Next Monday (10th December) Keith White will be discussing “Beautiful, Fair And Lovely Akhetaten”…. The Rhetoric And The Reality.
Tomb and temple scenes suggest Amarna was a city of plenty and a happy populace. But Keith White will show the reality was quite different!
Keith presents evidence from investigations over the last decade suggesting that the reality – at least for the non-elite – was very different, with malnutrition and disease common. Spinal and limb injuries also suggest a work-load that was excessive even for the average ancient Egyptian. Why was this such an unhealthy population? The likely explanation does not reflect well on the pharaoh whose obsession with rapidly establishing his city to his new god Aten in “this distant place” was at the expense of the ordinary Egyptian.
Everyone welcome! Monday 10th December 7:30pm Manchester Conference Centre / Pendulum Hotel, Sackville Street, Manchester, M3 1BB.


Join the Manchester Ancient Egypt Society tonight to hear Alan Hayward tell the story of how an industrial town acquired a surprisingly high quality collection of objects from ancient Egypt. When Alan began to research the material, few objects had a known provenance and it was thought to have been the collection of two Victorian ladies. Marianne Brocklehurst, and her friend Mary Booth (known as the ‘MBs’), who were indeed central to the collection, but Amelia Edwards and Flinders Petrie had a significant impact and their involvement added much to the stories that many of the objects have to tell.


Come and join us on Monday 14th May to hear about the life of the “well-to-do” New Kingdom couple Kha and Meryt and how the exciting discovery of their intact tomb at Deir el-Medina led to wonderful insights into the lives of non-royals in New Kingdom Thebes.
This lecture will look at a number of individuals involved in this process looking at their lives, careers and their motivation, to examine this process.