DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.26359#0012
By way of introduction
A group of enthusiasts, young assistants and students in Ancient Egyptian language and
archaeology at Warsaw University, suggested organising a meeting of young egyptologists from
Central Europe. The initial project was very modest: it was meant to have been a mostly
informal forum bringing together a group of friends and colleagues for a free exchange of
ideas.
However, it started looking serious when, quite unexpectedly, numerous applications started
flowing in. It became even more serious after the meeting, when groups of young people in
some neighbouring countries expressed their disappointment at not having been able to attend
the Conference.
Looking for a possible reason for this spontaneous “community” feeling among egyptologists
“in statu nascendi”, one is tempted to check not only scholarly, but also human and social
needs of the generation maturing at the turn of the two millennia. One feels that today’s
youth, accustomed to moving silently in the shadows of various congresses organised and
dominated by the “old ones”, would also like to articulate itself in another way, with a voice
which would not just echo the authority of “those who know everything (better)”. One does
not need to be “young” to feel more creative in the atmosphere of a free discussion (a real
“table ronde”) among colleagues and friends. In this kind of ambience one gets closer to the
realisation of a dream cherished by many egyptologists, to have a “perfect congress, namely
that without papers”, the dream expressed by some scholars during the great international
congresses of Egyptology.
One more and more frequently hears the question cWhy does Poland not organise a world
congress of egyptologists?” With their large number of various activities in Egypt, with the
growing number of Polish students and researchers in this field, and particularly the omnipres-
ent Polish involvement in the conservation of Egyptian antiquities, Polish egyptologists would
like to signal hereby, on a microscale, their “organisational alert”, the willingness to welcome
groups of foreign colleagues, hoping that they would not feel strangers in a country which
became nearly “genetically egyptological” at the end of XlXth century, when Boledaw Prus
wrote “The Pharaoh”. Since that time, every Polish child starts his education by reading this
fascinating story concerning the Ramesside Period. Even less committed students at least know
the film made some thirty years ago, on the basis of this novel.
We would like to create a tradition of international meetings of young egyptologists in
Poland, and we do not see why colleagues from Africa, Asia, Australia or the Americas could
not join their European homologues in their future discussions which should retain a measure
of informality.
For my younger colleagues,
just as a link between generations,
Karol Mysliwiec
A group of enthusiasts, young assistants and students in Ancient Egyptian language and
archaeology at Warsaw University, suggested organising a meeting of young egyptologists from
Central Europe. The initial project was very modest: it was meant to have been a mostly
informal forum bringing together a group of friends and colleagues for a free exchange of
ideas.
However, it started looking serious when, quite unexpectedly, numerous applications started
flowing in. It became even more serious after the meeting, when groups of young people in
some neighbouring countries expressed their disappointment at not having been able to attend
the Conference.
Looking for a possible reason for this spontaneous “community” feeling among egyptologists
“in statu nascendi”, one is tempted to check not only scholarly, but also human and social
needs of the generation maturing at the turn of the two millennia. One feels that today’s
youth, accustomed to moving silently in the shadows of various congresses organised and
dominated by the “old ones”, would also like to articulate itself in another way, with a voice
which would not just echo the authority of “those who know everything (better)”. One does
not need to be “young” to feel more creative in the atmosphere of a free discussion (a real
“table ronde”) among colleagues and friends. In this kind of ambience one gets closer to the
realisation of a dream cherished by many egyptologists, to have a “perfect congress, namely
that without papers”, the dream expressed by some scholars during the great international
congresses of Egyptology.
One more and more frequently hears the question cWhy does Poland not organise a world
congress of egyptologists?” With their large number of various activities in Egypt, with the
growing number of Polish students and researchers in this field, and particularly the omnipres-
ent Polish involvement in the conservation of Egyptian antiquities, Polish egyptologists would
like to signal hereby, on a microscale, their “organisational alert”, the willingness to welcome
groups of foreign colleagues, hoping that they would not feel strangers in a country which
became nearly “genetically egyptological” at the end of XlXth century, when Boledaw Prus
wrote “The Pharaoh”. Since that time, every Polish child starts his education by reading this
fascinating story concerning the Ramesside Period. Even less committed students at least know
the film made some thirty years ago, on the basis of this novel.
We would like to create a tradition of international meetings of young egyptologists in
Poland, and we do not see why colleagues from Africa, Asia, Australia or the Americas could
not join their European homologues in their future discussions which should retain a measure
of informality.
For my younger colleagues,
just as a link between generations,
Karol Mysliwiec