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Al-Ahram Weekly 27 Jan. - 2 Feb. 2000 Issue No. 466 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 27 Jan. - 2 Feb. 2000 Issue No. 466
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Pompeii remains in Alexandria
By Nevine El-ArefVery few Roman antiquities have survived in Egypt. Most Roman settlement sites were swept under the plough or covered with layers of alluvial soil in the centuries following the depopulation of declining Roman communities. Thus, the discovery and subsequent restoration of an intact Roman villa, found in the Kom Al-Dikka area, makes for a significant and exciting addition to Egypt's growing cache of enticing sites that provide a door into the ancient world.
Of the little that remains of ancient Alexandria, most lies beneath today's modern city. Excavations in the Kom Al-Dikka area, located in the heart of the central city, were started in the 1960s by the Polish Centre for Archaeology, working with Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA). Restoration of the villa, assisted by the American Research Centre in Egypt (ARCE), started in 1998 and was completed at the end of last year. Governor of Alexandria Abdel-Salam El-Mahgoub plans to put the site on Alexandria's tourist map.
Known as the "Villa of Birds", the find was officially opened to the public last Saturday with a festive ceremony attended by high-ranking officials of the SCA, the Polish Embassy, the ARCE and a representative for USAID, which financed the restoration in the amount of $92,000.
The Roman monuments at Kom Al-Dikka include the Odeon amphitheatre, with its 13 rows of European white-marble seating, columns of Aswan granite, and green marble from western Asia. Also of interest are the Roman baths, previously excavated, which once provided hot and cold water to the illustrious upper-class. Now add the first complete villa.
"This wonderful, unique villa is one of the few Roman houses found in Alexandria and the best example of a wealthy, urban residence," said Minister of Culture Farouk Hosni during the opening. The villa, redecorated at least four times, lies in the southern part of the Kom Al-Dikka site. It contains a bathroom and a number of chambers arranged around an open courtyard that provided light and ventilation.
"The Villa of the Birds provides a rare chance to imagine city-life during the Roman period," said Gaballa Ali Gaballa, secretary-general of the SCA. Opening onto the courtyard is a dining room, where guests lounged on couches and enjoyed fine Egyptian wines and other goods, probably imported from abroad (amphorae fragments from Crete, the Aegean Islands, and Mauritania were all found in the house). Three nearby rooms may have served as bedrooms or even offices.
The villa appears to have been built in the reign of Hadrian (117-138 AD), when Alexandria was enjoying a period of great prosperity. The earliest walls are painted in imitation of marble panels, similar to houses found in Pompeii, while the floors are lime plaster. Later generations laid the magnificent coloured mosaic flooring resembling carpets in two stages, and the house has come to be known as the Villa of the Birds because of the elaborate bird panels that decorated the dining room during the second phase of its development. The birds are shown eating and standing on a branch; a beautiful mosaic "carpet", made of tiny cubes, features a duck.
Despite Alexandria's ostensible affluence, the late-second and early-third centuries were also a time when Egyptians suffered under the ruling power's quest for grain, which was exported to feed the Roman masses. The villa appears to have been subsequently destroyed; the window panes were smashed, the wooden beams burned and the mosaics bulged from the heat. In the late-third century, the villa was destroyed by fire, possibly as a result of political strife during the reign of the emperor Diocletian, about 297 AD -- a retaliation against popular rebellion. After the fire, people carted away any usable building materials.
With the passage of time, what remained of the villa fell to ruin, and in the fifth and sixth centuries, modest houses, storerooms and workshops were built on the site, burying the villa. A wall from these later constructions, used for about a century, can be seen over the Roman courtyard. The mosaics were thus protected; one mosaic discovered during the restoration depicts a panther -- still visible near its forepaws are the horns of its prey.
The creation of mosaic decoration is a long tradition in Egypt. Alexandrian workshops produced such fine mosaics that they were exported to other parts of the Roman world, including Greece. The most common type, dating to the end of the first century AD, uses small cubes of stone, marble, glass paste or faience (decorated earthenware). The rosette mosaic found in the villa dates after the year 133 AD, indicated by a coin of this date found beneath the floor.
"The ceramics provide the biggest collection ever found in situ," said Gaballa enthusiastically. "The mosaics were found much deteriorated and the pieces were spread around the place, but they were carefully retrieved, sorted out, and restored by conservationists."
The restoration project has successfully upgraded the site to satisfy both visitors and conservationists concerned with protecting the site. The site of the villa, which lies beneath the ground level of Alexandria (within the archaeological area of the amphitheatre), has been surrounded by a wrought iron fence and the slopes surrounding monuments have been carpeted with greenery. The villa itself is protected, around and above, with unbreakable glass, and the fragile elements inside are cordoned off with rope, in order to guide visitors. The fire-blackened mosaics have been painstakingly cleaned by conservators and breaks caused by collapsing walls were repaired, the missing portions restored. A special ventilation system has been installed, as well as an overhead cover and an underground airing system, to protect the mosaics from water damage.
The returns of this archaeologically-important area are still being reaped. During the opening ceremony of the villa, Gaballa announced that only two days earlier, excavations near the amphitheatre revealed the ceramic floor of another villa also dating to the first century AD. "Only a part was found," said Gaballa, "but the rest will undoubtedly come to light beneath the amphitheatre." He added that excavation and restoration of the find will run concurrently.
Visitors who purchase a ticket to the amphitheatre of Kom Al-Dikka will have to purchase a separate ticket to see the villa -- an attempt to control the number of visitors (now set between seven and eight persons at any one time) and protect the delicate elements of the structure.
