Talking Pyramids: Ancient Egyptian Pyramids» Talking Pyramids: Ancient Egyptian Pyramids News

Overseer of the Great Pyramid Returns?

Vincent — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 00:53:35 +0000

Hemiunu, Vizier to king Khufu. Photo by kairoinfo4u

The return of the seated staute of Hemiunu, overseer of the construction of the Great Pyramid has been confirmed. On Sunday the Roman and Pelizaeus Museum in Hildesheim, Germany stated that it would lend the prized statue to Egypt for the opening of the Grand Egyptian Museum in 2013.

However, there are already doubts over whether this loan will go ahead after Zahi Hawass has stated that he expects the statue to remain in Egypt after the loan.

Kristina Zappen of the Hildesheim Museum said there had never been any official request from Cairo to give the statue back. She confirmed an agreement had been reached on the 2013 loan and she added that it provided for the statue to then return to Germany.

Hildesheim was not even considering giving the statue back, she added. The whole museum collection was of honest provenance.

“Every item in our collection arrived in Germany legally,” she said. If the Egyptian government were to officially question the statue’s ownership, the museum would have to reconsider the loan.

“The whole thing would have to be thought out again,” she said.

Source:
German Museum Confirms Loan of Disputed Statue to Egypt

Photograph of the face of Hemiuni by kairoinfo4u under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial ShareAlike 2.0 license.

Friday Photo: Making Way for the GEM at Giza

Vincent — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 00:25:17 +0000

Work is underway at Giza to complete the Grand Egyptian Museum by 2012

This week we return once again to the Giza plateau with this recent observation. Talking Pyramids reader and explorer Leszek Zadlo snapped this photo of some large earth moving trucks on the south-west corner of the plateau. They appear to be working in the area of the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM), the construction of which is currently underway.

Over eight years after personally laying the foundation stone, Culture Minister Farouk Hosni signed the contract last month for phase 3 of the GEM’s construction. According to Hosni, this phase would be completed in 26 months, in time for the opening of the museum around June 2012.

“It will be the biggest cultural project in the world…a cultural high dam that fulfills Egyptians’ dreams and belongs to the whole world.”

More information:
Dr Zahi Hawass: Grand Egyptian Museum
Egypt State Information Service: Culture Ministry inks contract with GEM managers
Photo of Giza by Leszek Zadlo. All rights reserved.

Friday Photo: Pyramidion of a Woman

Vincent — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 06:52:24 +0000

This weeks feature photo comes from the Brooklyn Museum’s Egypt collection:

Beginning in the New Kingdom, when the solar cycle became a major theme in art, small pyramid-shaped objects called pyramidions (which, like the pyramids themselves, were solar symbols) were made as separate funerary stelae or to cap the pyramids now built atop private tombs. On this pyramidion, its owner adores both the god Osiris and a solar deity, is protected by funerary deities, and receives libations from the gods Horus and Thoth. On the top, the goddess Isis spreads her wings protectively.

Pyramidion of a Woman, ca. 1185-718 B.C.E. Brooklyn Museum, Creative Commons-BY-NC

Medium: Limestone
Place Made: Egypt
Dates: ca. 1185-718 B.C.E.
Dynasty: XX Dynasty-XXII Dynasty
Period: New Kingdom-Third Intermediate Period
Dimensions: 8 9/16 x 8 1/16 x 5 1/8 in. (21.8 x 20.5 x 13 cm)
Collections: Egyptian, Classical, Ancient Near Eastern Art
Museum Location: This item is not on view
Accession Number: 05.336
Credit Line: Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund
Rights Statement: Creative Commons-BY-NC

Pyramidion of a Woman, ca. 1185-718 B.C.E. Limestone, 8 9/16 x 8 1/16 x 5 1/8 in. (21.8 x 20.5 x 13 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund, 05.336. Creative Commons-BY-NC

Update on the Brooklyn Mummy Scans

Vincent — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 23:14:06 +0000

Cat mummy x-ray, Brooklyn Museum CC BY-NC-ND

The Brooklyn Museum has an update on the musuem’s animal mummy research project.

In the video Lisa Bruno, head conservator of objects at the Brooklyn Museum, discusses the nature of many of the animal mummies in the Brooklyn Museum’s collection. She begins her presentation, however, with the scanning of the human mummy, Demetrios, who was scanned at the North Shore University Hospital in October 2007. Found in Hawara, Egypt, by the 1910 British school of archaeology, he was transported to the Brooklyn Museum in 1911.

He is part of a group of about 14 Roman mummies that are called ‘Red Shroud Mummies’, due the outer cover of linen being painted with red paint. Samples of the paint from six of these mummies were analyzed and they were all found to be painted with a red led paint from a common source, a region in southern Spain. This finding reveals much about the nature of trade routes in ancient times.

Not only did the team find out from the recent CT scanning that he was actually male, not female as originally catelogued, but the age of Demetrious was able to be confirmed as being 59.

