Tyldesley, Joyce – The Bell Bookshop https://www.bellbookshop.co.uk Henley-on-Thames Fri, 04 Apr 2025 17:28:43 +0000 en-GB hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9 https://www.bellbookshop.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/cropped-Bell-Background-Blue-32x32.png Tyldesley, Joyce – The Bell Bookshop https://www.bellbookshop.co.uk 32 32 Nefertiti’s Face https://www.bellbookshop.co.uk/product/nefertitis-face/ Thu, 02 Jan 2020 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.bellbookshop.co.uk/product/nefertitis-face/ More than three thousand years ago a sculptor working in the royal city of Amarna carved a limestone bust of an Egyptian queen. The queen was Nefertiti, consort of the ‘heretic pharaoh’ Akhenaten. Plastered and painted, Nefertiti’s bust depicted an extraordinarily beautiful woman. However, Akhenaten’s reign was drawing to an end, and the royal family was soon to be written out of Egypt’s official history. Not long after its creation the stone Nefertiti was locked in a storeroom and forgotten. In 1912 the bust was re-discovered and transported to Germany. Initially hidden from the public view, the beautiful queen was eventually displayed in Berlin Museum. Instantly, she became an ancient world celebrity. Egypt has yielded more than its fair share of artistic masterpieces, but no other sculpture has so successfully bridged the gap between the ancient and modern worlds. The timeless beauty of the Nefertiti bust both attracts us and sparks our imagination, but in so doing it obscures our view of the past, shifting attention not only from the other members of the Amarna court, but also from other, equally valid, representations of Nefertiti herself. In this book Joyce Tyldesley explores the creation of a cultural icon, from its ancient origins to its modern context: its discovery, its display, and its dual role as a political pawn and artistic inspiration.

]]> The Penguin Book of Myths and Legends of Ancient Egypt https://www.bellbookshop.co.uk/product/the-penguin-book-of-myths-and-legends-of-ancient-egypt/ Thu, 04 Aug 2011 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.bellbookshop.co.uk/product/the-penguin-book-of-myths-and-legends-of-ancient-egypt/ ‘This readable anthology is a good introduction to a civilization that fascinates like few others … in this book there are animals who talk, princesses who are locked up at the top of towers, wicked stepmothers and many other themes … An enjoyable book by a skilled author’ Financial Times

The civilization we know as Ancient Egypt stretched over three thousand years. What was life like for ancient Egyptians? What were their beliefs – and how different were they from ours? Myths and Legends of Ancient Egypt uses Egypt’s vivid narratives to create a panorama of its history, from the earliest settlers to the time of Cleopatra.

Gathered from pyramid texts, archaeological finds and contemporary documents, these stories cover everything from why the Nile flooded annually to Egyptian beliefs about childbirth and what happened after death. They show us what life was really like for rich and poor, man and woman, farmer and pharaoh.

Myths and Legends of Ancient Egypt brings a long-dead culture back to life.

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