News from the Valley of the Kings

It sounds as though reports the museum had been attacked were a false alarm. Dr Salima Ikram has just posted on Facebook. The situation remains volatile and news is patchy. I will update again tomorrow.

UPDATE 22:24 UK: it gets even more confusing.  Some are suggesting that the museum wasn't looted last night, but it is feared that it is in imminent danger of being looted.

I have just updated the Looting Database to report that the Museum in Kharga was looted.

I am having trouble sorting the news in Kharga into a timeline, so I am not sure what news is yesterday, and what is unfolding today.  There are reports that the museum is facing attack and has been abandoned by the police, but I cannot determine whether that refers yesterday's attack or whether it is a new crisis.  See here.

The human situation in Kharga is also desperate.  It is impossible to verify the news but allegedly the police have let criminals out of the prisons (but did not free political prisoners) and the police are using live ammunition against pro-democracy protesters.  Five people are reported dead so far.  All unverified but video is starting to appear as well as Twitter reports.

Sorry not to be more precise, but with no media in Kharga it is very difficult to form a proper picture.

There have been a few articles about the discovery of Umm Mawagir but this article in the Yale Almumni Magazine which Vincent Brown found is the best.  Most tales of the discoveries of lost cities are fantasy stories or are over-hyped.  This is an honest-to-goodness discovery of a real lost city near the dessert oasis of Kharga to the West of Luxor.

The dessert city blossomed from1650 to 1550 BCE, just before the dawn of the New Kingdom.  Because the site is dessert and away from modern cities, preservation should be very good.  So far less than ½% of he city area has been excavated but that has revealed buried mud-brick walls which still stand 3 feet high.  So far there is no report of an associated cemetery but inevitably a city that size must include burials and probably a temple.  Hopefully there will be new texts and inscriptions which reveal more about period which is much less well-known than the New Kingdom which followed.