In July 2026, Egypt announced two major archaeological discoveries: a thousand-year-old city buried in the Dakhla oasis, far in the western desert, and 18 ancient tombs on the Mediterranean coast. Together, these finds reveal how people lived and organized their lives across Roman-controlled Egypt.

The Dakhla City

Archaeologists led by Mahmoud Massoud found a settlement laid out like a grid — streets running north to south crossed by streets running east to west, much like modern city blocks. At its heart stood a large church built in the fourth century, positioned to look down the main streets. Watchtowers guarded the edges, and a moat surrounded a heavily defended residential area with thick stone walls and arched ceilings. The entire city dates to around the fourth century CE.

One house stood out: the home of Tisous, a church leader, apparently used as a private worship space before the big church was built. This pattern — small household churches becoming formal public churches — happened in many communities around the Mediterranean as Christianity grew.

Coins, pottery, and scratched notes on broken pots tell us when people lived here. Gold coins from a Roman emperor named Constantius II (who ruled 337–361 CE) prove the city was occupied during that time. Bronze coins with imperial faces and Christian symbols add more evidence. About 200 pottery shards with writing on them — records of buying and selling, personal letters, everyday notes — show this was a real working city with a real economy. Ovens, kitchens, and stone tools for grinding grain confirm people here were not soldiers or administrators passing through, but permanent residents.

The discovery matters because it shows how the Roman empire reached far into Egypt's interior. The desert oases — Dakhla, Kharga, Farafra — were trading posts along routes crossing the Sahara and farmland that fed the main population centres along the Nile River. A city this well-built and organized, with a monumental church and defensive walls, was not a small outpost. It was an important regional hub.

Marina el-Alamein

The second discovery happened at Marina el-Alamein on the coast, where archaeologists have been digging since 1986. The site is the remains of an ancient port city called Leukaspis, founded in the second century CE. A team led by Eman Abdel-Khaliq found 18 new tombs — some carved into rock, others built from limestone — bringing the total found there to 48.

Inside: a stone coffin 2.5 metres long with human remains, and pieces of a plaster statue of a sphinx. Four gold coins were placed inside the mouths of some of the dead. Ancient peoples around the Mediterranean believed a gold coin placed in a dead person's mouth helped them travel to the afterlife — a burial custom archaeologists have found in many ancient cemeteries in Egypt.

The tombs at Marina el-Alamein fit with what archaeologists already know about this Roman-era port. Each new tomb adds information about who lived in this community and how they honoured their dead. Leukaspis was a trading hub whose merchants likely bought and sold goods across the entire eastern Mediterranean during the height of Rome's power.

These two discoveries — hundreds of kilometres apart — show Egypt's continued success at uncovering major archaeological sites. The pottery with writing found at Dakhla could be especially valuable. If the writing can be read — in ancient Greek or Coptic — it would give us rare, firsthand accounts of life in an ancient city.