Join Andrew Collins, author of Gobekli Tepe: Genesis of the Gods, and Hugh Newman, author of Earth Grids and Stone Circles, with special guest from the USA, JJ Ainsworth, a leading authority on ancient symbolism for the Megalithomania Tour of East Turkey on September 14-26, 2024.

The tour focuses on the traditional area of the 'Garden of Eden' visiting some of the world’s most important archaeological sites including Göbekli Tepe, the oldest stone temple complex, and Karahan Tepe, a recently excavated site from the same era. The new Urfa Archaeological Museum has hundreds of artefacts from Göbekli Tepe, Nevali Çori and other Pre-Pottery Neolithic 'Tas Tepeler' sites. We explore also the ancient city of Harran, and Sogmatar, site of the Seven Planetary Temples of the Sabians.

We get exclusive access to the stunning Blue Mosque, Hippodrome and underground Basilica Cistern in Istanbul, and take a private yacht trip on the Bosphorus. We visit Sanliurfa, the ancient Christian city of Edessa, birthplace of Abraham; and the traditional location of the Garden of Eden, home of the Watchers from the 'Book of Enoch', and the Annunaki of Sumerian legend. We visit the sacred city of Mardin and see also 12,000 year old artefacts from Neolithic sites such as Kortik Tepe, Çayönü and Bonkuklu Tarla. We will look at newly opened 'Tas Tepeler' sites, see the old city of Midyat, visit Lake Van, Tushpa, the Gate of Mehr, the biblical Mount Ararat, including the controversial location of Noah's Ark, and experience an atmospheric sunset at Nemrut Dag (Nimrod’s Mountain).

Your hosts Andrew Collins, Hugh Newman and JJ Ainsworth will be presenting evening lectures throughout the tour and discussing theories and new research on site.

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TREASURES OF ANCIENT EGYPT ONE-WEEK TOUR

November 16-23 2024

Join Andrew Collins and a host of Megalithomaniacs on the ultimate ‘Grand Tour’ of Egypt. The tour is divided in two, so you can enjoy one or both aspects of ancient Egypt (north and south), with private 2-hour access visits inside the Great Pyramid and the enigmatic Osirion at Abydos, as well as 5-star hotels and a beautiful Nile cruise. With special guest Andrew Collins (for main tour only), Yousef Awyan, Hugh Newman and J.J. Ainsworth. (Main Tour: Nov 16th - 23rd 2024 / Add-On: Nov 23rd - 30th 2024)

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Watch this video of Andrew Collins's lecture from Megalithomania 2022 titled "Karahan Tepe: The Greatest Archaeological Discovery of the 21st Century." Learn about how the Pre-Pottery Neolithic peoples of southeastern Turkey's Tas Tepeler culture aligned the world's earliest rock architecture with Galacter Center as much as 11,000 years ago.

Sobekneferu: Egypt's First Female Pharaoh and Her Rebirth as a Modern Pop Icon

Read Andrew's important new article on Egypt's first female pharaoh Sobekneferu (or Neferusobek). She remains one of the most obscure of all the female pharaohs to rule Upper and Lower Egypt, something she did for just four years at the end of the Twelfth Dynasty, circa 1800 BCE. The monarch's life and achievements show that she was a powerful ruler that managed to hold together the kingdom as it tittered on the brink of collapse, initiating a new nationalistic dynasty whose descendants would eventually rise up against the incoming Hyksos warlords of the Second Intermediate Period. The mystery surrounding Sobekneferu's reign, her magical and religious beliefs, and her legacy in the nineteenth century led to her coming to the attention of speculative Egyptological writers such as the mythologist Gerald Massey, and through this attention she would go on to feature as the antagonist in Irish writer Bram Stoker's Egyptian novel The Jewel of Seven Stars (1903). We take a brief look at all aspects of her life and achievements as a preview to the monarch's first full-length biography The First Female Pharaoh (2023), penned by the present author. The article is available now on Academia.edu

Without Sobekneferu’s brief but eventful four-year reign there is every chance that Egypt’s independence would have been lost and the entire western world would be a different place today. The First Female Pharoah by Andrew Collins explores Sobekneferu’s role in keeping Egypt alive, exploring also the close relationship with her brother Amenemhet IV, her sister Neferuptah, and their father Amenemhet III. It explores her suspected relationship with Joseph of biblical tradition, her identity as the legendary female ruler Nitocris of Greek tradition, and Sobekneferu's creation of the Egyptian Labyrinth as the center of a new religion focused around the crocodile god Sobek and his mother, the hippo goddess Neith, both of which she venerated in connection with the constellations of Draco, Ursa Minor and the seven stars of Ursa Major. The book examines Sobekneferu’s religious beliefs, her early life in the Nile Delta, her eventual death, and the fate of her body. It goes in search of the temples and ruins associated with her reign showing their relationship to the stars of the northern night sky. Andrew demonstrates how Sobekneferu's deeds and actions would eventually be suppressed by those who followed her, although the potency of her achievements and the cult ignited in her name would continue to ripple down through the ages, leading to her reemergence during the Victorian age as a Gothic icon and occult inspiration through her role as the antagonist in Bram Stoker’s shocking Egyptian novel The Jewel of Seven Stars (1903). From there she went on to become the role model for every ancient Egyptian queen that rises from the dead in horror films, the most recent being 2017's "The Mummy" starring Tom Cruise. Sobekneferu's return to popular consciousness has taken a long time, indeed many thousands of years, but some occultists, such as Kenneth Grant and Nicholas de Vere, recognised the potency of her revival and created her as a powerful avatar of an age-old Typhonian gnosis, a stellar current, that through his works has helped her live again in the modern age. For more information on Sobekneferu see the following article by Andrew Collins Amazon.com Amazon.co.uk Barnes & Noble