To
Supreme Council of Antiquities Department
of Foreign Missions Affairs Cairo, Egypt
Subject: Excavation Report
According to the permission from the Supreme Council of Antiquities we started the eleventh excavation season on 1st of Mars and finished it on 26th of June.
Members:
Calliope Limneos–Papakosta, archaeologist,
director of H.R.I.A.C.
Nikolia Spanou, archaeologist
Panagiotis Konstantinidis, archaeologist
Angela Tsesmetzi, architect
Inspectors:
Samer Alaadien Abdel Ghafour
Doaa Fathy Shalaby
Amira Alaadien Ali
Abeer Houssein Abdo
The excavation work was held out by 10-12 workers per day.
Excavation
This season we extended the excavation area 8m to the west, 8,70m. to the south-west and 5,50m. to the east in order to check if the Ptolemaic foundation is extended toward these directions. Also, two small trenches were made to the north of the area, 3,40 x 3 each. A big amount of modern debris was removed and two additional wells were opened in order to pump out the water that is found at the depth of c. 6m [pl. 1, 2]
At the SW area, under the remnants of walls that belong to a construction of a later date, it was revealed part of a channel like structure made of pinkish coarse mortar and brownish red bricks [pl. 3]. At parts, the mortar of its walls has been applied on blocks of the Ptolemaic foundation, which seem to be at place [pl. 4]. It is based on breccia and it’s probably date at the roman period.
About 70 cm deeper, at the west and south side of this structure, parts of the Ptolemaic foundation have been revealed extending N to S and E to W respectively [pl. 5]. These two rows of the foundation are found to be out of the main axis of the Ptolemaic building, forming a kind of separate, but not independent, room. Further excavation is needed for revealing its plan.
At the east side of the area parts of later construction were excavated, but lower we didn’t detect blocks of the Ptolemaic foundation [pl. 6], either we reached the east end of the building or the blocks have been removed from this area. Further excavation toward the east direction is needed in order to conclude.
The excavation at the north part of the area uncovered the continuation toward this direction of the western N to S row of the foundation [pl. 7]. It is extended even northern but the debris and a modern construction do not allow the extension of the excavation further to this direction. The excavation at the northern part of the middle N to S row of the Ptolemaic foundation revealed part of a construction built by Ptolemaic blocks that have been removed of their original place [pl. 8, 9].
The excavation research of this season confirmed that after the destruction of the Ptolemaic building, the place was occupied during the early and late roman period. The plan of the Ptolemaic building is yet to be revealed, as it extents further to the north and south – west.
The excavation produced pottery of Hellenistic to roman date, stamped amphora handle, architectural parts mainly from architraves and capitals etc. Among the finds there is a part of the right arm from the Alexander statue, now at the National museum of Alexandria [pl. 10]. The rest of the finds were delivered to Mareya and Mustafa Kamel storage facilities.
Besides the excavation work, 10 drillings were made to testify certain points appointed by the results of the geophysical survey that was conducted during the previous season. At all of them, traces of constructions were detected with high certainty.
We would like to thank for their support the Supreme Council of Antiquities and the authorities of the Antiquity Service of Alexandria.
For and On Behalf of
Hellenic Research Institute of Alexandrian Civilization
Calliope Limneos-Papakosta
Director