Search results for ""author josef wegner""

The ruins of the mortuary complex named Enduring-are-the Places of Khakaure-true-of-voice in Abydos are located at South Abydos. Erected for pharaoh Khakaure-Senwosret III (ca. 1878-1841 BC) of Dynasty 12, the Abydos complex includes a subterranean royal tomb built beneath a peak anciently called Anubis-Mountain, and a mortuary temple named Nefer-Ka (Beautiful-is-the-Ka) established for the afterlife cult of Senwosret III. Although the Egypt Exploration Fund initially discovered and examined the site between 1899-1902, the Senwosret III complex has for the last century remained enigmatic, partially through virtue of its location at Abydos. It has often been identified as an Abydene royal cenotaph. In 1994 the University of Pennsylvania-Yale University-Institute of Fine Arts, NYU Expedition initiated a renewed program of excavation at South Abydos. A focus of this work has been a comprehensive investigation of the Senwosret III mortuary temple. Excavation of the temple's well-preserved architecture in tandem with work on its surroundings now provides the basis for a detailed reconstruction of this major Middle Kingdom royal mortuary temple. The volume includes six parts arranged in twenty-two chapters with three appendixes. Part I examines the organization of the Senwosret III complex as a whole. Part II is devoted to the architecture and functions of the containment building that housed the stone-built cult structure named Nefer-Ka . Part III examines the architecture, decorative and statue program of the cult building proper and presents a reconstruction of the building's layout and appearance. Part IV discusses the significant archaeological contexts that surround the temple including external activity areas, refuse deposits and the temple's ceramic assemblage. Part V includes publication of the seal corpus associated with the temple and presents a model of the temple's administrative structure based on institutional stamp seals and private name seals. Part VI examines the current evidence pertaining to the tomb enclosure and Senwosret III's subterranean tomb. The volume includes drawings and photographs of approximately one thousand objects: relief, statue and architectural fragments, small objects, seals and seal impressions, and ceramics. In its overall characteristics, the Senwosret III complex is an innovative royal mortuary establishment. Although it has discernible roots in the preceding royal pyramid tradition, the complex as a whole displays traits which presage the New Kingdom format of royal burial complex in the Valley of the Kings. Its hidden tomb at the foot of Anubis-Mountain , paired with its cultivation-edge mortuary temple makes this site pivotal in the evolution of the Egyptian royal mortuary complex. The volume addresses our understanding of this site as either a cenotaph or burial complex for Senwosret III, and the cult of this king which was maintained at South Abydos for some 150 years until its decline at the end of the 13th Dynasty, ca. 1700 BC.

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The quartzite architectural block E16230 has been on display in the Penn Museum for 115 years. E16230 is one of the few large architectural pieces in the world surviving from the much-debated reign of the "heretic" king Akhenaten. This block is one of the most historically significant objects on display in the Egyptian galleries, yet it has never been analyzed or published. This volume addresses that glaring gap and provides for the first time a translation and discussion of the important texts on the object, along with analysis of the architectural evidence it provides. The block is part of the once intensely ornamented façade of a solar chapel ("sunshade") dedicated to princess Meritaten, the eldest daughter of Akhenaten and Nefertiti. The large (1100 kg) block originates in a chapel that was part of a royal ceremonial palace of Akhenaten named Per-Waenre ("the house of the Unique-one-of-Re"). Later, after demolition of the building, the block was reused in the city of Heliopolis as the base for a sphinx of king Merenptah (Dynasty 19). Subsequently the block underwent a final stage of reuse in Cairo in the Islamic Period where it was found ca. 1898 in the Mousky district of central Cairo. Because the block is such a major architectural element it provides considerable detail in the reconstruction of the essential appearance, decoration, and other aspects of the Meritaten sunshade. The volume addresses the significance of the piece and the Meritaten sunshade in the context of Akhenaten's monumental program. Major implications emerge from the analysis of E16230 providing further evidence on the royal women during Akhenaten's reign. The book examines two possibilities for the original location of the Per-Waenre in which the Meritaten sunshade stood. It may be part of a large Amarna Period cult precinct at Heliopolis, which may, like the capital city at Tell el-Amarna, have born the wider name Akhet-Aten, "Horizon of the Aten." Alternatively it could derive from Tell el-Amarna itself, possibly belonging to a hitherto unidentified palatial complex at that site. The book is a contribution to the study of one of the most debated eras of ancient Egyptian history focused on this long-ignored treasure of the Penn Museum's Egyptian collection. University Museum Monograph, 144

