Coptic burials found in Western Desert

State Information Service

This bulletin on the State Information Service website is entitled "Prehistoric skeletons found in Egyptian Desert", but don't get too excited if you lean towards the earlier periods of Egypt - the content of the post makes it clear that they are Coptic, possibly as old as the Graeco-Roman period but no older.

A tomb dating back to the Coptic era has been discovered Al-Wadi Gadid governorate. Khaled Saad, of the Pre-historic Antiquities Administration, said expeditions of the black and white deserts in El-Farafra and El-Bahariya Oases have led them to the burial chamber, in which three skeletons lay. "We came upon two female skulls full of hair that also covered their ears," Saad said in press statements Thursday 13/9/2007. A third empty-but-intact skull was also found, he added, noting that the remaining parts of the skeleton were so fragile. Concrete adobe columns measuring three metres long were lined up in a rectangular frame, Khaled went on to say. He has reason to believe the tomb existed towards the end of the Graeco-Roman era and the beginning of the Coptic age.

Interview with Dr. Gawdat Gabra

http://www.ambilacuk.com/coptic/index.html

Howard Middleton-Jones has published his interview with the Coptologist Dr. Gawdat Gabra in Munster Germany on his Coptic Research site, at the above page. Please click on the photograph on the above page to watch the streamed video - this will open a new window. If you are using Firefox and it fails to load, try it in Explorer instead.

Dr. Gawdat Gabra is an independent scholar specializing in Coptic studies, and former director of the Coptic Museum in Cairo (1985). He is also a member of the board of the Society of Coptic Archaeology and chief editor for the St. Mark Foundation for Coptic History Studies.

More details about Dr Gabra can be found on the above site at

http://www.ambilacuk.com/coptic/gabra.html.

The Coptic Research site is an ongoing research project which aims to provide useful links and articles on Coptic archaeology, art and history.