EES Theban Harbours and Waterscapes Project

The last few days, for now...

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 10:00:05 +0000

Thursday 1st March

The morning was a bit of a lie in and then starting work on processing the geophysics raw data and working through the topographic data. We visited the Theban Mapping Project’s new library and archive centre on the West Bank with Kent Weeks in the afternoon. Their archival material will prove very helpful to our work as it progresses.

Friday 2nd March

A visit to Chicago House to look through their map collection was very productive combined with a great lunch with friends and colleagues in their courtyard.

Saturday 3rd March

Angus took our geophysics kit to Luxor airport to be shipped back to the UK. Smiles all round as our faces and boxes have become very familiar to them from last year and this. The waybill is typed out on a marvellous ageing East German typewriter with great aplomb and everyone is incredibly helpful. Hats off to Egyptair! Done and dusted just after 11am and straight to Luxor Museum for the beginning of the International Research Conference on the Colossi of Memnon and the Mortuary Temple of Amenhotep III. Kris and Sarah hammered away at survey data for much of the day. The day ended with take away pizza in front of a DVD.

Sunday 4th March

Continued work on processing the geophysics data and then to the afternoon session of the Conference. Sorting equipment boxes, packing and off to the airport at 05.10. Augering part of the season will follow very soon!

The enigmatic ‘Birket Luxor’ on the East Bank

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 16:46:30 +0000

Wednesday 29th February

Today our target for work was the enigmatic ‘Birket Luxor’ on the East Bank, south of Luxor. We had decided to try to work in the northern part of this large rectangular feature marked on Jacotin’s Description de l’Egypte map as ‘Village ruine’, but thought to be a Hippodrome along with the Birket Habu by Jomard. After our visit last year and looking at satellite images the northern area is not quite so densely occupied and seemed a good location to try and place a profile into the area surrounded by the villages on the raised features.

P14 runs through yet another dung heap. Fortunately, the probe locations fall either side of it.

We chose to run our profile (no. 14 this season) along the edge of a track running along the west side of a modern beginning in the NW corner and running towards the centre of the fields enclosed by the villages. Everyone was very welcoming and happy for us to do our work along the edge of the track – something that we have experienced many times this season.

Harvest on the move along P14

We started outside the feature to try and gain some context and ran it across the local road (turning off two probes on the laptop) without incident. We recorded resistance measurements to a depth of 20m along a 660m profile. With the laptop and resistance meter in the shade of the tree mid-afternoon a cool westerly wind set us all racing to the minibus to put jumpers back on. We had achieved all we wanted and more with the geophysics this season and this was our last day in the field. We had planned to do half a day on the Thursday, but after our two very productive days we were able to finish ahead of schedule. We finished with team photos by the canal.

Kris and Mandour clean, count and pack the probes at the end of the day

The geophysics and topo team members 2012: Standing L-R – Mandour Suleiman, Reis Omar Farouk, Sarah Jones, Warda el-Nagar (our MSA Inspector) and Angus Graham. Sitting L-R – Bassem, Tarik Abd el-Basset and Kris Strutt

Arrival in front of the Palace and Temple complex of Amenhotep III (Malkata)

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 16:34:00 +0000

Tuesday 28th February

Back to our regular pick-up at 06.45 with equipment loaded we’re usually away a few minutes before seven. We headed to the entrance of Birket Habu lying in front of the Palace and Temple complex of Amenhotep III (Malkata), where we had originally planned to start our season. After some walking up and down the east side of the village of Naj‘ Raml al-Aqaltah, which lies on the ancient spoil mounds on the southern side of the entrance to the Birket, we found an ideal location for the profile which we hoped would cross from al-Aqaltah to Kom al-Bi‘irat on the the mounds to the north.

The first 180m of the profile runs along the east edge of a field that had recently been harvested and the stubble burnt. It crossed a small irrigation canal that marks the boundary between the two villages and through a swath of sugar cane that had been cropped and the stubble burnt. As we set up the profile with a series of 30m and 50m tapes and started to place our probes at 3m intervals ploughing the burnt field began for the next planting. The strong westerly wind swirled up the ash and conditions were awful for the first hour or two. Once we reached the irrigation channel we were free of ash and started to bake in an airless stretch of field between stands of sugar cane. We started our acquisition of our first roll-along at 09.43 and saved the final traverse at 16.11 having covered 654m of ground and taking readings to 16.5m below the surface.

