Poor, Ramses II and Akhenaten, as well as the Greeks and Roman emperors. All of whom have left their distinctive mark upon the scarred landscape. Many of the most important sites and monuments in Egypt were built using Gebel el-Silsila sandstone.
We know plenty about the rulers of Egypt through their tombs and monuments but we know comparatively little about the everyday ancient Egyptians. Gebel el-Silsila gives us the chance to understand them better and to tell their story in their own words.
Throughout the quarries there is a variety of ancient graffiti including prehistoric pictographs, hieroglyphic, hieratic, demotic, Greek and Coptic inscriptions, as well as figurative representations dating from the Old Kingdom. There is older evidence too, and possibly Egypt’s largest collection of quarry marks.
The Gebel el-Silsila team consists of around 100 international scholars from right across the globe, with around 40 coming directly from the local Egyptian community.
Maria and John are familiar faces to viewers of National Geographic documentaries on Disney+ and the Travel Channel – see Lost Treasures of Egypt, Egypt’s Treasure Guardians and Expedition Unknown, as well as featuring in various international programmes, documentaries and one-off specials. Together with their children Freja and Jonathan, they have become a regular fixture on Disney+.
Friends of Silsila
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• Journals for Egyptology
John’s journals have proved invaluable in helping him keep an accurate record of the ongoing excavation, as well as his musings in the field. Some of these journals should rightfully be in a museum themselves as they contain delicate, important information and material on the discoveries of tombs and the lost temple of the Egyptian god Sobek, alongside many other important discoveries.
Together with his handwritten journals, John also keeps a record of the site and the excavations through watercolours which allows him to view and record the landscape in a far better way than through the lens of a camera. The watercolours are carried around the site throughout the dusty, ancient terrain in John’s handmade drawing board/portfolio which has served him well over the last 17 years.
• Collaboration
We want to give John’s journal a personality of its own and allow people to share in its adventures. It will travel to different sites and temples as Maria and John embark on research trips during their upcoming 17th season.
We want to update followers on what the journal will be up to on any given day – where is it on site? What was discovered? What did John draw in it? What’s the historical importance of the discovery?
The team would love to have their own reusable outer skin, embossed with our logo (as above) which would allow all our team members to carry their various journals pertaining to the different parts of this massive site.
These could also be sold on your website, with a proportion of profits being donated to our Friends of Silsila charity which is raising funds for the excavation, conservation and protection of the site.
