The spirit of monasticism in Upper Egypt

Al Ahram Weekly (Jill Kamil)

The recent Coptic convention at Naqada drew scholars from all over the world. The symposium, organised by the Saint Mark Foundation for Coptic Studies, took place in the church of the Archangel Michael from 6 to 11 February. Its aim was to draw attention to the rich heritage of one of the lesser-known monastic sites in Upper Egypt; to present an overview of the current state of research, conservation and restoration in the Naqada and Qus (Coptos) region; to increase general knowledge of the area; and to activate concern for conserving and preserving its Christian heritage. Bishop Beiman gave the opening address in the grand new hall of the monastery. Attending were Magdi Ayoub, the governor of Qena, who said a word about the specialised gathering being a part of a wider culture and identity which spanned the ages, along with VIPs, participants, guests, the press, and a large number of residents of Naqada and Qena anxious to witness such an important event taking place at a site which is not on the regular tourist map and, until relatively recently, not easily accessible by road. Jill Kamil was there

Entitled "Christianity and Monasticism in Upper Egypt", this was the fourth in the series of Coptic symposia organised by Fawzi Estafanous to take place in a monastic setting. Although the smallest of the four such gatherings to date, it was lacking neither in spirit nor in the quality and diversity of the papers presented.

See the above page for the full story.

Why do virtual heritage?

Archaeology Magazine (Donald H. Sanders)

Those of us in the virtual heritage business who create digital surrogates of the ancient world see many benefits of visualizing the past interactively and in 3D. We understand that the past did not happen in 2D and that it cannot be effectively studied or taught as a series of disconnected static images that, for the most part, represent incomplete remains. It seems obvious to us that you need an interactive, 3D approach if you expect others to get excited about ancient cultures or expect them to grasp the implications of the evidence.

But how do we convince archaeologists, who should be embracing our technologies, that it is to their advantage to see the ancient world as the ancients did, rather than as static 2D representations in black and white? Today, when personal digital video and music players, GPS-enabled camera cell phones, wireless high-speed home networks, and laptops for schoolchildren are commonplace, why is it so difficult to convince scholars that interactive 3D environments are instructive not simply eye-catching novelties? We could even state this more forcefully: Archaeologists are doing a disservice to their discipline, colleagues, students, and the public by not using all means available to record sites, test hypotheses, and teach about the past.

I have worked in virtual heritage for more than a decade, and in 1993 was involved in one of the earliest virtual re-creations of ancient sites, Buhen, a 12th Dynasty Egyptian fortress whose remains were inundated by Lake Nasser in the late 1960s. Over the years my two companies have worked on dozens of projects--partnering with many archaeologists, museums, broadcast channels, publishers, and even foreign governments--and covering all types of data and visualization goals, from teaching packages, to research resources, to digital publications, to hypothesis tests. We have found that projects routinely generate unexpected revelations about the excavated record, and that the archaeologists who collaborate with us learn about their sites in ways not possible with traditional analytical tools.

See the above page for the full story

The Egyptian Art

Klick Educacao

The Egyptian artists produced first-rate work for close to 4,000 years.

The main reason for this extraordinary success will be found in their respect for tradition. They honored tradition in their paintings and sculpture just as they did in their daily life. It is therefore not difficult to understand why they were more interested in the type of person they were representing (be it royalty or the common man) in their drawings and statues than the individual.

When they were told to make a statue of the Pharaoh, for example, they naturally took into account those features that were characteristic of his face; however, such details as the shape of this eyebrows, the width of his chin and the length of his nose were relatively unimportant.

The main concern was to represent their ruler in such a way that everyone seeing the statue would exclaim: "No question about it. That is a king!". They would recognize qualities which they expected to find in their sovereign; that he should be someone above the concerns of everyday life, a person of this world but at the same time so identificable with his godlike predecessors as not to be in any way like the rest of mankind.

See the above for more details.

