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Update on the Egyptian National Museum

The Egyptian National Museum is still not entirely safe, unfortunately. Turns out that it’s right next door to the national headquarters for Egypt’s ruling party, the focus of much of the protesters’ ire. Said building is still on fire, and firefighters worry that if the building is destabilized because of the fire, it will collapse…right onto the museum.

There was some looting in the museum as well before the army arrived, according to this AP report.

Hyperallergic is monitoring Al Jazeera, and has posted these heartbreaking pictures of looting damage, in which the museum appears to be in far worse shape than the AP report would indicate.

There are also pictures of a really wonderful thing that happened, though, as described in the AP article:

Before the army arrived, young Egyptians — some armed with truncheons grabbed off the police — created a human chain at the museum’s front gate to prevent looters from making off with any of its priceless artifacts.

Edit: The History Blog also has more information about the museum, including some terrific quotes from the Egyptians who helped form that living chain.

Egyptian National Museum in danger

Breaking news from Cairo, where government protesters have been filling the streets for several days now: fires are breaking out near the Egyptian National Museum.

The whole country is in a communications lockdown, so reporting is very much in flux. Reuters has confirmed however that the Egyptian army has been called out to secure the museum.

The Egyptian National Museum is home to the greatest ancient Egyptian treasures in the world, including King Tut’s mask. The next few hours should offer more complete information about exactly how much danger the museum’s artifacts (and staffers) are in. We’ll have updates here when we know anything for sure.

For more about the Egyptian protests, check out the New York Times. Their front page is entirely given over to covering various aspects of the crisis.

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