Zahi Abass Hawass (; born May 28, 1947) is an Egyptian archaeologist, Egyptologist, and former Minister of Tourism and Antiquities, a position he held twice. He has worked at archaeological sites in the Nile Delta, the Western Desert and the Upper Nile Valley.
Early life Hawass was born in a small village near Damietta, Egypt. Although he once dreamed of becoming an attorney, he ended up becoming an Egyptologist. Hawass was involved in excavations early on. He recalled that in 1960, he was part of a group working with Sheikh Ali Abdel-Rasoul in the Tomb of Seti I in the Valley of the Kings, when they found a tunnel in the tomb. Hawass also recalled that, as a young archaeologist excavating at Kom Abu Billo, he had to help transport several artifacts from the Greco-Roman site. Valley of the Golden Mummies, Zahi A. Hawass, pp. 94–97, American University Press in Cairo Press, 2000,
He obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree in Greek and Roman archaeology from Alexandria University in 1967. In 1979, Hawass earned a diploma in Egyptology from Cairo University. He then worked at the Great Pyramids as an inspector—a combination of administrator and archaeologist.
When he was 33 years old, Hawass was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to attend the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia to study Egyptology, earning a Master of Arts degree in the subject and also one in Syro-Palestinian archaeology in 1983, and his PhD in Egyptology in 1987 from the University of Pennsylvania's Graduate Group in the Art and Archaeology of the Mediterranean World (AAMW), concentrating on "The Funerary Establishments of Khufu, Khafra and Menkaura During the Old Kingdom."
Career
Archaeology and early government career Hawass was Associate Director of Excavation at Hermopolis in 1968 and Tarrana 1970–74. Since 1975, he has been Excavation Director and Restoration Director at various sites throughout Egypt, predominantly Giza.
From 1969 to 1975, Hawass was Inspector of Antiquities for a multitude of archaeological expeditions, for instance the Yale Expedition at Abydos, Egypt in 1969, and Abu Simbel between 1972 and 1974.
He sporadically taught Egyptian archaeology and history and culture at universities in Egypt and the US between 1988 and 2001, most notably at the American University in Cairo, the University of California, Los Angeles and Alexandria University. Hawass has described his efforts as trying to help institute a systematic program for the preservation and restoration of historical monuments, while training Egyptians to improve their expertise on methods of excavation, retrieval and preservation.
Giza
Hawass was Inspector of Antiquities for Giza 1972–74, First Inspector until 1979 and Chief Inspector in 1980. Starting in 1987, he held the position of Director General of the Giza monuments, which included the sites of Giza, Saqqara, Memphis, Dahshur, Abusir and Bahariya Oasis.
After the discovery of Gantenbrink's Door in 1993, he left the position – according to Hawass, a resignation – but was reinstated several months later, following a change in leadership and the transformation of the Egyptian Antiquities Organization into the Supreme Council of Antiquities.
He was promoted to Undersecretary of the State for the Giza Monuments in 1998.
Hawass continues to be involved in archaeological projects at Giza and other sites in Egypt. , he headed the science committee overseeing the ScanPyramids project.
Politics In 2002, Hawass was appointed as the Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities. When US President Barack Obama visited Cairo in June 2009, Hawass gave him personal tours of ancient Egyptian archaeological sites. Facing mandatory retirement, he was promoted by President Hosni Mubarak to the post of Vice Minister of Culture at the end of 2009.
2011 protest vandalism On January 29, 2011, in the midst of the Egyptian protests of that year, Hawass arrived at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo to find that a number of cases had been broken into and a number of antiquities damaged, so police were brought in to secure the museum. According to Andrew Lawler, reporting for Science, Hawass said that he "faxed a colleague in Italy that 13 cases were destroyed. My heart is broken and my blood is boiling".
Hawass later told The New York Times that thieves looking for gold broke 70 objects, including two sculptures of the pharaoh Tutankhamun, and took two skulls from a research lab, before being stopped as they left the museum.
Minister of Antiquities Hawass was appointed to the position of Minister of State for Antiquities Affairs, a newly created cabinet post, by Mubarak on January 31, 2011, as part of a cabinet shake-up during the 2011 protests. A press release including a statement from Hawass stated that he "will continue excavating, writing books, and representing his country," ensuring that archaeological sites in Egypt were being safeguarded and looted objects returned. Regarding the Egyptian Museum looting, he said: "The museum was dark and the nine robbers did not recognise the value of what was in the vitrines. They opened thirteen cases, threw the seventy objects on the ground and broke them, including one Tutankhamun case, from which they broke the statue of the king on a panther. However, the broken objects can all be restored, and we will begin the restoration process this week." Hawass rejected comparisons with the looting of antiquities in Iraq and Afghanistan.
On February 13, Mahmoud Kassem of Bloomberg reported Hawass as saying that "18 artifacts, including statues of King Tutankhamun", were stolen from the Egyptian Museum in January; Kassem, paraphrasing Hawass, continues: "The missing objects include 11 wooden shabti statuettes from Yuya, a gilded wooden statue of Tutankhamun carried by a goddess and a statue of Nefertiti making offerings".
