Flinders Petrie

Sir Flinders Petrie FBA
Petrie in 1903
Born	William Matthew Flinders Petrie (1853-06-03)3 June 1853 Charlton, London, United Kingdom
Died	28 July 1942(1942-07-28) (aged 89) Jerusalem, Mandatory Palestine
Resting place	Mount Zion Cemetery
Known for	Proto-Sinaitic script, Merneptah Stele, pottery seriation[2]
Spouse	Hilda Urlin ​ (m. 1896)​
Awards	Fellow of the Royal Society[1] Huxley Memorial Medal (1906)
Scientific career
Fields	Egyptology
Doctoral students	Howard Carter

Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie FRS FBA ((1853-06-03)3 June 1853 – (1942-07-28)28 July 1942), commonly known as simply Sir Flinders Petrie, was a British Egyptologist and a pioneer of systematic methodology in archaeology and the preservation of artefacts.^[3] He held the first chair of Egyptology in the United Kingdom, and excavated many of the most important archaeological sites in Egypt in conjunction with his wife, Hilda Urlin.^[4] Some consider his most famous discovery to be that of the Merneptah Stele,^[5] an opinion with which Petrie himself concurred.^[6] Undoubtedly at least as important is his 1905 discovery and correct identification of the character of the Proto-Sinaitic script, the ancestor of almost all alphabetic scripts.

Petrie developed the system of dating layers based on

He has been referred to as the "father of Egyptian archaeology".[9]

Early life

Petrie was born on 3 June 1853 in Charlton, Kent, England, the son of William Petrie (1821–1908) and Anne (née Flinders) (1812–1892). Anne was the daughter of British Captain Matthew Flinders, who led the first circumnavigation of Australia (and after whom Petrie was named).^[3] William Petrie was an electrical engineer who developed carbon arc lighting and later developed chemical processes for Johnson, Matthey & Co.^[10]

Petrie was raised in a Christian household (his father being a member of the Plymouth Brethren), and was educated at home. He had no formal education. His father taught his son how to survey accurately, laying the foundation for his archaeological career. At the age of eight, he was tutored in French, Latin, and Greek, until he had a collapse and was taught at home. He also ventured his first archaeological opinion aged eight, when friends visiting the Petrie family were describing the unearthing of the Brading Roman Villa in the Isle of Wight. The boy was horrified to hear the rough shovelling out of the contents, and protested that the earth should be pared away, inch by inch, to see all that was in it and how it lay.^[11] "All that I have done since," he wrote when he was in his late seventies, "was there to begin with, so true it is that we can only develop what is born in the mind. I was already in archaeology by nature."^[12]

Academic career

The chair of Edwards Professor of Egyptian Archaeology and Philology at University College London was set up and funded in 1892 following a bequest from Amelia Edwards, who died suddenly in that year. Petrie's supporter since 1880, Edwards had instructed that he should be its first incumbent. He continued to excavate in Egypt after taking up the professorship, training many of the best archaeologists of the day. In 1904, Petrie published Methods and Aims in Archaeology, the definitive work of his time, in which he defined the goals and methodology of his profession along with the more practical aspects of archaeology—such as details of excavation, including the use of cameras in the field. Insights include the contention that research results were dependent on the personality of the archaeologist, who, he felt, needed to possess broad knowledge as well as insatiable curiosity. His own abundance of that characteristic was never questioned.^[13]

In 1913, Petrie sold his large collection of Egyptian antiquities to

Archaeology career

In Britain

In his teenage years, Petrie surveyed British prehistoric monuments,^[15] commencing with the late Romano-British 'British Camp' that lay within yards of his family home in Charlton, in attempts to understand their geometry. At 19 he produced the most accurate survey of Stonehenge.^{[citation needed]}

