Heroes, travellers and villains: the early history of Egyptology involves a cast of fascinating and often flamboyant characters. Some of them, such as the circus strongman Giovanni Belzoni, are practically household names. Many popular books have recounted the highlights of the colourful early days, but a definitive synthesis has been long overdue. Jason Thompson, author of esteemed biographies of pioneer Egyptologist John Gardner Wilkinson and orientalist Edward William Lane, has now turned his formidable talents to a comprehensive history of Egyptology. He plans a three-volume study, of which this is the first, covering Antiquity to 1881: the dawn of Egyptology's golden age.

Thompson takes us back as far as the Setem-priest Khaemwaset of the Fifth Dynasty, who had a passion for restoring ancient monuments. He treats familiar and less well-known Greek and Roman authors, and points out that medieval European travellers knew more about Egypt than is often assumed. Enlightenment visitors to this then little-known country included the French consul Benoît de Maillet, who made a memorable study of the Pyramids of Giza in the very early eighteenth century, and the well-known travellers Frederik Norden and Richard Pococke. Two French observers, Claude Savary and Constantin Volnay, described modern, rather than ancient, Egypt and assessed its suitability as a French colony. Napoleon read their books and took Volnay's account with him when he invaded Egypt in 1798. He also brought with him a commission of 151 experts, charged with studying Egypt, ancient and modern. The artist and writer Baron Vivant Denon also accompanied Napoleon. His popular account of his travels enjoyed a wider popularity than the commission's monumental Description de l’Égypte, which took years to appear. After Napoleon, Thompson casts a much wider antiquarian net than merely dwelling on such familiar characters as Giovanni Belzoni, Bernardino Drovetti and Henry Salt. He places Jean-François Champollion's partial decipherment of hieroglyphs in a much wider context, and introduces us to less well-known pioneers, among them William Richard Hamilton, who travelled through Egypt in 1801 during the chaotic years following the French withdrawal.

Thompson travels well-researched territory with the decipherment of hieroglyphs, but he brings to it a valuable perception of the years during and after Champollion's partial decipherment. The artist and antiquarian John Gardner Wilkinson was highly influential. His shadow looms large over a constellation of antiquarians, avid travellers and artists, who helped lay the foundations of today's Egyptology. Alas, much of their work remains unpublished and largely forgotten. Their number includes the wealthy dilettante William Bankes, also the Scot Robert Hay and his artist Joseph Bonomi, who explored and recorded important sites. It was Hay who employed the artist Frederick Catherwood, later famous for his Maya paintings, to work along the Nile. There were tourists such as Lord Prudhoe, who acquired a large collection that is now at Durham University. All kinds of fascinating historical titbits emerge, among them the revelation that an obscure Irish parson, Edward Hincks, known for his research on Assyrian cuneiform, tried unsuccessfully to encourage follow-up research on ancient Egyptian language and script in Britain. Wonderful things weaves an engaging tapestry of discovery out of the well-known and the obscure, forming an invaluable synthesis as well as being a smooth read.

Champollion's celebrated Nile expedition of 1828 was the first government-sponsored exploration of ancient Egypt, but there was somewhat of a lull after his untimely death. Two classics defined mid-nineteenth century knowledge of ancient Egypt—Wilkinson's Manners and customs of the ancient Egyptians (1837) and Edward William Lane's equivalent on the modern Egyptians, published a year earlier. Then there were Richard William Howard Vyse's energetic and gunpowder-defined investigations of the Pyramids of Giza, published in 1840. The French adventurer and antiquarian Émile Prisse d’Avennes made meticulous drawings, plans and watercolours, but much of his work still remains unpublished. Similar to Hay and his colleagues, this gifted artist and scholar has remained undeservedly in the shadows. Thompson discusses other scholars and collectors as well, but they pale into insignificance against the great Prussian expedition, led by philologist Karl Richard Lepsius during 1842–1845. Lepsius travelled as far upstream as Khartoum and the Blue Nile, visiting Meroe. The 12 folio volumes of his Denkmäler (1849–1859) formed a unique, and then definitive, description of ancient Egypt.

Two chapters chronicle the aggressive collecting of Egyptian antiquities by European museums, which accelerated after the 1830s. The market for antiquities was very lucrative, fuelled both by acquisitive museum curators and by private collectors, as well as a burgeoning tourist trade after the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. The chapter ‘Taking possession of Egypt for the cause of science’ places the celebrated Frenchman Auguste Mariette in his proper context, including his work on Verdi's Aida, performed in Cairo in 1871. A welcome chapter discusses the often neglected topic of the depiction of ancient Egypt in art, photography and literature, which pays tribute not only to novelist Amelia Edwards, often called the ‘Queen of Egyptology’, but more obscure figures such as the consumptive Lucie Duff Gordon, who lived atop the Luxor Temple during the 1860s, and the pioneer photographer Francis Frith, who made a fortune cornering the raisin market, then took up photography. The book ends with Egyptology and Egyptian archaeology in a precarious state, with uncertain prospects on the eve of a new era of discovery, to be described in volume II.

Wonderful things is a rare treasure of Egyptology and historiography, based on meticulous, often very obscure, research and turned into a mellifluous narrative. This is no catalogue of heroes and villains, but a balanced and measured account that is a definitive history and a first-rate read at the same time. One eagerly awaits the two forthcoming volumes in this remarkable story, written by a scholar with considerable academic and literary gifts. And, as a bonus, he promises us a separate volume devoted entirely to illustrations of all kinds to amplify the story. By any standards, this book is a remarkable achievement. Just the Notes and comprehensive Bibliography are worth the price of admission.