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This Smithsonian article provides a detailed summary of the wealth of tombs, burials and grave goods discovered in subterranean "megatombs" around Saqqara.
INSIDE THE TOMBS OF SAQQARA

Dramatic new discoveries in the ancient Egytptian burial ground. A special report ...

Beneath the ruins of the Bubasteion temple, archaeologists discovered "megatombs" crammed with burials. ...
FULL STORY: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/inside-tombs-saqqara-180977932/
 
I'll park this here.
Some crazy-but-interesting stuff about the pyramids:
 
New discoveries in the ruins of the ancient city of Oxyrhynchus include a rare sealed / never-opened tomb and multiple gold-foil tongues.
Mummies With Gold Tongues Found Inside 2,500-Year-Old Tombs in Egypt

Archaeologists have unearthed two tombs, containing the mummified remains of a man and woman who died about 2,500 years ago, in the ruins of the ancient Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchus, in what is now El Bahnasa.

During the excavation, the team stumbled upon a unique find: three gold-foil tongues. Adding to the surprise, one of the tombs had never been opened. ...

The sealed tomb, a male sarcophagus made of limestone, held mummified remains and an array of items, including a scarab amulet, four canopic jars that were used in the mummification process, and more than 400 pieces of faience, in the form of small funerary figures made of glazed earthenware. The mummy’s face was also well preserved with a golden tongue still inside his mouth ...

In ancient Egypt, embalmers sometimes crafted tongues from gold foil and placed them inside the mouths of the dead to enable them to speak with Osiris, the god of the underworld.

Earlier this year, archaeologists working in Alexandria discovered a mummy with a similar gold tongue dating to around 2,000 years ago, as reported by Isis Davis-Marks for Smithsonian magazine at the time.

The three gold tongues found in the two tombs date to the Roman period that began in 30 B.C.E., reports The National. ...

he other tomb, which had already been raided by grave robbers around the time of burial, held a sarcophagus in the shape of a woman, but the mummified remains were in poor shape ... Buried alongside the body were beads, a stone headrest amulet and a figure of the falcon-headed god Horus. Two more gold tongues were also found; one inside the woman’s mouth, and another believed to have been placed in the mouth of a child’s remains.

The tombs date to the Saite dynasty, a period that lasted from about 664 to 332 B.C.E. ...
FULL STORY: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smar...2500-year-old-tombs-found-in-egypt-180979185/
 
Today's Quora featured ancient Egyptian statues with remarkably realistic eyes.

The skill of the sculptors some 3 to 4,500 years ago was absolutely stunning and that Queen Nefertiti must have been quite a looker!

Nefertiti:

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Unknown scribe:

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Princess Nophret:

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Why discover just one when two are better?

Archaeologists Unearth Colossal Pair of Sphinxes in Egypt During Restoration of Landmark Temple​

Fragments of a colossal pair of limestone sphinxes were unearthed at the ancient Egyptian temple of Amenhotep III in western Luxor. A German-Egyptian team of researchers, led by archaeologist Hourig Sourouzian, discovered the artifacts half-submerged in water during their restoration of the funerary temple of the pharaoh and the Colossi of Memnon, two monumental statues in his likeness.

The sphinxes measure around 26 feet long and likely depict the ancient ruler outfitted wearing a mongoose-shaped headdress, a royal beard, and a broad necklace. A restoration of the limestone revealed “the beloved of Amun-Re” across the sphinx’s chest, according to Egypt’s Ministry of Tourism & Antiquities.
https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/sphinxes-found-amenhotep-iii-temple-luxor-1234616230/
 
Five ancient tombs discovered in Egypt

The well-preserved tombs, thought to be at least 4,000 years old, were unearthed in Saqqara, outside Cairo last week.

The Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities has since confirmed that the tombs belonged to some of the era’s top officials, including court advisers and priests.

Pictures taken by photographers show the inside of the tombs, which boast elaborately painted walls.

