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Remains of the 13th Hypostyle Hall

The results of fieldwork at Kom el-Hettan (Amenhotep III, Luxor)

drhawass.com (Zahi Hawass)

Press Release (see the above page for the full story). With photos.

During their excavation at the funerary temple of the 18th Dynasty king, Amenhotep III (c. 1390-1352 BC), at Kom el-Hettan on the west bank of Luxor, the mission of the Colossi of Memnon and Amenhotep III Temple Conservation Project unearthed an alabaster colossus of the great king. The team has also discovered the head of a deity, as well as restoring a stele and a head of the same king.

Dr. Zahi Hawass, Minister of State for Antiquities (MSA), has announced that the colossal statue shows Amenhotep III seated, and wearing the Nemes headdress, a pleated shendjyt kilt and a royal beard. It was found in the passageway leading to the third pylon (gate) of the funerary temple, 200 m behind the Colossi of Memnon, which guarded the first pylon.

“The statue is the northern one of a pair of colossi that were once placed at the gate of the third pylon,” reported Hawass. It is likely that both statues collapsed during an earthquake that took place in antiquity, but parts of them were still visible in a layer of Nile alluvium. The back of one of the two statues’ thrones had already been discovered in a previous excavation and its fragmentary text published. The other parts will be gradually uncovered for conservation and the statue restored in its original location in the near future.

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

With photos.

During a routine excavation at the funerary temple of the 18th Dynasty king, Amenhotep III (c. 1390-1352 BC), at Kom el-Hettan area on Luxor’s west bank, the mission of the Colossi of Memnon and Amenhotep III Temple Conservation Project unearthed an alabaster colossus of the great king. The team has also discovered the head of a deity, as well as restoring a stele and a statue head of the same king.

Zahi Hawass, Minister of State for Antiquities, has announced that the colossal statue shows Amenhotep III seated, and wearing the Nemes headdress, a pleated shendyt kilt and a royal beard. It was found in the passageway leading to the third pylon of the funerary temple, 200 metres behind the colossi of Memnon, which guarded the first pylon.

“The statue is the northern one of a pair of colossi that were once placed at the gate of the third pylon,” said Hawass. It is likely that both statues collapsed during an earthquake that took place in antiquity, but parts of them were still visible in a layer of Nile alluvium. The back of one of the two statues’ thrones had already been discovered in a previous excavation and its fragmentary text published.

Secrets of Ancient Egypt Revealed through Modern Science in Exhibit

Baylor University

A 16-year-old Egyptian girl who lived 2,300 years ago could not have imagined today's CT Scans. But because of the impact such technology has had on archeology, much has been learned about the mummified mystery teen -- all without ever unwrapping her.

That mummy -- dubbed "Annie" by those who study her -- and her sarcophagus will be part of a new interactive exhibition that opens at Baylor University's Mayborn Museum Complex this weekend. The traveling exhibition -- LOST EGYPT: ANCIENT SECRETS, MODERN SCIENCE -- explores how the lives and culture of ancient Egyptians are being uncovered in new ways, thanks to modern science and technology.

Hawass demands palaces fall under control of Antiquities Ministry

Al Masry Al Youm

Egyptian Minister of State for Antiquities Zahi Hawass on Monday demanded that all presidential palaces in Egypt fall under control of the ministry’s Islamic and Coptic antiquities department. In a statement, Hawass said he had sent a memo to Prime Minister Essam Sharaf asking him to include the Oruba Palace, the former headquarters of deposed President Hosni Mubarak, as well as other presidential palaces.

Hawass also demanded that a ministry committee be formed to examine the contents of the Oruba Palace and other presidential palaces, as well as the palaces and rest houses of former senior officials, to indicate whether the contents include antiquities.

Giza Zoo 1891

CairObserver

With some excellent photographs.

Khedive Ismail (1863-1879), the ruler of Egypt, was the first to think of opening the Zoo on the occasion of the inauguration of the Suez Canal in 1869 but he could not do so for the lack of enough time. On March 1, 1891, the Zoo at Giza was opened for the public.

It was first established to be a botanical garden, with various imported rare species of the most beautiful plants and cactus all over the world.

Its area is about 80 acres. It is located near the west bank of the Nile. Its northern tip overlooks Cairo University. It has five gates at each direction. The Zoo is under the supervision of the Ministry of Agriculture in Egypt.

