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Thursday, April 29, 2021

A Pregnant Ancient Egyptian Mummy Has Been Discovered in a Shocking World First

https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-have-identified-the-world-s-first-ever-pregnant-embalmed-egyptian-mummy


Photo and scans of the mummy. (Ejsmond et al., J. Archaeol. Sci., 2021)

A Pregnant Ancient Egyptian Mummy Has Been Discovered in a Shocking World First

30 APRIL 2021

At first, archaeologists thought they were scanning the mummy of an ancient Egyptian priest named Hor-Djehuty. Then, in the body's abdomen, images revealed what appeared to be the bones of a tiny foot.

Full scans confirmed it: the foot belonged to a tiny fetus, still in the womb of its deceased and mummified mother.

Not only is this the first time a deliberately mummified pregnant woman has been found, it presents a fascinating mystery. Who was the woman? And why was she mummified with her fetus? So peculiar is the discovery, scientists have named her the Mysterious Lady of the National Museum in Warsaw.

"For unknown reasons, the fetus had not been removed from the abdomen during the mummification," archaeologist Wojciech Ejsmond of the Polish Academy of Sciences told Science in Poland.

"For this reason, the mummy is really unique. Our mummy is the only one identified so far in the world with a fetus in the womb."

The mummy and its sarcophagus were donated to the University of Warsaw in 1826 and kept in the National Museum in Warsaw, Poland since 1917. The artifact actually has an interesting history. The mummy was initially thought to be female, likely because of the elaborate sarcophagus.

mummy setThe coffin, cartonnage case, and mummy. (National Museum in Warsaw, Warsaw Mummy Project)

It wasn't until around 1920 when the name on the coffin and cartonnage was translated that perception shifted. The writing revealed that the interred was named Hor-Djehuty, and was highly placed.

"Scribe, priest of Horus-Thoth worshiped as a visiting deity in the Mount of Djeme, royal governor of the town of Petmiten, Hor-Djehuty, justified by voice, son of Padiamonemipet and lady of a house Tanetmin," the translation read.

In 2016, however, computer tomography revealed that the mummy in the sarcophagus may not have actually been Hor-Djehuty. The bones were too delicate, male reproductive organs were missing, and a three-dimensional reconstruction revealed breasts.

Given that artifacts weren't exactly handled with the best care in the 19th century, and given that the coffin and cartonnage were indeed made for a male mummy, it seems that an entirely different mummy was placed in the sarcophagus at some point - perhaps to be passed off as a more valuable artifact.

This is supported by damage to some of the mummy's bandages - likely caused by 19th century looters rifling through looking for amulets, the researchers said.

Thus, it's impossible to know who exactly the woman was, or even if she came from Thebes where the coffin was found; however, a few facts can be gauged from her remains.

Firstly, she was mummified with great care, and with a rich set of amulets, suggesting in and of itself that she was someone important - mummification was a luxury in ancient Egypt, unavailable to most.

abdominalX-ray and CT scans of the mummy's abdomen, revealing the fetus. (Ejsmond et al., J. Archaeol. Sci., 2021)

She died just over 2,000 years ago, in approximately the first century BCE, between the ages of 20 and 30, and the development of the fetus suggests she was between 26 and 30 weeks pregnant.

As the first-ever discovery of a pregnant embalmed mummy, the Mysterious Lady poses fascinating questions about ancient Egyptian spiritual beliefs, the researchers said. Did the ancient Egyptians believe that unborn fetuses could go on to the afterlife, or was this mummy a strange anomaly?

It's unclear how she died, but the team believes that analysis of the mummy's preserved soft tissues might yield some clues.

"High mortality during pregnancy and childbirth in those times is not a secret," Ejsmond said. "Therefore, we believe that pregnancy could somehow contribute to the death of the young woman."

The team's research has been published in the Journal of Archaeological Science.

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Journal of Near Eastern Studies: Press release

https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/journals/jnes/pr/210419

New evidence of the importance of the Roman/Byzantine Mons Smaragdus settlement within the emerald mining network

A new paper published in the Journal of Near Eastern Studies presents the results of and images from the resuming of the archaeological seasons in the Mons Smaragdus region in the Egyptian Eastern Desert. The region is known for Roman-era emerald mines, chronicled by authors like Pliny the Elder and Claudius Ptolemy, were rediscovered in the 19th century by the French mineralogist Fréderic Cailliaud. During the 1990s a team from the "Berenike Project" started to survey the area and conducted the first excavations, focusing on the main site identified, Sikait, where the archaeological seasons resumed in January of 2018 and January 2020.

The Large Temple of Sikait seen from the wadi                  floor.

