Reimagining the soul: ancient Egyptian iconography and British material culture, 1830 - 1930

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My research argues that the cultural significance of Egyptianising iconography has been underestimated by Egyptologists and historians. The current literature divides into two distinct groups. One examines cultural history, imperialism and religion yet disregards material culture (Colla, Luckhurst, Gange). Others focus on aesthetics without probing the history of ideas and belief (Curl, Rugg, Brooks). In contrast, I argue that the material culture of the Egyptian revivals in Britain were not purely decorative, but were material markers of fractious debates regarding the nature of the soul and the afterlife of consciousness. My research will be the first to use Victorian appropriations of Egyptian imagery, combined with archival research, to reveal how ideas of ancient Egypt transcended time and cultures, and were displayed materially in Modern Britain. My approach unites perspectives on material culture, religion, and display to show how ancient Egypt influenced conceptions of death, the soul, and the afterlife in Modern Britain. Current scholarship largely focuses on the decorative elements ofmetropolitan cemeteries, however, I will analyse numerous cemeteries in the Midlands to reveal the extent to which ancient Egypt was influencing Modern Britain more broadly. Also, archival sources from occultists such as Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and Aleister Crowley show the ways in which ancient Egyptian notions were reconceptualised. In addition to showing how these burial sites and monuments influenced British culture on a decorative level, this research will reveal how the material culture of British Egyptomania represented notions of spiritualism, death and the after-life that had been influenced by the Egyptian revivals, and Britain's imperial involvement in Egypt. Ultimately, I aim for the PhD to lead to a career in academia and a monograph on the cultural appropriation of Egyptian notions of death and the soul within modern Britain.