‘The Battle for Abu Simbel’: Archaeology and Postcolonial Diplomacy in the UNESCO Campaign for Nubia

This article will examine the role of British archaeologists in the rebuilding of Anglo-Egyptian relations after the Suez Crisis of 1956. Even though Britain’s participation in the failed intervention brought relations between the two states to their lowest point in decades, the work of British organizations in the country was not entirely halted, and British Egyptologists continued to negotiate with Egyptian authorities for a full resumption of their activities. Such engagement was made possible by Egypt’s construction of the Aswan High Dam beginning in the late 1950s. The dam was conceived as a grand engineering project that would harness nature in order to transform the Egyptian economy. But it also threatened the country’s cultural heritage, as flooding caused by the dam would destroy numerous archaeological sites along the Nile River on the border of Egypt and Sudan. With the blessing of the Egyptian and Sudanese governments, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) launched a complex rescue operation in 1960 with the goal of surveying the affected sites, in some cases removing entire structures to safe locations. Despite Britain’s initial reluctance to participate in a program that would benefit a hostile regime, British scientific expertise and private fundraising soon came to play an important role in UNESCO’s ‘Campaign for Nubia.’

Using diplomatic papers and the records of various scientific bodies, I will argue that the campaign functioned as a crucial avenue for Anglo-Egyptian rapprochement after the Suez crisis and set the stage for a new diplomatic relationship between the Egyptian and British states. After outlining the broad historical trajectory of British archaeological work in Egypt, I will examine the origins of UNESCO’s Campaign for Nubia. I will then address the decisive role of the Egypt Exploration Society (EES) in brokering British participation in the UNESCO Campaign and thus in reconstructing Anglo-Egyptian relations after the 1950s.

By focusing attention on Anglo-Egyptian relations in the UNESCO Campaign, this article makes a contribution to several historiographical conversations. First, it sheds new light on processes of decolonization and on the British role in the Middle East during the mid-twentieth century. The existing literature has focused on British interventions during this period as creating a state of ‘conditional independence’ in Egypt, with the 1950s and the Suez Crisis in particular marking a decisive turning point. ¹ William Carruthers has noted the failure of the ‘lackadaisical’ approach by British Egyptologists to Egypt’s new regime during the 1950s. ² Their response seems more sensible when we consider the nuances of the conditions previously imposed on Egypt, which had focused on safeguarding Britain’s geopolitical interests and had generally not extended to domestic policy. ³ As Egypt had already developed a postcolonial antiquities policy during the interwar period, British Egyptologists underestimated the effects that a change in the political climate would have during the 1950s. However, their previous experiences also uniquely prepared them to reestablish themselves in Egypt in the aftermath of the Suez Crisis.

Second, this article expands our understanding of the phenomenon of heritage diplomacy in negotiating postcolonial relations in the postwar world. Tim Winter has defined heritage diplomacy as ‘a set of processes whereby cultural and natural pasts shared between and across nations become subject to exchanges, collaborations and forms of cooperative governance.’ He argues that heritage diplomacy ‘helps us to move beyond the commonly used frameworks of the colonial and postcolonial’ by revealing ‘hidden forms of sovereignty’ and illuminating ‘the power relations of collaboration in terms of mutual gain and self-interest’ on the part of various state and non-state actors. ⁴ Paul Betts and Lynn Meskell have pointed to the Campaign for Nubia as a particularly important event in the development of the new concept of ‘world heritage’ promoted by UNESCO during the 1960s and formalized by the World Heritage Convention of 1972. ⁵ Moving beyond the importance of the Campaign for the institutional history of UNESCO and its well-documented utility for the Nasserite agenda in Egypt, I will demonstrate that British actors used this collaboration to achieve goals of their own. ⁶

Finally, this article develops an understanding of archaeology as an important aspect of science diplomacy. Historical works on science diplomacy have mainly focused on ‘big science’ and nuclear physics but have largely left out the role of archaeology in foreign relations. William Carruthers has provided a rare exception by showing how the Egyptian government’s skillful deployment of the language of scientific multilateralism served the advancement of its own political program during the revolutionary 1950s. ⁷ Given the Egyptian state’s prior engagement with archaeological science, this is unsurprising. Egypt had been deeply involved in the effort to develop international standards for archaeological research during the interwar period, hosting an international conference on the subject in 1937. ⁸ As noted above, antiquities policy and related cultural affairs were not restricted by the terms of Egypt’s conditional independence after 1922. In fact, these were areas in which Egyptian national interests were aggressively pursued during the interwar period, most notably in the controversy that surrounded the excavation of the tomb of Tutankhamun. The Egyptian authorities subjected British Egyptologists to greatly increased scrutiny and required them to conform to the highest standards of scientific professionalism in order to continue working in Egypt. ⁹ By the 1950s, the pursuit of scientific insight divorced from any overt political agenda was firmly entrenched in the ethos of British Egyptology. This would be vitally important for the negotiation of British participation in the UNESCO Campaign.

