Empress of the Nile: The Daredevil Archaeologist Who Saved Egypt's Ancient Temples from Destruction

 I wish I had read Lynne Olson's biography Empress of the Nile: The Daredevil Archaeaologist Who Saved Egypt's Ancient Temples from Destruction (#1,303) before I went to Egypt and before I read Fiona Davis's The Stolen Queen.  Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt led such an amazing life I can't believe I never heard of her before having this book recommended by the Egyptologist leading my tour.  If you've read Fiona Davis's book, you'll realize how much of Christiane's life experiences were incorporated into her character of Charlotte Cross.

Christiane Desroches was educated at the Louvre, taught in their school, helped rescue priceless Egyptian antiquities from the Nazis during the war, and came back to an empty museum to join the Resistance.  Although she was a curator at the Louvre, Desroches's real love was her Egyptian field work.  She participated in digs all along the Nile.  As a woman, most Western Egyptologists treated her as a pariah, suitable only for sketching or labeling the artifacts, not doing the actual digging.  They also did not care for the fact that she treated the Egyptian laborers who actually did the work as members of the team, learning to speak Arabic to better communicate with them, and treating their injuries and illnesses.  Many of the actual finds that she made were appropriated in scholarly works by her male colleagues.

But because she was trusted by the Egyptians themselves, when the political climate changed after World War II, she was invited back to consult as the work to uncover Egypt's past was given over to the Egyptians themselves.  When the decision was made to build a huge dam at Aswan to control the flooding of the Nile, it was Christiane who rang the alarm bells about the potential loss of unique cultural sites to the flood waters of the dam.  Persuading the newly formed UNESCO to bring together an international coalition to relocate the temples at Abu Simbel and Philae, among others, was her brainchild.  It's an amazing story.

 I enjoyed looking at the photographs of people and places included in the text, but I must admit I did find a couple of omissions puzzling.  Christiane was married, and had a son, but no pictures of either appear in the text.  She apparently did not want to talk about either of the men in her life.  There always have to be some mysteries in life!

Even if you never plan to go to Egypt yourself, this is a fascinating life story of someone who seized every opportunity given to her.