Westerly wind blasts across the fields

Our inspector Warda, Kris, Reis Omar and Bassem were blasted by the westerly wind on the spoil mounds to the rear while locating control points - kindly given to us by the Malakata Project - and setting up the Total Station. The minibus also managed to get stuck in soft sand - a local farmer came to their rescue with his tractor. The surveying team set up local stations near the line of the profile so that it could all be surveyed in. We had pencilled in one and half days to complete the profile in our schedule so an extremely productive day at the office!

An early start to avoid the tourists!

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 20:12:00 +0000

Monday 27th February

We had an earlier start today getting up at 4.45 so we could get going on a north-south profile before the temple got busy with visitors. Starting at the far end of the Open Air Museum, P12 ran through the First Court just in front of the Second Pylon, out through the Bubastite Portal, through the blockyard, past Khonsu Temple crossing a short ERT profile we had carried out with Kris in 2008 (see EA 36, pp. 25-28) and running to within 3m of the south section of Nectanebo enclosure wall. Kris and Sarah spent the day surveying in P11 and P12 within the Karnak co-ordinate system with support from the CFEETK topographer Vincent. Yet another very long, but productive day.

Mandour standing behind Sarah’s ‘axial probe’ at 200m along P12 with Reis Omar at 196m and Sarah at 204m along the profile

Our inspector Warda el-Nagar surveying Profile 12 running through the Bubastite Portal. The ERT is all boxed up and ready to go on the buggy behind

Back at Karnak!

Sun, 26 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Buggy used to move 118kg of geophysics kit to the start of P11 in front of the First Pylon. (L-R: Kris, Tarik, Salah el-Masekh (MSA Inspector currently excavating the Roman Baths at Karnak) and Reis Omar)

These two days (Saturday 25 and Sunday 26 Feb) were spent doing a local East-West profile (no. 11) running approximately parallel to the axis of the Amun-Re temple at Karnak. Starting as close to the MSA/CFEETK offices as we could within the site, and heading between the MSA excavations of the Ptolemaic and Roman baths, the profile headed through a small gate cut through the massive mudbrick enclosure wall of the Amun-Re complex and running north of the axis exiting the complex through an eastern gate and out as far as the modern road to the east of the complex.

Tarik and Mandour are keeping an eye on resistance readings as our profile approachs small Eastern Gate at Karnak

Kris and our inspector Warda el-Nagar on the Nectanebo Wall surveying in the E-W profile through Karnak

Our longest profile so far at 828m, the profile was set to take resistance readings to 32m below the modern surface in order to further our understanding of the formation processes of the land upon which the initial temple of Karnak was founded in the First Intermediate Period.

A view westwards across Karnak with team members standing along the line of Profile no. 11.

It was great to be back at Karnak seeing many friends and colleagues and discussing their work and ours together as we headed east towards Luxor airport (not quite)!! We also had the pleasure of the company of EES Field Director Jo Rowland who was taking a short break from her work for the EES Minufiyeh Survey.

To Kom el-Hetan for a very long day

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 20:12:00 +0000

We completed P8 to the canal and then had a grand second breakfast at 10.30 with foul, tamaya, tuna, fresh village bread, tomatoes … P9 was a short profile perpendicular to the Ramesseum axis about 250m in front of the first pylon.

Kamel keeping eye on readings on P9 Ramesseum in background

Sarah and Kris continued surveying in all our work on the West Bank to-date. We arrived at Kom el-Hetan to be greeted by Hourig and Rainer at 2 pm and carried out a short profile with the probes at 1m spacing in the second court. The readings are taken every 1m horizontally and every 0.5 m vertically down 6.5 m below the surface. The team had chicken and rice and koushary and fizzy drinks mid-afternoon to keep us all going. Packing up at 6.15 after the sun had gone down and the lights had come on - a very very long, but productive day’s work. Kris and Sarah had finished tying in all our work on the West Bank by the end of the day. We head to the East Bank and Karnak on Saturday.