British archaeology has a long history in Egypt, though the 1880s marked a distinct turning point. William Matthew Flinders Petrie arrived in Egypt in 1880, and his archaeological excavations constituted the first major British contribution to the field. In 1882, British forces occupied the country, stirring interest in Egypt among the British public. This worked to the benefit of the Egypt Exploration Fund (EEF), which had been organized in London early in 1882 to support the study of ancient Egypt. By the mid-1880s, it had become a key supporter of Petrie’s excavations. The partnership between Petrie and the EEF—while often contentious—solidified the reputation of British archaeology in Egypt and shaped a generation of British Egyptologists. ¹⁰

Egypt’s relationship to the British Empire remained ambiguous in the years following the occupation. In order to avoid conflict with the Ottoman Empire, which had its own claim to Egypt, the British colonial authorities maintained the pretense that they were merely acting as advisors to the Egyptian viceroy of the Ottoman sultan. The 1904 Entente Cordiale between France and the United Kingdom also formalized a French role in Egypt, conceding that the directorship of the Egyptian Antiquities Service would be held by a French scholar.

The onset of the First World War simplified this situation dramatically. Given that a state of war now existed between Britain and the Ottoman Empire, Egypt was declared to be a British protectorate in late 1914. The French administration of the Antiquities Service was disrupted, as its newly appointed director-general was trapped in Europe until near the end of the war. Any hopes that these developments might enhance the standing of British archaeology in Egypt were quickly dashed by an upsurge of Egyptian nationalism during the war years. A mass uprising in 1919 paved the way for Britain’s formal recognition of Egyptian independence in 1922. Although Britain maintained a right to intervene in Egyptian affairs, particularly in matters related to British imperial defense, control of antiquities policy was effectively surrendered to the national government. Rather than assuming their privileged status in a semi-colonial Egypt, British Egyptologists would have to earn access to archaeological sites through quality scholarship, compliance with Egyptian law, and the avoidance of scandal. The British archaeological illustrator Amice Calverley described her approach as ‘deep diplomacy’, advising a colleague that it was ‘as well to keep in with the powers that be—also one can get more out of ‘em when needed if in a state of official dignity and impressiveness!’ ¹¹ When a British Egyptologist expressed frustration with the Egyptian authorities during the Second World War, an official at the British Foreign Office reminded him that

if we were to oppose them directly e.g. by seeking to impose British or foreign officials we should probably make an unsatisfactory situation even worse. On the other hand, the Egyptian is not insensitive to criticism; and if tactfully prompted he is likely to retain in his service a sufficiency of foreign experts and advisors (as opposed to foreigners with executive responsibility) to allay such criticism. ¹²

This guidance reinforced the idea that British Egyptologists would have to rely on cultivating their own relationships with the Egyptian authorities; British officials were unwilling to offer any support that might jeopardize their own priorities.

Scholars working under the aegis of Britain’s EES (successor to the old Egypt Exploration Fund) relied on ties with both the British and Egyptian governments to maintain access to important archaeological sites. By the mid-1950s, the most visible representative of the EES in Egypt was Walter Bryan Emery, a rising star of British Egyptology. Emery’s interest in Egyptology had been sparked as a teenager by the novels of H. Rider Haggard and by public lectures in his hometown of Liverpool. He went on to study archaeology at the University of Liverpool and began his long career with the EES in 1923. In 1929, he accepted a position as director of the Egyptian Antiquities Service’s archaeological survey of Nubia. From 1935 to 1939, he oversaw EES work at Saqqara, an important archaic necropolis located near the ancient capital city of Memphis in Lower Egypt. Emery joined the British army when excavations were halted by the outbreak of the Second World War, rising to the position of director of military intelligence in Egypt with the honorary rank of lieutenant colonel. He then served at the British embassy in Cairo from 1947 until 1951, when he was appointed to the Edwards Chair of Egyptology at University College London. ¹³

Work at Saqqara resumed under Emery’s leadership in late 1952, just months after the Free Officers Coup. Although Emery had advised against excavating in such a climate—the few remaining British employees at Cairo University had been dismissed less than a year before—the executive committee of the EES feared the loss of a valuable grant from the British Treasury and opted to forge ahead. The members of the committee expressed their respect for Emery’s knowledge of the Egyptian political scene by granting him wide discretion with regard to the Saqqara enterprise. Emery chose to employ the techniques of architectural history developed by the German Egyptologist Ludwig Borchardt, an approach that appealed to the monumental vision of the leaders of the new Egyptian Republic. By early 1954, his team had uncovered a promising tomb, which he described as ‘one of the largest ever discovered, with interesting architectural features’ and ‘paint-work … so well preserved that restoration was possible’. He informed the executive committee that ‘the Egyptians were helpful as ever and … had intimated that the Society could continue to dig at Saqqara indefinitely’. ¹⁴

