From stones that helped us decipher the hieroglyphs, to strange new finds on mummies, here are
8 amazing discoveries from Egypt.
8.
Cemetery of Thoth You might not believe this but even today,
the rich history of Egypt makes it so that many treasures can still be discovered.
Just last year, 2018, an entire Necropolis was discovered!
The city of Minya is in the Nile Valley, and archaeologists were doing some work outside
of the town when they found a large burial site.
This isn't too unusual per se because the people of Egypt have long believed in elaborate
burials for their people, especially higher ranking ones.
But here, this particular Necropolis, or cemetery wasn't for a large family or a group of royals.
Instead, it was made for a group of priests.
These particular priests worshipped the god Thoth, who was the god of Wisdom and the Moon
in the Egyptian Pantheon.
These priests were buried along with their families, and every single one of them had
their bodies wrapped in a certain way, the high priest being wrapped in a bronze sheet,
and put inside their unique sarcophagus.
Some of the priests even had their organs removed and placed into individual jars.
Egyptologists speculate that to document the findings of this cemetery fully will take
around five years!
7.
Unfinished Obelisk An unfinished obelisk was found in Aswan in
Egypt, and it's clear that the Egyptians were working on it when they suddenly decided to
stop.
Should they have finished the endeavor, this would've been the biggest obelisk ever made
by them, at about a height of 138 feet.
But something happened and this gigantic monument never made it out of the ground.
Even so, it hasn’t stopped architects and Egyptologists from studying this unfinished
obelisk in order to learn more about the ancient Egyptians building process.
The obelisks themselves were carved from a single piece of stone, and were named in order
to reference how they "pierce the sky".
In the context of the Aswan obelisks, they were carved out of bedrock, and then moved
out of the quarries, moved towards the Nile River, ferried to their final resting places,
and then brought up to full height by more workers.
So, lots of places where they could crack or break.
When it was first discovered, many thought that this unfinished obelisk was actually
a monument that had fallen over at some point.
But then, after it was fully revealed, it was discovered that there were cracks in the
large granite stone.
So the workers abandoned it rather than risk damaging it more.
6.
The Sphinx If you were to go to Egypt today, the two
things that would likely top your list of "go-to places" would be the Pyramids of Giza
and The Great Sphinx.
The structure of the Sphinx was modeled after its namesake in Egyptian mythology.
Described as a half-lion- half human, it was a spiritual guardian depicted as male and
wearing a Pharaoh's headdress.
The Sphinx was also truly built to last.
It was crafted from a giant limestone slab, which is very hard to erode, thus making it
perfect for the winds and sands of Egypt.
To this day, there is great debate over when exactly it was made, or even who built it,
and to what purpose.
A general consensus has been made that the face of the Sphinx looks like the late Pharaoh
Khafre, which would put the construction of the monolith at around 2500 BC.
It is also agreed that it may have been built to honor him since he built the second pyramid
of Giza.
The Sphinx has been lost and rediscovered several times, due to the fact that it has
been buried by sand.
The only reason we can see it now is because of a decades-long excavation of the site.
Coming up is something we can actually thank Napoleon for!
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5.
Rosetta Stone During one of Napoleon's campaigns where he
tried to take over Egypt and failed, near the town of Rosetta, a group of soldiers was
working on a fort when they decided to take down a certain wall.
Among the group was Pierre-Francois Bouchard, and when the wall fell, he found a slab of
stone that was unlike anything he'd seen before.
To be more specific, it had writings on it, but it was in different languages, including
one he recognized.
This was the official discovery of the Rosetta Stone.
Upon its finding in Egypt in 1799, research immediately took place, and it was found that
the stone was actually from 196 B.C.
All the more curious about this stone was that it had three languages written onto it.
The first of the languages were Hieroglyphics, the symbols seen on Egyptian tombs and pyramids,
and a true hallmark of the country and culture.
Then there was Demotic, another Egyptian language that the people used.
But the third language was the biggest surprise: Greek.
A likely remnant of the reign of Alexander the Great.
After the surrender of the French, the British got the Rosetta Stone into their possession,
which led to Jean-Francois Champollion and Thomas Young examining and deciphering the
entire stone text.
Through the Greek version of the stone, they were able to translate both sections of the
Egyptian text, and through this, the world now had a way to decipher the past.
