...and there's more. This time, from the second century AD - from el-Alamein..and not a desert rat in sight. http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/40362/Egyptian-archaeological-mission-discovers-tomb-in-Alamein
-
Tchy stuff bursts a bubble. If you've never viewed the Manchester Museum collection of Egyptian stuff, take a look; it's of world importance. One of the mysteries, however, has been solved. There had been speculation that two mummies found in the same, rather rare, 'double coffin' were lovers in death as well as in life. Whole papers of romantic speculation followed this find. Hard luck: the sund of books being ditched is deafening....because DNA has shown that they were, in fact, step-brothers. Still, the mummies are worth a look; and so is this article. https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-01/uom-adr011518.php
-
First the Japanese. Then the Germans. Now the Italians are at it. Since Nicolas Reeeve's controversial theory that KV 62 - the endlessly fascinating enigma that is Tutankhamun's tomb - has as yet undiscovered chambers lying beyond the crudely painted burial chamber, scans have been...inconclusive. Now the Italians are having a go. http://luxor-news.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/search-for-tuts-hidden-chambers.html
-
Major find dating from the end of dyn V (about 100 years after the 'great' pyramid of Giza) announced from Egypt's department of antiquities this morning: http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/40/289277/Heritage/Ancient-Egypt/BREAKING-yearold-tomb-of-Fifth-Dynasty-prominent-w.aspx
-
The big controversy that's been doing the rounds for the past few decades is the identity of Tutankhamun's mum. Here's a glimpse at a recon of "KV35 yl", the prime candidate for the position, identified by brilliant scholar Aidan Dodson (among others) as Nefertiti, great Royal wife of Akhenaten (Tut's dad) and, as Neferneferuaten, King in her own right. https://www.today.com/video/get-an-exclusive-first-look-at-the-face-of-king-tut-s-m other-queen-nefertiti-1153878083619
-
An insight into provincial life in Upper (southern) Egypt around 26oo BC from rare examples of buildings newly excavated..... https://news.uchicago.edu/article/2018/02/06/newly-discovered-buildings-reveal-clues-ancient-egyptian-dynasties
-
Have a drink on them! Beer was a staple in Ancient Egypt....and the Egyptians had a long, long time to perfect the art of brewing - the earliest evidence for beer making dates from before Egypt was unitd in around 3100 BC. Here's a report on a new find - a micro-brewery, Egyptian style. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/archaeology/egypt-beer-making-ancien t-brewery-archaeologists-a8201471.html
-
Another week, another find. This time from the Saite period - dyn XXVI; the period whn Egypt was struggling to maintain its' indepndence against an expansionist Persia. The time, also, when several kings and events are mentioned in the Bible - and which coincide with the actuall history of the period. This time, what could be quite a significant provincial burial ground. http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/291590.aspx
-
And more spadework digs up yet more stuff...... https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/ramses-ii-sandstone-colossus-remains.html#!/2018/02/ramses-ii-sandstone-colossus-remains.html
-
Tatoo ain't new..... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-43230202
-
There's a bit in the New Testament where Philip encounters an 'Ethiopian'. What he probably encountered was a Kushite. These were an amalgum of African and Egyptian cultures, who had a quasi-Egyptian state - complete with albeit wierd looking pyramids, which lasted feom around 700BC - 400 AD, going through various phases. Here's the latest find from Nubia - a Kushite King - Asphalta - i all his finery. https://www.livescience.com/61801-ancient-statue-nubian-king.html#undefined.gbpl
-
A great lecture update on the finds at "Khufu's harbour", dating from the very start of the 'pyramid age', and giving insights - from found papyrus documents - the earliest yet found - on the construction andorganisational skills of 5,800 years ago. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FB9xT2aWXSY&feature=youtu.be
-
Pics from the excavation of a twelfth dynasty tomb in Middle Egypt dating to around 4000 BC. This shows the 'democratisation of death' was extending to nobles of middle rank....possibly a sign of affluence becuse of foriegn trade and military expedition to Syria/Palestine, as documented on wall paintings in the vicinity of this one. https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.co.uk/2018/03/funerary-scenes-unveiled-in-4000-years.html#!/2018/03/funerary-scenes-unveiled-in-4000-years.html
-
Jim, I was watching a BBC2 film last night on Karnak. There were lots of things in it which boggled my mind, not least the sheer size of the place, but she said that a lot of grave-robbing there was instigated by various priests, who had bodies unwrapped and rewrapped, so that gold and other valuables could be taken. Is this correct? I guess it is, as otherwise she would not have broadcast it, (Joann Fletcher).
Also stuff about a town dump they found, with various messages on bits of pot, e.g. 'get six loaves'.
I am a fan, anyway, and must start reading about it.
-
Jim, I was watching a BBC2 film last night on Karnak. There were lots of things in it which boggled my mind, not least the sheer size of the place, but she said that a lot of grave-robbing there was instigated by various priests, who had bodies unwrapped and rewrapped, so that gold and other valuables could be taken. Is this correct? I guess it is, as otherwise she would not have broadcast it, (Joann Fletcher). Also stuff about a town dump they found, with various messages on bits of pot, e.g. 'get six loaves'. I am a fan, anyway, and must start reading about it.
Ah, Jo - "The dolly with the brolly"! Jo's a friend of mine, and despite her sometimes scatterbrained persona, she really knows her stuff. If you liked that four part series, Wiggs, the book - "The Story of Egypt" is a good read...even if there are a few bits with which I've disagreed amicably over a drink with Joann. The bit about stripping the royal dead is true. The robberies in the Valley of the Kings were getting out of hand - there are some great court records of the time - the "Tomb robbery papyri" detailing some of them. The Amun priesthood finally stripped the tombs, put many of the dead in cheap coffins, and put them into tow caches which we label KV 35 and TT 320. They were found in the late nineteenth century; names like Amenhotep III, Ramesses II, Thitmose III and twenty-odd other kings, not to mention queens and princes, turned up. DNA analysis of them,and the burals of Tutankhamun, Akhenaten, and Tut's great grandparents, have (sort of) sorted out who's who in the eighteenth dynasty mummy shuffle.
-
By the way, Wiggs, if you want a view of royalty in all its' gory detail, go to http://anubis4_2000.tripod.com/mummypages1/intro.htm Unfortunately, this site doesn't cover the pitiful remains behind the gold ans silverware found at Tanis, though.
-
Cheers, Jim, I like her persona, not stuck in an ivory tower. She's doing well, to be galloping through all that in 4 episodes. Quite hard to keep track of the timeline, but yeah, a few books would help.
-
Cheers, Jim, I like her persona, not stuck in an ivory tower. She's doing well, to be galloping through all that in 4 episodes. Quite hard to keep track of the timeline, but yeah, a few books would help.
Books? Depends how deep you want to go into the subject.
My specialities are the later eighteenth dynasty and the third Intermediate and Late periods - but I'm a geek.
If you want to read some serious - but readable - scholarly stuff, Aidan Dodson writes on the Amarna period (Akhenaten) with his "Amarna Sunrise" and Amarna Sunset" books - both brilliant works. And Nicolas Reeves' "Akhenaten; Egypt's false prophet"'s worth a look as well. For other periods, modern authors such as Donald Redford, Toby Wilkinson, Salima Ikram and Joyce tyldesly - as well as Joann Fletcher - are always worth a look.
Meanwhile, here's part one of a two-parter documentary, first shown on the Beeb, with Joann giong into details on that tomb-workers village, Deir-el-Medina.
Part 2's also available on youtube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C39cgxTRh_c
-
Thanks, Jim. I've just realized that the Petrie museum is next to UCL, where I was a postgrad, although I never went in. Looks fun.
-
Thanks, Jim. I've just realized that the Petrie museum is next to UCL, where I was a postgrad, although I never went in. Looks fun.
You need to go or a shuftie.
There's not too much sparkly stuff, but some of the predynastic and Olkd Kindom artefacts are amazing. I've been there a few times (had hands on with a few pots, ostraca, bits of statues, etc, aswell.
The place is an undiscovered gem!
-
.....and some more discoveries - closer to home. Many museums collected "Egyptian stuff" from the mid nineteenth century when Egyptomania hit the world for the first time. Objects were either displayed without research, or flung into boxes and forgotten about. A couple of years ago, I managed to get up close and personal with some 'shabti' figures in the local Dick Institute, Kilmarnock. Thry'd been on display for decades but no-one had bothered to translate them...but when yours truly had a shuftie, two turned out to be reasonably special, dating from the mid XVIIIth and the early XXIth dynasties. Anyway, here's a find relating to the female king Hatshepsut....from Wales, of all places... http://www.swansea.ac.uk/press-office/latest-news/mysteriousheadofapharaohdiscoveredbyswanseaegyptologist.php
-
It's bizarre what relatively small museums has from Egypt. I was fascinated as a child by what my local museum had
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/McLean_Museum
-
It's bizarre what relatively small museums has from Egypt. I was fascinated as a child by what my local museum had
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/McLean_Museum
Yep.
Even the more important museums hold stuff they don't really understand.
Bolyon museum had a cardboard box full of fragments of stone from a wall - kept in storage from the day they got it in the late 1930's.
Egyptologist Christine el-Mahdy was scrabbling about in the depts of the stores looking foe items to display when she found the box in the late 1980's.
When she put the fragments together, the inscription there virtually rewrote Egyptian history, showing a female king definately ruled just before Tutankhamun came to the throne.
Even the Kelvingrove doesn't really know how important its' small collection is: that massive stone sarcophagus belongs to Pabasa - virtual ruler of upper Egypt during most of the twenty fifth dynasty, and his tomb is one of the best (and biggest) examples of a nobleman's burial place from that time period.
-
If you haven't talked to the people in charge at the McLean, I think you could help them out. It's a lovely little museum
-
If you haven't talked to the people in charge at the McLean, I think you could help them out. It's a lovely little museum
I'm almost certain Cambell Price - the guy in charge of the Egyptian departments of both Liver pool and Manchester Uni Egyptology departments and the museum collections of both cities - has had a look. He's a Scot, and has rooted about various central belt Egyptian collections, including Paisley, Falkirk and Stirling - he was the one who confirmed my suspicions regarding the Dick Institute shabtis.
I'll let him know, NS.
-
Jim, I was watching a BBC2 film last night on Karnak. There were lots of things in it which boggled my mind, not least the sheer size of the place, but she said that a lot of grave-robbing there was instigated by various priests, who had bodies unwrapped and rewrapped, so that gold and other valuables could be taken. Is this correct? I guess it is, as otherwise she would not have broadcast it, (Joann Fletcher).
Also stuff about a town dump they found, with various messages on bits of pot, e.g. 'get six loaves'.
I am a fan, anyway, and must start reading about it.
Glad you mentioned this. I'd missed the start of the series, but I see there's another episode tonight.
-
There's a bit in the New Testament where Philip encounters an 'Ethiopian'. What he probably encountered was a Kushite. These were an amalgum of African and Egyptian cultures, who had a quasi-Egyptian state - complete with albeit wierd looking pyramids, which lasted feom around 700BC - 400 AD, going through various phases. Here's the latest find from Nubia - a Kushite King - Asphalta - i all his finery. https://www.livescience.com/61801-ancient-statue-nubian-king.html#undefined.gbpl
Did they have a habit of castrating any male who gained a position of authority, or was Philip's eunuch just a one-off (or maybe two or even three. Sorry).
-
Glad you mentioned this. I'd missed the start of the series, but I see there's another episode tonight.
All four episodeshave been kicking around Youtube for a couple of years, if you can't get them on iplayer, DU.
-
Did they have a habit of castrating any male who gained a position of authority, or was Philip's eunuch just a one-off (or maybe two or even three. Sorry).
Dunno about that.....but they had a habit of circumcising adults and burying donkeys with their kings....
'nuff said.....
-
Siwa. Alexander the Great was here. So were a lot of Greeks and Romans....and now archaeologists, who have uncovered a temple complex. http://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.co.uk/2018/04/egyptian-archaeologists-discover-greaco.html#!/2018/04/egyptian-archaeologists-discover-greaco.html
-
Siwa had a strong Berber influence, iirc?
-
Siwa had a strong Berber influence, iirc?
Given its' location, yes.
After all, the precursors of the Berbers were no strangers to Egypt - thrir kings formed the Egyptian dyn XXII-XXIV, and XXVI-XXX rulers, for the most part.
-
Siwa had a strong Berber influence, iirc?
May as well shove this in. Any excuse to highlight the discoveries by Montet at Tanis in the 1930's is good enough for me. It's the funerary mask of Sheshonq II - second king of the XXII nd (Lybian) dynasty, part of his burial equipment - one of several completely intact royal burials located under the Temple of Amun at Tanis. http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/sheshonqii.htm
-
May as well shove this in. Any excuse to highlight the discoveries by Montet at Tanis in the 1930's is good enough for me. It's the funerary mask of Sheshonq II - second king of the XXII nd (Lybian) dynasty, part of his burial equipment - one of several completely intact royal burials located under the Temple of Amun at Tanis. http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/sheshonqii.htm
And while we are shoving stuff in, recently caught up with Alastair Sooke's programmes on iPlayer looking at Egypt as the birth of art. Not sure if you have watched them? Link below.
I think it's an interesting approach but I think is likely that the classical concept of art as he discusses it was the exception and is more about a very specific take and needs challenged overall rather than just pointing at things and going surely that is art.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p01mv16n/treasures-of-ancient-egypt-1-the-birth-of-art
-
And while we are shoving stuff in, recently caught up with Alastair Sooke's programmes on iPlayer looking at Egypt as the birth of art. Not sure if you have watched them? Link below. I think it's an interesting approach but I think is likely that the classical concept of art as he discusses it was the exception and is more about a very specific take and needs challenged overall rather than just pointing at things and going surely that is art. https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p01mv16n/treasures-of-ancient-egypt-1-the-birth-of-art
Yes: I think he's putting a personal interpretation on things which don't merit it. The series is worth a look, though. There's a bit in the second episode where he visits Djeser-Djeseru' the mortuary complex of Hatshepsut...and waxes lyrical about a scene in the inner chapel of Hathor. Sine, in actuality, only one or two priests of the female king's mortuary cult would have access to this chapel, it was hrdly public art; and the concept of Hathor tenderly suclking the infant Hatshepsut is more in keeping with Hathor's role as a royal protector and balance against the growing power of the Karnak Amun cult, than any tender scene of affection. Yes, I'm a cynic......
-
There is another thread's discussion on what constitutes art, and he's right that certain aspects of it will always be flexible enough to include things that weren't at the time deemed 'art' and at least it allows a view of how quite extraordinary artifacts might be that engages on a different level then look how old and big.
I'm some ways it's the clash between Civilisation and Civilisations on a smaller scale. Art in the end is defined by the observer not the producer.
-
There is another thread's discussion on what constitutes art, and he's right that certain aspects of it will always be flexible enough to include things that weren't at the time deemed 'art' and at least it allows a view of how quite extraordinary artifacts might be that engages on a different level then look how old and big.
I'm some ways it's the clash between Civilisation and Civilisations on a smaller scale. Art in the end is defined by the observer not the producer.
Then much of the incredible jewellery, masks, coffins, furniture, etc, which so astonish us in their beauty, cant really be defined as art in Egypt, at any rate.
After all, the only 'people' much of these artefacts were designed to please were the 'ka' of the deceased, and the dieties of the underworld.
-
I think though that defining things as art by the producer is too restrictive. Obviously Lascaux isn't produced as art in any sense we understand it, but then even allowing for a Greco-Roman sensibility. Is the Pieta on levels not meant to please a deity in some ways? Art is a slippery concept so perhaps we can restrict ourselves to the idea that beauty, and an attempt to achieve motivated many Egyptians who created visual images?
-
I think though that defining things as art by the producer is too restrictive. Obviously Lascaux isn't produced as art in any sense we understand it, but then even allowing for a Greco-Roman sensibility. Is the Pieta on levels not meant to please a deity in some ways? Art is a slippery concept so perhaps we can restrict ourselves to the idea that beauty, and an attempt to achieve motivated many Egyptians who created visual images?
I honestly don't know. The one 'artwork' most mention as 'iconic beauty' in connection with Egypt, is the well known bust of Nefertiti found in the remains of the sculptor Thutmose's workshop at Akhetaten (Amarna) by Borchart. It's on disply in a room of itrs' own in Berlin....and people such as Sigmund Freud, Hitler (yes, Hitler), Dali, Thompson and umpteen others have rhapsodised over its' near perfection and declared it the finest sculpture in the Ancient World.....but....and, there's always a 'but'. Most Egyptologists will tell you that the piece isn't finished - and nowhere near it! It seems to have simply been left on a shelf when the city was abandoned - probably when Nefertiti herself, ruling as Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten, returned to Thebes at her husband's death. Over time, the shelf collapsed, and the bust, along with several other superb examples of Thumose's work - all unfinished - fell on the floor of the workshop and a sandstorm hid them. What we percieve as flawless beauty wasn't what Thutmose had intended....so which 'art' is correct? Even the statues and obelisks which adorned temples are not what they were meant to be. We see sandstone statues, diorite and granite columns, walls with beautifully inscised scenes....when what we miss is that each surface, column, wall, statue and obelisk was originally painted with a riot of whites, greens, blues, blacks and every other colour as well. Which is art: what we see now or what was once there? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nefertiti_Bust
-
Yep, Jim, I don't know either. And your whole point about what the original looks like applies to the art that we just 'think' of as art. The very things that Sooke is trying to say the creations of the Egyptians fit with would look hugely different when they were produced. I know many people hate much of modern art but Duchamp askedvalud questions about what we mean by art. In the end it doesn't matter much other than as a question of how we understand each other.
-
Apologies that this is from the Daily Fail; but here are some spectacular images from the dig at the latest Greco-Roman Temple find. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-5582079/Archaeologists-remains-Greco-Roman-temple-Egypt.html?ito=social-facebook
-
Ancient Egyptian-ish.... Probably the least documented bit of Egyptology...the civilisation south of Aswan. The snycretism of Egyptian and African cultures left a long lasting impact which lasted into the Christian era - indeed may have shaped the Kingdom of Ethiopia which lasted until the 1970s. Anyway, here's a report from the Meroitic Sedeinga necropolis in what is now Sudan. https://www.livescience.com/62272-oldest-meroe-inscriptions-sudan-africa.html
-
You wit for one new discovery, and...... ....well, discoveries at Luxor, Karnak and Aswan turn up. http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/298146.aspx
-
And some pics from an important "heb-sed" hall founded apparently by Ramesses II, but which appeared to have been used for over a thousand years therafter....and, yes, it's a recent discovery. http://www.egyptindependent.com/photos-egypt-unearths-royal-celebrations-hall-dating-back-to-ramses-era-at-matareya/
-
The very latest from Saqqara. This one's interesting; a general of the Egyptian army from the time of Seti I and Eamesses II - and a non-Egyptian, to boot. By his name, and the names of those of his family found so far in the tomb, he may have had some Canaanite or Syrian origin...not uncommon in Northern (Lower) Egypt, and many such were involved in the care andtraining of the roal chariot force. https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.co.uk/2018/05/3500-year-old-army-generals-tomb.html#!/2018/05/3500-year-old-army-generals-tomb.html
-
To avoid cluttering up another thread, here's last year's report from the south cemetary at Akhetaten (Tel-el-Amarna) which points to the brutal treatment of the workers involved in the construction of the city. It should be pointed out that remains from other sites in Egypt from the same period show no signs of severe overwork - nor, for that matter, child labour. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/273293452_Life_death_and_beyond_in_Akhenaten's_Egypt_Excavating_the_South_Tombs_Cemetery_at_Amarna
-
Another find. This gets to the guts of the matter - literally.... http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/305454.aspx
-
Not a find in itself, but illustrative of one of the most serious problems in Egyptology - antiquities smuggling. Over the past decade, Egypt has managed to retrieve stolen and smuggled antiquities from not only Israel, but America, Austria, France, Britain, Australia, Brazil and Spain, amongst others. The smuggling trade persists, though. https://eklutdvotyzsri.dailynewssegypt.com/2018/06/25/egypt-retrieves-91-smuggled-antiquities-from-israel/
-
Just when you think you know everything about the pyramids, someone goes and finds a statue. This one's of Aser - Osiris - and it shouldn't really be there. It seems to have been put in Netjerkhet (Djosser)'s incredible Step Pyramid two thousand years after the thing was built. At the time of Djoser - who built the first pyramid, which, IMHO, is far more impressive than the later Giza examples - Osiris wasn't the main deity of theafterlife. He wouldn't be top of the death pops for another tw centuries or more. https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/2018/07/the-god-statue-discovered-in-first.html#!/2018/07/the-god-statue-discovered-in-first.html
-
And there's more... This time from Alexandria. It's all Greek to me. http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/305971.aspx
-
Raise your glasses to the latest find.... http://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/2018/07/ancient-egyptian-5000-year-old-brewery.html#!/2018/07/ancient-egyptian-5000-year-old-brewery.html
-
What could be an important find at Saqqara - near the fifth dynasty pyramid of Unas, a significant embalmers' workshop - a very, very rare find - and a cache of mummies and funerary equipment. From what the article says, I suspect that this find dates to a much later period - probably around 1200-800 BC or so, though the details of the find haven't been published. Still, pretty important,. http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/306535.aspx
-
Anyone lost a city? 'Cos they've just found one..... It's all Greek to me. http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/53696/Ancient-city-dating-back-to-Greco-Roman-era-uncovered-in
-
A link to the latest finds from Saqqara - a mumification worksop, over thirty mummies, a gilded mask and much more - dating from the Saite period - from approx 664 Bc....for those of you Biblically inclined, just after the time of Senaccharib, when Egyptian kings employed Jewish mercenaries in the south of Egypt. The pics here are very interesting, and may ge pretty significant. http://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/#!/2018/07/new-discovery-mummification-workshop.html
-
Some of the latest pics from the Saqqara finf ; https://www.history.com/news/ancient-egypt-mummies-discovery
-
The potter's wheel - Well, the one that's 4,ooo years old, anyway. A very rare finf - an example of a 'factory' dating from around the time of Snefru or Khufu, bulders of the first 'true' pyramids...but found at the very south of 'classical' Old Kingdom Egypt - Aswan. https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2018/07/archaeologists-find-ancient-pottery.html#tGsSgXriMKexgDCL.97
-
Good news and bad news. The bad news is that Zahi Hawass is in charge of this....Egyptology's political - with a small 'p', and Hawass is a very controversial figure in many circles - plagiarism, self-aggrandisement and narcissism are only three of the charges laid at his feet. The good news is that, at last, a decent survey of the area near KV 62 - Tutankhamun's tomb, is going to take place. We know of 64 designated tombs in the Valley - and a probable 65th - but we suspect there should, by rights, be two or three others which we have not, as yet found. Watch this space..... https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/40627/New-excavation-works-led-by-Zahi-Hawas-take-place-in
-
Re-excavation of a site at Beni-Hassawn, in Middle Egypt, has yielded important finds from Egypt Middle Kingdom....from about 1900 BC. Tombs of two 'nomarchs'; effectively, mayors of nomes - provinces of Egypt. http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/40/308828/Heritage/Ancient-Egypt/Burial-chambers-of-two-Middle-Kingdom-officials-di.aspx
-
The riddle of the Sphinx. Well, not really, but it sounds good. There are literally hundreds of them dating from all eras of Egypt's history, bearing images of gods and kingss. Even the one at Giza wasn't the first one! Anyway, someone's stuck a shovel in the sand and found another one. http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/55645/New-sphinx-discovered-in-Luxor
-
......for mice with a craving...... https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/08/180815105307.htm World's oldest identifiable cheese found.
-
From the Beeb today: confirmation that mummification - as an artificial process - is far older than we thought. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-45175764 This finding confirms Doctor Joann Fletcher's theory that the first attempts at mummification by artificial means began before the Pharonic state itself was founded.
