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Gaston Maspero
Gaston Maspero
Gaston Maspero
Born June 23, 1846
Paris
Died June 30, 1916
Nationality French
Fields Egyptology

Gaston Camille Charles Maspero (June 23, 1846–June 30, 1916) was a French Egyptologist. Events 1180 - First Battle of Uji, starting the Genpei War in Japan 1305 - The Flemish For the game see 1846 (board game. Year 1846 ( MDCCCXLVI) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link will display Paris (ˈpærɨs in English; in French) is the Capital of France and the country's largest city Events 350 - Roman usurper Nepotianus, of the Constantinian dynasty, is defeated and killed by troops of the Usurper Year 1916 ( MCMXVI) was a Leap year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Leap year This article is about the country For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic France topics. Egyptology (from Egypt and Greek grc -λογία -logia. علم المصريات مصر شناسی is a major field of Archaeology Events 1180 - First Battle of Uji, starting the Genpei War in Japan 1305 - The Flemish For the game see 1846 (board game. Year 1846 ( MDCCCXLVI) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link will display Events 350 - Roman usurper Nepotianus, of the Constantinian dynasty, is defeated and killed by troops of the Usurper Year 1916 ( MCMXVI) was a Leap year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Leap year This article is about the country For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic France topics. This is a partial list of Egyptologists. An Egyptologist is any Archaeologist, Historian, linguist, or Art historian who specializes in

Contents

Life

Gaston Maspero was born in Paris to parents of Lombard origin. Paris (ˈpærɨs in English; in French) is the Capital of France and the country's largest city Lombardy (Lombardia Latin: Langobardia, Western Lombard: Lumbardìa, Eastern Lombard: Lombardia) is one of the While at school he showed a special taste for history, and by the age of fourteen he was already interested in hieroglyphic writing. Egyptian hieroglyphs (ˈhaɪərəʊɡlɪf from Greek grc-Grek ἱερογλύφος " sacred carving " also hieroglyphic = grc-Grek It was not until his second year at the École Normale in 1867 that Maspero met fellow Egyptologist Auguste Mariette, who was in Paris as commissioner for the Egyptian section of the Exposition Universelle. École Normale de Musique de ParisThe École normale supérieure (also known as Normale Sup’, Normale, ENS, ENS-Paris, ENS-Ulm or This is a partial list of Egyptologists. An Egyptologist is any Archaeologist, Historian, linguist, or Art historian who specializes in The French scholar and archaeologist François Auguste Ferdinand Mariette ( February 11, 1821 &ndash January 19, 1881) was the foremost This article is about the country of Egypt For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Egypt topics. In 1864 it was decreed by Emperor Napoleon III that an international exposition should be held in Paris in 1867. Mariette gave him two newly discovered hieroglyphic texts of considerable difficulty to study, and the young self-taught scholar produced translations of them in less than a fortnight, a great feat in those days when Egyptology was still almost in its infancy. Note Please link only to revelant articles per "WPOVERLINK" The publication of these texts in the same year established his academic reputation.

A short time was spent in assisting a gentleman in Peru who was seeking to prove an Aryan affinity for the dialects spoken by the Indians of that country to publish his research, but in 1868 Maspero was back in France at more profitable work. Peru (Perú Piruw Piruw officially the Republic of Peru ( reˈpuβlika del peˈɾu is a country in western South America. Aryan is an English word derived from the Sanskrit " Ārya " meaning "noble" or "honorable" In 1869 he became a teacher (répétiteur) of Egyptian language and archeology at the École Pratique des Hautes Études, and in 1874 he was appointed to the chair of Champollion at the Collège de France. Egyptian is an Afro-Asiatic language most closely related to the Berber, Semitic, Somali and Beja languages École pratique des hautes études is a University in Paris, France. Jean-François Champollion ( 23 December 1790 – 4 March 1832) was a French classical scholar, philologist The Collège de France is a higher education and research establishment ( Grand établissement) located in Paris, France, in the 5th arrondissement

He originally wanted to attend Hermans Van Lisk School for dance and homography but his father wouldn't support his chosen path. So in November 1880 Professor Maspero went to Egypt as head of an archeological mission sent there by the French government, which ultimately developed into the well-equipped Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale. The Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale (or IFAO) is a French research institute based in Cairo, Egypt, dedicated to the study of the This occurred a few months before the death of Mariette, whom Maspero then succeeded as director-general of excavations and of the antiquities of Egypt.

Aware that his reputation was then more as a linguist than an archaeologist, Maspero's first work in the post was to build on Mariette's achievements at Saqqara. Saqqara or Sakkara, Saqqarah ( Arabic: سقارة is a vast ancient burial ground in Egypt, featuring the world's oldest standing Step He expanded their scope from the early Old Kingdom to the later, with particular interest in tombs with long and complete hieroglyphic inscriptions that could help illustrate the development of the Egyptian language. The Old Kingdom is the name commonly given to that period in the 3rd millennium BCE when Egypt attained its first continuous peak of civilization in complexity and achievement Selecting five later Old Kingdom tombs, he was successful in that aim, finding over 4000 lines of hieroglyphics which were then sketched and photographed.

