两性色午夜

Professor of Religion Shannon Grimes recently visited Egypt for the first time to present a keynote speech at the international Hermopolis Symposium. Her talk was on Seshat, a goddess of scholars, scribes, and temple artisans.聽

Grimes was invited to present at the conference by Dr. Mervat Nasser, with whom she shares a publisher.聽 鈥淪he invited me and our publisher, Dr. Aaron Cheak, as keynote speakers, along with Professor Charles Stang from Harvard Divinity School, and Professor Wouter Hanegraaff from the University of Amsterdam,鈥� Grimes said.

The conference was held at New Hermopolis, an educational retreat center in Egypt. The event featured around 20 speakers. The presentations were recorded and were also made available online.聽

Visiting Egypt was an amazing experience for Grimes. While there, she visited several ancient sites and studied the iconography of Seshat and her better-known companion deity, Thoth, the god of wisdom and writing.

鈥�Dr. Nasser arranged for a tour guide to take us to the Giza pyramids and Saqqara before we headed down to the conference site in Tuna al-Gebel, which is in middle Egypt. The New Hermopolis retreat center is beautiful, almost like a monastery, and we had a wonderful group of scholars and artists gathered there,鈥� said Grimes. 鈥淓ach night, after our presentations, we would have entertainment; Egyptian folk dancing, an adorable children’s choir, stargazing in the desert, and even a blue lotus tea and meditation ceremony.鈥�

After the conference, Grimes and other participants traveled to Luxor, and along the way, they visited several temples and intricately decorated tombs.聽

鈥淚 was able to see places I’ve been studying and imagining for decades, and it was quite moving to finally be there in person,鈥� Grimes said.

Grimes鈥檚 interest in Seshat began when she was working on Becoming Gold: Zosimos of Panopolis and the Alchemical Arts in Roman Egypt, which was published by Rubedo Press in 2018.

Her accommodations at the conference had a fun connection to Grimes鈥檚 scholarship.

鈥淓ach room at New Hermopolis is named after a thinker who has perpetuated, in some way, the ideas and ideals of ancient Hermetic teachings,鈥� Grimes said. 鈥淭here is a room named after Zosimos of Panopolis (now Akhmim), the alchemist I’ve studied for years, and I was happy that I got to stay in his room.鈥�

Since she returned from the conference, Grimes has been working on a new project that looks at women and goddesses in the Hermetic tradition. Her research on Seshat, which was the focus of her keynote, is part of that. 听听

鈥淚 first learned about Seshat when I was working on my book on alchemy in Roman Egypt. She was described as the wife of the god Thoth, who is very well known, but I’d never heard of this goddess before,鈥� Grimes explained. 鈥淚 was drawn to her because she’s the goddess of the scribes, the scholars of the ancient temples, and I am very interested in their ideas of scholarship and writing as a spiritual practice.鈥