It's reported the chambers contained over 20 sarcophagi, toys, wooden boats, masks and more artefacts.
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Exploring the Osiris shaft on the Giza plateaux. Short video. 13 minutes.

The bloke is promoting his Egyptian/pyramid tours company but it is interesting none the less. This is yet another one of those mysteries that no one as yet can explain. Personally I ignored the bit about using advance technology. No one what this particular shaft was made for or how it was made.

 
By Jove! Zeus Temple found in Egypt.

Egyptian archaeologists have unearthed the ruins of a temple for the Greek god Zeus in the Sinai Peninsula, antiquities authorities said.

The Tourism and Antiquities Ministry said the temple ruins were found in the Tell el-Farma archaeological site in north-western Sinai.

Tell el-Farma, also known by its ancient name Pelusium, dates back to the late Pharaonic period and was also used during Greco-Roman and Byzantine times. There are also remains dating to the Christian and early Islamic periods.

Mostafa Waziri, secretary-general of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities, said archaeologists excavated the temple ruins through its entrance gate, where two huge fallen granite columns were visible. The gate was destroyed in a powerful earthquake in ancient times, he said.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/world/arid-40858730.html
 
Apologies if this has already been posted. Computer wizardry used to bring ancient Pharaohs to life, based on their mummies and statues.

The images below are of Seti I and Tutankhamun. Watch the video for the impressive animation, which is both remarkable and slightly eerie.

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What a difference a little bit o' cleaning makes ...

EgyptTemple-ArtCleaning.jpg
Gorgeous paintings of ancient Egyptian goddesses revealed under layers of bird poop

Archaeologists have discovered 46 stunning depictions of goddesses from ancient Egypt, which were previously buried under layers of soot and bird poop. Artists created the detailed and colorful frescoes on the ceiling of a temple nearly 2,200 years ago.

The temple is located at Esna, a city in southern Egypt that is about 37 miles (60 kilometers) south of Luxor (ancient Thebes). It is dedicated to Khnum, an ancient Egyptian god associated with fertility and water.

Hieroglyphs on the temple show that it was used for nearly 400 years — between the time of pharaoh Ptolemy VI (reign 180 B.C. to 145 B.C.) and the Roman emperor Decius (reign A.D. 249 to 251) ...

he team found that the temple's paintings depict Nekhbet, a goddess who is depicted like a vulture, and Wadjet, a cobra-headed goddess who has wings. Nekhbet is shown wearing the white crown of Upper Egypt and Wadjet wears the crown of Lower Egypt. Nekhbet and Wadjet were sometimes referred to by the ancient Egyptians as the "two ladies."

"The glory of the color used in the depictions of the 'Two Ladies', Nekhbet and Wadjet, which has now been revealed, was previously unknown to experts," according to a statement ...

Only the vestibule (also known as the pronaos) of the temple survives today, ... measuring 121 feet (37 meters) long, 66 feet (20 m) wide and 49 feet (15 m) tall. ... Work is ongoing and the team will be publishing details about their finds in the future.

Cleaning and conservation of the paintings are still underway. "More than half of the ceilings and eight of the 18 columns have now been cleaned, conserved and documented," the statement said. ...
FULL STORY (With Photos): https://www.livescience.com/colorful-ceiling-ancient-egyptian-temple
 
Not a new discovery, but a good one.

Otter statue. Period: Late Period or Ptolemaic Period. Date: 664–30 B.C. On display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY.

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New Necropolis artefacts found.

Egypt has displayed a trove of ancient artefacts dating back 2,500 years said to have been unearthed at the necropolis of Saqqara near Cairo.

The artefacts were showcased at a makeshift exhibit at the feet of the Step Pyramid of Djoser in Saqqara, 15 miles south west of the Egyptian capital.

The finds include 250 painted sarcophagi with well-preserved mummies inside, as well as 150 bronze statues of ancient deities and bronze vessels used in rituals of Isis, the goddess of fertility in ancient Egyptian mythology, all from the Late Period, about 500BC, head of the Supreme Council of Antiquities Mostafa Waziri said.

