Exercise 6

Structure: In the middle there´s a short introduction and the main video. On the left there are other videos related with our video and the last videos. And on the right there are other sections like: "World News" which has got another section called Egypt; "Science" with another section called Archaeology and the last one is Culture with another section called heritage.
And two more which are related with more videos and news.Formats:There are hypertexts in the other sections like: World News, Science Culture...
Moreover there is a video which lets you send the video to a friend, share it or copy it.

Features: This website hasn´t got any imelines, maps, infographics...

User oriented: You can surf using hypertexts, videos and using other sections of the websitehttp://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=351194206329726584&postID=5609533465766610936
Updating of contents:This article is not very actual. Its date is Wednesday 11 February 2009

Web 2.0: I´ve you got an account in digg or in buzz, you can comment something.

Comparison: I have found an article about the topic but it hasn´t got a lot of multimedia elements, only a video which talks about the mummies found in the south of Cairo. It has been a very important discovery. I´m going to compare with the Raquel´s news beacuse it has got other elements like a photo gallery that my website hasn´t got.

Practice 6

My page belongs to the part which talks about the British museum inside the online New York Times. This is the link : http://topics.nytimes.com/topics/news/science/topics/egyptian_civilization/index.html?s=oldest&
Structure:
This page has got an inverted chronologie. The main page has got links to different articles, which are news about Egyptian Civilization. Above the news, there´s an audio player and at the right of the page there´s a photo gallery, two adverts and a list of the mosto popular articles chosen by the users.




In each article there is a similar structure being the article the main content. It includes different liks to many pages. At the right of the page and at the bottom of it there are more adverts and the same list that before.

Formats:
The article is structured in a way that the hypertext sends you to different articles, and inside them, there are differents links too.All of them are intern links, which send you to other articles, not to official websites or other pages.


As we have said, the photo gallery is at the right and each photo is a link to the article where the image appears.

The audio is at the top of the page and it talks about an archeologic restauration about a temple among the mountains.

Features:
There are no features in the page, nor timelines, infographics or maps.

User oriented:
The user can surf the page easily with the menu which appears at the top of every article. He can also look fot specific news with a searcher which is at the right top of the page. There is another searcher at the bottom which lets the user look for articles related to the same topic of the article he is reading. There is no chance to publish any comments, so there is no feedback.






Updating of contents:
The first of all these articles was published on 1983 and the last one was published last week (October, the 8th). Among them there are about 200 articles related to the topic.

Web 2.0:
The New York Times appears twice in facebook. You can create an account and become a suscriptor of the page and maybe then you can start publishing comments in the articles.

Comparative:
I´ve compared my page whith the one that Beñat is working on.
The main difference is that Beñat´s page is one of the articles where you can go from the page that I have talked about. In his article there´s is an audio format that also appears on my page and different images about the topic.
On the right of the page there are some adverts and the same list as appears on my page about the most popular pages visited in the online New York Times.
There´s the same chance to interact that in my page. The reason is that the home page of bouth pages are the same one, the New York Times. Related to the features, in Beñat´s article there aren´t either timelines nor maps.
Another difference is that as Beñat´s page is an article,so all of it was published the same day, instead of being published day by day.

Practic examples

After more than an hour writing my post, the internet turned off and I lost all my work, so this is a rewriting in bad humour, so I may forget many things.

Here it is an example of egyptian music, the music of the ancient empire.

In this video, we can difference an harp played very softly and a female singer, who uses the pentatonic scale, employing just 5 notes of the 7 we know (Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, Si or C, D, E, F, G, A, B). In this way, every note she sings sounds well. This was the technique also used in blues, and afterwards in rock, pop, or even hip-hop. The blues developed this scale modifying it, and transforming into the blues scale. This particular case can seem a bit boring because of its repetition. The pictures shown in the video are also beautiful, and relaxing, with the music.

