A Certificate of Completion
At the end of this course you will be able to download a personalised certificate of completion from the classroom. A great way to keep track of your learning and celebrate your Egyptological journey.
The End of the New Kingdom
with Dr Henning Franzmeier
8x Monday Evenings 10th February - 31st March 2025
Times: 7.30-9pm (UK Times) to join live.
We love to see you for the live lectures, but if you have to miss one, don't worry, you can of course catch up (or watch again) at your leisure via the recordings. You will have access to the recorded lectures for a whole month after the last live lecture. Recordings will be available until 1st May 2025.
The New Kingdom is undoubtedly one of the most important periods of Ancient Egyptian History. It is often seen as the period when Egypt reached the apex of its power, creating an Empire that ruled over territories from the Sudan in the south up to the Euphrates in the North over a distance of 3000 kilometers. Moreover, it can be considered a period of great stability where the state survived even such episodes as the Amarna Period, lasting a total of almost 500 years. But at its end there are major changes, political, social and cultural. Never again Egypt experienced such a power, wealth, and long periods while being ruled from within. Short periods of indigenous rule intermingled with long periods of foreign rule, basically until the 20th century AD. For this reason, it seems extremely relevant to take a closer look at the last 150 years – from the end of the rule of Ramesses II to the end of the New Kingdom, tracking the developments which led to the demise of the old order. The class will take a diachronic look at this period, extending into the Third Intermediate Period to understand better what actually changed. In addition, the development outside Egypt will feature prominently to understand better the influence of what happened in the rest of the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age world where all around the Eastern Mediterranean and beyond Empires collapsed and profound changes are to be seen.
Week1:
Decline, Collapse, and the End of New Kingdom Egypt: Important Questions and Factors
Week 2:
The 19th Dynasty after Ramesses II: The beginning of the end?
Week 3:
Ramesses III: Egypt’s last hero? or Between Sea Peoples and an untimely death
Week 4:
Ramesses IV-VIII: Children and grandchildren of Ramesses III on the throne
Week 5:
Ramesses IX-XI: The end
Week 6:
The beginning of the Third Intermediate Period: What is really different?
Week 7:
The international context: The end of the New Kingdom and the end of the Bronze Age in the Eastern Mediterranean and beyond
Week 8:
Overall conclusion and discussion
Dr Henning Franzmeier
Henning Franzmeier has been working at Qantir-Piramesse for the past 18 years and directed the excavations since 2015. Over the past ten years, he has taught at UCL Qatar in Doha, the University of Innsbruck, and the University of Bologna.
In 2014, he received his PhD from the Free University of Berlin with a thesis on the New Kingdom cemeteries at the Middle Egyptian site of Sedment – a reassessment of the 1920/21 excavations of William Matthew Flinders Petrie. His MA thesis at the University of Göttingen dealt with a well of Ramesses II at Samana near Qantir-Piramesse.
His interests range from settlement archaeology to the history of Egyptology and the analysis of funerary assemblages.
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