Exhibition: Review of Excavating Egypt at the Columbia Museum of Art

Free Times

This exhibit promises to feed the fascination. Objects and artwork ranging in age from the early Egyptian history to the late Roman period provide a view into the lives of both royal and ordinary Egyptians. The exhibit is not simply an overview of ancient Egyptian culture, though. It also places that culture within the context of its early investigators, the amateur and professional archaeologists who both explored it and, in their own way, preserved it.

The history of Egyptology, the study of Egypt, is relatively recent, with its beginnings in the late 19th century. The real world of the early archaeologists working in the field was only slightly less swashbuckling than the fictional world of Indiana Jones or Amelia Peabody, the main character of Elizabeth Peters’ popular mystery novel series. The lives of William Flinders Petrie and Amelia Edwards were hardly less exciting.

Excavating Egypt is pulled from the collection of the Petrie Museum in London. Founded by Amelia Edwards, the museum houses material collected by both Edwards and Petrie.

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