Unwrapping Ancient Egypt: The Shroud, the Secret and the Sacred

by Christina Riggs

Overview

"In ancient Egypt, wrapping sacred objects, including mummified bodies, in layers of cloth was a ritual that lay at the core of Egyptian society. Yet in the modern world, attention has focused instead on unwrapping all the careful arrangements of linen textiles the Egyptians had put in place.This book breaks new ground by looking at the significance of textile wrappings in ancient Egypt, and at the way their unwrapping has shaped the way we think about the Egyptian past. Wrapping mummified bodies and divine statues in linen reflected the cultural values attached to this textile, with implications for understanding gender, materiality and hierarchy in Egyptian society. Unwrapping mummies and statues similarly reflects the values attached to Egyptian antiquities in the West, where the colonial legacies of archaeology, egyptology and racial science still influence how Egypt appears in museums and the press.From the tomb of Tutankhamun to the Arab Spring, Unwrapping Ancient Egypt raises critical questions about the deep-seated fascination with this culture - and what that fascination says about our own"--

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780857855398
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	06/05/2014
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 0.75(d)

About the Author

Christina Riggs is a Senior Lecturer in the department of Art History and World Art Studies, University of East Anglia, UK.

Table of Contents

List of Figures
Preface
Desecration
Revelation
Mummification
Linen
Secrecy
Sanctity
Figure credits
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

Riggs' critique of the academic treatment of mummies is well taken, but its implications reverberate far beyond Egypt, mummies, archaeology, or the museum. As anthropologists, we are compelled to ask whether, how, and to what extent our disciplinary practices and gazes have misconstrued and actually damaged the very knowledge that we set out to reveal.

Anthropology Review Database - Jack David Eller

Each chapter of this book represents one lecture from a series delivered in 2012 at All Souls College, Oxford [...] With 79 pages of notes and bibliography, the extensive research behind this book is well documented [...]The issues discussed go beyond the art historical. Riggs covers the psychology of entombing, hiding, and revealing in artistic, religious, and political contexts

N. J. Mactague

An original and powerful volume ... Riggs provides a (very) critical history of Egyptology and related curatorial practices. The result is a book that not only wears its erudition lightly, but also challenges the legitimacy and apparent exceptionality of what it is that Egyptologists do. Opening Egyptology's "black box," Riggs makes a major contribution to understanding what that box might contain, in addition to how this understanding might change our perceptions of "ancient Egypt" and scholarly practices related to it.
Museum Anthropology Review

Each chapter of this book represents one lecture from a series delivered in 2012 at All Souls College, Oxford ...With 79 pages of notes and bibliography, the extensive research behind this book is well documented ... The issues discussed go beyond the art historical. Riggs covers the psychology of entombing, hiding, and revealing in artistic, religious, and political contexts. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through researchers/faculty; general readers.
CHOICE

This is a work of passion, poetically written and convincingly argued, which highlights the crucial role played by textiles, wrapping and concealment in the structuring of ancient Egyptian society.
Ancient Egypt

From the Publisher