The History, People and Culture of the Nile Valley.

This UK publication first appeared mid 2000 and appears bi-monthly. Initially rather light-weight in content, it underwent a transformation under new editorship in mid 2004 and now carries articles of more scholarly import, though lacking footnotes.

‘Perilous descent: the Hall of the Mountain Kings’, Ancient Egypt 4.1 (July/August 2003), 30-35. An account of a descent of the Agatha Christie path and my first entry into the TT320 royal cache tomb in 2003.

‘Look on my words, and despair!’ Ancient Egypt 5.1/25 (August/September 2005), 16-19. Considering Shelley’s Ozymandias poem, one less well known by Horace Smith, and how the message may be applied to the current destruction of Egyptian monuments by rising groundwater.

‘So you want to know about… The Royal Mummies and the Valley of the Kings’, Ancient Egypt 5.4/28 (February/March 2005), 17-19. Helps to identify the most useful and available books and web-sites.

‘The Thrice (or more) – Buried Queen’, Ancient Egypt 5.6/30 (June/July 2005), 13-15. Concerning the mummy of Queen Ahmose Nefertari which apparently ‘fell into putrefaction’…and then recovered!

‘The (Royal) Mummy Returns…but is he Ramesses I?’, Ancient Egypt 6.2/32 (Oct/Nov 2005), 42-48. Showing that the mummy from the Niagara Falls Museum, returned by the Michael C. Carlos Museum to Egypt, cannot have come from the royal cache, and cannot be Ramesses I.

‘Strong Man – Wrong Tomb: the problem of Belzoni’s Sarcophagi’, Ancient Egypt 6.6/36 (June/July 2006), 22-30. Clearing up the confusion over which sarcophagi Belzoni removed when. In particular, the sarcophagus lid ‘given’ to him by Drovetti was not that of Ramesses III, and the base of the Ramesses III was not removed until later, by Athanasi.

‘Hadrian, Pharaoh of Egypt and the Birth of Egypt’s Last God, Antinous’, Ancient Egypt 9.4/52 (Feb/March 2009), 34-40. When Hadrian’s favourite, Antinous, drowned in the Nile the emperor had the young man declared a god. The circumstances were suspicious. What really happened?

The Royal Mummies of Thebes: Their Journeys and Resting Places.

This is a very large work commenced in 1997 which examines the history of royal burials in Ancient Egypt; their robbery; the creation of cache tombs; the discovery of royal tombs and caches in the modern era; the study and identification of royal mummies. It has been broken into four parts, each of which will be issued on completion.

Sections:

Part One. Finding the Pharaohs. Nearing completion, due late 2010. The discovery of royal tombs and mummies in the modern era, with particular emphasis on the royal cache tombs.

Part Two. The Rise and Fall of the Theban Royal House and Necropolis. In Progess. From the obscure tombs of heroes, to the grand sepulchres of a decling empire, to the pillaging and ‘recycling’ and creation of caches in a fallen age.

Part Three. Clues from the Caches. In Progess. How and why the caches were created at the end of the New Kingdom.

Part Four. Identifying the Royal Mummies. Now available. Buy here. A thorough evaluation of the methods used to identify Royal Mummies and how good they are. Assessment of the evidence for each individual royal mummy. Detailed contents of mummies, coffins and identifying dockets for TT320 and KV35 royal caches.

This American publication has appeared quarterly since Spring 1990 and has featured contributions from many eminent Egyptologists. Articles are fully referenced.

My contibutions are listed below:

ARTICLES
‘Hidden in Plain Sight: The facts Surrounding the Burial of Unknown Man E’, KMT 10.1 (Spring 1999), 68-76. This remains the most comprehensive coverage of the reports on the strange, contorted mummy Elliot Smith listed as Unknown Man ‘E’.

‘The Discovery of Hatshepsut’s ‘Throne”, KMT 13.1 (Spring 2002), 71-77. Discussing the possible provenance of the enigmatic artefact (actually a funerary bed) and the objects associated with it.

‘The Mummy in the Nile’, KMT 13.2 (Summer 2002), 74-79. Amelia Edwards said that her travelling companions, the ‘MBs’ threw the mummy they had purchased into the Nile. Was it a pharaoh from the royal cache? If not, then who was it?

‘Examining the Mystery of the Niagara Falls Mummy. Was he from the Royal Mummies Cache? And is he Ramesses I?‘, KMT 17.4 (Winter 2006-07), 26-34. The mummy returned to Egypt as Ramesses I cannot have come from the royal cache and cannot be that pharaoh, but who is he, and why are his arms crossed like a king?

