The Oxyrhynchus Papyri LXXI (online preview)

What's New in Papyrology

The following post comes from the above blog focusing on “recent publications of papyri & ostraca 4th BC-8th AD; conferences, lectures etc”. If this field is of interest, this is a very good site to bookmark.

Saturday, December 22, 2007
The Oxyrhynchus Papyri LXXI (online preview)

Oxyrhynchus Papyri 71
edited by N Gonis

Not yet listed in Worldcat; "not yet availble" according to Oxbow Books, but images and cataloguing info are available at the Oxyrhynchus Online site.

Blurb from Oxbow Books:
This volume adds to previously published early Christian texts four new papyri of the Gospel of John and also includes fragments of a lost play by Sophocles (Epigonoi), two prose works on Hellenistic historians and Hellenistic kings, a rhetorical exercise on speeches in Thucydides, and a lost novel with an Ionian setting. A further group of papyri of Iliad and related Homeric texts, including a paraphrase of Iliad I (its texts transmitted verbatim by at least two other papyri), scholia minora to Iliad I, and commentaries on Odyssey III and XV with scholarly credentials. Documentary texts include declarations of livestock, loans, leases, and other contracts. Finally it records publication of a group of drawings that appeared outside the series but assigns Oxyrhynchus publication numbers to them for the first time. Images of the drawings were prepared for and will be published in the volume Oxyrhynchus A City and its Texts (GRM 93) and Egyptian Archaeology 22. 188p (Graeco-Roman Memoirs 91, Egypt Exploration Society 2007)

Book Review: Greetings in the Lord

Bryn Mawr Classical Review (review by Roberta Mazza)

AnneMarie Luijendijk, Greetings in the Lord: Early Christians and the Oxyrhynchus Papyri. Harvard Theological Studies 60. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Divinity School, 2008.

The city of Oxyrhynchus has attracted the attention of scholars in early Christian studies since the first archaeological season of Grenfell and Hunt on the site (1896-1897), which, amongst others, brought into light the Greek original of what came to be known about fifty years later as the Gospel of Thomas (P. Oxy. I, 1). From that moment onwards the ancient rubbish heaps of the city have given to us a wide range not only of Christian literature, but also of documents -- such as letters, lists and contracts -- relating to the everyday life of Christians and Christian institutions in that city and its neighbourhood.

AnneMarie Luijendijk's "Greetings in the Lord" is an updated and well-structured presentation of the papyrological material relating to early Christianity from the site. The book, mainly addressed to students and scholars in early Christian studies, is divided into three parts ("Meeting Christians at the Marketplace"; "Papa Sotas, Bishop of Oxyrhynchus"; "Legal matters and Government Dealings"), preceded by a general introduction ("Destination Oxyrhynchus: Historical Detective Work in the Footsteps of Monks and Papyrologists") and ended by a concluding chapter ("Early Christians in the Oxyrhynchus Papyri: New Voices in Ancient History").

More on the Oxyrhynchus Papyri

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/05/31/features/hype.php

An article which describes some of the responses to The Independent's article about the Oxyrhynchus papyri: "Unearthed from centuries-old garbage dumps in central Egypt in the late 19th century, the Oxyrhynchus Papyri - a trove of classical material dating from the second century B.C. to the seventh century A.D. - have yielded gem after gem: plays by Aristophanes, Sophocles, Aeschylus and Euripides; early fragments of the Gospels; accounts of daily life in the Greco-Roman empire 2,000 years ago. But the papyri, old forms of paper made from reeds that grew along the Nile, are fragmentary and fragile, and the pace of translating them and placing them in context is mind-numbingly slow. Scholars have become accustomed to the decorous pace of the Oxyrhynchus work, which is published as it goes along, in a new volume every year or two. With only 5,000 or so of the estimated 500,000 fragments translated so far, Volume 69 is being published this month. There is no end in sight".

I found this a really interesting piece, although it is out of my period/field of interest. It is a particularly good insight into heritage journalism.

Mysteries of Ancient Egyptian Papyri Revealed

http://nn.byu.edu/story.cfm/63063

Thanks very much to Chris Townsend for this article from 14th February, which I missed:

"Three BYU professors have uncovered mysteries in ancient Egyptian writings aided by new technology that allows people to see inscriptions invisible to the naked eye.
The professors Roger Macfarlane, Stephen Bay and Thomas Wayment, have been working on deciphering these writings on papyrus found in an Egyptian dump where an ancient city known as Oxyrhynchus previously existed. The papyri are now housed at the University of Oxford in England and studied by various scholars around the globe.
The technology developed by BYU called multispectral imaging, can penetrate through dirt, stains and other material on the papyri, making it possible to expose obscured lettering. . . . Multispectral imaging uses filters from ultraviolet to infrared waves of light to see through the dirt and stains on the papyri surface. These filters reveal what was written on the papyri over 2,000 years ago. BYU scholars have found original texts from the Bible and even new apocrypha using this technology."

See the above page for the full story

For other posts on this blog about the Oxyrhynchus papyri see:

http://egyptology.blogspot.com/search?q=Oxyrhynchus

Oxyrhynchus - the dustbin of history

Guardian Unlimited (Khaled Diab)

Our collective memory of the past is mostly confined to grand figures and epic events, while the vast majority of humanity ends up in the wastelands of oblivion.

Thanks to nearly half a million papyrus fragments uncovered in Hellenic Egyptian rubbish dumps which are being gradually decoded, however, we are, quite literally, salvaging fragments of ordinary people's lives from the dustbin of history.

