George Reisner

George Andrew Reisner (November 5, 1867 - June 6, 1942) was an American archaeologist, best known for his excavations of Pyramids of Giza and other sites of Ancient Egypt. Through his expeditions, Reisner discovered thousands of historical treasures, including the tombs of ancient Egyptian royalty, papyri, and numerous other artifacts. He was famous for his meticulous approach to archaeological excavations, keeping accurate records, and the preservation of artifacts. As a result, he earned the reputation for being the "Father of Modern Scientific Archaeology."

Life

George Andrew Reisner was born on November 5, 1867 in Indianapolis, Indiana to George Andrew Reisner and Mary Elizabeth Mason. His father's parents were of German decent. George Reisner received his undergraduate degree at Cambridge University, graduating in the class of 1889. Then he went on to study at Harvard University, receiving his Masters in 1891.

In 1892, he married Mary Putnam Bronson and then left for an excavation in the Middle East. His specialty was Assyriology. He received his Ph.D. in 1893, writing his dissertation on Semitic languages. At Harvard, he received a study grant to research cuneiform at the University in Göttingen where he studied under the Egyptologist Adolf Erman (1845-1937)and Kurt Sethe (1869-1934) in Berlin, Germany. Sethe taught Reisner hieroglyphs, supplementing his already extensive knowledge of Arabic, cuneiform, and various other ancient languages. This training would prove invaluable when Reisner excavated archaeological sites in Egypt.

Even in his old age, despite suffering from progressive blindness, he worked on dictating manuscripts. Reisner died in his sleep on June 6, 1942 in Giza in Egypt, and is buried in the American cemetery in the Mari Girgis area of Cairo. Following his death, Resiner's Harvard camp was closed in 1947 and the Egyptian government awarded one half of the objects found by Reisner to the excavation sponsor-the Hearst Museum at University of California, Berkeley, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

Work

George Reisner worked as a traveling fellow of Harvard University, and worked as an Assistant of Egyptology in Berlin from 1893 to 1896. From 1897 to 1899, he worked in Cairo, Egypt, on the Catalogue General Project for the Egyptian Museum.

After that he received funding for excavations in Egypt from Phoebe Apperson Hearst, mother of newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst. This Hearst Expedition of the University of California was funded for five years, from 1899 to 1905. During this time period, Reisner excavated the cemeteries of Naga ed-Deir, Egypt, as well as Quft and Deir el-Ballas. At these sites, Reisner began to formulate his own scientific approach to archaeological excavations, based on the methodological systems he had learned in Berlin. He developed a number of expedition record books and put an emphasis on filed photography.

File:Mastaba Memfis 1902.png

Egyptian mastaba

During this time he also explored mastabas, flat-roofed, mud brick, rectangular buildings with sloping sides that marked the burial site of many eminent Egyptians of Egypt's ancient period. Inside the mastaba, a deep chamber was dug into the ground and lined with stone or mud bricks. This was where the body would reside. When a mastaba was built for the burial of the Third Dynasty king Djoser, the architect Imhotep enlarged the basic structure to be a square, then built a similar, but smaller, mastaba-like square on top of this, and added a fourth, fifth, and sixth square structure above that. The resulting building is the Step Pyramid, the first of the many pyramidal tombs which succeeded it.

As part of the Hearst expedition work Reisner also discovered what came to be known as the "Reisner Papyri." Dating back to the eighteen hundred B.C.E. periods, they contain one of the most basic mathematical texts. The texts were later deciphered in Boston. The early publications showed that the scrolls were among the oldest Egyptian bureaucratic texts known, recording the mundane business details of construction projects, work in the royal dockyards, and agriculture in the royal fields. They showed evidence of mathematical knowledge, particularly remainder arithmetic, carefully applied to the practical situation of building projects.

At Meroë, in the Sudan, crumbling pyramids recall the vanished glories of the Kushite kings, who were buried inside them.

In 1905, Reisner returned to Harvard to work as an assistant professor, a post he held until 1914. During this time, he led several important projects, including the archaeological survey of Nubia for the Egyptian government, 1907-1909, and directing the excavations of Samaria in Palestine, 1908-1910. From 1910 to 1942, Resiner was Curator of Egyptian collections at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, and from 1914 to 1942, Reisner held the position as a Professor of Egyptology at Harvard. In addition, he explored the pyramids of Meroe and dug out the temple at Napata.

