Egypt's Antiquities Ministry reported on Saturday to have discovered an ancient necropolis near the Nile Valley city of Minya, to the south of Cairo — a vast archaeological site on the edge of the western desert.
The family burial place hosts a number of family tombs and graves, including coffins and other funerary artifacts. The excavation work has just started, Antiquities Minister Khaled al-Anani said, and is slated to continue for the next five years at least.
Ancient necropolis uncovered in Egypt containing over 1,000 statues https://t.co/1UVR9Mm5qx pic.twitter.com/nGZDfy1eUm
— Muwadat Ali (@AliMuwadat) 24 февраля 2018 г.
READ MORE: France-Egypt Plane Deal Blocked by US, Fearing Spread of Missile Tech — Official
One of the unearthed tombs includes more than 1,000 statues and four well-preserved alabaster canopic jars with hieroglyphic inscriptions, which had been specially designed to hold the mummified internal organs of their owner — a high profile priest of the mighty god Thoth.
The priest's mummy was also unearthed in a nearby location, adorned with blue and red beads and bronze gilded plates.
Archaeologists also uncovered 40 sarcophagi believed to house the priest's family members’ ashes, some bearing the names of their owners in hieroglyphics.
In early February, the 4,400-year-old tomb of Hetpet, an ancient priestess of Hathor, a goddess portrayed as a cow and associated with fertility, motherhood and love, was found in Egypt.
Separately, in 2017, the ministry found a necropolis holding at least 17 mummies in the area of Tuna al-Gabal. The location is also known to include tombs, a funerary building and a large cemetery for thousands of mummified ibis and baboon birds, as well as other animals.
Egypt has been pinning a lot of hope on the recent discoveries across the country ultimately inflating the now-sagging tourism sector, with antiquities sightseeing being now prioritized after it plunged following the 2011 uprising and subsequent political quagmire.
