LOCATING THE ANCIENT AVARIS HARBOR NEAR THE PELUSIAC BRANCH IN THE EASTERN NILE DELTA

Avaris, near the margin of the eastern Nile delta, was the capital of northern Egypt during the Hyksos rule, around 1700 BC. The Austrian team led by M. Bietak and I. Forstner Muller now excavates the archaeological site. The city owes its commercial and strategic importance to the immediate proximity of the Pelusiac branch. Directly linked to the Nile, the city was probably abandoned when the river stopped flowing in this area.

While depicted in the Khamose stele, the city harbor remained undiscovered. Even the very nature of this harbor was debated: was it a purely fluvial harbor, set on the Pelusiac branch, or could have it been a lagoon harbor, set near the Manzala lagoon? Indeed, the palaeo-shoreline of the lagoon itself during the Hyksos rule is unknown, but could have been much closer to Avaris than today’ shoreline.

Archaeologists and geoarchaeologists have been studying the region since 1970, using various methods, including sedimentary drillings and geomagnetic surveys, carried out by different international teams. During the last two years, our team made three coring campaigns, allowing a better reconstruction of the ancient landscape.

These new data provide insights about the general environment of the area. The behavior of the multiple paleo-channels of the anastomosing Nile is now better understood. We were able, using OSL datings, to establish a chronology of the sedimentary deposits during the Holocene, and to isolate the main sedimentary phases of the river: installation of the river, accretion period, and progressive disappearance of the flow.

Furthermore, we propose new hypothesis about the possible location of the harbor, based upon sedimentary analysis and geomagnetic surveys. Radiocarbon and OSL datings have been made in the potential basins, relating it to the main occupation periods of the archaeological site. The harbor itself proved to be fully fluvial, since no traces of the lagoon were found in the drillings.

Essential from a geomorphologic point of view, these new results are also especially important for archaeological research, for this harbor would have been the gateway to Lower Egypt during the 2^nd millennia BC.