AERA: A return to Memphis & the Great Sphinx!

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Return to Ancient Memphis: Our field school begins its 2nd year! Top: A student and field school supervisor celebrate her mastery of the auto level. Bottom: A student works on her 3D model of the House of the Apis Bull at Memphis.  In September, we began work on the second year of our heritage, outreach and training project at Memphis, Egypt's ancient capital city. Over a three month period this fall we will be training nearly 50 Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities inspectors in cultural heritage management, site interpretation, community engagement, archaeological site recording, and research techniques. In collaboration with our Egyptian field school students, we're creating bilingual Arabic/English websites, brochures and guidebooks with information about the ancient city available for both tourists and scholars, and will produce the first fully illustrated catalog of objects from the Memphis Open Air Museum. We're also building a walking circuit with information panels around the remains of the city, so that its ancient sites can be opened to tourists for the first time next year! This project is a partnership with the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities and the University of York and is made possible thanks to a grant from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). More information about the Memphis Site and Community Development project is available on our website.  AERAgram 16.1 now online! While the most recent edition of our newsletter is only available to AERA members, previous issues can be downloaded from our website. This includes the recently posted spring 2015 issue with the following articles: What was the original size of the Great Pyramid? Discovery 2015: House of a high official The Gallery Complex gives up its secrets Hidden details come to light with reflectance transformation imaging (RTI) Download the PDF or become an AERA member to receive future editions hot off the press.  AERA's Sphinx data to go online! Mark Lehner's 1979-1983 work with James Allen on the Sphinx Project is still the only systemic survey and architectural study of the Great Sphinx of Giza that has ever been made. The Sphinx Project's archive includes: a stack over 5 feet long of written reports, notes, journal entries, site forms, and survey data, 7716 photographs, 266 architectural drawings and maps, one of which unrolls to over six feet long! These documents show the bedrock surface of the Sphinx's body, the history of its ancient repair, and the degree of erosion that existed when stonemasons first added its protective casing. Much of this evidence has since been covered by subsequent restoration work and is no longer visible. For more than 35 years, these documents have remained largely unpublished and inaccessible to researchers. Now, thanks to a grant from the American Research Center in Egypt, we are hard at work scanning, digitizing and cataloging the data in order to make this archive of information freely and permanently available online through Open Context. We look forward to announcing its online launch sometime next year! You can read more about the original Sphinx Project's findings on the AERA website.    Our members help make possible our excavations in Egypt, field school training, rescue archaeology, conservation, education and outreach. Members also receive printed copies of AERAgrams and annual reports as soon as they are published.  Help us keep our field programs vital and effective by becoming a member or giving a gift membership, by donating to AERA or by directly sponsoring an area of research through our giving catalog. AERA is a 501(c)(3) tax exempt, nonprofit organization. Your membership or donation is tax deductible. Ancient Egypt Research Associates, Inc.  |  info@aeraweb.org  |  aeraweb.org STAY CONNECTED

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