Obituary: William Kelly Simpson

The renowned American Egyptologist and lover of Egypt professor William Kelly Simpson passed away recently at the age of 89. Simpson was a great friend and lover of Egypt. He spent his whole life and distinguished career in the service of Egypt and its monuments, especially those of ancient times.

Simpson was a professor of Egyptology emeritus at Yale University in the US. He was born in New York City and received his BA in 1947, MA in 1948, and PhD in 1954 from Yale University. He was one of the most important public figures at Yale University later in his career.

He first worked in the Egyptian Department at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Then he obtained a Fulbright fellowship to Egypt and a research fellowship at the Centre for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. In 1958, he was promoted to professor of Egyptology and Near Eastern Languages and Literatures at Yale University. He also served for around 20 years as curator of Egyptian and Ancient Near Eastern Art at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

While in Boston, he increased the museum’s collections tremendously, reinstalled the galleries, and launched excavations and documentation at several sites in Egypt, principally the Giza Pyramids area and in Sudan. He also taught at several US universities, including as the Harvard University Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilisations and the University of Pennsylvania. He also lectured at the Institute of Advanced Studies at Princeton, the Collège de France in Paris, and the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon. In terms of fieldwork, Simpson was the director of the well-known Pennsylvania-Yale Expedition to Egypt. He also participated in the UNESCO campaign to rescue the Nubia monuments in Egypt and the Sudan in the 1960s. He was the co-director of very important excavations at Abydos in Upper Egypt and epigraphic missions in the Giza Pyramids area.

He was the author of many books and articles on Egyptian art, archaeology and literature. He co-authored a book on the history of the Ancient Near East and also co-authored, with other scholars, one of the best-known anthologies of ancient Egyptian literature. He was elected to three terms as president of the International Association of Egyptologists and served as president and later chairman of the Board of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, as vice-chairman of the Board of the American University in Cairo, and as trustee of the Archaeological Institute of America and the American Research Centre in Egypt.

In 1965, Simpson was awarded a Guggenheim fellowship for the humanities in Near Eastern Studies. He received the Distinguished Achievement Award from the American Research Centre in Cairo on the occasion of its 50th anniversary in 1998. He also received the Award for Distinguished Service from the American University in Cairo and the Medal of Honour for Distinguished Service to Egyptology and Egypt from Farouk Hosni, Egypt’s minister of culture at the time, and the Organising Committee of the Eighth International Congress of Egyptologists in Cairo in 2000.

In 2001, he received the honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters from the American University in Cairo. In 2003, he was awarded the Augustus Graham Medal by the Brooklyn Museum in the US for services to Egyptology and the museum. He was elected to membership of the American Oriental Society, the American Philosophical Society, and the German and Austrian Archaeological Institutes.

I met professor Simpson several times at the Giza Pyramids area and during the Eighth International Congress of Egyptologists in Cairo in 2000. He served the monuments of Egypt, especially the Giza Pyramids and the archaeological remains in Nubia, with unstinting passion, and he also helped many Egyptians to study Egyptology in the US. He was an unfailingly modest and helpful person, as well as an authority on ancient art, archaeology and literature. He served as a major channel between Egypt and the US to the benefit of the two nations and the archaeological and cultural ties between the two countries.

Later this year, Yale University will commemorate the memory of this distinguished person and scholar, and Egypt should do the same for the country’s great friend, professor William Kelly Simpson. Professor Simpson will be very greatly missed, but his multifaceted legacy at all levels between Egypt and the US and among many Egyptians and Americans will last forever.

Source: Al Ahram Weekly

News, Giza: Tutankhamun's Bed, Chariot Set to Arrive at Grand Egyptian Museum

The artifacts are being moved in preparation for the new museum's soft opening in 2018. Written By/ Nevine El-Aref.

The funerary bed and chariot of Tutankhamun is set to be delivered on Tuesday evening to the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) overlooking the Giza Plateau in preparation for the new museum's soft opening in 2018.

State of the art technology and efficient scientific techniques were used in lifting and moving the artifacts from their current display at the Egyptian Museum in Tahrir into the packing boxes.

The bed is carved out of wood and covered with golden sheets with decoration depicting the goddess Mahit Weret.

The chariot, one of the king's five chariots, is also carved out of wood and covered with golden sheets and decorated with precious stones.

GEM supervisor-general Tarek Tawfik said that the packing and transportation was carried out by an Egyptian-Japanese team that has consolidated the wooden surfaces of both artefacts as well as strengthened the weak points before packing.

Scientific studies have been also conducted on the condition of the chariot and bed to ensure they can be safely transported.

Egyptian and international media, as well as Tawfik and Minister of Antiquities Khaled El-Enany, will be present at the GEM when the artifacts arrive.

Source: Ahram Online

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Back Home: Egypt Says It Retrieved 4 Stolen Artifacts From Britain

The Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities announced on Tuesday that it has retrieved from the United Kingdom four artifacts that had been stolen and smuggled out of Egypt.

