EGYPTOLOGY: The Western Desert of Egypt and its Oases, Part #2

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It has been again a few days since I wrote my last article. Apologies for that. Now I am back in Germany and will review all my notes and pictures I took and in this post, I want to give you the promised information about the second oasis of my journey: Kharga Oasis – a wonderful place to dive into Greco-roman and Persian period of Ancient Egypt. Follow me if you like to know more about unique places in Ancient Egypt that cover hidden and long forgotten monuments of the pharaonic period – and that you probably never heard of before.

Kharga Oasis

Kharga is another huge oasis in the western desert of Egypt (Libyan Desert), located between Assiut and Dakhla (see map below). It is the capital of the New Valley District (Al Wadi Al Gadid) and can easily be reached by bus from Cairo in the north or Luxor in the south.

_{Pict. 1: Map of Egypt with the most important oases}

Bus trips through the desert are quite adventurous, not to say dangerous. From time to time you can see street signs that remind you that the road can be suddenly covered by sand.

History of Kharga Oasis

There are traces of settlement since the palaeolithic (stone age) with the usual remains of flintstone tools and later then also rock art drawings, for example in Gebel al Tair. In the Pharaonic times of Ancient Egypt, we have also proof of trading activities at central points along certain caravan routes such as the Darb El Arba'īn ("Way of the Forty"), which dates back to the 6th dynasty (the Old Kingdom, around 2347 bis 2216 BCE). This number 40 was mentioned by Herodotus as a road that could be travelled (by camel) in forty days. Important to know is, that these trading points connected Ancient Egypt with Sudan (Ancient Nubia). Her name in pharaonic times was wḥꜢ.t rsy.t = the "Southern Oasis".

_{Pict. 3: Prehistoric rock art drawing in Gebel al Tair.}

The area around Gebel al Tair was first discovered by John Ball 1898. In the 1940's the Egyptian Archaeologist and Egyptologist Ahmed Fakhry did extensive research on the rock art drawings there.

Climate in Kharga Oasis

Kharga Oasis is, like Dakhla Oasis, is humidified by huge groundwater wells that exist for thousands of years. Although this resource is not likely to be consumed in the next thousand years inhabitants of Kharga and Dakhla experience often a shortage of water supply which is not caused by a lack of water but is caused by the actual electricity crisis in Egypt. The water must be pumped up by big wheels and those wheels are stopped at evening to save electricity that is needed for other facilities in this fast-growing area. The climate is hot – and especially for me as a European – sometimes challenging. Even in winter, the temperatures can climb up to 30 °C. We spent Christmas and New Years Eve outdoors with summer clothes. Record highs of temperature can be measured at 50 °C (mostly June or July). Due to the natural water supply, Flora and Fauna in the oases in Egypt are very unique. There were times when there were lots of gazelles, ostriches and other animals that can usually be found not in the desert but steppe areas. So it is not surprising that decorated ostrich eggs were a common find in archaeological sites dating back to predynastic to early dynastic times (around 4000–2707 BCE).

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In Roman times the Kharga Oasis was a place for banned Christians and from the 3rd century AD, we can find remains of continuing Christian settlement there such as the Christian Cemetery of Bagawat.

_{Pict. 5: Tomb chapels of the Christian Cemetery of Bagawat in the Kharga Oasis.}

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1996 there was a railroad built to connect Kharga with Qena and Luxor, but there is no traffic anymore. As you can see in the picture below the rails are wafted by the sands.

_{Pict. 6: Abandoned rail in the midst of the desert. Felt a bit like in a western movie ;).}

_{Pict. 7: A crossroad in Kharga Oasis during midday heat. Interesting are especially the antique street lamps everywhere in the oasis that remind me of the 1920's in Europe. ;)}

Archaeological Sites

Kharga is famous for many archaeological areas from Ancient Egypt such as the Hibis Temple, Dush Temple, Qaṣr el-Ghuweiṭa (temple of the Theban Triad) and the Bagawat Tombs. About Hibis Temple I am already preparing a special article. But there is more in Kharga to discover. In this post, the Kharga Museum Al Wadi Al Gadid is featured.

_{Pict. 8: The New Valley Museum in Kharga.}

Kharga Museum

The Kharga Museum Al Wadi Al Gadid is a little "pearl" in this oasis. Not very well known but with a huge amount of ancient Egyptian treasures. There are unique objects that can't be found in similar museums. On two floors you can view archaeological artefacts from the early dynastic pharaonic times (first floor) up to the Christian and Islamic period (second floor).

Here are now just a few examples of the displayed objects that are quite impressive.

_{Pict. 9: Funerary stela of the governor named Khentika, 6th dynasty, Old Kingdom, contains a huge list of offerings, from Balat (Dakhla Oasis).}

_{Pict. 10: Two sphinxes from the Temple of Deir al Hagar. One of them (the right) still has remains of coloring which was usual in Ancient Times.}

_{Pict. 11: Mummified animals with painted cartonage covers. The colors are still bright and vivid.}

_{Pict. 12: Double statue made of limestone from an oasis governor with his wife, intimate touching each other's shoulder, 6th dynasty, Balat (Dakhla Oasis).}

_{Pict. 13: An Erlenmeyer flask from an ancient Egyptian #steemstem laboratory? No, but nevertheless a fascinating example of early glass production in the Greco-Roman period.}

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Thank you for reading. If you want to know more about the oases of Egypt, follow me. The upcoming posts will cover the famous Persian Hibis Temple, the Fayoum Oasis and the Temple of Medinet Madi.

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_{Sources and further reading:
• Barich, Barbara E. et al. (eds.), From lake to sand: the archaeology of Farafra Oasis Western Desert, Egypt, Florenz 2014.
• Brugsch, Heinrich, Reise nach der grossen Oase El Khargeh in der libyschen Wüste: Beschreibung ihrer Denkmäler, Leipzig 1878.
• Caton-Thompson, Gertrude, Kharga Oasis in prehistory, London 1952.
• Firth, C.M., The Archaeological Survey of Nubia, Report for 1909–1910, Cairo 1913.
• Ikram, Salima / Rossi, Carolyn, Surveying the North Kharga Oasis, in: KMT: a modern journal of ancient Egypt, 13,4 (2002), pp. 72–79.
• Nicholson, Paul T. / Shaw, Ian, Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology, Cambridge 2000, pp. 332–
• Wiseman, Marcia F., Kharga Oasis, prehistoric sites, in: Bard, Kathryn A. (ed.): Encyclopedia of the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt, London 1999.
• https://de.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Gebel_eṭ-Ṭeir_(el-Chārga)}

_{Images:
• Image used in the editorial picture: my own photograph, taken 01/2018, depicting a nice little café in the center of Kharga.
• Pict. 1: (edited by the author): CC BY-SA 3.0 Source
• Pict. 3: Source
• Pict. 5: Source
• Pictures 2, 4, 6 –13: my own photographs, taken 01/2018.}

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If you liked this article, please follow me on my blog @laylahsophia. I am a german Egyptologist writing about ancient and contemporary Egypt, history of science, philosophy and life.