By: Charlotte Rose
Ancient Egyptians welcomed childbirth with ritual, using medico-magical spells, amulets, and various other objects to help ensure the survival of mother and child. Objects used in childbirth rituals took many forms. For example, a Middle Kingdom (2055–1650 BCE) magical birth brick discovered by the Penn Museum in South Abydos—used to support the mother during labor—depicts […]
By: Paul Mitchell
After 2,000 years of repose, 11 mummified human corpses and a few scrolls of papyrus entombed at Thebes became entangled in the interwoven threads of an Egyptian autocrat’s ambitions, the American public’s fascination with displays of the odd and exotic, and the formulation of the United States’ most prominent homegrown religion. Life after death has […]
By: Kate Murphy and Cynthia Susalla
In ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, and Rome, practitioners of magic exploited symbolic words, images, and rituals to achieve desired outcomes through supernatural means. Using magical acts, they attempted to control supernatural powers— gods, demons, spirits, or ghosts—to accomplish something beyond the scope of human capabilities. The exhibition Magic in the Ancient World, now at the […]
The current academic year has seen the launch of an exciting period of renovations and updates for the Penn Museum and its neighbor, the University of Pennsylvania Health System (UPHS). UPHS began the demolition of Penn Tower, located directly to the south of the Museum, in preparation for construction of a new Patient Pavilion designed […]
By: Joshua Aaron Roberson
“I will tear the veils from every mystery: mysteries of religion or of nature, death, birth, the future, the past, cosmogony, and nothingness.” – Arthur Rimbaud, Une Saison en Enfer, I, III (1873). Few mysteries fascinate humankind so deeply as that veil to which Rimbaud alludes: the gossamer barrier that separates “here” from “hereafter.” All […]
By: Leslie Anne Warden
The Old Kingdom (ca. 2600–2200 BCE) was the first major florescence of the Egyptian state. This period is often de ned in both scholarship and the popular imagination as a time when powerful, pyramid-building pharaohs controlled Egypt and dictated social, religious, and economic a airs. The role of the general population in forming and supporting […]
By: David P. Silverman
Having worked at the 1964 New York World’s Fair when I was a teenager, I thought that I knew a great deal about how things operated in such venues. Much later, I learned through my research at the Penn Museum, however, that, in addition to visiting exhibitions, tasting exotic foods, and buying souvenirs, one could […]
By: Jennifer Houser Wegner
We have had raised at Memphis a colossal sphinx of Rameses II about 11 feet long, 11 ton weight. The head has been much weathered, the body and inscribed base are perfect, of red granite… Would such a piece as this be acceptable for your Museum? With these lines, the renowned archaeologist, William Matthew Flinders […]
By: Josef Wegner
Abydos in southern Egypt is one of the great sites of ancient Egyptian civilization. At the dawn of Egyptian history, ca. 3000–2800 BCE, Abydos was the burial place of Egypt’s first pharaohs. Subsequently the site became the primary cult center for veneration of Osiris, god of the netherworld. The archaeology of Abydos spans over five […]
By: Josef Wegner
Beneath the sands of South Abydos is an astonishing monument: a gigantic tomb, one of the largest in Egypt, and a striking testimonial to the ancient Egyptians’ belief in the divine afterlife of their pharaohs. This is the tomb of pharaoh Senwosret III who reigned ca. 1878–1841 BCE, 5th king of the powerful 12th Dynasty. […]