The rubbish dumps in question belonged to the provincial but thriving Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchus (City of the Sharp-Nosed Fish), about 100 miles south of modern Cairo, which was established during the pharaonic New Kingdom and became Hellenised in Ptolemic times, but was eventually reduced to a single standing column.

Most of the unearthed documents, discovered by two Victorian archaeologists, date from the time when Egypt was part of the Roman empire, and include a treasure trove of lost classics and non-canonical gospels.

Peter Parsons, an archaeologist who spent two decades leading the team deciphering the papyri, has written a book that offers a fascinating reconstruction of life in Oxyrhynchus.

For me, the mundane aspects of ordinary life highlighted in correspondences and letters in the book are among the most enthralling of all the finds because they reveal both how familiar and how different that lost world is.

"... Write to me about your health and what you need from here," Achillion exhorts his brother, Hierakapollon. "If you do this, you will have done me a favour: for we shall have the impression, through our letters, of seeing one another face to face."

See the above page for the full story, which has attracted 19 comments so far. The book referred to, by Peter Parsons is City of the Sharp-Nosed Fish - Greek Papyri Beneath the Egyptian Sand Reveal a Long Lost World (2007). I've had it sitting on my book shelf for around a year - I'm glad that this post appeared because I had forgotten I had it and I've now excavated it and am looking forward to reading it. I posted links to a couple of reviews about the book last year, by William Dalrymple in New Statesman and Tom Holland on the Guardian.

Open Access Oxyrhynchus

Ancient World Online

See the above address for the links.

Archive.org now has the first fourteen volumes of The Oxyrhynchus Papyri online in toto and in a variety of formats, for viewing and for download; Volumes 1-5 are digitized by Google Books from Harvard University Library and so should appear also on Google Books in due course. They do not yet have my favourite format, the flip book, but no doubt that will appear in due course. Volumes 6-14 are digitized by Brigham Young University and include the flip book format. I have also noted below an alternative (and superior) version of Volume 4, from University of California Libraries, which has been online for much longer.

Egiptólogos catalanes encuentran 1.200 peces de la época faraónica

La Vanguardia (Silvia Colome)

Thanks to Amigos de la Egiptologia for this link.

With some great photos.

Rough and ready translation: This year's season of the Catalan mission at Oxyrhynchus has ended with the unexpected discovery of about 1200 fish buried in the necropolis.  All were deposited at the same time and the archaeologists are discussing what may lie beneath them, hypothesising that they were perhaps deposited as a grave offering, with the burial beneath the fish.  It is not yet know which specie the fish is, although the team think that it would by nice if they were Oxyrhynchus , the specie after which the city was named.  The dating of the fish is also to be resolved, as they were found at levels below the Roman layers. 

Other finds by the team include both a complete funerary statue of a meter high and the head of a statue, both women, probably Roman.  A major discovery at the site was monumental way (flanked with porches, columns with impressive Corinthian captials and architraves, probably made of Aswan granite) running through the cemetery as far as the Osireion, an underground temple dedicated to the god Osiris.  It matches up with a street shown in aerial photographs and may be Ptolemaic in date. The first building along this route is now being excavated, probably a temple that later became Christan.  Finally, fragments of a Roman mosic was found in the same area.

La misión catalana que trabaja en la antigua ciudad de Oxirrinco ha finalizado la campaña de excavación con una inesperada sorpresa: el hallazgo de unos 1.200 peces enterrados en la necrópolis. “Nunca habíamos visto nada parecido, pensamos que se trata de un ritual”, explica Josep Padró, director de la misión liderada por egiptólogos de la Universitat de Barcelona. Todos fueron depositados en el mismo momento “formando capas entre estores vegetales”, precisa la arqueóloga Maite Mascort.

La hipótesis que baraja el equipo de egiptólogos es que “debajo de estos peces haya algo más”, sigue Mascort. “Quizás fueron depositados como ofrenda encima de una tumba”, añade. “Nos ha costado mucho dejar la excavación para el año que viene, pero así es el trabajo del arqueólogo”, se lamenta.

El equipo ha extraído miles de espinas de estos peces y ahora está trabajando en determinar de qué especie se trata.

Magazine: Current World Archaeology, Egypt Special

Current World Archaeology

Many thanks to lovely Mark Morgan for sending me the following information.

The August/September issue of Current World Archaeology is devoted to Egypt. Over the years, some of the greatest discoveries in this extraordinary land have been made by members of the Egypt Exploration Society (EES).

We report from North Saqqara, where some of their most remarkable discoveries have been uncovered. Indeed, it is there, in the shadow of the Pyramid of King Djoser ( shown on the front cover), that they have found a cemetery dedicated not to mummified people but to mummified animals. Then, we travel across the country, wherever the EES has been at work: from deep,dark catacombs to remote, abandoned hill-tops, their members have been uncovering the secrets of this very ancient land.


THE EES
EGYPT EXPLORATION SOCIETY: Celebrating 125 years of discovery.

SAQQARA
THE TOMBS OF TUTANKHAM'S PEOPLE: Seeking Saqqara's New Kingdom tombs.

NORTH SAQQARA
CULTS, CACHES AND CATACOMBS: The animal necropolis.

DELTA
EGYPT'S LOST CITIES: The Delta Survey.

SAIS
THE ROYAL CITY OF SAIS: Revealing the Delta's secrets.