This is important for a very simple reason, at the time, we couldn't even hope to translate
the Egyptian writings and hieroglyphs that lined their monuments.
So this Rosetta Stone essentially unlocked the entire history of Egypt for the world
to read.
Through this discovery, we have learned more and more about the Ancient Egyptians, their
cultures, and have found many new discoveries along the way.
4.
Third Kingdom In 1902, a series of tombs were discovered
by a legendary Egyptologist named Flinders Petrie.
But despite finding them, he chose not to examine them himself, and thus left them alone
for someone else to explore.
The prevailing theory is that he didn't think it was worth his time.
Fast forward a hundred and twelve years, and some archaeologists decided to take up the
charge and do what he didn't.
And what they found in those tombs was a king.
Specifically, one from a third kingdom of Egypt dating back 3600 years.
His name was King Senebkay, and he ruled a central part of Egypt before the unification
of the nation.
This is significant for numerous reasons.
The first is that it was held to be true that only two kingdoms of Egypt were around before
the unification.
But because of the discovery of King Senebkay, that's now proven wrong.
The second fact is that it helps fill in a big hole in history, as the placement of this
kingdom was literally between the other two, which means there's a lot more to piece together
about the region.
Finally, a third kingdom was theorized by many, but no one could ever prove that it
was real outside of vague references.
But these tombs proved the third kingdom was real.
And thus, history is rewritten once again.
The teams of Egyptologists are still searching the tombs, and the more they find, the more
complete the history of the kingdom.
3.
The Temples of Abu Simbel Two temples reside near Aswan Egypt, and were
constructed by none other than Ramses II between 1279-13 BC.
These massive temples were lost for some time before being rediscovered by Johann Ludwig
Burckhardt in 1812.
The place was completely buried, so and his friend Giovanni Belzoni actually went and
dug out the entrance so that they could explore it.
Aside from the massive structure itself, the Temples of Abu Simbel are punctuated by four
massive statues of Ramses.
Though only three remain mostly intact.
Along the feet of the statues are carvings of Ramses wife and children.
The temple itself is actually dedicated to the sun gods of Egypt, and the temple was
constructed in such a way that on two specific days of the year, February and October 22nd,
the first lights of the sun will actually penetrate the temples and shine all the way
into the innermost sanctuary.
Not far from the main temple is actually a smaller one dedicated to Ramses wife Nefertari,
and her god Hathor.
2.
The Oldest Tattoo Ever During an excavation, two bodies were found
in a shallow grave.
One of a man, and one of a woman.
While at first, there was nothing special about the two, a smudge on their bones of
their arms caught the eye of many.
Mainly because the scientists couldn't figure out what the smudges were.
They didn't conform to any known burial rights of Egypt, and the fact that they were in a
shallow grave proved that they were unprepared for a burial.
Then, in 2018, a scan was done of the smudges, and what it revealed was that the smudges
were actually ancient tattoos.
On the male was a bull and a sheep, and then on the female was S-shaped tattoos.
The key significance of this was that these tattoos were documented as being 5000 years
old, which is well before the first "known" tattoos in Africa, and the world.
1.
The Tomb of Tutankhamun Easily the most famous archaeological find
in all of Egypt is that of the tomb and sarcophagus of Tutankhamun.
The legendary pharaohs' burial site was found by a group of archaeologists in 1922, and
headed up by Egyptologist Howard Carter.
The tomb of the pharaoh was already a priceless treasure, but when they moved to the sarcophagus,
they found that the legendary ruler was actually held within three of them!
And the final one had treasures laid inside, as well as a mask to cover his face.
Carter himself was amazed by the sights he beheld when he entered and can be quoted as
saying: "As one's eyes became accustomed to the glimmer
of light, the interior of the chamber gradually loomed before one, with its strange and wonderful
medley of extraordinary and beautiful objects heaped upon one another."
Tutankhamun himself was a beloved leader of Egypt, mainly because he was one who tried
to restore Egypt to its former glory in terms of how its society was run.
However, due to health issues, he actually died rather young.
And he was so young when he ruled that he was referred to by some as "The Boy King".
The only downside to his discovery was that there were rumors of a "curse" that sprung
when the tomb was opened, as some of the archeology team did die soon after they examined everything.
But this was later debunked as a story by the team to ward off grave robbers.
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