Thames Valley Ancient Egypt Society

ON June 5, Christian Knoblauch, from Swansea University, spoke to the Thames Valley Ancient Egypt Society on “The Middle Kingdom border with Kush”.

He has made excavations at Uronarti, an 1800s BC fortress in Nubia with 10m high, 7m thick brick walls with large gates and wall buttresses, very like an English medieval castle.

Originally built by the invading Egyptians to keep the local Nubian population under control, it became a trading post where Egyptian grain was exchanged for the more exotic Nubian produce of gold and incense.

Once thought to have been submerged under the High Dam built in the Sixties, the fortress still stands on an island in Lake Nasser with internal walls high enough to give a feeling of walking down the ancient main street.

Francesca Jones