-
Some stuff dating from the mid-late Ptolemaic period...tyombs, tombs and more tombs. https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/2018/08/ptolemaic-rock-cut-tombs-discovered-in.html#!/2018/08/ptolemaic-rock-cut-tombs-discovered-in.html
-
This one's a biggie. The Nile Delta is an archaeologist's nightmare - organic remains rot in the swampy, salty conditions - but this is a major find; a Neolithic village with substantial organic remains dating from around 4100BC - a thousand years before the first united Egyptian state. Already, even at this date, it seems trade was extant - bits of pottery and stone which can only have come from Syria have been found there. http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/310709.aspx
-
A youtube video from Egypt'a Ministry of Antiquities showing the discovery of a tomb dating to around the twelfth dynasty at the Lisht/Dahshur necropolis. No names yet, but from what I can see, it looks like dating to the later part of the dynasty, probably to the riegn of Amenemhet III. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwqwt0YhjzQ&feature=youtu.be
-
Sphinxes became symbols, both of divine protection of the king, and divine kingship, down through the Pharonic age. The earliest example represents the mother of Kafre, who himself created the 'Great Sphinx' of Giza. This latest find from Upper (Southern) Egyptdates from the Ptolemaic period, and, from its' style,probably around 250 BC https://www.egyptindependent.com/archaeological-team-at-kom-ombo-temple-unearth-sphinx-statue/
-
A mummy a day makes Egyptophiles stay...... Another day, another discovery.... http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/40/311786/Heritage/Ancient-Egypt/A-sarcophagus-with-a-mummy-uncovered-in-Late-Perio.aspxhttp://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/40/311786/Heritage/Ancient-Egypt/A-sarcophagus-with-a-mummy-uncovered-in-Late-Perio.aspx
-
One of the biggest problems in Egyptology is illegal smuggling of antiquities to suit the private market. Such finds are never catalogued or documented properly, and often the context in which they were originally placed is as important as the object itself. Egypt has been trying hard, with limited resources, to recover these stolen antiquities. Here's one repatriated - from London. http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/40/311942/Heritage/Ancient-Egypt/A-relief-of-king-Amenhotep-I-recovered-from-London.aspx
-
Right through the history of Ancient Egypt, ther main centre - capital - was ant Men-Nefer (Greek; Memphis, modern Mit Rahina) Not much is left of what was a stupendus site, bordered as it was by the enormous burial centre of Sakkara. Here's the latest pics from the newest find, dating from the early Roman period. https://apnews.com/e3c67e17833542fa8d07584b3f3eb58f
-
South Assasif (more properly el-Assasif) near Luxor, has proven incredibly rich in finds over the last five years - thirty or more major discoveries. The area was used for burils from around 1900-500 BC, therefore much of the history, changing artistic and religio-political thought of Upper Egypt is buried there. Here's the latest find. http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/58219/Egyptian-Archeological-Mission-uncovers-2-ancient-tombs-in-Luxor
-
Not a tomb, but probably more interesting to the Egyptologist. Two rock carvings, separated by a thousand years, uncovered at Aswan - the natural southern border of "Egypt proper"; one of Seti I, father of Ramesses II, the other of a Ptolemy...both classical Egyptian in style. http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-10/01/c_137504563.htm
-
The tomb of the Keeper of Secrets has bee foud. NO, not some pyramidiot's fantasy, or even a masonic precursor, but just one of the titles born by an officialof the fifth dynasty. The discovery was announced today. Sorry, Dan Brown devotees. https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/2018/10/czech-archaeologists-discover-keeper-of.html#!/2018/10/czech-archaeologists-discover-keeper-of.html
-
A nice report on the latest find at Abusir; that previously announced dyn V tomb. https://cegu.ff.cuni.cz/en/2018/10/02/the-discovery-of-the-tomb-of-priest-kaires/
-
Another day, another find: This one's significant. It dates to the dawn of the New Kingdom, when very powerful ladies, such as Tetisheri, Ahmes Nefertari, and Ahotep, guided, sometimes even led, the armies of Lower Egypt against the occupying Hyksos, and eventually helped craft a united kingdom after nurturing three generations of "warrior kings!". It shows the vital importance of powerful women in this period; https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/2018/10/egyptian-archaeologist-discover-stela.html?view=magazine#!/2018/10/egyptian-archaeologist-discover-stela.
-
Finally, Heliopolis is getting its' day in the sun. (See wot I did there). This was once the religious capital of Egypt for over three thousand years, but has all but vanished under modern Cairo. However, more and more clues as to the vast, imposing sight it must have been in its' heyday are turning up; this time a base for a pavillion or temple shrine of Ramesses II has been uncovered. Yes, yet another Ramesses II monument.... https://www.heritagedaily.com/2018/10/booth-of-ramses-ii-discovered-by-egyptian-archaeologists/122017?fbclid=IwAR0A_9z-J0hSmK7L6-eqM4qCtuwFneLMsBJN7y8Oqs6bmp8YRLizeu1_uPg
-
For any pyramidiots out there wh still think it was aliens wot did it..... A new report to depress you. https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/2018/10/discovered-how-ancient-egyptians-moved.html#!/2018/10/discovered-how-ancient-egyptians-moved.html
-
It's a bug's...er....death. A spectacular fifth dynasty tomb, re-used for later mummified animals around 600-4-- BC, including scarab beetles! https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-archaeology-discovery/ancient-egyptian-tombs-yield-rare-find-of-mummified-scarab-beetles-idUSKCN1NF0KY?fbclid=IwAR2hS0XFCN-84mcCxyPJbuGVStiS9WGZMB2cKLBzsxUKtaoku9964xvHquo
-
A rather patheticdiscovery unvieled this time; an almost unique female mummy....who died in pregnancy. https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/2018/11/3500-year-burial-of-pregnant-woman.html?m=1#!/2018/11/3500-year-burial-of-pregnant-woman.html
-
Egypt: ther gift that keepsbon giving. This time, an example of recycling, Egyptian style. A rather important tomb, dating to the start of Egypt's 'golden age', the eighteenth dynasty, discovered recently...revealing some later twenty fifth and twenty sixth dynisty intact intrusive burials. https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/2018/11/breaking-news-3000-year-tomb-contains.html#!/201 8/11/breaking-news-3000-year-tomb-contains.html
-
Tombs are like buses. You wait for one for ages, and then.... Oh, well, another day, anot https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/2018/11/several-mummies-discovered-by-egyptian.html?view=magazine&fbclid=IwAR2j2dS4qADb3pKtyLgG2UrfYbp9N1w15uIlWYcVAL3DAd0feAO_dbcROjI#!/2018/11/several-mummies-discovered-by-egyptian.html her announcement....
-
Another day, anotherannouncement. Thistime, Giza...near the pyramid plateau,eight superbly preservedLate Period cartonagesarcophagiwith intact mummies. From thebrilliant images, they look likevery late Egyptian specimens, just before the time ofAlexander the Great. I'dsay around 400 BC. https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2018/11/eight-limestone-sarcophagi-with-mummies.html#PpAKG256iQ3xBIj7.97
-
A rare find dating from Egypt's Middle Kingdom - the so-called 'classical' period, dynasties 11-13; a robbed tomb, probably from the time of the first king of dyn XII, Amenemhet I. https://luxortimesmagazine.blogspot.com/2018/12/middle-kingdom-burial-shaft-discovered.html#!/2018/12/middle-kingdom-burial-shaft-discovered.html
-
Cool thread AM, love archaeological stuff and like this site:
https://www.ancient-origins.net/general :)
If the story grabs my attention i look it up on a more.. scientific site!
-
Cool thread AM, love archaeological stuff and like this site:
https://www.ancient-origins.net/general :)
If the story grabs my attention i look it up on a more.. scientific site!
Cheers, KO.
I've been hooked on the subject since I was a young 'un, and things have got a lot worse since then.....
Finally got my degree a couple of years ago, and now there's no hope for me.
I don't know if you haunt Facebook, but there are a few very good groups there....as well as some run by pyramidiots. Em Hotep BBS, Sussex Egyptology Unofficial Page, to name two of the former for starters.
Umpteen serious sites as well, such as
http://emhotep.net/
Which is run in partnership with Em Hotep BBS, and
https://osirisnet.net/e_centrale.htm
A very good Franco-English site with great pics, as well as current news.
-
One of the most productive excavations in Egypt today is the ongoing work at Gebel-el-Sisila, in the south of the country, near Aswan.
A vast necropolis dating from between 1700-1000 BC has yielden many very significant tombs of high and middle ranking nobles from Egypt's New Kingdom, plus graves of mercenary soldiers from both Sudan and the Aegean employed in the pacification and 'Egyptianisation' of Nubia.
Here's the very latest discovery of an intact eighteenth dynasty burial.
https://gebelelsilsilaepigraphicsurveyproject.blogspot.com/2018/12/new-discovery-intact-mass-grave.html?spref=fb&fbclid=IwAR39UkD8-FTIn56KW_XMSi6kyC100JWJtYkx1YqZcHuIcXP4JFdFmxcEBAQ
-
...And there's more.
From the reign of the fifth dynasty king Neferirkare,dating to about a century after the Great pyramid of Giza, a major find at the vast necropolis of Sakkara,south of modern Cairo.
A 'wah' priest's burial, and, from what the excavator's report, in superb condition, still to be fully explored, but probably intact.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/320140.aspx?fbclid=IwAR152A_af--yADcuCySPme8OuHuIT5KwxK6ZaQkyDFERu_GJO82IvL47MIE
-
Here's some footage of the newly discovered dyn V tomb at Saqqara, with great pics of the wall decoration, still in superb condition after four thousand years. Media reports of pharaoh's statues are wrong....statues were of the tomb owner and his family. No nobles were buried with royal statuary at this time; though the names of Neferirkare, third of the dyn V 'sun kings' do appear in the tomb, along with a couple of mentions of 'the Aten' as an aspect of the Sun....eight centuries before the 'Aten heresy' at the end of the eighteenth dynasty. http://luxortimes.com/2018/12/exclusive-video-inside-the-newly-discovered-tomb-in-sakkara/?fbclid=IwAR2IYBgNfkNcGg-BVr6iXXmbf7P1xvMjv5A6J-LBJfWfdabnzfHQtQO7_eM
-
Soup with that human touch? https://www.livescience.com/64321-waterlogged-mass-grave-egypt.html?fbclid=IwAR3xjPLExlUvHaZECsYfSYrW7Veepx66WuIWAERrIJKrutL2nnZHsGbHC1s
-
The name's the thing. Sometimes the really important archaeology isn't the bling in the tomb...and this is a prime example. Kom Ombo was long recognised as an important settlement in Upper (Southern) Egypt in the time of the New Kingdom. Now excavations are starting to show that it was probably the second city of Egypt in the time of the Old Kingdom as well Seal impressions ov various Fifth dynasty kings, including the 'sun kings' Sahure and Neferirkare, have been found in large quantities. Seal impressions of the latter were, until this find, pretty rare. . http://luxortimes.com/2018/12/old-kingdoms-kings-names-discovered-in-kom-ombo/?fbclid=IwAR1Qf7QQqZf0xUwNFIIGYvNsqrfaCEbGcxH5BgcRvwux3tAkaBTmo2pOaPQ
-
Been watching Tony Robinson in Egyptian Tomb Hunting on Channel 5 (yes it's a legitimate channel!!)
It's a good watch. :)
-
Been watching Tony Robinson in Egyptian Tomb Hunting on Channel 5 (yes it's a legitimate channel!!)
It's a good watch. :)
Yep.Tony's enthusiasm came through in bucket loads.
When archaeologists find a few fragments of the remains of a hut here, they enthuse for weeks.
In Egypt, the problem is trying to find time to document the continuing avalanche of new finds.
Gebel-el-Sisila is an incredible dig, and seems to be one that might just last for decades.
The mud soup through which Tony swam seems to be pretty significant, though, but might have to wait a few more months till funds for more powerful pumps become available in order to get to the second, as yet unexplored chamber of what is a unique New Kingdom tomb.
-
When they said pumps i thought they would be bring out the high tech jobs, not the locals turning up with something as reliable as my lawn mower!! :)
Damn I was dying to see what was ... beyond the door!
-
When they said pumps i thought they would be bring out the high tech jobs, not the locals turning up with something as reliable as my lawn mower!! :)
Damn I was dying to see what was ... beyond the door!
So much for the dry sands of Egypt, then.
Anyhoo, here's the site for the updates from the el-Sisila dig.
http://gebelelsilsilaepigraphicsurveyproject.blogspot.com/
-
Damn I.T.s filter!
Thanks AM i'll check it out when I get home. :)
-
It's been a bumper year for finds - though a rough estimate reveals that less than a third of the archaeology in Egypt has as yet been found. Anyway, here's a top ten of the finds of 2018....but I could have posted a top fifty.... http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/News/26129.aspx?fbclid=IwAR15BIEht9ZHjK6YtuIdnT_DJTKdt34Ara_7cukJhoe_66vQnRh81EBtUfY
-
.....Well, not Egypt - Spain! Museums are getting round to round to using modern tech to examine their exhibits,and sometimes surprises turn up. Here's one....the positive ID of an eye doctor who served Ptolemy XII, dyn 31....Cleopatra VII's dad. https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2019/01/madrid-mummy-found-to-be-ptolemy-iis.html#Q8ttkgw5sidKQfI7.97
-
And there's more. This time, a story from Saudi which doesn't involve bombs, guns or (modern) religion.... Evidence of Egyptian activity in the Arabian peninsula in the time of Ramesses III; presumably a trade expedition or a tax gathering raid on the frankincense and myrrh growing area at the time. There's a mistake in the article, though; Ramesses III was not the son of Ramesses II. There was no family relationship, and the two kings rules are separated by fifty years. http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/63386/Hieroglyphic-inscriptions-discovered-in-Saudi-Arabia
-
Anotherday, another find....Roman period http://luxortimes.com/2019/01/egyptian-archaeologists-discover-two-tomb-in-dakhla-oasis/?fbclid=IwAR1N4jtqDZV4ncaQ-c-TCKM-7Xk0nnB4zdCqh6hSz4AcM63_hVFZCtq-u_Y
-
anchorman
I hadn't clicked on this topic for ages, so have just enjoyed a most interesting catch-up readof several pages. Thank you.
-
anchorman
I hadn't clicked on this topic for ages, so have just enjoyed a most interesting catch-up readof several pages. Thank you.
Thanks, Susan.
All those finds can be a real pain, though. I'm writing a book that no-one with any sense will ever read, about four years...four out of four thousand ....in Egyptian history.
The trouble is, I've had to re-write bits of it more
than once in the last few months because some blasted so-and-so keeps digging up morenew finds whichshed new light on those four blassted years.
Sometimes I wish I'd taken up flower arranging instead.... ;)
-
:) all very interesting, though! I first became interested when my mother, having more time to herself now that all four of us were at school all day, decided to educate herself more. She went to the Library and asked the Librarians where she should start. They recommended reading about Tutankhamen's tomb and I, being a reader of anything with words on, read it too! Also, my mother was enthusiastic about what she was reading.
-
:) all very interesting, though! I first became interested when my mother, having more time to herself now that all four of us were at school all day, decided to educate herself more. She went to the Library and asked the Librarians where she should start. They recommended reading about Tutankhamen's tomb and I, being a reader of anything with words on, read it too! Also, my mother was enthusiastic about what she was reading.
I blame my primary school teacher.
As ten year olds, our class was deemed able to choose personal projects to pursue.
Given the date - 1970 - I chose space flight. My teacher - still a close personal friend - suggested I choose something different....so I chose Egypt, because that hellish film, "The Egyptians", a Hollywood sword-and-sandal hokum, had just been on the telly.
The rest was, as they say, history.
I was hooked...and by the time I was in first year secondary school, I'd taught myself rudimentary hieroglyphs.
At that time, I could use a bog standard magnifying glass - though nowadays my sight's a lot worse, and I use a Humanware explore 5 handheld electronic job for outdoors, and a prodigy desktop electronic magnifier for indoor reading.
-
Here's some footage of the newly discovered dyn V tomb at Saqqara, with great pics of the wall decoration, still [b]in superb condition after four thousand years[/b][/u]. Media reports of pharaoh's statues are wrong....statues were of the tomb owner and his family. No nobles were buried with royal statuary at this time; though the names of Neferirkare, third of the dyn V 'sun kings' do appear in the tomb, along with a couple of mentions of 'the Aten' as an aspect of the Sun....eight centuries before the 'Aten heresy' at the end of the eighteenth dynasty. http://luxortimes.com/2018/12/exclusive-video-inside-the-newly-discovered-tomb-in-sakkara/?fbclid=IwAR2IYBgNfkNcGg-BVr6iXXmbf7P1xvMjv5A6J-LBJfWfdabnzfHQtQO7_eM
Oh, just a little while after God created the universe then . . . !
-
Oh, just a little while after God created the universe then . . . !
Ah....
That's usher-ind a whole new topic....
(seewotIdidthere?)
-
....Another week, another find..... This time from Aswan, the southern 'frontier town' in the third millennium BC. http://see.news/six-tombs-dating-back-to-old-kingdom-discovered-in-aswan/?fbclid=IwAR32wI6yI-YSYIiRURbnzfzTeTWK-zqn9gS27wA-qtOEq-j2FGQRAUM7dzo
-
Another day, another announcement. This time, a double whammy, significant finds dating to two of the more obscure periods of history. The earlier dates to the Badarian period, just before the formation of what would become 'Lower Egypt', and eventually part of the 'two lands', from around 3200 BC. The later dates from the Second Intermediate period, when, for around a century, Lower Egypt was ruled by a set of rival dynasts collectively known as the Hyksos. The distinctly Semitic style of pottery shows the Canaanite origins of the site. The Hyksos were eventually expelled from the Delta by Ahmose I, founder of the eighteenth dynasty. http://luxortimes.com/2019/01/egyptian-archaeologists-discover-5000-year-old-burials/?fbclid=IwAR18GkiSAv6j6wkn79XYGPyh0_x5HQ5gacuWEFGUcopg2bL7CxV1u1hYMzY
-
I can just see the headlines.....
"Plonk from the pyramids".......
OK, anachronistic, but snappy.
http://luxortimes.com/2019/01/2000-year-old-winery-discovered-in-delta/?fbclid=IwAR0s51bN7aY4yN_T1m2X3nEBdmIc4qPb7d1hcN-m8UoOzJObD5fawdrIF8w
-
.....another day, anotherr discovery. I can remember someone telling me, as I first studied Eyptology, that Egypt was 'dug out'. That was in 1980. This year - 2019 - there have been at least five significant finds already... here's the latest.... http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/63937/Exclusive-to-Egypt-Today-A-cemetery-housing-40-mummies-uncovered?fbclid=IwAR3rz0VXhn6Uj1zARvcLLZArEj9mQufT7t4RSL6TxQsQXL4UvWJg6ESRmcM
-
Knee deep in mummies.
The latest discoveries from a rich necropolis dating from c100BC-400AD.
http://see.news/new-archeological-discovery-in-minia-announced/?fbclid=IwAR3zX0FAflhjHCl-Dc7a6zY0sGQIVb8QbgHUL8qpRRVbfNjz-ll33dqKFKM
-
And here's a video, taken this morning, from the new find;
http://luxortimes.com/2019/02/exclusive-video-the-mummies-discovered-by-mini-university/?fbclid=IwAR16f3UIDK6UwfNExHixVbwvn0V-sJelJ1kB4nP9yJpGRAcIHe0ORyO98tQ
-
"Honest, guv, we wuz only doin' a bit of DIY....."
WWhat happens when you do a liitle building without planning permission?
You stumble across a tomb full of Greco-Roman mummies, that's what.
And then the old Bill get involved.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/324949.aspx?fbclid=IwAR1U51bHy21FLI1bCs_kb_Ho7-LJyfrRx_6tU8BCZA585y0bFC-eL-KdTsw
-
Not a find, more a clearance.
One of the biggest villains in Egyptology was the American Theodore M Davies...who wrecked more sites and ransacked more pristine tombs than most tourists have ever seen. His 'excavation' of the controversial KV 55 has created more controversy than any other dig in Egypt; his 'donation' of items to friends and families, and museums, without recording or researching them is still creating problems today - and sometimes answering questions.
Here's a blog from the Valley of the Kings illustrating the work being undertaken even now to try to redress the balance - and discover a few gems Davies either missed or discarded.
https://egyptcentrecollectionblog.blogspot.com/2019/02/gold-from-valley-of-kings.html?fbclid=IwAR18tvY2RtnIsmEBgSEXocdf8E4aSP8P3G9AQr78tyIFK30qPonMQlnwHho
-
It's not often a new 'mastaba' burial is unearthed.
'Mastaba' is the Arabic word for bench, as thisdescribes the superstructure of the tomb. Mastabas were used from predynastic times to the dawning of the pyramid age, invariably for royal or very high ranking personages.
This ine seems to be for a teenager, whose position at burial suggests a date earlier than the traditional form of burial, but still shows some efforts at mummifacation.
http://luxortimes.com/2019/02/4500-year-old-burial-of-a-teenager-discovered/?fbclid=IwAR0U2l4DDg7DKCkPalQqfQlfUbOF_SkV8segweGDXM1cj7XFae4RMSN8SQY
-
Egyptology's not just about getting yourself knee deep in mummies or falling into tombs.
Here's a link to a friend of mine, Jan Picton' who is working at the Malquatta project (Yes, there are several ways to spell it...)
The Malquatta is the modern name for a massive palace compound built by Amenhotep III around 1360, mainly of mud brick, so it's a wreck of a site...but massive amounts of rubbish and deposits are left to show us what it would have been like in the thirty years it was in use.
There are tantalising clues as to trade with the Agean, maybe even with China, and the story of the Amarna period kings who used the place.
This blog gives an insight into the painstaking work at the site.
https://imalqata.wordpress.com/2019/02/11/tracking-pot-designs/?fbclid=IwAR1z2pI3UTmqz2oDvoOPmQj7PuEutoPiP23saMz1m0OEJaaRQO5OGuQeSyU
-
Another day, another find.
This time, the Greco-Roman equivalent of John Brown's shipyard on the Clyde.
http://luxortimes.com/2019/02/roman-shipyard-discovered-in-egypt/
-
OK....forget the hyperbole - Gabolde is a superb Egyptologist and certainly wouldn't use those words; but his finding of Neferneferuaten as the owner of Tutankhamun's sarcophagus confirms what most of us suspect that Akhenaten's wife ruled as king and that most of her funerary equipment was used for Tutankhamun's very irregular burial.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1087721/egypt-mystery-solved-archaeologist-hidden-secret-tutankhamun-tomb-spt?fbclid=IwAR1aEg03xFRN0qQ_0V6WKNKTptkMn_X4TH
CIJTki-vjd3lFClwy8UKmMjSU
-
It's been a whole week since a discovery was announced.
Worry not....
This time, from the incredible Gebel-el Sisila dig zone, a 'builders' yard' from the New Kingdom, with some unfinished work in progress - showing sculptural methodology.
This one's not gold or mummy filled stuff, but it is nonetheless very important.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/326232.aspx?fbclid=IwAR2wVMTWenalF4nhvJ-EBYxwHDkziacn-8L5GcqKB7Q5hpj8mWD8eaCt_DI
-
Have a shuftie at this link.
It isn't a new discovery, but it has just been re-opened to the public.
There has been no restoration to the colours or paintwork - what's there is the way the craftsmen left it, over five thousand years ago.
The tomb owner was a very high ranking official at the court of the sixth dynasty, around two centuries after the pyramids of Giza were built, and nine centuries before Tutankhamun.
Yes, I know - the mind boggles at the timeline.
Anyhow, Mehu had great power and responsibilities equivalent to the present day combined power of a UK chancellor of the exchequer and home secretary combined, so his king(s) - he server under two successive monarchs - splashed out on a lavish monument for him.
https://globalnews.ca/news/4437704/4000-year-old-tomb-egypt/
-
Wow
-
OK, I couldn't not share this one....any anchor floats my boat -or not.
Seriously, though, this is just the latest in a massive haul of finds from the sea off the Delta...which subsided as a result of a massive earthquake in Ptolemaic times, and a second around the time of the Roman Emperor Augustus. The sea came in covering harbours,ships, towns, temples and cities in sand, preserving them in almost perfect condition - and giving us material dating from c. 2000 BC -30 AD to play with.
http://luxortimes.com/2019/03/2000-year-old-anchors-discovered-in-the-mediterranean-waters-near-alexandria/?fbclid=IwAR0cmQS4FD8dqFnCH4TD9BM4aGwi34UEuo6Ai
Gdf5N866l_zkD0gTVUMjrg
-
Abydos was important in Egypt from earliest times.
Located near Nekhen (Heirakonpolis, it was the earliest site of royal power in pre dynastic and early dynastic times,and hosted the burials of Egypt's earliest kings.
As the cult of Osiris became the main gateway to the afterlife,around eighty years after the 'great pyramid' was built, Abydos became the cult centre for Osiris and remained so until Roman times.
There's superb temple built by Seti I and his son, Ramesses II stands in splendour, with jaw-dropping wall carvings and historically vital inscriptions, there - and now a new temple/palace compound of Ramesses II has been found - with the remnant of superb decoration indicating that it was, for a time, a royal residence.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/40/329050/Heritage/Ancient-Egypt/New-ttemple-palace-discovered-at-Ramses-IIs-temple-.aspx?fbclid=IwAR2e0Lvn9Q_tzaLteYArlU3T8YfVQWGqv4Y_PDjYL5pyemxtaxHOBt2E7VQ.
-
....and another, and another....
