Saturday, July 26, 2008

Theban Mapping Project website updated?

VOA News

Thanks to Rhio Barnhart for pointing me at this item recommending the Theban Mapping Project website:

Time again for our Website of the Week, when we showcase interesting and innovative online destinations. Our web guide is VOA's Art Chimes.

The latest Indiana Jones film is likely to remind people about the thrill of archaeology. Well, maybe not the adventure, romance and bullwhip-cracking thrill of the Harrison Ford version, but the excitement of discovering the past is still there.

The Middle East has always been a rewarding place for excavating the past. It certainly has been for Dr. Kent Weeks, who has spent decades mapping the burial place of Egypt's Pharaohs at Thebes, the capital of ancient Egypt. In 2000, he and his colleagues published an atlas that mapped out the Valley of the Kings.

WEEKS: "And it struck us at that time that it would be especially useful if, instead of just publishing a hard copy of the atlas, we could also put it up online. And so we established a website that put our atlas up, along with elaborately detailed descriptions of all of the tombs in the Valley of the Kings. And, well, as of last count, around 8,500 color photographs of the decorations on their walls."


It is a very long time since I've heard any news about the TMP and its plans for the site, and it is a long time since I've visited it, but it looks to me as though they have a new image database advertised in the What's New section on their home page.


No comments: