Submitted by Nick Gilbert on Wed, 02/10/2010 - 20:07
Valentine's day is approaching and those of us who are still single are being bombarded from all sides with pressure to find a soulmate in time for the weekend. I thought I'd pile the misery on a bit more with a list of some of the great romantic couples of ancient history. Some are known to us all, others are little known stories with sometimes touching and sometimes sordid details. Over the years these relationships have been dramatised and become legendary. They are the templates for modern fictional romance, and stories that will live forever in their own right.
Dr Zahi Hawass talks about the tomb robbers and how the Tomb of King Tutankhamun was saved from being raided after it was sealed by the Valley of the Kings police. Work on creating the Tomb of Ramesses VI, which is adjacent to KV62, led to part of King Tut's tomb caving in and sealing the entrance. It makes KV62 the only tomb in the Valley of the Kings to be discovered fully intact.
Professor of Archaeology and Director of Amarna Project
Barry Kemp is a Professor of Egyptology at the University of Cambridge's Department of Oriental Studies, and the Director of the Amarna Project - the major excavation at the site of Tell el-Amarna in Egypt which has been ingoing since the late 90s.
He has written several books and papers, most notably Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization (first edition 1991, second edition 2005), which has become a key text book in many university Egyptology and ancient history courses. Other titles Kemp has contributed to include Journal of Civilisations of the Ancient Near East, edited by Jack Sasson, and Ancient Egypt: A Social History, by BG Trigger.
He has worked at Amarna since 1977, and is currently based in Cairo, Egypt.
Submitted by Jon Himoff on Tue, 11/24/2009 - 14:01
The big Museums have the greatest advantage when it comes to the artefacts that the UNESCO heritage sites and others want back -- the big Museums have possession. Further, the Museums typically reside in the countries that made the laws governing repatriation. But as cultural tourism continues to be a growing and massive business, the UNESCO sites are making their own big Museums and are able to hire their own lawyers to defend their interests (check Zahi Hawass' Most Wanted List). The complex battle for who controls artefacts is really heating-up now. Perhaps the issue of who owns antiquity is possibly less urgent than who controls it.
Tell el-Amarna was the short-lived capital of the Pharaoh Akhenaten, who infamously instituted a kingdom under one god (the sun deity Aten) that was so controversial it saw later kings attempt to write him out of history altogether. He had the city purpose built in the desert on the East bank of the Nile, 312 km south Cairo and 402 km north of Luxor.
Tell el-Amarna was impressive and all powerful in its day, but after Akhenaten's death the capital was moved back to Memphis, and the city was completely abandoned and left to crumble into the desert. Many of its remains survive today however, and it represents an archaeological treasure trove, as the largest readily-accessible living-site in Egypt.
The city was roughly divided into various zones. The Northern City housed the royal palace - the residence of Akhenaten, his wife Nefertiti (whose famous bust was found in the workshop of the sculptor Thutmose in the southern suburbs of the city) and their children. The Central City contained important administrative and ceremonial building, including the Great Temple of the Aten and the Small Aten Temple. The southern suburbs was where Tell el-Amarna's powerful nobles lived.
This beautiful stela from Amarna encapsulates the Amarna artistic style and the religion of the Aten in one place. It is not the only one of its kind, but it is one of exceptional workmanship and is in remarkable condition.
It’s long been a common stereotype that Akhenaten was a pacifist, someone who avoided warfare when possible. If you read Heritage Key’s article on Nazi Egyptology you will see that the Nazis hate him for that precise reason.
But recent research, presented this weekend at an Egyptology symposium in Toronto, shows that the Amarna leaders – including Akhenaten, King Tut and Nefertiti - all supported a sizable fortress in the Sinai desert.
Located at Tell el-Borg it was a formidable bastion. It was 120 meters east-west by 80 meters north-south. The walls were four meters thick (at the base) and it was at least partially surrounded by a moat.
It’s long been a common stereotype that Akhenaten was a pacifist, someone who avoided warfare when possible. If you read Heritage Key’s article on 
