Chicago House, shown here in the 1920s on the banks of a flooded Nile, has long served as the home base for the Epigraphic Survey’s scholars, artists, stonemasons, architects, and other staff. It houses more than 20,000 volumes in its research library, which is considered among the finest in Egypt. (Photo courtesy the Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures)
The Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures celebrates 100 years of studying inscriptions.
This year marks the centennial of the Epigraphic Survey of the Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures (ISAC). Since 1924 ISAC staff have returned nearly every winter to Luxor, Egypt—once the ancient city of Thebes, Egypt’s southern capital. There they carefully record inscriptions from the area’s monuments using a combination of photography and illustration. In recent decades, they’ve also added conservation, site management, and training to their charge. The Chicago House Method of epigraphy, pioneered by ISAC founder James Henry Breasted, allowed scholars to record these carvings in precise detail: they would photograph an inscription, then draw over the print while sitting in front of the original, capturing subtle details obscured in the photo. Today digital technology has augmented film and pencil, but the basic technique remains the same—an unbroken line of tradition that now enters its second century. The Epigraphic Survey is the subject of an ISAC exhibition that runs through March 23, 2025.
Updated 10.22.2024 to correct the dates noted in the two photo captions.