In "New evidence regarding emerald production in Roman Egypt coming from Wadi Sikait (Eastern Desert)" authors J. Oller Guzmán, D. Fernández Abella, V. Trevín Pita, O. Achon Casas, and S. García-Dils de la Vega detail what was found in three buildings. The first structure, referred to as the "Administrative building," was likely a temple long occupied between the 1st and the 4th-5th centuries. Nineteen coins were recovered at the site, along with other items indicating ritual use like incense burners and bronze and steatite figurines. The "Large Temple," one of the most well-preserved structures standing in Sikait, also contained religious artifacts like bones, terracotta body parts, and amulets, and was likely occupied between the 4th and the 5th centuries AD, although inner shrines were possibly used earlier, based on surviving traces of Egyptian hieroglyph and other materials. Finally, the "Six Windows Building" complex, possibly a residential space, included an older inner cavity, which may have been related to mining activity. However, concerning this type of structures, common in Sikait, the authors write, "After analyzing most of these spaces, we can conclude that almost none of them can be identified as beryl mines, and mainly we are dealing with storage or living spaces." Nevertheless, the study of the underground structures presents in Sikait and the surrounding areas allowed the documentation of several beryl mining spaces. The detailed analysis of some mines showed relevant evidence concerning their structure, typology, and evolution, including the discovery of the first register inscription ever found in an ancient emerald mine.

These excavation seasons, the authors write, add to knowledge about emerald production in Roman Egypt. "First, it confirmed the significance of the religious aspect in mining settlements like ancient Senskis." This shows the importance of the settlement within the emerald mining network, as there is no other site in which a similar concentration of cult spaces has been recorded. "This links Sikait to other productive regions in the Eastern Desert, which also offer plentiful evidence of the importance of cult and religion, like the imperial quarries."

The authors propose this work will provide key evidence in the future for determining how exactly were the mines exploited. Future seasons will focus on documenting the mining complexes to get a complete overview of the process of extraction and commercialization of emeralds, which will provide greater historical context. "According to literary sources such as Olympiodorus, in the 5th century AD a permit from the king of the Blemmyes was required to enter the emerald mines." Considering that most of the surviving structures in Sikait date to this period, archaeological information from such sites are fundamental for understanding the progressive abandonment of the Roman/Byzantine control in this area and the gradual substitution by the Blemmyan power.

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Wednesday, April 28, 2021

Scientists Find First Evidence on Dental Surgeries in Ancient Egypt | Asharq AL-awsat

https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2943781/scientists-find-first-evidence-dental-surgeries-ancient-egypt

Scientists Find First Evidence on Dental Surgeries in Ancient Egypt

Wednesday, 28 April, 2021 - 05:30

Scientists Find First Evidence on Dental Surgeries in Ancient Egypt

Wednesday, 28 April, 2021 - 05:30
Archaeologists remove the cover of an intact sarcophagus inside a tomb in Luxor, Egypt. Reuters file photo

A virtual autopsy of the Osirmose's mummy, the doorkeeper of the Temple of Re, revealed several medical interventions in the mouth area that likely took place throughout the life of Osirmose.


This is the first evidence on the use of oral surgeries in Ancient Egypt. The studied mummy belongs to the Royal Museum of Art and History in Belgium.


Osirmose lived during the 25th dynasty, and was a member of a prominent family of Thebes' priests. His mummy was among the memorabilia of the Swedish Antiquarian Giovanni Anastasi, and was sold after his death at an auction to a Belgian antiquities collector, and then to the Royal Museum of Art and History in Belgium.


During the study, published in the latest issue of the journal Ojs earlier this month, researchers at the Saint Luc University performed a virtual autopsy on the Egyptian mummy using a three-dimensional (3D) high-resolution computed tomography (CT) scan. The taken images were later examined by a multidisciplinary team composed of radiologists, archaeologists, and oral and maxillofacial surgeons.


The researchers confirmed the mummy belonged to a man. They found the heart, aorta, and kidneys inside the mummy's body. Brain excerebration was performed, and artificial eyes were added above the stuffing of eye globes.


The teeth decay was more obvious in the upper maxilla, where the researchers discovered several anomalies including a rectangular hole on the palatine side of tooth n°26. The palatine root of tooth n°26 was missing.


Based on these findings, the researchers believe that this study provides the first evidence of a tooth removal site, and of oral surgery procedures previously conducted in old Egyptian embalmed mummy.


Archaeologists remove the cover of an intact sarcophagus inside a tomb in Luxor, Egypt. Reuters file photo

A virtual autopsy of the Osirmose's mummy, the doorkeeper of the Temple of Re, revealed several medical interventions in the mouth area that likely took place throughout the life of Osirmose.


