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There are 34 results. | |
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Few figures in nineteenth-century American Egyptomania were as scandalous or as popular as Madame Helena Petrovsky Blavatsky. Blavatsky was a Russian immigrant who founded a group known as the Theosophical Society in New York in 1875. A school of thought still in operation today, theosophy is a combination of religion, philosophy, linguistics, and the study of the paranormal, and was one of... [more]
Cleopatra was one of American Egyptomania’s most popular subjects. Sexy, scandalous, powerful, and tragic, the myths and legends of Cleopatra’s life made her a perennial favorite for writers and artists who wanted to indulge in subject matter otherwise taboo for the nineteenth century. Tales of her sexual intrigues, decadent lifestyle, political bedrooming, and eventual suicide were staples of... [more] Nineteenth-century Egyptomania was one of the parents of early science fiction. In its combination of scientific revelations, imperial adventurers, exotic mystery, and outright speculation, Egyptomania opened the door for all sorts of fantasies about the course of time, the history of civilization, and the meanings of exploration. Even today, the mysteries of the ancient past as revealed... [more]
Early Egyptology was on very intimate terms with another nineteenth-century science, ethnology. A precursor to later fields such as comparative anatomy and evolutionary biology, ethnology was, as its name implies, the study of different “ethnic” differences between human groups. Nineteenth-century ethnologists, or “race scientists,” attempted to determine the inherent differences between... [more]
As often as writers and artists loved to imagine themselves looking upon the body of the Egyptian queen Cleopatra at the moment of her suicide by snakebite in the first century B. C., others loved to imagine that they themselves were Cleopatra at the moment of her death. First-person poems were especially popular forms for rendering these fantasies; with the excuse of providing “first-person”... [more]
Few icons of nineteenth-century Egyptomania enjoyed such fame as Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt. Powerful, dangerous, sensual, erotic, and ultimately a victim of her own desires, Cleopatra – or, more properly, her legend, as received and reconstructed by her interpreters in the nineteenth century – was never a simple or straightforward figure. Complex and contradictory, her story varied from century... [more]
In the twentieth century, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper found herself admitted to the ranks of canonical African American women writers. Her 1892 novel Iola Leroy; or, Shadows Uplifted, is considered one the most important African American novels of the nineteenth century, and is frequently taught as a prime example of the most prominent black literary themes of Reconstruction: reunion,... [more]
Most nineteenth-century Egyptologists were also race scientists. The study of the history of ancient Egypt was often seen as a way of explaining not only the history of “civilization,” but of the different cultures which related to that history. With the rise of race science, both professional and amateur intellectuals had ways of making large-scale generalizations about large-scale groups of... [more]
Most nineteenth-century Egyptologists were also race scientists, The study of the history of ancient Egypt was often seen as a way of explaining not only the history of “civilization,” but of the different cultures which related to that history. With the rise of race science, both professional and amateur intellectuals had ways of making large-scale generalizations about large-scale groups of... [more]
Few black men have accrued such prominent reputations in the history of black nationalism as Edward Wilmot Blyden. Born free in 1832 on the Caribbean island of St. Thomas, Blyden traveled extensively in North America, Africa, and the Arab world. A prolific writer, politician, spokesman, and teacher, Blyden made his home in Liberia, and lived and worked at the highest levels of local and... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more]
Rose Terry Cooke was an extremely prolific and popular American writer of the nineteenth century, but who is largely forgotten today. Born in 1827, Cooke lived her whole life in Connecticut, where she published hundreds of poems and dozens of short stories, as well as novels, children’s fiction and a host of nonfiction essays on religion and politics. Somewhat notorious for her opposition to... [more]
James Henry Breasted was America’s first dean of Egyptology. Founder of the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago, Breasted was the first American to receive a Ph.D. in Egyptology, and his A History of Egypt of 1905 was the first major textbook published in America by an American Egyptologist, and represents the first major sign of the professionalization of American Egyptology. In... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more]
