15. The Egyptian Museum, Cairo; designed by a Frenchman, its facade bears the names of the great European Egyptologists of the nineteenth century.
16. The great temple at Abu Simbel: for many travellers, the ultimate destination and the highlight of a Nile cruise.
17. A triad of King Menkaura flanked by two goddesses; one of the masterpieces of ancient Egyptian sculpture discovered by George Reisner at Giza.
18. Hie portable furniture (bed, chair and canopy) of gilded wood made for Queen Hetepheres in the fourth dynasty and unearthed by Reisner some 4,400 years later.
19. The gilded mask of Tjuyu from the Valley of the Kings; discovered in 1905 by Theodore Davis, it formed part of the greatest treasure found in Egypt to that date.
20. Evelyn Baring, Lord Cromer, de facto ruler of Egypt for a quarter of a century until his retirement in 1907.
21. The mortuary temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el-Bahri, western Thebes, one of the sites where Howard Carter cut his teeth as a young archaeologist.
22. The painted limestone bust of Nefertiti, icon of ancient art, discovered in 1912 by Ludwig Borchardt in the ruins of the abandoned capital city of Amarna.
23. The golden mask of Tutankhamun; thanks to Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon, a once-obscure boy-king has become the most famous of all Egyptian pharaohs.
A
WORLD
BENEATH
THE SANDS
Professor Toby Wilkinson is an internationally acclaimed Egyptologist, and the prize-winning author of twelve books which have been translated into twelve languages. His books include The Rise and Fall of Ancient Egypt, The Nile and A World Beneath the Sands. He is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries and the Royal Historical Society, and a member of the international editorial board of the Journal of Egyptian History. He is the Vice-Chancellor of the Fiji National University and a Bye-Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge.
‘A World Beneath the Sands is more than a saga of foreigners in the desert – it also follows Egypt on its rocky path to the 20th century.’
The Economist
‘The story that strings these wonderful characters together is the steady professionalisation of Egyptology – the shift, as Wilkinson puts it, from “scoundrels to scholars”.’
James McConnachie, Sunday Times
‘A superbly readable, magnificently entertaining, profoundly thoughtful and scholarly history of the bizarre and determined characters who burrowed into Egypt in comparatively recent history – and who all too often made away with their finds. You will want to read chunks of it aloud to anyone who happens to be around.’
Sue Gaisford, Tablet ‘Books of the Year’
‘The definitive account of the golden age of Egyptology.’
Waterstones Best Books of 2020: History
‘The debate over the decolonization of Egyptology and the repatriation of artefacts has only just started. Wilkinson’s elegantly written book provides a sound background and a useful biography that will allow readers to understand and participate in that debate.’
