Category Archives: Egypt Bad lighting and dancing shadows lend an eerie air of animation to the figures on the walls all around us. Intricately carved pillars and beautifully restored wall-reliefs contrast with uneven stones and rough scaffolding: it truly is surreal walking after dark through structures built over 2000 years ago. My Nile river boat was rafted up […]  You could be nowhere else… The songs of Imams on the hot, heavily scented air, are calling you to prayer. The hawkers and beggars lining the streets are noisily entreating you into the bustling markets. The tourist boats rafted on the river are enjoining you to travel back to colonial times … A Nile riverboat, […]  So much of Ancient Egypt was about one’s relationship to the Gods and the afterlife. And, so much art and architecture dedicated to these relationships remains to be explored today. From the mind-blowing pyramids at Giza (see: Stories in Ancient Stone) to the amazing tombs in the Valley of the Kings (see: The Writing on […]  Hatshepsut, fifth pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty, has been called one of Ancient Egypt’s most successful pharaohs. And yet, she was almost removed from history! Hatshepsut, whose name means: “Foremost of Noble Ladies” was born to power. She was the only surviving child of King Thutmose I, the third pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty, and his primary wife. […]  The Ancient Egyptians had a complex religious system which pivoted around their belief in immortality. They saw death as a temporary interruption to life, rather than as an endpoint. But, there were several catches: the form of one’s afterlife depended on one’s social status in this life; ensuring eternal life required paying appropriate homage to the various gods; and […] |
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