In “Dinner with King Tut,” Sam Kean examines how a burgeoning field is recreating ancient tasks to uncover historical truths.

Key Takeaways

• Experimental archaeology adds emotional and sensory depth to history by replicating ancient tasks and experiences.
• Though sometimes dismissed as a hobby, this hands-on field can generate valuable hypotheses and challenge entrenched assumptions.
• By engaging with the lives of people from the past, experimental archaeology helps practitioners reconnect with shared human experiences.

I have always enjoyed learning about history, and true to the cliché, the older I get the more I relish the subject. However, I’ve recently realized that my beloved history books — and documentaries and podcasts, for that matter — often lack something.

Histories will go into extraordinary detail about the past, presenting readers with the nitty-gritty on how Neolithic hunters tracked game or how Egyptians baked bread or how medieval doctors mixed up their favorite salves. But too often missing from these details are the sensory experiences of our ancestors’ worlds — the sights, sounds, tastes, pains, and euphorias that gave their lives depth and vibrancy.

Absent those, history becomes less a story we can engage with and more a still-life diorama we view through glass. The result is disconnection from our shared past and the value it brings to our modern lives. Ask yourself for a moment not just how Neolithic hunters tracked their wounded prey, but what focus must they have had to fight through the miles of gnawing stitches and sweat-stung eyes? Not just why medieval physicians dressed wounds in a puree of onions, garlic, wine, and ox gall, but how scary life must have been if that’s your go-to antiseptic?

These types of questions lay the groundwork for a different kind of archaeology, and I recently found answers to them all in Sam Kean’s new book, Dinner with King Tut (2025).

Since 2010’s The Disappearing Spoon, Kean has been chronicling the lesser-known corners of science history. His latest book explores the world of experimental archaeology, whose practitioners attempt to recreate past tasks to gather data and test hypotheses. These are the folk who aren’t content to just study artifacts. They’re the ones who want to cook the meals, tan the hides, drive the chariots, and even make the mummies (yes, seriously) with the same tools our ancestors did (or as close as possible). Think hardcore reenactors with a scientific attitude.

Not content to sit back, observe, and watch someone else have all the fun — or, in some cases, the exact opposite — Kean joined in these experiments. I recently sat down with him to discuss what he learned from trying to experience the past firsthand.

A lesson in history and hip checks

Kean obviously has a fondness for history; he’s written seven books on the subject, so I was surprised when he confessed that he has always found archaeology to be rather dull. The feeling proved especially strong when he visited field sites.

“No matter where I was in the world, it was just scores of sunburned men and women sprawled in the dirt, dusting off broken pot shards with toothbrushes. And not for a few hours, but day after day, year after year. It was such a letdown, the most godawful tedium I could imagine,” he writes in the introduction to Dinner with King Tut.

Still, he adores the field for its stirring conclusions and the “deep questions about humankind’s origins” it helps us answer. It’s just the process of getting there that he finds trying, and this ambivalence toward archaeology frustrated him. Then, over the past few years, he began slowly “gathering string” on the burgeoning field of experimental archaeology and decided to give it a go.

His self-experiments spanned the historical gamut — from 75,000 B.C. to 1500s A.D., Çatalhöyük to China. He tanned animal hides. He made a canteen from an ostrich egg. He fired a trebuchet and medieval cannon. He even styled hair in the high Roman fashion. During our conversation, I asked him which of his experiments proved the most surprising or fascinating. His answer: ullamaliztli.

Ullamaliztli is a Mesoamerican ballgame. It was suppressed after the Spanish conquest in the 16th century, but survived in some remote provinces. Today, it is undergoing a revival in Mexico, where it is popularly known as ulama (ullamaliztli was its Aztec name). This makes it one of the oldest continuously played sports in the world.

To experience the game, Kean partnered up with Arturo Sánchez, a robotics engineer and ullamaliztli enthusiast, and even got to play on an authentic Aztec court.

Like its name, the game’s rules can vary, but most require players to bat around a “cantaloupe-sized” rubber ball (~15 pounds) using only their hips. Luckily, a player’s hips are protected by a stylish-yet-practical loincloth made of leather and cotton. The gear is patterned after the Aztecs’ — the ball was even sourced from the same rubber trees. But while authentic, Kean writes, the loincloth does come with the unfortunate side effect of crushing one’s groin to “neutron-star density.”

