Re -Train Your Brain To Happiness: Egypt

Showing posts with label Egypt. Show all posts

November 15, 2016

Egyptian Mummy And Temple 4200 Years Old With Well-Preserved Art Revealed

From the Guardian:

The mummy, bound with linen stuck together with plaster, was in a brightly coloured wooden sarcophagus buried near a temple from the era of the warrior king Thutmose III.

The tomb was likely to have belonged to a nobleman, Amenrenef, who would have been a servant of the royal household, the ministry said.

The archaeological team’s head, Myriam Seco Alvarez, said the mummy was adorned with many colourful decorations recalling religious symbols from ancient Egypt, such as the goddesses Isis and Nephtys displaying their wings, and the four sons of Horus.

Evidence suggests that the practice of wrapping bodies to preserve them after death in Egypt dates back as far as 4500BC.

Luxor, a city of about 500,000 people, has many temples and tombs built by pharaohs. It is a key site for Egypt’s tourist industry, which has been battered by political instability and jihadi violence since the 2011 revolution that toppled the longtime dictator Hosni Mubarak.

From My Modern Met:
By Christine Mitchell

Scattered throughout modern Egypt are many ancient temples which are famous for their splendor and historical significance. The perfect example of one of these breathtaking displays of luxury is the Temple of Hathor.

Built around 2250 BC, the artwork that runs throughout the building is remarkably well kept, despite being thousands and thousands of years old. As the main temple within the significant Dendera Temple complex, it is known for being one of the best-preserved sites in all of Egypt.

Facing the Nile, the sanctuary layout is classical Egyptian, containing stunning examples of Ptolemaic Egyptian artwork including depictions of Cleopatra and her son, fathered by Julius Caesar. The temple itself was built to worship the Ancient Egyptian goddess Hathor, who personified feminine love, healing, and motherhood. Imposing columns have been carved to bear the face of the goddess, complete with the cow horns she is typically shown to bear.

Though the entire temple is magnificent, it is the ceiling that remains the true masterpiece. Recently, workers carefully removed hundreds of years of black soot which accumulated as a centuries-old Arab village established camp within the temple.

Through the restoration, a spectacular and vibrant painting overhead was slowly revealed. Decorated with a complex astrological chart of the heavens and zodiac signs, the ancient temple ceiling now offers a highly detailed setting to study or just a lovely scene to visit and be swept away by the antiquated opulence.
For a 360 degree view go here.

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November 04, 2016

Tutankhamun: Mini-series About The Most Famous Archaeological Find Of All Time

Great to see Sam Neill again, and also Max Irons who was in "Woman In Gold" as well.

Same Niell has done some terrific movies. Filmography here.

This discovery would have been so much harder had not Jean-François Champollion deciphered the Rosetta Stone.It took him a very long time to do this.

King Tutankhamun is possibly the most famous pharaoh ever, but in reality he did very little to warrant this.His incredible tomb made him so famous.

Cleopatra is equally famous, but she actually did quite a lot!

His father, Akhenaten, was virtually wiped from history because he was possibly the first monotheist ever. His mother, Nefertiti, is also incredibly famous because of the bust of her which resides in a German museum. She was known for her beauty.

This story was depicted in the movie "The Egyptian", which is always worth watching.

One was a flamboyant aristocrat with a passion for fast cars, erotic photography, gambling and racehorses. The other was a dour and prickly archaeologist who it was said had “a chip on his shoulder” and could pick a fight in an empty room.
The Fifth Earl of Carnarvon George Herbert and Howard Carter were the most unlikely of associates yet the two men, who on the face of it had so little in common, collaborated successfully to make the most famous archaeological find of all time.

A new four-part ITV series Tutankhamun, which begins this Sunday, tells the story of that find and how, thanks to Carnarvon’s riches and Carter’s stubborn perseverance, the 3,300-year-old tomb of the Boy King of ancient Egypt was unearthed in the Valley of the Kings in 1922.

The discovery made both men global celebrities and led to a wave of “Tutmania” across the world but for Carnarvon the euphoria was short-lived as he died just five months later – his untimely demise taken by some as evidence of a mummy’s curse.

