Inside:  Current projects in the Valley of the Kings, Steve’s meeting with the new head of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, and a picture of KV64 you will not see anywhere else!

Em Hotep:  How did you happen to be on the site of KV64 to take this photograph?

The newly-discovered tomb KV64 (left) next to KV40 (right). KV64 was discovered during routine clearing of debris by a team from the University of Basel in their work to document uninscribed tombs in the Valley of the Kings (photo by Steve Cross)

Steve Cross:  The photo was taken from the path along the cliff top above the Valley.  This was for the study I was doing on the ancient workmen’s huts which required me to walk all the paths and photograph and map the huts.  I had special permission to photograph from the Director of the West Bank.

Stephen Cross

Em Hotep:  What is the current policy on photography in the Valley of the Kings?

Steve Cross:  Photography outside and inside the tombs in the Valley is still banned I’m afraid.  I did mention this to [Dr. Mohamed el Bialy] the new head of the SCA saying it was bad for tourism and he said he is thinking of stopping the ban.  The ban on photography inside tombs will of course remain.

Close up of KV64 (left) and KV40 (right)—before being identified as a tomb in its own right, KV64 was simply called KV40b (Photo by Steve Cross)

Em Hotep:  Is there anything you can share with us about the work going on around KV64?  Elsewhere in the Valley?

Steve Cross:  The University of Basel is investigating all uninscribed tombs in the Valley, a very necessary task that has been a long time in coming.  During this work surface clearing is taking place which is how they discovered KV64.  My specific interest is that more workmen’s huts are also being uncovered.  As many of the groups of huts can be dated, they are invaluable for working out the stratigraphy of the Valley.

Detail of KV64 (photo by Steve Cross)

A Finnish Mission is also excavating the Village de Repose at the top of the col between the Valley and Deir el Medina.

Sarcophagus of Merenptah (photo by Hajor)

Edwin Brock and Lyla Brock are also working in KV8, Merenptah, re-constructing and photographing the sarcophagus.  This must be an immensely satisfying task!

KV34, Tuthmosis III, is unfortunately closed for restoration.  (My favourite tomb!)

Em Hotep:  You mentioned that you had an opportunity to speak with Dr. Mohamed el Bialy, the new Director of the Supreme Council of Antiquities.  What is your impression?  Did he speak about the near and distant future of work in Egypt?

Dr. Mohamed el Bialy

Steve Cross:  Dr. Bialy is a lovely man.  He is also a scholar, he was director of the West Bank, then Aswan, and he has also excavated in his own right, e.g. the clearance of KV42.  I had a very good chat with him and he stated that no one man now has the power to make a decision, anything now must go to the committee in Cairo.  He toured the East and West Bank monuments and I think we will see some changes for the better now.  I believe that archaeology in Egypt can now return to normal scientific work.

Obviously the state of the country is still in flux and plans for the future must wait until after the elections and a new government has also been elected.

Em Hotep:  Can you tell us about any current project s you have going on?

Entrance stairs to KV34 (photo by Hajor)

Steve Cross:  Yes, writing!  Always writing!  Is it not funny that a few seasons excavating can lead to years of study, and writing it up?  After all, there is no point in excavating unless it is published for all.  I just finished a paper on the workmen’s huts and it’s off to the journal.  This was the purpose of my last trip to Luxor.  I’m also working on another paper on just how arduous it was to cut a royal tomb, but this is on the back burner for now.  To be honest, in some ways the workers who made the tomb interest me more than the kings, their lives and working practices.  I would love to see the huts reproduced in a side wadi with men performing the tasks the ancients did in making a tomb, mixing plaster, grinding inks, filling lamps etc.  Perhaps even cutting of a sample tomb?

There is a section off cliff face to the west (right) of the staircase up to KV34 that is fractured across its bottom and is in danger of falling.  The SCA asked if it could be saved as it is full of ancient graffiti.  I am working on this and will try to get the World Monument Fund involved.