OXYRHYNCHUS
READING HISTORY: The papyri of Oxyrhynchus.


READERS WRITE
Robinson Crusoe; Roman latrines; oldest calendar; SOS Bulgaria; in praise of Africa.

WORLD NEWS
Latest on archaeological news, discoveries and scientific research.

DIGGING DEEPER
News extra from Brian Fagan.

EGYPT: Editor of Ancient Egypt magazine, Bob Partridge, reflects how the country has changed over the 30 years he has been visiting.

ON SITES ONSIGHTS: On site at Luxor Temple.

LISTINGS: Exhibitions on Egypt from around the world; and an Egyptian themed photography competition .

REVIEWS
Exhibition The Carnarvon Exhibition at Highclere Castle.
Books Abydos: Egypt's First Pharaohs and the Cult of Osiris; The British Museum Dictionary of Ancient Egypt.

GREAT DISCOVERIES
Tell-el-Amarna The city of Pharaoh Akhenaten explained.


To order your copy of Current World Archaeology, call us on 08456 44 77 07 or go to our website by clicking on www.world-archaeology.com and subscribe today

More on the Oxyrhynchus Papyrii

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/04/0425_050425_papyrus.html
"Salvaged from an ancient garbage dump in Egypt, the collection is kept at Oxford University in England. Known as the Oxyrhynchus Papyri, the collection includes writings by great classical Greek authors such as Homer, Sophocles, and Euripides. Using a technique called multi-spectral imaging, researchers have uncovered texts that include parts of a lost tragedy by Sophocles, the 5th-century B.C. Athenian playwright; sections of a long-vanished novel by Lucian, the second-century Greek writer; and an epic poem by Archilochos, which describes events that led to the Trojan War". See the article for more.

Oxyrhynchus Papyri Decoded - Important Breakthrough

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/science_technology/story.jsp?story=630165
"For more than a century, it has caused excitement and frustration in equal measure - a collection of Greek and Roman writings so vast it could redraw the map of classical civilisation. If only it was legible.
Now, in a breakthrough described as the classical equivalent of finding the holy grail, Oxford University scientists have employed infra-red technology to open up the hoard, known as the Oxyrhynchus Papyri, and with it the prospect that hundreds of lost Greek comedies, tragedies and epic poems will soon be revealed.
In the past four days alone, Oxford's classicists have used it to make a series of astonishing discoveries, including writing by Sophocles, Euripides, Hesiod and other literary giants of the ancient world, lost for millennia. They even believe they are likely to find lost Christian gospels, the originals of which were written around the time of the earliest books of the New Testament".
See the Independent article for more.

What's New, Pussycat?

As a sincere thank you to everyone who emailed yesterday here are some odds and ends that I’ve been collecting over the last month. Most of it is old hat but I hope that some of it will provide a useful starting point for the eventual resumption of the blog. I'll do another summary next week.

I haven’t got links for all the articles and I’ve only listed the items that seem to be of most interest. And I haven’t checked all of the links due to the state of my dial-up connection which is wobbly to say the least. This really IS an experiment but it seemed like a good place to start. Apologies for any problems!

GENERAL NEWS


Pharaonic-Era Sacred Lake Unearthed in Egypt
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=8834458
Archaeologists have unearthed the site of a pharaonic-era sacred lake in a temple to the Egyptian goddess Mut in the ruins of ancient Tanis, the Culture Ministry said on Thursday. The ministry said the lake, found 12 meters below ground at the San al-Hagar archaeological site in Egypt's eastern Nile Delta, was 15 meters long and 12 meters wide and built out of limestone blocks. It was in a good condition.


Body Part Mummified With Ancient Egyptian Recipe
Rossella Lorenzi, Discovery News
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/10/15/salt-mummification.html
Swiss researchers have succeeded in mummifying a body part using the salty recipe of the ancient Egyptians. The experiment, which has been running for more than four months, takes inspiration from a 1994 study by Ronald Wade, director of Maryland's State Anatomical Board, and Bob Brier, one of the leading experts on mummies and Egyptology.


Louvre agrees to return frescoes to Egypt
There have been numerous reports about the appeal from Cairo to the Paris Louvre for the repatriation of Luxor tomb frescoes. AFP reported on 7th October that Egypt had devided to break ties with the museum and the museum’s interests in Egypt until the matter was resolved. Hawass made a statement to the effect that items purchased by the museum had been stolen from Luxor prior to the sale. The response by the Louvre was positive but as with many national museums the decision had to be escalated to a government office for consideration. The French Culture Minister Frederic Mitterand confirmed that a special commission had been convened to consider the request. Mitterand said that it wasn’t until the rediscovery of the tomb in 2008 that doubts emerged about the legality of the frescoes. On Friday October 9th the decision was taken to return the five fragments.
The discussion was exclusive to the Luxor frescoes and did not address the issue of the Denderah zodiac which Egypt has been trying to repatriate for many years.
http://artmuseumjournal.com/louvre_to_return_stolen_artifacts_to_egypt.aspx


KV63 Update
www.KV-63.com
Otto Schaden relaunches his Dig Diary. Additions to the site include a listing of new KV-63 publications, some new images and a Special Commentary on the Menkheperre Seal by Dr. Otto Schaden.


