Philae Island .. Geographical & Historical informations .. Part ( 2 )

Geographical informations about the Philae area

Philae itself is an island situated at the beginning of the First Cataract, from which the river descends on its way to the Mediterranean Sea . Today a modern road skirts the Cataract and follows the crest of the first Aswan Dam, giving a splendid view of the Cataract and the island of Siheil where traders inscribed their names on the numerous rocks and boulders before continuing on their way to Central Africa, the " Land of Ghosts " .

Philae Island – Historical Notes .. Part ( 1 )

Foreword

It does not often happen that a calamity is reversed, especially in the fields of archaeology and the environment . A barrow ploughed flat by a careless or rapacious farmer can never be reconstituted ; a country house demolished for redevelopment cannot be restored to what it once was, even if it is lovingly rebuilt according to its ancient form ; a countryside ruined by an industrial complex or a motorway can never be quite the same again . Yet a distinction can be made between the destruction of the man-made and the devastation of a landscape ; the former may be thought irrevocable, the latter a change which time will repair . Nature will not restore precisely, but she has the power to rehabilitate, to wipe out the rapacities of man, to replace what has been lost with something perhaps even better .

Detailed description and hieroglyphic texts of the first discoveries of the Osireion – Small Objects and Graffiti .. Part ( 10 )

The Small Objects

A few small objects were found in the filling of the passages and halls, apparently having been thrown away as mere rubbish . The building itself had evidently been rifled, and every object removed, whether of value or not .