Em Hotep:  Can you tell us anything about future plans you have?

Steve Cross:  I have been asked to write a chapter for new book on the Valley that will be published next year.  I am currently collecting the research for this.

And one day, Inshalla!  I hope to excavate again in the Valley!

Stephen is a member of the Egypt Exploration Society, The Geologist’s Association (UK), the Merseyside Archaeological Society and the Liverpool Geologist’s Association. He writes and lectures on the Valley of the Kings. He was an advisor to the SCA excavations in the Central Area and KV8 digs, 2008/09 seasons.

For a the full-sized untouched photo of KV64 click here

Copyright by Keith Payne, 2012.  All rights reserved.

All pictures of KV64 are used with permission and are the sole property of Steve Cross, copyright by Steve Cross, 2012, all rights reserved.  Photos “Sarcophagus of Merenptah-KV8” and “Entrance to KV34” by Hajor are used in accordance with the Creative Commons share alike license.

Food and fun, work and play, you will be surprised by how much remains the same.  Summary, analysis, and some really cool video clips wait inside!

The Hidden History of Egypt is presented by Terry Jones, with Egyptologist and fellow Brit, Dr. Joann Fletcher serving as his guide and advisor.  It was written by Terry Jones, Alan Ereira, and Phil Grabsky, and was directed and produced by Phil Grabsky, in conjunction with Seventh Art Productions, for the Discovery Channel (original air date—January 20, 2002).

In The Hidden History of Egypt, comedian, philosopher, and social commentator Terry Jones seeks to uncover the mysteries of one of ancient Egypt’s most secretive orders—the everyday man and woman.  With all the attention given to celebrity mummies, touring treasure troves, and custody battles over “stolen” artifacts, it’s easy to forget about the people who paid the taxes, crafted the treasures, and built the monuments, which Terry Jones dismisses as the “funeral arrangements for some crazed megalomaniac.” 

But this documentary doesn’t rely solely on ancient chronicles to bring the citizens of Dynastic Egypt to life (although there is certainly plenty of that as well).  Instead, Mr. Jones asserts that in many ways life in Egypt remains unchanged, and to get an idea of how the average ancient Egyptian lived, one needn’t look further than how ordinary Egyptians live today.

Click here to view the embedded video.

To assist him in this undertaking, Mr. Jones enlists the expertise of Dr. Joann Fletcher to act as his (and our) guide.  The mix is a good one and it is clear the Mr. Jones and Dr. Fletcher are genuinely enjoying their tour of ancient and modern Egypt.  Dr. Fletcher is equally at home in the field and in the Egyptian social milieu, and Mr. Jones’ natural wit—in all senses of the word—is both entertaining and thought provoking in equal measure.   

The video opens with scenes of modern agrarian life and Dr. Fletcher’s observation that one of the key similarities between the ancient and the modern Egyptians is their spirit of cooperation.  Neighbors help neighbors with planting and harvesting, building houses and maintaining common resources, and putting on social events and celebrations, just as they have always done. 

The collective activities of average individuals working together toward common goals is a recurring theme throughout the video, and  Dr. Fletcher points out that it is this communal character that transformed the Giza Plateau into the Sphinx, the temples, and the pyramids.

This leads into a montage of clips of ancient builders that seems to have been culled from classic movies and outdated documentaries showing slaves and citizens-in-duress toiling under threat of the pharaoh’s whip.  Fortunately Terry counters this with the radical notion that the pyramid builders were not slaves, but free people working in a collaborative effort (for more on this, see Who Built the Pyramids? Part 1: The Lost City of the Pyramid Builders, here on Em Hotep).

