Talk Like An Egyptian23 Sep 2025

S01E01 What's Right with The Mummy (1999)

So, it's easy – if you an Egyptology pedant – to pick holes The Mummy, which the two of us have done several times at the British Museum. But actually, being more generous about it, a lot of what's in the film is clearly inspired by good evidence and in this episode we tried to cover what seemed to us to be the most important themes: including the way ancient Egypt appears – architecture, landscape, people, costumes, names – characters and places – the idea of the 'Medjay', the practice of mummification and whether anyone was ever mummified alive as in the movie (nope), and the way more modern Egypt and Egyptologists are portrayed (Egyptian Museum good, Bembridge Scholars… What?? No, what are they talking about?!)

Links:

To watch the movie online: https://www.justwatch.com/uk/movie/the-mummy

For the original (1932) movie featuring Boris Karloff in the lead role which provides some of the inspiration including the names Imhotep and Anck-su-namun: https://www.justwatch.com/uk/movie/the-mummy-1932

Some excellent books on some of the themes we covered include:

Gods and goddesses: Wilkinson, The Complete Gods and Goddesses of Ancient Egypt

Mummification: Dodson and Ikram, The Mummy in Ancient Egypt

The Book of the Dead (the real one that isn't really a 'book'): Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead

The novel Chris mentioned about a society of Egyptologists which is actually a cover for men to get away from their wives and have affairs etc is Kingsley Amis and Robert Conquest, The Egyptologists.

Oh and iszi's book incase she feels left out: https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/cursed-tomb-9781801996020/

www.talklikeanegyptian.com

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