For those that love heretical Egyptology, mixed with the fascinating subject of archaeoastronomy (wait, that might be all of you!), a new book from an old friend is definitely worth a read: Ancient Egyptian Sky Lore: Rethinking the Conventional Wisdom, by Joanne Conman, is about an entrenched misunderstanding in the orthodox view of ancient Egyptian astronomy and art:

Before hieroglyphs could be read, before anyone actually knew anything factual about ancient Egypt, certain early scholars were convinced that they were right about what they thought they saw in ancient Egyptian art. They were wrong. New research reveals that Egyptologists and archaeoastronomers have misunderstood ancient Egyptian art and have misinterpreted two of the five planets visible to the naked eye as Orion and the Big Dipper.

Joanne Conman examines some of Egyptology’s most long-standing comfortable opinions and exposes them to some much needed thought. Her courageous groundbreaking work sets the record straight by examining the rationales offered by the perpetuators and proponents of Egyptology’s and archaeoastronomy’s well-established myth. Conman walks the reader through the ideas objectively, focusing on reason and critical thinking. Beginning where Egyptology itself first went wrong, she looks at both the Greco-Roman-era temple zodiacs and the scholars who first studied them. Next, she reveals the most important piece of the puzzle, perhaps the best single piece of evidence identifying the five planets in Pharaonic Egypt: an ancient Egyptian textbook. She follows that with a review of what has been offered as support for the identifications of Orion and the Big Dipper over the last two centuries so the reader can see how it fails. Finally, she explores evidence that contradicts that dogma of Egyptology in both art and in texts and reveals tantalizing links between very ancient Egyptian religious texts and astrology.