Public release date: 21-Apr-2005
E-mail Article
Contact: Ann Marie Menting
amenting@bu.edu
Boston University Egyptian sea vessel artifacts discovered at pharaonic port of Mersa Gawasis along Red Sea coast Discovery includes steering oars, other evidence of Egypt's sea-faring past (Boston) When Kathryn Bard reached through the small hole that opened in a hillside along Egypt's Red Sea coast, her hand touched nearly 4,000 years of history. The opening that Bard, an associate professor of archaeology at Boston University, and her team's co-leader Rodolfo Fattovich, a professor of archaeology at Italy's University of Naples "L'Orientale," discovered was the entrance to a large, man-made cave. Two days later at a site about 30 meters beyond this cave, the team removed sand covering the entrance to a second cave, one that held the well-preserved cedar timbers of an ancient Egyptian sea-faring vessel. The timbers, together with limestone block-anchors, curved cedar steering oars, rigging ropes, and other items, are from ancient Egyptian ships. In addition to the nautical items in the second cave, and the two antechambers discovered to branch from it, the archaeologists found limestone tablets with hieroglyphic inscriptions that detail long-ago trade expeditions to the Red Sea region known as Punt. Bard and Fattovich will present their findings on the two caves and discuss the promise their discoveries hold to fellow archaeologists on April 23 during the 56th annual meeting of the American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE) in Cambridge, Mass. | |
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