NEW EGYPTOMANIA BOOK BY PROFESSOR BOB BRIER PUBLISHED IN DECEMBER 2013

It takes a lot of devotion to Egyptiana to earn the nickname “Mr. Mummy,” as Bob Brier has. His books and documentaries cover subjects from pyramids, mummies and tombs to the murder of King Tut (film rights optioned by the director of “Godzilla”), and he is an avid collector of the paraphernalia he calls Egyptotrash. So “Egyptomania” promises to be the most accessible, entertaining and kitschiest of his books so far.

But in 2011, Mr. Brier told a reporter for The New York Times that he was working on a book about the transportation of Egyptian obelisks to Paris, London and New York. This was a painstaking business, and “Egyptomania” covers it in detail. Each trip involved daunting feats of engineering, not to mention quick thinking. A lot of the book turns out to be about the pulleys, pontoons, windlasses, wooden supports and iron strapings that were needed to transport these artifacts. By far the most dramatic journey was the turbulent sea voyage of Cleopatra’s Needle from Egypt to its present home at Greywacke Knoll in Central Park, near the Metropolitan Museum.

Our organization the Archaeological Associates of Greenwich was delighted to hear the story about NYC's Central Park obelisk in 2013. On May 15, 2014, Mr. Mummy will return to the Bruce Museum in Greenwich to talk about this new book.