Stephen Quirke

Middle Kingdom Studies

Carol Andrews

Facsimile Drawing

The Rosetta Stone

Mark Collier

The University College London Lahun (Middle Kingdom) papyri constitute one of the most remarkable harvests of papyri of any age. This volume communicates the content of the surviving letters and letter fragments from the Petrie excavations at Lahun in an accessible and affordable format.

Letters

The UCL Lahun Papyri

Accompanying CD-ROM contains pictures related to accompanying text.

Accounts

David O'Connor

Mysterious Lands covers two kinds of encounters. First, encounters which actually occurred between Egypt and specific foreign lands, and second, those the Egyptians created by inventing imaginary lands. Some of the actual foreign lands are mysterious, in that we know of them only through Egyptian sources, both written and pictorial, and the actual locations of such lands remain unknown. These encounters led to reciprocal influences of varying intensity. The Egyptians also created imaginary lands (pseudo-geographic entities with distinctive inhabitants and cultures) in order to meet religious, intellectual and emotional needs. Scholars disagree, sometimes vehemently, about the locations and cultures of some important but geographically disputed actual lands. As for imaginary lands, they continually need to be re-explored as our understanding of Egyptian religion and literature deepens. Mysterious Lands provides a clear account of this subject and will be a stimulating read for scholars, students or the interested public.

Mysterious Lands

Ute Wartenberg

R. B. Parkinson

Bridget Leach

One of the most remarkable inventions of ancient Egypt was the making of paper from the papyrus plant. As early as 3000 BC sheets and rolls of papyrus provided an ideal surface for writing with reed pen and cakes of carbon black and red ochre pigment. Egyptian scribes used papyrus for administrative records, legal documents and letters of business and personal life. Equally important for our understanding of ancient Egypt, papyrus was used to record literary texts as well as compendia of knowledge such as the famous Rhind mathematical papyrus. Religious hymns and litanies are recorded, as are the great collections of formulae to secure life after death, the Book of the Dead.

Papyrus

Gianluca Miniaci

Juan Carlos Moreno Garcìa

Andréas Stauder

This book provides an innovative analysis of the conditions of ancient Egyptian craftsmanship in the light of the archaeology of production, linguistic analysis, visual representation and ethnographic research. During the past decades, the "imaginative" figure of ancient Egyptian material producers has moved from "workers" to "artisans" and, most recently, to "artists." In a search for a fuller understanding of the pragmatics of material production in past societies, and moving away from a series of modern preconceptions, this volume aims to analyze the mechanisms of material production in Egypt during the Middle Bronze Age (2000-1550 BC); to approach the profile of ancient Egyptian craftsmen through their own words, images, and artifacts; and to trace possible modes of circulation of ideas among craftsmen in material production.

Voices, Images, and Objects of Material Producers 2000-1550 BC

The Arts of Making in Ancient Egypt

Peter Der Manuelian

William Kelly Simpson

On Titles in the Middle Kingdom

Horn, Feather and Scale, and Ships

Exploring Religion in Ancient Egypt

First full illustrated translation with Egyptian transliteration, aiming to present with their individual histories all the compositions on prt m hrw "Book of the Dead" papyri from the New Kingdom to Ptolemaic Period. The volume gives at least one version of every written composition, together with one or more images for the essential pictorial component of all writings for which illustrations are known. Writings at the margins or outside the prt m hrw corpus, including all ascribed "Book of the Dead" numbers in Egyptological publications, are included in the final section. The translations are supported by a thematic and historical introduction and closing glossary.

Prt M Hrw - the Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead: Translations, Sources, Meanings

Going Out in Daylight

The Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead - translation, sources, meanings

Going out in Daylight – prt m hrw

Did the ancient Egyptians believe in many gods, or was it one god in many guises? The answer lies in the special relationship between the sun god Ra and the king, in his central title "Son of Ra". Stephen Quirke draws together recent advances in our understanding of the cult of Ra, from the third millennium B.C. to the Roman conquest of Egypt and the rise of Christianity. He explores the Egyptian sources for the character of Ra, his pivotal role in creation, and the way in which the Egyptians expressed the world as physical matter unfurling from the sun. Through select inscriptions and manuscripts the reader enters the closed world of the king as he carried out his principal function, to maintain life itself. With prayer, sacrifices, and the power of knowledge, Pharaoh ensured the smooth passage of the sun hour by hour through the sky. The epicenter of the cult was the temple of Ra at Iunu (the Heliopolis -- "city of the sun" -- of the ancient Greeks). All but inaccessible within the urban spread of modern Cairo, the sacred precinct of Iunu formed the greatest religious complex of ancient Egypt. Excavations at the site offer a glimpse of vanished magnificence, echoed in displaced monuments within Egypt and around the globe, and in better-preserved sites inspired by the solar city, such as Karnak and Tanis. Pyramids and obelisks represent the outstanding architectural and engineering achievements of ancient Egypt, and here their precise links to the sun cult are examined. The book closes with an account of Akhenaten, the most exclusive son of Ra, who transformed the Ra cult into the royal worship of the sun-disk, Aten. From this richly rewarding and provocative book we learn justhow central the sun and its cult were to ancient kingship and personal belief in the Valley of the Nile.

Sun-worship in Ancient Egypt

The Cult of Ra

Stephen Quirke

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