Friday, November 13, 2009

News: Discoveries of Polish archaeologists in a Byzantine basilica in Egypt

Serwis Nauka w Polsce

Actually this "news" dates back to September but I've only just noticed it. With photograph.

Polish archaeologists discovered an unknown baptistery, and a few hundred bronze coins during the tenth archaeological season in Marea, a town situated 45 kilometers southeast of Alexandria. Under the command of Prof. Hanna Szymańska and Dr. Krzysztof Babraj scientists from The University of Warsaw's Center of Mediterranean Archaeology and The Archaeology Museum in Kraków have focused their efforts on examining the eastern side of the basilica and rooms placed behind the southwestern corner of the building.

Whilst excavating the floors in the basilicas main nave and its northern side nave the scientists discovered a baptistery. Its dimension is 4.5 by 2.5 meters and is 1.5 meters high. It is built from large stone blocks.

The archaeologists also discovered a well attached to the baptistery with special holes in its walls for the people who where to clean it. , that was attached to the baptistery, It hasn't been established whether water from the well, that was used to baptize people came from a lake or from an underground source.

The archaeologists are also surprised that the whole construction was rested on a stylobate, they suppose the column was removed in order to build the baptistery.

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