29/01/2021
New artefacts unearthed at Taposiris Magna in Alexandria
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The team succeeded in revealing 16 catacombes, inside the big necropolis that was previously discovered, where mummies were covered with a layer of cartonnage bearing gold and others had golden tongues.
The Dominican-Egyptian archaeological expedition from Santo Domingo University has uncovered several artefacts during their excavation work at Taposiris Magna archaeological site in Alexandria.
They succeeded in revealing 16 catacombes, inside the big necropolis that was previously discovered, where mummies were covered with a layer of cartonnage bearing gold and others had golden tongues.
Kathleen Martinez Head of the archaeological mission said that the most interesting part is that all the graves had the heads of the mummies oriented to the west, towards the temple.
She added that two of the uncovered mummies were covered with traces of gold and with unique cartonnage wrapping represented as the mummified God, Osiris from the end of the Ptolemaic period. One mummy wears the Atef crown with gilded horns and a cobra in its forehead. It has a falcon-headed terminal Usekh collar and a golden rectangular pectoral that hangs at the neck.
The mission has also unearthed a beautiful funerary mask of a woman featuring the head, the face, the neck, and the chest, eight golden pieces; two of which are mummies' tongues and the rest are pieces of gold leaf for a diadem.
Eight very well carved marble portrait sculptures from the Graeco-Roman period depicting the facial features of people were also unearthed.
Throughout the last ten years the mission made several interesting discoveries at Taposiris Magna, that shed light on the Greco-Roman period in Alexandria.
Inside the wall of the temple, the expedition had previously found important artefacts such as coins with the portrait and name of the famous queen Cleopatra, several granite royal statues and the foundation plaques of the Taposiris Magna temple that proves that it was built at the beginning of the dynasty by Ptolemy IV.