An Egyptian archaeological team in the northern coastal city of Alexandria on Friday discovered the remains of a residential and commercial suburb dating back to the Graeco-Roman period.
The remains of the suburb were unearthed in the Alexandria district of Shatby.
Secretary-General of the Supreme Antiquities Council Mustafa Waziri said the discovery is gives insights into life outside Egypt’s capital during the Greek and Roman eras.
The team found places visitors to the city had to wait for permits to enter the city, Waziri said.
Also found were traces of areas where goods entering Alexandria were inspected and assessed for tax, the Waziri added.
Preliminary studies suggest the layout consisted of a main street off which smaller streets branched at right angles. All thoroughfares were linked to a sewage network.
The suburb was inhabited between the second and fourth centuries BC, Waziri said.
Ayman Ashmawy, head of the Egyptian Antiquities Sector at the Supreme Antiquities Council said the team had discovered several water wells carved in the rock and a network of tunnel cisterns covered with a layer of pink mortar.
“The network was used for the storage of water from wells, rains and floods for use in dry seasons,” Ashmawy said.
He pointed out that some pottery vessels, lamps and statues were found in the wells and cisterns, which suggest that the suburb must have been densely populated.
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