Volume 33 : Articles

New Discoveries at Abydos, Egypt

By: David O'Connor

The study of ancient Egypt revolves around a number of questions about major aspects of Egyptian culture, questions not yet fully resolved in spite of their fundamental nature. One such set of questions concerns that most “Egyp­tian” of forms, the pyramid, or rather, the pyramid and the complex of cult structures which are attached to […]

Froehlich Rainey served as Director of The University Museum from 1947 to 1976. During those years he helped to make the Museum one of the pre­eminent institutions in this country devoted to archaeological excavation and the innovative application of scientific technology to archaeology. Under his leadership more than 200 Museum expeditions were sent into the […]

Reports from the Field

By: Robert S. O. Harding

Many Museum members are familiar with the popular “Reports from the Field” lecture program. In an effort to expand the focus of that program and to reach those of you who live far from Philadelphia, this series will examine some of the field research being carried out by the Museum and associated departments at the […]

International Trade and the Late Bronze Age Aegean

By: Eric H. Cline and Martin J. Cline

Lewis Carroll, author of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, was no stranger to classical antiquity. It is, however, extremely unlikely that the Walrus, who never finished the above speech, was going to talk about trade and commercial enterprise in the ancient world. If be bad, his lecture may have been as follows. […]

By: Kenneth M. Kensinger

It was only a brief comment from a father to his young son but it launched me on one of the most illuminating and exciting lines of inquiry during my seven years of fieldwork with the Cashina­hua of eastern Peru. The men were sitting on low wooden stools or turtle shells around an assortment of […]

Monumental Ruins in Peru's North Highlands

By: William H. Isbell

More than three thousand years ago, a great tradition of stone sculpture and mega­lithic architecture emerged in Peru’s north highland valleys of which the Early Horizon (1200-200 B.C.) temple complex at Chavin de Hunter is a spectacular early example. In the subsequent Early Intermediate Period (200 B.C.-A.D. 550), the Callejón de Huaylas (or upper Santa […]

Opportunistic Cultivation in South India

By: Seetha N. Reddy

From time immemorial river floodplains have been an attractive environment for human exploitation, particularly through agriculture and pastoralism. Well-known examples, prehistoric and historic, range from the Missis­sippi and the Amazon in the New World, to the Danube, Nile, Tigris, Euphrates, Indus, and Hwang Ho in the Old World. But river floodplains are dynamic and each […]

Behind the Scenes

By: Lucy Fowler Williams

The University Museum has an exceptional collection of artifacts from the Calusa site at Key Marco, Florida. The pelican, wolf, and deer figureheads mentioned here (Figs. 5,8,4) traveled this year, in an unprece­dented loan of the Key Marco material, to the National Gallery of Art where they were exhibited as part of the Columbian Quincentenary […]

Reports from the Field

By: Robert J. Sharer and Loa P. Traxler and Julia C. Miller

Sylvanus G. Morley referred to the river cut through the Acro­polis at Copan, Honduras, as “the largest archaeological cross-section in the world” (The Ancient Maya 1948:324). Although perhaps overstated, these words certainly convey the magnitude of this fea­ture, known simply as the cortex (or “cut”). The cortex is the result of centuries of erosion by […]

By: Marianne L. Stoller

“When we plant corn we place seven or eight seeds in each hole. Of course, we don’t need to grow that many plants for ourselves, but one plant is for the mouse and two are for the crow. They need to eat, too, you know, and they like corn just as we do.” –Clifford Balenquah […]