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The Saqqara site is part of a sprawling necropolis at Egypt’s ancient capital of Memphis that includes the Giza Pyramids and the smaller pyramids at Abu Sir, Dahshur and Abu Ruwaysh (Amr Nabil/AP)

A headless bronze statue of Imhotep, the chief architect of Pharaoh Djoser, who ruled ancient Egypt between 2630BC and 2611BC, was also displayed.

The artefacts will be moved for a permanent exhibit at the new Grand Egyptian Museum, a major project still under construction near the Giza Pyramids, just outside Cairo.

The Saqqara site is part of a sprawling necropolis at Egypt’s ancient capital of Memphis that includes the Giza Pyramids and the smaller pyramids at Abu Sir, Dahshur and Abu Ruwaysh.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/world/arid-40884341.html
 
Tunnel found below Taposiris Magna Temple

Near Alexandria. Six feet high & almost a mile long. Speculation linking it with Cleopatra’s tomb.

Archaeologist Kathleen Martinez from the University of San Domingo, who called the tunnel ‘an engineering miracle’, explained that its architectural design closely resembles the Yubilinus tunnel project in Greece, aside from being considerably longer. She pointed out that a decent portion of the tunnel was discovered beneath the Mediterranean Sea.

The excavations also unearthed several ceramic jars and pots, along with a rectangular block of limestone hidden under the mud and sand sediments.

At least 23 earthquakes hit the Egyptian coast between 320 AD and 1303 AD, which caused a portion of the Temple of Taposiris Magna to sink and collapse.

The research team is also reportedly attempting to uncover a portion of the temple’s foundations that have been revealed by countless of archaeological pieces of evidence.

The Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities said: ‘It is noteworthy that the mission, during previous excavation seasons, was able to find many important artefacts inside the Temple including coins bearing the images and names of both Queen Cleopatra, Alexander the Great, and a number of beheaded statues, and statues of the goddess Isis, as well patterns and figurines of various shapes and sizes.’

Past excavations have so far uncovered a network of tunnels stretching from King Marriott Lake to the Mediterranean and 16 burials inside rock-cut tombs commonly used in the Greek and Roman periods.

In addition, several mummies highlighting the features of the mummification process during the Greek and Roman periods have also been discovered.
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Unlooted Tomb Discovered

Archaeologists say they have found a gold leaf-covered mummy sealed inside a sarcophagus that had not been opened for 4,300 years.

The mummy, the remains of a man named Hekashepes, is thought to be one of the oldest and most complete non-royal corpses ever found in Egypt.

It was discovered down a 15m (50ft) shaft at a burial site south of Cairo, Saqqara, where three other tombs were found.

One tomb belonged to a "secret keeper".
The largest of the mummies that were unearthed at the ancient necropolis is said to belong to a man called Khnumdjedef - a priest, inspector and supervisor of nobles.

Another belonged to a man called Meri, who was a senior palace official given the title of "secret keeper", which allowed him to perform special religious rituals.

A judge and writer named Fetek is thought to have been laid to rest in the other tomb, where a collection of what are thought to be the largest statues ever found in the area had been discovered.

Several other items, including pottery, have also been found among the tombs.

Archaeologist Zahi Hawass, Egypt's former antiquities minister, has said all the discoveries date from around the 25th to the 22nd centuries BC.
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There’s a brief video showing the tomb in remarkable condition.
 

How a Meteor Crash Formed Stunning Desert Glass

It was precious enough for King Tut’s tomb.

LET’S GO BACK IN TIME roughly, oh, 20 million years. It’s the Miocene era, which formally began 3.03 million years prior, and India and Asia are just beginning to collide and form the impressive mountain ranges we know today. Kelp forests and brown algae are appearing and diversifying oceans at rapid rates; in Europe and Africa, around 100 different species of early apes are monkeying around.

