When you think about contemporary politics in the United States, Pharaonic Egypt may not be the first place that comes to mind. But stories and ideas about that civilisation have shaped the African American experience for decades; more recently, they have begun to affect more mainstream politics.

Ben Davies was at UCL’s Petrie Museum on 24 November to hear Birkbeck’s Dr Anna Hartnell give a lecture on the topic of ‘Excavating ‘Egypt’ in the African American Imagination’.

Dr Hartnell identified two main ‘narratives’ that have been appropriated by African Americans. Although at first they seem entirely at odds with one another – and indeed are often presented as such – she explained that they are actually harder to separate than it appears.

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In what amounts to either a delicious coincidence or a scheduling coup, the Institute of Archaeology held its ‘Cybertut: Archaeology Discovery, Tutankhamun and Cyberman’ event last week, just as the ruthless Cybermen reappeared in the latest series of Doctor Who.

A Cyberman insignia from The Tomb of The Cybermen

For those of you who don’t know, these emotionless cyborgs replaced their body parts with robotics in a supreme act of self-preservation and vie with the Daleks for the title of the Doctor’s greatest adversary.

So, what is the link between them and Tutankhamun? This was exactly the question posed by a new documentary, Curse of the Cyberman’s Tomb, which was screened at the event – following a short introduction by Vice-Chair of the Egypt Exploration Society and UCL PhD student John J Johnston.

Filmed in the UCL Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, the documentary is scheduled to appear as an extra on the new DVD edition of classic Doctor Who serial, The Tomb of the Cybermen.

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Heads collected by Flinders Petrie. Credit: Kathy Aitchison

We all like to think of history as an objective study of the way people long ago used to live don’t we? Well, at the UCL Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology last night Sally-Ann Ashton, of the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, suggested that that isn’t always the case.

Seated among some of the museum’s 8,000 artefacts she talked about the discovery of a collection of terracotta heads by Flinders Petrie in 1907-1912 and how his personal views coloured his interpretation of the findings.

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‘Who is the man from Mitanni?’ was the question posed by an iPad as part of the Qrator exhibit, on a digital tour I took of the UCL Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology on 12 May. Qrator invited visitors to comment on a cast of the man from Mitanni made in 1887 by Flinders Petrie, the museum’s founding archaeologist, in Karnak, Egypt. Visitors’ interpretations then became part of the object’s history and the iPad display.

The digital tour, which also showcased technologies called Tales of Things and 3D Encounters, was a chance for visitors to help shape the development and use of technology in a museum environment.

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