Ruins Of 7,000-Year-Old City Found At Site of "Mummy Portraits"- PICTURES

[Bianca]

Portrait of a young boy, identified by inscription
as Eutyches, on display at the

Metropolitan Museum of Art.

[Bianca]

Portrait of a man with black curly hair, on display at the

Metropolitan Museum of Art.

[Bianca]

Portrait of bearded man Edinburgh, MoS 1911.210.1,

Royal Museum of Scotland

[Bianca]

A photo released by the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities on April 12, 2009 shows a mummy found 90kms south of Cairo.

Archaeologists working in an Egyptian oasis have found a necropolis containing dozens of the brightly painted mummies dating back as far as 4,000 years, the country's antiquities chief said
on Sunday.

(AFP/HO)





                                                         F A Y O U M   O A S I S


                                            Mummies found in ancient Egypt burial chamber
 



         
April 12, 2009
CAIRO
(AFP)

– Archaeologists working in an Egyptian oasis have found a necropolis containing dozens of brightly painted mummies dating back as far as 4,000 years, the country's antiquities chief said on Sunday.

"The mission found dozens of mummies in 53 rock-hewn tombs dating to the Middle Kingdom" from 2061-1786 BC, Zahi Hawass told AFP.

"Four of the mummies date back to the 22nd Dynasty (931 to 725 BC) and are considered some of the most beautiful mummies found," he said.

The linen-wrapped mummies are painted in the still-bright traditional ancient Egyptian colours of turquoise, terracotta and gold.

The necropolis was uncovered near the Ilahun pyramid in Fayoum oasis south of Cairo.

Abdel-Rahman el-Ayedi, who headed the mission, said that a Middle Kingdom funerary chapel with an offering table was also found, and that it was probably used up to the Roman era which lasted from 30 BC to 337 AD.

The team also found 15 painted masks, along with amulets and clay pots, Hawass said.

[Bianca]

             






FAYOUM OASIS


The Al-Fayoum oasis is the largest oasis of Egypt (60KM long, 70KM wide). Instead of the other Western oases this oasis is at rather short distance of the Nile and Cairo.