Egypt finds clue to ancient temple’s secret

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CAIRO — An Egyptian archaeological team has discovered a series of structures in the southwestern town of Fayoum that could yield vital data as to how a Middle Kingdom temple was built, the culture minister said on Thursday.

Farouk Hosni said that the structures included administrative buildings, granaries and residences believed to have belonged to priests of the temple, which was dedicated to Renenutet, the goddess of harvest, as well as the crocodile-god Sobk and falcon-deity Horus, Hosni added.

“This find can be considered one of the most important discoveries in Fayoum, as it unveiled remnants of all architectural elements making up the Medinet Madi temple,” according to Zahi Hawass, secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA).

He noted that Medinet Madi, completed during the rule of the 12th dynasty Pharaoh Amenemhat IV (1808-1799 BC), was “the only intact temple still existing from the Middle Kingdom”.

The find, he said, had already shed light on how ancient Egyptians placed limestone tiles on the monument’s floor - flanked on each side by statues resembling the Sphinx - and constructed the temple from mud bricks.

Items found at the site included seals used by the priests of Renenutet with hieroglyphic inscriptions, a headless limestone statue, a bronze statue of a woman and papyri with Greek and demotic writings, said Abdel Rahman Al Aidi, director of the SCA’s excavations department and team leader.

Some of the papyri contained royal correspondences, including one from the wife of Ptolemy I to the priest of the temple of Renenutet “thanking him for the temple’s magnificent services”, Hawass said.

Amenemhat IV had a co-regency with Amenemhat III, one of the greatest rulers of the Middle Kingdom.

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