KHD PROJECT

Narmer's family came from Upper Egypt (i.e. the south), and while his defeat of Wash (a Delta king) may be partly propaganda, this time does coincide with major changes throughout the region and the spread of Upper Egyttian culture as far afield as the Middle East. It was a time of variability and regionalisation, reflecting different groups of people living in a range of environments and relying on a wide range of natural resources. While largely agricultural, people of this period were also pastoralists, fishers, hunters…driven to this East African region by the drying of what is now the Sahara over the preceding 3000 years.

The history of early Egypt is sketchy at best, and we have to rely on a lot of much later sources to understand what was happening then. Apart from this, however, we lack a nuts and bolts undertanding of the lives of actual people: history is selective at best, and in this remote period we can learn almost nothing about non-elites, their personal lives, diets, behaviour, economy, belief systems, activity levels, child development, maturation, death and funerary behaviour from what little literary accounts remain. Sites that approximate to the PD/ED boundary are therefore both rare and important, and that is where KHD comes in.

The ancient village of KHD remains elusive. We know it must be there. But what the site is famous for is the enormous cemetery that stretches out over what was once the Nile’s floodplain, originally containing thousands of burials that straddle the crucial Predynastic to Early Dynastic (ED) boundary (Middle Kingdom, Late Period & classical remains are also found here). The materials found in the graves hint at both social hierarchies and local elites, as well as s range of exotic materials from far flung corners of the nation. The Wadi Tumilat (in which it sits) was a major route out of the region, and it has been suggested that copper (which was mined locally) was a major draw to the area. However, while the cultural materials can be very informative, the other angle on the site is assessing how – or even if – the unification of Egypt brought about more immediate results to the populations who lived here. As a bioarchaeologist, I can read answers to many of the questions that we have in the bones of these ancient people.

WHAT IS THE KHD PROJECT?

The KHD project was founded by noted Egyptologist Dr Geoffrey Tassie, who spent thirty years in the field, becoming a curator of at the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) shortly before his untimely passing in 2019. The project is run in his memory by me and Dr Grzegorz Bak-Pryc (Jagellionian University), in collaboration with the Ministry for Tourism and Antiquities (MoTA) and the Egyptian Cultural Heritage Organisation (ECHO). The initial brief of the project was to follow up on earlier excavations at the site in the 1990s, and to take a holistic approach to the cultural and biological remains and what they can tell us about lifeways and cultural changes in the earliest days of Egyptian civilisation, as well as site reuse in later periods. The project has morphed since its relaunch, and has a more determined focus on the earliest parts of the site; we are also continuing the hunt for the habitation areas, as well as assessing the temporal and spatial ranges of the cemetery. I continue to try to understand the lives of people as written in their bones, while my colleagues specialise in ground stone, geophysics, petrology, pottery, small finds…we form a small academic army with a single aim in mind

WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED SO FAR?

The 2019 season was exploratory and saw us opening up a series of 10 x 10 metre trenches in the northern art of the western cemetery, near to the original excavation and abutting the edge of the historical Islamic cemetery. We used a large JCB to clear away several hundred tonnes of sand from the dune covered area of the site, establishing very few Predynastic/ED interments but a concentration of large rectangular graves that seem to date to the Islamic period; this area was abandoned for this reason, in addition to the fact that this area of the site was particularly prone to flooding. Nearer the research centre, manual labour brought us down through the sand to the muddier, darker horizon (caused by repeated Nile inundations) upon which the original inhabitants of KHD made their home. We located a series of graves containing human remains and cultural artefacts, including Naqada ceramics and red, black and white stone beads that - judging from their positions in the graves - were probably necklaces and bracelets. The results of the 2019 season are published (here):

https://reach-egyptarch.com/reach-volume-1-2024

The 2023 season saw us return with a larger team, from the UK, Holland, Brazil and the USA. While much hampered by COVID, we expanded the project area and found a series of conventional single/multiple burials as well as a ‘roofed’ circular interment containing various individuals and a large assemblage of ceramic vessels. A large yet seemingly single ED burial was uncovered, differing from the earlier examples in terms of size and format (elongated, rectangular), although we were unable to excavate it completely before the end of the season. Most were single interments, but several contained multiple individuals. What this means is uncertain – it may indicate familial ties, although the reuse of graves may reflect some form of social hierarchy or affinities.

