The pyramid necropolis at Abusir (EAR), which the Czech Institute of Egyptology, Faculty of Arts, Charles University has been excavating for almost 55 years, proved once again that it is one of the most important sites in Egypt. During autumn, members of the Czech Mission explored a tomb, which is part of a small cemetery to the south of the funerary complex of King Raneferef. In the cemetery, members of the court elite of the middle of the Fifth Dynasty (about 2450 B.C.) were buried.

We all know about Medieval Literature, don’t we? We know about Knights in Shining Armour, and Damsels in Distress. We know about the struggle two-thirds of the way through the plot for said Knight to prove plucky, make like a hero, and rescue the biddable babe (as still witness in almost all Hollywood Rom-Coms). We know about this. We know about Princesses in towers, locked up by evil witchy-types, but also bawdy Wife-Of-Bath-types, and Pious Pilgrims.

When a team of three researchers of the Institute of Classical Archaeology, CU FA set off for the Paschurt Valley, their initial plan was to inspect kurgans, funeral barrows typical of steppe cultures. A discovery they made in a nearby site meant a complete change of their plans. What they discovered was settlements dating back to the Iron and Bronze Ages, including a well-preserved irrigation system.

On Thursday, November 6, the Faculty of Arts of Charles University hosted a lecture by Professor John C. Lennox, Professor of Mathematics and Philosophy of Science in Oxford University, titled “Has Science Buried God?” The vast interest in this topic was clear from the moment I arrived at the venue in the Faculty of Arts main building.

One topic that is closely followed by ecologists is the spontaneous spread of non-native species in the countryside. Amongst the most well-known of these in the Czech Republic is the black locust tree or bush, which in some areas creates unbroken, impenetrable ‘forests’, destroying the original vegetation. Dr. Jiří Reif and his team from the CU Faculty of Science are currently starting a new study which aims to clarify the effect that invasive plants have on birdlife in the Czech Republic.

Unfortunately, we don’t know if Egyptians in love exchanged presents on special occasions; on the other hand, we have a relatively good idea of how Ancient Egyptian marriages worked. PhDr. Hana Vymazalová, Ph.D., of the Czech Institute of Egyptology of the CU Faculty of Arts, told us more.

Having first travelled to the Altai Republic, a land in the middle of Siberia with wild landscape and idiosyncratic inhabitants, Mgr. Luděk Brož, M.Phil., Ph.D. was so enchanted by the genius loci and culture of the region that he abandoned his chemistry studies and became a social anthropologist.

Following a number of anti-Roma marches at the end of summer, associate professor Kristina Koldinská from the Department of Labour and Social Security Law of the CU Faculty of Law lost patience.

An academic who has conducted research on topics ranging from wages in McDonalds to the effect of weather on wine was on the 15th of January awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Charles University in Prague. But it was not for his wine equation, as useful a discovery as it may be that Professor Orley Clark Ashenfelter, the Joseph Douglas Green 1895 Professor of Economics at Princeton University, was awarded the doctorate by Charles University.

As a Biology Erasmus student at Charles University, I was given the option to attend the unique course “Field Course in Fish Parasitology”. The course takes place outside of Prague, at the Field Biology Station Ruda by Veselí nad Lužnicí which is in South Bohemia. Organised and run by Dr. Libor Mikeš and Associate Professor Jan Votýpka, we were invited to watch the traditional Czech carp harvesting and then perform dissections to observe the parasites of the fish.