An illustration of Aztecs playing ullamaliztli, drawn by Christoph Weiditz in 1528. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

“I usually don’t think about archaeology and sports going together,” Kean says, “but it was a nice treat. It ended up being one of my favorite sections of the book just because I was floundering around.”

In fairness, any hip-based sport is likely to have a heck of a learning curve. Kean describes the gameplay as a fusion between soccer and tennis: soccer because you score by knocking the ball past your opponent’s end line; tennis because you have to rally the ball between the teams. Should the ball lose momentum and fall to the ground, players’ only recourse is to flail about. For Kean, it felt like “trying to play hockey without knowing how to ice skate.”

“It made for an interesting scene because you get to experience all the frustrations and emotions of it. I think that’s an important part of experimental archaeology,” Kean tells me.

Another surprising experience for Kean was knapping — the practice of shaping stone tools with a hammerstone (read: a big, dense, round rock). Before trying it himself, Kean fell for what his instructor, Metin Eren, an anthropologist at Kent State University, calls the “2001 fallacy.” Named after the famous scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey, it’s the belief that our Neolithic ancestors made tools by smashing rocks together until something helpful could be salvaged from the rubble.

But knapping is a precise process. Master knappers like Eren know their tools as well as any carpenter, and they can determine what a flint, chert, or obsidian piece will produce after only a few thwacks.

“I didn’t understand the precision involved in it and how precisely you can make these tools,” Kean tells me.

Of course, not every experience proved as rewarding. One had him urine-tanning salmon skin in his spare bathroom. Apparently, ancient Canadians, Japanese, and Scandinavians tanned fish for use in items such as boots and clothing. But even with modern conveniences like Tupperware, the smell of urine and fish skin aging proved, well, nasty.

“There are some [experiences] I would revisit,” Kean says. “Not that one.”

The beginnings of a flint arrowhead knapped by a modern practitioner. (Credit: Vera Kuttelvaserova / Adobe Stock)

A field of half-baked ideas?

Something I noticed reading Kean’s book is that experimental archaeology appears to be an incredibly diverse field. It brings together academics like Eren and hobbyists like Sánchez, all of whom pursue experiences in the hopes of contributing to our knowledge of the past while also passing these traditions on.

“Passion is a big part of it,” Kean tells me. “There’s also the desire to know more about the past. It’s those two things working together.”

However, not everyone sees experimental archaeology as worthwhile. For detractors, the field is at best an avocation — a fun way to spend one’s weekend hours, but not a legitimate source of data that can be translated into knowledge about the past.

Kean understands where this mindset comes from. Academics in any field have to fend off all manner of kooky ideas proposed by cranks wanting to fast-track their pet theories without putting in the time and effort to validate them properly. That goes double for archaeologists and triple for Egyptologists, who must contend with bonkers supernatural explanations for things like how the pyramids were built. (“I’m not saying it was aliens, but it was aliens” is a meme for a reason.)

Setting aside the cranks, archaeologists also worry over the field’s empirical rigor. After all, just because you can perform a task in a way that resembles something our ancestors did, doesn’t necessarily mean you have transported yourself into a historical mindset. You may inadvertently use knowledge or techniques unknown to our ancestors, which can throw off the veracity of your results.

The Pyramid of Giza. Archaeologists have a good understanding of many aspects of how the Egyptian pyramids were built. While some details remain open questions up for debate, there is no evidence that aliens played a role in their construction. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

Kean mentions one such story in his book. Seamus Blakely, a video game designer with a passion for heirloom foods, attempted to bake bread in the style of the ancient Egyptians. His initial attempts proved questionable for several reasons, such as using yeast strains that weren’t available to the Egyptians. When he posted the results online, several people called him out over his lack of authenticity — including his wife.

Blakely took these criticisms to heart and refined his experiment; however, the story shows that archaeologists have legitimate concerns over experimental archaeology. Even if an experiment seems perfect, we should be careful about what conclusions we draw from it.