ERT Team really into the swing of things as the temperature rises

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 20:12:00 +0000

Sarah must have brought the warm weather with her as the temperature has stepped up now and with some humidity from the crops it was a real change from the cooler preceding days. We took up the offer from yesterday and carried out a short ERT profile across the axis of Amenhotep II. Tarik brought a huge cake for the day, which was the perfect pick me up for some of us.

Feeding Tarik cake on profile 6

We then started P8 which runs parallel to P1 on the north side of the Ramesseum axis with the aim of getting to the canal some 500+m away. The probes are spaced at 3m intervals with 13 levels of readings taking us down to 19.5m – the same as P1. The team have really got into the swing of the ERT moving probes and sliding along the cables and re-clipping them to the probes with great efficiency. Hats off to Reis Omar for putting together such a fantastic small team of workmen that are great fun and very sharp. After each roll-along is complete all the cable contacts are unclipped from the probes and the first 25 probes are pulled up and placed at the other end of the line. The cable is dragged along and all the contacts are clipped back on to the probes. The resistance meter and laptop are placed in the middle of the profile connected to the cables and off we go. At this configuration of probe spacing depth of readings and we move along 75m with each roll-along. When a profile is complete all the readings can be joined up to produce the complete profile. We managed to do four roll-alongs on P8 ie 300m.

Kris and Sarah spent the day traversing along the road placing survey stations and tying into the Theban Mapping Project co-ordinate system so that we could place all our work within the system.

ERT 6 and celebratory fizzy drinks

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

ERT Profile 6 was laid out parallel to and just north of the axis of the Mortuary Temple of Thutmose III.

Second breakfast in front of Thutmose III’s first pylon

The profile started close to the mudbrick pylon. We had hoped to run it several hundred metres to a large standing crop of sugar cane. Unfortunately, it was cut short after some issues of access to land. So far all the farmers had been incredibly friendly and cooperative, but one changed his view. Another farmer very kindly offered us access to work along field boundaries in front of Amenhotep II’s MT tomorrow and along the north side of the axis of the Ramesseum. The day ended with celebratory fizzy drinks all round for the team.

Prof Kent Weeks and other colleagues stopped by for a short visit. Kent was on his way home from a day at KV5 and we look forward to catching up again as the season proceeds.

A fantastic back-drop

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 20:12:00 +0000

We met Drs Hourig Sourouzian and Rainer Stadlemann at the start of the day and spent our day doing two short profiles at different resolutions and different depths – one reaching 8m below the ground level and the other 16m – perpendicular to the axis of the Mortuary Temple of Amenhotep III about 120m in front of the Collosi. The two profiles along the same line will allow us to compare the data. What a fantastic back-drop!

The team in song along profiles 4 and 5 with the Collosi of Amenhotep III in the background (Left to right Kamel Helmi Sharit, Tarik Abd el-Basset, Kris Strutt, Reis Omar Farouk and Mandour Suleiman)

We collected Sarah Jones from the airport at 22.30. She joins us for two weeks to work on the topographic survey with Kris Strutt.

Sarah Jones in sing-a-long on the way to work in the Mickey Mouse minibus after landing just a few hours earlier. Sadly we only had the Mickey Mouse minibus for one day. Too smart for us and our kit!

Magnetometry completed, and a second ERT profile

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Kris completed his magnetometry in the field. We also carried out a second 276m-long ERT profile roughly perpendicular to ERT P1 that ran along the west edge of the magnetometry crossing the axis of the Ramesseum.

ERT P2 Tarik Abd el-Basset reeling out the cable

Each cable drum has 64 probes spaced 5 m apart with connectors on each end for the resistivity meter – about 325 m in total. Caution! – trip hazard. We’ve all become very adept at moving along narrow field boundaries with cables clipped to probes.

ERT P2 Trip hazard!

ERT P3 was a short 64m-long higher resolution profile lying along P1 centred across the West Bank Dewatering Project trench in order to see what resistance readings were collected. The remainder of the afternoon was spent surveying in these first two ERT profiles and the mag area 1 using the EES’ Leica Total Station. This all needs to be tied into local, national and global co-ordinate systems.

An excellent lecture was delivered by Dr Laurent Coulon on the Karnak Cachette Project (IFAO-SCA) at the Mummification Museum organised by Mr Mansour Boraik and Mr Ibrahim Suleiman.

