Bibliography

This is a short commented bibliography about Ancient Egypt. It's completely arbitrary and linked to my tastes. It was written in order to be able to easily send references on the "sci".archaeology newsgroup, so it overemphasizes works written in english.

General

Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization Kemp B.J. Routledge, London, 1989.

Very innovative study on the Egyptian civilization, and on Egyptology itself. Of particular note is a new view on the development of Egyptian architecture, with a stress on the existence of local forms until the end of the old kingdom, and their gradual suppression in favor of state promoted forms.

Egypt of the Pharaos Gardiner, Sir A.H. Oxford 1961

A book on Egyptian history, Gardiner's swan's song, according to himself. Emphasis is put on the sources. Reads like a novel.

Dictionnaire de la civilisation égyptienne Posener, G., Sauneron, S. and Yoyotte, J.

A very nice and well written dictionnary on ancient Egypt, with beautiful illustrations. Only little default: it lacks a bibliography.

Religion

Conception of God in Ancient Egypt: the One and the Many Hornung, E. London, 1993

One of the major recent books on Egyptian religion.

Les dieux de l'ÉgypteTraunecker C. Presses Universitaires de France, 1992 ISBN 2-13-044368-0

A concise and very well done roundup of the current views on Egyptian Religion.

Religion and Philosophy in Ancient Egypt Allen, J.P. et al, ed. Yale Egyptological Studies 3. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989, ISBN 0-912532-18-1

A important collection of articles on religion by some of the heavyweight in the domain, including two articles by J.Assman

The Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead, Faulkner, R.O. British Museum Press, 1993 ISBN 0-7141-0946-0

A translation of the spells found in the various books of the dead, with a nice illustration.

The Egyptian Book of the Dead Translation by Faulkner, R.O., comments by Goelet, O., facsimile by Budge, Sir E. W. ISBN 0-8118-0767-3

The whole Any Papyrus, with photographs of all the facsimile plates, and comments on the pictures. Nice !

Symbol and Magick in ancient Egypt Wilkinson, R.H. Thames & Hudson, London, ISBN 0-500-23663-1

Architecture

Karnak d'Égypte, domaine du divin; Les bâtisseurs de Karnak, Aufrère, Golvin and Goyon, Éditions du CNRS.

Two books on the Karnak temple, the second is full of information about Ancient Egyptian building techniques.

Ancient Egyptian Construction and Architecture Clarke and Engelbach, Dover ISBN 0-486-26485-8

an old (1930) book, re-published by Dover, but with much information, mainly on technical points.

The Pyramids of Egypt Edwards, I.E.S.

A classic on the subject. Revised Edition.

Le mystère des pyramides Lauer, J.P.

The title is a joke ; the book deals with both the construction of the pyramids and their history afterwards, including a debunking of the pyramidologists thesis.

L'écriture et l'art de l'Égypte Ancienne, Fisher, H.G. Presses Universitaires de France, 1986, ISBN 2-13-038788-8

A very interesting book on the relationships between the hieroglyphs and the rest of Egyptian Art.

United with Eternity - A concise Guide to the Monuments of Medinet Habu, the American University in Cairo Press, 1980, ISBN 0-918986-28-1

A short guide for Ramesses III's temple, very interesting if you want to have a quick view of the inner working of a temple.

Egyptian Towns and cities Uphill, E.P. Shire Egyptology, 1988 ISBN 0-85263-939-2

A short book about cities in Egypt. Part of a series of nice monographies on various Egyptological subjects, and unexpensive.

The Hidden Tombs of Memphis Martin, G.T. Thames & Hudson, London ISBN 0-500-27666-8

A book on the XVIII and XIX dynasty tombs recently found in Memphis.

Language

General books on the writing system

Reading the Past, Ancient Writing from Cuneiform to the Alphabet Bonfante L, Chadwick J, Cook B.F, Davies W.V, Healey J.F, Hooker J.T, and Walker, C.B.F British Museum Publication 1990 ISBN 0-7141-8072-6

A very nice book on ancient writing, which goes quite far. Translated in French by C. Zivie-Coche, Editions du Seuil, 1994

Naissance de l'Écriture Réunion des Musées Nationaux 1982

A very complete catalog, with lots of interesting articles on Hieroglyphs and Cuneiform.

Literature

Ancient Egyptian Litterature Lichteim, M., 3 vols, University of California Press, Berkeley.

A collection of literary texts. Every classical text in ancient Egyptian Literature is here, in a modern translation, with a commentary.

Letters from Ancient Egypt Wente

A collection of letters from the whole history of ancient Egypt.

Voices from Ancient Egypt Parkinson, R.B. British Museum Press, 1991, ISBN 0-7141-0961-4

A choice of various Egyptian texts, from graffito and letters to stelas.

