OUR forthcoming lectures are as follows:

November 10, 2pm at the Oakwood Centre in Headley Road, Woodley, Reading RG5 4JZ — “To hear or to divide words? The changing face of Egyptian justice, 2700-1700 BCE” by Dr Alex Loktionov.

A new approach to prosopographic and textual analysis allows us to reconstruct the judicial landscape at the time before the New Kingdom in unprecedented detail.

This talk brings that detail to light, arguing that a previously unnoticed revolution in Egyptian justice occurred during the First Intermediate Period and led to the emergence of lawyers as a professional class and law as a definable, abstract concept.

December 8, 2pm at Coronation Hall, Headey Road, Woodley, Reading RG5 4JB — “The First Egyptologists” by Professor Alan Lloyd.

Egyptology starts with the Ancient Egyptians, the best-known example being Khaemwese, a son of Ramesses II.

A particularly interesting case is Horapollo, who wrote at the time when Pharaonic culture was almost dead.

This lecture will explore aspects of ancient Egyptology to determine what these writers thought they were doing and how well, or badly, they did it.

January 12, 2pm at the Oakwood Centre in Headley Road, Woodley, Reading RG5 4JZ — “The emergence of the Egyptian State — links with the landscape evolution of the Nile Delta” by Dr Ben Pennington.

Around 3100 BC, early upstream centres of culture were transformed into a larger territory encompassing all Egypt.

Recent work shows the deltaic landscapes downstream to have been highly dynamic.

A new model suggests that this landscape remodelling may have allowed, or even stimulated, a variety of important socio-economic changes in this region which could have impacted upon the emergence of Dynastic Egypt.