User:CabbageP/Stone quarries of ancient Egypt
 | This is the sandbox page where you will draft your initial Wikipedia contribution.
If you're starting a new article, you can develop it here until it's ready to go live. If you're working on improvements to an existing article, copy only one section at a time of the article to this sandbox to work on, and be sure to use an edit summary linking to the article you copied from. Do not copy over the entire article. You can find additional instructions here. Remember to save your work regularly using the "Publish page" button. (It just means 'save'; it will still be in the sandbox.) You can add bold formatting to your additions to differentiate them from existing content. |
Article Draft
Lead
The stone quarries of ancient Egypt once produced quality stone for the building of tombs and temples and for decorative monuments such as sarcophagi, stelae, and statues[1]. These quarries are now recognised archaeological sites. Ancient quarry sites in the Nile valley accounted for much of the limestone and sandstone used as building stone for temples, monuments, and pyramids[1]. Eighty percent of the ancient sites are located in the Nile valley; some of them have disappeared under the waters of Lake Nasser and some others were lost due to modern mining activity[citation needed].
Some of the sites are well identified and the chemical composition of their stones is also well known, allowing the geographical origin of most of the monuments to be traced using petrographic techniques, including neutron activation analysis.
In June 2006, the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) of Egypt established a new department for conservation of ancient quarries and mines in Egypt. The new department was designed to work in close cooperation with the regional SCA offices, and special training programmes for Inspectors of Antiquities will be carried out to enable the regional authorities to tackle inventory, documentation, risk assessment and management of the ancient quarries and mines.
This article details some of the most important ancient quarry sites in Egypt.
Article body - planning to arrange quarries based on location (Nile valley vs other)
The quarries of Aswan
The quarries of Aswan are located along the Nile near the city of Aswan. There are a number of well-known sites: Shellal, consisting of northern and southern quarries within an area of about 20 km2 (7.7 sq mi) on the west bank, and the islands of Elephantine and Seheil. One of the known directors of the Aswan sites was Hori during the reign of Ramses III. Great amounts of granite were quarried from Aswan at an extent only comparable to ancient Egypt's limestone and sandstone quarries[2].
In the present days, the quarry area is to become an open-air museum.
Typical materials known from this site are:
- Coarse-grained pinkish to reddish granite[3]
- Coarse-grained gray to black granodiorite[3]
- Fined-grained pinkish to gray granite[3]
- Black Dolerite[3]
Some of the monuments known to come from this site are:
- Cleopatra's Needle
- The unfinished obelisk still on site, at the northern quarry
- The unfinished partly worked obelisk base, discovered in 2005
- The sarcophagus made from granite at the burial chambers of the Third Dynasty Pharaoh Djoser at Saqqara[4] and the Fourth Dynasty Pharaoh Sneferu at Dahshur
- The Grand Gallery and the King's Chamber within the pyramid of Khufu as well as his granite block sarcophagus[5]
- Sarcophagus and lowest layer of outer casing in the pyramid of Khafre at Giza, as well as a statue of Khafre all made of granite[4]
- Burial chamber and lower layers of outer casing in the pyramid of Menkaure at Giza made of granite[4]
The quarries of Giza
The quarries of Giza...
Typical materials known from this site are:
- Limestone
Gebel el Ahmar
Gebel el Ahmar is located near Cairo on the east bank of the Nile, near the suburb of Heliopolis. The name means Red Mountain. The site was in full production in the times of Amenhophis III, Akhenaton, Tutankhamon, and Ramses III. The quarry was directed by Huy, known as "Chief of the King's Works", and also by Hori.
Typical materials known from this site are:
Some of the monuments known to come from this site are:
Widan el-Faras
Widan el-Faras is located on Gebel el-Qatrani, Faiyum, 60 km (37 mi) southwest of Cairo in the Western Desert. The quarry landscape of the Northern Faiyum Desert comprise both the Umm es-Sawan and Widan el-Faras basalt quarries, both heavily exploited for hardstone during the Old Kingdom pyramid age due to their proximity to the Nile Valley[1].
Typical materials known from this site are:
Some of the monuments known to use materials from this site are:
- 4th and 5th dynasty mortuary temple walls and floors[6]
Umm es-Sawan
Umm es-Sawan is also located on Gevel el-Qatrani, Faiyum, 20 km (mi) north-east of Wide el-Faras in the landscape of the Northern Faiyum Desert. The white gypsum from this site occurs in near-vertical veins that cross-cut the other stratigraphy[6].
Typical materials known from this site are:
Tura-Masara
Tura-Masara is located 12 km (7.5 mi) south of Cairo and spans 6 km (3.7 mi) of underground quarries along the eastern bank of the Nile. The Tura quarry and Masara quarry are often separated, viewed individually, but due to their proximity they are more appropriately recognized as one extended system[7].
Typical materials known from this site are:
- High quality, fine-grained white limestone[4]
Some of the monuments known to use materials from this site are:
- Casing stones for 4th-6th dynasty pyramids[7]
- Memphite necropolis in the 12th dynasty[7]
Gabal Abu Dukhan
Main article: Mons Porphyrites
The Gabal Abu Dukhan site, near modern Hurghada on Egypt's Red Sea coast, was particularly important for the Roman Empire. Pliny the Elder's Natural History stated that "imperial porphyry" was discovered at an isolated site in Egypt in 18 CE by a Roman legionary named Caius Cominius Leugas. The location of the site, known to the Romans as Mons Porphyrites, was lost for many centuries until rediscovered in the 19th century. It is the only source of imperial porphyry in the world.
Typical materials known from this site are:
- Reddish-Purple porphyry with pale pink to white phenocrysts[3]
- Greenish-black porphyry with pale green to white phenocrysts[3]
- Black porphyry with pale green to mostly white phenocrysts[3]
Some of the monuments known to come from this site are:
- The baptismal font in the Cathedral of Magdeburg, Germany.
- The porphyry togas of the busts of Roman Emperors
- Porphyry panels in the Pantheon
- The Portrait of the Four Tetrarchs
References
- ^ a b c d Abu-Jaber, Nizar, ed. (2009). QuarryScapes: ancient stone quarry landscapes in the Eastern Mediterranean. Geological survey of Norway special publication. Trondheim: Norges Geologiske Undersøkelse. ISBN 978-82-7385-138-3.
- ^ "quarries in Egypt". www.ucl.ac.uk. Retrieved 2024-02-29.
- ^ a b c d e f g h "C:\HMPRO2\gifs\geoarc30.htm". www.eeescience.utoledo.edu. Retrieved 2024-02-29.
- ^ a b c d "Stone quarries in ancient Egypt. Details about the Giza quarries, the granite quarries in Assuan and the Tura limestone quarries". www.cheops-pyramide.ch. Retrieved 2024-02-29.
- ^ Lehner, Mark, ed. (1997). The complete pyramids. London: Thames and Hudson. ISBN 978-0-500-05084-2.
- ^ a b c "QuarryScapes :: Northern Faiyum Quarry landscape". www.quarryscapes.no. Retrieved 2024-02-29.
- ^ a b c Harrell, James A. (2016). "Mapping the Tura-Masara Limestone Quarries". Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt. 52: 199–214. ISSN 0065-9991.