The archaeological excavation of an ancient Egyptian city at Tell Edfu in southern Egypt, led by the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, has discovered well-preserved settlement remains dating to an important turning point in ancient Egyptian history, when the pharaohs began to renew interest in the provincial regions in the far south of their kingdom.
The excavation site at Tell Edfu (with the temple of Horus and the modern town of Edfu in the background) [Credit: G. Marouard] |
“It’s a wonderful find because we have so little information about this era of settlement in the southern provinces,” said Nadine Moeller, associate professor of Egyptian archaeology, who leads the excavation together with Oriental Institute research associate Gregory Marouard. “We don’t know any such similar complex for the Old Kingdom.”
UChicago graduate student Emilie Sarrazin and researcher Katarina Arias (Charles University, Prague) sampling the content of a large Old Kingdom storage jar [Credit: G. Marouard] |
Last December, they unearthed two large mudbrick buildings that appear to be centers for official administration. They are surrounded by vast open courtyards and workshops, where the excavation uncovered storage containers and other artifacts that suggest manufacturing activities such as bread and beer-making, as well as copper slag, pieces of crucibles, small weights and other evidence of metallurgy.
Ongoing excavation of the Oriental Institute team on the large administrative area of the late 5th Dynasty (ca. 2350 BCE) [Credit: G. Marouard] |
These expeditions would have supplied metals for the king, the elites of his court and construction projects in the capital at Memphis. Red Sea shells and rare Nubian imported ceramics further confirm the link to royal expeditions into the Eastern Desert, the researchers said.
Ceramicist Aaron De Souza (Macquarie University, Sydney) studying Nubian imported pottery found at the site [Credit: G. Marouard] |
A number of oddities puzzled the archaeologists. The largest building has outer façades with a very distinct slope. “It’s very well-constructed and so the slope is certainly intentional, which highlights the architectural peculiarity of this monument,” Marouard said. “We don’t know of any other structure within an urban context in Egypt that looks like this.”
Example of a clay sealing bearing two of the names of King Djekare-Isesi (ca. 2400-2350 BCE) [Credit: N. Moeller] |
Given that the buildings were set so close to the temple—about 20 yards—it’s possible they had religious or cult ties, the researchers said.
“It’s such a unique site. We’ve had a hard time finding architectural parallels, because no other settlement in Upper Egypt has such extensive remains from this time period,” Moeller said. “We’ve learned so much at Tell Edfu, and there’s still more to come.”
More than a dozen UChicago students have worked on the Tell Edfu excavation since it began, Moeller said. Current UChicago students include Emilie Sarrazin, Oren Siegel and Sasha Rohret.
Author: Louise Lerner | Source: University of Chicago [February 07, 2018]