From 18-20 April 2006 there were the regular "Readings" organized by the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the State Hermitage and the Oriental Department of St Petersburg State University. This year the "Readings" were scheduled to coincide with the 150th anniversary of the birth of the outstanding Russian Egyptologist Vladimir Semenovich Golenishchev. During the conference, expert Egyptologists who assembled from various cities around Russia delivered 18 reports. The reports by researchers into Ancient Egypt touched upon various issues relating to the history, philology, religion and epigraphic aspects of the ancient civilization of Egypt.

In a report entitled “Models of derivation for the morphemes km, nm, wn,” A.G. Sushchevsky set out his understanding of the process of formation of the given morphemes of numerous derivatives. M.A. Chegodaev delivered a paper on "Linear hieroglyphics an its place in Ancient Egyptian Writing" in which he tried not only to trace how this special system of writing down the Egyptian language arose but also to comment on the special features of its use, determined above all by the specific features of texts written in linear hieroglyphs

The philological part of the conference was represented by Kh.V. Anokhina's report on "Revealing the author's style in ancient Egyptian didactic literature." She attempted to apply grammatical and syntactic analysis to texts in order to reveal the extent to which the language varied in one and the same work written down at different times by different scribes.

A.A. Nemirovsky delivered a report entitled "How should the tale of Apopi and Sekenenr have ended? Egyptian literary folklore and the subject ÀÀ *922 I". The researcher tired to find parallels in world folklore for the subject of the Egyptian tale in which real historical rulers Egypt are the main characters, and he suggested possible versions for reconstructing its lost concluding part.

Historical topics were touched upon in the reports of A.E. Demidchik on "The history of domain properties in the Heracleopol monarchy," V.A. Golovina's report on "Sebeknefru - empress-ruler of Egypt," and in I.A. Ladynin's paper entitled "The construction program of the Argeads in Egypt in the context of temple construction of the XXIX-XXX dynasties."

Questions of fine art were the subjects of the presentations by E.A. Romanova "Servants êà and depictions of performing rituals in tomb scenes of the Giza necropolis in the period of the Ancient Kingdom," in F.I. Kulikova's paper "Iconography of the aristocracy in a boat of reeds. The question of combination of forms in old Egyptian wall art," as well as in N.V. Lavrentieva's "Description of another world and the pictorial structure of the Book of Two Paths." In I.V. Bogoslovskaya's report "Principles of reconstructing the typology of a costume (based on materials of the tombs of Mersiankh III and Kauaba)" the author demonstrated how large was the number of different costumes worn by wealthy people as early as in the Old Kingdom. She offered different versions of explanations for the many functions of clothing among the Ancient

Egyptians. Î.À. Vasilieva gave a speech on Osiris and Mitra. Using a great deal of illustrated material, the author showed how the cult of the god Osiris assumed diverse and often unexpected forms in the Late Roman period. A.O. Bolshakova' report on "The first Egyptian sacrificial formulae" a detailed analysis was given of the earliest versions of sacrificial formulae used over practically the entire history of Egypt. Bolshakova showed what real ritual practice stood behind the phrases in the formulae.