Ancient Egypt

• "With the float out of the Viking Hathor, we look forward to welcoming more guests to experience this fantastic region."
• The traditional float out ceremony of the Viking Hathor took place at Massara shipyard in Cairo and is significant because it denotes a ship moving into its final stage of construction.
• An identical sister ship to the Viking Osiris and the Viking Aton , the Viking Hathor features several aspects familiar to Viking guests, such as a distinctive square bow and an indoor/outdoor Aquavit Terrace.
• Viking will have six ships sailing the Nile by 2025 with the addition of another sister ship, the Viking Sobek , which is already under construction and will be delivered next year.

• The artist's proof decanter was offered as part of Sotheby's Whisky & Whiskey Auction, which took place in New York last Saturday, 9th December.
• James Turrell, renowned for his work with light and space, celebrated his 80th birthday earlier this year.
• When we first launched Eight Decades in May, we knew it was a very special decanter – working with James Turrell was truly an honour.
• We feel the decanter blurs the lines between art and whisky, and the auction result is testament to that.

• LOS ANGELES, Sept. 12, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Viking® ( www.viking.com ) today announced voyages on its newest Nile River ship, the Viking Sobek, are now available for booking.
• "With the addition of the Viking Sobek, we will offer the largest fleet and the most elegant ships on the Nile, by far.
• Additionally, TIME magazine featured both Giza and Saqqara on its "World's Greatest Places of 2023" list, recommending sailing the Nile River with Viking.
• Other ships in Viking's Egypt fleet include the Viking Ra and the MS Antares ; with the addition of the Viking Sobek, Viking will have six ships sailing the Nile River by 2025.

• However, some time measurement units that derive from astronomical phenomena are quite easy to explain and likely were independently observed in many different cultures across the world.
• One of the most ancient written traditions, Egyptian hieroglyphic texts, gives us new insight into the origin of the hour.

Time in Ancient Egypt

• The Pyramid Texts, written before 2400 BCE, are the earliest writings from Ancient Egypt.
• Included in the texts is the word wnwt (approximately pronounced “wenut”), and the meaning-hieroglyph associated with it was a star.
• But around 1210 BCE in New Kingdom — the period of ancient Egypt between the 16th and 11th centuries BCE — the link between the number of rows and the word wnwt is made explicit.

Astronomical instructions

• One temple, the Osireion at Abydos, contains a wealth of astronomical information, including instructions on how to make a sundial and a text describing the motions of stars.
• It also contains a star table of the coffin type where, uniquely, the 12 rows are labelled with the word wnwt.
• By the New Kingdom, there were 12 night-wnwt and also 12 day-wnwt, both clearly time measures.
• First, although there are 12 day-hours and 12 night-hours, they are always expressed separately but not together as a 24-hour day.

Timekeeping stars

• The ancient Egyptians chose to use the bright star Sirius as a model, and selected other stars based on their behavioural similarity to Sirius.
• The key point seems to be that the timekeeping stars disappeared for 70 days each year, just like Sirius, even though the other stars were not as bright.
• Depending on the time of year, between 10 and 14 of these stars are visible each night.