LUXOR, EGYPT—Ahram Online reports that a tombstone carved with a cross and Christian texts written in Coptic was uncovered during restoration of the area known as the Avenue of Sphinxes, built by the 30th Dynasty king Nectanebo I, who ruled from 380 to 362 B.C. According to Egypt’s Ministry of Antiquities, the site has long been a place of religious significance. In antiquity, the approximately 1.5-mile-long, sphinx-lined avenue was the site of a procession of priests, royalty, and devotees from Karnak Temple to Luxor Temple during the annual Festival of Opet, which celebrated the gods Amun, Mut, and their son, Khonsu. Christianity is thought to have arrived in Egypt in the first century A.D. For more on archaeology in Egypt, go to “In the Time of the Rosetta Stone.”