Emery’s notebooks from Saqqara contain no allusions to political conditions or conflict with the Egyptian workforce at the site. Even when Nasser abruptly ordered the nationalization of the Suez Canal in July of 1956, the EES showed little concern for the changing situation. At the September meeting of the executive committee, the Saqqara operation was one of the last items on the agenda, at which point the committee decided to proceed with the usual arrangements for the next season’s work despite the unfolding international crisis. It was only after the failed Anglo-French invasion a few weeks later that the impact of these events on British Egyptology became apparent. In January of 1957, Emery had to report that the Egyptian authorities had given no reply to his correspondence regarding the upcoming season. ¹⁵

With the EES’s future in Egypt now uncertain, the executive committee dispatched Emery to Khartoum to explore the possibility of ‘a season in the Sudan as an alternative to Saqqara’. The newly independent Sudanese government had requested that the EES excavate in the northern region of Nubia, along the Egyptian border, where flooding caused by the Aswan High Dam was expected to occur. Emery was already familiar with this region, having worked for the Egyptian Antiquities Service as director of the Archaeological Survey of Nubia from 1929 to 1935. He returned to London in March to make a favorable report on the prospective site at Buhen. ¹⁶

Two months later, with the Sudanese negotiations still ongoing, a Dutch colleague relayed news that threw everything into confusion. Contrary to initial reports, the Egyptians had not seized the Society’s equipment left behind at Saqqara at the end of the previous season but had merely locked it up for safekeeping. In fact, the local authorities were reportedly awaiting the return of Emery’s team and holding the concession for them. This posed something of a dilemma: the Society was intent on preserving its concession at Saqqara, but also wanted to maintain the new relationship with Sudan. Fortunately, there were sufficient funds on hand to do a bit of both. Plans were made for Emery to visit Saqqara in October 1957, pick up the equipment there, and then proceed to Buhen to lead an abbreviated two-month dig. At the beginning of 1958, he would then return to Saqqara for another two months. ¹⁷

By late July, however, the Egyptian government still had not responded to the Society’s formal request for the renewal of the Saqqara concession. Furthermore, given the break in diplomatic relations between Britain and Egypt, Emery had not even been able to secure a visa for his planned October visit. By September, with no diplomatic resolution in sight, this plan was abandoned in favor of a full season in Sudan. Emery himself held the British government partially responsible for this decision, writing that the British Foreign Office ‘would not be in favour of the Society attempting to go out under present conditions and … therefore work should begin in the Sudan in the hope that the situation as regards Egypt might improve in the new year’. ¹⁸

Within six months, the Egyptian Antiquities Service did indeed extend an invitation for the Society to resume its work in Egypt—but not at Saqqara. The proposed sites were instead in Egyptian Nubia, across the border from Buhen in areas that would also be flooded by construction of the new dam. Work at Saqqara, on the other hand, would remain suspended. A disappointed Emery reported that ‘there was no promising site’ among those specified by the Egyptian authorities; given their new priorities, he considered it ‘doubtful whether any foreign excavators would be able to continue work at present’. At this point, the minutes of the Society’s executive committee described the concession at Buhen as ‘very fortunate’: it was ‘an area threatened by the proposed high dam, and probably the most valuable Pharaonic site in the Sudan.’ ¹⁹

At the time, Emery observed that the Suez Crisis had not interfered with work carried out by American, Dutch, or most other international teams. ²⁰ The revolutionary changes of the 1950s had far-reaching consequences for all foreign archaeologists working in Egypt, but it now seemed clear that British and French scholars had the farthest to fall. ²¹ The French director-general of the Egyptian Antiquities Service was replaced by a native Egyptian in late 1952, and many of his compatriots were expelled after France’s intervention in the Suez Crisis. ²² The EES lost access to Saqqara, though it did retain a limited presence in Egypt through its sponsorship of the Argentine scholar Ricardo Caminos, who worked at Gebel es-Silsila in 1959 and 1960. Caminos wrote that this was a ‘lonely and arduous’ time, as his British assistant, Cyril Aldred, was refused a visa by the Egyptian authorities. ²³ Meanwhile, the Egyptian authorities promoted a Polish excavation at Tell Atrib in the Nile Delta, and the Aswan High Dam itself prominently displayed the Soviet funding and expertise that made its construction possible. ²⁴

Egyptian authorities had long recognized that economic gains would not come without an environmental cost: the new dam would cause considerable flooding upstream along the Nile River in both Egypt and Sudan. ²⁵ The planned reservoir was expected to inundate archaeological sites in Nubia—some still not fully surveyed—and had the potential to impact Egypt’s valuable tourist industry. With the EES unwilling to exchange Saqqara for less interesting sites in Egyptian Nubia, the Egyptian government decided to issue a broad appeal to the international community for technical assistance in the survey and rescue of the endangered antiquities. The project to salvage the Nubian sites opened up a new arena for heritage diplomacy by bringing together a coalition of state and non-state actors, including a crucial partnership between Egypt and the Paris-based UNESCO, founded in 1945. Through its connection of diplomatic, technical, and institutional expertise, the UNESCO Campaign for Nubia anticipated the World Heritage Convention of 1972 and the formalized World Heritage system that it created. ²⁶ It also pushed British Egyptologists into a new role with regard to the Egyptian state. Although the EES had operated in a fundamentally bilateral relationship with the Egyptian government since 1922, the UNESCO Campaign for Nubia created a new institutional context for the deployment of their expertise.

