Category Archives: AFRICA

AFRICA, EGYPT, WORLD

Thousands of Mummified Ram’s Heads Uncovered in Abydos

Thousands of Mummified Ram’s Heads Uncovered in Abydos

Thousands of Mummified Ram’s Heads Uncovered in Abydos
A group of 2000 mummified heads of rams

Excavation work carried out by an American mission from New York University at the temple of Ramses II in Abydos has stumbled upon a menagerie of mummified animals that provides previously undocumented evidence of cultic worship through the ages.

The most significant find at the site is over 2,000 mummified heads of rams from the Ptolemaic period along with other mummified ewes, dogs, wild goats, cows, gazelles and mongooses, said Mostafa Waziri, secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities.

The mummified remains, some still in their linen wrappings, were found stored in one of the recently discovered magazines within the temple’s northern precinct, Waziri added.

Sameh Iskander, head of the mission, noted that the discovery of this large number of mummified rams, presumably as votive offerings, placed inside the temple points to an unprecedented rams’ cultic practice in Abydos during the Ptolemaic period. It indicates that the memory of Ramses II was still revered in Abydos a thousand years after his time (1303-1213 BC).

The mission also discovered a large palatial structure with an unusual architectural layout with walls about five metres thick, which appears for the first time in Abydos, and dates to the end of the Sixth Dynasty (c.2181 BC) of the Old Kingdom.

“This structure will provide important, multifaceted and spectacular information on the activities of the Old Kingdom in Abydos, opening up major new perspectives that will contribute to reestablish the sense of the ancient landscape of Abydos before the construction of the Ramses II temple,” Iskander said.

Mohamed Abdel-Badei, head of the central department of Upper Egypt Antiquities, said that the mission was also able to clear the temple’s northern enclosure walls and its various structures, which clearly defines the boundary of the temple’s domain and helps us better understand the daily life in the precinct, its administration and cultic activities.

This will lead to reconsidering the image of the temple and its details as perceived by earlier research since the temple’s discovery over 150 years ago.

The mission also recovered a number of statues, papyri, remains of ancient trees, leather garments and shoes.

The new discoveries contain a wealth of information that drastically expands our knowledge of the temple’s site, located along the Nile more than 400 kilometres south of Cairo, to a period spanning over two millennia, from the Sixth Dynasty to the Ptolemaic period.

AFRICA, SUDAN, WORLD

Bone tools for bleeding cows discovered in a 7,000-year-old cemetery in Sudan

Bone tools for bleeding cows discovered in a 7,000-year-old cemetery in Sudan

Bone tools for bleeding cows discovered in a 7,000-year-old cemetery in Sudan

During excavations in the Letti basin in northern Sudan, archaeologists have unearthed 7,000-year-old bone tools used to bleed cows. Explorers believe this may be the earliest evidence of such a practice.

7,000-year-old burials were discovered during the excavation of a cemetery in the Letti Basin, including the remains of an elderly man and animal skin fragments that had been dyed red by the mineral ochre.

The burials belonged to some of the region’s first cattle breeders.

Along with five bone blades probably made from cattle bones, the burial pit also contained a small bowl with ochre traces.

The bone blades had a funnel-like or gutter-like shape and were still razor-sharp, as revealed by a closer inspection.

The tools immediately drew the attention of researchers, Piotr Osypiński, one of the excavations’ lead archaeologists, told Science in Poland.

Experts believe these tools were used for cattle bloodletting, the release said. The custom of bleeding cows is still practiced today by the Maasai people of Kenya and Tanzania, Osypiński said.

Dr. Piotr Osypiński, said: “Given the characteristic shape of the blades, they could have been used to bleed cows, similar to modern African shepherds, such as the Maasai.

Without any harm to the animals, cows’ blood is drunk on special occasions, usually mixed with milk. It would be the oldest known record of this type of practice”.

For the Maasai people, cow’s blood is “both ordinary and sacred food,”  and is “considered beneficial for people with weakened immune systems” with its high amount of protein.

Blood can be consumed on its own, mixed with milk, or mixed into other cooked dishes. Cattle bleeding entails nicking the animal’s neck, collecting the blood in a bowl, and then clotting the wound to ensure proper healing.

At a different cemetery burial, more bone blades were discovered. The remains of a young man were curled up in a fetal position in this tiny oval grave.

The deceased, with a small, precisely cut hole in his skull, was covered with animal skin dyed in ochre.

According to the press release, the man’s skull hole may have contributed to his demise. It’s unclear whether this hole was made during surgery or as part of a ritual.