This time, rather rare finds, probably dating to the end of the first Intermediate Period and start of the Eleventh dynasty.
Yes, the preservation is poor, but nevertheless, the fact that the burial was found in situ in a rather damp area means that any sort of organic material is a bonus.
http://luxortimes.com/2019/04/anthropoid-sarcophagus-and-gold-appliques-discovered-in-4000-year-old-cemetry-north-of-cairo/?fbclid=IwAR1lZ_yjNurjw7ITgd5ow2ltPWfxA9IacHEza5NuG377E3en4kIcJNOWGsY
-
Another day, another announcement.
This time, from the massive royal necropolis of south Saqqara, where kings, noble sand dignitaries from the third till eighth dynasties were buried.
A typical dyn V tomb of a high ranking noble, like most others, robbed in antiquity.
From another news feed, though,I gather that some Egyptologists are in head scratching mode,as an inscription in the tomb mentions the Aten - an aspect of the Sun, well known as a form of the solar deity Re from this time - but apparently, this example stresses the Aten as a deity separate from Re - nine centuries before the mid eighteenth dynasty kings start to promote it as a supreme deity - culminating in Akhenaten and the Amarna so-called revolution.
https://cegu.ff.cuni.cz/en/2019/04/02/discovery-of-a-unique-tomb-and-the-name-of-an-ancient-egyptian-queen-in-south-saqqara/?fbclid=IwAR2taB3CUNqItEX4Z7XZ8zpgnha11xn8a8feCs3StmrxMEsmIB7c6mVXs4I
-
Another day, another tomb.....
This time, from the Ptolemaic era - but more Egyptian in style than Greek.
The exceptional 'classical' wall painting harks back to the 'golden age' - by then receding into ancient history.
The amount of animal mummies buried with the deceased shows the 'industrialisation' of animal votive offerings which only came to the fore after the 'humanisation' of the kings toward the fourth century BC.
Prior to that time, the king acted as intermediary to the gods...now animals took over the role - by the million.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/329501.aspx?fbclid=IwAR3uoSnlVU9_pQZpHm7Pc6J-HXpCi59WJ1a9_GVGbU5sY0ruDwlSnQP-lzM
-
This one's causing a stooshie.
Apparently, controversial 'Egyptologist' Zahi Hawass engendered even more self-publicity by unveiling three sarcophagi containing mummies and other artefacts, on a 'live' broadcast on the Discovery channel on Sunday night.
The mummies date from the Saite period - around 600 BC - and this link gives good images.
That's not the issue, though.
Many Egyptologists were rightly incensed to see Hawass picking up and handling objects - despite them not being photographed and measured in situ first.
That is simply terrible archaeology.
It's not as if he wasn't aware of GOOD archaeology...after all, he's always banging on about Howard Carter and Tutankhamun. Carter was meticulous in cataloguing, measuring and photographing each object in situ - and again in the conservation lab. This archive of photographs and data is still invaluable for modern researchers today.
But, then, that's typical Hawass.
https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2019/04/egypt-unveils-2500-year-old-mummy-at.html#Z1H4GU5rmD60zExY.97
-
Been to the dentists recently?
This might make you think what the future archaeologists will make of your lifestyle.
Bio-archaeology is a complex, yet valuable resource when dealing with the ancient dead...and this article shows how meticulous research on otherwise nondescript middle ranking noble remains from the First Intermediate Period can reveal lots more than we thought.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinakillgrove/2019/04/11/archaeologists-discover-a-new-profession-in-an-ancient-egyptian-womans-teeth/?fbclid=IwAR1DtKIRJtl-BYAZ2ut5bUZY_cGIPtl9HcCLI0tj0jlN-pu4HMFujvCJ_0E#6a8123c93098
-
Been to the dentists recently?
This might make you think what the future archaeologists will make of your lifestyle.
Bio-archaeology is a complex, yet valuable resource when dealing with the ancient dead...and this article shows how meticulous research on otherwise nondescript middle ranking noble remains from the First Intermediate Period can reveal lots more than we thought.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinakillgrove/2019/04/11/archaeologists-discover-a-new-profession-in-an-ancient-egyptian-womans-teeth/?fbclid=IwAR1DtKIRJtl-BYAZ2ut5bUZY_cGIPtl9HcCLI0tj0jlN-pu4HMFujvCJ_0E#6a8123c93098
I had my 6 monthly dental check up on Wednesday. The sadistic dentist I had as a young child would have not been out of place all those millennia ago! :o
-
I had my 6 monthly dental check up on Wednesday. The sadistic dentist I had as a young child would have not been out of place all those millennia ago! :o
What gives you the idea that medics in Egypt were regarded as 'sadist'?
We have several tombs from Saqqara, Memphis, El-Kab, Luxor, etc, which belonged to the equivalent of doctors - tombs gifted by the state - dating from 2900 BC -700 BC; showing the high regard the state had for such people.
Meanwhile, here's a scholarly article from the British Dental Association.
https://www.nature.com/articles/sj.bdj.2009.355
-
For an overview of tombs created for dentists, go to https://news.softpedia.com/news/Dentists-039-Tombs-from-Ancient-Egypt-39079.shtml
-
What gives you the idea that medics in Egypt were regarded as 'sadist'?
We have several tombs from Saqqara, Memphis, El-Kab, Luxor, etc, which belonged to the equivalent of doctors - tombs gifted by the state - dating from 2900 BC -700 BC; showing the high regard the state had for such people.
Meanwhile, here's a scholarly article from the British Dental Association.
https://www.nature.com/articles/sj.bdj.2009.355
They didn't have the use of painkillers in those days. Of course our dentist did but chose not to use them! >:(
-
They didn't have the use of painkillers in those days. Of course our dentist did but chose not to use them! >:(
I think you'll find Egyptian medicine was highly sophisticated - for its time; medical tretises survive from c1800 BC. Here's a link to an overview. https://www.ancient-egypt-online.com/ancient-egyptian-medicine.html
-
Another day, another tomb. This time, from the massive Dra abul -el Naga necropolis near Luxor; the site of the burials of Dyn XV II ruler, and later nobles and minor royals of the New Kingdom. This seems a spectacular find, and from magnifying the images, I'd suggest the mid eighteenth dynasty as a date for the occupant. The images are spectacular. http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/68489/Egypt-announces-tomb-discovery-at-Luxor%E2%80%99s-Draa-Abul-Naga-necropolis?fbclid=IwAR3VPUGwZPnX1rIFbR9FgD2p6KTivBZdE89QwZbt0WsLJq-Rm0yJqVYFZeE
-
....and a video of the latest find from dra abu el-naga -with typical Eyptian hyperbole. Mind you, they've got something to crowabout; thisseemsto be the first in aseries of spectacular tombs built for very high ranking semi-royal officials of the seventeenth and eighteenth dynasties. http://luxortimes.com/2019/04/exclusive-video-ancient-egyptian-mayors-tomb-discovered-in-luxor/?fbclid=IwAR3uwUVpiUsrNSoM3ZbnHJW6qBdCDIQta-hzQ-UkUhLJDkrxfWrOH4gT2dg
-
Another day, another tomb.
This time, a newdiscovery from Aswan,in the south, dating from the Greco-Roman era.
Stillworth a look,though.
http://luxortimes.com/2019/04/italian-archaeologists-discover-graeco-roman-rock-cut-tomb-in-aswan/
-
Definitely not in Egypt...but Aussie!
Look what the digger dug up in the war.....
She'll be right!
Seriously, this an example of antiquities bought by well meaning tourists and soldiers in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Ye, they are preserved....but without research and provenance,they're just baubles in a case.
Hundreds of local museums and probably dozens of attics contain similar forgotten treasures.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com.au/australia/anzacs-egyptian-treasure-trove-unearthed-in-sydney.aspx?fbclid=IwAR2exbHJLrtRQcRFVovCWmmcRw8-ccWXP4FYD6G7etVukMTy6rEhwtcsRGI
-
Not a single tomb.... Lots of 'em. A whole new cemetary, dating from the mid - late Olk Kingdom, at the Giza Plateau...an area thought to have been 'dug out' ages ago. This find looks to be keeping the experts busy for a long while to come. http://luxortimes.com/2019/05/old-kingdom-cemetery-discovered-in-giza%e2%80%8f/?fbclid=IwAR1sD3pq-tMsT9PLfdL4mGQtNpaDES0-QjBsGyJM9OLRDr_stooI-hRljKE
-
Been to the dentists recently?
This might make you think what the future archaeologists will make of your lifestyle.
Bio-archaeology is a complex, yet valuable resource when dealing with the ancient dead...and this article shows how meticulous research on otherwise nondescript middle ranking noble remains from the First Intermediate Period can reveal lots more than we thought.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kristinakillgrove/2019/04/11/archaeologists-discover-a-new-profession-in-an-ancient-egyptian-womans-teeth/?fbclid=IwAR1DtKIRJtl-BYAZ2ut5bUZY_cGIPtl9HcCLI0tj0jlN-pu4HMFujvCJ_0E#6a8123c93098
catching up on reading your posts here - always interesting.
Re bones:| I had an audio book a while ago about the archaeology of bones and how new techniques for detecting traces of all sorts of stuff are adding information to the records.
On the 'Mysteries' board of the graham Hancock forum, today there is yet another new poster claiming that he has worked out - and why don't all the archaeologists of the world flock to his doorstep?!!! - that it was a previous, and of course, lost - civilisation which built the pyramides. :D
-
catching up on reading your posts here - always interesting. Re bones:| I had an audio book a while ago about the archaeology of bones and how new techniques for detecting traces of all sorts of stuff are adding information to the records. On the 'Mysteries' board of the graham Hancock forum, today there is yet another new poster claiming that he has worked out - and why don't all the archaeologists of the world flock to his doorstep?!!! - that it was a previous, and of course, lost - civilisation which built the pyramides. :D
Aaaaaargh! You just HAD to mention Hancock....and I was having such a nice day, Susan! I think I've had nightmares about his 'precession' gibberish. Egypt seems to attract the, er, less stable individuals, whether to spout crackpot theories like von Danekin or the aforementioned Hancock, or pseudo religious twaddle such as Smythe,Russell or Smith. Getting back to the bones bit. I'm still blown away with the real science which means that we can identify unidentified mummies through DNA sequencing, and create a very accurate family tree for individuals who lived thirty-three hundred years ago.
-
Before Egypt was Egypt. Latest finds show pre dynastic proto-hieroglyphic inscriptions dating to around 3300-3200 BC, before the unification of Egypt. Pretty significant is the Horus falcon sign - denoting the development of the Horus cult and associating it with kingship 150 years before the recognisable iconography of Pharonic times. http://luxortimes.com/2019/05/egyptian-archaeologists-discover-neolithic-royal-inscriptions-in-aswan/?fbclid=IwAR2QNcz5afY7r1rrvtLwefQ6gjSia3u-TvXL88nMVFpxaGSzxTFosopYrNE
-
This is popping up over a few Egyptology sites...and you can bet the conspiracy nuts, curse addicts and pyramidiots are getting ready for action.
It confirms what we already knew; that the area in which Tutankhamun's tomb is located in the King's valley has several as yet uninvestigated anomalies.
Couple that with two digs in the 'Western Valley' - a run off from the main Valley, one of which is proving tantalisingly significant,as it is very near the place where Tutankhamun started building the tomb which was meant for him, but ended up being used by his successor, and the place will be ringing with the sounds of shovels shortly.
https://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/researchers-discover-anomalies-in-egypt-s-valley-of-the-kings?fbclid=IwAR3hGwUlOD3ascWSUqy6oeGwtYsfO7s_boBRkco_jagcop8L4y6bBVGoBuw
-
Anchorman, ever wondered that you might be talking to yourself? ;)
-
Anchorman, ever wondered that you might be talking to yourself? ;)
He isn't
-
He isn't
oh yes he is ….
-
Anchorman, ever wondered that you might be talking to yourself? ;)
Well, the fact that you responded would suggest otherwise.
-
A fortress dating to the Saite period - dyn XXVI, around the time of the Biblical Babylonian exile, announced yesterday.
http://luxortimes.com/2019/05/ancient-egyptian-military-fortress-discovered-in-north-sinai/?fbclid=IwAR01wyLz5Icu-seMi5wnWpdnWZKevehPgFMGrD79_MKpKRxkN0TH-GzatNY
-
Greek stuff.
Dating from around the time of Ptolemy IX, right through the era of Cleopatra VII and Roman Egypt, this complex excavation is yielding quite a few Greco-Roman finds.
http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/71025/New-discoveries-made-in-Tuna-el-Gebel-area?fbclid=IwAR2F4V-go5JWUUZ2GixWqrTyJ0nzxJYBuNvkWsFqi3Q6z_NgW2mAPSW8pqo
-
Not a find, but a controversy.
The stushie over the Elgin marbles can be seen as unique - it isn't. Multiply it with the plundering of antiquities from Egypt by rich tourists of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and there's always a controversy on the go - the last on these shores being the infamous sale of the unique statue of Sekhemka.
This time, it's an auction of a controversial bust of Tutankhamun.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/335997/Egypt/Politics-/Egypt-calls-on-Christies-auction-house-in-London-t.aspx?fbclid=IwAR1Ra5wGD0PjaPuskHbY6uedhQDVTW5NiVXO61wxKBQ0W
EeyxzIuTHBsR4A
-
Egyptologists are divided on this. Some say this should not be on public auction; others doubt the previous owner's method of obtaining it - still others doubt its' authenticity.
For my part, I think it IS authentic,and pictures the king, probably as either the god Khonsu or Amun; several statues of Amun from Karnak and Luxor have the image of Tutankhamun as the deity's representative.
I think this should have returned to Karnak, given the dubious nature of its' acquisition.
However, once again, this article shines a light on the modern illegal export of Egyptian antiquities which are looted from their original site without proper research.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-48865336
-
Here we go again....
Latest speculations on yet more scans supposedly revealing hidden chambers in the tomb of Tutankhamun, and what they contain.
Chambers, they might be, but who, if anyone, is there, I don't know.
I very much doubt it to be 'king' Nefertiti; I'm almost sure we have her - the mummy labelled KV35YL,who, by DNA, seems to have been Tutankhamun's mother, and either sister, or, more likely, given the convoluted family tree, first cousin of Tutankhamun's father, Akhenaten.
So: What lies beneath - or beyond?
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=12247394&fbclid=IwAR3qFCUDGzmveu5H-FF6cA4fOOLGmyc2vxVC
wBzUFheobGJh6OjjTRgrrOY
-
Still looks very unclear as to the situation. Lots of speculation for obvious reasons but I suspect this will run for some time.
-
Still looks very unclear as to the situation. Lots of speculation for obvious reasons but I suspect this will run for some time.
The Egyptian government will milk the situation for all its' worth; it brings in tourists to Luxor and the Valley of the Kings while the new Grand Egyptian Museum is being made ready, and the Cairo museum reorganised.
Couple that with the substantial Tutankhamun exhibition now touring the world (it reaches London in November) in an effort to raise more cash for the GEM, and the more delays there are, the better, as far as they are concerned.
They'll have to close KV 62 - Tutankhamun's tomb - to the public in order to investigate these anomalies; the best time for this would be the cooler times - when tourism is at its' height.
I can't see the attraction of the tomb myself; there are only the three rather crudely painted walls in the burial chamber to see....tourists ignore the superbly decorated next door tomb of Ra messes VI which is plastered floor to ceiling of each chamber with superbly crafted paintings.
-
Not a find, but a controversy.
The stushie over the Elgin marbles can be seen as unique - it isn't. Multiply it with the plundering of antiquities from Egypt by rich tourists of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and there's always a controversy on the go - the last on these shores being the infamous sale of the unique statue of Sekhemka.
This time, it's an auction of a controversial bust of Tutankhamun.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/335997/Egypt/Politics-/Egypt-calls-on-Christies-auction-house-in-London-t.aspx?fbclid=IwAR1Ra5wGD0PjaPuskHbY6uedhQDVTW5NiVXO61wxKBQ0W
EeyxzIuTHBsR4A
As I understand it, the Elgin marbles were not "plundered": they were bought by Lord Elgin from the Greek government of the day. You might argue that the Greek government should'nt've sold them, but the fact is that they did, so if Greece wants them back, they should pay us what Lord Elgin paid, adjusted for inflation.
-
As I understand it, the Elgin marbles were not "plundered": they were bought by Lord Elgin from the Greek government of the day. You might argue that the Greek government should'nt've sold them, but the fact is that they did, so if Greece wants them back, they should pay us what Lord Elgin paid, adjusted for inflation.
Greece could probably afford to buy and display the marbles properly, but the same isn't true of Egypt. Even were a tenth of the legally obtained antiquities returned, Egypt could not cope with providing buildings to display them. Add on the trade in illicit items - which are still dug up and exported, without knowing where they came from, and the problem's magnifued tenfold.
An example is Psametik I (father of the 'Necho mentioned in the Bible)
We know someone has found his tomb; 'shabti' figures, a few pots and a rather fine 'ka' statue which can only have come from a tomb, belonging to him have appeared on the black market,and a dwe confiscated from America, Austria and Saudi Arabia....but we can't find the tomb; some blighter's beaten the experts to it.
-
Although I do not always read a new post here immediately, I always catch up on all posts since my last visit, since I have been very interested in AE since I was a child and have been fortunate enough to visit Giza twice and Luxor once.
I also occasionally challenge the more way-out ideas on the GH forum!! Mostly I don't bother though, as they really do lack credibility.
-
As I understand it, the Elgin marbles were not "plundered": they were bought by Lord Elgin from the Greek government of the day. You might argue that the Greek government should'nt've sold them, but the fact is that they did, so if Greece wants them back, they should pay us what Lord Elgin paid, adjusted for inflation.
First of all the whole idea of that is questionable, but secondly there was not a Greek govt at the time
-
Although I do not always read a new post here immediately, I always catch up on all posts since my last visit, since I have been very interested in AE since I was a child and have been fortunate enough to visit Giza twice and Luxor once.
I also occasionally challenge the more way-out ideas on the GH forum!! Mostly I don't bother though, as they really do lack credibility.
Ah!
I was debating the Sphinx with a Hancockian pyramidiot last week....said debater claimed that the Sphinx was actually a representation of an extinct "cat-ape" which died outten thousand years before the desertification of Egypt!
(look, stop laughing....)
He was somewhat miffed when I pointed out that the Giza Sphinx, whilst the largest by a country mile, wasn't the first sphinx to be made...we have two earlier ones, one bearing the head of a King - Djedefre - and the other his wife, Hetepheres II.#
-
OK, Pharaohs weren't only Egyptian - and I'm not talking about the Ptolemies.
As Egyptian power declined, the client land of Kush - Nubia - long under Egyptian sway broke away around 850 BC.
From then until around the fourth century AD,a culture of Egyptian and African civilisation existed, with kings reviving the custom of pyramids long abandoned in Egypt - indeed there are hundreds more pyramids in Sudan than in Egypt itself.
These kings had little influence beyond their borders - except for five rulers who conquered Egypt in the seventh century BC - the twenty fifth dynasty; 'Black Pharaohs'.
Here's a report of a dig involving divers in one of the pyramid fields; it appeared on the BBC site last week.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-48867830?SThisFB&fbclid=IwAR1rtiudZ54HHDPIRZo6Ly9F4dzJw33CdP44WtEHWimjMtMO8QiaOS0MR2k
-
Surly a fascinating subject whichever part of Egyptology visited, I particularly enjoy the artistry of the buildings and the hieroglyphs they're so absolutely splendid, they're a delight to the eye as well as all of the other aspects involved.
Regards ippy
-
Surly a fascinating subject whichever part of Egyptology visited, I particularly enjoy the artistry of the buildings and the hieroglyphs they're so absolutely splendid, they're a delight to the eye as well as all of the other aspects involved.
Regards ippy
Yep- and not as hard to learn as you might think!
The symbols vary a bit over three millennia, but they remain in unchanged in essence.
I can still trace them reasonably well if they are carved in smooth stone, and I have a desktop magnifier that can play around with colours as well, making it possible to enhance them on printed MSS, or facsimile scrolls.
The ieratic script - that's a kind of cursive hieroglyphs - is another kettle of fish, though.
-
On the subject of the sphinx, when I first visited Giza, in 1963 I think, the gide took us around the sphinx, walking right up close and being able to touch the layers of rock, but of course I've no idea what the situation there is at present.
-
On the subject of the sphinx, when I first visited Giza, in 1963 I think, the gide took us around the sphinx, walking right up close and being able to touch the layers of rock, but of course I've no idea what the situation there is at present.
Hi, Susan;
You can still getup close and personal with the Sphinx. They've even put a reproduction of the famous 'Dream Stela' of Thutmose IV which he had placed between the paws when HE restored it around 1400 BC!
Giza will be the main focus for the tourists in Cairo once the new state-of-the-art Grand Egyptian Museum - the GEM - is up and running there, replacing the Cairo Museum...the latter will be able to show more of its' vast stores of artefacts, and give the superb Tanis treasures the prominence they deserve in the former Tutankhamun gallery.
Incidentally, the GEM will have full audio guides, large print and braille guidebooks available.
-
Now, THAT's what I call a perm.
Definately not hair today, gone tomorrow.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/ancient-egyptian-mummy-hair-unearthed-17490913?fbclid=IwAR2Lu6tTC9b1sHBOVHj3sw1xqTiIWLVJQaU2I2ETOH494OnOysYia40liTM
-
First of all the whole idea of that is questionable, but secondly there was not a Greek govt at the time
Well, I did say "as I understand it": I read that somewhere, but it may be inaccurste or misleading.
-
Lots of stuff from Dahshur, site of several Middle Kingdom pyramids, notably that of Amenemhet II, who ruled nearly seven centuries before Tutankhamun.
The finds date from his era to Roman Egypt, showing the common practice of recycling funerary material.
http://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/72744/A-number-of-stone-pottery-and-wooden-coffins-were-uncovered?fbclid=IwAR2E2uhRO4xStP3Ht09_J4JEkIRXBirXjNZJt_jY1Pwe_IAppdsWDhzJfrY
-
Now, THAT's what I call a perm.
Definately not hair today, gone tomorrow.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/ancient-egyptian-mummy-hair-unearthed-17490913?fbclid=IwAR2Lu6tTC9b1sHBOVHj3sw1xqTiIWLVJQaU2I2ETOH494OnOysYia40liTM
"The Ancient Egyptians applied the serum to their hair, leaving them with perfectly preserved curls lasting over three centuries." I assume that's a mistake for "thirty centuries", since they apparently date from the first millenium BC.
-
"The Ancient Egyptians applied the serum to their hair, leaving them with perfectly preserved curls lasting over three centuries." I assume that's a mistake for "thirty centuries", since they apparently date from the first millenium BC.
Yep; it's an error.
The Egyptians took hair seriously, both before and after they snuffed it.
Wigs were common for men and women, as most who could afford it shaved their heads in the interests of hygiene and trying to cool down.
Dyes and hair extensions were pretty common, but some recipes for dyes are pretty revolting.
One, dating from around 1500 BC involved henna, honey sap from the date palm and donkey urine.
Anyway, if you're interested, here's a blog which might make
https://mathildasanthropologyblog.wordpress.com/2008/08/23/ancient-egyptian-hair-and-wigs/
-
Hi Anchs - I was told something at school many years ago (and have seen it again since) that I wondered about, and you seem the very man to answer if you don’t mind.
Apparently/allegedly the Egyptians used crocodile poop as a contraceptive. I was too shy to ask though how. Was it the chemical content that they ingested and thereby stopped fertility, or is the poop sufficiently elastic to form a barrier of some kind?
I await your expert reply with considerable eagerness!
-
Hi Anchs - I was told something at school many years ago (and have seen it again since) that I wondered about, and you seem the very man to answer if you don’t mind.
Apparently/allegedly the Egyptians used crocodile poop as a contraceptive. I was too shy to ask though how. Was it the chemical content that they ingested and thereby stopped fertility, or is the poop sufficiently elastic to form a barrier of some kind?
I await your expert reply with considerable eagerness!
I believe its use was as a spermicide
-
Hi Anchs - I was told something at school many years ago (and have seen it again since) that I wondered about, and you seem the very man to answer if you don’t mind. Apparently/allegedly the Egyptians used crocodile poop as a contraceptive. I was too shy to ask though how. Was it the chemical content that they ingested and thereby stopped fertility, or is the poop sufficiently elastic to form a barrier of some kind? I await your expert reply with considerable eagerness!
Probably a lot more prosaic than that, bhs. Egyptian 'medicine' was weird and wonderful, and their religion was roped in... Sobek was a deity of both war and fertility in Middle Egypt (Howzat for a contradiction). He's usually portrayed as having a crocodile head. Crocs were seen to regulate their breeding to the Nile inundation, and, Egyptian logic made them think they could 'abstain' from sex for ten months of the year. So; a quick prayer to Sobek, some crocodile dung applied to the lady's vagina, and hopefully, she wouldn't be pregnant. OK, she might die of infection, but, hey, that's life. Mind you, the Egyptians DID have condoms....some with tiny stones or shells sewn onto the surface....er....I'm supposed not to know why.....
