A Lichfieldian in Egypt: Henry Salt's contribution to Egyptology more

A resident of Lichfield and a researcher of her local community history, the author provides an insight into the life of Lichfield-born Henry Salt (1780 – 1827); an artist, author, explorer of foreign lands, antiquity enthusiast and British Consul-General in Cairo in the early nineteenth century, when Muhammad Ali Pasha was the viceroy of Egypt and the Sudan. The paper is a brief discussion of the Egyptology-related activities of Salt, from commissioning archaeological digs to collecting antiquities and authoring an essay about the decipherment of hieroglyphs. Moreover, the author refers to the contribution of this enigmatic man to Egyptology and investigates why Henry Salt was, and still is, a misunderstood person by many. Last, this research presents a set of results on the size of the awareness of Salt's name among the members of Lichfield community and interrogates why this man is not placed among the famous men and women of the city.