what was the first thing that attracted you to ancient egypt?
When I was five years old, my mom and dad gave me a little children’s encyclopedia for my birthday. in one of its pages different writing systems from all over the world were exposed; there was Roman, Arabic and Indian writing. the figures that really caught my attention were the hieroglyphs. I discovered – which was terribly early, I know – how to write my name in hieroglyphics. at least it only had four letters! and from that moment I thought: ‘I want to be able to do this well’. I want to be able to read this language like a real language. so that was the seed that was planted at the age of five.
You are reading: Best books about ancient egypt
that’s awesome! Let’s talk about your first option. what made you decide on an atlas? (This is a Cultural Atlas of Ancient Egypt, by John Baines and Jaromir Malek).
Actually, that was the first Egyptology book I bought with my own money. I bought it before going to university, in preparation for studying Egyptology. I have always liked atlases and find them a very attractive way of presenting the world.
this remains my most thumbed book on ancient egypt for the last 23 years. It has fantastic maps, photos, illustrations, charts and graphs. It presents what is a very complex civilization in a visually compelling and accessible way, and is written by two of the UK’s leading Egyptologists. making it an incredibly useful compendium of knowledge. and because it’s broken up into sections and sites, and there are plenty of maps and plans, it’s not too hard to get into. you can simply pick and choose from their content and find the things that interest you. it is a very accessible way of what is a rather complicated topic.
Unlike your next book, Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization, which is a bit more complicated, because it represents a reappraisal of Ancient Egypt, right?
yes. this is, in my opinion, one of the most original scholarly works on ancient egypt published in the last 50 years, and there is a particular connection to me, because the author, barry kemp, was my professor at university. he also supervised my doctoral thesis, so I know him very well. but that’s not why I chose the book!
I chose it because, as its name suggests, it’s a brilliant dissection of ancient Egypt, using not the surgeon’s knife, but the archaeologist’s palette, so to speak. It goes under the skin of ancient Egypt and examines what made that civilization tick. and it is so full of original insights; Barry Kemp is a truly original thinker. he looks at the archaeological evidence in an extraordinary way. So, for example, when he looks at the early temples, Barry isn’t afraid to take an educated guess and piece together a very plausible picture of early religious life in ancient Egypt, which fits all the archaeological evidence beautifully, but is also very imaginative.
Another great thing about the book, and one reason I think so many people love it, is that it’s full of wonderful illustrations. They are just about the most useful illustrations in any scholarly book on ancient Egypt, and they are all by Barry Kemp himself. they really bring complicated subjects to life. For anyone who wants to scratch the surface of ancient Egypt, this is a fascinating discussion and analysis.
what kind of new evaluations do you do?
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this is the extraordinary. The first edition of Barry Kemp’s book was published in 1989, and the second edition came out 16 years later, and there is a lot of new information in the second edition; this just emphasizes to me how fast the topic is moving. There have been dozens of new digs, and because Barry is the doyen of Egyptian archaeology, he has his finger right on the pulse of all the new work being done. For example, if he looks at the excavations in the northeastern Tell Ed-Daba delta, which was home to an Asian line of pharaohs called the Hyksos, who invaded Egypt around 1650 B.C. all kinds of weird and wonderful things that you normally never find in egypt. And the way Barry takes that place and brings it to life to illuminate a very peculiar episode in ancient Egyptian history is just brilliant.
next is the armies of tutankhamun by john coleman darnell and colleen manassa.
yes. This is another very original little book, which actually goes way beyond what the title suggests, because it’s not just about tut’s armies; It is also about foreign policy and internal security in the time of Tutankhamen, which is one of the most fascinating periods in the long history of ancient Egypt. what it does is bring vividly to life a particular period that many people are very interested in. This is the reign of Akhenaten, the so-called “heretic king”, who was the father of Tutankhamun.
It really evokes what life was like at the time. we normally tend to focus on great architectural achievements instead of asking ourselves, “what was it like to live in a country ruled by a despot, with a huge cult of personality and a tremendous internal security apparatus?” well this book uncovers that darker side of ancient egypt really bright. It’s something I’ve also tried to highlight in my new book, because I think we often look at ancient egypt through rose-colored glasses: we’re mesmerized by pyramids and temples, and we don’t often stop to think about the human misery that accompanied to these great civilizations. this book is a useful tool to use in rebalancing our understanding of ancient egypt.
what kind of security measures did akhenaten have?
