El Matareya ( ) is a district in the Eastern Area of

Cairo Cairo ( ; , ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Egypt and the Cairo Governorate, being home to more than 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, L ...

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

. The district is unrelated to the coastal town in the

Dakahlia Governorate Dakahlia ( ', ) is an Egyptian governorate lying northeast of Cairo, Egypt. Its area is approximately 3,500 km2. Although the capital of the governorate is Mansoura, it got its name from the ancient town of Daqahlah (, from ) which is locat ...

, that is also named

El Matareya El Matareya (also spelled al-Matariyya, al-Matariyyah or Mataria) may refer to: *El Matareya, Cairo El Matareya ( ) is a district in the Eastern Area of Cairo, Egypt. The district is unrelated to the coastal town in the Dakahlia Governorate, th ...

. The district holds the ruins of the

ancient Egypt Ancient Egypt () was a cradle of civilization concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in Northeast Africa. It emerged from prehistoric Egypt around 3150BC (according to conventional Egyptian chronology), when Upper and Lower E ...

ian city of Heliopolis, one of the oldest cities of ancient Egypt.

Name

The name, El Matareya, is thought to come from the

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

word '' Mater'' which means 'mother', and is from the presence of the 'tree of the

Virgin Mary Mary was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Joseph and the mother of Jesus. She is an important figure of Christianity, venerated under titles of Mary, mother of Jesus, various titles such as Perpetual virginity ...

' in this district.

History

El Matareya, with the nearby

Ain Shams Ain Shams (also spelled Ayn or Ein - , , ) is a district in the Eastern Area of Cairo, Egypt. The name means "Eye of the Sun" in Arabic, referring to the fact that the district contained the ruins of the ancient city of Heliopolis, once the spir ...

district, had a notable history during Egypt's Pharaonic period as a part of ancient Heliopolis. The district has archaeological sites of the period, some only recently discovered, beneath its current structures.Descubrimientos - Egipto - Junio / Diciembre 2004; "Pharonic tomb uncovered in Cairo, suburbs of Matareya"
August 26, 2004 . accessed 1.28.2011 In

ancient Roman In modern historiography, ancient Rome is the Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of Rome, founding of the Italian city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, collapse of the Western Roman Em ...

times Heliopolis belonged to the

Augustamnica ''Augustamnica'' (Latin) or ''Augoustamnike'' (Greek language, Greek) was a Roman Empire, Roman Roman province, province of Egypt created during the 4th century and was part of the Diocese of Oriens first and then of the Diocese of Egypt (Late Ant ...

province. Legend tells of the Christian

Holy Family The Holy Family consists of the Child Jesus, the Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph. The subject became popular in art from the 1490s on,Ainsworth, 122 but veneration of the Holy Family was formally begun in the 17th century by Saint François de La ...

sheltering under a tree in Heliopolis, presently known as 'the tree of the

', now with the Chapel of the Virgin in El Matareya. The French naturalist Pierre Belon du Mans mentions visiting El Matareya in his 1547 journey to

. El Matareya once had the

villa A villa is a type of house that was originally an ancient Roman upper class country house that provided an escape from urban life. Since its origins in the Roman villa, the idea and function of a villa have evolved considerably. After the f ...

s of prominent people. The famous Egyptian poet

Ahmed Shawqi Ahmed Shawqi (, , ; 1868–1932), nicknamed the Prince of Poets ( ''Amīr al-Shu‘arā’''), was an Egyptian poet laureate, linguist, and one of the most famous Arabic literary writers of the modern era in the Arab World. Life Shawqi was b ...

lived in a villa he named ‘Karmet Ibn Hani’ or Ibn Hani's Vineyard (كرمة ابن هانى) here, near the palace of the Khedive Abbas II at Saray El-Qobba, until his exile from Egypt at

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

Historic elements

The El Masalla area of the district contains the ancient Masalla

Obelisk An obelisk (; , diminutive of (') ' spit, nail, pointed pillar') is a tall, slender, tapered monument with four sides and a pyramidal or pyramidion top. Originally constructed by Ancient Egyptians and called ''tekhenu'', the Greeks used th ...

, or Misalla (, trans. obelisk), one of the Pharaonic era obelisks that still remain in Egypt. It is the only surviving element of Heliopolis standing in its original position, and of the great Temple of Ra—

Atum Atum (, Egyptian: ''jtm(w)'' or ''tm(w)'', ''reconstructed'' ; Coptic ''Atoum''), sometimes rendered as Atem, Temu, or Tem, is the primordial God in Egyptian mythology from whom all else arose. He created himself and is the father of Shu and ...

constructed by Pharaoh

Senusret I Senusret I (Egyptian language, Middle Egyptian: wikt:z-n-wsrt, z-n-wsrt; /suʀ nij ˈwas.ɾiʔ/) also anglicized as Sesostris I and Senwosret I, was the second pharaoh of the Twelfth dynasty of Egypt, Twelfth Dynasty of Egypt. He ruled from 1971 ...

(1971—1926 BCE) of the

Twelfth Dynasty The Twelfth Dynasty of ancient Egypt (Dynasty XII) is a series of rulers reigning from 1991–1802 BC (190 years), at what is often considered to be the apex of the Middle Kingdom (Dynasties XI–XIV). The dynasty periodically expanded its terr ...