This is the first evidence on the use of oral surgeries in Ancient Egypt. The studied mummy belongs to the Royal Museum of Art and History in Belgium.


Osirmose lived during the 25th dynasty, and was a member of a prominent family of Thebes' priests. His mummy was among the memorabilia of the Swedish Antiquarian Giovanni Anastasi, and was sold after his death at an auction to a Belgian antiquities collector, and then to the Royal Museum of Art and History in Belgium.


During the study, published in the latest issue of the journal Ojs earlier this month, researchers at the Saint Luc University performed a virtual autopsy on the Egyptian mummy using a three-dimensional (3D) high-resolution computed tomography (CT) scan. The taken images were later examined by a multidisciplinary team composed of radiologists, archaeologists, and oral and maxillofacial surgeons.


The researchers confirmed the mummy belonged to a man. They found the heart, aorta, and kidneys inside the mummy's body. Brain excerebration was performed, and artificial eyes were added above the stuffing of eye globes.


The teeth decay was more obvious in the upper maxilla, where the researchers discovered several anomalies including a rectangular hole on the palatine side of tooth n°26. The palatine root of tooth n°26 was missing.


Based on these findings, the researchers believe that this study provides the first evidence of a tooth removal site, and of oral surgery procedures previously conducted in old Egyptian embalmed mummy.


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Tuesday, April 27, 2021

Northern Cal. Egyptology Lecture May 2 - The Life and Deeds of Luigi Vassalli: Painter, Patriot and Egyptologist






The American Research Center in Egypt, Northern California Chapter, and the Near Eastern Studies Department, University of California, Berkeley, invite you to attend a virtual lecture by Dr. Francesco Tiradritti, Director, Italian Archaeological Mission to Luxor



The Life and Deeds of Luigi Vassalli: Painter, Patriot and Egyptologist

When: Sunday, May 2, 2021, 3 PM Pacific Time

Zoom Lecture. A registration link will be automatically sent to ARCE-NC members. Non-members may request a registration link by sending email with your name and email address to arcencZoom@gmail.com. Attendance is limited, so non-members, please send any registration requests no later than April 30.

Glenn Meyer
Publicity Director

About the Lecture:
May 30
Luigi Vassalli (photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons)

Luigi Vassalli was born in 1812 in Milan. In 1828 he enrolled at the Brera Academy and around this period he joined the Mazzinian activism but after a failed conspiracy he was sentenced to death, only to be pardoned but exiled. He moved in several places across Europe and later he traveled to Egypt where he began working for the local government.

In 1848 Vassalli returned to his homeland to join the revolutionary movements against the Austrian Empire, but after the failure he returned to Egypt where he became a portrait painter and an archaeological guide for wealthy foreigners. Around 1858 he was appointed Inspector of excavations by the French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette, who was Director of Antiquities at this time. Vassalli assisted in excavations at Giza and Saqqara until 1860, when he returned home to give his contribution to the Expedition of the Thousand led by Giuseppe Garibaldi. After the victory he was appointed First Class Conservator at the Naples National Archaeological Museum; however, the office was soon abolished by the still pro-Borbonic museum management and Vassalli again came back to Cairo.

In Egypt he made several archaeological explorations in many sites such as Tanis, Saqqara, Dendera and Edfu from 1861 to 1868. He sent many mummy remains to the Museo Civico di Storia Naturale of Milan and in 1871 he made around 150 casts from monuments exhibited in the Bulaq Museum which he brought to Florence with him. During his short stay here the Italian government asked him to inspect many Egyptian collections in Italy, after which he returned to his duties in Cairo.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f7/OiesdeMeidoum.JPGMeidum geese, museum of Cairo. Dimensions: 160 x 24 cm. Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Still in 1871, along with Mariette he discovered the mastaba of Nefermaat at Meidum, which is well known for the famous scene commonly referred as the "Meidum geese". Vassalli carefully removed the whole scene from the tomb wall and reassembled it inside the Bulaq Museum. This fact sparked a controversy over a century later in  2015, when  the Egyptologist Francesco Tiradritti suggested that the Meidum geese scene is a 19th-century forgery possibly made by Vassalli himself, a claim disputed  by Egyptian authorities, among them Zahi Hawass.

After Mariette's death in 1881, Vassalli became interim director until the installation of Gaston Maspero. He retired in 1884 and returned to Milan and then to Rome, where he committed suicide on June 13, 1887.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luigi_Vassalli
 
About the Speaker:



Dr. Francesco Tiradritti (Photo from francetvinfo.fr)


Francesco Tiradritti was born in Montepulciano, Italy, on August 17th, 1961. He is currently Director of the Italian Archaeological Mission to Luxor, where he is working in the Funerary Complex of Harwa (TT 37) and Akhimenru (TT 404) and the Tomb of Pabasa (TT 279). He received his PhD at the University of Rome "La Sapienza" with a doctoral thesis on the Propaganda on Royal Stelae of the XX Dynasty. He also obtained a D.E.A. at the University La Sorbonne in Paris.