The artifacts have now been restored in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, the ministry added in a statement.

Shaaban Abdel Gawad, a ministry official, said that two of the artifacts were displayed at an auction house in the UK while the two other pieces were in the possession of an antiquities dealer in London.

Two of the artifacts were stolen during the security mayhem that prevailed in the wake of the 2011 Uprising, which resulted in the ousting of long-time president Hosni Mubarak, while the other two were stolen in 2013, according to the ministry.

In 2011, Egypt witnessed a period of security chaos during which the rate of antiquities thefts increased by 90 per cent compared to the pre-2011 rate, according to previous statements made by Egyptian officials.

Egypt seeks to regain illegally smuggled antiquities that date back to the pharaonic era.

Source: Middle East Monitor

To Read All Back Home Antiquities Posts Click Here 

New Discovery, Luxor: Embalming Materials For Middle Kingdom Vizier Lpi Rediscovered On Luxor's West Bank

Newly discovered embalming jars.Photos courtesy of the Spanish Mission

The embalming materials of Ipi, vizier and overseer of Thebes and member of the elite during the reign of King Amenemhat I in the early 20th Dynasty, have been rediscovered in his tomb at Deir Al-Bahari on Luxor's west bank. Written By/ Nevine El-Aref.

Within the framework of the Middle Kingdom Theban Project, an international mission under the auspices of the University of Alcalá (UAH, Spain) has uncovered over 50 clay jars filled with embalming materials for the mummification of the ancient Egyptian vizier Ipi during the cleaning of the courtyard under his tomb number (TT 315).

Mahmoud Afifi, head of the antiquities ministry’s Ancient Egyptian Antiquities Department, said that the jars were first discovered in 1921 and 1922 by American Egyptologist Herbert Winlock inside an auxiliary chamber in the northeast corner of the upper courtyard of Ipi’s tomb, where they were left as is.

Time has taken its toll on the courtyard, which had been buried in sand before being uncovered by the Spanish mission.

The jars hold equipment such as bandages, oils and salts, which were used by embalmers in mummification, as well as jars, bowls, scrapers, and a mummification board decorated with ankh-signs.

“The identification of these materials is of great importance for understanding the mummification techniques used in the early Middle Kingdom and the assessment of the kinds of items, tools, and substances involved in the process of embalming,” head of the Spanish mission Antonio Morales told Ahram Online.

Morales added that the deposit of the mummification materials used for Ipi included jars with potmarks and other types of inscriptions, various shrouds and four-metre-long linen sheets, shawls, and rolls of wide bandages.

Embalming Materials Discovered

Photos Courtesy of The Spanish Mission

There were also other types of cloth, rags, and pieces of slender wrappings designed to cover fingers, toes, and other parts of the vizier’s corpse.

Team specialist Salima Ikram has identified what seems to be the mummified heart of Ipi, an uncommon practice that no doubt deserves more investigation.

Morales said that the deposit also contained around 300 sacks of natron salt, oils, sand, and other substances, as well as jar stoppers and a scraper.

Among the most outstanding pieces of the collection are the Nile clay and marl jars, some with potmarks and hieratic writing, various large bandages six metres in length, as well as a shroud used for covering the body of the vizier Ipi; a fringed shawl 10 metres in length.

There are also natron bags that were deposited in the inner parts of the vizier’s body, twisted bandages used as mummy packing, and small pieces of bandages for the upper and lower extremities.

Embalming Materials Discovered

Photos Courtesy of The Spanish Mission

The collection should provide members of the Middle Kingdom Theban Project an excellent opportunity for the scientific analysis of the substances, components, textiles, and human remains found in the embalming cache, as well as the technical procedures and religious rituals used in the mummification of a high official in the early Middle Kingdom.

Ezz El-Din El-Noubi, director of the Middle Area of Al-Qurna Antiquities, said that the discovery was made during the third season of project by the University of Alcalá Expedition to Deir El-Bahari in collaboration with the Ministry of Antiquities and the Luxor Inspectorate.

The main purpose of the project is the archaeological study and epigraphy of the tombs of Henenu (TT 313) and Ipi (TT 315), the funerary chamber and sarcophagus of Harhotep (CG28023), as well as the conservation and detailed publication of information of these monuments and others located at Thebes.

Source: Ahram Online

Find More About New Discoveries in Egypt Here &  About Luxor City' Treasures Click Here

New Discovery, Sohag: Ancient Stone Block Discovered At Illegal Excavation Site in Upper Egypt’s Sohag

The block is engraved with the cartouche of the 30th Dynasty King Nectanebo II, who is known for his construction projects. Wreitten By/ Nevine El-Aref.

The Whole Block Discovered

An Egyptian archaeological committee from Al-Belinna inspectorate in the Sohag town of Abydos found a stone block engraved with the cartouche of the 30th Dynasty King Nectanebo II during the inspection of an old house in the Beni Mansour area, under which the owner was carrying out an illegal excavation.

