Researchers have discovered that 19 objects in New Yorks Metropolitan Museum of Art are from King Tuts tomb, and an agreement has been struck that will see them be returned to Egypt. The research indicates that Howard Carter kept a few pieces which were bequeathed to the Met after his death in 1939. The artefacts are quite small and at the time it was not known that they were from the tomb itself. Fifteen of the 19 pieces have the status of bits or samples, read a Supreme Council of Antiquities Press release. The remaining four are of more significant…
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New research on a 2,400 year old star table shows that the Ancient Egyptians kept close tabs on the Big Dipper, monitoring changes in the constellations orientation throughout the course of an entire year. The Big Dipper is composed of seven stars and is easily viewable in the northern hemisphere. Its shape looks like a ladle with a scoop attached. Ancient Egyptians represented it as an oxs foreleg. If a personwere to observethe constellationat the exactsame time every night they would see it gradually move counter-clockwise each time they saw it. Professor Sarah Symons, of McMaster University in Hamilton Canada,…
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A new study shows that Tutankhamun, Egypts famous boy-king who died around the age of 18, suffered a massive crushing tearing injury to his chest that likely would have killed him. X-rays and CT scans have previouslyshown that the pharaohs heart, chest wall, the front part of his sternum and adjacent ribs, are missing. In Ancient Egypt the heart was like the brain and removing it was something that was not done. The heart, considered the seat of reason, emotion, memory and personality, was the only major organ intentionally left in the body, writes Dr. Robert Ritner in the book…
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Dr Michel Baud of the Louvre Museum in Paris gave an interesting lecture last week about his excavations of a pyramid at Abu Roash. The monument was badly preserved and its stone had been quarried in Roman times, but the certain details, such as its apparent solar connections, were still discernable. Earlier, Vassil Dobrev stated that the pyramid may actually be a solar temple. However, Baud dismisses these claims…. Nearly 4,500 years ago, in the time of the Old Kingdom, the pharaoh Khufu built one of the greatest monuments on earth – the Great Pyramid. His pyramid was actually a complex of monuments…
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A new study shows that Tutankhamun, Egypt’s famous “boy-king” who died around the age of 18, suffered a “massive crushing tearing injury to his chest” that likely would have killed him. X-rays and CT scans have previously shown that the pharaoh’s heart, chest wall, the front part of his sternum and adjacent ribs, are missing. In Ancient Egypt the heart was like the brain and removing it was something that was not done. “The heart, considered the seat of reason, emotion, memory and personality, was the only major organ intentionally left in the body,” writes Dr. Robert Ritner in the book Ancient Egypt.
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Archaeologists today discovered the upperportion of a statue of Egyptian Pharaoh Amenhotep III at Luxor, Egypt. The find part of a double statue featuring King Amenhotep III with the falcon-headed sun god Re-Horakhti was made at the pharaoh’s funerary temple, locatedon the west bank of the Nile. In a press statement, Egypt’s Minister of Culture, Farouk Hosny said that the discovery was made during routine excavations at Amenhotep III’s mortuary temple carried out by the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA). The dig issupervised byDr. Zahi Hawass, who thinks of the newly discovered statue as one of the best of the…
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A new discovery made by Dr. Zahi Hawass and his team shows that an ancient pharaoh made serious efforts to save the Sphinx. At Giza his team found the remains of a mudbrick enclosure wall that would have surrounded the Sphinx, perhaps protecting it from sand blown by wind. Made of mudbrick, the first section runs to the east of the Sphinx for 86 meters north-south and is 75 cm tall. The second section is 46 meters long, 90 cm in size, and runs east-west along the perimeter of Khafre’s valley temple. The two sides converge in the southeast. Archaeologists are already aware…
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The royal tomb of Pharaoh Psusennes I is said to be one of the most spectacular discoveries ever made in Egypt. So, why hasn’t the world heard about it? And what does it reveal about Ancient Egypt? Find out in ‘Secrets of the Dead:The Silver Pharoah’, premiering this Wednesday. Tanis, Egypt, circa 1939. An excavation team led by French archaeologist Pierre Montet unearthed an intact royal burial chamber (NRT III), which containedtreasures that (almost) rivals the riches found in Tutankhamuns tomb almost two decades before. One of the most spectacular discoveries inside the crypt was the exquisite silver sarcophagus of…
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Archaeologists have unearthed Bronze Age hoard containing 3000-year-old axe heads, spear tips and other metal objects in a field in the Burnham-on-Crouch area, Essex. The objects foundat the fieldinclude an pottery container with heavy metal contents unearthed undisturbed. The first finds at the location were all metal work and reported to the Portable Antiquities Scheme in September. At the same field, metal detectorists later discovered an in situ pottery vessel. They covered up the pot, and reported this find tothe PAS as well. A dig was planned, and early October,archaeologists from PAS joined the landowner and four metal detectorists to…
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What makes a city? Certainly an abundance of people is needed (that and maybe a few skyscrapers too.) But when trying to find signs of urbanization in the ancient world, archaeologists like to look at more than just population size. Factors like whether or not a social hierarchy existed, was there a political system in place, and if the denizens specialized in different professions, are just some of the indicators used. Even the development of art and monuments can serve as benchmarks. We’ve picked out 10 of the earliest cities in the world — each one being among the first…