In order to get a more realistic depiction of how the ordinary ancient Egyptian spent a typical day at work, we begin at Saqqara with a visit to the tomb of Ti “the Rich.”  Ti was an important Fifth Dynasty court official whose rather large estate employed an equally large workforce.  Apparently Ti was given to wandering his grounds and eavesdropping on his employees, and many of the rather mundane interactions he observed found their way onto the walls of his tomb.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Actually, tomb scenes depicting average people going about the business of their average days are not all that unusual in Egypt, as the ideal afterlife was basically a continuation of an ideal life.   These portrayals provide us with a detailed look at ancient life, which this documentary makes good use of by interjecting clips of modern Egyptians conducting the same activities in much the same way.

 Another example visited by The Hidden History of Egypt is the tomb of master craftsman Sennedjem at Deir el-Medina, a sort of up-scale village adjacent to the Valley of the Kings where the builders of the royal tombs dwelt.  Like Ti, Sennedjem had his tomb decorated with scenes of how he envisioned his afterlife, which included working in his garden with his wife.  Again we see video clips of modern Egyptians doing the same work with the same tools.

We then take a walk down into Deir el-Medina for a tour of Sennedjem’s house.  Dr. Fletcher explains the architecture of the house and shows evidence of how the furniture was arranged, food and water were stored, and how and where the family would have slept.  This is followed by a trip to a modern working-class Egyptian house where we see how little things have changed in 4,500 years, from the architecture down to the furniture.

The Hidden History of Egypt stands apart from other Egyptological documentaries in its ability to get its point across without the use of reenactments and computer animations.  Not that there is anything wrong with reenactments and animations per se, it’s just that this documentary doesn’t need them.  The juxtaposition of ancient artistic renderings with modern video footage and comparing ancient sites to currently occupied spaces leaves little doubt that the secret lives of ordinary ancient Egyptians are not so secret after all.  They are still going on every day throughout Egypt.

The video turns next to comparing the ancient and modern palates with a trip to the suq.  Winding our way through the marketplace we again find that the Egyptians have found little need for change.  But the scenes of beer and winemaking and the baking of bread are interrupted when Terry and Joann arrive at a tailor where they commission a kilt and robe ensemble for Terry based on an ancient pattern provided by Joann.

While the tailor weaves his ancient magic, we resume our culinary comparison with a trip to the village of Gurna, located across the Nile from Luxor, not far from Sennedjem’s house.  Over a lunch of beer and a variety of breads, Dr. Fletcher explains that bread and beer were the fuel that powered the pyramid builders.  Unlike our modern lackluster bread, the fare of the ancient Egyptians provided the calories needed to put in a hard day of cutting stone and dragging blocks.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The documentary provides another interesting example of the ancient surviving into the modern with a discussion of how the ancient Egyptian language was kept alive by, of all institutions, the Coptic Church.  When the Roman Emperor Theodosius banned pagan temples, the video explains, his edict had the collateral effect of closing the schools, libraries, medical centers, and legal courts of Egypt.  All civil life was tied to the temples, and when they closed they took with them the written, and eventually the spoken, language.

But just as the Catholic Church preserved Latin, the Coptic Church retained a distant linguistic cousin of ancient Egyptian as the official language of the liturgy.  Terry Jones points out that modern Coptic is probably as distinct from ancient Egyptian as modern English is from Anglo Saxon, but it was sufficient to help with decoding the hieroglyphs after the discovery of the Rosetta Stone in 1799.

The Hidden History of Egypt makes other comparisons between ancient and modern Egyptians, and modernity does not necessarily always come out on top.  In one segment we learn that the engineers who moved the colossal temple of Ramesses II at Abu Simbel were not able to reassemble it with the same precision as the ancients, and in another segment we find that women in ancient Egypt had superior rights and equality to much of the world today. 

And the Monty Python alumnus has his trademark moments of humor, such as when he dons his ancient Egyptian kilt and robe, along with traditional makeup and a stylish (by Old Kingdom standards) wig, for a walk around the modern streets.  Judging from the reactions he gets, some things have clearly changed over the millennia.