Dr. Tiradritti has taken part in excavations in Italy, in the Sudan and at a several sites in Egypt – including the Tomb of Sheshonq (TT 27) and at Gebelein. He has worked for many years as consulting Egyptologist at the Civiche Raccolte Archeologiche of Milan. Additionally he has taught Egyptology in Enna, Naples, Foggia, Turin and at the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia. In 2004-2005 Dr. Tiradritti occupied the Dorothy K. Hohenberg Chair of Excellence in History of Art at the University of Memphis in Memphis, Tennessee. In 2013 he was scholar at the Getty Research Institute. He has been a member of the commission for the feasibility study of the Grand Egyptian Museum at Giza and for the renovation project of the Egyptian Museum in Turin. He has organized and worked on more than twenty exhibitions on various aspects of ancient Egyptian civilization in Italy, Hungary, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, Czech Republic and in Egypt.

He is the author of Ancient Egypt: Art, Architecture and History, published in 2002 in Italian, English, Spanish, & Chinese, and Egyptian Wall Paintings, published in 2008 in Italian, French, German, & English. Dr. Tiradritti is also the editor of Egyptian Treasures from the Egyptian Museum of Cairo, published in 1999 and translated into thirteen languages between 1998 and 2000. He has authored several scientific publications on Egyptology and Sudanese archaeology, and regularly writes for "The Art Newspaper" and "Archeologia Viva".

Dr. Triadritti's research focuses primarily on a semantic approach to archaeology, history of art and the culture of ancient Egypt.

About ARCE-NC:

For more information, please visit https://facebook.com/NorthernCaliforniaARCE/, https://arce-nc.org/, https://twitter.com/ARCENCPostings, or https://khentiamentiu.org. To join the chapter or renew your membership, please go to https://www.arce.org/become-arce-member and select "Berkeley, CA" as your chapter when you sign up.

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Egypt’s Center of Documentation &Studies on Ancient Egypt celebrates its 65th anniversary - EgyptToday

https://www.egypttoday.com/Article/4/101355/Egypt%E2%80%99s-Center-of-Documentation-Studies-on-Ancient-Egypt-celebrates-its

Egypt's Center of Documentation &Studies on Ancient Egypt celebrates its 65th anniversary

BY

Tue, 27 Apr 2021 - 11:10 GMT

 

 
The Center of Documentation and Studies on Ancient Egypt celebrated its 65th anniversary yesterday. It is  one of the most important archaeological scientific centers, and archive for documents and information, recording the most important archaeological work done in the last and current century. It's work extends to include the registration of Egyptian antiquities throughout the country.
 
Dr. Hisham Al-Leithy, head of the Center of Documentation and Studies on Ancient Egypt, explained that the idea behind establishing the center began after the launch of the international campaign to save Nubia temples by keeping track of them in a scientific manner before moving them from their original place. 
 
He added that one of the center's tasks is to record and study Egyptian antiquities and the scientific publications, and to provide scientists and researchers with the necessary scientific material for their studies. In addition to using the scientific registration work of restoration and periodic inspection carried out by the Supreme Council of Antiquities. The Center also preserves documents collected by registration and those exchanged with various scientific and technical entities and universities. 
 
- Achievements of the Egyptian Antiquities Registration Center 
 
The Center has witnessed many achievements in the field of archaeological work and scientific publishing since its establishment where it succeeded in registering and documenting a number of archaeological areas, where the center began to record and document the traces of Nubia, which was threatened to sink under the waters of Lake Nasser after the construction of the high dam. 
 
After the completion of the registration of Nubia temples before, during, and after the rescue operation, the Centre began to record and document various archaeological areas, including the registration of the cities of Luxor, Aswan, Esna, Asyut, and Alexandria. 
 
Antiquities of Luxor, including The Temple of Ramsium, the Temple of The City of Habu, The well-known tombs of the Valley of the Queens (Nefertari- Kha'a um Wast), the Valley of the Kings (Tutankhamun Cemetery - Amenhotep II Cemetery), as well as the tombs of al-Ashraf in the areas Sheikh Abdul Qurna, Al-Bokha, Al-Asaif, Abul Naga arm and Qarna Merhi, as well as the tombs of workers in the monastery of the city, including but not limited to Menena - Ramuza - Shay - Akht - Kh m Hat - Osser Hat). 
 
