Internet Archive - Free Egyptian Historical Resources

Advice, information and discussion about Egypt in general.

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Hafiz
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Internet Archive - Free Egyptian Historical Resources

Post by Hafiz »

Posters probably know about the Internet Archive and its collection of out of copyright books, music and ephemera available for download.

For those who don’t, here is a very small sample of the available objects in English of relevance to Egypt:

Maspero’s Art of Egypt with color plates in PDF, Kindle etc.
The monuments of Upper Egypt, a translation of the "Itinéraire de la Haute Égypte", of Auguste Mariette-Bey in similar formats to above
A guide to the antiquities of Upper Egypt from Abydos to the Sudan Frontier
by Weigall, Arthur Edward Pearse Brome, 1880-1934
Ten years' digging in Egypt, 1881-1891
by Petrie, W. M. Flinders (William Matthew Flinders), Sir, 1853-1942
Egypt and its monuments; pharaohs, fellahs and explorers
by Edwards, Amelia Ann Blanford, 1831-1892
The manners and customs of the ancient Egyptians
by Wilkinson, John Gardner, Sir, 1797-1875
The Literature of Egypt and the Soudan from the Earliest Times to the Year 1885 [i.e. 1887

There are many periodicals and much available in French and German.

Ephemera includes:
A photographic souvenir of Egypt
by Vegnios; Zachos from the 1920’s
Dead towns and living men, being pages from an antiquary(s notebook
by Woolley, Leonard, Sir, 1880-1960 complete with a bizarre photograph of Woolley and T E Lawrence at the dig in their school blazers.
Herodotus on Egypt
Noam Chomsky - 2000-12-14 - The Crisis in the Middle East
Islamic Fascism Abdel Samad, Hamed 2016

And many travel books from the 19th and early 20th century. There are also sound files/spoken books.

Besides the usual the following curiosa might be of interest to Luxorphiles:
Luxor as a health resort
by Worthington, George Vigers 1914 with beautiful period photographs.
A Ride in Egypt, from Sioot to Luxor in 1879: With Notes on the Present ...
by William John Loftie
Hints for invalids and travellers, with observations on the climate of Luxor and Egypt : made during a three years' residence 1877-78-79
by Maclean, T.E; Royal College of Surgeons of England proving there is nothing new under the sun and that medical tourism has been tried before

It’s a huge database with a frustrating search function so it pays to be specific. Even then you will miss much or get too much. A particular resource for those who like to collect historical photographs – if you know how to copy an image from a PDF file.

The connection with Egypt has another angle. The foundation which runs the site has established its backup server at the Biblioteque Alexandria.

Off topic – its also very useful for those interested in full text classics like Remberance of Things Past or sound files of old wax and cylinder recordings - Jazz, Classical, Blues and popular.

Its all free and allegedly legal.
https://archive.org/


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Re: Internet Archive - Free Egyptian Historical Resources

Post by Horus »

Thanks for posting Hafiz, as you say it is a huge resource site and I agree it is a bit difficult to navigate, although maybe spending more time there would help. Dowloading a book with text and photographs as a PDF file worked very well, although I did not have much luck with Kindle or EPUB files for readers, maybe that version did not exist for the ones I chose?
Here is an example of an image link, it is to the Colossi of Memnon and is series of very detailed close ups, not your normal tourist image.

https://archive.org/details/RayBooysenColossiofMemnon
Image
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