But The Hidden History of Egypt is by no means cheeky, it easily stands toe to toe with the best Egyptological documentaries.  The humor is functional in supporting the thesis that not only have the tools and trades of the ancients survived the ages, the sometimes quirky and sometimes sublime character of the Egyptian people endures to this day.  Mr. Jones concludes that while the pharaohs and their riches have been preserved as public property in the world’s museums,

Perhaps the real immortality is to be found among ordinary men and women, living lives that have changed very little since the days of the pharaohs.  Perhaps the hidden history ancient Egypt has been here all along, under our noses.

After viewing The Hidden History of Egypt, I am inclined to agree.

See Also

• Hemienu to Houdin: Building A Great Pyramid – Introduction
• Coptic Cairo: A Complex Design of Many Parts
• Dance of the Ancient and the Modern: The Streets of Cairo

Copyright by Keith Payne, 2010.  All rights reserved.

The clips “Intro”, “In the Tomb of Ti”, and “Lunch with Sennedjem”, are taken from the Discovery Channel video “The Hidden History of Egypt,” copyright by the Discovery Channel, 2002, all rights reserved.  These clips and the related still images are used in accordance with the fair use provisions of the Copyright Act in that they are used for purposes of education and critique.  The fair use clause provides that the reviewer has the right to use as much of an original work as they need to in order to put it under some kind of scrutiny, so long as the reviewer analyzes, comments on, or responds to the work itself, and such use does not satisfy the consumer’s need or desire for the original.

But with all the jars now opened, work on KV63 is far from over and the most exciting discoveries are certainly yet to come.

Dr. Schaden had three major goals for the 2009 season:  finish mapping the KV63 complex, open and examine the sixteen jars that remained sealed, and get as far as possible into the process of removing the resin from the coffins (Source: Schaden, Otto J.  “KV63 Season 2009.”  KMT vol. 20, no. 3, pp. 18-29).  On March 17, 2009, Dr. Schaden announced that the mapping had been completed.  With the opening of the remaining jars, that leaves the coffins.

Of course, treatment and analysis of the coffins is just one part, albeit a major one, of the work ahead.  We still have no idea of what purpose KV63 originally served.  It was probably intended to be a tomb, but for who?  It appears to be constructed in a style consistent with Eighteenth Dynasty tombs.  Was it temporary storage for the mummy of someone we may have heard of? The removal of the resin from the coffins could reveal clues as to who they were made for, which may tell us something about KV63.

The journal entry states that in addition to the work on the coffins, Dr. Schaden’s team will begin more specialized studies of some of the other artifacts in early 2010.  There is also a section on the symposium held to mark the opening of the Carter House back in November, and some additional projections about 2010.    You can read Dr. Schaden’s journal and follow the team’s progress at the official KV-63 website.

There is an article in the works for Em Hotep! which will serve as a reference point for future discoveries, stories, and announcements about KV63.  The reference article will begin with Dr. Schaden’s serendipitous discovery and will bring the reader up to the current season.  If you have been following the story of KV63 as it unfolded, then the coming reference article may not have much news for you, but if you don’t know KV63 from R2D2, then expect a full account here in early January!

Copyright by Keith Payne, 2009.  All rights reserved.

The Children’s Museum, which just bid farewell to the Tutankhamun:  The Golden King and the Great Pharaohs travelling exhibit last week, has a special relationship with Egypt so it should come as no surprise that they would continue to deliver Egypt to the region, an easy drive from the Louisville and Kentuckiana area.

The tomb of Seti I (KV17) is the largest tomb discovered in the Valley of the Kings to date.  The tomb was discovered in 1817 by Giovanni Battista Belzoni and was originally believed to be about 328 feet long.  More recent excavations have shown the tomb to be at least 446 feet long, and there is reason to believe that more remains to be discovered.  The tomb of Seti I is one of the most exciting digs currently underway in Egypt.