Between Colossi (the Ramesseum and Amenhotep III)

Sat, 18 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Our drive to the West Bank from Luxor over the bridge is about 35 mins to site. We continued and completed our 720m-long first ERT profile, ending at a canal, that runs SW-NE across the floodplain. As we proceeded along the profile we had the Ramesseum to the west and the Colossi of Amenhotep III to the south. Higher resistance readings towards the east end of the profile are intriguing and when the raw data has been processed through the software we should get a clearer picture of a preliminary interpretation of them. After checking with an incredibly friendly farmer Kris laid out a series of 30x30m grids in a field containing burnt sugar cane stubble in preparation for a magnetometry survey. The field identified from the balloon flight lies across the axis of the Ramesseum.

A very useful balloon ride!

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Up at 04.35 to meet colleagues from the Joint Expedition to Malkata to go for a balloon flight. The flight was fantastic and on a very clear day we had amazing views of many of the monuments on the West Bank. It proved to be very useful for our work as we identified some suitable fallow fields for magnetometry that were not easily seen from the ground in the area between the Ramesseum and balloon take-off site to the north.

Our balloon in preparation

A view of the Colossi of Amenhotep III and his palace remains with Medinet Habu in the background

Our first ERT profile has been along the north (right) side of the path leading from the village to the south (left) of the Ramesseum to the canal in the foreground

A great relief to be back in Egypt!

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Thursday 16th February 2012

Our first full day in the field was a great relief to us after our work was cut short last season. It is great to be back in Egypt and Luxor where everyone is as hospitable as ever. It’s a great time to visit the city and all the sites!

We have started a long Electrical Resistivity Tomography profile from the edge of the West Bank going into the floodplain along a dirt track just south of the Ramesseum. The tea was flowing from the villagers. There’s nothing glamorous about working in Donkey dung! But what could be better than the first pylon of the Ramesseum as your back drop. Using a system that has 64 probes placed a few cms into the ground and connected by cables to a meter and laptop we managed to record electrical resistance measurements up to 19.5 m below the surface for 300 m along our profile and will complete the profile on Saturday. We hope that our work will identify the modern groundwater lowering trench that crosses our profile as well as any other earlier canals should they exist in this cross-section of the floodplain.

UPDATE 27 Feb 2012: Pics now added as follows:

Kris Strutt on ERT kit with Ramesseum to North

Mandour Suleiman watering in probe

Reis Omar Farouk watering in probe

Season underway!

Sun, 23 Jan 2011 20:47:00 +0000

Wednesday 19 January 2011

The permit is signed! I got a friendly welcome at the SCA and it was all sorted in an hour. I picked up the Total Station and other equipment from the EES storeroom at the British Council and bought train tickets for the overnight train to Luxor tomorrow for myself and Reis Omar Farouk. A huge amount of building work is being carried out at Midan Ramesses train station and the tunnels of Mubarak Metro station below are a dust filled maze. It was nice to have some sun after our cold weather at home, but it was cool enough in the evening to need a fleece. It’s good to be back!

View of the Nile running around the west side of Zamalek. Taken from the 6th October looking south with the Cairo Tower to the left

View of the Nile running around the west side of Zamalek with the EES Office in the British Council behind the trees on the left. Taken from the 6th October looking north

Thursday 20th Jan

I took a taxi out to the Map office (just north of the zoo) to enquire about requirements to buy maps in the future. A walk through Doqqi took me to the former Palace of Princess Fatima where 5 or 6 museums are found in the palace grounds relating to the flora and fauna of Egypt and the region as well as a Cotton Museum and the Agricultural Museum. I arrived shortly before closing at 13.35, but the brief visit has certainly wet my appetite to return. If you have done everything there is to do in Cairo, but haven’t been to these museums – take a look next time you’re here. The walk back along 6th October Midan Tahrir took in the Nile running around Zamalek. The sky was clearer today and the sun that little bit warmer. The train leaves at 10 pm.

Traffic on the 6th October Bridge with the Cairo Ritz-Carlton (formerly the Cairo Hilton) in the background. The orange-red tinge to the right of the bus is the roof of the Cairo Museum

Pleasure boats on the Nile with the Cairo Museum in the background