Minister of Culture, Farouk Hossni, decided to form a panel of Egyptian archeologists to examine new 22 archeological sites, recently discovered in the Suez governorate. The minister declared that 8 stores of seeds date back to the Modern Kingdom were discovered northern of El Fayoum.

    Head of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, Dr. Zahi Hawas, said that silos in El Fayoum are among the most important discoveries which shed light on an important stage of cultural heritage in Egypt and the whole world. He made it clear that the way those stores were protected helped archeologists to understand the process of society’s transformation from one based on haunting animals into a stable agricultural society.

    Chief of the US mission noted that this discovery was completed by an American mission from California University during works of excavation inside the archeological area in El Fayoum where there are 97 stores of seeds dating back to the modern Stone Age were discovered at the beginning of the twentieth Century.

    For his part, Director General of Lower Egypt Antiquities, Dr. Mohamed Abdul Maksoud, pointed out that the governorate of Suez was not isolated from the ancient Egyptian civilization and may be it was the connecting link between civilizations of Iraq and Egypt since beginnings of age of dynasties to the end of the Pharonic, Greek, Roman and Nuptic ages through the Suez Gulf.

    Director General of the Suez area of monuments, Dr. Mohamed Salem, expounded that the Suez governorate, after those discoveries, contained 29 archeological sites dating back to the Pharonic, Greek, Roman and Nuptic ages distributed on 4 sites.

    First Site: south of Suez on the road of Suez-Za’afarana. It contains 13 sites including Al Ein Al Sokhna, Selek, Hegaz, Nakhla, Ismail, Bosailat, Nokosh of valley of doum, haroos, rases and Khafori.

    Second Site: north of Suez. It includes 10 sites including Ganefa, Abu Helefa, Abu Shkio, Kobreet of Al Bahara, Shenawi, Sefran, Al Shaloufa, Awlad Moussa, village of Amer and Affi.

    Third Site: west of Suez on the road of Suez-Cairo. It contains two sites including Haragy and Abu Ahmed.

    Fourth Site: inside the Suez city. It contains two sites including Tal El Yahodia and Tal El Kalzam.

    Dr. Salem added that the discovered sites which had existed as engravings in the Valley of Doum in the form of five stone portraits including engravings. In Al Khafori, houses of miners were discovered in the form of circle and oval stones, Dr. Salem said. He pointed out that an old Pharonic stone was discovered in Kharagi Ennara.

    He added that El Kalzam includes a brick-built military castle for King Ramses III. In Abu Daoud, there were two Pharonic wells, which provide miners with water in winter. Dr. Salem said that the sites which date back to the Greek and Roman areas existed in Tal El Yahodiya which includes limestone buildings used as stores and tombs in the Coptic age.