During an underwater excavation at the sunken city of Heracleion in Abu Qir bay in Alexandria, the Egyptian-French mission, led by the European Institute for Underwater Archaeology (IEASM), uncovered remains of a military vessel and a funerary complex.
Mostafa Waziry, secretary general of Egypt’s
Supreme Council of Antiquities, announced the discovery of the remains of a
military vessel in the submerged city of Thônis-Heracleion, which sank
receiving huge blocks of the famed temple of Amun in the second century BC. The
ship was to be moored at a landing stage in the canal that flowed along the
south face of the temple, when it was totally destroyed during a cataclysmic
event. The fallen blocks have kept the precious naval remains pinned to the
bottom of the deep canal along with the debris of the sanctuary.
According to Head of Egyptian Antiquities
Sector at the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities of Egypt, Ayman Ashmawy, the
ship was detected under nearly 5 metres of hard clay mixed with temple debris
thanks to a cutting edge prototype electronic sub-bottom profiler.
French archaeologist Franck Goddio pointed
out that finds of ships from this age remain extremely rare, with the only
example being the Punic Marsala Ship (235 BC). The Hellenistic ships of this
type were completely unknown from an archaeological perspective before this
discovery.
Ehab Fahmy, head of the Central Department
of Underwater Antiquities, said that the preliminary study shows that the hull
of this ship was built in the classical tradition and relied on long
mortise-and-tenon joints and a well-developed internal structure. However, at
the same time it also features ancient Egyptian construction techniques. It was
a rowing ship that was equally provided with a large sail as evidenced from its
mast step of considerable dimensions. This long boat was flat-bottomed and had
a flat keel, quite advantageous for the navigation on the Nile and within the
delta. Some typical ancient Egyptian shipbuilding features, together with the
evidence of wood reuse, indicate that the ship was built in Egypt. With a
length of more than 25 m it had a length-to-breadth ratio close to six to one.
In another part of the city, a tumulus
(burial mound) stretching alongside the north-east entrance canal also revealed
remains of a large Greek funerary area, all covered with rich offerings. They
date from the very first years of the fourth century BC. This discovery
beautifully illustrates the presence of the Greek merchants who lived in that
city, controlling the entrance to Egypt at the mouth of the Canopic branch of
the Nile. The Greeks were allowed to settle in this city during the late Pharaonic
dynasties. They built their own sanctuaries close to the huge temple of Amun.
Those were destroyed simultaneously and their remains are found mixed with
those of the Egyptian temple.
Important remains of the temple of Amun
slipped into the deep canal during a land slide caused by a land liquefaction
phenomenon. They were discovered in a pristine state of preservation. They are
the witnesses of the richness of the sanctuaries of this city, now located
under the sea seven kilometers from the present coast of Egypt.
Thônis-Heracleion was for centuries the
largest Egyptian port on the Mediterranean Sea, prior to the founding of
Alexandria by Alexander the Great in 331 BC. Several earthquakes, followed by
tidal waves, triggered land liquefactions, causing a 110 square kilometer
portion of the Nile delta, with the cities of Thônis-Heracleion and Canopus, to
collapse into the sea. Both cities were rediscovered by the IEASM in
collaboration with the Underwater Archaeology Department of Ministry of Tourism
and Antiquities, respectively in 2001 and 1999.
Source: Ahram Online
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