The tomb of Seti I (KV17) is the largest discovered in the Valley of the Kings to date (Photo by Jean-Pierre Dalbera)

Painted hieroglyphs in bas-relief from the wall of KV17 (Photo by Jon Bodsworth)

In addition to being the largest tomb in the Valley of the Kings, KV17 is also one of the most richly decorated.  Every wall of every passageway and room is adorned with intricate raised reliefs and vividly colored hieroglyphs and paintings.  The second pharaoh of the Nineteenth Dynasty, and father of Ramesses the Great, Seti I ruled Egypt during one of its most culturally and artistically productive periods, and his tomb reflects this sophistication.

The work to stabilize and preserve the tomb of Seti I is a continual process (Photo by Jean-Pierre Dalbera)

As part of an exhibit called National Geographic Treasures of the Earth, the Seti I section will be a partial replica that will teach kids about hieroglyphics, archaeology, and site conservation.

Heroic efforts have been made to stabilize and preserve KV17, and young future archaeologists will gain an appreciation for the kind and amount of work that goes into protecting these heritage sites for generations to come.  Due to open in late 2011, Dr. Patchen will be making a more detailed announcement about the exhibit in the next few months.

Anubis guarding the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis skywalk (Photo by Meredith Hayden)

Young people (and the young at heart alike) will have an opportunity to enjoy the next best thing to standing within the tomb of Seti I.  The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis has a reputation for transporting its visitors to distant locations on a grand scale.  In a current exhibit called Take Me There: Egypt, kids can board a two minute simulated Egypt Air flight that lets out in a 13,000 square feet reproduction of Egyptian urban and rural settings where they can interact with “locals” and participate in cultural events.

To learn more about Take Me There: Egypt, and to learn what other archaeological sites wil be featured in the National Geographic Treasures of the Earth exhibit, be sure to read the full interview with Dr. Jeffrey Patchen, which will premiere on Monday, November 9, 2009, on Em Hotep!  We will be talking about how the Tutankhamun travelling exhibit came to Indianapolis, Dr. Patchen’s involvement with the Suzanne Mubarak Children’s Museum in Cairo, and a number of other issues of interest to local and international readers.

Copyright by Keith Payne, 2009.  All rights reserved.

Photo “La tombe de Sethi 1er (KV.17) (Vallée des Rois, Thèbes ouest) – 2.jpg” by Jean-Pierre Dalbera, “Image-La tombe de Sethi 1er (KV.17) (Vallée des Rois, Thèbes ouest) -3.jpg” by Jean-Pierre Dalbera, “Hieroglyphs from the tomb of Seti I.jpg” by Jon Bodsworth, are provided courtesy of Wikimedia Commons  and are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License. In short: you are free to share and make derivative works of those files under the conditions that you appropriately attribute them, and that you distribute them only under a license identical to this one. Official license 

Jenny the Egyptian Scribe from The Egyptian Yell has a Toast to Tutankhamun from the San Francisco Chronicle.  She also brings us a book review on Itamar Singer’s The Hittites and Their Civilization.  Read Book – The Hittites’ Thousand Gods.  And while you are over at the Yell, check out Exhibit:  The Art of Death in Ancient Egypt.

Kate Phizackerley from News from the Valley of the Kings has some great posts on that famous royal necropolis.  Exploring the possibilities of the enigmatic KV63, Kate writes KV63 and Nefertiti?  She also takes a look at a mummy posing with Dr. Hawass, er..  make that Dr. Hawass posing with a mummy:  Dr. Hawass and the KV55 Mummy.

Speaking of the Valley of the Kings, Jane Akshar of Luxor News fame warns No cameras/photos in Valley of Kings.  She also has an informative post on a New Theory on Tutankhamun’s parents but will Zahi back it?  That’s right, someone else is weighing in on the subject of the genetic mapping of the Eighteenth Dynasty.  Em Hotep! readers should check this out!

Page Strong from The Mummy’s Wrap brings us the latest installment in her long-running series on Ancient Egyptian Medicinal Practices (Part 13).  Clearly a lot of work and research is going into this blog series, so check it out.