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Hunting scene

Discovery of mud brick wall from reign of King Thuthmose IV at Giza

drhawass.com (Zahi Hawass)

An Egyptian archaeological mission directed by Dr. Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), has discovered a large mud brick wall dating to the reign of King Thuthmose IV (1400-1390 BCE). The wall was uncovered in the area located in front of King Khafre’s valley temple on the Giza plateau.

Minister of Culture, Farouk Hosny added that the discovery was made during routine excavation work carried out by the SCA.

Dr. Hawass stated that the newly discovered wall consists of two parts: the first section is 75cm tall and stretches for 86m from north to south along the eastern side of Khafre’s valley temple and the Sphinx; the second part is 90cm tall and is located in the area north of Khafre’s valley temple. This section is 46m long and runs from east to west along the perimeter of the valley temple area. The two parts of the wall converge at the south-east corner of the excavation area.

Hawass explained that according to initial studies carried out at the site, the newly discovered wall is a part of a larger wall found to the north of the Sphinx. This wall was constructed by King Thuthmose IV as an enclosure to protect the Sphinx from winds. According to ancient Egyptian texts the construction of this wall was the result of a dream which Thuthmose had after a long hunting trip in Wadi El-Ghezlan (Deer Valley), an area next to the Sphinx. In the king’s dream, the Sphinx asked the king to move the sand away from his body because it choked him. For this favor, the Sphinx promised to make Thutmose IV King of Egypt. To accomplish this task, Thuthmose IV removed the sand that had partially buried the Sphinx and built an enclosure wall to preserve it.

Hawass pointed out that archaeologists previously believed that the enclosure wall only existed on the Sphinx’s northern side because a 3m tall by 12 m long section had been found there. This theory has now been disproven thanks to the discovery of the two new wall sections along the eastern and southern sides of the Sphinx.

In addition to the two sections of the enclosure wall, the SCA team found a mudbrick wall on the eastern side of Khafre’s valley temple. Hawass believes that this wall could be the remains of Khafre’s pyramid settlement, which was inhabited by priests and officials who oversaw the activities of the mortuary cult of Khafre. This cult began at the king’s death and continued until the eighth dynasty (ca. 2143-2134 BCE), which was the end of the Old Kingdom.

Essam Shehab, supervisor of Khafre’s valley temple excavation, said that the mission also dug a 6m deep assessment trench in the area located in front of Khafre’s valley temple to search for any activity dating to the Middle Kingdom (2030 – ca. 1660 BCE). Initial inspection did not reveal any Middle Kingdom activity in the trench as it was filled with almost 5m of sand. Such amount of sand, said Shehab, suggested that the area was abandoned during the Middle Kingdom.

Excavations continue in order to reveal the rest of the Thuthmose IV enclosure wall and any other secrets still hidden within the sand.

Hawass says that BBC broke MSA regulations

drhawass.com (Zahi Hawass)

I was very pleased to be involved with this project, which will be aired in a television program called Egypt’s Lost Cities. Unfortunately, however, an inaccurate article about it was prematurely released, even before the BBC’s press release was checked by my Ministry.

According to Ministry of State for Antiquities (MSA) regulations, it is prohibited for anyone to announce a discovery before notifying and obtaining the approval of the Ministry first. This procedure is in place to ensure that any discoveries people want to announce are real and have been officially verified. If every mission authorized to carry out work in Egypt was allowed to announce things without them being checked first, there could potentially be lots of false claims made all the time.

Sadly, this was the case with the BBC. I am disappointed that not only was the report published without the approval of the MSA, but also that its announcement was not accurate, showing how important it is to follow the proper protocol. The draft press release reported that 17 new pyramids and thousands of ancient Egyptian settlements have been discovered by the University of Alabama using infrared satellite images and that the last major pyramid find was made over 20 years ago.

Bikya Masr

Egypt’s Minister of Antiquities Zahi Hawass wrote on his official blog that the BBC had broken government regulations on the reporting of the discovery of 17 previously unknown pyramids and thousands of tombs via satellite.

“According to Ministry of State for Antiquities (MSA) regulations, it is prohibited for anyone to announce a discovery before notifying and obtaining the approval of the Ministry first,” he wrote.

