Holy Mountains of the Near East, Rewley House, Oxford, 5 July 2008
It was another delightful ASTENE weekend, with challenging lectures and, as always, the chance to catch up with old friends and meet new ones.

It all started off the evening before with a visit to the Griffith Institute, where our Vice-president, Dr Jaromir Malek, showed off a collection of drawings and photographs. Then two dozen members adjourned to the Al Shami restaurant, where the sight of Brenda Moon hitching a lift on Vivienne Sharp’s buggy made a good conversational starting point. The conversation never flagged as we enjoyed a succession of delicious dishes.

The next morning we were ready to visit the Holy Mountains. First, Professor Malcolm Wagstaff gave us a brief introductory outline from which we could link the various sites and ideas that the day would encompass. He then introduced Dr Trevor Curnow, whom he had in fact met on Mount Athos. Dr Curnow’s lecture ranged widely but was, to me at least, absolutely fascinating – taking me to parts of the world I did not know, and showing clearly how mountains and their equivalents come to be considered holy. Then Jacke Phillips brought us back to ASTENE’s core area, talking of Jebel Barkal in the Sudan and its position in Egyptian and Nubian culture down even to the present day.

After lunch we met the agnostics: two people who seemed untouched by the holy environs they visited. Malcolm Wagstaff reported that as there was little Classical material on Mount Athos, Colonel Leake seems to have concentrated on topography, when the weather allowed, and the acquisition of useful information from the monks – even though he thought little of them themselves.

Then to Turkey and Bin Bir Kaliseon Karadag. Stephen Hill gave us a fascinating portrait of a frenetic Gertrude Bell rushing around measuring and photographing. She herself had described her first visit in the telling sentence: ‘I had the most delightful day playing at being an archaeologist; it’s the most fascinating study.’ Despite the descriptions and the excellent photographs gleaned from her book and the Newcastle Archives (a collection we had a chance to see during the ASTENE conference at Edinburgh in 2001), I did not learn the answer to the question that haunts me: Why all those churches amid ordinary dwellings? Perhaps the answer lies in her book. Stephen awed us by waving about his own copy – which had once been T.E. Lawrence’s. I shall go back to it.

The final paper was by Dr Peter Frankopan on Mount Zion and Jerusalem, where the interplay of the multitude of holy sites in and around the city with the various hills seems to have resulted in competition for symbolic importance. I was reminded of the more specific paper on the Church of the Holy Sepulchre that we had heard from Professor Martin Biddle at a previous day school, and the influence of that building on the West. There was clearly much going on here – perhaps Jerusalem itself could be a theme for another day school.

Lisa French

The Lure of the East Study Day, with Leighton House, London, 3 October 2008
This study day about the wonderful exhibition at the Tate Gallery took place after the Bulletin had gone to press and will be covered in the next issue.

Eighth ASTENE Biennial Conference
ASTENE’s next biennial conference will be held at Collingwood College, Durham University, from 10 to 13
July 2009. We are planning to include a visit to Hadrian’s Wall – the northern boundary of the empire of Hadrian, the southern limits of which were in North Africa and along the Nile.

We include the Call for Papers for the conference in the Bulletin. Please let ASTENE have your proposals for papers, display the Call for Papers in your library or department and tell your acquaintances.

As in previous years, there will be a small number of bursaries for members to attend the conference. The booking form for the conference will be included with the next Bulletin.

THE ASTENE SYRIA TOUR, FOLLOW-UP

There was a small surplus of US$295 from the ASTENE Syria Tour last autumn: the Committee decided that it would be donated to the McCabe charity.

ASTENE Annual General Meeting, 5th July, 2008
Following another successful study day at Oxford University's Continuing Education Department -this time on the Holy Mountains of the Near East, the Annual General Meeting was held. Sadly, Dr Lorien Pilling has had to stand down as Secretary as he takes up a new job, but Angela Reid was elected to the committee as Secretary and Paul Robertson, who the committee co-opted during the year, has now fully joined the committee.

ASTENE Membership
Please use our new membership form (designed by our many-talented Treasurer, Diane Fortenberry); use it to encourage interested colleagues and friends to join us. Some members have given membership to friends for a special anniversary.

