Tremendous interest surrounds the world premiere of artefacts that have lain under the sea for more than millennium — already thousands have visited in the few first weeks since the Martin Gropius Bau including Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and his German counterpart Horst Kohler opened the show.

Curators say the exhibit brings "a lost history" to light through some 500 artefacts never shown before. The exhibition owes its origin to marine archaeologist Franck Goddio.

For the past 15-20 years he has found and excavated 14 ships that have been resting on the bottom of the sea for hundreds of years, along with unique artefacts of Egyptian history, dating from the 7th century BC to the 8th century AD, off the coast of Alexandria, Egypt and in the nearby Bay of Abu Qir. It has taken years of painstaking work and state-of-the-art technology to recover them.

Berlin tourism official Hanns Peter Nergeron calls the exhibit the "cultural highlight" for 2006: "This exhibition will, without a doubt, attract and enthral many tourists and inhabitants of Berlin..."

Berlin museum's sunken treasures a hit, Expatia, Netherlands, June 01, 2006.

Visitors to the Tut exhibit may be puzzled by the dates listed on the information placards.

Tut, for example, is said to have been born in 1340 BCE.

His father, Amenhotep IV, began his reign in 1353 BCE.

Traditionally, years have been designated with "BC," meaning "Before Christ." Or with "AD," or Anno Domini, which is Latin for "year of the Lord," to roughly describe years after Jesus Christ's death.

The new BCE designation means Before Common Era.

The letters CE replace AD and mean Common Era...

BCE date designation called more sensitive, Chicago Sun-Times, Illinois, USA, May 27, 2006.

cf. Wikipedia entry for Common Era.

... archaeologists believe they have stumbled across one final secret: The mummified remains of the boy king's widow buried 3000 years ago.

In a mysterious shaft less than 15m from Tutankhamen's burial ground, US archaeologists found seven coffins.

They believe one they have not yet been able to open may contain the remains of Queen Ankhesenpaaten.

The tomb — found by accident by Memphis University team leader Dr Otto Schaden — contained seven coffins stacked closely together and ringed by 28 clay jars, each decorated with a beautiful face mask. The coffins were buried about 1320BC...

... Ankhesenpaaten's link to the tomb was further underlined when a coffin seal was found with part of her name on it.

"I think there is a 70 per cent chance that Ankhesenpaaten's mummy is in that last coffin," Egyptian antiquities head Dr Mansour Boraik said...

Mystery tomb could hold Tutankhamen's widow, The Daily Telegraph, Australia, June 02, 2006.

The Ancient Egypt Research Associates (AERA) website provides a window into the ongoing work of Dr. Mark Lehner and the international team of the Giza Plateau Mapping Project.

If you haven't visited their website yet then you are in for a treat. It is very slick and professional and jam packed with information and essays.

Ancient Egypt Research Associates.

The Discovery Channel have launched the official website that accompanies the documentary Egypt's New Tomb Revealed which is scheduled to air on the Discovery Channel at 9PM ET/PT on Sunday 4th June.

The site contains a nice interactive map of the tomb which allows you to click objects for more information.

Egypt's New Tomb Revealed, The Discovery Channel, USA.

It had been 84 years since a tomb was unearthed here in the scorching desert burial ground for pharaohs, and the hope, of course, was for mummies. What else could be inside the seven coffins, at the bottom of a shaft that until February had been sealed off from all but termites for over three millenniums?

Very nice pillows, for starters.

"No idea, I'm sorry," Elsie van Rooij, an expert on ancient textiles, said, when asked why it was that some burial worker had stuffed five pillows into the child-size coffin she was examining. Coffins usually hold bodies. She had never seen anything like it. Naturally, that pleased her.

"A tomb should be mysterious," she said.

After three months of painstaking work since the February discovery, with five of the coffins opened, no mummies have been found. So there is a chance that this is not a tomb at all, but rather a cache for used embalming materials.

But there is one big coffin left to open — the most tantalizing one, sealed, wedged into the back of the space and supported by pillows at its head and feet, with the kind of care that could suggest that someone important is inside...