AFRICA, EGYPT, WORLD

Ancient Egyptian pharaoh-sphinx statues unearthed at sun temple

Ancient Egyptian pharaoh-sphinx statues unearthed at sun temple

Ancient Egyptian pharaoh-sphinx statues unearthed at sun temple
This head of a sphinx statue shows Ramesses II, a ruler who expanded Egypt’s empire.

Archaeologists in Egypt have discovered broken statues of ancient royalty at a sun temple in Heliopolis, an archaeological site that was once a major city near what is now Cairo. 

The stone-carved fragments include depictions of Ramesses II (reign circa 1279 B.C. to 1213 B.C.), Ramesses IX (reign circa 1126 B.C. to 1108 B.C), Horemheb (reign circa 1323 B.C. to 1295 B.C.) and Psamtik II (reign 595 B.C. to 589 B.C.), the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities said in a statement released March 20. 

Sun temples are found at a number of sites in Egypt and are dedicated to Ra, the ancient Egyptian sun god, but the sun temple at Heliopolis was of particular importance. (Heliopolis is a Greek name; the Egyptian name was Iunu.) 

According to ancient Egyptian belief, Heliopolis is where “the world was created, with the first sunrise,” excavation dig leader Dietrich Raue, the director of the Cairo department of the German Archaeological Institute, told Live Science in an email.

“Here the connection of kingship to the creator and sun god was celebrated,” Raue said, noting that pharaohs constructed statues, obelisks, and other structures at Heliopolis to legitimize their rule and honor the sun god. 

The heads of the pharaohs were part of sphinxes. This shows a fragment of the bottom of a sphinx.

“Serving the gods was one of the major duties of ancient Egyptian kings, and dedicating statues is a part of this,” Raue explained. “Ideally, no ruler of Egypt should be in office without the blessing of the sun god.” 

The newly discovered statue fragments, which show the heads of the pharaohs on sphinxes, would have been placed in front of gates or beside obelisks at the sun temple, Raue said. At some point in antiquity, the statues were destroyed and reused as building materials, he added.

Live Science contacted scholars not involved with the excavation to get their thoughts. “The abundant statuary material found by the mission testify of the long-lasting importance of the site in pharaonic [times],” Massimiliano Nuzzolo, an Egyptologist with the Polish Academy of Sciences who is studying a sun temple at Abu Ghurab in Egypt, told Live Science in an email.

The pharaoh-sphinx findings also reveal “the wish of the kings of the second and first millennium [B.C.] to leave a tangible sign of their worship for the sun god Ra in one of the main places of Egyptian civilization,” Nuzzolo added.

Peter Brand, a history professor who specializes in Egyptology at the University of Memphis, said that there is much we still don’t know about Heliopolis. For instance, while Ramesses II was a prominent pharaoh who expanded Egypt’s empire, it’s not clear if he rebuilt parts of this sun temple or continued using an older one.

“Archeologists have only scratched the surface of this area,” Brand told Live Science in an email. “Much of its rich and complex history over the course of three millennia of pharaonic history patiently await[s] discovery beneath the desert sands.”

Here we see part of the sun temple that is under excavation.
AFRICA, EGYPT, WORLD

Scientists reveal new discovery inside the Pyramid of Khufu

Scientists reveal new discovery inside the Pyramid of Khufu

Scientists reveal new discovery inside the Pyramid of Khufu

An Egyptian pyramid for 4,500 years is still spilling secrets. After a years-long project using modern technology to reveal the secrets inside the last of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World that is still standing, a once-hidden corridor inside the Great Pyramid of Khufu (Great Pyramid of Giza) has been identified.

An international research team used a cosmic ray imaging method to analyze a cavity discovered behind the pyramid’s north face in 2016. Their findings were announced at a news conference with Egyptian officials.

“This discovery, in my opinion, is the most important discovery of the 21st Century,” Zahi Hawass, Egypt’s former minister of antiquities, told reporters outside the pyramid.

The corridor – on the northern side of the Pyramid of Khufu – was discovered using modern scanning technology.

It measures 9 meters (nearly 30 feet) in length and is 2 meters (over 6 feet) wide, perched above the main entrance of the pyramid.

Archaeologists have not yet ascertained the function of the chamber, which is not accessible from the outside. In 2017, scientists announced the discovery of another sealed-off corridor, a 30-meter chamber – or about 98 feet – also inside the Pyramid of Khufu.

The corridor, officials said, adding that it was most likely designed to help relieve the weight of the vast structure, which was built as royal burial chambers around 2560 B.C.

A hidden corridor inside the Great Pyramid of Giza that was discovered by researches recently, in Giza, Egypt.