Trivia: Agora

Cinematical

Rachel Weisz and Max Minghella (Art School Confidential) star in the film, which takes place in Ancient Egypt. More specifically, Weisz will play the astrologer-philosopher Hypatia of Alexandria, in Roman Egypt during the fourth century. "Trapped in the Library of Alexandria as religious riots flare on the city's streets, Hypatia battles to save the collected wisdom of the ancient world. Meanwhile, her slave Davus (Minghella) is torn between his love for his mistress and the freedom he could attain by joining the rising tide of Christianity." Aside from Ershadi, Oscar Isaac, Ashraf Barhom, Michael Lonsdale, and Rupert Evans have roles.

Amenabar plans to use a "hyper-realist approach" to bring Alexandria to life, and says: "We want the audience to see, feel and smell a remote civilization as if it were as real as the present day."

Daily Photo - Karnak wildlife reliefs

Antiquity smugglers arrested

CNN

Egyptian police confiscated four ancient mummies on Wednesday and arrested three antiquities smugglers who had stolen them from an ancient graveyard, a security official said.

Wrapped in layers of linen and decorated with ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, the mummies were found in the southern province of Minya, 135 miles south of Cairo, the official said on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the press.

The three smugglers also were allegedly found with 10 small ancient statues. They confessed that they had planned to sell the objects to antiquities brokers, the official said.

The mummies are of a child and three men, but no further details were available, the official said. Archeologists were summoned to check the mummies, he added.

News24

Tourist police in the town of Fayyum, south of Cairo, arrested the men as they sought to sell the four mummies and other looted artefacts on the international antiquities black market.

The source said the mummies appeared to have been stolen from an illegal dig carried out by the men near Minya, 120km south of Fayum, and are likely previously unknown to antiquities authorities.

"One of the mummies is of a child, the other three are of men, all covered with linen and plaster," the source said, adding that another 10 small statues and a Pharaonic sarcophagus decorated with hieroglyphs were also seized.

"The smugglers were arrested before they could sell the mummies to antiquities traders for about $5.3m," the source said.

The police are now trying to work out exactly how old the artefacts are and who the mummies are. The smugglers face a minimum of three years in jail.

Exhibition: Rediscovering the tomb of Tutankhamun

WRS World Radio (Audio report)
WRS World Radio (Text introduction to report, with extracts from the audio report)

The discovery of the tomb of the Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun in 1922 ranks as one of the most sensational finds of the century. Now an exhibition in Zurich is attempting to recapture the magic of the moment by recreating the tomb chambers, as archaeologist Howard Carter would have found them. What makes this exhibition unique is that there are no original items on display. Everything is a replica, created in workshops in Cairo. World Radio Switzerland’s Zurich correspondent, Vincent Landon, has more.

The exhibition will also travel to Hamburg, Munich, Lisbon and Prague.

American University of Beirut to appoint Peter Dorman

The Chronicle of Higher Education

The American University of Beirut is expected to name the University of Chicago’s Peter Dorman as its new president next week.

Mr. Dorman, an Egyptologist and chairman of Chicago’s department of Near Eastern languages and civilizations, said he planned to accept when the American University of Beirut, known as AUB, makes the offer official.

“Well, yes, I have indicated that I plan to accept to the AUB board,” said Mr. Dorman, speaking from his Chicago office. “It is far too thrilling an opportunity to pass up.”

No stranger to the Middle East, Mr. Dorman has spent much of his career shuttling between Chicago and Egypt. After receiving his Ph.D. from Chicago in 1985, he spent nine years leading the university’s fieldwork in Egypt, documenting inscriptions and relief scenes at the Temple of Luxor and the nearby Temple of Amun.

See the above page for the full report.

50.000 visitors for Tutankhamen Exhibition in Vienna

State Information Service

Art History Museum in Vienna was opened for visitors on 11/3/2008 to visit Tutankhamen's Exhibition for which more than 50.000 tickets were sold before its opening, which reflects the Austrians' appreciation for the Egyptian civilization.

The exhibition is held under the title of "Tutankhamen – the Golden King and the Great Pharaoh", and it will travel to 8 European countries and US during the period from 9/3/2008 till 31/12/2012 in return for $ 50 million directed to contribute in establishing the big Egyptian Museum and repairing some other antiquities locations.