The Earl, known to his friends as “Porchy”, only became associated with Carter and digging for ancient tombs in Egypt by accident. In his youth the devil-may-care Etonian, who loved to wear the best clothes and chain-smoke cigarettes in a long holder, showed little interest in academic matters.

“At Cambridge University he was more often at the races than at lectures,” noted Middle Eastern scholar HVF Winstone. Porchy sailed round the world when he was 21 and two years later he inherited his title and the family seat, the magnificent Highclere Castle in Hampshire – later the setting for TV series Downton Abbey.

(No coincidence that the dog in the show is called "Isis").

“His handsome features and rather diffident manner – he was sometimes thought to be a prototype of Wodehouse’s Bertie Wooster – made him popular with all classes of people wherever he went,” wrote Winstone.

In 1903 Porchy was driving his car on a country road in Germany at his usual breakneck speed when he swerved to avoid two carts and was seriously injured. His doctors advised him to go to Egypt to convalesce. It was there that he became hooked on Egyptology and decided to finance his own excavations.

Carter had first arrived in Egypt in 1891. The son of a wildlife artist from Norfolk he had none of the social advantages bestowed by birth on his future benefactor. His interest in all things Egyptian began when he was employed as a draughtsman at Didlington Hall, home to one of the largest collections of Egyptian art in England.

Carter had been in Egypt on and off for 16 years when he first encountered Carnarvon. The two men, from very different backgrounds, were both determined to unearth old tombs – and in particular that of the Boy King who had ruled for around 10 years in the 14th century BC.

Carnarvon, the great racing enthusiast, declared that he’d rather find an undisturbed tomb than win the Derby. Carter started working for the nobleman in 1907 but in 1914 his excavations had to be put on hold because of the outbreak of the First World War.

In 1917 he resumed his work with Carnarvon once again ready with the funds. But the years passed and still there was no discovery. By 1922 the Earl had spent around £50,000 on excavations with very little to show for it. Understandably his patience was running out but at Highclere Castle in June 1922 Carter managed to persuade his patron to finance one more season of digging.

On November 6 that year Carnarvon received a coded telegram from Carter. It read: “At last have made wonderful discovery in Valley. A magnificent tomb with seals intact. Re-covered same for your arrival. Congratulations.” Carnarvon headed to Egypt and on November 26 he and Carter prepared to view the antechamber.

“I was struck dumb by amazement and when Carnarvon, unable to stand the suspense any longer, inquired anxiously, ‘Can you see anything?, it was all I could do to get out the words, ‘Yes, wonderful things’,” Carter later wrote. The first press report of the discovery a few days later caused an international sensation.

“In private houses, hotels, subways, suburban trains, theatres and in Wall Street everywhere one goes one hears constantly of the great Pharaoh and his treasures and the light that is about to be thrown on a historical mystery,” it was reported from the US.

On his return to Britain the Earl had an audience with the King. Keen to see a return on his considerable investment Carnarvon sold exclusive newspaper rights and began to discuss film deals. But disagreements with Carter about rights to the tomb’s artefacts occurred.

The two men had a heated row – and shortly afterwards Carnarvon was bitten by a mosquito. He cut the inflamed bite while shaving and blood poisoning and then pneumonia developed. He passed away at the Continental Hotel in Cairo in the early hours of April 5, 1923. He was 56.

Just before he died the lights in the Egyptian capital are said to have gone out, with no explanation given for the blackout. But what really inspired the idea of a curse linked to the discovery of Tutankhamun was the news that thousands of miles away at Highclere, the Earl’s devoted dog, a three-legged fox terrier called Susie, “howled inconsolably” and died – at the same time as her master.

In addition there were reports that on the day Tutankhamun’s tomb was opened a cobra – the snake that was regarded as a symbol of royalty in ancient Egypt – had entered Howard Carter’s house and eaten his pet canary.

The Daily Express reported: “The death of Lord Carnarvon has been followed by a panic among collectors of Egyptian antiquities. All over the country people are sending their treasures to the British Museum, anxious to get rid of them because of the superstition that Carnarvon was killed by the ‘ka’, or double of the soul of Tutankhamun.”