. The tall red

granite Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...

obelisk weighs 120 tons—. A pink granite megalithic colossus statue, with features resembling those of the Pharaoh

Ramesses II Ramesses II (sometimes written Ramses or Rameses) (; , , ; ), commonly known as Ramesses the Great, was an Pharaoh, Egyptian pharaoh. He was the third ruler of the Nineteenth Dynasty of Egypt, Nineteenth Dynasty. Along with Thutmose III of th ...

, was found in El Matareya in 2006, weighing five tons—. It was at the ruins of a sun temple dating back to the reign of Ramses II (reigned 1279—1213 BCE), at the site of later Souk El-Khamis. The underground tombs of

High Priests of Re High may refer to: Science and technology * Height * High (atmospheric), a high-pressure area * High (computability), a quality of a Turing degree, in computability theory * High (tectonics), in geology an area where relative tectonic uplift ...

of the

Sixth Dynasty The Sixth Dynasty of ancient Egypt (notated Dynasty VI), along with the Third Dynasty of Egypt, Third, Fourth Dynasty of Egypt, Fourth and Fifth Dynasty of Egypt, Fifth Dynasty, constitutes the Old Kingdom of Egypt, Old Kingdom of Dynastic Egyp ...

(2345—2181 BCE) were found in the southeast corner of the Re-Atum Temple archaeological site in El Matareya. The

Necropolis A necropolis (: necropolises, necropoles, necropoleis, necropoli) is a large, designed cemetery with elaborate tomb monuments. The name stems from the Ancient Greek ''nekropolis'' (). The term usually implies a separate burial site at a distan ...

of Heliopolis, east of the Masalla obelisk in El Matareya, dates from the Middle Kingdom (c. 2055—1550 BCE) and

New Kingdom New or NEW may refer to: Music * New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz * ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013 ** "New" (Paul McCartney song), 2013 * ''New'' (EP), by Regurgitator, 1995 * "New" (Daya song), 2017 * "New" (No Doubt song), 1 ...

(c. 1550—1069 BCE). A domed tomb made for a priest during the

Twenty-sixth Dynasty The Twenty-sixth Dynasty of Egypt (notated Dynasty XXVI, alternatively 26th Dynasty or Dynasty 26) was the last native dynasty of ancient Egypt before the Persian conquest in 525 BC (although other brief periods of rule by Egyptians followed). T ...

(c. 685—525 BCE), was discovered under a construction site in 2004. Many funereal small figure statues were found inside (over 400), and

hieroglyph Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs ( ) were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt for writing the Egyptian language. Hieroglyphs combined ideographic, logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, with more than 1,000 distinct characters. ...

ic writing was on the tomb's walls from the seventh century

BCE Common Era (CE) and Before the Common Era (BCE) are year notations for the Gregorian calendar (and its predecessor, the Julian calendar), the world's most widely used calendar era. Common Era and Before the Common Era are alternatives to the o ...

. In March 2017, the Egyptian-German team of archaeologists unearthed an eight-meter 3,000-year-old statue that included a head and a torso thought to depict Pharaoh Ramses II. According to Khaled El-Enany, the Egyptian Antiquities Minister, the statue was more likely thought to be King Psammetich I. Excavators also revealed an 80 cm-long part of a

limestone Limestone is a type of carbonate rock, carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material Lime (material), lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different Polymorphism (materials science) ...

statue of Pharaoh Seti II while excavating the site.

Pilgrimage site

A sycamore tree within the suburb, known locally as the Tree of the Virgin, has been a place of pilgrimage for

Coptic Christians Copts (; ) are a Christian ethnoreligious group native to Northeast Africa who have primarily inhabited the area of modern Egypt since antiquity. They are, like the broader Egyptian population, descended from the ancient Egyptians. Copts p ...

for many centuries, who come to pray by it or touch it, believing that it will heal illness. According to local beliefs, the

and

Saint Joseph According to the canonical Gospels, Joseph (; ) was a 1st-century Jewish man of Nazareth who was married to Mary, the mother of Jesus, and was the legal father of Jesus. Joseph is venerated as Saint Joseph in the Catholic Church, Eastern O ...

stopped at El Matareya (then a small village) when they fled into Egypt. Mary rested against the tree and a spring of water sprang up near it for Mary to wash the infant

Jesus Jesus (AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and many Names and titles of Jesus in the New Testament, other names and titles, was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the Jesus in Chris ...

. For many years its bark was taken by Christians in the belief that it had miraculous properties. Next to the tree is a small chapel.

Administrative subdivisions

Matariya is subdivided into nine shiakhas. Cairo - Al-Matariya District Map

In the 2017 census Matariya had 602,485 residents across its nine shiakhas.

Education

* Desert Research Center, established by Laszlo Almasy * Faculty of Engineering,

Helwan University Helwan University is a public university based in Helwan, Egypt, which is part of Greater Cairo on over . It comprises 23 faculties and two higher institutes in addition to 50 research centers. Overview Helwan University is a member of the ...

* National Urology Institute of Egypt * El Matareya Teaching Hospital

Industry

The western part of El Matareya, within the industrial area of Musturud along the Ismailia canal, is the location of oil companies (Shell, Misr Petrol, and General Association of Oil in Egypt), and food industries ( BiscoMisr and Misr lil Albaan).

References

{{coord, 30, 7, 46.08, N, 31, 18, 26.94, E, source:cawiki_type:landmark, display=title History of Cairo Districts of Greater Cairo Archaeological sites in Egypt Districts of Cairo