Environment: Western Desert groundwater could last 300 years

Egypt Daily Star News

As the Arab Water Council meets today for the first Arab Region Consultative Workshop March 13-15 to prepare its research papers and regional reports for the Fifth World Water Forum in Istanbul in March 2009, many questions surround Egypt’s water situation.

UN and World Bank reports warn of the grave threats to Egypt’s freshwater supplies posed by climate change, while a series of water shortages in rural areas last summer highlighted the need for improvements in Egypt’s water supply network.

The Ministry and the government have also come in for heavy domestic criticism over the Toshka land reclamation project, which has fallen far short of its targets, and criticism from abroad for its refusal to relinquish the 1959 Nile Treaty, which effectively gives Egypt 85 percent and Sudan 15 percent of the entire water of the river Nile.

“So far the [10] Nile Basin countries only use five percent of the total available Nile water,” explained the Minister for Water and Irrigation, Mahmoud Abu Zeid, in an interview with Daily News Egypt at the Ministry’s Nile Water Authority in Nasr City.

“Therefore the Nile Treaty only pertains to that five percent of the water, so the goal is for other countries to use more Nile water that is going to waste.”

Egypt, along with the other nine Nile Basin countries are part of what is known as the Nile Basin Initiative (NBI), which aims to put together a final status agreement over the distribution of the Nile’s water, and promote joint cooperation with other Basin countries.

While the minister admitted that the Toshka part of Egypt’s land reclamation project has taken longer and cost more than expected, he insisted that the results would be worth the wait and said that many investors, predominantly from the Arab world, had begun investing in the reclaimed land.

The ministry is also engaged in developing groundwater resources in the Western Desert — known as the Nubian Sandstone aquifer — the minister said, adding that if it was exploited carefully it could last as long as 300 years.

See the above page for the full story.

Weekly Websites

Cairo/Giza Daily Photo Blog
Cairo/Giza Daily Photo

Maryanne Stroud Gabbani lives in the Cairo area and frequently heads out into the desert on horseback. Most days she posts a photograph from around the Cairo area, and they are always interesting, usually accompanied by explanatory text. She shows everything from a rather surrealistic view of the Giza pyramids shown from the interior of a nearby Pizza Hut, to the garbage left behind by excavation teams working at Saqqara. Always worth checking.


Smithsonian featured Egyptology articles
Smithsonian Institution
A series of featured articles on the Smithsonian's site, looking at various aspects of the ancient Egyptian past, including Egyptology's 10 most significnant finds over the last twenty years and a Q&A with hieroglyph expert Judith Kamrin.


Review: Khufu's Wisdom by Naguib Mahfouz (Review by Henry Midgley)
Bits of News

Naguib Mahfouz seems to be equally able to write about ancient and modern Egypt. His novels about Ancient Egypt concern themselves with an analysis of high politics, often through using mythic stories to indicate political concerns. So for example, his novel about Akhenaten, the ancient Pharoah focuses on the links between faith and politics and questions about how far religious motivations can justify political actions. Khufu's Wisdom, his novel about the Pharoah Khufu (also known as Cheops) focuses on similar issues. Mahfouz is fascinated by the way that the personality of the ruler effects his power to control and rule his nation. Khufu's Wisdom concerns the succession to Khufu, from the beggining of the novel the scent of death rests over the realm, after ten years the Great Pyramid is still unfinished. The real story though concerns Khufu's effort to avoid a prophesy that says Djedjef, son of the priest of Ra, will succeed him and not his own sons. The novel shows us the way that despite Khufu's best efforts, Djedjef does come to succeed him, ultimately through the Pharoah's own intercession.

Statecraft is central to this novel. Khufu's actions rest upon the fact that as Pharoah his interests and the people's interests are presumed to be exactly aligned.

Tutankhamun and Amarna Period Books
Suite 101
By Stan Parchin

Scholarly books about ancient Egyptian art and culture during the Amarna Period and the reign of Pharaoh Tutankhamun are available for students and enthusiasts alike.

