Tutankhamun's Trumpet

Ancient Egypt in 100 Objects from the Boy-King's Tomb

By: Toby Wilkinson

Narrated by: David Timson

In 1922, after fifteen years of searching, archaeologists finally discovered the tomb of King Tutankhamun. There, buried alongside the king's mummy, they found more than 5,000 unique objects, from the mundane to the extravagant, from the precious to the everyday. Tutankhamun's spectacular gold mask is justifiably famous, but the rest of the treasures remain largely unknown, their stories untold.

In this rich work of history, renowned Egyptologist Toby Wilkinson allows one hundred artifacts from the boy king's tomb to speak again—not only for themselves, but as witnesses of the civilization that created them. A gold-decorated chariot reveals the impressive scale of Egyptian technology. Loaves of bread, baskets of fruit, and jars of wine hint at the fertility of the Nile Valley and the abundant feasts enjoyed by its people. Ebony and ivory from Nubia and a jewel of Libyan desert glass show the range of Egypt's trading and diplomatic networks. Shaving equipment and board games provide a window into the everyday lives of the people. And perhaps most poignant of all the objects in the tomb is one that conjures up a lost world of human experience: Tutankhamun's silver trumpet.

Filled with surprising insights and vivid details, Tutankhamun's Trumpet offers an indelible portrait of the history, people, and legacy of ancient Egypt.

©2023 Toby Wilkinson (P)2022 Tantor

Wealth of knowledge with references

I thoroughly enjoyed this text. It gave me the references that I have always sought on the vast topic of ancient Egypt.

Trinkets, Treasure, and History

If you think that this book is going to list 100 items from Tutankhamun's tomb, and just talk about those, you are mistaken! I wasn't sure what to really expect going into this book, but I was pleasantly surprised.

The author takes you on a journey, talking about the significance of items that were placed in the tomb, tying it back through the ages of Egyptian history. He also talks about some of the items that were left, and the significance they would have had to the boy king, such as toys from his childhood.

This was more than just items that were found in the tomb, but a thorough discussion on pieces that were used throughout the ages, what their functions were, and how they might be used in the afterlife.

I truly enjoyed this book, and was sad when it ended. The history is amazing, and the author has certainly done his research on putting together a book that is well worth taking the time to read.

The final 25 pages are missing

When I listened to this book, the narration ended with the exhortation: "Perhaps." I found this a bit odd, so I consulted the print version, and found that this one word sentence appears about 25 pages before the end of the main text (not including the end notes, etc). I deleted my Audible file and redownloaded it. I tried re-downloading and listening on the iPhone Audible app, the iPad app, and via the Audible website on my Mac laptop. I changed settings from standard to high-quality and back, and from single-part to multi-part. All to no avail; every version I listened to ended at "Perhaps." I was unable to find a way to report this problem to Audible, so I'm mentioning it here. If you're listening to this otherwise excellent book and the narration ends with the word "perhaps", be advised that there are about 25 more pages in the printed text. With luck, someone at Audible will read this and fix the issue.

Superb Content Relevantly Applied

An in depth look at pharaonic and ancient Egyptian cultural and social practices and evolution applied meticulously to archaeology and the tomb of the boy king. Well worth the listen and deserving of high praise. If Egyptology is something you enjoy then this book will prove a worthy addition to your collection. I have found it absolutely stellar.

Excellent

I have the ”skeleton” of Egyptian history by “History of Egypt” by Bob Brier, and this is just a brilliant illustration to that knowledge.
Having that backbone knowledge made it very easy to listen to all the interesting details and viewpoints in this reading.
David Timson reads very well.
Highly recommended!

Outstanding!

Full marks! Comprehensive, in depth, even-handed, learned and very well written! Could be the text for an introductory course on ancient Egypt. Kept my interest throughout…no, kept my enthusiasm throughout. One of those rare books that I was sorry when it was finished.

Fantastic

I absolutely loved this fascinating, informative book. Wilkinson gives a history of Ancient Egypt, using 100 different articles found in Tutankhamun's tomb as a jumping off point for each topic. It's well-written, surprisingly engrossing, and gave me a new interest in Ancient Egypt.

Mr. Timson gave an above average performance.

Wasn't what I was expecting

3 stars - I liked it

This book wasn’t really what I was expecting. From the title, I thought that this was just going to discuss 100 objects that were in Tutankhamun’s tomb. Instead this book gives a lot of history on Egypt and links it to certain items of Tutankhamun’s. This made it a little harder to determine what 100 objects were being discussed because it would be intertwined with a bunch of Egyptian history.

While I did enjoy this unique approach to these objects and learned a lot of history, I think I would have liked it better to have just had an informative book about each item like I was expecting. There were so many items in his tomb and I was really hoping to learn more about them individually than in the context of history.

Also a downfall of listening to this audiobook was that I couldn’t see the pictures of these items so I would have to Google the items that he mentioned. An accompanied PDF of images would have been great for this audiobook, but Google worked in a pinch.

Nothing new

This book had such high ratings I had high expectations for it. However, I did not learn anything I had not already known from previous authors. It is also clear the author was male as several female pharoahs were completely skipped over. Hatshepsut was hardly discussed at all. Disappointed.