The best books that will make you rethink ancient Egypt

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve been interested in ancient Egypt ever since I read Asterix and Cleopatra when I was a boy. The hilarious moment of Obelix accidentally knocking off the Sphinx’s nose has always stayed with me in particular. By my early twenties, I was reading authors like Graham Hancock, Robert Bauval, and Colin Wilson, who showed me that what we think we know about ancient Egypt is not wholly correct. For instance, there’s little evidence that the Great Pyramid’s purpose was to be a tomb and the Sphinx seems to be much older than Egyptologists believe. In 2010, at thirty-four years old, I finally got to visit the wonders of Egypt myself.


I wrote...

The Road to Purification: Hustlers, Hassles & Hash

By Harry Whitewolf,

Book cover of The Road to Purification: Hustlers, Hassles & Hash

What is my book about?

When stress-headed Mad Harry spontaneously books a flight for Egypt after a rather nasty break-up, he doesn’t know he’s about to embark on a mad pot-smoking pilgrimage of adventure. 

Guided by signs in numbers, names, and otherworldly encounters, Mad Harry’s trip often seems to be a magical manifestation of his fragile mind. This good-humoured true travel tale is told in a frank, rhythmic, and playful voice. Set in 2010, shortly before Egypt's revolution, The Road To Purification is a backpacking odyssey through tremendous temples, towering pyramids, chaotic cities, small villages, dirty beaches, and deceitful strangers... with a backdrop of ancient spiritual gnosis. A holiday this is not.

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of The Obelisk and The Cross: An Alternative History of God, Myth and Meaning in the Western World

Harry Whitewolf Why did I love this book?

As one of earth’s oldest civilisations, ancient Egypt can tell us a lot about early religion and how it affected later spiritual practices and faiths. In this book, Tony Sunderland begins with the question: why is there an Egyptian obelisk standing in the centre of St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City? The question becomes even more pertinent when you learn that the obelisk celebrates an ancient sun god! I loved this fascinating book that traces religion from ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia through to early Christianity and beyond. Whatever your level of historical religious and spiritual understanding is, The Obelisk and the Cross comes highly recommended.

By Tony Sunderland,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Obelisk and The Cross as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Why does an ancient Egyptian obelisk celebrating the god of the sun stand in the centre of St Peter's Square in Vatican City, the home of the Pope and the heartland of Catholicism?
Taking this mysterious fact as his starting point, Tony Sunderland examines the history of religious belief in an attempt to understand how what has happened in the past continues to exert a ghostly influence in the present. Going right back to the voluptuous mother goddess figures of our ancestors, the pantheons of the Greeks and Romans, the wisdom of the Hebrew Bible, the birth of Christ, the…


Book cover of The Orion Mystery: Unlocking the Secrets of the Pyramids

Harry Whitewolf Why did I love this book?

It’s now pretty well known that the position of the three Giza pyramids exactly corresponds to the three stars of Orion’s Belt. The Nile even mirrors the Milky Way. As above, so below, don’t you know. But the incredible discovery was only published in the 1990s, by the one and only Robert Bauval. His discovery, and other new insights from him and Adrian Gilbert, are documented in The Orion Mystery. If there’s one man who will make you question everything you thought you knew about the land of the pharaohs, it’s Robert Bauval. You need to start reading his books. All of them.

By Robert Bauval, Adrian Gilbert,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Orion Mystery as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A revolutionary book that explains the most enigmatic and fascinating wonder of the ancient world: the Pyramids of Egypt.

In 1993, German robotics engineer Rudolf Gatenbrink discovered a sealed door within the Great Pyramid of Giza--a door left unopened for 4,500 years. With this discovery, Robert Bauval--who spent the decade prior to the discovery researching the pyramids--and Adrian Gilbert used astronomical data to reveal that more than just tombs, the pyramids were created to serve as a gateway to the stars; in the process, they uncovered what they believe to be the key to the plan that governed the construction…


Book cover of The Tutankhamun Prophecies: The Sacred Secret of the Maya, Egyptians, and Freemasons

Harry Whitewolf Why did I love this book?

What has ancient Egypt got to do with Freemasonry? Quite a lot as it turns out. The author of The Tutankhamun Prophecies, scientist and mathematician Maurice Cotterell, weaves together the esoteric knowledge of modern secret societies with Egyptian religion and the ancient Mayan people. I’m chuffed to have a signed hardback copy of this book, which I seem to recall I found in a charity shop. Actually, now I come to think of it, the bloke that sold it to me gave me a rather funny handshake… Hm…

By Maurice Cotterell,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Tutankhamun Prophecies as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This text reveals the remarkable similarities between Tutankhamun and Lord Pacal of the Maya. Re-examining the life, times and tomb of Tutankhamun, Maurice Cotterell explains many of the mysteries that have puzzled scholars.


