Category: Issue 15

Welcome to the first edition of CWA for 2006. We start the year in true style with Qatna, a Syrian site that defies imagination. There, archaeologists have made the once-in-a-lifetime find, uncovering untouched royal tombs concealed beneath a Bronze Age palace. The tombs boast splendid gold, precious jewellery, and other ancient treasures, which have lain hidden since the day of their abandonment following the destruction of the palace – probably by the Hittites in 1340 BC.
From royal tombs in Syria, we turn up the heat and move south to look at the civilisation most famed for its tombs: Ancient Egypt. Here, Egyptologist Nigel Strudwick draws on his excavation at the Theban tomb of a high official, Senneferi, to explore exactly how

Qatna, Syria

Peter Pfalzner, of the University of Tubingen writes of the extraordinary Brinze Age royal tombs at Qanta

Senneferi, Tomb of

How did a high-class Egyptian tomb work? All is revealed at the tomb of Senneferi who lived at the height of the New Kingdom at around 1420

Egyptian Dwarfs

Biological and artistic evidence suggests that dwarfs held a privilaged position in Ancient Egyptian society

Blow to Nero’s Palace

Nero’s palace has been forced to close after rain in December 2005 threatened to bring down part of the building

Neolithic Baby Boom

Scientific study reveals the invention of agriculture led to significant population increase

Tomb of Agamemnon, The

In the 1870s, the German grocer Heinrich Schliemann decided to devote the wealth he had accumulated in grocery to go and dig up first Troy and then Mycenae. In Mycenae he struck gold – literally. In 1876, just inside the Lion Gate, he excavated a circle of stone slabs which contained five shaft graves and […]

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