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A World Beneath the Sands: The Golden Age of Egyptology
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About This Book
A thrilling history of the West's scramble for the riches of ancient Egypt by the foremost Egyptologist of our time. From the decipherment of hieroglyphics in 1822 to the discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb by Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon a hundred years later, the uncovering of Egypt's ancient past took place in an atmosphere of grand adventure and international rivalry. In A World Beneath the Sands, acclaimed Egyptologist Toby Wilkinson chronicles the ruthless race between the British, French, Germans, and Americans to lay claim to its mysteries and treasures. He tells riveting stories of the men and women whose obsession with Egypt's ancient civilization helped to enrich and transform our understanding of the Nile Valley and its people, and left a lasting impression on Egypt, too. Travelers and treasure-hunters, ethnographers and archaeologists: whatever their motives, whatever their methods, a century of adventure and scholarship revealed a lost world, buried for centuries beneath the sands.
Reviews
"A few Americans and Englishwomen take minor roles; Egyptians are somewhere in the wings."
"The story that strings these wonderful characters together is the steady professionalisation of Egyptology — the shift, as Wilkinson puts it, from 'scoundrels to scholars' ..."
"The result is an essential portrait of how the rediscovery of '[Egypt's] ancient past paved the way for its modern rebirth.'"
"The people engaged in the discoveries are a compelling study ..."
"I think it's important to say that Wilkinson's prose style is so smooth and straight and unadorned as to be nearly nonexistent ..."
"The challenge faced by Champollion, of negotiating a tension between a buried past and an uncertain future, did not end with him, however ..."
"This comprehensive study is highly recommended for anyone interested in the exploration and study of Egypt, both ancient and modern."
"Late on in A World Beneath the Sands I realised what I should probably have studied was not Egyptology but Egyptologists."
"[A] dramatic, detailed and eccentric-packed story of the century between the decoding of the Rosetta Stone in 1822 and the discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922 ..."
"The story zips along as they race against each other ..."
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