Also, the center recorded monuments in different governorates including the Temple of Esna, the Temple of Hibs in the courtyards outside, the Cemetery of Panhassi in the Area of Al Matarya in Cairo, the remains of a dead hostage, Sakara, and the pyramid, as well as the Temple of Sarabit al-Khadem in Sina. In addition to recording and documenting the statue of King Ramses II, which existed in Ramses Square in Cairo before it was transferred to the Grand Museum. 
 
In Aswan province, the 77 rock tombs in the air dome and cape cemeteries were recorded and documented. 
 
In Minya governorate, cemeteries in the areas of Tuna al-Jabal, Tal Al-Amarna, Fraser, Bani Hassan, Artmedos Cave (Antar Stable), Clinical Cabin, Sheikh Saeed Cemeteries and The Corner of the Dead were recorded and documented.

Egypt's Center of Documentation &Studies on Ancient Egypt celebrates its 65th anniversary

BY

Tue, 27 Apr 2021 - 11:10 GMT

 

 
The Center of Documentation and Studies on Ancient Egypt celebrated its 65th anniversary yesterday. It is  one of the most important archaeological scientific centers, and archive for documents and information, recording the most important archaeological work done in the last and current century. It's work extends to include the registration of Egyptian antiquities throughout the country.
 
Dr. Hisham Al-Leithy, head of the Center of Documentation and Studies on Ancient Egypt, explained that the idea behind establishing the center began after the launch of the international campaign to save Nubia temples by keeping track of them in a scientific manner before moving them from their original place. 
 
He added that one of the center's tasks is to record and study Egyptian antiquities and the scientific publications, and to provide scientists and researchers with the necessary scientific material for their studies. In addition to using the scientific registration work of restoration and periodic inspection carried out by the Supreme Council of Antiquities. The Center also preserves documents collected by registration and those exchanged with various scientific and technical entities and universities. 
 
- Achievements of the Egyptian Antiquities Registration Center 
 
The Center has witnessed many achievements in the field of archaeological work and scientific publishing since its establishment where it succeeded in registering and documenting a number of archaeological areas, where the center began to record and document the traces of Nubia, which was threatened to sink under the waters of Lake Nasser after the construction of the high dam. 
 
After the completion of the registration of Nubia temples before, during, and after the rescue operation, the Centre began to record and document various archaeological areas, including the registration of the cities of Luxor, Aswan, Esna, Asyut, and Alexandria. 
 
Antiquities of Luxor, including The Temple of Ramsium, the Temple of The City of Habu, The well-known tombs of the Valley of the Queens (Nefertari- Kha'a um Wast), the Valley of the Kings (Tutankhamun Cemetery - Amenhotep II Cemetery), as well as the tombs of al-Ashraf in the areas Sheikh Abdul Qurna, Al-Bokha, Al-Asaif, Abul Naga arm and Qarna Merhi, as well as the tombs of workers in the monastery of the city, including but not limited to Menena - Ramuza - Shay - Akht - Kh m Hat - Osser Hat). 
 
Also, the center recorded monuments in different governorates including the Temple of Esna, the Temple of Hibs in the courtyards outside, the Cemetery of Panhassi in the Area of Al Matarya in Cairo, the remains of a dead hostage, Sakara, and the pyramid, as well as the Temple of Sarabit al-Khadem in Sina. In addition to recording and documenting the statue of King Ramses II, which existed in Ramses Square in Cairo before it was transferred to the Grand Museum. 
 
In Aswan province, the 77 rock tombs in the air dome and cape cemeteries were recorded and documented. 
 
In Minya governorate, cemeteries in the areas of Tuna al-Jabal, Tal Al-Amarna, Fraser, Bani Hassan, Artmedos Cave (Antar Stable), Clinical Cabin, Sheikh Saeed Cemeteries and The Corner of the Dead were recorded and documented. 
 
In Assiut province, the tombs of the Western Mountain, the Short Amarna cemeteries, the Mir tombs, the tombs of Deir al-Jabrawi, Al-Humamiyah, Deir Riva, Deir al-Barsha and the border paintings of Akhenaten in the eastern region of Al-Huta were recorded and documented. 
 
In Alexandria province, Mustafa Kamel's tombs, Anfushi tombs, Al-Shatabi tombs, Al-Wardan cemetery, The Kum al-Shaqafa area, which includes Katacombe Cemetery, Tigran Cemetery, Salvajo Cemetery, as well as the Al-Sawari Column area, which includes the Temple of Sarabium, the Temple of Isis and Harbocrats, the Cleansing Basin, the Ptolemaic Mausoleum, and some of the artifacts on display at the site have been recorded and documented. 
The Cemetery of "Khaso War", Al-Beheira governorate, the royal cemeteries in Tanis, Al-Sharqiya governorate, and the "Nafr Ma'at" terrace, Beni Suef governorate. 
 