Animal Mummies from Brooklyn Museum.

Lisa goes on to describe many of the animal mummies in the collection showing X-rays and pointing out many interesting features. Some of the items discussed include a guilded Ibis mummy, a metal statue of Wadjet-Bast with some surprises inside, cats with long teeth and their relationship with the domestic cat, fake cat mummies, a look at a range of mummified birds including the intricate weaving on human-shaped bird mummies, crocodile mummies and a look at resin used in mummified animals as evidence of trade routes.

Read the full story over with photos at the Brooklyn Museum website: Animal Mummy Update

Photo of the Cat Mummy X-Ray courtesy of the Brooklyn Museum / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Body Parts: A Feast For the Eyes

Vincent — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 03:24:22 +0000

In a previous post about the statue of Hemiunu, I mentioned that his eyes, which were probably made from coloured stones, were gouged out by robbers.

The Brooklyn Museum yesteday made the announcement of an upcoming exhibition Body Parts which will feature a range of other body parts from ancient Egyptian works of art in their collection. One such item is this beautiful eye made of obsidian, crystalline limestone, and blue glass which once belonged to a New Kingdom anthropoid coffin.

From the Brooklyn Museum's Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund

From the Brooklyn Museum’s website:

Body Parts features thirty-five objects that represent individual body parts in ancient Egyptian art from the Brooklyn Museum’s collection, many of which will be displayed for the first time. While traditional exhibitions of ancient art focus on reconstructing damaged works, this exhibition uses fragmentary objects to illuminate the very realistic depiction of individual body parts in canonical Egyptian sculpture. The ancient Egyptians carefully depicted each part of the human body, respecting the significance of every detail. When viewed individually these sculptures and fragments reveal ancient notions of the body, as well as details of workmanship, frequently unnoticed in more complete sculptures.

This exhibition is organized by Yekaterina Barbash, Assistant Curator of Egyptian Art, Brooklyn Museum.

Where: Special Exhibitions Hall, Egyptian Galleries, 3rd Floor, Brooklyn Museum.
When: November 19, 2009–October 2, 2011.

Image courtesy of the Brooklyn Museum, under a CC by NC ND 2.0 license

Report on the Mummies’ Trip to the Hospital

Vincent — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 04:48:19 +0000

Brooklyn Museum’s trip to the hospital with four of their mummies yesterday was an event not to be missed. Many of us all over the world were able to ‘tune in’ via popular social networks such as Flickr and Twitter.

Shelley Bernstein, Brooklyn Museum’s technology geek, delivered a running commentary with photos as the four mummies were taken from the museum to the North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset.

Tina determines the best route

The innovative use of the micro-blogging platform Twitter not only allowed many to follow the event step by step, but also allowed others to jump in and add their own two cents worth.

As Tina puzzled over a fold-out street map to determine what the best route was that should be taken, one observer Ian suggested Shelly help Tina by using the GoogleMaps application on her iPhone instead. Apparently Tina wanted a real map so Shelley checked the current state of the traffic on the iPhone instead.

Here’s one of her tweets:

brooklynmuseum: Figuring out good route to bring mummies into hospital #mummyCT

In no time at all word had spread all over the world as more people came on to Twitter to follow the event. Others were able to do so because all of messages, or ‘tweets’ as they are known as, had the keyword “#mummyCT” added to them. Others wanting to engage also used that keyword, or ‘hashtag’.

Shelley mentioned that there was an interview with the doctors from the hospital on the radio station 1010 Wins and within minutes someone had found the link to the audio and posted it to Twitter for the rest of us to listen to as we watched.

Shelley reads the Twitter responses

I had to chuckle as Shelley revealed that she could overhear doctors in the corridor talking about the radio segment and how they sounded in the interview. We were not only getting live coverage but also a lot of behind-the-scense action as well.

brooklynmuseum: just heard drs in hallway talking about their 1010wins interview – cute, right? http://twurl.nl/ih1bvi (expand) #mummyCT

We then received a snippet of the discussion between Dr Ousid and Egyptian Curator Ed Bleiberg:

Dr: there’s often a lot of air around the linens, making organs easier to see…depends on how well preserved

Ed Bleiberg: we’re interested in the organs that may still be in there…

Dr. Ousid – scanning will only take 60 seconds per mummy…

Meanwhile, Paul measured the room and hallways to determine how to best allow the the art handlers and conservators to move the mummies into the building.

As word spread around the internet other Museums began tuning in to follow what the Brooklyn Museum was doing.

Scanning begins:

Lady Hor was the largest mummy in the scanner and there was some question over whether or not she would fit:

..first mummy in the scanner is Lady Hor (we think she’s female, hoping to find out!)…resin in the brain, somthing in the chest cavity, crossed hands – still looking at gender…dr looking at pelvis to try and determine gender…

Natron sacks were found inside of Lady Hor as well as four wrapped organs – consistent with what they were expecting. Then, as the specialists were looking closer at the scans for more information, Shelly announced to the world the news that would change history: Lady Hor was not a lady but in fact a man!

brooklynmuseum: it’s a boy! – scrotum and penis pretty well preserved, but the anthropoid coffins says “woman” but going for closer look #mummyCT

It's a boy!