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Written to celebrate the centennial of the Sphinx's arrival in Philadelphia, The Sphinx That Traveled to Philadelphia tells the fascinating story of the colossal sphinx that is a highlight of the Penn Museum's Egyptian galleries and an iconic object for the Museum as a whole. The narrative covers the original excavations and archaeological history of the Sphinx, how it came to Philadelphia, and the unexpected ways in which the Sphinx's story intersects with the history of Philadelphia, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Museum just before World War I. The book features ample illustrations—photographs, letters, newspaper stories, postcards, maps, and drawings—drawn largely from the extensive materials in the Museum Archives. Images of related artifacts in the Penn Museum's Egyptian collection and other objects from the Egyptian, Near East, and Mediterranean Sections (many not on view and some never before published), as well as pieces in museums in the United States, Europe, and Egypt, place the story of the Penn Museum Sphinx in a wider context. The writing style is informal and text is woven around the graphics that form the backbone of the narrative. The book is designed to be of interest to a wide audience of adult readers but accessible and engaging to younger readers as well.

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This volume is the publication and analysis of the tomb of pharaoh Seneb-Kay (ca. 1650-1600 BCE), and a cemetery of associated tombs at Abydos, all attributable to a group of kings of Egypt's Second Intermediate Period. The tomb of Seneb-Kay has provided the first known king's tomb of pharaonic Egypt that included decorated imagery in the burial chamber. That evidence, presented in full-color and discussed in detail in the volume, allows us to identify this previously unknown ruler along with a group of seven similar tombs that can be attributed to an Upper Egyptian Dynasty that survived for approximately half a century during a period of pronounced territorial fragmentation in the Nile Valley. The book examines the architecture and artifacts associated with these tombs as well as presents an osteological analysis of the bodies of Seneb-Kay and the other anonymous individuals buried at South Abydos. Seneb-Kay's skeletonized mummy was recovered inside his tomb and provides a rare opportunity to examine the body of a king of this era. He is the earliest substantially preserved body of an Egyptian king to survive in the archaeological record, and the first known Egyptian pharaoh whose skeletal remains show that he died in battle. The analysis of his death in a military encounter, along with insights from the other skeletal remains indicates a line of kings whose rise to power was associated with their social background as members of the military elite. The book examines the wider implications of these bodies in terms of the pronounced militarization of society in the Second Intermediate Period. Seneb-Kay's tomb has also provided extensive evidence, through its use of reused blocks bearing decoration, of earlier elite and royal monuments at Abydos. The combination of evidence provides a new archaeological and historical window into the political situation that defined Egypt's Second Intermediate Period.

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The current volume assembles a series of studies of Middle Kingdom culture gathered around the theme of archaism, change and innovation. The papers had their origin in a symposium the University of Pennsylvania Museum hosted in 2002, and held in memory of the great Middle Kingdom scholar, Oleg Berlev. The Penn Museum organized the conference that received generous support from the Center for Ancient Studies of the University of Pennsylvania and the Marilyn and William Kelly Simpson Endowment in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at Yale University. For the publication, the authors revised and augmented their essays, allowing this volume to include up-to-date information. The editors also invited other scholars to contribute additional studies resulting in a volume that deals with the Middle Kingdom in a broader context. The Marilyn and William Kelly Simpson endowment in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at Yale University generously provided the funds necessary for the publication of the volume.

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