The Lost Are Found PDF - Ancient Egyptian Cities

## The Lost Are Found Ancient Egypt was a busy place. There were many great cities, centers of business, government, and learning. Some of these cities still exist today. Many others are in ruins, but people know where these places are. However, the stories of Egypt include three more great cities....

## The Lost Are Found Ancient Egypt was a busy place. There were many great cities, centers of business, government, and learning. Some of these cities still exist today. Many others are in ruins, but people know where these places are. However, the stories of Egypt include three more great cities. And until recently there was no evidence of their location. They certainly do not exist today. Yet, even the legends of the Greeks tell of these cities. Their names were Herakleion, Canopus, and Menouthis. People didn't know where the cities were. Therefore, these cities were "lost." Chances are that they disappeared because of a disaster. These lost cities were like the city of Atlantis. An important city in ancient times, Atlantis disappeared. For years scientists tried to find it. They found old stories about travelers going there. Therefore, they were able to figure out the distance to Atlantis. Today most scientists believe that Atlantis was probably on Santorini, an island in the Mediterranean. Santorini is a volcanic island. Archeologists believe that Atlantis disappeared when the volcano erupted. In the water around Santorini, there are parts of a city under the water. Most of the city is not there. It simply vanished. Therefore, Atlantis was a "lost" city. What is the story about the three missing Egyptian cities? In ancient Greek dramas, there was information about them. Archeologists followed the clues in the Greek stories and continued to look for the three cities. They showed extraordinary ability because they followed the clues carefully. They looked even though there was no land where the cities were supposed to be. Archeologists started looking in Mediterranean waters! And they found all three sites. There are houses, temples, and the structures of a harbor. According to the Greeks, these cities were famous because they were very rich. These cities had huge temples; people came from distant places to see them. These people were pilgrims, making pilgrimages to holy places. They came and spent lots of money in these cities. The three lost cities were also famous for their art. Because the temples were holy places, they were decorated with many beautiful things. Archeologists have found incredibly beautiful statues. There is a statue of the Egyptian goddess Isis that is extraordinary. It is black granite and life-size. She is wearing a beautiful long dress. Today she stands in a museum. The city of Herakleion was a busy seaport. It was the center of shipping until Alexandria was established by Alexander the Great in 331 B.C. Under the water, Herakleion appears to be whole. It seems that the whole city just sank. Nothing else changed. A French archeologist, Franck Goddio, was in charge of the team. Goddio said, "We have a complete city with temples, walls, and a harbor with 10 ancient ships." One architectural structure, a stele, was found intact. It seemed to be frozen in time. Today Herakleion lies under 20 to 30 feet of water. Goddio's team worked with modern technology to create a map of the area. They used magnetic waves to make a city plan for Herakleion. In a strange way, the sea has saved the cities. Now archeologists can learn even more about the structure of cities and how the people lived. Nothing has changed since the cities sank into the water. Gaballa Ali Gaballa, the head of the Egyptian archeology, had some interesting information about the cities. For example, he explained about the temples and the pilgrimages. He was able to date the cities. The Egyptians built these cities in 600 or 700 B.C. No one knows exactly what happened to them. This area has frequent earthquakes. Perhaps it was an earthquake that caused the land to fall. In any case, the sea moved over the land. The site of Herakleion is now four miles from land. It is in the Bay of Abu Qir. The best guess of the archeologists is that the disaster happened in the seventh or eighth century A.D. And now, the lost are lost no more.