Giza survey

His father had corresponded with

Petrie's published reports of this triangulation survey, and his analysis of the architecture of Giza therein, was exemplary in its methodology and accuracy, disproving Smyth's theories and still providing much of the basic data regarding the pyramid plateau to this day. On that visit, he was appalled by the rate of destruction of monuments (some listed in guidebooks had been worn away completely since then) and mummies. He described Egypt as "a house on fire, so rapid was the destruction" and felt his duty to be that of a "salvage man, to get all I could, as quickly as possible and then, when I was 60, I would sit and write it all."^{[citation needed]}

Egypt Exploration Fund affiliation

Returning to England at the end of 1880, Petrie wrote a number of articles and then met

Tanis dig

He first went to a

By the end of the Tanis dig, he ran out of funding but, reluctant to leave the country in case it was renewed, he spent 1887 cruising the Nile taking photographs as a less subjective record than sketches. During this time, he also climbed rope ladders at Sehel Island near Aswan to draw and photograph thousands of early Egyptian inscriptions on a cliff face, recording embassies to Nubia, famines and wars.^{[citation needed]}

Fayum burials

By the time he reached Aswan, a telegram had reached there to confirm the renewal of his funding. He then went straight to the burial site at

However, when he later found that Gaston Maspero placed little value on them and left them open to the elements in a yard behind the museum to deteriorate, he angrily demanded that they all be returned, forcing Maspero to pick the 12 best examples for the museum to keep and return 48 to Petrie, who sent them to London for a special showing at the British Museum. Resuming work, he discovered the village of the Pharaonic tomb-workers.^[18]

Palestine, Tell Hesi and Wadi Rababah

In 1890, Petrie made the first of his many forays into

From 1891, he worked on the temple of Aten at Tell-el-Amarna, discovering a 300-square-foot (28 m²) New Kingdom painted pavement^{[dubious – discuss]} of garden and animals and hunting scenes. This became a tourist attraction but, as there was no direct access to the site, tourists wrecked neighbouring fields on their way to it. This made local farmers deface the paintings, and it is only thanks to Petrie's copies that their original appearance is known.^{[citation needed]}

Discovery of the 'Israel' or Merneptah stele

In early 1896, Petrie and his archaeological team were conducting excavations on a temple in Petrie's area of concession at Luxor.^[19] This temple complex was located just north of the original funerary temple of Amenhotep III, which had been built on a flood plain.^[20] They were initially surprised that this building which they were excavating

was also attributed to

Peoples of the Sea; [Wilhelm] Spiegelberg [a noted German philologist] came over to read it, and near the end of the text he was puzzled by one name, that of a people or tribe whom Merenptah had victoriously smitten-"I.si.ri.ar?" It was Petrie whose quick imaginative mind leapt to the solution: "Israel!" Spiegelberg agreed that it must be so. "Won't the reverends be pleased?" was his comment. At dinner that evening Petrie prophesied: "This stele will be better known in the world than anything else I have found." It was the first mention of the word "Israel" in any Egyptian text and the news made headlines when it reached the English papers.^[20]

During the field season of 1895/6, at the Ramesseum, Petrie and the young German Egyptologist Wilhelm Spiegelberg became friends. Spiegelberg was in charge of the edition of many texts discovered by his British colleague, and Petrie offered important collections of artefacts to the University of Strasbourg. In 1897, the Kaiser-Wilhelms-Universität Straßburg gratefully conferred to Petrie the title of doctor honoris causa,[22] and in June 1902 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS).^[23] He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1905.^[24]

Hu and Abadiya cemeteries

From 1889 to 1899, Petrie directed a team excavating over 17 cemeteries containing numerous graves between Hu and Abadiya, Egypt. The dig team included Beatrice Orme, David Randall-MacIver, Arthur Cruttenden Mace, Henrietta Lawes and Hilda Petrie. Predynastic, Old Kingdom, Middle Kingdom and Roman graves were excavated and published at 'Diospolis Parva'.^[25]

Discovery of the Proto-Sinaitic script

In the winter of 1905, Petrie and his wife Hilda were conducting a series of archaeological excavations in the

