A sandstone lintel painted with gilded solar child deities was unearthed yesterday at the Temple of Mut in Luxor Excavators from the Brooklyn Museum stumbled upon the unique lintel painted with five gilded deities during routine cleaning of the precinct enclosure wall of the temple. Topped with a cavetto cornice embellished with painted stripes, the lintel is well preserved. It is framed by rounded moulding and the decoration includes raised relief figures.
Nearly 5,000 years old, a monument known today as the Shunet el-Zebib, the only surviving example of a series of monumental cultic buildings built by Egypt’s earliest kings at Abydos, has been ravaged by the elements, attacked by animals and insects, and structurally compromised by humans over the millennia; its present day survival seems almost miraculous. One of the most mysterious of ancient Egypt’s monuments was in danger of imminent collapse. In 2001, the experts all agreed that unless steps were taken immediately this massive mud-brick structure would not remain standing much longer.
Scientists at The University of Manchester have teamed up with colleagues in Egypt in a bid to discover what medicines were used by the ancient Egyptians. The KNH Centre for Biomedical Egyptology in the Faculty of Life Sciences and the Egyptian Medicinal Plant Conservation Project in St Katherine's, Sinai, have formed a partnership to research Egyptian pharmacy in the times of the pharaohs. The 'Pharmacy in Ancient Egypt' collaboration, which is funded by a grant from the Leverhulme Trust, will compare modern plant species common to the Sinai region with the remains of ancient plants found in tombs.
The Greeks developed mathematics as a deductive science that reached its climax with Euclid of Alexandria in his masterpiece The Elements. Before that, during the ancient Egyptian era, mathematics was an inductive discipline of a utilitarian nature used to perform practical tasks such as flood control or land measurement using rope. It has been suggested that mathematics then amounted to no more than the two-times table and the ability to find two-thirds of any number. The whole structure of Egyptian mathematics was said to be based on these two simple rules, and indeed no evidence exists of a textual geometry with constructions and proofs. Yet, looking at the Egyptians' stunning monuments, as well as a civilisation that spanned three millennia, one might expect to find a similar element of grandeur in their sciences -- especially in mathematics and astronomy. How did they configure the manpower and materials needed to build more than 90 pyramids? It is obvious that to calculate the vast amount of computations they needed, the ancient Egyptians reached a fairly advanced mathematical knowledge.
Restoring a Mud-Brick Tribute to a Departed Egyptian King Before the great pyramids, ancient Egyptian kings left less grandiose monuments to themselves: fortress like sanctuaries enclosed by mud-brick walls. Inside these mortuary complexes, people presumably gathered to worship and perpetuate the memory of their departed ruler.
Egyptian archaeologists have begun restoring the world's oldest wall made of mud bricks, Culture Minister Farouk Hosni said Friday. The 5,000-year-old wall is based in the southern Egyptian governorate of Sohag.
Egypt announced Sunday the discovery of a carving dating back to the 12th century BC which could hold the key to valuable information on Karnak Temple, the largest ancient religious site in the world. According to an Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) statement, the stone carving was found during excavations at the Kibash Alley that links the Karnak with the Luxor Temple. Egyptian Culture Minister Farouk Hosni reportedly pointed out to the significance of the find which it reveals a lot of new facts about the 20th dynasty. Dr Zahi Hawas, head of the Supreme Council of Antiquities explained that the large quartzite stone, carved with 17 lines of hieroglyphics, highlights the achievements of high priest Bak En Khonso and his contributions to the grand hall at Karnak. Hawas told reporters that the stone consists of two parts: the upper part depicts King Set Nakhat lying prostrate with the blue crown on his head. He offers the symbol of justice to the supreme deity Amon Ra, that appears sitting on his throne while holding with his left hand