Marea
Marea ( ancient Greek : Μάρεια Mareia ) was an ancient city in the western Nile Delta . The current hill of ruins of Kom el-Idris ( Arabic ﮐﻭﻡ ﺍﻻﺩﺭﯾﺱ) is located about 40 kilometers southwest of Alexandria on the southern bank of the Mareotis Lake , whose name is probably derived from the ancient city.
Marea is probably identical with the city of Chastemeh , which is mentioned in the Aramaic inscription on a death stele from Saqqara , which dates to the fourth year of the reign of Xerxes I (482 BC). The Egyptian place name Chastemeh means desert area of the Tjemehu Libyans and referred to both the city and the associated administrative district, which was established by Psammetich I.
Herodotus reports that Psammetich I , the founder of the Egyptian 26th dynasty , set up a garrison in Marea to protect against the Libyans . According to Herodotus, the people of Marea considered themselves Libyans. Especially in the first millennium BC The western Nile Delta was the catchment area for Libyan tribes. According to Diodorus , there was also a battle between Apries and Amasis near Marea . Strabon reports that Marea was famous for its viticulture.
Excavations have mainly brought to light remains from the Byzantine period, including two bathhouses, a Christian basilica, shops and a bakery mill.
literature
- Farouk Gomaa: Kom el-Idris . In: Lexicon of Egyptology . Volume III, Wiesbaden 1980, Col. 674.
- Creighton fork: Marea. In: Kathryn A. Bard (Ed.): Encyclopedia of the Archeology of Ancient Egypt. Routledge, London 1999, ISBN 0-415-18589-0 , pp. 465-69.
Individual evidence
- ^ Karl Richard Lepsius , Julius Euting : An Egyptian-Aramaic stele , in: Zeitschrift für Ägyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde (ZÄS) 15 (1877), pp. 127–132; Max Burchardt : Dated monuments of the Berlin collection from the Achaemenid period, in: ZÄS 49 (1911), pp. 73–74 plate 8.2, 10.6 no. 5; Bezalel Porten, Ada Yardeni: Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt. 4: Ostraca & Assorted Inscriptions , Winona Lake 1999, pp. 254-255 (D 20.3).
- ↑ Jean Yoyotte : Berlin 7707. Un detail. In: Transeuphratène. Volume 9, 1995, p. 91; Günter Vittmann: Egypt and the foreigners in the first millennium BC. Mainz 2003, p. 14 Note 58.
- ↑ Herodotus , Historien Buch 2, 30, 2.
- ↑ Herodotus Histories, Book 2, 18, 2; see: Alan B. Lloyd: Herodotus, Book II. Commentary 1-98. Leiden 1976, pp. 87-89.
- ↑ Diodor , Diodori Siculi Bibliotheca historica book 1.68; Herodotus, on the other hand, relates that the battle of Momemphis (Kom el-Hisn) took place (Herodotus 2, 163, 169).
- ^ Strabon, Historiká Hypomnếmata Buch 17, 799.
- ↑ Mariusz Gwiazfa, Dagma Wielgosz-Rondolino: 'Marea' on Lake Mareotis: A Roman Amphora dump, a Byzantine Period House, and Its Early Islamic Dwellers. In: Journal of Egyptian Archeology. Volume 105, No. 2, Decemger 2019, pp. 259-273.
Coordinates: 30 ° 59 ′ 39 ″ N , 29 ° 39 ′ 20 ″ E