Feb 21st, 2012 at 1:30PM: A sacred boat that lay hidden in the sands of the Sahara for 4,500 years will be restored and put on display, Egyptian authorities say.
The boat is one of a pair discovered buried next to the pyramid of the Pharaoh Khufu at Giza, also known as the Great Pyramid. They rested in long, stone-covered pits.
The first boat, shown here in this photo courtesy Berthold Werner, was excavated in 1954 ...Click on a label to read posts from that part of the world.
egypt posts
Sacred ship from ancient Egypt is undergoing restoration
Feb 21st, 2012 at 1:30PM: A sacred boat that lay hidden in the sands of the Sahara for 4,500 years will be restored and put on display, Egyptian authorities say.
The boat is one of a pair discovered buried next to the pyramid of the Pharaoh Khufu at Giza, also known as the Great Pyramid. They rested in long, stone-covered pits.
The first boat, shown here in this photo courtesy Berthold Werner, was excavated in 1954 ...Animal mummies discovered in Egypt
Feb 18th, 2012 at 11:00AM: A cache of animal mummies is among the finds from a recent excavation in Egypt.
The discovery was made by a University of Toronto team last summer at Abydos and was announced at a recent meeting. Abydos was the first burial ground for the pharaohs and remained a holy place throughout the history of ancient Egypt. The tomb of Osiris, king of underworld, was believed to be there.
Because of ...Photo of the Day: Falafel, going fast
Feb 2nd, 2012 at 6:00PM:
We at Gadling love street food. Whether it's from an upscale Manhattan cart or from a Chinese cannon, you'll find that some of the most satisfying and authentic local food doesn't come from a restaurant. Today's Photo of the Day by Flickr user micke77023 comes from Cairo, Egypt of a falafel man who seems to enjoy his product. You can almost smell the chickpea goodness emanating from his kitchen ...Egypt to reopen Avenue of Sphinxes in Luxor
Dec 27th, 2011 at 1:00PM:
The Egyptian Minister of State for Antiquities Mohamed Ibrahim has announced that the Avenue of Sphinxes in Luxor will reopen in March after a long period of restoration.
Luxor is a sprawling complex of temples and one of the greatest monuments of the ancient world. The Avenue of Sphinxes is a long road stretching 2.7 kilometers flanked by hundreds of sphinxes. It was built by the Pharaoh ...Ancient Egypt--Art and Magic, opens at the Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg, Florida
Dec 19th, 2011 at 2:00PM: Ancient Egypt never ceases to fascinate. Its elaborate religion, art, and ritual make it at once foreign and compelling. Now a new exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg, Florida, showcases some of the highlights of this unique culture.
Ancient Egypt--Art and Magic: Treasures of the Fondation Gandur pour l'Art brings to the public eye one of the greatest private collections of ...Ancient Christian city discovered in Egypt
Dec 2nd, 2011 at 3:00PM: An ancient Christian city dating to the fourth century AD has been discovered in Egypt.
Archaeologists digging at the Ain al-Sabil area of the New Valley Governorate have discovered the remains of a basilica and buildings to serve the priests. This is the first excavation at the site and researchers hope more discoveries will be made under the Egyptian sands.
Egyptian Christians trace their ...Egyptologists get back to work despite continuing tensions
Oct 15th, 2011 at 11:00AM:
Egypt has been in the news again this week with more tensions between the people and the army. What has received less coverage is the fact that Egyptologists are quietly resuming their work after an unwanted vacation. You can't keep a good Egyptologist down, and these folks are busy making discoveries and taking care of the country's fabulous monuments. Old projects are getting back into gear, ...Queen Hatshepsut and the case of the poison skin cream
Aug 21st, 2011 at 11:00AM: German archaeologists studying a skin cream once owned by Queen Hatshepsut have found evidence that the female pharaoh may have accidentally poisoned herself.
The tiny bottle, which has an inscription saying it was owned by Hatshepsut, was still partially filled with a substance that the archaeologists subjected to chemical analysis. It included nutmeg and palm oils, commonly used to soothe ...Pyramids and monasteries among the many ancient monuments under restoration
Aug 10th, 2011 at 1:00PM:
Around the world, ancient monuments are crumbling. As our heritage wears away through neglect, "development", or simply the harsh treatment of time, some countries are doing something about it.