Reisner uncovered the fact that the Nubian kings were not buried in the pyramids but outside of them. He also found the skull of a Nubian female (whom he thought was a king), and which is now displayed in the Peabody Museum at Harvard. Reisner believed that Kerma was originally the base of an Egyptian governor and that these Egyptian rulers evolved into the independent monarchs of Kerma. He also created a list of Egyptian viceroys of Kush. He gained notoriety for finding the tomb of Queen Hetepheres the mother of King Khufu (Cheops in Greek) who built the Great Pyramid of Giza. Reisner rewrote the history of Nubia, and explored the world-famous Pyramids of Giza.

Legacy

George Reisner, an experienced egyptologist, is ranked among the most important archaeologists of the twentieth century. He worked during apart of the great era of American museum-sponsored expeditions. As methods began to take on a more scientific perspective. Reisner developed a new method of documentation that proved to be more elaborate and methodical than that of Sir Flinders Petrie, making it the most methodical procedure used in Egyptian excavations.

Reisner was well-known for his humor and intelligence, even leading to the nickname "Papa George" used by his students. Reisner had excavated one of the most famous archaeological sites in the world, the Giza pyramids, not to mention thousands of ancient artifacts and hundreds of art masterpieces, rewritten Egypto-Nubian history, and changed the course of modern scientific archaeology.

Publications

• Reisner, George. 1924. Harvard excavations at Samaria, 1908-1910,(Harvard Semitic series).Cambridge:Harvard University Press. ASIN B0006AJ4PQ
• Reisner, George.1936.The Development of the Egyptian Tomb Down to the Accession of Cheops.Cambridge:Harvard University Press. ASIN B000MX4ZUQ
• Reisner, George.1942. Egyptian Conception of Immortality(1912): The Ingersoll Lecture of 1911.Kessinger Publishing.ISBN 076610446X
• Reisner, George.1942. A History of the Giza Necropolis, Volume 1.Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0674402502 ISBN 978-0674402508
• Reisner, George, and William Smith.1955. A History of the Giza Necropolis, Volume 2: The Tomb of Hetepheres,the Mother of Cheops: A study of Egyptian Civilization in the Old Kingdom.Cambridge: Harvard University Press.ISBN 0674403002 ISBN 978-0674403000
• Reisner, George.1955. The tomb of Hetep-heres the mother of Cheops;:A study of Egyptian civilization in the Old Kingdom(His: A history of the Giza Necropolis).Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ASIN B0007GYEAE
• Dunham, Dows, and George Reisner.1970.The Barkal Temples.Boston, MA: Museum of Fine Arts.ISBN 0878461086
• Dunham, Dows, and George Reisner.1982.Excavations at Kerma, Part IV.Boston, MA:Museum of Fine Arts Boston. ISBN 0878461922 ISBN 978-0878461929
• Reisner, George, Giovanni Pettinato,1985.Tempelurkunden aus Telloh.Unione accademica nazionale.

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• [Bio.: American National Biography, 18, 328-9] Archaeology Dictionary definition of George Andrew Reisner.The concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology. Copyright©2002,2003 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.
• DelVecchio, Rich. 2006. Egyptian scrolls finally head for Cal home San Francisco Chronicle Thursday, November 2, 2006. Retrieved July 27, 2007.

External links

• Works by George Reisner. Project Gutenberg Retrieved August 1, 2007.
• Explore Ancient Egypt Retrieved July 8, 2007.
• Ian Shaw Building the Great Pyramid BBC article on the Giza Pyramids Retrieved July 12, 2007.
• Egyptian Art Retrieved July 12, 2007.
• Reisner and Giza Retrieved July 12, 2007.
• Biography of George Reisner at Dictionary of Art Historians Retrieved August 1, 2007.
• Reisner Biography George Andrew Reisner Retrieved August 1, 2007.
• American Research Center in Egypt(Northern California) George Reisner and the Giza Pyramids Retrieved August 1, 2007.

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