Academics want to test an ancient fake big toe to see if it really did help its owner to Walk like an Egyptian.

They have made a replica of the “Cairo toe”, a bending leather and wood body part which they believe could be the world’s earliest practical prosthetic.

Now they are seeking volunteers who themselves lack a right big toe, to test their theory that it actively helped its original user to walk.

If proved correct, it would mean prosthetic medicine started at least 700 years earlier than previously thought.

Jacky Finch, lead researcher at Manchester University’s KNH Centre for Biomedical Egyptology, said the fact that it showed signs of wear indicated it was a practical limb. It was found strapped to the mummified foot of a 50- to 60-year-old woman who had undergone a toe amputation.

“The toe dates from between 1069 and 664BC, so if we can prove it was functional then we will have pushed back prosthetic medicine by as much as 700 years,” she said...

Fellow Egyptologists at neighbouring Salford University are also testing a model of another fake big toe, fashioned from a type of papier-mâché known as cartonnage...

Click on the picture above for another image of the toe.

Is 'Cairo toe' the first practical prosthetic?, Stephen Adams, The Telegraph, UK, July 27, 2007.

cf. Going out on a limb over 'Cairo toe', Sheryl Uberlacker, The Toronto Star, Ontario, Canada, July 27, 2007.

Previously:

Science steps in to discover wonders of Toe-tankhamun, July 26, 2007.

Braving the heat waves that hit Egypt last week, Culture Minister Farouk Hosni embarked on his first field tour of the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) to inspect the progress on building the most ambitious archaeological museum ever planned.

At the western edge of the GEM, on a plot overlooking the Al-Rimayah residential complex, a huge high-tech building complex is planned lying 10 metres below street level. The layout is for four main museological facilities; an archaeological conservation centre, archaeological storehouses, a fire-fighting unit and an energy production station which will provide the power needed to operate equipment for restoring the estimated 150,000 objects of the museum's display.

The conservation centre will contain separate laboratories for stone, wood, ceramics, papyri, metal, textile and leather, as well as an organic laboratory -- designed for running tests on ancient textiles, papyri, dried plants, and species of insects found on excavated items.

To guarantee tight security and complete isolation of the complex from the surrounding neighbourhood, an iron surround fence has been erected and is monitored by CCTV cameras. A buffer zone of trees conceals the complex and provides privacy and security for the transfer of artefacts, while the roof has been covered with the natural sand of the main bedrock. Over the forthcoming six months any required equipment will be fitted in each section...

Egypt's fourth pyramid, Nevine El-Aref, Al-Ahram, Egypt, Issue No. 855, July 26 - August 01, 2007.

A Smithsonian team has now uncovered first underwater evidence pointing to an urban settlement dating back seven centuries before Alexander showed up [in what was to become Alexandria] in 331 B.C...

But little was known about the site in pre-Alexander times, other than that a fishing village by the name of Rhakotis was located there.

Coastal geoarchaeologist Jean-Daniel Stanley of the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History said the work by him and his colleagues suggested there had been a much larger community than had previously been believed.

The discoveries, reported in the August issue of GSA Today, the journal of the Geological Society of America, came by accident when his team drilled underwater in Alexandria's harbour, Stanley said...

U.S. geological team uncovers first evidence of city hidden beneath Alexandria, AP via PR Inside, USA, July 26, 2007.

Hidden City Found Beneath Alexandria, Charles Q. Choi, Live Science, USA, July 24, 2007.

cf. Alexandria, Egypt, before Alexander the Great: A multidisciplinary approach yields rich discoveries, Jean-Daniel Stanley, Richard W. Carlson, Gus Van Beek, Thomas F. Jorstad, Elizabeth A. Landau, GSA Today, The Geological Society of America, USA, Volume 17, Issue 8, August 2007. Full text is available free in HTML and PDF formats.