A History of Art in Ancient Egypt (1&2)

A History of Art in Ancient Egypt in two volumes is a study of Egyptian arts and of their connection with the national religion and civilization written by French archeologists and historians Georges Perrot and Charles Chipiez. The aim of the work was to trace the course of the great evolution which culminated in the age of Pericles and came to an end in that of Marcus Aurelius. That evolution forms a complete entirety - an unbroken chain of cause and effect uniting the two eras. Using carefully selected examples authors prove that the art of the Egyptians went through the same process of development as those of other nationalities, earlier and later ones, and that the unique quality of the sculptures and paintings of the Nile Valley was a persistent affinity to simplification, which comes in part from the habit created by writing the hieroglyphic and in part from the materials used.

Georges Perrot (1832-1914) was a French archaeologist. He taught at the Sorbonne and was director of the École Normale Supérieure. His most famous archaeological discovery was made while on an expedition to Asia Minor in 1861 and 1862, where he found a Greek translation of the document known as 'The Political Testament of the Emperor Augustus'. With the help of Charles Chipiez, influential French architect, Egyptologist, Iranologist, and an avid historian of the ancient world's architecture, Perrot wrote some of the most detailed description of the architectural achievements of the ancient world in such places as Egypt, Greece, Persia, Lydia, Lycia and Assyria.