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Ancient Egypt Magazine -- Volume Three  Issue Five  -- March/April 2003

Editor's Column

It would be hard to ignore the world situation as we go to press and by the time the next issue of Ancient Egypt is on the newsstands, the situation could have changed again. However, one thing is clear from the accounts of recent visitors to Egypt – those who have been in contact with the magazine have made it clear that they have all had a safe and enjoyable trip. The fabled Egyptian hospitality has, as always, been clearly to the fore during their time there.

In this issue of Ancient Egypt there is a description of one of the most famous tourist icons: the original Winter Palace, an established landmark for decades although it created some controversy in its early days. Bob Partridge’s travel piece includes an insight into how the design met the standards of its day. We make a visit to an exceptional touring exhibition in the USA in the company of Patrick Houlihan, who also takes a provocative look at that most misunderstood of ‘Egyptian’ beasts, the camel.

This issue sees the conclusion of Cathie Bryan’s praised piece on Napoleon’s ‘savants’, who endured hardships beyond those of even the most seasoned modern traveller before returning to France. Here, the monumental task of converting all the information they had recovered into the massive Description de l’Egypte was only just beginning; and it continued beyond the lifetime of some of the contributors.

Ancient Egypt has always delighted in new perspectives on the subject of Egyptology. The unusual combination of a thoroughly ‘Britannic’ poet whose work had deep roots in both a temperate landscape and war, with the strange atmosphere of a newly discovered tomb is contributed by David and Caroline Gill.

The modern and ancient worlds meet in the subject of Egyptology; news of the Global Egyptology Museum created by the Centre for Computer-aided Egyptological Research (CCER) arrived too late for a comprehensive view in this issue, but will definitely make an appearance in a future edition. The bringing together of items from museums all over the world, with world-wide access via the internet, surely indicates the shape of things to come; will it even unite some long-dispersed items? Within our news pages there is also a report from ‘Current Research in Egyptology IV’ held at UCL earlier in the year, as well as brief news of the latest discoveries in Egypt and the Sudan.

The subject of modern technology and the latest ways of presenting the subject brings us back to modern Egypt. In the case of the Global Museum, the benefits are immediately obvious, without detriment to the individual museums but that is not invariably the case. One of the big issues currently affecting Egypt’s tourist industry concerns the option now available to visitors to the Cairo Museum to use a hand-held ‘digital’ guide as they make their way round the building.

As every visitor to Egypt knows, the guiding system has always been integral to the success of the Egyptian tourist industry. Indeed, it has been a major part of the unique Egyptian ‘experience’ and has, on the whole, distinguished visits to the Egyptian Museum from visits to any other museum containing Egyptian antiquities in the world. The controversy created by the new digital items lies in the fact that they will create unemployment and hardship amongst Egypt’s living guides at a time when young people in Egypt are being positively encouraged to gain qualifications in tourism and in-depth knowledge of the antiquities.

That the hand-held guide has its virtues is unquestionable; it will allow the lone visitor in particular a relatively leisurely means of learning about the artefacts. However, a digital guide will not be there first thing in the morning to greet bleary-eyed travellers with a cheerful smile; it will not crack hilarious and completely un-PC jokes about Ramesses II or Hatshepsut; and it will definitely not be able to offer a helping hand in and out of a boat or across a difficult piece of terrain.

Miriam  A Bibby

Editor

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