Book cover of From Atlantis to the Sphinx

Harry Whitewolf Why did I love this book?

Conventional Egyptologists still insist the mighty Sphinx in Egypt dates to around 4,500 BC. Well, those so-called experts really should start listening to the likes of Colin Wilson. In From Atlantis to the Sphinx, you’ll read how Boston University’s Robert Schoch has proven the Sphinx was damaged by floodwater, meaning it must be much older than it’s generally thought to be. Many believe the Sphinx actually dates from 10,500 BC! Read this book and you’ll probably agree.

By Colin Wilson,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked From Atlantis to the Sphinx as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In this work, Colin Wilson goes beyond the conviction that a pre-Ice-Age civilization existed before being wiped out by some great catas trophe. He suggests that a highly advanced knowledge system, developed by this society was passed on to ancient man by survivors. It is this knowledge system, argues Wilson; that enabled the ancient Egyptians to move heavy blocks of stone; drill a granite coffin with an accuracy that still baffles modern engineers; and hollow out stone vases whose long necks will not admit a child's finger. Wilson attempts to reconstruct the knowledge system, and try to understand how these…


Book cover of Heaven's Mirror: Quest for the Lost Civilization

Harry Whitewolf Why did I love this book?

Much of the key stuff that’s mentioned in the books above are contained in Heaven’s Mirror by the great Graham Hancock and his wife Santha Faiia. So, the book’s a great place to start if you’re new to all this rethinking ancient Egypt malarkey. Heaven’s Mirror also covers other civilizations like the Mayans and Incas. For me, this book is so special because it contains some absolutely glorious and spellbinding photos of key ancient sites in Egypt, such as Karnak, Dendera, Abydos, and the pyramids of Giza, Dashur, and Saqqara, which I was lucky enough to visit myself and which I wrote about in The Road To Purification.

By Graham Hancock, Santha Faiia,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Heaven's Mirror as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This is the sequel to the international bestseller, "Fingerprints of the Gods". In very different parts of the world, evidence exists of a common legacy - shared by cultures separated by hundreds, sometimes thousands of years. From Mexico to Iceland, Cambodia to Easter Island, China to Egypt, we are finding a common astronomical wisdom handed down from a time before history, a time perhaps before the 'Great Flood'. This book addresses a common wisdom from a lost civilisation which might hold the key to our own identity on earth. "Heaven's Mirror" is a personal quest for the answer - the…


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Native Nations: A Millennium in North America

By Kathleen DuVal,

Book cover of Native Nations: A Millennium in North America

Kathleen DuVal Author Of Independence Lost: Lives on the Edge of the American Revolution

New book alert!

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a professional historian and life-long lover of early American history. My fascination with the American Revolution began during the bicentennial in 1976, when my family traveled across the country for celebrations in Williamsburg and Philadelphia. That history, though, seemed disconnected to the place I grew up—Arkansas—so when I went to graduate school in history, I researched in French and Spanish archives to learn about their eighteenth-century interactions with Arkansas’s Native nations, the Osages and Quapaws. Now I teach early American history and Native American history at UNC-Chapel Hill and have written several books on how Native American, European, and African people interacted across North America.

Kathleen's book list on the American Revolution beyond the Founding Fathers

What is my book about?

A magisterial history of Indigenous North America that places the power of Native nations at its center, telling their story from the rise of ancient cities more than a thousand years ago to fights for sovereignty that continue today

Native Nations: A Millennium in North America

By Kathleen DuVal,

What is this book about?

Long before the colonization of North America, Indigenous Americans built diverse civilizations and adapted to a changing world in ways that reverberated globally. And, as award-winning historian Kathleen DuVal vividly recounts, when Europeans did arrive, no civilization came to a halt because of a few wandering explorers, even when the strangers came well armed.

A millennium ago, North American cities rivaled urban centers around the world in size. Then, following a period of climate change and instability, numerous smaller nations emerged, moving away from rather than toward urbanization. From this urban past, egalitarian government structures, diplomacy, and complex economies spread…


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Interested in ancient Egypt, Egypt, and Tutankhamun?

10,000+ authors have recommended their favorite books and what they love about them. Browse their picks for the best books about ancient Egypt, Egypt, and Tutankhamun.

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