Ancient Egypt. Martial Arts. B

The roots of martial arts extend to ancient Egypt ,long time  before to take its complete shape in China and the rest of Asia. Ancient Egypt,  always had a striking military forceand was the pioneer civilization  in inventing most of  weapons of the ancient world and in developing its fighting techniques. The ancient Egyptian invention for the training sword is a profound evidence on having an early martial art practice. Spotting such wooden training swords in the Egyptian museum may surprise many of us specially with the common believe that the use of such sword was always limited to China or Japan” .

F-1. King Tutankhamen wooden sword, 1400 B.C ,The Egyptian Museum. 

In fact taking a detailed look at battle scenes and the hieroglyphic carvings would help very much in tracing the starting of most of martial arts and for example in F-2  we can observe the ancient Egyptian way of holding and grasping a sword which does not differ from modern styles of sword fight as for kendo or  Aikido. As per F-4 which represents the modern style of sword fight, the right hand has to be the upper one while holding the sword and the other hand has to be the lower one which was  applied by the ancient Egyptian thousands of years before. 

F-2.   Carving of  hieroglyphic shows the way to hold a sword.

F-4. The modern style of holding swords in Kendo and Aikido.

 

F-2,3&4. Represent breaking the falling in Aikido ”Mae-Ukemi”

Another great example in history through the Hieroglyphic refers to the authenticity of martial art in ancient Egypt which is the hieroglyphic characters that represent the falling in fight. Aikido techniques for breaking falls by rolling the body see( F-2,3&4) or what is called the Mae-Ukemi techniques surprisingly were practiced by ancient Egyptians.( F-5) shows one of the carvings of an Egyptian Mae-Ukemi! The Mae-Ukemi starts by bending the body while standing, then stepping with the right foot forward then extending the right arm forward while bending the left arm inwards then falling on the ground while bending head  towards the left side .  

F-5.A carvings of an Egyptian Mae-Ukemi

 

By Yasser Kamel” Aikido practitioner

“ for Museumegypt, All rights reserved. Copyrigt©Museumegypt.　　 

My Pyramids Tour

大ピラミッド は 素晴らしい ですね。

大ピラミッド　は　素晴らしい　ですね。

クフ王　の　ピラミッド　は　ギイザ　に　一番　大きい　物　です。大ピラミッド　の　高さ　は　１３７メーテル　ですくて　、おもさ　は　せんまん　トノ　ですね。　クフ王　の　ピラミッド　も 　さんじゅうまん　いし　の  ブロック　が　あります。その　ピラミッド　は　今　から　　４５００　年　凡そ　です。

by Yasser kamel for Museumegypt.Copyright2006@museumegypt.All rights reserved.

Best wishes for Ramadan

 Photo by Yasser Kamel.

Egypt now is enjoying the holy and the spiritual month of Ramadan.

Special articles, The art of Mummification between science and superstition, part.4

Mummy of the pharaoh Ramses II was the first to be carried on a plane abroad. In the year 1977, mummy of the great pharaoh was allowed to leave Egypt on a plane to Paris with the permission of the smart Egyptian president Anwar El Sadat as it was reported to him that the mummy was about to suffer serious fungal problems. The mummy as soon as arrival in Paris was treated royally by the French government which dedicated its best medical teams to help Ramses II mummy to cure. Then, the mummy returned to Egypt nearly after a year with a full recovery. The French medical experts published several books that represent their researches on that unique mummy.
Preserving a mummy is a great challenge even with our so modern technology but making a perfect mummy is the toughest target to reach.
A perfect mummy needs to be prepared in almost a vacuum container or an air sealed laboratory which should have no more than 1% of oxygen and almost no moisture to exist. Thinking deeply of what ancient Egyptians should have done to stick to that formula, makes the mind boggle. We may confirm that using a stone case to keep the mummy safe from the reach of air makes a lot of sense as well as covering it with flowers and plants sounds to be a smart technique to vacuum the oxygen. It seems that leaving that much of flowers to surround the mummy inside the sarcophagus was not just a bless for the dead but it had to do with making plants and flowers to consume oxygen once the sarcophagus is sealed and once to become dim. In side the Mummy case and while the absence of light, the chlorophyll substance and the Photosynthesis which normally allow plants to produce oxygen in sunlight would not function. Flowers such as Mandrake "mandragora", Night shades berry species and red berry were usually left with the royal mummy. The species of flowers which usually found next to the mummy are by natures toxic and poisonous which may also protected the mummy from insects attack. The second method to get rid of the oxygen which may surround the mummy could be by the use of a flaming substance that can be inserted into the sarcophagus in order to burn the remaining oxygen. After all the serious efforts of cutting and digging out such a heavy sarcophagus which in average could weigh 40 tons aims at making no access to air and moisture.
By Yasser Kamel for Museumegypt, All rights reserved. Copyrigt©Museumegypt.