A brief history of the Centre

The Centre for Egyptological Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences (the CES RAS) was established in November of 1999 by the decree of the Presidium of the RAS. The Centre originated from the Department of Egyptology that was founded as a subdivision of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the RAS in 1992.

The main goal of the Centre is to study history, culture, languages and religions of ancient, medieval, and modern Egypt. It is evident that if anyone wants to achieve new and up-to-date results in this field, the complex study of the written sources is not enough. The organization of independent archeological investigations, detailed description and analysis of the artifacts discovered and the setting in which they were found is also necessary. That is the main reason why the Centre conducts the archaeological researches in Egypt since 2001. Furthermore, it was the first academic institute in Russia that acquired a right to organize such studies. Also should be mentioned, that the Russian Institute of Egyptology in Cairo (the RIEC), a branch of the Centre and the office for the Centre’s stuff working in Egypt, was founded in 2000.

The first archaeological project in which the Centre took part was the collaborative Russian-Dutch excavation at the site of Tell Ibrahim Awad, located in the northeastern part of the Nile’s Delta. The next project consisted in the clearing and archaeological study of the Theban tomb 320. This work was carried out in collaboration with the Institute of Egyptology and Coptology of M?nster University during the period from 1998 till 2006. Since 2001 the Centre has been organizing independent excavations on the site of Memphis, the most ancient Egyptian capital. Today the archaeological works are conducted on the whole territory of Egypt: in Alexandria, at the site of ancient Memphis, at Deir el-Banat (Fayoum Oasis) and Luxor. On the basis of the results achieved, the Centre’s staff publishes monographs, collected volumes, and articles in academic and popular scientific journals.

There is another area of the Centre’s activity, which is no less important than the previous one: the investigation, restoration, and cataloging of the relics of ancient and early Christian Egypt. In particular, since 1999 the Centre has been working on the study and restoration of Coptic icons and other early Christian relics (this project is carried out in collaboration with the Russian, American, and Egyptian colleagues of the Centre). Since 2004 the Centre has been restoring the al-Mu‘allaqa Church of the Holy Virgin in Old Cairo (in collaboration with the Grabar Art Conservation Center and Egyptian company “Aswan”).

Since 1997 the Centre has been taking part in the “Databank of Eastern-European Egyptology” project. The goal of the project is to gather, process, and bring into the database relevant information concerning Egyptian antiquities, stored in the museum collections of Russia and other former Soviet countries, Eastern Europe, and Egypt.

The Centre provides a number of educational programs; projects seeking to popularize and disseminate the academic knowledge of Egyptian history and culture are realized as well. In order to train a new generation of highly skilled Egyptologists, the postgraduate courses in “General History (Ancient World)” were launched in 2007.