The Ancient Egyptian World (World in Ancient Times) Review

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This is just about the best, funniest book I've read all year--who would have expected this from a book on the ancient Egyptian World?
I'm not an expert on this subject but the writing has the ring of truth and seems to be well-researched.
The authors have a gift for making old topics seem this-minute relevant.
For instance, Egyptian priesthood: "Plucking out your eyebrows and eyelashes may sound painful., but being a priest had advantages. For one thing, you didn't have to pay taxes..." Or, on fashion: "So what would an Egyptian Fashion magazine look like (other than the fact it would be written on papyrus, need only one issue every thousand years or so, and could only be read by a few people since only aobut 1 percent of Egyptians could read?)"
I think the ho-hum title and amazingly dull cover are like displaying a perfect rose in a milk bottle, but you can't have everything.


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Sticks, Stones, & Shadows: Building the Egyptian Pyramids Review

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(More customer reviews)Pyramid building, according to the author, should be placed not in the context of only Ancient Egyptian technology, but rather in that of Near Eastern technology. This book is devoted to understanding the methods used by the Ancient Egyptians to build the pyramids. Numerous illustrations and excellent evidence complete this professional, believable and backed-up discussion, which will be of much use to interested readers.

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What do the pyramids of Egypt really represent? What could have driven so many to so great, and often so dangerous, an effort? Was the motivation religious or practical?

Richly illustrated with more than 300 photographs and drawings, Sticks, Stones, and Shadows presents an entirely original approach to the subject of pyramid building. Unlike other books discussing these majestic structures, this book reveals the connection between devices that served both a practical need for survival and a spiritual belief in gods and goddesses. Few have closely examined Egyptian technologies and techniques from the origins of pyramid development to the step-by-step details of how the ground was leveled, how the site was oriented, and how the stone was raised and placed to meet at a distant point in the sky.

Nevertheless, this is much more than a how-to-do-it book. Martin Isler also asks and answers questions virtually ignored for the last century. He discloses, for example, the ancient use of shadows--now denigrated to the ornamental back-yard sundial--but once an important tool for telling the height of an object, geographical directions, the seasons of the year, and the time of day. Isler also reinterprets the ancient "stretching of the cord" ceremony, which once was thought to have only religious significance but here is shown as the means of establishing the sides of a pyramid.

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