Profane Humanities Podcast

A Final 'Episode' (in name only), updating on the status of the show, and our move to YouTube. Be sure to download any outstanding episodes you've been meaning to give a listen, as they won't be available after August 17th 2021! You can find the new channel, which will have content moving forward through autumn/fall 2021, at 'Profane Egyptology'! Thank you all for your time and support, and thank you to my wonderful guests. I couldn't have done it without you. Now so long, and thanks for...

In this episode I’m joined by my pal, director Chris Kemble as we discuss various Egyptology-based things that surround Egypt-centred films and horror film in particular, including curses, labyrinthine pyramid structures, the Egyptian gods, space archaeology and much, much more. Strap in because this is a big old candid ride through the pile of stones that is The Pyramid from 2014.

Welcome back! In this episode, I'm giving you guys a free preview of my latest course over on the Listenable platform, All About pyramids! "Have you ever marvelled at the grandeur of the pyramids of Egypt? Ever wondered just how a civilization using the most basic tools created them? In this course, you'll discover the origins of the mysterious and enduring pyramids of Egypt. We'll see how pyramid technology evolves, from the pit graves of the first pharaohs to the mighty Great Pyramid of...

Welcome everyone and happy new year! This is the first episode of 2021, and as such I’ve decided to try something different! A couple of you fine folks, including I believe one of my patrons, the fantastic Kemetic artist Setken, expressed interest in me divulging more of the story of Egyptian stele 666 and the founding of one of the first Egyptian revival religious movements of the modern era, the Temple, or Church of Thelema. So I’m pleased to say that’s the story I’ll be exploring today....

After a brief absence for editing, I'm pleased to announce the return of the Yuletide special! Welcome back long-time listeners, and welcome to shiny new listeners who have come for this week’s wonderful guest, Simon Merrells! Simon is often known for his stellar turn as Marcus Crassus, the man who defeated Spartacus, and the titular character's antagonist in the hit tv show. Spartacus shot Merrells to international fame, and he has since put in turns on The Tomorrow People, Dominion, DC’s...

Welcome back long-time listeners, and welcome to shiny new listeners who have come for this week’s wonderful guest, Simon Merrells! Simon is often known for his stellar turn as Marcus Crassus, the man who defeated Spartacus, and the titular character's antagonist in the hit tv show. Spartacus shot Merrells to international fame, and he has since put in turns on The Tomorrow People, Dominion, DC’s Legends of Tomorrow ,12 Monkeys, and Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett’s Good Omens!! Simon...

Dr Chris Naunton is back, and The Golden Age of Egyptology Part 2 is here! Danger! Why did early travellers to Egypt choose to 'take on the appearance of Turks'? How inhospitable was Egypt in the 19th Century? Which tombs found in the golden age have since been lost and who decided to remove some of the most beautiful friezes? Why did Akhenaten cause Egyptologists to fall out and what's with the purchase of slave girls??? Find out this and more in part two of what proved to be a...

Welcome back all! Thanks for joining us! Today it’s the sequel I’ve been looking forward to recording for a while now – I’m joined by the charming and witty Chris Naunton to discuss his newest release, Egyptologists Notebooks, and the so called Golden Age of Egyptology – but was it all that golden? Stay tuned to find out! Chris Naunton is former director of the Egypt Exploration Society. He’s appeared on the BBC and channel five hosting shows covering Flinders Petrie (the founding father of...

It's that time of year again, my favourite holiday, and we're getting spooky on this ship! Today I'm joined by The Curator of the Stygian Chronicles. Stygian Chronicles is a horror fiction audio project that takes original and classic stories and treats them to a lavish full audio production, including original voice acting (some by yours truly in a future episode, in fact) and soundscapes and effects. The result is an audio story with 10x the production of an audio book that rivals the...

Welcome back everyone! I had the honour of sitting down for a fascinating conversation with Josh Guerrero for this episode. Josh is the host of the All Around Adventure podcast, and is also a former US Marine, and Peace Corps volunteer, who spent two years helping train teachers in a remote village in Gambia, and nowadays, he's an archaeologist, too! This will hopefully be part one of two or three, time allowing, as Josh and I plan to have more conversations about his archaeological...

