Influences from Gandhara & Interior of Africa in Ancient Temple on the Red Sea in Egypt

Archaeologists excavating a temple in the port of Berenice Troglodytica have discovered stone heads imitating sculptures from Gandhara and the depths of Africa.

Berenice, also known as Baranis was founded in the 3rd century BC by Ptolemy II Philadelphus on the west coast of the Red Sea and was named after his mother Berenice I.

The port city served as a trading centre with the East Coast of Africa, India, and Arabia, mainly for the transportation of war Elephants.

Trade from Berenice is described in the 1st century AD travelogue Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, written by a Greek merchant based in Alexandria. The Periplus indicates that “on the right-hand coast next below Berenice is the country of the Berbers”.

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Image Credit : I. Zych

A multi-national team of archaeologists from the Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology of the University of Warsaw, and the University of Delaware has been excavating a temple dedicated to Isis (the sister and wife of Osiris who was worshiped as the goddess of the moon, motherhood, marital devotion, healing the sick, and the working of magical spells and charms) and the cult of Serapis (a Graeco-Egyptian deity).

Archaeologists found various images of Serapis, architectural fragments of stone, marble and pieces of sculptures, with the most notable find being heads imitating sculptures from Asian Gandhara – a historical region that covered parts of present-day Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Inside the temple ruins, they also uncovered a locally sculptured statue of the Nubian deity Sebiumeker, referred to as Lord of Musawwarat (supreme god of procreation and fertility) in Meroe, Kush, in present-day Sudan.

His statues have often been found near doorways at the Nubian sites Tabo (Nubia) and Musawwarat es-Sufra, giving rise to the interpretation that he was a guardian god.

PAP

Header Image Credit : K. Braulinska

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Mark Milligan
Mark Milligan
Mark Milligan is an award winning journalist and the Managing Editor at HeritageDaily. His background is in archaeology and computer science, having written over 7,500 articles across several online publications. Mark is a member of the Association of British Science Writers (ABSW), the World Federation of Science Journalists, and in 2023 was the recipient of the British Citizen Award for Education and the BCA Medal of Honour.

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