Where is this? If you know, email the Editor peter@ancientegyptmagazine.com before 28 February with your answer, giving your full name, address, and a contact phone number. One lucky reader’s name will be selected at random from all the correct answers…
The long-delayed official opening of the Grand Egyptian Museum finally took place on 1 November, after a decade of announcements and postponements. The lavishly staged opening ceremony featured music and dance, speeches by top officials and cultural figures, and was…
A newly published statue found at Gisr el-Mudir (Saqqara) in 2021 has revealed an unusual family portrait. The 100cm-high limestone figure depicts a nobleman standing in a typical Old Kingdom stance with his left foot forward, but also includes images…
A well-preserved military fortress dating to the New Kingdom has been discovered by an Egyptian team at the site of Tell el-Kharouba, near to the coast in Sinai. Constructed close to the ancient ‘Way of Horus’ military road (connecting Egypt…
A large-scale geoarchaeological study of the Temple of Karnak has just been published, revealing new insights into the foundation of the complex and its relationship with the changing movements of the Nile. The international study, published in Antiquity (October 2025),…
A new study published in the American Journal of Archaeology casts doubt on the theory that Akhenaten’s city Akhetaten (Amarna) was abandoned due to plague. The researchers drew on textual, archaeological, and bioarchaeological data from Amarna, and compared this to…
Two decades of restoration work has finally been completed in the Tomb of Amenhotep III (WV22). The preservation of the tomb scenes was carried out by a Japanese-Egyptian team under the sponsorship of the UNESCO Japan Trust Fund. Restoration work…
• A German-Egyptian ScanPyramids team has discovered two previously unknown air-filled cavities in the Pyramid of Menkaura at Giza, which might suggest the presence of a second entrance on the eastern side of the monument. • Research published in the…
• King Scorpion: ritual and power at the dawn of Egyptian kingship
• The obelisk of Antinous: clues that might lead to the location of Antinous’ tomb
• Hesyre the Dentist: the life and career of a court official, scribe, and world’s first dentist
• Senusret III: warrior and innovator, one of the best known kings of the Twelfth Dynasty
• The dragon roars: exploring the long and brilliant legacy of the Welsh Egyptologists
• Egypt in Rovigo: Egyptian treasures of the Accademia dei Concordi in Rovigo, Italy
• Out and about: the ‘Art of Cusae’ in Middle Kingdom tombs at Meir
• The next best thing: the preservation of Egypt’s cultural heritage through 3-D replicas
A recent study has successfully carried out full genome sequencing of a person from ancient Egypt for the first time.
Excavations by an Egyptian archaeological mission at the site of Tell el-Kharouba in North Sinai have discovered a large military fortress dating to the New Kingdom period, c.1550-1070 BC. Initial archaeological work has revealed part of the fortification’s southern wall,…
Recent research at the Karnak temple complex near Luxor, Egypt, is offering new insights into the site’s origins and the development of the surrounding landscape over its 3,000 years of use. The famous religious site has been subject to excavations…
A new exhibition explores ancient Egypt from the perspective of its craftspeople, showcasing their creations and illuminating their experiences. Carly Hilts visited to learn more.
Philippe Rosset explores the iconography of this ceremonial weapon, which marks a transitional moment in Egyptian kingship.
Wolfram Grajetzki continues his series with one of the most important and best known kings of the Twelfth Dynasty.
Where is this? If you know, email the Editor peter@ancientegyptmagazine.com before 31 December with your answer, giving your full name, address, and a contact phone number. One lucky reader will have their name selected at random from all the correct…
Karl Harris continues his ‘Travels in an Antique Land’, discovering the ‘Art of Cusae’ in Middle Kingdom tombs at Meir – accompanied by a local snake charmer.
Roger Forshaw records the life and career of a court official and scribe who was the world’s first recorded dentist.
Campbell Price selects a collection of votive plaques depicting cats from Serabit el-Khadim in the Sinai.