The story of American Egyptomania is often one of rather freewheeling imagery. Pyramids, sphinxes, pharaohs, slaves, science, magic, secrets, revelations – all could be combined in almost infinite number of unpredictable ways, making for an almost endless number of variations. This was, in fact, one of Egyptomania’s biggest draws: for every person interested in narrowing down the specific... [more]
Sex sells, and in Egyptomania, the question of which came first – the sex or the mania – was impossible to answer. With Egyptomania came a whole host of already-packaged exotic erotic sexual images: slave women, harem girls, “Oriental” temptresses, even Cleopatra herself. In fact, so attached to one another were advertisements for Egyptian attractions and images of sex and exotic sexuality... [more]
As popular as ancient Egypt was in nineteenth-century cultural circles considered “respectable” or “highbrow” – such as archaeology, history, linguistics, or even architecture – it was at least as popular in social areas decidedly more democratic. Popular culture of all sorts was quick to seize on images and discourses of ancient Egypt and use them as forms of knowledge and entertainment. In... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more]
No single publication was more infamous or influential in the history of nineteenth-century American Egyptomania than Josiah Clark Nott and George Robins Gliddon’s 1854 Types of Mankind. Over 800 pages long, carefully compiled and lavishly illustrated, packed with data and provocative conclusions, Nott and Gliddon’s Types of Mankind was an instant classic, a best-selling scientific textbook that... [more]
No single publication was more infamous or influential in the history of nineteenth-century American Egyptomania than Josiah Clark Nott and George Robins Gliddon’s 1854 Types of Mankind. Over 800 pages long, carefully compiled and lavishly illustrated, packed with data and provocative conclusions, Nott and Gliddon’s Types of Mankind was an instant classic, a best-selling scientific textbook that... [more]
No single publication was more infamous or influential in the history of nineteenth-century American Egyptomania than Josiah Clark Nott and George Robins Gliddon’s 1854 Types of Mankind. Over 800 pages long, carefully compiled and lavishly illustrated, packed with data and provocative conclusions, Nott and Gliddon’s Types of Mankind was an instant classic, a best-selling scientific textbook that... [more]
No single publication was more infamous or influential in the history of nineteenth-century American Egyptomania than Josiah Clark Nott and George Robins Gliddon’s 1854 Types of Mankind. Over 800 pages long, carefully compiled and lavishly illustrated, packed with data and provocative conclusions, Nott and Gliddon’s Types of Mankind was an instant classic, a best-selling scientific textbook that... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more]
Early Egyptology was on very intimate terms with another nineteenth-century science, ethnology. A precursor to later fields such as comparative anatomy and evolutionary biology, ethnology was, as its name implies, the study of different “ethnic” differences between human groups. Nineteenth-century ethnologists, or “race scientists,” attempted to determine the inherent differences between... [more]
The 1850s saw an explosion of American interest in the figure of Cleopatra. Poems, paintings, sculptures, and novels all were written with the Egyptian queen at their center, but the main form accounts of Cleopatra took during this decade was biography. Short or book-length, praising or damning, sanitized or scandalous, biographical studies of Cleopatra were hugely popular and sold regularly,... [more]
The Washington Monument in Washington, D.C., is probably the most famous and iconic example of Egyptian Revival architecture in American history. Designed by South Carolina architect Robert Mills in 1836 but not completed until 1884, the Monument is modeled after a classic ancient Egyptian obelisk, but is stripped of any external markings and expanded in size, standing a bit over 555 feet in the... [more] One of nineteenth-century America’s most successful sculptors, William Wetmore Story worked in the neoclassical idiom, sculpting large marble figures modeled after classical Greek and Roman styles, and even lived for a time in Rome, Italy, at the height of the neoclassical vogue. Like his colleague Hiram Powers, he was a fixture in the white liberal upper-class social circles of New England, and... [more]
The visual arts were one of the most active sites for nineteenth-century American Egyptomania. Because so many of the discoveries in nineteenth-century Egyptology were visual in nature – ancient ruins, massive structures, stone carvings, even hieroglyphics – and because these discoveries took place in striking natural areas – deserts, oases, river valleys – painters and other illustrators found... [more] | ||
