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Al-Ahram Weekly 10 - 16 February 2000 Issue No. 468 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 10 - 16 February 2000 Issue No. 468
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Focus Profile Travel Books Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Beneath the sands of Karara
By Samir NaoumIt seems that Karara was more of an important community in its past incarnations than its present condition suggests. The sight of stone ruins in the centre of the village hardly inspires enthusiasm for the non-professional, but the site harbours a long history spanning several centuries, from the late-Pharaonic to the Byzantine periods.
The village of Karara lies on the eastern bank of the Nile opposite Maghara, in Minya governorate. It is an unassuming community, at the edge of the desert, which would have little to commend it were it not for the large burial site dating to late-Roman and early-Byzantine rule identified by British archaeologists at the beginning of the 20th century. Despite the interesting find, there has been no sustained excavation of the site until the recent efforts of a joint Egyptian-German archaeological team.
"The site was briefly excavated just before the First World War, in the 1913-14 archaeological season," says Sami Farid, supervisor of the fieldwork at Karara. "Several Coptic cemeteries and a large number of artefacts were found to the north and south of Karara village." Only in 1981 did a German archaeological mission visit Karara and carry out two surveys. "They decided the site warranted serious excavation and a digging site was chosen," said Farid.
The ruins of three limestone buildings have been unearthed in the excavations. The buildings proved to be part of a temple dedicated to the goddess Hathor but were, in the words of Farid, extremely modest. One building was 4 by 1.5 metres, its walls rising to a height of only 70 centimetres. Another building covered a surface of 4.5 by 4 metres, its walls only 140 centimetres high. The third building was a rectangular enclosure divided into two parts by a wall partition.
There was more excitement about the unearthing of two sections of an unfinished limestone statue. "It is not big," conceded Sami, "but it was found along with inscriptions in the name of Ramses IV (about 1150 BC) and some of the kings of the Libyan dynasty (around 945 BC)". A relief of the goddess Hathor, with an inscription of religious texts, was also part of the find.
The discoveries of the current Egyptian-German mission has drawn attention to Karara once again and has ignited renewed enthusiasm for the site. Several probes have been made opposite the temple's main gate, revealing a coffin with a top shaped like a pyramid. The coffin belongs to an unknown person and dates back to the 12th century. It was covered with dark red linen netting and found along with it was a wooden container, probably for spices, with crosses delicately and beautifully carved on it. Says Farid, "Strangely, the origin of the name Karara is unknown; whether it was ancient Egyptian or Greek is unknown". The dig yielded numerous papyri written in Coptic, hieratic and hieroglyphics.
Ruins of a temple dedicated to the ancient goddess Hathor are the source of recent archaeological excitement at a site once abandoned
photos: Samir NaoumKarara is not exactly poised to become a major tourist destination anytime soon. What will happen is that Karara is to become an archaeologically protected area; visited faithfully by missions searching for still more treasures and the occasional adventure traveller who seeks to verge off the beaten track.