Besides, the Center digitally converts black and white images resulting from the recording work, as well as the glass and gelatin (film) negatives, which are included in the center's scientific archive, by scanning and converting them to the digital body.
 
As for the work of scientific publishing, Dr. Hisham Al-Laithi noted that the Council has issued many books, such as the Scribbles of Jabal Tiba al-Gharbi, the Temple of Abu Simbel al-Kabir, the Temple of Abu Simbel, the Temple of Kalbasha, and the Temple of Jarf Hussein. In the last five years, many books have been published: The Tombs of Bani Hassan, the Tombs of the Valley of the Queens, The Tomb of Kha'im Hat No. 57 in Luxor, Nefertari Cemetery No. 66, The Temple of Jarf Hussein (Part 5), and the Northern Treasure Chambers of the Great Temple of Abu Simbel. Two books are currently being prepared for the issuance, a book about the Temple of Wadi Al-Sweek, and the other of the Oziri column hall of the Great Temple of Abu Simbel, and another book on The Tomb of Osser Hat No. 56 in Luxor.
 
In addition to the registration and documentation missions in cooperation between the Center and several scientific bodies, including the Egyptian-French Joint Mission at the Ramsium Temple, the Egyptian-Brazilian Mission in The 123rd, 368th in Luxor, the Egyptian-Brazilian Joint Mission at Cemetery 93 in Luxor, the Egyptian-Spanish Joint Mission in the Valley Environment at the Maritime Monastery in Luxor, and the Joint Egyptian Mission with the German Institute of Antiquities in Cairo, to preserve and digitize the scientific archives of the center. 
 
The Center also carried out the work of removing the rubble, restoration, and scientific registration of the Tombs of Repo No. 416 and Samut No. 417 in Luxor.
 
In Assiut province, the tombs of the Western Mountain, the Short Amarna cemeteries, the Mir tombs, the tombs of Deir al-Jabrawi, Al-Humamiyah, Deir Riva, Deir al-Barsha and the border paintings of Akhenaten in the eastern region of Al-Huta were recorded and documented. 
 
In Alexandria province, Mustafa Kamel's tombs, Anfushi tombs, Al-Shatabi tombs, Al-Wardan cemetery, The Kum al-Shaqafa area, which includes Katacombe Cemetery, Tigran Cemetery, Salvajo Cemetery, as well as the Al-Sawari Column area, which includes the Temple of Sarabium, the Temple of Isis and Harbocrats, the Cleansing Basin, the Ptolemaic Mausoleum, and some of the artifacts on display at the site have been recorded and documented. 
The Cemetery of "Khaso War", Al-Beheira governorate, the royal cemeteries in Tanis, Al-Sharqiya governorate, and the "Nafr Ma'at" terrace, Beni Suef governorate. 
 
Besides, the Center digitally converts black and white images resulting from the recording work, as well as the glass and gelatin (film) negatives, which are included in the center's scientific archive, by scanning and converting them to the digital body.
 
As for the work of scientific publishing, Dr. Hisham Al-Laithi noted that the Council has issued many books, such as the Scribbles of Jabal Tiba al-Gharbi, the Temple of Abu Simbel al-Kabir, the Temple of Abu Simbel, the Temple of Kalbasha, and the Temple of Jarf Hussein. In the last five years, many books have been published: The Tombs of Bani Hassan, the Tombs of the Valley of the Queens, The Tomb of Kha'im Hat No. 57 in Luxor, Nefertari Cemetery No. 66, The Temple of Jarf Hussein (Part 5), and the Northern Treasure Chambers of the Great Temple of Abu Simbel. Two books are currently being prepared for the issuance, a book about the Temple of Wadi Al-Sweek, and the other of the Oziri column hall of the Great Temple of Abu Simbel, and another book on The Tomb of Osser Hat No. 56 in Luxor.
 
In addition to the registration and documentation missions in cooperation between the Center and several scientific bodies, including the Egyptian-French Joint Mission at the Ramsium Temple, the Egyptian-Brazilian Mission in The 123rd, 368th in Luxor, the Egyptian-Brazilian Joint Mission at Cemetery 93 in Luxor, the Egyptian-Spanish Joint Mission in the Valley Environment at the Maritime Monastery in Luxor, and the Joint Egyptian Mission with the German Institute of Antiquities in Cairo, to preserve and digitize the scientific archives of the center. 
 