“This procedure is in place to ensure that any discoveries people want to announce are real and have been officially verified. If every mission authorized to carry out work in Egypt was allowed to announce things without them being checked first, there could potentially be lots of false claims made all the time,” Hawass added.

Many news outlets, including Bikya Masr reported the new discovery using satellites. Bikya Masr did not, and has not, asked for the ministry’s permission to report on substantiated and sourced stories pertaining to new discoveries in Egypt.

Hawass said the BBC has apologized for not notifying the ministry beforehand.

Update on Tuthmosis III temple excavations

Luxor News blog (Jane Akshar)

The third consecutive season of archaeological investigations at the funerary temple of Thutmosis III , on the west bank at Luxor, started on October 2nd, until December 17th. The season of excavations and work was made possible by the continued support of CEPSA, with further support by the Marcelino Botin Foundations enabling the season to be prolonged. This led to a marked increase in the amount of work that the joint Spanish-Egyptian team was able to achieve.

The team was further reinforced this season by the addition of several members of the Department of Fine art and Archaeology at the University of Granada, along with several graduate students in order to gain valuable field experience with specialists in Egyptology, Archaeology and Restoration.

High hopes for Egypt’s first institute of museology

Al Masry Al Youm (Steven Viney)

Earlier this month, the Ministry of State for Antiquities (MSA) announced that it would be establishing the first Institute of Museology in Egypt after a funding proposal put forth to USAID was revisited and moved to the next phase of development.

“We’ve been talking to USAID for a year and a half about opening a museology school in Cairo,” states Ramadan Hussein, a senior archaeological supervisor at the MSA. “After the revolution, they’ve shown new interest in the project and decided to move forward with funding.”

Despite the large number of museums that the country enjoys, Egypt’s museums suffer from a shortage of qualified personnel at the senior management level. This has been often reflected in poor exhibition design and resource management, as well as increased reliance on foreign experts.

Exhibition: Unpublished Faiyum portraits in Madrid

Art Daily

The Fayum Mummy Portraits continue to surprise to this day with their modern sensibility and vitality. Made between the first and fourth centuries A.D. they come from the tomb of Al- Fayum as well as from other places across Egypt, and they are borne of a mixture of Greek encaustic painting, Roman realism, and Egyptian funerary rituals. The exhibition Fayum Portraits + Adrian Paci: No Visible Future, organized by the Ministry of Culture, National Archeology Museum and PHotoEspaña posits these paintings as the earliest antecedent of photography since, in a manner similar to ID photos, the painters portray with the greatest possible exactitude the characteristics of their subjects so that the souls of the dead could recognize them – hence the portraits’ simplicity and accuracy.

John Berger dedicated one of his most elegant texts to these works; in it, he relates them to the migrations of our time. This exhibition seeks to pay them homage, bringing together 13 portraits that are shown along with the video Centro para la permanencia temporal (Center for Temporal Permanence), by Adrian Paci, a work in which time stops, and its protagonists – possible emigrants seek to depart but do not move – are subtly fashioned like the living-dead of Fayum.

More re Faiyum archaeology and ecology under threat

CairObserver

Fayoum is a lush area around an ancient sea in the desert 130 kilometers south of Cairo. There is a small city and several villages. There are also natural reserves and bird areas, an artist village and Egypt’s caricature museum. This sounds like Fayoum has enough uniqueness and attractions to be the star of Egypt’s next tourism campaign. Alas, this is not what the government thinks mainly because there is no big five-star hotel development copy and pasted from another location. So Mubarak’s government decided to sell the natural reserve, legally a protected area, to Amer Group, a massive developer who builds the worst of neolibralism from resorts to malls. The super rich developer has a 99-year leasehold on the land for $28,000/year! that comes down to 1 cents per square meter. If this isn’t a clear case of corruption I am not sure what is.

Arabist.net

Environmentalists currently represent a small subsection of activists in Egypt, but like everybody else they've received a boost from the revolution, as well as more problems to deal with. The former comes in the sense that people are generally more willing to pay attention to the kind of political, economic, ecological and community problems environmentalism attempt to deal with — everyone is more empowered and has a great sense of community belonging. Yet, at the same time, the partial collapse of the state has led to many abuses (most notably illegal construction) and many people prioritize security or party politics ahead of environmentalism.

Can a tomb bring Egyptian tourism back to life?

