• malcolmj

    Frazzled Hair and Clogged Arteries: Stress in the Ancient World

    We, sitting comfortably in front of our computers here in the 21st century, a mocha-choca-frappe-latte possibly close at hand, like to complain a lot about stress. Balancing the demands of work, family, health and the full range of entertainment offered our by multi-channel digital TV package, is after all a trying daily endeavour. Its blissful to believe that life was somehow calmer and simpler in the quaint days of ancient history. But the findings of some new studies have suggested that that firmly was not the case. High levels of the stress hormone cortisol have been detected in the hair…

  • malcolmj

    Treasures of King Tut – Tutankhamun’s Jewellery and the Love of a Queen

    When Howard Carter said he spied wondrous things upon cracking open the tomb of Tutankhamun in 1922, he wasnt joking. KV62 was filled with probably the most fantastic collection of ancient treasures ever discovered in one place all from beautiful golden coffins, to giant statues, canopic shrines and a golden throne. Tuts own body was literally stuffed with precious jewellery. In the third instalment of our four-part video series King Tut Revealed filmed by Nico Piazza, and featuring still photography by Sandro Vannini Dr Zahi Hawass, who you can watch in this video revealing the cause of Tuts death and…

  • malcolmj

    Preserving King Tut’s Guts: The Canopic Shrine and Jars Introduced

    As we described in our recent handy guide to how to make a mummy, the ancient Egyptians went to great and grizzly lengths to ensure that every last bit of a body was efficiently preserved. The internal organs had to be removed in order to effectively dry out a corpse. They would then be individually wrapped and preserved separately in canopic vessels. King Tuts guts in keeping with the generally lavish and wondrous spirit of his mummification and burial were given extra-special treatment, as we discover in the first instalment of the new four part video series, Tuts Treasures. Shot…

  • malcolmj

    How did King Tut die? Cause of Death Established

    Hes the most famous figure in ancient Egyptian history, but theres still plenty of mystery surrounding King Tut. Who better to clear up a few of them for us than Dr Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities? In part one of King Tut Revealed a four part video interview exclusive by Sandro Vannini Dr Hawass broaches the tricky and controversial subject of how the Boy King, whose tomb KV62 was famously discovered in the Valley of the Kings by Howard Carter in 1922, met his premature end in 1323 BC at just 19 years of…

  • malcolmj

    How To Make A Mummy

    Want to know how to mummify a body but don’t know where to start?Well, you’ve come to the right place. Following on from our video featuring Dr Zahi Hawass, in which he gives Heritage Key a fascinating insight into how mummies are made (see the video embedded below), and an enlightening interview with Bob ‘Mr Mummy’ Briers on mummification, we’ve condensed millenia of wisdom into 7 not-so-easy and certainly not pleasant steps. Egyptian embalmers were masters of their craft, and while we possess a lot of clues about the long and laborious procedure they went through in order to ensure…

  • malcolmj

    Lewis Chessmen May Be From a Different Board Game

    The Lewis Hnefataflmen: doesnt quite have the same ring to it as the Lewis Chessmen, does it? But if what a new paper by a trio of heritage experts is saying is true, the famous 900-year-old set of ivory-carved pieces discovered on a Scottish island in 1831 may not be from a chess set at all, but rather an ancient Viking board game. The study also questions the popular notion of how the hoard came to end up on Lewis, and calls for new excavations at a site near to where they were reportedly found. Hnefatafl, which was popular in…

  • malcolmj

    First Pictures of Stirling Iron Age Gold Hoard Treasure

    As blogged by Sean yesterday, a precious hoard of Iron Age gold treasures worth an estimated 1 million has been discovered by a first-time metal detector enthusiast near Stirling. It was unveiled to the media at an event at the National Museum of Scotland this morning. The collection was described as the most important hoard of Iron Age gold found in Scotland to date. The Stirling Hoard: Gold Iron Age Torcs The artefacts four neck ornaments of European significance, dating from between the 1st and 3rd centuries BC were discovered by a local man, David Booth, on private land back…

  • malcolmj

    ArchaeoVideo: The Tomb of Diplomat Montuemhat Featuring Dr Farouk Gomaa

    The tomb is one of the largest in Thebes, says Dr Farouk Gomaa, the highly-respected archaeologist from the University of Tbingen in Germany who is leading the exploration of the burial monument of Montuemhat, in a new video interview for Heritage Key by Nico Piazza. Clearly, Montuemhat was a powerful and influential figure in ancient Egypt if he was able to carve out such a substantial resting place for himself in the necropolis of the pharaohs. Yet you wont find him on any Egyptian king lists. In this latest ArchaeoVideo from the Theban tombs, from where Sandro Vannini has been…

  • malcolmj

    Why The Bust of Nefertiti Should Be Returned To Egypt

    With the recent reopening of the Neues Museum on Berlin’s Museum Island, the argument over ownership of the Bust of Nefertiti has once again been stoked. The Germans have made the priceless, beautiful, 3,400-year-old sculpture of the famous Egyptian Queen one of the centerpiece attractions of the 200-million Neues. It seems to have only caused the Egyptians to become more resolute in their efforts to get her back. Secretary General of the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities Zahi Hawass stated recently that he would send a letter in October to Neues Museum directors containing irrefutable evidence in support of the…

  • malcolmj

    ArchaeoVideo – Saving Pharaoh Amenhotep III’s Funerary Temple at Thebes

    18th dynasty pharaoh Amenhotep III was the king of Egyptian kings. Under his rule, from around 1391 to 1353 BC, Egyptian civilization reached its very apex all powerful, influential beyond compare, rich beyond dreams and basking in opulent artistic splendour. In a list compiled by American business and financial bible Forbes in 2008, Amenhotep was ranked as the 12th richest person in human history. His funerary temple was therefore never going to be a modest affair. As we discover in a new video interview shot by Nico Piazza with the highly-respected German-Armenian archaeologist leading the excavation of the site, Dr…