For our latest Reflections in the Nile, Su Bayfield takes us out for a day at the museum.  Read Luxor Museum Extension. 

Vincent Brown gives us an update on the Giza Caves story over at Talking Pyramids.  Check out Update on the ‘Giza Caves’ from P Manuelian.  Also, if you are not following Vincent’s Friday Photo series, you should be!  Check out this classic (and classy) shot of the Entrance to the Great Pyramid, and this kind of eerie photo of the Serapeum at Saqqara.

Over at Tim’s Egyptians, Tim Reid has a nice piece on the Arts of Ancient Egypt:  Museum of Fine Arts Highlights.  Tim also brings us an interesting article about the prophets of Khemet:  Gods Prophets in Egypt.

My fellow bloggers at Heritage Key have their usual awesome collection of Egyptian offerings.  Prad Patel brings us more of Sandro Vannini’s photography with this exploration of Tomb KV63 – Storage Room?  [Story no longer online] 

Owen Jarus has some odd goblets from Abydos:  Ritual Pottery Find at Terrace of the Great God at Abydos. 

Malcolm Jack has an article on the floods of ancient Egypt.  Check out Tears of the Gods:  Ancient and Modern Floods in the Valley of the Kings.

Copyright by Keith Payne, 2009.  All rights reserved.

Zahi Hawass has released a new video, which premiered at Heritage Key, with some of the recent discoveries at Dra Abu el-Naga, including some details about the tomb of Amun-Em-Opet, the Supervisor of Hunters.

Dr. Hawass relates that his team has discovered three tombs at Dra Abu el-Naga, but previously not much had been detailed about two of them.  We knew that one of the tombs belonged to Amun-Em-Opet, a Theban court official who served as the Supervisor of Hunters at some point during the Eighteenth Dynasty, probably closer to the end than the beginning.  But all we knew about the other two tombs was that they were “undecorated.”  Odd, that, considering that they do indeed have some lovely decorations at the entrance, and are to my understanding unexcavated.

To see the video and get the rest of the details, check out Heritage Key, where I blog about it under my daytime name, Keith Payne:  Dr. Zahi Hawass’ Video with the Latest Discoveries from Dra Abu el-Naga.

One additional comment I will add here.  Ancient Egyptian tombs are often reused, so there is nothing too uncommon about that.  It turns out that Amun-Em-Opet’s tomb was commandeered at some point by someone identified only as “Ray.”  For some reason that tickled my funny bone.  There’s just something kind of, I don’t know, blues-y about having your tomb jacked by some cat named Ray.  It’s so very Third Intermediate Period..

Photograph ”Queen Ahhotep I’s sarcophagus.jpg” by Hans Ollermann, is provided courtesy of Wikimedia Commons  and is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License. In short: you are free to share and make derivative works of those files under the conditions that you appropriately attribute them, and that you distribute them only under a license identical to this one. Official license 

ALL OTHER photographs and text are copyright by Keith Payne, 2009, all rights reserved.

There are a couple of pieces that give us an idea of how the workmen spent their leisure time, and all I can say is boys will be boys..

Dr. Hawass shares several much more interesting pieces, including a floor plan for a tomb and an inventory of the daily food requirements for the workers.  There are a couple of other pieces, but you will have to check them out on Heritage Key, where I blog about it under my daytime name, Keith Payne:  Dr Zahi Hawass Shows New Artifacts Discovered in the Valley of the Kings.  There you can check out the video, plus individual snapshots of the artifacts by Sandro Vannini.

I have to admit I was a little disappointed that there was no mention of KV64, although the artifacts are obviously related to the search for the next tomb from the Valley of the Kings.  And in my blogpost on Heritage Key I raise the possibility of a Zahi Hawass in the Valley of the Kings: Part 3 clip, but a little birdie has since told me no such video is in the works.  But October is just around the corner, so you can expect things to really start to heat up.