Update re Grand Egyptian Museum, Cairo
http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090820/FOREIGN/708199898/1185/enewsletter


Neues Museum opening Friday 16th October
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hvoeb4YGM_wAD1Y_zHgp-_e6ZptAD9BBHURG2
Berlin's Neues Museum, boasting ancient treasures such as a famous bust of the Egyptian queen Nefertiti and a magnificent Bronze Age golden hat, is finally reopening to the public after standing for decades as a bomb-damaged shell. The museum is being inaugurated Friday by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and opens its doors to the public Saturday. That will mark the first time since World War II that the whole of Berlin's neoclassical Museum Island complex, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, has been open.


Egypt to preserve tombs with closures and replicas
http://artmuseumjournal.com/egypt_to_preserve_pharaonic_tombs.aspx
Dr. Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities of Egypt and Director of Excavations at the Giza Pyramids, Saqqara and Bahariya Oasis, told Agence France-Presse on August 17, 2009 that the wall decorations of his country's pharaonic tombs near Luxor (ancient Thebes) are in danger of disappearing due to environmental and biological factors. His solution is to close many of the tombs to tourists after conservation and construct scale replicas within each site's vicinity near the Nile River's west bank.

Mummy Scan
http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/1728134,stanford-scan-ancient-mummy-082109.article
Scientists trying to unwrap the mysteries of a more than 2,500-year-old mummy believed to be an ancient Egyptian priest conducted computer scans Thursday to help determine how the man died, what was buried with him and what he looked like. In a basement lab at Stanford University Medical School, Iret-net Hor-irw's mummy lay tightly wrapped in tattered linen as a handful of scientists looked on.


Farouq Hosni misses out on UNESCO appointment
Hosni lost his bid to become the new Director General of UNESCO in September. The new Director General is Bulgarian Irina Bokova.

Brooklyn Museum launches new smartphone tours
http://artmuseumjournal.com/brooklyn_museum_launches_new_smart_phone_tours.aspx
Individuals with Web-enabled phones make their initial selections of art. The museum's program then suggests related works to see. Visitors can then create sets of annotated objects and share their customized tours with others on the museum's Web site, which contains images and brief descriptions of more than 11,000 artworks.



EXHIBITIONS

The Secrets of Tomb 10A: Egypt 2000 BC
Sunday, October 18, 2009 - Sunday, May 16, 2010 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
http://www.mfa.org/exhibitions/sub.asp?key=15&subkey=7332

World of the Pharaohs: Treasures of Egypt Revealed
An exhibit on loan from the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Arkansas Arts Centre
http://www.paragoulddailypress.com/articles/2009/10/04/opinion/doc4ac8edacea60b536445697.txt



BOOKS

The Oxford Handbook of Papyrology
Roger S. Bagnall
http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/ClassicalStudies/?view=usa&ci=9780195178388

The Idea of Writing: Play and Complexity
Edited by Alex de Voogt and Irving Finkel
http://www.brill.nl/default.aspx?partid=18&pid=33455
The Idea of Writing is an exploration of the versatility of writing systems. From ancient Egyptian, Cuneiform and Merotic writing to Chinese, Maya and Maldivian script, the authors examine the problems and possibilities of polysemy, representing loanwords and the problems of adapting a writing system to another language. The playful and artistic use of writing, including a contribution on writing dance, further illustrates the intricacies of the systems.

Debating Archaeology
http://lcoastpress.com/book.php?id=248
Lewis R. Binford
1989 (re-released August 2009), 556 pages, $39.95 Paper
In this volume, the founder of processual archaeology, Lewis R. Binford collects and comments on the twenty-eight substantive papers published in the 1980's, the third in his set of collected papers (also Working at Archaeology and An Archaeological Perspective). This ongoing collection of self-edited papers, together with the extensive and very candid interstitial commentaries, provides an invaluable record of the development of "The New Archaeology" and a challenging view into the mind of the man who is certainly the most creative archaeological theorist of our time. A new 2009 foreword by Binford reflects on the importance of these articles to later developments in the field.


JOURNAL UPDATES

The British Museum Studies in Ancient Egypt and Sudan (BMSAES), Issue 12
http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/online_journals/bmsaes/issue_12.aspx
Contents
- Constructing word similarities in Meroitic as an aid to decipherment
Reginald Smith
- Early Kushite Tombs of South Asasif
Elena Pischikova
- Edfu under the Twelfth–Seventeenth Dynasties: The monuments in the National Museum of Warsaw
Marcel Marée
- On Publication
Jeffrey Spencer


Journal of the Serbian Archaeological Society
[Glasnik Srpskog arheoloskog drustva]
http://scindeks.nb.rs/issue.aspx?issue=6970&lang=en
Free download of all the papers/reviews in pdf format


Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, Vol. 28, Iss. 3, 2009
Shifting social networks along the Nile: Middle Holocene ceramic assemblages from Sai Island, Sudan
Elena A.A. Garcea, Elisabeth A. Hildebrand


PalArch
http://www.palarch.nl
Journal of Archeaology of Egypt/Egyptology 6 (5) 2009
BOOK REVIEWS:
P. Davoli about Peacock, D. & L. Blue. Eds. 2006. Myos Hormos – Quseir al-Qadim. Roman and Islamic Ports on the Red Sea. Survey and Excavations 1999-2003. - Oxford, Oxbow Books
J. Moje about Sederholm, V.H. 2006. Papyrus British Museum 10808 and its Cultural and Religious Setting. – Leiden, Brill (Probleme der Ägyptologie 24)



NEW WEBSITES AND WEB LINKS

Taa-oewie
www.taa-oewie.nl
Live date November 2009

The Gazelle in Ancient Egyptian Art - Image and Meaning
By Åsa Strandberg
http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-107642
(Uppsala Studies in Egyptology 6, 2009) is now available for downloading.
Thanks for John Wyatt for this link

Jsesh 2.12
http://jsesh.qenherkhopeshef.org/node/1402
Thanks to Serge Rosmorduc for the link to the latest version of JSesh, his free hieroglyph editor.