The conservation of archaeological sites was an early focus of UNESCO’s efforts. ²⁷ This part of its agenda originated in discussions during the 1930s within the International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation and the International Museums Office of the League of Nations. In March of 1937, the Egyptian government hosted a conference of primarily European and American experts in Cairo with the goal of creating a framework for international collaboration in archaeology. Conversations continued through the Second World War, with both the ICIC and the League of Nations proposed as the proper organization to coordinate the worldwide enterprise of archaeology. ²⁸ With the replacement of the League of Nations by the United Nations after the war, UNESCO took up the cause. The organization had some success in sending teams of archaeologists to Peru in 1950 to assist in the aftermath of an earthquake, though early assistance programs in Tanganyika and Haiti are regarded as failures. ²⁹ In 1954, UNESCO dispatched Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt of the Louvre to advise the Egyptian government in the establishment of Cairo’s Documentation and Study Centre for the History of Art and Civilization of Ancient Egypt. More UNESCO-funded experts and supplies followed, and the Cairo center quickly became a base for supporting the study of Nubian monuments. ³⁰ At its general conference in New Delhi in 1956, UNESCO also adopted a document entitled Recommendation on International Principles Applicable to Archaeological Excavations, which urged international cooperation in the study and preservation of archaeological discoveries that enrich the international community. ³¹

For UNESCO, Nubia presented a valuable opportunity to showcase its role as a steward of world culture. For Egypt, meanwhile, with its dependence on tourism and the special importance of antiquities in its cultural life, UNESCO represented a source of expertise independent of any imperialist agenda, an international partner that could be used to help implement the Free Officers’ revolutionary vision. ³² As Carruthers has written, Nasser wanted Egypt’s monumental past to serve as a ‘visible precursor of its modern, revolutionary future’. ³³ However, excavations carried out under Egypt’s new regime had thus far failed to produce any appropriately monumental vista of Egyptian antiquity. American archaeologists, who were also valued by the Egyptian authorities as non-imperialist collaborators, were chosen to excavate Mit Rahina in the hope that they would present a compelling visual reconstruction of the ancient capital city of Memphis. The Americans’ use of stratigraphic techniques did not yield the desired result, however, and they ‘could make little visual sense of the ruins that now appeared in Mit Rahina’s ground’. ³⁴ One observer complained that the site was simply composed of ‘lots of holes dug here and there’. ³⁵

The expulsion of most British and French personnel at the time of the Suez Crisis, combined with the withdrawal of the frustrated American team from Mit Rahina in 1957, cleared the field for the newly reorganized Egyptian Department of Antiquities. Future concessions for excavation could be tied to the needs of the Egyptian state, and in particular to the need for archaeological work in Nubia. Nasser was personally indifferent toward the archaeological sites of Nubia, but a sustained campaign led by Mustafa Amer of the Antiquities Department and Minister of Culture Tharwat Okasha persuaded him of their importance. ³⁶ Egypt’s modern, revolutionary future, symbolized by the Aswan High Dam, would be spectacularly wedded to the monuments of Pharaonic antiquity.

In 1959, Okasha asked UNESCO’s leadership to take a more direct role in public advocacy for the preservation of such monuments. Its recently appointed director-general, Vittorio Veronese, gladly accepted the invitation. He submitted a formal proposal to his executive board, and in March of 1960, he made a public appeal for support of UNESCO’s ‘Campaign for Nubia’. Richly illustrated promotional material from UNESCO pointed to the work of the EES at Buhen, where Emery’s team had recently discovered a ‘remarkable fortress’, as evidence that ‘valuable discoveries’ still awaited in Nubia. ³⁷ It described the danger facing specific sites, such as the temples on the Nile island of Philae, as well as the ambitious steps envisioned for their protection:

When the High Dam is finished, Philae will be caught between the new [‘High’] dam and the old [‘Low’] one… . Several times a day, the [water] level will rise and fall 4 meters (13 feet), with the result that the foundations of the monument will be eroded and will eventually disintegrate. To protect the sacred island, therefore, it is proposed to build low dykes around it, thus forming an artificial lake, from which the island would emerge forever, in its former setting. ³⁸