That said, Kean’s experiences suggest to him that experimental archaeology isn’t a distraction from traditional archaeology. It’s complementary.

While no modern experiment can perfectly replicate what these tasks were like for our ancestors, experimental archaeology provides opportunities to challenge entrenched assumptions, test hypotheses, and generate new questions to ask of the historical record. It can also enrich the field with outsider knowledge (the non-kooky variety) and help reconnect people with our history, especially those who may find more traditional approaches a bit dull.

And the passion Kean mentioned means that many of these “hobbyists” are dedicated to improving their empirical rigor where possible. Take Blakely. After taking a hard look at his recipe’s shortcomings, he gathered a “nerd army” to bake the most authentic Egyptian bread he could. His team collected yeast from ancient pottery. They built replicas of conical bread molds. They even sourced the same acacia wood.

“He worked really hard to make sure he was using authentic materials,” Kean says. “[Sometimes], I think the barriers are a little high, and that probably contributes to the rift. Just because a person doesn’t have academic training doesn’t mean that their knowledge is irrelevant.”

We were the 99%

Kean analogizes the current state of experimental archaeology with other sciences during the 18th and 19th centuries. At the time, biology, psychology, geology, and even archaeology were beginning to solidify into the scientific disciplines we recognize today. They were also considered hobbies for doctors, clergymen, and other gentlemen of means with the leisure time to spare. 

His point is that instead of gatekeeping, academia could help develop the field’s practices and theoretical framework to make it more rigorous and limit problematic inferences. In fact, many academics, including master knapper Eren, are doing just that.

“I think anyone can benefit from doing or thinking about such experiments — whether it’s testing some theory you have or going whole hog and just doing it because you want to experience what these people experienced,” Kean says. “You do have to be careful with the kind of things you’re going to do, but as long as you are careful, it can really enrich our understanding of the past.”

For me, another way that experimental archaeology seems complementary to more traditional archaeology is in its focus. 

In its early days, archaeology was more akin to treasure hunting than science. The field obsessed over unearthing Pharaoh’s tombs, ancient crown jewels, and the ruins of grand temples. This was partly because funding came from museums, foundations, and wealthy collectors who sought spectacular finds to exhibit. It was also partly because many practitioners were wealthy themselves and desired to have their legacies associated with history’s renowned people and places.

The cautionary tale here is that of German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann, who claimed to have found the site of the historical Troy in 1873 and then destroyed the city again in a rushed excavation in search of Priam’s treasure. (His example is also one of many for why today’s archaeologists favor trowels and brushes over pickaxes.)

Sophia Schliemann wears some of the jewelry Heinrich recovered from the site of the historical Troy. Although Heinrich believed they belonged to Priam’s treasure trove, they were later found to belong to an entirely different civilization. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

After World War II, archaeology expanded to include practitioners from all walks of life. Fieldwork funding also diversified, coming from sources more concerned with historical analysis, such as government grants. The result is what archaeologist Jeremy Sabloff called the shift from archaeology of the 1% to the 99%.

Now, if you are fabulously wealthy and can hire a large group of very understanding employees, I suppose you could try to experiment with what it was like to be a pharaoh. But for most experimental archaeologists, the joy of these experiences comes from connecting with the 99% — those countless men and women whose names are forgotten to time but who nonetheless built our history day after day.

“It’s fun to read about kings and generals and the like, but if you’re immersed in the life of an everyday person, it’s more relatable,” Kean says. “You can relate it back to your own life as well.”

And that’s exactly what his experiments did for him. On the one hand, the experiences showed him all the wonderful and hard-earned aspects of modern life that we often take for granted, such as clothing stores, indoor plumbing, and antiseptics that don’t list ox gall as an active ingredient. 

On the other hand, these experiences also revealed to him the things we’ve lost along the way and how our disconnection from these traditions has rendered some aspects of the world “ghostly” by comparison. 

“In some ways, [these experiences] also highlighted some of the emptier aspects of modern times. If you had to make your own food or stone tools, there was a benefit to that because it wasn’t just something disposable. It’s not something you were just going to toss away because you put a lot more of yourself into that thing. It helps us get in touch with our deeper humanity and get over some of the discontents of modern times.”