Oxyrhynchus Hymn
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLYfLEZW3bc
Video/audio of the The Oxyrhynchus Hymn.

Video on the cave paintings in Gilf Kebir, and the blogpost that goes with it (thanks to Ann Wyts)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCUdOhG__d4&feature=player_embedded
http://heritage-key.com/blogs/malcolmj/archaeovideo-prehistoric-paintings-swimmers-and-beast-gilf-kebir


MAGAZINES


Ancient Egypt
The October/November 2009 issue of “Ancient Egypt” magazine (published in the U.K.) is now available.
This issue is also available as an electronic version which can be found at the web site www.ancientegyptmagazine.com This may be useful for anyone with a broadband connection who may have difficulty in getting hold of a paper copy of the magazine, or who might want to see a copy before subscribing.
Contents of this issue include;
- News from Egypt and the World of Egyptology: A bumper ‘From our Egypt Correspondent’ brings the latest news and information including reports on new work at Tell Dafna in the Delta, at Saqqara, Luxor and a special exhibition in the Egyptian Museum on Japanese work in Egypt.
- The Re-sealing of KV62: The Tomb of Tutankhamun was sealed by priests and officials at the time of his burial and again after robberies. One of the reasons this tomb (and possibly others) lay undiscovered was that it was then further sealed by natural forces when there was a flood in the Valley of the Kings, as Steve Cross reveals.

- Bits and Pieces: Most of us are familiar with museums displaying ancient Egyptian objects, but what happens to the pieces we don’t see, the damaged, incomplete, modest pieces? Earl L. Ertman investigates.
- Nabta Play Saved: Nabta Playa is a place that few people have heard about, yet it is hugely important to the history of Egypt. Raymond Betz explains where and what it is and how it is an interesting example of Archaeoastronomy.
- The Mortuary temple of Merenptah: AE explores the little-visited temple of Merenptah and its small site museum and finds that it is well worth a visit, especially for anyone interested in the reign of Amenhotep III.
- An unexpected Turkish Delight: Mark Walker, visiting Turkey, discovers temples to the ancient Egyptian gods and explains how and why they came to be built.
- Egyptian Masterpieces: AE looks at a statue of a scribe in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.
- The Sycomore and Fig: The sycomore fig was a special plant to the ancient Egyptians. Not only did it provide an edible fruit, but it became associated with funerary beliefs as Hilary Wilson shows.
- The Work of the Egypt Exploration Society: in the fifth of a series of articles, in this issue, Joost Hagen writes about his findings and experiences when studying some Coptic texts, found at the site of Qasr Ibrim in Nubia.
- How old is that mummy in the coffin: Aidan Dodson investigates and questions the current aging techniques.
- PerMesut: in our regular feature for younger readers, Hilary Wilson looks at ancient Egyptians life in and on the river in an article entitled “Sink or Swim”.
- Net Fishing: our regular look at Egyptology on the Web, tracing the history of ancient Egypt. This issue Victor Blunden looks at the last Ramesside kings.

New Books featured in the October issue
Abydos: Egypt’s first Pharaohs and the Cult of Osiris, by David O’Connor.
The Encyclopedia of the Egyptian Pharaohs: Vol 1 – Predynastic through 20th Dynasty, by Darrell D. Baker.
Ancient Egypt and Nubia, by Helen Whitehouse.
The Life of Meresamun: A temple singer in ancient Egypt, Edited by Emily Teeter and Janet Johnson.
The Curse of the Mummy and other Mysteries of Ancient Egypt, by Charlotte Booth.
The Illustrated guide to the Coptic Museum and Churches of Old Cairo, by Gawdat Gabra and Marianne Eaton-Krauss.
Tutankhamun Uncovered: The adventure behind the Curse, a novel by Michael J. Marfleet.
The Murder of King Tut, by James Patterson and Martin Dugard.


BOOK REVIEWS

Scholia Reviews ns 18 (2009) 26.
Neville Morley, Antiquity and Modernity. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009.
http://www.classics.ukzn.ac.za/reviews/09-26mor.htm

PalArch
http://www.palarch.nl
Journal of Archeaology of Egypt/Egyptology 6 (5) 2009
P. Davoli about Peacock, D. & L. Blue. Eds. 2006. Myos Hormos – Quseir al-Qadim. Roman and Islamic Ports on the Red Sea. Survey and Excavations 1999-2003. - Oxford, Oxbow Books
J. Moje about Sederholm, V.H. 2006. Papyrus British Museum 10808 and its Cultural and Religious Setting. – Leiden, Brill (Probleme der Ägyptologie 24)



CONFERENCE REPORT

The International Egyptological Conference in Moscow 2009
http://heritage-key.com/blogs/dasha/international-egyptological-conference-moscow-2009-day-four

Egyptology News for 15th - 20th May 2013

The Temple of Karnak

Fieldwork

Egyptian-Nubian soldier skeleton discovered by Dr.Irene Forstner-Müller at late Roman site Hisn Al-Bab. Luxor Times http://bit.ly/15MvbEE 

