To this Fourth ASTENE Conference, participants came from 18 different countries, including for the first time Austria, Cyprus, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and South Africa. No less than 21 of about 120 people had attended the very first conference in Durham in 1995.
Even by teatime on the first afternoon, there was already a cheerful hum of people greeting old acqaintances and new, and exchanging reminiscences and information over the teacups.
On the first evening, as a keynote paper, Professor Jason Thompson, of the American University in Cairo, gave - as we have come to expect of him - a fine exposition of Edward William Lane. As the second keynote speaker next day, Professor Carole Hillenbrand, of Edinburgh University, previewed for us her new book on Islamic travel writing, with a stunning array of illustrations.
We can here only highlight a few of an enormously varied range of excellent papers in the programme put together by Deborah Manley and Janet Starkey (see the list below). As we were in Edinburgh, it was very relevant to hear various views of James Bruce, Scottish traveller in Abyssinia and the Near East, while everyone came out enchanted (and in stitches of laughter) from the account of the sad adventures of the first mummy to arrive in Scotland.
In some of the papers we were introduced to some very early travellers indeed, from 'anatomically modern humans' from Egypt and the Near East colonising Europe and Africa over many thousands of years, to ancient Greek and Roman views of the seafarers they encountered. Among the papers about writers, we met the authors of Quo Vadis and Ben Hur. Among the artist travellers were, for the first time, those who recorded Cyprus. Late one afternoon, we made strange spectacles of ourselves by donning strange spectacles to watch an early stereographic picture show. We met a great number of earnest, learned and/or eccentric travellers from many countries.
Away from the lecture rooms, the Librarian, Ian Mowat, cordially welcomed us to the Conference Reception at the Edinburgh University Library, where a showcase of Islamic and 19th century European books had been arranged for our aesthetic pleasure. Later in the evening, one was almost stunned by aesthetic pleasure on entering the Playfair Library Hall for the Conference Dinner, for this, with its wonderful barrel-vaulted ceiling is one of the finest Neo-classical interiors in Britain. After a delicious repast, the 'ASTENE Players', in some curiously eclectic costumes, offered us a recital of poetry by travellers to Egypt, while Heather McCracken brought a tear to many an eye with a selection of songs which might have been given at a Victorian soirée. We would particularly like to thank Brenda Moon for arranging this memorable occasion.
By a happy coincidence, two papers were offered on 'The dancer of Esna' and 'The Almeh', which led most appositely to the evening's entertainment by the Almeh, Lorna. With the graceful, sinuous gestures of Egyptian dance, and the face of a Scottish rose, she could not have better epitomised ASTENE-in-Edinburgh.
Other special exhibitions had been kindly arranged for ASTENE. At the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Nicola Kalinsky had not only highlighted various pictures of interest to us, but had produced a catalogue with biographical data. Her list, ranging as it did from the first Earl of Balfour to David Wilkie, from William Aikman in the early 18th century to Sir Steven Runciman in the 20th, abundantly illustrated that Scots are well-travelled and enterprising people.
At the National Library of Scotland, lain Gordon Brown had mounted a display of relevant manuscripts. Included in the 13 diverse exhibits were Alexander Gordon's volume of Egyptian engravings, two volumes of David Roberts's Eastern journal; a letter from John G Kinnear, ridiculing a mummy-unwrapping conducted by Thomas Pettigrew, and speculating what an examination of the mummy of his old friend David Roberts might reveal; a sketch map of the Nile in Upper Egypt, Nubia and the Sudan by Major Orlando Felix, who was travelling with Lord Prudhoe, later fourth Duke of Northumberland; a letter from Edward William Lane to Robert Hay.
Besides these, there happened to be an exhibition of the work of Sir William Allan at the City Art Centre, while Jennifer Scarce led a small detachment to visit the Scottish War Museum inside the walls of Edinburgh Castle.
James Thin, the Edinburgh booksellers, held a bookstall at the Conference, where also Katie Starkey, ably assisted by Jan Dobrowolski, ran an ASTENE bookstall. Jan and Richard Long mounted their interesting Gertrude Bell exhibition created for the British Council.
At Pollock Halls, Edinburgh First provided a comfortable venue for the Conference, with good food and helpful staff -though even they had not been able to arrange the good weather ASTENE has come to expect. But spirits at least remained undamped and many participants departed looking forward to meeting again at Worcester College, Oxford, in 2003.
All in all, a triumph again for the Conference Organisers, Deborah Manley, Brenda Moon, Janet Starkey and Jennifer Scarce.
