The city was located at the western end of the wide-branched mouth of the Nile into the Mediterranean Sea, on the so-called Canopic Arm. It had been built in a close-knit network of canals in the marshland of the delta. Along the canals, merchant ships from all over the eastern Mediterranean were located in numerous basins. The goods that they brought from the Greek world, from Cyprus or from Phoenicia were cleared here and shipped via a canal to Kanopus, the neighboring town in the west, or up the Nile to the interior.
In the south of the busy port city, the massive walls of the temple of Amun-Gereb rose-also on a Nile island. Amun was one of the highest deities in the Egyptian pantheon. At the entrance to this central sanctuary, from which a boat procession led to the neighboring Kanopus in honor of the god Osiri every year stood colossal statues of pharaons and deities from rose granite up to six meters high.
To the north and to the east of the city stretched the individual basins of the extensive port. 2,500 years ago, foreign merchant ships loaded with wood, precious metals, wine, oil and other goods regularly headed for the basins – or more precisely, the ship's captains were required to approach this port exclusively, as required by Egyptian law. "If a ship entered another mouth of the Nile, one had to swear that this had happened only out of necessity," noted the historian Herodotus of Halicarnassus, who lived in the middle of the 5th century BC. he even visited the country on the Nile. "Then the ship had to go back and try to reach the Canopic mouth of the Nile.«
The Egyptians called this city, which offered them access to the "Sea of the Greeks", Thonis; In the Hellenes, for which she was the goal in Egypt for more than three centuries, she was called Herakleion. The temple of Amunsohn Chon was considered a sanctuary of the Heracles. According to legend, the demigod is said to have entered Egyptian soil for the first time. From the end of the 7th century BC BC, the place benefited from its status as a goalkeeper Egypt and very soon developed into a busy "Emporion", a market and trading center for long-distance trade. Only the foundation of Alexandrias by the eponymous Macedonian conqueror 331 BC. The flourishing center at the mouth of the Nile robbed its economic importance.
Ancient items originating from the entire Mediterranean
The dozens of shipwrecks and more than 800 anchors, which the researchers from the European Archéology Sous-Marine (IEASM, European Institute for Underwater Archeology) under the direction of Franck Goddio, report on how far.
Have found coast so far.
"There was immense shipping here," says Goddio.
The charge of the wrecks still reveals their origin today.
"We found ceramics from all over the Greek world, from Sicily to Asia Minor, silver from Attica, amphorae with wine, olives and grapes." Most of the ships came from the 5th and 4th centuries BC.
BC, when Thonis was such a lively and rich trade port.
At that time, some Greek traders and mercenaries settled permanently. Their houses, which, like those of the locals, were built of unfired mud bricks, have long since dissolved in the Mediterranean. But numerous Greek coins, ceramics, statuettes and weapons, which archaeologists have found in recent years, testify to the Hellenic presence in the Egyptian city. Finally, in 2019, the researchers discovered another, even clearer indication of the immigrant inhabitants. Near the sanctuary of Amun, they found the remains of a typical Greek round temple, which, like the more imposing Egyptian neighboring building, had been built in the 4th century BC.
Exactly 30 years ago, in the summer of 1992, the French underwater archaeologist Franck Goddio and his team started a large-scale research project in the Bay of Abukir in close consultation with the Egyptian Antiquities Administration. It continues to this day and there is still a long way to go to an end. Although the names of the cities that once lay on the Canopic Arm of the Nile were known from ancient Egyptian and Greek sources, the places themselves had disappeared in the Mediterranean as well as parts of Alexandria.
In the middle of the 2nd century BC BC, according to Goddio, an earthquake shaken the region. The tidal wave resulted in this buried Alexandria Portus Magnus. The big temple of Thonis and parts of canopus also fell victim to the disaster. That was also due to the situation in the mouth of the Nile: the ground had softened for centuries and therefore decreased slightly. Huge granite blocks from the Wall of the Amun Temple plunged down at the time and slid together with the colossal statues in the nearest channel, where they buried numerous ships.
A galley wreck that is more than 25 meters long
Even during the last excavation season in the summer of 2021, the underwater archaeologists have come back to a wreck lying under the sea floor thanks to the prototype of a new type of sediment olot-the 76th so far. It is a Ptolemaic gallery that had been sunk from the temple wall in the huge earthquake of chunks of rock. Soil and keel were flat, which was an advantage for shipping on the Nile and in the delta.
"The galley must have been moored at a jetty that ran along the southern facade of the temple," says Goddio. The remains of the more than 25–meter-long ship were preserved for thousands of years under the ruins of the temple and together with them, covered by a five-meter thick, hard clay layer - and they continue to remain so. Because the archaeologists leave the vast majority of their discoveries under water at the respective site, as they immediately threaten to disintegrate in the air. However, under the dense sediment layer, the artifacts remain preserved and accessible for future generations of researchers. They are examined, registered and entered in the excavation map of Thonis-Herakleion. It is not a particularly glamorous job, which Goddio has been doing with scientific meticulousness for over a quarter of a century now.
Manager to underwater anthropologist
At the beginning of his career in the underwater archeology, the Frenchman was considered many academic colleagues as treasure hunters and showman without any idea of the scientific standards of their discipline. When he started working in Abukir's bay, however, he had already caused a sensation with the discovery and recovery of several shipwrecks, including some Chinese junnings loaded with precious porcelain from the 16th century and ships of the English East India company. Even off the Egyptian coast, Goddio had initially searched for the remnants of the French Mediterranean fleet, which had previously brought Napoleon's expedition army to Egypt in 1798 under Admiral Nelson.
