Archaeologists generally downplay the Indiana Jones side of their discipline, full of derring-do and unexpected discoveries. But every once in a while, an amazing find surprises even the most experienced researchers. And that's just what happened two years ago when Boston University's Kathryn Bard reached into a hole in the sand at the edge of the Egyptian desert and found the first of six caves. Her research team of Italians and Americans now knows those caves hold the most ancient ship stores ever discovered, perfectly preserved timbers, ropes and other fittings perhaps 4000 years old.

"It's incredible, basically a mothballed military base where the people packed up and left," says marine archaeologist Cheryl Ward of Florida State University in Tallahassee, a member of the research team. A sand-covered bluff along the Red Sea — called Wadi Gawasis or "Wadi of the Spies" — was a lagoon during ancient Egypt's Middle Kingdom era. From there, the pharaoh's servants launched expeditions, perhaps five or six ships every few hundred years, to the fabled land of Punt somewhere in the southern Red Sea in a bid to return with ebony, ivory and rare spices, such as Frankincense, treasured by the priestly caste of the day...

Click on the image above for USA Today's image gallery.

In Egyptian desert, a surprising nautical find, USA Today, Virginia, USA, March 05, 2006.

cf. Cheryl Ward of Florida State University offers this write-up of her findings in an exclusive to USA TODAY: World's most ancient ship timbers found in Egypt, USA Today, Virginia, USA, March 05, 2006.

Tut's is among the most-visited holes in the ground of the Valley of the Kings, where the humidity down below makes the 105-degree September morning seem cool and refreshing when I re-emerge into the present.

The tomb is empty except for the boy king himself, tucked back into his sarcophagus in the wake of his most recent trip topside, for CT scans last year.

Gazing in at the most famous teenager in world history, and the gods painted on the surrounding walls to guide him (and his two also-mummified children) to the netherworld, my mind reels at the tiny size of the burial chamber. How could all those coffins, shrines and relics possibly have been squeezed in here?

That staggering horde is what makes this poor little rich kid so famous. All his fat-cat neighbours were robbed blind over the centuries, leaving their huge crypts pretty much as we see them today, empty mausoleums...

All the king’s bling, The State, South Carolina, USA, March 05, 2006.

A cache of manuscripts up to 1,500 years old has been discovered in a Coptic monastery in the Western Desert of Egypt. The find was made at Deir al-Surian, the Monastery of the Syrians, which already has one of the richest ancient libraries in Christendom. Set in the desert sands and virtually cut off from the outside world until recently, Deir al-Surian traces its roots back to the earliest period of Christian monasticism. Established in the 6th century, it was soon occupied by monks from Syria and Mesopotamia and is currently home to 200 Egyptian Copts.

Deir al-Surian is in what was once called the Holy Desert of Scetis, in Wadi al-Natrun, a valley 60 miles south of Alexandria. Approaching it across the sands, the 40-foot-high walled complex, with its buildings and tower, appears like a ship — and hence the tradition that its architecture is based on the design of Noah's Ark. Inside, the monastery is centred on the Church of the Holy Virgin, built in the 7th century...

Ancient Manuscripts Found In Egyptian Monastery, Forbes, USA, May 29, 2002.

Hmmm. This one is doing the rounds, so I have posted it here also but it is dated 2002.

Six statues of the Egyptian goddess of war, Sekhmet, have been discovered at the Amenhotep III Temple on the West bank of Luxor, 700 kilometres south of Cairo, Egyptian experts said Monday.

Head of the Supreme Council for Antiquities, Zahi Hawass, said that the statues, sculpted in dark granite, portray Sekhmet seated on a throne and holding the symbol of life. The statues, which were found in good condition, were discovered by a German excavation team [headed by Hourig Sourouzian].

Hawass said three of the statues were found intact and were crowned with the sun disc, while the upper part of the fourth Sekhmet statue is still covered. The fifth and sixth statues are partly conserved up to the waist raising speculation that a bust found by the mission last season would fit onto one of them...

Statues of war goddess found in southern Egyptian temple, dpa via Monster & Critics, UK, March 06, 2006. Includes gallery with bthree pictures.

cf. Ancient war goddess statues unearthed in Egypt, Middle East Online, UK, March 06, 2006.

Many thanks to Andy Bak for providing me with this translation.

Polish-Egyptian team of archaeologists have discovered in Egypt in the temple of Queen Hatshepsut an Egyptian tomb of a vizier from the 25th dynasty (8th — 7th century BCE) says the head of the Polish mission in Deir el Bahari, Dr. Zbigniew E. Szafrański. The tomb had earlier been plundered but some fragments of mummy remained as well as beautiful painted cartonnage.

From 1961 the Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology mission, University of Warsaw, has been reconstructing the temple of Queen Hatshepsut of the 14th century BCE. Amongst other things they have found items belonging to the temple sanctuary of Amun-Re, the main courtyard and the portico with monumental images of Queen Hatshepsut in the form of the god Osiris.

Poles continue to reconstruct the 3rd, highest, terrace of the temple. Near the terrace were found even earlier tombs of the dignitaries from the 23rd and 25th dynasties.

Lately the Polish explorers happened upon a tomb shaft carved into the rock-face. At the end at a depth of 8 metres was found a burial chamber.

