Conservation of second Khufu's boat begins in Cairo

Submitted by Barbara Borghese on

CAIRO: A significant fragment believed to be from a ship built for King Khufu has been unearthed from a site near the Great Pyramid at Giza. The plank is made of cedar wood and measures 26 metres (85 feet); it is believed to be part of a second boat discovered at this site in 1954, together with another boat, now housed in The Khufu Boat Museum, a small modern facility resting alongside the Great Pyramid. The two boat were first located by archaeologist Kamal El-Mallakh with Zaki Nour, who found the pits during routing cleaning of the southern side of the Great pyramid.
The team working on the recovery of the fragment have so far already uncovered 700 pieces of the boat and now believe that they have unearthed most of its pieces.
The fragments were located in a pit nearly three meters underground. They were moved to a nearby temporary conservation facility where they will receive the first treatments to stabilise their conditions.
The team working on the boat is composed of conservators and archaeologists from Japan and Egypt; once the work is complete it is hoped that the boat will be exhibited in the Grand Egyptian Museum scheduled to open in 2018.