ALEXANDRIA, EGYPT—Live Science reports that 18 tombs have been uncovered at Marina el-Alamein, the site of an ancient town located near Egypt’s Mediterranean coastline. Seven of the tombs were found close to the surface of the ground, while the other 11 had been dug deep underground. An offering altar with a base resembling a false door was recovered from one of the tombs. “The false door is one of the oldest and most recognizable elements of ancient Egyptian funerary architecture,” said Hesham Hussein of Egypt’s Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities. “In traditional Egyptian belief, it symbolized the interface between the worlds of the living and the dead, through which the deceased could spiritually receive offerings presented by the living,” he explained. More than 20 “gold tongues” were also recovered from the tombs. “Gold tongues are a well-documented feature of some burials dating to the Ptolemaic and Roman periods in Egypt,” Hussein said. “They are generally interpreted as symbolic funerary amulets intended to enable the deceased to speak in the afterlife, particularly during the judgment before Osiris, or more broadly to communicate and recite sacred formulas in the next world,” he explained. The investigation also recovered a granite coffin measuring more than eight feet long, and an unfinished statue of Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and beauty. To read about a study of another Egyptian false door, go to "Magical Mystery Door."