The Center also carried out the work of removing the rubble, restoration, and scientific registration of the Tombs of Repo No. 416 and Samut No. 417 in Luxor.
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In Photos: Ancient tombs and prehistoric burials found in Nile Delta - Heritage - Ahram Online

https://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContentP/9/410090/Heritage/In-Photos-Ancient-tombs-and-prehistoric-burials-fo.aspx

In Photos: Ancient tombs and prehistoric burials found in Nile Delta

Mostafa Waziri, secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, said that 68 of these tombs date back to the Boto I and II eras, five from the Naqada III era, and 37 from the Second Intermediate Period era

Nevine El-Aref , Tuesday 27 Apr 2021
tomb
A collection of 110 tombs from the Boto I and II, Naqada III, and the Second Intermediate Period eras have been uncovered in Kom Al-Khelgan in the Daqahliya governorate in the Nile Delta.

Mostafa Waziri, secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, told Ahram Online that 68 of these tombs date back to the Boto I and II eras, five from the Naqada III era, and 37 from the Second Intermediate Period era.

Most of the tombs from the Boto eras are rounded and oval shaped burials containing skulls and skeletons of the deceased laying bending on their left side. Other burials included newly born children buried inside clay pots.

Meanwhile, 31 tombs from the Second Intermediate Period era are rectangular shaped with a depth ranging between 20 to 85 cm deep, and the rest are for young children buried in clay sarcophagi.

A funerary collection of clay pots — rounded and oval pots with holders — as well as stelae amulets and scarabs carved in faience and decorated with well-known motifs of the era, have also been unearthed, along with stone instruments and knives made of flint. Further excavations will continue at the site 

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Egypt archaeologists unearth 110 ancient tombs in Nile Delta - CNA

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/world/egypt-archaeologists-unearth-110-ancient-tombs-in-nile-delta-14705624

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Friday, April 23, 2021

The incredible story behind the world's oldest dress from Egypt that's more than 5,000 yrs old - Face2Face Africa

https://face2faceafrica.com/article/the-incredible-story-behind-the-worlds-oldest-dress-from-egypt-thats-more-than-5000-yrs-old

The incredible story behind the world's oldest dress from Egypt that's more than 5,000 yrs old

Mildred Europa Taylor Apr 23, 2021 at 01:00pm

Mildred Europa Taylor

Mildred Europa Taylor

April 23, 2021 at 01:00 pm | Fashion Finds, History

The world's oldest woven garment found in Egypt. PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY PETRIE MUSEUM OF EGYPTIAN ARCHAEOLOGY, UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON

Garments worn thousands of years ago have survived to the present day. Those garments were merely wrapped around the body. But the "Tarkhan Dress," named for the town in Egypt where it was found in 1913, is beautifully stitched. About five years ago, it was precisely dated using the latest radiocarbon dating technology. Researchers determined that the linen dress with fine detail dates to between 3482 and 3103 B.C., making it the world's oldest woven garment.

Textiles recovered from archaeological sites are generally no older than 2,000 years, Alice Stevenson, the curator of London's Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, recently said. The Tarkhan Dress, however, dates back more than 5,000 years, and when it was new, it may have been longer, researchers said.

It was once part of a "large pile of dirty linen cloth" excavated by Sir Flinders Petrie in 1913 at the site he named Tarkhan after a nearby village 30 miles south of Cairo, archaeology.org said. In 1977, researchers from the Victoria and Albert Museum were preparing to clean the large pile of dirty linen cloth when they discovered the Tarkhan Dress, finely made. Though there were creases at the elbows and armpits showing that someone once wore the dress, the V-neck linen shirt with pleated sleeves and bodice was in excellent condition despite its age.

The researchers conserved the fabric, sewed it onto Crepeline silk to stabilize it, and displayed it. Soon, it was being hailed as Egypt's oldest garment and the oldest woven garment in the world largely due to the age of the tomb in which it was discovered. However, because the tomb in which the garment had been found had been plundered, researchers couldn't provide a precise age to the dress.

In the 1980s when linen associated with the dress was analyzed using a new technology of accelerator mass spectrometry, it was believed to date to the late third millennium BC. But this date was too broad, according to researchers.

Finally, in 2015, a sample — weighing just 2.24mg — from the dress itself was analyzed by the University of Oxford's radiocarbon unit. The results showed that the Tarkhan Dress is from between 3482 and 3102 B.C. and might even pre-date Egypt's 1st Dynasty (ca. 3111–2906 B.C.).

"We'd always suspected it was old, and even if it wasn't near the 1st Dynasty, even a 5th Dynasty dress [ca. 2500 B.C.] is still pretty old by archaeological standards for this type of object," Stevenson said at the time, adding that the new dating has affirmed her appreciation of the garment. "…There's nothing quite like it anywhere of that quality and of that date. It's amazing to think it has survived some 5,000 years."