The ceaseless fascination with ancient Egyptian art and civilization during the revolutionary age of the "heretic" pharaoh Akhenaten (r. 1353-1336 B.C.) and Tutankhamun (r. 1332-1322 B.C.) continues to inspire extensive research and the publication of quality color-illustrated studies. Suitable for students, scholars and enthusiasts, many are exhibition catalogues authored by world-renowned museum curators and art historians. Most are available in bookstores and through Internet retailers.

See the above page for the list of recommended books.

Taxation in Ancient Egypt
Netfirms.com

There's not very much information about the ancient Egyptian economy, and although this seems to be an informal survey of some of the data I thought it worth adding the link.

The fifth dynasty Palermo Stone provides the earliest details of taxation. These royal annals record, year by year, the reins of individual kings nearly of pharaohs s early as the first dynasty identify a biennial event known as the "Following of Horus," a royal tour of inspection during which the king appeared before his people and collected revenues due him as the incarnation of Horus and head of the state.
In the reign of Ninuter (second dynasty), the entries for the Following of Horus include references to what was evidently a biennial census or enumeration. In two instances late in the dynasty, this census is described as an "enumeration of gold and land." Therefore toward the end of the second dynasty, the royal tour had become biennial and had expanded to include the counting of gold and land. In the reign of Senefru (fourth dynasty), cattle are fist mentioned as the subject of this count. By the reign of Neferirkara in the fifth dynasty, oxen and small livestock are included.
Supervision of the national revenue as early as the predynastic period was under the authority of the chancellor in charge of the treasuries of Upper and Lower Egypt. By the reign of Ninuter, this responsibility included the biennial census as well as the collection and distribution of various commodities levied as taxes in kind in a non-monetary economic system.

Cartoon - by Cyanide and Happiness
Explosm.net

Mildly amusing pyramid cartoon.

Daily Photo - Qila el Dabba

The Old Kingdom necropolis of Qila el Dabba in Dakhleh Oasis near Balat, once associated with the town of Ain Asil. The necropolis contained the burials of the oasis governors. The last two photographs show the excavated mastaba of Khentika, a Sixth Dynasty governor.

More re donkey domestication

Science Daily

An international group of researchers has found evidence for the earliest transport use of the donkey and the early phases of donkey domestication, suggesting the process of domestication may have been slower and less linear than previously thought.

Based on a study of 10 donkey skeletons from three graves dedicated to donkeys in the funerary complex of one of the first Pharaoh's at Abydos, Egypt, the team, led by Fiona Marshall, Ph.D., professor of Anthropology at Washington University in St. Louis, and Stine Rossel of the University of Copenhagen, found that donkeys around 5,000 years ago were in an early phase of domestication. They looked like wild animals but displayed joint wear that showed that they were used as domestic animals.

"Genetic research has suggested African origins for the donkey," said Marshall. "But coming up with an exact time and location for domestication is difficult because signs of early domestication can be hard to see. Our findings show that traces of human management can indicate domestication before skeletal or even genetic changes."

Domestication of the donkey from the African wild ass was a pivotal point in human history. It transformed ancient transport systems in Africa and Asia and the organization of early cities and pastoral societies.

Also on Fox News and MSNBC, both with photographs of the skeletons.

There's a biog of Fiona Marshall on the Washington University in St Louis website.

If domestication of animals is of interest, the Science Daily item above points to a related article: the domestication of pigs (which significantly predates donkey domestication in Egypt).

The indefatigable Mr Lane

SaudiAramco World

Late one September afternoon in 1825, an apprehensive 24-year-old Englishman arrived in the Eastern Harbor of Alexandria, Egypt. “As I approached the shore,” he wrote, “I felt like an Eastern bridegroom, about to lift up the veil of his bride, and to see, for the first time, the features which were to charm, or disappoint, or disgust him.” He continued:

I was not visiting Egypt merely as a traveller, to examine its pyramids and temples and grottoes, and, after satisfying my curiosity, to quit it for other scenes and other pleasures: I was about to throw myself entirely among strangers; to adopt their language, their customs and their dress; and, in associating almost exclusively with the natives, to prosecute the study of their literature. My feelings therefore, on that occasion, partook too much of anxiety to be very pleasing.

