Professor Naguib Kanawati of the Australian Center for Egyptology at Macquarie University believes that the history of Egyptology should be, if not rewritten, then substantially corrected and supplemented.
Checking research on the history of Egypt, Kanavati discovered many factual errors and inaccuracies that gave rise to misinterpretations and theories. Modern science and technology allow Egyptologists to more accurately dispose of factual materials that have fallen into their hands for more reliable conclusions.
He made records of ancient drawings and hieroglyphs that chronicle the lives of high-ranking officials of Ancient Egypt - priests and officials from the 4th Dynasty, from which the construction of the great pyramids began. Its results indicate that archaeologists and Egyptologists of the past missed a lot from the life of the noble people of Ancient Egypt, and confused something.
Although many of the drawings and hieroglyphs were already known at the beginning of the last century, Professor Kanawati discovered many errors.
He said he was amazed to find the famous German work, which was considered almost the "Bible of Egyptology", with a mass of "errors."
One of the areas of research of Professor Kanavati was to study the life of the so-called "Viziers". The vizier held the highest position in the ancient Egyptian administrative system. The name "vizier" is Turkish and means "the right hand of the lord."
Previously it was believed that in the 5th Dynasty, in the era of 2550 BC, the position of vizier could be awarded to any noble person, depending on their merits and abilities. However, as Professor Kanawati says, his study of the lives of four generations of viziers during the 5th Dynasty showed that none of them came from a non-royal family.
“This is a major change that needs to be made in our understanding of Egyptian society. Perhaps the candidate for the vizier was selected according to merit and merit, after all, the Pharaoh's family is huge, but it was not absolutely open to all officials,”he says.
Promotional video:
He also argues that there are arguments that both the vizier and other upper classes could have lived in polygamy. It was previously believed that only Pharaoh was allowed to have many wives, and that this was a kind of privilege that was granted to him because he was considered a deity.
Professor Kanavati says that in order to determine the degree of polygamy throughout ancient Egyptian society, it is important to examine the tombs of the lower classes. Alas, the life story of ordinary people is lost over time, because their graves are hidden under the sands of the desert.
“I suspect that a hundred years ago, archaeologists and Egyptologists relied on draftsmen's drawings and fuzzy photographs while writing reports at home in the library,” Kanawati said. Therefore, he believes that everything should be rechecked.
Professor Kanavati says his main interest lies in the study of the graves at Giza. “I do not intend to change Egyptian history. I only intend to fix it,”he says. "People can argue with my interpretations, but they cannot argue with my photographs."
In the meantime, all his research is hampered by other archaeologists.
He says that the Egyptian authorities do not want to carry out any more excavations until the reports on the excavations already carried out by previous archaeological groups are published. And they are right. “Archaeologists are quick to dig and slow to publish results. One archaeological team excavated for 35 years and eventually published nothing. Who benefits from this?”Said Professor Kanavati.
“I have worked in Egypt since 1979 and I have never returned without publishing my previous research.”
As an argument, he cites his 35 books, written in 22 years of work.
Recently, Egyptologists have been "lucky" especially often. PRAVDA. Ru wrote about important discoveries made by scientists in recent years. And just the other day, Egyptologists made a unique find that sheds light on many white spots in the history of the ancient world.
The papyrus scroll found inside the mummy brought new valuable information.
Just like we wrap trash in a newspaper today, during the era of the second century BC. the mummy's creator took a scroll of the poem and used it as filler for the body of the deceased. The papyrus roll remained hidden in the mummy's breastbone until re-examination in the early 1990s. But today, what was once viewed as unnecessary paper trash in antiquity, is the oldest example of Greek poetry and carries an important source of information about the past.
To study this ancient scroll as far as possible, the Department of Ancient History at the University of Cincinnati convened an international meeting of scholars November 7-9. More than 60 experts from the fields of papyrology, Hellenistic and Roman literature, artistic history and studies of antique drawings, etc., will gather in Vernon Manore for the New Posidippus Conference, analyzing this new exhibit.
Prior to the discovery of the scroll, scholars knew of only two brief poems or epigrams on papyrus, and both were attributed to the ancient Greek poet Posidippus, who was known before the new scroll as the author of more than 20 other epigrams. The new scroll contains 110 new epigrams of Posidippus in addition to the two already known.
Scientists do not know anything about the body mummy and its origin, because it is a private burial of a not very noble person.
The text of the scroll contains omens, dedication, epitaphs, descriptions of statues, information about races, shipwrecks, means and methods of treating diseases. In this regard, this scroll constitutes the most significant discovery of previously unknown Greek literature.
The length of the scroll and its excellent condition after 2,200 years have allowed us to convey to us information about how the poetry of ancient Greece was spread in that early period.
The information in the scroll shed new light on history, especially on women. Posidippus wrote his poems for the Ptolemaic Dynasty of the rulers of Egypt, who inherited this part of the former empire of Alexander the Great after his death. In the initiation section, epigrams praise the cult of the queen, who was considered a goddess after her death. In the section on horse racing, Posidippus praises the successes of the three queens of the Ptolemaic Dynasty for their success in the chariot races that they won throughout the Greek world.
Provides new information about papyrus and artistic history. The section on statues contains links to three of the most famous Greek sculptors - Polycleitus, Myron and Lysippus.
Most of Greek literature has come down to us only after being copied dozens of times in manuscripts over two millennia. Papyri from Egypt are our only source of new texts in Greek literature, and significant finds like this are very rare. Most of the papyri are just idle talk, containing texts that do not carry any information. In this case, some fortunate coincidence made the creator of the mummies stick the most valuable piece of papyrus for us into the body of the deceased.