Hilary Wilson explores the preservation of Egypt’s cultural heritage through replicas – the next best thing to visiting the monuments themselves.
The Egyptian government’s ‘Great Transfiguration Project’ for the UNESCO World Heritage site of Mount Sinai – the location of the 6th century Monastery of St Catherine – has caused international concern, and calls for the area to be placed on…
A new and complete version of the Ptolemaic Canopus Decree has been found by an Egyptian team working at Tell Far’oun (Tell Nabasha) in Egypt’s Sharqia Governorate. Unlike other surviving versions of this decree, which are trilingual (written in hieroglyphic,…
A new air-purification system has been installed inside the Great Pyramid of Khufu to stabilise humidity levels within the monument and prevent the erosion of the inner walls. The improved air quality will also provide a more comfortable environment for…
The Egyptian Department of Underwater Antiquities has recovered three heavy ancient artefacts from the seabed off the coast at Abu Qir Bay in Alexandria. One of them is a large quartz sphinx bearing the cartouches of Ramesses II. The team…
An Egyptian team excavating the Wadi el-Nasab site in south Sinai has discovered a copper-smelting and -casting workshop with administrative buildings at what was one of the most important ancient mining centres. Copper ingots of different sizes and shapes were…
• The gold bracelet of the Twenty-first Dynasty pharaoh Amenemope was recently stolen from the conservation laboratory of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Arrests were made but, sadly, the bracelet had already been melted down for gold. • An ancient…
In 1925, two colossal statues of Akhenaten were discovered in an unpromising area outside the eastern enclosure wall of Karnak Temple. Since then, many more have been found.
REVIEW BY ANDREW FULTON This volume is part of a series of books of ancient texts that Amber Books are publishing in hardback using traditional Chinese bookbinding methods that were first developed in the Ming Dynasty. The results are impressive…
REVIEW BY MICHAEL TUNNICLIFFE This important work claims to be the first authoritative edition to combine both transliteration and translation of the Amarna Letters since their publication by Norwegian linguist J A Knudtzon in 1915. The 1992 volume by W…
REVIEW BY ROGER FORSHAW Michelle Middleman’s new book presents a well-structured and perceptive exploration of how individuals attained administrative positions during Egypt’s early dynastic era. Focusing primarily on tomb biographies from the Sixth Dynasty, Middleman uses these inscriptions as a…
REVIEW BY HILARY WILSON Any author might be daunted by the ambitious subtitle of the ‘Brief Histories’ format, but Campbell Price has risen to the challenge. In little more than 100 smaller-than-A5 text pages, with only three randomly placed photographic…
• Hierakonpolis: the Predynastic ‘City of the Falcon God’
• Tattooing in the New Kingdom
• Palestrina GraecoRoman Egypt in a stunning Nilotic mosaic
• The reign and innovations of Khakheperra Senusret II
• Aquila Dodgson, the oft-forgotten collector and polymath
• Oxyrhynchus Papyri and the ordinary people of late ancient Egypt
• Hands: not everything is as you would expect!
• Out and about: The isolated Temple of Qasr el-Sagha
Excavations at Tell Nabasha are shedding new light on life in a delta city, and the death of its great temple. To find out more, Matthew Symonds spoke to Nicky Nielsen.
Geoffrey Lenox-Smith visits an isolated temple in the desert north of the Fayum.
A joint Egyptian–Italian archaeological mission (University of Milan) has discovered more rock-cut Graeco-Roman tombs in the necropolis surrounding the Aga Khan Mausoleum on Aswan’s West Bank (for previous finds, see AE 144). The most impressive tomb to be found so…
The remains of large multistorey tower houses have been discovered at the ancient Delta city of Imet (modern-day Tell Nabasha) in the eastern Delta by an Egyptian–British team from the Universities of Sadat City (Cairo) and Manchester. Such buildings, which…