-
Thank you both - highly enlightening!
-
OK, you asked for it.
My translation of Papyrus Ebers (1(c) )
".....that the fruiting her be not strong, say to the lord of battles, in the morning of the river "Take my ka from me when I am with her!
Take the milk from the palm and the offering from .......(Sobek?)
and use it in the gates....(....) and take the clothes to the river and wash them, perfume them with incense....."
The river was the Nile - the Egyptians had no word for Nile'
Presumably, this ritual took place at dawn.
"Lord of battles" was an epithet of Sobek.
-
There is a possibility that it may have at least been partially effective.
-
Anchs - indeed I did. Thank you (I think!).
NS - perhaps, but would that have been because of a chemical effect or because the local studs got within six feet and said, “dear god but you reek of crocodile poo” and rapidly withdrew) as it were)?
-
This is a good article with video link showing forensic Egyptology at its' best.
The mummy of Ramesses III,along with more than thirty other kings and nobles of the New Kingdom, was found in one of the two 'cache tombs' nearly 120 years ago.
We've long known, through a papyrus, that a plot to put a usurper on the throe at the end of his life was uncovered, and the culprits 'dealt with'.
Now CT scans of the mummy of the king clearly indicates that he was assassinated.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1169343/egypt-pharaoh-ramses-ct-scan-queen-tiye-bettany-hughes-spt?fbclid=IwAR10SDIcpt1ES6Far8PYpEN7GYxqnqHUXjVWRSDYkkzdEK4YOpSj4LJJxv4
-
Getting down and dirty with the Nubiologists.
Some great pics from the pyramids.
Not the Egyptian ones, though: the Kushite ones.
From around 1000 BC, Kush - modern day Sudan - started to develop a culture based on African and Pharonic Egyptian themes, gods, writings - the lot.
In the seventh century BC, they ruled a weakened Egypt itself, the twenty-fifth dynasty.
After being expelled, the culture continued to evolve, and exist as a separate quasi-Pharonic state till the fourth century AD, building temples, tombs and royal pyramids - a custom which the Egyptians themselves had ditched around 1800 BC.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/2019/07/dive-ancient-pyramid-nuri-sudan/?fbclid=IwAR2HehLomxBwCJenCdMbku3Wc7J7wZVNwX-bCXoMk_QfiiGVMgWmxiBWOB0
-
Sites are like buses; you wait for ages for one, and twenty turn up..... https://egyptindependent.com/coincidence-leads-to-discovery-of-20-archaeological-sites-in-alexandria/?fbclid=IwAR2nXsYBw6OgArE4KFUKp0x01tDEZj-L3pR58-YkLXKlSpSTzLaSVh3Yn1E
-
Another day, another Temple. This time from the Ptolemaic era. In any other country, this would be a major find....but this is Egypt - there are umpteen such examples, and more found each year. https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/74815/Ptolemaic-temple-was-uncovered-in-Sohag?fbclid=IwAR1CiBAHcMhHLkS9WYeJp1RH12MexHpYflh-2sloUEO7dsR-F1y77q5aUE8
-
This looks interesting. We've known about Egyptian tracks and 'roads' for as long as there have been Egyptologists. These normally consisted of flattened earth or impacted sand stretching from one town to another, or marked desert trade routes. Now, what looks like a very sophisticated road construcred around 1250 BC has been unearthed. By the description in the article, it equals Roman roads in its' sophistication. https://spectator.sme.sk/c/22210885/slovak-eg yptologists-discovered-ancient-transport-road.html
-
Just doing a bit of catching up - that is all very interesting
It never fails to surprise me that people think the Egyptians couldn't possibly have built what they did - it must have been an unknown superior people, or aliens!!
-
Just doing a bit of catching up - that is all very interesting
It never fails to surprise me that people think the Egyptians couldn't possibly have built what they did - it must have been an unknown superior people, or aliens!!
Most definitely aliens! ;D
-
Hi Anchorman , I have a question ,
Are there any examples of tube drill cores with a continuos helical cut marks showing drillilling techniques of rotation in one direction ?
I'm more interested in how they did it , not why or who for
Cheers
-
Hi Anchorman , I have a question ,
Are there any examples of tube drill cores with a continuos helical cut marks showing drillilling techniques of rotation in one direction ?
I'm more interested in how they did it , not why or who for
Cheers
Off the top of my head, U'd say that was a technology too far; mainly because the only metals at their disposal were copper and bronze, niether of which would be strong enough to act as srill bits for most stone. Iron only started filtering into Egypt in any quantity from the first millenium onwards.
I'll ask around, though.
-
Off the top of my head, U'd say that was a technology too far; mainly because the only metals at their disposal were copper and bronze, niether of which would be strong enough to act as srill bits for most stone. Iron only started filtering into Egypt in any quantity from the first millenium onwards.
I'll ask around, though.
thanks pal 👍
-
thanks pal 👍
There are a few academic papers on AE tech (as well as drivel from pyramidiots); but here's one you might find relevent.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2842001?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
-
There are a few academic papers on AE tech (as well as drivel from pyramidiots); but here's one you might find relevent.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2842001?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
Anchs
Unfortunately I don't have the facility to look at all that at the moment
Cheers though 👍
-
Off the top of my head, U'd say that was a technology too far; mainly because the only metals at their disposal were copper and bronze, niether of which would be strong enough to act as srill bits for most stone. Iron only started filtering into Egypt in any quantity from the first millenium onwards.
I'll ask around, though.
Lots of it (and steel) around centuries before that in the Americas, though (according to the Book of Mormon :) )
-
Lots of it (and steel) around centuries before that in the Americas, though (according to the Book of Mormon :) )
Yeah, but...yeah but....
All dat steel an' stuff wuz probably trampled underground by dem elephants, innit?
-
Drilling for temples. It's all Greek to me. https://www.ibtimes.sg/archaeologists-unearth-ancient-pharaoh-ptolemy-ivs-temple-egypt-photo-32680?fbclid=IwAR0YZamQAgs_plkeCT4a4hnjT5OtHbDB86mOTXAlaKHwDYZ9tfdEHsgK04Q
-
An example of what we're up against.
A report on the latest arrests for illegal digging, and confiscated artefacts.
This is only one report.
Literally thousands of illegal items are found and put on the illegal antiquities market every year; sold to unscrupulous dealers and end up in private collections or even major museums.
As an example, last week, America handed over a superb gilded coffin of a priest which had been smuggled out of Egypt in the 1970's.
I don't particularly object to the sale of antiquities;
As long as the items are studied in situ, documented and researched, and their locations in their new home well known, I can live with that.
In any other country, this kind of thing would be a national scandal....but Egypt has so much wealth of archaeology that the world seems to turn its back and look the other way.
https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/1/75528/Pics-Gang-arrested-with-193-statues-sarcophagus-in-Giza?fbclid=IwAR2Ze-Yr9DAZZ507o6oDxqVITxtdhEIhDE5fFjGFbKkbw0rDRRlQ-eTuNeE
-
Warning; this article contains references to Zahi Hawass.....
As I type this, Hawass is announcing a find in the Valley of the Kings - that part known as the 'West Valley', which contains the tombs of Amenhotep III ansd Ay, amongst others. The tomb of Ay was originally started as Tutankhamun's, but he was laide in a much smaller, less ornate resting place, and his successor ended up using the tomb himself.
Hawass claims Tutankhamun's widow, Ankhesenamun 'must' be there, and he has excavated in the area fior several years trying to find it.
(Many Egyptologists argue that we already have the lady's mummy as an unidentified "KV21a" )
However, Hawass hass unearthed a workers' settlement - huts where workers working on tombs camped and stored tools, or embalmers worked outside tombs, far from habitation. If this is so, it indicates the presence of an as yet undiscovered royal tomb in the near area.
Watch this space.
https://m.facebook.com/luxortimesmagazine/photos/a.172787962907723/1157590764427433/?type=3&refid=17&_ft_=mf_story_key.1157590791094097%3Atop_level_post_id.1157590791094097%3Atl_objid.1157590791094097%3Acontent_owner_id_new.172787876241065%3Athrowback_story_fbid.1157590791094097%3Apage_id.172787876241065%3Aphoto_id.1157590764427433%3Astory_location.4%3Astory_attachment_style.photo%3Apage_insights.%7B%22172787876241065%22%3A%7B%22page_id%22%3A172787876241065%2C%22actor_id%22%3A172787876241065%2C%22dm%22%3A%7B%22isShare%22%3A0%2C%22originalPostOwnerID%22%3A0%7D%2C%22psn%22%3A%22EntStatusCreationStory%22%2C%22post_context%22%3A%7B%22object_fbtype%22%3A266%2C%22publish_time%22%3A1570695365%2C%22story_name%22%3A%22EntStatusCreationStory%22%2C%22story_fbid%22%3A%5B1157590791094097%5D%7D%2C%22role%22%3A1%2C%22sl%22%3A4%2C%22targets%22%3A%5B%7B%22actor_id%22%3A172787876241065%2C%22page_id%22%3A172787876241065%2C%22post_id%22%3A1157590791094097%2C%22role%22%3A1%2C%22share_id%22%3A0%7D%5D%7D%2C%22112384738789408%22%3A%7B%22page_id%22%3A112384738789408%2C%22actor_id%22%3A172787876241065%2C%22dm%22%3A%7B%22isShare%22%3A0%2C%22originalPostOwnerID%22%3A0%7D%2C%22psn%22%3A%22EntStatusCreationStory%22%2C%22role%22%3A16%2C%22sl%22%3A4%7D%7D%3Athid.172787876241065%3A306061129499414%3A2%3A0%3A1572591599%3A-8048377807866501364&__tn__=EH-R
-
The valley's going to be busy.
Hawass - under the auspices of the Department of Antiquities - announces not one, but two major expeditions and some startling results, promising some exciting things to come.
https://see.news/funeral-furniture-manufacture-workshops-discovered-in-apes-valley/?fbclid=IwAR0wZqLHkmXGtFcR_0K5m4-VoJSimUMQGb85dIq2ylwtAXb5kwpsPQuLj54
-
The valley's going to be busy.
Hawass - under the auspices of the Department of Antiquities - announces not one, but two major expeditions and some startling results, promising some exciting things to come.
https://see.news/funeral-furniture-manufacture-workshops-discovered-in-apes-valley/?fbclid=IwAR0wZqLHkmXGtFcR_0K5m4-VoJSimUMQGb85dIq2ylwtAXb5kwpsPQuLj54
anchs,
when I read what you write on here I'm reminded of the dog who looks at the pointing finger rather than what the finger is pointing at ::)
-
How the other half died.
A good blog from a respected source, on the findings at the latest burial site found at Saqqara.
This site gives an insight into not only burial practice, but, through studies, the life, health and to some extent, religion, of the working class in Late and Ptolemaic Egypt.
https://khentiamentiu.blogspot.com/2019/10/cemetery-of-poor-discovered-south-of.html?spref=fb&fbclid=IwAR2rHFCSyhfcXhwmnfYT3nsZDFq9FxbW0UfeUBHKRJz42RJVznrhGH3_N1Y
-
Some pics from the latest find at South Assasif, Luxor, where a cache of at least 20 coffins, intact with undisturbed mummies, has been found.
Great images of surviving colours.
https://see.news/antiquities-ministry-releases-images-of-colored-coffins-found-at-luxor/?fbclid=IwAR3pvF5Hf67MAKkJ3axWs6NHCoJ5Cd2UTM2Xtqvq8f9detWsI69T5Nf5MK4
-
Some pics from the latest find at South Assasif, Luxor, where a cache of at least 20 coffins, intact with undisturbed mummies, has been found.
Great images of surviving colours.
https://see.news/antiquities-ministry-releases-images-of-colored-coffins-found-at-luxor/?fbclid=IwAR3pvF5Hf67MAKkJ3axWs6NHCoJ5Cd2UTM2Xtqvq8f9detWsI69T5Nf5MK4
That is quite amazing
-
Incredible and the coffins seem to be in such good condition.
-
The latest extraordinary pics from the new cache tomb near Luxor, plus a statement from the Egyptian department of Antiquities.
The English isn't great, but the images are superb.
http://luxortimes.com/2019/10/dozens-of-intact-ancient-egyptian-coffins-and-mummies-discovered-in-luxor/
-
Interesting excavation
s from the Roman Period at Saqqara
https://www.egyptindependent.com/team-excavates-first-roman-catacomb-tomb-discovered-in-saqqara/?fbclid=IwAR2oe2LR3EMSn7CVUneUWYbv8JUlDrvASFPc4M8XWpmX4JHhepberKw8eS8
-
Interesting excavation
s from the Roman Period at Saqqara
https://www.egyptindependent.com/team-excavates-first-roman-catacomb-tomb-discovered-in-saqqara/?fbclid=IwAR2oe2LR3EMSn7CVUneUWYbv8JUlDrvASFPc4M8XWpmX4JHhepberKw8eS8
Off topic for this thread. re my post #52 in LR's thread "Using the Bible as an excuse for bigotry" (Christian topic), I'd welcome some input from your expert knowledge on the historical evidence for the references in Isaiah and Ezra about King Cyrus, and his role in the liberation of the Jews from Babylon, and his promoting the rebuilding of the Jerusalem temple. Both prophets speak of Cyrus in the most glowing terms - "Messiah" - especially since he was a pagan king.
Off topic for that thread too, but it makes a change from repeated mantra such as "The god of the bible is evil".
-
We've known about mummified cats, dogs, baboons, crocs, bulls - you name it - for ages; now a lion mummy at Sakkara.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/gdpr-consent/?destination=%2fworld%2fmiddle_east%2fegypt-says-its-unearthed-large-animal-mummy-likely-a-lion%2f2019%2f11%2f11%2f52a55312-0471-11ea-9118-25d6bd37dfb1_story.html%3f
-
Nice pics from the latest find from 'Roman Egypt' at Saqqara
This shows the influence of Hellenistic religion and thought combined with native Egyptian.
Judging by the name, the deceased was Egyptian with pretentions of Hellenism¬!
https://www.livescience.com/ancient-egypt-catacomb-mummies-carvings.html?fbclid=IwAR0y1ORXF0nRQeEvgCoOeCYq5SnWklfoigBcKh_Sg2w69e8feNTJkn_jRUI
-
Saqqara has yielded literally millions of animal mummies.
So many that some of the catacombs have simply been resealed and left unexplored.
Yet news today of a haul of statues of cats, ibis, dogs, and others, as well as coffined animal mummies galore.
Good pics.
https://see.news/details-of-new-archaeological-discovery-in-saqqara-photos/?fbclid=IwAR2hdegel9MCUUooKvsqmcgW503m6ySasZaGopT5Q63KtbuP7_h9kTY2xpk
-
I just found this on MSN and thought of you, you've already mentioned some (Saqqara) but not all. Fascinating!
https://www.msn.com/en-xl/news/other/rare-cache-of-mummified-animals-unveiled-in-egypt/ar-BBXe5BO
-
I just found this on MSN and thought of you, you've already mentioned some (Saqqara) but not all. Fascinating!
https://www.msn.com/en-xl/news/other/rare-cache-of-mummified-animals-unveiled-in-egypt/ar-BBXe5BO
Yep.
Saqqara never seems to disappoint, and this latest find is pretty much par for the course.
Of course, we have umpteen stues, coffins and literally millions of mummified animals, but these lion cubs are virtually unique.
The question of where they, and the countless other animals, came from, is still unanswered.
Given the sheer quantity of mummies (so much that a steamship loaded with mummified cats landed in Liverrpool, and the 'cargo' was used as fertiliser), there had to be industrialised farming of cats, ibis, baboons, etc on a scale never seen before or since.
-
And....... Liverpool farming with that antique Egyptian touch..... https://blog.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/2011/06/a-mummy-cats-tale/
-
You can tell the dig season's up and running.
Three fine coffins excavated from an already known tomb courtyard at Luxor.
Nice pics.
http://luxortimes.com/2019/11/french-archaeologists-unearth-ancient-egyptian-wooden-coffins/?fbclid=IwAR1rNtWkrgGS_xjQ3uuiMzAX8NR1vgL5vY4li4brORZ-qxm42rhcXRMBF2Y
-
My little wife and I did the Tutankhamen exhibition in 'The Saatchi gallery' Chelsea yesterday Anchor, I hope the powers that be bring it up to somewhere near you, it was only just about moderately interesting!
My favourite exhibit was the black guy, the warrior protecting the doorway, the one with, what looked like, a club wearing a golden apron and also holding, a spear, I'm sure you'll know the figure I speak of, the amount of walking killed our feet, there's a lot to look at.
Regards, ippy.
-
My little wife and I did the Tutankhamen exhibition in 'The Saatchi gallery' Chelsea yesterday Anchor, I hope the powers that be bring it up to somewhere near you, it was only just about moderately interesting!
My favourite exhibit was the black guy, the warrior protecting the doorway, the one with, what looked like, a club wearing a golden apron and also holding, a spear, I'm sure you'll know the figure I speak of, the amount of walking killed our feet, there's a lot to look at.
Regards, ippy.
I bit the bullet and went down on the first week (No, I didn't buy a ticket....my cousin bought me one as an early - esxpensive - Christjas present.)
The exhibition wasn't bad...the canopic coffin, throne, several statues from the 'treasury' etc, were here for the dirst - and last time.
That black statue thingy was a 'Ka' statue - in case the jmummy was destroyed, the king's Ka could nip into the statue and scoff the theological grub in those containers.
By the way, I hope you weren't daft enough to buy stuff at the shop - 'cos it was overpriced tat, mostly.
The hardcover book of the exhibition by Hawass is actually quite good, though.
Tonight on C5, part two of a three parter on Tut with Dan Snow. Not bad - part one was last night, part three tomorrow.
If you go to catchup, last night's prog had John Srgeant - yes, John Sergeant - scoffing Egyptian grub and trying the reconstructed beer (which is actually pretty potent and tasty).
-
Forgive my former understatement I was really impressed by the sheer beauty of these beyond any price items that give so much credit to the people that made them, I spent five years at the London central school of arts an crafts learning alongside various craftsmen, no females there training at that time, and as a craftsman myself I can perhaps have more of an eye and appreciation of the effort that goes into the sometimes most simple of items displayed there.
The shop you mention there were a few items worth buying perhaps as gifts for young children provided there was a 75% discount on everything.
We've done a catch up on channel five and have now seen the first two programmes and are looking forward to the last one tonight 28th, we were really surprised when, although knowing the tomb was virtually untouched by robbers, at the quantity of items the sheer volume.
We now about three years ago downsized to a small bungalow, plug the vacuum cleaner and do the whole place without unplugging, even so if I could have nicked that figure with the war club etc I'd find some room for him somewhere here it was something I really liked, no idea why.
What a day out it's moved my thought over a few notches in my appreciation of the people of that area, in a good way, but in a way I find difficult to describe in words, more a feeling of shuffling the king western world idea I'm inclined to hang on to more than perhaps I should.
Not a very clear description but it's somewhere around my thoughts, I don't know?
My mother in law was always into Egyptology and we've loads of her books on all aspects of that stuff and my wife's cousin has learned how to read their hieroglyphics, what with that and her Richard the third society I don't know how she even finds time for food shopping, the bright ones all seem to be on my wife's side of the family but there we can't all be good looking.
Oh yes it must have been a bit of a saga of a journey from, I believe You're from Glasgow or around there well done I thought I was keen coming from North Essex, oh yes and I did wonder if you saw any of the shops openly selling vegetables while you were down this way?
Regards, ippy
P S Our grandson's mother's a Glaswegian.
I bit the bullet and went down on the first week (No, I didn't buy a ticket....my cousin bought me one as an early - esxpensive - Christjas present.)
The exhibition wasn't bad...the canopic coffin, throne, several statues from the 'treasury' etc, were here for the dirst - and last time.
That black statue thingy was a 'Ka' statue - in case the jmummy was destroyed, the king's Ka could nip into the statue and scoff the theological grub in those containers.
By the way, I hope you weren't daft enough to buy stuff at the shop - 'cos it was overpriced tat, mostly.
The hardcover book of the exhibition by Hawass is actually quite good, though.
Tonight on C5, part two of a three parter on Tut with Dan Snow. Not bad - part one was last night, part three tomorrow.
If you go to catchup, last night's prog had John Srgeant - yes, John Sergeant - scoffing Egyptian grub and trying the reconstructed beer (which is actually pretty potent and tasty).
-
S'ok, I had my passport handy.
I stayed overnight at my cousin's gaffe, where asuitable (imported) liquid lubrication was to hand, since you can't trust the water down there.
The content of the tomb never ceases to amaze me - not only the bling; of all the tombs to be preserved in the Valley, his poses the most questions, spawning umpteen serious theories and ten times that of daft ones.
For example, at least five of those blingy exhibits were not made for him at all - including that tiny gold coffinette and the statue of the king on the leopard.
The latter clearly shows a female, rather than a male ruler, and the name on the inside of the former belonged, not to Tutankhamun, but to another - female - king - Ankkheperure. The identity of that ruler has set the fur flying for decades, and there are still three main theories surrounding it...theories which have set some of the more - enthusiastic - Egyptologists to threats, even to legal action!
-
You can't escape him....you name a place in Egyptm,he's either recreated it for himself, written over it, built bits onto it, planted temples in it, or left statues of himself in it.
Here's the latest one - Ramesses II, as if you hadn't guessed.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/357585.aspx?fbclid=IwAR1sAIwX87vJuwm9w_xlpgQtzoh7627WtTr6YFsX-fHwyAZ40qCn_3_lFuQ
-
A nice wee sphink statue from Tuna-el-Gebel.
It has a royal head, but no name yet.
I'd hazard a guess, based on style, that this was either very late period (around c350 BC, making it Nectanebo II, or one of the early Ptolemies.
https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/78685/A-small-royal-statue-of-a-sphinx-uncovered-in-Tuna
-
One for the birds.
The funerary temple of Amenhotep III has always been a mine for superb sculpture.
I said 'always'...it was reused, usurped, and emptied from less than fifty years after its' completion.
However, even today, it yields treasures.
A few years back, several dozen statues of the king and various deities were found; now a fragmented statue of Horus - more properly Re-Horakhty, solar protective deity of Egyptian kingship, has turned up, among other things.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/0/358052/Heritage//A-granodiorite-colossus-of-Horus-unearthed-in-Egyp.aspx?fbclid=IwAR0el66Ig6o9MqFHVESKaRpnBjehpAeNJLSCpTPfPiE4WEaART0qnmxvw8o
-
Anchs
did you have a mummy fixation when you were a kid ;)
-
Anchs
did you have a mummy fixation when you were a kid ;)
Nope.
I had a space fixation.
Then some blasted teacher suggested I try something new for a project.
I wasten.
It went downhill from there.
-
From the Smithsonian; a new take on a (very) old book; possibly the oldest known illustrated book in existance. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/4000-year-old-guide-ancient-egyptian-underworld-may-be-oldest-illustrated-book-180973880/?fbclid=IwAR3vOTAzd-fvVx2X4-fZNFBLCkKNg-iFzm4lYvTdT-qWU1okRlHBbFQFSlo
-
One of the problems for archaeology in Egypt is the amount of stuff still buried. Here, find a fragment of Roman pottery, a remnant of a cist burial or a bit of a torque and everyone's thrilled. In Egypt,try to dig a hole for a sewer, and some remnant of ancient times is bound to come up. This time,what looks like bits of a rather fine temple, probably twentieth or twenty-first dynasty, have started to be revealed. https://www.egyptindependent.com/photos-workers-in-daqahlia-village-stumble-upon-pharaonic-artifacts/?fbclid=IwAR0VYZ3b_2dey-9qT3X5nty-Uca9f3uDdkMhqbHFRsJV3GzysuUI7Ov7sUI
-
Dead men (and women) walking.
As preparation for the new Grand Egyptian Museum at Giza near completion, the Tahrir Square Cairo Museum is getting a much neede cler out.
A lot is moving to the GEM, other stuff to a humanities display, leaving room at the Cairo for the vast amount of stuff now held in storage.
The royal dead are having an outing ; the mummies from the cache tombs of TT320 and KV35 are on the move.