We also hope that existing members who are paying annually will choose to use the form to set up a standing order for their membership, thus saving the Treasurer (and themselves) a lot of work. Some overseas members who find it difficult to set up standing orders, pay for three years at a time, which is also very helpful to the Treasurer.

During the year 2007-8 we published four editions of the Bulletin. In these there were 69 articles and entries by ASTENE members, including articles, queries and responses to queries, reports, book reviews and members sharing information, research resources and notes on little known books.

There are ASTENE members in all regions of Britain - 60 in London and the South East alone - and members in almost all European countries, there are also members in China, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Singapore and USA and more than a dozen members in Egypt and the Near East. If you are a member and would like to contact other members in your area, please contact the Secretary.

Membership Leaflet
As a means of recruiting new members to ASTENE, a leaflet (designed by our Treasurer, Dr Diane Fortenberry) was proposed and adopted. This will be distributed to all members in the Bulletin. Please use it to recruit new ASTENE members.

The ASTENE Bibliography
Dr Diane Bergman, the Griffiths Librarian of the Sackler Library, Oxford University has over the past months been putting together a bibliography of the many, many publications by ASTENE members in the region of the eastern Mediterranean and Arabian Peninsula between 1997 and the present. It is a fascinating collection of material, showing the very varied, but still interlinked work of our members.

This bibliography will shortly go onto the ASTENE website - to be added to as members and ASTENE continue to research and to publish.

Should you wish to up-date your entry or you have not included your publications, contact Dr Bergman at dianebergman@saclib.ox.ac.uk or write to her at the Sackler Library, St John Street, Oxford OX1.

Travellers in the Near East
The selection of papers from ASTENE's Edinburgh Conference edited by Charles Foster and published by Stacey International is available again from all good booksellers ( £18.99) and at ASTENE events. ISBN 1900988 712.

It includes the following articles:

• A Tale of Two Ciceros: Travels in Asia Minor in the late Roman Republic by Marcha B. McCoy
• Mercantile Gentlemen and Inquisitive Travellers: Constructing the Natural History of Aleppo by Janet Starkey
• Jean-Baptiste Adanson (1732-1804): A French Dragoman in Egypt and the Near East by Jen Kimpton
• The Journey of the Comte Forbin in the Near East and Egypt, 1817-18 by Pascale Linant de Bellefonds
• Travellers, Tribesmen and Troubles: Journeys to Petra, 1812-1914 by Norman Lewis
• Surveying the Morea: The French Expedition, 1828-1832 by Malcolm Wagstaff
• Le Mission Scientifique de Moree: Captain Peytier's Contribution by Elizabeth French
• Christian Rassam : Translator, Interpreter, Diplomat and Liar by Geoffrey Roper
• Mr and Mrs Smith in Greece, Egypt and the Levant by Brenda Moon
• Robert Murdoch Smith and the Mausoleum: Excavations at Halicarnassus (Bodrum) 1856-59 by Jennifer Scarce
• Listening to the Sound of Running History: Sir George Adam Smith, 1856-1942 by Rev Iain Campbell
• Politics and Travel of Gertrude Bell by Richard Long

The Danish Institute in Damascus
The Danish Institute in Damascus was established in 1996 to preserve and develop cultural links between Denmark and Arab and Islamic countries. Its aim is to stimulate research, education and the promotion of culture, classical as well as modern. The Institute carries out these objectives by supporting Danish artists and scholars engaged in archaeology, history, literature, architecture and other areas. The Institute supports and initiates publication of such subjects.

The Institute at the beautiful, late 15th century 'Aqqud-house, a short distance from the Omayyad Mosque, has rooms for visiting scholars and areas for lectures and meetings. The library has been transferred from the Danish Palestine Exploration Fund at Aarhuis. For further information, including pictures of the beautifully restored 'Aqqud-house see www.damaskus.dk. The address is P.O. Box 1262, Damascus.