The Independent, UK (Patrick Cockburn)

Egypt has opened to the public the tombs of leading retainers of the Pharaoh Tutankhamun at Saqqara, south of Cairo, in a desperate bid to lure back tourists who have avoided the country since the revolt in February that toppled President Hosni Mubarak.

Unemployed guides at Saqqara, one of the great archaeological sites of the world, speak hopefully of the publicity surrounding the grand opening of seven tombs boosting foreign interest in Egypt's past. They stress that never before have visitors been able to see the tomb of Maya, Tutankhamun's treasurer, with its scenes of bearers bringing offerings, or of the young pharaoh's general, Horenheb, with incised stone carvings of his military victories.

But it may some time before fascination with ancient Egypt will be enough to make tourists forget the recent television pictures they have seen of fighting in Tahrir Square.

German university loses Egyptian collection bought under Nazis

Ahram Online (Nevine El-Aref)

A German court ruled that the University of Leipzig must hand over its 150 ancient Egyptian artefacts to the Jewish Claims Conference (JCC) as compensation for Holocaust victims and their descendants.

This collection came into the possession of the museum of the University of Leipzig in 1936 when the late Jewish professor Georg Steindorff, who held Leipzig’s Egyptology chair, sold it to the museum. Steindorff possessed this collection since 1915 when he excavated the site located to the west of King Khufu’s necropolis in the Giza plateau in a German mission. In accordance with Egyptian law at the time, he received 50 per cent of the discovered artefacts.

Al Masry Al Youm

A pharaonic artifact that was smuggled out of Egypt, taken to Germany, and is now in an Israeli institution must be returned, Minister of Antiquities Zahi Hawass announced Saturday.

The piece was discovered in Egypt in 1910, west of Khufu Pyramid. An archeologist called George Steindorff took it, along with half the pharaonic artifacts found by the expedition, for display in museums and universities.

Hawass told Al-Masry Al-Youm that the University of Leipzig in Germany gave the artifact to a committee for the victims of the Holocaust.

Monsters and Critics

The University of Leipzig is to lose an ancient Egyptian collection which it bought in 1936 from a Jewish professor, Georg Steindorff, a court ruled Thursday.

A court in Berlin decided that the collection must be handed to the Jewish Claims Conference (JCC), as Steindorff had sold it for a value far below its actual worth.

Leipzig university could produce no evidence to counter the charge that Steindorff had been forced to sell his collection under Nazi rule.

Book Review: House of Windows

New York Times (Anthony Julius)

The Lost and Found World of the Cairo Geniza by Adina Hoffman and Peter Cole.

About 120 years ago, a cache of manuscripts, mostly fragments, was discovered in the storeroom of an old Cairo synagogue. Its members had deposited them there over many centuries. This collection of documents managed to be both heterogeneous and comprehensive at the same time.

Adina Hoffman is the author of “House of Windows: Portraits From a Jerusalem Neighborhood.” Peter Cole is a poet and translator. As they relate in their engaging book “Sacred Trash,” the materials in the storeroom included letters, wills, bills of lading, prayers, marriage contracts and writs of divorce, Bibles, money orders, court depositions, business inventories, leases, magic charms and receipts. One early examiner of the cache described the scene as a “battlefield of books.” The most recent deposits were made in the 19th century; there were fragments that dated back to the 10th century. Another early visitor described the scene thus: “For centuries, whitewash has tumbled” upon the documents “from the walls and ceiling; the sand of the desert has lodged in their folds and wrinkles; water from some unknown source has drenched them; they have squeezed and hurt each other.”

KMT Volume 22, Number 2, Summer 2011

KMT

Thanks to John Rauchert for this information. Includes Six Feature Articles:

• Rediscovering the Karnak Cachette by Laurent Coulon, Emmanuel Jambon & Cynthia Sheikholeshlami
• KV63 Update: The 2010 Season by Otto J. Schaden
• Spanish Excavations of Tomb 28 at Luxor by Francisco J. Martin Valentin & Teresa Bedman
• Theodore M. Davis & His Excavators by John M. Adams
• The Origins of Egyptian Civilization Exhibition in Chicago by Emily Teeter
• Egypt in Mantua, Italy, by Lucy Gordan-Rastelli

Plus “Nile Currents” & “For the Record,” as well as reviews of: Sex and the Golden Goddess I, Ancient Egyptian Love Songs in Context by Renata Landgrafova & Hana Navratilova; Before the Pyramids: The Origins of Egyptian Civilization edited by Emily Teeter; & Architecture of Alexandria and Egypt, 300 BC-AD 700 by Judith McKenzie.

