Preface

About This Tale

Almost one hundred years ago, in November 1922, Howard Carter opened the tomb of Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings near Luxor in Egypt. The tomb had lain largely undisturbed since the death of the king in or about 1325BCE. (I’ve used the term BCE – ‘Before the Common Era’ rather than the BC that I grew up with in deference to modern academic practice.) Carter’s discovery triggered a wave of fascination in ancient Egypt that has in many ways continued until today; a fascination that I share and that contributes to this tale.

Parts of the following story are set in ancient Egypt at the time of the rule of Queen Cleopatra VII, twelve hundred years after Tutankhamun’s reign. Cleopatra was the last of the Greek dynasty of Pharaohs that ruled Egypt after its conquest by Alexander the Great. She was the last* in a line of pharaohs that stretched back almost 3000 years.

At that time Egypt - or the Kingdom of the Two Lands as it was known - was divided up into a series of administrative areas or Nomes, each ruled over by the pharaoh’s representative, a Nomarch.

The story starts in Busiris, a town in the delta region of the River Nile, on the Damietta branch, close to the modern village of Abu Sir Banna. The action moves between there, Alexandria and Oxford in the UK.

The story includes reference to Isis, one of the goddesses of Egypt who (among many other roles) protected women and children as goddess of life and magic. In Egyptian myth, Isis defended her husband Osiris, recovering the pieces of his body after he was dismembered and scattered by his scheming brother Seth, and fashioning a replacement penis for the part she could not find because it had been eaten by a crocodile. This allowed Osiris to be reborn as ruler of the underworld and protector of the dead and enabled Isis’s son Horus to gain his rightful inheritance It also touches on the concept of Ma’at; the Egyptian sense of order. Maintaining Ma’at was an important aspect of Egyptian life. Ma’at personified was the goddess of truth, justice and wisdom and a defender against chaos.

There are mentions of some real people in this story (Howard Carter, Lady Evelyn Beauchamp née Herbert, her husband Brograve, Lord Carnarvon and Harry Burton). Some but not all of the actions ascribed to them are real. Their motivations and thoughts are all imaginary.

The modern day story involves around a researcher studying the figures known as shabtis (pronounced “shab-tees”). Most of what I say about them and their significance to ancient Egyptian culture is true. The Griffith Institute, Sackler Library, the Jericho district of Oxford and Ashmolean Museum are all real places. The museum where Angela works and her colleagues are all figments of my furtive imagination, as are all the inhabitants of Busiris.

I have tried to be accurate in historical matters, however this is fiction. It may, however, make you wonder about the stories behind some of the objects in museums; stories that may not always be displayed on the labels of their cases.

But you probably don’t really need to know all that...

*Unless you count the two weeks or so that her son, Caesarion, ruled technically between her suicide and his assassination by Octavian (Augustus) at the end of August 30BCE.

Chapter 1 »