The ancient ass
New Scientist in March 2008 had an interesting brief report of research on the donkeys of Egypt - a form of travel for many centuries. A study of 5000-year-old skeletons from ancient burial sites indicate that modern day donkeys are descended from domesticated African wild asses. These bones resemble the modern day, larger Nubian and Somali wild asses. The researcher, Fiona Marshall of Washington University, St Louis, Missouri is quoted: "The engine of the Egyptian state ... was the donkey." (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, DOI: 10.1073/prias .0709692105).

THE BRITISH INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF IRAQ

As many members will be aware, the British Academy has recently cut its funding to a number of organisations working in the ‘ASTENE region’, notably the Egypt Exploration Society and the Society for Libyan Studies. One of those hardest hit has been the British School of Archaeology in Iraq (Gertrude Bell Memorial) which was founded in1932. After 75 years of work in Iraq, the School has decided to change its name to The British Institute for the Study of Iraq (Gertrude Bell Memorial). Although the archaeology and ancient languages of Iraq remain central to the Institute’s remit, the change in name is to reflect the broadening of its areas research in recent years. Details of its activities, fund-raising events, and publications can be found on http://www.britac.ac.uk/institutes/iraq/ The secretary is Joan Porter MacIver and the postal address is BISI, The British Academy, 10, Carlton House Terrace, London SW1Y 5AH.

ASTENE Tour of Syria, October 2007
It is always delightful to travel with ASTENE - with a group of cheerful friends, old and new, some very knowledgeable, but bearing their erudition lightly and sharing it willingly if requested. Non-specialists, such as myself, are never excluded. One feels like a traveller in the best ASTENE sense.

In Damascus we walked the Street called Straight and visited the enormous Umayyad Mosque - one of the most important monuments of Islam. In the souk we walked with women in long coats and headscarves and men in Arab, western and Kurdish dress - many queuing to buy icecream, a Syrian favourite. There were few other westerners or tourists and we were treated with great courtesy.

A highlight was the visit to Jane Digby's tomb in the Protestant cemetery. On her tombstone: "My trust is in the tender mercy of God for ever and ever." 26.lu.8. We visited part of her house too. Now in private ownership, this was a rare treat.

In Aleppo we stayed in the Old City and experienced fine examples of 17th century Aleppine architecture. A highlight of Aleppo was the newly opened 13th century hospital for nervous illnesses, where the amazingly modern treatment included simple vegetarian diet, music and water provided by fountains in the inner courtyards. We made a teatime visit to Barons Hotel - little changed since T.E. Lawrence, Agatha Christie, Dame Freya Stark and Gertrude Bell stayed here. Our conference was held one evening in Aleppo, when we were treated in true ASTENE fashion to six excellent and diverse papers.

At Palmyra our hotel was within the walls of Zenobia's sand-stone oasis city. The views from the terrace at sunset of the long lines of columns marching across the desert were unforgettable. Being able to walk straight out of the hotel into the ruins, it was easy to imagine oneself a traveller from a previous century.

Indeed, we were astonished one evening when out of the ruins stepped Mr Robert Wood in person, in full 18th century garb: tricorne hat, white stockings, breeches, lace ruff, waistcoat and buckled shoes, and, of course, his notebook. He explained that he had just arrived after a difficult journey and regaled us with details of this journey and his thoughts on Palmyra. He then excused himself as he had to go and assist his two companions with their task of mapping the site.
Sadly, our Chairman, Brian Taylor, was unaccountably absent and so missed this treat, which he would have much enjoyed, being something of an expert on Mr Wood…

One late afternoon we spent a magical hour wandering through the immense, hilltop ruins of Hellenistic Apamea - silent except for birdsong. We lingered until the barleycorn columns were silhouetted blackly against the sunset.

Other highlights of a packed itinerary included the great castle of Crak des Chevaliers, the Roman waterwheels at Hama, the lady in the church at Ma'alula saying the Lord's Prayer for us in Aramaic, the amazing Hittite Tell at Ain Dara, complete with a splendid lion statue; the 'dead city' of Serjilla on our last afternoon, the vast and beautiful St Simeon's site which grew up after the death of the aesthete who spent more than thirty years preaching from a high column.
The tour was a huge success, in no small measure thanks to the exceptional organisational skills of Elisabeth Woodthorpe and to our excellent, patient, efficient and good-humoured guide Fayez-Alasa - now an honorary member of ASTENE.