Clearly, the fineness of the garment is a testament to the fact that ancient African civilisations were just awesome.

--   Sent from my Linux system.

In the tombs of Saqqara, new discoveries are rewriting ancient Egypt’s history - The Washington Post

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/04/22/tombs-saqqara-new-discoveries-are-rewriting-ancient-egypts-history/

In the tombs of Saqqara, new discoveries are rewriting ancient Egypt's history

Renowned archaeologist Zahi Hawass's dig site at Saqqara, Egypt, in February. The discovery, among many others, of a previously unknown queen has reshaped researchers' understanding of ancient Egyptians. (Sima Diab for The Washington Post)

SAQQARA, Egypt — Seated in a yellow plastic laundry basket attached to two thick ropes, I was lowered into the earth. The light got dimmer, the temperature colder. A musty smell filled the air. The only sound was from the workmen above handling the ropes and yelling "shweya" — slowly.

One miscue, and I could fall 100 feet.

I was inside a burial shaft in Saqqara, the ancient necropolis roughly 19 miles south of Cairo. In recent months, a series of discoveries have captivated the world of archaeology.

The most significant find came in January, when archaeologists came upon inscriptions showing that the temple they were unearthing belonged to a previously unknown ancient queen. Her name was Queen Neit. She was the wife of King Teti, the first pharaoh of the Sixth Dynasty, which ruled more than 4,300 years ago as part of Egypt's Old Kingdom.

I was descending into the cemeterial netherworld below her funerary temple.

Midway down the shaft, the walls took on a honeycomb pattern, with large shelves carved into them. Thousands of years ago, they held painted coffins and mummies wrapped in linen and reeds. While I descended farther, the shaft narrowed as I passed through a wood frame that supports the walls. Just above the bottom, water glistened on the walls like jewels.

The basket touched ground.

The eyes adjusted to the dark. On the floor were two limestone coffins. Both damaged, their contents looted, perhaps more than 2,000 years ago. Who had been buried here? How and why were their coffins lowered so far into the earth? And how did the thieves know where to look?

"Our civilization is full of mysteries," NeRmeen Aba-Yazeed, a member of the archaeological team, said afterward. "And we have discovered one of these mysteries."

Before the inscription was found, King Teti was thought to have only two wives, Iput and Khuit. But the realization he had a third, Neit, with her own temple, was prompting a rethink of those ancient days.

"We are rewriting history," Zahi Hawass, Egypt's most well-known archaeologist and its former antiquities minister, would say later in the day.

An archaeological bonanza

Workers lift a team member out of a Saqqara shaft using a pulley and basket. (Sima Diab for The Washington Post)

Ancient history is being revealed in many parts of Egypt these days. In early February, archaeologists found 16 human burial chambers at the site of an ancient temple on the outskirts of the northern city of Alexandria. Two of the mummies had golden tongues, which Egyptian Antiquities Ministry officials said were to allow them to "speak in the afterlife."

That same month, a massive 5,000-year-old brewery — believed to be the world's oldest — was discovered in the southern city of Sohag. The beer, researchers hypothesize, was used in burial rituals for Egypt's earliest kings.

Last month, ruins of an ancient Christian settlement were discovered in the Bahariya Oasis, nestled in Egypt's Western desert. The find sheds new light on monastic life in the 5th century A.D.

And just last week, archaeologists announced they had unearthed a 3,000-year-old "lost golden city" in the southern city of Luxor, a discovery that could be the biggest since the tomb of the boy king Tutankhamen.

The ladder leading to the newly discovered sarcophagi in Saqqara. (Sima Diab for The Washington Post)

With every discovery, the government's hopes rise that more tourists will arrive, bringing much-needed foreign currency and creating new jobs for millions. Egypt's tourism-dependent economy has suffered in the past decade from the political chaos that developed after the 2011 Arab Spring uprising.

The Saqqara necropolis is at once a center of the country's aspirations and of its subterranean secrets. It was part of the burial grounds for the ancient capital, Memphis, its ruins now a UNESCO World Heritage site.

In Saqqara, 17 Egyptian kings built pyramids to house their remains and possessions for what they believed was the transition to the afterlife. These pyramids include the world's oldest, the Step Pyramid of Djoser, built in the 27th century B.C. Recent finds have drawn the world's attention, depicted in the Netflix film "Secrets of the Saqqara Tomb" and National Geographic's "Kingdom of the Mummies" TV series.

In November, for instance, archaeologists dug up more than 100 ornately painted wooden coffins, some with mummies, and dozens of other artifacts, including amulets, funeral statues and masks. Some of the coffins had been found on those shelves I had passed during my descent.

A king becomes a god