Photographing Tutankhamun

Photographing Tutankhamun
Archaeology, Ancient Egypt, and the Archive
Edited By Christina Riggs

ISBN 9781350038516

They are among the most famous and compelling photographs ever made in archaeology: Howard Carter kneeling before the burial shrines of Tutankhamun; life-size statues of the boy king on guard beside a doorway, tantalizingly sealed, in his tomb; or a solid gold coffin still draped with flowers cut more than 3,300 years ago. Yet until now, no study has explored the ways in which photography helped mythologize the tomb of Tutankhamun, nor the role photography played in shaping archaeological methods and interpretations, both in and beyond the field. This book undertakes the first critical analysis of the photographic archive formed during the ten-year clearance of the tomb, and in doing so explores the interface between photography and archaeology at a pivotal time for both. Photographing Tutankhamun foregrounds photography as a material, technical, and social process in early 20th-century archaeology, in order to question how the photograph made and remade ‘ancient Egypt’ in the waning age of colonial order.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents
List of Figures
Acknowledgments
Preface
Chapter 1. Photographing Tutankhamun: An Introduction
Chapter 2. Mirrored Memories: Excavating the Photographic Archive
Chapter 3. 'The first and most pressing need': Photographic Practice at the Tomb of Tutankhamun
Chapter 4. Tutankhamun's Treasures: Objects, Artworks, Bodies
Chapter 5. Men at Work: The Resurrection of the Boy-king
Chapter 6. Worlds Exclusive: Mediating Tutankhamun
Chapter 7. The Looking-glass: Egyptology’s Archival Afterlives
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Editor

Christina Riggs is Professor of the History of Visual Culture at Durham University.