Egypt

Conrad Black adheres firmly to the ‘great man’ view of history

27 January 2024 9:00 am

The movers and shakers of Volume I of his projected history of the world are Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar and Hannibal rather than any socio-economic forces

The wonder of the wandering life

9 July 2022 9:00 am

Anthony Sattin begins with a quotation from Bruce Chatwin, who famously tried all his life to produce a book about…

Does knotted string constitute ‘writing’?

16 April 2022 9:00 am

What particularly excites Silvia Ferrara, the author of The Greatest Invention, is not language per se but writing – that…

Marina Warner becomes her mother’s ‘shabti’

24 April 2021 9:00 am

There comes a time after the death of parents when grief subsides, the sense of loss eases, and you, the…

The Egyptians knew the value of accidental discoveries

27 February 2021 9:00 am

The government has plans to fund a new research agency to back ‘cutting-edge science’. Ptolemaios (Ptolemy) I (367-282 bc), the…

The art of the hermit

4 April 2020 9:00 am

Holed up in her sixth-floor London flat, Laura Freeman finds solace in the art of the hermit

Arabian nights

28 October 2017 9:00 am

Recall the media coverage at the height of the Jimmy Savile scandal, times it by about a thousand, and you…

King of heavy metal Bruce Dickinson at Madison Square Gardens in 1983

Meet the fans who risk death for heavy metal

14 May 2016 9:00 am

We in the West may snigger at heavy metal, but in some parts of the world its practitioners face the death penalty. Karen Yossman reports

Egypt on its knees: Friday prayers in Tahrir Square

For Egypt, a bitter winter has followed the Arab spring

30 January 2016 9:00 am

Jack Shenker is a throwback to an older, more romantic age when foreign correspondents were angry, partisan and half-crazed with…

'Lion Hunt', 1861, by Eugène Delacroix

Galleries are getting bigger - but is there enough good art to put in them?

2 January 2016 9:00 am

Martin Gayford recommends the exhibitions to see — and to avoid — over the coming year

Islamic State is making its threats a reality

14 November 2015 9:00 am

Isis could be on the brink of creating a terrifying new world order

Standing figure of the ancient Egyptian god Horus, wearing Roman military costume, 1st–2nd century AD and Seated figure of the ancient Egyptian god Horus, wearing Roman military costume, 1st–2nd century AD

Egypt: where gods are born and go to die

29 October 2015 9:00 am

Tom Holland on Egypt, where the deities were born and history itself began

Brothels, hashish, a poisonous scorpion, a cursed necklace: all excuses for macho antics in the Valley of the Kings

25 April 2015 9:00 am

Gore Vidal has form as a crime writer. In the early 1950s, when his sympathetic literary treatment of homosexuality had…

The writing on the wall: some of the well-preserved hieroglyphs at Karnak

Tourists are trickling back to Egypt – to beat the crowds, go now

4 April 2015 9:00 am

Egypt’s revolution of 2011 didn’t just get rid of President Mubarak: it did a pretty good job of clearing out…

Portrait of the week

7 February 2015 9:00 am

Home MPs voted by 382 to 128 to make Britain the only country to allow genetic modification of embryos to…

Why BBC Arabic is booming

7 February 2015 9:00 am

Last weekend BBC Arabic celebrated 77 years since John Reith (as he then was) launched the first foreign-language service of…

How to save Islam from the Islamists

17 January 2015 9:00 am

It’s time to reclaim Islam from the Islamists

Why does Isis slay hostages? To cover up the fact that it’s losing

10 January 2015 9:00 am

Isis slaughters kidnap victims because it guarantees headlines. It's better at slaughtering innocents than it is at winning wars

In Gaza, the siege mentality is helping Hamas

19 July 2014 9:00 am

  Gaza The main entrance to Al-Shifa Hospital was crowded with what seemed to be journalists. This wasn’t unusual. They…

How the Westminster hawk became an endangered species

21 June 2014 9:00 am

There is a slight whiff of the summer of 1914 to Westminster at the moment. The garden party season is…

Portrait of the week

31 May 2014 9:00 am

Home David Cameron, the Prime Minister, responded to the triumph of the UK Independence Party in the European elections (which…

If we have to let generals run Egypt, must we pay for them, too?

31 May 2014 9:00 am

America has let Egypt’s old military oligarchs take hold again. Must it carry on paying for them, too?

Portrait of the week

29 March 2014 9:00 am

Home David Cameron, the Prime Minister, said that inheritance tax ‘shouldn’t be paid by people who’ve worked hard and saved…

Is Hamas finally losing its grip on Gaza?

22 March 2014 9:00 am

The party is out of favour with its foreign neighbours and with ordinary Gazans