In 1923, Petrie was knighted for services to British Archaeology and Egyptology.^[27]

Palestine: Jemmeh and Ajjul

The focus of his work shifted permanently to Palestine in 1926. From 1927 until 1938, he excavated in Palestine under the auspices of the

In parallel with his work in Palestine, Petrie became interested in early Egypt. In 1928, while digging a cemetery at Luxor, this proved so huge that he devised an entirely new excavation system, including comparison charts for finds, which is still used today.^[citation needed]

Move to Jerusalem

In 1933, on retiring from his professorship, he moved permanently to

Sir Flinders Petrie died in Jerusalem on 28 July 1942. His body was interred in the

There is a popular legend that Hilda brought back her husband's head in a hat box from Jerusalem after the war. But letters in the Petrie Museum archive illustrate that this legend is not true.^[28]

Personal life

Petrie married

By linking styles of pottery with periods, he was the first to use seriation in Egyptology, a new method for establishing the chronology of a site.

Teacher and mentor

Petrie was also responsible for mentoring and training a whole generation of Egyptologists, including Howard Carter. On the centennial of Petrie's birth in 1953, his widow Hilda Petrie created a student travel scholarship to Egypt.

Egypt findings

Many thousands of artefacts recovered during excavations led by Petrie can be found in museums worldwide.^[30]

Petrie Medal for archaeology

The Petrie Medal was created in celebration of Petrie's seventieth birthday, when funds were raised to commission and produce 20 medals to be awarded "once in every three years for distinguished work in Archaeology, preferably to a British subject".^[31] The first medal was awarded to Petrie himself (1925), and the first few recipients included Sir Aurel Stein (1928), Sir Arthur Evans (1931), Abbé Henri Breuil (1934), J.D. Beazley (1937), Sir Mortimer Wheeler (1950), Alan Wace (1953), and Sir Leonard Woolley (1957).^[32]

Racist views

• 
• 
  ^[33]

Petrie remains controversial for his pro-

In August 2012, more than a hundred people gathered at Petrie's grave, to commemorate the 70th anniversary of his death. His headstone is marked only with his name and an ankh symbol, the Egyptian hieroglyph for "life".^[38]

Published work

Wikisource has original works by or about:
Flinders Petrie

A number of Petrie's discoveries were presented to the

• "Abydos (Egypt)". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
• "Egypt". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
• "Pyramid". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
• "Weights and Measures". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.

Selected works

• Naukratis, Pt. I, Egypt Exploration Fund, 1886.
• Tanis, Pt. I, Egypt Exploration Fund, 1889.
• Egyptian decorative art, London, 1895.
• The Religion of Ancient Egypt (1906)
• Migrations, Anthropological Inst. of Great Britain and Ireland, 1906.
• Janus in Modern Life, G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1907.
• "Neglected British History". Proceedings of the British Academy, 1917–1918. 8: 251–278. November 1917.
• Eastern Exploration – Past and Future London: Constable and Company Ltd., 1918.
• Some Sources of Human History, Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1919.
• The Status of the Jews in Egypt, G. Allen & Unwin, 1922.
• The Revolutions of Civilization, Harper & Brothers, 1922.
• Gaza I-V, to up 1931

Gallery

• 
  Flinders Petrie, 12 years old, c. 1865.
• 
  Flinders Petrie, as a young man, n.d.
• 
  Flinders Petrie, c. 1886.
• 
  Flinders Petrie, by George Frederic Watts, 1900.
• 
  Flinders Petrie and Hilda Petrie in 1903.
• 
  Flinders Petrie, Luncheon Party at the House of Commons, 1908.
• 
  Petrie at Abydos, Egypt, 1922.
• 
  Petrie Exhibiting Material from

  Tell Fara

  in London.
• 
  Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie, in Jerusalem, ca. late 1930s.
• 
  Flinders Petrie, by Ludwig Blum. Painted in Jerusalem in 1937.

References