Well, he had regular security patrols all over the capital. there was a network of roads criss-crossing the city and all the areas around the city, and there seems to have been almost permanent paramilitary surveillance of its capital city.
Who was threatening him?
probably the bureaucrat class; akhenaten had gone on a complete revolution and kicked out many of the old order, and there would have been a great number of people who would have resented him for doing that. every time he left the palace, he did so with military detachments, much like a president going out with motorcyclists. it is a clear illustration of the way power was exercised in the ancient world.
you talk about rebalancing our image of ancient egypt. but for many people, there is this popular image of all the slaves dying while building things like the pyramids…
that’s one of the enduring myths about ancient egypt that isn’t actually true! there was no slavery at the time of the pyramids. To put it bluntly, 95% of Egypt’s population worked on the land, and for three months of each year the land was under water when the Nile flooded. So what do you do to feed and mobilize an otherwise inactive and potentially restless workforce? the answer is that people were forced to give their labor to the state as a form of taxation (in a pre-monetary economy). It was a brilliant way to deploy a large workforce.
but it was still a feudal society.
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They had no choice about whether or not to pay their taxes, just like us. so to that extent, they couldn’t escape the call. but we do know that the workers in the pyramid were well housed and well fed, and certainly given rations higher than those an average worker would have received during the normal working year. and there is very good evidence for medical treatment. there are skeletons of pyramid builders who clearly suffered wounds that healed again.
tell me about your next pick, dominic montserrat’s akhenaten.
This is a very different kind of book. It’s not so much about ancient egypt as it is about the modern obsession with ancient egypt. Why does ancient Egypt seem to us such an endlessly fascinating subject? What is it that fascinates us and has fascinated countless generations? The book is about the character of Akhenaten, who is probably the most controversial figure in the entire history of ancient Egypt. he is the “heretic king” best known for being the founder of monotheism in ancient egypt. he abolished all the gods except one, of whom he said that he was the only god and his personal god.
The book looks at how Akhenaten has been co-opted and hijacked by an entirely different range of groups, from psychoanalysts to Protestant fundamentalists to gay rights advocates. Everyone has seen in Akhenaten a figure that he or she could use for their own purposes. many people would probably recognize him from the way he was depicted in Egyptian art; he was shown in a very strange way, with an elongated skull, and of course he later became famous for being the father of tutankhamun. but he himself was the king who overthrew centuries of tradition in ancient egypt to found a brave new vision of the cosmos, with himself at the center.
and why do you think we are so endlessly fascinated with ancient egypt?
I think it’s the great antiquity, and the fact that it’s so foreign to Western civilization. Greece and Rome somehow feel more familiar, while ancient Egypt seems very different, with its animal-headed gods and tombs; it’s something about that combination of antiquity and mystery that is endlessly appealing.
Let’s end with an art book, Egyptian Art in the Age of the Pyramids, by Dorothea Arnold.
I wanted to choose a book that demonstrated the intensely visual nature of ancient Egypt; this one is full of fantastically beautiful art. and it’s also one of the best recent examples of a coffee table book, if you will. but it’s a coffee table book with outstanding scholarship too.
Ancient Egypt is one of those subjects that lends itself to large-format books, and has done so for the last 200 years. this is one of the best. It has fantastic illustrations of sculpture, painting, architecture and jewelry from the first great flourishing of ancient Egypt in the age of the pyramids. If you’re going to have a book that really brings you face to face with some of the most glorious products of ancient Egyptian civilization, this is it.
one last question: after all your years of study, which artifact do you like the most?
I think the only object I would choose is a statute from a king named Thutmose III. he was a great warrior pharaoh who forged the egyptian empire from south to modern sudan and north to syria. there is the most beautiful statue of him, perfectly preserved, in the luxor museum, and i can stare at it for hours, face to face with one of the greatest pharaohs of all.
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