Marea ( Ancient Egyptian: ;

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

: , , ;

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

: ) was an ancient city in

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

, located 45 km south-west of

Alexandria Alexandria ( or ; ar, ٱلْإِسْكَنْدَرِيَّةُ ; grc-gre, Αλεξάνδρεια, Alexándria) is the second largest city in Egypt, and the largest city on the Mediterranean coast. Founded in by Alexander the Great, Alexandria ...

, on the southern shore of

Lake Maryut Lake Mariout ( ar, بحيرة مريوط ', , also spelled Maryut or Mariut), is a brackish lake in northern Egypt near the city of Alexandria. The lake area covered and had a navigable canal at the beginning of the 20th century, but at the begin ...

(ancient , ).

History

The pharaoh

Psamtik I Wahibre Psamtik I ( Ancient Egyptian: ) was the first pharaoh of the Twenty-sixth Dynasty of Egypt, the Saite period, ruling from the city of Sais in the Nile delta between 664–610 BC. He was installed by Ashurbanipal of the Neo-Assyrian Empire ...

installed a garrison at Marea in 654 BCE to secure the western borders of his kingdom after he had previously defeated the

Libyan Demographics of Libya is the demography of Libya, specifically covering population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, and religious affiliations, as well as other aspects of the Libyan population. The ...

tribes living in the area who had taken over the Oxyrhynchite nome of Lower Egypt.

Archaeological research

In 1977–1981, archaeological excavations were conducted by researchers from the

University of Alexandria Alexandria University ( ar, جامعة الإسكندرية) is a public university in Alexandria, Egypt. It was established in 1938 as a satellite of Fouad University (the name of which was later changed to Cairo University), becoming an indepen ...

. Since 2000, the work is carried out by a Polish expedition from several scientific institutions, including the

Archaeological Museum of Kraków The Archaeological Museum of Kraków ( pl, Muzeum Archeologiczne w Krakowie) is a historic museum in Kraków, Lesser Poland Voivodeship, Poland. It was established in 1850. History The Archaeological Museum in Kraków is the oldest archaeological ...

and the Institute of Archaeology and the

Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology The Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology University of Warsaw (PCMA UW; pl, Centrum Archeologii Śródziemnomorskiej UW im. Kazimierza Michałowskiego) operates as an independent research institute of the University of Warsaw under the p ...

(both

University of Warsaw The University of Warsaw ( pl, Uniwersytet Warszawski, la, Universitas Varsoviensis) is a public university in Warsaw, Poland. Established in 1816, it is the largest institution of higher learning in the country offering 37 different fields of ...

). The expedition is currently headed by Prof. Tomasz Derda (Institute of Archaeology UW) and Dr. Krzysztof Babraj (Archaeological Museum of Kraków). In 2003, excavations in the Byzantine

basilica In Ancient Roman architecture, a basilica is a large public building with multiple functions, typically built alongside the town's forum. The basilica was in the Latin West equivalent to a stoa in the Greek East. The building gave its name ...

began.

Description of the site

The site of Marea was a large port city in the

Roman period The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Roman Republic, Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings aro ...

, and possibly already in the

Ptolemaic Ptolemaic is the adjective formed from the name Ptolemy, and may refer to: Pertaining to the Ptolemaic dynasty * Ptolemaic dynasty, the Macedonian Greek dynasty that ruled Egypt founded in 305 BC by Ptolemy I Soter * Ptolemaic Kingdom Pertaining ...

times. The research results indicate that the harbor might have functioned until the medieval period, as attested by finds dated to the 13th–14th century. Its remains include four large jetties, the longest of which extends 120 m into the lake. The ancient city was famous for its wine, which was distributed throughout the Mediterranean Basin. The

amphorae An amphora (; grc, ἀμφορεύς, ''amphoreús''; English plural: amphorae or amphoras) is a type of container with a pointed bottom and characteristic shape and size which fit tightly (and therefore safely) against each other in storag ...

in which it was transported were also produced locally. Marea was undoubtedly a large pottery production center – one of the largest pottery kilns in Egypt was found here. A bath complex and a funerary chapel dated to the 6th century, as well as a large (49 m by 47 m) basilica with a

transept A transept (with two semitransepts) is a transverse part of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In cruciform churches, a transept is an area set crosswise to the nave in a cruciform ("cross-shaped") building withi ...

, are examples of

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

architecture at the site. An important discovery was made in 2001: the largest known set of

ostraca An ostracon (Greek language, Greek: ''ostrakon'', plural ''ostraka'') is a piece of pottery, usually broken off from a vase or other earthenware vessel. In an archaeology, archaeological or epigraphy, epigraphical context, ''ostraca'' refer ...

from the 5th–6th century was found, inscribed with notes regarding the construction of the basilica. Under the basilica, the excavators uncovered the remains of an older church, dated preliminarily to the second half of the 4th century. The history of this center from the end of the 3rd century to the building of the Byzantine city in the 5th–6th century is also the object of study.

Footnotes

References

* Babraj, K., Drzymuchowska, A. and Willburger, N.
Marea 2011. „Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean” 23/1 (2014)
* Szymańska, H., Babraj, K.
Marea: Fourth season of excavations. „Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean” 15 (2004)
* Szymańska, H., Babraj, K.
Marea: First interim report, 2000. „Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean” 12 (2001)

External links

Marea Archaeological Project – homepage of the project

Marea Archaeological Project – information on the PCMA UW website
{{coord, 30, 59, 39, N, 29, 39, 20, E, display=title Archaeological sites in Egypt Roman Egypt Byzantine Egypt