Hallan los restos de un soldado de origen nubio fallecido hace 1.400 años. With photo. EFE Ikuna http://bit.ly/10ZkpBW 

Research

Research in Dakhleh Oasis suggests that Roman period babies were conceived in the heat of July, August. Live Science http://bit.ly/10IHp9u

Cornell Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections (RMC) identify unique Ptolemaic funerary text. Cornell Chronicle http://bit.ly/10z12Up 

Just in case you missed it, here's another account of the theory of why pyramid construction was abandoned. Huff Post http://huff.to/10oaEkN

Video re the Oxford Uni project to involve the public in translating the Oxyrhynchus papyri. Guardian http://bit.ly/19FZZ6r  Via @SJRoyce

Scientific Insurgents Say 'Journal Impact Factors' Distort Science. Science Daily http://bit.ly/10VptgD 

Heritage Management and Looting

Egyptian heritage body calls for authorities to halt unauthorized renovation at Sayyeda Zeinab Mosque. Ahram Online http://bit.ly/115zBDH 

Archaeologists and Cairenes call on antiquities ministry to save Qaitbay’s water basin from encroachment. AhramOnline http://bit.ly/16Cexad 

In French: A livestock market is set to encroach upon the Matariya archaeological site. Ahram Hebdo http://bit.ly/10tcktr 

Egyptian antiquities with "convincing provenances" were withdrawn from sale at Christie's. Looting Matters http://bit.ly/148JGOR 

Video: Cairo's Abu el-Ela Bridge, featured in film and music videos, may be rebuilt. Aljazeera http://aje.me/10CrIDV . Via @PatriciaSpencer

Although times changed, many of the ancient Egyptian funeral customs have lingered on. Al Ahram Weekly http://bit.ly/11IfvRu 

 

Books 

Forthcoming book: Diachronic Trends in Ancient Egyptian History. Eds. Miroslav Bárta + Hella Küllmer, Charles University in Prague.

Conferences

The International Congress of Egyptologists in Alexandria has been postponed for a year until September 2014: http://www.iae-egyptology.org/ 

Museums and exhibitions

In Spanish. The artificial dome that houses the relocated Nubian Abu Simbel temples will be converted into a museum. http://bit.ly/10IIbmZ 

How the British Museum protects more than seven million objects (including a touchable Rosetta Stone copy). BBC http://bbc.in/19Jcga6 

Interview with Dr. Yazzez from the Egyptian Museum in Cairo about the current state of the museum: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=O-Zjgd9N2lg …

 

Houston Museum of Natural Science has welcomed a giant coffin to its new Egyptian displays. kuhf.fm http://bit.ly/184oLOD 

 

AE antiquities featured at Western Australian Museum, part of ongoing collaboration with British Museum. Australian http://bit.ly/YUZzaG 

Houston Museum NS Unveils Egyptian Sarcophagus, Hall of Egypt. With slideshow of green-faced sarcophagus. news92fm http://bit.ly/10tbjBC 

 

Museums at Night Report: Gavin Turk, pyramid power and Bristol Museum and Art Gallery. Culture24 http://bit.ly/15SZmtY 

Free online

Free online: Analysis of wooden finds from burial shafts of A38 (from ABUSIR XXII, Abusir, Egypt). J.Beneš. Academia http://bit.ly/110ZUuJ 

Article free online: "The History and Research of the Naqada Region Collection" by G. J.Tassie + J.van Wetering. UCL http://bit.ly/YN7ruR 

 

Journals and Magazines 

Pyramids : special issue of Pharaon Magazine, cahier supplémentaire #2, digital volume. in french. http://goo.gl/RbZ2J 

Travel and Tourism

Why cultural heritage, cultural and creative industries, tourism can help poverty & unemployment http://ow.ly/l38gJ 

Job Opportunities

Job: British Museum Dept of Anc. Egypt & Sudan seeks Project Curator to support exhib re science of mummies. Details http://bit.ly/1175Igk 

Obituary

Sad news: Kew botanist and Africa / Egypt specialist Nigel Hepper, author of “Pharaoh’s Flowers,” has passed away.

Miscellaneous 

A railway journey to the Giza pyramids in 1910 - wonderful footage from the Huntley Film Archives: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3oTKK4IS8M …

Superb slideshow of the discovery of an Egyptian statue found in a hidden chamber of the tomb of Meketre. Met Museum http://met.org/YJftF5 

British Virgin Islands have officially issued a new and unique coin featuring the Great Pyramids of Giza. Coin Update http://bit.ly/17u7n8d 

Think you're an expert on all things Egyptian? Houston Museum Ancient Egypt quiz. http://www.hmns.org/quiz/ 

Cairo's 19th Century transformation in 7 points. Cairobserver http://bit.ly/16yZKgC 

Exhibition: Text and Textiles

University of Melbourne

With photos

Rare Greek papyrus texts and Coptic textiles from Egypt form the basis of a dramatic exhibition at the Ian Potter Museum of Art that gives a fascinating insight into ancient lifestyles. Katrina Raymond reports.

Papyrus fragments discovered at Oxyrhynchus, a site in Upper Egypt, include the first book of Thucydides and other texts as well as private accounts, receipts and personal letters. An extraordinary declaration concerns the sale of an eight-year-old slave girl without blemish apart from epilepsy and leprosy.

The papyrus texts and the Coptic textiles that once belonged to elaborately adorned items of clothing worn in the time of Christian Egypt, during the fourth to seventh centuries, will be on display at the Potter until April.