PUBLICATION OF THE 4TH ASTENE CONFERENCE, EDINBURGH 2001
After considerable thought and discussion the Committee decided on a fourfold system of publication of the 2001 conference bearing in mind the various problems which had arisen from the syslems used for the publication of the first three conferences.
We hope that authors of these papers will be willing to have interested specialists put in direct touch with them through the ASTENE office.
A revised list of the 2001 conference papers will be published in the Bulletin and on the website giving the information as to which form of issue is relevant in each case.
THE FINAL VOLUME OF THE 1999 CONFERENCE PAPERS HAS APPEARED-
It may be ordered from the Museum Bookshop.
|
Participant
|
Title
of Paper
|
| Dr Sahar Abdel Hakim, University of Cairo | (Inter)ruptive Communication: Elizabeth Cooper's Photo-writing of Egyptian Women |
| Susan Allen, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York | The ephemeral tourist: Non-literary resources for the study of travel in Egypt in the late 19th and early 20th centuries |
| Arita Baaijens, Amsterdam | Desert Travels by camel in northern Sudan: a comparison of travels made by Browne, Nachtigal, Hassan Bey and others with travels in the Sudan today |
| Giovanni Boaglio, Centro Studi Drovetti, Turin | Pietro Lorenzo Pinchia, an Italian priest, and his journey to the East |
| James Beresford, Keble College, Oxford | Good, bad, or just plain ugly: sailors of the Ancient Near East and Egypt as portrayed by Greek and Roman travellers |
| Morris Bierbrier, formerly British Museum | Preparations for 'Who was Who in Egyptology' (3rd edition) - Presentation to Resources session |
| Iain Gordon Brown, National Library of Scotland | The affair of Lord Morton's Mummy |
| Iain D. Campbell, Isle of Lewis | In search of the physical: George Adam Smith's journeys to Palestine and their importance |
| Dr Peter Christensen, Cardinal Stritch University, Milwaukee | Defending the Ottomans: Lew Wallace's The Prince of India |
| Felicity Cobbing, Curator, Palestine Exploration Fund | The American Palestine Exploration Society and the Survey of Eastern Palestine - The story of a lost cause |
| David Dixon, formerly University College, London | A young Scottish soldier in Egypt and the Sudan, 1882–1886 |
| Jaroslaw Dobrowolski, Cairo | Not quite in the Desert; not exactly in the Wilderness |
| Dr Pavel Dolukhanov, University of Newcastle | Early travellers: Egypt and Prehistoric migrations |
| Dr David Elgavish, Bar-Ilan University, Israel | The travels of emissaries in the ancient Near East |
| R Elaine A. Evans, Curator, Frank H. McClung Museum, Knoxville, Tennessee | By brush and lens: Revealing the Sphinx |
| Charles Foster, London | Early Crusaders' impressions of the Near East |
| William M. Frick - delivered by Dr Elizabeth French, ASTENE Treasurer | Expedition Scientifique de Moree: Captain Peytier's contribution |
| Dr Jochen Hallof, Wurzburg, Germany | A Royal visit to Royal mummies: The journey of the last king of Saxonia to the Sudan and Egypt in 1911 |
| Gottfried Hamanik, Klagenfurt, Austria | The rediscovery of A.C. Harris' notebooks |
| Rowena Hart and Dr Paul T. Nicholson, Cardiff University | Stereographers in Egypt: Frith and the Underwoods |
| Professor Mike Heffernan, Nottingham University | An Empire of Science: The politics of French military surveys in the Mediterranean Basin, 1798-1840 |
| F. Nigel Hepper, formerly Kew Herbarium | James Bruce and Luigi Balugani's drawings of African mammals, birds and fishes |
| Professor Carole Hillenbrand, Edinburgh University | Keynote address: 'Even unto the walls of China' - Islamic travel literature |
| Roger de Keersmaeker, Graffiti Graffito, Belgium | Panel member for session on Research Resources |
| Aviva Klein-Franke, University of Cologne | Carsten Niebuhr and the Danish expedition |
| Professor Nadia Kholy, American University in Cairo | The Crusaders in children's stories between East and West |
| Jen Kimpton, John Hopkins University | Lost and Found? The Adanson Collection, 1762-1782 at John Hopkins University |
| Nigel Leask, Queen's College, Cambridge | James Bruce, the Medici Venus and the 18th century traveller as Libertine |
| Norman Lewis, Institute of Lebanese Studies, Oxford | Travellers, Tribesmen and Trouble: Journeys to Petra in the 19th century |