Sarah Wood

January 2008

Papers given at the Conference in Aleppo
Paul Hetherington: Travellers to the Cretan Labyrinth; Sonia Anderson: Sources for the English factory at Aleppo 1650-1700; Morris Bierbrier: Aleppo: city of trade; Deborah Manley: Consul Barker of Aleppo; Malcolm Wagstaff: Colonel Leake in Syria, Johanna Holaubek: The real life of the English Patient

January 2008

ASTENE visit to the British Museum
Ten of us arrived at the British Museum on Tuesday morning, 20 November, to a warm welcome from Patricia Usick who outlined a busy programme for the day ahead, organised for us by John Taylor.

We made our way upstairs to the Department of Ancient Egypt and the Sudan archive room, and Patricia explained to us the shortcomings of the various cataloguing systems, developed over the years, which now have to cope with over 100, 000 objects. In particular we looked at the meticulous, handwritten records of Samuel Birch who spent around fifty years (1835-1885) cataloguing the 10,000 items in the Egyptian collection at that time. We were also shown Henry Salt's detailed plans of the Saqqara necropolis, and George Edward's beautifully coloured drawings of a collection of mummy cases.

The Department library was our next destination, and there Patricia introduced us to the intriguing Madame D'Orbiney, as revealed through her lively correspondence with Samuel Birch as she negotiated the sale of a papyrus to the Museum. English by birth, Madame D'Orbiney appears to have had several careers: the first possibly as a courtesan in the French court; the second, as a dealer in antiquities who travelled the world. (See Queries.)

When deciphered, the papyrus told a story similar to that of Joseph and Potifar's wife, except that it also involved magical spells and consequently was the first allegorical 'fairy' story to come out of Ancient Egypt.

After lunch John Taylor led us down to the basement, the home of the Egyptian stone store. We walked past shelves and alcoves packed with objects, from rows of stelae to armies of shabti, from two ton sarcophagi to carefully carved canoptic jars. A group of lion-headed Sekhmets were also of interest: some 760 of them were commissioned by Amenhotep III. Surely the ultimate Limited Edition!

A small seated statue of Queen Tetisheri, purchased in 1890, provides an insight into the difficulties that even the experts can have telling the genuine from the fake. Recent detailed assessment of this statue raised major concerns as to its authenticity. Hence its current position as a resident of the stone store.

We then inspected a collection of everyday items in use in Ancient Egypt. It included board games, chairs, stools, a wooden hoe, and musical instruments, collected by Henry Salt. Several of the objects were the original subjects of illustrations by John Gardener Wilkinson in his Manners and Customs of Ancient Egyptians (3 vols, 1837).

However, perhaps the most marvellous moment came when we were shown the recently restored collection of wall paintings, also collected by Henry Salt, from an unknown tomb. The scenes, involving numerous delicately painted cows and geese, flocks of wild birds and rows of elegant girls, are exquisite. To be able to examine these beautiful paintings so closely was an enormous privilege.

Then it was upstairs to the Papyri room where we saw an original section of the D'Orbiney papyrus, and the famous judgement scene from Ani's Book of the Dead.

Back in the library, Henrietta McCall completed our day with an absorbing talk regarding the discovery of Ancient Mesopotamia and the excavations of Austren and Henry Layard at Nimrud and Ninevah. She illustrated the effect his discoveries had on the early Victorians with a selection of commemorative ceramics and a gleaming array of golden jewellery, all emblazoned with the winged bull of the Assyrian

Altogether we had a wonderful day at the British Museum and would like to give a huge vote of thanks to everyone who made it such a truly memorable experience.

Angela Reid

January 2008

ASTENE around the world
Members of the Association are based in nearly two dozen countries of the world. We send out the Bulletin to them in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, China, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Egypt, France, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Malta, Netherlands, Romania, Singapore, Slovenia, South Africa, Sweden, Syria and United States of America.

