"Human beings," the acclaimed Egyptologist Jan Assmann writes, "are the animals that have to live with the knowledge of their death, and culture is the world they create so they can live with that knowledge." In his new book, Assmann explores images of death and of death rites in ancient Egypt to provide startling new insights into the particular ......
Osiris, Horus, Isis, Thoth, Anubis - the many strange and compelling figures of the Egyptian gods and goddesses seem to possess endless fascination. The renowned Egyptologist Erik Hornung here studies the ancient Egyptians' conceptions of god, basing his account on a thorough reappraisal of the primary sources. His book, now available in English ......
The Animals of Ancient Egypt Then and Now provides a simultaneous guide to some 60 species of mammal, bird, reptile, amphibian, fish and invertebrate recorded in modern Egypt and also portrayed in the tombs and temples or as mummies and gods in ancient Egypt - or even earlier in the case of the cave art from the Gilf Kebir. Accompanied by ......
The Gods of Egypt, first published in France in 1992 and now in its third French edition, is a short, elegant, and highly accessible survey of ancient Egyptian religion. The clarity and brevity of Claude Traunecker's book make it especially valuable to readers seeking an authoritative introduction to this complex topic. The Cornell edition, the ......
The Bible shaped nearly every aspect of Jewish life in the ancient world, from activities as obvious as attending synagogue to those which have lost their scriptural resonance in modernity, such as drinking water and uttering one's last words. And within a scriptural universe, no work exerted more force than the Psalter, the most cherished text ......
Ritual Objects and Silent Subjects in Late Antiquity
What can we know about the everyday experiences of Christians during the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries? How did non-elite men and women, enslaved, freed, and free persons, who did not renounce sex or choose voluntary poverty become Christian? They neither led a religious community nor did they live in entirely Christian settings. In this ......
The Mechanics of Extraction in Comparative Perspective
A collection of studies that explore the extractive systems of twelve ancient states and societies from across the ancient world The studies collected in Ancient Taxation explore the extractive systems of twelve ancient states and societies from across the ancient world, ranging from Bronze Age China to Anglo-Saxon Britain. Together, the ......
2006-2008 Excavations of a Late Antique Site in Egypt's Western Desert (Amheida IV)
The fourth volume in the Amheida series, 'Ain el-Gedida: 2006-2008 Excavations of a Late Antique Site in Egypt's Western Desert (Amheida IV) presents the systematic record and interpretation of the archaeological evidence from the excavations at 'Ain el-Gedida, a fourth-century rural settlement in Egypt's Dakleh Oasis uniquely important for the ......
Explore the Egyptian war machine of the New Kingdom and discover how it was supplied and how it fought, the use of logistics and rations, as well as the designs of hand weapons and bows. Many pieces of kit have been reconstructed for the book, giving the reader a very immediate sense of what an Egyptian warrior's equipment looked like.