The Tourism and Antiquities Police caught the suspects conducting the illegal excavation red-handed and have confiscated the house until the completion of investigations, according to Hani Abul Azm, the head of the Central Administration for Antiquities of Upper Egypt.

Abul Azm added that the block may have been part of King Nectanebo II's royal shrine or an extension of a wall of a temple built by the king. Nectanebo II is well-known for his construction projects in Abydos. Abul Azm said that after the completion of the expropriation procedures, more excavation will take place at the site.

Ashraf Okasha, director-general of Abydos Antiquities, pointed out that the newly discovered block measures 1.40x40 cm, but the high level of subterranean water has made it difficult to determine whether it was part of a shrine or a temple wall.

Okasha added that the archaeological committee inspected the site at the two-storey mud brick house where the illegal excavation was underway, with the block discovered at the bottom of a four metre-deep hole.

Source: Ahram Online

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News, Cairo: Funerary Bed of King Tut Packed for Transfer to Grand Egyptian Museum

The bed of Tutankhamun

The king's entire treasured collection is planned for transfer to the GEM ahead of its 2018 opening. Written By/ Nevine El-Aref.

A team from the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) began packing on Monday King Tutankhamun’s treasured collection at the Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square in a step towards transferring to its permanent location at the GEM.

Tarek Tawfik, GEM supervisor-general, said that the team is now packing the golden king’s funerary bed which is made of wood gilded with golden sheets and decorated with the head of the goddess Sekhmet.

Before packing the bed was subjected to scientific documentation and first aid restoration to guarantee its safe transportation.

GEM's head of first aid restoration Eissa Zidan told Ahram Online that the packing process is carried out in collaboration with a Japanese scientific team and will take eight hours to complete. 

The team will use acid-free packing materials and equipment to minimise vibrations during the bed’s transportation.

Zidan during packing process

Japanese expert during packing

Zidan said that devices to measure heat and vibration intensity would be used on the bed during its transportation.

All the Tutankhamun artifacts are to be packed and transported to the GEM according to a planned schedule until the soft opening of the new museum in mid-2018.

Source: Ahram Online

 All Related Posts About Tutankhamun Click Here 

Short Story: A Forecast of Egyptian Civilisation

Mai Samih listens to the story of civilisation in Egypt from a geological perspective.

Rocks and earth layers have as much to say as a drawing on a temple about the past, maybe even more. Head of the Department of Geology and professor of Geo-Archaeology at the Faculty of Science at Cairo University Mohamed Abdel-Rahman Hemdan said as much at a seminar at Beit Al-Sinary in Cairo in March when he claimed that “the past is the key to the present.”

“We geologists study the present to understand what happened in the past. However, that past is also the key to the present because archeologists have learned much about how the climate in particular has changed over time. This is a new trend we are now trying to work with,” he said.

The climate is the weather over the long term, Hemdan said, commenting that time-scales of 100 to a million years are not uncommon in geology. Cold weather in the north could affect the surface of the oceans and the winds in another part of the planet that carry rain.

“Rain for us in Egypt originates from two sources, the Atlantic monsoon from the west and the Indian monsoon from the east. These unite into one front named the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), which causes rain. If this is directed northwards, it leads to rain, as happened some 11,000 to 8,000 years Before the Present (BP). If it goes southwards, a state of drought occurs. This could be good news for those who fear global warming, as when the sea level rises our desert will become green because there will be more rain,” he said.

Some 150,000 years BP the sea level was low, and the weather in Ethiopia was not as wet as it is today, so it did not feed a lot of water into the Nile. The River Nile looked like a small channel at the time, and the water level in the Mediterranean was 120 metres lower than it is today.

“Approximately 25,000 to 11,000 years BP there was a dry era called the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), and Egypt went through a drought. In cool weather, the sea level decreases. The Nile flood level was low, and because of the low sea level the Delta had more branches that started to multiply and deepen. These left what are sometimes called ‘turtle backs’ behind them, sediments of soil that people would settle on to be higher than the water level during floods,” Hemdan said. 

This period was followed by wet conditions. “From 11,000 to 8,000 years BP, the Nile flood was very high, and the desert also saw a lot of rain, meaning that scientists called it the ‘Green Sahara’ era,” he said, adding that human beings were free to live more widely as a result. 

From 10,000 to 8,000 years BP, the land was once again very wet, and the River Nile would increase one cm every year. There was a lot of rain in Ethiopia, and the water in the Nile turned the flood plains into swamps. The river did not deposit much sediment, and it would flood the valley all year round, Hemdan added.

“Some 2,000 years BP is a very important era for the whole planet as it was an ice age that lasted for about 1,000 to 1,500 years, also affecting Egypt,” he said, adding that the Nile at that time consisted of two channels, the main one and one that resembled the Bahr Al- Lebeni and Giza channels that can still be seen today. “We discovered this through satellite images. The first was a short, thin channel near the desert during the Pre-Dynastic Period, and the second one was a large one in the current Nile channel,” he said....  READ MORE.

Source: Al-Ahram Weekly