With this as the backdrop, let’s zoom in on North Africa specifically. Libya, bordered by the Mediterranean Sea on the north and Egypt to the east, is about to experience a geological miracle. Unbeknown to the colliding mountains and swinging apes of the Miocene, the 420,000 square miles that make up the Libyan desert (which is part of the Sahara) would soon be caramelized into shards of foggy green glass. This rare and precious material, known as Libyan Desert Glass, was found in King Tutankhamun’s burial tomb millions of years later.

Dr. Jane Cook, chief scientist at The Corning Museum of Glass in Corning, New York, explains, “glass happens when just the right ingredients are heated up and cooled down quickly.” But in the case of Libyan Desert Glass, the series of events was much more elaborate. “About 20 million years ago, either a meteor impact or atmospheric explosion got to the desert part of the lower atmosphere, heated it up and fragmented and exploded,” she says. “It dumped a huge amount of heat, like in thousands of Fahrenheit degrees, into that portion of the desert, which was a relatively pure deposit of quartz sand. And it brought it up hot enough that it was able to liquefy for a short period of time.”

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When British archaeologist Howard Carter began searching through King Tut’s treasure chests in 1922, he found a decorative breastplate depicting the Sun God Ra. Housed in the center of this armor sits a chartreuse scarab: a beetle symbol, usually cut from gemstones, that ancient Egyptians held sacred. This particular 18th-Dynasty scarab was carved from the rare and precious Libyan Desert Glass, as confirmed by Italian mineralogist Vincenzo de Michele in 1998.

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/libyan-desert-glass

maximus otter
 
This is similar to (or based on) Christopher Dunn's theories:
Something worth remembering about Dunn. For all of his claims about ancient stone work and what was done. He's never compared his claims to Roman stone work. Which we happen to have much more writing about.
Not that we have nothing about Egyptian or MesoAmerican. But he doesn't really look at the various unfinished stages of stonework we have, just what he wants to use.
 
Laughing Sphinx, probably amused by cats.

Egypt archaeology: Dig unearths smiling mini-sphinx which may represent Claudius​



An archaeological worker unearthing a Sphynx statue during in Egypt
IMAGE SOURCE, EPA. By Emily McGarvey, BBC News.


Archaeologists have unearthed a sphinx-like statue and the remains of a shrine in an ancient temple in southern Egypt, the antiquities ministry says.

The artefacts were found near the Hathor Temple, one of Egypt's best-preserved ancient sites. The limestone sphinx with its "smiley face and two dimples" is thought to represent Roman Emperor Claudius.

It is much smaller than the famous Sphinx in the Pyramids of Giza, which is 20m (66ft) high. The artefacts were found inside a two-level tomb in the temple of Dendera in Qena Province, 450km (280 miles) south of the capital of Cairo.

Emperor Claudius, whom archaeologists believe the statue's smiling features may belong to, extended Roman rule into North Africa between 41 and 54 AD.

Archaeologists will study the markings on the stone slab, which could reveal more information on the statue's identity, the ministry said. ...

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-64870562
 
The Zodiac, planets and decans on the walls of a temple.

Looking to the stars for constellations that preside over birth and life has a long and complex history, and archaeologists have just uncovered a small piece of it.

A spectacular series of relief paintings on the ceiling of an ancient Egyptian temple depict 12 signs of the zodiac, and you might be surprised to recognize some of them.


In addition to the representations of the zodiac, the artworks restored in the magnificent Temple of Esna in Upper Egypt, dedicated to the ram-headed god Khnum and others, also include depictions of five of the planets in our Solar System, the "seven arrows" of Sekhmet, and some of the decans used to measure the hours of the night.

It's a rare find, and a beautiful one, joining a series of stunning and intricate nearly 2,000-year-old artworks adorning the temple walls.

sagittarius-cleaning-642x295.jpg


The depiction of Sagittarius, after cleaning (left) and before (right). (Ahmed Emam/Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities)


https://www.sciencealert.com/complete-depiction-of-the-zodiac-found-in-ancient-egyptian-temple
 
Sagittarius was of ancient Greek origin, so curious that the Egyptians also used it in their zodiac.
 
