A large administrative settlement from ancient Egypt's Second Intermediate Period has been discovered in Kharga Oasis, Nevine El-Aref reports An American-Egyptian mission from Yale University has discovered what is believed to be the remains of a substantial settlement in Kharga Oasis in the Western Desert. The archaeologists were carrying out routine excavation work within the framework of the Theban Desert Road Survey when they made the discovery. The survey aims to investigate and map ancient desert routes in that portion of the Western Desert. The settlement, which is laid out on a grid pattern, is 1,000 years older than previous ancient remains found in the Umm Mawagir area in Kharga Oasis. The find was announced by Culture Minister Farouk Hosni, who said that the settlement could be dated to the Second Intermediate period (1664-1569 BC). Zahi Hawass, secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), said that the newly-discovered settlement was one kilometre long from north to south and 250 metres wide from east to west. It sits astride the bustling trade routes that connected the Nile Valley of Egypt and the desert oases with points as far as Darfur in western Sudan. He continued that archaeological evidence on the site indicated that the inhabitants of the settlement belonged to an administrative and provision centre and were engaged in baking on a massive scale. John Coleman Darnel, head of the mission, said that during excavations the mission found remains of large administrative structures in mud brick consisting of rooms and halls similar to the type of official architecture previously found in sites in the Nile Valley. These may have been used as look-out posts and were part of the administrative centre of the settlement. Part of an ancient bakery was found containing two ovens and a potter's wheel used to make the ceramic bread moulds in which the bread was baked. The sheer volume of remains and debris dumped outside the bakery suggests that the settlement produced a food surplus and may have even been feeding a passing army. "From the orthogonal planning to the administrative and food- supply areas, this new settlement in the desert reveals the incredible organisational abilities of the ancient Egyptians," Coleman Darnel suggests. "We have identified a major north- south road leading through the Umm Mawagir city, the most ancient version known of the famous Darb Al-Arbain Road (the Forty Days Road) linking Egypt with Darfour and points beyond," Darnel told Al-Ahram Weekly. He continued that broken pots along this road indicated activity as early as 3300 BC and revealed the passage of vessels from as far away as the Levantine coast and Nilotic Sudan. "Roads such as these could be used for trade and religious activities as well as for military manoeuvre," Coleman Darnel said. Deborah Darnel, co-director of the mission, says early studies of the site reveal that the settlement was founded during the Middle Kingdom (2134-1569 BC) and lasted until the beginning of the New Kingdom (1569-1081 BC), but that it was at its largest extent and saw the greatest amount of activity during the Late Middle Kingdom between the 13th Dynasty (1786-1665 BC), the Second Intermediate Period and the 17th Dynasty (1600-1569 BC). "The discovery of a major urban site with associated caravan routes which flourished primarily during the Second Intermediate Period is key to understanding an obscure, but important phase in Egyptian history," Darnel says.