The ancient texts were donated to the University of Melbourne in 1901 and 1922 by the Egyptian Exploration Society, London UK.

Book Review: Anubio, Carmen astrologicum elegiacum.

Bryn Mawr Classics (Reviewed by Roger Beck, University of Toronto)

Dirk Obbink (ed.), Anubio, Carmen astrologicum elegiacum. Bibliotheca Teubneriana. Munich and Leipzig: K. G. Saur, 2006.

Anoubion (hereafter A.), probably of Egyptian Thebes, composed a poem on astrology, probably in the late first century A.D. What distinguishes him as an astrological poet is that unlike his near contemporaries, Dorotheus of Sidon and Manilius, he wrote in elegiacs.

In this Teubner edition Dirk Obbink (hereafter O.) presents the surviving fragments and testimonies. A modern edition is needed because a large proportion of the fragments are from papyri, most of them published by O. himself in 1999 as nos. 4503-4507 in the Oxyrhynchus Papyri series. O's introduction to and commentary on these papyri should be used in tandem with his Teubner edition by any one looking for more than just a definitive text of A.

See the above page for the full review.

Online resources for study of writing surfaces

Egypt Exploration Society

Following the very successful seminar on scribes and writing surfaces, 'Inside the Mind of the Scribe' at Doughty Mews on 14 April 2012, we are delighted to be able to provide links to a number of online resources to support research into the topics discussed in the seminar.

Prof. Tait referred to an article of Jac. J. Janssen's, 'On Style in Egyptian Handwriting', which was published in the JEA (vol 73, 1987). The article is available via JSTOR to those members who subscribe: http://goo.gl/z9bVP. Long considered a primary research source for palaeographic studies, this article outlines how a single, common word (the late Egyptian pA, 'the') can be used to distinguish between scribal hands.

Dr Obbink introduced the Ancient Lives project, http://ancientlives.org/, which is a crowd-sourcing enterprise, allowing members of the public to transcribe Oxyrhynchus Papyri fragments, and submit them to the professional translators for batch processing and translation. 

Oxford University wants help decoding Egyptian papyri

BBC News

Oxford University is asking for help deciphering ancient Greek texts written on fragments of papyrus found in Egypt.

Hundreds of thousands of images have gone on display on a website which encourages armchair archaeologists to help catalogue and translate them.

Researchers hope the collective effort will give them a unique insight into life in Egypt nearly 2,000 years ago.

Project specialist Paul Ellis said: "Online images are a window into ancient lives."

The collection is made up of papyri recovered in the early 20th Century from the Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchus, the so-called "City of the Sharp-Nosed Fish".

At the time the city was under Greek rule. Later the Romans settled the area.

Online Images for Distributed Oxyrhynchus Papyri Pt One

What's New in Papyrology

O'Brien Library, United Theological Seminary, Dayton OH

These are the texts were formerly part of the Ambrose Swasey Library, Colgate Rochester

1. P. Oxy. 1256: List of priests under age.
2. P. Oxy. 1265: Affidavit of priestly rank.
3. P. Oxy. 1300: Letter of Peter.
4. P. Oxy. 1351: Leviticus xxvii.
—— P.Oxy.1353 = no. 30 below
etc.

Egyptian Archaeology No.36, Spring 2010

Egypt Exploration Society

The welcome sound of heavy mail hitting the floor in my hallway greeted me this morning. It doesn't mean that there will be no bills in amongst it but that particular "clunk" usually indicates that a few goodies have arrived. Included in the pile of books and magazines was Egyptian Archaeology, The Bulletin of hte Egypt Exploration Society, the contents of which are as follows (in alphabetical order by author):

• Will Carruthers, A means to an end: seeking Bryan Emery in archives
• David Dufton and Tom Branton, Climate change in early Egypt
• Sami el-Husseiny and Adel Okasha Khafagy, The Dahshur tomb of the Vizier Siese rediscovered
• Angus Graham, Ancient landscapes around the Opet temple, Karnak
• Nozomu Kawai and Sakuji Yoshimura, The tomb chapel of Isisnofret at Saqqara
• Chris Naunton, The EES Oral History Project
• Dirk Obbink, Recent discoveries from Oxyrhynchus
• Stephen Quirke, Petrie at Abydos in 1900: Margaret Murray's album
• Kveta Smolarikova, Embalmers' caches in the shaft tombs at Abu Sir
• Patricia Spencer, Harry James and the EES
• Patricia Spencer, Digging Diary
• Kristin Thompson, Concrete evidence on Amarna composite statuary
• Gyoso Voros, The temple treasures of Taposiris Magna

I am particularly looking forward to the Dufton and Branton article about climate change in early Egypt.

Egyptology News for March 14th - 16th 2013

From @egyptologynews.  Happy St Patrick's Day for tomorrow!

Open Air Museum. Temple of Tod.