The pyramid, also known as Khufu’s Pyramid, was built by Khufu, a 4th Dynasty pharaoh who ruled from 2509 to 2483 B.C., on the Giza plateau outside of Cairo.

“The discovery today tells us there is something important to be discovered soon under that tunnel, which could be the real burial chamber of Khufu,” Hawass said.

The most recent find is a part of the global “ScanPyramids” project, which was initiated by Egypt’s antiquities ministry in October 2015 and aims to peer inside the enormous structures without using invasive drilling techniques.

Since there is disagreement among experts regarding how the pyramids were built, even relatively small discoveries are of great interest. To increase tourism, a key source of foreign currency for the cash-strapped Middle Eastern nation, authorities frequently publicly tout discoveries.

AFRICA, SUDAN, WORLD

Unusual Ancient Temple Blocks Unearthed in Sudan

Unusual Ancient Temple Blocks Unearthed in Sudan

Unusual Ancient Temple Blocks Unearthed in Sudan
Ancient blocks with hieroglyphic inscriptions were discovered in Sudan.

Archaeologists have uncovered the remains of a temple dating back around 2,700 years, to a time when a kingdom called Kush ruled over a vast area, including what is now Sudan, Egypt and parts of the Middle East. 

The temple remains were found at a medieval citadel at Old Dongola, a site located between the third and fourth cataracts of the Nile River in modern-day Sudan. 

Some of the temple’s stone blocks were decorated with figures and hieroglyphic inscriptions. An analysis of the iconography and script suggest that they were part of a structure dating to the first half of the first millennium B.C.

The discovery was a surprise, since no finds dating as far back as 2,700 years were known from Old Dongola, archaeologists with the Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology at the University of Warsaw said in a statement.

Dawid Wieczorek sits with one of the blocks from the temple.

Inside some of the temple’s remains, the archaeologists found fragments of inscriptions, including one mentioning that the temple is dedicated to Amun-Ra of Kawa, Dawid Wieczorek, an Egyptologist collaborating with the research team, told Live Science in an email.

Amun-Ra was a god worshipped in Kush and Egypt, and Kawa is an archaeological site in Sudan that contains a temple. It’s unclear if the newfound blocks are from this temple or one that no longer exists.

Julia Budka, a professor of archaeology at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich who has done extensive work in Sudan but is not involved with this research project, told Live Science in an email that “it is a very important discovery and poses several questions.” 

For example, she thinks more research may be needed to determine the temple’s exact date. Another question is whether the temple existed at Old Dongola or whether the remains were transported from Kawa or another site, like Gebel Barkal, a site in Sudan that has a number of temples and pyramids, Budka said.

Although the discovery is “very important” and “very exciting,” it’s “too early to say something precise,” and more research is needed, she said. 

Research at Old Dongola is ongoing. The team is led by Artur Obłuski, an archaeologist at the Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology. 

AFRICA, EGYPT, WORLD

Sphinx Uncovered in Upper Egypt

Sphinx Uncovered in Upper Egypt

An Egyptian archaeological mission from Ain Shams University uncovered a smiling sphinx of a Roman emperor and remains of a shrine during excavation work carried out today at the eastern side of Dendara Temple in Qena, where Horus Temple was once located.

Sphinx Uncovered in Upper Egypt

Former minister of antiquities and professor of Egyptology at Ain Shams University Mamdouh El-Damaty said the remains of the shrine are carved in limestone and consist of a two-level platform with foundations and a ramp.

In the shrine, a mudbrick Byzantine basin with a ladder covered with plaster was found. During cleaning, a smiling sphinx carved in limestone was uncovered in the basin.

“It is a beautifully and accurately carved sphinx,” said El-Damaty, explaining that it bears royal facial features with a smiling face and two dimples.

The statue wears the names on his head with the cobra-shaped ureas.

“Primary examination of the statue shows that it could belong to the Roman emperor Claudianoius,” El-Damaty said, adding that Roman stelae written in Demotic and Hieroglyphic were also unearthed beneath the statue.

Studies will be carried out to read the stelae which could reveal the identity of the statue or the secrets of the area.

The mission, which started its excavation work in November, will continue its work in the area to uncover more of the Horus Temple blocks.

AFRICA, SUDAN, WORLD

Archaeologists have discovered sandstone blocks belonging to a pharaoh’s temple covered with hieroglyphs in Sudan

Archaeologists have discovered sandstone blocks belonging to a pharaoh’s temple covered with hieroglyphs in Sudan

Archaeologists have discovered sandstone blocks belonging to a pharaoh’s temple covered with hieroglyphs in Sudan

Polish archaeologists have discovered sandstone blocks belonging to a pharaoh’s temple covered with hieroglyphs during excavations at Old Dongola in Sudan.

