Free Republic

During the 1970s, excavations at the Al-Asasif necropolis on Luxor's west bank uncovered an elaborate rock-cut tomb. Archaeologists theorized that it must have belonged to an Egyptian dignitary, but at the time they were unable to identify the deceased and the tomb was labeled with the generic name of Kampp 23. Now, Ahram Online reports, a joint Egyptian-Canadian team has finally determined that the Kampp 23 tomb was built for a man named Amun-Mes, the erstwhile mayor of Thebes during the Ramesside period (ca. 1295–1070 b.c.). Several inscriptions found elsewhere in Luxor mention a certain Amun-Mes along with many other...

SNIP To understand the text, we need to know a little about the obelisk’s history. Before it was gifted to Paris, the monument used to be one of two that stood outside the Luxor Temple in Upper Egypt. Both pillars were built around the 13th century BCE, at the time of Ramses II’s reign. But at this time, the obelisk that is now in Paris would have had a face that could be seen by passengers traveling along the Nile River, and it is from this angle (around 45°) that the secret message is visible.“When I calculated where to stand...

Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) announced the discovery of a tomb belonging to a high-ranking military commander who served during the reign of Ramesses III (reigned ca. 1184–1153 b.c.), Ahram Online reports. The burial was uncovered during excavations at the site of Tell Roud Iskander in Ismailia. The mudbrick structure contained a burial chamber and three adjoining rooms with walls covered in white plaster. Among the artifacts found within the tomb were bronze arrowheads, painted alabaster jars, a collection of beads, a small ivory box, and a gold ring engraved with a cartouche of Ramesses III. The soldier was...

Harvard University educated archaeologist and president of the Paleontological Research Corporation, Dr. Joel Klenck, states an array of archaeological discoveries evidence a crisis during the reign of the Egyptian Pharaoh Thutmose II... in the Eighteenth Dynasty. An inscription by the succeeding Pharaoh Hatshepsut... in her Underground Temple at Speos Artemidos states that Egypt was "ruined" and "had gone to pieces" before the beginning of her reign. Hatshepsut's inscription also states that a population of "vagabonds" emerged from former Asiatic populations that once controlled northern Egypt and caused this ruination. Hatshepsut notes these vagabonds were responsible for "overthrowing that which had...

In the late 1930s and early 1940s, an entire complex of royal tombs was found intact at Tanis, yielding four gold masks, solid silver coffins, and spectacular jewelry... The treasures are one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of all time... And while everyone knows Howard Carter's name, that of the excavator of Tanis is Egyptological trivia. It's Pierre Montet... Today, as Tutankhamun once again begins a royal procession through the United States, it is good to remember Tanis and its discoverer, Pierre Montet. The treasure of Tutankhamun may be more extensive, but Montet found three intact royal burials, an achievement...

La Brújula Verde reports that the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities completed a two-year excavation and preservation project of an ancient mining camp at Jabal Sukari near the Red Sea. Archaeologists were under pressure to complete the project as the site is currently endangered by modern mining activities. The Egyptian team uncovered a vast gold processing complex that dates back 3,000 years, as well as a settlement inhabited by those who worked at the mine. The mining facility included specialized factories for extracting the gold from quartz veins, which has provided new information about ancient methods of obtaining and...

Ancient Egypt apparently predicted The Simpsons. More seriously though, a discovered tomb features a painting that looks suspiciously like a character from the beloved American sitcom. The internet is loving it. Discovering an ancient Egyptian tomb is one thing... But what about discovering an ancient Egyptian tomb with a painting on it that bears an uncanny resemblance to a character from American animated sitcom The Simpsons? That’s precisely what happened when a 3000-year-old tomb was discovered in an ancient cemetery in the Egyptian city of Minya, on the western bank of the Nile – with the upper lid looking like...

Amenhotep III became king while he was still a child. Image credit: Moraes et al., Clinical Anatomy (2024), Courtesy of Cícero Moraes Known by his superb nickname "The Magnificent", Pharaoh Amenhotep III oversaw arguably the most glorious period in Ancient Egyptian history, bringing peace and prosperity to the empire while commissioning the construction of some of its most lavish landmarks. Now, more than 3,350 years after his death, the ancient ruler has finally been restored to his former brilliance thanks to a new reconstruction of his mummified face. Presiding over Egypt for just under 40 years during the 18th Dynasty...

Graphics experts have recreated the face of a pharaoh who founded the Valley of the Kings and rewrote history in ancient Egypt. Amenhotep I - the second ruler of Egypt's 18th Dynasty - is thought to have died 3,500 years ago at around age 35 before being painstakingly preserved through mummification. He was the first to be buried in the Valley of the Kings - the resting site of almost all the Pharaohs of the 18th, 19th and 20th dynasties.

An Egyptian archaeological team discovered the remains of the sixth-century-B.C. structure three years ago during excavations at an archaeological site in the ancient city of Buto, now called Tell Al-Faraeen, in Egypt's Kafr El-Sheikh governorate...Unlike traditional monuments, which typically have a single pylon, the observatory had two pylons facing each other, framing the circular observatory spot and symbolizing akhet, or the horizon where the sun rises. Facing this Akhet was a limestone watchtower that was likely once paired with another and used to observe constellations, Ghonim said.The excavation also uncovered a statue of the falcon-headed god Horus. The depiction of...