January 2008

The experience of an ASTENE Conference

This was indeed a buffet of delights: the papers ranged geographically from Greece in the west to Arabia and Mesopotamia in the east, from Egypt in the south to Central Europe in the north (though with a strong bias towards Egypt). The historical emphasis was on the nineteenth century, but there were sallies into much earlier periods (for example, one on the beginnings of the incense trade in about 1800 BCE) and later ones (e.g. Czech travel clubs between the wars).

Paul Robertson (in Bulletin 32) has categorised the papers into three groups according to the kinds of questions asked by their authors. For me, they also fell into a different three-way grouping: there were a few papers which were directly relevant to my own research, a larger number on topics about which I had a little bit of knowledge, and many (probably the largest group) on subjects which were completely new to me. This made for a fascinating and challenging few days: it was certainly necessary to keep one's wits about one!

Highlights for me (to name only three - inevitably a personal choice) were Malcolm Wagstaff on the mysterious Evliya Celebi in the Mani, Paul Robertson on Muhammed Sadiq's hajj guide, and Brian Taylor on Beaufort's work on charting the Anatolian coast. But there were many others that left me wanting to know more - and when I'm working in pencil-only libraries, I shall think of Conte, one of Napoleon's savants, introduced to me by Andrew Oliver.

Few marks to Southampton University for its creaky technology, but we were wonderfully lucky to have Bart Ooghe to step into that particular breach, and there was an ample supply of good humour all round.

As a first time participant in an ASTENE conference, I realised that there were a lot of people there from different countries who already knew each others, so the friendliness and lack of cliqueyness was all the more welcome. I appreciated the interesting conversations over meals and drinks as much as the formal sessions. It was perhaps a pity that the planned discussion sessions didn't materialise, but the packed schedule left few gaps, and the smooth organisation was a tribute to the hard work put in by the Wagstaffs. The farewell picnic in the grounds of Highclere
Castle - after a visit to the Carnarvon's Egyptian museum - on a beautiful summer day made a fitting end to the days of the conference.

Lucy Pollard

Lucy Pollard's introduction to her first ASTENE Conference was giving her paper on Stuart Travellers' Perceptions of Greeks in the Ottoman Empire in the opening session after Professor Emilie Savage-Smith's keynote paper and Dr Renata Tatomir's paper on incense, "the Egyptians' gift to the Ancient World". The abstracts of all the papers can be seen on the ASTENE website.

November 2007

Yanni's House at Gourna opposite Luxor

ASTENE's Annual General Meeting in Southampton agreed that, if our constitution allowed, we would help to support the reconstruction of the house on the hillside above the village of Gournu on the west bank of the Nile opposite Luxor, known as "Yanni's House". This house is said to have been built for the British Consul General Henry Salt in the 1820s and was used by his agent in Upper Egypt, the Greek, Giovanni d'Athanasi (1798-1854). Dr Brian Taylor has now checked with the Charity Commissioners that our constitution allows us to contribute to this work, and the ASTENE committee decided at its meeting on 29 September to follow up our involvement with the restoration.

This traditional mud-brick house was popularly known as 'Yanni's house' or the 'English house'. Travellers congregated there on their visits to the sites of the west bank and the Valley of the Kings to take refreshment, often to meet other travellers, and to see the antiquities Yanni had purchased for Salt's collection.

Many of the travellers wrote about their visit. As a contribution to the project of reconstructing this historic house as a living part of Egypt's heritage, we are planning to prepare a short anthology of travellers' descriptions of the house and the people who wrote about it.

We are already aware of the travellers' accounts of : John Madox (1823), Anne Katherine Elwood (1826). If you have a contribution to this project, please would you let the Bulletin Editor know the traveller, date and detailed source of the record. Any information about illustrations of the house or of people at the house will also be welcomed.

November 2007

ASTENE Biennial Conference, 12-16 July at Southampton University

Full programme of the ASTENE Conference.

