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.