Kind regards

Andie

Archaeology has a feature in the March/April 2008 issue entitled Nefertiti’s Eyes, which you can see online at the above address.

Did the queen’s distinctive feature become a symbol of Egyptian royalty?

All eyes were on the Valley of the Kings the morning of February 5, 2006, when our expedition first looked into the chamber now known as KV63, the first tomb found in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings since that of Tutankhamun (KV62) in 1922.

Press speculation was rampant over what the tomb might hold. Would our expedition find the mummies of royal women from the late 18th Dynasty, such as Queen Nefertiti, thought by some to be Tut’s mother? Or the six princesses she bore to the pharaoh Akhenaten, including Tut’s queen, Ankhesenamun? The mummies of these women have either not been found or identified. Perhaps they were removed from Akhenaten’s capital at Amarna when a later king, presumably Tut, returned to the traditional capital of Thebes on the Nile opposite the Valley of the Kings. Did Tut rebury them in the Valley?

After taking out several stones blocking the doorway from the tomb shaft into the chamber, we peered through the narrow opening. Inside, we could see many large ceramic jars and several wooden coffins, some with yellow-painted faces. The press speculation was incorrect on all counts. We found no mummies in any of the tomb’s seven coffins and no inscriptions to tell us for whom these coffins were initially intended.

But while studying the coffins, I discovered–in the eyes of faces painted on three of them–an intriguing link to Nefertiti, the queen whose name means, simply, “the beautiful one has come.” While none of the coffins held Nefertiti’s remains, the eyes may tell us something unexpected about her celebrated beauty. Was it in part the result of a genetic syndrome?

See the above page for the full story.

The February/March 2008 issue of “Ancient Egypt” magazine (published in the U.K.) is now available.

Contents of this issue include;

• News from Egypt: The magazine’s Egypt Correspondent, Dr. Ayman Wahby Taher, brings the latest news from Egypt which includes a report on the placing on display of the mummy of Tutankhamun, more new discoveries in and around the Temple of Karnak and on the west bank and an exhibition of Polish work in Egypt at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.
• The Amarna Project: In the first in a series of articles on the latest work at Amarna, city of Akhenaten and Nefertiti, Professor Barry Kemp looks at how the city was founded and how it developed and ultimately failed.
• The KNH centre for Biomedical Egyptology at the University of Manchester: Students from the KNH centre report on some of the varied aspects of their work and research on human remains.
• Tutankhamun and the Royal Crowns of Egypt: AE looks at royal crowns, as illustrated by the Ushabti figures and many statues of Tutankhamun found in his tomb.
• Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs: A photo report on the exhibition currently showing in London, featuring some of the main, bust also some of the lesser-well-known, but equally interesting pieces.
• The Dakhleh Oasis Project In the last in a series of articles on work in the Oasis, Professor Fred Leemhuis looks at the discoveries and conservation work being done in the old town of Qasr Dakhleh..
• An ancient Egyptian-style building in the shadow of the Great Pyramid. AE looks at the unusual and striking building, erected at Giza by King Farouk and now in need of urgent repair.
• Per Mesut: For younger readers: This issue Hilary Wilson looks at Light.

Book Reviews:

• Omm Sety’s Egypt, by Hany el Zeini and Catherine Dees.
• The Two Brothers: Death and the Afterlife in Middle Kingdom Egypt, by Rosalie David.
• An Introduction to the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt, by Kathryn A. Bard.
• The Rough Guide to Tutankhamun, by Michael Haag.
• Tutankhamun: The Eternal Splendor of the Boy King, by T.G.H. James.
• King Tutankhamun: The Treasures of the Tomb, by Zahi Hawass.
• Tutankhamun: Ultimate Activity Book, by Hendrikje Nouwens.
• The Tutankhamun File: The Secrets of the Tomb and the Life of the Pharaoh, by Jaromir Malek.
• Tutankhamun’s Cookbook, by Jackie Ridley.
• Carnarvon and Carter, by Fiona, 8th. Countess of Carnarvon.
• The Boy Behind the Mask, by Charlotte Booth.
• CD: Coffee Time, by the Bedouin Jerry Can Band.

Plus other Regular Features that include:

Egyptology Society details for the UK and many overseas and full listing of forthcoming lectures and events in the UK from February to April 2008.

]]> http://touregypt.net/teblog/egyptologynews/?feed=rss2&p=3519 http://touregypt.net/teblog/egyptologynews/?p=3518 http://touregypt.net/teblog/egyptologynews/?p=3518#comments Sat, 09 Feb 2008 17:24:30 +0000 Andie Uncategorized http://touregypt.net/teblog/egyptologynews/?p=3518

Pasadena Star

Silk kites and beer will be the tools of choice for Cal Poly Pomona students as they try to build a pyramid.

Architecture students in the cement and masonry structure class will construct a 106-ton pyramid without modern tools.

Instead, they will use a technique that could have been used by ancient Egyptians.

Maureen Clemmons, president of the management consulting practice Transformations, explained the theory during an introduction to the course Thursday.

Cal Poly Pomona will be one of several colleges helping Clemmons research the theory. The class of 100 will use her seven years of scaled testing to figure out if building at a large scale would be feasible.

“How can you turn the opportunity away?” said Gary McGavin, associate professor of architecture at Cal Poly Pomona and instructor of the cement and masonry class.

Clemmons proposed the idea that a smaller work force and innovative use of available resources made making the massive Egyptian monuments easier than once believed.

In her research, Clemmons claimed that hieroglyphics show ancient Egyptians using their sailing knowledge to harness and use wind in their favor.

Jane has posted the sad news that author and lecturer Professor Christine el-Mahdy has died. Professor el-Mahdy was head of the Egyptian Society (Taunton). Apparently she had been unwell for some time. Sympathies to her family and friends. There is a short biography of her, in German, on Wikipedia.

Nile Letters: From Montrealers and Others is centered on the letters Peter Redpath sent to a friend in London while he was travelling up the Nile in Egypt in the winter of 1873. Peter Redpath was not the only notable McGill benefactor and supporter whose interest in ancient Egypt led to their embarking on journeys up the Nile in the late nineteenth or early twentieth century. On display are some of the books and photographs, which were bequeathed or donated to the collections by several benefactors who made the journey. Where the names of the donors are known, they are indicated in the display.

Tourism on the Nile started quite early in the nineteenth century, but grew significantly from the 1850s onward, and even more dramatically after 1870 when the British travel firm Thomas Cook first offered a Cook’s tour by steamer up the Nile. Peter Redpath, however, like the other travellers whose accounts are used to describe the journey, travelled from Lower Egypt into Nubia in the traditional manner by sail boat, known as the dahabiyah.

See the above page for the full story.

See the above page for the full story.

This site recommends the top 10 sites you should see if you are going to visit Egypt. Most of them you could guess, but some that might suprise are New Kalabsha, the Temple of Tod and the Temples of Montu (the last of which I cannot actually place off the top of my head). Sites that you might have expected to see are Abu Simbel and the Temple of Luxor, but these are missing.