It's a bit like gathering all the Tudor, Stewart and Hanovarians and flitting them to a new address.
https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/79668/Preparations-for-transfer-of-22-royal-mummies-finalized?fbclid=IwAR1wEJoakX9wMoof7cIPAeGzMIQG0FTnPzRj6kGll5fHr8nV7XeJZw08Kzg
-
In Our Time does Tutankhamun
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000cng6
-
In Our Time does Tutankhamun
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000cng6
I'll give it a go. Sometimes I wish I hadn't written a paper on the end of the Amarna period...there are so many possible theories concerning kings, gender, co-rule, kidnap, murdering foriegn princes sent as husbands, palace coups, political chicanery, that if you threw a few flying saucers and a randy camel into the mix, there might be a possibility of truth there as well.....
-
One of the epithets used to describe a person after death in Egypt waqs 'true of voice'.
After mummification, prior to encoffining, a ceremony was performed - the 'openinig of the mouth' in order that the mummified corpse's 'Ka' could speak in the afterlife.
Now scientists have given the mummy a voice!
Nesiamun/Nesuamun was a high ranking priest at Karnak at the collapse of Egypt's New Kingdom. As such he would have enjoyed considerable temporal authority in the semi-autonomous Upper Egypt.
Now, gizzmos and tech can reproduce what he sounded like in life.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-51223828?fbclid=IwAR3SeITHmKfpbteq7xx4WrckYp5O--Nr7BbXyEdvGi2nXHmjddewA436t9M
-
One of the epithets used to describe a person after death in Egypt waqs 'true of voice'.
After mummification, prior to encoffining, a ceremony was performed - the 'openinig of the mouth' in order that the mummified corpse's 'Ka' could speak in the afterlife.
Now scientists have given the mummy a voice!
Nesiamun/Nesuamun was a high ranking priest at Karnak at the collapse of Egypt's New Kingdom. As such he would have enjoyed considerable temporal authority in the semi-autonomous Upper Egypt.
Now, gizzmos and tech can reproduce what he sounded like in life.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-51223828?fbclid=IwAR3SeITHmKfpbteq7xx4WrckYp5O--Nr7BbXyEdvGi2nXHmjddewA436t9M
Sounds rather weedy?
-
Sounds rather weedy?
Luckily he wouldn't have needed to preach...'cos there were no sermons as we know them.
-
There's been a murder.......
OK....so an Irish mummy gives up its' secrets....probably a mixed race Greco-Egyptian living in an Egypt ruled by black kings from Sudan.....
This is groundbreaking tech, giving an insight into life - and violent death - in the twenty-fifth dynasty, which saw Egypt as a pawn in a struggle between Assyria and Ethiopia, in which Ethiopian kings ruled most of the land, though a rebellious group of Egyptians of Lybian ancestry supported by Assyria still held a torch for independence in the coastal lands of the Delta.
They would eventually succeed and rule Egypt for over a century, and, curiously, depend on Greek mercenaries to bolster their southern borders.
It would seem, though, that Greeks lived in the Theban area - what is now Luxor - in the eighth and seventh centuries BC, and interacted with the local population to produce a refreshingly cosmopolitan element we didn't suspect at this time.
https://www.itv.com/news/utv/2020-01-27/new-research-reveals-how-mummy-at-belfast-museum-died/?fbclid=IwAR2i29CUBeT8LTyZmP60LJM1Er9SULhv2J9hSNPgp4FOgo2Ru9j42CvDwsU
-
Hot off the camera.
The very latest pics from the latest tomb found this year at Tuna-elGebel, which has proved incredibly rich as far as middle-ranking Late Period (525-303BC) burials.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIvuClQSqLw&fbclid=IwAR0TLBIZacZ63UDmUCOxB4zzAH19u-9P8l7rpzcuSUwEV4O8cL3DfCq5IGM&app=desktop
-
A very significant find from Egypt's Delata.
83 superbly preserved burials dating from c4000Bc and three of them to around c3300BC...before the foundation of the pharonic state. The earlier 'Buto culture' burials show a well developed funerary culture, with pottery vessels and even pottery coffins; a level of sophistication which had previously been unsuspected in Delta culture of that period.
https://www.egyptindependent.com/dozens-of-ancient-graves-discovered-in-egypts-daqahliya-governorate/?fbclid=IwAR0xpcUtRhsgaJfYOiPp_02BNYaT8yVsVXtBYxgdO7EuRTYuKkxA1ZBtqdQ
-
Another day, another find.
Some rather splendid coffins from Luxor.
At a cursory glance, they look like mid-ranking noble burials from around 1500BC.
http://luxortimes.com/2019/11/french-archaeologists-unearth-ancient-egyptian-wooden-coffins/?fbclid=IwAR11pBFHOek7xIII_CJ74dfuS-MRtgM5kKECDvqUVRcyACSoOrAlTbq3u2Q
-
The room that won't go away. Yet another series of scans may -or may not - show further rooms in KV 62. This will be the third lot of scans in Tutankhamun's tomb; the last lot were inconclusive. The story that won't go away...... This time, though, it's an as yet unpublished report from 'Nature', which doesn't normally go in for crackpot ideas. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00465-y?fbclid=IwAR3_MUiB9Rn8W6ivJrg3HHkY9EplynViX1wxsEpztffnaK3261_rfbqFH_I
-
There's still some Egyptology going on.
This link is to a new find in Saqqara, a very luxurious tomb dating to the 'Sun kings' - the fifth dynasty, just after the Giza pyramids.
This period showed the full flowering of devotion to the Sun god Re in all its' aspects, including a rather obscure aspect - Aten - which would cause all sorts of problems nine centuries later.
This era saw the development of funerary theology for the nobles as well s the kings, and the first emergence of Osiris as the main funerary deity, eclipsing the earlier Khenty-amentiu.
This particular tomb shows the use of vibrant colours, and indicates a flourishing trade with Mediterranean and Asiatic areas, as, at this time, blue was usually only obtained by crushing rocks or other laps-bearing stone, sourced from what is now Turkey.
https://mymodernmet.com/khuwy-egyptian-tomb-saqqara/?fbclid=IwAR0lA4dkX32wRx8ZUQNLjlEw55auP_-YhR-EaMrEY3gOz5cmRDrcHvB55yo
-
Have a shuftie at this link.
It melds in two finds; a rather spectacular shaft tomb from Saqqara, probably a family tomb of the Third intermediate period (1000-6000 BC)
and a rather splendid mummy from Thebes dating to around 1750 BC.
The latter is a very good example of the 'Theban style' which developed as Upper Egypt was ruled by native Egyptian kings who formed the seventeenth dynasty, prior to the expulsion of the Asiatic rulers in the north and reunification of Egypt to form the New Kingdom and a 'golden age'.
https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/ancient-egypt-discoveries-saqqara/index.html?fbclid=IwAR2yQ5e3jaF0DuV0E6C8TA02nBcP6JLh5K4syCvUxBhJ5pknB6sjvjZu8rk
-
Getting to the guts of things.
More on the latest finds at Saqqara,including details of the excavation of a rather rare embalmers workshop - the 'house of purification' as the Egyptians called them; though they must have smelled anything but pure.
Also some great pics on the latest shaft tomb burials.
https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/85371/Egypt-announces-new-discoveries-studies-at-the-Mummification-Workshop-Complex?fbclid=IwAR3HauU3HDg9nzFU2efpNJiIZvsi7JxqF2Ce_yF_eI8qmbkJB9lS_VM5tok
-
Latest news announcing a unique Saite Period (Dyn 26, around 590 BC( tomb, and a Roman period cemetery with both 'Egyptianised' and Christian burials.
https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2020/05/egypt-archaeological-discover-cemetery-coronavirus.html
-
Not Egypt, but ancient Roman sites have been recently discovered in Wales according to this article.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-44806069
-
anchorman
Catchng up on all the posts I've missed! All very interesting. Also interesting are the Archae-something e-mails.
-
anchorman
Catchng up on all the posts I've missed! All very interesting. Also interesting are the Archae-something e-mails.
Thanks, Susan.
Umpteen things grab me as far as Egypt goes; not only the 'big' stuff concerning kings and eras, though that in itself, is absorbing, but the incredible breath of time, evolving culture, glimpses into the daily lives of men, women and children living so long ago.
PPlus the fact that much of the much vaunted Greek astronomy, philosopphy, archetecture, sculpture and military prowess can be traced back to, well, you've guessed it......
-
Not exactly Egypt, but Egyptian.
This find shows predynastic trade and cultural influnce from as early as c5000 BC - a ritual platform with Egyptian artef
https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/ritual-platform-arabia-0013847?fbclid=IwAR2G-Qj3iv7EepMy1CS7_q5MunMmt9xX_YFnNyWrRw9bBYkgMCWkGgMGZvM
acts....in Saudi Arabia.
-
Carry on Cleo?
OK, I doubt whether they'll find the last Egyptian female king's tomb, never mind her body, but this is interesting nonetheless.
https://www.histecho.com/mummies-two-high-status-egyptians-found-offers-clues-hunt-cleopatras-tomb/?fbclid=IwAR0h8vQHjluNGys_9WvWdpypxDpXVlyLfdMLZLyK4nKLKcoTDrZaRzNSY_Q
-
Most folk know of the stunning sites at Karnak and Luxor, - Thebes.
However, throught Egypt's history, the main centre of administration was Men-nefer - bGreek 'Memphis'.
Due to the destruction of the sites to make way for Cairo, we have lost almost all of what was once there. Indeed, the very name 'Egypt' comes from 'Aegyptos' - the Greek effort to write 'Ken-gup-Ptah' - the Temple complex of Ptah, creator deity of Memphis.
The latest finds seem to be part of a vast temple complex built by Ramesses II to honour both Ptah and Hathor/Sekhmet, the latter being two aspects of the one female creator protector deity.
https://dailynewsegypt.com/2020/07/28/egypt-announces-new-archaeological-discovery-from-ramses-ii-era/?fbclid=IwAR2JIBrdv9jKx3rPtqeNV39sDm4-R9iHuy0GCh
v27VriBUb8H9WeALRJYsU
-
Thought this was interesting
http://www.openculture.com/2020/07/take-an-360-interactive-tour-inside-the-great-pyramid-of-giza.html
-
Thought this was interesting
http://www.openculture.com/2020/07/take-an-360-interactive-tour-inside-the-great-pyramid-of-giza.html
Thanks, NS.
I've been on the Giza plateau a few times, but never visited Khufu's pyramid (Though I've been to Menkhaure's, and several other tombs in the area).
People are still finding out stuff about the monument; a dirty great void was detected inside it in 2017, for example, but the things that interest me are the town constructed for the workers who built it - found in the 1980's - and the cemeteries, where the remains show evidence of a well fed, and relatively well cared for, workforce.
Perhaps the most interesting find in recent years has been the worlds' oldest papyrus document, dating to the 'gang master' of one of the crews who quarried and ferried stones for the completion of the monument.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/ancient-egypt-shipping-mining-farming-economy-pyramids-180956619/
-
I'm posting a find first announced two years ago, but still under investigation. It appears that several of the mummies are non-Egyptian, and are probanly Syrio-Palestinian in origin - though one may even be that of a Carian Greek. This would confirm the cosmjopolitan nature of Egypt in the seventh century BC, as we kow the rulers employed Greek mercenaries to fight off the Persians - and established a Jewish Temple at Egypt's soutern border to enable the garrison of Jews who manned it against the incursion of the Kushitesl. This is a very significant new discovery, probably the most important since the discovery of the intact royal tombs at Tanis in the late 1930's (which, imho, are still far to under reported). A whole collection of mummies, coffins, superb silver artefacts including masks - dating from the Saite Period - dyn XXVI. A very rare example of an embalmer's workshop to boot. This find has yet to be fully inspected, never mind published, but its' importance can't be understated. http://luxortimes.com/2018/07/new-discovery-mummification-workshop-installation-in-sakkara/?fbclid=IwAR38mMQMoMVs1H2_Mv6szg2_4HvP3aGr6twUs3HWo1MbUbdZRBo6dL0hC_I
-
When I studied Egyptology at Uni, part of the course was a hands-on unwrapping of some of the vast collection of animal mummies stored in the vaults of various museums.
Now, scanning can do the work for us, and this report from 'Nature' is a well-written insight on the latest British research.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-69726-0?fbclid=IwAR3pidBxZUOPW2EMUcOr-V5jXfCqyZHf8QdIFXYHkpG0M3ScWh3RWpww2lY
-
In any other country, this find would be the discovery of the century - but this is Egypt, and it's only another mass burial tomb cache.
Saqqara never seems to disappoint; tombs from Egypt's second dynasty to the Roman period continue to be found; kings to commoners, priests to mummified cats, ibis, lions and hedgehogs.
This cache hasn't been fully excavated, but it looks like dating from Egypt's thirtieth (and last Pharonic) dynasty, till around the time of Ptolemy III.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/379451/Egypt/Politics-/Cache-of-sealed-coffins-unearthed-in-Saqqara-Egypt.aspx?fbclid=IwAR0w3snQmFeIriA8gwFmKy5AEOHJMfDunpHN3wwY1riEEIPRcZtlxuGyiDA
-
Great pics from the Beeb, showing the removal of the 27 intact coffins from the Saqqara cache.
There are at least two galleries as yet unexcavated, so the final haul may be even more spectacular.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-54227282
-
The tomb which keeps on giving.
Just when you think you know everything about the contents of KV62 - Tutankhamun - a lump of mush in a museum surprises you.
An example of the skill of the modern conservator.
https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/91984/King-Tutankhamun%E2%80%99s-tomb-never-runs-out-of-surprises?fbclid=IwAR2NpSzEKdrtnM0a8si-YHMhNG39y1tBrQrOGOeIST-wrFzzNuRcU6er018
-
The tomb which keeps on giving.
Just when you think you know everything about the contents of KV62 - Tutankhamun - a lump of mush in a museum surprises you.
An example of the skill of the modern conservator.
https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/91984/King-Tutankhamun%E2%80%99s-tomb-never-runs-out-of-surprises?fbclid=IwAR2NpSzEKdrtnM0a8si-YHMhNG39y1tBrQrOGOeIST-wrFzzNuRcU6er018
All very interesting information. I listened yesterday to the latest archeo thoughts e-mail about pseudo-archaeology - more interesting work.
-
All very interesting information. I listened yesterday to the latest archeo thoughts e-mail about pseudo-archaeology - more interesting work.
Yep. The pseudohistorians and tinfoil hat brigade have always had a field day with KV62 - from aliwen involvement, through Joseph, Moses and monotheistic tendancies, to the 'tragic boy king murdered for keepng secrets' stuff.
The real analysis of the complex content and context of the tomb is far more convoluted!
-
And the finds keep on coming - 59 of them, to be precise....and the occasional statue, shabti and fragment of papyrus.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/10/3/egypt-unveils-59-ancient-coffins-in-ma
jor-archaeological-discover
-
Not a find, but a nice CGI reconstruction of the possible face of the female king Maatkare Hatshepsut, one of the most powerful rulers of Egypt's 'Golden age', the eighteenth dynasty, of the New Kingdom, using what is almost certainly her mummy as a template. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KuWpEfj6EK8&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR1xwdvFPcIfyKhdSnLS3sRa-_e_J2d0vQIDzCCuY1nGbCrBwiBY6Ijp810
-
Now we're up to our ears in coffins. This is proving to be a spectacular find....Egypt never fails to surprise us. https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1666429903513244&id=172787876241065&_rdr
-
Watch this space...
...or these holes.
http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/388692.aspx?fbclid=IwAR3rWfg4sz6VyLz5azGrnJS2g3wgFpYLRLJtdLi7ZaeptYx2_K77r79JUoo
-
I can see the pyramidiots having a field day, and die-hard JWs throwing a wobbly, as their already inaccurate calculations are thrown aside.
We've known about 'voids' in the Khufu pyramid for a while, but this intriguing article suggests a whopping great gallery.
Interesting.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1346220/egypt-great-pyramid-giza-discovery-hidden-chamber-scanpyramid-pharaoh-khufu-japan-spt?fbclid=IwAR2GJ7OyRtpwdTLyz6ZeoUDyKstyIvLePJQ4GnGo8JPQ2WNOwixgFGxLTiE
My main quibble is that the scans were made by the same outfit which claims to have found voids behind the burial chamber of Tutankhamun's tomb, and that's still stirring up a hornet's nest.
-
How many coffins so far have been found in the excavations you have been talking about? How near are they to the main pyramid area? Should I presume the coffins are wood, as it seems unlikely that all can be stone?
It all sounds very interesting and fortunately, it is not the sort of thing that can be faked, is it?!!! :)
-
How many coffins so far have been found in the excavations you have been talking about? How near are they to the main pyramid area? Should I presume the coffins are wood, as it seems unlikely that all can be stone?
It all sounds very interesting and fortunately, it is not the sort of thing that can be faked, is it?!!! :)
There are two finds in the last few posts, Susan;
One from Saqqara, the other from near Luxor.
Both are mummy caches, though, and both yielded mainly wooden coffins with a few cartonage - rather like paper mache - as well.
All the coffins are superbly preserved; many decorated, the mummies having funerary masks. Statuettes of most of the major deities have turned up: Ptah, Wepwawet,Osiris, Sokar, Isis, Selkit, Hath or - plus many shabti figures and canopic jars.
Most of the coffins - especially those from Luxor - date from around the seventh century BC, though the Saqqara cache has examples dating from Roman times put into the mix to confuse us!
The total of mummies keeps on rising, as both tombs have tunnels as yet unexcavated.
This'll keep them busy writing these finds up for years after the
-
Sounds Brilliant to me I'll be looking forward to seeing a really good documentary about these finds, the sooner the better.
ippy.
-
Thank you for the info, anchorman, most interesting.
-
Missed this one; though it's pretty rare.
The owner of this fine coffin is described as 'high priest of Djehuty', and the coffin dates from the twenty-sixth dynasty.
From my 'Coffins of Ancient Egypt' reference, this looks like midway through the period, I'd say around 575 BC, given the changing fashions in coffins.
Djehuty, by the way, was the deity the Greeks knew as Thoth, and to find one of his priests is a rarity.
https://www.archaeology.org/news/9139-201014-egypt-minya-sarcophagus?fbclid=IwAR1X0B32_Av7Frwpfudh14XsM9Yo1TESgOXDS_3
qMeccM-C55E2-FxALsx8
-
A heads up for what looks like an interesting programme if you have Netflix
It's virtually unheard of to have an intact tomb from Egypt's fifth dynasty, the time of the so-called 'Sun kinks', because of their devotion to the cult of Re at Heliopolis, and their unique 'sun temples'.
Neferirkare's reign is relatively well documented; his pyramid - what's left of it - has fine internal decoration.
This particular tomb yielded a massive haul of statues, as well as several biographical inscriptions lauding the owner - but the surprise came when it came to analysing the semi-mummified remains themselves
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1352664/egypt-secrets-saqqara-tomb-netflix-wahtye-pharaoh-archaeology-ancient-history-bone-spt?fbclid=IwAR2SuqkKioEMICA9lv1TrYs6BLcDdhWpD3MWIfl
yKON3lMTnAMODf_bojmM
-
Not Egyptian, but African-Egyptian.
The kingdom of Kush lasted well into the fourth century AD, and was an amalgam of African and Egyptian culture and religion, with many aspects of the Egyptian religion imported into the culture.
One of these was the pyramid.
Pyramid building went out of fashion in Egypt around 1800 BC....but it was revived by the Kushites in the seventh century BC and endured till the Islamic era.
Indeed, it survived the Christian presence; quite a few Kushite and Ethiopian rulers were buried Egyptian style whilst professing Christianity.
Here's an intriguing discovery shedding new light on the Kushite civilisation
https://archaeology-world.com/archaeologists-discover-35-burial-chambers-in-the-sudan-desert-with-fascinating-links-to-ancient-egypt/?fbclid=IwAR2MUrEdm4lzamk-qMPLxSDrX44rF90V51eENuMCnNYA0vLE3s8_en5wl8k
-
If you've nothing better to do during lock down, have a listen to this lecture by Prof Aid an Dodson, giving his take on one of the most controversial personages of Ancient Egypt, Nefertiti, wife and co-ruler of Akhenaten, whom many believed - probably wrongly - was the first monotheist.
I've one or two disagreements with Aid an here, but, given the topic, put five Egyptologists in a room and you'll end up with seven opinions and a couple of broken ribs.
It's still worth a look, though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_CCmpBVH0g&fbclid=IwAR0JfkVq3f6QU882B9s5qir1Y7wlGeG3nKmdwoyoUwEo_7HHz-RN6eqck2k
-
If you've nothing better to do during lock down, have a listen to this lecture by Prof Aid an Dodson, giving his take on one of the most controversial personages of Ancient Egypt, Nefertiti, wife and co-ruler of Akhenaten, whom many believed - probably wrongly - was the first monotheist.
I've one or two disagreements with Aid an here, but, given the topic, put five Egyptologists in a room and you'll end up with seven opinions and a couple of broken ribs.
It's still worth a look, though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_CCmpBVH0g&fbclid=IwAR0JfkVq3f6QU882B9s5qir1Y7wlGeG3nKmdwoyoUwEo_7HHz-RN6eqck2k
Interesting posts as usual. I don't know about watching the lecture, I'll see.
I read a lot about Nefertiti years ago.
-
Interesting posts as usual. I don't know about watching the lecture, I'll see.
I read a lot about Nefertiti years ago.
The Amarna period remains as fascinating as ever, Susan. The more we uncover, the more questions we have.
The old nineteenth century idea of Akhenaten and the utopian paradise he built for his new one god has ben torn to shreds years ago; now the concentration is on Nefertiti, who ruled as King Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten...and may or may not have been both Tutankhamun's mother and co-regent.
Then there's a king Smenkhare to throw in the mix...who may have been a brother of Tut, a brother of Akhenaten....or, believe it or believe it not, simply another name for Nefertiti as king!
There are umpteen theories going round, each as plausible as the other....you pays your money, you takes your choice!
-
Must be the pandemic' 'cos there's a lot of coffin....... Sorry. Watch this space for yet another spectacular haul of very high quality coffins and mummies from Saqqara. From what I'm told, many of the coffins contain not only mummies, but funerary papyri,which shed light on not only the deceased, but the times in which they lived - in these instances, Egypt's 26th dynasty - the Saite Period. A friend emailed me to say that a substantial number of the mummies may be of Greek or even Hebrew origin, which ties into the Saite kings' recruiting mercenary troops to bolster Egypt's defences. https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/94052/Egypt-to-announce-discovery-of-100-more-coffins-in-Saqqara?fbclid=IwAR1NRzt8oF03I9Js40WgF_QhOXb6doOSEldp1NVmqyWORZpyFyv4Tld_s_8
-
Spectacular reveal of over 100 coffined mummies and at least 40 superbly gilded funerary statues from a cache tomb dating to the twenty-sixth dynasty.. This has turned out to be one of the most spectacular and, more importantly, historically significant finds of the decade. A friend of mine who is on site is bowled over by the condition of many of these coffins, which contain, not only mummies, but funerary papyri and evidence which will enable us to date them almost to the month of their burial. I'm reliably informed that, although research has barely scratched the surface of the find, some of the individuals are of Carian Greek and Hebrew origin, which would be a find indeed, and tie into the Saite dynasty rulers' policy of importing foreign mercenary troops and officials to bolster up their regime, which was a reconstituted state after the Nubian and Assyrian conquests. https://english.alarabiya.net/en/life-style/travel-and-tourism/2020/11/14/Egypt-unveils-100-ancient-coffins-statues-found-in-Saqqara And http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/393774.aspx?fbclid=IwAR0B2I7gB1of6hhbE5jR0qwXH2Wa_5I50EaS9wXL7MMCI2dofB2eX-Img14
-
A rather fascinating investigation showing the sophisticated level of science behind the inks used in Egyptian writing.
https://www.wired.com/story/high-energy-x-rays-reveal-the-secrets-of-ancient-egyptian-ink/?fbclid=IwAR07wP_lm1NiIwHRl8ldv0RATWVK1TvWeIdqO__FOf2c1pIQJ9GXjEN2Tes
-
Watch this space.
Yet more finds from Saqqara, this time dating from the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties -1800 -1100 BC), to be officially unveiled next month.
Unfortunately, the excavation is led by Zahi Hawass, the Marmite of Egyptologists, but you can't have everything.
Here's a taster.....
https://see.news/a-recent-archaeological-discovery-saqqara-zahi-hawass/?fbclid=IwAR3Fjz56xZrFdkJLVxa14yuCrMrv-U2HxL27BllkJgenQ7kmnEEaPVco2Gs
-
It's amazing the things you find in a cigar box.
This is a very precious piece of scrap wood - one of the few fragments ever found in the Great Pyramid...and turning up in Aberdeen of all places.
Mind you, many museums have bits and pieces they simply haven't catalogued properly - and I suspect there are more hidden gems to find, such as a fragment from Bolton which opened a whole can of worms to Amarna scholars.