And here, another music example which has less to do with ancient Egypt, and even with actual Egypt. It's a song by Madness the famous ska band which composed famous themes like "Our house" or "It must be love". This song talks about a mysterious trip on a boat trying to reach Cairo. The video is funny, the movements done by the band are really nice. Here it is: Night Boat To Cairo:

I hope you've liked the videos, even if they are a bit away from the topic (Maybe you've liked them just because of that! ;)

Egyptian Multimedia

Podcasts about Egypt

Finding videoblogs and podcasts about egyptian culture is a really difficult work. This wonderful art is usually transmitted by pictures and texts, but I have searched through the Internet and I have found some interesting podcasts.

This one is about the the role of the scarab beetle in Ancient Egyptian religion.

This podcast talks about the role of the scarab beetle in Ancient Egyptian religion and funerary art as both the Egyptian god Khepri and an iconographic motif of resurrection.

Scarab beetle (or Kepher in hieroglyphic writing) is identified with Ra as a creator-god. The locutor tells the story about Ra or Re, his meaning in funerals (the example of the picture 2:03) where he appears with his mother.

Scarabs are used as amulets in necklaces too. They appear in the new and ancient Egypt painted in blue or green. They also were used to decorate temples and mommys.

If you want to know more about scarabs and his meaning listen to this podcast!

Changing the subject, I have found another podcast about the pyramids and the city of the Cairo. This adventurer who visited the city relate us his experience, here he goes!

Videoblogs

This is the vblog of an institute of archaeology. Here you can find some sources to learn more about Egypt through the video support. A group of students make this vblog as a project to be enjoyed by archaeologists or people like you or me. They are not focused on the Egyptian culture, but on Egyptian excavations, the Egyptian desserts and all related with Egyptian territory. How can we speak about culture if we don´t know anything about the country we are talking about? Have a look to this page, it could be interesting:

http://www.ioa.ucla.edu/multimedia-resources/egypt

Finally, although I haven´t been able to find a vblog about Egypt (this is a difficult topic to search videos!) I have looked for a web where it appeared videos about Egypt and I have found it:

http://sobreegipto.com/category/egipto/videos-de-egipto/

You can cross the Nile river, visit the Philae Temple or even the Keops Pyramid. Don´t loss this opportunity to travel around Egypt without going out from home!

Introduction to the Egyptian Culture

After publishing some posts, I realised that it was needed to write about the ancient egyptian society in general to be able to understand many topics that we are talking about. That´s why I´m going to publish this post, although it should have been written at the beggining.

History
The pharaon´s civilitation in Egypt started at the end of the fourth millenium before Crist. Nevertheless, the egyptian culture started around 5000 B.C with the first cities around the Nile. They were sedentary townships whose habitants practised agriculture and craftsmanship. The aparition of the first dinasties(between 3100 and 2700 BC) meant the birth of of the pharaonic state and the union of High and Low Egypt, which had been separated until that moment.

Around 2500 BC the first stone pyramid was built, during Zoser´s reign. The capital of the civilatation moved during all this time from Tinis to Menfis, later to Listh, Avari, Thebes and Tanis.

Around 332 BC Alexandre the Great arrived to Egypt and he set up Alejandría.During the roman period (30BC until 395 AC) Egypt became a roman province with Octavio Augusto. Cristianism is declarated the official religion of the state. The byzantine period started in 395 AC and finished in 640, the year when Egypt became a province of the khalifat and converted to the islamism.

Fluvial civilization: the importance of the Nile

The egyptian culture is a fluvial civilization which stands around

the Nile, the longest river in the world. It appears in Burundi and

it has two main tributaries, the White Nile and the Blue Nile. The

river mouth goes into the Mediterranean Sea.

The Nile was the fundamental element of agriculture and economy for the whole Egypt during the pharaonic period. Every July the monzonic rain in Etiopy increases the level of water of the river and it floods the fields. Egyptians used to say that this wonderful phenomenon was caused by Hapi, a god with a human appearance which came with lots of plants and fishes. The truth is that this flood was great for the egyptians and when the water dissapeared again, there was a black mud over the ground which made it rich and fertile.