Edward William Lane need not have worried. He would become, one day, Britain’s most renowned scholar of the Middle East. He would write a fascinating study of Egyptian society, a book so definitive and widely read that it would never go out of print; his great Arabic–English dictionary would become a basic, irreplaceable reference work; and his translation of The Arabian Nights would delight and instruct generations of readers. Lane’s name would come to be known throughout the field of Middle Eastern studies, admired by western and Arab scholars alike.

See the above page for the full story.

Study of ancient tsunami that destroyed Alexandria

National Geographic

Tsunamis like the the one that devastated ancient Alexandria in A.D. 365 may hit the Mediterranean relatively often, a new study argues.

Scientists say they have pinpointed the geological fault—off the coast of the Greek island of Crete—that likely slipped during a huge quake and caused the ancient tsunami.

Massive earthquakes—greater than magnitude 8—may strike the Mediterranean roughly every 800 years, the research suggests.

But other scientists say that not enough is known about these faults to predict how often such quakes might strike. They argue that the 365 disaster may have been unique.

The authors of the new study measured the remains of corals, algae, and other sea life that run in a band along the coast of Crete.

"The ancient shoreline resembles a bathtub ring high above the sea on the cliff face," said Beth Shaw of the University of Cambridge in England, lead author of the study.

The findings, published in Nature Geoscience, fix a date to when western Crete was suddenly lifted up, strengthening the tie between this event and the tsunami (see a map of Crete).

The team narrowed down the date of the uplift to within a few decades of 365, bolstering the idea that the upward shift happened in one sudden jolt.

See the above page for the full story.

The Italian Archaeological Mission in the Sudan - Report for 2008

Archaeogate Egittologia

Thanks to Pier for the above link.

The present research – being the continuation of the historical mission carried on till 2005 under the auspices of Rome University "La Sapienza" – has resumed the excavations in the archaeological site of Jebel Barkal, ancient Napata, near modern Karima. Its working period covered the span between February 11th and 29th, having as main goal the complete clearing of the building labeled B2400. It has to be stressed that the label B2400 has been definitely attached to the building that lay near the modern road, where in 2001 features of Greek architecture turned out in our excavations. It is therefore displaced in reference to the site which was named B2400 by Timothy Kendall, and where no archaeological work has been hitherto carried out. . . .

The choice of the working place was due to the suitable time and the need to achieve a good result in a period of remarkable changes. On the one side the town of Karima has increased to a considerable degree of importance after the construction of the Hamdab Dam and of the bridge; on the other side tremendous rainfalls affect more and more the ruins, in spite of any restorations. A priority task is therefore to publish in the most complete form the issue of fieldwork, especially as it was eventually remarked that unrecorded excavations took place in the area and damaged in addition the scanty remaining evidence.

See the above page for the full report.

Creating a traveling exhibition: Lost Egypt

The Lost Egypt Exhibition Blog

Thanks to Kat for sending me the link to this blog.

Lost Egypt is a traveling exhibition being created by the COSI science center in Columbus, Ohio, and it is set to open Summer 2009. This blog is documenting the development of the exhibition and giving you a sneak-peak and behind-the-scenes commentary about its construction.

Here’s our big idea: modern archaeologists use science and technology to uncover and understand the people and culture of ancient Egypt.

Why Build an Exhibit about Egypt?

Let’s face it…Egypt is cool! Archaeology has come a long way from its treasure seeking past. As a science, archaeology is the study of historic people and their cultures by excavation and analysis of their material remains. Egypt is full of mystery, and it is reported that there is still 70% of ancient Egypt still buried in the sand.

COSI is about creating experiences that give people a sense of wonder when they discover something new. We felt that a hands-on exhibit centering on archaeology would address misunderstandings people have regarding the topic, as well as inspire future generations of scientists to the excitement of archaeological discovery.