What a discovery! It was like a plot from a movie and we were watching it unfold live before us…and that was just the first of four mummies to be put through the CT scanner.

Mummy number 2, otherwise known as “anon man” was then scanned. Until this CT scan very little was known about mummy #2 who lived roughly around the time 300-400 BC. The scan showed that he was well preserved, had no organs and showed the brain preserved in the skull, the nose not being cracked to remove the brain. It even showed a preserved beard as indicated by his portrait.

One of the mummies was then wheeled through the hostpital for a press conference, the hospital staff gathering around snapping pics with their cell phones.

Here is part of the press conference:

Ed at press conf: ongoing process to study mummies @brooklynmuseum to determ more info cause + date of death among other things

Dr Chusid reviews prelim findings such as diffs of methods of preservation w/ diff time periods.

Drs will be trying to make 3D reconstructions in a little while – we’ll try and share those a bit later.

Ed: we thought Lady Hor was a woman because there was no beard, but CT reveals a penis

Drs saying we won’t know everything today, but will be continuing to review.

Ed: @brooklynmuseum started doing non-invasive xrays of mummies in 1936 – much better quality in CT scans today

Ed: now pronouncing mummy names for reporters (forget it, i’m not going to even *try* and go there!)

A reed in his throat?

Reporters now asking about transgender practices in egypt re: “lady” Hor – Ed: “um, no” … and then gives lots of specifics.

Ed: may need to rethink what we know about beards, lots of talk about burial practice.

Ed talking about what he learned: “shows the basic humanity of the ancient Egyptians”.

Ed: “these are our best preserved human mummies, which is why we brought them”.

Ed: two mummies, including “lady” Hor will go back on view in the galleries June 30.

Ed on who the mummies were in society: inscriptions tell us a lot, so does the quality of the coffin and the materials used.

Next mummy #3, Thothirdes was scanned and then mummy #4, Pasebakhaienipet. There were a few surprises, probably the strangest was that a reed was found in Pasebakhaienipet’s esophagus, not his SARCophagus, his ESophagus!

Brooklyn Museum’s innovative use of social networks to engage with the public has once again proved to be a great success. I am sure other museums are taking notes and learning that these tools are a very effective way of sharing this sort of information with the public.

Keep an eye on the Brooklyn Museum’s blog for more information as there will be a series of updates on yesterday’s trip to the hospital.

More information:
Mummy #1: Lady (sic) Hor
Mummy #2: “anon man”, scan showing brain
Mummy #3: Thothirdes
Mummy #4: Coffin and Mummy Board of Pasebakhaemipet

Yesterday’s post: Mummies Go to Hospital – Live Coverage!
Twitter: the source of the live reports.
Flickr: the Set of photos of the event.
Audio: Egyptian Mummies to Get CAT Scans at L.I. Hospital
Related story: LI hospital CT scan may shed new light on mummies
Related story: Demetrios Gets CT Scanned
Related story: More on mummies…

Mummies Go to Hospital – Live Coverage!

Vincent — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 01:16:09 +0000

Tomorrow morning the Brooklyn Museum will be taking their four ancient Egyptian mummies to North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset to undergo CT scanning. One of the four mummies is former royal prince of Thebes, Pasebakhaienipet, another is simply referred to as the “mystery mummy”. The aim of the scanning is to help learn more about the mummies.

“It’s possible that we will find the cause of death, history of ancient disease, and be able to verify which methods of mummification were used,” said Edward Bleiberg, the museum’s curator of Egyptian art.”

The mummies, two male, two female, will undergo a 64-slice computed tomography scan that will allow radiologists to examine the mummies in great detail.

“It’s the same procedure for living people to look at coronary arteries for blockages of the heart, but obviously the mummy’s heart is not there anymore, unless they used something to preserve it,” said Dr. Amgad Makaryus, director of cardiac CT and MRI at North Shore. “I think the thing that strikes me is the way we are able to use the very most modern equipment to study these ancient people,” Bleiberg said. “It’s a fascinating juxtaposition of the very old and the very new to gain new knowledge.”

Source: LI hospital CT scan may shed new light on mummies

Shelley Bernstein, the Museum’s chief geek has informed me that they will be covering the trip live so I have knocked up a widget and embedded it in this page so that others can follow the journey.

Come back to this page at 7am EST, or 12pm UTC to follow the action live. You’ll have to refresh the page to see the latest photos.

Twitter: the source of the live reports.
Flickr: the source of the live photos.
Read more: LI hospital CT scan may shed new light on mummies
Audio: Egyptian Mummies to Get CAT Scans at L.I. Hospital
Related story: Demetrios Gets CT Scanned
Brooklyn Museum on Twitter: www.twitter.com/brooklynmuseum