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Egyptian scholar speaks of country’s discoveries
Posted on Sunday, August 31, 2008 (CDT) by Thoth
 One of the world’s pre-eminent experts on Ancient Egypt said the country’s rich history is anything but fully understood, or discovered. Dr. Zahi Hawass, the secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Egypt, spoke to more than 600 people Saturday at the Hyatt Regency Lake Tahoe ballroom for the annual Siebens-Binz Tahoe Forum of Sierra Nevada College.
Hawass, who heads up all excavation in Egypt, estimated only about 30 percent of the nation’s treasures have been discovered.
He’s even gone so far as to probe the Nile River, which transported vital goods from the south of Egypt to the ancient city of Alexandria on the northern end.
“I thought, how did they transport goods in antiquity? How did wine come up to the cities from the valley?” Hawass said. “They had to use the river, and pharaohs were people like us, they made mistakes.”
So Hawass
arranged a team of divers to scan the depths of the Nile until they
discovered plates, still stacked from the kitchen cupboard of the ship
in which the plates were housed.
Such discoveries, Hawass
said, are the wave of the future for finding the keys to the past. He
stressed going over well-known sites, such as the Valley of the Kings
and the Pyramids at Giza.
Hawass spoke to the
sold-out forum at the behest of longtime friend and Sierra Nevada
College donor Nancy Siebens-Binz, who introduced him before his speech.
He spoke about the challenges facing Egyptian artifacts, such as pollution and over-tourism.
“It’s simple, our economy
needs tourists, but we have to protect our history and environment,”
Hawass said. “So we’ll close down and reopen exhibits every year to
make sure they don’t get over used.”
Hawass’ work, especially, relies on tourism dollars, he said.
“We spend about ($200
million American) each year on upkeep and excavations, and that money
comes only from tourism. Every dollar I get from the gift shops goes
back into new discoveries and excavations,” Hawass said.
The Discovery Channel and
National Geographic magazine also help fund exploration, Hawass said,
in exchange for articles and television programs.
“We try to get them out to
the Valley of the Kings often because they will pay for everything, the
salaries of scientists, everything,” Hawass said.
He is credited with the
discovery of a number of high-profile Egyptian artifacts, including the
tomb of Queen Hatshepsut and the Golden Mummies. The latter were
hundreds of mummies literally encased in gold from the shoulders up.
The mummies were so exorbitantly designed because they hailed from the
“Napa Valley” of Egypt, paid for in wine money from the pharaohs and
elite in Ancient Egypt. Hawass says it is the most important discovery
of his career, until later this year, possibly.
That’s when he’ll start to
probe the upper reaches of the pyramids for the tomb of Cleopatra, from
which he believes he’s not far away.
“It may be the greatest discovery ever,” Hawass said.
To lead such a career, Hawass said in addition to hard work, a passion is needed to succeed.
“Whenever children ask me
what it takes to be an archaeologist, I tell them it’s not enough to
like what you do, it’s not enough to love it, you have to have a
passion for your work,” Hawass said.
Copyright: TahoeBonanza.com
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