After the Arab Spring, a new Islamist Winter for Egyptology?

My fears for Western Egyptology

I can’t help feeling concern about the new era for archaeology in Egypt. Especially when an Egyptian imam recently suggested that pharaonic statues were no better that idols and they should have the heads covered in wax.

Maybe these new people hope the tourists will come in their millions to see their mosques and Islamic Cairo. Good luck with that.

It’s not that I lack appreciation of Islamic architecture.

I think much of it is breathtaking, but then I think the same about many Western cathedrals. Yet I can’t imagine people in the Islamic world dreaming about seeing them and willing to spend a quarter of a year’s salary to do so.

 My new archaeological adventure, about to be released in the New Year, is set in these turbulent times and follows on from The Smiting Texts, The Hathor Holocaust and the Ibis Apocalypse.

The Egypt adventure trilogy - about to become a series