The 2025 season was carried out in collaboration with the Polish team, reopening the above-mentioned excavation area to complete the large ED burial (which contained around 25 large ceramic vessels) and locating a series of other burials including – unusually – at least two subadults (which are extremely under-represented in the KHD sample, perhaps indicating that subadults were interred in or around the as-yet unlocated settlement). A stone palette and other grave goods were recovered, including the single ‘richest’ individual so far recovered by our team: a diminutive female with around 300 stone, bone and ivory adornments plus ceramics and metal items. The largest individual I have ever recovered on an archaeological site was also uncovered – being almost as tall as I am – and, unusually, possessed not a single grave good.

SUMMARY AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS

In general terms, the bodies were interred in a flexed or 'foetal' position, in oval, rectangular or circular graves, with their heads facing towards the North, and their faces towards the East, although the presence of other variations may relate to the beliefs of the various groups within the KHD community. As stated, children were under-represented in the sample, as were males; while this may purely reflect the choice of trench location, it also seems possible that different ages and sexes received different treatment, and perhaps burial locale. The average adult age at death was in young adulthood; very few individuals can be confidently aged beyond about 40. People were largely healthy insofar as we can see from bones. Their teeth seem largely free from the usual pathology that tends to reflect carbohydrate-heavy (i.e. agricultural) diets.

It is early days, but the cemetery has revealed a great deal of information already – more than we could have expected after a first season. While preservation is often less than perfect, enough remains to assess the population’s possible biological origin, as well as factors such as diet, activity levels and behaviour. The ceramologists and small finds specialists also have a great deal to work with, plotting artefact origin and function, and relating these to the individuals in the graves. We also have all the data from previous seasons to collate and combine with the 2019 findings, and once we have that it will make this the largest and best understood Predynastic cemetery site in the Delta area.

We can then use this formidable dataset to address the bigger questions: what were women's status or roles? Did they change through time? Who wielded power - locals or incomers? Did the village change over time? Did people get ill more or less often? Was this to do with diet or other factors? Did people die younger or older? Were childhoods more or less healthy? We can then compare our findings with funerary evidence from Lower and Upper Egypt, to contribute to the wider understanding of local/regional/supraregional health-related developments. All of these are important issues to be considered within research into the dynamics of the origins of the state

CAN YOU HELP?

Yes. You can.

Archaeologists are usually wary of total excavation, i.e. completely ‘emptying’ a site of its archaeological remains. The reason is simple – it is likely that future technological and methodological developments will be able to bring about a more ordered or fruitful result, perhaps even precluding the need for excavation at all. In the case of KHD, however, we are against the clock. Rising groundwater from neighbouring mega-farms, as well as encroachment from the village and the associated cemetery are threatening the precious sediments at KHD. The site’s extraordinary rarity makes this project of the greatest possible importance to understanding the formation of early states and the very genesis of Egyptian civilisation. This is a unique opportunity to be part of something remarkable – we hope that you can help.

ECHO is a UK-registered charity (ref:1142484), authorised to accept donations that can count towards tax relief. Further, major donors can expect to receive updates, exclusive communication with site directors and staff, reportage on the project as it develops, and a host of other benefits. Please go to the DONATIONS BUTTON page via the button below, and find out what you can do.

I hope to see you there.

KHD FOUNDER: DR GEOFFREY TASSIE (1959-2019)

DONATE TO SAVE KHD

ECHO is a UK-registered charity (ref:1142484) authorised to accept donations that can count for tax relief. Further, major donors can expect to receive updates, exclusive communication with site directors and staff, photographic reportage on the project as it develops, and a host of other benefits. The extraordinary rarity of KHD makes this project of the greatest possible importance to understanding the formation of early states and the very genesis of Egyptian civilisation. Equally, the sites' vulnerability in the face of modern threats such as agriculture and urbanisation cannot be overstated. This is a unique opportunity to be part of something remarkable - we hope that you can help.

This project and fundraiser is organized by the Egyptian Cultural Heritage Organisation

Registered Charity No. 1142484 https://e-c-h-o.org/

DONATE TO SAVE KHD

LAWRENCE S. OWENS Ph.D.

BIOARCHAEOLOGIST / PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGIST

COMING SOON: KHD 2026 DIG DIARY

Funding the KHD Research Project

VISIT the ECHO WEBSITE

KAFR HASSAN DAWOOD 2025 DIARY

KAFR HASSAN DAWOOD EGYPT PROJECT

WHAT IS THE KHD PROJECT?

WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED SO FAR?

SUMMARY AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS

CAN YOU HELP?

KHD FOUNDER: DR GEOFFREY TASSIE (1959-2019)

DONATE TO SAVE KHD