Since its creation in 1988, the Friends of the Petrie Museum has published an (almost) yearly magazine for our members. Friends will continue to receive our yearly magazine (either in print or digitally) in December, but we’ll be posting previous issues on this page two years after they’re published to members. Over time we also hope to digitize and upload downloadable copies of all previous issues of the Friends of the Petrie Museum Magazine to form a permanent online archive.

Please note that the subjects covered in the magazines reproduced here include a wide range of themes, some of which some readers may find distressing. The magazines may also include representations (drawings, reconstructions and photographs) of human remains, which may make a strong impression. Photographs of exposed human remains and quotations with outdated, offensive or inaccurate language are only included where academically necessary.


The Friends of the Petrie Museum Magazine issue 55 from 2022-2023 brought us the typical wide range of subjects, from Predynastic child burials to Ancient Egypt and manga! Egyptian objects in the museum were represented by further updates on the Petrie Museum’s ‘Tutankhamun the Boy’ exhibition, the Petrie Museum Ephemera Project, and the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek exhibition ‘Amarna – City of the Sun God’. Sites covered included Jebel Moya in Sudan, new research at Naqada, and the so-called ‘Oratory of Ptah and Mertseger’ near Deir el-Medina. The history of Egyptology featured in a report on reconciling dispersed collections and the role of Quftis in excavations. Other subjects varied from ancient Egyptian courtyards, to giraffe imagery in Meroitic Sudan, and ancient Egyptian music.

Petrie Magazine Issue 55 2023 v9 FINAL 2023Download

The Friends of the Petrie Museum Magazine issue 54 from 2021-2022 was a fantastic issue which celebrated the 100th anniversary since the discovery of the Tomb of Tutankhamun with detailed coverage of the Petrie Museum’s ‘Tutankhamun the Boy’ exhibition, which explored Tutankhamun’s likely early life at Amarna and childhood experience more generally in ancient Egypt. This issue also included two reports on aspects of Petrie’s life and work, ‘Petrie and the materiality of time’, and ‘Petrie the Curator’; covered major sites at Kom el-Hettan, Quft, Amara West, and Old Dongola; considered ‘Name choices and religion in Roman Egypt’, and the ‘First Pharaohs’; and examined various artefacts through reports on predynastic palettes, the ‘black goo’ used in funerary rituals, and ‘The King with Wings’, a fabulous statue of two reunited halves (UC 16020 and Manchester Museum Acc. No 11444), probably of Thuthmose III with the feathered plumage of a bird.

Petrie Magazine Issue 54 2021-2022 2022Download

The Friends of the Petrie Museum Magazine issue 53 was a bumper two-year edition covering 2019-2021. In addition to covering two years, this issue included the outbreak of COVID and the lockdowns of 2020 and 2021. Despite the looming pandemic and the lockdowns, this issue published excavations at many exciting sites: Abydos, Armant, the tomb of Harwa in the Theban necropolis (TT37), and Amara West. Other articles reassessed the tombs of Deir Medina and New Kingdom funerals, the focus and orientation of the royal necropolis at Luxor and the Valley of the Kings, Women in the Petrie Museum, the mummies of the Louvre, the objects from Tutankhamun’s tomb, and Durham University’s Sudan archive. There were also important obituaries of George Hart, founding member and longtime supporter of the Friends of the Petrie Museum; Lisette Petrie, granddaughter of Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie; and Helen Pike, who was technically the Petrie Museum’s Public Programme Manager, but so much more in reality.

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The Friends of the Petrie Museum Magazine issue 52 demonstrated the value that the Friends bring to archaeological research. The first article discussed the relationship between the Petrie Museum and the Griffith Institute, which holds important archival sources related to Petrie and early Egyptology. The Friends of the Petrie Museum have funded various transcription, cataloguing and digitisation programs for components of this archive including: The digitisation of Petrie’s photograph album from his and Griffith’s 1886-7 trip up the Nile; the transcription, cataloguing and digitisation of the part of the Petrie archive at the Griffith Institute; and, most recently, the purchase of Jenny Lane’s diaries, providing an alternative perspective on Amelia Edwards visit of 1873-4 which gave rise to her ‘One Thousand Miles up the Nile’ and the Egypt Exploration Fund (now society). This issue also covered the study day on Kom el-Hetan, Amenhotep III’s funerary temple; Friends of the Petrie Museum handling seminars on Mediterranean imports, Roman musical instruments, Ramesside burial customs, Sudanese material culture and Nefertiti. Sadly, this issue also said goodbye to Geoffrey John Tassie (Tass) who was such a prominent member until his death in March 2019.


The Friends of the Petrie Museum Magazine issue 51 was the 30th anniversary issue, celebrating 30 years of the Friends of the Petrie Museum and our former President, Harry Smith’s 90th birthday. This magazine also recorded the completion of the digitisation of the Petrie Archive at the Griffith museum, funded by the Friends.The magazine also includes reports on the Deir el-Medina Study Day and an update on the Papyrus for the People project, the Petrie Museum’s Arts Council funded project to improve conservation, storage, display and database access to the collections many papyrus artefacts. This issue also included reports on Friends museum seminars and handling sessions; A Brunton Tomb Group from Qau; and Objects from Amarna to the Petrie Museum via the
Wellcome Collection. Sadly, obituaries are a regular feature of the magazine and this issue commemorated distinguished Egyptologist, Eric Uphill.


The Friends of the Petrie Museum Magazine issue 50 began the celebration of 30 years of the Friends of the Petrie Museum, by reprinting the first page of the very first issue of what was then the Friends of the Petrie Museum Newsletter. This issue also introduced us to Anna Garnett, as she began her curatorship at the Petrie Museum. Reports include reviews of the Discovering the People of Ancient Thebes study day and Robert Morkot’s Soleb Lions of Amenhotep III lecture. This issue also featured two fascinating articles, one on experimental reconstructions of Predynastic palettes by Matt Szafran; and the other the second part of a report on Petrie’s Pups (archaeologists trained by Flinders Petrie) in World War One. There are also two reports on Friends museum seminars and handling sessions; Experiencing the invisible: identifying mythology and
household religion, and The Queens, the Princes and the Officials: the court of Ramesses II. Sadly this magazine recorded the loss of John Dewey, a founder member of the Rainham and
Medway and Swale Egypt
Society (RAMASES).

Petrie Mag50Download

The Friends of the Petrie Museum Magazine issue 49 reported on the Petrie Museum’s Papyrus for the People Project funded by Arts Council England’s Designation Development
Fund and two projects approved for funding from the Friends: the publication of Barbara Adams last unfinished manuscript Fancy Vessels; and the Griffith Institute of the University of Oxford project to catalogue and digitise Petries’ journals from 1880-1929. This issue also featured fascinating articles on Friends events. We visited Hierakonpolis in the second of two reports on Liam McNamara’s lecture on the ivory objects from the Main Deposit and Tarkhan Kafr-Ammar in Tian Tian’s research into Bronze Age burials. Marcel Marée’s lecture on Criteria for Authenticating Egyptian Sculptures considered forgeries and how to spot them; Reg Clark gave us a tour of tomb security across Egyptian history; and Susan Biddle reported on her own research into Petrie’s Pups (archaeologists trained by Flinders Petrie) in World War One. There are also two reports on Friends museum seminars and handling sessions; Images of Osiris, and Nefertiti in the Petrie Museum: her evolving image and ststus. Sadly this magazine recorded the loss of several members including Nesta Caiger, John Jennings, John Oakes and Susan Mary Seaburn.

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