Members came from eight countries and gave papers covering the whole ASTENE region from the Mani area of Greece, through Turkey and Syria, into Arabia and down the Nile beyond the cataracts, discussing topics from the early incense trade to the plague season and from lordly Scottish preparations for Eastern travel to General Gordon's pilgrimage to Jerusalem and travellers' accounts of the discomfort and comedy of the camel. The Conference dinner celebrated the tenth anniversary of ASTENE's foundation - and many of the founding members were present. We greatly appreciated the work of Pat Wagstaff in making the conference run so well and so imaginatively - ending with a picnic under the cedars of Lebanon at Highclere Castle.

Conference Review
Perhaps the most striking characteristic of this year's conference was the skilful way in which the programme had been put together. This is never an easy task with such a potentially eclectic range of presentations, covering the full range of ASTENE interests. But it was clear from the questions that were posed in the scheduled sessions, and from the discussions that took place on the fringes of the official timetable, that many of us were actively looking for thematic development across the programme, and for comparisons of approaches and methods to the material with which travellers had constructed their journeys and responses to place. Needless to say, we found it.

My own response to the over-arching themes - and these things are inevitably idiosyncratic - is a home-spun classification of papers that began to take shape with the thought-provoking address of the key-note speaker (Professor Emilie Savage Smith) on the first afternoon and emerged in its final form over a conversation at the conference dinner table some three days later. It is an attempt to structure the material we digested in terms of three questions that participants seemed to be posing of their travellers and the journeys they undertook - the emphasis what, the how and the why of travel in Egypt and the Near East - and is offered here with an implicit nod of acknowledgment of the direction of all who participated in Southampton, without whom there would be no foundations on which a review could elaborate.

The first of these three questions, the 'what', was addressed by papers that were broadly historical in their approach. Drawing on a wide range of documentary evidence to construct, and, in some cases, to re-construct, the 'facts' of the journey, they demonstrated the quality and the detail of original archive research undertaken by ASTENE members. The historical approach to travel and place was further supported by the additional resource sessions, which focused on both the opportunities and the obstacles that present themselves to anyone keen to 'make' travel history from its original sources.

The distinction between history as 'what happened' and literature/art as 'how it came to be seen' is not always an easy one to draw. But the papers that addressed the representational 'fictions' of the traveller, as opposed to the observable 'facts' contained in their sources, often picked up on the thorny questions of perspective, authorship and audience, among others. Covering a range of travel 'products', from the apparently ephemeral to works with conscious literary and artistic ambitions, these papers were motivated by questions about the internal and external factors that shape the written and visual record left by travellers, questions which often blurred the distinction between representation and explanation.

It is this interest in explaining travel (the 'why' of this little typology) that leads me to the third and final category of papers, many of which were concerned with what I will loosely label travel 'culture': the practices and values by which categories, types or modes of travel and traveller are defined by a society at any given point in time. There were, of course, the usual suspects who muddled the tidy distinctions between pilgrim, explorer, tourist, artist, courier or scholar. Nevertheless, the sense of there being cultural shifts between one travel 'era' and another, and the questions posed by a 'tradition' reaching the end of its shelf-life, arguably offer some of the most exciting opportunities for synthesis that straddle the varied interests and approaches of individual members of the Association.

Paul Robertson

August 2007

Discovering Egypt: the Ancient and the Oriental

On 21st April Dr Robert Morkot organised and hosted a delightful study day at Exeter for ASTENE and the Egyptian Exploration Society on (mainly) British 18-19th century explorers and travellers in Egypt.

Brian Taylor, Chairman of ASTENE, gave the first lecture: "Lusting all his Life: the insatiable, incorrigible and incomparable 4th Earl of Sandwich". This gentleman - also known as John Montagu - was an inveterate rake-hell and close friend of Sir Francis Dashwood of Hellfire Club fame. It was appropriate that he should feature as at the time the wonderful exhibition of William Hogarth's works was at the Tate - there a micro portrait of Montagu could be seen leering out of a halo perched above Dashwood's head.

In 1748, at the age of twenty, Montagu with a posse of his dilettante friends - including the artist Jean Etienne Liotard, set off on a grand tour of all the great centres of ancient civilization: Rome, Athens, Constantinople, and later the Eastern Mediterranean, Alexandria and Cairo - which they reached in 1739. Although a rake, who took great personal interest in the brothels and harems he came across, Montagu and his party also studied to some effect the ancient art and architecture that they saw in such abundance. As Dr Taylor said, "He certainly deserves to be recognised as one of the foremost Orientalists of his generation." His erudite Voyage around the Mediterranean was published seven years after his death in 1792.