Copyright by Keith Payne, 2009.  All rights reserved.

The bloggers from Heritage Key have a couple of choice offerings from Egypt this week.  From Ann, we have Zahi Hawass’ response to the new book by Andrew Collins, Beneath the Pyramids:  Egypt’s Greatest Secret Uncovered, and in the Comments part of Ann’s blog post, Andrew Collins responds to Dr. Hawass’ response. 

Sean Williams has a great piece on solar architecture with Plumb With the Sun:  Is Karnak Temple Egypt’s Stonehenge?

There is also a beautiful piece at Heritage Key on Tutankhamun’s Golden Death Mask featuring Sandro Vannini’s photography.

Jane Akshar of Luxor News has some exciting news from Luxor—new excavations!  Read New Excavations starting next Saturday at Luxor Temple.

Kate Phizackerley from News from the Valley of the Kings has a great post about the 2009 season report from the University of Basel, who have a team working the Valley of the Kings.  Check it out at University of Basel 2009 Report. 

Also from Kate, would you like to blog about something related to Egypt, but can’t commit to running and maintaining a blog of your own?  Well, your chance is coming very soon.  Read Pre Announcing Ancient Egypt 4All. 

Page Strong from Mummy’s Wrap just posted Ancient Egyptian Medicinal Practices Part 12.  Why haven’t you heard of Parts 1 through 11?  Because I just found Mummy’s Wrap!  Spend a little time looking around her site, it’s very well done.  And since I am a latecomer to the series, I’ll post a link to the Introduction to Ancient Egyptian Medical Practices to get you started off right.

EgyptianScholar at The Egyptian Yell has more about Egyptian medicine, but you’ll have to read Filming the Mummy at the Manchester Museum to find out what.  And while you are over there, check out a Picture of Groundwater Testing Under the Great Sphinx.

This week Su Bayfield over at Reflections in the Nile takes us on a Day Trip to Kharga Oasis.  This is not a usual stop on the typical traveler’s itinerary, and Su’s words and photos bring the experience to you.

From Talking Pyramids, Vincent Brown brings us our weekly dose of forensic mummy studies with an Update on the Brooklyn Mummy Scans.  And for your bookshelves, Vincent offers a chance to win a free signed edition of Michelle Moran’s Cleopatra’s Daughter!

From The Egyptians, Tim Reid has a couple of book reviews this week:  The Nile and the Egyptian Civilization by Alexander Moret, and The Pyramids of Ancient Egypt by Aidan Dodson.

As always, Em Hotep! is open to suggestions from our readers for blogs to be featured in the Blogroll Roundup.  Do you know of or run an active blog on subjects related to Egyptology?  Then leave a note here in the comments section, or click on Send me an Email under Contact Shemsu in the sidebar. 

But are there any hints about where the Next Big Thing from the Valley of the Kings may be located?  Hmm.

I blog about it under my daytime name, Keith Payne, over at Heritage Key:  Tomb KV64 in the Valley of the Kings: Nefertiti, Queen Tiye, or Weret-Whats-Her-Name?   You can read my ruminations and check out the video over there.

Did I mention there is some really stunning photography by Sandro Vannini?

But if that little snafu prompts extra caution and discretion in the hunt for KV64, then that’s a Good Thing.  Over at Heritage Key, I provide a little primer on this developing story..

The story of KV64 starts with the search for KV63, and this is a tale with more than a couple twists and turns.  There is a good chance that KV64 will be announced this fall or winter, so you will want to know the entire back story.  Hop over to Heritage Key, where I blog about this under my daytime name, Keith Payne:  Ramesses, Thutmose or Nerfertiti? The Search for KV64.

For a blog that specializes in the search for KV64, don’t miss Kate Phizackerley’s News from the Valley of the Kings.  Kate has devoted a considerable amount of time and effort to staying on top of this story.  

Photograph “Rubble being cleared” by drewnoakes is courtesty of Heritage Key–All rights reserved.