Anyway, this has set heads scratching; C14 dating seems to indicate that the wood is four hundred years older than the date we thought was the best guess for the construction of the pyramid itself.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-55315623
-
It's in the stars.
A nice report, with pics, on the restoration of star maps - Egyptian style - showing superb colours.
My only quibble is in the intro, where it describes Seth as 'god of evil'. The Egyptians themselves had no god of evil. Set was a god of chaos (isfet) opposing order (Horus 'Ma'at')
The 'god od evil' bit was a Greek re-imagining of the complex Egyptian mythology.
https://www.livescience.com/ancient-egyptian-star-constellations.html?fbclid=IwAR0XoEmyLCxCLRVkwK-jlqWgxy9Xis1brtNuorOvrdPxEJhAH1LljS2Of9M
-
All very interesting. As far as pyramid dating is concerned, what's 400 years one way or the other! :)
-
All very interesting. As far as pyramid dating is concerned, what's 400 years one way or the other! :)
Well, it might save the increasing baldness of some Old Kingdom experts...they're scratching their heads a lot now.
But what difference would it make?
Quite a lot, Susan - because it throws the entire chronology of Egypt off kilter...since we know the approximate reign length of mot of the rulers, we calculate the dates from there. We assume the dating from 2800 BC until 2000 BC can be plus or minus twenty years...but four hundred years would be problematic.
Of course, that bit of wood might be some kind of relic [- antique - when it was put into the building; however some have suggested it was part of a ruler used to measure building blocks, and I can't understand why anyone would use a five hundred year old ruler when building what was then a modern structure.
The best way to solve this puzzle would be to use a fragment of a papyrus - the oldest known papyrus - found a few years back. This is a document written by a gang master engage in transporting blocks to the site, and perhaps a tiny blank sliver could be sacrificed to radiocarbon date it.
That might negate the wooden fragment.
-
Well, it might save the increasing baldness of some Old Kingdom experts...they're scratching their heads a lot now.
But what difference would it make?
Quite a lot, Susan - because it throws the entire chronology of Egypt off kilter...since we know the approximate reign length of mot of the rulers, we calculate the dates from there. We assume the dating from 2800 BC until 2000 BC can be plus or minus twenty years...but four hundred years would be problematic.
Of course, that bit of wood might be some kind of relic [- antique - when it was put into the building; however some have suggested it was part of a ruler used to measure building blocks, and I can't understand why anyone would use a five hundred year old ruler when building what was then a modern structure.
The best way to solve this puzzle would be to use a fragment of a papyrus - the oldest known papyrus - found a few years back. This is a document written by a gang master engage in transporting blocks to the site, and perhaps a tiny blank sliver could be sacrificed to radiocarbon date it.
That might negate the wooden fragment.
I was thinking more in terms of human chronology in general, but very interesting about the dating of papyri.
-
Further updates, with quite detailed info, on the remarkable finds at Saqqara last Autumn.
This elevates the little-understood cult of royal ancestor worship to a new level, and may help to reinforce the theory that Akhemnaten's religious revolution was actually a syncretism of pre-existing Sun worship with the cult of divine kingship personified in the king's own father.
And you wonder why Egyptian religion gives me a headache?
http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/398931.aspx?fbclid=IwAR2LwuY9EZTar-5T-PpGTzTNaCmVTQPG7GkFxETkl_Urme1C6hVCys0evkk
-
A nice write up, plus some good pics, from the latest Saqqara discoveries. The focus on the funerary goods of a late eighteenth dynasty couple is interesting. The name 'Mutemwiya' is telling; it's very rare, and the lady in question may have been named after the mother of kung Amenhotep III, thus dating the mummy to around 1350 BC. https://www.livescience.com/queen-temple-book-of-dead-found-egypt.html
-
This one's new, and demonstrates the evolution of religious thought through the ages.
One of the epithets to describe the dead was 'true of voice', meaning that they could answer the many questions posed them in the 'book of the dead' by the gods.
This Greco-Roman find shows tongue amulets made of gold leaf (the 'flesh of the gods', thus identifying the deceased with Osiris) placed in what were otherwise bog standard lower middle class mummies.
https://www.livescience.com/mummy-with-gold-tongue-discovered.html?fbclid=IwAR1vMVVlerwtMG8hPVTaui_2QSRVwtwvMOFCofw7U_txniAwgIDx8irdK-k
-
This isn't news, but, if you've nothing better to do, have a look at this site - "Theban Mummy Project".
It does what it says on the tin.
This page in particular
http://anubis4_2000.tripod.com/SpecialExhibits/YuyaTuyu.htm?fbclid=IwAR2zxwb5vhmD_JGV9jnxByEHFdIemaofF0STtwa6tk4oxcuyiev94PzESKY
gives a great overview of what was the most sensational find in Egypt before Tutankhamun's tomb; the tomb of Yuya and Thuyu, very high ranking nobles from around 1370 BC, whose tomb was found almost intact.
The contents were astonishing...and the fact that the couple were Tutankhamun's great grandparents simply added to their importance.
-
This isn't news, but, if you've nothing better to do, have a look at this site - "Theban Mummy Project".
It does what it says on the tin.
This page in particular
http://anubis4_2000.tripod.com/SpecialExhibits/YuyaTuyu.htm?fbclid=IwAR2zxwb5vhmD_JGV9jnxByEHFdIemaofF0STtwa6tk4oxcuyiev94PzESKY
gives a great overview of what was the most sensational find in Egypt before Tutankhamun's tomb; the tomb of Yuya and Thuyu, very high ranking nobles from around 1370 BC, whose tomb was found almost intact.
The contents were astonishing...and the fact that the couple were Tutankhamun's great grandparents simply added to their importance.
Sounds interesting. Amazing when you think that all those tombs in the Valley of the Kings (and Queens) with their artwork and wonderful treasures plus all the other thousands of finds in different locations were just there for thousands of years undiscovered.
-
Sounds interesting. Amazing when you think that all those tombs in the Valley of the Kings (and Queens) with their artwork and wonderful treasures plus all the other thousands of finds in different locations were just there for thousands of years undiscovered.
The Kings Valley and the surrounding necropoli are a magnet for tourists - or would be if this mess was over - and Tutankhamun is always a great crowd puller.
Of course, the Amarna period and its' aftermath have always been a favourite period of mine - but I wish the incredible finds made by Pierre Montet in the Delta in the late 1930's were better known to the wider world.
Three intact royal tombs, four other very high ranking burials, gods an silver work to rival anything in Tutankhamun's tomb, but that damn chap Hitler put the kibosh on the publicity.
The Tanite necropolis was located under the ruins of the temple of Amun at Tanis - and I was really lucky to have been part of a three month dig in 1980, when we excavated a midden are just to the north of that complex.
Most of the stone buildings - temples, obelisks, the lot, had been moved brick by brick, colossal statue by colossal statue, from Piramess, the city built by Ra messes II, but which had been abandoned as the course of the Nile changed.
The feat of moving an entire city rivals the building of pyramids or the Theban Temples, and, until Tanis was rediscovered, we had thought the rulers of the twenty first dynasty ephemeral; we now know this was far from the case.
Anyway, here's an article on the objects found at the Montet dig.
https://archive.archaeology.org/0505/abstracts/tanis.html
-
Ok, that is my task for today! Go to that link and find out more. Thank you.
-
Not a new find, but new-ish; these are great pics from a recently discovered tomb at Luxor.
The Dra abu-el-naga necropolis isn't as well known as it should be; a burial ground for over eight centuries, for nobles, craftsmen, officials, and high status members of the court in Egypt, with over four hundred tombs excavated so far.
Not only that; it was a royal burial ground before the valley of the Kings became the des res for the afterlife.
Kings of the sixteenth and seventeenth dynasties, when Egypt was split into fragments, were buried here - some of the surviving coffins are in the British museum; the very earliest king of the eighteenth dynasty was also interred here - we don't know where, but the robbers found out millennia ago, as his mummy went on several journeys, ending up in one of the royal cache tombs, around 1000 BC.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/11/24/egyptian-archaeologists-unveil-newly-discovered-luxor-tombs/?fbclid=IwAR2R1pdkfKVV6LzIHOgPgRI1HMZItfPdY42mJ0QqcWGuUYEuZEc4_4MmzLs
-
A rather extraordinary event - labelled "The march of the dead" is upcoming next month.
The Royal mummies are being moved from the Cairo museum to the Museum of Egyptian civilisation.
They've been in the Cairo since their discovery in the late nineteenth century, where two cache tombs, labelled DB320 and KV 35, were found to contain literally dozens of royal mummies of the Eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth dynasties (1590 -1000 BC) as well as some very high ranking priest kings of the Theban twenty first dynasty.
Most of these mummies had been stripped of all jewellery by the state, after a spare of tomb robberies, and probably because Upper Egypt was strapped for wealth, their bodies wrapped in linen and placed in crude wooden coffins.
The DB320 cache was found after Egyptologists followed a crime gang which had first found it and was selling antiquities from it to tourists.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8mS0WuV2tM
-
I'm never one for those digital reconstruction thingies, but I'll make an exception here.
These spectacular images are of the Malqata - the modern Arabic name for the remains of the magnificent palace built by Amenhotep III, and occupied for around thirty years, being last used by Tutankhamun and his successor (and uncle) Aye.
This was mainly a working palace and not the main seat of power; though today we see Luxor with its' incredible ruins as the main Egyptian capital in Pharonic times, it was no such thing; the main royal residence, right from times long before the pyramids were thought of, was Men-nefer...Memphis, now submerged beneath modern Cairo.
Nevertheless , Malqata showed signs of opulence, with evidence of imported artwork from Minoan Crete, Greece, Turkey and the Levant, as well as Egypt herself.
https://antiqueprofil.wixsite.com/palais3d/r%C3%A9alisations?fbclid=IwAR2c_yqclW-V9dJGK_3-2LibyqUesORAGUf_ZgVArFbyOJYIBILg8yVD_lA
-
A royal procession.
Egypt's tourist bods are really hyping the moving of the royal mummies to their new, hopefully final, home.
Bells, whistles, horses galore..but, with any luck, no camels.
https://www.egyptindependent.com/mummies-on-the-move-what-to-expect-during-the-pharaohs-golden-parade-on-saturday/?fbclid=IwAR3EePUFpmER7VRIX7TIbPn3zC2HnIzOse7RkLCrNXXgQw3VK25f27styJc
-
This is a cut and paste, and I have permission to copy it. It concerns a massive, and major, find at Luxor; an excavation which will take years to complete - an entire city complex dating to the end of the eighteenth dynasty, and the importance of the find cannot be understated. The official announcement of the find will be made tomorrow, but here's what we know so far: Dr. Zahi Hawass. . Zahi Hawass Announces Discovery of 'Lost Golden City' in Luxor The Egyptian mission under Dr. Zahi Hawass found the city that was lost under the sands and called: The Rise of Aten. The city is 3000 years old, dates to the reign of Amenhotep III, and continued to be used by Tutankhamun and Ay. 'Many foreign missions searched for this city and never found it. We began our work searching for the mortuary temple of Tutankhamun because the temples of both Horemheb and Ay were found in this area' Hawass said. The Egyptian expedition was surprised to discover the largest city ever found in Egypt. Founded by one of the greatest rulers of Egypt, king Amenhotep III, the ninth king of the 18th dynasty who ruled Egypt from 1391 till 1353 B.C, this city was active during the great king's co-regency with his son, the famous Amenhotep IV/Akhenaton. It was the largest administrative and industrial settlement in the era of the Egyptian empire on the western bank of Luxor. 'The city's streets are flanked by houses, which some of their walls are up to3 meters high,' Hawass continued, 'we can reveal that the city extends to the west, all the way to the famous Deir el-Medina.' Betsy Brian, Professor of Egyptology at John Hopkins University in Baltimore USA, said 'The discovery of this lost city is the second most important archeological discovery since the tomb of Tutankhamun". "The discovery of the Lost City, not only will give us a rare glimpse into the life of the Ancient Egyptians at the time where the Empire was at his wealthiest but will help us shed light on one of history's greatest mystery: why did Akhenaten & Nefertiti decide to move to Amarna," Brian added. The excavation area is sandwiched between Rameses III's temple at Medinet Habu and Amenhotep III's temple at Memnon. The Egyptian mission started working in this area in search of Tutankhamun's Mortuary Temple. Tutankhamun's successor, King Ay, built his temple on a site which was later adjoined on its southern side by Rameses III's temple at Medinet Habu. Egyptologists believe Ay's temple may formerly have belonged to Tutankhamun as two colossal statues of the young king were found there. The northern part of the temple is still under the sands. The excavation started in September 2020 and within weeks, to the team's great surprise, formations of mud bricks began to appear in all directions. What they unearthed was the site of a large city in a good condition of preservation, with almost complete walls, and with rooms filled with tools of daily life. The archaeological layers have laid untouched for thousands of years, left by the ancient residents as if it were yesterday. The first goal of the mission was to date this settlement. Hieroglyphic inscriptions found on clay caps of wine vessels. Historical references tell us the settlement consisted of three royal palaces of King Amenhotep III, as well as the Empire's administrative and industrial center. A large number of archaeological finds, such as rings, scarabs, colored pottery vessels, and mud bricks bearing seals of King Amenhotep III's cartouche, confirmed the dating of the city. After only seven months of excavation, several areas or neighborhoods have been uncovered. In the southern part, the mission found a bakery, a cooking and food preparation area, complete with ovens and storage pottery. From its size, we can state the kitchen was catering a very large number of workers and employees. The second area which is still partly uncovered, is the administrative and residential district, with larger and well-arranged units. This area is fenced in by a zigzag wall, with only one access point leading to internal corridors and residential areas. The single entrance makes us think it was some sort of security, with the ability to control entry and exit to enclosed areas. Zigzag walls are one of the rare architectural elements in ancient Egyptian architecture, mainly used towards the end of the 18th Dynasty. The third area is the workshop. On one side, the production area for the mud bricks used to build temples and annexes. The bricks have seals bearing the cartouche of King Amenhotep III (Neb Maat Ra). On the other, a large number of casting molds for the production of amulets and delicate decorative elements. This is further evidence of the extensive activity in the city to produce decorations for both temples and tombs. All over the excavated areas, the mission has found many tools used in some sort of industrial activity like spinning and weaving. Metal and glass-making slag has also been unearthed, but the main area of such activity has yet to be discovered. Two unusual burials of a cow or bull were found inside one of the rooms. Investigations are underway to determine the nature and purpose of this practice. And even more remarkable burial of a person found with arms outstretched to his side, and remains of a rope wrapped around his knees. The location and position of this skeleton are rather odd, and more investigations are in progress. One of the most recent finds of a vessel containing 2 gallons of dried or boiled meat (about 10 kg), has a valuable inscription: Year 37, dressed meat for the third Heb Sed festival from the slaughterhouse of the stockyard of Kha made by the butcher luwy. This valuable information, not only gives us the names of two people that lived and worked in the city but confirmed that the city was active and the time of King Amenhotep III's co-regency with his son Akhenaten. The excavation also reveals a mud seal with inscriptions that can be read: "gm pa Aton" that can be translated as " the domain of the dazzling Aten", this is the name of a temple built by King Akhenaten at Karnak. As history goes, one year after this pot was made, the city was abandoned and the capital relocated to Amarna. But was it? And why? And was the city repopulated again when Tutankhamun returned to Thebes? Only further excavations of the area will reveal what truly happened 3500 years ago. To the north of the settlement a large cemetery was uncovered, the extent of which has yet to be determined. So far, the mission has discovered a group of rock-cut tombs of different sizes that can be reached through stairs carved into the rock. A common feature of tomb construction in the Valley of the Kings and in the Valley of the Nobles. Work is underway to document the extent of the necropolis; many tombs appear to be intact and unopened.
-
Some pics from the latest discovery; the new 'lost city' found near Luxor.
I'd be a bit careful about the article; the writer seems to think we have the history of the period completed.
We don't.
One glaring example is that it mentions a co-regency between Amenhotep III and his son Akhenaten.
Get five Egyptologists in a room to discuss this, and you'll end up with eight theories, several bloody noses and a cauliflower ear; it's one of the most disputed periods in Egypt's history, and all the more fascinating for that.
Anyway, the pics are good.
https://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/40/408778/Heritage/Ancient-Egypt/In-Photos-Egyptologist-Zahi-Hawass-announces-disco.aspx?fbclid=IwAR2mZpblZmLZMRoUdlWtVKF8pPZ9moLWpzfytDKr1rq7-XnnhIA_Bikw01k
-
Some really superb images from the new city site discovery.
The name of the place 'Dazzling Aten" echoes a royal barge built by Amenhotep III, who promoted the solar cult of Aten, which had started to rise, possibly as a bulwark against the Theban Amun priesthood, in the time of his grandfather, Amenhotep II.
The cult would see its' full flowering in the timer of his son, Akhenaten
That this city complex, placed slap bang in the middle of Luxor, Amun's main centre, yet dedicated to Aten, is immensely significant..
Already the artefacts recovered are pretty significant, the walls exposed are in superb condition, and inscriptions bearing the names of several kings and royal personages discovered.
https://trendswide.com/first-look-inside-egypts-lost-golden-city/?fbclid=IwAR0dBei7HpjzdDOiZXLbF5OTz5WuG5Gmm70TyqEDAfU6XceaBSTWJSM0dZc
-
Just wow!
-
Just wow!
Yep.
The Amarna period has always drawn me....umpteen theories propounded depending on the viewpoint of the writer....even Freud (Sigmund, not Clement) put his oar in.
Nowadays, the theories are sort of coming together...and the old ideas of a peaceful monotheistic paradise invented by a 'dreamer king' have disappeared up the Nile like a tourist pursued by a hoard of huxters.
-
.....and part of the press coverage of the new find, which should have hit the media on Friday, with video of the actual ruins uncovered so far.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwQt8bXsHc4
-
Wow....maybe my mummy wasn't a priest.........
https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/egyptian-mummy-pregnant-woman-male-priest-77394998?fbclid=IwAR2jLQlPYI8lZPVham8bfpsvCXUBp59fh-T9HClSpJGn14iH-GMbU-mMGI0
-
Wow....maybe my mummy wasn't a priest.........
https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/egyptian-mummy-pregnant-woman-male-priest-77394998?fbclid=IwAR2jLQlPYI8lZPVham8bfpsvCXUBp59fh-T9HClSpJGn14iH-GMbU-mMGI0
I bet there's more to this story than meets the eye. Do they imply that the mummy had not had any of the bandages etc removed before now?
-
I bet there's more to this story than meets the eye. Do they imply that the mummy had not had any of the bandages etc removed before now?
Probably.
There hasn't been an official mummy unwrapping since the late 1960s (Though the great prof Rosilie Davies did some work on a few which had already been partially stripped in Manchester and Liverpool unis in the '70s)
The practice is to CT, x-ray and MRI scan mummies nowadays.
When I did some vluntary work at the BM conservation lab for my degree, we put some of the mummies stored in the various vaults through CT and x-ray units which we'd borrowed from UCL.
The process was fascinating, and somewhat humbling as well.
-
A nice video announcing new finds at the largely unknown necropolis in Upper Egypt first noticed only about a decade ago, but has recently yielded over 200 tombs dating from around 2200 -320 BC...a wide range indeed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS9Ww9pNiOk
-
A nice video announcing new finds at the largely unknown necropolis in Upper Egypt first noticed only about a decade ago, but has recently yielded over 200 tombs dating from around 2200 -320 BC...a wide range indeed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS9Ww9pNiOk
I won't try and watch the video, but when you think about all the tombs, towns and remains of temples etc etc that have been discovered during the past hundred years or so, it makes you - well it does make me! - think about the population numbers and the fact that they certainy thrived because of the numbers required to design, excavate, often decorate and then (usually?) seal the tombs.
-
I won't try and watch the video, but when you think about all the tombs, towns and remains of temples etc etc that have been discovered during the past hundred years or so, it makes you - well it does make me! - think about the population numbers and the fact that they certainy thrived because of the numbers required to design, excavate, often decorate and then (usually?) seal the tombs.
Hi, Susan.
The population probably remained around one and a half million during the Old and Middle Kingdoms, rising to between two and three million in New Kingdom times.
When you think of, say, Babylonia at its peak had maybe one and a half million, and the Roman Em pie under Ceaser had perhaps ten million souls, that puts numbers into perspective.
The incredible fertility of the Nile, with its annual inundation bringing a superabundance of mineral rich mud to fertilise crops, was the crucial factor in defining, not only Egypt's prosperity, but her existence as the world's first nation-state with a sense of its' own identity.
As far as finds go?
Probably less than half of what was buried in the desert has yet been found.
There are three new temple sites being excavated in the Delta, two more in Middle Egypt, and the new palace-city at Luxor, as well as necropolis digs at Sakkara, Gebel el-Sisila, Dra abu el Naga, Tuna-el-Gebel...and on,and on, and on.
There are two excavations in the Valley of the Kings, one of which has found foundation deposits which almost always indicate a high status tomb in the near vicinity....but so far the actual tomb has escaped detection. Were it found, due to its' proximity to the tomb of Amenhotep II, it would probably belong to the Amenhotep-Akhenaten-Tutankhamun family
Watch this space.......
-
Anchorman
Thank you for interesting response. Will you please tell all these archaeologists etc to hurry up and get on with it - I want to know all the answers while I'm still alive! :D
-
Anchorman Thank you for interesting response. Will you please tell all these archaeologists etc to hurry up and get on with it - I want to know all the answers while I'm still alive! :D
I'm not getting any younger either! The problem with excavating in the Kings' Valley used to be tourism...even, well, especially, Howard Carter was plagued with them, wanting a look, an invite, asking questions, etc. Eight years earlier, the widow of Napoleon III almost wrecked a priceless decorated throne in the nearly intact tomb of Yuya and Tuyu by sitting on it for a rest! Nowadays, the problem is terrorism. Luxor is a hot bet of Islamic Extremism, and any dig in the Valley has to have security built in. For the same reason, these digs are now led by Egyptian Egyptologists as a matter of course, in an effort to try to prevent trouble. A sign of the times.
-
This is a brilliant article from the Smithsonian,demonstrating the amount of information one can glean from the most unlikely sources; in this case, a mummified shrew dating from the late Ptolemaic or early Roman periods.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/blogs/national-museum-of-natural-history/2021/05/18/mummified-shrew-discovery-unearths-ancient-egypts-wetter-climate/?fbclid=IwAR3r_jzIaljRFI27jsXLxR941_gsG9RuAgX4-0jD_3ROyPlSYmOfLFQSC3I
-
Egypt blowing her own trumpet...and tantalising the curious.
Yes, it's blurb aimed at the media, but I'm getting info that this 'big discovery' may be something rather significant.
We already know of a tomb entrance in the Valley of the Kings tentatively labelled KV 64, but there are two further spots in the valley which seem to be rather significant, both of which have been sealed off to tourists and visitors for the past two months.
Watch this space.....
https://dailynewsegypt.com/2021/05/30/another-royal-parade-in-egypt-avenue-of-sphinxes-and-huge-archaeological-discovery-coming/?fbclid=IwAR2IQyd4-w6g5s7XrZyVv_b5gjNbnANEWLrpocH-HC-N2peFukgbrWDenxk
-
Egypt blowing her own trumpet...and tantalising the curious.
Yes, it's blurb aimed at the media, but I'm getting info that this 'big discovery' may be something rather significant.
We already know of a tomb entrance in the Valley of the Kings tentatively labelled KV 64, but there are two further spots in the valley which seem to be rather significant, both of which have been sealed off to tourists and visitors for the past two months.
Watch this space.....
https://dailynewsegypt.com/2021/05/30/another-royal-parade-in-egypt-avenue-of-sphinxes-and-huge-archaeological-discovery-coming/?fbclid=IwAR2IQyd4-w6g5s7XrZyVv_b5gjNbnANEWLrpocH-HC-N2peFukgbrWDenxk
One of the big advantages that Egypt has on this is that such finds simply can't e faked! It's amazing how much more there might be left to find.
P.S. I do hope the lack of 'unread posts since last visit' is only a temporary thing. It is either the forum slowing down almost to a halt or, more likely, I've done something to the computer which means they are not showing properly.
-
One of the big advantages that Egypt has on this is that such finds simply can't e faked! It's amazing how much more there might be left to find.
P.S. I do hope the lack of 'unread posts since last visit' is only a temporary thing. It is either the forum slowing down almost to a halt or, more likely, I've done something to the computer which means they are not showing properly.
We know that there are several 'famous faces' still to find in the Eighteenth Dynasty who's who of royalty, and there should be a tomb in the Valley for Amenhotep I - as we have his mummy, therefore his tomb is there, somewhere.Also, there remains the question of the whereabouts of the 'priest kings' of the divided twenty-first dynasty - who ruled from Thebes, and who were very active when it came to building bits onto the Karnak temple estates.
