Abstract:

The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries are popularly called the "Golden Age" of Egyptology - a term which begs a lot of questions. Golden for whom? And how? Large-scale excavations in Egypt, both official and unofficial, enriched museum and private collections outside Egypt, and scientific and popular publications brought Pharaonic Egypt to ever more interested and informed audiences. Robert de Rustafjaell is one of the strangest and most mysterious figures of this period - a bigamist, a serial absconder and man of many aliases, an amasser of valuable and worthless objects including the oldest paintings in the world on canvas and a relic of the true cross, a Zelig-like figure who turns up in the oddest places - and one whose Egyptian collections enriched the Egypt Centre Swansea. This lecture will provide an outline of Robert de Rustafjaell's life, attempting to disentangle truth from fiction, and to set de Rustafjaell in the context of his times.

Speaker Bio:

Tom Hardwick is an Egyptologist and curator. He has worked with Egyptian collections in the UK, USA, and Egypt. He is a specialist in pharaonic Egyptian sculpture and iconography, and has worked extensively on the history of collecting Egyptian objects.

Event details:

Upon booking tickets for this event, you will automatically receive an email from Eventbrite with the Zoom link. If you have not received this within 24 hours please contact Ken Griffin at k.griffin@swansea.ac.uk

The room will open approximately 15 minutes before the start of the lecture.

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