Religion and Science in Late Nineteenth-Century British Egyptology
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8959289 |
|---|---|
| Authors | David Gange (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2006 |
| Volume | 49 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 1083-1103 |
| Publication date | 2006-11-24 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The Historical Journal (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0018-246X • E-ISSN: 1469-5103 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s0018246x06005747 |
| OpenAlex | W2124987622 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 22 |
The late nineteenth century is generally considered to be the period of Egyptology’s development into a scientific discipline. The names of Egyptologists of the last decades of the century, including William Flinders Petrie, are associated with scientific technique and objective interpretation as well as colonialist agendas. This article’s thesis is that rapid developments in scientific technique were largely driven by spiritual objectives rather than any other ideologies. Egypt – after being derided and ignored during the mid-century – became of great significance to the British when spectacular finds suggested that Egyptology might offer conclusive evidence against Darwinism and the higher criticism while proving events of the Old Testament to be historically true. Other groups used ancient Egypt – professing Darwin, Spencer, and Huxley as inspirations – but the teleologies they invariably produced owe more to spiritualism than to scientific naturalism, blurring boundaries between science, the occult, and religion. In terms of popularity traditional Christian approaches to ancient Egypt eclipsed all rivals, every major practising Egyptologist of the 1880s employing them and publications receiving large, demonstrably enthusiastic, audiences. Support for biblical Egyptologists demonstrates that, in Egyptology, the fin de siècle enjoyed a little-noticed but widely supported revival of Old-Testament-based Christianity amidst a flowering of diverse beliefs
Ancient history · Archaeology · Christianity · Egyptology · Epistemology · Ideology · Interpretation (philosophy · Naturalism · Political science · Politics · Spiritualism · African history and culture analysis · Ancient Egypt and Archaeology · Classics · History · Islamic Studies and History · Law · Philosophy
Two Victorian Egypts of Herodotus
‘Romantic Poet-Sage of History’
Herodotus as Anti-classical Toolbox
Herodotus’s Travels in Britain and Beyond
From Ethnography to History
George Grote and the ‘Open-hearted Herodotus’
Herodotus and the 1919–1922 Greco-Turkish War
Troy
Herodotus in the Long Nineteenth Century
Imagining Empire through Herodotus
The Provincial Press and the Imperial Traffic in Fiction, 1870s–1930s
The Cambridge History of the Gothic
A Victorian Gentleman in the Pharaoh’s Court
Imperialism and Racial Geography in James Henry Breasted’s Ancient Times, a History of the Early World
The Middle Line of Truth
Odysseus in Eden
The Allure of Archaeology
General Gordon, the Palestine Exploration Fund and the Origins of 'Gordon's Calvary' in the Holy Land
Pennies from Heaven and Earth in Mass Observation's Blackpool
Science in History
Treading on antiquity
The Philae Controversy-Muscular Modernization and Paternalistic Preservation in Aswan and London
| Citations per year | 1.22 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2008 - 2021 (14) |
| Highly cited | No |