The pyramid of Djoser, the oldest of the pyramids of Egypt, will be the object of a major restoration effort. The government recently announced that funding has been earmarked for restoration after the ...The world's most disputed antiquities: a top 5 list
Aug 3rd, 2011 at 1:00PM:
New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art announced Tuesday that it would return 19 Egyptian antiquities that have lived at the museum for most of the last century. These artifacts, excavated from the 14th century B.C. tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamun (King Tut), include a sphinx bracelet, a small bronze dog, and a broad collar with beads, among other bits and pieces. Zahi Hawass, the former Secretary ...Ancient port discovered in Egypt
Jul 30th, 2011 at 12:00PM:
Archaeologists working in Egypt have discovered a harbor on the Red Sea that was used for international trade.
The excavation at Mersa Gawasis has revealed traces of an ancient harbor. It's long been known that the Egyptians traded down the coast of Africa, but the location of their embarkation was unknown. A famous carving at Deir el-Bahari, the temple of Queen Hatshepsut, shows an ...Mummies of the World exhibition opens in Philadelphia
Jun 21st, 2011 at 9:30AM:
Mummies are endlessly fascinating. To see a centuries-old body so well preserved brings the past vividly to life. While Egyptian mummies get most of the press, bodies in many regions were mummified by natural processes after being deposited in peat bogs or very dry caves.
Mummies of the World is a state-of-the-art exhibition bringing together 150 mummies and related artifacts. It opened last ...Riddle of pyramid's secret hieroglyphs solved
Jun 8th, 2011 at 9:30AM:
Last month we reported on some secret writing discovered in the Pyramid of Cheops at Giza, near Cairo. A robot with a camera went down a mysterious passage only eight inches wide and found some hieroglyphs daubed with red paint onto the floor of a secret chamber at the end of the tunnel.
Egyptologist Luca Miatello has deciphered the writing and says they're engineering marks. They make the ...Robot discovers secret writing in Great Pyramid
May 28th, 2011 at 3:00PM:
The Great Pyramid of Cheops at Giza has always sparked the imagination. Among its many mysteries are four tiny passages running through the interior. The smallest are only eight inches square, far too small for a person to crawl through, so what were they for?
As you can see from the cutaway above, two of the tunnels angle up from the King's Chamber to exit the pyramid. Some researchers ...Lost pyramids found in Egypt
May 25th, 2011 at 8:30AM:
You'd think it would be pretty hard to lose a pyramid, yet in fact plenty have gone missing in Egypt over the years. Not all of them are giant edifices like the Great Pyramid at Giza. Most are only a dozen or so meters high and were meant to house the body of a Queen. In 2008 the pyramid of Sesheshet was discovered in the desert near Saqqara, and now a survey using infrared satellite imagery has ...Egypt's newest public wonder: the temple of the crocodile god
May 13th, 2011 at 10:00AM: Last week a new ancient site opened to the public in Egypt--a temple of the crocodile god Sobek.
Medinet Madi is located in Egypt's Faiyum region, a fertile area around a lake at the end of a branch of the Nile called Bahr Yusuf ("The River of Joseph").
The temple features a long avenue lined with sphinxes and lions, plus an incubation room for hatching the eggs of sacred crocodiles. You'd ...Ancient art stolen from Egyptian Museum recovered by police
May 3rd, 2011 at 11:30AM: Egyptian police have recovered four stolen statues, two of which were taken from Cairo's Egyptian Museum, Ahram Online reported.
Two of the statues were among several items that went missing when rioters broke into the Egyptian Museum. The other two were apparently looted from somewhere else, perhaps an archaeological site. There were scattered incidents of looting from several museums and ...Oxford's Ashmolean museum improving its world-class Egyptian galleries
Apr 28th, 2011 at 2:00PM:
The famous Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology in Oxford, England, reopened in 2009 after a £61 million ($101 million) makeover. The redesigned space is more open and airy, with more natural light and windows between exhibitions. Floorspace was doubled in size and the exhibits were made more informative and user firendly. A museum worker explained to me that part of the plan was to ...Travel caution urged but experiences await, what to do?
Apr 23rd, 2011 at 12:00PM:
Troubling events around the world can often bring official alerts and warnings against travel to protect us from harm. Savvy travelers know to pay attention to those words of caution, but not let them define their adventures. Connecting with experienced travelers can bring a fuzzy picture of what is actually happening on the ground into focus. A clear picture of the real situation from a trusted ...Reflections on Revolution - A photographer's travels through the Arab tumult
Apr 12th, 2011 at 9:00AM:
"May you live in interesting times" is a proverb with an unattributed origin. Most speculate the phrase came from China, some assume its origins to be of 20th century English design, but all agree that the phrase is a curse. We no doubt live in "interesting" times. 2011 has already brought revolution, quakes, tsunamis, government shutdowns, and an escaped cobra. Interesting is not always a ...
