Smithsonian online

360 degree tour of Smithsonian and the grounds. Navigation takes a bit of getting used to.

Gosh, it's like I've actually been there.

America's attic, you know.

And so far it turns out looking like any ordinary museum. Although I haven't explored the gem room yet, that gallery is big with lots of dots to land on and explore. I was hoping for things uniquely American. The junk that they save that turns out to be valuable eventually like weather vanes and pot metal objects and large clay pots, Travon Martin's hoodie and civil rights memorabilia, but no, so far it is all regular things. Naturally my initial interest is specific.

Civilization, the early years.

The box top right navigates the building. You can click on the dots and be positioned in that spot. At the top of the list "Western Cultures" the third dot goes to Egypt. Before that the two previous dots are blah.

And I recognize that scene, of course, and I recognize that writing. Not only that, I recognize the handwriting as being other than copied from the most famous of all copies of "Coming Forth by Day" drawn up for Ani. It sticks out. These hieratic characters are cleaner than the scribe's handwriting for Ani.

The writing was done in an ancient workshop. Ani chose the chapters he wanted for his burial. His name was filled in later by a separate scribe, Ani's name often appears at the beginning of a block of text or following a rubric introducing him and sometimes omitted where it should be. Oops. The artwork is by separate teams of scribes. The whole thing is a mess, actually, chopped up in pieces irrational to the story but convenient for transporting. Presented out of order the ancient text does not match the modern translations page for page, after all that effort making sense of the thing and thought put into its representation the result is barely intelligible and annoyingly difficult to follow. That is, looking for their interpretation of anything specific is harder than translating myself.

And Ani's is different from the Smithsonian's representation, Ani's little word-birds have feathers. It makes the handwriting completely different.

On the second floor, Egypt has a tiny section and that makes me sad. Only two dots to click.

Anubis does not lead Ani anywhere in Ani's copy.

Here is my copy of Ani's copy, and look, ibis-headed Thoth scribe is exactly the same at Smithsonian except different colors.

Exactly. Hand and arm configuration, posture, proportion canon, scribe implements. But the words above the picture are different. I cannot even locate those words ↑ in my copy ↓. (bottom right in both)

Disappointing all around. Meager.

Well I had just go to New York for interesting Egyptian exhibits. They have the best.