File:Ancient Egypt ((198-)) (18006912558).jpg

Title: Ancient Egypt
Identifier: ancientegypt00fiel (find matches)
Year: [198- [198-]] ([190 [190s)
Authors: Field Museum of Natural History
Subjects: Egyptology
Publisher: Chicago : Field Museum of Natural History
Contributing Library: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

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the rooms of the tomb chapels, the Museum xdsitor will gain a much better understanding of the tomb as architec- tural space. The second part of the reinstallation focuses on the objects in the collection. The artifacts from Ancient Egv'^it in the Egv'ptian Hall have long been arranged in a sort of U'pology with, for instance, all the alabaster vases in one case, all the usheb- ties (servant figurines placed in the tombs) in another, canopic jars in another, and so forth. This style of presentation is useful lor the archeologist who uses stvlistic trends for chronological and regional dif- ferentiations, but such an arrangement also removes the objects from their origi- nal, natural association with one another. The Oriental Institute Museum of the Uni- versity of Chicago has a ver\' handsome typological display from which the student of Eg\iptian archeology may learn much. The purpose of the Field Museum Egyptian Hall, however, is not to teach archeolog\' but to explore and explain for the viewer the en\aronmental and cultural history' of this part of the ancient world. The two approaches are complementary, and ideal- h' the Field Museum, with its great collec- tions of fauna and flora as well as artifacts, is ideally suited to study the broad inter- connections of land and people. This goal can be simph' realized b\' providing a large map of Eg\'pt and a time line chart to orient the visitor geographically and chronologicalh'. Likewise, in the rein- stalled exhibit, a photo of the Step Pyramid of Eljoser with two arrows indicating the two Field Museum tomb sites dramatically demonstrates the relationship of this pyra- mid with the tombs, which were located almost literally in the p\Tamid's shadow. The exhibition begins with the prehis- toric period, before the unification of all of EgApt under one ruler, when groups settled in \illages along the Nile, adding irrigation agriculture to hunting and fishing econo- mies. During this pred\Tiastic period, the characteristic Egyptian culture would coalesce and political unity under the pharaoh began to develop. In the jire- d\aiastic alcove one sees a naturalh' mum- mified burial. Natural mummification led, indirectly, to the art of mummifica- tion. The alcove's pottery and stone vessels reflect the high standards of craftsmanship and art which led to elaborate Old Kingdom tombs, just as the ideas and hierogh'phic symbols of this earlv period anticipate 5

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