Deep in Egypt’s eastern desert, just a few miles from the Red Sea town of Marsa Alam, a team of archaeologists has in recent years uncovered an extraordinary gold extraction and processing complex dating to about 3,000 years ago. The unearthed facilities include crushing and grinding workshops, settling ponds and clay furnaces, as well as residences, temples and administrative buildings.
Archaeologists have determined that mining activity at the site was concentrated in the Third Intermediate Period of Ancient Egypt, between the 21st and 25th dynasties, roughly 300 years after a regional gold rush prompted the pharaohs Thutmose III and Amenhotep IV to send expeditions that located more than two hundred gold deposits.
