Book Review: Egyptology Today - An Introduction

Egyptology Today (Charlotte Booth)

Egyptology Today is a collection of essays by a team of archaeologists, curators, scholars, and conservators who are all working in the field, present techniques and methods to explain the discipline of Egyptology. Richard Wilkinson has written a short introduction about how Egyptology has changed from a gentleman’s pastime to a multi-disciplinary science. The book is separated into four parts, with three essays covering many aspects of Egyptology.

Kent Weeks writes a nice introductory chapter describing Egyptology, its history and key players from the past including Petrie, Mariette, Reisner and Rhind. He describes the process required to obtain a concession in Egypt and the opportunities available in what is a changing, multi-disciplinary career. He makes an interesting comment that no new concessions are given in Upper Egypt. Only the Delta has available sites, in order to protect them from the threat of urbanisation.

This well-written chapter is followed by a rather verbose essay on the difficulties and challenges facing history writers, writing about ancient Egypt which Redford claims has too long been dominated by art history.