Equally, several pretty significant 'great Royal Wives' - if you like, queens, should be in the Valley,or nearby.
A friend of mine, Chris Naunton, who recently published a book on these 'missing' tombs, calculated that there should be twenty seven major finds of the eighteenth to twenty second dynasties yet to find
-
This article shows that the trade in stolen or illegally exported artefacts from Egypt shows no sign of ending any time soon. Even legal items require strict permits, certificates and authentification before export [ you have to jump through hoops if you wish to obtain something. I have a 'shavti' figure from the twenty sixth dynasty, probably made for king Psamtik II. There are a further three hundred such items - the compliment for a royal burial - known. They appeared on the illegal market in the later nineteenth century, indicating that tomb robbers beat us to Psamtik's resting place - which we haven't, as yet, found. I acquired mine through an Egyptologist friend way back in 1980, and even them I has to have a folder dull of paperwork from both Cairo and London confirming legality. The ten thousand or so items smuggled out of Egypt in the last fifteen years, sadly, have no indication of provenance, location or context. https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/105348/Egypt-recovers-3-smuggled-artifacts-from-UK-before-sale-to?fbclid=IwAR3CJgBnpU50Z13fYGXCRGqAAyOMGbQMzURCJIJY8gCHRRP-hrQGzU8uwbs
-
Messing about on the (solar) river.
The second 'solar barque' in the boat pit found near the pyramid of Khufu is to be fully excavated and reconstructed.
These boats were buried with fourth dynasty kings (and a few Great Royal wives as well) to carry the 'ka' of the king as they journeyed with the Sun god Re in his sojourn through the night sky.
They were probably sailed up from Memphis and were seaworthy.
Two examples have been reconstructed using the original material, and are amazing examples of the boat builders' skill.
https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/416631.aspx?fbclid=IwAR3bEkVk9JTb3YpEIE_09_oGq_GYGFpjmZoM-whhOEyou7mMuY9fl8LZEMs
-
Marvellous find of a well preserved second century BC warship from the incredibly rich underwater archaeology site of Herakleon,which was Egypt's major seaport from around 800 BC until Alexandria reached its' full potential.
Some of the artefacts, statues and sculptures recovered from the mud of the sea bed in recent years are breathtaking in their preserved state.
So far, less than 5% of the site has been surveyed, never mind excavated.
https://maritime-executive.com/article/archaeologists-uncover-rare-fast-galley-from-2nd-century-bce?fbclid=IwAR0OOgOstye9NJis8fAvobX7BGH5P1l3JXEsRlfVBKAFHaj-GzJ7crSQqZk
-
That sounds very interesting.
-
Related amusing animation video..IMO
https://youtu.be/j6PbonHsqW0
-
Related amusing animation video..IMO
https://youtu.be/j6PbonHsqW0
I'll raise you Horrible Histories.
Getting to the guts of the matter.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xx9Yyh8xqg
-
We're just getting started in the new season for excavation - already Salima Ikram has started finding interesting stuff in tombs supposedly cleared in the Valley of the Kings, and indications of some rather interesting finds dating to the hitherto obscure late sixteenth/early seventeenth dynasties, when Egypt was embattled and divided, are starting to come onto the radar.
Anyway, one of the best newsletters giving updates is Osiris.net, a French outfit with English language sections, if anyone's interested.
https://osirisnet.net/news/n_09_21.htm?fr
-
Ipetsut - better known today as 'Karnak', is vast, and still manages to surprise us. Here's a video of the recent find dating to perhaps Egypt's greatest warrior king, Thutmose III - and from what I'm hearing, there maybe more to find, possibly even material from his predecessor and co-regent, Hatshepsut. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjotzMsc9Qk
-
....so; check your back gardens, folks! https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10081637/Sphinx-garden-statues-auctioned-house-turn-genuine-Egyptian-ariefacts.html?fbclid=IwAR1fckssMU5ZL7_Gi8pUrHYvACayQosp4Is_xhpdp3bpe1DLcjOxw6oiCFE
-
A new, significant discovery of over a hundred burials, many dating to pre dynastic times as early as ca. 3800 BC, others to the hyksos period around 1700 BC, has been announced.
https://egyptologie-news.fr/2021/10/15/photos-110-archaeological-tombs-discovered-in-kom-al-khaljan-area-near-daqahliya/?fbclid=IwAR01_02PRWyIjzGSEmFxflw5peboteBuLtBvdADeJ4A6r2R-dZOitJw-MSM
-
Ipetsut - better known as Karnak - has many secrets hidden in its' vast area.
Apart from earlier buildings used as filling for later structures, revealing their own inscriptions, statues and criosphinxes have turned up over the past few years...these three are the latest.
They are ram headed sphinxes - the ram was one of the animals sacred to Amun-Ra, to whom Karnak was dedicated.
We have a wonderful avenue of these sphinxes linking Karnak to the nearby Luxor temple dating from the Eighteenth dynasty - but these three appear to be much later - the wadjet cobra - or uraeus - is a symbol of kingship, and was not normally seen on deities' statues until the power of the kings started to wane in the third century BC.
https://www.livescience.com/ram-head-statues-luxor-avenue-of-sphinxes?fbclid=IwAR0KfwHZTHgHjF7CzIk3m-yCX4uPHxCpq-3MjZe
POp7B5Kxwpn4DXZG1tNI
-
I love how our understanding of ancient Egypt is evolving.
-
I love how our understanding of ancient Egypt is evolving.
Yep.
When confronted by a picture of one of the ram-headed sphinxes dedicated by the female king Hatshepsut, Freud declared that it was an idealised form of manhood envisaged by the lady to suppress her sexual conflict as a female king.....
-
The female king Hatshepsut has always fascinated me; her rule, monuments and strength shown by her building achievements speak volumes.
Her funerary temple complex at Deir-el-Bahari,'Djeser-djeseru' is still probably the most breathtaking in Egypt, and I still remember spending time there when I was a student and studied in the field.
Now, yet more finds from this complex to add to our corpus of knowledge, which has only deepened since the identification of her mummy through DNA confirmation in the last few years:
https://www.heritagedaily.com/2021/11/new-discoveries-in-tomb-beneath-temple-of-hatshepsut/142071?fbclid=IwAR2f9f3DeBQH6VJHOMFtyj9CQ6lquovoZPx9mk5uftnO
qSYiuYzbw3G1Jsk
-
Interesting find from Cyprus, showing the extent of trade in the Mediterranean in the late Bronze age.
The Egyptian vessels confirm something written on one of the 'Amarna letters' a series of clay tablets containing diplomatic correspondence from the time of Amenhotep III, Akhenaten, Neferneferuaten and Tutankhamun, which gives incredible insight into the relations between the major powers and their vassal states at that period.
https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2021/12/gold-jewellery-from-time-of-nefertiti.html?fbclid=IwAR1XUEXQyAZXOTwOkQQb_RSh_2CBzl0SNU6PS17802HG40hiVXQJ4OCZ6AU#.YaenggGgjfs
-
I love how our understanding of ancient Egypt is evolving.
Ah, yes - me too. It would be so fascinating to have the chance to visit those wonderful places again.
-
Right.
If you're cheesed off roasting someone's chestnuts over an open fire, and fancy getting your teeth into a mystery, here's a link.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTPN4hjnqdM
It's about the most controversial woman in Egypt, and I'm not talking about Cleopatra.
Nefertiti; queen, king, both, and mother - or stepmother - of Tutankhamun.
Who was she?
Where is she?
For my money, I think I know, having worried at this like a Chihuahua on a dinosaur bone for three decades, but, hey, you decide....
-
Silver tongued devil...
Well, for 'silver', read 'gold'.
There seems to have been a fashion in funerary art in the seventh and sixth centuries to coat the tongues of some mummies with gold - possibly trying to get in the good books with the deities in the judgement hall in Amduat, gold being the 'flesh of the gods'.
The practice wasn't widespread, and good finds are rare...but there's an intact sarcophagus in a plundered tomb; a find recently announced to the world:
https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/443817.aspx?fbclid=IwAR1aCz3eouAk45iyWQU_WRXOtc4LOu8_OloSSXXzCfHdIWsLc1Lp2LHhQjM
-
A cursory look at Egypt through Greek or Roman eyes would have you believe that the main female deity was Iset (')('Isis')
That was never the case; from prehistoric till Ptolemaic times, the main female deity was Hathor and her alter ego, Sekhmet.
Polish excavators have found a massive hoard of votive offerings in Ipestsut (Luxor).
https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2021/12/hundreds-offerings-egyptian-fertility-goddess-uncovered-luxor?fbclid=IwAR3ld6EfDvU0-LeuUOokek69RgGKeUvHP19wjKscQdPnJDrI7hmzSdkiC9E
-
Years ago, Egyptology comprised shovels, knowledge of hieroglyphs, a fair overview of Egyptian history and a lot of luck. People such as Howard Carter and Arthur Weigall, not to mention Harry Burton and Elliot Smith dragged the discipline into the twentieth century. Now botanists, metallurgists, physicists, biologists and the like are either on hand or close by, every dig. Here's a fascinating medical overview of a mummy we've had for well over a century, that of the Dyn XVII king Sequenenre Tao II, found in a dreadfully mutilated state, and now dissected (metaphorically) to reveal its' secrets. Sequenenre ruled during a particularly murky period of turmoil and disunity, a period in which I've long been very interested. I know this dates from February this year, but it's still interesting. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmed.2021.637527/full
-
Years ago, Egyptology comprised shovels, knowledge of hieroglyphs, a fair overview of Egyptian history and a lot of luck. People such as Howard Carter and Arthur Weigall, not to mention Harry Burton and Elliot Smith dragged the discipline into the twentieth century. Now botanists, metallurgists, physicists, biologists and the like are either on hand or close by, every dig. Here's a fascinating medical overview of a mummy we've had for well over a century, that of the Dyn XVII king Sequenenre Tao II, found in a dreadfully mutilated state, and now dissected (metaphorically) to reveal its' secrets. Sequenenre ruled during a particularly murky period of turmoil and disunity, a period in which I've long been very interested. I know this dates from February this year, but it's still interesting. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmed.2021.637527/full
I have not listened rightthrough to the end, but yes, very interesting.
On my computer, I have an audio copy of a book entitled, 'Speech: how language made us human' by Simon Prentiss, who was Author of the Month in September on the Graham Hancock forum. I am only on Chapter 2 at the moment, but it is most interesting and of course refers a lot to Egyptian hieiroglyphs.
-
I have not listened rightthrough to the end, but yes, very interesting.
On my computer, I have an audio copy of a book entitled, 'Speech: how language made us human' by Simon Prentiss, who was Author of the Month in September on the Graham Hancock forum. I am only on Chapter 2 at the moment, but it is most interesting and of course refers a lot to Egyptian hieiroglyphs.
The Graham Hancock Forum?
I think I'd better take a dram for medical reasons.
I trust there are a few folk there willing to argue with Hancock's, er, ideas?
Hancock, Icke, and, to a lesser extent, Rohl, are, shall we say, provocative?
Two of the three - Hancock and Rohl - have tried to remake Egyptian chronology to fit their theories; Rohl being armed with a Bible whilst doing so.
-
The Graham Hancock Forum?
I think I'd better take a dram for medical reasons.
I trust there are a few folk there willing to argue with Hancock's, er, ideas?
Hancock, Icke, and, to a lesser extent, Rohl, are, shall we say, provocative?
Two of the three - Hancock and Rohl - have tried to remake Egyptian chronology to fit their theories; Rohl being armed with a Bible whilst doing so.
I can assure you I challenge all such stuff if it comes up on the Inner Space board!! I cannot cope with the Mysteries board - it is too tiring!! And I can assure you that Simon Prentiss is not supportive of GH's or others' similar work - 'Speech- is 100% scientific - and that earlier in the year 'Entangled Life' by Merlin Sheldrake was a thoroughly scientific book and was, in fact, the BBC Science programmes book of the year. My (older) son read me that over the phone and it was excellent.
-
Hancock is the sanest of that lot, and has been quite prepared to modify his ideas when new archaeological finds turn up which cannot fit into his original premiss. Not that he's adopted a completely different paradigm.
As I understand it, he's arguing that there's ample time to fit in another civilisation that has risen and fallen, in between the emergence of Cro Magnon man and the Sumerians and the Egyptians.
I'm NOT convinced of this, particularly because he seems to suggest that the Egyptians' technology seemed to appear fully formed out of nowhere. Whereas, it's obvious that they had to follow the usual learning curve.
His ideas about the conventional dating of the Sphinx being wrong seem plausible, though.
At least he's not a loony like Icke who thinks the controlling powers of the world are space lizards in human form. Nor does Hancock quite 'do a Von Daniken' with the Bible, like the other bloke you mentioned.
-
Hancock is the sanest of that lot, and has been quite prepared to modify his ideas when new archaeological finds turn up which cannot fit into his original premiss. Not that he's adopted a completely different paradigm.
As I understand it, he's arguing that there's ample time to fit in another civilisation that has risen and fallen, in between the emergence of Cro Magnon man and the Sumerians and the Egyptians.
I'm NOT convinced of this, particularly because he seems to suggest that the Egyptians' technology seemed to appear fully formed out of nowhere. Whereas, it's obvious that they had to follow the usual learning curve.
His ideas about the conventional dating of the Sphinx being wrong seem plausible, though.
At least he's not a loony like Icke who thinks the controlling powers of the world are space lizards in human form. Nor does Hancock quite 'do a Von Daniken' with the Bible, like the other bloke you mentioned.
Hancock seems obsessed with the Giza Sphinx...he claims it to be the 'original' from which all others were modelled during the next three thousand years.
This is patent rubbish; we have a sphinx of Hetepheres I, mother of Khufu, dating to thirty years before Khafre modelled that outcrop of sandstone into sphinx form. There's also a rather damaged sphinx of Djedefre, Khufu's hier. Going further back, there is a base which had to be made for a sphinx found in Saqqara, dating to Khasekhemy, last kimng of the second dynasty. Had this survived, it would have been thirty feet long.
When confronted with this evidence, Hancock stuck his fingers in his ears and ignored it...the same technique he usually uses when dealing with uncomfortable facts.
As for the Giza Sphinx, I'm with Jean Pierre Houdin, probably the foremost living expert on the Giza plateau; the Giza sphinx was simply a lump of rock which got in the way when Khafre constructed his causeway temple; instead of rerouting the temple alignment, he simply sculpted the sphinx, associating himself with the solar cult in the process.
-
Hancock is the sanest of that lot, and has been quite prepared to modify his ideas when new archaeological finds turn up which cannot fit into his original premiss. Not that he's adopted a completely different paradigm.
As I understand it, he's arguing that there's ample time to fit in another civilisation that has risen and fallen, in between the emergence of Cro Magnon man and the Sumerians and the Egyptians.
I'm NOT convinced of this, particularly because he seems to suggest that the Egyptians' technology seemed to appear fully formed out of nowhere. Whereas, it's obvious that they had to follow the usual learning curve.
His ideas about the conventional dating of the Sphinx being wrong seem plausible, though.
At least he's not a loony like Icke who thinks the controlling powers of the world are space lizards in human form. Nor does Hancock quite 'do a Von Daniken' with the Bible, like the other bloke you mentioned.
Thank you - interesting post. Yes, I agree a bout GH. I did not read his later books, but the first ones always had a paragraph at the end of each chapter stating clearly what in it was factual and what was speculation. And that is one of the reasons I have stayed interested in the site.
If he read the book 'Origins: how the Earth made us' by Lewis Dartnell, I think he would drop the idea of a civilisation that rose and disappeared along the way.
-
Hancock seems obsessed with the Giza Sphinx...he claims it to be the 'original' from which all others were modelled during the next three thousand years.
This is patent rubbish; we have a sphinx of Hetepheres I, mother of Khufu, dating to thirty years before Khafre modelled that outcrop of sandstone into sphinx form. There's also a rather damaged sphinx of Djedefre, Khufu's hier. Going further back, there is a base which had to be made for a sphinx found in Saqqara, dating to Khasekhemy, last kimng of the second dynasty. Had this survived, it would have been thirty feet long.
When confronted with this evidence, Hancock stuck his fingers in his ears and ignored it...the same technique he usually uses when dealing with uncomfortable facts.
As for the Giza Sphinx, I'm with Jean Pierre Houdin, probably the foremost living expert on the Giza plateau; the Giza sphinx was simply a lump of rock which got in the way when Khafre constructed his causeway temple; instead of rerouting the temple alignment, he simply sculpted the sphinx, associating himself with the solar cult in the process.
Hi Anchorman
It's a very long time since I've given any thought to these matters. I understand that one of Hancock's arguments for the great antiquity of the Giza Sphinx is that grooves of wear on its surface must have been caused by water. What are your views on this?
-
Thank you - interesting post. Yes, I agree a bout GH. I did not read his later books, but the first ones always had a paragraph at the end of each chapter stating clearly what in it was factual and what was speculation. And that is one of the reasons I have stayed interested in the site.
If he read the book 'Origins: how the Earth made us' by Lewis Dartnell, I think he would drop the idea of a civilisation that rose and disappeared along the way.
Thanks for the L Dartnell book reference, Susan.
I'll check it out.
-
Hi Anchorman
It's a very long time since I've given any thought to these matters. I understand that one of Hancock's arguments for the great antiquity of the Giza Sphinx is that grooves of wear on its surface must have been caused by water. What are your views on this?
I think I'd defer to what I know of the evolving religion of Egypt, rather than geology, DU. though, in passing, the sandstone structures of the Dyn III king Djoser at Sakkara show similar weather damage - they are the subject of a major conservation project which is almost complete - and there is no suggestion that their dates are questioned (C14 dating of organic remains found under the Step Pyramid back the conventional dates plus or minus twenty years)
The solar cult of Re at Heliopolis was starting to be foremost at - the end of Dyn IIi and start of Dyn IV, rivaling the cult of the deity of kingship itself. The preponderance of -re endings in royal and noble names show this; it would reach its' zenith in the following dynasty.
Given the solar aspect of the sphinx associated with Sekhmet/Hathor, the creation of these monuments would show the thought process of the time. Sphinxes would be associated with the solar cult down through history, whether as Re-Horakhty, Horemakhet, or, with the New Kingdom, Amon-re.
-
CT scan of Amenhotep I.
This is exciting news; the first king buried in the Valley of the Kings has been CT scanned - at last.
Amenhotep I eventually ended up in the Deir el Bahari 'cache' tomb DB320, along with quite a few other royal refugees who were stored there after the state judiciously cleared their tombs - making sure the last vestiges of royal bling was removed first.
Most of these mummies have been examined in modern times, but the delicate nature of the cartonage face mask meant that Amenhotep I remained relatively untouched.
Incidentally, the face mask, like the other royal face masks we have from the royal necropolis at Tanis, bears only the Wadjet - or uraeus - cobra.
The only kingly face mask to bear both vulture and cobra is that covering Tutankhamun.
Since the vulture - Nekhbet - adorned female crowns, this adds to the hypothesis that the Tutankhamun mask was originally meant for the female king Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten, and adapted for Tutankhamun's use.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-59808883
-
Interesting article about the latest excavations in the remains of the funerary complex of Nebmaatre Amenhotep III at Luxor. Amenhotep III has to be one of the greatest builders in Egypt, certainly one of the most important figures of Egypt's New Kingdom. His increasing obsession with solar deities and final self-apotheosis with the sun in the form of the Aten was the springboard for his son and successor, Neferkheperure Akhenaten, and the Amarna period. https://www.archaeology.wiki/blog/2022/01/18/sphinx-and-sekhmet-statues-found-at-pharaoh-amenhotep-iiis-mortuary-temple/?fbclid=IwAR2Nmt-_QG8nwMKP8gdGzt7HY4d8LnoKDKMuFwGNivlx99t8z6rx597Eio0
-
A rare, and very important, find; an embalming cache containing leftovers and used tools from an embalmers' workplace, datinfrom around 620 BC.
https://www.heritagedaily.com/2022/02/archaeologists-unearth-ancient-egyptian-embalming-cache/142739?fbclid=IwAR122dt1whMJdoiONpfUp4aimzTjNaBlvEj-E48_dzveo9l9Yq_rjP9zKDY
-
In any other country, a Roman house would excite historians....but the plaque is stirring my brain cells.
Co-regency wasn't unknown in Egypt - far from it; but this tile shows two kings - both living. There have been papers written about co-regencies in the eighteenth dynasties, but this one was more speculative than anything else.
If there WAS such a co-regency, Amenhotep III must have been a child of three or four years old when this tile was created under the rule of his short-riegn father Thutmose IV.
https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/113194/Rare-plaque-4-meter-deep-furnace-a-house-dating-back?fbclid=IwAR0j1f8RJR0cgMQa-1OAU4d7UMjqUiXTeO0_hmWvSCkjr
DsJktklRjmjcvU
-
Normally, folk....well, geeks...associate Abusir with pyramids and sun temples dating way back to Egypt's fifth dynasty.
This find shows the site's yse for a further two thousand years; a rare cache of embalming equipment from the Third Intermediate Period.
Good report, and good pics as well.
https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/mummy-embalming-egypt-scn/index.html?fbclid=IwAR066XHC0H7NbaYZk85OpUwg5NAIvQjNqg4EEnyteXVhWhfn4p10EOCCxJk
-
The Sinai peninsula was always important to Egypt, from pre dynastic times onward.
Sinai was a source of copper and other minerals, as well as a vital land route to Palestine and the Levant.
The New Kingdom rulers recognised the military potential, building strategic forts to both defend mining colonies and act as staging posts for military expeditions.
A new find of five wells, plus copper smelting facilities, dating from the nineteenth dynasty, and the rule of Seti I, father of Ramesses II, has just been announced.
https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2022/03/five-pharaonic-wells-uncovered-sinai?fbclid=IwAR3WWvbUe9WK2Z1VS_ihnBDcy6UHuJnCDNsf1c50o0Tbhc0RuWBAUbbHxtc
-
.....and there's more.
Well, more from Saqqara, anyway.
Five tombs dating from the end of the Old kingdom and the chaos of the first Intermediate period,from the rule of Merenre I to the 'heralkeopolitan' Dyn VIII Iby, have been found, giving a new insight into the chaos which led to the end of the Old Kingdom and nearly a century of divided rule and civil war.
https://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/40/463002/Antiquities/Ancient-Egypt/In-Photos-Five-ancient-Egyptian-tombs-uncovered-in.aspx?fbclid=IwAR31LXFleVpTKFaHVErBldudG7LNJSfLZu7O-4C2Fm6RVr29zv8yXIXPXSg
-
This one's significant.
By the end of the fourth dynasty, the fashion for building massive pyramids was on the wane.
Kings would still build pyramids - of a sort - for five centuries, but these would be mainly smaller mud brick affairs faced with stone.
Instead, as the religious focus changed from worship of a living god-king to solar worship, a new type of 'sun temple' was built by successive fifth dynasty kings, each glorifying the sun - Re - and the king who built them.
We only have two reasonably preserved examples of this monument - or at least we thought we had - till now, that is.....
https://bx.newcarsz.com/egypts-biggest-discovery-in-decades-solves-4500-year-old-pharaoh-mystery-impressive/?fbclid=IwAR3UTcQahjqqGNn15_HfNGVJx_FPh1tWLPjEd57MTNrLhJ44huIZ6ooLhg4
-
Getting rat arsed Egyptian style? Actually beer played a vital role as an antibacterial answer to the Nile water when it came to fluid intake. Also, there was the infamous festival dedicated to Sekhmet, the alter ego of the nurturing, protective goddess Hathor....in which drunkenness was requires behaviour for one and all..... https://abydos.org/blog/2022/3/18/what-happened-to-all-that-beer?fbclid=IwAR2Ae5nldYcgyC6Qao5gC2l3t_ZhUSf28rw_kAHCD-1OTn31KLxd5SaQfrA
-
The wonders of modern tech.
Analysing the remnants of food for eternity; the contents of Kha and Meryt's tomb are fantastic - if you ever go to Turin, this is a must-see. I'd quibble with the 'most intact nobles tomb' though; I'd contend that honour goes to the burial of Yuya and Thuyu, KV 43 in the Valley of the Kings; Tutankhamun's great-grandparents.