Sagittarius was of ancient Greek origin, so curious that the Egyptians also used it in their zodiac.
The article says 2000 years old, so this would have been when Egypt was part of the Roman Empire, with Roman influence on artistic forms, and that's not even taking into account the Greek influence during the Hellenistic Period (the Ptolomaic Kingdom), after Alexander the Great invaded in 332 BC.
 
Losing your right hand man.

A dozen severed hands found piled in the courtyard of an ancient Egyptian palace could be the result of a gruesome "trophy-taking" ritual by a foreign invader, according to a new study.

Inscriptions and reliefs from Egyptian tombs and temples depict mutilated or amputated hands as early as the New Kingdom from the 16th to 11th centuries BCE. According to the authors of this new study, this is the first time archaeologists have found and analyzed the actual amputated hands.

"They belonged to at least eleven males and possibly one female, which may indicate that women and warfare were not worlds apart," the study authors write in their published paper.

The team conducted their analysis on what they determined to be right hands that were originally found in 2011, buried in three separate pits in the courtyard of the Hyksos palace at Avaris/Tell el-Dab'a in northeastern Egypt.

An image showing 11 right hands in the pits L1542 and L1543 in front of the Hyksos palace.


Eleven right hands were found buried in two of the pits, L1542 and L1543. (Gresky et al., Scientific Reports)

The palace dates to the 15th Dynasty (1640-1530 BCE), when the Hyksos kings ruled over Lower and Middle Egypt all the way up to the city of Cusae, today known as El Quseyya. The Hyksos were thought to be invaders of Egypt and their kings the civilization's first foreign rulers, although recent evidence shows this may have been misunderstood.

https://www.sciencealert.com/a-pit-...emains-of-a-grisly-ancient-egyptian-ceremony?


 
He ain't heavy, he's my Buddha.

Buddhists lived in Egypt during Roman times, a 1st-century Buddha statue found in Berenike suggests.

Two views of a broken standing Buddha statue carved out of white stone. One view is the profile. The other is a frontal image, showing Buddha dressed in robes with halo-like circle behind his head.

This 1,900-year-old statue of the Buddha is 28 inches (71 centimeters) tall and was found at Berenike, an ancient port city in Egypt by the Red Sea. (Image credit: Courtesy of the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities)

A 1,900-year-old statue of the Buddha — discovered at the ancient Egyptian port city of Berenike, on the coast of the Red Sea — likely belonged to a transplant from South Asia, according to archaeologists.

The Buddha statue depicts Siddhartha Gautama, who lived in South Asia around 2,550 years ago. Born a prince, he would later renounce his worldly wealth and seek out enlightenment, eventually becoming the Buddha, a Sanskrit-derived word that means "the enlightened one," according to Buddhist tradition. The religion he founded gradually spread around the world.

The newfound statue dates to between A.D. 90 and 140, said Steven Sidebotham a history professor at the University of Delaware who is co-director of the Berenike Project, told Live Science in an email. ...

https://www.livescience.com/archaeo...ndicates-buddhists-lived-there-in-roman-times
 
Tutankhamun may have died in drink-driving crash

Biomedical Egyptologist Sofia Aziz proposes that it was a wine-induced high-speed chariot crash that led to Tutankhamun’s infected open wound. That's right, a drink-driving accident.

How sceptical should you be? Well, it is true that a major 2010 study concluded the pharaoh likely died from an open wound (combined with a weakened immune response due to malaria). However, the same research also suggested Tutankhamun had a clubbed foot that left him struggling to walk, let alone ride a chariot.

However, Aziz suggests that scientists have been wrong to profile the king as an invalid.

“He was like a typical teenager, drinking and probably driving the chariot too fast,” Aziz [said].