One early focus of the UNESCO campaign was the renowned Abu Simbel temple complex, which would be completely inundated by the rising waters of the Aswan High Dam’s reservoir. Alan Gardiner, perhaps the most influential member of the EES, wrote that his ‘foremost wish would have been the complete preservation of the temples and particularly Abu Simbel.’ ³⁹ Yet in 1960, this seemed to him ‘a dream utterly beyond the possibility of realization.’ ⁴⁰ The largest Pharaonic sanctuary in the entire region of Nubia, Abu Simbel consisted of two monumental temples cut directly into cliffs along the Nile, separated by an expanse of sand running down from a sandstone amphitheater. The larger, or Great, temple cut 53 m (172 feet) into the sandstone, which was reported to be in poor condition. Preservation of these intricate structures presented a technical challenge of the highest order. ⁴¹

UNESCO’s early promotional material reflected the view that both temples would have to be protected in situ from flooding by an earth and rock-fill dam, which would preserve much of the existing natural setting. However, the dam would essentially put the complex in a pit, obstructing views of the temples and keeping them out of direct sunlight for much of the day. There would also be ongoing expenses for pumping and maintenance of the protective structure. ⁴² In a letter to the editor of the Times, the film producer William MacQuitty argued that it would be safer and more cost-effective to simply allow the Abu Simbel site to be flooded. Perhaps inspired by his work on A Night to Remember, which retold the last night of the doomed ocean liner Titanic, he suggested that visitors could travel below the water in elevators to view the temples from air-conditioned viewing chambers and dine at an air-conditioned underwater restaurant. Maintenance costs would be more than covered by entrance fees, and MacQuitty speculated that ‘viewing the statues under water [would] add considerably to their attraction to tourists’. ⁴³ But the solution ultimately backed by UNESCO and the Egyptian government was no less impressive. Following a proposal developed by the Swedish geological engineering firm Vattenbyggnadsbyrån, the entire complex was cut piece by piece from the cliff, raised by hydraulic jacks above the level of the new reservoir, and then reassembled over the course of five years. ⁴⁴

Work of this nature allowed UNESCO to demonstrate its commitment to world heritage preservation, encouraging international cooperation without any political agenda. But doing so would require the mobilization not just of technical expertise but also of significant financial resources. ⁴⁵ UNESCO’s preliminary funding for studies in the late 1950s totaled $126,000, but the estimated cost of the Abu Simbel relocation alone was estimated at $70 million. ⁴⁶ The success of the UNESCO campaign would depend on attracting both the technical and financial support of a broad-based international coalition.

Lucia Allais has depicted the Aswan High Dam as ‘a veritable iron curtain neatly dividing the Nile Valley between Eastern and Western blocks’, with Russian engineers working downstream at the dam and its associated power stations, and Western archaeologists and engineers working upstream in Nubia under the auspices of UNESCO. ⁴⁷ However, this view overlooks the complexities of engagement between Britain and Egypt in the late 1950s and early 1960s. In fact the EES remained in contact with the Egyptian government to a degree that has not been appreciated. Both British officials and British Egyptologists were hesitant to engage with the UNESCO campaign, but the institutional interests of the EES would ultimately tip the scales in favor of cooperation. As the EES negotiated its own return to Egypt, it shaped a climate in which political reconciliation between the UK and Egypt would become possible.

As international support for the UNESCO campaign came together, British participation was noticeably limited. A group of dignitaries was assembled to form an ‘Honorary Committee of Patrons’. Chaired by King Gustav VI Adolf of Sweden, the committee also included Queen Elizabeth of Belgium; Queen Frederika of Greece; Princess Mikasa of Japan; UN secretary-general Dag Hammarskjöld of Sweden; and André Malraux, France’s Minister of Culture. Julian Huxley was the only notable Briton included in the group, but he was included because of his prior connection with UNESCO rather than as a representative of the British government. Despite an invitation to coordinate its response with its American and West German allies, the British government was reluctant to take any action that might be construed as supportive of the Nasser regime. ⁴⁸ The EES likewise hesitated over supporting the Nubia campaign. For both state and non-state actors on the British side, there were complex reasons for this lack of enthusiasm. From the point of view of the EES, excavation in Egyptian Nubia was a low priority and one that did not fit well with its available resources. Despite continued interest in the Saqqara site and sponsorship of Caminos’ work in Egypt, by the end of the 1950s, the executive committee seemed content to focus fieldwork efforts on Buhen. The Sudanese government had displayed an eagerness to host the EES, free of the political complexities involved with work in Egypt. Within the executive committee of the EES, there was a particular reluctance to accede to political pressure from Egypt. Instead, cooperation on the Egyptian side of the border was treated as a bargaining chip for regaining access to Saqqara. In itself, Egyptian Nubia held little interest for the Society, with Emery expressing the view that ‘as far as Pharaonic Egypt was concerned, Nubia had already been fully explored.’ ⁴⁹ At a 1959 conference on the topic of Nubian antiquities threatened by the high dam project, convened in Cairo under the auspices of UNESCO, Emery made the Society’s conditions explicit. In response to an Egyptian offer to award additional concessions as a reward to ‘scientific organizations [that committed] to excavate the threatened [Nubian] sites’, Emery ‘enquired about the possibility of the Society returning to Saqqara’ and was informed that ‘this would be possible on the condition of helping in Nubia’. ⁵⁰ Although excavations in Egyptian Nubia were considered unlikely to yield much apart from prehistoric materials that were of limited interest to the Society and its subscribers, the Egyptian government proposed ‘to recompense excavators from the antiquities in their magazines—the Society might even be able to secure some of the material from Saqqara’. ⁵¹

