Publication date: 4 June 2015
DOI: https://doi.org/10.14324/111.9780191063402
Number of pages: 120
Number of illustrations: 125
The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology
Characters and Collections
Alice Stevenson (Editor)
The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology first opened its doors in 1915, and since then has attracted visitors from all over the world as well as providing valuable teaching resources. Named after its founder, the pioneering archaeologist Flinders Petrie, the Museum holds more than 80,000 objects and is one of the largest and finest collections of Egyptian and Sudanese archaeology in the world. Richly illustrated and engagingly written, the book moves back and forth between recent history and the ancient past, between objects and people. Experts discuss the discovery, history and care of key objects in the collections such as the Koptos lions and Roman era panel portraits. The rich and varied history of the Petrie Museum is revealed by the secrets that sit on its shelves.
Introduction: a modest little museum
Alice Stevenson and Debbie Challis
Violette Lafleur: bombs, boxes and one brave lady
Helen Pike
The earliest evidence for people in Egypt: the first tools
Norah Moloney
Out of this world: prehistoric space beads
Alice Stevenson
Abu Bagousheh: Father of Pots
Alice Stevenson
Lost and found: the rediscovery of the Tarkhan dress
Janet Johnstone
The lost lions of Koptos
Alice Stevenson
King Catfish and his mud seals
Pia Edqvist
Pulling early kingship together
Richard Bussmann
A face in the crowd: chance encounters with Egyptian sculpture
Alice Stevenson
Best foot forward: items of ancient Egyptian dress
Tracey Golding
Pyramids in the Petrie
Alice Stevenson
An offending member
Debbie Challis and Alice Stevenson
Wandering wombs and wicked water: the ‘gynaecological’ papyrus
Carole Reeves
Ali Suefi of Lahun and the gold cylinder
Stephen Quirke
Seth: seductions and stelae
John J. Johnston
Termites and tapioca: the survival of Amarna’s colours
Lucia Gahlin
The sacred geometry of music and harmony
Sherif Abouelhadid
Reconnecting across the centuries: fragments from Abydos
Alice Stevenson
‘While skulls bobbed around on the waves …’: retrieving Horwedja’s shabtis
Campbell Price
Revealing animals: discoveries inside funerary bundles
Lidija McKnight
Miw: the Langton Cat Collection
Debbie Challis
Myth and science: ancient glass collections
Daniela Rosenow
‘She smites the legions of men’: a Greek goddess in Egypt
Edmund Connolly
Journeys to the Afterlife
Alice Stevenson
Living images: funerary portraits from Roman times
Jan Picton
’Tis the Season: annual exhibitions in archaeology
Amara Thornton
The archaeology of race: Petrie’s Memphis heads
Debbie Challis
Hakubutsukan: Egypt between East Asia and England
Alice Stevenson
From China to Sudan
Debbie Challis
The ancient Kushite city of Meroe
Kandace Chimbiri
He Tells Tales of Meroe
Al-Saddiq Al-Raddi
‘Camel, O camel, come and fetch and carry’: on two camels
Jennifer Cromwell
Composed of air and light: a rare survival from medieval Egypt
Carolyn Perry
‘To my wife, on whose toil most of my work has depended’ : women on excavation
Alice Stevenson
‘The largest and the only fully dated collection’: Xia Nai and Egyptian beads
Alice Stevenson
DOI: 10.14324/111.9780191063402
Number of pages: 120
Number of illustrations: 125
Publication date: 04 June 2015
PDF ISBN: 9781910634356
Read Online ISBN: 9781911307259
Paperback ISBN: 9781910634042
Alice Stevenson (Editor)
Alice Stevenson is Professor of Museum Archaeology at UCL’s Institute of Archaeology. She has previously held posts as the Curator of the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology and as Researcher in World Archaeology at the Pitt Rivers Museum. Her academic specialization is Predynastic and Early Dynastic Egyptian archaeology, but she has a written on a broad range of topics including the history of archaeology, anthropology and museums.
‘For any visitor to the museum, this book will be a very worthwhile souvenir and it will certainly encourage others to see its astonishing variety of exhibits, many of which are unique and of enormous importance to the world of Egyptology.’
Ancient Egypt Magazine
‘Expertly demonstrates the characters, both past and present, famous and relatively unknown, whom the ancient objects of the museum have ‘collected’. From the ancient maker and owner, to the nineteenth century excavator and collector, to the modern curators and conservators, Stevenson’s collection of short articles written by a variety of staff members and academics connected to the museum illuminate the characters behind the rare and fascinating objects which currently reside in this small London museum.’
Birmingham Egyptology Journal
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