While the summer break is approaching, I am delighted to announce the next DiverseNile Online Seminar next Tuesday. Dr. Mohamed Osman will give a talk with the title „Tracks on the sand, ancient Egyptian mobility in the desert“.

Mohamed is the Director of the Coptite and Theban Desert Eastern Hinterlands survey project, Visiting Scholar at Humboldt University Berlin and Visiting Scholar at New York University. He is an expert about trade routes in ancient Egypt and Sudan. His book published in 2022 (Osman 2022) highlights the possibilities to trace Old and Middle Kingdom (3000 to about 1700 BCE) trade routes using textual evidence, archaeology but also satellite images.

His DiverseNile talk will be about the approaches and methods used when researching about travelling routes. Starting from the theoretical backgrounds and the GIS spatial analysis and how it can be useful, Mohamed will also outline how we can detect the errors in this analysis.

The upcoming DiverseNile Seminar will present case studies from both the Western and Eastern Desert. One particular example will be Mohamed’s discussion about the route between Aswan and Kerma.

I am very much looking forward to this talk presenting fresh research about patterns of ancient mobility in the desert!

Reference:

Osman Abdollah, Mohamed 2022. Trade centers and trade routes in Upper Egypt, during the Old and Middle Kingdoms. GHP Egyptology 36. London: Golden House.