But then the researchers came across the city at the bottom of the sea about 6.5 kilometers off the Egyptian coast. More than a quarter of a century ago, in 1996, underwater archaeologists began mapping the site. Just five years later, Goddio was able to proudly announce that his team and he had undoubtedly discovered the city of Thonis, which had finally sunk into the sea during further earthquakes. In addition, the researchers were able to prove on the basis of inscriptions from different epochs that Thonis was identical to the Heracleion on the Canopic Arm, which is also known from ancient sources. "It's still a dream come true for me to be able to explore this sunken city and uncover its secrets," says Goddio, who is celebrating his 75th birthday this year, but seems at least ten years younger and whose original life planning pointed in a completely different direction.
The French, born in Casablanca in 1947, studied statistics and mathematics at the École Nationale de la Statistique et de l'ordministration Économique, one of the group of cadrees under the collective term of the Grandes Écoles, in which France's offspring for chief posts in politics, economy, military and culture trained becomes. "You had to work extremely hard, but the world was open to you after graduation," says Goddio, who actually moved into the world after studying. As an economic advisor, he worked for the United Nations as well as various governments in the Middle and Far East until the mid -1980s. Finally, he managed infrastructure projects for the development fund Saudi Arabia. At that time Goddio was constantly on the move, spent barely a week in a country for five years. However, Goddio took a break at the age of 33 and reoriented himself. It took a change, he says today. "And I wanted to know what I really want."
He decided to get into archeology that had inspired him as a child. Goddio, the manager, tackled the matter systematically, he practically evaluated the ancient science market and found a niche for himself and his plans. "I knew there were thousands of excellent archaeologists, but very few work under water." He founded his institute and got to work. From the beginning, he sought successfully to inspire sponsors and experts for his projects. The non -profit Hilti Foundation, for example, has supported Goddio's dives in a long time. He presents his most spectacular discoveries worldwide in exhibitions, films and illustrated books.
The skepticism of the first years was quickly faded. In the meantime, Goddio has long since become part of the academic world. Almost 20 years ago, he was involved in the foundation of the Oxford Center for Maritime Archeology at the University of Oxford, in which he still works as a guest lecturer.
The coastal metropolis's decline
In Thonis Herakleion, the former manager finally became an antiquity researcher. "Today we know maybe five to ten percent of this city, which was an economic and religious center of ancient Egypt," he says. Even after 25 years there would be a lot to discover. Finally, according to Goddio, Pompeii had already been discovered in the 18th century and has not yet been completely researched. "But Thonis Herakleion alone is twice as big as Pompeii," he says. "So I would have to dive here for at least 300 years to completely explore this city."
Even after Alexandria had lost its status as a vibrant coastal metropolis to the older cities on the Nile Delta, even after the catastrophe in the 2nd century BC, which engulfed parts of the places, Kanopus with its Serapis sanctuary and Heracleion with the temples for Amun and Heracles remained the religious and social centers of the region. The Ptolemies who ruled Egypt after the death of Alexander traced their lineage on the paternal side to Heracles, on the maternal side to Zeus, who in Egypt corresponded to Amun. A city in which a sanctuary, already considered ancient at that time, stood for both deities, thus had dynastic significance for them and could count on their benevolence.
The archaeologists found a stele from the time of Ptolemaios' VIII (around 180–116 BC). A few years after the devastating earthquake, the Pharaoh confirmed the right of priesthood to come together in Thonis, and confirmed the asylum law of the temple. For centuries earlier, Herodotus had also mentioned the HERAKLESTEN Temple at the Canopic Nilarm. Since the times before the Trojan War, this has been "an asylum for all slaves that have escaped their Lord and inaugurated the god by creating the holy signs".
By the time of the Romans, the sinking of Thonis was already well advanced, large parts of the city had sunk into the sea; but Kanopus had developed into an excursion destination for city dwellers from the metropolis of Alexandria, which is about 30 kilometers away. "Some enjoy themselves on ships and indulge in flute music – men and women mixed – unrestrainedly, while the others run inns in Kanopus near the canal, which serve for pleasure and pleasure," the historian Strabon described (around 63 BC–23 n. The canopic nights with a quiet moral shudder and concluded soberly: "Behind Canopus lies Heracleion with his temple of Heracles." In Christian times, Kanopus also fell into disrepair, the old temples served as a quarry – and the liquefaction of the soil progressed unobserved. At the end of the 8th century, the coastal section finally disappeared completely in the Mediterranean Sea due to another earthquake.
Thonis Herakleion was missing in the Abukir Bay for centuries. Then Franck Goddio came and has been doing this again on time every year at the beginning of the excavation season. In the summer of 2021, the underwater archaeologists, apart from the Ptolemaic galleys, found the remains of a Greek burial site in another part of the city with precious additions and thus a new reference to the city's Hellenic residents.
During this year's season, the researchers plan to use geophysical surveys to get a more precise overview of the entire area and to explore a slightly smaller burial mound that they noticed in 2021. "We also want to take a closer look at another wreck that we discovered in another canal in the city," Goddio adds. There is still work for centuries.