At Tomb, Pillows but No Mummies So Far, The New York Times, New York, USA, May 31, 2006.

cf. Infant-Sized Gold Coffin Found! Newest Treasure is the Latest of Many Unearthed in the First Tomb Discovered in Egypt's Valley of the Kings in Over 80 Years, Discovery Channel via PR Newswire, USA, May 30, 2006.

cf. The Roxanne Wilson interview page has been updated with the infant-sized coffin find including a couple of pictures, KV 63: A Look at the New Tomb, Archaeology Magazine, New York, USA, May 30, 2006.

cf. The KV63 official website has also been updated with the infant-sized coffin find including nine superb pictures, KV 63: A Look at the New Tomb, Amenmesse Project, University of Memphis, Tennessee, May 30, 2006.

They have been called mystical, awe-inspiring, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. But it is safe to say that in the 45 centuries the great pyramids of Giza have cast their formidable shadow over the desert, they have never before been described as a cuckoo clock.

But that is what Jean-Pierre Houdin said as he lifted his tall lanky body up the steps into the pyramid of Cheops, the largest of the three pyramids high up on the Giza plateau overlooking this teeming, ancient city on the Nile.

"This is not just a pile of rocks," he said, his words curled around a soft French accent. "This is a cuckoo clock."

Then with a short, friendly laugh, he loped through the cool, dank passage and examined his cuckoo clock with the enthusiasm of a child. He pointed excitedly at what he calls its mechanics — every carving, every joint, every scratch — all, he said, part of a fabulously intricate engineering design by ancient Egyptians.

"It is an engineering project, from A to Z," he said, again with the same friendly chuckle...

Great Pyramid as Cuckoo Clock? It Might Not Be Crazy, The New York Times, New York, USA, May 27, 2006.

A lengthy article from MSNBC about the discoveries in KV63 and an interview with Dr. Otto Schaden.

"Until we examine each coffin to some extent, we can't draw a conclusion," University of Memphis archaeologist Otto Schaden told MSNBC.com. "We can draw one, but it might be wrong."

Schaden spoke via telephone from the Valley of the Kings, where he and his colleagues are continuing to remove artefacts from the chamber, including jars of mummification materials and the coffins labelled A through G. During the interview, he gave a progress report on the dig as well as a behind-the-scenes perspective on a TV show chronicling the find, "Egypt's New Tomb Revealed," which premieres June 4 on the Discovery Channel.

Professional Egyptologists, as well as legions of fans, are keeping a close eye on what Schaden and his team are up to, because it's so rare to find a completely new chamber in the thoroughly-explored Valley of the Kings...

Mysteries still surround Egyptian chamber, MSNBC, USA, May 26, 2006.

When she was rediscovered three decades ago, in a darkened storage area at Philadelphia's Academy of Natural Sciences, she caused a bit of a sensation.

Lying in a plain wooden crate was an Egyptian mummy, her gilded death mask undimmed by the passage of centuries.

The Egyptian government had restricted the export of such artefacts decades earlier, so the appearance in 1977 of a "new" one outside the country drew some interest.

X-rays taken at the time led researchers to identify the body tentatively as that of a 14-year-old girl.

But mysteries remained. When did she live, and where? How did she die? Might her dusty linen wrappings hold any clues as to her place in society, or the customs of her time?

In short, who was she..?

It's the oldest of cold cases: A girl's death 2,200 years ago, Grand Forks Herald, North Dakota, USA, May 26, 2006.

Adorned with lotus and papyrus columns, Egypt's top courthouse evokes the pharaonic temples of the country's ancient past.

The Supreme Constitutional Court, built in 2000, marked the most prominent attempt in decades to revive the pharaonic style in Egypt.

On the east bank of the Nile south of Cairo, the court has inspired more attempts to imitate the ancient.

The government has erected a series of neo-pharaonic buildings, the style apparently striking a chord with officials...

Architects try to revive pharaonic style in Egypt, Al-Arab Online, May 26, 2006.