But with the resources of the EES now fully committed to the Buhen project in Sudan, additional funding would be required from the British government so that ‘the Society could take over the survey of prehistoric sites [in Nubia] and thus ensure the return to Saqqara’. ⁵² Less than three years after the Suez Crisis, the decision to return to work in Egypt was not an easy one. The officers of the EES were divided over ‘the amount of financial support that Egypt ought to expect from other countries to offset the consequences of a work of engineering for the benefit of Egypt’. ⁵³ But Emery, who through UNESCO continued to work with the Egyptian government in an advisory capacity, urged the EES to accept the offered terms. ⁵⁴ After lengthy discussions, in the summer of 1960, the executive committee approved the release of a statement ‘appealing for help in the preservation of the monuments of Nubia’ and volunteered the Society as ‘a channel for funds’ to be raised by the newly organized United Kingdom National Committee for Nubian Antiquities. ⁵⁵

The British government’s response to the UNESCO campaign was complicated by both domestic pressures and geopolitical challenges. In December of 1959, three months before Veronese’s public appeal officially launched the UNESCO campaign, officials at the British Foreign Office laid out some of the difficulties it presented. Anthony Haigh of the Cultural Relations Department anticipated that Treasury funding and even expressions of moral support would be obstructed in parliament by the spokesmen of British subjects who felt that they had ‘been inadequately compensated for the loss of their property and prospects of livelihood in Egypt’. ⁵⁶ It was regarded as likely that the compensation fund set up by the Egyptian government after its nationalization of the Suez Canal would prove insufficient. ⁵⁷ But Ralph Murray, who had worked at the Cairo embassy in the mid-1950s and personally participated in the Suez invasion, argued that popular support for the campaign could ultimately be stronger than the loud voices raised against cooperation in Parliament. He pointed out that the plight of Nubia’s antiquities had already been publicized on the BBC’s Panorama program and in numerous newspaper articles, attracting the attention of art lovers and archaeology enthusiasts across the country. ⁵⁸ The Foreign Secretary, Lord Selwyn-Lloyd, felt that the UNESCO appeal put the British government in an ‘embarrassing situation’. ⁵⁹ He advised the Ministry of Education to inform UNESCO that, while there were no objections to the campaign, there was doubt about the prospects for its success in the United Kingdom.

The embarrassment felt by Selwyn-Lloyd had as much to do with the international situation as with domestic feeling about the campaign. Given the damage done to Britain’s moral standing by its aggressive actions during the Suez Crisis, the government was in no position to discourage the campaign from taking place. France had sought to move beyond its role in the Suez aggression by signaling its support to the UNESCO director-general, joining the superpowers of the United States and the Soviet Union. But in the eyes of British policymakers, Nasser’s regime remained a dangerous adversary, actively encouraging hostility to British interests especially within the Arab world.

It was in this context that UNESCO appealed for British assistance in rescuing the archaeological treasures of Egyptian Nubia. The British government carefully threaded the needle in order to save face on the world stage. Although the Treasury agreed to award the EES a special grant of £20,000 for work in Nubia—more than tripling the usual amount allocated through the British Academy—a number of conditions were attached. The grant was designated as being for exploratory purposes only, explicitly excluding its use for the ‘rescue of temples’. It would also be mostly spent on the less controversial work in Sudan, rather than in Egypt. ⁶⁰ The Ministry of Education engaged in informal discussions with the Egyptian government over the nomination of a British representative to UNESCO’s honorary committee for the Nubia campaign. But the sense at the Foreign Office was that officially suggesting a name would ‘compromise’ the government, though there could be no objection to ‘a British private person accepting an invitation from UNESCO’ to serve in this capacity. ⁶¹

This private partnership was precisely the role that the EES determined to take upon itself. ⁶² Bryan Emery again played a key role: he had accepted formal advisory roles with the governments of both Sudan and Egypt, including service on Egypt’s International Consultative Committee, and he had succeeded in persuading the EES executive committee to fully engage with the campaign. Many prominent members of the United Kingdom National Committee for Nubian Antiquities, organized in 1960, had ties to the EES. Its chairman, Sir Mortimer Wheeler, was a member of the EES, the former director-general of the Archaeological Survey of India, and a regular guest on the popular BBC program Animal, Vegetable, Mineral? In an article in the Times, Wheeler expressed appreciation for the British government’s encouragement of the committee and called for international support in ‘the battle for Abu Simbel’. ⁶³ The National Committee also included Emery; his former assistant L. P. Kirwan, now director and secretary of the Royal Geographic Society; and Alan Gardiner, a longtime officer of the EES now serving as its president. ⁶⁴