Welcome everyone and welcome BACK! As you can see, I was blessed with an interview with Shelley Blond the original voice of Lara Croft this week, for which I’m eternally grateful. This week’s guest certainly bought out my inner fanboy! Shelley Blond is an actor and voice actor whose work includes west end stage productions and many a household name tv show, including Cold Feet, Peep Show, and feature films such as Snow White: the Sequel. She’s been a voice you’ve likely heard on Heart FM,...

How did Egyptian mummies become entwined with fairy tale princesses? What was an Egyptian queen doing in King Arthur's court? What Do Egyptologists Wallis Budge & Battiscombe Gunn, have in common with Occultists Aleister Crowley & Florence Farr? And where do Lovecraft, Freud, and Cleopatra fit in? Answers to this, and more in this weeks episode! Dr Eleanor Dobson is lecturer in nineteenth century literature at the university of Birmingham, with a particular focus on the reception of ancient...

Is there anything left to find in the sands of Egypt??? YES! And this man knows how and (potentially) where!! Dr Chris Naunton is an Egyptologist, broadcaster and author. In addition to being the former director of the Egypt Exploration Society, he’s appeared on the BBC and Channel Five, hosting shows covering Flinders Petrie (the founding father of scientific Egyptology) and Tutankhamun, among numerous other subject relating to ancient Egypt. He’s currently the Director of the Robert...

“If Archaeologists won’t talk to (people) someone else will (…) we’ve been duped into thinking we need to struggle to tell our story…” Today’s guest should be a familiar face to anyone who’s watched archaeological media online. Marc Barkman-Astles is the creator and face of Archaeosoup, a Youtube channel he established way back in the almost prehistoric-vlogger days of 2010. In his twelve-year career as a professional archaeologist, Marc has produced more than fifteen hundred videos, and...

Dreams! Nightmares! Demons! What were the role of these concepts in ancient Egypt? The Answers may surprise you... Dr Kasia Szpakowska is an Associate Professor of Egyptology at Swansea University, and Director of The Ancient Egyptian Demonology Project for The Leverhulme Trust. Kasia’s research is especially fascinating for me, as it focuses on Ancient Egyptian private religious practices, so not necessarily the practices of the elites, though it does include them…but the practices of...

Hello everyone and welcome to profane Egyptologists, the show where we discuss Egypt’s past in the present! Today I’m joined once more by my friend, the award-winning horror film-maker Chris Kemble, as we discuss 2017s remake of the Universal film, The Mummy! This is part TWO of a two-part episode where we’ll dig into both the Egyptology and film-history that this movie taps into. As a specialist in the horror genre Chris is uniquely positioned to give insight into this film, and as a...

Welcome to part 1 of this 2-part Halloween Special focused on those classic staples of the horror genre...MUMMIES!! Today I’m joined by my friend, the award-winning film-maker Chris Kemble, as we discuss 2017s remake of the Universal film, The Mummy, and dive into it's legacy on film and in literature. This is part one of a two-part episode where we’ll dig into both the Egyptology and film-lore that this movie taps into. As a specialist in the horror genre Chris is uniquely positioned to...

Today we re-join the Temple of Ra and Kemetic Temple of San José for the second part of this interview with key figures and authors of the contemporary Kemetic Reconstructionist movement in the West. Be sure to check out part 1 if you haven’t yet. A very valuable point is raised in this interview regarding phenomenological and performative archaeology – given a reliance of shared resources, and given the focus on academic resources in Kemeticism, why is it not valued in the same was as...

Today’s episode was recorded on location in San Francisco back in spring 2018, where I met with members of the Kemetic Temple of San José and the Temple of Ra. I first encountered the Temple of Ra through one of its founders, Richard Reidy, who was a participant In my phd research, and so generous with his time and knowledge that we later became friends. Sadly, Richard passed away in 2015 but his legacy lives on in the form of a number of Egyptian Kemetic Temples in the USA and two books on...

Today’s guest will be familiar to anybody who’s a fan of Kemetic art or who happens to have seen the luscious artwork that graces the cover of my book Profane Egyptologists (shameless plug!) Setken describes his paintings as “Nouveau Kemetic”, “Neo Kemetic”, and “Neo Pharaonic”, as these terms speak to the ancient Egyptian themes that his work centres upon, and his contemporary, and I must say quite striking take on Egyptian themes. This is the second part of this two-part interview, so be...