Egyptian state television reported that Hawass called upon Egyptians not to believe the "lies and fabrications" of the Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya satellite television channels. Hawass later said: "They should give us the opportunity to change things, and if nothing happens they can march again. But you can't bring in a new president now, in this time. We need Mubarak to stay and make the transition". On March 3, 2011, he resigned after a list was posted on his personal website of dozens of sites across Egypt that were looted during the 2011 protests.
Hawass was reappointed Minister of Antiquities by then-Prime Minister Essam Sharaf. On March 30, 2011, a tweet was posted, stating: "I am very happy to be the Minister of Antiquities once again!" but resigned on July 17, 2011, after Sharaf informed him he would not be continuing in the position. According to opinion report from an Egyptian commentator in The Guardian, Hawass was "sacked".
Claimed discoveries
As his biography at the National Geographic Explorers webpage notes, he states that he is
Appearances
Hawass has appeared on television specials on channels such as the National Geographic Channel, the History Channel and the Discovery Channel. Hawass has also appeared in several episodes of the U.S. television show Digging for the Truth, discussing mummies, the pyramids, Tutankhamun, Cleopatra and Ramesses II. He also appeared on Unsolved Mysteries during a segment on the curse of Tutankhamun's tomb. In 2010, Hawass appeared on a reality-based television show on The History Channel called Chasing Mummies.
Hawass also worked alongside Egyptologist Otto Schaden during the opening of Tomb KV63 in February 2006 – the first intact tomb to be found in the Valley of the Kings since 1922.
In June 2007, Hawass announced that he and a team of experts may have identified the mummy of Hatshepsut, in KV60, a small tomb in the Valley of the Kings. The opening of the sealed tomb was described in 2006 as "one of the most important events in the Valley of the Kings for almost a hundred years."
Hawass was interviewed about his work by Keith Floyd as part of his television series Floyd around the Med in the episode "Cairo, Egypt and Aswan to Luxor" (2000).
Hawass was the host of the documentary Egypt's Ten Greatest Discoveries.
In May 2025, Hawass appeared as a guest on episode #2321 of The Joe Rogan Experience podcast.
Views Return of artifacts to Egypt Since the 2000s, Hawass has repeatedly spearheaded movements to return many prominent and irregularly taken Ancient Egyptian artifacts back to Egypt from collections in various other countries. Examples of these artifacts include: the Rosetta Stone, the bust of Nefertiti, the Dendera zodiac ceiling painting from the Dendera Temple, the bust of Ankhhaf (the architect of the Khafre Pyramid), the faces of Amenhotep III's tomb at the Louvre Museum, the Luxor Temple's obelisk at the Place de la Concorde and the statue of Hemiunu.
In July 2003, the Egyptians requested the return of the Rosetta Stone from the British Museum. Hawass, then serving as Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Cairo, spoke at a press conference saying: "If the British want to be remembered, if they want to restore their reputation, they should volunteer to return the Rosetta Stone because it is the icon of our Egyptian identity". Referring to Egyptian antiquities at the British Museum, Hawass said: "These are Egyptian monuments. I will make life miserable for anyone who keeps them".
In 2019, Hawass relaunched his restitution campaign, asking the Berlin State Museums, the British Museum and the Musée du Louvre: "How can you refuse to lend to the new Grand Egyptian Museum when you have taken so many antiquities from Egypt?" All three museums refused his loan requests.
In 2022, Hawass launched another petition, calling once again for the return of the Rosetta Stone, the bust of Nefertiti and the Dendera Zodiac ceiling to Egypt.
DNA testing of Egyptian mummies
Hawass has been skeptical of the DNA testing of Egyptian mummies: "From what I understand," he has said, "it is not always accurate and it cannot always be done with complete success when dealing with mummies. Until we know for sure that it is accurate, we will not use it in our research."
In December 2000, a joint team from Waseda University in Japan and Cairo's Ain Shams University tried to get permission for DNA testing of Egyptian mummies, but was denied by the Egyptian Government. Hawass stated at the time that DNA analysis was out of the question because it would not lead to anything.
In February 2010, Hawass and his team announced that they had analyzed the mummies of Tutankhamun and ten other mummies and said that the king could have died from a malaria infection that followed a leg fracture. German researchers Christian Timmann and Christian Meyer have cast doubt on this theory, suggesting other possible alternatives for Tutankhamun's cause of death.
In 2012, a study signed by Hawass disclosed that Ramses III may have had a haplogroup E1b1a that most dominant in Sub-Saharan Africa, and it also occurs at moderate frequencies in North Africa, West Asia, and Southern Europe.
A 2020 study by Gad, Hawass, et al. analysed mitochondrial and Y-chromosomal haplogroups from Tutankhamun's family members of the 18th Dynasty, using comprehensive control procedures to ensure quality results. The study found that the Y-chromosome haplogroup of the family was R1b. Haplogroup R1b is carried by modern Egyptians. Modern Egypt is also the only African country that is known to harbor all three R1 subtypes, including R1b-M269. While mitochondrial linage was found to be on K and H2b, both haplogroups did not originate in Africa yet it exists in both Ancient and Modern Egyptians.
On Afrocentrism