Book Review: The Stones of the Pyramids

Bryn Mawr Classical Review (Reviewed by William H. Peck)

Thanks to Kate Phizackerley for this link.

Dietrich D. Klemm, Rosemarie Klemm, The Stones of the Pyramids: Provenance of the Building Stones of the Old Kingdom Pyramids of Egypt. Berlin/New York: De Gruyter, 2010.

Dietrich and and Rosemarie Klemm have published extensively in the past on the geology of Egypt, the stones used in ancient Egyptian construction and the quarries from which building stone was obtained in antiquity. Their work, employing petrographical and geochemical methods, has become something of a model for the analysis of ancient construction material and its sources in Egypt. This text is concerned with the provenience of the stone used in the pyramids of the Old Kingdom, differentiating between the material of core and casing, as well as the stone of attendant structures (Valley Temple, Causeway, and Pyramid Temple, where they exist.) Proximity of quarries to the monuments is taken into consideration as a natural element in the study of the logistics of supply.

Each pyramid is discussed chronologically beginning with the Step Pyramid of Djoser and ending with the Pyramid of Pepi II, but also including the Mastabat el-Faraoun and the Sun Temples of Userkaf and Niuserre. The geological setting of each structure and any physical factors that may have influenced its building and condition are given as preliminary information. Number and source position of stone samples are given and the results of the petrographical and geochemical analysis for structures and quarries are presented in textual and graphic form. Each structure is given its exact geographical coordinates, height, base and slope. Original height and preserved height are sometimes indicated. The size of the base is stated in meters. “Slope” indicated the inclination of side. In general the text is simply and direct and there are only occasional infacilities in the English translation from the German. Numerous photographs both aerial and ground of structures and quarries, plus construction details where appropriate, are included.

The samples for study and analysis taken were made with the permission, agreement and supervision of the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities.

Egypt’s man from the past who insists he has a future

Past Horizons (Jack Shenker)

No one interviews Zahi Hawass, Egypt’s self-styled Indiana Jones of the east – he interviews himself, fist pounding on desk and spittle flying forth into the ether.

“Do I look like a minister to you? Of course not!” thunders the minister for antiquities, a man appointed by Hosni Mubarak to oversee his nation’s cultural riches and, improbably, the great survivor of this year’s dramatic revolution.

“I am not part of the old regime – I love Egypt, I love archaeology and I will never be a politician,” Hawass continues. “I’m a damned archaeologist through and through.”

Zahi’s strength of feeling is understandable. The 63-year-old headed Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) from 2002 onwards. Like so many other Mubarak-era public figures he is struggling to carve out a role in post-uprising Egypt.

He is desperate to hammer home his apolitical virtues but after accepting a cabinet job as the regime was beginning to crumble and then taking to the airwaves in early February to declare ”we need President Mubarak” the task was always going to be tricky.

Ancient Egypt Magazine has new Facebook page

Official Ancient Egypt Magazine on Facebook

From Bob Partridge:

Over the last few years we have started to use Facebook to pass on relevant new information to you which sometimes cant wait for the two monthly publishing cycle.

For some reason we seem to have two magazine Facebook pages, one of which enabled the Editor to send a message to each Facebook friend (run by myself as Editor) and a second by the magazine publishers which only enabled messaging to the wall and not necessarily seen by everyone.

So we have now opened a new official Facebook page (replacing the original pages) for anyone interested in ancient Egypt and for subscribers to the magazine. The new page is called Official Ancient Egypt Magazine and the pages that I have been running will be closed in the next few days. So could I please ask you to close your Facebook membership of the old Ancient Egypt Magazine Facebook page and reregister under the new site as soon as possible.

It is still the intention to continue sending you extra news and information via the new Facebook page and hopefully it will encourage Facebook friends of the page to communicate with each other.

Please note, this is not intended as a forum for friends to contact the Editors, for example wanting help writing essays or for other general queries, as we sadly just do not have the time to do this, although we are always pleased to hear from anyone with comments or suggestions for the magazine.

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