In 1935, the Metropolitan Museum of New York led an archaeological expedition to Egypt. In Deir Elbahari near Luxor, the site of ancient Thebes, they excavated the tomb of Senmut, the architect and overseer of royal works—and reputedly, lover—of the famed queen Hatschepsut (1479–1458 BCE). Beneath Senmut's tomb, they found a separate burial chamber for his mother, Hat-Nufer, and other unidentified relatives.Here, they made an uncanny discovery: a wooden coffin holding the mummy of an elderly woman, wearing a black wig and two scarab rings in silver and gold. But what struck the archaeologists was the mummy's expression: with the...

A study shows that repetitive tasks carried out by ancient Egyptian scribes – high status men with the ability to write who performed administrative tasks – and the positions they sat in while working may have led to degenerative skeletal changes.Researchers in Prague, Czech Republic, examined the skeletal remains of 69 adults males, 30 of whom were scribes, who were buried in the necropolis at Abusir, Egypt...They identified degenerative joint changes that were more common among scribes compared to men with other occupations.These changes were in the joints connecting the lower jaw to the skull, the right collarbone and the...

Ahram Online reports that a fortified royal retreat has been uncovered at the Tel Hebwa site, which is located in North Sinai. Mohamed Ismail Khaled of the Supreme Council of Antiquities said that the mudbrick structure was likely used during the 18th Dynasty reign of Thutmose III (ca. 1479–1425 B.C.). The structure’s entrance, located on its northern side, led to a large hall with three columns, added Hisham Hussein of Sinai Antiquities. This room connected to a smaller hall with entrances flanked by columns. The thresholds of entrances to these rooms were also uncovered, along with the thresholds for small...

A joint Egyptian-U.S. archaeological mission has uncovered the upper part of a huge statue of King Ramses II during excavations south of the Egyptian city of Minya, Egypt's tourism and antiquities ministry said on Monday.The limestone block is about 3.8 metres (12.5 feet) high and depicts a seated Ramses wearing a double crown and a headdress topped with a royal cobra, Bassem Jihad, head of the mission's Egyptian team, said in a statement.The upper part of the statue's back column shows hieroglyphic writings that glorify the king, one of ancient Egypt's most powerful pharaohs, he said.Also known as Ramses the...

"[The king] Unis seizes the sky and splits its iron."Inscribed in hieroglyphs in a 4,400-year-old pyramid, this sentence evidences that ancient Egyptians understood the extraterrestrial origin of iron-rich meteorites—thousands of years before European scientists reached the same conclusion......the world's oldest-identified iron objects are small beads that come from a burial in Gerzeh, a roughly 5,300-year-old village in northern Egypt. Other pre-Iron Age iron objects have been found in Egypt, including an amulet in the 4,000-year-old tomb of Queen Aashyet in Deir el-Bahari and a dagger blade in King Tutankhamun's tomb...The earliest-known Egyptian references to iron in connection with stars, meteoroids...

An ancient Egyptian woman had an ovarian tumor with teeth and was buried with a possible healing object.While excavating an ancient Egyptian cemetery, archaeologists made a rare discovery: an ovarian tumor nestled in the pelvis of a woman who died more than three millennia ago. The tumor, a bony mass with two teeth, is the oldest known example of a teratoma, a rare type of tumor that typically occurs in ovaries or testicles.A teratoma can be benign or malignant, according to the Cleveland Clinic, and it is usually made up of various tissues, such as muscle, hair, teeth or bone....

Egyptian archaeologists recently located a lost 3,500-year-old cemetery containing mummies and statues... A particularly exciting find was a Book of the Dead papyrus scroll measuring over 43 feet long—a rare surviving copy of the traditional burial item...While the cemetery—dating to sometime between 1550 BC to 1070 BC—was significant for the hundreds of archaeological finds and tombs carved into the rock located within its boundaries, the discovery of what could be a copy of the Book of the Dead captured the attention of experts as a truly rare find. But with few details released to the public about the contents of...

Scientists x-rayed ancient Egyptian tomb paintings to better understand the painters' creative process.Every painter has a process, but the painstaking revisions and countless tiny edits are invisible to those who only see the final product. In a study published today in PLOS ONE, researchers used x-rays to reveal how 3000-year-old paintings inside Egypt’s Theban Necropolis unfolded step by step. The findings hint at the creative process used to produce these ancient masterworks.Applying the x-ray method to ancient Egyptian wall paintings “is really a game changer,” says Marine Cotte, a chemist at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, who previously collaborated with...

Egyptian officials have banned Dutch archaeologist from the country after an exhibition was launched which portrays black American singers, comedians and musicians as the rulers of ancient Egypt...However Dutch archaeologists have been banned from the Saqqara burial ground, near Cairo because of the portrays which have been described by as 'falsifying history.'...The controversy comes after Netflix received backlash for their casting of black British actress Adele James as Cleopatra.The show has been subject to 'blackwashing' claims after James was cast despite historical records showing Cleopatra was Macedonian-Greek.The ban comes as a big blow to RMO who have been active in...

Tutankhamun and the Tomb that Changed the World with Dr. Bob Brier | 22:16World History Encyclopedia | 73.9K subscribers | 3.1K views | 7 months ago