The 19-year-old’s leg would have hit the ‘dashboard’ of the chariot during the crash, causing the fracture described in autopsy reports and an open wound.

https://www.sciencefocus.com/news/tutankhamun-death-drink-driving/

maximus otter
 
Tutankhamun may have died in drink-driving crash

Biomedical Egyptologist Sofia Aziz proposes that it was a wine-induced high-speed chariot crash that led to Tutankhamun’s infected open wound. That's right, a drink-driving accident.

How sceptical should you be? Well, it is true that a major 2010 study concluded the pharaoh likely died from an open wound (combined with a weakened immune response due to malaria). However, the same research also suggested Tutankhamun had a clubbed foot that left him struggling to walk, let alone ride a chariot.

However, Aziz suggests that scientists have been wrong to profile the king as an invalid.

“He was like a typical teenager, drinking and probably driving the chariot too fast,” Aziz [said].

The 19-year-old’s leg would have hit the ‘dashboard’ of the chariot during the crash, causing the fracture described in autopsy reports and an open wound.

https://www.sciencefocus.com/news/tutankhamun-death-drink-driving/

maximus otter
He'd probably been on this stuff;

Egyptian moonshine: Not for the fainthearted, literally​


gordonsmoonshine.jpg


https://egyptindependent.com/egyptian-moonshine-not-fainthearted-literally/
 
Ancient Egyptian followers of a deity called Bes may have used hallucinogens

An ancient Egyptian vase in the shape of the deity Bes showed traces of chemical plant compounds known to produce hallucinations, according to a recent preprint posted to Research Square. The authors suggest that members of the cult of Bes may have consumed a special cocktail containing the compounds to induce altered states of consciousness.

Davide Tanasi of the University of South Florida and his co-authors analyzed an Egyptian ritual vase in the shape of Bes dating back to the second century BC in the collection of the Tampa Museum of Art in Florida. Bes was a popular deity believed to confer protection on households, especially mothers and children. So unlike most other Egyptian deities, images of Bes were quite common in Egyptian homes.

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Tanasi et al. applied various techniques—including proteomic and genetic analyses and synchrotron radiation-based Fourier-transform infrared microspectroscopy—to characterize the residues.

Among the more intriguing results was the presence of Syrian rue (Peganum harmala), whose seeds are known to have hallucinogenic properties that can induce dream-like visions, per the authors, thanks to its production of the alkaloids harmine and harmaline. There were also traces of blue water lily (Nymphaea cerulea), which contains a psychoactive alkaloid that acts as a sedative; it's one of several candidate plants that scholars believe might be the fruit of the lotus tree described in Homer's Odyssey. Both were known to the Egyptians, and the authors concluded that these two plants "were deliberately used as sources of psychoactive substances for ritual purposes."

https://arstechnica.com/science/202...deity-called-bes-may-have-used-hallucinogens/

maximus otter
 

Oldest Known Condom Found in a Tomb in Egypt


When the tomb of Tutankhamun was discovered in 1922, archaeologist Howard Carter was amazed at the amount of items that were part of the "burial" that accompanied his corpse.

More than 5,000 artifacts were buried—for the young king to use in the afterlife.

But among the array of gold, silver, ebony, ivory, expensive jewelry, weapons, tools, beautiful fabrics and perfumes, one thing caught the attention of experts—King Tut's condom—and those who placed it probably considered it it is important to the king to be absorbed in eternal life.

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It's like a casing or sheath made of fine linen. Researchers found out that the condom was soaked in olive oil, and attached to a string that the user probably ties around his waist during sex. It is estimated that the condom was made in 1350 BC, and is considered the "oldest known condom in existence."

If Tutankhamun had used condoms to prevent pregnancy—rather than for rituals or to avoid contracting a disease—it may not have been effective. The remains of two fetuses were also discovered in his tomb.

https://www.esquiremag.ph/life/sex-...ahukay-tomb-hari-egypt-a2748-20230221-src-pep

maximus otter
 
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