Bobblehead no more: finishing the falcon mummy conservation treatment. With photos. Penn Artifact Lab http://bit.ly/ZZL2Kx

RT @SakhmetK Report on findings of two visitor surveys about using mobile devices in museums. Digital Media at V&A http://bit.ly/YtSAnt

#ForeignBodies Exhibition visitor information can be found here: http://blogs.ucl.ac.uk/researchers-in-museums/foreign-bodies/ … Trail maps will be uploaded very soon! @UCLMuseums

More photos from the discovery of the remains of battle against the Hyksos. Luxor Times http://bit.ly/WNV8zy

Important discoveries at Tel Habuwa dig in Delta shed light on campaign by Ahmose I against the Hyksos Ahram Online http://bit.ly/XfABia

Surprising, but NBC says that for the 1st time the Pyramids of Giza + Sphinx will be lit green on St. Patrick’s Day. http://nbcnews.to/WLDc8E

Call for abstracts. Origins5 conference 13-18 Apr 2014 (Predynastic and Early Dynastic) Cairo 2013. Full details at http://bit.ly/ZHD19L

RT @TheSSEA Monica Hanna's photos of destruction at World Heritage Site Dashur http://bit.ly/Zcs9ml  + Antinoupolis http://bit.ly/Yi1OkA

RT @wzzw Oriental Stone: New entry on UCLA's free online Encyclopaedia of Egyptology http://escholarship.org/uc/item/4xk4h68c …

Via Kimberley Freeman ‏@Kim0006
The launch of #foreignbodies in UCL's North Cloisters was AMAZING! Well done @ResearchEngager ! pic.twitter.com/U69c9K66LR

Middle East in Early Prints and Photographs (NYPL Digital Gallery). 1000s of prints, photos from 17th-20th Cs. AWOL http://bit.ly/Zcs9ml

The Coptic blog has just been resumed by Howard Middleton-Jones with updates on Coptic themes. Coptic News + Archive http://bit.ly/YewLcv

Travelers in the Middle East Archive. Digital archive emphasising travels to Egypt in 19th and early 20th Cs. AWOL http://bit.ly/16y3qNO

Short article (from Feb, but I missed it). Musical Apes:Can Baboons Play the Harp? By Gemma Angel. UCL http://bit.ly/Z26vOx

New Book (French): Laurent Bricault "Les cultes isiaques dans le monde gréco-romain" Les Belles Lettres http://bit.ly/15QWr0V

Kings and Queens and the case of the pink hippo? Review of the LGBT event at the Petrie, by Chris Webber. UCL http://bit.ly/YyMjqQ

New Book: Ancient Egyptian Administration ed. Juan Carlos Moreno García. Looks comprehensive but very expensive. Brill http://bit.ly/SbttGS

Summary of University of Basel 2013 season at the undecorated non-royal tombs in the side valley leading to KV34.Past Horizons http://bit.ly/10PJgdP

In Spanish. Egyptian state subsidies withdrawn, but as at Aswan excavations continue at Oxyrhynchus. La Vanguardia http://bit.ly/XybJrN

Via Campbell Price ‏@EgyptMcr
Tea and cake for #ComicRelief @McrMuseum today - and GINGERBREAD SHABTIS! pic.twitter.com/rkqn0WxIDx

Landscaping the entry to the open-air museum was the theme of the Aswan International Sculpture Symposium. Ahram Wkly http://bit.ly/14xRp78

Further to my previous post re the 2013 Amheida/Trimethis report, find out more about the project from their homepage http://www.amheida.org/

Amheida/Trimithis (Dakhleh Oasis) 2013 season report, Jan 20th-Feb 14th. Directed by Roger Bagnall. PDF New York Univ http://bit.ly/WK2nIN

Travel in the Fayoum, rich in contrasts. Sun-baked desert valleys, frigid lakes and lush farmland. Daily News Egypt http://bit.ly/Z6p1s6

During excavations in the Kings’ Valley University of Basel researchers found one of world’s oldest AE sun dials. http://bit.ly/X9Jfid

End of the season post from the Temple of Mut team, from their dig diary, with loads of great photos. Brooklyn Museum http://bit.ly/YnmbPr

More on the Sappho Love Poem

http://books.guardian.co.uk/news/articles/0,6109,1513491,00.html?gusrc=rss

"The poem which is now her fourth to survive had a tortuous and not unromantic discovery. It was found in the cartonnage of an Egyptian mummy, the flexible layer of fibre or papyrus which was moulded while wet into a plaster-like surface around the irregular parts of a mummified wrapped body, so that motifs could be painted on. Last year two scholars, Michael Gronewald and Robert Daniel, announced that a recovered papyrus in the archives of Cologne University had been identified as part of a roll containing poems by Sappho. Researchers realised that parts of one poem corresponded with fragments found in 1922 in one of the great treasure troves of modern classical scholarship - the ancient rubbish tips of the Egyptian town of Oxyrhynchus". Many more details can be found on the above Guardian Unlimited web page.

http://www.the-tls.co.uk/this_week/story.aspx?story_id=2111206
Thanks to AKE for the pointer the the Times Literary Supplemement website which contains further details, and an extract from the poem: "We have a poem of twelve lines, made up of six two-line stanzas. The last eight lines are virtually complete. The first four are still lacking two or three words each at their beginnings. But we can make out the sentence structure and restore the sense of what is lost, if not the exact words. Here is the poem in my own restoration and translation. The words in square brackets are supplied by conjecture. "[You for] the fragrant-blossomed Muses’ lovely gifts [be zealous,] girls, [and the] clear melodious lyre: [but my once tender] body old age now [has seized;] my hair’s turned [white] instead of dark; my heart’s grown heavy, my knees will not support me, that once on a time were fleet for the dance as fawns. This state I oft bemoan; but what’s to do? Not to grow old, being human, there’s no way. Tithonus once, the tale was, rose-armed Dawn, love-smitten, carried off to the world’s end, handsome and young then, yet in time grey age o’ertook him, husband of immortal wife."