After eight years of restoration works, Minister of Antiquities Khaled El-Anany inaugurated on Saturday the fully renovated Tel Basta Museum in Sharqiya Governorate. The restoration of the museum came with the aim of raising the awareness of Tel Basta's citizens of the legacy and heritage of the area, as well as to attract tourists to new historical places other than the usual, well-known ones. The open-air museum showcases artefacts that were unearthed in Tel Basta. The restoration work first started in 2006 and lasted until 2010 when it stopped, before it resumed again at the end of 2017. In a press release, Elham Salah, head of the museums sector at the Antiquities Ministry explained, "the second of phase of the project aims to prepare the interior design of the building as well as to prepare a suitable exhibition scenario with objects to highlight the history of the area and excavation work." The showcased artefacts include a collection of several shapes and sizes of clay pots and canopic jars, as well as coins, statues, tombstones, offering tables, and jewellery. One of the displayed pieces is devoted to the main ancient Egyptian deity of Sharqiya, Bastet, where a collection of its statues of different shapes, sizes, and materials are shown. The area is one of the richest archaeological sites. In 2009, a French-Egyptian mission discovered the location of the sacred lake of goddess Mut's temple, which was the second sacred lake to be revealed at the site. In 2013, in Tel-El-Yahudia area, a mission from the Ministry of Antiquities uncovered a huge fortification of mud brick inside the Hyksos fortress as well as a residential city on its northeastern corner.
