Amulets

Facsimile edition of the 1972 reissue of Flinders Petrie's 1914 pioneering typological catalogue of Egyptian amulets, one of a number of such catalogs to be reissued in this new series. Remarkably, though it can be criticized in points of detail emanating from more recent research, it remains unsurpassed in its comprehensive description, typological classification, and interpretation. While an absence of reasoned argument for the dating of his various groups is a weak point of Petrie's study from the point of view of modern scholarship, his attention to detail and careful consideration of typology and potential meaning, borne of decades of observation, means that this, and the other catalogs in the series, remain as invaluable reference books for Egyptologists. Based on examination of his own extensive collection of Egyptian artifacts, Petrie presents a typologically ordered catalog divided into seven main groups defined on the basis of interpretation rather than subject: amulets of 'similar,' i.e., relating to body parts; power; property; protection; human-headed; animal-headed; and animal gods. Each class of object is described along with its varieties: material, distribution, position within burials, its chronological position as defined by Petrie himself, and its meaning interpreted. Collections containing examples are listed and hundreds of objects are presented in photographs and a selection of burial associations illustrated by coffin plans. AUTHOR: Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie (1853?1942) was a pioneer in the field of 'modern' archaeology. He introduced the stratigraphical approach in his Egyptian campaigns that underpins modern excavation techniques, explored scientific approaches to analysis and developed detailed typological studies of artefact classification and recording, which allowed for the stratigraphic dating of archaeological layers. He excavated and surveyed over 30 sites in Egypt, including Giza, Luxor, Amarna and Tell Nebesheh.