In practice, the National Committee seems to have been little more than an extension of the EES. Both took their cue from Emery, who made the case that EES leadership in Egyptian Nubia would be beneficial both scientifically and for the ‘prestige of the United Kingdom.’ ⁶⁵ When Egypt put the British government on the spot with an official invitation to participate in the Nubia operation, the Foreign Office pointed to the National Committee and the Treasury grant for exploration as evidence of the UK’s ‘active part in the UNESCO international campaign to save the monuments of Nubia’. ⁶⁶ In addition to applying for government funding, the National Committee sought subscriptions from museums and held out the possibility that Nubian artifacts might be made available to them. ⁶⁷ Emery expressed surprise at the generosity with which such artifacts were handled by the Egyptian Antiquities Service. ⁶⁸

Hopes that this could be parlayed into a grand exhibition of Tutankhamun artifacts did not reach fruition for more than a decade, but in 1962, London’s Burlington House hosted a smaller exhibition of antiquities loaned out by Egypt for a European tour. A review in the Times noted the ‘small scale’ of the exhibition and the absence of the ‘more spectacular aspect’ of Egyptian art—specifically mentioning the lack of objects from Tutankhamun’s tomb, which at the time were touring North America. However, the reviewer could not overlook evidence of ongoing British archaeological work in Egypt: ‘a remarkable survival is the carpet of the fifth century, A.D., found among other objects excavated this year by Professor Walter [Bryan] Emery in the area scheduled to be flooded by the construction of the dam at Aswan’. ⁶⁹ In 1968, the EES organized a more impressive exhibition at the British Museum, which proved so popular that it was extended an additional two months into January of 1969. ⁷⁰ The exhibition guide noted that much of the Society’s efforts in the preceding nine years had been directed toward the ‘Nubian emergency’—yet the first two sections of the guide were devoted to its work at Saqqara, which remained its real priority throughout the Nubia campaign. ⁷¹

While the EES-led effort to support the Nubia campaign attracted wide interest in the project and in the Society itself, the actual work in the field proved challenging. ⁷² Logistical problems delayed the Society’s initial excavations in Egyptian Nubia until January of 1961, raising concerns that the old Saqqara concession might be awarded to another organization. There were also unspecified ‘difficulties in exporting Sudanese materials through Egypt’, prompting some on the EES committee to call for a formal protest to the Egyptian government. However, Emery advised that such difficulties ‘were inevitable at the time and that written complaints would fail to achieve their object’. Instead, he addressed the problem informally with the authorities in Cairo. ⁷³

Emery’s approach succeeded, and frictions diminished as the Nubia project progressed. In 1964, articles in the Egyptian government-produced Egypt Travel Magazine recognized the work of the EES to ‘establish all the historic sites later than 3100 B.C.’, noting that the Society had already published its results, and hailed Emery as ‘a great authority on the archaeology of Nubia’. ⁷⁴ But rapid progress on the Aswan High Dam lent a great sense of urgency to the work of excavation, and with that urgency came a need for increased funding. Water was expected to begin rising at Buhen in October 1964 and would cover the entire site. The UNESCO program called for the relocation of a number of structures threatened by rising water levels, and the Society was committed to paying for the removal of the temple from the Buhen site in addition to the accelerated completion of excavations there. Ibrim, the main EES site in Egyptian Nubia, was secure from flooding, but it was nevertheless regarded by Emery as a priority because of the importance of maintaining good relations with the Egyptian government. ⁷⁵ The EES also continued to support the work of Ricardo Caminos, who was engaged in the publication of epigraphical studies of endangered Nubian sites. Despite pledges of funding and personnel from institutions in Britain, Canada, and New Zealand, these multiple commitments began to place a real strain on the Society’s finances. ⁷⁶ An additional grant of £5000 was secured from the Treasury in November 1962, with the prospect of a further £20,000 to follow. ⁷⁷ This time, no stipulation was put forth as to the division of the funds between Egypt and Sudan. ⁷⁸ The money allowed the Society to plan for two simultaneous large-scale expeditions during the 1963–4 season: ‘to Buhen because it was urgent, to Ibrim because it was politic’. ⁷⁹

EES work took place against the backdrop of an Anglo-Egyptian relationship that remained troubled throughout the 1960s. In 1965, the Egyptian government temporarily broke off diplomatic ties over the British failure to take strong action against the white regime in the former British colony of Rhodesia. Egypt and Britain remained rivals in Southwest Arabia until economic crisis forced the final withdrawal of British forces from Aden in 1967. ⁸⁰ Yet the archaeological partnership between the two powers remained a rare bright spot. In 1964, the Egyptian government returned the Saqqara concession to the EES ‘in recognition of the British contribution to the UNESCO campaign to rescue the archaeological artifacts of Nubia’. ⁸¹ Meanwhile, British officials, too, had come to appreciate the importance of these ties.

