It was a lovely sunny day throughout the UK and everyone at the exquisite Pollok Country Park was making the most of the sunshine. I walked passed the sunbathers to where The Burrell Collection is housed, to attend a Study Day about the work and life of Flinders Petrie, organized by Egyptology Scotland. Magi Sloan, chairperson of Egyptology Scotland, did an excellent job of putting together three specialists on Petrie collections from different parts of the country: Professor Stephen Quirke from the Petrie Museum in London, Simon Eccles, senior curator of Ancient Civilizations at the Burrell Collection and responsible for…
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I will soon be visiting Scotland for a exciting archaeological event. No, it won’t involve traipsing around soggy fields looking for cup and ring marked stones. Instead, I will be finding out about one of Egyptology’s most respected figures, William Flinders Petrie. In the Footsteps of Petrie is a study day dedicated to the life of Petrie, founder, along with Amelia Edwards, of the Petrie Museum. The event will be held at the exquisite Burrell Collection in Glasgow, and will explore Petries life of excavation and collecting. A lineup of Egyptologists from across Britain’s museums will offer lectures, a film…
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A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to take part in the scanning of a female mummy from ancient Egypt, and to take photos to document the experience. This young girl was only around 25 at the age of death, and survived in relative peace for thousands of years. In the last century, however, she’s been used as a bargaining tool by the Germans, survived attacks by torpedos and fires, and even suffered physical traumas. I discovered that the scientific analysis of a young mummy can show us a lot about the life in ancient Egypt, but tell…
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We are just learning fresh news about research on King Tut’s mummy, in advance of tomorrow’s publication in the American Medical Journal of the results of the most recent DNA and other tests. Over the years, there have been many different theories, but now we can scientifically prove what killed the Boy King, his parentage, and other health conditions affecting him at the time of his death. Early Research KV62 – Tut’s tomb – was discovered by Howard Carter in 1922. Multiple attempts at proving kinship between various royal mummies have been made since then, including tests by Connolly (1976),…
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The ancient Egyptians were well aware of the properties of Frankincense, and used it to treat phlegm, asthma, throat and larynx infections that bleed, and for calming down vomiting. The inhalation of the melted stem relieves both bronchitis and laryngitis. But new research by immunologist Mahmoud Suhail suggests that it may contain properties that could cure cancer. Could the knowledge of the ancient Egyptians be scoured to revolutionise cancer treatment today? Frankincense is grown in green valleys, on the other side of the Dhofar Mountains that catch India’s summer monsoons, making the area a paradise in the Arabian Peninsula. Boswellia…
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The rich and famous people of ancient Egypt lived a decadent lifestyle with fine wine, sex, high fashion, and plenty of partying. How do they compare with their equivalents today – the modern western celebrity set? The main differences might be regarding who were the richest people then, and who are the richest people now. In ancient Egypt the pharaoh was at the top of the pyramid and his family, noble people who owned land, and the priests came after. Scribes, architects and doctors were well off, and skilled craftsmen also had many privileges. Peasants and unskilled workers were low…
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CRE XI’s Religion Day – if you’ve missed day 1 of the Egyptology conference, read up here – started off with Susanne Tpfer from Leipzig. In this very very interesting session, we all heard about how some papyri describing embalming rituals can have direct connections to religion myths as the body and the afterlife were treated with the best care. Many publications have been published on Papyrus Boulaq 3 in Cairo, from 1871 to 2009. The position of body parts, the instructions on the application of anointments and other products onto the body of the deceased, how the bandages should…
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Another exciting CRE conference is about to begin today, as I write this, this time and for the first time ever in Leiden, The Netherlands. Current Research in Egyptology (CRE) has always happened in The UK but, last time, at Liverpool, no one from UK universities wanted it, so our beloved colleagues from Leiden applied and won! CRE is the best way to show your work, explain your research, collect contacts from all over the world and get access to books that don’t exist in your country either by buying them at sale prices or by browsing the nicest libraries…
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In this Heritage Key video, Dr. Janice Kamrin, head of the EgyptianMuseum Database Project, shows and discusses some of the lifestyle objects found in Tutankhamuns tomb by Carter in 1922, and now housed in The Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Board games, and containers for perfumes, cosmetics and unguents, are amongst the objects shown in this video that give an insight into the livestyles of the rich and famous ancient Egyptians. You can catch up on the previous videos in this series when Dr Kamrin looks at Animal iconography (Watch the video), The Canopic Shrine, Chest and Jars (Watch the video)…
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Unseen photographs by Flinders Petrie are now on temporary display in the Petrie Museum in London in an exhibition called Framing the Archaeologist: Portraits and Excavation. The photos were taken by Petrie on site in Egypt, featuring himself, his wife and the excavation workers, and offer a remarkable view of the early years of archaeology. To mark the exhibition, the museum hosted an informal talk between Stephen Quirke and documentary maker Ayman El-Kharrat, entitled Workers and/or Archaeologists: In Conversation, questioning the status of Bedouin workers involved in early excavations in Egypt. You can watch Dr Quirke in this video interview…