Ptolemy I Soter PTOLEMY I SOTER (367/6 – 282 BC)    I find the career of the eponymous founder of the dynasty which bears his name an extremely interesting personality, particularly when viewed through the lens of ancient Egypt. There a tradition maintains that Ptolemy was a son of Philip born to one of his [...]

By JILL KAMIL EGYPTOLOGY is constantly enriched as new evidence comes to light, and every discovery provides food for thought One of the most important finds of recent years has been a cache of statues found in 2003 by the University of Geneva’s archaeological mission in the ditch of a temple compound at ancient Kerma [...]

  Earl L. Ertman Several writers have discussed the jewelry found in the tomb of King Tutankhamun 1 as well as the pectoral under review that was found in a chest in the tomb’s Treasury. Among the treasures from this tomb are a variety of rings and pectorals. One of the many beautiful pectoral examples [...]

   By Marianne Luban  When Thutmose III, finally freed of the shadow of his aunt in the 22nd year of his unusual reign, decided to march east on his first Levantine campaign, there were some things to take into consideration.  According to the annals of the pharaoh, there were 330 princes rebellious toward the Egyptian [...]

As the guest of The Egyptian Society of South Africa marking the society’s 10th anniversary The Society hosted Dr. Zahi Hawass,  Secretary General of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities in South Africa on a short lecture tour – visiting Johannesburg where he gave a lecture on Monday 14th August 2006 at the Great Hall of [...]

MARKING THE REVIVAL OF THE BIBLIOTHECA ALEXANDRINA A review by Eucalyptus In the words of H.E. Mrs. Suzanne Mubarak, wife of the President of Egypt and Chair of the Board of Trustees of Bibliotheca Alexandrina: “The goal of this enormous project is to honour the past, to celebrate the present and to invent the Future [...]

MAKING HISTORY WHILE INVESTIGATING IT A report by Keith Grenville On September 5th 2000, Dr. Kent Weeks and his wife Susan arrived at Cape Town International Airport  for their first visit to South Africa and a 10-day National Lecture Tour arranged by the Executive Committee of The Egyptian Society of SA with the assistance of [...]

by Angus McBride One aspect of Egyptology that has always caused me slight irritation – and probably many others too, is the continuing confusion over royal names, with one (mainly American) school of thought preferring to call the builder of the Great Pyramid “Khufu”, whilst the other (mainly British) preferring “Cheops”, and so on throughout [...]

by Keith Grenville The fate of the original Great Library of Alexandria is shrouded in mystery. It was built during the reign of Ptolemy Soter, one of the Greek Ptolemies who ruled Egypt for the last 300 years of the first millennium BC. The library is said to have contained more than 500,000 texts from [...]