The Egyptian culture was based on the agriculture, and that´s why the annual calendar takes its form from the different stages that the river follows.

From July to November the fields were completely submerged by the Nile. Because of this reason July means the start of the egyptian year, our 1^st of January.

Then, from November to March, the fields appeared again under the water and it was time to cultivate.

Finally, from March to July it was the dry season.

Geography

Egyps is an heterogenean land. It suddenly changes from the “Black Ground” (Kemet), which is the fertile zone, to the desertic sand, property of Red God Seth.

The confines of the ancient Egypt were conformed by the Valley of the Nile, the delta of the Nile and the Fayum, an oasis besides a lake in the western part of the Valley and at the south of Menphis. It could also be complemented in different periods by some desserts, which were only controled by the most powerful governments.

The Valley and the delta covered 3400 square kilometers.

Society

In the Ancient Egypt ehre were big cities such as Menphis, Buto or Thebes. They were very populated and inside them we can differenciate different types of buildings:

• Palaces, which were very adorned, and surrounded by gardens and little lakes.
  

• Houses, which had more than a floor and were aligned in small and thin streets.
  

• Temples, which were all built in the same district of the city
  

• King´s palaces, whose floors and walls were really docorated with paintings and could get to have more than 40 acres of ground.

All these buildings were made of bricks manufactured with mud from the Nile, baked in wooden ovens and dried by the sun.

The population hadn´t got the same rights. In fact, this society was extremely hierarchical.

The pharaon was on the top of the society, which can be imagned as a ppyramid. He had to make sure that there was order ( Maat) in the city. His wife, the queen, was also very prestigious, she went with her husband to the religious ceremonies. She could take part in the government activities, but there is no constance of many queens who were interested on it.

The vizier was a employee of the government which only was subordinate of the Pharaon.

There also was a regular army, conformed by four different infantry divisions. These four divisions had the name of the 4 most important gods of the state, which were Ra, Amon, Ptah and Set.

In this society we could also find more government employees, farmers and traders or merchants.

After reading this post, you can understand much better the egyptian culture in the ancient ages of the pharaons. In order to get more information , here are two links to some podcasts that I have found on the Internet. They belong to a page about Tutankhamun and the golden ages of the pharaons. Here are also two videoblogs about the same topic, the marvellous ancient egypt

Egyptian music

Well, it's time to start with the real topic. I'm going to talk specially about music in the ancient Egypt.

Music was used in some activities, but it's main development was into the temples, where it was used during the rites celebrated for some gods. It was also used as a therapeutic solution as it has been found in some papyrus. In fact, the hieroglyphic picture of the music was the same as happiness and well-being. Like in other countries, it was considered as a communication way with the deaths, and musicians used to reach such an important status that some of them are buried in royal necropolis.
Ancient musicians didn't develop a system to play the music they created, 'cause they used to transmit from master to apprentice, so we don't know how that music really was. Anyway, there are some known aspects which have been known by texts. Besides, instruments shown on museums, wall-pictures of musicians and dancers and singer's oral tradition has given us some extra information.
Evolution
We can appreciate an evolution of the music by studying the instruments, the pictures and the offerings which have been found in temples. At first they just have percussion instruments (my favorite ones!) so it's obvious that music was rhythmic. By the pictures that have preserved we can know that music was used to invoke gods for the good harvest, or to frighten off the plagues.
In the fourth millennium vertical recorder and harp appeared, being this last one something like Egyptian national instrument.
Ancient Empire
Music was religious, priests' songs during the rites. By the studies of the instruments of which have done lots of representations, it's been concluded that they used to play using pentathonic or heptathonic (the one we use) scales. Instruments:

-Wind instruments:
Straight flute, with vertical reed with four or six holes without mouthpiece and nearly a meter long. Still nowadays it's called nay and uffata in official and pupular musics in Egypt.
Double Chirimy which had two parallel of reed with the same measure, that used to sound at the same time. Nowadays this instrument is called zummarah. It may was used to play the same melody in a duplicate way, or maybe it consisted on some kind of stereophony or a practice of a snare.
Trumpet, of silver or copper which was used in the military parades and in the cult of the death. They were made of metal, similar to Palestine trumpets.