Recent excavations have uncovered over 100 blocks of white sandstone, inscribed with Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics from the period of the 25th dynasty of Egypt, also known as the Nubian Dynasty.

The blocks found in Old Dongola were originally part of a structure, possibly a temple, built in the first half of the 1st millennium BC, which is the earliest example of human activity on a site identified so far.

Egyptologist Dr. Dawid F. Wieczorek said: “This is a huge discovery, because despite the 60-year Polish archaeological presence in Old Dongola, no evidence of such early construction activity on the site has been identified so far.

It is impossible to say whether this material is local or was brought from some other site. Nevertheless, it is surprising that there are so many of these blocks, and from different parts it seems of the same temple.”

Some of the blocks are from the flooring, outer walls, and from a pylon (a tower flanking the entrance to the temple). “This would push back the known history of this city by over 1000 years,” said Dr. Wieczorek.

Within a radius of more than 100 kilometers from Old Dongola, there are no other known examples of sites with Egyptian-style architecture.

The closest is Gebel Barkal (about 150 km up the Nile), and Kawa (about 120 km down the Nile). Both were leading urban and religious centers established during the New Kingdom in the 16th and 14th centuries BC.

The Kushite king Kashta came to Egypt amid political turmoil to run for the office of pharaoh, apparently in Thebes and apparently peacefully.

He was the first of the Nubian line of kings who ruled as the 25th dynasty of Egypt (747–656 BC). Piye, the next king, led the conquest of Egypt into the Nile Delta, reacting dramatically to the threat of a combination of powerful northern dynasty. He created an empire that stretched from the 6th cataract to the Mediterranean Sea.

The Kushite rulers presented themselves as pharaohs who could return Egypt to its former glory. They assimilated into society by reaffirming Ancient Egyptian religious traditions, temples, and artistic forms, while introducing some unique aspects of Kushite culture.

AFRICA, EGYPT, WORLD

Camera Glimpses Hidden Corridor in Egypt’s Great Pyramid

Camera Glimpses Hidden Corridor in Egypt’s Great Pyramid

Camera Glimpses Hidden Corridor in Egypt’s Great Pyramid
Video footage from an endoscope showed an empty corridor with a vaulted ceiling

Egyptian antiquities officials say they have confirmed the existence of a hidden internal corridor above the main entrance of the Great Pyramid of Giza.

Video from an endoscope showed the inside of the corridor, which is 9m (30ft) long and 2.1m (7ft) wide.

The officials say it could have been created to redistribute the pyramid’s weight around the entrance or another as yet undiscovered chamber.

It was first detected in 2016 using an imaging technique called muography.

A team of scientists from the ScanPyramids Project were able to sense density changes inside the pyramid by analysing how it was penetrated by muons, which are by-products of cosmic rays that are only partially absorbed by stone.

The non-invasive technique detected an empty space behind the northern face of the Great Pyramid, about 7m above the main entrance, in an area where there is a stone chevron structure.

Further tests were carried out with radar and ultrasound before a 6mm-wide (0.24in) endoscope was fed through a tiny joint in-between the stones that make up the chevrons.

The endoscope was pushed into the empty space behind a chevron structure on the pyramid’s wall

The footage from the camera was unveiled at a news conference beside the pyramid on Thursday. It showed an empty corridor with walls made out of roughly-hewn stone blocks and a vaulted stone ceiling.

“We’re going to continue our scanning so we will see what we can do… to figure out what we can find out beneath it, or just by the end of this corridor,” said Mostafa Waziri, head of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities.

The Great Pyramid, which is 146m high, was built on the Giza plateau during the fourth dynasty by the pharaoh Khufu, or Cheops, who reigned from around 2609BC to 2584BC.

Despite being one of the oldest and largest monuments on Earth, there is no consensus about how it was built.

The Great Pyramid, seen in the background, is the largest of the three pyramids located at Giza

Egyptian archaeologist Zahi Hawass said the corridor represented a “major discovery” that would “enter houses and homes of people all over the world for the first time”.

He also said that it might help reveal whether the burial chamber of King Khufu still existed inside the pyramid.

He speculated that there might be “something important” in the space below the corridor, then added: “I’m sure in a few months from now we can see if what I’m saying is correct or not.”

A second, larger void inside the pyramid was detected using muography in 2017. It is estimated to be 30m long and several meters in height and is located directly above the Grand Gallery.