COSI is part of the Science Museum Exhibit Collaborative (SMEC), which is a partnership of science museums across the USA. SMEC has had a hand in creating traveling, hands-on exhibitions since 1984. COSI Columbus created the first of these exhibits called the “Science of Sports.”

Daily Photo - Ain Asil (Dakhleh Oasis)

Ain Asil is a well preserved Old Kingdom settlement in Dakhleh Oasis - a good summary of the site has been published by Su Bayfield on her Egyptian Monuments website.

How wild asses became donkeys of the pharaohs

New Scientist (Andy Choghlan)

Thanks to Vincent Brown for pointing this out to me. New Scientist has a feature this week on the domestication of the donkey in Egypt. The article is a summary of research published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: Domestication of the donkey: Timing, processes, and indicators by Stine Rossel, Fiona Marshall, Joris Peters, Tom Pilgram, Matthew D. Adams, and David O'Connor. Unfortunately only subscribers to New Scientist have access to the full story, but the magazine is available from news stands, so you may be able to get hold of a print copy. Here's the extract shown on the New Scientist website:

The ancient Egyptian state was built on the backs of tamed wild asses. Ten skeletons excavated from burial sites of the first Egyptian kings are the best evidence yet that modern-day donkeys emerged through domestication of African wild asses. The 5000-year-old bones also provide the earliest indications that asses were used for transport.

The skeletons suggest that the smaller frames of today's donkeys hadn't yet evolved. Instead, the bones resemble those of modern-day Nubian and Somali wild asses, which are much larger than today's donkeys.

Extensive wear on the joints of the excavated skeletons shows that the animals lived their lives transporting heavy loads. Cargoes may have included stone for a nearby temple at the excavation site in Abydos, 500 kilometres south of Cairo, as well as wine, grain and precious stones.

"This is the very dawn of the Egyptian state, the engine of which was the donkey," says Fiona Marshall of Washington University in St Louis, Missouri, US, a member of the research team.

The only anatomical signs of the transition from ass to donkey are changes in the metatarsal bone of the lower leg, which made the leg more compact – presumably an adaptation to cope with carrying loads.

If the subject is of particular interest you can purchase a short term access to the article on the website of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

An earlier informal report about archaeologist Fiona Marshall's investigations into the domestication of the donkey appeared in the Washington University of St Louis newsletter in May 2007.

Excavation with UBC’s Dr. Thomas Hikade

The Ubyssey (Anthea Tsoukalas)

A student shares her experiences of working at Hierakonpolis with Dr Hikade:

On Christmas day of 2007, I began my journey to Egypt to participate in a world class archaeological excavation at Hierakonpolis led by UBC’s Dr Thomas Hikade, which consisted of an international team of undergraduates, graduates, and archaeologists. The area of interest was the ruins of Hierakonpolis, 80km south of Luxor, near the village of Kom el-Ahmar. The former city was an early Egyptian settlement headed by Narmer, the first Pharoh of unified Egypt. The archaeologists hoped that the ruins could yield clues to how states form, since Hierakonpolis was the original capital of one of the earliest large civilizations.

“When I was an officer in the German army in the early 1980s I had the opportunity to travel as a tourist twice to Egypt,” said Dr Hikade. “I have been working in Egypt since 1988 and have joined many international excavations. In addition to its role in state formation, Hierakonpolis is important in that it raises intriguing questions about trade links and contacts with Nubia in the south, the Red Sea Coast area in the east, and societies in the Near East.

“In general studying the past is important. As history shows, people are confronted with similar challenges and circumstances that occur in one way or another again and again around the world. And ancient Egypt, is no exception. So when we learn about the economy, religion, international affairs, the material culture of ancient Egypt we try to understand their mind and their way of solving problems and creating things.

“When it comes to ancient Egypt, as one of the cradles of civilization, it has held a fascination for both ancient and modern man in terms of history, technology, literature and art, among other things.”

Through participating in Egyptology courses with UBC’s Classical, Near Eastern and Religious Studies Department I was able to participate in this excavation. I had to pay my way to Egypt, but the rest of the costs were handled by the team.

See the above page for the full story