User:Eleanorfay/Alexandria Project

The Alexandria Project is the discovery of Ancient Alexandria just off the harbor. After a century of D.G. Hogarth exclaiming “there is nothing to hope for in Alexandria”, and others should just stick with the Greeks and Egyptian pyramids where more was being discovered, Jean-Yves Empereur, a French Archaeologist discovered remains of the lost ancient city.

Discovering the Ancient Alexandria

Nineteen years ago, Jean-Yves Empereur, after working on a site near the Alexandrian Harbor, decided to take a swim and check out the place nearby, where scholars believed the Pharos lighthouse would be. While examining the area, the city of modern Alexandria, around that time, were planning on doing some construction that would destroy most of the artifacts lying under the harbor. Barge Cranes were lowering 20 ton concrete blocks into the water and by the time Empereur asked the Government to stop the construction, 3,600 ton of concrete destroyed a lot of the artifacts.

Ancient Alexandria Deep Under

There were many experts excavating the site, including two that were rivals, Empereur and Franck Goddio, a French Maritime Archaeologist, and because of that they excavated on opposite sides of the harbor. Each of their finds were, however, equally important in uncovering vast amounts of artifacts and clues that would make the lost ancient city of Alexandria come alive. There were also many other experts on the site to make their contributions, like Geologist Jean-Daniel Stanley, Archaeologist Grzegorz Majcherek, Archaeologist Dr. Sally-Ann Ashton, and Psychic Archeologist Stephan Schwartz. First to discover was Jean-Yves Empereur, who examined the floor of the harbor and detailed several of thousands of relics . He “uncovered statuaries and maybe some blocks that may have been part of the famous ancient Seven Wonders of the World, Pharaohs, the light house which was destroyed in the earthquake in the 14th Century . Several other finds by Empereur include columns (one which had a diameter of 7.5 feet), Corinthian capitals, obelisks, and huge stone sphinxes. The Egyptian styled columns found “had markings dating back to Ramses II, nearly a millennium before Alexandria was founded .” One of the statues that he and his team discovered was made very clear that it was representing a pharaoh, similar to the statue that had been raised in the 1960s near Qait Bey, the excavation Empereur was working when he discovered ancient Alexandria. It is believed to be Pharaoh “Ptolemy I and his wife, Berenis I, presiding over a normally Greek city. With their bases, they would have stood 40 ft tall.” Since starting his discoveries, Empereur and his team discovered over 3,300 pieces of relic. Each was photographed, mapped and cataloged. Of those 3,300, columns, 30 sphinxes and 5 obelisks are included. He guesstimates about 2,000 more still need to be cataloged . However, while they were still excavating, today’s Alexandria were making plans for new construction on the harbor. The city gave a time limit to gather all the artifacts they could before they started bulldozing and destroying what was left of the ancient city. Empereur began doing “rescue digs” , to save what he and his team could from the site that was going to be renovated. Over all he has taken on 12 digs, one in which he examined for 2 years at a burial ground, before the city destroyed the ancient catacombs for a thoroughfare. The rival of Empereur, Franck Goddio, worked the opposite side of the harbor. He discovered many items of the ancient city that were similar to Empereurs finds. There were columns, statues, sphinxes, and ceramics. Some were thought to be from Ptolomy’s royal quarter, and possibly even Cleopatra’s Palace . Parts of monuments were found by his team in 2008, one estimated to be 328 feet long and 230 feet wide. There was also a finger discovered from a bronze statue, and from that Goddio estimated the statue would have stood about 13 feet tall. A remarkable find from Goddio was uncovering the old shoreline with special sonar instruments and global positioning equipment. “The new maps reveal foundations of wharves, store houses, and temples as well as the royal palaces that formed the core of the city, now buried under Alexandria sand” . He used radiocarbon dating and discovered that the “wooden planks and other excavated material shows evidence of human activity from the 4th Century B.C. to the 4th Century A.D”. Dr. Sally-Ann Ashton discovered two Ptolemaic statues that provided evidence of the whereabouts, but in all actuality the geo-radar was a help in the investigation . Grzegorz Majcherek digging in the area where ancient Alexandria was not covered in water, he “uncovered Roman villas, complete with colorful mosaics, which offer the first glimpses into everyday, private life in ancient Alexandria.” A row of rectangular shaped halls, each with its own entrance way in to the roads and with that, horseshoe-shaped stone bleachers. The halls are positioned between the Greek theater and the Roman Baths. Majcherek excavated the site for 2 years and estimated that it was built around 500 A.D. He believes the halls were used for a learning environment and it may be the first hint of what a modern university would become. Evidence that the ancient city was a mixture of multiple religious and intellectual views leads experts to believe that Alexandria was ahead of its time.

“The decoration of the city’s monumental tombs…provides fascinating evidence of the way in which Greek, Roman, and Egyptian religious beliefs fused into a hybrid. From the beginning, the Greeks had incorporated Egyptian architectural elements into their Hellenic Buildings. The Romans in their usual heavy handed way, turned this around, placing a Roman imprint upon the Egyptian. Guarding the entrance of one of the tombs is the Egyptian Jackal-Headed God, Anubis, but dressed and armed as a Roman".

Disasters

In 1998, Goddio explained the clues found indicating what happened to ancient Alexandria. He explains that “90% of the artifacts were found left on the pavement, indicating that the population was overwhelmed by a surprise event. His meticulous radiocarbon dating of the surviving wooden structures of the submerged harbor showed how the port was gradually submerged. ” Using geological evidence, an American Italian team found results that a tsunami hit the city around 365 AD. Geologist Stanley found evidence of the destruction of Alexandria by examining dozens of cores from the floor of the harbor. The evidence shows multiple catastrophes creating the subsidence. Very likely they include earthquakes, tsunamis, and the slow process of the city’s foundation sinking into unstable soil.

Psychic Evidence

Psychic Archaeologist, Stephen Schwartz, examined the maps of Alexandria with his team of 10 other psychic who choose to use their ability to search for artifacts. They use a process called “remote viewing” , pinpointing on the map where they sense the artifacts would be found. They were accurate in pointing out the correct place most of the time, and they led to the discovery of Cleopatra’s Palace and the lighthouse of Pharaohs. In the testing of Dowsers, they were also correct most of the time in finding water where they pointed. “Active harbors are hubs for seagoing transportation and shipping, and with those activities come shipwrecks. In fact, the mud in Alexandria’s harbor is littered with arch remains as a result. It would have been difficult for psychics not to find stuff in the harbor” . There is no proof that the abilities work because Alexandria is not a place to really prove that the psychic archaeology works on finding artifact.

Bibliography

Lawler, Andrew. Ancient Alexandria Emerges, By Land and By Sea.Science. American Association for the Advancement of Science: 2005. 1192-1194. [[1]]

Chamberlin, Russell. Alexandria Below the Waves.History Today.Proquest: (May 2005): 7-8 [[2]]

Feder, Kenneth L. Alexandria Project. Encyclopedia of Dubious Archaeology. Greenwood-Publishing Group:2010: 5-7

Lawler, Andrew. Raising Alexandria. Smithsonian Magazine. April 2007:1-4 [[3]]