Two factors in particular brought the EES to prominence within British political circles during the mid-1960s. First was the positive publicity that accompanied the resounding success of the 1964–5 season at Saqqara. Although upstaged by the exhibition of Tutankhamun artifacts that Desroches-Noblecourt secured for Paris in 1967, publicity around British archaeological work in Egypt called attention to cultural affinities and laid the groundwork for the British and Egyptian governments to work themselves back into a more stable diplomatic relationship. British officials recognized that this archaeological work helped to maintain a British cultural presence in the region, securing alternative channels of influence even after Britain’s military withdrawal from the region in 1967. ⁸² The 1972 Tutankhamun exhibition at the British Museum showcased this new relationship particularly well: while giving Egypt an opportunity to represent its new self-confidence in world affairs by way of its cultural heritage, it also showed that Britain was committed to maintaining and extending its partnership with Egypt in the field of heritage diplomacy.

Second, the personal connections between British Egyptologists and Egyptian officials proved a stabilizing force at a time when formal diplomacy was challenging at best. In particular, Bryan Emery’s strong ties to the Egyptian government were greatly valued, and not only by the executive committee of the EES. Following the election of Harold Wilson’s Labour government in 1964, longtime civil servant and EES committee member A.H.K. Slater emerged as an important voice on science issues. He received an appointment to a position in the newly created Ministry of Technology and was charged with preparing the prime minister for a meeting with Emery in November 1966. Slater described the excavator as occupying

quite a unique position amongst British persons of a quasi-official position in contact with Egypt. He is well known and respected in Ministerial as well as senior official circles, and to many of the Egyptians with whom he is in contact the embodiment of all they thought best in the older type of British residential official. He has managed to keep almost a Kitchener position without anything of an Imperial strut: and, as such, is a valuable link (even if an unofficial one) in any chain of UK/Egypt relations today. ⁸³

The revolution of 1952 and the Suez Crisis severely weakened Britain’s geopolitical situation, undermining alliances that had been carefully cultivated for decades. The confrontational policies of the Nasser regime exposed Britain’s postwar financial weakness and its dependence on American support. As John Darwin has noted, it was above all economic realities that drove British policy toward a ‘conscious retreat from the old burdens and privileges of imperial power’ by the early 1970s. ⁸⁴ A new diplomatic paradigm was required, one that did not rely on expensive military interventions.

Egypt’s appeal to UNESCO for assistance in rescuing archaeological sites threatened by construction of the Aswan High Dam presented an opportunity that was not immediately appreciated in Britain. Government officials and archaeologists alike were reluctant to partner with an Egyptian regime they regarded as untrustworthy. But influential members of Britain’s EES could not resist the chance to regain access to the valuable site of Saqqara. They volunteered to raise funds and ultimately played a key role in the survey and rescue of Nubian antiquities.

British officials were if anything even more reluctant to engage with the new Egyptian regime. Yet rapprochement between British Egyptologists and the Egyptian state paved the way for a diplomatic rapprochement between the two states. The British government could not realistically prevent the private efforts of the EES and, witnessing their success, soon came to embrace them. At a time when official diplomacy was in abeyance, the UK could point to the work of the EES as evidence of British goodwill toward Egypt. In the establishment of the National Committee for Nubian Antiquities, in the scientific and financial contributions of the EES to the UNESCO campaign, and in the exhibitions of Egyptian antiquities in Britain during the 1960s, a new relationship between the two states was made visible. The UNESCO Campaign for Nubia opened new channels for partnership and rapprochement between Britain and Egypt in a time of diplomatic tension, providing an opportunity for both sides to draw a line under the history of British imperialism and the conflicts of the 1950s. In the battle for Abu Simbel, at least, the two were on the same side.

The Campaign for Nubia brought together diplomacies of heritage and science in ways that shaped the futures of UNESCO and of the Egyptian state. This article has shown that the nexus of these diplomacies also provided an opportunity for British officials and archaeologists to recast their own relationship with Egypt. British participation in the campaign—and the initial British reluctance to participate—points to the complexity of processes of decolonization. There was no clean break between Egypt and the British Empire either in 1922 or 1952. Rather, decolonization proceeded unevenly between the 1920s and the 1950s, and these processes left an enduring and multifaceted legacy in later Anglo-Egyptian diplomacy. The prior experience of working in a quasi-independent state made it difficult for British archaeologists to quickly comprehend the changing political environment of the 1950s. However, the cultivation of an ethos of apolitical scientific expertise allowed archaeologists such as Bryan Emery to maintain dialogue with Egyptian authorities, demonstrating the important stabilizing role of nonstate experts even in moments of political crisis. Their scientific expertise also allowed British archaeologists affiliated with the EES to exercise agency in negotiating the terms of their return to work in Egypt during the UNESCO Campaign, using their participation as a bargaining chip to pursue their own goals and in particular access to the Saqqara site. By calling attention to the complex political nuances of such scientific collaboration, this case study raises intriguing questions about the role of experts in framing postcolonial relationships.