-String Instruments:
Harp of six or eight strings very decorated. It's been found one in the necropolis of Giza from year 2000 b.C. It was played resting it on the floor and its one-pieced tailpiece reminds to the most ancient musical arc. This goes to an wide resounder, shovel-shaped, which used to have pictures o gods' eyes, employed to counteract the tragedies. Its strings where fixed over an tuning bar, which hypothetically would have served to change the tuning of all the strings, like is done nowadays with modern harps' pedals. In iconography, harp appears as an helping instrument to singers, flutes... and sometimes creating a part of an orchestra (it's been found a representation of an orchestra of seven harpists).
Three strings guitar, with a neck which was two times the body.

-Percussion:
Cymbals,
Drums,
"Sistroes", percussion instruments with an U shaped wooden frame, a handle and crossed bars which held up some metal made sheets, which varied by the years went on (picture).

- Jufu Anj, singer and flute player of the court.

Next week I´ll go on with the topic, explaining the rest of the evolution. I hope you've liked this week's post. I'm sorry for giving the URL's information in spanish, but there's an option to change the languaje.

Pharaoh´s language: the hieroglyphs

The History of Egyptian writing

Although it´s difficult to make sure when they appeared, the first hieroglyphs dated to about 3000BC, in the Predynastic Period. The hieroglyphic language has suffered six periods during the History. After the Roman Empire began, hieroglyphs faded from popular use. When Napoleon invaded Egypt and discovered the Rosetta stone, hieroglyphic writing started to be known among the population. This stone was written in two Egyptian symbols: demotic and hieroglyphic. The second one was developed towards the end of the ancient language´s use and utilized a cursive script. If you want to write as the ancient egyptian gods did, follow these instructions.

Some rules to decipher hieroglyphs

This “literary art” is composed by phonetic symbols and ideographic characters. Each symbol can mean a sound, a letter or even the same thing that the symbol represents (for instance, a figure of a man means “man” or “servant”, but an owl represents the letter “m”). The “grammar” of this language is written as follows.

There are three kind of symbols:

• The determinatives. They help to determine when a word ends. They haven´t a phonetic sense, they represent the nature of the thing they refer to. For example, if you want to write the name of a person, you must draw a man after the name .
  
• The phonograms. Symbols which represent sounds. They are always consonants, but we can also find weak vowels which are pronounced as consonants. This signs can represent only a letter, two letters (these are the most usual), three letters (for example, the famous beetle contains these three consonants “hpr”) or even four letters.
  
• The ideograms. These symbols represent words, not sounds. It can become a logogram if the picture is the exact word that it means.

More ideas to understand hieroglyphs:

• Direction: the symbols which compose the hieroglyphs can not be lined-up. They must appear regrouped inside an imaginary square. It does not exist spaces between the words or sentences and this language does not own punctuation rules. Besides, some symbols can appear in a vertical or horizontal position to fit in that imaginary square.
  The Egyptian writing can be written in vertical or horizontal direction too. This is a real example of vertical hieroglyph from the Vatican Museum.
  Symbols can also be facing left or right: this fact will determine the direction on which we must read them.
  
  
• Pronunciation: hieroglyphic writing has not got vowels, it is composed only by consonants. Trying to understand the meaning of a word which has not got vowels is difficult. To solve that problem, some experts in Egyptian writing have decided to include an “e” between all the consonants. If Egyptians wanted to write plural words, they added three ticks under the symbol.

If you follow these rules you are prepared to decipher a hieroglyph as a good egyptologist! And that is not all, you can also write your name in this ancient language, click here!