“The tomb had been plundered. We don’t know whether in antiquity or in more recent times, however we have found fragments of the mummy. On the basis of the inscriptions found in the tomb we suspect that buried there was the vizier Padiamonet who died in the 27th year of the rule of the pharaoh Piankhi (Pije) from the 25th dynasty” explains Szafrański.

Apart from the tomb of the vizier, the archaeologists also discovered three different plundered burial chambers. At the moment it is difficult to say who is buried there. [Forensic-]Anthropologists are to determine this next year based on analysis of the remains of the mummy.

In the tomb-chamber of the vizier, [were found] part of the deceased’s endowments — cartonnage (a type of cover in which the mummy is placed) as well as bandages in which the mummy was bound.

Cartonnage made of layers of clothes, glue, crushed lime, gypsum, and so-called gesso. The finished cover was painted.

“On the cartonnage beautiful, ornate, colourful pictures [in which] you can read in hieroglyphs the name of the vizier. It is also visible on the fragments of the bandages” says Dr. Szafrański.

Apart from the tomb within the rock-face, the investigators came across other more recent very unusual interesting finds. The remains of endowments of an early Christian church from the 6th — 8th century AD [including] wooden alter bulkheads(?).

Construction of the church was made in the ruins of the highest terrace of the temple of Queen Hatshepsut. “Alongside the remains of the wooden equipment and furniture we found fragments of utensils and so-called ostraca on which the monks wrote letters, shopping lists, receipts and accounts, amongst themselves” added Dr. Szafrański.

The Polish mission in Deir el Bahari has reconstructed three unusual important elements of the highest terrace — the overhead [highest?] courtyard (the place where the most important festivities occurred), the Coronation Portico with statues of the queen, as well as the main sanctuary of the god Amun-Re, the most important place in the temple.

Polscy archeolodzy odkryli grób wezyra w świątyni Hatszepsut, Szymon Łucyk, PAP - Nauka w Polsce, Poland, February 22, 2006. Translated by Andrew Bak, March 06, 2006.

by Zahi Hawass

A week after we demolished the house of the old women, I entered the burial chamber; and I saw a very large anthropoid sarcophagus. At that moment, I could not breathe because of the smell. As I peered into the room, I discovered a very thick yellow power around the sarcophagus. I could not walk and did not have time to read the inscriptions. The smell was overpowering and I had to leave.

We purchased masks for all the workers, who began to remove the material. It was hematite, quarried at nearby Bahariya. Why this material was there was unclear. What was it function? I could not understand.

After much clearing, we finally were able to get inside the chamber and reached the limestone sarcophagus, which measured seven feet long by three feet wide. On the lid was a human face with beautiful large features, representing the governor. As we cleaned the long line of hieroglyphic inscriptions extending from the chest to the end of the sarcophagus, we all read the name Djed-Khonsu-ef-ankh. We all screamed and could not believe that we had found what Fakhry dreamed of discovering. We also found his titles as priest of Amun and other gods including Isis.

Removing the lid of the sarcophagus would be a huge task and I called for the el-Kriety brothers to come from Cairo to help us. They are specialists in moving heavy objects.

The day of the opening, I chose Mahmoud, Tareq, Abdel Hamid and Ken Garrett, a photographer from National Geographic, plus three workmen.

It was very hot inside the chamber and everyone was sweating. The workers began to chant and I began to chant with them, "Hela hob, hela hob, hela hob," (an Arabic phrase to help with the rhythm).

I went over to help push. We all pushed and the lid began to move. At that moment, I thought about how this sarcophagus had lain here undisturbed for 2,500 year. What would we find inside?

Djed-Khonsu-ef-ankh - Governor of Bahariya (Part 4), The Egyptian Gazette, Egypt, March 06, 2006.

“Napoleon in Egypt” at the Museum of Arts and Sciences in Macon, [Georgia], tells the story of Napoleon Bonaparte’s invasion of Egypt in 1798. Though the invasion failed, it opened Egypt to the western world and began the discipline of Egyptology, organizers of the show say. The exhibit includes origin documents signed by Napoleon, ancient artefacts and mummies.

The exhibit continues through March 26 [2006]...

Closer to home: “Napoleon in Egypt”, The State, South Carolina, USA, March 05, 2006.

Zahi Hawass, Egypt's top man in charge of antiquities, has asked the St. Louis Art Museum to return a 3,200 year-old mummy mask the museum purchased in 1998, which it believed was brought out of Egypt in 1952. Hawass insists that it was looted from storage near the archaeological site in the early 1990s.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City is reluctantly returning to Italy the so-called Euphronios krater, a Greek vessel it purchased in 1972. The vase, one of the most beautiful of its type, had been only recently dug up and spirited out of the country when acquired, a history the museum has long denied.

Peru is demanding that Yale University return an entire collection of antiquities excavated at Machu Picchu in 1912 that it insists was deposited at Yale only as a loan. New York City antiquities dealer Frederick Schultz is in jail for conspiring to buy looted Egyptian antiquities.

The curator of antiquities at the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, the very proper Marion True, is on trial in Italy for conspiring to acquire illegally exported classical antiquities for the museum.

What's going on is that the entire world of buying and selling antiquities has been turned upside down...

Curators, countries debate who owns the past, Lexington Herald-Leader, Kentucky, USA, March 05, 2006.