EXPEDITION 2024 (Kharga)

Dates: 02 – 26 May 2024.

Area/site: Fortified Settlement and Cemetery G of Umm al-Dabadib.

Short description: The aim of this expedition was to start the archaeological excavation of the site. Two targets were identified: Unit C in the Fortified Settlement and Cemetery G, the only one apparently dating to the Fourth Century AD, and thus contemporary to the settlement under study.
The excavation of Unit C focused on the central living room, covered by the typical pair of orthogonal vaults. It was mainly filled by blown sand and contained a series of objects that appear to have been abandoned there as either broken or too heavy to be removed, including a large number of loom weights, several vessels and a grinding stone basement made of granite. A small selection of objects was removed, transported to the Taftish and stored in the local magazine, whilst most of the finds were recorded, measured, photographed and then re-buried on site. The room was backfilled up the original level of the sand.
The excavation of Cemetery G aimed at confirming its date and test its extent. The findings confirmed a full Fourth Century date and that the cemetery is definitely denser than it appears at first sight, but probably not much larger in terms of extent. Four intact graves were excavated, the human remains were exposed and studied in situ, then reburied by re-composing the layers in the same order. On the last day, all the scattered bones laying around each robbed tomb were collected and re-buried in the corresponding sandy hollow.
From the magazine in Kharga we retrieved two large granite grinding stones retrieved, respectively, in 2003 and 2015 and surveyed them in 3D by photogrammetry.

Team: Dr Corinna Rossi (Director), Dr Alessandro Mandelli (Surveyor), Dr Clementina Caputo (Ceramicist), Dr Stefania Alfarano (Archaeologist), Mr Cesare Iezzi (Archaeologist), Mr Mohamed Hassan Gaber al-Wahati (Inspector), Dr Adel Abdelhamed Abdo (Conservator), Ayub Kolib Younes Mustafa, Mohamed Fathy Khawas, Mustafa Abdelhad Khalifa, Mustafa Ibrahim Ahmed Ali, Ayman Ali Saad, Abdel Naser Orman Mohamed Orman, Mahmoud Mohamed Ahmed Mohamed, and Gamal Hussein Mohamed (Workmen), Essam (chief driver and head of camp, Pan Arab Tours), Aysam, Mohamed, Alaa, Ahmed (drivers, Pan Arab Tours), Shukri, Mustafa and Hossam (cooks, Pan Arab Tours), Ali, Mustafa and Ali (Policemen).

Acknowledgements: Mr Mohamed Ibrahim Ahmed (General Manager of the Kharga Antiquities), the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, Ms Amal Moussa and Ms Marwa Fawzy (Pan Arab Tours), Magdy Ali (Project Representative in Cairo).

This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizion 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement n°  681673).