As an aspect of his attempt to curtail the rampant illegal export of Egyptian antiquities by tourists, collectors and agents for the major European and American museums, Maspero arrested the Abd al-Russul brothers from the notorious treasure-hunting village of Gorna, who confessed under torture to having found the great cache of royal mummies at Deir el-Bahri in July 1881. A mummy is a Corpse whose Skin and Flesh have been preserved by either intentional or Incidental exposure to Chemicals extreme Deir el-Bahri (Arabic دير البحري dayr al-baḥrī, literally meaning "The Northern Monastery " is a complex of Mortuary temples and tombs The cache was moved to Cairo as soon as possible to keep it safe from robbers.

In 1886 he resumed work begun by Mariette to uncover the Sphinx, removing more than 65 feet of sand and seeking tombs below it (which he did not find, but have later been found but not opened). He also introduced admission charges for Egyptian sites to the increasing number of tourists to pay for their upkeep and maintenance.

In spite of the brutality towards the Abd al-Russul brothers, Maspero was popular with museum keepers and collectors because he was known to be a "pragmatic" director of the Service of Antiquities, one who would allow them to remove from the country what he did not want for the Bulaq Museum. Maspero did not attempt to halt all collecting, but rather sought to control what went out of the country and to gain the confidence of those who were regular collectors. When Maspero left his position in 1886 and was replaced by a series of other directors who attempted to halt the trade in antiquities, his absence was much lamented.

Maspero resumed his professorial duties in Paris from June 1886 until 1899, when, at 53, he returned to Egypt in his old capacity as director-general of the department of antiquities. On October 3rd that year an earthquake at Karnak collapsed 11 columns and left the main hall in ruins. Maspero had already made some repairs and clearances there (continued in his absence by unofficial but authorized explorers of many nationalities) in his previous tenure of office, and now he set up a team of workmen under French Egyptologists and regularly visited to oversee its reconstruction work, opposing some Romantics who wished the ruins left as they were. Romanticism is a complex artistic literary and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Western Europe, and gained strength during the In 1903 an alabaster pavement was found in the court of the 7th Pylon, and beneath it a shaft leading to a large hoard of almost 17,000 statues, with every part of the dig drawn, recorded and photographed.

On his arrival in 1899 he found the collections in the Bulak Museum enormously increased, and while working to expand them further he superintended their removal from Gizeh to the new quarters at Kasr en-Nil in 1902. The Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, known commonly as the Egyptian Museum, in Cairo, Egypt, is home to the most extensive collection of Ancient You may have been looking for the Great Pyramid of Giza. For the three pyramids of Giza visit the Giza pyramid complex. The vast catalogue of the collections made rapid progress under Maspero's direction. Twenty-four volumes or sections were already published in 1909. This work and the increasing workload of the Antiquities Service led to an expansion of staff at the museum, including the 17 year old Howard Carter. Howard Carter may refer to Howard Carter (archaeologist, discovered Tutankhamun's tomb Howard O'Neal Carter, retired basketball player It was Maspero who recommended Carter to Lord Carnarvon in 1907, when the Earl approached him to seek advice for the use of an expert to head his planned archaeological expedition to the Valley of the Kings. Earl of Carnarvon is a title that has been created three times in British history The Valley of the Kings ( Arabic: وادي الملوك Wadi Biban el-Muluk; "Gates of the King" is a Valley in Egypt where for

He also set including a network of local museums throughout Egypt, including a new larger Cairo facility, to encourage the Egyptians to take greater responsibility for the maintenance of their own heritage by increasing public awareness of it. In 1912 he also succeeded where his predecessors had failed in the introduction of a series of anti-looting laws, before retiring in 1914.

Maspero died in June 1916 and was interred in the Cimetière du Montparnasse in Paris. Montparnasse Cemetery ( French: Cimetière de Montparnasse) is a famous cemetery in the Montparnasse quarter of Paris, part of the

Works

Among his best-known publications are the large Histoire ancienne des peuples de l'Orient classique (3 vols. , Paris, 1895-1897, translated into English by Mrs McClure for the S. P. C. K. ), displaying the history of the whole of the nearer East from the beginnings to the conquest by Alexander; a smaller Histoire des peuples de l'Orient, 1 vol. Alexander the Great ( or, Mégas Aléxandros; July 20 356 BC June 10 or June 11 323 BC also known as Alexander III of Macedon (el Ἀλέξανδρος Γ' , of the same scope, which passed through six editions from 1875 to 1904; Etudes de mythologie et d'archéologie égyptiennes (Paris, 1893, etc. ), a collection of reviews and essays originally published in various journals, and especially important as contributions to the study of Egyptian religion; L'Archéologie égyptienne (1907), of which several editions have been published in English. He also established the journal Recueil de travaux relatifs à la philologie et à l'archéologie égyptiennes et assyriennes; the Bibliothèque égyptologique, in which the scattered essays of the French Egyptologists are collected, with biographies, etc. ; and the Annales du service des antiquités de l'Egypte, a repository for reports on official excavations, etc.

Maspero also wrote: Les inscriptions des pyramides de Saqqarah (Paris, 1894); Les momies royales de Deir el-Bahari (Paris, 1889); Les contes populaires de l'Egypte ancienne (3rd ed. Saqqara or Sakkara, Saqqarah ( Arabic: سقارة is a vast ancient burial ground in Egypt, featuring the world's oldest standing Step , Paris, 1906); and Causeries d'Egypte (1907), translated by Elizabeth Lee as New Light on Ancient Egypt (1908).

See also

External links

References

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