The glory of the Pharaohs — Reading Companion

Firsthand Excavation and Scholarly Authority

Weigall's professional credentials are not merely listed in the front matter; they shape the prose. He supervised excavations in the Valley of the Tombs of the Kings and was present at major discoveries. In the excerpt, he describes finding the tomb of Akhnaton in 1907, noting that the entrance was blocked with stones and sealed with a fragment of Tutankhamon's seal. This detail is not presented as secondhand knowledge but as something he personally observed. The publisher's foreword emphasizes his reforms in preserving antiquities and suppressing illegal excavation, lending weight to his observations. When he writes that the body in the tomb was Akhnaton's, not Queen Tiy's, he is correcting earlier Egyptological assumptions based on his own findings.

The Human Drama Behind the Artifacts

Weigall does not limit himself to cataloging objects. He reconstructs emotional states: Akhnaton, he writes, “must have felt that his religion could not outlive him” and “sunk to the very depths of despondency.” The author wonders whether the pharaoh found “consolation in the sunshine and amidst the flowers.” This speculative, almost novelistic tone is balanced by concrete evidence—the erasure of Akhnaton's name from inscriptions, the removal of Queen Tiy's body, the abandonment of the city. Weigall interprets the physical traces as signs of a deliberate campaign to erase the heretic from memory, culminating in the tomb being “polluted by the presence of the heretic.” The reader is given both the archaeological data and a plausible human narrative.

A Distinctive Voice in Egyptological Writing

Weigall's prose is characterized by direct address and vivid phrasing. He refers to Akhnaton as “that criminal” (quoting the later priesthood's view) and describes the fallen city as “the haunt of jackals and the home of owls.” The language is accessible yet precise, avoiding the dry catalog style of many contemporary reports. The excerpts show a writer who can shift from technical description—the “canopic jars, the alabaster vases, the gold vulture”—to lyrical quotation, as when he includes Akhnaton's prayer: “I shall breathe the sweet breath which comes forth from Thy mouth.” This blending of scientific observation and literary sensibility gives the work a distinctive character, one that reflects Weigall's dual identity as both a trained Egyptologist and a popular author.

Readers approaching this work should expect a series of essays that combine personal recollection with historical interpretation. Weigall's authority as a former Inspector General of Antiquities means his observations carry weight, but his willingness to speculate about motives and emotions means the book is as much a narrative as a scholarly account. The excerpts suggest that the full volume covers a range of topics beyond Akhnaton, but the same blend of evidence and empathy likely persists throughout.

That rainy afternoon, Weigall’s account of Akhnaton’s tomb left me restless, the sand and politics still clinging. I wanted something simpler, sturdier—and found myself wandering into The Storehouses of the King; Or, the Pyramids of Egypt What They Are and Who Built Them — Key Ideas to Explore. The same stones, but a quieter question: not who was buried, but who bothered to lift them.