Littérature et politique dans l'Égypte de la XIIieme dynastie Posener, G., Éditions Champion, Paris 1969

A fundamental book on the birth of Egyptian literature, the thesis being that the XIIth dynasty fostered the development of the classical literature to rebuild the state.

Grammar and Dictionaries

You will find many grammars and dictionnary listed below. If you want to teach yourself Egyptian, you can use a recent grammar, or you can get the two classics (Gardiner and Faulkner), plus some recent grammar to complete them. There are also a number of courses available, either in universities, by mail, or in some private institutes.

Egyptian Grammar, Being an Introduction to the Study of Hieroglyphs Gardiner, Sir A.H. Griffith Institute ISBN 0-900416-35-1

The classical grammar. Nice, complete, and a beautiful book at that. Written as an introductory grammar as first, but also a reference book. With exercises, and vocabulary lists. In fact, if you intend to go into serious egyptology, you will need it. It's a good start for a egyptological library :-) Plus, but this is a personal opinion, I find it very pedagogically written.

but... a little outdated on the verbal system. H. J. Polotsky, using linguistical methods, has changed much of our understanding of the Egyptian verbal system. Unfortunately, he never wrote a grammar. You might consider getting a good recent grammar first, although money spent on Gardiner is certainly not wasted.

A good news is that clues for the exercices are available on the WWW, in the Griffith Institute!

Budge grammar

Budge's grammar is perhaps cheap, but it's also completely obsolete. don't lose your time on it. Ancient Egyptian Religion is quite old, also, but contains a few texts in hieroglyphs, and so does Budge's book on Any papyrus. Provided you know Budge's translation is outdated, it can be interesting.

Grammaire de l'égyptien classique Gustave Lefebvre IFAO, Le Caire, 1954

a reference grammar, not suited for self-study. Close to Gardiner's grammar as far as theorical view is concerned.

Cours d'égyptien hiéroglyphique Grandet, P. and Mathieux, B. Khéops, Paris (second edition)

A recent grammar, with exercises, vocabulary, and sign list (in the second, one-volume edition). Includes some very interesting new ideas about a number of phenomenon.

Middle Egyptian: An Introduction Englund, G. Uppsala University, 1988 ISBN 91-506-0660-3

A short introductory grammar, in English, which is up-to-date, but without exercises.

Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian Faulkner, R.O. Griffith Institute, 1962 ISBN 0-900416-32-7

like Gardiner's grammar, simply a must.

Grosses Handwörterbuch Ägyptisch-Deutsch : (2800-950 v. Chr.) : die Sprache der Pharaonen Hannig, Rainer Mainz : P. von Zabern, c1995, ISBN 3805317719

a recent dictionary, in german ; it is very complete, and quite good. Includes both Middle and Late Egyptian terms. It looks like a bilingual dictionnary for two modern languages, in a way (lots of colloquial expressions); the only problem (beside it being in german), is the lack of text references. But, then, the dictionnary size would be doubled. Lots of interesting annexes, Proper Names, Sign List, Map, and so on... The price is about 100$, which is expensive, but reasonable, given the quality of the book.

Ancient Egyptian: a linguistic introduction Antonio Loprieno Cambridge University Press,1995 ISBN 0-521-44849-2

A global linguistic tour of Ancient Egyptian, from the Old Kingdom to Coptic. Aimed at linguists interested in Egyptian, or egyptologists interested in linguistics. Might be considered as a state of the Art for the current problems in Egyptian Linguistics. Plus, it's rather inexpensive :-) some parts are not for the faint hearted, though.

La langue des Ramsès Neveu, F. Khéops, Paris, 1996 ISBN 2-9504368-3-8q

a new, very readable and very humourous grammar of Late Egyptian ; it's designed for people who have some knowledge of Middle Egyptian, and who would like to learn the Ramesside tongue. Note that if you are looking for vivid texts and information on daily life, you will find much more documentation in Late Egyptian than in Middle Egyptian.

Texts for self-study

Getting something interesting to read is difficult. Here is a short list of books you can use. A nice source is the Bibliotheca Aegyptiaca, a serie of texts transcriptions at reasonnable prices. Note that some of them are in Late Egyptian, which means you won't be able to read them if you only know Middle Egyptian.

An Egyptian ReadingBook De Buck, A. Nederland Institute for the Near East.

A collection of exercises and a wide choice of Egyptian texts, aimed at the learner.

The Story of King Kheops and the Magicians, Blackman A. M., J. V. Books, 1988.

I think it's The easiest literary text. It's also quite funny.

(oh, BTW, books of the dead are noted for their frequent mistakes. As they weren't really read and were more or less massively produced, corrupt passages are frequent. And furthermore the meaning of correct passages is not always easy to grasp. So, if you intend to learn the language, you's better first try easier texts.)