However, this article is not to be sniffed at.
https://ancient-archeology.com/historic-smells-reveal-secrets-and-techniques-of-egyptian-tomb/?fbclid=IwAR3--7vbgWNbwvY0xTGgqlgcei7TwzborM3nGZZx6WPdSY2X2n4QkdUsP5M
-
An insight into the murky world of political intrigue in Egypt's old Kingdom. Dyn VI was a time of change; earlier kings had taken power from the immediate royal circle and vested it in capable nobles....who passed it, father to son, in mini dynasties, up and down the country. Outwardly, Pharonic power remained supreme - though in fact , year by year, it was diluted, till the dynasty collapsed, the country fragmented into what would be termed the 'First Intermediate Period'. This latest find, from the very short reign of Userkare, is significant. We don't yet have Userkare's tomb - though it will be near this site, and, given the brevity of the reign, unfinished. https://www.heritagedaily.com/2022/05/archaeologists-discover-tomb-of-ancient-egyptian-royal-clerk-at-saqqara/143476?fbclid=IwAR3cqlU5wCg4RhZNdSOUvs-cSMEp5aNgQCibR5_q-e9kE6qlCa8aDxynT8w
-
Still reading 'Origins', I am on a section about the Mongols and it seems they got as far as Egypt but I'm not sure of date or how long they stayed.
-
Still reading 'Origins', I am on a section about the Mongols and it seems they got as far as Egypt but I'm not sure of date or how long they stayed.
It'd have to have been in the early medieval period, at which time Egypt was governed by a Caliphate, so any contact would've been trade only, Susan.
There are strong indications of trade links from Egypt to what became India in the twelfth century BC, though whether they were contacts made through Asia Minor or actual routes is still unknown.
-
It'd have to have been in the early medieval period, at which time Egypt was governed by a Caliphate, so any contact would've been trade only, Susan.
There are strong indications of trade links from Egypt to what became India in the twelfth century BC, though whether they were contacts made through Asia Minor or actual routes is still unknown.
Thank you - world-wide travel certainly has its ups and downs..
And yes, I now realise it must have been the mediaeval period because the next page I have been reading this afternoon mentions the fact that the bubonic plague was brought from the Steppes, via China via Genoa and Venice in the 1340s.
-
You wait for a tomb and eighty odd turn up.
This seems to have been an Old Kingdom necropolis, re-used in Ptolemaic times....quite a rare find in Upper (Southern) Egypt.
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202205/1264842.shtml?fbclid=IwAR1CPGQcYfjak40Oa6UM4TOCS4qFTnkpnFDinEjej02Fvn0f7haKb--ID8A
-
A heads up from the Beeb on an exhibition detailing the brilliant content of the Griffiths Institute, Oxford.
The diaries,notes, plans, and, above all, photographic plates detail the first in-depth archaeological scientific excavation of a tomb as we understand it - Tutankhamun's tomb, of course.
I'm glad the exhibition gives credit to Harry Burton, Arthur Weighall, Alan Gardiner, as well as Howard Carter, in this, the centenary year of the discovery.
I've used the online resources of the Griffiths for years, and, if you've a spare moment, go there and see for yourself.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-61394416?fbclid=IwAR18fvoJumnCKumKD2oEjuEtEOg3XvyUHtkJBBJmGgBOC_VvyH0mhWUqobE
-
A massive discovery of over 250 intact late period (c600-300 BC) coffins, as well as bronze statues, canopic jars, funerary papyri, food offerings, embalmers' tools and items of jewellery, have been found at the Bubastion, a temple site dedicated to Bast and Thoth, at Saqqara.
The condition of the coffins is superb, many of them showing vivid colours, gold leaf, inscriptions, accompanied with intact jars of unguents which were used at the funeral ceremonies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?fbclid=IwAR25jZaW_ro5P58e670cgSLcEYJv9Zn6ygh8ZExJPJs7al34bBbsjOzfwMo&v=TLKsR3q7nW0&feature=youtu.be
-
Quite a nice written summary of the latest finds from the Bubastion.
The haul of bronze statuary is quite breathtaking in itself. Saqqara never fails to disappoint; it has been used as a necropolis since the earliest dynastic times, through Pharonic period, right up until the Roman occupation - a staggering 3,500 years. There should be much, much more still to find there: three expeditions are working there at the moment.
Apart from the Bubastion dig, there are excavations dealing with late second and early third dynasty tombs, as well as a dig giving tantalising hints of the 'missing' royal tombs of the fifth and seventh dynasties.
https://ancientegypt4travel.com/150-statues-and-250-coffins-the-new-archaeological-discovery-in-saqqara/?fbclid=IwAR0O3lqAg4lny7O5RC057o70xQ0JgvKVDAV3FSqzExwJ8UuMu2FYwrv5Hcw
-
A massive discovery of over 250 intact late period (c600-300 BC) coffins, as well as bronze statues, canopic jars, funerary papyri, food offerings, embalmers' tools and items of jewellery, have been found at the Bubastion, a temple site dedicated to Bast and Thoth, at Saqqara.
The condition of the coffins is superb, many of them showing vivid colours, gold leaf, inscriptions, accompanied with intact jars of unguents which were used at the funeral ceremonies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?fbclid=IwAR25jZaW_ro5P58e670cgSLcEYJv9Zn6ygh8ZExJPJs7al34bBbsjOzfwMo&v=TLKsR3q7nW0&feature=youtu.be
It is quite astonishing that all these discoveries continue to be made. The Egyptians and archaeologists must sometimes sigh and think, 'Oh dear, not another one!'
When you consider the huge numbers of people, the physical labour involved, the numbers of skilled artists, the huge expense in funds and time needed, etc, it's difficult to get one's head round!
-
It is quite astonishing that all these discoveries continue to be made. The Egyptians and archaeologists must sometimes sigh and think, 'Oh dear, not another one!'
When you consider the huge numbers of people, the physical labour involved, the numbers of skilled artists, the huge expense in funds and time needed, etc, it's difficult to get one's head round!
I remember a lecturer at uni telling me, with confidence, that Egypt was, as he put it, "dug out".
That was in 1980.
In the last four years alone, there have been over eighty major discoveries.
As for the ancient Egyptian burial customs?
By the late period, with the diminution of pharonic power, and the democratisation of death, meaning that even lower middle class folk could afford a decent embalming and stock coffin, the funeral industry became an economic mainstay of both artisans and priests.
The latter were responsible for the mass breeding of cult animals to be offered as prayers, whether real or faked mummies, to the gods...and making a nice little earner in the process.
The result is a vast number of animal mummies - estimated in the millions, and high quality human burials - at least on the outside.
On closer examination, mummification techniques were sometimes rushed, with costs cut. Plaster and bandages covered a multitude of sins.
Most of these modern finds will be CT scanned, any inscriptions deciphered, and returned to the tomb, which will be sealed and secured against grave robbers.
A few will be kept and displayed, along with the bronze statues, in the new Grand Egyptian Museum.
None will be unwrapped. That practice is no longer necessary. Only mummies which are found in a destroyed state are ever examined internally by hand nowadays.
-
I remember a lecturer at uni telling me, with confidence, that Egypt was, as he put it, "dug out".
That was in 1980.
In the last four years alone, there have been over eighty major discoveries.
As for the ancient Egyptian burial customs?
By the late period, with the diminution of pharonic power, and the democratisation of death, meaning that even lower middle class folk could afford a decent embalming and stock coffin, the funeral industry became an economic mainstay of both artisans and priests.
The latter were responsible for the mass breeding of cult animals to be offered as prayers, whether real or faked mummies, to the gods...and making a nice little earner in the process.
The result is a vast number of animal mummies - estimated in the millions, and high quality human burials - at least on the outside.
On closer examination, mummification techniques were sometimes rushed, with costs cut. Plaster and bandages covered a multitude of sins.
Most of these modern finds will be CT scanned, any inscriptions deciphered, and returned to the tomb, which will be sealed and secured against grave robbers.
A few will be kept and displayed, along with the bronze statues, in the new Grand Egyptian Museum.
None will be unwrapped. That practice is no longer necessary. Only mummies which are found in a destroyed state are ever examined internally by hand nowadays.
Very interesting - I didn't know that.
-
Was wondering if there were any reliable population estimates for the various ancient Egyptian periods, or other demographics?
There were a lot of people that needed burial ... and clearly a culture encouraging of belief in an after-life and preservation of remains.
-
Was wondering if there were any reliable population estimates for the various ancient Egyptian periods, or other demographics?
There were a lot of people that needed burial ... and clearly a culture encouraging of belief in an after-life and preservation of remains.
Estimates are problematic at best, given immigration from the Levant, Lybia, and mercenary colonies of Carian Greeks and Hebrews in the Late period; they vary from 3.9 to 5.3 million at around the time of the twenty-seventh dynasty, when Persia overran Egypt.
Estimates of around three million at the peak of the Eighteenth dynasty empire period seem reasonable.
-
This is a biggie.
Very rare blocks from a temple construction of the fourth dynasty king Khufu, along with statues, fragments of building work, and inscriptions found in a dig at Heliopolis.
The dig is still in progress; along with the material from later periods, it's just possible we might find a contemporary image of Khufu.
Ironically, the only image we have of the builder of the Great pyramid is a tiny ivory statuette less than three inches tall, which itself may be of a much later date.
https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/467855.aspx?fbclid=IwAR2tZUBk8ZhNbz3VCICgGpc8AISSXlo8wGOhjIJiq53_l1JNZNf-4csgEMI
-
A nice wee article showing just how in-depth scientific research has grown in Egyptology.
Potential evidence of stroke victims in Ancient Egypt.
https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/stroke-victim-egypt-0017049?fbclid=IwAR1h0A2lgK0a8qfx9XOjytoSn6jnfI9HQ06iBqrUWuxIEd6SN6KpKNro7ok
-
Some nice pics of the conservation and restoration work being undertaken by the Egyptian government.
This article's about a colossal statue of Thutmose II, fourth king of the eighteenth dynasty, usually overshadowed by his wife and sister, Hatshepsut, who assumed the kingship a few years after his death.
If you go to Karnak or Luxor temples, you'll see a great deal of work being done there, especially recovering the infill from the great pylon gates - that rubble is actually bits of previous constructions, sometimes buildings of controversial kings such as Akhenaten or Tutankhamun, which were destroyed and recycled.
The rubble, when reconstructed, either manually or digitally, can provide very valuable nuggets of history.
https://see.news/egypt-completes-work-on-restoration-of-king-tuthmosis-ii/?fbclid=IwAR0rgmXlyQ1U7I3uznyYwaA3LlFK2K0Pobs9t7GSpWdRtu78OGb_jPqeCAg
-
A heads-up for Londoners; not only is this year the 100th anniversary of the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun, but it marks 200 years since first real Egyptology. The British Museum has come up with a significant exhibition;
https://www.britishmuseum.org/exhibitions/hieroglyphs-unlocking-ancient-egypt?fbclid=IwAR2ZLwfsu2qJ17m63DOalZAMSpyP-Zvl3AN9KBSqGjzYpjekLznSPvvsiiM#:~:text=For%20centuries,%20life%20in%20ancient,history%20by%20some%203,000%20years
-
Not exactly Egypt, but Caanan.
This rather special find indicates Caananite burial customs in the Latre Bronze age. Items bearing the prenomen of Ramesses II - Usermaatre - indicate that the owner(s) of this tomb were vassals of that king. Egypt still controlled that area, and would do so for another sixty years.
https://archaeonewsnet.com/2022/09/intact-burial-cave-from-time-of-rameses-ii-discovered-on-israeli-coast.html?fbclid=IwAR0AK4iXiTMz9rQFTRsAk2LNDjI8PP2z3178KvIzTGKa6XGCC7-W5A8gzLs
-
It was 200 years ago today......
......when what had been thought as mystical symbology became readable - Champollion finally managed to crack the code and decipher Hieroglyphs, opening the world of thought, philosophy, literature - and the occasional love letter and hissy fit - of the ancient Egyptians to scrutiny.
Of course, being Egyptology, it created a whole new realm of argument....folk who thought Greece was the cradle of philosophy, science and mathematics refused to acknowledge a far more ancient source of learning.
Indeed, many papyri which had been collected on the 'grand tour' were either sold or even destroyed before they could be translated, in case they burst the bubble of Classical scholars.
Of course, a certain pseudo Christian sect founded on a spurious papyrus by one Joseph Smith, quietly 'lost' their document...which, unfortunately turned up in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, meaning some rapid change of literature.
I first got into hieroglyphs as a hobby in my last year of primary school - and never looked back.
Now, of course, unless I use very high magnification and colour change gizmos on my computer or hand held electronic magnifier, I have to rely on translated works.
I still keep my hand in by laboriously trawling through images of ostraca or potsherds, just to keep what's left of my brain working.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Fran%C3%A7ois_Champollion
-
It was 200 years ago today......
......when what had been thought as mystical symbology became readable - Champollion finally managed to crack the code and decipher Hieroglyphs, opening the world of thought, philosophy, literature - and the occasional love letter and hissy fit - of the ancient Egyptians to scrutiny.
Of course, being Egyptology, it created a whole new realm of argument....folk who thought Greece was the cradle of philosophy, science and mathematics refused to acknowledge a far more ancient source of learning.
Indeed, many papyri which had been collected on the 'grand tour' were either sold or even destroyed before they could be translated, in case they burst the bubble of Classical scholars.
Of course, a certain pseudo Christian sect founded on a spurious papyrus by one Joseph Smith, quietly 'lost' their document...which, unfortunately turned up in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, meaning some rapid change of literature.
I first got into hieroglyphs as a hobby in my last year of primary school - and never looked back.
Now, of course, unless I use very high magnification and colour change gizmos on my computer or hand held electronic magnifier, I have to rely on translated works.
I still keep my hand in by laboriously trawling through images of ostraca or potsherds, just to keep what's left of my brain working.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Fran%C3%A7ois_Champollion
How hard would it be for a relatively intelligent person (I like to think so, at least) to learn how to read Egyptian Hieroglyphs?
-
How hard would it be for a relatively intelligent person (I like to think so, at least) to learn how to read Egyptian Hieroglyphs?
It's not as hard as you might think.
Primers are available for the basic symbols, both online and in hard copy. Of course, the headache starts when you realise that, over three millennia, the structure and sense of some words change, and there are no vowels as such.
Then there are the two variants of hieroglyphs, Hieratic and Demotic.
Hieratic was developed as a more cursive form to put on papyrus, whilst demotic grew from that - and forms the basis of Coptic Egyptian script today.
There are a few online courses available, from reputable sources, which I can source for you.
This is one of the best doing the rounds at the moment:
https://www.reed.co.uk/courses/egyptian-hieroglyphs-diploma-course/268126
-
It's not as hard as you might think.
Primers are available for the basic symbols, both online and in hard copy. Of course, the headache starts when you realise that, over three millennia, the structure and sense of some words change, and there are no vowels as such.
Then there are the two variants of hieroglyphs, Hieratic and Demotic.
Hieratic was developed as a more cursive form to put on papyrus, whilst demotic grew from that - and forms the basis of Coptic Egyptian script today.
There are a few online courses available, from reputable sources, which I can source for you.
This is one of the best doing the rounds at the moment:
https://www.reed.co.uk/courses/egyptian-hieroglyphs-diploma-course/268126
Thanks, I'll look into it.
-
This one's pretty exciting.
We don't often find intact burials of officials of the nineteenth dynasty, and this one looks to be pretty significant.
Dyn XIX was a time of warrior pharaohs, and a tightening of administration after the hiatus of the 'Amarna period' at the end of Dyn XVIII
The most famous kings were Seti I and his son, Ra messes II, the latter responsible for more building projects than any other Egyptian ruler.
Not only building on his own account, but nicking building material from earlier structures and using them as fillers for his own, thus preserving them for posterity to discover.
There's hardly a colossal statue in Egypt dedicated to earlier rulers which hasn't got Ra messes' name on it somewhere - and the occupant of this sarcophagus was one of those responsible for gathering the wherewithal to finance the work.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2022/oct/02/egypt-saqqara-ptah-em-wia-archaeologists-discover-sarcophagus-cairo?CMP=fb_gu&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwAR2kYdHfE1SAHf6D6MXYbSOvKzYVMvVZjNUzaHTaKu4a3mdu7iCA5lao0zQ#Echobox=1664698965
-
I'm flagging this up for three reasons;
1) The 100th anniversary of the discovery of KV62 is next month;
2) Bristol, along with Liverpool uni, has a great reputation for this kind of thing;
and 3) Aidan Dodson has a great grasp of the New Kingdom. He is a prolific author, and his books are scholarly but readable. His latest, Tutankhamun, King of Egypt, Life and afterlife, comes out next month - part of his 'life and afterlife' series of biographies.
I may not entirely accept his conclusions as to the period between Akhenaten and Tutankhamun, but he is still well worth a listen.
https://www.bristolmuseums.org.uk/bristol-museum-and-art-gallery/whats-on/archaeology-online-tutankhamun-king-of-egypt/?fbclid=IwAR1e2L09GYV3aX2RHD7Pp8-w82P1e1RAuOtNkI746R3XlvXspeBR4ehyXAI
-
This is a nice site, from a professional Egyptologist who specialises in photography, mainly in museums. It's definitely worth a view.
Now concentrating mainly on small artefacts which often go unnoticed, the images produced can sometimes be both breathtaking and instructive.
Incidentally, the username 'Tetisheri' comes from the grandmother of Ahmose I, founder of the eighteenth dynasty, and first of a series of redoubtable women who were administrators, regents, warriors in their own right, and, eventually, a female king.
https://tetisheri.co.uk/scariest-artefacts-photographed/?utm_campaign=my-5-scariest-artefact-photography-sessions-so-far&utm_medium=social_link&utm_source=missinglettr-facebook
-
A nice blog covering excavations at Abydos, site of the earliest Pharonic settlement and tombs....and a place to have a bender in eternity......
https://abydos.org/blog/2022/3/18/what-happened-to-all-that-beer?fbclid=IwAR21iKzO6k7EMv6MYa324vO37scIVKE5TiqYNNlYdxaikYHRt0x_CTIS9i4
-
A good article from a very reliable blog.
(Khenty-amentiu, incidentally, was the main Egyptian god of the dead before Osiris made it to top of the pops in the fifth dynasty, absorbing the character of old Khenty....(
Anyway, this shows that true mummification is a lot older than we previously thought. Accidental preservation of remains in the desert sands was well known, as was the treatment of excarnated skeletal remains with ochre, but this example shows true efforts at mummification were well under way in the Old Kingdom, and must have been developing for centuries beforehand.
https://khentiamentiu.blogspot.com/2022/10/mummification-in-egypt-may-be-1000.html?spref=fb&fbclid=IwAR1bNQRQjBPi0WTH_QJtdDLEywIvfYy0k7DXDkmXiVkFYo5eB44k43epzJs
-
To mark the 100th anniversary of Carter's discovering Tutankhamun's tomb, here's a seven -hour marathon podcast from History of Egypt.
https://shows.acast.com/egyptianhistorypodcast/episodes/anniversary-the-tomb-of-tutankhamun-hardcore-edition?fbclid=IwAR27OiN2K8-2YZ2sFggDeXzjotvkbKXWUS5Ov0PReKrcOK4Qo8SzZ2slHek
-
Yet another 'new' temple.
This one's significance lies in the location; Buto was a major city in the Delta in the Saite period, Dyn XXVI. However, historically, it goes a lot further back - to pre dynastic times, in fact. Because of shifting branches of the Nile and consequent poor preservation, to find a major temple site is exceptional, and early reports suggest further sites in the area may well yield more evidence of earlier settlement.
https://www.heritagedaily.com/2022/11/ancient-temple-remains-uncovered-on-hill-of-the-pharaohs/145242?fbclid=IwAR1PnbTECQDmceW07WwYF4OB2snuQHS54v6VczMsGQ5Lb2v4ePzthWquO7E
-
OK, this one's personal.
A while back, I posted that I keep my hand in by translating ostraca as a bit of a hobby.
Ostraca are bits of slate or flakes of stone on which folk have written lists, law rulings, prayers, complaints, you name it.
Anyway, a friend who is digging at Gebel el-Sisila sends me photos of ostraca and potsherds to decipher.
This one came up, and I thought it was reasonably exciting.
The real experts at the British Museum agree.
It must have been inscribed by some bored artisan, around the time of king Ay - who succeeded Tutankhamun, around 1331 BC.
It hints at some kind of rebellion:
Here's the text:
....."always turmoil at Ipetsut; we don't hear what is needed. Why is Wadjikheperru so useless?....."
'Ipetsut' is Karnak, and 'Wadjikheperru' was the name by which Ay was known on official documents.
Whatever the trouble, to put a critique of the king in stone was dicey, unless the king hadn't much control; this is possible, because Ay was elderly and his rule ended two years later.
The ostraca is so new that it hasn't yet been given a reference number.
It's about three inches by five.
Sometimes the small things make a big difference.
-
Pyramids, even if they were made of mud brick and eroded, should be easy to find, right?
Think again....this one's still lost - again.
It was never fully investigated, so we don't know who built it, or when.
If I had to guess, I'd go for one of the obscure kings of the eighth dynasty, a time when Egypt was divided, and two power bases ruled the land in what is known as the 'First Intermediate Period'.
https://www.heritagedaily.com/2022/12/the-lost-pyramid-of-athribis/145545?fbclid=IwAR0JNZhYdwV84vt2VZFEETVrwfTl29mEZhukVBtWfFyL1UJsoLKwfxU9apA
-
The re-unification of the 'Two lands' to form the Middle Kingdom marked a change in religious thought from the cult of Re toward more local deities.
These two remarkable finds show the rise of Sobek, the deity personified in the crocodile, who was linked to both war and fertility.
https://www.heritagedaily.com/2022/12/crocodile-heads-found-in-tombs-of-ancient-egyptian-nobles/145615?amp&fbclid=IwAR0hG89b75E0RrJn-2XTZ-prD4NN7ImcMJViscFN_nCYcyv3WW1WVJSf68c
-
Do I file this in the 'climate change' thread or leave it here?
Oh, here it is anyway [- and it shows just how diverse the field of Egyptology has become.
https://bmcecolevol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12862-022-02101-x?fbclid=IwAR3J4yULWtSwcphb0FXf2HnuoimZfrFbZyiTXuKOuJ97jQlZ5VODv7PU_tY
-
If you're trying to understand Egyptian religion, you need both paracetamol and a decent malt whisky.
There are at least eight creation stories, some involving deities entirely absent in others, depending on the area in which the story originated.
Khnum, a ram-headed deity, was popular in the Middle Kingdom and Ptolemaic periods....yes, deities rose and fell like Christmas number ones - and here's a report from the latest excavations at Esna, one of the cult centres of Khnum.
https://www.heritagedaily.com/2022/12/new-findings-at-temple-of-khnum-in-egypt/145650?fbclid=IwAR3h1lQXiKKO7N-6MRzq3Icj4cgCB8vXhPoZs2yimLqd8pkqeewYmpiMVSA
-
Interesting article from the 'Groniad' of all places, worth reading, not only because it highlights the trend in modern archaeology, but it delves into Nubiology, a discipline which, till recently, has been sadly overlooked.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/dec/27/young-sudanese-archaeologists-dig-up-history-as-west-knows-best-era-ends?CMP=share_btn_fb&fbclid=IwAR0KIElUoPQRPn1yjFOSOue3_w995td-
oH8hBqatABY4dDzYW_0-d4VFlIc
-
Last find of 2022.
The Egyptians were experts at recycling, especially when it came to a 'des res' for eternity.
A massive mummy cache found in the area of a very important eighteenth dynasty official's tomb.
Whether those who re-interred their dead there knew just how important Amenhotep son-of-Huy was isn't known, but he may have been the one who held the south of Egypt together during the first few turbulent years of Akhenaten's rule.
https://www.laprensalatina.com/spanish-egyptologists-unearth-60-mummies-at-luxor-site/?fbclid=IwAR3kkwC4er9uwkML34MEHeXrjSgoBol5tb6Uiiyp0orVLIRyqIwExI9GyxE
-
Keeping an eye on the distressingly expansive illegal antiquities trade is never easy....but in THIS case.....er....how were they going to fence the loot?
https://scenenow.com/Buzz/3-Men-Caught-Trying-to-Steal-10-Tonne-Statue-of-Ramses-II-in-Aswan?fbclid=IwAR0hZyh762BPi1b0_2cCcDGPipaX9lNRYz_Kx3SsVxqMOw1QBrMpI6ejln8
-
Might as well enter another Egyptian post to start things off.
I accompanied my cousin to the blessed realm to stop me banging my head against a brick wall.
Luckily, I still have my Egypt Exploration Society membership....thank you, Miss Edwards....
This gained access to sites the general public are normally barred on grounds of potentially damaging them...so the pyramid of Unas with it’s cannibal text’s, various Sakkara sites, as well as the Valley of the Kings to say hello to Thutmose III's tomb, and reacquaint myself with Seti I's burial, as well as loitering with intent round the Luxor Museum, invading Karnak, before stopping at Abydos on the way back to Cairo, and limited access to the new Grand Egyptian Museum at Giza, and the two main museums in Cairo....plus a mosque, two Coptic churches and a belly dancer...tactile investigation was not required.
Bummer.