Less sensational but equally enjoyable was Robert Morkot's description of Giovanni Belzoni at Abu Simbel in 1817 with the two half-pay naval captains, Charles Irby (1789-1845) and James Mangles (1786-1867). Very appropriately this day school was held at St Loyes in Exeter which incorporates Fairfield House - the one time home of James Mangles from 1852 until his death. The previous afternoon Robert Morkot had shown an ASTENE group around the still recognisable garden.

This was Belzoni's second visit to Abu Simbel. The immense Ramesside structure was virtually buried in wind blown sand and Belzoni and his small party set about clearing the entrance. A local work force was recruited with the promise of a share of the 'treasure' when the work was completed. After great difficulty with the sand, heat and recalcitrant labour force, they completed the work in 23 ten-hour days. An amazing achievement.

Soon after Belzoni met a Mr John Fuller who presented him with a three-part mummy case complete with its deceased. It needs to be remembered that antiquities at this time were abundant and perceived of little value. On occasions, Belzoni and his wife Sarah camped in rock-cut tombs - and wood from burial artefacts were often used for kindling. The fate of Mr Fuller's mummy was only slightly less tragic: the mummy itself being buried in Exeter and one of the mummy cases being destroyed.

Bryony Llewellyn, our excellent third lecturer, never fails to inform and entertain. The majority of her lecture was taken up with David Roberts - the self-taught Scotsman who produced the splendid and immensely popular paintings and engravings of Egypt and the Holy Land.

Librarian of the Egypt Exploration Society, Chris Naunton's theme was "Careful Coloured Drawings"- the title Howard Carter gave to the facsimiles he produced at Beni Hasan and other sites in the 1890s. Carter's work recording reliefs and inscriptions in line drawing and watercolour was to a standard that many believe has never been surpassed.

Some of the original coloured drawings are still at the EES, some elsewhere, and some are lost. The practice of recording decoration in this way has long since been abandoned, largely due to inexpensive colour photography. The splendid results achieved by Carter and his contemporaries are valuable for the light they shed on techniques employed by the Egyptologists at the end of the 19th century. Many are works of art in their own right and great credit is due to the custodians at the EES for their present day conservation and presentation.

The day's organisation was excellent - the audio-visuals worked well, the lunch was excellent too - all in all a day ASTENE could be proud of.

Ashley Jones

August 2007

THE MELIK SOCIETY
On 16 February a Memorandum of Agreement was signed at the Sudanese Embassy in London between the Melik Society and the Sudan National Corporation for Antiquities to set up the Nile Foundation for the purpose of restoring two historic vessels: the gunboat Melik and the armed steamer Bordein and giving them a new life as tourist attractions. It is planned that travellers will again sail down the Nile on the these boats. which were originally built on the Thames, shipped to Sudan and reassembled on the Nile well over a century ago.

April 2007

THE MELIK IN THE NEWS
We know of the 19th century gunboat, the Melik, from the late Dr David Dixon and other members of both ASTENE and the Melik Society. The Society has for a dozen years been campaigning to save this historic gunboat in the Sudan and for it to turn into a floating tourist attraction. A marine engineer's survey has recently confirmed the possibilities of the project, and we will up-date information about this project from time to time. An article of the Times of London of Saturday 25th November gives the details or you can turn to www.melik.org.uk

January 2007

The Travellers Club's 175th anniversary
Those members who have attended joint meetings at London's Travellers Club know the club-house designed by the architect-traveller Charles Barry. The Library's anniversary newsletter in discussing a visit to the Royal Academy reminded readers that in the artist Zoffany's famous painting The Tribuna of the Uffizi, the Scottish traveller James Bruce appears. Having returned from the Blue Nile, Bruce visited Marseilles, Paris, Rome, Bologna and Florence, arriving there just in time to be included in Zoffany's painting of the Tribuna - one of the most famous images of the Grand Tour.

April 2007