General Info

ARCE MAKING A DIFFERENCEThe American Research Center in Egypt ( ARCE ) is remarkably active in supporting scholarship, training, and conservation efforts in Egypt. Among ARCE s many great achievements is our relationship with the Supreme Council of Antiquities ( SCA ) within the Egyptian Ministry of Culture, without whom our work would not be possible. ARCE is viewed as making important contributions that serve to help Egypt directly in its pursuit of cultural heritage preservation.The American Research Center in Egypt ( ARCE ) is a private, nonprofit organization founded in 1948 by a consortium of educational and cultural institutions to support research on all aspects of Egyptian history and culture, foster broader knowledge among the general public, and strengthen American-Egyptian cultural ties.ARCE was formally established in Boston on May 14, 1948, at a meeting presided over by Harvard s Edward W. Forbes and Archaeological Institute of America President Sterling Dow. It was attended by some of the era s most distinguished Egyptological scholars and institutional leaders. This meeting was the culmination of a growing sense, in the years immediately following World War II, that there was a great need to establish an official presence for North American scholars in Egypt. Although during the early part of the twentieth century, leading American archaeological institutions had conducted major excavations in Egypt, there was no central office in Cairo serving these institutions in their fieldwork or associated research.ARCE was formally incorporated under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1950, and the Cairo Center was opened in 1951, using temporary space in a small office within the U.S. Office of Information and Educational Exchange.The founding members of ARCE understood that in the postwar era, Americans were in urgent need of greater knowledge of the Arab world, of which Cairo was the cultural center, and the Center s scope soon broadened to cover the study of medieval and modern Egypt as well. At the 1957 annual meeting, Edward Forbes put it thus: