separated in time by more than two thousand years -- be so clearly identical? Was it just a coincidence? Or maybe, somehow, something more? I had no way of answering these questions -- yet at least I could now be certain that they needed to be asked.
Not at El-Amarna, though, for soon after the excavation was brought to a close, and with the end of the season I left the site for good. What I had learnt there, however, was to alter the entire course of my life. Under Petrie’s supervision, I had begun my transformation into an archaeologist, a true professional, able to dig and examine systematically, and to temper the wildness of my untutored enthusiasms. But I had also, so I thought, stumbled upon the evidence of a remarkable and puzzling enigma - one which was to haunt me, as it proved, for the length of my career.
After leaving El-Amarna, I was fortunate, in the autumn of 1893, to obtain a post which kept alive my concern with the mystery. Indeed, I was fortunate to obtain a post at all, for I had briefly feared that I would be left unemployed and with no alternative but to depart Egypt altogether. However, with the assistance and recommendation of my former patrons, I was able not only to continue at work in the country, but to do so in that part of it I had most desired to visit. Ever since Petrie had spoken to me of its magnificence, I had longed to behold the great temple of Karnak and to inspect the environs of ancient Thebes. The post I had obtained gave me just such a chance - and brought me to that place where I sit writing even now.
Nor, despite the many years I have spent here, has it ever ceased to excite my wonder. For it is the spot, perhaps, more than any in Egypt, where past and present can seem most annihilated; even the Nile, the palms, the very crops in the fields, when they are outlined by the brilliance of the midday sun can appear like the features of a timeless architecture, unchanging, unchangeable, so distinct and stilled they seem. I can remember being struck by this thought on my very first arrival at Thebes, leaning from the window of my train and then, a moment later, seeing a flash of stone above the distant palms, stone and yet more stone, and knowing that I was glimpsing the great temple of Karnak. I visited it that same afternoon and imagined, lost amidst its stupendous and grandiloquent bulk, that the centuries might indeed have learned to dread such a monument. Courtyard after courtyard, pylon after pylon, the temple appeared to extend without end, and I could not help but contrast it with the sands and barren waste of El-Amarna 200 miles away to the north. Certainly, I felt the mystery of Akh-en-Aten’s revolution all the more keenly now, for I could understand, gazing about me, that in seeking the destruction of Karnak, he had been attempting what Time itself is yet to achieve. What dreams could have inspired him to challenge so awesome a place? What dreams, what hopes -- or, it may have been, what fears?
I would have welcomed the chance to stay in Karnak and consider further such mysteries. My post, however, required me elsewhere, and so that same evening, as the twilight began to deepen, I crossed the Nile to the western bank. Mud-rich fields soon gave way to tawny sands and beyond me, its peaks dyed red by the setting of the sun, arced a low range of mountains. Here, in the ancient mythology, had lain the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead; just as the sun each evening would disappear beneath the western horizon, so also, it was conceived, would the spirits of the departed journey west towards the desert. I had come to work within the shadow of this boundary, for it was marked by monuments of unparalleled romance and interest, built as gateways to the underworld and forming, to this very day, one vast and fabulous city of the dead.
Here, over the next six years, I laboured hard to become the master of my chosen calling. I had been employed to work upon the
Not at El-Amarna, though, for soon after the excavation was brought to a close, and with the end of the season I left the site for good. What I had learnt there, however, was to alter the entire course of my life. Under Petrie’s supervision, I had begun my transformation into an archaeologist, a true professional, able to dig and examine systematically, and to temper the wildness of my untutored enthusiasms. But I had also, so I thought, stumbled upon the evidence of a remarkable and puzzling enigma - one which was to haunt me, as it proved, for the length of my career.
After leaving El-Amarna, I was fortunate, in the autumn of 1893, to obtain a post which kept alive my concern with the mystery. Indeed, I was fortunate to obtain a post at all, for I had briefly feared that I would be left unemployed and with no alternative but to depart Egypt altogether. However, with the assistance and recommendation of my former patrons, I was able not only to continue at work in the country, but to do so in that part of it I had most desired to visit. Ever since Petrie had spoken to me of its magnificence, I had longed to behold the great temple of Karnak and to inspect the environs of ancient Thebes. The post I had obtained gave me just such a chance - and brought me to that place where I sit writing even now.
Nor, despite the many years I have spent here, has it ever ceased to excite my wonder. For it is the spot, perhaps, more than any in Egypt, where past and present can seem most annihilated; even the Nile, the palms, the very crops in the fields, when they are outlined by the brilliance of the midday sun can appear like the features of a timeless architecture, unchanging, unchangeable, so distinct and stilled they seem. I can remember being struck by this thought on my very first arrival at Thebes, leaning from the window of my train and then, a moment later, seeing a flash of stone above the distant palms, stone and yet more stone, and knowing that I was glimpsing the great temple of Karnak. I visited it that same afternoon and imagined, lost amidst its stupendous and grandiloquent bulk, that the centuries might indeed have learned to dread such a monument. Courtyard after courtyard, pylon after pylon, the temple appeared to extend without end, and I could not help but contrast it with the sands and barren waste of El-Amarna 200 miles away to the north. Certainly, I felt the mystery of Akh-en-Aten’s revolution all the more keenly now, for I could understand, gazing about me, that in seeking the destruction of Karnak, he had been attempting what Time itself is yet to achieve. What dreams could have inspired him to challenge so awesome a place? What dreams, what hopes -- or, it may have been, what fears?
I would have welcomed the chance to stay in Karnak and consider further such mysteries. My post, however, required me elsewhere, and so that same evening, as the twilight began to deepen, I crossed the Nile to the western bank. Mud-rich fields soon gave way to tawny sands and beyond me, its peaks dyed red by the setting of the sun, arced a low range of mountains. Here, in the ancient mythology, had lain the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead; just as the sun each evening would disappear beneath the western horizon, so also, it was conceived, would the spirits of the departed journey west towards the desert. I had come to work within the shadow of this boundary, for it was marked by monuments of unparalleled romance and interest, built as gateways to the underworld and forming, to this very day, one vast and fabulous city of the dead.
Here, over the next six years, I laboured hard to become the master of my chosen calling. I had been employed to work upon the