‘Embalming Caches in the Valley of the Kings’, KMT 18.2 (Summer 2007), 46-53. The recently discovered ‘tomb’ in the Valley of the Kings is in fact an embalming cache. The role of these caches is discussed as are the clues they may offer to the location of associated tombs.

‘Death in the Nile. The Birth of Egypt’s Last God’, KMT 19.2 (Summer 2008). The visit of the Roman emperor Hadrian to Egypt was crowned with tragedy when his favourite, Antinous, drowned in the Nile. Hadrian is said to have been devastated by the loss, but the death was suspicious. Antinous died at just the right place and time to become a new god.

‘The Fury of Amen. The Cursed Play in the Valley of the Queens’, KMT 19.3 (Fall 2008). In 1909 a play was to be staged in the Valley of the Queens in which the heretic pharaoh, Akhenaten, would receive the pardon of the gods. However, the participants were beset with a series of disasters and ailments. Was it the curse of the god Amen?

‘The King is Dead. How Long Lived the King?’, KMT 21.2 (Summer 2010), 38-44. Did everyone really die young in the past? How accurate are estimates of the age attained at death by ancient Egyptian kings and queens through examination of their mummies likely to be, when skilled observers get the ages of British Victorian bodies so badly wrong?

 ‘The Enigma of Kings Valley Tomb 58,’ KMT 21.3 (Fall 2010), 35-44. How did Kings Valley tomb 58 come to contain gold foil naming Tutankhamun, and Ay as both a private individual and as king? Who is represented by the calcite shabti figure found on the tomb floor? This tomb has much to tell us about events in the Post Amarna period.

LETTERS
KMT 11.2 (Summer 2000), 3-4. Concerning Unknown Man E. KMT 13.2 (Summer 2002), 6-7. Concerning Hatshepsut’s ‘Throne’. KMT 13.4 (Winter 2003/4), 3-4.Concerning Unknown Man E. KMT 14.3 (Fall 2007), 4-5. Refuting Fletcher’s identification of the ‘Younger Woman’ as Nefertiti. KMT 18.2 (Summer 2007), 6. Amarna head in Birmingham UK identified as a fake. KMT 18.3 (Fall 2007), 6-7. Refuting Lacovara’s reassertion that the Niagara mummy is Ramesses I.
Note also that the article in KMT 13.1, and the letter in KMT 13.2, concerning Hatshepsut’s Throne are cited in Catherine H. Roehrig (ed.) Hatshepsut From Queen to Pharaoh The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2005), 257-9.

This is a new English/Arabic publication with an Egyptian editor.

 ‘The Burial of Hatshepsut’, The Heritage of Egypt 1 (January 2008), 2-12. This article reviews all the evidence for the burial of Hatshepsut, including the recent claims for identification of the one of the mummies from tomb KV60 as the famous female pharaoh. Recent CAT scan evidence provides grounds for speculating that Hatshepsut might have had Thutmose II murdered.  

‘Pharaoh Faseekh’, The Heritage of Egypt 3 (September 2008), 12-14. This relates tales of mummies (one of them a king) passed by customs as dried fish.

 ‘The Tomb of Akhenaten and the Golden Ring of Nefertiti’, The Heritage of Egypt 6. Who was buried in the royal tomb at Amarna, and was anyone buried in the other tombs nearby? Was the desecrated mummy of Akhenaten found outside the royal tomb? What is the significance of jewellery, including a gold ring of Nefertiti, found nearby?

See also Forthcoming Publications.

This was the publication of ISIS, an organisation devoted to the reconstruction of ancient chronologies. Owing to my knowledge of the TT320 Royal Cache tomb I was persuaded by David Rohl to write an overview of the discovery of the tomb and update such conclusions as could be drawn from the published data in the light of the recent re-clearance. This was the final issue of JACF as ISIS folded in 2006. My photographs here remain amongst the most useful published to date. ‘The Royal Cache Revisited’, Journal of the Ancient Chronology Forum 10 (2005), 9-25.

This society exists to study the literature and culture of our Anglo-Saxon ancestors. ‘Saxon Brigands Destroyed’, Widowinde: the Periodical of the English Companions. No. 115 (Autumn 1998). The Roman author, Ammianus Marcellinus, is cited to show that Saxons were in regular conflict with the Roman army on the continent in the 4th Century A.D.