| Pascal Linant de Bellefonds, Paris | The expedition of Comte de Forbin to the East, 1817-18 |
| Bryony Llewellyn, Independent Art Historian | Pictorial exchanges, I: David Wilkie and John Frederick Lewis in Constantinople, 1840 |
| Richard Lobban, Rhode Island College | Pierre Tremaux's Voyage au Sudan Oriental, (1847-1854) |
| Dr C.W.R. Long, Newcastle | Politics and the Travels of Gertrude Bell |
| J.P. Luft, Durham University | Sir Robert Ker Porter's Travels in Persia |
| Marsha B. McCoy, Classical Studies, Fairfield University, Connecticut | A Tale of Two Ciceros: Travels in Asia Minor in the late Roman Republic |
| Deborah Manley, ASTENE Conference Organiser | A famous Scottish traveller's little known journey: Isabella Bird at St Catherine's |
| Brenda Moon, formerly University of Edinburgh Librarian | Mr and Mrs Smith in Greece, Egypt and the Levant |
| Yvonne Neville-Rolfe, Bonomi descendant | W.E. Jennings-Bramley, 1871-1960: Explorer and Surveyor in the Lybian Desert, Sudan and the Sinai Peninsula, authority on and friend of the Bedouin |
| Charles Newton, Victoria & Albert Museum | Pictorial exchanges II: A qajar case study. Who was Haluka Mirza? |
| William H. Peck, Curator on Ancient Arts, Detroit Institute of Arts | The Dancer of Esna |
| Sylvia Peuckert, Frei University, Berlin | 'A threatening literary inundation' - German 20th century writers visiting Egypt |
| Jacke Phillips, McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, Cambridge | The God, the King and 'the Child': a much interrupted journey |
| Lyla Pinch-Brock, Cairo | The short, happy life of Ernest Harold Jones (1877-1911): Artist and Egyptologist |
| Jessamine Price, Middle East Studies, New York University | Tourist hotels in Cairo in the age of the package tour, 1869-1914 |
| Megan Price, Wolfson College, Oxford | Buried Women |
| Peta Rée, ASTENE Bulletin | The Caledonian Mussulman: Osman Effendi |
| Professor John Rodenbeck, American University at Cairo | The origin of Shelley's Ozamandias |
| Professor John Rodenbeck, American University at Cairo | The Awalim |
| Barnaby Rogerson | Ahmad Mohamed Hassanein Bey, Explorer in Egypt and Libya and Royal Chamberlain, 1920s and 1930s |
| Geoffrey Roper, University Library, Cambridge | Christian Rassam (1808-72): translator, interpreter, diplomat and liar |
| Gabriel M. Rosenbaum, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem | Egypt, travel laughing: Travel and travellers through the satirical eye |
| Jennifer Scarce, formerly Scottish National Museum | The Mausoleum and Robert Murdoch Smith at Halicarnassus, 1856-9 |
| Sarah Searight, London | Walter Plowden in Abyssinia |
| Rita Severis, Cyprus | Artists in Cyprus in the nineteenth century: the difference in their perceptions through the century |
| Caroline Simpson, The Omda House, Qurna | Qurna - who saw it, where, when and why? |
| Janet Starkey, Durham University | Bagnios, Coffee-houses and 'glistening pomegranate-thickets' |
| Paul Starkey, Durham University | A Lebanese Traveller in Egypt |
| John Taylor, Department of Egyptology, British Museum | Giovanni d'Athanasi (1798-1854): an outline biography |
| Marianna Taymanova, Durham University | Egypt in Russian poetry |
| Dr Jason Thompson, American University at Cairo | Keynote address: Edward William Lane's Bicentenary: A Biographic Perspective |
| Marie-Paule Vanlathem, Belgium | Egypt on the itinerary of the pilgrimages of penitence (1882-1914) |
| Marjorie Venit, University of Maryland | Early travellers to Alexandria: dirt, darkness and dismay |
| Professor Petrus Vermaak, University of South Africa | Crossing borders in the Near East and Egypt: comparative research resulting from travel to the ancient sites |
| Cassandra Vivian, GDI | John Antes: Dilletante Americano or What? |
| Malcolm Wagstaff, ASTENE Chair, Southampton University | Surveying the Morea: the French Expedition, 1828-32 |
| Bruce Wannell | Ventur de Paradis: Reports from Tunis |
| Jeanne- Marie Warzeski, Columbus Museum, Georgia | American female missionaries and archaeologists, 1854-1914 |
| Emily Weeks, Yale University | Text versus Image: Dialogues between Edward William Lane and John Frederick Lewis |
| Caroline Williams, William and Mary College | 19th century Images of Egypt |
| Andrew Wilson, Leeds | Railway Engineers in Ottoman Yemen |
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